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Title: The life and times of George Villiers, duke of Buckingham, Volume 1 (of 3) - From original and authentic sources
Author: Thomson, A. T., Mrs.
Language: English
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[Illustration:
I. H. BAKER, SC.
GEORGE VILLIERS,
_Duke of Buckingham_.
London: Hurst and Blackett.
]
THE LIFE AND TIMES
OF
GEORGE VILLIERS
DUKE OF BUCKINGHAM.
FROM ORIGINAL AND AUTHENTIC SOURCES.
BY MRS. THOMSON,
AUTHOR OF
“MEMOIRS OF THE COURT OF HENRY THE EIGHTH,”
“LIFE OF SIR WALTER RALEGH,”
“MEMOIRS OF SARAH, DUCHESS OF MARLBOROUGH,”
&c., &c.
IN THREE VOLUMES.
VOL. I.
LONDON:
HURST AND BLACKETT, PUBLISHERS,
SUCCESSORS TO HENRY COLBURN,
13, GREAT MARLBOROUGH STREET.
1860.
_The right of Translation is reserved._
PREFACE.
No complete life of this favourite of James I. and Charles I. has
hitherto appeared, except the biographical sketch by Sir Henry Wotton.
That interesting account deserves all credit, from the character of its
author; yet coming from one who owed Buckingham great obligations, it is
more of a eulogy than a memoir; and is evidently written with a view to
silence those slanderous attacks which not only pursued the Duke during
his life, but continued after his death.
The “Disparity between the Earl of Essex and the Duke of Buckingham,” by
Clarendon, printed, as well as Sir Henry Wotton’s Memoir in the
“Reliquiæ Wottonianæ,” bears, likewise, the impress of enthusiastic
admiration. It is the tribute of a partisan rather than the memorial of
an historian.
The opinions expressed, nevertheless, in both these works, have been
confirmed, in many points, by the letters in the State Paper Office, to
which historical writers have not only now free access, but which have
lately been arranged, whilst valuable Calendars have been published, so
as to facilitate investigations which were formerly most laborious. In
all that relates personally to George Villiers, the State Papers are
especially important.
The great Rebellion, amongst mightier devastations, swept away most of
that domestic correspondence which might otherwise have been found in
the three noble families who are collaterally descended from Buckingham;
those of the Earls of Jersey and Clarendon, and of his Grace the Duke of
Rutland, none of whom possess any letters of their unfortunate ancestor.
Nor is this fact to be wondered at, when we consider not only the stormy
period that succeeded Buckingham’s death, but the extreme youth of his
children at the time of his assassination, the second marriage of his
widow, and the long years of exile which his heir, George, the second
Duke of Buckingham of the house of Villiers, passed in wandering and
indigence.
The documents in the State Paper Office become, therefore, doubly
valuable, and every possible advantage has been taken of a mine so rich
in the present Memoir. It was, indeed, in 1849, some time before the
Calendars by Mrs. Everett Green, and Mr. Bruce, were published, that
this work was begun. The letters in the State Paper Office were then
merely arranged in chronological order, and divided into foreign and
domestic. But the valuable advice, the very great courtesy, and kind
assistance of Mr. Lechmere and Mr. Lemon, enabled the authoress still to
derive great benefit from her researches even at that time. Her work
having been laid aside, though nearly completed, during a residence of
several years on the Continent, the publication of the Calendars of
State Papers had, meantime, taken place, and they enabled her, in
resuming her task, to revise such parts of the memoir as had been
written, and to finish the whole with greater accuracy and fulness of
information than could otherwise have been done, and although the
revision has caused considerable delay and labour, it has been of
incalculable advantage to the work.
Of the Calendar for 1628-1629, which recently appeared, edited by Mr.
Bruce, the authoress has not been able to avail herself to the same
extent as of the four former volumes, since her work was nearly printed
before it was published. She has, therefore, been obliged to insert in
her Appendix the examination of Ben Jonson, and one or two other papers
which could not be interwoven with the narrative, although of great
interest. It is satisfactory to her to find that the contents of this,
the latest volume of the State Paper Calendars, confirm, in some
important points, the views which she has taken of Buckingham’s motives
and intentions. They also exhibit distinctly the great difficulties of
his course; and more especially in regard to the fatal expedition to La
Rochelle.
The authoress believes that she has discharged her task as a biographer
with impartiality: she confesses, nevertheless, to a strong interest in
the faulty but attractive character which she has attempted to
delineate. When stating, in her summary of the Duke’s qualities, that
time and trouble were rendering him a wiser and a better man, she was
ignorant of the following tribute to Buckingham, written, when all
patronage was closed by his death, by Dudley, Viscount Dorchester, to
the Queen of Bohemia, and printed in the last volume of the Calendar.
“The Duke declared a purpose to Dorchester on his (the Viscount’s) last
return from the Queen of Bohemia, which he has since often reiterated,
of making him, by his favour with the King his master, an instrument of
better days than they have seen of late, he having a firm resolution
(which he manifested to some other persons) to walk new ways, but upon
old grounds and maxims, both of religion and policy, finding his own
judgment to have been misled by errors of truth and persuasions of
persons he began better to know; so as knowing otherwise the nobleness
of his nature, and great parts and vigour, Dorchester had full
satisfaction in him himself, and made no doubt but the world would have,
notwithstanding the public hatred to which he was exposed. This
testimony Dorchester owes him after his death.”[1]
Footnote 1:
Calendar, edited by Mr. Bruce, for 1628, 1629, p. 270.
Of the restoration of the Navy by the strenuous efforts of the Duke the
State Papers present almost a chronicle. The authoress regrets that she
is not competent to do the subject justice; and hopes that some abler
hand may employ with more effect the copious materials which will be
found in those documents, of which she has touched merely on the leading
points. Her aim has been chiefly to shew the energy, the sometime lofty
purposes, of one who has been portrayed as a merely rapacious, vain,
remorseless oppressor.
The state of the times, the Impeachment, the Remonstrance, the Petition
of Right, all bear so strongly on the circumstances of the Duke’s life,
that it would be impossible, in a Memoir of him, to escape the difficult
office of explaining to some extent the intricate politics of the day.
In this attempt she also has derived her chief materials from the State
Papers. Personal incidents, trusts, manners, character, literature, the
arts, are subjects in regard to which the annals of this period are
calculated to afford a great amount of instruction and interest.
The authoress has already expressed her obligations to Mr. Lechmere and
Mr. Lemon; to Mr. Bruce she also begs to offer her thanks for a
suggestion by which she is enabled to insert an interesting account of
the murder of Buckingham, in a letter from Lord Dorchester. (See page
112, vol. iii.)
She begs also to express her sense of the valuable aid afforded her by
her friend, Mr. Amos, Professor of Law, Downing College, Cambridge, to
whose kindness and great historical knowledge she is indebted for much
that has facilitated her efforts.
March 1, 1860.
CONTENTS OF VOL. I.
CHAPTER I.
State of England on the Accession of James I. compared with
that when Elizabeth began to Reign—The Great Rebellion
Attributable to the Misrule of James—Allusion of Lord
Clarendon to this Subject—The Luxury of a Favourite
Essential to James since the Age of Fourteen—Birth and
Origin of George Villiers—His Family little known to Fame
until his Elevation—The Sneers thrown upon it by Sir
Symonds D’Ewes; and its Claims to Honourable Descent
Considered—Sir Henry Wotton’s Testimony—The Family of
Villiers long known in the County of Leicester—The
Different Spellings of the Name—The Fortunes of the Family
in France—Remark of Lord Clarendon upon the Condition of
the Villiers Family in England—Also of the Historian
Sanderson—Brookesby, the Native Place of George
Villiers—His Mother, Mary Beaumont—Her Menial Condition in
the Family of Sir George Villiers—His Marriage—The Family
by a Former Union—Sir William Villiers—John, Viscount
Purbeck—The Children of the Second Marriage: Mary,
Countess of Denbigh—Christopher, George—Lady Villiers
retires to Goadby—Her Efforts for her Son’s Benefit—His
Education, Disposition, and Acquirements—The Slender Means
of his Mother—Her Second Marriage to Sir Thomas
Compton—George Villiers sent to Paris to complete his
Education—State of that Capital in the 17th
Century—Villiers returns from Paris, improved, and repairs
to his Mother’s House at Goadby 1
CHAPTER II.
James I., his Disapproval of the Gentry crowding into
London—Disgust Entertained by the Old Families to him and
his Court—The Clintons, Blounts, Veres, and Willoughby
D’Eresbys show it—Character of Sir Thomas Lake—William,
Earl of Pembroke, the Early Patron of Villiers—Account of
the First Introduction of Villiers to James—Ambitious
Views which it Suggested—His Attachment to the Daughter of
Sir Roger Ashton—Their Engagement Broken off—Account of
the King’s Visit to Cambridge in 1614-15—Some Description
of the Courtly Ladies who were present there—The Queen’s
Absence—Countess of Arundel—Countess of Somerset—Countess
of Salisbury—Lady Howard of Walden—Performance of the Play
of “Ignoramus” in Clare Hall—The Design of this Comedy to
Ridicule the Common Law—Admiration expressed by the King,
during the Performance, of the Personal Appearance of
Villiers, who was Present—The Subsequent Representations
referred to 33
CHAPTER III.
The Fascination of Villiers’s Character as opposed to the
Venality of Somerset—Lord Clarendon’s Opinion—The
Friendship of Archbishop Abbot—Character of the
Primate—His Affection for Villiers—Anecdote of Villiers
when Cup-Bearer. He is befriended by Anne of Denmark—By
her means Knighted—Singular Scene in the Queen’s
Chamber—Jealousy of Somerset—Ingratitude afterwards shewn
by Villiers to Abbot—Abbot commits Manslaughter—Is
pardoned by the King—The Incessant Pleasures of the
Court—Horse-Racing—Ben Jonson’s “Golden Age
Restored”—Allusion in it to Somerset, and to Overbury—An
Angry Interview between Villiers and Somerset—Villiers
supplants the Favourite—He uses no Unfair Means to do
so—Discovery of Somerset’s Guilt by Winwood, who finds
Proofs of it in an Old Trunk—Somerset’s Downfall—Bacon’s
Letter to Villiers—Villiers continues to Profit by the
Delinquencies and Disgrace of Somerset 71
CHAPTER IV.
The King’s Projects—A Journey to Scotland—Obstacles to that
Intention—Want of Money—£100,000 raised in the
City—Dislike of the People to this Journey, on Account of
Expense—James sets out, March 13th, 1616-1617—His
Attendant Courtiers, Sir John Zouch, Sir George Goring,
Sir John Finett—Characteristics of Each—Surpassing
Qualities of Buckingham—Objects of James’s Journey to
Edinburgh—Anecdote of Lord Howard of Walden—Disputations
at St. Andrews—The King knights many of the Young
Courtiers—Offence given at Edinburgh by Laud—A Project to
assassinate Buckingham Suspected—James’s Progress
Concluded—His Visit to Warwick—Affairs relating to Sir
Edward Coke and his Family—Base Conduct of all the Parties
Concerned—Meanness of Bacon—His Letters—Frances
Hatton—Contrast between her and the Earl of Oxford brought
forward by Lady Hatton—Coke restored to Favour—Marriage of
Frances Hatton to Lord Purbeck 139
CHAPTER V.
Buckingham’s Favour Paramount—Change in the King’s
Temper—His Poetic Flights—His Reign a Course of
Dissipation—The Masques of Ben Jonson—Their Great
Beauty—Patronized by the Queen—How Performed—The Vision of
Delight—Composed to Celebrate Buckingham’s being made a
Marquis—His Appearance at this Era—The Banquet given for
this Occasion—Great Extravagance of the
Entertainment—Rivals to Buckingham in James’s Favour—Sir
Henry Mildmay—Brooke—Young Morrison—The Diversions of the
Court—The Meteor that appeared—Foot-Racing—Buckingham’s
Profusion—Jealousies between Prince Charles and him 189
CHAPTER VI.
Review of the State of Political Affairs—Dissolution of
Parliament—Protest—James tears it out of the Journals of
the House of Commons—Acts of Oppression—Case of the Earl
of Oxford—of Lord Southampton—Persecution of Sir Edward
Coke—The Conduct and Impeachment of Lord Bacon—The Part
taken by Buckingham in this Affair—The Abuses of
Monopolies—Case of Sir Giles Mompesson—Of Sir Francis
Michell—Bacon’s Letters to Parliament—His Illness—The
Great Seal taken from Him—James’s Reluctance to act with
Vigour—Sheds Tears upon the Occasion—Bacon still protected
by Buckingham—Williams, Bishop of Lincoln, is made
Chancellor—His Character, by Bishop Goodman 275
CHAPTER VII.
The Spanish Treaty—Negotiations between the Duke of Lerma
and Lord Digby—The Infanta described by Lord Digby—Her
Great Beauty, Piety, and Sweetness—The Description of her
by Toby Matthew—She is disposed to receive Charles’s
Addresses—Gondomar—Attentions shown to him in England—Ely
House allotted for his Reception—Jealousy of the
Protestants at the Favour shown him—First Notion of
Charles’s Journey to Spain suggested by Buckingham—His
Arguments in Favour of it—Obstacles to the Prince’s
Marriage with the Infanta—Buckingham’s Debts and
Difficulties—Interview between Gondomar and the Duke of
Lennox—Journey of Charles and Buckingham into Spain—They
stop in Paris—Louis XIII.—Anne of Austria—Henrietta
Maria—They proceed to Madrid—Reception there—Entrance in
State into that City—Countess of Philip IV.—Festivities in
Honour of the Prince—The King’s Letters to him 315
------------------------------------------------------------------------
CHAPTER I.
STATE OF ENGLAND ON THE ACCESSION OF JAMES I. COMPARED WITH THAT WHEN
ELIZABETH BEGAN TO REIGN—THE GREAT REBELLION ATTRIBUTABLE TO THE
MISRULE OF JAMES—ALLUSION OF LORD CLARENDON TO THIS SUBJECT—THE
LUXURY OF A FAVOURITE ESSENTIAL TO JAMES SINCE THE AGE OF
FOURTEEN—BIRTH AND ORIGIN OF GEORGE VILLIERS—HIS FAMILY LITTLE
KNOWN TO FAME UNTIL HIS ELEVATION—THE SNEERS THROWN UPON IT BY SIR
SYMONDS D’EWES; AND ITS CLAIMS TO HONOURABLE DESCENT
CONSIDERED—SIR HENRY WOTTON’S TESTIMONY—THE FAMILY OF VILLIERS
LONG KNOWN IN THE COUNTY OF LEICESTER—THE DIFFERENT SPELLINGS OF
THE NAME—THE FORTUNES OF THE FAMILY IN FRANCE—REMARK OF LORD
CLARENDON UPON THE CONDITION OF THE VILLIERS FAMILY IN
ENGLAND—ALSO OF THE HISTORIAN SANDERSON—BROOKESBY, THE NATIVE
PLACE OF GEORGE VILLIERS—HIS MOTHER, MARY BEAUMONT—HER MENIAL
CONDITION IN THE FAMILY OF SIR GEORGE VILLIERS—HIS MARRIAGE—THE
FAMILY BY A FORMER UNION—SIR WILLIAM VILLIERS—JOHN, VISCOUNT
PURBECK—THE CHILDREN OF THE SECOND MARRIAGE: MARY, COUNTESS OF
DENBIGH, CHRISTOPHER, GEORGE—LADY VILLIERS RETIRES TO GOADBY—HER
EFFORTS FOR HER SON’S BENEFIT—HIS EDUCATION, DISPOSITION, AND
ACQUIREMENTS—THE SLENDER MEANS OF HIS MOTHER—HER SECOND MARRIAGE,
TO SIR THOMAS COMPTON—GEORGE VILLIERS SENT TO PARIS TO COMPLETE
HIS EDUCATION—STATE OF THAT CAPITAL IN THE 17th CENTURY—VILLIERS
RETURNS FROM PARIS, IMPROVED, AND REPAIRS TO HIS MOTHER’S HOUSE AT
GOADBY.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
LIFE AND TIMES OF
GEORGE VILLIERS.
----------
=CHAPTER I.=
The historians who attribute the calamities of the Great Rebellion to
the misrule of James the First, under the pernicious influence of his
favourites, draw a lively parallel between the condition of England at
the accession of that monarch and the state of peril and embarrassment
with which his great predecessor had to contend. Elizabeth, whose
inauguration, long celebrated, after her death, as a day of jubilee, was
regarded as the commencement of national prosperity, came to the throne
under very adverse circumstances. The functions of Government were
clogged with debt. The miserable state of the navy required a constant
vigilance to repel the chance of invasion, and to drive away pirates by
whom the narrow seas were infested. The revenues of the Crown were
insufficient to maintain its power and dignity; the country, moreover,
was embroiled in religious dissensions; whilst the authority of the
Queen was lessened by a disputed succession, and her mind harassed and
embittered by the pretensions of the Dauphin of France to the Crown of
England, in right of his wife, Mary Stuart.
James, on the contrary, began his reign with every exterior advantage.
His claim to the sovereignty was undoubted; and various causes had
concurred to give great influence to the Crown. The subservient tributes
of respect paid to its dignity were such as even to astonish the envoys
of despotic France. Elizabeth had been served and addressed by her
subjects on the knee; James, at all events for a time, continued that
abject custom, which was a type of the prevailing national sentiment
towards royalty. Commerce, in spite of monopolies, and of the
injudicious interference of the Legislature with wages, was advancing;
leases granted of large tracts of land had increased the opulence of the
country; the improved prospects of the landholders acted on the
prosperity of the manufacturing classes: whilst the general welfare was
increased by emigration; the religious persecutions on the Continent,
driving from foreign towns ingenious workmen, sent them into England,
where they introduced arts hitherto unknown in this country. The
Constitution, too, had been maintained; and, with the exception of the
court of the Star Chamber, over which James presided in person, the
principles of liberty had not been materially invaded. There was no
standing army; the tenets of Protestantism were established; and the
Presbyterian education of the King afforded a hope that certain traces
of the faith which had been renounced would die away, and that
ceremonials which were objectionable to many would be speedily
discontinued. Thus, the first of the Stuart Kings enjoyed blessings not
possessed by any of his predecessors; and, ascending the throne, opened
a new era in the history of the country.[2]
Footnote 2:
Brodie’s Constitutional History, vol. i., p. 337.
James, nevertheless, was not long in showing how fallacious were all
expectations founded on his good sense, and on the supposed liberal
views which a people, now intelligent and prosperous, fondly anticipated
in their ruler. Educated by Buchanan as if he had been destined for the
Tutor of a College rather than for a King; his memory crammed; his
capacity clogged with ill-digested learning; prejudiced as a Scotchman,
yet prejudiced against the established church of his native country,
James well merited the sneering appellation of Henry IV. of France, who
called him “Captain of Wits and Clerk of Arms,”[3] and proved, too
lamentably, how easy it is by wrong-headedness to embroil and debase a
country.
Footnote 3:
Sully’s Memoirs, vol. i., p. 309.
The blunders which James committed in his civil government began before
the subject of this memoir was introduced to royal notice; yet, since
George Villiers, first Duke of Buckingham, figured prominently in that
period which is supposed to have been the commencement of decay, the
origin of the Great Rebellion has been attributed to his
maladministration, nor has the grave responsibility been absolutely
disavowed, even by Lord Clarendon, the apologist and admirer of the Duke
of Buckingham.
“I am not,” writes Lord Clarendon, “so sharp-sighted as those who have
discerned the Rebellion contriving from (if not before) the death of
Queen Elizabeth, and fomented by several Princes and great Ministers of
State in Christendom to the time it broke out; neither do I look back so
far, because I believe the design to have been so long since formed, but
that, by viewing the tempers, dispositions, and habits at that time of
the Court and country, we may discern the minds of men prepared, of some
to act, and of others to suffer all that has since happened.”[4]
Footnote 4:
History of the Rebellion.
Whatsoever may have been the faults of James the First, it is probable
that they would not essentially have affected the well-being of his son,
had not the system of favouritism, which was one of James’s greatest
weaknesses, acted upon the character of the young Prince, whose earliest
associations were stamped with devotion to Buckingham. At once minister,
minion, and master, the power behind the throne, to whose dictation,
during the years of his brief and bright career, even the High Court of
Parliament submitted—the distinction of being the last royal favourite
in England is due to this ill-fated man. By him the “sluice of honour,”
as an old writer expresses it, “was opened and closed at pleasure.” He
was to King James a sort of “Parhelion,”[5] at whose course foreign
Courts wondered, whilst the sagacious and prophetic at home trembled as
they beheld at once its eccentricity and its splendour. At his death the
experiment, which had been tried once too often, was abandoned, never to
be renewed; and no acknowledged successor in the meteoric career of
Buckingham ever appeared before the dazzled gaze of our countrymen. The
minutest circumstances relative to his origin are interesting, not only
as they concern one whose noble bearing and powers of fascination almost
effaced, during his life, the remembrance of his errors, but as they
unfold the foundation of a great family which still influences our
national councils.
Footnote 5:
Bishop Hacket’s Life of the Lord Keeper Williams, p. 39.
Until the elevation of George Villiers from low estate to an
unparalleled career of success, the race from which he sprang, though
ancient and honourable, was but partially known to fame, and his
ancestors, how valiant and loyal soever they had proved, had held the
tenor of their way with little variation, and with only an occasional
gleam of celebrity on one or other of its lineage; a course of moderate
prosperity maintaining, without altering, its condition—rather, as Sir
Henry Wotton has well expressed it, “without obscurity than with any
great lustre.”[6] “I will, however,” adds the same quaint writer, after
referring to the difficulty of making a proper estimate of all public
characters, “show, therefore, as evenly as I can, and deduce him from
his cradle through the deep and lubrick waves of State and Court till he
be swallowed in the Gulf of Fatality.”[7]
Footnote 6:
Reliquiæ Wottonianæ. Life of Geo. Villiers, Duke of Buckingham, p.
208.
Footnote 7:
Reliquiæ Wottonianæ.
It was the fashion of those who were opposed to the Duke of Buckingham
in his political career to speak with contempt of his origin, and thus
attack one who was endowed with every possible advantage of natural
gifts—and upon whom honours were lavished—on what was erroneously
supposed to be his vulnerable point. Sir Symonds D’Ewes, as might be
expected, was not backward in his strictures against a courtier so
favoured and envied. He compares Villiers, indeed, to a man of the
highest rank, but draws the parallel in these offensive terms:—“He was
likest to Henry Loraine, Duke of Guise, in the most of the later
passages of his life and death, that possible could be, onelie in this
they differed, that Guise was a prince born, but Buckingham was but a
younger son of an ordinarie familie of gentrie, of which the coat
armoure was so meane as either in this age or of late years, without any
ground, right, or authoritie, that I could see, they deferred their owne
coate armoure, and bare the arms of Weyland, a Suffolke family, being
argent on a cross gules, five escalops, &c.”[8] And again, when speaking
of Felton, the assassin of the Duke, Sir Simond cannot forbear
remarking:—“His familie was, doubtless, more noble and ancient than the
Duke of Buckingham’s, and his ende much blesseder.”[9] To similar
strictures does Wotton probably refer, when he remarks that, in “a wilde
pamphlet” published about the Duke of Buckingham, the writers, “beside
other pityfule malignities, would scant allow him to be a gentleman.”
Footnote 8:
Quoted in Nichols’s History of Leicestershire, vol. iii., p. 189.
Footnote 9:
Nichol’s History of Leicestershire.
It is far easier to make a charge of this nature than to maintain it,
for the family of Villiers had long been known in the County of
Leicester, where it removed from Kinalton, in Nottinghamshire, the first
place of migration from Normandy; where, writes Sir Henry Wotton, “it
had been long seated.” It does not appear that Leicestershire was the
only place of residence which the ancestors of George Villiers
possessed; as the same authority expresses it, they “_chiefly_
continued” in that county for the space of four hundred years before the
birth of the first Duke of Buckingham;[10] a time long enough, one might
suppose, to satisfy a reasonable genealogist.
Footnote 10:
Reliquiæ Wottonianæ, p. 208.
The name of Villiers, conformably to the arbitrary spelling of ancient
times, was written differently, sometimes Villiers, at others Villers,
Villeres, and Vyleres; nor did those who bore this famous surname
finally adopt the spelling “Villiers” until the reign of James I.
The founder of the family, Philip de Villers, of Lisle Adam, was a
Norman Seigneur; he was also Grand Master of the Island of Rhodes, and
signalized himself in the defence of that island against the Turks.
After the conquest, certain lands in Leicestershire were granted by
William the Conqueror to a Norman Knight hearing the appellation De
Villers; but another branch of the same race remained in France, and its
various members have been distinguished in courts, in arms, and as
legislators. Argiver de Villers was sewer[11] to Philip the First;
Pierre de Villers held the office of Grand Master in his native country,
under Charles the Sixth.[12]
Footnote 11:
Fuller’s Worthies of Leicestershire.
Footnote 12:
Sanderson’s Lives of Mary, Queen of Scots, and her Son, p. 467.
Invention was therefore not requisite to dignify the long unbroken line
of respectable progenitors to whom George Villiers owed his origin.
“Heraldry,” remarks a certain writer, when referring to this celebrated
man, “might blazon as large fields of his pedigree as might concern any
subject to prove.”[13] Without bringing that assertion to the test, it
is sufficient to add that successive generations flourished and passed
away, sometimes emerging from their seclusion to follow the reigning
monarch to the wars, as in the instances of Sir Alexander de Villers,
and Sir Nicholas his son, the former assisting Edward the First in the
Crusades, and adding to his name the designation of “Brookesby;” and the
latter, after sundry exploits in the Holy Land, augmenting his armorial
bearings by the Cross of St. George and five escalop shells, ancient
badges of the Crusaders; so that the “coat armour,” esteemed so mean by
Sir Symonds D’Ewes, and said to have been borrowed, was not without its
distinctions, even at an early period.
Footnote 13:
An officer appointed to serve up a feast.
But it is singular that from a personage of lowly fortunes, if not of
humble family, sprang the generation which was so noted in its time.
At Brookesby, the manorial residence of the race, there had dwelt, for
several centuries, successive proprietors, little remarkable, since the
time of the valiant Crusaders, either for their career in arms, or for
their ambition to rise in the State. A stream, dignified by the name of
the River Wreke, flows near the house, which is said to have been the
residence of the Villiers family; a gentleman’s seat, a plain and
somewhat insignificant building, having a central division, and two
projecting wings, now owns the name of Brookesby.[14]
Footnote 14:
It is situated nine miles from Leicester, and six from Melton Mowbray.
The town of Brookesby has, of late years, been returned as a decayed
town; but its church is worthy of note in a county which, as Fuller
remarks, “affordeth no cathedrals, and as for the parish churches, they
may take the eye, but not ravish the admiration of the beholder.” This
structure, dedicated to St. Michael, boasts a handsome tower, above
which rises a small spire, well crocheted; the battlements of the tower
are remarkably beautiful, being open worked, and embellished with a row
of shields, of which the most conspicuous is that of George Villiers,
first Duke of Buckingham, and of his Duchess, and on it there is an
honorary augmentation, showing the descent which he claimed from the
blood royal of Edward the Fourth.[15] It seems as if, amid the decay
which surrounds it, this church has remained as a witness of the former
greatness of that now extinct branch of the Villiers family, whose
glories emblazon its battlements and windows. The direct line of the
favourite of James the First ceased in two generations after his proud
and brief career.
Footnote 15:
Nichols’s History of Leicestershire, vol. iii., p. 189.
From the retirement of Brookesby, one of its owners was summoned, during
a royal progress, to the presence of Queen Elizabeth. This was Sir
George Villiers, the father of the Duke of Buckingham, who was
consequently knighted, when High Sheriff for Leicestershire,[16] by the
Queen. Sir George married the daughter of William Sanders, of
Harrington, in the County of Northampton, and had by that marriage two
sons, William, who inherited Brokesby and became a baronet; and Edward,
afterwards President of Munster, and the ancestor of the present Earl of
Jersey.
Footnote 16:
In 1591. Nichols’s History of Leicestershire.
Three daughters were also the issue of this marriage; Elizabeth, who
married Lord Butler, of Bramfield; Anne, who married William Washington,
of Pakington, County of Leicester; and Frances, unmarried.[17] Their
mother died, and Sir George, perhaps imprudently, for his estate was not
considerable, formed a second union.
Footnote 17:
Collins’s Peerage. Edited by Sir Egerton Brydges. Art., Jersey.
Some circumstances rendered this step, indeed, peculiarly indiscreet;
and nothing could account for so rash an act in a man of grave years,
but an infatuation produced by extraordinary personal gifts, and
probably by some ability and management on the part of his second wife.
It is evident that the Knight had never contemplated the probability of
such an event, for he settled the greater portion of his estates upon
his first wife and her children; and a mere pittance remained for the
issue of any second marriage. Yet, in spite of these considerations, Sir
George Villiers was captivated by a handsome person, the attractions of
which appear not to have been wholly lost upon him even during the
lifetime of the first Lady Villiers.
It happened that among the inferior servants of his household, there
lived a young woman, named Mary Beaumont, the indigent member of an
ancient family,[18] by some asserted to have been that of the Beaumonts
of Cole-Orton, in Leicestershire, by others, to have been settled at
Glenfield, in the same county.
Footnote 18:
Roger Coke’s Detection of the Court of James I., vol. i., p. 81. See,
also, note in the Secret History of the Court of King James I., vol.
i., p. 444, edited by Sir Walter Scott.
The occupation of Mary Beaumont is stated to have been that of a
“kitchen-maid” in the house of Sir George Villiers, but this assertion
may possibly be traced to the desire of a certain class of writers to
debase as much as possible the family of Villiers.
That she was, however, in a menial capacity of some kind, appears from
common report to have been understood.[19] “Her ragged habit,” observes
a contemporary historian, “could not shade the beautiful and excellent
frame of her person, which Sir George, taking notice of, prevailed with
his lady to remove her out of the kitchen into her chamber, which, with
much importunity on Sir George’s part, and unwillingness of my lady, at
last was done.”
Footnote 19:
Sir Anthony Weldon, speaking of the Duke of Buckingham, observes, that
his “father was of an ancient family, his mother of a mean, and a
waiting gentlewoman, with whom the old man (Sir George Villiers) fell
in love.” Secret History, vol. i., p. 442, edited by Sir Walter Scott.
After the death of his wife, the sentiments of the widower were
expressed without reserve. He was observed “to look very sweet upon my
lady’s woman;” he was known to bestow upon her twenty pounds, to
purchase as good a dress as that sum would procure; and when he saw her
attired in a manner suitable to her age and loveliness, he was
transported with admiration. The result may easily be conceived; the
knight married the serving-maid, and as ambitious a spirit as ever
stimulated the energies of woman thus received its first gratification.
Endowed by nature with such profuse outward gifts, Mary Beaumont
possessed, no less, the advantages of a shrewd sense; she was fond, as
her subsequent career showed, of state and profusion; she became, from
her influence and her attractions, the leader of the highest circles;
whilst she retained over the mind of her son that sway which she
deservedly acquired by her care of his infancy and childhood.
