implicit obedience. This general, in 1568, conducted from Italy to the Low Countries a powerful body of veteran Spaniards; and his avowed animosity to the Flemings, with his known character, struck that whole people with terror and consternation. It belongs not to our subject to relate at length those violences which Alva's natural barbarity, steeled by reflection and aggravated by insolence, exercised on those flourishing provinces. It suffices to say, that all their privileges, the gift of so many princes, and the inheritance of so many ages, were openly and expressly abolished by. edict; arbitrary and sanguinary tribunals erected; the counts Egmont and Horn, in spite of their great merits and past services, brought to the scaffold; multitudes of all ranks thrown into confinement, and thence delivered over to the executioner; and notwithstanding the peaceable submission of all men, nothing was heard of but confiscation, imprisonment, exile, torture, and death. Elizabeth was equally displeased to see the progress of that scheme laid for the extermination of the Protestants, and to observe the erection of so great a military power in a state situated in so near a neighborhood. She gave protection to all the Flemish exiles who took shelter in her dominions; and as many of these were the most industrious inhabitants of the Netherlands, and had rendered that country celebrated for its arts, she reaped the advantage of introducing into England some useful manufactures, which were formerly unknown in that kingdom. Foreseeing that the violent government of Alva could not long subsist without exciting some commotion, she ventured to commit an insult upon him, which she would have been cautious not to hazard against a more established authority. Some Genoese merchants had engaged, by contract with Philip, to transport into Flanders the sum of four hundred thousand crowns; and the vessels on which this money was embarked, had been attacked in the Channel by some privateers equipped by the French Hugonots, and had taken shelter in Plymouth and Southampton. The commanders of the ships pretended that the money belonged to the king of Spain; but the queen, finding upon inquiry that it was the property of Genoese merchants, took possession of it as a loan; and by that means deprived the duke of Alva of this resource in the time of his greatest necessity. Alva, in revenge, seized all the English merchants in the Low Counries, threw them into prison, and confiscated their effects. The queen retaliated by a like violence on the Flemish and Spanish merchants; and gave all the English liberty to make reprisals on the subjects of Philip. These differences were afterwards accommodated by treaty, and mutual reparations were made to the merchants ; but nothing could repair the loss which so well-timed a blow inflicted on the Spanish government in the Low Countries. Alva, in want of money, and dreading the immediate mutiny of his troops, to whom great arrears were due, imposed, by his arbitrary will, the most ruinous taxes on the people. He not only required the hundredth penny, and the twentieth of all immovable goods; he also demanded the tenth of all movable goods on every sale; an absurd tyranny, which would not only have destroyed all arts and commerce, but even have restrained the common intercourse of life. The people refused compliance; the duke had recourse to his usual expedient of the gibbet; and thus matters came still nearer the last extremities between the Flemings and the Spaniards.* All the enemies of Elizabeth, in order to revenge themselves for her insults, had naturally recourse to one policy, the supporting of the cause and pretensions of the queen of Scots and Alva, whose measures were ever violent, soon opened a secret intercourse with that princess. There was one Rodolphi, a Florentine merchant, who had resided about fifteen years in London, and who, while he conducted his commerce in England, had managed all the correspondence of the court of Rome with the Catholic nobility and gentry. He had been thrown into prison at the time when the duke of Norfolk's intrigues with Mary had been discovered; but either no proof was found against him, or the part which he had acted was not very criminal; and he soon after recovered his liberty. This man, zealous for the Catholic faith, had formed a scheme, in concert with the Spanish ambassador, for subverting the government, by a foreign invasion and a domestic insurrection; and when he communicated his project by letter to Mary, he found, that as she was now fully convinced of Elizabeth's artifices, and despaired of ever recovering her authority, o even her liberty, by pacific measures, she willingly gave he Concurrence. The great number of discontented Catholics were the chief source of their hopes on the side of England * Bentivoglio, part. i. lib. v. Camden, p. 416. and they also observed that the kingdom was at that time full of indigent gentry, chiefly younger brothers, who, having at present, by the late decay of the church, and the yet languishing state of commerce, no prospect of a livelihood suitable to their birth, were ready to throw themselves into any desperate enterprise.