A D. 1618.] and on the bench. ASCENDANCY OF BUCKINGHAM. 71 Scotland, Coke had had a private interview with Bucking-my lord of Buckingham, it was a shame to see the purse ham, in which he agreed to consent to the marriage on and seal of so little value or esteem in his chamber, though condition of regaining his honours and position in the council the carrier without it merited nothing but scorn, being worst amongst the basest. But the servant told me they had command it must be so. After two days he had admittance. At his first entrance he fell down flat at the duke's foot, kissing it, and vowing never to rise till he had his pardon; and thus was he again reconciled. And since that time so very a slave to the duke and all that family, that he durst not deny the command of the meanest of the kindred, nor yet oppose anything. By which you see a base spirit is even most concomitant with the proudest mind; and surely, never so many brave parts, and so base and abject a spirit, tenanted together in any one earthen cottage, as in this one man." During the absence of the court in Scotland, and whilst Bacon was in the full blow of his assumed greatness, he discovered this compact, which boded him nothing but destruction. Without delay he incited the lady Hatton, who was in almost everything violently opposed to her husband, to make haste and secure her daughter by secreting herself in the house of Sir Edward Withipole, near Oxford, and by contracting her in marriage to Henry de Vere, earl of Oxford, for whom the young lady really entertained a regard. Coke, enraged at this flight, and at the attempt to marry his daughter contrary to his own plans, applied for a search-warrant to enter the house where she was secreted. Bacon refused it, but Winwood was only too happy to grant it. Coke, supported by twelve armed men, made a forcible entry, and carried away his daughter. On this, Bacon procured the new attorney-general, Yelverton, to file an information against Coke in the star-chamber for a breach of the peace. Bacon also wrote to the king and the favourite in Scotland, representing to Buckingham that it was by no means to his honour or interest to ally his family to that of Coke, a fallen, disgraced man, and disliked of the king, and especially as much better matches might be found. To James he represented the trouble which Coke had given to his majesty, his fondness for opposing his wishes, and the disturbances there had been in the kingdom and courts of justice so long as he had been in power. He added that now everything was quiet, and that his majesty knew that he had in him an officer always anxious to do his will. The answer of the king struck him at once to the earth. The great philosopher was not aware how far the compact with Coke had really gone; and when he read the king's letter, reprimanding his presumption, accompanied by another from Buckingham, in which he rated him for his officious meddling, and telling him that the same hand which had made him could unmake him, he saw the gulf into which he had plunged. At once he wrote off to both monarch and minion, imploring the humblest pardon for his unworthy offence, which he would now do all in his power to wipe away. Accordingly, he stopped the proceedings before the council and in the star-chamber against Coke, and assured lady Hatton and her friends that he could not assist them in a course so opposed to the wishes of the young lady's father. On the return of the court, Bacon hastened to pay his homage to the proud favourite; but he was then made to feel how much it is in the power of a base and little-souled man in favour, to humiliate the most gigantic mind when it forgets its own dignity. The great renovator of science, the proud and vaunting lord-keeper, was made to wait for two whole days in the lobby of the upstart. This is Weldon's account of it:-"He attended two days at Buckingham's chamber, being not admitted to any better place than the room where trencher-scrapers and lackeys attended, there sitting upon an old wooden chest, amongst such as for his baseness were only fit for his companions, although the honour of his place did merit far more respect, with his purse and seal lying by him on that chest. Myself told a servant of Buckingham condescended to forgive the suppliant lordkeeper: the marriage was accomplished, and Bacon soon after, that is, on the 4th of January, 1618, was raised to the dignity of lord chancellor, with a pension of twelve hundred pounds a year, and the title of baron Verulam. So that he threw no obstacle in the way of the marriage, both James and Buckingham preferred his pliancy to the sturdy spirit of Coke. The consequences of this forced and unnatural marriage were as deplorable as the means of effecting it were vile. The brother of Villiers was created viscount Purbeck; but no title could give him a sound body or a healthy intellect. It was not long before he was pronounced utterly mad, was shut up in an asylum, and Buckingham took possession of his wife's property under pretence of managing it for lord and lady Purbeck, but spent it for his own purposes; and Coke's daughter, outraged in all her feelings as a woman, and her rights as a subject, became a degraded and abandoned character. Buckingham now reigned supreme at court. He had rapidly risen from a simple country youth into a baron, viscount, earl, and