Too intelligent a politician not to feel the absolute necessity of at last coming into the field to help the Netherlanders to fight her own battle, she was still willing, for a season longer, to wear the mask of coyness and coquetry, which she thought most adapted to irritate the Netherlanders into a full compliance with her wishes.  Her advisers in the Provinces were inclined to take the same view.  It seemed obvious, after the failure in France, that those countries must now become either English or Spanish; yet Elizabeth, knowing the risk of their falling back, from desperation, into the arms of her rival, allowed them to remain for a season on the edge of destruction—­which would probably have been her ruin also—­in the hope of bringing them to her feet on her own terms.  There was something of feminine art in this policy, and it was not without the success which often attends such insincere manoeuvres.  At the same time, as the statesmen of the republic knew that it was the Queen’s affair, when so near a neighbour’s roof was blazing, they entertained little doubt of ultimately obtaining her alliance.  It was pity—­in so grave an emergency—­that a little frankness could not have been substituted for a good deal of superfluous diplomacy.

Gilpin, a highly intelligent agent of the English government in Zeeland, kept Sir Francis Walsingham thoroughly informed of the sentiments entertained by the people of that province towards England.  Mixing habitually with the most influential politicians, he was able to render material assistance to the English council in the diplomatic game which had been commenced, and on which a no less important stake than the crown of England was to be hazarded.

“In conference,” he said, “with particular persons that bear any rule or credit, I find a great inclination towards her Majesty, joined notwithstanding with a kind of coldness.  They allege that matters of such importance are to be maturely and thoroughly pondered, while some of them harp upon the old string, as if her Majesty, for the security of her own estate, was to have the more care of theirs here.”

He was also very careful to insinuate the expediency of diplomatic coquetry into the mind of a Princess who needed no such prompting.  “The less by outward appearance,” said he, “this people shall perceive that her Majesty can be contented to take the protection of them upon her, the forwarder they will be to seek and send unto her, and the larger conditions in treaty may be required.  For if they see it to come from herself, then do they persuade themselves that it is for the greater security of our own country and her Highness to fear the King of Spain’s greatness.  But if they become seekers unto her Majesty, and if they may, by outward show, deem that she accounteth not of the said King’s might, but able and sufficient to defend her own realms, then verily I think they may be brought to whatsoever points her Majesty may desire.”