ully fomented by Scottish emissaries, produced, in 1566, the first
symptoms of discord between the queen and her faithful commons.

A motion was made in the lower house for reviving the suit to her
majesty touching the naming of a successor in case of her death without
posterity; and in spite of the strenuous opposition of the court party,
and the efforts of the ministers to procure a delay by declaring "that
the queen was moved to marriage and inclined to prosecute the same," it
was carried, and a committee appointed to confer with the lords. The
business was not very agreeable to the upper house: a committee however
was named, and the queen soon after required some members of both houses
to wait upon her respecting this matter; when the lord-keeper explained
their sentiments in a long speech, to which her majesty was pleased to
reply after her darkest and most ambiguous manner. "As to her marriage,"
she said, "a silent thought might serve. She thought it had been so
desired that none other trees blossom should have been minded or ever
any hope of fruit had been denied them. But that if any doubted that she
was by vow or determination never bent to trade in that kind of life,
she bade them put out that kind of heresy, for their belief was therein
awry. And though she could think it best for a private woman, yet she
strove with herself to think it not meet for a prince. As to the
succession, she bade them not think that they had needed this desire, if
she had seen a time so fit; and it so ripe to be denounced. That the
greatness of the cause, and the need of their return, made her say that
a short time for so long a continuance ought not to pass by rote. That
as cause by conference with the learned should show her matter worth
utterance for their behoof, so she would more gladly pursue their good
after her days, than with all her prayers while she lived be a means to
linger out her living thread. That for their comfort, she had good
record in that place that other means than they mentioned had been
thought of perchance for their good, as much as for her own surety:
which, if they could have been presently or conveniently executed, it
had not been now deferred or over-slipped. That she hoped to die in
quiet with _Nunc dimittis_, which could not be without she saw some
glimpse of their following surety after her graved bones."

These vague sentences tended little to the satisfaction of the house;
and a motion was made, an