The England of Elizabeth, Walsingham, Burghley, Drake, and Raleigh, of Spenser and Shakspeare, hardly numbered a larger population than now dwells in its capital and immediate suburbs.

It had neither standing army nor considerable royal navy.

It was full of conspirators, daring and unscrupulous, loyal to none save to Mary of Scotland, Philip of Spain, and the Pope of Rome, and untiring in their efforts to bring about a general rebellion.

With Ireland at its side, nominally a subject province, but in a state of chronic insurrection--a perpetual hot-bed for Spanish conspiracy and stratagem; with Scotland at its back, a foreign country, with half its population exasperated enemies of England, and the rest but doubtful friends, and with the legitimate sovereign of that country, "the daughter of debate, who discord still did sow,"-- [Sonnet by Queen Elizabeth.]--a prisoner in Elizabeth's hands, the central point around which treason was constantly crystallizing itself, it was not strange that with the known views of the Queen on the subject of the reformed Dutch religion, England should seem less desirable as a protector for the Netherlands than the neighbouring kingdom of France.
Elizabeth was a great sovereign, whose genius Orange always appreciated, in a comparatively feeble realm.

Henry of Valois was the contemptible monarch of a powerful state, and might be led by others to produce incalculable mischief or considerable good.