ORIGINAL LETTERS, ETC. LETTER CLXXXIX. Minute of a Letter from Queen Elizabeth to the Queen of Scots, Feb. 1st. 1571. [MS. COTTON. CALIG. C. III. fol. 141.] MADAME, of late time I have receaved divers letters from yow to the which you maie well gesse, by the accidentes of the time, whie I have not made anie answer; but speciallie because I sawe no matter in them that required any such answer as could have contented yow, and to have discontented yow had bin but an increase of your impatience which I thought tyme would have mitigated as it doth commonlie where the cause thereof is not truelie grounded and that it be so understand; but now findinge by your last letter the 27th, of the last, an increase of your impatience tending allsoe to manie uncomelie, passionate, and vindicative speeches, I thought to change my former opinion and by patient and advised wordes to move yow to staie, or ells to qualifie your passions, and to consider that it is not the manner to obtaine good thinges with evill speeches, nor benefitts with injurious chalenges, nor to gett good to yourself with doinge evill to another. And yet to avoyd the fault which I note yow have comitted in filling a longe letter with multitude of sharpe and injurious wordes, I will not by way of letter write anie more of the matter, but have rather chosen to committ to my cosin the Erle of Shrewsbury the thinges which I have thought meete upon the readinge of your letters to be imparted unto you, as in a memorial in wrytinge he hath to shewe you: wherwith I thinke yf reason may be you, and passion absent at the reading, you will folowe hereafter rather the course of the last part of your letter then the first ; the later being wrytten as in a calme and the former in a storme, wishing to you the same grace of God that I wish to myself, and that he maie direct you to desire and attaine to that which is meete for his honnor and your quietnes, with contentacion both of bodie and minde. Given at my Pallace of Westminster the first daie of February 1571. Your Cosyn that wisheth present with a LETTER CXC. Henry Middelmore to Lord Burghley, reporting a Conversation he had had with the Lord Admiral of France, concerning Flanders, the proposed match with the Duke d'Anjou, &c. (MS. COTTON. VESP. F. VI. fol. 89. Orig.] Gaspard de Coligni, the second of the name, Lord Admiral of France, was born in 1516 at Chatillon sur Loing, was a soldier from his infancy, and had signalized himself in numerous military engagements in the reigns of Francis the First and Henry the Second. After the death of the latter monarch, having become a huguenot at the persuasion of his brother, Francis de Coligni, he headed the Protestants against the Guises. The court which he paid to Elizabeth, and which is so particularly expatiated upon in this Letter, increased the hatred in which he was held by Catherine de Medicis and her party. The dissimulation of Charles the Ninth toward him, is without a parallel in History. It ended, as the reader probably knows, in an awful scene of unexpected treachery, more particular mention of which will occur hereafter. Right honorable, Sir Arthur Champernome and I being invityd by the Admirall of Frawnce to supper the tenthe of this present, the sayd Admirall in the ende of the same desieringe throwghe olde acquayntawnce (as he sayd) to have some speache with me privatelye, dyd take me asyde, and usyd suche wordes unto me as I have thowght it my dutye faythfullye to make reaport therof. His entrye into his discourse tok begyninge at the infinite obligations he had to hir |