On the 6th June heralds in London proclaimed hostilities, and Philip for the first time, even at this eleventh hour, saw some return for the sacrifice he had made in marrying the Queen of England. He hated war, and his methods were essentially peaceful and diplomatic; but he knew that his best chance of securing a durable peace was to exert his utmost power whilst his control of English resources lasted, which it was evident could not be very long, for the Queen’s declining health was plain now to every one but herself, though she clung still tenaciously to her pathetic dream of happy maternity. Satisfied with the results of his mission, Philip rode on the 1st July, 1557, from Gravesend through Canterbury to Dover. Mary would not leave him whilst he remained on English soil, and, weak and ailing but happy with her new fallacious hope, she was carried in a litter by her husband’s side to the coast. On the 3rd July she bade him a last farewell, as he stepped upon the barge that was to carry him to the waiting galleon, and then, with sorrow and satisfaction mingled, she turned her back upon the sea and was carried to her desolate palace at Greenwich. The gentry of England, at all events, were ready to welcome the war with France that gave them the taste of warlike adventure which they loved, and the contingent to fight in Flanders was soon made ready, whilst the Lord Admiral with his fleet of twenty-three ships held the Channel. Philip’s General-in-Chief was his young cousin Emmanuel Philibert of Savoy, who had an army of fifty thousand men under him ready for the autumn campaign; whilst the French on the Flemish frontier, under Constable Montmorenci, numbered less than half that strength, for the flower of the French troops were under Guise in Italy, with difficulty defending the Pope from the great Duke of Alba, and Emmanuel Philibert opened his campaign as soon as the English arrived. By a series of rapid and unexpected movements, which entirely misled the French, he suddenly concentrated his attack upon the rich and important city of St. Quintin, weakly garrisoned and in poor condition of defence. Montmorenci hurried with his main army to relieve the fortress, and on the 10th August was cleverly outflanked by Emmanuel Philibert; caught in a trap between a stronger enemy and a morass, the French were utterly routed with a loss of half their numbers, Montmorenci himself being captured, and the whole force dispersed. Coligny with his tiny garrison in St. Quintin heroically held out for a fortnight longer; but from the day of Montmorenci’s defeat there was no force to prevent Philip from marching upon Paris and crushing his enemy for good.[114] This was his chance, and he missed it, as he did every great opportunity in his long life by that “prudent” leaden foot of his which always lagged when it should have hastened. In vain Savoy begged his permission to march on, and was refused, to the