Page:History of England (Froude) Vol 10.djvu/486

 466 RETGN OF E LIZ ABE TH. [CH. 6 1 . ness, instead of relief should receive reprehension.' 1 ' If/ wrote Walsingham to Hatton, whom he September. perhaps suspected of encouraging Elizabeth, l if it be good to have these countries possessed by France, and alienated from England, then have you returned Mr Somers ' (the Queen's messenger) ( with a good dispatch ; if nothing can be worse than such a resolution, then you have committed an irreparable error. These people will depend no more on you and your uncertainties. Her Majesty will never more have the like opportunity. Seeing how you have acted with Scotland, I am the less surprised, but from both causes I have occasion to think there hangs over us some fearful storm.-' 2 More confidentially, in reply to a letter from Burgh- ley, he said, ' As you write, he had need to be furnished with patience that shall deal in such service as we are employed in, being almost ashamed to shew our faces abroad. Besides the alienation of these people's hearts, which cannot but be perilous both to herself and her realm, it will render her Highness hateful to the world. To have all the world your enemies at once ! It is greatly to be doubted you will return Monsieur's minis- ters unsatisfied ; and then I know not any prince whose friendship you may assure yourself of. Navarre and Conde will learn by your dealings with the States here what they are to look for in the time of their necessity. As for Casimir he doth curse the time that ever he de- parted out of his country, finding her Majesty deal so 1 Cobham and Walsingbam to I 2 Walsingham to Hatton, Sep- Eiizabeth, September 24 : MURDIN. I tember 9 : WRIGHT, vol. ii.