The Protestant policy had completely gained the ascendant in the councils of Elizabeth; she was still officially at peace with Spain; but, for many years her great admirals, Drake, Hawkins, and Sir Walter Raleigh, freely overran the seas, taking possession of all the Spanish vessels which they encountered, furnished with letters of marque, pillaging at times the Spanish towns, and constantly the Spanish settlements in America. { 391} For a long while, moreover, the cause of liberty in the Low Countries had been secretly protected by the money and assistance of Elizabeth, and she had recently lent her brilliant support by sending an army of six thousand men, under the orders of the Earl of Leicester, to support the war which had lost (a year before, on the 10th of July, 1584,) its illustrious chief, William the Taciturn, by the dagger of Balthazar Gérard, an assassin in the pay of Philip II. The Queen of England again declined the Protectorate of the United Provinces; but she accepted as a pledge of her close alliance with that rising state the surrender of the towns of Brill and Flushing. On his own motive, and without consulting the queen, Leicester even went so far as to cause himself to be nominated governor by the States-general of the Low Countries. But he had presumed too much upon his past influence over his queen; she had never forgiven him for his marriage with the Countess of Essex; he gained no success in the Low Countries; his military talents were not as great as his political skill. Elizabeth flew into a passion against him, with a violence which gave uneasiness to the members of the council; great difficulty was experienced in preventing her from recalling Leicester at once, and the States-general, who had thought to satisfy the Court of England, soon perceived with grief that Elizabeth was growing cold toward their cause.
A fresh effort was being prepared in favour of Queen Mary, the last link of the long succession of plots which were to bring her to the scaffold. Anthony Babington, a young man of good birth, a fervent Catholic, rich, for a long while devoted to the unhappy captive, engaged in a project of conspiracy, supported, it is said, by the Duke of Parma, Alexander Farnèse, who was to make a descent upon England as soon as he should succeed in assassinating Queen Elizabeth. Babington was desirous of delivering Mary Stuart and placing her upon the throne; he did not take heed of the means proposed by Savage, the prime mover in the plot, and he gathered around him a few friends as bold and imprudent as himself. It appears certain that from this point Walsingham was aware of the conspiracy, but he allowed matters to proceed until Queen Mary had written twice to Babington. As soon as the captive was compromised, the accomplices were all arrested. Savage and Babington alone had desired and plotted the murder of the queen; a few of the conspirators contemplated only the deliverance of Mary Stuart, others limited themselves to keeping silence concerning the conspiracy. "It is my cruel destiny," exclaimed Jones, before the tribunal, "that I should betray my friend whom I love as myself or fail in my allegiance, and become a false friend or a miserable traitor. My tender feeling for Thomas Salisbury has ruined me, but God knows that I meditated no treason." The less guilty among the conspirators were condemned to be hanged; the chiefs of the conspiracy suffered the horrible punishment at traitors. They were so young and of such good appearance that their punishment caused a certain degree of emotion in London. These were the last victims of the beauty and misfortunes of Mary Stuart.