It was quite right to appoint commissioners, but it was
never for an instant to be forgotten that the sole object of treating was
to take the English unawares. "And therefore do you guide them to this
end," said the King with pious unction, "which is what you owe to God, in
whose service I have engaged in this enterprise, and to whom I have
dedicated the whole." The King of France, too--that unfortunate Henry
III., against whose throne and life Philip maintained in constant pay an
organized band of conspirators--was affectionately adjured, through the
Spanish envoy in Paris, Mendoza,--to reflect upon the advantages to
France of a Catholic king and kingdom of England, in place of the
heretics now in power.

But Philip, growing more and more sanguine, as those visions of fresh
crowns and conquered kingdoms rose before him in his solitary cell, had
even persuaded himself that the deed was already done. In the early days
of December, he expressed a doubt whether his 14th November letter had
reached the Duke, who by that time was probably in England. One would
have thought the King addressing a tourist just starting on a little
pleasure-excursion. And this was precisely the moment when Alexander had
been writing those affectionate phrases to the Queen which had been
considered by the counsellors at Greenwich so "princely and Christianly,"
and which Croft had pronounced such "very good words."

If there had been no hostile, fleet to prevent, it was to be hoped, said
Philip, that, in the name of God, the passage had been made. "Once landed
there," continued the King, "I am persuaded that you will give me a good
account of yourself, and, with the help of our Lord, that you will do
that service which I desire to render to Him, and that He will guide our
cause, which is His own, and of such great importance to His Church." A
part of the fleet would soon after arrive and bring six thousand
Spaniards, the Pope's million, and other good things, which might prove
useful to Parma, presupposing that they would find him established on the
enemy's territory.

This conviction that the enterprise had been already accomplished grew
stronger in the King's breast every day. He was only a little disturbed
lest Farnese should have misunderstood that 14th November letter.
Philip--as his wont was--had gone into so many petty and puzzling
details, and had laid down rules of action suitable for various
contingencies, so easy to put comfortably up