woman":—such was the judgment of a daughter of France and a mother in the Protestant Israel, of Renée, the venerable Duchess of Ferrara. Another observer, Hubert Languet, said that the English were so proud of the conversion of Scotland that they were recovering their old insolence and would be the very people to defy the imminent Council at Trent. The tone of Catholic correspondence changes: the Elizabeth who was merely rushing to her ruin, will now set all Europe alight in her downward course. That young woman's conduct, when we now examine it, will not seem heroic. As was often to happen in coming years, she had been pursuing two policies at once, and she was ready to fall back upon an Austrian marriage if the Scottish revolt miscarried. But this was not what men saw at the time. What was seen was that she and Cecil had played and won a masterly game; and Englishmen must have felt that the change of religion coincided with a transfer of power from incapable to capable hands.
All this had been done, not only without Spanish help, but (so a patriot might say) in defiance of Spain. To discover Philip's intentions had been difficult, and in truth he had been of two minds. Elizabeth was setting the worst of examples. Say what she would, she was encouraging a Protestant revolt against a Catholic King. She was doing this in sight, and with the hardly concealed applause, of the Netherlander«; a friar who dared to preach against her at Antwerp went in fear of his life; whole families of Flemings were already taking refuge in England. Philip's new French wife was coming home to him; his mother-in-law, Catharine de' Medici, implored him to stop Elizabeth from "playing the fool." He had in some kind made himself responsible for the religious affairs of England, by assuring the Pope that au would yet be well. But the intense dread of France, the outcome of long wars, could not be eradicated, and was reasonable enough. He dared not let the French subdue Scotland and threaten England on both sides. Moreover he was for the moment miserably poor; Margaret of Parma, his Regent in the Netherlands, had hardly a crown for current expenses, and the Estates would grant nothing. So in public he scolded and lectured Elizabeth, while in private he hinted that what she was doing should be done quickly. The French, too, though they asked his aid, hardly wished him to fulfil his promise of sending troops to Scotland. Then his navy was defeated by the opportune Turk (May 11); and the Spaniards suspected that the French, if guiltless of, were not displeased at the disaster.
This was not all. The Pope also had been humiliated. The conciliatory Pius IV had not long been on the throne before he sent to Elizabeth a courteous letter (May 5, 1560). Vincent Parpaglia, the Abbot of San Solutore at Turin, once the secretary of Cardinal Pole, was to carry it to her as Nuncio. She was to lend him her ear, and a strong hint was given to her that she could be legitimated. When she heard
