Page:History of England (Froude) Vol 10.djvu/519

 1579- ] TJSE ALENgON MARRIAGE. 49$ great a purpose. Above all she should not neglect Scot- land. There lay her greatest peril. Some part of the large allowance now made to the Queen of Scots might be reasonably transferred to her son if she could not otherwise afford to help him. In other words the coun- cil advised her to adopt the policy to which Sussex thought her resources unequal, become ' The Head of the Name,' and with the glory, risk the perils. They did not press their recommendations ; they offered them merely as the only visible means of escape from the marriage, and they concluded with desiring that ' inter- cession should be made to God to direct her Majesty's heart, as should be most to His honour, her comfort, and the weal of the realm/ l It is needless to say that the advice was not accepted. Burghley reported two days later ' that the remedies proposed to her Majesty had misliked her.' He there- fore, for his own part, was of opinion that the marriage must go forward. Yet so unfavourable still was the general feeling* that only Sussex went with him. The rest of the Lords waited in a body on the Queen, and represented to her that the objections of the nation to Alengon amounted to abhorrence, and that it would be unsafe for her to persevere. It would be a sufficient excuse to France that the people reasonably or unreasonably declined to receive the Duke among them. Bromley, who with Bacon's office had inherited his freedom of speech, added Report of Proceedings in Council at Greenwich, October 2 : MURDIN.