OK, here's how you do it. You, ruler of England, have this gung-ho general over in the Netherlands going way beyond his orders. He's going to put you in a big war in no time. You're a woman who's not supposed to know much about these things. You were educated in classical languages, for Heaven's sake, Latin and Greek. He's been brought up to be a warrior, as were all these bloods around you — Raleigh, Drake, Essex. What, with them listening, do you say to him? Here's what, in the next letter by emissary:
We could never have imagined...that a man raised up by ourself and extraordinarily favoured by us...would have in so contemptible a sort broken our commandment in a cause that so greatly touches us in honour....And therefore our express pleasure and commandment is that, all delays and excuses laid apart, you do presently upon the duty of your allegiance obey and fulfill whatsoever the bearer hereof shall direct you to do in our name. Whereof fail you not, as you will answer the contrary at your utmost peril.[109]
In short, "Bottle it, Leicester." And did it work? You bet it did. Leicester had to stand there while the emissary read out the whole letter, including the above words, before the Dutch Council of State. That was her commandment.
All right, that's turning off the testosterone. How about turning it on? We know (from the preceding Post, #156) how necessary that might be at times. Here's Elizabeth at a time when the need, by the known circumstances, could hardly have appeared greater: the Spanish Armada is bearing down on England. A landing is expected at any time. The troops are gathered at Tilbury, near the coast. Elizabeth appears before them "wearing a silver breastplate over a white velvet dress." Imagine yourself a young lord, mounted before your company. I'm going to keep an eye on your testosterone gauge, male readers, as she speaks:
I am come amongst you as you see at this time, not for my recreation and disport, but being resolved, in the midst and heat of the battle, to live or die amongst you all; to lay down for my God, and for my kingdom, and my people, my honor and my blood, even in the dust. I know I have the body but of a weak and feeble woman, but I have the heart and stomach of a king, and of a king of England too, and think foul scorn that Parma or Spain, or any prince of Europe, should dare to invade the borders of my realm.
Are you not banging on your shield? I am. I, an American in the 21st century. How much louder, then, will those aristocrats in the age of chivalry, looking there at the frail woman who needs their protection, be pounding.
Now, the intelligenc. It's easy, with Elizabeth, to miss the full range. You already know that she was hard as nails. She had to be, right from the beginning. Declared illegitimate, imprisoned, her life threatened, she comes, at the age of 23, to the throne of an England torn by faction and plagued with plots, many against her. Her world, the one she learned to survive in, is not just "a man's world" in the sense that every important world before recent times was a man's world; it's "a man's world" in the sense that expression has when we rebuke somebody for their illusions. "You expect pity on Wall Street? at the bank? from NATO? Those are real worlds, free of sentiment — you know, free of what women are always bringing in."
We have Elizabeth, then, walking into a man's world and playing the game played there realistically and coolly and, yes, ruthlessly. Threaten her throne and she, though not quick to do it, will take off your head. It's not surprising then that, in the crowd of medieval and renaissance women, she, for feminists, stands out like a giant. She was no poor-little-me-needing-protection.
"But wasn't she a poor-little-me before her knights at Tilbury?"
Of course, but that was no slide back into old roles, that was a move in the game, a very powerful one, and it showed her resourcefulness. Got some knights? Use them. Tap that testosterone. You can say she' s using feminine wiles but you can't say she's backsliding, no more than you can say that a female reporter who bats her eyes at a male Congressman to get an interview ahead of a male reporter is backsliding. That's the way the game is played. It's a man's world, you work every angle, and the female reporter is never more of a "man" than when she bats her eyes.
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