port of the committee was laid before them they cut it down to half.
They agreed to give four shillings in the pound for one year, and to
pay it all at Midsummer. "They entreated her majesty to stay the
demanding of more" until another session of parliament. Should
circumstances then require it, they promised that they {p.307} would
add whatever might be necessary; but, for the present, "if any
invasion should be in the realm, or if the enemy should seek to annoy
them at home, they would have to employ themselves with all their
powers, which would not be without their great charges."[636]

[Footnote 633: _Commons Journals._]

[Footnote 634: Ibid. The famous graziers and other
people, how well willing soever they be taken to
be, will not be known of their wealth, and by
miscontentment of their loss, be grown stubborn and
liberal of talk. The Council to Philip: _Cotton.
MS. Titus_, B. 2.]

[Footnote 635: Estimate of the money to be provided
for the furniture and charges of the war: _MS.
Mary, Domestic_, vol. xii.]

[Footnote 636: Discourse on the order that was used
in granting of the Subsidy: _MS. Mary, Domestic_,
vol. xii.]

The resolution of parliament decided the council in the course which
they must pursue with respect to Calais. Philip, unable to prevent the
catastrophe alone, proposed to take the field at once with a united
army of English and Spaniards, to avenge it, and effect a recapture.
He laid his plans before the council. The council, in reply, thanked
his majesty for his good affection towards the realm; they would have
accepted his offer on their knees had it been possible, but the state
of England obliged them to decline. The enemy, after the time which
had been allowed them, "would be in such strength that it was doubtful
if by force alone they could be expelled." If England sent out an
army, it could not send less than twenty thousand men; and the troops
would go unwillingly upon a service for which they had no heart, at a
time of year when they were unused to exposure. Before the year was
out L150,000 at the lowest would have to be spent in keeping the
musters of the country under arms. The navy and the defences of the
coast and of the isles, would cost L