Page:History of England (Froude) Vol 9.djvu/142

128 REIGN OF ELIZABETH. [CH. 53. arrest the movement. He sent out a Commission to assemble the ' force of the shire ; ' but if it came to- gether he feared that it would be more likely to go over to the rebels than fight for the Queen ; could he trust the levies otherwise, he had no money to pay them with ; and Yorkshiremen, as Sir George Bowes had to warn him, would never serve without wages/ 1 Slow, per- plexed, irresolute, the same at York as he had been six years before in his unlucky command in Ireland, Sussex could see nothing but the uselessness of resistance, and recommended Elizabeth to come to terms, if possible, with the insurgent leaders. ' If the rebels prepare to fight/ he wrote, ' they will make religion their ground ; and what force they may have in that cause, and how faintly the most part of the country that go with me will fight against that cause, and what treason may be wrought against mine own force for that cause, I know not. But truly, and upon my duty to your Majesty, I have great cause to doubt much of every of them, and nobility as others, have promised our faith to the furtherance of this sure good meaning. Forasmuch as divers disordered and ill-disposed persons about the Queen's Majesty have by their crafty and subtle dealing, to advance themselves, overthrown in the realm the true and Catholic re- ligion, and by the same abuseth the Queen, dishonoureth the realm, and now lastly seeketh to procure the destruction of the nobility : We therefore have gathered ourselves together to resist force by force, and rather by the help of God and of you good people, to reduce these things amiss, with the restoring of all an- cient customs and liberties to God and this noble realm. And lastly, if we shall not do it ourselves, we might be reformed by strangers, to the great hazard of the state of this our country, whereunto we are all bound. God save the Queen.' Proclamation of the Earls, Novem- ber 19: MSS. Border. 1 Bowes to Sussex, November 17-