Thus, then, whatever the private sentiments of Elizabeth and her
counsellors, they shrank from engaging England in a life and death
struggle with the greatest power of the time; though as the struggle
went on the queen's sympathy with the people of the Netherlands
was more and more openly shown. In 1572 she was present at a parade
of three hundred volunteers who mustered at Greenwich under Thomas
Morgan and Roger Williams for service in the Netherlands. Sir Humphrey
Gilbert, half brother of Sir Walter Raleigh, went out a few months
later with 1500 men, and from that time numbers of English volunteers
continued to cross the seas and join in the struggle against the
Spaniards. Nor were the sympathies of the queen confined to allowing
her subjects to take part in the fighting; for she sent out large
sums of money to the Dutch, and as far as she could, without openly
joining them, gave them her aid.

Spain remonstrated continually against these breaches of neutrality,
while the Dutch on their part constantly implored her to join them
openly; but she continued to give evasive answers to both parties
until the assassination of William of Orange on 10th July, 1584,
sent a thrill of horror through England, and determined the queen
and her advisers to take a more decisive part in the struggle. In the
following June envoys from the States arrived in London, and were
received with great honour, and a treaty between the two countries
was agreed upon. Three months later the queen published a declaration
to her people and to Europe at large, setting forth the terrible
persecutions and cruelties to which "our next neighbours, the people
of the Low Countries," the special allies and friends of England,
had been exposed, and stating her determination to aid them to
recover their liberty. The proclamation concluded: "We mean not
hereby to make particular profit to ourself and our people, only