and Sir John Boroughs acquired reputation this campaign, and revived in France the ancient fame of English valor.
The army which Henry, next campaign, led into the field, was much inferior to that of the league; but as it was composed of the chief nobility of France, he feared not to encounter his enemies in a pitched battle at Yvrée, and he gained a complete victory over them. This success enabled him to blockade Paris, and he reduced that capital to the last extremity of famine; when the duke of Parma, in consequence of orders from Philip, marched to the relief of the league, and obliged Henry to raise the blockade. Having performed this important service, he retreated to the Low Countries; and, by his consummate skill in the art of war, performed these long marches in the face of the enemy, without affording the French monarch that opportunity which he sought, of giving him battle, or so much as once putting his army in disorder. The only loss which he sustained was in the Low Countries, where Prince Maurice took advantage of his absence, and recovered some places which the duke of Parma had formerly conquered from the states.[*] [32] * See note FF, at the end of the volume.
{1591.} The situation of Henry’s affairs, though promising, was not so well advanced or established as to make the queen discontinue her succors; and she was still more confirmed in the resolution of supporting him, by some advantages gained by the king of Spain. The duke of Mercoeur, governor of Brittany, a prince of the house of Lorraine, had declared for the league; and finding himself hard pressed by Henry’s forces, he had been obliged, in order to secure himself, to introduce some Spanish troops into the seaport towns of that province. Elizabeth was alarmed at the danger; and foresaw that the Spaniards, besides infesting the English commerce by privateers, might employ these harbors as the seat of their naval preparations, and might more easily, from that vicinity, than from Spain or Portugal, project an invasion of England. She concluded, therefore, a new treaty with Henry, in which she engaged to send over three thousand men to be employed in the reduction of Brittany; and she stipulated that her charges should, in a twelvemonth, or as soon as the enemy was expelled, be refunded her.[*] These forces were commanded by Sir John Norris, and under him by his brother Henry, and by Anthony Shirley. Sir Roger Williams was at the head of a small body which garrisoned Dieppe: and a squadron of ships, under the command of Sir Henry Palmer, lay upon the coast of France, and intercepted all the vessels belonging to the Spaniards or the leaguers.
The operations of war can very little be regulated beforehand by any treaty or agreement; and Henry, who found it necessary to lay aside the projected enterprise against Brittany, persuaded the English commanders to join his army, and to take a share in the hostilities which he carried into Picardy.[**] Notwithstanding the disgust which Elizabeth received from this disappointment, he laid before her a plan for expelling the leaguers from Normandy, and persuaded her to send over a new body of four thousand men, to assist him in that enterprise. The earl of Essex was appointed general of these forces; a young nobleman, who, by many exterior accomplishments, and still more real merit, was daily advancing in favor with Elizabeth, and seemed to occupy that place in her affections, which Leicester, now deceased, had so long enjoyed.
Essex, impatient for military fame, was extremely uneasy to lie some time at Dieppe unemployed; and had not the orders which he received from his mistress been so positive, he would gladly have accepted of Henry’s invitation, and have marched to join the French army now in Champagne.
This plan of operations was also proposed to Elizabeth by the French ambassador, but she rejected it with great displeasure; and she threatened immediately to recall her troops, if Henry should persevere any longer in his present practice of breaking all concert with her, and attending to nothing but his own interests.[***] * Camden, p. 561.
** Rymer, vol. xiv. p. 116.
140.
Urged by these motives, the French king at last led his army into Normandy, and laid siege to Rouen, which he reduced to great difficulties. But the league, unable of themselves to take the field against him, had again recourse to the duke of Parma, who received orders to march to their relief. He executed this enterprise with his usual abilities and success; and for the present frustrated all the projects of Henry and Elizabeth. This princess, who kept still in view the interests of her own kingdom in all her foreign transactions, was impatient under these disappointments, blamed Henry for his negligence in the execution of treaties, and complained that the English forces were thrust foremost in every hazardous enterprise.[*] It is probable, however, that their own ardent courage, and their desire of distinguishing themselves in so celebrated a theatre of war, were the causes why they so often enjoyed this perilous honor.
Notwithstanding the indifferent success of former enterprises, the queen was sensible how necessary it was to support Henry against the league and the Spaniards; and she formed a new treaty with him, in which they agreed never to make peace with Philip but by common consent; she promised to send him a new supply of four thousand men; and he stipulated to repay her charges in a twelvemonth, to employ these forces, joined to a body of French troops, in an expedition against Brittany, and to consign into her hands a seaport town of that province, for a retreat to the English.[**] Henry knew the impossibility of executing some of these articles, and the imprudence of fulfilling others; but finding them rigidly insisted on by Elizabeth, he accepted of her succors, and trusted that he might easily, on some pretence, be able to excuse his failure in executing his part of the treaty. This campaign was the least successful of all those which he had yet carried on against the league.
