[114] Cuneo, Dec. 18, 1637: ‘Io non contraverro mai ad alcuna di queste conditioni che voi pretendete, ma con vostra buona licenza, io voglio mostrare essere di quella religione che professo. So che il papa mi vorebbe altrimente che sono.’ [115] G. Giustiniano, Oct. 1: ‘Avanzate le loro istanze nel pretendere che anche in questo regno si chiami il parlamento per unitamente dare la miglior forma al governo.’ [116] As early as September 1637 the Venetian ambassador speaks of the ‘pericolo evidente che s’estenda la sollevatione anche per questo regno, dove i popoli non meno che gli Scocesi avidi si mostrano dell’ occasione di sottrarsi al giogo a cui poco a poco si sono universalmente piegati.’ [117] Compare ‘A design to extricate His Majesty out of these present troubles with the Scots,’ in Clarendon Papers ii. [118] Chemnitz, Schwedischer Krieg i. 43. [119] The pass given to Lesley by Charles I extends over a year (May 1637-38). In a Venetian report of April 1638 it is stated that Lesley had taken leave of the King in order to go to Scotland and from thence to Pomerania into the Swedish service. In that case Rothes must have induced him to remain behind. [120] ‘To help their bested mother church and country, they have deserted their charges abroad to their great loss, which they knew she was never able to make up.’ Baillie, Sept. 1639, i. 223. [121] ‘They are a people that can live of nothing, and we that can want nothing.’ Countess of Westmoreland to Windebank: Hardwicke Papers ii. 129. [122] Depêche de Bellièvre, 12 Mai: ‘Les seigneurs qui étoient à York s’étoient déjà assemblés pour voir ce qu’il il y auroit à faire en ce rencontre, et avoient été à trouver le comte d’Arundel, qui est le premier, pour porter la parole.’ [123] Sir Henry Devick’s account of this conference in Burnet, Dukes of Hamilton 133. Although it there appears to have taken place later than the application to the King, yet it must have preceded it. The application was made in consequence of the conference. [124] Pacification of Berwick. Hardwicke Papers ii. 241. [125] Giustiniano July 1-8, 1639. CHAPTER II. RELATIONS OF THE ENGLISH COURT WITH THE COURT AND POLICY OF FRANCE. Let us now once more direct our close attention to the relations between England and France, which at that time, as they had almost always done, determined the general course of European policy. In July 1637 the two powers, between which, notwithstanding the above-mentioned objections on the part of Wentworth, negotiations had always been going on, came to an agreement about the articles of an alliance for mutual assistance, which opened a wide prospect for the general relations of Europe, especially with regard to Germany[126].