1584.] THE BOND Of ASSOCIA TION. 47' open day, under the very guns of the Queen's ships at Portsmouth. M. de Segur, Henry of Navarre's ambas- sador, had to wait, on his return, at Southampton, till an armed escort could be provided for him. Even vessels lying at the pier there were not safe from plunder. 1 The especial nursery of dishonesty remained, as be- fore, Elizabeth's peculiar province, the Church. So long as a single turn of the wheel, a violent revolution, or the Queen's death, might place a Catholic on the throne, the Established Church held a merely condi- tional existence. It had no root in the nation, for every earnest man who was not a Puritan was a Catholic ; and its officers, for the most part, regarded their tenures as an opportunity for enriching themselves, which would probably be short, and should in prudence be made use of while it remained. The worst abuses of the unre- formed system were revived or continued. Benefices were impropriated to laymen, sold, or accumulated upon favourites. Churches in many places were left unserved, and coblers and tailors were voted by the congregations into the pulpits. 3 1 ' Je vous diray aussy que 1'em- boucliure de cette Havre est si bien garde par les pirates, que hicr un passagier de Jersey, se voulant met- tre en mer, fut attaque et contrcint de rentrer dans ceste riviere. Je ne pouvois prendre ung plus mauvais lieu pour m'embarquer que cestuicy, car la plus part des pirates de ce pays sont entre PIsle de Wick et la Poole, oil il fault necessairement que ie passe; et quelqties na vires de la Royne estants a Portsmouth deliveroycnt toute cette coste de ccs brigans, qui ne se contentent de voler ceulx qui sont en mer, mais d'avantage viennent dans les havres piller les marchands et mesmes jus- ques devnnt ccste ville qui est diz on douze milles dans terre.' M. de Segur to Walsingham, December 15, 1584: MSS. France, Jiolit House. 2 ' In nymy places the people have
