If she intended to continue in this line of conduct, he begged to resign his office of Lord Treasurer; wishing; before God and man, to wash his bands of the shame and peril which he saw could not be avoided.

The Queen, astonished at the audacity of Burghley's attitude and language, hardly knew whether to chide him for his presumption or to listen to his arguments.

She did both.

She taxed him with insolence in daring to address her so roundly, and then finding he was speaking even in 'amaritudine animae' and out of a clear conscience, she became calm again, and intimated a disposition to qualify her anger against the absent Earl.
Next day, to their sorrow, the two councillors found that the Queen had again changed her mind--"as one that had been by some adverse counsel seduced." She expressed the opinion that affairs would do well enough in the Netherlands, even though Leicester were displaced.

A conference followed between Walsingham, Hatton, and Burghley, and then the three went again to her Majesty.