marquis; he was a member of the privy council, knight of the garter, had been a master of the horse, and was now lord high-admiral; the earl of Nottingham, the brave old Howard, the hero of the Armada, having been compelled to resign to make way for him. He and his mother disposed of all places about court, in the church, in the courts of law, and in the government. Peers, prelates, and men of all degrees courted humbly his favour, and paid him large sums of money for the places they sought, or agreed to annuities out of their salaries and emoluments. The king seemed to rejoice in the wealth which flowed in on his favourite from all these corrupt services, and could not bear him out of his sight. Let us take Weldon's account of this state of things:"And now Buckingham, having the chancellor or treasurer, and all great officers his very slaves, swells in the height of pride, and summons up all his country kindred, the old countess providing a place for them to learn to carry themselves in a court-like garb." The old countess, as Weldon calls her, was far from old, but a woman yet in her prime, and of singular beauty, and of as notorious wickedness. She was another Elizabeth Wydville, in looking out for all the rich heirs and heiresses, and marrying her kin to them. The brothers, half-brothers, cousins of Buckingham, were all matched to rich women, and the women were matched to the eldest sons of earls, barons, and men of largest estate. And where there was no title, such was soon conferred. The madman that they hung on Coke's daughter, as we have seen, was made lord Purbeck, another brother was created earl of Anglesea. Fielding, who married Buckingham's sister, was made earl of Denbigh, and his brother carl of Desmond. Cranfield, who married a female relative, was made earl of Middlesex. But the most shameful case of all, perhaps, was that of Williams, dean of Westminster, a paramour of the countess's, who was made bishop of Lincoln, and allowed to retain not only the deanery of Westminster, but the rectories of Dinam, Waldgrave, Grafton, and Peterborcugh; the prebends of Asgarbie and Nonnington, besides like little rabbits startled out of their burrows. Here was a strange change. That the king, who formerly would not endure his queen and children in his lodgings, now you would have judged that none but women frequented them. Nay, this was not all; but the kindred had all the houses about Whitehall, as if bulwarks and flankers to that citadel." All the relations in turn, as soon as settled thus about the court, commenced selling offices, but the countess surpassed them. Lord Dover, in his comments on the origin of the British peerages, says that all the titles of that date, as those of the Spensers, Fanes, the Petres, the Arundels, Cavendishes, Sackvilles, Montagues, &c., were purchased for sums of money, or were obtained by the vilest favouritisın. other dignities, so that, says Heylin, he was a perfect diocese in himself, being bishop, dean, prebendary, residentiary, and parson, and these all at once. Other livings and bishoprics were sold as highly as these were freely given. Fotherby of Salisbury paid three thousand five hundred pounds for his see, and all other dignities and benefices in the church were equally at the disposal of this upstart and his venal, lascivious mother. "There were books of rates," says Weldon, "on all offices, bishoprics, and deaneries in England, that could tell you what fines and pensions were to pay." He adds, "that Buckingham's female relatives were numerous enough to have peopled any plantation. So that king James, that naturally, in former times hated women, had his lodgings replenished with them, and all of the kindred, and little children did run up and down the king's lodgings Where wealthy people were not inclined to buy, they were compelled to it. Such was the case of Richard Robartes, a wealthy merchant of Truro, who was forced to purchase the title of baron Robartes. Even the most distinguished ministers were not safe from the all-absorbing favourite's lust of wealth. As he had compelled the old hero of the Armada, Howard earl of Nottingham, to give up his post of high-admiral to him, he now charged the earl of Suffolk, the father of the infamous countess of Somerset, with peculation, and had both the earl and countess thrown into the Tower. The earl petitioned the king, telling him that so far from having enriched himself by peculation, he was forty thousand pounds in debt. This had no effect on Buckingham, who had him fined thirty thousand pounds; but this afterwards was compounded for seven thousand pounds, which was pocketed by Ramsay, earl of Haddington, one of James's favourites, and the earl and countess set at large. Lord chief-justice Montague purchased the post of lord-treasurer, but in less than a year it was taken from him, and given to Cranfield, earl of Middlesex, who had married one of the "kindred." Buckingham himself, in time, seemed to clothe himself with half the offices in the country. He became warden of the Cinque Ports, chief justice in Eyre of all the parks and forests south of the Trent, master of the King's Bench Office, high steward of Westminster, and constable of Windsor Castle. In his person he was lavish and showy even to tawdriness. He was skilled in dancing, and therefore kept the court one scene of balls