In after times, it is curious to find Mary Beaumont, then Lady Villiers
Compton, inviting her country kindred to Court, and providing a place
for them to learn to carry themselves in a “Court-like manner.” It was
the lowly serving-maid who first introduced what were called Country
Dances instead of French dances, which her provincial relations could
not learn soon enough for their deportment to assimilate with the costly
garments with which their prodigal kinswoman supplied them, in order
that they might do her credit in the gay spheres to which they were
introduced.[20]
Footnote 20:
Secret History, vol. i., edited by Sir Walter Scott.
Three sons and a daughter were the offspring of this marriage; the
eldest, John, afterwards created Baron Villiers, of Stoke, and Viscount
Purbeek, was singularly infelicitous in his domestic life, but is said,
by an historian adverse to the family, to have “exceeded them all in wit
and honesty, and, by his influence, to have kept his brother George in
some bounds of modesty, whilst he lived with him, by speaking plain
English to him.”[21]
Footnote 21:
Nichols’s Progresses of James I., vol. iv., p. 688.
The next child of the second marriage was George Villiers, who was born
at Brookesby, on the 20th of August in the year 1592.[22] Another son,
Christopher, became eventually Baron Daventry, and Earl of Anglesea; a
daughter, Mary, afterwards Countess of Denbigh, was also born, to
encumber, as it seemed, the limited means with which the parents of this
younger race were scarcely able to endow them.
Footnote 22:
Fuller styles him the second son of his mother, and the fourth of his
father.—Fuller’s Worthies of Leicestershire.
On the fourth of January, 1605-6, Sir George Villiers died. His landed
property consisted at that time of the Manors of Brookesby, Howby, Godby
Marward, and the Grange of Goadby. These were all settled on the
children of his first marriage. He was also lay improprietor of the
tithes of herbage and hay, in the parishes of Cadewell and Wikeham, and
these, he settled on the three sons of Mary Beaumont, John, George and
Christopher;[23] his daughter appears to have been left wholly
portionless. When it is remembered that this family were all raised to
rank and opulence, and that they were, in various instances, the sources
from which the ancestry of several great houses is derived, the early
privation and difficulties of their career form a strong contrast to
their subsequent elevation.
Footnote 23:
Nichols’s Hist. of Leicestershire, p. 189.
It was not alone poverty that seemed likely to keep the younger children
of Sir George Villiers in obscurity; there were wanting in his father’s
heir those qualities which bring the humble forward, and enrich more
than even prudence and frugality. Sir William, who now took possession
of Brookesby, was contented with his country lot; and so much did he
despise honours and titles, that when he was created a Baronet in
1619,[24] the dignity was almost forced upon him. “He was,” says a
contemporary author, “so careless of honour in courting that compliment,
as that the King (James First) said, ‘Sir William would scarce give him
thanks for it, and doubted whether he would accept of it.’” Thus, little
assistance in the career of life could be expected from one who would
scarcely deem the prizes most sought for by men, worth the trouble of a
little personal exertion.
Footnote 24:
This title, the 109th baronetcy, ceased in 1711, when the elder branch
of the Villiers family became extinct by the death of the third
Baronet, Sir William, without issue.
Upon the death of her husband, Lady Villiers retired to Godby Marward,
which was appropriated to her as a dower house. Her son, George, was
then ten years old; the loss which he had sustained in the death of his
father, great as it seemed, was fully compensated by the care of her
whom Sir Henry Wotton entitles “his beautiful and provident mother.” The
promising boy had already received some education at Billesdon, in
Leicestershire, where he was sent to school, and instructed in music and
in some “slight literature;” but to no common hands would Lady Villiers,
as the dawning personal charms of her son unfolded, entrust the culture
of this, her favourite child; she had him, henceforth, as his biographer
expresses it, “in her especial care.”[25] Possibly, in her widowed
seclusion, when she looked upon the face which afterwards captivated all
beholders, she anticipated the day when her son should appear at Court,
and attract some marks of that royal favour which had been shewn to
Leicester, to Raleigh, and to Essex for no better reason than that they
were handsomer and more graceful than their compeers, and that their
manly beauty was set off by the gallant bearing of well-trained “carpet
knights.” Queen Elizabeth had taught her subjects to value those
attributes which had sunk so low in fashion and estimation in the
troublous reign of Mary, or during the short and saintly career of
Edward.
Footnote 25:
Reliquiæ Wottonianæ.
Lady Villiers had the discernment to perceive the deficiencies of her
son’s mind and character, and resolved to avail herself of those
advantages with which he was endowed, without forcing his attention to
pursuits that were ungenial to him. She soon discovered that he was
neither inclined to reflection, nor disposed to study; nor did he ever
alter in those respects, but continued, through life, illiterate, a
defect which his readiness in some measure supplied, but which prevented
his becoming a great statesman, in spite of the fairest opportunities
that ever man enjoyed. In after life he learned, when at Court, “to sift
and question well,”[26] and to supply his own shallow stock of
information by “drawing or flowing unto him” the best sources of
experience and knowledge in others. His manner, says Sir Henry Wotton,
was so sweet and attractive, “in seeking what might be for the public or
his own proper use, that if the Muses favoured him not, the Graces were
his friends;” and Lord Clarendon remarks of Villiers, that “concerning
the traits and endowments of his mind, if the consideration of learning
extend itself not further than drudgery in books, the Duke’s employment
forbids us to suspect him of being any great scholar; but if a nimble
and fluent expression and delivery of his mind (and his discourse was of
all subjects) in a natural and proper dialect be considered, he was well
lettered.”[27]
Footnote 26:
Reliquiæ Wottonianæ.
Footnote 27:
Disparity between Robert Davereux, Earl of Essex, and the Duke of
Buckingham, by Lord Clarendon.
Lady Villiers seems both to have foreseen all these defects, and to have
prognosticated the atoning graces in her son. She acted as a needy and
ambitious woman was likely to act. Instead of supplying the deficiencies
of her son’s character and intellect by a sound education, she directed
his attention to dancing, fencing, and the other exercises, styled by
Lord Clarendon “the conservative qualities and ornaments of youth.”[28]
And in these pursuits so rapid a progress was made, that the tutors of
all the three brothers were obliged to restrain the progress of George
Villiers in order that their other pupils should not be disheartened by
his proficiency. Meantime, his expanding beauty of form and face seemed
to his proud mother to render her son worthy of a higher culture than
that which she could bestow upon him at Godby. Her jointure was very
small, and although Godby, where she resided, was a suitable abode for
the widow of Sir George Villiers, the Manor House being large enough to
receive James the First and his retinue during a royal progress, yet her
poverty obliged her to live in great retirement. A rigid economy must
have been necessary to regulate its household. Lady Villiers had only
two hundred a-year, both for herself and her family, and that income was
to cease at her death, when her orphan children would have but a
pittance besides their beauty and their talents.[29] Impelled, as it is
hinted by several historians, by a desire to benefit her children, the
widowed lady, still young and fair, resolved to marry again. Sir Thomas
Marquin was first the object of her choice, and after his death, she
bestowed her hand upon Sir Thomas Compton, Knight of the Bath, and
brother of Lord Compton, First Earl of Northampton, whose marriage with
the daughter of Sir John Spencer, Lord Mayor of London, and commonly
called “rich Spencer,” had brought an increase of honour and influence
to his family. This union was the more important to Lady Villiers and
her children, because their half-brothers and sisters looked upon them
with no good will, and were little disposed to further their interests.
Footnote 28:
Ibid.
Footnote 29:
Coke’s Detection, p. 81.
It was at that time the custom to send our young nobility, and even
their inferiors, to France to complete their education. Lady Villiers
resolved to afford her son George this advantage. She selected him from
her other children partly from partiality, for it is expressly stated
that “he who was debarred from his father’s estate was happy in his
mother’s love;”[30] and partly on account of his singular beauty of
person. He is said, indeed, to have had, when he reached man’s estate,
“no blemish from head to foot,” save that his eyebrows are stated to
have been somewhat over pendulous, a defect which some of his admirers
thought to be redeemed by the uncommon brilliancy of the eyes which
flashed beneath them.[31] The Earl of Essex, to whom Villiers is
compared, was taller, and of an “abler body” than the favourite of James
I. But Villiers had the “neater limbs and freer delivery, he carried his
well-proportioned body well, and every movement was graceful.” Nor does
Lord Clarendon, who thus describes him, think it beneath the dignity of
his subject to remark that Villiers “exceeded in the daintiness of his
leg and foot,” whilst Essex was celebrated for his hands, which, says
his panegyrist, though it be but feminine praise, “he took from his
father.”[32] The complexion of George Villiers was singularly clear and
beautiful, his forehead high and smooth, his eyes dark and full of
intelligence and sweetness, whilst the perfect oval of his face, and
delicate turn of features, fine, yet noble, and the air of refinement
which characterised both his countenance and his bearing, rendered him
one of the most attractive of human beings. As he attained to maturity,
a peculiar courtesy of manner, a frankness and merriment which diverged
at times into a total forgetfulness of forms, a power of throwing off
the appearance of all oppressing business and secret cares, although of
these he had his share, and of assuming “a very pleasant and vacant
face,” a love of social life, and certain traits of character, half
folly, half romance, won upon everyone that approached him before
prosperity had changed courtesy into arrogance, or political intrigues
marred the open expression of a physiognomy on which none could look
without admiration.
Footnote 30:
Reliquiæ Wottonianæ.
Footnote 31:
Fuller’s Worthies of Leicestershire.
Footnote 32:
Reliquiæ Wottonianæ, 171.
The youth, whose promise, even at a very early age, augured the results
which I have anticipated, reached Paris after the death of Henry IV.[33]
It was probably in the autumn that Villiers repaired to the Continent,
since it is expressly stated that he was eighteen when he undertook that
journey, and he had not attained that age until August, 1610. It seems,
therefore, likely that Villiers beheld France under a strange aspect,
that of a universal state of despair. Protestants and Catholics were
alike overwhelmed by the recent calamity; the former might well dread a
fresh massacre, but the grief of their Roman Catholic fellow-countrymen
dispelled that apprehension. The excess of lamentation, expressed
somewhat theatrically—the cries of widows and orphans in the streets—the
sight of women rushing through the mourners at the funeral,
screaming—the orations, interrupted by sobs, in which the virtues of the
deceased monarch were panegyrized—these must have ceased before Villiers
visited Paris; but the Huguenots still sheltered themselves in the
Arsenal, where the great Sully mourned his royal master and friend.[34]
Footnote 33:
Henry IV. was stabbed by Ravaillac on the 14th of May, 1610.
Footnote 34:
The women, in some instances, refused to take food, by way of shewing
their grief for the murder of Henry, and even the men gave way to
despondency. “Plusieurs des meilleurs citoyens de la ville,” says
Lacretelle; “se sont sentis frappés du coup de la mort, en apprenant
cette nouvelle; d’autres, qui expirent plus lentement, se plaignent de
survivre trop long temps a ce bon roi.”—Lacretelle “Histoire de
France,” pendant les Guerres de Religion, tome iv., p. 385.
In Paris, Villiers remained three years, prosecuting his studies, which
consisted of French, and the practice of polite and martial exercises.
His education tended, indeed, to increase his failings, to heighten his
taste for display and love of pleasure, and to weaken his reasoning
faculties. He had, according to the acknowledgment of his great
partisan, Sir Henry Wotton, “little grammatical foundation;” and French
appears to have been the only foreign language that he ever acquired;
nevertheless, it is remarkable what application to business he evinced
during the last few years of his life; his punctuality in
correspondence, and the clear and simple style of his letters, prove how
easily his mind might have been trained to higher pursuits than those on
which his mother, worldly, but not wise, based her expectations of his
future fortunes.
Paris, which Villiers was destined twice to revisit under circumstances
very dissimilar to those of his first residence there, was then the
resort of foreigners. The youth, who had emerged from the quiet haunts
of Goadby Grange, took his first lessons in life in the city which
Howell, in his familiar letters, styles, the “huge magazine of men.”
“Its buildings,” says that writer, “were indifferently fair; its streets
as foul during all the four seasons of the year; a perpetual current of
coaches, carts, and horses encumbering them, narrow and dirty as they
were, and were sometimes so entangled that it was an hour or more before
they could proceed. In such a stop,” as Howell terms it, “was
Ravaillac‘s fatal opportunity afforded, and the great Henry slain.”[35]
The plague[36] settled perpetually in one corner or another of Paris,
but Villiers escaped that risk; he returned, apparently exempt from
foreign vices, unscathed by a more fearful contagion than the plague; at
least, thus may we infer from the assertion of Sir Henry Wotton. “He
came home,” says that writer, “in his natural plight, without affected
forms, the ordinary disease of travellers.”[37] It may reasonably be
presumed that the young man who retains his simplicity of deportment,
still possesses a corresponding integrity of character.
Footnote 35:
“Howell’s Familiar Letters,” p. 39.
Footnote 36:
It is as well to remind the reader that before the year 1752, the
civil or legal year began on the 25th of March (Lady Day), while the
historical year began on the 1st of January, for civilians called each
day within that period one year earlier than historians. The
alteration in the calendar took place by Act of Parliament, on the 2nd
day of September, 1752, when it was enacted that the day following
should be the 14th instead of the 3rd of September.—“Nicolas’s Notitia
Historica.”
Footnote 37:
Reliquiæ Wottonianæ, p. 209.
Villiers was now twenty-one years old; his accomplishments may shortly
be summed up: he was an excellent fencer, an incomparable dancer, he
understood the arrangement of costume and the art of dressing well, but
those valuable acquirements lay dormant in one who possessed no
wardrobe, for he went to France poor, and his family had not been
enriched during his absence. Villiers was, in addition to these graces,
a perfectly well-bred man. Lord Clarendon describes him to have been “a
fair-spoken gentleman, of a sweet and accostable nature.” At present,
his constitution, which afterwards gave way beneath the pressure of
business, or in consequence of the excitements of his dazzling career,
was in full vigour. Such was the youth who now returned to gratify his
mother’s ambitious hopes, by that career to which the efforts of the
young aristocracy of England were then chiefly directed. It may be here
remarked as singular, that Villiers was trained to no specific
profession; he had not been initiated into those elements of learning
necessary to qualify him for the church or the bar; he had not served in
the army; but was, in fact, literally brought up to follow his fortunes
at the Court of James the First. It appears to those in modern times a
bold speculation, but the character of the monarch upon whose
peculiarities it was based accounts for the scheme, apparently so
chimerical, of qualifying a son for nothing better than to depend merely
upon the chances of an hour, for, had opportunity been wanting, the
graces and accomplishments of George Villiers might have been for ever
concealed, or disregarded.
But it is not improbable that Lady Villiers, especially after her second
marriage, had certain dependence upon the exertions of personal friends,
through whose agency she trusted to advance her son’s interests at
Court. From them, too, she probably learned that the disgrace of
Somerset was at hand.
When Villiers returned to England, he found no better prospect before
him than to pass some time at Goadby, under the “wing and counsel of his
mother.”[38] In this retreat, he had leisure to study the temper of the
times, and to view from afar the characteristics of that sphere for
which he was destined.
Footnote 38:
Sir Henry Wotton.—“Reliquiæ Wottonianæ,” p. 208.
It appears to have been the fashion of the day to rush to London, and to
desert those country seats to which James the First and his son Charles
endeavoured by proclamations and harangues to restrain the gentry. The
innovation was severely reproved by James in the summer of 1616, when he
made that memorable speech in the Star Chamber, in which he censured the
custom, attributing it, of course, to the wives and daughters of the
offenders. “Thus,” remarked James, “do they neglect the country
hospitality, and cumber the city.” He next complained of the new and
sumptuous buildings in the metropolis, of the coaches, lacqueys, and
fine clothes in which the higher classes indulged, comparing them to
“Frenchmen,” or, as if that were not harsh enough, declaring that they
“lived miserably in their houses, like Italians, becoming apes to other
nations.” Finally, he proposed to remedy these evils by an edict of the
Star Chamber.
CHAPTER II.
JAMES I., HIS DISAPPROVAL OF THE GENTRY CROWDING INTO LONDON—DISGUST
ENTERTAINED BY THE OLD FAMILIES TO HIM AND HIS COURT—THE CLINTONS,
BLOUNTS, VERES, AND WILLOUGHBY D’ERESBYS SHOW IT—CHARACTER OF SIR
THOMAS LAKE—WILLIAM, EARL OF PEMBROKE, THE EARLY PATRON OF
VILLIERS—ACCOUNT OF THE FIRST INTRODUCTION OF VILLIERS TO
JAMES—AMBITIOUS VIEWS WHICH IT SUGGESTED—HIS ATTACHMENT TO THE
DAUGHTER OF SIR ROGER ASHTON—THEIR ENGAGEMENT BROKEN OFF—ACCOUNT OF
THE KING’S VISIT TO CAMBRIDGE IN 1614-15—SOME DESCRIPTION OF THE
COURTLY LADIES WHO WERE PRESENT THERE—THE QUEEN’S ABSENCE—COUNTESS
OF ARUNDEL—COUNTESS OF SOMERSET—COUNTESS OF SALISBURY—LADY HOWARD OF
WALDEN—PERFORMANCE OF THE PLAY OF “IGNORAMUS” IN CLARE HALL—THE
DESIGN OF THIS COMEDY TO RIDICULE THE COMMON LAW—ADMIRATION
EXPRESSED BY THE KING, DURING THE PERFORMANCE, OF THE PERSONAL
APPEARANCE OF VILLIERS, WHO WAS PRESENT—THE SUBSEQUENT
REPRESENTATIONS REFERRED TO.
=CHAPTER II.=
It might be presumed, from this harangue, that never had the Court of
James been so magnificent, nor such a throng of the high-born and the
opulent clustered in the metropolis as at that time. But the fact was
that whilst obscure country gentlemen brought thither their families,
the old nobility fled from a court which cherished Somerset and
proscribed Raleigh, and where all the real business of the King’s life
consisted in expedients to raise money in order to support an
expenditure from which he derived no dignity. The great and gallant
representatives of the Houses of Clinton, Blount, and Willoughby
D’Eresby sought in continental countries the meed of honour which was
denied them in the service of their own country by the pacific temper of
the King.[39] The Tower entombed some of the noblest spirits. There
still languished the Earl of Northumberland and the Earl of Wilton; the
one beloved, nevertheless, by Henry Prince of Wales, though suspected of
being concerned with his kinsman Percy in the Gunpowder Plot; the other
a “very hopeful gentleman blasted in the bud,” who had been imprisoned
since the Raleigh plot. Others prosecuted schemes of discovery; West,
Earl of Delawarr, in Virginia, attempted to second Raleigh, and
contenting himself with that return and inward satisfaction which a good
mind feels in its own consciousness of virtue, died in the undertaking.
Others, such as the Earl of Arundel, could not tolerate the vulgar
revels, the tasteless prodigality of the Court of James; that nobleman
confined himself, therefore, to the splendours of his stately home, for
his soul was not that of a patriot, nor had he, says Lord Clarendon,
“any other affection for the nation or kingdom than as he has a home in
it, in which, like the great Leviathan, he might disport himself.”[40]
Footnote 39:
Quotation from Birch’s work on the Colonies. See Brydges’ Peers of
England in the Time of James I., p. 171.
Footnote 40:
Clarendon’s History of England, vol. i., p. 55.
Room and opportunity there were, therefore, for fresh aspirants to
compete for royal favour; nevertheless the Earl of Somerset still
reigned pre-eminent, and had then been recently promoted to the highest
office about the King’s person, that of Lord Chamberlain. The reason
assigned for this new display of partiality was also such as to prove
that Somerset was firmly planted in his sovereign’s favour. He succeeded
in the high office the Earl of Salisbury, who, as James expressed it,
was wont to entertain his royal master with “epigrams, discourses, and
learned epistles, and other such nicks and devices.” These, the King
observed, would pay no debts, and he therefore selected in Somerset, he
said, a “plain and honest gentleman, who, if he committed a fault, had
not rhetoric enough to excuse it.”[41] It seemed therefore very
improbable that Villiers should ever hope to rival one who was so rooted
in the King’s regard as the Earl of Somerset, but events which no human
foresight could have anticipated worked for him in the dark secrecy of a
woman’s guilty career.
Footnote 41:
Nichols’s Progresses of James I., vol. iii., page 19, note.
Mature years, precipitated into old age by disease and infirmities, had
brought no increase to James of that practical wisdom which regulates a
Court as well as a family. His imputed wisdom, which was so over
panegyrized in his own time, and which has been too much depreciated in
ours, consisted in shrewd and sensible general notions, which he never
seems to have applied to his private benefit.
So that, though the favour of Somerset, when George Villiers returned
from France, was in its decline, the King could not be deterred from
seeking a new object for his partiality. He might indeed have learned a
lesson which should have taught him that he had disgusted the nation and
lowered himself by his system of favouritism, yet, after recovering from
the perils and vexations of the infamous business which ruined Carr, he
had not a notion that it would be wise to profit by experience, and was
ready to commence a new career of folly, and to sacrifice all the
slender portion of dignity that remained to him—a dignity which
consisted chiefly in the general confidence of his subjects towards
him—by adopting any new object that might chance to cross his path.
It was during the year of inaction which Villiers passed at Goadby, that
he became acquainted with the family of Sir Roger Aston. This knight was
the father of four daughters, for one of whom Villiers, in the quiet
hours of his country life, conceived an attachment. One might, on a
first view of this incident, wonder at the want of caution in Lady
Villiers, in detaining her son at Goadby, there to shackle his future
course by an early, and, apparently, unprofitable engagement; but she
was not acting, it appears, inconsistently with her schemes of future
advancement, when she permitted the intimacy which produced this result.
Sir Roger Aston was, it is true, only the base-born son of John Aston,
of Aston, in Cheshire;[42] he could, therefore, derive no lustre from
that ancient family; he had held formerly the office of barber to King
James when in Scotland, where Sir Roger was chiefly educated.[43] He
was, in time, made a groom of the royal chamber, and further promoted to
be master of the wardrobe, and, however humble his birth and education
may have been, became a person of no inconsiderable influence at Court.
During the last twenty years of Elizabeth’s reign, he was the continual
correspondent of Cecil, whom he supplied with details of all that
transpired in Scotland. The powerful minister was not, it appears,
ashamed to owe much important information to the former barber, and,
fortunately for those who rested upon the good offices of Aston, he is
reported to have been a “very honest, plain-dealing man, no dissembler,
neither did he do any ill office to any man.”[44]
Footnote 42:
Court of James I., by Dr. Godfrey Goodman, edited by the Rev. T. S.
Brewer, vol. i., p. 16.
Footnote 43:
Carte’s History of England, vol. ii., p. 42.
Footnote 44:
Bishop Goodman, 1, p. 18.
In addition to these acquired advantages, Sir Roger was enabled to
provide his daughters with portions. It may, therefore, be inferred that
Lady Villiers—who could never have foreseen that her son would have
claimed the hand of an heiress of ducal line, nor have anticipated that
those attractions, of which she could but partially calculate the value,
should captivate in after times even a royal mistress—approved of the
growing affection which sprang up amid the rural scenes of Goadby. It
was permitted, indeed, at first, by both the parents, whose interests
were concerned in it, and it seems, on the part of the lady, to have
been a fervent and disinterested sentiment. But the question of a
settlement intervened: Villiers, in consideration of a handsome dower,
to which the young damsel was entitled, was required to settle upon her
the moderate sum of eighty pounds a-year. The arrangement was
impracticable, for all his fortune at that time, and even after he had
appeared for some time at Court, amounted to only fifty or sixty pounds
annually.[45]
Footnote 45:
Carte, vol. ii., p. 43.
Some opposition to the engagement originated, therefore, with the
friends of the young lady, though she, passionately enamoured, was at
first fixed in her choice, and firm to her professions of affection.
“The gentlewoman,” says Sir Anthony Weldon, “loved him so well as, could
all his friends have made for her great fortune but a hundred marks
jointure, she had married him presently, in despite of all her friends,
and, no question, would have had him without any fortune at all.” But
whilst the affair was under consideration, or probably when it was
partially concluded, but was still cherished in the minds of the parties
most concerned in it, a circumstance occurred which diverted the hopes
of Villiers into another direction; a new stimulus was given to the
energies of his nature, and ambition, as it is known to have done
before, proved mightier than love.
It was at a horse-race in Cambridgeshire that Villiers first attracted
the attention of the King. The poverty of the young man was then such
that even on this notable occasion, when the sovereign, on his annual
progress, was expected, and at a time when the costliness, or, as it was
well styled, the “bravery” of dress was at its height, he could not
afford any new attire. An “old black suit, broken out in divers places,”
was, as Sir Symonds D’Ewes asserts,[46] the garment in which his narrow
means constrained him to appear amid the gay courtiers who composed the
royal train.
Footnote 46:
Life of Sir Symonds D’Ewes, edited by Halliwell, vol. i., p. 86.
As if this were not a sufficient mortification, other inconveniences
arose. The race had taken place near Linton, and most of the company
slept at that town. There was no room in the lodgings of the inn for the
ill-dressed youth in the old black suit, “and he was obliged,” adds the
same writer, “and even glad, to lie on a truckle bed in a gentleman’s
chamber, of mean quality, also, at that time, from whose own mouth I
heard this relation, who was himself an eye-witness of it.”[47]
According to another account, it was at Apthorpe, whither King James, in
the month of August, 1614, had sent his dogs, that the monarch was so
struck by the appearance and deportment of Villiers, that he resolved to
mould him, as it were “platonically, to his own idea.”[48] The
impression produced upon the King was publicly observed by attendants
and courtiers, and the success of Villiers was decided. About this time,
indeed, Villiers formed an acquaintance upon whose counsels he acted, so
as to take the tide of fortune at its height.
Footnote 47:
Life of Sir Symonds D’Ewes.
Footnote 48:
Reliquiæ Wottonianæ, p. 210; and Nichols’s Progresses
Sir Thomas Lake is said to have ushered of James I., vol. iii, p. 19.
Villiers into the English Court,[49] and there was, perhaps, not one of
the subordinate personages better calculated to guide, in that sphere,
the first steps of an inexperienced youth than Lake. Patronized
originally by Sir Francis Walsingham, and by him recommended to the
service of Queen Elizabeth, he had acted as Secretary for the French and
Latin tongue to his Royal mistress, and acquired, from his accurate and
rapid writing, the name of “Swiftsure.” In the Court of Elizabeth, where
none but men of ability flourished, he had received his political
education. He had enjoyed the Queen’s confidence, and was reading to her
in French and Latin at the very moment when the Countess of Warwick told
him that the Queen had expired. James made him a Privy Counsellor, and
afterwards appointed him one of his Secretaries of State.[50] Lake
eventually fell into disgrace, not from his own fault, but owing to the
unfortunate marriage of his eldest daughter to the Lord de Roos, son of
the Earl of Exeter, and to the subsequent enmity of the Cecils. But at
the time when Villiers owed his first introduction to him, Lake was in
the height of his influence, and James, even after his downfall,
accorded to him the praise that “he was a Minister of State fit to serve
any greater prince in Europe.”[51]
Footnote 49:
Kennet’s History of England, p. 706.
Footnote 50:
Fuller’s Worthies of Leicestershire.
Footnote 51:
Fuller’s Worthies of Hants. There is a curious account of the
mysterious affair of the Lakes, in Bishop Goodman’s Court and Times of
King James, vol. i., pp. 193-197; also some letters of Lady Lake’s, in
the second volume of that work. The State Paper Office contains more
upon the same subject, as yet, inedited.
Under such auspices, Villiers secured the best introduction to the world
that can be obtained—that afforded by individuals whose high rank was
upheld in public estimation by their personal influence; and it augurs
well of the views which were at that time entertained of his character,
and of the terms on which it was desired to place him with the King,
that those who were real lovers of their country, and patrons of its
best interests, should have presented him to their sovereign.
Lucy Harrington, Countess of Bedford, “led him,” says Fuller, “by the
one hand, and William, Earl of Pembroke, by the other.”
Few women shone in the giddy revels of the Court with a purer lustre
than the Countess of Bedford; her virtues and accomplishments may have
been exaggerated by grateful poets and dependants, but they were such as
to confer a certain dignity on all whom she countenanced. Hence we must
admire the discrimination of Lake in obtaining for the youthful Villiers
the friendship of one whom society estimated so highly. The sister of
Sir John Harrington, the Countess of Bedford, resembled her brother in
his love of letters, and fortune favoured the full indulgence of her
inclinations. By the death of that accomplished brother, she succeeded
to two-thirds of his possessions. She had then been married six months
to Edward, Earl of Bedford; and, at his decease, which happened in 1627,
she was left in the uncontrolled possession of all that nobleman’s
estates. This proof of her husband’s confidence and attachment was not
misapplied. The widowed Countess, resembling somewhat the Mrs. Montagu
of later times, aimed to be the patroness of poets. Of course her
motives have been satirised, and her mode of dispensing her patronage
impugned, for there seems to be, in most biographers, a love of decrying
lettered women of rank. Grainger, for instance, declares that the
Countess of Bedford bought the praise of poets by money, and that they,
in return, were lavish of incense.[52] Her taste for gardening has,
however, met with more indulgence. Sir William Temple, in his “Gardens
of Epicurus,” praises her “most perfect picture of a garden” at Moor
Park, in Surrey, for she was, in truth, the first improver of the
English flower-garden—an honourable distinction. Her education was in
conformity with the practice of the day; she was well read in classics,
and had a knowledge of ancient medals. Such was the lady-patroness of
Villiers. To her Ben Jonson inscribed three of his epigrams:[53] to her
Dr. Donne addressed several poems, whilst Daniel celebrated her in
verse.
Footnote 52:
Grainger’s Biography.
Footnote 53:
He addresses her in one of these in the following terms:—
“Lucy, you brightness of our sphere, who are
Life of the Muses’ day, their Morning Star;
If works [not authors] their own grace should look,
Whose poems would not wish to be your books?”
It is singular that no relics have been discovered of this far-famed
lady’s writings, though numerous allusions are made to them in the works
of others. A marvellous degree of uncertainty even attends many points
of her career; the place of her death is unknown; and she left behind
her no will; the abode on which she spent large sums is long since
levelled to the ground; this was Burleigh-on-the-Hill, which she sold,
eventually, to Villiers, when in the height of his fortunes; he erected
a noble mansion upon it, but it was destroyed in the time of the
Rebellion. Thus, as Mr. Lodge observes, “she has left, by a singular
fatality, as it should seem, a splendid reputation, which can neither be
supported nor depreciated by the evidence of historical facts.”[54]
Footnote 54:
Lodge’s Historical Portraits, Art. Lucy Harrington.
Less exclusive, more patriotic, and far more popular even than the great
Earl of Arundel, William, Earl of Pembroke, stood, on that day, on the
same vantage ground with that lofty nobleman, the pre-eminence of
character. Pembroke, however, was beloved as well as respected; he was
pious, liberal, honourable; a lover of literature and the arts: he
encouraged the ingenious and the learned, not only because he delighted
in their society, but from a higher motive, a sense of duty to the
community. He inherited, indeed, that generous spirit which ennobles the
noble, for he was the nephew of Sir Philip Sydney, and the son of that
Countess of Pembroke whom Ben Jonson has termed “the subject of all
verse.” He was brave and honourable; his abilities were excellent; his
character above all suspicion of the ordinary insincerity of courtiers.
