very reasonably written, and I did consider also the great wrong offered
him by the Count, and so forbore it. I was so careful for the Count's
safety after the brawl between him and Norris, that I charged Sir John,
if any harm came to the Count's person by any of his or under him, that
he should answer it. Therefore, I take the story to be bred in the bosom
of some much like a thief or villain, whatsoever he were."

And all this was doubtless true so far as regarded the Earl's original
exertions to prevent the consequences of the quarrel, but did not touch
the point of the second correspondence preceded by the conversation in
the dining-room, eight days before the voyage to England. The affair, in
itself of slight importance, would not merit so much comment at this late
day had it not been for its endless consequences. The ferocity with
which the Earl came to regard every prominent German, Hollander, and
Englishman, engaged in the service of the States, sprang very much from
the complications of this vulgar brawl. Norris, Hohenlo, Wilkes,
Buckhurst, were all denounced to the Queen as calumniators, traitors, and
villains; and it may easily be understood how grave and extensive must
have been the effects of such vituperation upon the mind of Elizabeth,
who, until the last day of his life, doubtless entertained for the Earl
the deepest affection of which her nature was susceptible. Hohenlo, with
Count Maurice, were the acknowledged chiefs of the anti-English party,
and the possibility of cordial cooperation between the countries may be
judged of by the entanglement which had thus occurred.

Leicester had always hated Sir John Norris, but he knew that the mother
had still much favour with the Queen, and he was therefore the more
vehement in his denunciations of the son the more difficulty be found in
entirely destroying his character, and the keener jealousy he felt that
any other tongue but his should influence her Majesty. "The story of