Page:History of England (Froude) Vol 11.djvu/543

 1584.] THE BOND OF ASSOCIATION. Scots was in fact ready to tie herself hand and foot in knots which she would have found it hard to undo. She was desperate of help and was willing to agree to anything. Her letter to Englefield had produced no effect. Parma wrote to her in terms of general polite- ness, but regretting that he was prevented by circum- stances from devoting himself, as he desired, to her cause. 1 The Archbishop of Glasgow reported from Paris that the Duke of Guise was willing as ever, but that the state of France forbade him at present to move for her. The arrest and confession of Crichton had disheartened her friends and created new difficulties. 8 Mr Lygons, an English refugee in the Netherlands, who had been especially active for her, wrote that Philip had designs of his own on England, and ' would never help her to what he grasped after himself;' if he had cared really to give her the crown he would have done it long since, ' to her liking if not to his ; ' but ' that the enterprise so furiously pretended ' had never been more than a stratagem. 3 From Rome itself the news was hardly better. Pere la Rue, who, dis- guised as a gardener, had been her chaplain at Sheffield, had gone over to rouse the languid interest of the Catholic courts. The Duke of Lorraine had told him that nothing could be done till James was a Catholic. He had told the Pope that the apathy of Spain was 1 Parma to the Queen of Scots, December, 1584: MSS. MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 2 The Archbishop of Glasgow to the Queen of Scots, December, 1584 : MSS. Ibid. 3 Lygons to the Queen of Soots, December 1424 : MSS. Ibid.