In his letter to the King the Churchman expresses himself as being much shocked at the barefacedness of the proposal; but he goes on to say that he believes that it is only by this means that the Queen can be brought round to the Spanish side. The gossip about her and Dudley, he says, is so scandalous that she will not dare to marry him without some strong support; and there was no price she would not pay to obtain it. Such a tendency as that shown in Sidney’s proposal would, of course, be strenuously opposed by most of Elizabeth’s advisers; and Paget, with Cecil and his friends, attempted a diversion by strongly advocating a close alliance with France, where the young King Francis II. had recently died, and Catharine de Medici had become supreme. The Dudley intrigue with Spain, however, went on, though probably, as we see now, without the full knowledge of the Queen. Lord Robert at length came with Sidney to see the Bishop on the 13th February, and professed his readiness to be the humble servant of King Philip if he would recommend the Queen to marry him. Quadra was cautious. He had no special instructions, he said, and the King was now in Spain, a long way off; but he would promise Dudley that he would, the next time he saw the Queen, urge her to marry; and if she mentioned any particular person he (the Bishop) would enlarge upon Lord Robert’s good qualities and King Philip’s affection for him. Two days later the smooth-tongued old Bishop found himself alone with the Queen, and ventured to say how glad he was to hear that her marriage was seriously under discussion at last. If she wished to consult the King of Spain on the matter the Bishop was very much at her service, though no instructions from Spain had been sent to him. The Queen talked wide of the subject for some time; but she said at last that she knew she was no angel, and would make the Bishop her confessor. She would not deny that she had some affection for Lord Robert for his good qualities, but had not decided to marry him or any one else. But she saw every day the necessity for her marriage, and that to satisfy the English humour it was desirable that she should marry an Englishman. What would the King of Spain think, she asked, if she married one of her servants? The Bishop said he did not know, but would ask if she directed him to do so; and then he launched out into warm praise of Dudley. Elizabeth promised to do nothing without Philip’s advice, and told the Bishop that when the time came she would speak to him on the subject. The Bishop, in relating the interview, says that he humoured her thus “because he saw the heretics so busy forming combinations with England, France, Scotland, and Germany, and, above all, because your Majesty’s neighbouring States are so pressed that a perverse decision of this woman might prejudice them, though she herself were ruined by it.”[148]