“You have done very well,” replied Philip, “but that commission is, on no account, to be used, except for show.  You know my mind thoroughly.”

Thus three months had been consumed, and at last one indispensable preliminary to any negotiation had, in appearance, been performed.  Full powers on both sides had been exhibited.  When the Queen of England gave the Earl of Derby and his colleagues commission to treat with the King’s envoys, and pledged herself beforehand to, ratify all their proceedings, she meant to perform the promise to which she had affixed her royal name and seal.  She could not know that the Spanish monarch was deliberately putting his name to a lie, and chuckling in secret over the credulity of his English sister, who was willing to take his word and his bond.  Of a certainty the English were no match for southern diplomacy.

But Elizabeth was now more impatient than ever that the other two preliminaries should be settled, the place of conferences, and the armistice.

“Be plain with the Duke,” she wrote to her envoys, “that we have tolerated so many weeks in tarrying a commission, that I will never endure more delays.  Let him know he deals with a prince who prizes her honour more than her life:  Make yourselves such as stand of your reputations.”

Sharp words, but not sharp enough to prevent a further delay of a month; for it was not till the 6th June that the commissioners at last came together at Bourbourg, that “miserable little hole,” on the coast between Ostend and Newport, against which Gamier had warned them.  And now there was ample opportunity to wrangle at full length on the next preliminary, the cessation of arms.  It would be superfluous to follow the altercations step by step—­for negotiations there were none—­and it is only for the sake of exhibiting at full length the infamy of diplomacy, when diplomacy is unaccompanied by honesty, that we are hanging up this series of pictures at all.  Those bloodless encounters between credulity and vanity upon one side, and gigantic fraud on the other, near those very sands of Newport, and in sight of the Northern Ocean, where, before long, the most terrible battles, both by land and sea, which the age had yet witnessed, were to occur, are quite as full of instruction and moral as the most sanguinary combats ever waged.

At last the commissioners exchanged copies of their respective powers.  After four months of waiting and wrangling, so much had been achieved—­ a show of commissions and a selection of the place for conference.  And now began the long debate about the cessation of arms.  The English claimed an armistice for the whole dominion of Philip and Elizabeth respectively, during the term of negotiation, and for twenty days after.  The Spanish would grant only a temporary truce, terminable at six days’ notice, and that only for the four cautionary towns of Holland held by the Queen.  Thus Philip would be free