Note 100 — DIALOGUE IV. ON THE AGE OF QUEEN ELIZABETH.

Secretary Walsingham, in a letter to the queen, Sept. 2, 1581, amongst other things to the same purpose, has the following words—“Remember, I humbly beseech your majesty, the respect of charges hath lost Scotland: and I would to God I had no cause to think, that it might put your highness in peril of the loss of England.”—“And even the Lord Treasurer himself (we are told) in a letter still extant in the paper-office, written in the critical year 1588, while the Spanish armada was expected against England, excuses himself to sir Edward Stafford, then embassador in France, for not writing to him oftener, on account of her majesty’s unwillingness to be at the expence of messengers.” Sir T. Edmondes’ State-papers, by Dr. Birch, p. 21.