accompany the commissioners who are coming from the Low Countries; but to
come over, either before them or after them, lest it be thought they come
over by her Majesty's procurement."

As if they were not coming over by her Majesty's most especial
procurement, and as if it would matter to Philip--the union once made
between England and Holland--whether the invitation to that union came
first from the one party or the other!

"I am retired for my health from the court to mine own house," said
Walsingham, "but I find those in whose judgment her Majesty reposeth
greatest trust so coldly affected unto the cause, as I have no great hope
of the matter; and yet, for that the hearts of princes are in the hands
of God, who both can will and dispose them at his pleasure, I would be
loath to hinder the repair of the commissioners."

Here certainly, had the sun gone most suddenly into a cloud. Sir Francis
would be loath to advise the commissioners to stay at home, but he
obviously thought them coming on as bootless an errand as that which had
taken their colleagues so recently into France.

The cause of the trouble was Flushing. Hence the tears, and the
coldness, and the scoldings, on the part of the imperious and the
economical Queen. Flushing was the patrimony--a large portion of that
which was left to him--of Count Maurice. It was deeply mortgaged for the
payment of the debts of William the Silent, but his son Maurice, so long
as the elder brother Philip William remained a captive in Spain, wrote
himself Marquis of Flushing and Kampveer, and derived both revenue and
importance from his rights in that important town. The States of
Zeeland, while desirous of a political fusion of the two countries, were