Farnese had also been strictly enjoined to deal gently with the English, after the conquest, so that they would have cause to love their new master.  His troops were not to forget discipline after victory.  There was to be no pillage or rapine.  The Catholics were to be handsomely rewarded and all the inhabitants were to be treated with so much indulgence that, instead of abhorring Parma and his soldiers, they would conceive a strong affection for them all, as the source of so many benefits.  Again the Duke was warmly commended for the skill with which he had handled the peace negotiation.  It was quite right to appoint commissioners, but it was never for an instant to be forgotten that the sole object of treating was to take the English unawares.  “And therefore do you guide them to this end,” said the King with pious unction, “which is what you owe to God, in whose service I have engaged in this enterprise, and to whom I have dedicated the whole.”  The King of France, too—­that unfortunate Henry iii., against whose throne and life Philip maintained in constant pay an organized band of conspirators—­was affectionately adjured, through the Spanish envoy in Paris, Mendoza,—­to reflect upon the advantages to France of a Catholic king and kingdom of England, in place of the heretics now in power.

But Philip, growing more and more sanguine, as those visions of fresh crowns and conquered kingdoms rose before him in his solitary cell, had even persuaded himself that the deed was already done.  In the early days of December, he expressed a doubt whether his 14th November letter had reached the Duke, who by that time was probably in England.  One would have thought the King addressing a tourist just starting on a little pleasure-excursion.  And this was precisely the moment when Alexander had been writing those affectionate phrases to the Queen which had been considered by the counsellors at Greenwich so “princely and Christianly,” and which Croft had pronounced such “very good words.”

If there had been no hostile, fleet to prevent, it was to be hoped, said Philip, that, in the name of God, the passage had been made.  “Once landed there,” continued the King, “I am persuaded that you will give me a good account of yourself, and, with the help of our Lord, that you will do that service which I desire to render to Him, and that He will guide our cause, which is His own, and of such great importance to His Church.”  A part of the fleet would soon after arrive and bring six thousand Spaniards, the Pope’s million, and other good things, which might prove useful to Parma, presupposing that they would find him established on the enemy’s territory.