His immense fortune was employed worthily, not lavished, for his
expenses were limited only by his “great mind,” and occasions, to use it
nobly. His personal qualities were such as to make even the Court itself
respectable, and “better esteemed in the country,” and he had the
happiness, in spite of envy, to have more friends than any public
character of his time No man dared to avow himself the enemy of one who
was beloved equally at the Court of James and in the retirement of a
home circle at Wilton; who sought for neither office nor honours, and
yet was lenient to the faults from which his noble nature was exempt.
Such was the nobleman who took by the hand a poor youth, whose present
integrity and innocence might, he perhaps believed, vanquish the
degrading influence of Somerset and his wife, to whose fame report
already attached the darkest rumours. In the patron who was moved to
second by his well-earned influence the fortunes of an obscure country
youth, Villiers was thus no less fortunate than in the favour of Lucy
Harrington. Happy had it been for him had he modelled his own conduct
and rectified his notions by the standards now placed before his view;
for there was nothing in the bearing of Pembroke to lower the dignity of
virtue. That nobleman had been termed “the very picture and _viva
effigies_ of nobility.”[55] In person, majestic, in his manners, full of
stately gravity, which characterised him, whether in repose or when
animated, his easy wit, free from every taint of malice, his habitual,
unconscious good-breeding, might have assisted that young and unformed
mind in the formation of good taste, a property which rarely flourishes
without the aid of refined associates. Some defects there were, and
those of a vital nature, which, in looking closely into any character of
that time, cannot but be discovered. These were materially owing to the
bartering marriages of the middle and early modern times—the selling
one’s dearest hopes and interests in this life for an estate, or an
honour, or a reversion. The standard of morality was, of course,
lowered, as it still is in France, by the excuse that fidelity to a wife
could hardly be expected under the circumstances of enforced unions,
sometimes contracted while the parties were children. William, Earl of
Pembroke, was one of the many who exhibited this doctrine in his
practice. United to an heiress, for whose fortune even the grave Lord
Clarendon observes, he paid “too dear by taking her person into the
bargain,”[56] he devoted himself publicly to Christian, the daughter of
Lord Bruce, afterwards Countess of Devonshire. To her he addressed those
beautiful lines which were, with other poems, edited by Dr. Donne,
prefixed with a fulsome dedication to the Countess.[57]
Footnote 55:
Clarendon, vol. i., p. 85; also, Lodge’s Portraits.
Footnote 56:
Clarendon, vol. i., p. 85; also, Lodge’s Portraits.
Footnote 57:
Peck’s Desiderata Curiosa, xiv., p. 541; Grainger’s Biographical
History of England, Art. Pembroke.
To Pembroke, Buckingham was, perhaps, indebted for that love of the arts
and taste for building and embellishments which afterwards distinguished
the lordly proprietor of York House and Burleigh. It is, however,
painful to reflect that not three years after the good offices performed
by Lord Pembroke to Villiers, a coolness took place upon some matters of
little moment compared with the debt of gratitude due to the Earl by the
favourite.[58]
Footnote 58:
The death of this nobleman was remarkable. It had been foretold by his
tutor and Lady Davis that he should not outlive his fiftieth birthday.
The fatal day arrived; it found his Lordship very “pleasant and
healthful,” and he supped that evening at the Countess of Bedford’s;
he was then heard to remark that he should never trust a lady
prophetess again. He went to bed in the same good spirits; but was
carried off by a fit of apoplexy in the night. Before his interment it
was resolved to embalm his body; when one of the surgeons plunged his
knife into it, the Earl is said by a tradition in the family to have
lifted up one of his hands. The Lady Davis, who had foretold the death
of this nobleman, was imprisoned for some time. The Earl died in 1630.
Notwithstanding the countenance of the Countess of Bedford, and of the
Earl of Pembroke, those who detailed the smallest incidents of the Court
observed that the favour of Villiers appeared to be stationary; even his
appointment as a Groom of the Bedchamber was deferred in favour of one
Carr, a baseborn kinsman of the Earl of Somerset; and it began to be
thought that the King’s preference for Villiers was declining.[59] But
the game was begun—the hopes of future power, of wealth, perhaps of
rank, cherished by maternal counsels, were now working upon the mind of
the young adventurer, and he resolved upon one sacrifice to obtain the
objects at which he grasped—the sacrifice was, his youthful attachment
to old Sir Roger Aston’s daughter.[60]
Footnote 59:
Inedited letter in the State Paper Office, from Mr. Chamberlain to Sir
Dudley Carlton, September 22nd, 1619.
Footnote 60:
Letter from Mr. Chamberlain to Sir Dudley Carlton, November, 1614,
given in Nichols’s Progresses of James I., vol. iii., p. 26.
As it often happens, the relinquishment of fondly-cherished hopes was
owing, in part, to the advice of a friend: the disposition of Villiers
was naturally so generous, that, to abandon all his pretensions to one
who was willing to forego the gifts of fortune for his sake, would,
probably, not otherwise have occurred to his mind. It happened, however,
that whilst he was lingering about the Court, a young companion, Sir
Robert Graham, one of the Gentlemen of the Bedchamber, professed himself
to be greatly interested in his advancement. Villiers soon constituted
Graham his “familiar friend,” and, being brought into what Sir Henry
Wotton terms “intrinsical society” with him, was naturally led to speak
of his hopes and fears, and to unfold to the young courtier, who could
boast more experience than he might pretend to possess, his projected
marriage. That bond was disapproved of by Graham. “I know not,” remarks
Wotton, “what luminaries he spied in his face;” but they were, at all
events, sufficient to indicate success at Court. Impressed with this
conviction, Graham dissuaded Villiers from his love-match, and
encouraged him rather to “woo fortune,” by still further improving the
King’s favourable sentiments towards him. It is not improbable that
Graham was the tool of that party who earnestly desired Somerset’s
downfall, and who gladly availed themselves of the attractions of young
Villiers to accomplish their desires. The advice given by Graham “sank,”
it is said, into the young man’s “fancy.” He may have remembered the
auspicious meeting at Abthorpe, when, in his old black suit, he had
charmed even the regard of a Monarch who rarely dispensed with the
display of costly garments in others, how slovenly soever he might, in
his royal pleasure, be in his own attire. A love-suit to a country
damsel, richly endowed, even if fond and faithful, seemed but a poor
exchange for a courtly career. Villiers, therefore, wavered; and perhaps
the obstacles thrown in his way by the Aston family added to his
irresolution. It is probable, too, that the prospect of aiding hereafter
his many relations and connections may have had an influence over his
decision. How great the struggle may have been, must be left to the
imagination, for no documents are at hand to reveal it. The step was
momentous; for it threw upon the world, to buffet with all the turmoils
of a conspicuous station, a man who, otherwise, would probably have
lived and died in respectable obscurity, existing upon his wife’s
fortune.
Villiers, however, in time, adopted the advice of Sir Robert Graham. He
abjured the thoughts of an early marriage, and devoted himself to
ambition.[61]
Footnote 61:
Reliquiæ Wottonianæ, p. 210.
An opportunity was soon found of bringing him again before the King,
under a more advantageous aspect than in his black suit, and those who
sought his advancement henceforth supplied him with the means of
appearing conformably to the fashion of the day, by affording him a
present income far above his poor patrimonial inheritance.[62] Thus
assisted, the young man prepared to meet the King at Cambridge, where,
in the month of March, 1614-15, the honour of a royal visit was
conferred upon that University.
Footnote 62:
Fuller’s Worthies of Leicestershire.
The influence of the Somerset family had, in a great measure, procured
this distinction to Cambridge, in preference to Oxford; for the Earl of
Suffolk, the father of the Countess of Somerset, had been chosen
Chancellor of Cambridge during the preceding year;[63] and to honour
this nobleman,—who had also been recently constituted Lord Treasurer, an
office from which he was eventually degraded—James announced that he
purposed to fulfil an intention which he had held for some years, but
had deferred, as the good fortune of Villiers decreed, until this
critical period. For a powerful cabal was now concentrated against the
hateful sway of this branch of the Howard family, and Villiers was the
anchor on which the hopes of the adverse party rested.
Footnote 63:
1613. To the sagacity of the Earl of Suffolk, and not to that of James
I., was the discovery of the Gunpowder Plot ascribed. See Winwood’s
Memorials, vol. ii., p. 186.
On the seventh day of the month, King James made his entry into
Cambridge with as much solemnity and as great a concourse of “gallants
and great men as the hard weather and extremely foul ways would permit.”
He was accompanied by Prince Charles, who had previously visited the
University; and these royal personages were met at the boundaries of the
town by the Corporation, and welcomed by the Recorder with an address
setting forth the loyalty of the Mayor and Burgesses of Cambridge, and
insisting upon the antiquity of the town, which “was builded ‘as
historians testifie, and as these worthy personages now certified,’
before Christ’s Incarnation, with a castle, tower, and walls of defence,
by Duke Cantaber.” “The Muses,” pursued the Recorder, “did branch from
Athens to Cambridge, and were lovinglie lodged in the houses of citizens
until ostles and halls were erected for them without endowments.” Two
cups were then presented, one to the King, the other to Prince Charles,
who was addressed as “a peerless and most noble Prince, our morning
starre,” and the procession moved onwards.[64] Among the gallants who
followed through the “foul ways” of the outskirts of the town was George
Villiers, no longer in his black and worn suit, but decked out with all
the advantages which the pride and ambition of his mother could command.
It is worthy of remark that at that time a plan for forming a public
library at Cambridge, similar to that at Oxford, was entertained by the
Heads of the College. The scheme was abandoned until many years
afterwards, when it was adopted by the very youth who passed along amid
a throng of others far more wealthy and important than himself, when he
was himself Chancellor of the University.[65]
Footnote 64:
Winwood’s Memorials, vol. ii., p. 48.
Footnote 65:
It was checked by the death of the Duke of Buckingham, whose project
had been to erect a Library between the Regent’s Walk and Caius
College. See Nichols’s Progresses, p. 40, note.
The whole body of the collegians was drawn out in their appropriate
costume, in order to receive the King. From some of the regulations for
this occasion, it appears that the habits of the University were not at
that time the most refined, nor their taste in attire the most modest.
It was found necessary not only to forbid the graduates, scholars, and
students of the University to frequent ale-houses and taverns during His
Majesty’s sojourn, but also not to presume to take tobacco in St.
Marie’s Church, or in Trinity College Hall “upon pain of expulsion.”
These young gentlemen, too, were prone to indulge themselves in strange
“pekadivelas, vast bands, huge cuffs, shoe-roses, tufts, locks, and
topps of hair,” unbecoming that modesty and carriage suitable to the
students of so renowned a University, and it was therefore determined to
enforce the dress fixed by Statute, upon a penalty of 6s. 8d. for every
default; and in case of contempt of this warning, of a month’s
imprisonment.[66] Thus restricted, the undergraduates and their
superiors appeared in all the advantage of academic attire, and the King
and his youthful son, passing through their well-disciplined ranks,
proceeded to Trinity College, where they were domiciled.
Footnote 66:
Nichols’s Progresses, p. 45.
One or two circumstances were wanting, nevertheless, to complete the
magnificence of this reception:—the first was the presence of the Queen,
who was not invited—an omission for which the Chancellor, and not the
University, was blamed—another, the scarcity of ladies, there being only
seven present, and those entirely of the Howard family. Such was the
pride or policy of that haughty and rapacious faction.
The Countess of Arundel, wife of Philip, Earl of Arundel, the
half-brother of the Chancellor, was one of the seven present on that
occasion. She was scarcely less exalted as the wife of the great Earl of
Arundel, than as the daughter of Gilbert, Earl of Shrewsbury, Earl
Marshal of England, whose co-heiress she was. Not only were her
possessions large, but her virtues great; she was beloved for her
excellence of character and conjugal virtues. Upon this lady’s brow, as
she passed along, a cloud of sadness may perhaps have been traced for
the loss of her son, James, Lord Maltravers, a young nobleman of great
promise, whose death, happening a few years previously, she had
incessantly deplored. By her side came the Lady Elizabeth Grey, her
sister.
The Countess of Suffolk was, of course, an object of considerable
attention. This lady was the second wife of the Chancellor, and was
equally celebrated for her beauty and her rapacity. At the time of her
marriage with the Earl of Suffolk she was a widow, having been united to
the eldest son of Lord Rich. Her birth was not noble, but she had
inherited a portion of the estate of her father, Sir Henry Knevit, a
Wiltshire Knight. The Countess acquired a great ascendancy over her
husband, and there is too much reason to suppose that he succumbed to
the influence of her talents and her beauty, and, although he did not
share in the fruits of her peculation, permitted her to indulge her
avarice. So notorious were the bribes of which this lady accepted, that
Lord Bacon compared her to an exchange woman who kept a shop, in which
Sir John Bingley exclaimed “What do ye lack?” At length the small-pox
destroyed the beauty which had been so fatal to the Countess’s peace and
honour, and which had wrought much misery and disgrace to all who
yielded to its influence.
But if the career of this busy female courtier were reprehensible, that
of her young and beautiful daughter, the Countess of Somerset, who
accompanied her mother that day, was tinged with guilt of a far deeper
dye. It is difficult, in modern times, to realise to one’s mind two such
women—the one availing herself of her high station and her personal
attractions to enrich her family at the expense of every delicate
sentiment and lofty principle; the other infuriated by a mad passion,
until every womanly attribute departed, and the vengeance of a fiend
alone characterised her dark career. The Countess of Somerset was, at
this time, still in the bloom of her youth, being about twenty-four
years of age, and the crimes which afterwards brought infamy and
retribution on her, were then known only to her corrupt and remorseless
heart. The Court, to use the expression of a contemporary historian,
“was her nest, and she was hatched up by her mother, whom the sour
breath of the age had already tainted, from whom the young lady might
take such a tincture, that ease, greatness, and Court glories would more
disdain and impress on her, than any way wear out and diminish.” Such
was the loveliness of this guilty woman, that those who saw her face
might, it has been said, “challenge nature for harbouring so wicked a
heart under so sweet and bewitching a countenance:”[67] nor were the
arts fashionable at the time forgotten; they heightened the attractions
of the Countess of Somerset. “All outward adornments,” we are told, “to
present beauty in her full glory, were not wanting;” among the rest,
yellow starch, “the invention and foyl of jaundiced complexions, with
great cut-work bands and piccadillies,” were adopted by the unhappy Lady
Somerset, and were, doubtless, produced on this, as upon other festive
occasions.
Footnote 67:
Wilson’s Reign of James I., p. 63.
The Countess of Suffolk and her retinue proceeded to Magdalen College,
which had been founded by Lord Chancellor Audley, the grandfather of the
Earl of Suffolk.[68]
Footnote 68:
Lord Audley is said to have given this College the name of Magdalen,
or rather Maudleyn, in allusion to his own name, adding one letter at
the beginning and at the end. M AUDLEY N. See Nichols’s Progresses, p.
45, note.
The youngest daughter of the Earl of Suffolk accompanied her sister and
mother. This was Catherine, married to William Cecil, second Earl of
Salisbury. By this union long enmities between the two families of
Howard and of Percy were partially reconciled; a daughter of the house
of Cecil marrying eventually Algernon Percy, Earl of Northumberland,
“whose blood,” it had been said by the Earl of Salisbury, “would not
mingle in a basin,” so inborn was the hereditary hatred between the two
races. This union had been one of policy alone; for the Earl of
Salisbury inherited no traits of his ancestry but their titles; and his
weak and abject nature revived the remembrance of only the worst parts
of his father’s character; “a man,” adds Clarendon, who sums up the
whole, “of no words, except in hunting and hawking.”
Lady Howard of Walden, the daughter of George Hume, Earl of Dunbar, and
wife of the eldest son of the Earl of Suffolk, and Lady Howard, the wife
of Thomas, Lord Howard of Charlton, his second son, completed the family
array. The latter of these two ladies was a Cecil, but her claims to
celebrity rest chiefly upon her being the mother of Lady Elisabeth
Howard, who married the great Dryden; her two sons, Sir Robert and
Edward Howard, enjoyed some portion of literary fame in their day.[69]
Footnote 69:
Brydge’s Peers of England, p. 260.
The first night’s entertainment at Cambridge was a comedy, acted by the
gownsmen of St. John’s College. This was a sort of burlesque, ridiculing
Sir Edward Radcliffe, the King’s physician; it proved, according to
public opinion, but “a lean argument, and though it was larded with
pretty shows at the beginning and end, and with somewhat too broad
speech for such a presence, still it was dry.”
On the following evening there was performed in Clare Hall the famous
play of “Ignoramus” a burlesque. This production was attributed to
George Buggle, a Fellow of Clare Hall. It was written and spoken in
Latin, nor was it even printed at the time when it agitated the polite
and learned society by which its points and satire were so keenly
enjoyed. The manuscript was, it appears, destroyed; and it was not until
ten years after the death of its reputed author that it was thought
prudent to print it, having been taken down from the mouth of the
author. The design of this popular comedy was to ridicule the Common
Law, and no one enjoyed the satire more than the august individual whose
office it was to uphold the laws. Never, it has been said, did anything
fascinate the King’s attention or suit his taste so much as this
representation, and he commanded several repetitions by the same
performers. “Ignoramus” was not, however, readily forgiven or forgotten
by that body whom it attacked; and, whilst the King and his Court
derived the most lively pleasure from its mingled invective and
burlesque, the lawyers were greatly offended by its pungent satire.
Successive publications afterwards appeared, taxing the justice of this
attack upon the legal profession, and written with much bitterness.
During the performance of this play, the King’s attention was not,
however, wholly riveted upon “Ignoramus” and his associates; among the
audience in Clare Hall, George Villiers, decorated with all the care
that his mother’s pride and affection could suggest, appeared,
resplendent in beauty. “The King,” to use the expression of a
contemporary writer, “fell into admiration of him,” so that he became
confounded between his delight at the appearance of Villiers and the
pleasure of the play. To both of these contending emotions, James, with
his usual absence of dignity, gave a free expression. “This,” says Roger
Coke, “set the heads of the courtiers at work how to get Somerset out of
favour, and to bring Villiers in.”[70]
Footnote 70:
Coke’s Detention, p. 82.
Ample time was permitted during the tedious performance for the King to
observe the young adventurer who sought his favour, and for busy
politicians to build upon the absurd partiality of the weak old King.
The representation of “Ignoramus,” with its dull pedantic jests, and its
personalities, long since passed away and forgotten, lasted eight hours;
the second time it commenced at eight in the evening, and was not
concluded until one in the morning.
The performers were chiefly Fellows of Clare Hall and of Queen’s
College, and their efforts met with the greatest applause. Thus, in
Bishop Corbet’s “Grave Poem,” written in 1614, to celebrate the
occasion, it is said:—
Nothing did win more praise of mine,
Than did these actors, most divine.
And, alluding to the clerical character of these much-approved
individuals, he adds:—
Their play had sundry wise factors,
A perfect diocess of actors
Upon the stage, for I am sure that
There was both bishop, pastor, curate,
Nor was their labour light and small,
The charge of some was pastoral.[71]
Footnote 71:
Nichols’s Progress of James I., vol. iii., p. 70.
Several of the younger men who figured on the stage of Clare Hall were
associated in their subsequent career with some of the most important
events of the period in which they lived. At the last hour, a boy of
thirteen was called upon to act the part of Surda, in which it was
necessary to assume female attire. This youth was, even at that early
age, an undergraduate; and he was thus summoned hastily to learn a new
part in addition to that of Venica, which had been allotted to him, from
the scruples of his tutor, the Rev. Mr. Fairclough, who had been
selected to undertake the character of Surda on account of his low
stature; but Mr. Fairclough was a Puritan, and, deeming it a species of
deception to wear women’s clothes, abjured the degrading task. The boy
who now supplied his place was Spencer Compton, afterwards Lord Compton,
an early favourite and attendant of Charles I., whom he accompanied into
Spain. His loyal exertions in the cause of his unfortunate master shed,
in after life, honour upon his name. Mr. Fairclough was not the only
person who objected to lower the dignity of man’s estate by the
assumption of a woman’s gown. The Head of Emmanuel College, then
esteemed a Puritanical house, objected also to one of its undergraduates
accepting the part of a girl; but these scruples were overruled by the
guardian of the youth.[72]
Footnote 72:
Sir Walter Mildmay, the founder of Emmanuel College, being at the
Court of Queen Elizabeth, she said to him:—“Sir Walter, I hear you
have erected a Puritan Foundation.” “No, madam,” he replied; “far be
it from me to countenance anything contrary to your established laws;
but I have set an acorn, and when it becomes an oak, God alone knows
what will be the fruit thereof.”—Fuller’s History of Cambridge, p.
147.
In the “Grave Poem” of Bishop Corbet, Emmanuel College is thus
satirised:—
But th’ poor house of Emmanuel
Would not be like proud Jesabel,
Nor shew herself before the King,
An hypocrite, or painted thing;
[And images she would have none,
For fear of superstition, or]
But that the ways might seem more fair,
Conceived a tedious mile of prayer.[73]
Footnote 73:
Nichols’s Progresses, vol. iii., p. 67.
The plot of “Ignoramus” was borrowed from the Trappolaria of
Giamballista Porta, an Italian dramatist, but the characters were taken
from life. “Ignoramus” was designed to personify Mr. Francis Brakyn, the
Recorder of Cambridge, who had rendered himself obnoxious to the
University in a dispute about precedence between the Mayor of the town
and the Vice-Chancellor. Mr. Brakyn was a barrister, and the ridicule
cast upon him was as much enjoyed by the dignified heads of houses as by
noisy undergraduates.[74]
Footnote 74:
A list of the _dramatis personæ_ in the play of “Ignoramus” is
preserved in Emmanuel College; it was once in the possession of
Archbishop Sancroft; and an elaborate edition of the play, with
valuable notes, has been printed by T.S. Hawkins.
Amongst the performers was John Cole, afterwards Earl of Clare,
distinguished for his moderation in the Civil Wars. The youth who was
nearly being precluded from acting by the tutors of Emmanuel College,
was the Rev. John Towers, afterwards Bishop of Peterborough, one of the
twelve loyal Prelates imprisoned by Parliament. Fuller says of him, “He
was a great actor when young, and a great sufferer when old, dying rich
only in children and patience.” “Ignoramus” was translated into English
in the year 1678, and a mutilated version of it was produced at the
Royal Theatre in the same year, called the “English Lawyer.” This was
written by Edward Ravenscroft.[75]
Footnote 75:
Nichols’s Progresses of James I., vol iii., p. 50.
Another play, entitled “Albumazar,” followed the successful
representation of “Ignoramus;” this, and a Latin pastoral, were the
“action or invention of Trinity College, and met with a gracious
approval from the King, who, even at his repasts, was now heard loudly
to extol Cambridge above Oxford; and yet an awkward incident occurred
during the royal visit. During the acts and disputations, in which James
delighted, the University orator addressed Prince Charles, who stood
beside his father, as Prince Jacobissime Carole;” it was also said that
he called him Jacobule, too, which, observed an eye-witness, “neither
pleased the King nor anybody else.”[76] Buckingham, who possibly
understood no Latin, must have found the dramas, the pastoral, the acts
and disputations insufferably tedious; but he was now the tool of a
party, and therefore, doubtless, remained to witness all these various
exhibitions, little dreaming that one day he was to be installed
Chancellor of that very University. Dark and contemptuous looks were
discerned on the faces of sundry jealous Oxonians, who had gone to see
and to ridicule their rivals, the Cambridge men, who were continually,
as a contemporary relates, “applauding themselves, and the Oxford men as
fast condemning and detracting all that was done.”[77] The best comment
upon the exploits of the boastful collegians was that returned by Mr.
Corbet, afterwards Bishop Corbet, who, “being seriously dealt withal by
some friends to say what he thought, answered that he had left his
malice and judgment at home, and came thither only to commend.”[78]
Footnote 76:
Nichols’s Progresses, vol. iii., p. 59.
Footnote 77:
Nichols’s Progresses. Letter from Mr. Chamberlain to Mr. D. Carleton,
State Papers, Domestic, James I.
Footnote 78:
Ibid.
King James, however, expressed such unqualified admiration of what he
saw, that fears were entertained by those who had had to entertain him
that he would have repeated his visit privately; apprehensions were felt
also lest he should order the performers of the “Ignoramus,” a band
chiefly composed of ghostly preachers and learned bachelors of divinity,
to repair to London; but the panic was groundless, and neither of these
dreaded events took place. Great, indeed, was the expense of the
reception and provision considered suitable to the grandeur of the
occasion. Nor was it long before events still more ruinous to the Earl
of Suffolk and his family than their enormous expenditure to grace the
King’s visit at Cambridge scandalized the public mind. The jealousy of
the Earl of Somerset was now aroused by the favour shown at Court to his
young rival. Slight occurrences warned the sinking favourite of his own
unpopularity. An entertainment was given at Baynard’s Castle by three
great families—those of Herbert, Hertford, and Bedford; as the company
were repairing to the appointed place, they discerned Somerset’s
portrait hanging out of a limner’s shop. Sanderson, the historian, who
happened to be a bystander, took occasion to inquire “on what score that
was done?” The reply was, “that this meeting at Baynard’s Castle was to
discover;” for there it appears the scheme to elevate Villiers was
concocted by those who viewed with disgust the ascendancy of Somerset.
CHAPTER III.
THE FASCINATION OF VILLIER’S CHARACTER AS OPPOSED TO THE VENALITY
OF SOMERSET—LORD CLARENDON’S OPINION—THE FRIENDSHIP OF
ARCHBISHOP ABBOT—CHARACTER OF THE PRIMATE—HIS AFFECTION FOR
VILLIERS—ANECDOTE OF VILLIERS WHEN CUP-BEARER—HE IS BEFRIENDED
BY ANNE OF DENMARK—BY HER MEANS KNIGHTED—SINGULAR SCENE IN THE
QUEEN’S CHAMBER—JEALOUSY OF SOMERSET—INGRATITUDE AFTERWARDS
SHEWN BY VILLIERS TO ABBOT—ABBOT COMMITS MANSLAUGHTER—IS
PARDONED BY THE KING—THE INCESSANT PLEASURES OF THE
COURT—HORSE-RACING—BEN JONSON’S “GOLDEN AGE RESTORED”—ALLUSION
IN IT TO SOMERSET, AND TO OVERBURY—AN ANGRY INTERVIEW BETWEEN
VILLIERS AND SOMERSET—VILLIERS SUPPLANTS THE FAVOURITE—HE USES
NO UNFAIR MEANS TO DO SO—DISCOVERY OF SOMERSET’S GUILT BY
WINWOOD, WHO FINDS PROOFS OF IT IN AN OLD TRUNK—SOMERSET’S
DOWNFALL—BACON’S LETTER TO VILLIERS—VILLIERS CONTINUES TO
PROFIT BY THE DELINQUENCIES AND DISGRACE OF SOMERSET.
=CHAPTER III.=
Introduced, as he now found himself, into the atmosphere of a Court,
Buckingham retained the free and joyous spirit, the boyish impetuosity,
the incapability of dissimulation which characterised him during the
whole of his life. The combination of “English familiarity and French
vivacity” have in his deportment been happily expressed by Hume. The
carelessness of consequences, which was a part of his variable and
fascinating character, was soon perceived by his friends, soon made the
theme of comment on the part of his enemies.
To those who had long deplored the rapacity of Somerset, and who viewed,
in the depravity of the Court, the degradation of the nation, the very
imprudence of Villiers, coupled, as it was, with great courage, quick
perceptions, energy, and a capability of being aroused to high designs
and “lofty aspirations,”[79] must have been refreshing. “As yet,” says
Lord Clarendon, “he was the most rarely accomplished the Court had ever
beheld; while some that found inconvenience in his nearness, intending
by some affront to discountenance him, perceived he had masked under the
gentleness of a terrible courage as could safely protect all his
sweetness.” The rise of this gifted and fascinating adventurer, rapid as
it undoubtedly was, was obstructed by various obstacles, the details of
which are not to be found in the ordinary narratives of his career.
Footnote 79:
See the Character of Buckingham in Disraeli’s Commentaries on Charles
I., vol. ii., p, 163.
Abbot, Archbishop of Canterbury, held at this time a supreme influence
both in Church and in State affairs. His great learning, his eloquence,
his moderation, and his indefatigable exertions for the public welfare
procured him at once the confidence of the country and the goodwill of
his sovereign. By his conciliatory deportment, Abbot, when he held the
appointment of chaplain to the Earl of Dunbar, Treasurer of Scotland,
effected such an understanding, as to ensure the establishment of the
Episcopal order in that country. He was also one of the eight divines at
Oxford to whom the charge of translating the New Testament, with the
exception of the Epistles, was entrusted.[80] Thus qualified for the
highest station in his sacred profession, Abbot had attained the rare
art of satisfying all parties. His zeal for the Protestant faith secured
the esteem of the Calvinist, and his devotion to the order to which he
belonged satisfied even the disciples of Laud.
Footnote 80:
Biographia Britannica.
This prelate now became the patron of George Villiers. Perhaps the
fearless, open disposition of the youth interested the Archbishop, who
was by no means an austere churchman, but who mingled to a great extent
in secular affairs, and united a love of popular diversions with his
saintly zeal and real piety of character;—enjoyed a day’s hunting, and
regulated alternately the concerns of foreign nations and the disputes
of controversialists. Archbishop Abbot appears to have fostered Villiers
as a son. A circumstance shortly occurred which showed how necessary to
the well-being of the rash youth such a protector and counsellor must
have proved.
Villiers now held the office of cup-bearer, and, since it was purchased,
as most offices in that reign were, it is probable that those who
promoted his rise, from a hatred of the Earl of Somerset, supplied him
with the means of thus drawing near to his sovereign at the social
board; nor was the office in those days, when James was frequently in a
state of inebriation, a sinecure.
One day, Villiers happened to take by mistake the upper end of the board
instead of another attendant. The person whom he had thus superseded was
a creature of Somerset’s; Villiers was told of his error in an offensive
manner, and removed from his post. Incensed afterwards by a second
instance of incivility, he lost his self-control, and gave his brother
cup-bearer a blow. By the custom of the Court, Villiers thus made
himself liable to have his hand cut off; and Somerset, who was Lord
Chamberlain, was bound by his office to see that penalty inflicted. It
may readily be conceived with what alacrity Somerset would have
fulfilled this part of his duty, but the King interposed, and pardoned
Villiers, “who henceforth,” remarks an historian, “was regarded as a
budding favourite, and appeared like a proper palm beside the discerning
spirit of the King, who first cherished him, through his innate virtue,
that surprised all men.”[81]
Footnote 81:
Sanderson’s Life of James I., pp. 45 and 457.
