The Great Lord Burghley: A study in Elizabethan statecraft
David Hume · en
Considering that the revolt in Holland had been mainly kept up from
England, this was indeed a complete change of policy; but more was behind
it even than appeared. Many of the Catholic refugees on the Continent
were spies in the service of Lord Burghley, to whom nearly all of them
appealed as their only hope and protector, and one of them particularly,
named Woodshaw,[386] who was deep in the confidence of La Motte, the
Spanish Governor of Gravelines. The latter suggested that, as war
between France and England was in the air, it would be a good plan for
the English to seize Calais or Boulogne, with the aid of the Spaniards,
and come to terms with Philip to prevent any aid or food reaching the
French from Flanders or Artois. This was conveyed to Burghley, and soon
Sir William Drury, Colonel Chester, and several of the officers who
had come from Holland, were in close conference daily with him and the
other Councillors remaining in London when the Queen went upon her summer
progress. De Guaras, whilst reporting their movements, was in the dark
as to their object. “During the last three days,” he says, “at night or
at unsuspected hours, they have taken from the Tower sixty waggons and
gun carriages, which have been shipped to Dover.” Guns, battery-trains,
culverins, fieldpieces, and ammunition were being shipped on four of
the Queen’s ships at Rochester. Mariners were being pressed, commanders
were leaving secretly for the coast, Burghley’s son-in-law the Earl of
Oxford, with Ralph Hopton and young Montmorenci, hurried off to Germany,
and the Huguenot agents were closeted with Burghley almost day and night.
We know now what it all meant, by a letter from the Earl of Sussex to
Lord Burghley,[387] in which he deplores the projected war with Catholic
France, which, he says, is only brought about by those who wish to
prevent the Queen’s marriage with Alençon. “It will bring her into war
with all Europe, and she and the realm will smart for the pleasing of
these men’s humours.” The cost of the war, he says, was to be defrayed
equally by the King of Navarre (Henry), the German princes, and the
Queen; “but he fears her Majesty in the end must pay for all, or let all
fall when she hath put her foot in.”