and masques. He had his Exeter herself, and that she had given it to them in the presence of lord Roos and his Spanish servant, Diego, at Wimbledon; and Sarah Swarton, a chambermaid, deposed that she had stood behind the hangings at the window where the interview took place, and saw and heard all that passed at that confession. This was a kind of case which called forth all the spirit of the detective in James. He despatched a messenger to lord Roos in Italy, who, with his man Diego, swore on the sacrament that the whole tale was a fabrication. James now professed to have discovered by indubitable signs that the instrument was a forgery, and mounting his horse without informing any tone of his object, he rode to Wimbledon, and satisfied himself, from the shortness of the hangings, that the legs of the maid would have been clothes trimmed at even an ordinary dance with great buttons of diamond, with diamond hatbands, cockades, and earrings; "he was yoked with manifold ropes and knots of pearl; in short, he was accustomed to be manacled, fettered, and imprisoned in jewels." Whilst the silly, doating old king was thus suffering the court to be overrun with the vermin of his favourite's relatives and retainers, and all offices of government and religion, and the business and revenues of the country to be thus shamefully sold, or thrown away on them and their customers, he was as keen as ever to discover some petty delinquency. A trial for adultery took place, in which Sir Thomas and lady Lake were accused of defaming lady Exeter. The defendants produced a written instrument, purporting to be a confession of her guilt in the handwriting of the countess of seen, and that therefore she was not there. The maid Swarton was condemned in the star-chamber to do penance in the church of St. Martin, and to be whipped at the cart'stail. Sir Thomas and lady Lake were fined ten thousand pounds payable to the king, and five thousand pounds payable to the calumniated countess, and besides to be imprisoned till they made their submission. But one of the most interesting and painful events of the reign of James, and one which does him little credit, now occurred. Sir Walter Raleigh, deprived of his beautiful estate of Sherborne, in Dorsetshire, "which he had beautified with orchards, gardens, and groves, of much variety and delight," as we have seen, to gratify the favourite Carr, had remained in the Tower from the time of his trial in 1603, that is, thirteen years. His captivity was rendered duced little effect, because the true persuasive with the greedy Villiers family was not applied. Meantime, Raleigh managed to interest secretary Winwood in a grand scheme which he had for discovering and working gold mines in Guiana. Raleigh, as our readers are aware, was of a romantic and adventurous turn. The admirals Drake, Hawkins, and Frobisher, with whom he had had the honour of defeating the grand Armada, had brought home immense treasure from the Spanish and Portuguese territories of South America. Raleigh himself had been engaged in the scheme of settling Virginia in North America, in the year 1584, when he procured a patent from Elizabeth—a copy of one granted still earlier to his half-brother, Sir Humphrey Gilbert-with full power to discover and settle any heathen lands not already in the possession of any Christian prince. In consequence, he had however, had all proved failures, and Sir Humphrey Gilbert, who conducted one of them, lost his life at sea. Sir Walter's enterprises, which had cost him much money, were immediate failures, failures to himself and his associates, but ultimate successes to the country, for they led to the settlement of that great northern American continent. less severe by the presence in the Tower of other prisoners of intelligence, and more than all the rest of the earl of Northumberland, whom we have already noticed as collecting round him in his prison men of science and literature, and thus converting his cell into a palace of knowledge and refined delight. Northumberland was another of those men who delighted in learning, whom a king really wise and learned would have delighted to honour. But James's love was not a love of learning or literature on its own account, it was a love of himself. It was the vanity of passing for a sagacious and learned king which he possessed, and not the sagacity and the learning themselves. Therefore, so far from cherishing science and learning, and loving the possessor of them, James was too shallow to comprehend the one, and so egotistical that he hated the other. Northumberland had been in prison ever since the year of the gun-equipped various expeditions to the coast of Virginia, which, powder plot, 1605, eleven years, a victim to the suspicions of the king and the tyranny of the star-chamber, for no participation in the plot was ever proved against him. Amongst his visitants and pensioners were, as we have stated, the most profound mathematicians of the age, Allen, Hariot, Warner, "the Atlantes of the mathematical world," Burchill, the celebrated Greek and Hebrew scholar, and other noted characters. Amongst them Sir Walter found the pleasure of cultivating inquiries which his busy public and court life had before kept unknown to him. He commenced a series of chemical experiments, and the celebrated Lucy Hutchinson, who was the daughter of