1620 THE FLEET AGAINST THE PIRATES. 375 seriously alarmed at the prospect. Orders were accordingly sent to Gondomar to stop the expedition at all hazards.' But the ambassador did not find it easy to carry out his instructions. Digby would not listen to his objections. For the attack upon the pirates he cared but little. Two years before he had argued that the chief loss fell upon the subjects of the King of Spain, and that it was, therefore, fitting that the brunt of the undertaking should be borne by Spain. But he knew as well as Gondomar that if war broke out in the spring it would be advantageous that an English fleet should be prepared for action in the Mediterranean.3 It was therefore in vain that Gondomar urged that after the King's declaration to the Council, it was impossible that his master could treat an English fleet on terms of assured friendship. The King, replied Digby, had no wish to quarrel with Spain. He had only promised to assist his son-in-law if he listened to reason. The people were wildly excited by Spinola's proceedings. The King could not do less than he had done. If Gondomar had orders to break with England he had better say so at once. Whether the King of Spain liked it or There were many persons in England glad to see it used in an attack upon Flanders, or upon Spain itself. By such language the ambassador was reduced to silence, and the fleet sailed from Plymouth without further difficulty." not, the fleet would sail. who would be only too Gondomar It was more easy to deal with the King than with Digby. For a few days after the interview at Hampton Court, James had maintained his ground. Though the ambasand James. sador knew that it would not be long before the old relations between them would be restored, his first effort was not crowned with success. He made a formal complaint that Minutes on the expedition against the pirates, Aug. (?), Simancas MSS. 2601, fol. 71. 2 Digby to Buckingham, Oct. 12, 1618, Harl. MSS. 1580, fol. 102. 3 Digby to the Commissioners for Spanish Affairs, July 26, 1621. Clarendon State Papers, i. App. vi. Buckingham to Gondomar, Oct. 3, Londorp, ii. 218. Gondomar to Philip III. Oct., Simancas MSS. 2601, fol. 104. 21 Naunton was treating the Catholics harshly. "I hope," said James, in language which would have suited Elizabeth, “that in future you will show more respect to me than to bring such charges against my ministers. My secretary is not in the habit of acting in matters of importance without my directions." Gondomar returned to the charge. This time his complaint was that there were rumours abroad by which his honour was affected. Persons in high places did not scruple to assert that he had promised that Spinola would not enter the Palatinate. He now called upon the King, his eyes flashing with well-assumed anger as he spoke,2 to defend him publicly against the liars who had traduced him. If not, he must clear his own reputation with his sword. This time Gondomar had struck home. Literally at least, his words were true. He had made many assertions, but he had given no positive engagement. James, therefore, came down to the Council and declared openly that there was no truth in the charges which had been brought against the Spanish ambassador. He ordered Buckingham to convey to Gondomar his acknowledgement that no one had ever engaged on the King of Spain's behalf that Spinola would not enter the Palatinate, but that, on the contrary, no hope had ever been given that any other course would be taken.3 By the last clause James deliberately contradicted the assertion which he had made in his passion at Hampton Court. It was all the more welcome to Gondomar. As a certificate of his own honesty he cared but little for it, but it was something to have lowered James in the eyes of his own subjects. Digby's demonstration of independence was now thrown back upon itself. Since the day on which, in obedience to his 'Lando to the Doge, Oct., Venice MSS. Desp. Ingh. 2 "Y cierto es que se lo dixe con la severidad y modo che el caso pidió, y la colera y sentimiento con que yo estaba." Gondomar to Philip III. Oct. 7, Simancas MSS. 2601, fol. 101. Buckingham to Gondomar, Oct. 2, S. P. Spain. Gondomar to Philip III., Oct. 7, Simancas MSS, 2601, fol. 101. 1620 377 THE MARRIAGE TREATY AGAIN. menaces, Donna Luisa de Carvajal had been set at liberty, Gondomar's supremacy at Whitehall had never been so uncontested. The marriage treaty. Yet Gondomar did not trust to his splendid audacity alone. Early in September he had received a letter from Madrid, which he was to take care to throw in James's way. The letter, which was written in Philip's name, contained an assurance that an answer would soon be returned to the overtures of the King of England on the subject of the marriage. At the same time the ambassador was informed in a private note, that the English proposals were altogether inadmissible. Nothing short of complete religious liberty could be accepted. He was therefore to keep James amused till the winter set in, by which time the result of the campaign in Germany would be known. At the moment when these letters were written, Philip was listening complacently to the overtures of Ferdinand's ambassador, Khevenhüller, who was instructed to propose a marriage between the InSeptember. fanta