But their duty kept them mostly at court; whereas Cecil, being free from office, went backwards and forwards between Cannon Row and Hatfield, making arrangements for the formation of a new Government when the sovereign should die. Feria writes that on the day the new Queen was proclaimed (17th November 1558), the Council decided that Archbishop Heath, Lord Admiral Clinton, the Earls of Shrewsbury, Pembroke, and Derby, and Lord William Howard should proceed to Hatfield, whilst the rest stayed behind; “but every one wanted to be the first to get out.” When they arrived at the residence of the young Queen, Cecil was already there and the appointments decided upon. Cecil was the first Councillor sworn, and was appointed Secretary of State;[86] the others mentioned above, with Paget and Bedford, being subsequently admitted; and the faithful Parry, her cofferer, elevated to the post of Controller of the Household; whilst Lord Robert Dudley, the son of Northumberland, Cecil’s former patron, was made Master of the Horse.
The Catholics, and especially the Spanish party, were in dismay. Changes met them at every turn. The Councillors who had fattened on Philip’s bribes, turned against him openly, although some few, like Lord William Howard (the Lord Chamberlain), Clinton, and Paget, secretly offered their services for a renewed consideration. But it soon became evident that the two men who would have the predominant influence were Cecil and Parry, and they had never yet been bought by Spanish money. Only a week after the Queen’s accession, Feria wrote to Philip:[87] “The kingdom is entirely in the hands of young folks, heretics and traitors, and the Queen does not favour a single man … who served her sister.… The old people and the Catholics are dissatisfied, but dare not open their lips. She seems to me incomparably more feared than her sister, and gives her orders, and has her way, as absolutely as her father did. Her present Controller, Parry, and Secretary Cecil, govern the kingdom, and they tell me the Earl of Bedford has a good deal to say.”
Before entering London from Hatfield, the Queen stayed for a day or two at the Charterhouse, then in the occupation of Lord North. All London turned out to do her honour, and she immediately made it clear to onlookers that she meant to bid for popularity and to depend upon the good-will of her subjects. On the 26th or 27th November the Spanish Ambassador went to the Charterhouse to salute her. He had been under Mary practically the master of the Council; but the new Queen promptly made him understand that everything was changed. Instead of, as before, having right of access to the sovereign when he pleased, he found that in future he and his affairs would be relegated to two members of the Council, and when he asked which two, the Queen replied, Parry and Cecil. Feria did his best to conciliate her—gave her some jewels he had belonging to the late Queen, and so forth; but when he mentioned that a suspension of hostilities had been arranged between the French and Spanish, she thought it was a trap to isolate her, and she dismissed the Ambassador coldly. When she had retired, Feria called Cecil and asked him to go in at once and explain matters to her, “as he is the man who does everything.” The effects of Cecil’s diplomacy were soon evident. The Queen smiled and chatted with Feria, took with avidity all the jewels he could give her, coyly looked down when marriage was mentioned, but would pledge herself to nothing. “She was full of fine words, however, and told me that when people said she was ‘French,’ I was not to believe it;”[88] but when the Ambassador treated such a notion as absurd, and endeavoured to lead her on to say that her sympathies were with Spain and against France, she cleverly changed the subject. Her sister, she said, had been at war with France, but she was not.