Ferdinando II, made inquiries of Lotti, his Minister in London, about the “Conte di Varuich” before taking him into his service. After expatiating upon the “exquisite stature, fair beard and noble appearance” of Sir Robert Dudley, Lotti added that King James was very angry at his marriage and his assumption of the title of Earl of Warwick, and then writes in cipher, “the chief reason is that His Majesty does not want Catholic subjects, especially when they are brave and worthy men.” This brought the matter to a conclusion, and Dudley immediately began building ships for the Grand Duke. He wrote proudly of the galleon _San Giovanni_, “she was a rare and strong sailer, of great repute, and the terror of the Turks in these seas”; and his designs seem to have attracted notice in England, as Lotti wrote to the Grand Duke in March 1607, “H. E. (Sir Thomas Challoner, tutor to Prince Henry) showed me the design of a ship made in Leghorn by the Earl of Warwick, and he also showed me another which he said was more perfect than any.” This may account for James I, sending Dudley an order to return to England, promising him an earldom and the title of Earl of Warwick. But all offers that left his own and his mother’s name under a slur were refused by Dudley, who remained in Tuscany where, thanks to him, Leghorn became a great commercial port. He induced the Grand Duke to build fortifications, to declare it a free port and to allow an English factory to be set up. The draining of the marshes between Leghorn and Pisa was also suggested by him. In the _Specola_, or Natural History Museum, in Florence, are three large manuscript volumes in Dudley’s writing on ship-building. The two first are in English, the third in Italian, and his orthography, to say the least, is in both languages peculiar. In the same museum is a curious instrument of his invention for finding the ebb and flow of the tides, of which I give, through the kindness of Mr Temple Leader, an engraving taken from his interesting _Life of Sir Robert Dudley_, from which most of my facts are taken. In Florence, Dudley and his wife (mentioned by Lord Herbert of Cherbury as “the handsome _Mrs Sudel_ whom he carried away with him out of England and is here taken for his wife”) were known as Earl and Countess of Warwick, until the Emperor Ferdinand II, to please his sister the Grand Duchess Maria Maddalena, whose grand chamberlain Dudley was, created him Duke of Northumberland in 1620.