Philip arrived in England on March 20, 1557, and at once tried to influence his wife to the ends he had in view. She on her part had not forgiven the intrigues of the French and De Noailles against her, and was willing to be revenged; but the council and, above all, the nation, had always dreaded this probable result of a Spanish match. They had no special quarrel with the King of France, and had no wish to be drawn into a war with him to benefit Philip’s Italian supremacy. In the meanwhile Henry II. tried to counteract Philip’s efforts in England. The abortive risings at the beginning of Mary’s reign had cast a great number of refugee Englishmen on to the coast of France--Carews, Staffords, Tremaynes, and the like,--and these men had always been held by the French king as a card in his hand to play against Mary in need, for the purpose of raising a diversion in her own country. He once more adopted the same policy, making much of the exiles, ostentatiously helping them, and hinting at hostile designs against Calais, and even England itself. Henry meant it for a feint, but hare-brained Stafford, with vague hopes of a crown, started from Dieppe with two ships on Easter Sunday 1557. He seized Scarborough Castle, but was seized himself directly afterwards, and he and his friends incontinently lost their heads. But it was enough that they had been cherished by the French king, and had started from a French port. With such an argument as this, Mary was able to persuade her council, and Philip had his way. On June 7 war against France was declared, and on July 3 the king bade his wife what was destined to be an eternal farewell, and left for Brussels. Eight thousand English troops were at once made ready to join Philip’s army in Flanders, under his young cousin Emmanuel Philibert, Duke of Savoy, which amounted in all to 50,000 men. Constable Montmorenci commanded the French force, which was much inferior both in numbers and quality (24,000 men). Savoy began the campaign by feigned attacks upon several frontier fortresses, his object being suddenly to turn aside and attack St. Quintin, a town of wealth and importance whose defences were known to be ruinous. Savoy’s rapid and unexpected movements completely puzzled the French, and Coligny, with a small force of about 1200 men, was ordered to watch him. Coligny made an attempt to surprise Douai, but was unsuccessful, and then seems to have learnt that Savoy’s real objective was St. Quintin. He hurried back over the frontier, just in time to cast himself into the town before it was invested, and then saw that he was in a trap. The place could not hold out for a week in its present condition, and he hastily begged Montmorenci to send him relief. Montmorenci’s idea of relief was to force a thousand men through Savoy’s lines into the town. In this he failed utterly. The way lay through a bog, in which the troops sank or were killed by Savoy’s men, and only a few stragglers reached the town.