During these military operations in France, Elizabeth employed her naval power against Philip, and endeavored to intercept his West Indian treasures, the source of that greatness which rendered him so formidable to all his neighbors. She sent a squadron of seven ships, under the command of Lord Thomas Howard, for this service; but the king of Spain, informed of her purpose, fitted out a great force of fifty-five sail, and despatched them to escort the Indian fleet. They fell in with the English squadron; and, by the courageous obstinacy of Sir Richard Greenville, the vice-admiral, who refused to make his escape by flight, they took one vessel, the first English ship of war that had yet fallen into the hands of the Spaniards.[***] [33]The rest of the squadron returned safely into England frustrated of their expectations, but pleasing themselves with the idea that their attempt had not been altogether fruitless in hurting the enemy.
* Camden, p. 562.
*** See note GG, at the end of the volume.
The Indian fleet had been so long detained in the Havana from the fear of the English, that they were obliged at last to set sail in an improper season, and most of them perished by shipwreck ere they reached the Spanish harbors.[*] The earl of Cumberland made a like unsuccessful enterprise against the Spanish trade. He carried out one ship of the queen’s, and seven others equipped at his own expense; but the prizes which he made did not compensate the charges.[**] The spirit of these expensive and hazardous adventures was very prevalent in England. Sir Walter Raleigh, who had enjoyed great favor with the queen, finding his interest to decline, determined to recover her good graces by some important undertaking; and as his reputation was high among his countrymen, he persuaded great numbers to engage with him as volunteers in an attempt on the West Indies.
{1592.} The fleet was detained so long in the Channel by contrary winds, that the season was lost: Raleigh was recalled by the queen: Sir Martin Frobisher succeeded to the command, and made a privateering voyage against the Spaniards. He took one rich carrack near the Island of Flores, and destroyed another.[***] About the same time, Thomas White, a Londoner, took two Spanish ships, which, besides fourteen hundred chests of quicksilver, contained above two millions of bulls for indulgences; a commodity useless to the English, but which had cost the king of Spain three hundred thousand florins, and would have been sold by him in the Indies for five millions.
{1593.} This war did great damage to Spain; but it was attended with considerable expense to England; and Elizabeth’s ministers computed, that since the commencement of it, she had spent in Flanders and France, and on her naval expeditions, above one million two hundred thousand pounds;[****] a charge which, notwithstanding her extreme frugality, was too burthensome for her narrow revenues to support.
* Monson, p. 163.
** Monson, p. 169.
**** Strype, vol. iii.
She summoned, therefore, a parliament, in order to obtain supply: but she either thought her authority so established that she needed to make them no concessions in return, or she rated her power and prerogative above money: for there never was any parliament whom she treated in a more haughty manner, whom she made more sensible of their own weakness, or whose privileges she more openly violated. When the speaker, Sir Edward Coke, made the three usual requests, of freedom from arrests, of access to her person, and of liberty of speech, she replied to him by the mouth of Puckering, lord keeper, that liberty of speech was granted to the commons, but they must know what liberty they were entitled to; not a liberty for every one to speak what he listeth, or what cometh in his brain to utter; their privilege extended no further than a liberty of “aye” or “no:” that she enjoined the speaker, if he perceived any idle heads so negligent of their own safety as to attempt reforming the church, or innovating in the commonwealth, that he should refuse the bills exhibited for that purpose, till they were examined by such as were fitter to consider of these things, and could better judge of them: that she would not impeach the freedom of their persons; but they must beware lest, under color of this privilege, they imagined that any neglect of their duty could be covered or protected: and that she would not refuse them access to her person, provided it were upon urgent and weighty causes, and at times convenient, and when she might have leisure from other important affairs of the realm.[*] Notwithstanding the menacing and contemptuous air of this speech, the intrepid and indefatigable Peter Wentworth, not discouraged by his former ill success, ventured to transgress the imperial orders of Elizabeth. He presented to the lord keeper a petition, in which he desired the upper house to join with the lower in a supplication to her majesty for entailing the succession of the crown; and he declared that he had a bill ready prepared for that purpose. This method of proceeding was sufficiently respectful and cautious; but the subject was always extremely disagreeable to the queen, and what she had expressly prohibited any one from meddling with: she sent Wentworth immediately to the Tower; committed Sir Thomas Bromley, who had seconded him, to the Fleet prison, together with Stevens and Welsh, two members, to whom Sir Thomas had communicated his intention.[**] About a fortnight after, a motion was made in the house to petition the queen for the release of these members; but it was answered by all the privy counsellors there present, that her majesty had committed them for causes best known to herself, and that to press her on that head would only tend to the prejudice of the gentlemen whom they meant to serve: she would release them whenever she thought proper, and would be better pleased to do it of her own proper motion, than from their suggestion.[*] The house willingly acquiesced in this reasoning.