Sir Allen Apsley, lieutenant of the Tower, in the preface to her interesting life of her husband, colonel Hutchinson, says, "Sir Walter Raleigh and Mr. Ruthin, being prisoners in the Tower, and addicting themselves to chemistry, my mother suffered them to make their rare experiments at her cost, partly to comfort and divert the poor prisoners, and partly to gain the knowledge of their experiments and the medicines, to help such poor people as were not able to seek physicians." In these chemical inquiries, Sir Walter imagined that he had discovered a universal panacea. The queen in an illness had taken it, and appeared cured by it, and afterwards, as we have seen, tried it in the case of prince Henry, but without effect. Sir Walter next turned his attention to history, and commenced a history of the world, a gigantic undertaking, but no doubt one that offered great consolation to the mind of a prisoner for life, from the very fact of its immensity, thus promising to him a constant forgetfulness of his captivity, and a busy discursiveness amid the peoples of the whole world. Such men as Burchill, who was not only a great classical scholar, but distinguished Latin poet, could furnish him with books and translations, by which means he has displayed so vast an acquaintance with Greek and rabbinical writers. Raleigh commenced his history for the instruction of prince Henry, who had a great regard for the author, and the death of that prince, in 1612, gave a check to the undertaking, and the whole which Raleigh completed, extends from the Creation to about a century and a half before the Christian era. The fall of Carr, in 1614, and the rise of Buckingham, awoke new hopes of liberty in Raleigh. His friends made zealous applications to the favourite, which for a time pro But still earlier, in 1595, he had made a voyage to Guiana. The glories of Drake and the other piratical admirals, and the wondrous legend of the golden empire of Guiana, with its inconceivable affluence, and the reported splendours of its capital, Manoa, called by the Spaniards El Dorado, or the golden city, inflamed his imagination. He sailed thither, touching at Trinidad, as if on his way to Virginia; and the Spaniards, deluded by this belief, entered into friendly relations, and bartered various commodities with him. But suddenly Raleigh, watching his opportunity, fell on the garrison, killed the guard, and secured the person of Berrio, the governor, whom he carried away as guide to Guiana, Berrio having already settled a colony there. This transaction, which was in the true spirit of Drake and the rest, who acted in those regions as if the Spaniards were at war, though they were at entire peace with England, was one of the charges afterwards brought against him. To this Raleigh replied that Berrio, at Trinidad, had formerly made prisoners of eight Englishmen, and that to leave him at his back when he was about to ascend the Orinoco, was to have been an ass. Whether the story of the eight Englishmen was true or not, it was clearly no business of Raleigh's, and the real motive was partly the last assigned, to secure so dangerous a person as Berrio, and at the same time so valuable a guide. In fact, Raleigh, with all his genius, was never renowned for very scrupulous ideas of right and wrong, and shared in all the loose maritime notions of the age. Thus provided, he sailed for the Orinoco, and advanced up it three hundred miles in boats. He seems to have heard many wonderful rumours of gold mines, and cities built of gold and silver, and embossed with precious stones; but he discovered no magnificent Manoa, with pinnacles blazing with diamonds and rubies, nor any gold mines, only signs of gold in the mountains beyond the Spanish town of St. Thomas. He gave out to the natives that he was come to relieve them of the Spaniards, and by their assistance explored the country for a month, when the waters of the mighty Orinoco rose so A.D. 1618.] FAILURE OF RALEIGH'S ENTERPRISE. 75 suddenly, and with such impetuosity, that they were carried ritories in possession of his allies, especially of the king of down at the peril of their lives to their ships. On his return Raleigh, though he brought no riches, brought marvellous descriptions of them. Though he had seen nothing but a pleasant country and friendly natives, he did not hesitate to publish the most amazing stories to draw fresh colleagues to the enterprise. He described the country and the climate in colours of heaven, and as for its riches, "the common soldier," he said, detailing the discovery of the large, rich, and beautiful empire of Guiana, with relations of the great and golden city, Manoa, "shall here fight for gold, and pay himself, instead of pence, with plates of half a foot broad, whereas he breaks his bones in other wars for provant and penury. Those commanders and chieftains that shoot at honour and abundance, shall find here more rich and beautiful cities, more temples adorned with golden images, more sepulchres filled with treasure, than either Cortez found in Mexico, or Pizarro in Peru." Probably Raleigh believed all this himself, on the faith of the natives; but though several expeditions went out, nothing of the kind was discovered. But these failures in no degree abated the enthusiasm of Raleigh. He represented to objectors that the adventurers sent out were