* But in order to inspire life and courage into all these malecontents, it was requisite that some great nobleman should put himself at their head; and no one appeared to Rodolphi, and to the bishop of Ross, who entered into all these intrigues, so proper, both on account of his power and nis popularity, as the duke of Norfolk. This nobleman, when released from confinement in the Tower, had given his promise, that he would drop all intercourse with the queen of Scots; † but finding that he had lost, and, as he feared, beyond recovery, the confidence and favor of Elizabeth, and being still in some degree restrained from is liberty, he was tempted, by impatience and despair, to violate his word, and to open anew his correspondence with the captive princess. A promise of marriage was renewed. between them; the duke engaged to enter into all her interests; and as his remorses gradually diminished in the course of these transactions, he was pushed to give his consent to enterprises still more criminal. Rodolphi's plan was, that the duke of Alva should, on some other pretence, assemble a great quantity of shipping in the Low Countries; should transport a body of six thousand foot and four thousand horse into England; should land them at Harwich, where the duke of Norfolk was to join them with all his friends; should thence march directly to London, and oblige the queen to submit to whatever terms the conspirators should please to impose upon her. Norfolk expressed his assent to this plan; and three letters, in consequence of it, were written in his name by Rodolphi; one to Aiva, another to the pope, and a third to the king of Spain; but the duke, apprehensive of the danger, refused to sign them. He only sent to the Spanish ambassador a servant and confidant, named Barker, as well to notify his concurrence in the plan, as to vouch for the authenticity of these letters; and Rodolphi, having obtained a letter of credence from the ambassador, proceeded on his journey to † Haynes, p. 571. * Lesley, p. 123. State Trials, vol. i. p. 102. Lesley, p. 155. State Trials, vol. i. p. 86, 87. Brussels and to Rome. The duke of Alva and the pope embraced the scheme with alacrity: Rodolphi informed Norfolk of their intentions; * and every thing seemed to concur in forwarding the undertaking. Norfolk, notwithstanding these criminal enterprises, had never entirely forgotten his duty to his sovereign, hs country, and his religion; and though he had laid the plan both of an invasion and an insurrection, he still flattered himself, that the innocence of his intentions would justify the violence of his measures, and that, as he aimed at nothing but the liberty of the queen of Scots, and the obtaining of Elizabeth's consent to his marriage, he could not justly reproach himself as a rebel and a traitor. It is certain, however, that, considering the queen's vigor and spirit, the scheme, if successful, must finally have ended in dethroning her; and her authority was here exposed to the utmost danger. The conspiracy hitherto had entirely escaped the vigilance of Elizabeth, and that of Secretary Cecil, who now bore the title of Lord Burleigh. It was from another attempt of Norfolk's that they first obtained a hint, which, being diligently traced, led at last to a full discovery. Mary had intended to send a sum of money to Lord Herreis and her partisans in Scotland; and Norfolk undertook to have it delivered to Bannister, a servant of his, at that time in the north, who was to find some expedient for conveying it to Lord Herreis. He intrusted the money to a servant who was not in the secret, and told him, that the bag contained a sum of money in silver, which he was to deliver to Bannister with a letter: but the servant, conjecturing from the weight and size of the bag that it was full of gold, carried the letter to Burleigh; who immediately ordered Bannister, Barker, and Hicford, the duke's secretary, to be put under arrest, and to undergo a severe examination. Torture made them confess the whole truth; and as Hicford, though ordered to burn all papers, had carefully kept them concealed under the mats of the duke's chamber, and under the tiles of the house, full evidence now appeared against his master. Norfolk himself, who was entirely ignorant of the discoveries made by his servants, was brought before the council; and though exhorted to atone for * State Trials, vol. i. p. 93. Lesley, p. 169. State Trials, vol. i. p. 87. Digges, p. 134, 137, 140. Strype, vol. ii. p. 82. Lesley, p. 158. Camden, p. 434. Lesley, p. 173. * his guilt by a full confession, he persisted in denying every crime with which he was charged. The queen always declared, that if he had given her this proof of his sincere repentance, she would have pardoned all his former offences; but finding him obstinate, she committed him to the Tower and ordered him to be brought to his trial. The bishop of Ross had, on some suspicion, been committed to custody before the discovery of Norfolk's guilt; and every expedient was employed to make him reveal his share in the conspiracy. He at first insisted on his privilege: but he was told, that as his mistress was no longer a sovereign, he would not be regarded as an ambassador, and that, even if that character were allowed, it did not warrant him in conspiring against the sovereign at whose court he resided.† As he still refused to answer interrogatories, he was informed of the confession made by Norfolk's servants; after which he no longer scrupled to make a full discovery; and his evidence put the guilt of that nobleman beyond all question. [1572.] A jury of twenty-five peers unanimously passed sentence upon him. The trial was quite regular, even according to the strict rules observed at present in these matters; except that the witnesses gave not their evidence in court, and were not confronted with the prisoner; a laudable practice, which was not at that time observed in trials for high treason. The queen still hesitated concerning Norfolk's execution; whether that she was really moved by friendship and compassion towards a peer of that rank and merit, or that, affecting the praise of clemency, she only put on the appearance of these sentiments. Twice she signed a warrant for his execution, and twice revoked the fatal sentence; and though her ministers and counsellors pushed her to rigor, she still appeared irresolute and undetermined. After four months' hesitation, a parliament was assembled; and the commons addressed her in strong terms for the execution of the duke; a sanction which, when added to the greatness and certainty of his guilt, would, she thought, justify, in the eyes of all mankind, her severity against that nobleman. Norfolk died with calmness and constancy; and though he cleared himself of any disloyal intentions against the queen's authority, he acknowl * Lesley, p. 175. Lesley, p. 189. Spotswood. Carte, p. 527, from Fenelon's Despatches. Digges, p. 166 Strype, vol. ii. p. 83 |