The States-General now offered the English queen Elizabeth I sovereignty. Elizabeth instead decided to extend an English protectorate over the Netherlands, sending an expeditionary force of 6,350-foot and 1,000 horse under Robert Dudley, 1st Earl of Leicester, to act as governor-general. In the Council of State, the English would have two voting members. The fortress ports of Flushing and Brill would be an English surety. The States-General agreed to this in the Treaty of Nonsuch of 20 August 1585, the first time the rebel state was diplomatically recognised by a foreign government.