It was however necessary that the merits of Villiers should be unfolded
to the Queen. Anne of Denmark, although apparently slighted by her royal
husband, exercised so considerable a control over his actions that he
never, according to the testimony of Archbishop Abbot, “would admit
anyone to nearness about himself but such a one as the Queen should
commend unto him, and had made some suit on his behalf.” Nor did this
wholly proceed from a reverence for Her Majesty’s judgment. It was the
result of the mingled weakness of conduct and duplicity which
characterised James, forming a strong contrast with his real ability and
acquirements; the absence of good sense and good taste were equally
conspicuous in all he did in private life; but he was cunning enough to
desire that if he made a false step the blame should rest upon his
Queen. His motive in desiring her approval was that, if she were ill
treated by the favourite, he might have the power of saying to her, “You
were the party that commended him to me.” “Our old master,” remarks
Archbishop Abbot, “took delight in things of this nature.”[82]
Footnote 82:
Rushworth’s Collections, vol. i., pp. 460 and 461.
Queen Anne had previously been solicited in behalf of Villiers, but in
vain; Abbot was, however, successful in his application. For some time,
indeed, the Queen answered him in these terms: “My lord, you and your
friends know not what you ask, for if this young man be brought in, the
first persons that he will plague will be you that labour for him. Yea,
I shall have my part also; the King,” added the wary Queen, “will teach
him to despise and hardly entreat us, that he may seem to be beholden to
no one but himself.”
“Noble Queen,” exclaimed Abbot, when, after experiencing the hollowness
of Court favour and the ingratitude of Buckingham, he wrote the
narrative of these incidents, “how like a prophetess did you speak!”
Upon the compliance of the Queen, it was resolved to introduce Villiers
to the King, for the double honour of being appointed one of His
Majesty’s Gentlemen of the Bedchamber, and of receiving knighthood. The
day was approaching, when Villiers fell ill, not without suspicion of
having taken the small-pox. This happened when all his friends were
“casting about” how to make him a great man. On the twenty-third of
April[83] he was, however, sufficiently recovered for the good offices
of his party to take effect.
Footnote 83:
1615.
The event was accomplished in the following manner:—The Queen and Prince
being in the King’s bedchamber, it was contrived that Villiers,[84] who
was near, should be summoned on some pretext, and when the “Queen saw
her own time, he was asked in.” “Then,” says an historian, “did the
Queen speak to the Prince to draw out the sword and to give it her; and
immediately, with the sword drawn, she kneeled to the King, and humbly
beseeched His Majesty to do her that especial favour as to knight this
noble gentleman, whose name was George, for the honour of St. George,
whose feast was now kept. The King at first seemed to be afraid that the
Queen should come too near him with a naked sword, but then he did it
very joyfully, and it might very well be that it was his own contriving,
for he did much please himself with such inventions.”[85]
Footnote 84:
State Paper, Domestic, 1616. Letter from Mr. Chamberlain to Sir Dudley
Carleton.
Footnote 85:
See Nichols’s Progresses, vol. iii., p. 80. By a page in that work, it
appears that Villiers’ appointment to the Royal Chambers, and his
being knighted, took place on successive days, the ceremony of
knighthood being performed at Somerset House.
It must have been a strange scene, for Somerset, who was at hand,
entreated of the King that his rival might only be made a Groom of the
Chamber; but Abbot, and others whom the Archbishop does not name, stood
at the door and plied the Queen with messages that she would “perfect
her work, and cause him to be made a gentleman,” and Her Majesty, as we
have seen, prevailed. Nor were these honours, in the case of Villiers,
attended with the expense which usually lessened their value; on the
contrary, a pension of a thousand pounds was added to maintain the
dignity of knighthood.[86]
Footnote 86:
Life of Bishop Goodman, vol. i., p. 223.
The termination of this incident, so important in the life of Villiers,
is related by Archbishop Abbot; Villiers at this time called him
“father.” The professions which he made to his reverend patron were then
doubtless sincere; but gratitude was not the only good seed which
political feuds and evil counsels stifled in the breast of Villiers.
“George,” relates the prelate, “went in with the King, but no sooner he
got loose but he came forth unto me into the Privy Gallery, and there
embraced me. He professed that he was so infinitely bound unto me, that
all his life long he must honour me as his father; and now he did
beseech me, that I would give him some lessons how he should carry
himself.” These lessons were three in number:—first, to pray daily to
God to bless the King his master, and to give him grace studiously to
serve and please him. The second was, that he should do all good offices
between the King and the Queen, the King and the Prince. The third, that
he should fill his master’s ears with nothing but the truth. These
excellent instructions were afterwards repeated to James, who observed
that they were “instructions worthy of an archbishop to give to a young
man.”
For some time, an affection, on the one hand expressed in parental
terms, and gratitude on the other, continued. “And now, my George,”
wrote the Archbishop, “because, out of your kind affection to me, you
style me your father, I will from this day forward repute and esteem you
for my son, and so hereafter you know yourself to be; and in token
thereof I do now give you my blessing again, and charge you, as my son,
daily to serve God, to be diligent and pleasing to your master, and to
be wary that at no man’s instance you press him with many suits, because
they are not your friends who urge those things upon you, but have
private ends of their own, which are not fit for you. So praying God to
bless you,
“I rest, your very loving father,
“G. CANT.”[87]
Footnote 87:
Extract from a letter quoted in Bishop Goodman’s Life, vol ii., p.
160. This epistle is endorsed “To my very loving son, Sir George
Villiers, Knight,” and dated Lambeth, December 10th, 1615.
The conduct of Villiers on a subsequent occasion made a deep impression
on the mind of the excellent prelate who thus befriended the youth. “The
Roman historian, Tacitus,” he bitterly remarks, “hath somewhere a note,
that benefits while they may be requited, seem courtesies, but when they
are so high that they cannot be repaid, they prove matters of
hatred.”[88] This was a severe reflection on one who ought never to have
forgotten the greatest of all obligations, those bestowed on the
unfriended by one in the height of favour. Villiers may henceforth be
regarded as fairly launched in his career; it was perhaps his misfortune
that so few important obstacles occurred in his progress, and that it
was achieved by an apparent concurrence of lucky events, and not by
patient merit, nor by any of the legitimate sources of success. “The
genius of the man,” observes a modern writer, “was daring and
magnificent, and his elocution was graceful as his manners; but these
were natural talents; he possessed no acquired ones.”[89]
Footnote 88:
Rushworth’s Collections, vol. i., p. 460.
Footnote 89:
See the Character of Buckingham, Disraeli’s Charles I., ii., p. 167.
A true, free-spoken, conscientious friend might have guarded his youth
from peril, and given to his aspiring mind a laudable bias. Abbot would
have been that friend, but Abbot was soon discarded, and an incident
occurred some years afterwards which clouded this excellent prelate’s
days, and produced a temporary, though unmerited, disgrace.
The archbishop, like many churchmen of his time, was an ardent lover of
the chace. In this respect he resembled Cranmer, who was so great a
horseman as to be called the “rough rider,” since no steed came amiss to
his fearless and practised guidance.
Abbot was hunting, in the summer of 1621, in Lord Zouch’s park of
Bramsell, in Hampshire. He aimed at a deer, which, leaping up, evaded
the shot, but a gamekeeper who had hidden himself behind the herd, was
killed by the discharge from the lively primate’s gun. An inquest was
held, and a verdict of death by “misfortune and the keeper’s own fault”
was returned. It appeared that the man had been that very morning warned
not to go in that direction. King James, on first hearing of this
occurrence, declared that none “but a fool or knave would think the
worse of Abbot for that accident, the like of which had once nearly
happened to himself.”
Abbot, it seemed, had gone into Hampshire with the intention of
consecrating a chapel as Lord Zouch’s, and not merely for the purposes
of amusement.[90] On considering the matter, nevertheless, his legal
advisers did not consider the verdict to have been legally drawn up.
Abbot therefore wrote to Lord Zouch, requesting him to have the coroner
and jury re-summoned, and the verdict re-considered, the credit of his
profession being involved, and his enemies ready to slander him.[91] In
a subsequent letter he recalled this request, declaring that it was
unnecessary; that he had a clear conscience, and was anxious to do
everything to give his enemies no advantages over him. In a few days,
nevertheless, he went again to Lord Zouch, declaring that his unhappy
accident had been a bitter potion to him, on account of the conflict
with his conscience, complaining that he was the talk of men, the cause
of rejoicing to the Papist and insult to the Puritan.[92] The King was
still gracious to him, but the primate remained in seclusion, and
misfortune seemed at hand.[93] These letters were written in August. In
the October of the same year, the King appointed an inquiry into the
accidental killing of the keeper in Bramsell Park, and desired three
bishops and others to examine whether there had been scandal brought
upon the Church or not.[94] The commissioners were divided, strange to
say, upon the question of the archbishop’s guilt or innocence, but their
decision, influenced by the strong advocacy of the Bishop of Winchester,
was ultimately in his favour. The King, as the head of the Church, then
absolved him, but all the new bishops were so unwilling to receive
consecration at his hand, that Abbot was obliged to appoint three
prelates to consecrate for him. All forfeitures and penalties for this
offence were remitted, and the archbishop restored to the King’s
presence. There is, however, no proof of what one looks for with
solicitude, the mediation of Buckingham in favour of his friend and
patron, although there is no reason, from the result, to suppose that it
may not have been exerted.
Footnote 90:
State Papers, Domestic, cxxii., No. 28.
Footnote 91:
State Papers, Ibid, No. 61.
Footnote 92:
Ibid, No. 97, vol. ii., 112.
Footnote 93:
Ibid, vol. cxxiii.
Footnote 94:
Ibid, cxxiii. No. 1000.
This attempt to make the archbishop’s mishap a “culpable homicide,”
originated in the Lord Keeper Williams, who had formed a plot for
_depriving_ Abbot. The accusation was based upon the ground that the
primate had been employed in an unlawful act when the accident occurred,
but Coke decreed that “by the laws of the realm, a bishop may lawfully
hunt in a park; hunt he may, because a bishop, when dying, is to leave
his pack of hounds to the King’s free will and disposal.”[95]
Footnote 95:
Lord Campbell’s Life of Coke, p. 314.
Such were the incidents which deprived Villiers, for a time, of the
valuable counsels of Abbot. It must, however, be also remembered, when
the real ignorance of Villiers is considered, and when his deficiencies
and his errors are lamented as constituting in his case a national
misfortune, that in his career as a courtier he wanted the needful
element in all improvement, leisure. The daily existence of James was
made up of toilsome pleasures,—the chase, the drama, the mask,—at which
Villiers, weary, doubtless, at times, of the incessant pageant,
sometimes assisted. He soon imbibed a still greater taste for display
than even his crafty mother had implanted in him for ambitious purposes,
and became, like most persons suddenly raised from poverty and
obscurity, inordinately ostentatious and prodigal.
It is amusing, however, to find him, in the early days of his greatness,
learning horsemanship. James was passionately fond of seeing others
exhibit on horseback. One of his favourite places of resort was
Newmarket. The King generally joined in all country amusements, drawn in
a litter, a mortal inward disease even then making that gentle movement
necessary; whilst the young and noble thronged around him on their
steeds, set off in all the bravery of costly caparisons. Prince Henry
had, during his brief career, set the fashion of a fondness for
horse-racing, and James, who suffered so many of his accomplished son’s
higher objects to become extinct in his grave, maintained in all its
prosperity that diversion. Newmarket, henceforth, was a favourite place
of resort. Amongst the late Prince’s equerries was a Frenchman named St.
Antoine, whose feats are frequently the subject of comment in the
newsletters of the day.
It was in the depth of the winter when James, attended by twenty earls
and barons, repaired to Newmarket. There was little accommodation for
them in that place, and the gay company were obliged to bestow
themselves in the poor villages around. Every morning, whilst at this
resort, Villiers was mounted on horseback, and taught to ride;[96] and
his progress in the King’s favour seemed to be commensurate with his
prowess. This was in the December of the year 1615. On the fourth of
January, 1615-16, Villiers was appointed Master of the Horse, instead of
the Earl of Worcester, who resigned all his posts into the King’s hands,
and was made Lord Privy Seal.[97]
Footnote 96:
Probably by Mons. St. Antoine, the equerry to M. Henry. He was engaged
as a riding-master, as we find by Endymion Porter’s letters, (State
Paper Office, Domestic) to many persons of condition.
Footnote 97:
Nichols’s Progresses, 7, 1, iii., 131.
This mark of royal preference gave a fresh impetus to the decline of
Somerset’s fortunes. In a masque written by Ben Johnson, and performed
at court, a bold allusion was made to the sinking prosperity of the
Earl, and a hint thrown out of his suspected crime. The play was
entitled, “The Golden Age Restored,” and these lines excited
considerable attention and speculation—
“Jove can endure no longer
Your great ones should your less invade:
Or that your weak, _though bad_, be made,
A prey unto the stronger.”
The “weak” was conjectured to be Overbury, and the delicacy of the
allusion has been pronounced by a modern critic[98] “to be above all
praise.” The masque was followed by a banquet, at which the new Master
of the Horse doubtless assisted, attired in all the splendours which his
now adequate means enabled him to assume.
Footnote 98:
Gifford. Ben Jonson’s Works.
Those who viewed, merely as spectators, these various incidents, were
curious to know on what terms Somerset and his young rival stood
together. It was impossible, they knew, for James, always involved, as
he was, in the labyrinths of some crooked policy, not to temporise with
one whose influence over him was fast waning away, not to unite, if
possible, amity to Somerset with partiality to Villiers. Accordingly,
whilst honours were thus showered upon the new favourite, “like main
showers, then sprinkling drops on dews,”[99] it was still thought
necessary to conciliate Somerset, and to make it appear, at all events
to the public, that Villiers owed his elevation to the goodwill of that
offended and resentful nobleman.
Footnote 99:
Reliquiæ Wottonianæ, p. 210.
It was deemed, therefore, expedient to take the very first opportunity
that could be available for propitiating Somerset, and, accordingly,
after the completion of the ceremonial of knighting, Sir Humphrey May
was despatched to inform Somerset that “Sir George Villiers, newly
knighted, would desire his protection.” Half an hour afterwards, Sir
George visited the Lord Chamberlain, and paid him this compliment:—
“My lord, I desire to be your servant and creature, and to take my court
preferment under your favour, assuring your lordship that you shall find
me as faithful a servant as ever did serve you.”
He spoke, however, to the inflamed mind of a jealous foe. The Earl is
said to have turned fiercely upon him, and answered impetuously in these
words:—[100]
“I will have none of your service, and you shall have none of my favour.
I will, if I can, break your neck, and of that be confident.” This rash
conduct is declared to have hastened the fall of Somerset, by proving to
the friends of Villiers that one of the two rivals in the royal favour
must retire, and that Somerset would brook no equal in the court.
Footnote 100:
Birch’s MS., British Museum, 4176.
But there were other circumstances palpably concurring to close the
shameless career of Somerset, and abundantly accounting for his fall,
without attributing much importance to the adventitious appearance of
George Villiers at Court. The discovery of his guilt by Secretary
Winwood[101] was preceded by such a long course of public and private
profligacy, that it is no wonder that Somerset should see, in the
prosperity of a young man whose reputation was unstained by a single
crime, an earnest of his own downfall, and that he should employ the
greater precaution to avert the coming storm. His efforts were, however,
unavailing. His sending away the apothecary who administered the poison
to Overbury to France; his disgracing all who spoke of the death of that
unfortunate man, hoping by such arbitrary acts to smother the
remembrance of that crime; his tyrannical investigation, by his warrant
as a privy counsellor, of all trunks, chests, and libraries in which he
suspected that any letters relative to that dark business might be
concealed; all were proofs confirmatory of that dark and foul plot the
recollection of which permitted to the terror-stricken Somerset not one
moment of comfort. He now began to act as a friendless and desperate
man, who, feeling that the ground is slipping from beneath his feet,
tries to hoard up wealth as a resource. He undertook no intercession
with the King without large bribes; and every new occurrence brought him
what is termed by the authors of the tract entitled “The First Fourteen
Years of King James’s Reign,” a fleece of money.[102] Offices about the
Court were all for the highest bidder, and even the King’s letters were
bought and sold; no plunder was obtained without purchase, so that
Somerset was soon known to be as notorious a bribe-taker as his
mother-in-law, the Countess of Suffolk. The high-born and the
highly-principled saw with disgust, now ill-concealed, the minion
leaning on the King’s cushion even in public, and treating their haughty
and influential class with rash scorn, disdaining even that respect
which was imperatively due to the Primate, Abbot, whose popularity was
at that time in its zenith. Many suspected that beneath this arrogant
bearing, stimulating an impolitic cupidity of gain, there lurked secret
fears and a stricken heart, a horror of the past and a dread of the
future; and conjectured, as well they might, that Somerset was never
more to know repose of mind—nor, perhaps, long to enjoy personal
security.[103]
Footnote 101:
Of the mode of this discovery, differing accounts are given. According
to Carte, Winwood derived the information of Somerset’s guilt, from
Archbishop Abbot, who detected it in some papers found in a trunk,
which was brought to the Archbishop by a servant of Overbury’s. See
Carte’s Hist. Eng. vol. ii. p. 43. Sir Symonds D’Ewes declares that
the foul deed was disclosed by Sir Thomas Elwis, Lieutenant of the
Tower, to Secretary Winwood, acknowledging and excusing his own
connivance in the affair, and laying the instigation of it to the
account of Somerset and his wretched wife.—D’Ewes’s MS. Journal in
Bishop Goodman’s Life, vol. iv., p. 144.
Footnote 102:
Published in Somers’s Tracts, vol. ii.
Footnote 103:
Somerset was even accused of having poisoned Prince Henry; but
Coppinger, a former servant of his, who accused him of that crime, was
said to be “cracked in his wits.” State Papers, vol. cxxxvii., p. 27.
By all these circumstances Villiers wisely profited during his early
days of favour; and happy had it been for him had he never forgotten the
lesson thus afforded him in the awful tragedy of Somerset’s career; more
awful, perhaps, than if the secret sins of the wretched Earl had been
visited with a signal retribution from the hand of power. There is
something in this miscreant’s forlorn and protracted existence, after
all that in life is valuable—honour, peace of mind, influence—were gone,
that is more desolate and appalling to the fancy than if the Tower had
for ever enclosed him, or the executioner claimed his life as a penalty
for his sins. The unpunished murderer walking abroad, shunned by all, is
a sort of moral leper; desolate in his freedom, and chastised even by
the silence and avoidance of his fellow men.
That Villiers took any active part in the measures which ensued, his
bitterest foes have not ventured to allege. Young, devoted to pleasure,
indifferent, at this time, to gain, ambitious, but not grasping, he
enjoyed at this period that general esteem, the absence of which he
bitterly felt in after life. Those who hated Somerset turned to
Villiers, and found him full of courtesy and of generous impulses. Those
who were on the point of offering bribes to Somerset discovering that
Villiers had the ear of the King, applied to him, and obtained
gratuitously what they sought. The country, as well as the Court, was
ringing with complaints of the Lord Chamberlain’s extortions, when the
accidental illness and remorse of an apothecary’s boy decided his fate.
That individual, employed by his master to administer the dose to
Overbury, fell ill at Flushing, and the whole mystery, with all its
concomitants, was revealed. “A small breach thus being made, Somerset’s
enemies, like the rush of many waters, rise up against him, following
the stream.” Thus does Arthur Wilson well express the ruin of one who,
for two years, had succeeded in defying curiosity and keeping the secret
of his crime unrevealed.
With the inconsistent conduct of the King during the proceedings against
his rival, Villiers appears to have had no concern, except such as his
situation of private secretary to King James, an office which appears to
have devolved upon him upon the disgrace of Somerset, necessarily
entailed. The alienation of James’s regard from Somerset, and the rising
influence of Villiers, are nevertheless, according to a high authority,
“very necessary to be borne in mind” through the legal proceedings
against the fallen favourite.[104] That Villiers desired the entire
exclusion of Somerset from royal favour is more than probable; that he
took any undue or direct means to ensure it is doubtful, unless we take
as evidence of an under-current of intrigue, the secret negociations
which went on between him and Sir Francis Bacon, to whom the conduct of
the prosecution was consigned before the 15th of February, 1615. Whilst
Footnote 104:
Amos’s Great Oyer of Poisoning, vol i., pp. 31 and 33.
Somerset was awaiting his trial, Bacon addressed to Villiers the
following letter. It is commonly remarked that a postscript is the most
important portion of a letter; but, in this case, the endorsement gives
the greatest insight into the motives of the writer. On the back of the
epistle are these words: “A letter to Sir G. Villiers, touching a
message brought to me by Mr. Shute, of a promise of the chancellor’s
place.” To this the following letter is the reply:—
“In the message I received from you by Mr. Shute, hath bred in me such
belief and confidence, as I will now wholly rely on your excellent and
happy self. When persons of greatness and quality begin speech with me
of the matter, and offer me their good offices, I can but answer them
civilly. But these things are but toys. I am yours, surer to you than my
own life. For, as they speak of a torquoise-stone in a ring, I will
break into twenty pieces before you fall. God keep you for ever.
“Your truest servant,
“FRANCIS BACON.”
“P. S.—My Lord Chancellor is prettily amended. I was with him yesterday
for half an hour; we both wept, which I do not do very often.”[105]
Footnote 105:
Bacon’s Works, vol. ii., p. 183.
That the fortunes of Villiers were ensured by the awful disclosures of
guilt which ensued, there can be no doubt. It is worthy of remark, how
vitiated must have been the state of that society, the highest in rank,
the foremost in fashion, in which crimes so fearful, compassed and aided
by associates of the lowest and most infamous description, could be
ascribed to individuals, and yet those individuals continue to hold
their position in society. It is true that, during that interval which
must have been to the guilty Earl and Countess of Somerset a season of
incessant fear and anguish, reports had been “buzzing about Somerset’s
ears, like a rising storm upon a well-spread oak;” but he had considered
himself to be too firmly planted in the King’s regard ever to be
up-rooted. And perhaps, had Villiers not come forward opportunely to
redeem the national credit, and to save a remnant of the King’s
character from utter reprobation and contempt, England might have been
still enslaved, until the close of James’s reign, by the extortionate
Earl and his haughty and murderous Countess.
Meantime, Villiers continued to profit by the delinquencies of his
rival. He profited in the way most gratifying to an honourable mind. No
intrigues to supplant, no efforts to hasten the ruin of the Earl, are
recorded to his discredit. He set, at this period of his career, a
bright, though unhappily a transient, example of what a royal favorite
might prove. He repudiated, not only the avarice, but the over-bearing
of Somerset.
He was courteous and affable to all, and seemed to “court men as they
courted him.” Free from all assumption, he still delighted to associate
with the gentlemen in waiting, and to join in their amusements, which
consisted, after supper, in leaping and exercises, in which none was so
active as the young favorite.[106] He thus preserved in health and
agility that noble form which excited the admiration of his country.
Such was his popularity, even with the old and haughty nobility, that
they were proud if they might aid in decking the “handsomest bodied man
of England.”[107] His taste for gorgeous apparel now displaying itself,
he was complimented by the nobles of James’s Court in the following
manner:—one of them would send to “his tailor and his mercer to put good
clothes upon the newly-made knight; another to his sempstress for
curious linen; others took upon them to be his bravos, and all hands
helped to piece up the new minion.”[108] So winning was the deportment
of Villiers, that even his enemies were propitiated to acknowledge “that
he was as inwardly beautiful, as he was outwardly, and that the world
had not a more ingenious gentleman.”[109] He incurred, however, some
risk in his ardour for amusement; and on one occasion over-strained
himself in running, which greatly distressed the King.[110] So rapid was
the rise of Villiers, that Lord Clarendon describes it by the term
“germination.” “Surely had he been a plant,” says that great historian,
“he would have been reckoned among the stoute nascentes, for he sprang
without any help, by a sort of ingenious composure (as we may term it)
to the likeness of our late sovereign and master, of blessed memory,
who, taking him into his regard, taught him more and more to please
himself, and moulded him, as it were, platonically, to his own idea,
delighting first in the choice of his materials, because he found him
susceptible of good form, and afterwards by degrees, as great architects
used to do, in the workmanship of his regal hand.”[111] This flattering
tribute to King James might have been spared, for the monarch, whose
blind and almost wicked partiality emboldened, and perhaps corrupted,
Somerset, can hardly be conceived to have formed the character of
Villiers.
Footnote 106:
I have passed over the dreadful story of Overbury’s murder, and its
concomitant circumstances, because Villiers had no participation in
public affairs until shortly before the arraignment of the two
culprits. A letter written by Lord Bacon immediately previous to that
event is evidently in reply to one addressed to his Lordship by
Villiers, by order of the King. This fixes the date of his acting as
private secretary to James. See Lord Bacon’s Works, vol. ii., p. 173.
Footnote 107:
Carte.
Footnote 108:
Bishop Goodman’s Life, vol i., p. 225.
Footnote 109:
Carte, vol. ii., p. 43, from Weldon’s Court and Character of King
James I.
Footnote 110:
Bishop Goodman’s Life, vol. i., p. 226.
Footnote 111:
Parallel between the Duke of Buckingham and the Earl of Essex.
Reliquiæ Wottonianæ, p. 163.
The testimony of Lord Clarendon that Villiers, like his supposed
prototype, the Earl of Essex, was a “fair-spoken gentleman,” not prone
and eager to detract openly from any man, “is a greater eulogy,” and to
this, the noble historian adds another, which, he affirms, “the
malignant eye could not refuse to Villiers;” “that certainly never man
in his place or power did entertain _greatness more familiarly_,” an
expression singularly felicitous, as conveying a sense of that innate
greatness which exalts its possessor above conventional distinctions.
His looks were “untainted by his felicity.”[112] No conscious
importance, no haughty contempt, none of the littleness of pride,
disgusted his equals or depressed his inferiors. “This, in my judgment,”
remarks Clarendon, “was one of his greatest virtues and victories of
himself.”
Footnote 112:
Ibid.
The elevation of Villiers appears, however, not to have been so
spontaneous as Lord Clarendon supposes. “Once commenced, it ran,” says
Sir Henry Wotton, “as smoothly as numerous verses, till it met with
certain rubs in Parliament.”
Thus, to borrow still from the same author, “the course of royal favour
being uninterrupted, the Duke’s thoughts were free.”[113]
Footnote 113:
Reliquiæ Wottonianæ, p. 166.
Meanwhile, the most fearful disclosures were shocking the public ear,
and rendering more secure than ever the prosperity of Villiers.
In the month of March, 1616, Lady Somerset was committed to the Tower.
So promptly were the measures now resolved upon executed, that she had
“scant leisure,” as a contemporary relates, “to shed a few tears over
her little daughter at the parting.”[114] This was the single touch of
natural affection which is latent in every heart, and was not wholly
extinguished even in the heart of the unhappy woman. Having given way to
that burst of emotion, she bore herself, as the same report states,
“constantly enough,” until she was carried into the enclosure of the
Tower. Then, affrighted and conscience-stricken, she did, according to
the same account, “passionately deprecate, and entreat the Lieutenant,
that she might not be lodged in Sir Thomas Overbury’s lodging, so that
he was fain to remove himself out of his own chamber for two or three
nights, till Sir Walter Raleigh’s lodging might be furnished and made
fit for her.”
Footnote 114:
Letter from Mr. Chamberlain to Sir O. Carleton; March 6, 1616. State
Papers. Also given in the “Grand Oyer of Poisoning,” by Andrew Amos,
Esq.
To this gloomy apartment, the wretched countess was consigned; her trial
was fixed for the fifteenth of May. But when that day drew near, when
the stage in the middle of Westminster Hall was completed, the
scaffolding around it finished, and when seats had been purchased at the
rate of four or five pieces each—that being an ordinary price—and when
even a lawyer and his wife, as Mr. Chamberlain, the writer of the letter
from whom these details are collected, states, agreed to give two pounds
for himself and his wife for ten days, and fifty pounds was given for a
corner that “would scarcely contain a dozen,” the eager public was
disappointed. The trial was put off till the twenty-second of the same
month.[115]
Footnote 115:
See State Paper Office. Domestic, 1616. This letter is printed in
Nichols’s Progresses.
Lady Somerset’s sudden illness was assigned as the cause of this delay.
Upon warning being given her that her trial was to come on on Wednesday,
“she fell to casting and scouring, and so continued the next day very
sick,” her illness being ascribed partly to trepidation, partly to the
suspicion of her having taken poison. But she recovered to make, as the
same eye-witness remarks, shorter work of it, by confessing the
indictment; and “to win pity by her sober demeanour,” “more curious and
confident than was fit for a lady in such distress; and yet she shed, or
made shew of, some tears divers times.” Contrary to the usual practice
in criminal trials, no invectives were urged against her, it being the
King’s pleasure that no “odious nor uncivil speeches” should be given.
The general opinion was, that in spite of her manifest guilt, this
miserable culprit would not suffer the penalty of the law. It must have
been a singular sight to have beheld the Earl of Essex, her former
husband, a spectator among the titled crowd at the arraignment; the
first day, privately—the second “full in Somerset’s face.”
Lady Somerset was sentenced “to be hanged by the neck till she was stark
dead.” When the fatal cap was assumed, and the decree uttered, she bore
herself with more calmness than her husband; who, upon sentence of death
being passed upon him, was so appalled that, when asked what he should
say to avert that decree, he would “stand still upon his own innocence,”
and could hardly be brought to refer himself to the King’s mercy. He was
afterwards induced to rest upon that point; to write to the King,
entreating that the judgment of “hanging should be changed to that of
heading;” “and that his daughter might have such lands as the King did
not resume.”[116]
Footnote 116:
Ibid; printed in Nichols’s Progresses, vol. iii., p. 169.
Villiers, no doubt, witnessed this memorable trial, and beheld the utter
degradation of his rival. The contrast which his own brilliant fortunes
presented to the disgrace and ruin of others, is shewn by the rapid
succession of honours which were conferred upon him.
The spectacle, which must have harrowed a mind not corrupted by the
ambition of a court, was diversified by a grand ceremonial, and a new
honour. This was the election of Villiers into the order of the Garter,
which took place on the 24th of April, on St. George’s day, whilst
Somerset and his wife lay trembling in the Tower.
Francis, Earl of Rutland, was admitted to a similar honour on the same
day. The world cavilled at this nobleman’s good fortune; for his wife
was an open and known recusant, and the Earl himself was thought to have
many disaffected persons about him. It was soon, however, discovered
that there was a design to improve the fortunes of Villiers by marrying
him to the young heiress of the house of Rutland. Meantime, to enable
his favourite to maintain the honours thus lavished upon him, and more
especially to support the dignities required by the express articles of
the Order in which he was installed, James bestowed upon Villiers “lands
and means;” and it was reported that estates, then belonging to the Earl
of Somerset, were to be added to those gifts, should that delinquent
“sink under his present trial.”[117]
Footnote 117:
Biographia Britannica, Art. Villiers.
Hitherto, Sir George Villiers appears to have figured alone amid the gay
and envying crowds of Whitehall, or among the equestrians at Newmarket.
But one of the greater proofs of his extending influence was the favour
shewn at this time to his mother.