So arbitrary an act, at the commencement of the session, might well repress all further attempts for freedom: but the religious zeal of the puritans was not so easily restrained; and it inspired a courage which no human motive was able to surmount. Morrice, chancellor of the duchy, and attorney, of the court of wards, made a motion for redressing the abuses in the bishops’ courts, but above all, in the high commission; where subscriptions, he said, were exacted to articles at the pleasure of the prelates; where oaths were imposed, obliging persons to answer to all questions without distinction, even though they should tend to their own condemnation; and where every one who refused entire satisfaction to the commissioners was imprisoned, without relief or remedy.[**] * D’Ewes, p. 497.
This motion was seconded by some members; but the ministers and privy counsellors opposed it, and foretold the consequences which ensued. The queen sent for the speaker, and after requiring him to deliver to her Morrice’s bill, she told him, that it was in her power to call parliaments, in her power to dissolve them, in her power to give assent or dissent to any determination which they should form: that her purpose in summoning this parliament was twofold, to have laws enacted for the further enforcement of uniformity in religion, and to provide for the defence of the nation against the exorbitant power of Spain: that these two points ought, therefore, to be the object of their deliberations: she had enjoined them already, by the mouth of the lord keeper, to meddle neither with matters of state nor of religion; and she wondered how any one could be so assuming, as to attempt a subject so expressly contrary to her prohibition: that she was highly offended with this presumption; and took the present opportunity to reiterate the commands given by the keeper, and to require that no bill, regarding either state affairs or reformation in causes ecclesiastical, be exhibited in the house: and that in particular she charged the speaker upon his allegiance, if any such bills were offered, absolutely to refuse them a reading, and not so much as permit them to be debated by the members.[*] This command from the queen was submitted to without further question.
Morrice was seized in the house itself by a serjeant-at-arms, discharged from his office of chancellor of the duchy, incapacitated from any practice in his profession as a common lawyer, and kept some years prisoner in Tilbury Castle.[**] The queen having thus expressly pointed out both what the house should and should not do, the commons were as obsequious to the one as to the other of her injunctions. They passed a law against recusants; such a law as was suited to the severe character of Elizabeth, and to the persecuting spirit of the age. It was entitled, “An act to retain her majesty’s subjects in their due obedience;” and was meant, as the preamble declares, to obviate such inconveniencies and perils as might grow from the wicked practices of seditious sectaries and disloyal persons: for these two species of criminals were always, at that time, confounded together, as equally dangerous to the peace of society.
It was enacted, that any person, above sixteen years of age, who obstinately refused during the space of a month to attend public worship, should be committed to prison; that if, after being condemned for this offence, he persist three months in his refusal, he must abjure the realm; and that, if he either refuse this condition, or return after banishment, he should suffer capitally as a felon, without benefit of clergy.[***] This law bore equally hard upon the Puritans and upon the Catholics; and had it not been imposed by the queen’s authority, was certainly, in that respect, much contrary to the private sentiments and inclinations of the majority in the house of commons. Very little opposition, however, appears there to have been openly made to it.[****] ** Heylin’s History of the Presbyterians, p. 320.
*** 35 Eliz. c. 1.
**** After enacting this statute, the clergy, in order to remove the odium from themselves, often took care that recusants should be tried by the civil judges at the assizes, rather than by the ecclesiastical commissioners.
Strype’s Ann. vol. iv p. 264.
