1921 IN 1562/3 AND 1566 511 sion, and will content themselves with vindicating the freedom of Parliamentary discussion * And W. Lambert, who played a prominent part in the struggle, wrote in later years how after the raising of the veto ' uppon consultacion amongst them selues, they spared to proceede anie further therein 2 Yet whilst moderate counsels were evidently strong enough to restrain the house from immediately taking up the suit where it had been stayed by the queen's veto, it would be an error to think that there was general contentment. Twice the queen had forestalled them in an attempt to express their wishes, once in the petition, and the second time in the address, if we con- clude that they had intended to go forward with this : and events were soon to reveal that they had not yet abandoned the desire to leave some record of their suit. Had there been an over- whelming revulsion of feeling in favour of the queen, there can be little doubt that the house would have at once revived the subsidy bill, which had lain derelict since its first reading on 28 October. 3 But 25 and 26 November passed without its reappearance. It emerged for a second reading on 27 November, but on the same day the queen notified her remittance of the third payment of the subsidy already provided for in the bill. 4 We are left to guess whether the remittance caused the revival of the bill or not, and what the motives of the queen were in forgoing part of her supplies. In Cecil's diary it is stated that Elizabeth ' did remit a Part of the Offer of a Subsidy by the Commons, who offred largely, to the end to have had the Succession stablished '. 5 But if this is anything more than a statement of the fact that they had used the bill, if not as a bribe, then as a weapon, to extort the desired concession, it is probably wrong. The commons did not offer largely. The supplies had been rated at one fif- teenth and tenth and a subsidy, 6 less, therefore, than the normal grant ; and the two members were surely right who protested at an implication in a draft preamble ' that the Commons granted more than Her Majesty wished to receive '. 7 We can advance it tentatively only, but it seems the best explanation of the queen's renouncing what she could ill afford to lose, that the remittance was made in order to revive the subsidy bill and to tilt the scale of opinion in the house, already inclining that way, definitely in her favour. She had surrendered on the matter of freedom of 1 Spanish Col., Eliz., i. 598. 2 Add. MS. 5123, ff. 10 b-11 a. 3 Commons Journals, i. 75. 4 Ibid.i. 78; e.g. on personalty this meant a remission of lOd. in the pound, the two remaining payments being Is. and lOd. respectively (Statutes of the Realm, iv. i. 507). 8 Murdin, Burghley State Papers, p. 762. 6 Commons' Journals, i. 75. 7 Hist. MSS. Comm., Hatfield MSS., part i, p. 341.
