The reception which he met with made him expect entire success, and gave him hopes that Elizabeth had surmounted all scruples, and was finally determined to make choice of him for her husband.

In the midst of the pomp which attended the anniversary of her coronation, she was seen, after long and intimate discourse with him, to take a ring from her own finger, and to put it upon his; and all the spectators concluded, that in this ceremony she had given him a promise of marriage, and was even desirous of signifying her intentions to all the world.

St.Aldegonde, ambassador from the states, despatched immediately a letter to his masters, informing them of this great event; and the inhabitants of Antwerp, who, as well as the other Flemings, regarded the queen as a kind of titular divinity, testified their joy by bonfires and the discharge of their great ordnance.[**] * Digges, p.

357, 387, 388, 409, 426, 439.Rymer.xv.

p.
793.
** Camden, p.486.Thuan.lib.