The expenses of the war with Spain having reduced the queen to great difficulties, the grant of subsidies seems to have been the most important business of this parliament; and it was a signal proof of the high spirit of Elizabeth, that, while conscious of a present dependence on the commons, she opened the session with the most haughty treatment of them and covered her weakness under such a lofty appearance of superiority. The commons readily voted two subsidies and four fifteenths; but this sum not appearing sufficient to the court, an unusual expedient was fallen upon to induce them to make an enlargement in their concessions. The peers informed the commons in a conference, that they could not give their assent to the supply voted, thinking it too small for the queen’s occasions: they therefore proposed a grant of three subsidies and six fifteenths; and desired a further conference, in order to persuade the commons to agree to this measure. The commons, who had acquired the privilege of beginning bills of subsidy, took offence at this procedure of the lords, and at first absolutely rejected the proposal: but being afraid, on reflection, that they had by this refusal given offence to their superiors, they both agreed to the conference, and afterwards voted the additional subsidy.[*] The queen, notwithstanding this unusual concession of the commons, ended the session with a speech, containing some reprimands to them, and full of the same high pretensions which she had assumed at the opening of the parliament. She took notice, by the mouth of the keeper, that certain members spent more time than was necessary by indulging themselves in harangues and reasonings: and she expressed her displeasure on account of their not paying due reverence to privy counsellors, “who,” she told them, “were not to be accounted as common knights and burgesses of the house, who are counsellors but during the parliament; whereas the others are standing counsellors, and for their wisdom and great service are called to the council of the state.”[**] The queen also, in her own person, made the parliament a spirited harangue; in which she spoke of the justice and moderation of her government, expressed the small ambition she had ever entertained of making conquests, displayed the just grounds of her quarrel with the king of Spain, and discovered how little she apprehended the power of that monarch, even though he should make a greater effort against her than that of his Invincible Armada. “But I am informed,” added she, “that when he attempted this last invasion, some upon the sea-coast forsook their towns, fled up higher into the country, and left all naked and exposed to his entrance: but I swear unto you by God, if I knew those persons, or may know of any that shall do so hereafter, I will make them feel what it is to be so fearful in so urgent a cause.”[*] By this menace, she probably gave the people to understand, that she would execute martial law upon such cowards; for there was no statute by which a man could be punished for changing his place of abode.
The king of France, though he had hitherto made war on the league with great bravery and reputation, though he had this campaign gained considerable advantages over them, and though he was assisted by a considerable body of English under Norris, who carried hostilities into the heart of Brittany, was become sensible that he never could, by force of arms alone, render himself master of his kingdom. The nearer he seemed by his military successes to approach to a full possession of the throne, the more discontent and jealousy arose among those Romanists who adhered to him; and a party was formed in his own court to elect some Catholic monarch of the royal blood, if Henry should any longer refuse to satisfy them by declaring his conversion. This excellent prince was far from being a bigot to his sect; and as he deemed these theological disputes entirely subordinate to the public good, he had secretly determined, from the beginning, to come some time or other to the resolution required of him. He had found, on the death of his predecessor, that the Hugonots, who formed the bravest and most faithful part of his army, were such determined zealots, that if he had at that time abjured their faith, they would instantly have abandoned him to the pretensions and usurpations of the Catholics. The more bigoted Catholics, he knew, particularly those of the league, had entertained such an unsurmountable prejudice against his person, and diffidence of his sincerity, that even his abjuration would not reconcile them to his title; and he must either expect to be entirely excluded from the throne, or be admitted to it on such terms as would leave him little more than the mere shadow of royalty. In this delicate situation, he had resolved to temporize; to retain the Hugonots by continuing in the profession of their religion; to gain the moderate Catholics by giving them hopes of his conversion; to attach both to his person by conduct and success; and he hoped, either that the animosity arising from war against the league would make them drop gradually the question of religion, or that he might in time, after some victories over his enemies, and some conferences with divines, make finally, with more decency and dignity, that abjuration which must have appeared at first mean, as well as suspicious, to both parties.
When the people are attached to any theological tenets merely from a general persuasion or prepossession, they are easily induced, by any motive or authority, to change their faith in these mysterious subjects; as appears from the example of the English, who, during some reigns, usually embraced, without scruple, the still varying religion of their sovereigns. But the French nation, where principles had so long been displayed as the badges of faction, and where each party had fortified its belief by an animosity against the other, were not found so pliable or inconstant; and Henry was at last convinced that the Catholics of his party would entirely abandon him, if he gave them not immediate satisfaction in this particular. The Hugonots also, taught by experience, clearly saw that his desertion of them was become absolutely necessary for the public settlement; and so general was this persuasion among them, that, as the duke of Sully pretends, even the divines of that party purposely allowed themselves to be worsted in the disputes and conferences, that the king might more readily be convinced of the weakness of their cause, and might more cordially and sincerely, at least more decently, embrace the religion which it was so much his interest to believe. If this self-denial, in so tender a point, should appear incredible and supernatural in theologians, it will, at least, be thought very natural, that a prince so little instructed in these matters as Henry, and desirous to preserve his sincerity, should insensibly bend his opinion to the necessity of his affairs, and should believe that party to have the best arguments, who could alone put him in possession of a kingdom. All circumstances, therefore, being prepared for this great event, that monarch renounced the Protestant religion, and was solemnly received by the French prelates of his party into the bosom of the church.
