The sending of Peace Commissioners to Parma was, as usual, the subject of division in the Council, Burghley naturally advocating the pacific policy, and Leicester, Walsingham, and Paulet violently opposing the negotiations except on impossible terms. The Queen wavered constantly, but was more frequently on the side of peace. Soon after Leicester returned from Holland (January 1588) he opposed in the Council the sending of Commissioners. A comedy was played the same night before the Queen and court, and as the company rose, Elizabeth turned upon Leicester in a great rage and told him she _must_ make peace with Spain at any cost. “If my ships are lost,” she said, “nothing can save me.” Leicester tried to tranquillise her by talking about Drake; but she replied that all he did was to irritate the enemy to her detriment.[551] The instructions to the Peace Commissioners, as drafted by Burghley,[552] seem to be an honest attempt to come to terms. England was to pledge herself not to send aid of any sort, to the prejudice of Philip, to any of the dominions he had inherited (thus excluding Portugal), and Philip was asked, at least, to bind himself to prevent the molestation by the Inquisition of English mariners on board their ships in Spanish ports. But side by side with this there is reason to believe that Lord Burghley, probably through Crofts, endeavoured to gain the Duke of Parma personally to the side of peace.[553] He had been badly treated by Philip in the matter of Portugal, and was still in the dark as to the King’s real intentions. He was liable to dismissal at any moment; he was short of money, and chafing at the inexplicable delay of the Armada. It was suggested that a condition of the peace might be to give him fixity of tenure of his government of Flanders for life. How far these approaches may have influenced him it is at present difficult to say, but he certainly appealed to Philip earnestly and solemnly to allow him to make peace,[554] and when the Armada finally appeared in the Channel he did nothing to falsify his own prediction of the disaster which awaited it.