"The fellow," said Leicester, "took it in such snuff, that he came proudly to the States and offered his letters, saying; 'Now I trust you have done all your sacrifices to the Queen of England, and may yield me some leisure to read my masters letters.'"-- "But they so shook him, up," continued the Earl, "for naming her Majesty in scorn--as they took it--that they hurled him his letters; and bid him content himself;" and so on, much to the agent's discomfiture, who retired in greater "snuff" than ever.
So much for the French influence.

And now Leicester had done exactly what the most imperious woman in the world, whose favour was the breath of his life, had expressly forbidden him to do.

The step having been taken, the prize so tempting to his ambition having been snatched, and the policy which had governed the united action of the States and himself seeming so sound, what ought he to have done in order to avert the tempest which he must have foreseen?
Surely a man who knew so much of woman's nature and of Elizabeth's nature as he did, ought to have attempted to conciliate her affections, after having so deeply wounded her pride.

He knew his power.

Besides the graces of his person and manner--which few women, once impressed by them, could ever forget--he possessed the most insidious and flattering eloquence, and, in absence, his pen was as wily as his tongue.
For the Earl was imbued with the very genius of courtship.