public feeling had left the majority of the members unaffected; they were still anxious to secure the reversion of the crown to the dying Lady Catherine and her children; and the tendencies of the country, generally in favour of the Scotch succession, made them more desirous than ever not to let the occasion pass through their hands. The House of Lords was in the interest of Mary Stuart, but some divisions had been already created by her quarrel with Darnley. The Commons perhaps thought that although the peers might prefer the Queen of Scots, they would acquiesce in the wife of Lord Hertford sooner than endure any more uncertainty; the Peers may have hoped the same in favour of their own candidate they may have felt assured that when the question came once to be discussed, the superior right of the Queen of Scots, the known opinions of the lawyers in her favour, the scarcely concealed preference of the great body of English gentlemen, with the political advantages which would follow on the union of the crowns, must inevitably turn the scale for Mary Stuart, whatever the Commons might will. Both Houses at all events were determined to bear Elizabeth's vacillation no longer, to believe no more in promises which were made only to be broken, and either to decide once for all the future fortunes of England, or lay such a pressure on the Queen that she should be forbidden to trifle any more with her subjects' anxiety for her marriage. On the 17th of October Cecil brought forward in the Lower House a statement of the expenses of the French and Irish wars. On the 18th Mr Molyneux, a barrister, proposed at once, amidst universal approbation, 'to revive the suit for the succession,' and to consider the demands of the exchequer only in connection with the determination of an heir to the throne.1 Elizabeth's first desire was to stifle the discussion at its commencement. Sir Ralph Sadler rose when Molyneux sat down, and after divers propositions' 'declared that he had heard the Queen say in the presence of the nobility that her Highness minded to marry.' Sadler possessed the confidence of the Protestants, and from him, if from any one, they would have accepted a declaration with which so steady an opponent of the Queen of Scots was satisfied; but the disappointment of the two previous sessions had taught them the meaning of words of this kind; a report of something said elsewhere to 'the nobility' would not meet the present irritation; 'their mind was to continue their suit, and to know her Highness's answer.' Elizabeth found it necessary to be more specific. The next day, first Cecil, then Sir Francis Knowles, then Sir Ambrose Cave, declared formally that the Queen by God's special providence was moved to marry, that she minded for the wealth of the commons to prosecute the same, and persuaded to see the sequel of that before further suit touching the succession." Cecil and Cave were good Protestants, Knowles was an advanced Puritan, 2 1 'October 18.-Motion made by | well allowed by the House.'-ComMr Molyneux for the reviving of mons' Journals, 8 Elizabeth. the suit for the succession, and to proceed with the subsidy, was very VOL. VII. 2 Commons' Journals, 8 Elizabeth. 29 yet they were no more successful than Sadler; the lawyers' still insisted; the House went with them in declining to endure any longer a future which depended on the possible 'movements' of the Queen's mind; and a vote was carried to press the question to an issue and to invite the Lords to a conference. The Lords, as eager as the Commons, instantly acquiesced. Public business was suspended, and committees of the two Houses sat daily for a fortnight, preparing an address to the Crown.1 Cecil, who was a member of the | against a successor that hath right Commons' Committee, has left a by law to succeed. paper of notes touching the main points of the situation : : 'Corollarium. The mean betwixt them is to determine effectually to marry, and if it succeed not, then proceed to discussion of the right of succession.' -Domestic MSS., Elizabeth, vol. xl. Another paper, also in Cecil's hand, contains apparently a rough sketch for the address to the Crown: 'That the marriage may proceed effectually. That it may be declared how necessary it is to have the succession stablished for sundry causes. To require the succession is hardest to be obtained, both for the difficulty to discuss the right and 'Surety and quietness of the the loathsomeness of the Queen's Queen's Majesty, that no person may Majesty to consent thereto. attempt anything to the furtherance "The difficulty to discuss it is by of any supposed title when it shall reason of I. 'The uncertainty of indifferency in the parties that shall discuss it. 2. The uncertainty of the right pretended. 'The loathsomeness to grant it is by reason of natural suspicion be manifest how the right is settled. Whereunto may also be added sundry devices to stay every person in his duty, so as her Majesty may reign assuredly. The comfort of all good subjects that may remain assured, how and whom to obey lawfully, and how In spite of her struggles the Queen saw the net closing round her. Fair speeches were to serve her turn no longer, and either she would have to endure some husband whom she detested the very thought of, or submit to a settlement the result of which it was easy to foresee. Into her feelings, or into such aspect of them as she chose to exhibit, we once more gain curious insight through a letter of de Silva. So distinctly was Elizabeth's marriage the object of the present move of the House of Commons that the Queen of Scots, in dread of it, was contented to withdraw the pressure for a determination in her own favour, and consented to bide her time. GUZMAN DE SILVA TO PHILIP II.1 October 26. 'The Parliament is in full debate on the succession. The Queen is furious about it; she is advised that if the question come to a vote in the Lower House the greatest number of voices will be for the Lady Catherine. This to avoid all errors in disobedience, | sion, that yet for the satisfaction of whereby civil wars may be avoided. 'And because presently it seemeth very uncomfortable to the Queen's Majesty to hear of this at this time, and that it is hoped that God will direct her heart to think more comfortably hereof, it may be required that her marriage may proceed with all convenient speed; and that if her Majesty cannot condescend to enter into the disquisition and stablishing of the succession in this Ses her people she will prorogue this lady and her husband Lord Hertford are Protestants; and a large number, probably an actual majority of the Commons, being heretics also, will declare for her in self-defence. I have never ceased to urge upon the Queen the inconvenience and danger to which she will be exposed if a successor is declared, and on the other hand her perfect security as soon as she has children of her own. She understands all this fully, and she told me three days ago that she would never consent. The Parliament, she said, had offered her two hundred and fifty thousand pounds as the price of her acquiescence; but she had refused to accept anything on conditions. She had requested a subsidy for the public service in Ireland and elsewhere, and it should be given freely and graciously or not at all. She says she will not yield one jot to them let them do what they will; she means to dissemble with them and hear what they have to say, so that she may know their views, and the lady which each declares for1-meaning the Queen of Scots and Lady Catherine. I told her that if she would but marry, all this worry would be at an end. She assured me she would send this very week to the Emperor and settle everything; and yet I learn from Sir Thomas Heneage, who is the person hitherto most concerned in the Archduke affair, that she has grown much cooler about it. The members of the Lower House are almost all Protestants, and seeing the Queen in such a rage at 1 'Por conocer las voluntades y saber la dama de cada uno.' |