Elizabeth, who was herself attached to the Protestants chiefly by her interests and the circumstances of her birth, and who seems to have entertained some propensity during her whole life to the Catholic superstition, at least to the ancient ceremonies, yet pretended to be extremely displeased with this abjuration of Henry; and she wrote him an angry letter, reproaching him with this interested change of his religion. Sensible however, that the league and the king of Spain were still their common enemies, she hearkened to his apologies; continued her succors both of men and money; and formed a new treaty, in which they mutually stipulated never to make peace but by common agreement.
The intrigues of Spain were not limited to France and England: by means of the never-failing pretence of religion, joined to the influence of money, Philip excited new disorders in Scotland, and gave fresh alarms to Elizabeth. George Ker, brother to Lord Newbottle, had been taken while he was passing secretly into Spain; and papers were found about him, by which a dangerous conspiracy of some Catholic noblemen with Philip was discovered. The earls of Angus, Errol, and Huntley, the heads of three potent families, had entered into a confederacy with the Spanish monarch; and had stipulated to raise all their forces; to join them to a body of Spanish troops which Philip promised to send into Scotland; and after reëstablishing the Catholic religion in that kingdom, to march with their united power in order to effect the same purpose in England.[*] Graham of Fintry, who had also entered into this conspiracy, was taken, and arraigned, and executed. Elizabeth sent Lord Borough ambassador into Scotland, and exhorted the king to exercise the same severity on the three earls, to confiscate their estates, and by annexing them to the crown, both increase his own demesnes, and set an example to all his subjects of the dangers attending treason and rebellion. The advice was certainly rational, but not easy to be executed by the small revenue and limited authority of James. He desired, therefore, some supply from her of men and money; but though she had reason to deem the prosecution of the three Popish earls a common cause, she never could be prevailed on to grant him the least assistance. The tenth part of the expense which she bestowed in supporting the French king and the states, would have sufficed to execute this purpose, more immediately essential to her security;[**] but she seems ever to have borne some degree of malignity to James, whom she hated, both as her heir, and as the son of Mary, her hated rival and competitor.
So far from giving James assistance to prosecute the Catholic conspirators, the queen rather contributed to increase his inquietude, by countenancing the turbulent disposition of the earl of Bothwell,[*] a nobleman descended from a natural son of James V. Both well more than once attempted to render himself master of the king’s person; and being expelled the kingdom for these traitorous enterprises, he took shelter in England, was secretly protected, by the queen, and lurked near the borders, where his power lay, with a view of still committing some new violence. He succeeded at last in an attempt on the king; and by the mediation of the English ambassador, imposed dishonorable terms upon that prince: but James, by the authority of the convention of states, annulled this agreement as extorted by violence, again expelled Bothwell, and obliged him to take shelter in England. Elizabeth, pretending ignorance of the place of his retreat, never executed the treaties, by which she was bound to deliver up all rebels and fugitives to the king of Scotland.
{1594.} During these disorders, increased by the refractory disposition of the ecclesiastics, the prosecution of the Catholic earls remained in suspense; but at last the parliament passed an act of attainder against them, and the king prepared himself to execute it by force of arms. The noblemen, though they obtained a victory over the earl of Argyle, who acted by the king’s commission found themselves hard pressed by James himself, and agreed on certain terms to leave the kingdom. Bothwell, being defected in a confederacy with them, forfeited the favor of Elizabeth, and was obliged to take shelter, first in France, then in Italy, where he died some years after in great poverty.
