Northumberland. Philip's envoy, the Count of Feria, saw incompetence everywhere. The nobles held aloof, while some aged clergymen tried to conduct a war. He hardly dared to think what would happen if a few French ships touched the shore. Since then, there had been some improvement. No invader had landed, and Guise's capture of Thionville had been balanced by Egmont's victory at Gravelines. Shortly before Mary's death negotiations for a peace were begun at Cercamp; the outline of the scheme was a restoration of conquests. But Calais stopped the way. The French could not surrender that prize, and they were the more constant in their determination because the King of Spain would not much longer be King of England, and an isolated Engl&nd would have no conquest to restore. When Elizabeth became Queen, Calais was not yet lost; that was the worst of it. Both Kings were weary of the war; behind both yawned gulfs of debt and heresy. But the ruler of the Netherlands was deeply concerned in the recovery of Calais-perhaps more materially, though less sentimentally, than were the English. Feria has reported the profound remark that when Calais was captured many Englishmen ceased to go to church. A Protestant Elizabeth might have to sign away the last memorial of old glories; and that would not fill the churches. Philip, it might be plain, would not suffer the French to invade England through Scotland; but the tie between Spain and an heretical England would be the coolest selfishness, the King's mind would he distracted between his faith and his policy, and if he were compelled to save England from the French, he certainly would not save England for the English.
True that for Protestant eyes there was light on the horizon. Anyone could see that there would be religious troubles in France and Scotland. Geneva was active, and Rome seemed to be doting. That summer the psalms had gone up loudly from the Pré-aux-Clercs, and a Châtillon had been arrested. That autumn St Giles of Edinburgh had lain prostrate in the mud. Expectant heirs and royal cadets, Bourbons and Hamiltons, were wavering; Maximilian was listening to an enlightened pastor; France, Scotland, the Empire, might some day fall to evangelical lords. Good news came from Poland, Bohemia, and Hungary; it was even rumoured that the Pope would at last succeed in shaking Philip's faith. Still, the black fact of the moment was that Philip and Henry were making peace in order that they might crush their respective heretics. And England's military weakness was patent to all. Her soldiers and captains were disgracefully old-fashioned, and what gunpowder she had was imported from the Netherlands. "To make a lewd comparison," said an Englishman, "England is as a bone thrown between two dogs." Was this bone to display an irritating activity of its own, merely because the two dogs seemed for the moment to be equal and opposite? To more than one mind came the same thought: "They will make a Piedmont of England."
