She declared that she had frequently, by amicable embassies, warned her brother of Spain--speaking to him like a good, dear sister and neighbour--that unless he restrained the cruelty of his governors and their soldiers, he was sure to force his Provinces into allegiance to some other power.

She expressed the danger in which she should be placed if the Spaniards succeeded in establishing their absolute government in the Netherlands, from which position their attacks upon England would be incessant.

She spoke of the enterprise favoured and set on foot by the Pope and by Spain, against the kingdom of Ireland.

She alluded to the dismissal of the Spanish envoy, Don Bernardino de Mendoza, who had been treated by her with great regard for a long time, but who had been afterwards discovered in league with certain ill-disposed and seditious subjects of hers, and with publicly condemned traitors.

That envoy had arranged a plot according to which, as appeared by his secret despatches, an invasion of England by a force of men, coming partly from Spain, and partly from the Netherlands, might be successfully managed, and he had even noted down the necessary number of ships and men, with various other details.