He asked her point blank whether she was a maid or a married woman, to which she replied that she was a maid, as the conditions upon which she gave the marriage pledge would never be fulfilled. He told her that she had acted very unwisely in carrying the matter so far and so ostentatiously, and they put their heads together there and then to devise some scheme by which the Queen’s words might be minimised, probably solely at Leicester’s instance, and contrary to her own better judgment, as her plans were well laid. A message was therefore sent to Alençon, saying that the Queen had been pondering about the ring she had given him, and she felt sure that if she married him she would not have long to live. He might, she said, see that for himself, as he was a witness of the dissatisfaction of the English people at her attachment to him, which attachment she hoped he did not wish to be fatal to her. She prayed him therefore to let the matter rest for the present, and there was nothing in her country she would refuse him. She would be more attached to him as a friend, even than if he were her husband. Walsingham took this message, and whilst he was with the Prince the latter remained calm. All he had said and done, he protested, was solely to please the Queen, whose death, very far from desiring, he would imperil his own life to avert and to give her pleasure, as, indeed, he was doing now to save her from annoyance by refraining from pressing his suit with less ardour at her request.[146] But as soon as Walsingham was gone the young Prince lost all control over himself. He saw now how he had been tricked; it was too late to prevent the coming of the commissioners whom his brother had despatched to England to finally settle the conditions, and in his rage he cursed the inconstancy of woman, tore the ring from his finger and cast it upon the ground.[147] He told Elizabeth he would leave at once, hinted at revenge for his and his country’s slighted honour, and again brought matters to a crisis. Then Elizabeth saw that her complaisancy to Leicester had led her into a false position, and once more resumed her original plan. She mollified and lulled the Duke into a fool’s paradise again with: “nouvelles démonstrations accompagnées de baisers, privautés, caresses, et mignardises ordinaries aux amants.” She received the King’s envoy, Secretary Pinart, with new protestations of her desire to marry, and appointed a committee of the Council, consisting of the Lord Chancellor, Cecil, Sussex, and Leicester to discuss the _pourparlers_ with him. She asked them first to report their opinion to her, as, desirous as she was of the marriage, she would not entertain it if she was not satisfied that it was for the benefit of her country; but they knew she was playing her own game, of which most of them did not see the drift, and were determined to avoid giving any opinion which might offend and hamper her. In the meanwhile Leicester, through his