The condition of Lady Villiers was wholly changed since her son had left
her a widow in the seclusion of Goadby. Having allied herself, by a
second marriage, to a rich and potent family—the Comptons—she had shared
in their prosperity. Compton had married Elizabeth, the daughter of Sir
John Spencer, Mayor of London, who had died some years previously,[118]
first leaving a fortune of three hundred thousand pounds, according to
some authors; to others, of eight hundred thousand pounds. The bequest
of this money to his wife completely upset Lord Compton’s reason; and it
seems to have benefited his family more than himself. For though he
appears to have recovered his intellect, he did not live long to enjoy
his great wealth, which went to enrich his brother.
Footnote 118:
The celebrated letter written by Lady Compton on this occasion, is
inserted in the Life of Bishop Goodman, vol. ii., p. 127, and affords
a fair specimen of the expectations of ladies of rank and fortune in
those days.
Lady Villiers, or as she was henceforth called, Lady Villiers Compton,
was now admitted into the circles of the exclusive and lordly inmates of
one of the King’s favourite resorts, Hatfield, and in June, 1616, she
met His Majesty there.
Some awkwardness attended this visit to the Earl and Countess of
Salisbury. The Countess of Suffolk, the mother of Lady Somerset, was
there; and fears might be entertained in what manner King James would
meet the mother of so great a culprit; but the imperturbable
insensibility of the monarch, or perhaps his lingering regard for
Somerset, obviated all difficulties. He kissed the Countess of Suffolk
twice; and performed the office of sponsor conjointly with her husband,
with whom, relates an eye witness, “the King is grown as great and as
far in grace as ever he was, which sudden invitations, without any
intermedience, made the Spanish Ambassador cry out, ‘Volo a dios que la
Corte d’Inglatiérra es com uno libró di Cavalleros andantes.’“ Upon this
stately occasion, the Countess of Suffolk “kept a table alone, save that
the Lady Villiers Compton only was admitted, and all the entertainment
was chiefly intended and directed to her and her children and
followers.” Nor was it only empty civility that marked the royal favour:
shortly afterwards the elder brother of George Villiers, John, was
knighted at Oatlands, in Surrey, that ceremonial being a prelude to the
titles of Baron Villiers of Stoke and Viscount Purbeck, which were
conferred upon him three years afterwards. On the sixth of July, the
instalment of the new Knights of the Garter, the Earl of Rutland and Sir
George Villiers, and of Robert Sydney, Viscount Lisle, took place; the
ceremonial was performed on a Sunday, and on the same afternoon, a
chapter was held to consider the point whether the Earl of Somerset’s
arms were to be taken away or left as they were. So closely did the
elevation of Villiers follow on the downfall of his rival.[119]
Footnote 119:
Nichols, iii., p. 175. His arms were, after a long dispute, removed
higher, in the same manner as when new arms and banners were
introduced. According to Camden, “the King ordered that felony should
not be reckoned amongst the disgraces of those who were to be excluded
from the Order of St. George,” “_which, was without precedent_.”
Nichols, iii., p. 177.
Somerset, however, still displayed, even in his prison in the Tower, his
Garter and his George; whilst the public were scandalized by repeated
messages carried by Lord Hay, between the King and the condemned Earl;
and the result of these was soon perceived. Somerset had the liberty of
the Tower granted to him; he was seen walking about, and talking to the
Earl of Northumberland, who was still in prison on account of the
Gunpowder Plot; and at other times saluting his lady at the window. “It
is much spoken of,” writes Mr. Chamberlain to Sir Dudley Carleton, “how
Princes of that Order, to let our own pass, can digest to be coupled
with a man civilly dead, and corrupt in blood, and so no gentleman,
should continue a Knight of the Garter.” Lady Somerset’s pardon had been
signed the foregoing week, and, as matters now stood, Villiers might
still tremble lest his advancement should be delayed, and the noble
miscreants be restored to favour.
His success, nevertheless, continued, for Anne of Denmark was in the
interests of the young favourite. During the month of August the Queen
addressed a letter to Villiers, who was then attending on the King,
couched in these familiar terms:—
“MY KIND DOG,
“Your letter hath been acceptable to me. I rest allreadie assured of
your carefulnesse. You may tell your maister that the King of Dennemark
hath sent me twelf faire mares, and, as the drivers of them assures, all
great with foles, which I intend to put into Byefield[120] Parke, where
being the other day a-hunting, I could finde but vere few deare, but
great store of other cattle, as I shall tell your maister myself when I
see him. I hope to meet you all at Woodstock at the time appointed, till
when I wish you all happiness and contentment,
“ANNA R.
Footnote 120:
Byfleet, in Surrey.
“I thank you for your paines taken In remembering the King for the
pailing of me parke. I will doe you any service I can.”
This characteristic letter was the prelude to the elevation of Villiers
to the peerage. At first, it was determined that he should be created
Viscount Beaumont, in compliment to his mother’s family; and the coronet
and robes were sent down to Woodstock; but that decision was changed for
an obvious reason, and the title of Baron Whaddon was conferred upon
Villiers, Whaddon being the estate of the unfortunate Lord Grey, who had
expired in the Tower in 1614, being implicated in the supposed attempt
to place Arabella Stuart on the throne.
On the twenty-seventh of August, 1616, the ceremony of this double
creation took place.
On this occasion, the preface to the patent was composed by Lord Bacon,
who, on sending it to the King, observed that he had not used in it
“glaring terms,” but drawn it according to His Majesty’s instructions.
It was determined that the two creations, those of Baron Whaddon and
Viscount Villiers, should take place at the same time, the former being
intended to secure the estates of Whaddon, the latter, to preserve the
name of Villiers in the appellation of the favourite. This appears to
have been the especial will of James. “For the name,” writes Bacon to
Villiers, on sending him his patent for the title of Viscount, “His
Majesty’s will is law in these things; and to speak truth, it is a
well-sounding name both here and abroad, and being even a proper name, I
will take it for a good sign that you shall give honour to your dignity,
and not your dignity to you. Therefore, I have made it ‘Viscount
Villiers;’ and as for your Barony, I will keep it for an Earldom, for
though the latter had been more orderly, yet that is as usual, and both
alike good in law.”
The patent, however, was again altered. It is possible that Bacon may
have imagined that the associations connected with Whaddon, and relating
to a nobleman generally compassionated,[121] might have rendered
Villiers unpopular: at all events he changed it to Blechly; and Villiers
received the patent of Lord Blechly, of Blechly.[122]
Footnote 121:
According to Carte, Villiers was obliged to pay 11,000_l._ to Sir
Rowland Egerton, who had married Lord Grey’s sister, and also to
procure Sir Rowland the patent of Baronetcy. But this is discredited
by Sir Egerton Brydges. See Men of Fame, vol. i., p. 79.
Footnote 122:
Bacon’s letters, vol. ii., p. 35.
“I have sent you,” Bacon thus wrote, “now, your patent of creation of
Lord Blechly of Blechly, and of Viscount Villiers. Blechly is your own,
and I like the sound of the name better than Whaddon; but the name will
be laid aside, for you wish to be called Viscount Villiers. I have put
them both in a patent, after the manner of the patent of arms where
baronies are joined; but the chief reason was, because I would avoid
double prefaces, which had not been fit; nevertheless, the ceremony of
robing, and otherwise, must be double.”[123]
Footnote 123:
Bacon’s Letters.
Sir George Villiers was introduced to the royal presence, on this
occasion, by his relative, Lord Compton, and by Lord Norris, the Lord
Carew carrying the robe of state before him, when his new honour of
Baron Blechly of Blechly was conferred. He was afterwards created
Viscount Villiers, when he appeared in a surcoat of scarlet velvet, and
was brought in by the Earl of Suffolk and Viscount Lisle, Lord Norris
carrying the robe of state of the same coloured velvet, and Lord Compton
the crown. The King was seated on his throne, and the Queen, and
Charles, Prince of Wales, were present, and all the company “seemed
jolly, and well afraid.”
The advice which Bacon proffered to Villiers, upon his elevation to the
peerage, is couched in noble terms, and wants nothing but the
indefinable charm of supposed sincerity to perfect it:—
“And after that the King shall have watered your new dignities with his
bounty of the lands which he intends you, and that some other things
concerning your means, which are now likewise in intention, shall be
settled upon you, I do not see but you may think your private fortunes
established; and, therefore, it is now time that you should refer your
actions chiefly to the good of your sovereign and your country. It is
the life of an ox or a beast, always to eat and never to exercise; but
men are born, especially Christian men, not to cram in their fortunes,
but to exercise their virtues; and yet the others have been the
unworthy, and sometimes the humour of great persons in our time; neither
will your further fortune be the farther off; for assure yourself that
fortune is of a woman’s nature, that will sooner follow you by slighting
than by too much moving.”[124]
Footnote 124:
Bacon’s Letters, vol. ii., p. 85.
He recommends the young peer, in this “dedication of himself to the
public, to countenance, encourage, and advance able and virtuous men, in
all degrees, kinds, and professions.” And in places of moment, “rather,”
he says, “make able and honest men yours, than advance those that are
otherwise because they are yours.”
“The time is,” he adds, in conclusion, “that you think goodness the best
part of greatness: and that you remember whence your rising comes, and
make return accordingly, God ever keep you.”
Some time afterwards, another characteristic epistle from the Queen
denoted the secret terms upon which Anne of Denmark stood with the young
favourite:—
“MY KIND DOG,
“I have received your letter, which is verie welcom to me; you doe verie
well in lugging the sowes (the King’s) ears, and I thank you for it, and
whould have you do so still, upon condition that you continue a watchful
dog to him, and be alwayes true to him. So wishing you all happines.
“ANNA R.”[125]
Footnote 125:
Nichols, vol. iii., p. 187.
It is not a matter of surprise that, thus caressed by both the King and
Queen, marks of favour should have followed in continual succession.
According to Lord Clarendon, the rapid rise of Villiers might be imputed
to a certain innate “wisdom and virtue that was in him, with which he
surprised, and even fascinated, all the faculties of his incomparable
master.”
And this was no matter of surprise, if we may believe in the truth of
the following remarks:—“That Villiers was no sooner admitted to stand
there in his own right, but the eyes of all such as look’d out of
judgement, or gazed out of curiosity, were quickly directed towards him;
as a man, in the delicacy and beauty of his colour, decency and grace of
his motion, the most rarely accomplished they had ever beheld.”
The emotions experienced by Villiers, as he gradually ascended higher
and higher towards the eminence of worldly grandeur, are well described
by Lord Clarendon, in the following words:—
“His swiftness and nimbleness in rising, may be with less injury
ascribed to a vivacity than any ambition in his nature; since, it is
certain the King’s eagerness to advance him, so surprised his youth,
that he seemed only to be held up by the violent inclinations of the
King, than to climb up by any art or industry of his own.”[126] It is
not to be marvelled at, that the character of Villiers should suffer in
this ordeal, fiercer than that of the most depressing vicissitude and
adversity; and soon, therefore, indications are to be found, in the
annals of the day, of a dawning selfishness and imperiousness, foreign
to the simple and courteous nature of Villiers.[127] Still there were
noble traits of a lingering greatness of spirit, which justify the
partiality which every one who analyses his character must necessarily
entertain for it; sometimes at variance with his better judgment. Whilst
by watchful bystanders it was remarked that Villiers, the new made
Viscount, “will hardly suffer any one to leap over his head,” nor would
he allow the Lord Chancellor Ellesmere to be made an Earl; by others, a
sacrifice of interest, proceeding from a generous scruple, is recorded.
Footnote 126:
Disparity, p. 194.
Footnote 127:
Nichols, vol. iii., p. 191.
It will be remembered by historical readers, that Sherborne Castle, the
forfeited estate of Sir Walter Ralegh, had been bestowed by James upon
the Earl of Somerset. When supplicated by Lady Ralegh to restore that
property to her children, the monarch’s answer was, “I mean to have it
for Carr;” a reply, which, as Mr. Amos justly observes, “cannot be read
in the present day without indignation;” “what impressions,” he adds,
“must it have produced on the contemporaries of Ralegh and Carr?”[128]
At the trial of Somerset, this luckless possession, upon which a curse
has been supposed to rest, was highly prejudicial to him; and many there
were, who regarded his calamities as a judgment for this detested
acquisition.
Footnote 128:
Great Oyer of Poisoning, p. 29, by Andrew Amos, Esq.
When the Earl of Somerset’s lands were given away, after his forfeiture,
the estate of Sherborne was offered to Villiers; he might, perhaps, have
accepted it without odium, for upon Prince Charles had been bestowed all
Somerset’s estates in the north. But he refused the offer of Sherborne,
according to a passage in Birch’s MSS., “in a most noble fashion;
praying the King that the building of his fortunes might not be founded
on the ruin of another.”[129] Sherborne, the value of which was at this
time about eight hundred pounds yearly, but was expected to be shortly
double that sum, was given to Sir John Digby, upon the payment of ten
thousand pounds, and has remained ever since in the same family. The
respect of Villiers towards the memory of an unfortunate man was much
appreciated; already had public opinion visited with its bitterest
curse, the traitor, Sir Lewis Stukeley, who was afterwards a prisoner in
that very “chamber in the Tower, in which Ralegh, whom he had betrayed,
had spent twelve years of misery.”[130]
Footnote 129:
Birch’s MSS. 4176. This anecdote, so creditable to Buckingham, is
confirmed by a grant in the State Paper Office. S. P. O. vol. cv., No.
20, see Calendar, 1616-17, March 12, the grant to the Earl of
Buckingham, fee-simple of the manors of Beaumont, Oldhall and Newhall
de Beaumont, Mose, Okeley Magna, Okeley Parva, Sligghawe, Okeley Park,
Mose Park, Essex, together with all timbers and advowsons belonging to
them, which the Lord Darcie of Chiche holdeth for terme of his life.
Manor of Fleete, marshes of Trewdales, Fleetehouse Hall Hills, in
Lincolne, in lieu of the manor of Teynton Magna, Gloucester, _part of
value for Sherborne_, escheated to the Crown by Somerset’s attainder.
Inedited MSS. Domestic, 1616-17.
Footnote 130:
Hutchins’s History of Dorsetshire, vol. iv., p. 83.
Sir Henry Wotton compares the repetition of benefits conferred upon
Villiers, to a kind of embroidering, or listing of one favour upon
another. But all these preferments were, he adds, but the “faceings or
fringeings of his greatness,” compared with that trust which the King
shortly reposed in his favourite, when he made him “the chief
concomitant of his heir apparent.”[131]
Footnote 131:
Reliquiæ Wottonianæ.
This important mark of respect and confidence had never been extended to
the ill-fated predecessor in James’s favour, the Earl of Somerset. If
Villiers were at that period of his life unworthy of the trust, James,
endowed as he was with all the experience which his own vicious Court
could bestow, was criminal beyond measure to place his only son, on whom
the hopes of the nation rested, in contaminated society. James must, in
that case, have been either grossly deceived, or immeasurably culpable.
The friendship, thus commenced between the prince and the favourite, in
youth, was fraught with consequences so important to this country, that
few points of historical biography can offer greater domestic interest
than the early intimacy between Charles and Villiers.
Charles, Prince of Wales, was eight years younger than the man whom he
afterwards admitted to an intimacy such as has been rarely permitted
between a monarch and a subject, and which ceased only when Villiers
expired. The superstitious, when they remembered, in aftertimes, the
perils of the young prince’s infancy, saw in them a type of his fate.
“He was born,” says the historian Kennet, “and baptized, in somewhat of
surprise and confusion, as it were beginning the world in a sort of
presage how he was to end it.”[132] So feeble was he, that even
afterwards, although in process of time there were many great ladies
suitors for the keeping of the infant Prince, yet when they saw how
sickly and fragile he was, their hearts failed, and none of them
consented to undertake so important a charge.[133] Little, indeed, could
it have been anticipated that the delicate boy was fated, not only to
outlive his energetic and robust brother, Henry, but even to become, in
times of danger, one of the hardiest and healthiest of those who fought
on Edgehill, and at Naseby. The constitution of Charles was invigorated
in his vicissitudes, and perfected by the toils of a soldier’s life.
Footnote 132:
Kennet’s Hist. England, p. 1.
Footnote 133:
Sir Robert Carey’s Memoirs, p. 201.
That he should reign over this country was foretold by second sight.
When James the First was preparing to remove from Scotland, there came
to the Court an aged Highland chief, to take a solemn leave of his
sovereign. The Queen and her children were present. The old man, after
addressing a great deal of affectionate and sage advice to the King,
turned to the children, and passing by Henry, he kissed with great
ardour and deep respect the hands of his younger brother, the Duke
Charles, as then he was called.
The King strove to correct what he fancied was a mistake on the part of
the chief, and to direct his attention to the heir apparent, the fit
object of such homage. But the Highlander heeded not those hints; he
continued to gaze upon and to address the infant Charles; saying that he
knew to whom he addressed himself. “This child,” he exclaimed, “will be
greater than his elder brother, and will convey his father’s name and
title to succeeding generations.” “This,” said Dr. Pernichief, Charles’s
tutor, “was conceived to be dotage; but the event gave it the credit of
a prophecy, and confirmed that some long experienced souls in the world,
before their dislodging, arrive to the height of prophetical
spirits.”[134] A long period of fragility seemed to throw doubt upon the
gratuitous prophecy of the aged chief. Fortunately, Sir Robert Carey, to
whom the charge of the drooping child was entrusted, was an estimable
person, incapable of anything deceitful, or unjust—a “plain, honest
gentleman.”[135] Those who wished ill to him and to his wife rejoiced at
this selection, for they were certain that the prince would never be
reared.
Footnote 134:
Kennet’s Hist. England.
Footnote 135:
Goodman’s Life, vol. i., p. 7.
The weakly Charles was four years of age when consigned to the care of
Sir Robert Carey. He could not, at this age even, stand alone; his
ancles appeared to be out of joint. The King, with his characteristic
conceit and want of gentle feeling, was disposed to use the most violent
remedies and measures to cure the defects at which his pride was
offended. The nostrums which he recommended were worthy of Martinus
Scriblerus. But he found a champion of the helpless child in Lady Carey.
“Many a battle my wife had with the King, but she still prevailed,”
writes Sir Robert Carey.[136] The King, nevertheless, wished that the
string under the young prince’s tongue might be cut; for the child, it
was thought, would never speak. Then he proposed wire boots for his
sinews and feet, but Lady Carey stood firm, and the Monarch was obliged
to yield to a woman’s arguments.
Footnote 136:
Carey’s Memoirs, p. 200.
The boy grew daily stronger, and repaying Lady Carey’s good care, gained
health under her mild auspices, “both in body and mind.”[137] Still the
impediment in his voice continued; his countenance exhibited that
mournful expression which was doubtless the natural consequence of a
weakly childhood, and of the consciousness of bodily defects, which is
the most likely of any circumstances to depress the buoyancy of the
young.
Footnote 137:
Carey’s Memoirs.
To the inevitable solitude of ill-health, Charles probably owed his
prudence, his early piety, and his taste for elegant pursuits. Villiers,
in after life, found his love of pictures and medals one road to
Charles’s affections, by producing a sympathy between himself and the
young prince. Charles was also, for his age, an accomplished theologian,
and notwithstanding the impediment in his utterance, he could discourse
to the admiration of all who heard him, on topics of general interest.
With the traveller, the mechanic, and the scholar, he was equally
fluent, meeting them on their own subjects, and imparting knowledge to
the learned. He improved, too, in those diversions, and exercises which
were then considered indispensable to the character of a gentleman. “He
rid,” says his tutor, Dr. Pernichief, “the great horse very well; and on
the little saddle he was not only adroit, but a laborious hunter or
fieldman.”[138]
Footnote 138:
Inedited MS. in the State Paper Office. Domestic, Nov. 1616.
The temper of Charles is said to have been tinctured with obstinacy; and
his old Scottish nurse reported him to have been of a very evil nature,
even in his infancy; whilst another attendant taxes him with being,
“beyond measure, wilful and unthankful.”[139] How far, in these uncured
qualities, “springing like rank weeds in the heart,” we may trace some
of the fatal errors in Charles’s career—his pertinacious adherence,
especially when King, to Villiers, whether his favourite was right or
wrong, is a matter of curious speculation.
Footnote 139:
Miss Aikins’ Life of Charles I., vol. i., p. 55, 56., from Sir Philip
Warwick’s; also Lilly’s Observations, p. 60.
But Dr. Pernichief, who knew Charles well, only allows that his
“childhood was blemished with supposed obstinacy, for the weakness of
his body inclining him to retirement, and the imperfections of his
speech rendering discourse tedious and unpleasant, he was suspected to
be somewhat perverse,” a construction often put upon the deportment of a
bashful, sad child. Such were his defects; and, as far as his royal
father was concerned, they were more offensive to the pride of the king,
than painful to the tenderness of a parent. All, however, acknowledged
that the youth of the accomplished Charles had hitherto been
irreproachable, and that, if he manifested not the powerful intellect
and extended views of his late brother, he resembled him in his love of
virtue, his sense of honour, and in the difficult task of being dutiful
and respectful to parents who were frequently at variance.
He now came, at the age of sixteen, before his future subjects, with
this singular disadvantage, that the death of his elder brother was
still a subject of lamentation. The clergy, especially, could not forget
one whose staunch Protestantism gave them the assurance of a steady
friend.
“Henry, Prince of Wales, was still,” says a contemporary writer, “so
much in men’s minds, that Andrews, Bishop of Ely, preaching at court,
prayed solemnly for him, without recalling himself.”[140] The Queen,
too, refused to be comforted, and upon the first public occasion on
which Charles appeared, declined being present, lest the ceremonial
should revive her grief.
Footnote 140:
Inedited MS. in the State Paper Office. Domestic, Nov. 1616.
Many could remember that at his installation into the Order of the Bath,
at four years of age, Charles, unable to walk, was carried in the arms
of the Lord High Admiral to the rites which, referring to chivalric
observances and martial deeds, seemed a sort of mockery to the infant
Prince. Those who recalled that hour, now beheld in the royal youth, who
at his creation as Prince of Wales appeared before them, a graceful and
manly figure set off to advantage by dress, and other circumstances.
In an old print, engraved by Renold Estraake, he is represented, as
Prince of Wales, in a slouched hat with a long falling feather; his
juvenile, and very slender form clad in a tight vest; a sash over the
right shoulder is tied with a large bow under the left arm, and the ends
are fringed with jewels. Around his waist is a scarf, also edged with a
fringe of pearls and jewels. A stuffed skirt, richly embroidered and
adorned, descends almost to the knee. His boots are apparently of some
soft material, being creased; the tops richly decorated with jewels.
Thus attired, and mounted on a superb horse, the head of which was
adorned with a Phœnix in flames, emblematically complimentary,
Charles presented himself to the people. Such was his costume before he
visited Spain, and imbibed a love of the graceful cloak, the Spanish
hat, and Vandyke collar.
His manners, serious though courteous, were highly acceptable to the
majority of those who gazed upon him, when, on the eve of All Saints’
day, October 31st, 1616, Charles was created Prince of Wales. His very
stammering began to be approved as a mark of wisdom; and “obloquy, it
was said, never played the fool so much as in imputing folly to the heir
apparent.”
Buckingham, although twenty-four years of age, seems by the earliest
portrait that there is of him—the engraving by Simon Pass, in 1617—to
have had a most youthful appearance. In that picture, taken when he was
made an Earl, and therefore during the ensuing year, he is depicted in a
tight doublet, with a small white collar edged with Vandyke lace, and
closed with one row of rich pearls down the centre. A cloak hangs over
one shoulder, but the other displays a short sleeve, or epaulet, opening
above the elbow, and having underneath a richly-worked sleeve, confined
at the wrist by a deep cuff, fringed, and turned back; his doublet is
richly guarded with lace. At this period, a very slight moustache is
seen upon his upper lip, and the pointed beard, which is afterwards to
be found in all his portraits, is not observable.
The ceremonials performed on this occasion were such as the people of
this country have ever dearly loved; and, without considering that they
emptied the royal coffers, and compelled James to resort to expedients
for raising money which rendered him a continual debtor to the bounty
and loyalty of his subjects, eventually taxing too far their liberality,
they loudly extolled them on this occasion. It must, however, have been
a cheering sight when the young Prince came in state from Barn Elms to
Whitehall, accompanied by a retinue of lords and gentlemen of honourable
rank. At Chelsea he was met by the Lord Mayor and citizens, in separate
barges; and the sounds of martial music, or, as the chronicler of the
day terms it, “the royal sound of drum and trumpet,” the sight of a
crowd of people on the shore and in boats, the rich banners and
streamers, with many trophies and ingenious devices which met him on the
water, must have presented as festive a scene as ever was enacted on the
bosom of the river Thames.
The speeches addressed were, of course, in verse. They were proffered by
a female figure, representing London, seated upon a sea unicorn, with
six Tritons supporting her, accompanied by Neptune and the two rivers,
Thames and Dee. This personage addressed the young prince in the
following terms:—
Treasures of hope and jewel of mankind,
Richer no kingdome’s head did ever see;
Adorn’d in titles, but much more in mind,
The love of many thousands speake in thee;
The ode went on to enumerate the blessings to be anticipated from the
promising virtues of Charles, and concluded:—
Welcome, oh, welcome—all faire joyes attend thee,
Glorie of life, to safety we commend thee.
After this address, the young Prince was wafted down to Whitehall
Stairs, where he landed. Passing on to the palace, he saluted the King,
who stood on the palace stairs. The ceremony of creation, which took
place on the following Monday, was performed in the hall of Whitehall
Palace; and at night, “to crown it with more heroical honour, fortie
worthy gentlemen of the ten noble societies of Innes of Court, and every
way qualified by birth to break three staves, three swords, and exchange
ten blows a-piece,” encountered each other. The delicate health of the
Prince, and the late season of the year, prevented any great procession
at the creation, but it was commemorated by tilting at the ring, to give
great lustre and honour to the occasion, and among fourteen names of
high degree, is found, among the challengers, that of Viscount Villiers,
his first appearance in the tilt yard. Among the gallants who flaunted
it out with the greatest bravery, are to be found many famous in
successive times.[141]
Footnote 141:
The Lord Seymour, who had married the Lady Arabella Stuart, was among
a set of newly-created Knights of the Bath; and Tom Carew and Phil
Lytton, third son of Sir Rowland Lytton, of Knebworth, Herts., “were
squires of high degree, for cast and bravery;” the one being esquire
to Lord Beauchamp, the other to his cousin, Rowland St. John.—Letter
from Mr. Chamberlain to Sir Dudley Carleton. State Paper Office,
November 4th.
Notwithstanding the sanction which James gave to a growing intimacy
between the heir apparent and his favourite, there had been various
early disagreements between them, which delayed the reciprocal affection
which the King strove to promote between Charles and Buckingham. Their
confidence was, in truth, the growth of years, and was impeded by
several incidents, which those who were adverse to Villiers were eager
to notice and to record. It was generally expected that a jealousy
between them would defeat the King’s wishes, and divide the court into
two parties; and the following letter imparts one of those incidents
upon which such anticipations were founded:—
_Letter of Edward Sherburn to Lord Holland._
“_March 14, 1615._
“There is a speech in court of the distaste Sir George Villiers hath
given the Prince about a ring. The manner, as I have heard it, is thus:
The Prince coming one afternoon into the Presence at Newmarket, with Sir
George Villiers, and discoursing with him, fixed his eyes upon a ring
which Sir George Villiers had upon his finger, which, taking from him,
put it upon one of his own; and having occasion to pull out his
pocket-handkerchief, the ring, being too large for the Prince’s finger,
fell into his pocket. The Prince parting from him, not thinking of the
ring, the next morning, Sir George Villiers, meeting the Prince in His
Majesty’s presence again, and finding the Prince to take no notice of
his ring, asked His Highness for it; to which he answered, that in good
faith he knew not what he had done with it; whereat Sir George Villiers
flew into such a passion, whether it was in regard of the value, or of
the piece, as he left the Prince, and went immediately to the King,
exceedingly disconcerted. The King, observing some distemper in him,
demanded the occasion. Expressing the same with some earnestness, Sir
George told the King that the Prince had lost a ring of his, which did
much trouble him. The King, moved thereat, sent for the Prince, and used
such bitter language to him, as forced His Highness to shed tears,
telling him also not to return to His Majesty until he had found it, and
restored the ring to Sir George Villiers. The Prince, after he came from
the King, gave commandment to Sir Robert Carey to search in the pockets
of his breeches which he wore that day, when by good fortune the ring
was found, and by Sir Robert Carey delivered to Sir George Villiers. By
this a man may see the force of the King’s affection, which is
boundless, and so likewise may be seen how far beyond reason presumption
may transport a man. What the consequence of this and the like will be,
time must produce. Only this much is conceived, that the favour of the
King on this particular cannot continue, because there wants a sound
foundation to uphold so great a building. Thus much I adventure to write
unto your lordship, whom I beseech to keep this in your own custody, or
else to commit it to the fire.”[142]
Footnote 142:
Inedited State Papers. Domestic, 1616, 1617.
Another occurrence, trivial under other circumstances, seemed to
indicate that no harmony was likely to exist between Charles and
Villiers. One day, as they were walking in the gardens of Greenwich
Palace, they approached a fountain, near which was a statue of Bacchus:
this figure was so constructed, after the fashion of ancient waterworks,
that, by touching a spring, the water was emitted. The Prince, grave as
he usually appeared, was that day in high spirits. He touched the
spring, the water spouted forth, and suffused the face of the favourite.
Villiers was greatly offended. The King took his part, not only
reproving severely his son, but adding the father’s correction of two
boxes on the ears. Those who stood by were certain that this boyish
frolic and its termination would ruin Villiers with the Prince. That it
did not, is a proof of the good disposition of Charles, who, perhaps,
did not the less admire Villiers because he had resented an act of
impertinence even from an heir apparent.[143]
Footnote 143:
Inedited letter in the State Paper Office, March 8, 1616, addressed to
Sir Dudley Carleton.
The partiality which James now openly manifested for Villiers drew down
upon him the animadversions of the world; and when he trusted him as the
associate of his son, invectives were loud and frequent. Although it was
the fashion of the day to impute to the sovereign the wisdom of Solomon,
lamentations were poured forth upon the unworthiness of those in whom he
confided. “Is it not prodigious,” writes one historian, “that a Prince,
who was as wise as the beloved son of David, should commit the reins of
government to a callow youth, of no more capacity than is enough to
qualify a modern beau?”[144] “For an old king,” observes Roger Coke, “he
having reigned in England and Scotland fifty-one years, to doat upon a
young favourite scarce of age, yet younger in understanding, though old
in vice as any of his time, and to commit the whole ship of the
commonwealth by sea and land to such a Phaeton, is a precedent without
any example.”[145] Not only Villiers, it is added, but even his mother,
began now to influence all matters of public concern; no places were
disposed of without her consent, and as much court was paid to her as to
her son.[146]
Footnote 144:
Oldmixon’s History of England, p. 31.
Footnote 145:
Roger Coke’s Delection.
Footnote 146:
Oldmixon.
