REIGN OF ELIZABETH. [CH. 41. agents through, whom to communicate with the Queen of Scotland.
- The Emperor also, you will observe, after what has
passed between the Cardinal of Lorraine and himself, 1 can know nothing of the wishes of the Queen of Scots herself or of her subjects ; he looks on his son's affair as already settled ; and I may say for myself that were there any likelihood of that marriage taking effect I should prefer it to the other. 2 I should not move in the matter at all till the Emperor was undeceived were it not for what you tell me of the unwillingness of that Queen and her advisers to accept the Archduke, and of the small advantage which they anticipate from the Austrian connection. ' I am alarmed especially at the possibility of her marrying a French King again, for I cannot but re- member the trouble which her last alliance in that quarter occasioned me. Should she marry in that quarter, I know but too well that at no distant time I shall be forced into war to protect the Queen of Eng- land from an invasion such as was intended before ; and you can judge yourself whether that is an event to which I can look with pleasure. 1 The Cardinal of Lorraine, in a personal interview with Ferdinand, had proposed a marriage between his niece and the Archduke Charles. 3 A note in the margin of the let- ter, in Philip's autograph, shows his extreme slowness and caution : ' Be punto en punto me vieis avisando de lo que en esto pasara, sin venir a convencion ninguna ; mas de en- tender lo que arriba se dice, hasta que yo os avise de lo que en ello se me ofriciese y se hubiese de hacer ; aunque podreis ascgurarlos que mi intencion es la que aqui se dice.'
