incapable of fear!); restore the Catholic religion, and wear the
English crown. A good plot, approved of by the Pope, but a plot which
did not suit the genius of Philip. He placed his leaden foot upon the
scheme and on various other gallant projects, conceived in the best
manner of Alexandre Dumas. Now Escovedo, to whom Don John was
devotedly attached, was the soul of all these chivalrous designs, and
for that reason Philip regarded him as a highly dangerous person.
Escovedo was at Madrid when Don John first went to the Low Countries
(1576). He kept urging Philip to accept Don John's fiery proposals,
though Antonio Perez entreated him to be cautious. At this date, 1576,
Perez was really the friend of Escovedo. But Escovedo would not be
advised; he wrote an impatient memorial to the King, denouncing his
stitchless policy (_descosido_), his dilatory, shambling, idealess
proceedings. So, at least, Sir William Stirling-Maxwell asserts in his
_Don John of Austria_: 'the word used by Escovedo was _descosido_,
"unstitched."' But Mr. Froude says that _Philip_ used the expression,
later, in reference to _another_ letter of Escovedo's which he also
called 'a bloody letter' (January 1578). Here Mr. Froude can hardly be
right, for Philip's letter containing that vulgar expression is of
July 1577.

In any case, in 1576 Philip was induced, by the intercession of Perez,
to overlook the fault, and Escovedo, whose presence Don John demanded,
was actually sent to him in December 1576. From this date both Don
John and Escovedo wrote familiarly to their friend Perez, while Perez
lured them on, and showed their letters to the King. Just as Charles
I. commissioned the Duke of Hamilton to spy on the Covenanted nobles,
and pretend to sympathise with them, and talk in their godly style,
so Philip gave Perez orders to entrap Don John and Escovedo. Perez
said: 'I want no theology but my own to justify me,' and Philip wrote