He expected disagreement, and did not mind it.

But no one could fail to see the evidence of patient, thorough research which every chapter, almost every page, contains.

Indeed, it might be said with justice, or at least with some plausibility, that the long and frequent extracts from the despatches of De Feria, de Quadra, de Silva, and Don Guereau, successively Ambassadors from Philip to Elizabeth, water-log the book, and make it too like a series of extracts with explanatory comments.

Of Froude's own style there could not be two opinions.

His bitterest antagonists were forced to admit that it was the perfection of easy, graceful narrative, without the majestic splendour of Gibbon, but also without the mechanical hardness of Macaulay.