Many of the animadversions thus thrown upon Villiers proceeded from the
laxity of his moral code. On this point, the accusations brought forward
are vague, and therefore difficult to be repelled. They were, in some
instances, the effect of a general impression that Villiers was a friend
of Laud and a favourer of Armenianism; and originated with the Puritans.
No instance of great dereliction from propriety being recorded, it may
be safely inferred that at this time public decorum was, at all events,
not outraged by Villiers, whatever the private course of his existence
may have been; and however humiliating it is to reflect that a character
so noble, so incapable of baseness, of such fair promise, may yet have
been tinged with vices that infallibly brush away much of the finest
attributes of virtuous youth, it must, at the same time, be allowed,
that to remain incorrupt in the reign of James, would have argued almost
super-human strength of character.
“Nothing,” relates Arthur Wilson, “but bravery and feasting, the parents
of debauchery and rioting, flourished among us. There is no theme for
history where men spill more drink than blood.” And he justly remarks
that the boasted Halcyon days of peace cease to be a blessing when they
“bring a curse” with them; the curse of licentious pleasures and
disgraceful idleness; and that thus war is more happy in its effects
than peace, “if it takes the distemper that grows by long surfeit
without destroying the body.”[147]
Footnote 147:
Wilson’s History of the Reign of James I.
In spite, however, of the animadversions of foes, and the still more
injurious temptations proffered by unworthy friends, the public
character of Buckingham maintained for some time its integrity. His
errors, real or imputed, were not at first such as to lower him in the
eyes of society. He appeared, as Lord Clarendon observes, “the most
glorious star that ever shined in any court; insomuch that all nations
persecuted him with love and wonder, as fast as the King with fancy; and
to his last he never lost any of his lustre.”[148]
Footnote 148:
Reliquiæ Wottonianæ, p. 194.
His mother assisted in the aggrandizement of her favourite son. It was
her office to teach his kindred, as fast as they came up to the
metropolis, “to put on a court dress and air.” The King, who had
hitherto hated women, soon began to have his palace crowded with the
female relations of Villiers; “little children did run up and down the
royal apartments like rabbit-starters about their burrows.” And the
monarch, who could never endure his queen or his own family near him,
made no remonstrance at this inconvenience, whilst the censorious, who
decided that the favourite had no merit except that “he looked well,
dressed well, and danced well,” were outrageous in their wrath. So well,
indeed, did he “look,” that James, more and more enchanted with that
open and beaming countenance, gave him the name of “Steenie,” in
allusion to one of the pictures in Whitehall, by an Italian master,
representing the first martyr, Stephen.
Villiers now enjoyed the different dignities and offices of Viscount
Villiers, Baron of Whaddon, Justice in Oire of all the forests and parks
beyond Trent, Master of the Horse, and Knight of the Garter. But these
were not sufficient in the sight of James. On the seventh of January,
the favourite was created Earl of Buckingham, upon such short notice,
that the drums and trumpets which should have been in the Chamber of
Presence, at Whitehall (but not have sounded), were not in attendance.
Villiers, in his surcote and hood, in an ordinary hat, and with his
rapier, passed from the Council Chamber, over the terrace, through the
great gateway, into the Chamber of Presence. He was assisted by the Earl
of Suffolk, Lord Treasurer, and the Earl of Worcester, afterwards the
gallant defender of Raglan Castle, all in robes and coronets. The Lord
Chamberlain met them at the door of the Presence Chamber, where Villiers
was duly presented to the King and Queen. The ceremonial, at which he
figured alone, no other peer being created, was not followed by a
supper, and therefore, adds Camden, “no style with largess
proclaimed.”[149]
Footnote 149:
From an autograph MS.—Camden, quoted by Nichols, vol. iii., p. 233.
This new honour enabled its object to appear
with still greater splendour and importance, at the performance of the
new masque of Christmas, by Ben Jonson; it was represented on Twelfth
night, and amongst the performers were Richard Barbadge, an original
performer in several of Shakespeare’s plays, and John Heminge, who
signed the “address to the reader” of Shakespeare’s folio works. In the
course of the masque, the Earl of Buckingham danced with the Queen; and
soon afterwards the society of the Middle Temple strove to conciliate
him by entertaining him with a supper and a masque.[150] At the end of
the month Buckingham was made a Privy Councillor, the youngest man that
had ever received that honour. He also contrived to get his brother
Christopher made either one of the Grooms or one of the Gentlemen of the
Bedchamber, upon which creation the following rhyme was circulated:—
“Above the skies shall Gemini rise,
And twins the Court shall pester;
George shall back his brother Jack,
And Jack his brother Kester.”[151]
Footnote 150:
It was suggested that Villiers might have been entered at the Middle
Temple, but of that circumstance there is no evidence. “Not knowing
the sacred antiquitie of anie of their houses, the chronicler set
downe their names in the same order as that in which they were
presented to his Majestie.” See Nichols, iii. 213, from Howe’s
Chronicle. It is well known that in former times only men of gentle
birth were entitled to be entered as students of law in the Temple—a
relic of the statutes maintained in strict force by the Knights’
Templars.
Footnote 151:
Nichols, 244.
It was about this time, probably, that Buckingham was first beheld drawn
about in that coach with six horses, which was not only wondered at as a
novelty, but “imputed to him as a mastering pride.” He had already
excited the indignation of the English public by his appearance in a
sedan chair; and when seen carried upon men’s shoulders, the populace
raised an outcry against him in the streets, “loathing,” says Arthur
Wilson, “that men should be brought to as servile a condition as
horses.” The chair was, however, forgiven, and soon sedans came into
general use. But the coach was the theme of every tongue; it was not
that the vehicle was strange to the people, for it had been introduced
in the late reign, but then only two horses were used; and when
Buckingham, in all his bravery of attire, was beheld drawn by six
prancing steeds, acclamations were general. The old Earl of
Northumberland heard those murmurs in his prison in the Tower, and
resolved that, should he ever recover his liberty, he would outvie the
favourite. Accordingly, when in 1621 he was set at liberty, he appeared
in the city of London, and at Bath, with eight horses; as much to the
amusement, probably, of him whom he strove to outvie, as to the
amazement of the admiring public.[152] It required, indeed, no ordinary
fortune to keep up this state; and the King so much disapproved of
expensive equipages in any but the great, that he subsequently
entertained a notion of imposing a tax of 40_l._ per annum, on all who,
below a certain degree, kept a coach, and of bestowing the proceeds of
the tax on decayed captains.[153]
Footnote 152:
Brydges’s Peers of James I.
Footnote 153:
State Papers, vol. cix., 26. See Calendars of State Papers, edited by
Mrs. Everett Green.
No clamours affected Buckingham long during this period of his life;
for, although there were occasionally some boisterous demonstrations of
disapproval, the affections of the majority of the people returned to
him shortly after a temporary unpopularity. And here, observes Lord
Clarendon, in his parallel between the Earl of Essex and Buckingham,
“the fortunes of our great personages met when they were both the
favourites of the princes, and of the people. But their affections to
the Duke of Buckingham were very short lived.”[154]
Footnote 154:
Reliquiæ Wottonianæ, 195.
CHAPTER IV.
THE KING’S PROJECTS—A JOURNEY TO SCOTLAND—OBSTACLES TO THAT
INTENTION—WANT OF MONEY—£100,000 RAISED IN THE CITY—DISLIKE OF THE
PEOPLE TO THIS JOURNEY, ON ACCOUNT OF EXPENSE—JAMES SETS OUT, MARCH
13TH, 1616-1617—HIS ATTENDANT COURTIERS, SIR JOHN ZOUCH, SIR GEORGE
GORING, SIR JOHN FINETT—CHARACTERISTICS OF EACH—SURPASSING QUALITIES
OF BUCKINGHAM—OBJECTS OF JAMES’S JOURNEY TO EDINBURGH—ANECDOTE OF
LORD HOWARD OF WALDEN—DISPUTATIONS AT ST. ANDREWS—THE KING KNIGHTS
MANY OF THE YOUNG COURTIERS—OFFENCE GIVEN AT EDINBURGH BY LAUD—A
PROJECT TO ASSASSINATE BUCKINGHAM SUSPECTED—JAMES’S PROGRESS
CONCLUDED—HIS VISIT TO WARWICK—AFFAIRS RELATING TO SIR EDWARD COKE
AND HIS FAMILY—BASE CONDUCT OF ALL THE PARTIES CONCERNED—MEANNESS OF
BACON—HIS LETTERS—FRANCES HATTON—CONTRAST BETWEEN HER AND THE EARL
OF OXFORD BROUGHT FORWARD BY LADY HATTON—COKE RESTORED TO
FAVOUR—MARRIAGE OF FRANCES HATTON TO LORD PURBECK.
=CHAPTER IV.=
Early in the year 1616-17, James determined to visit Scotland—a
resolution which was opposed, somewhat to the displeasure of the King,
by Buckingham. But the King was soon pacified, and the journey was
decided upon. Some obstacles existed; for instance, the want of money,
which was to be borrowed from rich citizens before the monarch’s project
could take place; then it was expected to prove a “hard journey,” for it
was thought the Court would reach the North before there would be grass
for their horses; and even the Scots expressed a wish that the
visitation might be deferred.[155]
Footnote 155:
Nichols, iii., p. 245.
The entertainment given to Monsieur de la Tour, the Ambassador
Extraordinary from the French King, delayed somewhat this freezing
expedition. At length, it was decided that James should set out on the
twenty-second of February; though money came in slowly; and it was found
extremely difficult to raise the sum of 100,000_l._ in the metropolis.
“Yet,” observes a contemporary, “there is much urging, and in the end it
must be done, though men be never so much discouraged.” To propitiate
the presiding Lord Mayor, he was knighted, and received, with his
companions, the King’s thanks for the 100,000_l._ in prospect, which
was, however, to be raised, _nolens volens_, whilst men of low condition
were called in to bear the burden.
It was not until the thirteenth of March that the King and Queen, with
Prince Charles, removed to Theobalds, preparatory to the progress of
James northwards. Never was undertaking so much disliked by the
generality of the people, chiefly on account of the immense expense
which it involved. It was now fourteen years since his Majesty had
visited his Scottish dominions. “He began the journey,” says Wilson,
“with the spring, warming the country, as he went, with the glories of
the Court;” and carrying with him those boon companions who best could
shorten the way, and consume the nights by their pranks and buffoonery.
These were Sir George Goring, Sir Edward Zouch, and Sir John Finett—men
“who could fit and obtemperate the King’s humour;” and it may,
therefore, be readily supposed what description of gentlemen they were.
Sir George Goring was a native of Hurst-per-point, in Sussex, in which
county his descendants still flourish. He had been brought up in the
Court of Queen Elizabeth, his father being one of the gentlemen
pensioners; and had been gentleman in ordinary to Prince Henry. He now
went as lieutenant of the gentlemen pensioners, and accordingly was
despatched with others of that hand by sea.[156] Goring had attracted
the regard of James by his sound sense and vein of jocular humour; like
Sir Edward Zouch and Sir John Finett, he was the “chief and master fool”
of the Court—sometimes “presenting David Dromore and Archie Armstrong,
the King’s fools, on the back of other fools, till they fell together by
the ears, and fell one over another.” Goring, like his colleagues in his
respectable employment, is said to have got more by his fooling than
other people did by their wisdom; he was, indeed, regarded as a sort of
minor favourite, yet Buckingham evinced no jealousy of him, and procured
him, in 1629, the title of Baron Goring, of Hurst-pierre-point.[157]
Finett and Zouch were equally expert with Goring in “antick” dances,
disguises in masqueradoes, and extemporary foolery; but in this last
accomplishment Sir John Millicent, whose name is not among the King’s
retinue in Scotland, excelled them all; and was the “most commended for
notable fooling.”[158] It was found, however, impossible to surpass
Buckingham in the accomplishment of dancing. His grace, and the fondness
he showed for the pastime, brought it into fashion. “No man,” writes an
historian, “dances better; no man runs or jumps better; and, indeed, he
jumps higher than ever Englishman did in so short a time—from a private
gentleman to a dukedom.”[159] He now reigned sole monarch in the King’s
favour; and everything he did was admired “for the doer’s sake.” The
king was never contented, except when near him; nor could the Court
grandees be well out of his presence; all petitions, therefore, “whether
for place or office, for Court or Commonwealth, were addressed to him.”
Footnote 156:
Nichols, vol. iii., p. 243.
Footnote 157:
In 1645, he was advanced to the Earldom of Norwich. He died in 1662,
leaving his title to George Goring, the celebrated loyalist, of whom
so masterly a portrait has been drawn by Clarendon.
Footnote 158:
Nichols, ii. p. 38, note; apud Sir Anthony Weldon.
Footnote 159:
Kennet’s England, vol. ii. p. 708.
The King proceeded by easy journeys of ten, twelve, and seventeen miles
a day northwards. It is curious to find him resting a day and a night at
the home of Sir Oliver Cromwell of Hinchinbrook, near Huntingdon.[160]
At Lincoln, he healed fifty persons of the Evil, a gracious act which
was succeeded by an attendance upon a cock-fighting, at which His
Majesty was very merry. This diversion was varied by horse-racing.
Footnote 160:
Nichols, iii., p. 258.
On his arrival near Edinburgh, the King took up his arrival at Seton
House, the seat of the Earl of Wintoun, whose family continued to be
faithful to the descendants of James during the calamitous contest
between the modern Stuarts and the Hanoverians. James remained in
Scotland until the fifth of July, when he returned by the west coast of
Scotland to Carlisle.
The three great objects of his Majesty’s journey to Scotland, were the
extension of episcopal authority; the establishment of some ceremonials
in religion; and the elevation of the civil above the ecclesiastic
authority.[161] It does not, however, appear that Buckingham took any
active part in these designs, or that he was at this period regarded in
any other light than as one of the ministering agents to the amusement
of James’s vacant hours. It is possible that he may have viewed Scotland
with that prejudice with which the English at that time regarded that
nation. The revenues of that country being then insufficient to maintain
the Government, Buckingham probably deemed it, as others did, nothing
but a drain upon the resources of England—a barren ground from which “a
beggarly rabble (like a fluent spring),” to use the words of Osborne,
“was for ever to be found crossing the River Tweed.”[162] The national
prejudice was likewise considerably strengthened by the King’s
favourite, but abortive scheme of union between the two crowns; thus
dividing the kingdom into halves, so that he, “a Christian king under
the gospel, should no longer be a polygamist to two wives, under which
discreditable imputation he conceived that the partition of the kingdom
placed him.”[163] Whether Buckingham may have been propitiated by the
hospitality of the Scots or not, or whether he thought with Sir Anthony
Weldon that “the country was too good for them that possess it, and too
bad for others to be at the charge to conquer it,” does not appear. In
some passages of the Royal Progress it is most likely that the young
courtier found but little delight. At St. Andrews, disputations in
divinity, and at Stirling in philosophy, were honoured by the King’s
presence. They were delivered by some members of the University of
Edinburgh, and were to have been held in the college there, had not
public business interfered.”[164]
Footnote 161:
Hume’s Hist. of England, iii., 83.
Footnote 162:
Osborne’s Tradit., Memorials of King James, p. 422.
Footnote 163:
Somers’s Tracts, 83
Footnote 164:
The subjects were these:—First, That sheriffs and other inferior
magistrates should not be hereditary. With this, James was so well
pleased that he turned to the Marquis of Hamilton, Hereditary Sheriff
of Clydesdale, and said, “James, you see your cause is lost.”
Secondly, On the rate of locomotion. The respondent in this
disputation quoting Aristotle, the King remarked, “These men know the
mind of Aristotle as well as he did himself when alive.” Thirdly, On
the origin of fountains or springs.
For a time the presence of James in Scotland produced all the good
effects which the aspect of royalty generally ensures. The English
became extremely popular in the northern capital, then rarely visited by
the great and fashionable. “We hear little out of Scotland,” writes Mr.
Chamberlain to Sir Dudley Carleton, “but that the Parliament is now
beginning, and that our English are extraordinarily respected, and
friendly to the nobles, to whom the King makes much caresses, and
receives them as his guests. The Earl of Buckingham is made one of the
council there, and takes his place above the rest as Master of the
Horse. They speak that he shall be made Marquis of Scotland, and the
Lord Compton an Earl, to counterpoise the Scotch that have been ennobled
here.”[165] James was indeed profuse beyond measure in his titles during
this progress.
Footnote 165:
Nichols’s Progresses, vol. iii., 367.
“All our peers’ sons that went with the King,” adds the same writer,
“were knighted there that were undubbed before, and all the gentlemen of
Yorkshire, so that there is scarce left an esquire to uphold the race,
and the order is descended somewhat lower, even to Adam Hill, that was
the Earl of Montgomery’s barber, and to one Jeane, husband to the
Queen’s laundress, our host of Doncaster; and to another that lately
kept an inn at Rumford; and a youth, one Conir, is come into
consideration as to become a prince of favourites, brought in by the
Earl of Buckingham, and the wags talk as if he were in possibility to
become Viscount Conir. All the mean officers of the household are also
said to be knighted, so that ladies are like to be in little
request.”[166]
Footnote 166:
State Paper Office, Domestic, 1616-1617.
But it was not in the nature of things that affairs should go on without
some inconveniences and apprehensions, and great offence was given in
Scotland, when, at the funeral of one of the guard, who was buried after
the English ritual, Laud, then Dean of St. Paul’s, desired those
assembled to join him in recommending the soul of his deceased brother
to Almighty God. He was afterwards obliged to retract, and to say that
he had done this in a sort of civility rather than according to rule.
Another exception was taken at his putting on a white surplice just at
that part of the funeral service when the body was going to be put into
the ground. The Dean of the royal chapel in Edinburgh also refused to
receive the communion whilst Dr. Laud was kneeling.[167]
Footnote 167:
Letter from Mr. Chamberlain to Sir Dudley Carleton. Domestic, June 21,
1621. State Paper Office.
During his residence in Edinburgh, the life of Buckingham was said to be
endangered by a plot to assassinate him, a prelude, as it seemed, to the
tragic doom which he afterwards encountered. In a letter from Sir Thomas
Lake to Sir Ralph Winwood, dated from Brougham Castle, and written on
the seventh of August, 1617, he thus refers to the peril which
threatened the favourite:—
“All the news which is here, is that many lords have been busied about a
fellow who, in his drink, spake some words as though he had an intention
to kill my Lord of Buckingham. He is one of the guard of Scotland, his
name is Carre, and said his intention was for that his lordship was the
cause of Somerset’s dismission. He has, since his being sober, confessed
his words to my Lord of Lennox. I came out from the last house before
some of the old lords of Scotland had done with him, and therefore can
yet say no more to you. The words were spoken in Scotland. Some of my
Lord of Buckingham’s friends do doubt Carre was but set on.”
On the twenty-seventh of the same month, the culprit had, it appears,
proceeded far on his journey southward, as a prisoner, to take his trial
in London for his meditated crime. “On Saturday last,” writes Mr.
Chamberlain to Sir Dudley Carleton, “here past, by Ware, one Carre, a
Scottish gentleman, being suspected and charged (together with four
others of that family and name) to have conspired the death of the Earl
of Buckingham, at his coming out of Scotland, and so was apprehended
near Carlisle.”[168]
Footnote 168:
Letter from Mr. Chamberlain to Sir Dudley Carleton, August 27, 1617,
dated, Ware Park. No mention is made of this attempt in any of the
biographies of Buckingham. State Paper Office, Domestic.
No further notice of this affair occurs in the correspondence from which
it is derived; and it is possible that the plot was inferred from the
hasty expressions of offended clansmen, and was found, on investigation,
to be without sufficient proof to bring it into a court of law.
Among the English peers who visited Scotland, the least popular was Lord
Howard of Walden, eldest son of the Earl of Suffolk. This nobleman
enjoyed the especial favour of King James; his name occurs in most of
the courtly festivities of the day, as one appointed to appear foremost
in all stately revels, and he received a more substantial proof of royal
preference in being called to the House of Lords in the lifetime of his
father. In the north, however, he was detested, chiefly on account of
his ill usage of his wife, Elizabeth, daughter of George, Lord Harris,
Earl of Dunbar, and likewise from his accustomed boasting of his
influence with Buckingham, for it was a favourite saying of Lord
Howard’s, “that he, and none other, had an especial interest in the
favourite.”
Lord Howard seems to have been a mark at which the courtiers aimed their
shafts of wit and ridicule; it was during the journey into Scotland that
he came into collision with a nobleman of a very different character,
James, second Marquis of Hamilton. This nobleman enjoyed, in a very
uncommon degree, the confidence and esteem of his royal master, who was
accustomed to call him familiarly by his Christian name. He held the
office of Lord Steward of the Household, and Privy Councillor; and, in
that capacity, was doubtless often surprised, if not irritated, by the
precedence and latitude given to Buckingham. By his countrymen, the
Marquis was considered “to be the gallantest gentleman in all Scotland.”
The following account is characteristic of the mingled idleness and
dissension of a courtier’s life:—[169]
“Riding one day with the king, a-hunting, he, Lord Howard of Walden,
asked the Marquis of Hamilton whether he were ever in love. He answered,
Yes. What effects wrought it? saith he. His answer was, It made him fat,
saucy, and ignorant. Other speeches passed just like this, but I proceed
to the quarrels he had with him. The Marquis of Hamilton hath a page,
whom my Lord Hay did liken, for his fairness of face, to the second
daughter of the Lord Burghley, Mrs. Diana Cecil, admired so much by the
Lord Walden, except he were unmarried. After my Lord Hay’s departure
thence, the Marquis, the Favourite, and Lord Walden being at dinner
together, and the boy waiting at the table, the Marquis and my Lord
Buckingham whispered and laughed, to which my Lord Walden said he knew
what they laughed at, and that he, that said that, was but a fool. To
which the Marquis replied that, ‘were he a roaring boy, he would have
flung a glass of wine in his face.’ It was my Lord Hay had said it. He
was his friend, and a noble gentleman, whom, in his absence, he would
not have wronged, and, therefore, bid him, before he should answer it,
draw his sword. But my Lord of Buckingham so talked with these lords
that after dinner he did reconcile this business, the Lord Walden
acknowledging him now, upon better consideration, to be a noble
gentleman, and that he knew no other of my Lord Hay. This business fell
out nigh a month before the king’s coming from Scotland, though it came
not to my knowledge since a week before the king’s departure there, at
what time the Marquis Hamilton was on the point to be sworn a
councillor. The Lord Walden, remembering some of these former passages,
and thinking to stop the conferring of this honour upon him, as is said,
did acquaint Sir Edward Villiers, that the Marquis should say that if my
Lord of Buckingham did not dispatch that business for him, of conferring
the councillorship, that he would cut his throat, wishing him to tell it
his brother, which he did; so that, when he met the Marquis, the Lord of
Buckingham questioned him of that, who presently demanded the author,
which he told him. Then the Marquis departed, and presently sent the
Lord Buckhurst to seek out the Lord Walden, with a challenge as was
thought, but he could not be found. In the end he came to my Lord of
Buckingham’s chamber, where, it is said, he lamented by ill fortune to
have these words spoken again, and from thence did not depart until by
acknowledgments the quarrel was reconciled.”
Footnote 169:
Letter from George Garrard to Sir Dudley Carleton, London, August
18th, 1617, from inedited State Papers. See also Brydges’s Peers of
James I., p. 160.
Buckingham appears, on this occasion, to have acted a kind and sensible
part. His utmost discretion was soon called upon in an affair upon which
the annals of the time ring changes, and the details of which present
the most curious combat of worldly passions, and the most fatal results
of misdirected influence, that can be conceived.
In spite of a “fearful dream” of Queen Anne’s, reported to James as a
warning, his progress was not shortened. He spent several days at
Brougham Castle, the residence of Francis Clifford, fourth Earl of
Cumberland, whose daughter, the celebrated Anne Clifford, afterwards
repaired the castle, which suffered during the civil wars; but which, so
vain were her exertions, has since been permitted to fall into ruins.
The expenses entailed by the king’s visit, including the music performed
in his presence, were considerable, and helped to ruin the lord of the
castle, an easy, improvident man, whose allusion to the tax imposed by
this royal visitation is almost touching. “I fynde plainly,” he thus
wrote to his son, “upon better consideration, that the charge for that
entertainment will grow very great, besyde the musick, and that instead
of lessening, my charge in general encreaseth, and new paiments come on
which without better providence hereafter cannot be performed.”[170] In
his progress from one mansion or manor-house to another, James visited
several of those families whose names became afterwards distinguished
among the adherents of his unfortunate son. At Hoghton Tower, in
Lancashire, at that time the principal seat of the Hoghton family, but
now unhappily a ruin, still containing an apartment called King James’s
room; where the monarch is said to have conferred the honour of
knighthood, which he had dispensed very freely during his progress upon
his subjects, on the loin of beef, that act being also one of the last
achievements of his journey. He visited also Lathom House, the seat of
the Stanleys; and was received with great demonstrations of respect and
joy at Stafford, where the Earl of Essex, who lived in an honoured
retirement at Chartley Castle, rode before him into the town. At
Warwick, he was entertained by Sir Fulke Grevill, who was then the
master of Warwick Castle, which he had found, on taking possession of
it, in a ruinous state, and used as a county jail.[171] In the hall of
Leicester Hospital, that charitable foundation, endowed by Robert
Dudley, Earl of Leicester, for twelve Brethren, James was entertained
with a supper; an event of which a tradition still remains attached to
the half-monastic institution in which it occurred. Sir Fulke Grevill
had his own private motives to induce him to extend his marks of respect
to Buckingham, as well as to the king; for, shortly afterwards, we find
him a suitor to the niece of Buckingham, Lady Anderson, for her
hand.[172] There can be no doubt, but that James and Buckingham visited
Warwick Castle, but were not entertained there on account of its ruinous
condition.
Footnote 170:
Nichols, vol. iii., p. 392, from Whitaker’s Hist. of Craven.
Footnote 171:
Nichols, iii., p. 434. In the harangue addressed to the king on his
entrance into Warwick, there is this passage:—“This castle, alsoe
moste desirous to receive you, the greatest guest that ever she
entertained, would speake in noe lower key, but that her late disgrace
abateth her courage. After shee became the jaylor’s lodge,
interchanging the goulden chaines of her noble erle’s with the iron
fetters of wretched prisoners, given over to be inhabited by battes
and owles, she is ashamed to speake before you.” Nichols’s, vol. iii.,
p. 431.
This speech was transcribed for Nichols’s Progresses, by the late
William Hamper, Esq., F.S.A., from the Black Book of Warwick, a book
preserved by the corporation.
Sir Fulke Grevill spent 20,000_l._ in restoring the Castle with its
pleasaunce and gardens. To his care the preservation of that
interesting structure is due.
Footnote 172:
Birch’s MSS., 4173.
Whilst Buckingham was in Scotland, overtures were made to reconcile
certain differences between him and Sir Edward Coke, then Lord Chief
Justice in England. In order to comprehend the conduct which the
favourite pursued in relation to that celebrated man, it becomes
necessary to review a series of occurrences which had happened
previously to the Scottish journey; to enter, likewise, into the topics
of the day; and, above all, to refer to the prejudices of the king, and
the resistance made to them by an honest, though a harsh, individual.
These considerations are mixed up with matters of apparently private
interest; yet are necessary to be unfolded, when the conduct of
Villiers, and the history of his family, are the subject of narrative.
It will be remembered that the chief interest which James derived from
the representation of the play of “Ignoramus” had arisen from the
ridicule cast upon the practice of the common law. In several passages
of that drama, Sir Edward Coke was supposed to be particularly alluded
to.[173] This great lawyer had, in various ways, given offence; he had
termed the royal prerogative, in one of his speeches in Parliament, “a
great overgrown monster;” and he had displayed a courage which redeemed
his character from many of its demerits, by insinuating that the common
law of England was in charge of being perverted. On two other notable
points Coke had also offended the king; the one being the famous dispute
respecting the Court of Chancery; the other, the still more celebrated
case of the Commendams.[174] In the former matter, the conduct of Coke
is allowed to have been highly discreditable to him and his associates;
in the latter, to have merited the warmest admiration.
Footnote 173:
Nichols, vol. iii., p. 90.
Footnote 174:
“The Court of Chancery,” says the author of the Life of Sir Edward
Coke (published for the Society for the Diffusion of Useful
Knowledge), “had long exercised a jurisdiction, which had formed one
of the articles against Wolsey, of revising and correcting judgments
which had been obtained in the courts of common law.” It was not until
the reign of James, that this privilege had been called into question.
Sir Edward Coke, who was tenacious of the authority of the Common Law
Courts, and the twelve judges, gave it as their opinion, that Chancery
had no such power; and that an appeal from a judgment at law could not
be made except to Parliament. To this decision proceedings were
instituted against the judges in the Star Chamber. The conduct of the
judges and of the chief-justice in this matter, has been generally
condemned.
Whatever view the public may have taken of these transactions, they
formed the first plea for that ruin of Coke to which Buckingham is said
to have given an impetus, by the intrusion of his own interests upon the
royal ear,[175] at this crisis of Coke’s destiny. The King, summoning
the Lord Chief Justice and the twelve judges to the council at
Whitehall, delivered his opinions concerning their conduct in an
harangue, in which he declared “that ever since his coming to the crown,
the popular sort of lawyers had been the men that most effrontedly had
trodden upon his prerogative;”[176] and, having expatiated upon their
offences with his usual pedantry and prolixity, he dismissed them,
declaring “that in his protection of them, and expediting of justice, he
would walk in the steps of the ancient and best of kings.” The firmness
with which Coke conducted himself during the whole of this affair,
whilst it won him a popularity which he would never otherwise have
acquired, prepared the way for those who, from interested motives,
sought his ruin, and, combined with his zeal and acuteness in the trial
of Lord and Lady Somerset—an acuteness which the King, it is rumoured,
had secret reasons to dread—completely undermined his credit at court.
Footnote 175:
See an able Life of Sir Edward Coke, published by the Society for the
Diffusion of Knowledge, p. 8. Also, Lord Campbell’s Lives of the Chief
Justices, Art. Coke, vol. i., p. 287.
Footnote 176:
Ibid.
In the intrigues which tended to ruin Coke, Buckingham certainly
participated.[177] The first instance of rapacity in the young favourite
is discernible at this period. Sir Henry Roper had for many years
enjoyed the place of Chief Clerk for enrolling the pleas of the King’s
Bench; it was supposed to be worth 4000_l._ per annum. Being advanced in
age, Sir Henry was disposed to relinquish the appointment, on condition
of being made Lord Teynham, receiving the salary during his life.
Buckingham seized this opportunity of improving his fortunes. He applied
for the reversion of this office to be granted to two of his trustees
during their lives—an application which had been successfully made by
the Earl of Somerset formerly.[178] But the Lord Chief Justice stood in
the way of this surrender on the part of Roper, and also of the proposed
arrangement. He answered, upon first being solicited, “that he was old,
and could not struggle”—a reply which was regarded as a compliance.[179]
But when Sir Henry Roper actually surrendered the situation, and was
created Lord Teynham, Coke changed his tone, and stated that, since the
salaries of the judges in his court were very low, it would be desirable
to increase them by the revenues of this office, which was at his
disposal. Upon this, it was resolved by the King and his favourite to
remove him, and to substitute on the Bench a more compliant judge. The
avowed plea of this iniquitous proceeding was the conduct of Coke in the
affair of the Commendams; but its real cause was his non-compliance with
the views of Buckingham. Bacon, with his usual subserviency, augmented
by his hatred of Coke, wrote to Villiers: “For Roper’s place, I would
have it by all means despatched, and therefore I marvel it lingereth.”
