There was no matter which concerned Cecil so much as this, as will be seen by his many interesting letters about it to Sir Ralph Sadler in the Sadler Papers. He had gone to Burghley in September 1559, and thence wrote to Sadler his anxiety to hear of Arran’s[113] safe arrival in Scotland. “Th’erle of Arrayn borrowed of me at his being at London 200 crowns, which he promised should be paid to you, Mr. Sadler, for me. After some tyme passed, I praye you aske it of hym.” The next day Cecil wrote that he had ordered Sadler “to lende the Protestants money, as of your selve, taking secretly the bonds of them to rendre the same; so as the Quene should not be partie thereto.” Thenceforward money was secretly sent in plenty by Sir William to maintain the Scottish reformers who were besieging Leith, but Knox and the rigid Calvinists, with their republican and anti-feminine ideas, were hated by the Queen, and made matters difficult. “Knox’s name,” says Cecil, “is the most odious here. I wish no mention of it hither.” “Surely I like not Knox’s audacitie.… His writings do no good here, and therefore I do rather suppress them.”[114]
But it became evident that the Lords of the Congregation would be unable much longer to hold their own without powerful armed assistance from England. This would of course mean a renewal of the war with France, and before it could be undertaken it was necessary to make quite sure of the attitude of Philip, who was about to marry the French Princess. On this occasion, for the first time, Cecil was met and hampered in his action by a counter intrigue within the English court, such as for the next twenty years continually faced him.
When the Queen rode through the city from the Charterhouse to the Tower on her white jennet, she was followed closely by a handsome young man of her own age, who attracted general attention. She had appointed Lord Robert Dudley, the son of Cecil’s old patron, Northumberland, Master of the Horse at Hatfield on the day that Mary died. In less than six months the tongue of scandal was busy with the doings of the Queen and her favourite, and the Spanish agents were calculating the chances of his being made an instrument for their ends. Gradually the English competitors for the Queen’s hand sank into the background, whilst Dudley, a married man, grew in favour daily.[115] He was made a Knight of the Garter, to the openly expressed annoyance of other older and worthier nobles; money grants and favours of all sorts were showered upon him, and the Queen would hardly let him out of her sight. So long as the talk of the match with the Archduke Charles only dragged on its interminable length, Dudley was mildly approving and claiming rewards and bribes from the Spaniards in consequence; for he knew perfectly well that the negotiation was a feint, and that the religious obstacles were unsurmountable. But when, as has been seen, national interests led Cecil to play his master-move and checkmate Mary Stuart and the French connection in Scotland with Arran and the English marriage, Dudley saw that the affair was serious, and at once set about frustrating Cecil’s national policy for his personal advantage. In order to obstruct the marriage with Arran, the first step was for Dudley to profess himself hotly in favour of the Austrian match.
