INTR OD UCTOR F. 33 



England during its weakness, misery, and degradation, into 

 a war with France, and was at no pains to protect a fortress 

 which the poverty of the English exchequer had allowed to be 

 dismantled. Nothing throughout their whole history has ever 

 enraged the English people so much as the loss of Calais did 

 at the time of its capture. It was the disillusion of a dream 

 which had lasted for more than two hundred years. It made 

 France and England enemies for nearly three hundred years 

 more. To satisfy public opinion in England, Elizabeth 

 affected to be seriously anxious for its recovery. She was 

 too wise to seriously wish for it. Elizabeth was a most reso- 

 lute liar in her administration of public affairs. But she never 

 lied when she thought she would be detected, and never, 

 except when she pretended to insist on the restoration of 

 Calais, lied to her subjects. She might have held Havre, but 

 she knew that the concentration of power is stronger than the 

 occupation of strong places, the retention of which is matter of 

 perpetual cost and constant anxiety. A century after the loss 

 of Calais, another landing-place in north-west Europe was 

 secured by the capture of Dunkirk. In the whole of Crom- 

 well's military successes, nothing pleased the English more 

 than this acquisition. It was very prudently sold by Charles, 

 who might have used the purchase money better ; and the 

 people, angry beyond endurance, nicknamed Clarendon's house, 

 and drove its owner into exile. 



No event, I believe, in English history gave more supreme 

 satisfaction to the English people than the death of Mary and 

 the accession of Elizabeth. The day on which she ascended 

 the throne, Nov. 17, was kept as a holiday long after the memory 

 of the great queen had faded away. It was a satisfaction 

 which all could feel. The most bigoted adherent of the old 

 faith, and there were very few such men in England, beyond the 

 exiles whom Pole had brought back with him, was glad that the 

 hateful connexion with Spain was over, for the Englishman 

 who preferred a foreign power, however justly disaffected he 

 might feel towards the administration of affairs at home, was 



VOL. IV. D 



