given at once to the state of Protestant affairs.

"If you mean to do anything," said he, "it is more than time now. If you
will send some man of credit about it, will it please your honour, I will
go with him, because I know the humour of the people, and am acquainted
with a number of the best. I shall be able to show him a number of their
dealings, as well with the French as in other affairs, and perhaps will
find means to send messengers to Ghent, and to other places, better than
the States; for the message of one soldier is better than twenty boors."

It was ultimately decided--as will soon be related--to send a man of
credit to the Provinces. Meantime, the policy of England continued to be
expectant and dilatory, and Advocate Buys, after having in vain attempted
to conquer the French influence, and bring about the annexation of the
Provinces to England, threw down his office in disgust, and retired for a
time from the contest. He even contemplated for a moment taking service
in Denmark, but renounced the notion of abandoning his country, and he
will accordingly be found, at a later period, conspicuous in public
affairs.

The deliberations in the English councils were grave and anxious, for it
became daily more obvious that the Netherland question was the hinge upon
which the, whole fate of Christendom was slowly turning. To allow the
provinces to fall back again into the grasp of Philip, was to offer
England herself as a last sacrifice to the Spanish Inquisition. This was
felt by all the statesmen in the land; but some of them, more than the
rest, had a vivid perception of the danger, and of the necessity of
dealing with it at once.

To the prophetic eye of Walsingham, the mists of the future at times