and the Archduke Ferdinand, now the eldest surviving son of the Emperor. After some consideration, he formally gave his consent to the arrangement, adding a suggestion that the Prince of Wales might be consoled with the hand of an Archduchess, who would doubtless be better fitted for a life amongst heretics than was possible for a Spanish princess. There could be little doubt that the Pope would take the burden of the change upon his own shoulders, but, if that could not be, the Infanta might be told to say that she would rather go into a nunnery than marry a heretic, and Philip might magnanimously refuse to force the inclinations of his daughter, even for the sake of an alliance with the King of England.2 Before Gondomar received his master's letters, the news October. Lafuente's mission to Rome. of the invasion of the Palatinate had reached England. He saw clearly that this was not the time to raise the slightest suspicion in James's mind, and that ' Philip III. to Gondomar (two letters) Aug. 23. Printed in Francisco de Jesus, Appendix vii Sept. 2 there must be no delay in despatching Lafuente, who had been charged with a mission to Rome, with the purpose of opening negotiations there on the basis of the English proposals. Accordingly, on October 16, Lafuente started for Madrid, on his way to Rome, leaving James in the belief that the Spaniards meant what they said.1 All this while the commissioners appointed to prepare measures for a Parliament were busy drawing up bills and in Bacon's draft of a proclamation. vestigating grievances. They knew, however, that the key-note of the coming session would be struck by the foreign policy of the Crown; and on the 18th, therefore, they forwarded to the King the draft of a proclamation, drawn up by Bacon, for the purpose of defining the position which they hoped that James would take up. "While we contained ourselves in this moderation," James was made to say, after recounting his reasons for taking no part in the Bohemian war, we find the event of war hath much altered the case by the late invasion of the Palatinate, whereby (however under the pretence of a diversion) we find our son, in fact, expulsed in part, and in danger to be totally dispossessed of his ancient inheritance and patrimony, so long continued in that noble line, whereof we cannot but highly resent if it should be alienated and ravished from him in our times, and to the prejudice of our grandchildren and line royal. Neither can we think it safe for us in reason of state that the County Palatine, carrying with itself an electorate, and having been so long in the hands of the Princes of our religion, and no way depending upon the House of Austria, should now become at the disposing of that House, being a matter that indeed might alter the balance of our State, and the estate of our best friends and confederates. "Wherefore, finding a concurrence of reasons and respects of religion, nature, honour, and estate, all of them inducing us in no wise to endure so great an alteration, we are resolved to employ the uttermost of our forces and means to recover and Salvetti's News-Letter, Oct. 12. Philip III. to Gondomar, 29 Nov. 30, Dec. 10. Simancas MSS. 2573, fol. 87. 1620 PARLIAMENT TO MEET. 379 resettle the said Palatinate to our son and our descendants, purposing, nevertheless, according to our former inclination so well grounded, not to intermit (if the occasions give us leave) the treaties of peace and accord which we have already begun, and whereof the coming of winter and the counterpoise of the actions of war hitherto may give us as yet some appearance of hope." 1 This was statesmanlike language. A proclamation, so temperate, and yet so firm, would have served as a rallying point for the whole nation. It would have formed a Its rejection. common ground upon which Pembroke and Abbot could join hands with Digby and Calvert. A king who could in the name of England put forth such a manifesto as this, would speedily have become a power in Europe which neither Spain nor Austria could afford to despise. The proclamation was too good for James. It was not that he held, as has been held by many statesmen in later times, that England ought to attend to her own affairs, and that she would only waste her strength in vain in attempting to adjust the relations of Continental states. No such doctrine was put forward either by James or by the opponents of Spain. Where men differed, as far as the Palatinate was concerned, was on the probability that England would find in Spain an enemy or a friend in the achievement of an object which all allowed to be desirable. It is the glory of Bacon and Digby that they attempted to obtain that object in the most conciliatory way, and to oppose Spain in such a manner as to make the risk of war as small as possible. For James, however, the suggested proclamation was too decided. Now, as ever, he shrank from committing himself to any definite step in advance. It would be better, he informed Bacon, to reserve what he had to say till the opening of the session. Matters of state, such as those upon which the proclamation touched, were above the comprehension of the common people. Draft of a Proclamation. Bacon to Buckingham, Oct. 18. Buckingham to Bacon, Oct. 19, Letters and Life, vii. 123. |