projects, and shut his eyes to the peril. The pirate fleet with which Seymour had been connected, amounted now to twenty well-armed vessels. The French Government gave them the use of their harbours, and the English traders were pillaged in revenge for the exploits of the privateers. When Flemish ships suffered also, the Emperor held the council in London responsible for the misconduct of its subjects, and the council April 17.were obliged to appeal to his forbearance and plead inability to put the pirates down.[1] Seymour's conspiracy at the same time opened a prospect of creating confusion, by which the French might profit. The Paris Government believed that such an enterprise, if it was real, would not have been ventured, unless there had been some secret disaffection more considerable than had come to light; and agents were sent both to England and to Ireland, if possible, to excite a civil war.[2]
The Emperor was struggling with the Interim and
- ↑ 'If the Emperor shall demand satisfaction for the injuries of his subjects, you must thereunto reply that these pirates be at the least twenty sail now in company together, and among them a great many good soldiers and as expert mariners as any be, which being left in despair, will no doubt continue their former ill lives, robbing and spoiling as they have done, and also of like give ear to the present practices of the French.'—Council to Sir P. Hoby: MS. Germany, Edward VI. bundle 1, State Paper Office.
- ↑ They considered, qu'une telle entreprise, sy elle est veritable, n'a peu avoir este conjurer sans l'intelligence de beaucoup de plus grandes, les quelles ne peuvent avoir esté tous descouverts. Henry sent agents, therefore, afin de mettre de dans le dit Royaulme d'Angleterre s'il estoit possible une guerre civile, et lei aviser à se venger les uns des autres pour d'aultant rendre ses affaires plus faciles, tant du costé d'Escosse que de celuy de dechà.—Documents communicated to Sir Thomas Gresham by the Regent of the Low Countries: printed by Haynes.