The “thing,” he declared, was so reasonable, “that it ought to be done
as soon as said.” Unhappily for Coke, he thought otherwise.
Footnote 177:
Bacon’s Letters, vol. ii., p. 85; taken from the Introduction to
Bacon’s Works by Stephens, p. 47.
Footnote 178:
Biographia, Art. Coke.
Footnote 179:
Biographia, Art. Coke, from Bacon’s Works.
It is hardly possible to conceive a line of conduct more degrading than
that which Buckingham pursued in the whole of this affair. He forfeited
by it all the credit due to him for the rejection of Sherborne, and the
principle of which he had boasted, that he would not rise upon the ruins
of others, was already effaced from his memory. Upon the third of
October, 1616, Coke was desired to desist from the service of his
place.[180] This intimation of a disgraceful act had come suddenly, for,
on the week before, the King had been at a great entertainment, given by
Lord Exeter at Wimbledon, and the Lady Hatton, the wife of the Lord
Chief Justice, was there, and “well-graced, for the King had kissed her
twice:” but this, it seems, was “but a lightening.” On the following
Sunday, Sir Edward Coke was sequestered from the council table, and
prohibited from riding his circuit, his place being supplied by Sir
Randolph Crew. “Some that wish him well,” adds a contemporary, “fear the
matter will not end here, for he is wilful and will take no counsel, and
not seeking to make good his first errors, runs in worse, and entangles
himself more and more, and gives his enemies such advantage to work upon
the King’s indignation towards him, that he is in great danger.” Others
scrupled not to say that he had been too busy in the late business (of
Somerset), and had dived into secrets further than there was need. “It
happens, also, that he had not carried himself advisedly and dutifully
to His Majesty.”[181] All these assigned causes are points which tend
somewhat to mitigate the censures which must be cast on Buckingham in
this affair. Lady Hatton, too, a Cecil, but not endowed with the
prudence of that sagacious family, and one of the fiercest of her sex,
contributed to the downfall of her husband, by carrying herself very
indiscreetly to the Queen, who forbade her the court. “The story,” adds
the same chronicler, “were long to tell; but it was about braving and
uncivil words to the Lady Compton, George Villiers’ mother, and vouching
the Queen for her author.” As usual,[182] to women was attributed all
the far-spreading evil which comes out of contention.
Footnote 180:
Note to Bacon’s Works, vol. ii., p. 85.
Footnote 181:
Nichols, vol. ii., p. 178; from Birch’s MSS., vol. iv., p. 173.
Footnote 182:
Bishop Goodman, vol. ii., p. 166.
A letter addressed by Coke to Buckingham, before his final removal from
his pre-eminent station, must, one would imagine, have touched a harder
heart than that of Villiers. Coke’s words are described as “now being
humble enough.” His letter, though supplicatory, was not abject. He
thanked Buckingham for having, by his honourable means, obtained a
hearing for him. He entered manfully into the defence of his book of
reports, to which objections had been made, which were the plea of his
suspension from his usual judicial duties, “assuring his Lordship that
never any book was written of any human learning that was not in some
part or other subject to exception.”[183]
Footnote 183:
Bishop Goodman, vol. ii., p. 166.
This remonstrance was dispatched to Buckingham at a time when the heart
of the favourite might have been softened by his own elevation, and by
the general joy. It reached him just before the creation of Charles,
Prince of Wales, and contained a request that the deeply-humbled Coke
might be permitted to attend that ceremonial.[184] There is no record
that the entreaty was acceded to.
Footnote 184:
Ibid.
Until the end of November (1616) the fate of the Lord Chief Justice was
undecided. The Queen, to her credit, and the Prince Charles, were urgent
in his behalf. And a rumour now first began to prevail that the younger
brother of the favourite, Sir John Villiers, who had an appointment in
the Prince’s household, was to marry Sir Edward Coke’s daughter, with a
dowry of 900l. in land from her father, and 2,100_l._ in land from Lady
Hatton, together with Lord Teynham’s office; but, in the meantime, the
Lord Chief Justice was, in his fortunes, affected as it were with an
“ague,” which has an alternate bad and good day.[185] The next report
was that Coke was “quite off the hooks,” and that orders had been sent
to give him a _supersedeas_. The jest of the day was that four P’s had
lost him his place—Pride, Prohibitions, Præmunire, and Prerogative.[186]
Shortly afterwards he was superseded, and had the mortification of
knowing that Sir Henry Montagu, who was appointed in his stead, went
with great pomp to Westminster Hall, accompanied by many noblemen, to
the number of “fifty horse, the whole fry of the Middle Temple, and
swarms of lawyers and officers.”[187] That was a day of triumph for
Buckingham.
Footnote 185:
Nichols, from Birch’s MS., p. 4172.
Footnote 186:
Ibid.
Footnote 187:
Ibid, p. 227.
The character of the most famous of English lawyers rose under this
unmerited injury.[188] He bore his misfortune with calm dignity. It is
related of him that when the new Chief Justice sent to buy from him his
collar of S.S., he answered that he would not part with it, but would
leave it to his descendants, that they might know that one day they had
a Chief Justice to their ancestor. A remarkable popularity followed his
degradation. Sir Edward Coke was the first judge that had set the
example of independence on the bench; and his refusing to be tampered
with in the disposal of a lucrative office caused him to be regarded as
a martyr. Even the King, when he intimated at the Privy Council his
intention to supersede Coke, did it with a sort of half shame, declaring
that he thought him “in no way corrupt, but a good justice,” and adding
“as many compliments as if he had meant to hang him with a silken
halter.”[189] Such was the corruption of the times, such the utter want
of all honourable principle, that it was well known that, had Coke been
wise enough to take advantage of the proposed match between his daughter
and Sir John Villiers, “he would have been that day Lord Chancellor.”
His avarice had been the impediment to that marriage. A dowry of
10,000_l._ had been asked with his daughter—he had offered 10,000 marks,
and “he had stuck at 1,000_l._ a year during his life,” letting fall
certain idle words, that he would not buy the King’s favour too dear,
“being so uncertain and variable.”[190]
Footnote 188:
Amos’s Great Oyer of Poisoning, p. 418.
Footnote 189:
Nichols, p. 227.
Footnote 190:
Ibid, p. 225.
The public were at no loss, as Lord Campbell remarks, to account for the
disgrace of Coke, when they knew that his successor, before accepting
his office, was obliged to bind himself to dispose of the chief
clerkship for the benefit of Buckingham, and when they saw two trustees
for Buckingham admitted to the place as soon as the new Chief Justice
was sworn in.
Such had been the state of affairs before James and Villiers set out for
Scotland; during their absence, the world was alternately amused and
disgusted by the proceedings of Sir Edward Coke and his lady, regarding
the match proposed between Sir John Villiers and their daughter.
This celebrated judge was peculiarly unhappy in his domestic life. Lady
Elizabeth Hatton, his second wife, the sister of Thomas Burleigh, Earl
of Exeter, and the widow of Sir Thomas Hatton, had brought him, along
with a large fortune, the unpleasant acquisition of a partner violent,
litigious, and unscrupulous. The very commencement of the inauspicious
nuptials had been attended with trouble, the parties subjecting
themselves to many inconveniencies from the irregularity of their
marriage, which took place in a private house, without bans or licence.
From the moment that the knot was tied, Coke found in this new
connection nothing but misery. Neither in private nor in public could
his wife and he abstain from the sharpest contentions.
Their daughter—that object which should most surely have cemented a
union—soon proved a new source of the bitterest feuds.
When Buckingham was in Scotland, an overture was made to him on the part
of Sir Edward Coke, relating to the marriage of his youngest daughter to
Sir John Villiers, the elder brother of the favourite. The proposal was
made through Secretary Winwood, the friend of Coke, and was, at first,
eagerly accepted by Buckingham; but, although it had these good
auspices, there were obstacles which prevented its favourable course.
One of these was the dislike of the young lady to her appointed suitor,
who was diseased, and troubled with a humour in his legs, and accounted
not a long-lived man; so that, as was observed by Mr. Chamberlain,
“there needed so much ado to get him a wife.” Another was the jealousy
of Lady Hatton. Incensed that her husband should dare to dispose of her
daughter without her consent, she carried her off, and secreted her in
the house of Sir Edmund Withipole, near Oatlands, in Surrey. From that
retreat, the young lady was removed to the residence of Archibald,
seventh Earl of Argyle, near Hampton Court.
Lady Hatton immediately hired a lodging in the town of Kingston; whence
she was permitted to visit her daughter, but not to sleep under the same
roof with her. “She kept her, however,” observes a contemporary writer,
“such company, that none else could have access to her.”[191] This
access was moderated, and her creatures, whom she had employed to take
her daughter away, were questioned and committed. Finding herself
forsaken by her friends, “who dared not show themselves too far in the
business, and seeing,” adds the same authority, “that she struggled in
vain, Lady Hatton began to come about.” At this juncture, Buckingham
interfered. He wrote a letter which calmed the fury: she returned him an
answer, “that if this way had been taken with her at first, they might
have proceeded better.”[192] Her husband was, however, now incensed
beyond control. He procured a warrant from Secretary Winwood, and
fetched away his daughter from Hampton Court, exceeding, indeed, the
terms of his warrant, for he is said to have broken open the doors of
the house to obtain her. Lady Hatton was quickly engaged in pursuit of
him; and “had not her coach tired,” as it is related, “there would soon
have been strange tragedies.”[193]
Footnote 191:
Mr. Chamberlain to Sir Dudley Carleton. State Paper Office. London,
August 9th, 1617. Inedited.
Footnote 192:
Nichols, iii., p. 371.
Footnote 193:
Letter from Mr. Chamberlain, before quoted.
Coke then conveyed his daughter to the care of Lady Compton Villiers,
but the next day the clerk of the council was sent to take the custody
of her, in his own house. The affair was heard before the Privy Council,
when a violent contention amused the indifferent spectators, and
aggravated the hatred of the parties concerned. Lady Hatton, in her
vehemence, is said to have declaimed with a force worthy of Burbage,
then the most popular actor of the day. At last, after much wrangling, a
reconciliation was effected. Lady Hatton was induced, upon some
conditions, to double the portion which her husband had offered, “and to
make up the match and give it her blessing.” Lady Compton Villiers and
her sons repaired to Kingston, where they remained two or three days,
“which,” adds the writer, “makes the world think they grow to
conclusion.” The fact was, that finding she had no power to resist, Lady
Hatton thought proper to give in with a good grace; thus commanding
better terms with Coke than a further resistance would have procured,
“and so,” adds Mr. Chamberlain, “defeat her husband’s purposes, towards
whom, of late, she had carried herself very strangely, neither like a
wife nor a wise woman.”[194]
Footnote 194:
Letter from Mr. Chamberlain, before quoted.
Thus, Coke’s “curst heart,” as his wife termed it, was forced to yield
to terms which he had never contemplated. The matter ended with the
young lady’s being sent to Hatton House, with orders that “Lady Compton
and her son should have access to win and wear her.” Meanwhile, all the
world expected that King James, whose minute interference in the affairs
of his courtiers equalled that of Henry the Eighth, would have mediated
a peace between Sir Edward Coke and his wife; but James forbore,
declaring that it “was a thing of more time and more care than he could
afford to give the matter.”
In this transaction, there is not a single individual who does not
appear to have harboured some unworthy motive. Coke, notwithstanding the
failure of his own matrimonial schemes, was ready to wed his daughter to
Sir John Villiers, without the slightest regard to her wishes and
affections.[195] Buckingham, his mother, and his brother were actuated
by the most mercenary considerations. Lady Hatton and her daughter were
aiming at a younger son of the Earl of Suffolk, Sir Robert Howard, who
was subsequently prosecuted for a criminal intrigue with Frances Hatton,
after she had become the wife of Sir John Villiers.
Footnote 195:
Stephens’s Introduction to Bacon’s letters, p. 42. Also Inedited
Letters in the State Paper Offices, Domestic, 1616, 17.
During the height of her opposition, the friends of Lady Hatton
published a contract, said to have been signed, in the presence of her
mother, by Frances Coke; and whether real, or merely contrived for the
purpose of preventing the marriage with Sir John Villiers (a precontract
being in those days as great an obstacle as a previous marriage), it is
highly characteristic of the parties concerned in it. This curious
document, from a young lady of the seventeenth century, is as follows:—
“I vow before God, and take the Almighty to witness, that I, Frances
Coke, younger daughter of Sir Edward Coke, late Lord Cheife Justice of
England, doe give myselfe absolutely to wife, to Henry Vere, Viscount
Balboke, Earl of Oxenford, to whom I plight my fayth, and inviolate
vows, to keepe myselfe till death us do part; and if ever I break off
the least of these, I pray God damme me body and soule in hell fyre in
the world to come. And in thys worlde, I humbly beseech God the earth
may open and swallowe me up quicke to the terror of all fayth breakers
that remayne alive. In witness thereof, I have written all thys with my
owne hand, and sealed yt with my own seale (a hart crowned), which I
will ware till you returne to make it good that I have sent you; and for
further assurance, I here underneath sett to my name,
“FRANCES COKE,
“in the presence of my deare mother,
“Elizabeth Hatton.
“July 10th, 1617.”[196]
Footnote 196:
Now first published from the State Paper Office. Domestic, July 10,
1617.
But the meanest actor in this whole affair was Francis Bacon. His
jealousy and hatred of Coke impelled him to oppose the marriage; but he
made the greatest profession of forwarding it. He wrote on the subject
to Buckingham, in these terms:—
“MY VERY GOOD LORD,
Since my last to your lordship I did first send to Mr. Attorney General,
and made him know that since I heard from court, I was resolved to
further the match and conditions thereof, for your Lordship’s brother’s
advancement, the best I could.”
He then details his further exertions in the matter; his apprising Lady
Hatton and some other special friends that he would in anything declare
for the match; his sending Sir John Bulter[197] to Lady Compton Villiers
to tender his good offices; but even whilst he made these overtures and
promises his courage flinched from abetting an event which would give
such influence to his old enemy, Coke.
Footnote 197:
A kinsman of Buckingham’s.
“I did ever foresee,” he writes, “that this alliance would go near to
lose me your lordship, that I hold so dear, and that was the only
respect particular to myself that moved me to be as I was, till I heard
from you. But I will rely on your constancy and nature, and my own
deserving, and the firm tie we have in respect of the King’s
service.”[198]
Footnote 198:
Nichols, 272.
Well might the writer of this letter complain that Lady Compton Villiers
and her son, Sir John, who saw through all his professions, spoke of him
with some bitterness and neglect. They were, it appeared, under the
influence of Sir Edward Coke, and of Secretary Winwood, the latter of
whom Bacon “took to be the worst of his enemies.” But he resolved “to
bear both with Lady Compton Villiers and her son—with her, as a lady;
with her son, as a lover”—and ended by the exclamation:—“God keep us
from these long journeys and absences, which make misunderstanding, and
give advantage to untruth; and ever prosper and preserve your lordship!”
Nevertheless, Bacon is supposed to have been the instigator of certain
proceedings in the Star Chamber, which were commenced against Sir Edward
Coke, for what was called an outrage; although the carrying his daughter
away were an action justifiable by law; and he quickly showed how
earnest was his determination to prevent the match, by another letter to
Buckingham. In this he complained of the officious busying himself of
Secretary Winwood, and asserted that it was done rather to make a
faction than out of any great affection for Buckingham. “It is true,” he
adds, “he hath the consent of Sir Edward Coke (as we hear) upon
reasonable conditions for your brother, and yet not better than, without
question, may be found in some other matches.” He next states the
objections to the match.
“First, that Sir John Villiers would marry into a disgraced house, which
in reason of state is never held good.
“Next, he shall marry into a troubled home of man and wife, which in
religion and Christian discretion is disliked.
“Thirdly, that he should incur the almost certain loss of friends,
myself only excepted, who, out of a pure love and thankfulness, shall be
ever firm to you.
“And lastly and chiefly, the danger that would be incurred of lessening
Buckingham’s influence with the King.” He therefore recommended
Buckingham to signify unto his mother, who seems to have been the
main-spring in the affair, that his desire was that the marriage should
not be proceeded in without the consent of both parties, thus making use
of a plea in order to sound a retreat from the alliance; but all was in
vain.
Bacon next addressed himself to the King. He touched him in his weak
part. “Your Majesty’s prerogative and authority have risen in some just
degrees above the horizon more than heretofore, which has distilled
vapours; your judges are in good temper; your justices of peace (which
is the great body of the gentlemen of England) grow to be loving and
obsequious, and to be weary of this humour of ruffling; all mutinous
spirits grow to be a little poor, and to draw in their horns, and not
the less for your Majesty’s disauthorising the man I speak of;[199] now,
then, I reasonably doubt that if there be but an opinion of his coming
in with the strength of such an alliance, it will give a downward
relapse in men’s minds unto the former state of things, hardly to be
helped, to the great weakening of your Majesty’s service. He is by
nature unsociable, and by habit unpopular, and too old to take a new
place. And men begin already to collect, yea, and to conclude that he
that raiseth such a smoke to get in, will set all on fire when he is
in.”[200]
Footnote 199:
Coke.
Footnote 200:
These letters are taken from Mr. Montague’s edition of Bacon’s works,
vol. vii., Bacon’s Life, p. 16.
Not content with these remonstrances, Bacon threatened Winwood with a
Præmunire for granting the warrant; but he was speedily checked by the
indignation of Buckingham, and consequently by that of the King. Coke
was reinstated in the favour of the Monarch, and restored to his place
in the Privy Council, September 15, 1617. He joined the Court on its
journey from Scotland at Woodstock, and “as if he were already on his
wings,” to use the expression of Sir Henry Yelverton, in his letter to
Bacon, “triumphed exceedingly.”
The poor puppet, Frances Hatton, whose inclinations, as Lord Campbell
remarks, were as little considered “as if she had been a Queen of Spain
under the influence of a Louis Philippe,” was now commanded by her
mother to write a second letter, consenting to marry one who, in thus
espousing her, proved to be most unhappy.
“MADAM,
“I must now humbly desire your patience in giving me leave to declare
myself to you, which is, that without your allowance and liking, all the
world shall never make me entangle or tie myself. But now, by my
father’s especial commandment, I obey him in presenting to you my humble
duty, in a tedious letter which is to know your ladyship’s pleasure, not
as a thing I desire, but I resolve to be wholly ruled by my father and
yourself, knowing your judgment to be such that I may well rely upon,
and hoping that conscience and the natural affection parents bear to
children, will let you do nothing but for my good, and that you may
receive comfort, I being a mere child, and not understanding the world,
nor what is good for myself. That which makes me a little give way to
it, is that I hope it will be a means to procure a reconciliation
between my father and your ladyship. Also, I think it will be a means of
the King’s favour to my father. Himself[201] is not to be misliked, his
fortune is very good, a gentleman well born * * * * So I humbly take my
leave, praying that all things may be to every one’s contentment,
“Your ladyship’s most obedient,
“and humble daughter, for ever,
”FRANCES COKE.
“Dear Mother,—Believe, there has no violent means been used to me by
words or deeds.”[202]
Footnote 201:
Lord Purbeck.
Footnote 202:
Life of Sir E. Coke, by Lord Campbell.
There now remained nothing but to unite the two young persons whose
affairs had become a matter of public interest. Accordingly, they were
married on Michaelmas day in the royal chapel at Hampton Court, by the
Bishop of Winchester, having been thrice publicly asked in church, the
King giving away “Mrs. Frances Coke the bride:” the Queen was present,
and Sir Edward Coke brought the bride and bridegroom from his son’s
house at Kingston, with eight or nine coaches. The consent of Lady
Hatton was gained; her daughter protesting that, “although she liked Sir
John Villiers better than any one else, she was resolved to keep a
solemn promise made by her to her mother, not to marry without her
consent.”[203]
Footnote 203:
Bacon’s Relics, ii., 29.
This marriage, however, did not pacify Lady Hatton’s haughty and
vindictive spirit. On the wedding-day, she honoured the event, it is
true, by a magnificent entertainment; her husband was not, however,
invited, but was seen dining at the public table in the Temple. Their
enmity endured for four years without mitigation; at the end of that
time, it was subdued by the interference of the King; but was never
wholly subdued.
By the alliance with Frances Coke, the Villiers family received
considerable accession of wealth; for besides the sum of 10,000_l._ paid
in money, Sir Edward and his son, Robert, did, upon the second of
November, _pursuant to directions of the Lords of Council_, assure to
Sir John Villiers an annuity of 2,000 marks per annum during Sir Edward
Coke’s life, and of 900_l._ a year during that of Lady Hatton; besides
the manor of Stoke Pogis, in Buckinghamshire, after their deaths: being
the moiety of those lands which Sir Edward Coke intended to bequeath to
his two daughters. These sums and this estate were settled by good
conveyances, which were certified to his Majesty by Sir Randolph Crewe,
Sir Robert Hitcham, and Sir Henry Yelverton, the King’s sergeants and
attorney; and eventually other possessions, and certain worldly honours,
were added to these acquisitions. But the marriage, notwithstanding the
success of these arrangements, was attended by misery. The young bride,
in spite of her profession at the time of her nuptials, had always
secretly hated the husband thus forced upon her choice. She had long
given a preference to Sir Robert Howard; and the result was such as to
embitter her own existence, and to degrade her into the lowest condition
to which a woman can descend; her husband incurring a heavy penalty for
his own compliance with the ambitious and mercenary views of
Buckingham—that of being wedded to a loathing and, eventually, a
faithless wife.
For some years, indeed, a hollow prosperity deceived superficial judges
of the affairs of life as to the happiness of this ill-fated pair. A
series of magnificent entertainments exalted the favour of Lady Hatton,
one of the most odious female characters of that period, and humiliated
her husband, who partook not of these festivities. All the great, the
gay, the courtly, attended the banquets of this imperious woman: but her
husband was never invited. Hatton House was graced repeatedly by the
King, who knighted there several among the guests who were favoured by
the lady of the mansion. In the words of an eye-witness, he made “four
of her creatures knights,”[204] so resolved was he to mollify this
virago. This shower of favours was the result entirely of the new
connection with the Villiers family; and a marked condescension was
shown on that day to the Lady Compton Villiers and her children, whom
the King “praised and kissed, and blessed all those that wished them
well.”[205]
Footnote 204:
Sir Peter Chapman, that belongs to the Earl of Exeter; Sir Francis
Nedham, an old solicitor betwixt her and Sir Christopher Hatton; Sir
Nathaniel Neil, a kinsman of Sir Robert; and one Withipole, a kinsman
of her own.
Footnote 205:
Nichols, iii. 448.
Amid all this carousing, some mistakes—intentional ones, it may be
suspected—were committed. The Earl of Pembroke, lord chamberlain, was
not invited to the dinner; but, as well as the Earl of Arundel, went
home to dine, and returned to wait upon the King—a trait of Lady
Hatton’s meanness and haughtiness which must have contributed to the
disgust felt for her conduct to her husband, “who was neither invited
nor spoken of, but dined that day in the Temple as usual.”
It is but justice to James to state that he now began to entertain a
serious intention of endeavouring to reconcile Sir Edward Coke to his
lady; but he truly observed that it was a matter of time and difficulty.
A cordial reconciliation had, however, taken place between Lady Hatton
and her daughter.
Beneath all these forced reconciliations and specious protestations, a
deep-seated disease—unsoundness of principle—was latent, only waiting
for time and occasion to give it effect. All, indeed, seemed prosperous;
in June, 1619, two years afterwards, Sir John Villiers was raised to the
dignity of Baron Stoke, in the county of Buckingham, and created
Viscount Purbeck,[206] in the county of Dorset, in spite of much
reluctance on the part of Lady Hatton to give him up Purbeck; in case of
her refusal, he was to have been styled Viscount Beaumont. It was long,
also, before Lady Hatton consented to put Lord Purbeck in possession of
Purbeck.[207] And the honour of being Viscountess of Westmorland was at
the same time offered to Lady Hatton, but was refused, “because she
would not come up to the price.”[208] This bait was held out in order to
induce her to assure to her son-in-law 7,000_l._, in land, a year, so
completely were the King’s interests those of the Villiers family. Had
she been obstinate, it was determined to make her husband a baron to
“spite her.”
Footnote 206:
The Isle of Purbeck belonged to Lady Hatton.
Footnote 207:
Calendar of State Papers for 1619, cix., p. 26.
Footnote 208:
Biog. Brit. Art. Coke.
The termination, however, of this ill-assorted union, thus formed,
proves how impossible it is for the most successful match-makers to
negotiate for happiness. The affection of Lady Purbeck for Sir Robert
Howard had never died away, and it soon showed itself in acts of
indiscretion, which gave occasion to much animadversion. In May, 1620,
Lord Purbeck went abroad, upon pretext of drinking the waters at Spa,
but, according to the account of Camden, to conceal his having “run mad
with pride.” By another writer, his loss of reason is imputed to the
improper support given to his wife in her outrage of public decorum, and
consequent insult to his honour. Whatever may have been the cause of his
infirmity, it is evident that the manœuvres of his family to increase
their wealth and dignity, were by no means conducive to his
felicity.[209]
Footnote 209:
Nichols, iii., 548.
During the whole of this discreditable transaction, and for a
considerable time after it had ceased to amuse the court circles, the
extraordinary influence of an imperious woman shows at once the weakness
of James and the incipient degradation of Buckingham. Whether Lady
Hatton’s influence proceeded from the expectations of further prosperity
to the Villiers family, she having 3000_l._ a year in her own power to
bequeath, or whether there existed in her any peculiar power to charm,
is uncertain. In the inedited State Papers, there are to be found many
scattered notices of the great court paid to this arrogant lady.
On the first of November, 1617, writes Mr. Chamberlain to Sir D.
Carleton, “the streets being full of people, on account of the Lord
Mayor’s passage to St. Paul’s,” the Earl of Buckingham, accompanied by
the Marquis of Hamilton, Lord Compton, and the Lord Hay, “Sir Edward
Cecil, and I know not whom, many more, to the number of twelve coaches,
went to fetch the Lady Hatton from Sir William Craven’s, and brought her
to her father’s, at Cecil House.” Here she remained some time, and went
in “like state to the Court, and there was much graced by the King, who
likewise reconciled her to the Queen, and made, at the same time, an
atonement ’twixt her and the Lady Compton, and a perfect peace ’twixt
her and her daughter, who would not be persuaded that she could forgive
and forget, till, at parting, the King made her swear that she loved her
as dearly as ever.”
During the course of the same month, another mark of favour was
exhibited.[210]
Footnote 210:
Nov. 14, 1617, Sir Nathaniel Brent to Sir Dudley Carleton. Domestic.
“On Saturday last, Lady Hatton entertained the King at dinner. Sir
Edward Coke gave it out it was for the reconciliation of him and his
wife; but it seems he mistook the case, for she gave orders that neither
he nor any of his sons or servants should enter her doors.” Then follows
the contrast, and the poor insulted husband appears on the scene. “His
ordinary residence is at the Temple, where very few come unto him, and
he sendeth for his diet to Goodman Gibbes, a slovenly cook, in Ram
Alley. I believe not that which some confidently report, that he sendeth
his shoes to be cobbled, and that on fasting night, when he meant not to
feast his men, he sent to his neighbour Gibbes for a breast of mutton.”
Upon the death of Secretary Winwood, Lady Hatton, it was supposed, would
have had the nomination of his successor, but the King seized this
opportunity of again marking his regard for the favourite.
“They do all apprehend,” writes Mr. Chamberlain, “how much the Lady
Hatton might prevail if she would set her whole mind and strength to it;
and I think they have and will find means to put her in remembrance; but
the voice goes that the place is not like to be disposed of in haste,
for the King says he was never so well served as when he was his own
secretary, and to that end hath delivered the seals, that were belonging
to Sir Ralph Winwood, to the custody of the Earl of Buckingham, and
there, perhaps, they shall remain till they both grow weary of
them.”[211]
Footnote 211:
Letter from Mr. Chamberlain to Sir D. Carleton, Nov. 8, 1617. Inedited
State Papers.
Sir Thomas Lake, according to the same correspondent, got possession of
the lodging at Court usually assigned to the secretary; and it was said
that he had the seals also, and a warrant for an allowance of 4,100_l._
a year for “intelligence;” but, adds Mr. Chamberlain, it falls not out
so.
Lady Hatton was, it appears, extremely anxious to advance the interests
of Sir Thomas Edmondes,[212] a desire which was doubtless favoured by
Buckingham, to whose interests Edmondes was, at this time, devoted. It
is satisfactory to find, in a subsequent letter, that Lady Hatton’s
ascendancy did not last long. “That first heat being over,” writes a
contemporary, “she may blow her nails twice before it kindle again.” Her
aim, as was acknowledged on all hands, “was rather to pull down her
husband” than to use her power and favour either for her own good, or
her friends.[213] A singular combination of everything that was violent,
and yet intriguing, rapacious, and yet lavish, seems to have been
exhibited in the character of this leader of fashion in the Court of
James the First.
Footnote 212:
See Letter from Nathaniel Brent to Sir D. Carleton.
Footnote 213:
Inedited Letter in the State Paper Office.
CHAPTER V.
BUCKINGHAM’S FAVOUR PARAMOUNT—CHANGE IN THE KING’S TEMPER—HIS POETIC
FLIGHTS—HIS REIGN A COURSE OF DISSIPATION—THE MASQUES OF BEN
JONSON—THEIR GREAT BEAUTY—PATRONIZED BY THE QUEEN—HOW PERFORMED—THE
VISION OF DELIGHT—COMPOSED TO CELEBRATE BUCKINGHAM’S BEING MADE A
MARQUIS—HIS APPEARANCE AT THIS ERA—THE BANQUET GIVEN FOR THIS
OCCASION—GREAT EXTRAVAGANCE OF THE ENTERTAINMENT—RIVALS TO
BUCKINGHAM IN JAMES’S FAVOUR—SIR HENRY MILDMAY—BROOKE—YOUNG
MORISON—THE DIVERSIONS OF THE COURT—THE METEOR THAT
APPEARED—FOOT-RACING—BUCKINGHAM’S PROFUSION—JEALOUSIES BETWEEN
PRINCE CHARLES AND HIM, 1617-1618-1619.
=CHAPTER V.=
1617–1618–1619.
Buckingham may now be said, in the words of Lord Clarendon, “to sleep in
the arms of fortune.” The King, notwithstanding his failing health,
continued his patient sittings in the Star-Chamber, where, groaning
under his mortal disease, he found fault with “lawyers’ repetitions,”
and sometimes indulged in petulant eloquence, comparing, when he
presided at the trial of Sir Thomas Lake, that disgraced courtier to
Adam, Lady Lake to Eve, and their daughter, Lady Roos, to the serpent.
