But Lady Elizabeth was not idle in her voluntary imprisonment. She
conceived the idea that the best method of preventing a match which
she disliked for her daughter would be to make one of which she could
approve. Accordingly she offered Frances to young Henry de Vere,
eighteenth Earl of Oxford. Although to a lesser extent, like Sir John
Villiers, he was impecunious and on the look out for an heiress, his
father--who was distinguished for having been one of the peers
appointed to sit in judgment on Mary, Queen of Scots, for having had
command of a fleet to oppose the Armada, for his success in
tournaments, for his comedies, for his wit, and for introducing the
use of scents into England--having dissipated the large inheritance of
his family.

Undoubtedly, Lady Elizabeth was a woman of considerable resource; but,
with all her virtues, she was not over-scrupulous; for, as Lord
Campbell says,[14] to induce her daughter to believe that Oxford was
in love with her, she "showed her a forged letter, purporting to come
from that nobleman, which asseverated that he was deeply attached to
her, and that he aspired to her hand." Lady Elizabeth was apparently
of opinion that everything--and everything includes lying and
forgery--is fair in love and war.

FOOTNOTES:

[11] Chamberlain, in a letter dated 22nd June, 1616.

[12] A quotation given by Lord Campbell (Vol. I., p. 297); but he does
not state his authority.

[13] Arthur Wilson, in his life of James I. (_Camden, History of