not say so, if it please your Majesty, to you.’ ‘Why then,’ said the queen, ‘belike you will to others.’ ‘No, if it please your majesty,’ quoth she. ‘I have borne the burden, and must bear it. I humbly beseech your majesty to have a good opinion of me, and to think me to be your true subject, not only from the beginning hitherto, but for ever, as long as life lasteth.’ And so they departed, with very few comfortable words of the queen in English: but what she said in Spanish, God knoweth. It is thought that King Philip was there, behind a cloth, and not seen, and that he showed himself a very friend in that matter.”[502] A week later, Sir Henry Bedingfeld’s task was done, and Elizabeth was free. Courtenay had been already released from his captivity at Fotheringhay Castle, and had received advice from the King and Queen, equivalent to a command, to travel for the improvement of his mind. He went first to Brussels, from which place the English ambassador wrote to Sir William Petre:— “Last Sunday, the Earl of Devon was conducted to the Emperor by the Duke of Alva. Masone was not present but by report of the Duke and Chamberlain, whom the Earl has requested to be his interpreter if necessary, he demeaned himself very well, declaring, among other things, how much he was indebted to King Philip for helping him, through the Queen’s favour out of custody, and also for procuring him leave to see the world, whereby he might attain to such knowledge, as displeasant fortune had caused him hitherto to lack: for which reason, he had come to offer his services to the Emperor, the renown of whose court was so great. His Majesty embraced his offer most willingly, minding from time to time, to show him such signs of his favour, as the Earl should have no cause to forthink his journey hither. To this he said he was moved, not merely by the King’s and Queen’s recommendation, but for the sake of the Earl’s father, whose noble virtues were not unknown to him.”[503] Courtenay afterwards went to Italy, where he died in 1556.