Page:History of England (Froude) Vol 7.djvu/216

196 REIGN OF ELIZABETH. [CH. 43. DE SILVA TO PHILIP II. London, June 2J. ' I arrived in London the 1 8th of this month. The day following, the Queen sent an officer of the house- hold to welcome me in her name. I had previously received a number of kind messages from the Lord Robert, and in returning him my thanks I had asked him to arrange my audience with her Majesty. She promised to see me on Thursday the 22nd. The Court was at Richmond : I went up the river in a barge and landed near the palace. Sir Henry Dudley and a rela- tive of Sir Nicholas Throgmorton met me at the stairs, and brought me to the Council Room. There Lord Darnley, Lady Margaret Lennox's son, came to me from the Queen, and escorted me into her presence. ' As I entered, some one was playing on a harpsi- chord. Her Majesty rose, advanced three or four steps to meet me, and then giving me her hand, said in Italian she did not know in what language to address me. I replied in Latin, and after a few words I gave her your Majesty's letter. She took it, and after first handing it to Cecil to open, she read it through. ' She then spoke to me in Latin also with easy elegance expressing the pleasure which she felt at my arrival. Her Court, she said, was incomplete without the presence of a minister from your Majesty ; and for herself she was uneasy without hearing from time to time of your Majesty's welfare. Her ' ill friends ' had told her that your Majesty would never send an am-