Leicester had rendered himself unpopular with the States-General, and with all the leading politicians and generals; yet, at that moment, he had deeply mortgaged his English estates in order to raise funds to expend in the Netherland cause.  Thirty thousand pounds sterling—­ according to his own statement—­he was already out of pocket, and, unless the Queen would advance him the means to redeem his property; his broad lands were to be brought to the hammer.  But it was the Queen, not the States-General, who owed the money; for the Earl had advanced these sums as a portion of the royal contingent.  Five hundred and sixty thousand pounds sterling had been the cost of one year’s war during the English governor’s administration; and of this sum one hundred and forty thousand had been paid by England.  There was a portion of the sum, over and above their monthly levies; for which the States had contracted a debt, and they were extremely desirous to obtain, at that moment, an additional loan of fifty thousand pounds from Elizabeth; a favour which—­Elizabeth was very firmly determined not to grant.  It was this terror at the expense into which the Netherland war was plunging her, which made the English sovereign so desirous for peace, and filled the anxious mind of Walsingham with the most painful forebodings.

Leicester, in spite of his good qualities—­such as they were—­had not that most necessary gift for a man in his position, the art of making friends.  No man made so many enemies.  He was an excellent hater, and few men have been more cordially hated in return.  He was imperious, insolent, hot-tempered.  He could brook no equal.  He had also the fatal defect of enjoying the flattery, of his inferiors in station.  Adroit intriguers burned incense to him as a god, and employed him as their tool.  And now he had mortally offended Hohenlo, and Buys, and Barneveld, while he hated Sir John Norris with a most passionate hatred.  Wilkes, the English representative, was already a special object of his aversion.  The unvarnished statements made by the stiff counsellor, of the expense of the past year’s administration, and the various errors committed, had inspired Leicester with such ferocious resentment, that the friends of Wilkes trembled for his life.

["It is generally bruited here,” wrote Henry Smith to his brother- in-law Wilkes, “of a most heavy displeasure conceived by my Lord of Leicester against you, and it is said to be so great as that he hath protested to be revenged of you; and to procure you the more enemies, it is said he hath revealed to my Lord Treasurer, and Secretary Davison some injurious speeches (which I cannot report) you should have used of them to him at your last being with him.  Furthermore some of the said Lord’s secretaries have reported here that it were good for you never to return hither, or, if their Lord be appointed to go over again, it will be too hot for you to tarry there.