All the North of England was on the alert and ready for action in her favour if success were assured by the aid they looked for from Philip; and to the Pope Mary appealed even before her marriage was publicly celebrated. The Protestants, she wrote, were in arms against her, the Queen of England was in desperation: if his Holiness would send a force of 12,000 men to Scotland for six months the religion of Rome might be restored permanently. It was too much for the Pope to do without Philip’s connivance, so he put off Mary’s envoy with fair words until the reply could come from Spain.[160] To Philip himself she also wrote shortly before her public marriage (24th July, 1565): “I have given notice to your ambassador of all that has taken place, on the assurance that in the event of my urgently needing your succour and assistance, which I do, your Majesty will grant them to me in order to maintain the faith, with which object you raise such great forces against the Turk. I can truly say that no war is more dangerous to Christianity nor more pernicious to the obedience due to princes than that moved by these new evangelists (God grant that you may never be troubled with them in your dominions), and I therefore beg your Majesty, for this reason, and in consideration of the desire I have and always have had to bind myself to you against all the world, to instruct your ambassador to uphold the rights of the Earl of Lennox’s son and my own in England, and to order him to declare to the Queen of England that you will not allow anything to be done to our disadvantage.”[161]