To Mary Mendoza sent the message of the Scottish Catholics in a somewhat softened form, in order not to arouse her maternal solicitude for James; but to his own Sovereign, Philip, he wrote almost vehemently, praying him to seize the opportunity for striking a fatal blow at Elizabeth. “With the two thousand soldiers they ask for, he says, the Scots might defy this Queen ... and the whole North of England would be disturbed, the Catholics there being in a majority, and the opportunity would be taken by the Catholics in other parts of the country to rise when they knew that they had on their side the forces of a more powerful Prince than the King of Scotland.”[238] There was no more concealment of Mendoza’s opinion beneath a veil of assumed humility: he not only urged Philip to ensure the victory of Scottish orthodoxy by force, but to aid a rising of English Catholics over the Scottish Border. The opportunity looked a tempting one, for it provided for the removal of the doubtful James, and the plan might be carried out (if the Scottish lords were to be depended upon) without giving to Elizabeth the legal right to interfere. The experienced Cardinal de Granvelle, who was governing Spain in Philips absence in Portugal, was almost as enthusiastic in its advocacy as Mendoza himself. “The affair is so important,” he wrote to Philip, “both for the sake of religion and to restrain England, that no other can equal it. By keeping the Queen of England busy we shall be ensured against her helping Alençon (in Flanders) or daring to obstruct us elsewhere.”[239] Mary Stuart was just as eager, but had wider views than Granvelle, seeing clearly with her great penetration, if she was to be Queen of Britain, the absolute need for organising the English Catholics, whilst keeping the French out of the affair and not arousing unduly the suspicions of Elizabeth. “In the event,” she wrote, “of the Scots having the support requested, and the Queen of England attempting to interfere, which might give an occasion for the English Catholics to rise, it would be necessary to have this latter part of the business arranged beforehand, but in such a way that they should not understand what is intended, or have any idea until everything was ready to burst forth.”