ignorant alike of the locality and of the art of conciliating the natives. Were he permitted to go, he would make Guiana to England what Peru was to Spain. His glowing descriptions at length captivated the imagination of Winwood, who did his best to excite the cupidity of James on the subject, and not without effect, for he began to speak of Raleigh as a very clever and gallant fellow. The scheme suited James extremely well, as he was always in want of money, and Raleigh asked for nothing, not even a ship to accomplish the enterprise, but guaranteed to the king one-fifth of the gold. Still there was one obstacle; James dared not issue the desired commission without the approbation of the favourite, and this Raleigh and his friends were obliged to purchase by a present of fifteen hundred pounds to Buckingham's uncles, Sir Edward Villiers and Sir William St. John. In the month of August, 1616, Sir Walter issued from his thirteen years' captivity in the Tower, and commenced preparations for the voyage. Plenty of adventurers and co-operators were found: the countess of Bedford advanced eight thousand pounds, and lady Raleigh sold her estate at Micham for two thousand five hundred pounds. A fleet of fourteen sail was equipped and manned. But before Raleigh could get out to sea, the Spanish ambassador, Gondomar, had caught wind of the real destination of the squadron. The Spaniard was a deep politician, who assumed an air of gaiety and freedom which won on the courtiers, and not less on James, whose vanity he flattered to the utmost; often speaking false Latin, that James might correct him, he would reply, "Ah, your majesty speaks Latin like a pedant, but I only speak it like a gentleman." On making the discovery, Gondomar rushed into the presence of the king, exclaiming, "Pirates! pirates! pirates!" James, who was always paralysed at the very idea of war, sent in a hurry for Raleigh, took back the patent which he had granted him, and altered it with his own hand. He strictly prohibited the adventurers from invading any ter Spain, but commanded that they should confine their enterprise to countries still in the hands of the heathen. They were allowed to trade and to defend themselves if attacked, but not to act on the offensive. He, moreover, demanded from Raleigh a memorial under his own hand, of the places with which he meant to trade, and the force he carried out. All this James is said to have shown to Gondomar, so that, fully forewarned, he despatched a squadron with troops to St. Thomas, of which his brother was governor. In all this, it is clear that Raleigh was imposing on the king. This Raleigh himself admits in his address to lord Carew :-"I acquainted his majesty with my intention to land in Guiana, yet I never made it known to his majesty that the Spaniards had any footing there. Neither had I any authority from my patent to remove them thence." But this was a point on which Gondomar could and probably did enlighten James. After the guarantees given by Raleigh, Gondomar appears to have ceased his opposition; having, moreover, taken measures to guard against any attack in Guiana. On the 28th of March, 1617, the fleet set sail, but owing to bad weather, was obliged to put into Cork, where they lay till August, and did not reach the coast of Guiana till November 12th, after a troublesome voyage of four months. On arriving, two of his ships were missing: disease had reduced his men to a state of miserable weakness, forty-two on board Raleigh's own vessel having died. He himself was disabled for active service, and to his mortification he learned that a Spanish fleet was cruising near in order to intercept them. He wrote to his wife, that reduced as they were, he deemed himself in sufficient force to accomplish the enterprise if the care taken at home to let the Spaniards know of their numbers, had not caused all approaches to be fortified against them. Being unable to proceed immediately, he sent Captain Keymis up the river in boats to discover the mine, whilst he lay at its mouth to ward off the Spanish squadron. Keymis was said to have been at the mine they were in search of in the expedition of 1595. He began the ascent of the river on the 10th of December, under orders to make straight for the mine, and if he found it rich to fix himself there; if but poor, to bring away a basket of the ore to convince the king that they had gone out after a reality. The exploring force landed near St. Thomas, but found the Spaniards prepared for them; a battle ensued, in which the governor, the brother of Gondomar, was killed, but at the same time also fell the eldest son of Sir Walter, Captain Walter Raleigh. This enraged the soldiers, who carried the town of St. Thomas by storm, and set fire to it. They expected to find in it great wealth, but all that they discovered were two ingots of gold and four refining houses, whence any ore that there might have been was carried off. The Spaniards entrenched themselves in formidable positions amongst the hills-as the invaders supposed, betwixt them and the mines; but Keymis was so much discouraged by the death of young Raleigh, and the violent discontent of the men on discovering the emptiness of the place, and the preparations of the enemy, who again fired upon and killed several of them, that he gave up the enterprise, and dropped down the river again, |