1563.] THE ENGLISH A T HA VRE. year, were carried on under the stimulus of the excite- ment. The result was the return of a House of Com- mons violently Puritan ; and those who were most anxious to prevent the recognition of the Queen of Scots ibund themselves opportunely strengthened by the pre- mature eagerness with which her claims had been pressed. MaitlaiicVs intended mission to London had been postponed till the meeting ; but meanwhile Sir William Cecil had ominously allowed all correspondence between them to cease; 1 and Randolph, on the 5th of I5 63. January, wrote from Edinburgh of the general Januu: 7- fear and uneasiness that 'things would be wrought in the approaching Parliament which would give little pleasure in Scotland.' 2 Diplomacy however still con- tinued its efforts. Notwithstanding the rupture with the Guises, the admission of Mary Stuart's right was still played off before Elizabeth as a condition on which France might be pacified and Calais restored : and there was always a fear that Elizabeth misrht turn back id upon her steps and listen. To end the crisis, Sir Thomas Smith advised her to throw six thousand men, some moonlight night, on the Calais sands. The garrison had been withdrawn after the battle of Dreux to reinforce the Catholic army, and not tw r o hundred men were left to defend the still incomplete fortifications. 3 But Eliza- 1 Maitland to Cecil, January 3 : Scotch MSS. Solly House. Randolph to Cecil : MS. Ibid. a Sir T. Smith to Elizabeth, January 2 : FOIJDES, vol. ii. The beneficial effects of the French con- quest had already been felt in the Pale. Before the expulsion of the English it was almost a desert. Sir Thomas Smith held out as an in- ducement for its recovery, that it had become ' the plentil'ullcst country ir all France.'
