as traitors, beaten off from the fortifications of Leith, and attacked by the French troops in Fife itself. [Sidenote: Elizabeth's action.] The Lords called loudly for aid from the English Queen. To give such assistance would have seemed impossible but twelve months back. But the appeal of the Scots found a different England from that which had met Elizabeth on her accession. The Queen's diplomacy had gained her a year, and her matchless activity had used the year to good purpose. Order was restored throughout England, the Church was reorganized, the debts of the Crown were in part paid off, the treasury was recruited, a navy created, and a force made ready for action in the north. Neither religiously nor politically indeed had Elizabeth any sympathy with the Scotch Lords. Knox was to her simply a firebrand of rebellion; her political instinct shrank from the Scotch Calvinism with its protest against the whole English system of government, whether in Church or State; and as a Queen she hated revolt. But the danger forced her hand. Elizabeth was ready to act, and to act even in the defiance of France. As yet she stood almost alone in her self-reliance. Spain believed her ruin to be certain. Her challenge would bring war with France, and in a war with France the Spanish statesmen held that only their master's intervention could save her. "For our own sake," said one of Philip's ministers, "we must take as much care of England as of the Low Countries." But that such a care would be needed Granvelle never doubted; and Philip's councillors solemnly debated whether it might not be well to avoid the risk of a European struggle by landing the six thousand men whom Philip was now withdrawing from the Netherlands on the English shore, and coercing Elizabeth into quietness. France meanwhile despised her chances. Her very Council was in despair. The one minister in whom she dared to confide throughout these Scotch negotiations was Cecil, the youngest and boldest of her advisers, and even Cecil trembled for her success. The Duke of Norfolk refused at first to take command of the force destined as he held for a desperate enterprise. Arundel, the leading peer among the Catholics, denounced the supporters of a Scottish war as traitors. But lies and hesitation were no sooner put aside than the Queen's vigour and tenacity came fairly into play. In January 1560, at a moment when D'Oysel, the French commander, was on the point of crushing the Lords of the Congregation, an English fleet appeared suddenly in the Forth and forced the Regent's army to fall back upon Leith. [Sidenote: The Huguenot rising.]