The established authority of the queen secured her from all such attempts as James was exposed to from the mutinous disposition of his subjects; and her enemies found no other means of giving her domestic disturbance, than by such traitorous and perfidious machinations as ended in their own disgrace, and in the ruin of their criminal instruments. Roderigo Lopez, a Jew, domestic physician to the queen, being imprisoned on suspicion, confessed that he had received a bribe to poison her from Fuentes and Ibarra, who had succeeded Parma, lately deceased, in the government of the Netherlands; but he maintained, that he had no other intention than to cheat Philip of his money, and never meant to fulfil his engagement. He was, however, executed for the conspiracy; and the queen complained to Philip of these dishonorable attempts of his ministers, but could obtain no satisfaction.[*] York and Williams, two English traitors, were afterwards executed for a conspiracy with Ibarra, equally atrocious.[**] Instead of avenging herself by retaliating in a like manner, Elizabeth sought a more honorable vengeance, by supporting the king of France, and assisting him in finally breaking the force of the league, which, after the conversion of that monarch, went daily to decay, and was threatened with speedy ruin and dissolution. Norris commanded the English forces in Brittany, and assisted at the taking of Morlaix, Quimpercorentin, and Brest, towns garrisoned by Spanish forces. In every action, the English, though they had so long enjoyed domestic peace, discovered a strong military disposition; and the queen, though herself a heroine, found more frequent occasion to reprove her generals for encouraging their temerity, than for countenancing their fear or caution:[***] Sir Martin Frobisher, her brave admiral, perished, with many others, before Brest.
Morlaix had been promised to the English for a place of retreat; but the duke d’Aumont, the French general, eluded this promise, by making it be inserted in the capitulation that none but Catholics should be admitted into that city.
381.
** Camden, p. 582.
*** Camden, p. 578.
Next campaign, the French king, who had long carried on hostilities with Philip, was at last provoked, by the taking of Chatelet and Dourlens, and the attack of Cambray, to declare war against that monarch.
Elizabeth, being threatened with a new invasion in England, and with an insurrection in Ireland, recalled most of her forces, and sent Norris to command in this latter kingdom. Finding also that the French league was almost entirely dissolved, and that the most considerable leaders had made an accommodation with their prince, she thought that he could well support himself by his own force and valor; and she began to be more sparing in his cause of the blood and treasure of her subjects.
Some disgusts which she had received from the states, joined to the remonstrances of her frugal minister, Burleigh, made her also inclined to diminish her charges on that side, and she even demanded by her ambassador, Sir Thomas Bodley, to be reimbursed all the money which she had expended in supporting them. The states, besides alleging the conditions of the treaty, by which they were not bound to repay her till the conclusion of a peace, pleaded their present poverty and distress, the great superiority of the Spaniards, and the difficulty in supporting the war; much more in saving money to discharge their encumbrances.
{1595.} After much negotiation, a new treaty was formed, by which the states engaged to free the queen immediately from the charge of the English auxiliaries, computed at forty thousand pounds a year; to pay her annually twenty thousand pounds for some years; to assist her with a certain number of ships; and to conclude no peace or treaty without her consent. They also bound themselves, on finishing a peace with Spain, to pay her annually the sum of a hundred thousand pounds for four years; but on this condition, that the payment should be in lieu of all demands, and that they should be supplied, though at their own charge, with a body of four thousand auxiliaries from England.[*] Camden, p. 586.
{1596.} The queen still retained in her hands the cautionary towns, which were a great check on the rising power of the states; and she committed the important trust of Flushing to Sir Francis Vere, a brave officer, who had distinguished himself by his valor in the Low Countries. She gave him the preference to Essex, who expected so honorable a command; and though this nobleman was daily rising, both in reputation with the people, and favor with herself, the queen, who was commonly reserved in the advancement of her courtiers, thought proper on this occasion to give him a refusal. Sir Thomas Baskerville was sent over to France at the head of two thousand English, with which Elizabeth, by a new treaty concluded with Henry, engaged to supply that prince. Some stipulations for mutual assistance were formed by the treaty; and all former engagements were renewed.
{1597.} This body of English were maintained at the expense of the French king; yet did Henry esteem the supply of considerable advantage, on account of the great reputation acquired by the English, in so many fortunate enterprises undertaken against the common enemy. In the great battle of Tournholt, gained this campaign by Prince Maurice, the English auxiliaries under Sir Francis Vere and Sir Robert Sidney had acquired honor; and the success of that day was universally ascribed to their discipline and valor.
Though Elizabeth, at a considerable expense of blood and treasure, made war against Philip in France and the Low Countries, the most severe blows which she gave him, were by those naval enterprises which either she or her subjects scarcely ever intermitted during one season. In 1594, Richard Hawkins, son of Sir John, the famous navigator, procured the queen’s commission, and sailed with three ships to the South Sea by the Straits of Magellan; but his voyage proved unfortunate, and he himself was taken prisoner on the coast of Chili. James Lancaster was supplied the same year with three ships and a pinnace by the merchants