Whilst encouraging, on the one hand, a treaty of marriage for his son
with a daughter of Spain, and ordering, on the other, musters of troops
to be ready to keep down the Papists, who might otherwise be emboldened
by that project; he still, throughout the whole of these troublesome and
often urgent affairs, had one object in view—the gratification and
aggrandizement of George Villiers. Sometimes we find the King indulging
in poetic flights. After a week or two of hard work in the Star-Chamber,
James, in a serious mood, wrote a meditation on the Lord’s Prayer, and
dedicated it to Buckingham.[214] On a festive occasion, in which the
favourite entertained him to his heart’s content, the Monarch thought it
not beneath him to write a poem and address it also to his young
host.[215]
Footnote 214:
State Paper, vol. cv., No. 103.
Footnote 215:
State Paper.
The latter part of King James’s reign was one perpetual course of what
may safely be termed dissipation, but which was then styled “good cheer
and jollity.” Amongst the most refined of his pleasures were the Masques
of Ben Jonson;[216] and the monarch showed his appreciation of the
merits of those beautiful productions by a pension of a hundred marks to
their author. Hitherto, Daniel had been the Laureate of the Court,
having been an especial favourite with Queen Elizabeth and her ladies.
Though the appointment had hitherto been unpaid, the slight thus passed
on Daniel embittered his declining years, and drove him from the Court,
where his talents and virtues were, as he fancied, no longer
appreciated.
Footnote 216:
Life of Ben Jonson, by Gifford, p. 33.
Shakespeare was now in the tomb; and Jonson, who “had hated and feared
him through life,” was left without a rival to interfere with his
triumph, or to commemorate the actions of the great. The death of Prince
Henry had saddened the nation and obscured the gaiety of the Court for a
season; but now, especially before the marriage of Villiers, whose
settling in life was an event cordially desired by James, no revels were
carried on without that most popular feature, a Masque; and no masque
could gain applause unless Ben Jonson were the writer. A frequent
visitor at Belvoir, at Burleigh on the Hill, and at Windsor, when the
Court was at either of these places, Jonson never wrote a masque without
exhibiting, in strong colours, qualities that astonished his
acquaintance. He delighted in the composition of those productions,
which, it has been truly said, were unrivalled except by Comus; of the
masque, he was, as he himself remarked, “an artificer;” it began with
him, and with him it ended. Pageants and masquerades had long been
familiar to the English; and masques, improperly so called, had been
carried to a great degree of splendour in the reign of Henry VIII., but
neither then, as Gifford observes, nor in that of Elizabeth, did the
masque acquire “that unity of design, that exclusive character, which it
assumed on the reign of James.”
That monarch had, in the opinion of the same admirable critic, more
literature than taste or elegance. What was deficient in him was,
however, apparent in the character of his Queen, Anne of Denmark, who
delighted in show and gaiety, loved pomp, and understood it; as Sully
expresses it, she “aspired to convert Whitehall into a temple of
delight.” She assembled around her the most brilliant leaders of fashion
among the nobility; and, not well comprehending our language, she
delighted in masques and shows which addressed themselves to the senses.
She had, however, sufficient discrimination to applaud the poetical
talents of Ben Jonson, whose compositions had delighted her at Althorpe;
and she called him to her Court, and engaged him “to embody her
conceptions,” soon after her arrival in London.[217]
Footnote 217:
Gifford, p. 65.
The masque of Ben Jonson consisted of dialogue, singing, and dancing;
worked up into one harmonious whole by the introduction of some striking
fable, generally borrowed from the Greek or Roman Mythology. The sister
arts were employed to bestow the splendours of moveable scenery,
hitherto unknown to the stage; for pomp and expense were essential to
the masque; “it could only breathe,” as Gifford observes, “in the
atmosphere of a Court;” it was composed for princes, and by princes was
it performed. The flower of all that was gay and gallant was collected
to constitute a band of royal and noble performers; and perhaps there
was never such a display of elegance and beauty as that which graced the
masques of Ben Jonson. The songs devolved probably on professional
performers, but the dialogues required great care and study to learn
them, and skill and practice in their delivery before a courtly and
critical audience. The dances were also executed by the Court; so
admirably, that Jonson paid to the exquisite performance of the
Measures, as he beheld them, in these lines:—
“In curious knots and mazes, so
The Spring at first was taught to go;
And Zephyr, when he came to woo
His Flora, had these notions too;
And thus did Venus learn to head
Th’ Indian brawls, and so to tread,
As if the wind, not she, did walk,
Nor pressed a flower, nor bow’d a stalk.”
The dialogue in the masques of Ben Jonson is marked by strength and
boldness, and the songs are replete with all the luxuriance of the
richest fancy. In his dramatic works, and also in his longer poems,
there is a compression which produces hardness and severity, but, as
Gifford beautifully expresses it, “no sooner has he taken down his lyre,
no sooner touched his lighter pieces, than all is changed, as if by
magic, and he becomes a new person. His genius awakes at once, his
imagination becomes fertile, ardent, versatile, and excursive; his taste
pure and elegant; and all his faculties attuned to liveliness and
pleasure.”[218]
Footnote 218:
Gifford, p. 67.
The masque was therefore one of the highest intellectual delights of an
intellectual age. Whilst Jonson composed the dialogues, in which “the
soundest moral lessons came recommended by the charm of numbers,” the
chief artists of the realm were employed in decorative scenery, the
construction of which was at its climax in the time of James. Lawes, and
other noted composers, set the songs to music; the masque was the
courtly recreation of gallant gentlemen, and ladies of honour, striving
to exceed one another in their measures and changes, and in their
repasts of wit. Notwithstanding the efforts of Inigo Jones, under whose
guidance many of the accompaniments were framed to preserve it, and
those of Aurelius Townshend, the masque fell again into the pageant and
masquerade after the death of James, and, in spite of an effort made by
Charles II. to revive it, ceased to exist.
The “Vision of Delight,” one of the most fanciful and beautiful of
Jonson’s masques, was performed on Twelfth Night, and the expenses of
the representation were defrayed by Buckingham. It was to celebrate his
new dignity as a Marquis, to which James had resolved to elevate him,
that the following lines, spoken by Delight, seen afar off, with his
attendants, Grace, Love, Harmony, Revel, Sport, Laughter, and followed
by Wonder, were composed, and sung in a recitative solo:—
“Let us play, and dance, and sing,
Let us now turn every sort
Of the pleasures of the Spring
To the graces of a court.
From air, from cloud, from dreams, from toys,
To sounds, to sense, to love, to joys;
Let your shows be new, as strange,
Let them oft and sweetly vary,
Let them haste to their change,
As the seers may not tarry;
Too long to expect the pleasing’st sight,
Doth take away from the delight.”
The “Vision” concluded with a dance of ladies, in which Aurora appeared,
and this epilogue followed:—
_Aurora._ “I was not wearier when I lay
By frozen Tithon’s side to-night,
Than I am willing now to stay,
And be a part of your delight;
But I am urged by the day,
Against my will, to bid you come away.”[219]
Footnote 219:
Ben Jonson’s Works.
At this masque Buckingham acted, and assumed his place as a Marquis,
taking, it appears, a precedence to which he was not entitled. “It is
thought strange,” Levingston wrote to Carleton, “amongst the old lords
that he should take precedence of them.”[220]
Footnote 220:
Calendar of State Papers, vol. cv., 4.
James had never, since his accession, conferred the dignity of Marquis
on any of his subjects. He now very hastily gave it to his favourite,
ascribing as the reason for this act that he bestowed that “title for
the affection he bore him, more than he did to any man,” and “for the
affection, faith, and modesty that he had found in Buckingham.”
A few of the nobility about the Court were hastily summoned to witness
the creation, which was by patent, and in private. In the evening great
festivities followed, Buckingham presiding as the master of the feast
which preceded the masque. His appearance at this era has been
delineated by Simon Pass, whose portrait is to be found among the
historical collection of prints in the British Museum. He now assumed a
deep falling ruff; his doublet was closed with a row of rich pearls, and
over it he wore the ribbon of the Garter and the George. A large cloak
of rich satin was suspended over one shoulder;—his hands are adorned by
a cuff of Vandyck lace. His portrait after this time exhibits two long,
very thin wavy curls, suspended from the left ear; his hair, otherwise,
is almost always worn rather short, and turned back from the forehead.
The slight moustache of his earlier portraits becomes augmented into one
of greater consequence, carefully turned up at each corner; and a peaked
beard environs the chin, which had before a youthful smoothness. He was
now matured in form and perfect in deportment.
In unwonted magnificence Buckingham received his royal guest at a
banquet long celebrated in the annals of the Court for its exuberance.
As yet, the Marquis owned no house sufficiently spacious for this
entertainment, and it appears to have been held in Whitehall. How
attractive must have been his deportment at this era, before care sat
upon his brow, and ill health, vexation of spirit, a consciousness of
deserved unpopularity, and a heart sated with unsatisfactory pleasures,
had changed into anxiety the eager enjoyment of his dazzling fortunes!
“Carrying his loves and his hatreds in his open forehead,” he presided,
careless of the future, full of health and hope, at that noisy and
festive board.
The repast on this occasion was served up in the French fashion, under
the auspices of Sir Thomas Edmondes, who had recently returned from
France. “You may judge,” writes an eye-witness, “of the feast, by this
scantling, that there were said to be seventeen dozens of pheasants and
twelve partridges in a dish, throughout which, methinks, were more spoil
than largesse.”[221] The entertainment, “in spite of many presents,”
cost six hundred pounds.
Footnote 221:
Letter from Mr. Chamberlain to Sir D. Carleton. Inedited State Papers,
Jan. 10, 1617-18.
There were some obstacles, even on this day, to Buckingham’s perfect
enjoyment. One of these was the uncertain temper of the King. He had
now, in the words of those who watched his varying humour, “become so
forward and morose, that few things seemed to please him.” The sight of
Buckingham alone appeared to appease him; he was, however, greatly
delighted with the banquet, and praised “both the meat and the master.”
Yet, in spite of this marked preference, and of these abundant honours,
there were rumours that Buckingham’s place in the King’s regard was not
secure; Sir Henry Mildmay, young Brooke, the son of Lord Cobham, and a
son of Sir William Monson’s, began, it was thought, to come into
consideration with the King.
The “Vision of Delight” became the chief theme of public discourse. In
this masque, Prince Charles was a principal performer; and the other
parts were filled up by Buckingham, the Marquis of Hamilton, the Earl of
Montgomery, and some other lords. Among the dancers, Isabel,[222] the
eldest daughter of Sir Thomas Edmondes, “bore away the bell.” She was,
as it were, “hanged all over with jewels;” but, notwithstanding the
beauty of the piece, and the rank of the actors, the plot of the “Vision
of Delight” is said “to have proved dull.” The representation was
attended by the Spanish and Venetian ambassadors, to the great affront
of the French ambassador; for Buckingham had now planned a deep game,
and the apparent frivolity of his pleasures was becoming merely the
surface of those political schemes which he had at heart. Soon after
these festivities, the King took occasion to affront young Monson, who
had been set up by the envious to be an idol in place of Buckingham, by
intimating that he did not like his forwardness in presenting himself
continually before him. The young man not only took the hint himself,
but imparted it to others; so “that all the young Court gallants
vanished like mushrooms;” and those who had taken great pains “to set
out young Monson to the best advantage, pricking and pranking him up,
besides washing his face every day with posset curd, in order that he
might rival the handsome Buckingham, received a severe rebuff.”[223]
Footnote 222:
Afterwards the wife of Henry, Lord de la Warr.
Footnote 223:
Inedited State Papers. Domestic. Mr. Chamberlain to Sir D. Carleton,
10 Jan., 1617-18.
Among the favourite diversions of King James was horse-racing. Early in
the spring, the Court was aroused by the racing of two footmen from St.
Albans to Clerkenwell; “and many came to pass the time,” writes Mr.
Chamberlain, merrily, “at Newmarket, and the running match ranges all
over the country, where they be fit subjects to entertain it, as lately
they have been at Sir John Croft’s, near Bury, and in requital, those
ladies have invited them to a mask of their own invention (all those
fair sisters being summoned for the purpose), so that on Thursday the
King, Prince, and Court go thither a shroving.”[224]
Footnote 224:
Inedited State Papers. It is dated, London, March 11, 1619-20.
The following extract from one of Mr. Chamberlain’s letters represents
another kind of diversion:—“The King came hither the Saturday before
Shrovetide, and the two days following there was much feasting and
jollity; and the Christmas mask repeated on Shrove Tuesday night. On
Saturday last, the Prince made a ball and a banquet at Denmark House,
which he had lost at Tennis to the Marquis of Buckingham,[225] who
invited thither a number of ladies, mistresses, and valentines, a
ceremony come lately in request, and grown so costly that it is said he
hath cast away this year 2000_l._ that way, among whom a daughter of Sir
John Croft’s that is unmarried, had a carcanet of 800_l._ for her share;
and the King is so pleased with the whole society of those sisters,[226]
that he extols them before all others, and hath bespoken them for the
Court against next Christmas. The banquet at Denmark House was so
plentiful that it cost 400_l._, and all the women came away, as it were,
laden with sweetmeats; but supper there was none, save what the Lord of
Purbeck made to his private friends.”[227]
Footnote 225:
Inedited State Papers, Feb. 26, 1619-20.
Footnote 226:
Sir J. Croft’s Daughters.
Footnote 227:
N. Brent to Sir D. Carleton, March 30, 1618. State Paper Office,
inedited.
Another of those aspirants to royal favour, to whom we have referred,
and whom the career of Buckingham drew forth from obscurity, was Sir
Henry Mildmay, and a son of George Brooke’s, who had been executed at
Winchester, on the supposed Raleigh plot. But James soon discovered that
both these young courtiers were the tools of factions directed against
Buckingham; and they were banished the Court. Some time afterwards, it
was thought that the return of young Monson might be effected through
the influence of his friends; but, observes a bystander of this game,
these Court resolutions do strangely alter, and for the most part, “the
day following gives the lie to that which preceded.”
The King, meantime, continued to amuse himself vastly at Newmarket. The
following description of one of his days of pleasure presents a singular
picture of the homely diversions of the first of the Stuart monarchs
that reigned in this country:—
“We hear nothing from Newmarket, but that they devise all the means they
can to make themselves merry, as of late there was a feast appointed at
a farm-house not far off, where every man should bring his dish. The
King brought a great chine of beef; the Marquis of Hamilton four pigs,
garnished with sausages; the Earl of Southampton two turkies; another,
some partridges; and one, a whole tray full of buttered eggs: and so all
passed very pleasantly.”[228]
Footnote 228:
Mr. Chamberlain to Sir Dudley Carleton, Nov. 28, 1618. State Paper
Office, inedited.
During these diversions, James’s good humour, often interrupted by
disease and self-indulgence, was maintained by his partiality for
Buckingham. “The King,” writes Mr. Chamberlain, “is never out of tune,
but that the sight of the Earl of Buckingham doth settle and quiet all.”
Meantime, one of those meteoric appearances to which the superstition of
the day attached some portentous meaning, excited popular alarm, and
suspended even the course of public business. “On Wednesday,” writes one
of the functionaries of government, “we had no Star Chamber, by reason
of the Lord Chancellor’s indisposition; that was the first day we took
notice here of the great blazing star, though it was observed at Oxford
a full week before. It is now the only subject of discourse, and not so
much as little children, but as they go to school, talk in the streets
that it foreshows the death of a king or a queen, or some great war
towards.”[229]
Footnote 229:
T. Locke to Sir Dudley Carleton, Nov. 17, 1618, State Paper Office,
inedited.
At another time a race of two footmen from St. Albans to Clerkenwell
diverted the Court. Many money bets were laid upon the result, and
Buckingham won three thousand pounds upon that day. “The story,” as the
narrator of it well observes, “were not worth telling, but that you may
see we have little to do when we are so far affected with these trifles,
that all the Court in a manner, lords and ladies, and some further off,
and some nearer, went to see this race, and the King himself almost as
far as Barnet; and though the weather was sour and foul, yet he was
scant _fils de bonne mère_ that went not out to see, insomuch that it is
verily thought there was as many people as at the King’s first coming to
London; and for the courtiers on horseback, they were so pitifully
bewrayed and bedaubed all over, that they could scant be known one from
another, besides divers of them came to have falls and other mishaps, by
reason of the multitude of horses.”
On some of these occasions, the lavish disposition of Buckingham was
exhibited. On St. George’s Day, a festival observed with much solemnity,
he presented forty of his gentlemen with fifty pounds a piece “to
provide themselves,” and twenty to ten of his yeomen, besides a hundred
pounds to treat them with a supper and a play on the following night at
the Mitre in Fleet Street. A retinue of fifty persons appears, in modern
days, a tolerable attendance for a nobleman even of high rank; but it
had recently been found necessary to limit them to that number, owing to
the unbounded ostentation and extravagance of many of the nobility.[230]
Footnote 230:
Nichols, vol. iii., p. 477.
Whilst this continued round of pleasures was carried on, some adverse
events checked the merriment of those who played a part in the revels.
Prince Charles, who was his mother’s favourite, was sometimes the object
of his father’s jealousy, although, by the gentleness and prudence of
his deportment, he had avoided the almost open state of variance with
the King, which, in his brother’s days, had divided the Court into two
parties. Still there were occasions on which the conduct of the young
Prince was misrepresented.
The difference was soon reconciled; and “my Lord of Buckingham,” as he
was called by several annalists of the day, gave a dinner to the King
and Queen for the express purpose of reconciling his Highness to his
royal father. The King and Queen dined at a separate table, but in the
same room as that in which the lords and ladies were feasted: among
these, Lady Hatton, Lady Villiers Compton, and Lady Fielding, and
several others of the same family, were placed; the King drank to all
these separately, and sent them secret messages. At the close of the
banquet, he rose, and drank a common health to all the noble family, and
declared that he desired them to advance them before all others. “And
because,” adds the writer of the letter in which this account is given
of himself, “there was no doubt—for, said he, ‘I live to that end;’ be
assured we live in their posterity’s name, that they would so far regard
their father’s commandments and instructions as to advance that house
above all others whatsoever.”[231]
Footnote 231:
Nichols, 484, from Birch’s MSS. British Museum.
The King shortly afterwards verified his assertion by creating Lady
Villiers Compton, by patent, Countess of Buckingham in her own right for
life. The Heralds, it is said, were “posed” to explain how Sir Thomas
Compton, himself of a noble and loyal family, should have no part in
this patent; but the public could easily comprehend that it was the aim
and intention of James to elevate the Villiers family by every mark of
especial favour. The newly-made Countess of Buckingham, thus raised by
fortune from a low estate, did not escape calumny; rumours, both
scandalous and unjust, being set afloat regarding her imputed intimacy
with Lord Keeper Williams, who succeeded Bacon on the woolsack.[232]
Footnote 232:
Life of B. Goodman, p. 286.
Another melancholy event saddened all hearts, and excited a deep and
generous resentment. This was the death of Sir Walter Ralegh. In this
event, “the sacrifice,” as Hume expresses it, “of the only man in the
nation who had a high reputation for valour and military experience,”
Buckingham had no doubt some indirect participation. He promoted it,
because he promoted the projected alliance with Spain, which had now,
for some years, lain the closest at the King’s heart. He was responsible
for it, because no intercession that he might have chosen to make for
the “gallantest worthie that England ever bred,” would have been
proffered in vain. During the early part of his career, Buckingham had,
indeed, befriended Ralegh; but little credit is to be assigned for the
mediation which, in 1615, had procured the release of the illustrious
prisoner, after twelve years of durance, since it was purchased, through
the agency of Lady Villiers, for fifteen hundred pounds. On that
occasion, Ralegh had addressed a letter of thanks to the all-powerful
favourite; but now affairs had undergone a marvellous change. Even money
could not avail, and Buckingham, in all the sunshine of his fortunes,
stood at all events indifferent, if not accessory, to the infamous
sentence, by the revival of which Ralegh was doomed to death.
The fashion of the day, as well as the wishes of the King, all tended at
this time to increase the ascendancy of Spanish counsels in England.
James entertained an opinion, peculiar to himself, that any marriage,
except with a daughter of France or Spain, would be unworthy of the
Prince of Wales, and he would never suffer a princess of any other royal
house to be mentioned in his presence as a suitable consort for the heir
apparent.[233] Upon the death of Prince Henry, a negotiation for a
marriage between the Prince Charles and the second daughter of France,
the Princess Christine, was set on foot, but failed, owing to the death
of the Count de Soissons, its chief promoter.[234] The efforts of the
Spanish ambassador, the famous Gondomar, and the long course of
intrigues which attended his visitation to England, afterwards
effectually set aside for a time all thoughts of prosecuting the scheme
of a marriage treaty with either of the French princesses, on the one
hand; whilst, on the other, the affairs of Germany were such as to
discourage, to all appearance, the exertions which were made by the
Spanish party in England to produce a union between the royal families
of Great Britain and Spain. Frederic, the Elector, and son-in-law of
James, had accepted the tender of the crown of Bohemia, and become,
consequently, involved in hostilities with Austria, and these were
regarded as a religious war; for Austria, which, throughout her
dominions, had always made religion a pretext for her usurpations, now
upheld the Catholic faith as her object, whilst the Elector Palatine, a
Protestant, ranged himself on the side of liberty. The whole of the
English nation were eager to espouse the cause, and to aid the brave
exertions of that prince. Sincerely attached to the Princess Palatine,
the ill-fated Elizabeth of Bohemia, they considered her interests, and
those of her husband, as constituting a sort of crusade, and they were
ready to risk plunging the country into all “the chaos of German
politics,” considering the contest as between Protestantism and
liberty—and Popery and despotism.
Footnote 233:
Hume. Life of James I.
Footnote 234:
Birch’s Negotiations between England, France, and Brussels, p. 372.
On the first introduction of Gondomar to the King, an accident had
occurred which was regarded by many as a presage.[235] As the ambassador
was passing from the Council Chamber, along the terrace towards the
Great Chamber in Whitehall, a piece of the floor sank, and several
persons fell down. The Earl of Arundel hurt his face; the Lord Gerrard
and Lord Gray also received some injury from the fall; the ambassador
alone escaped, being held up by two of the household guards. This
accident seemed ominous of the ultimate rupture between England and
Spain; James regarded it in that light, and could never bear to hear it
mentioned!
Footnote 235:
Inedited State Papers, March 20, 1619-20.
Unwonted honours were indeed shown to Gondomar. He was received with
marks of great distinction, and lodged at Ely House, which had been
prepared for his use with considerable expense. But the most important
deviation from established custom was the appropriation of a cloth of
state to this ambassador, an appendage never permitted to any such
personage before. That mark of favour, however, which gave the greatest
offence to the Puritan party, was the order that the chapel should be
renewed and embellished, and an altar placed in it. All the ambassador’s
expenses of living were defrayed by the King; although, on being offered
some of the royal attendants, Gondomar declined their services. Whilst
these things were going on at Court, the populace, cherishing the cause
of the distant and deserted daughter of James, Elizabeth of Bohemia,
were parading the streets with drums beating, to muster recruits for the
Palatinate.[236]
Footnote 236:
Inedited State Papers for 1619-20.
But James was under the influence of Gondomar, and Spain was connected
by the closest ties of blood, and by the still dearer bonds of political
interest, with the Emperor of Austria. Gondomar well understood the
King, and divined his wishes. He offered, at this juncture, the second
daughter of the King of Spain to Prince Charles, and backed his proposal
by the promise of an immense sum of money, which he well knew would be
acceptable in the present needy circumstances of the British King. The
proposal, though entertained by James, was distrusted by the public, and
deemed wholly insincere, for it was thought that Spain had no intention
of forming any union with a princess of heretical principles.
The fate of Sir Walter Ralegh was therefore sealed. Twenty-three years
before, he had acquired for the crown of England a claim to the
continent of Guiana; and, in his second expedition, had planned, and
executed through his son Walter, the sacking of St. Thomas, a small town
which the Spaniards, not acknowledging the British claim to the
territory of Guiana, had built on the river Oronooko. The young Walter
Ralegh was killed in that attempt. He was a young man more desirous of
honour than safety; “with whom,” said the agonized father, on hearing of
his loss, “to say truth, all the respects of this world have taken end
in me.”[237]
Footnote 237:
Letter to Winwood.
Ralegh was now to suffer for the results of an enterprise which he had
undertaken with the express consent of the King.[238] Whilst proceedings
were carried on against him, Gondomar was entertained, as it will be
remembered, with a marked distinction by Buckingham. The extreme youth
of the favourite had indeed attracted the witticisms of the artful
Spaniard, who had converted that circumstance into a compliment to the
King’s penetration, telling his Majesty “that he was the wisest and
happiest prince in Christendom, to make privy-counsellors sage at the
age of twenty-one, when his master, the King of Spain, could not do it
when they were sixty.”[239] The wily Spaniard dealt out his phrases in
points and conceits, a sort of discourse then well received in society,
and peculiarly agreeable to the King. He affected, also, to speak false
Latin. The King laughed at him, on which the Ambassador rejoined, “Your
Majesty speaks like a pedant, but I speak like a gentleman,” and James
gloried in his acknowledged superiority in the classics. By these small
contrivances had Gondomar insinuated himself into royal favour, so that
no boon that he could ask—not even the life of the venerated
Ralegh—could be refused.
Footnote 238:
Hume. Reign of James I.
Footnote 239:
Oldmixon. History of the House of Stuart, p. 52.
There was another wheel within this closely-contrived political machine.
The Countess of Buckingham was inclined to Popery; and became,
eventually, a convert to that faith. This circumstance naturally
influenced greatly the son, over whose counsels the Countess continued
to hold a sway, and to dispose them to the marriage of the heir apparent
to a Catholic.
Some time previously, when the affair of the marriage was first
broached, the sentiments of the Marquis and his mother were, therefore,
generally understood to be favourable, and the Lord Treasurer Cranfield,
at that time, under their influence, was zealous in a cause so
acceptable to the favourite.
In February, 1617, Nathaniel Brent wrote to Sir Dudley Carleton: “By the
Marquis of Buckingham and his mother the Spanish match is much
apprehended, though methinks there needs no such haste, the lady being
yet scant eleven years old. In the meantime every man hopes or fears as
he is affected, and they say the Lord Treasurer is so far possessed,
that, like another Cato, that began to learn Greek at threescore years
old, he hath got him a Spanish reader, and applies it hard.” The
influence of the Countess of Buckingham doubtless, therefore, turned the
scale against Ralegh, to the vexation of her son’s best friends. “She
was,” writes Bishop Hacket, who knew her well, “mother to the great
favourite, but, in religion, became a step-mother. She doated upon him
extremely, as the glory of her womb, yet, by turning her coat so
wantonly when the eyes of all the kingdom were upon her, she could not
have wrought him a worse turn if she had studied a mischief against
him.” “Many,” adds the same writer, “marvelled what rumbled in her
conscience all that time; for, from a maid to a maiden, she had not
every one’s good words for practice of piety.”[240] “Arthur Wilson
complains also that the Countess of Buckingham was the cynosure that all
the Papists steered by; but that it was above her ability to bear the
weight of that metaphor.”
Footnote 240:
Hacket’s Life of Archbishop Williams, vol. i., p. 171.
“The Countess was,” he adds, “a protectress of the Jesuits and
Jesuitesses, the females of that order, of whom there were no fewer in
England than two hundred English ladies of good families.” Her opinions
were well known to affect her son, who now began to be accused by the
Puritans of Armenianism, and became the friend and patron of Archbishop
Laud. Gondomar saw well to what point to direct his insidious game. The
Countess had a share in the management of State affairs; she, with her
son, guided the helm, and as much court was paid to her as to
Buckingham, whilst both received far more adulation than was thought
necessary to bestow on the King himself. Wittily, though somewhat
impiously, Gondomar wrote to the Spanish Court that “there never was
more hope of the conversion of England than now; for there are more
prayers and oblations offered here to the mother than to the son.”[241]
Footnote 241:
Oldmixon, p. 52.
Under this complication of interests, Ralegh, on the 24th of October,
1618, was given to understand that it was the King’s intent that he
should be put to death, and that he should therefore prepare himself for
the same.[242] Between that intimation and the fulfilment of his doom,
the courage of the broken-spirited and diseased prisoner, prematurely
old with sorrow and disappointment, gave way. He sought to anticipate
his fate, and attempted suicide, but the wound which he gave himself by
stabbing—a cut, rather than a stab—was not fatal, and he recovered to
address to his disconsolate wife one of the most eloquent and
heart-rending letters that ever emanated from that tomb of the living in
which he passed the close of his days.[243] How Buckingham could hear of
this last act of a mind almost frenzied with misery, of a being, to use
Ralegh’s own words, “not tempted with Satan,” but only “tempted with
sorrow, whose sharp teeth devour my heart,” and not plead for this
ornament of his age, it is scarcely possible to conceive. He would have
culled golden opinions for such an interference; he would have
established a source of proud and consolatory recollections for his own
heart; but he lost that glorious opportunity, and left the illustrious
prisoner, to use his own words, to be a “wonder and a spectacle,” and
went on in his own perilous career, until the hour of retribution, even
to him, arrived.
Footnote 242:
Nichols, iii., p. 493.
Footnote 243:
It begins thus:—“Receive from thy unfortunate husband these, his last
lines; these, the last words that ever thou shalt receive from him.
That I can live, and think never to see you and my child more, I
cannot. I have desired God, and disputed with my reason, but nature
and compassion hath the victory. That I can live to think how you are
both left a spoil to my enemies, and that my name shall be a dishonour
to my child, I cannot—I cannot endure the memory thereof. Unfortunate
woman! unfortunate child! comfort yourselves, trust God, and be
contented with your poor estate; I would have bettered it, if I had
enjoyed it a few years.”—Bishop Goodman, ii., p. 93. Mr. Brewer has,
by the discovery of this letter, in the College of All Souls, Oxford,
definitively settled the question whether Ralegh did or did not
attempt his life in the Tower. Ralegh’s list of his debts, and his
beseeching his wife “to take care of them,” are not among the least
affecting parts of his letter.
Ralegh’s execution was fixed to take place—so conscious was Government
of the odium which it would incur—on the Lord Mayor’s Day, “that the
pageants and fine shows might,” as Aubrey expresses it, “avocate and
draw away the people from beholding the tragedie of the gallantest
worthie that England ever bred.”[244]
Footnote 244:
Nichols, p. 493.
On the twenty-third of October, a discussion took place in the Privy
Council as to the mode in which prisoners who had been condemned for
treason, and set at liberty, could be executed. The subject was one of
much perplexity, but everything that was subservient and expedient could
be accomplished in those days. It was, however, determined to send a
Privy Seal to the judges on the King’s Bench, desiring them to try Sir
Walter Ralegh “according to law.” The death to which he was doomed, by
the hand of the executioner, was already impending over the illustrious
prisoner in the form of disease. He had sent to the merciless Cecil his
mournful manifesto of privation and sickness; his left side was numbed,
his fingers on the same side were beginning to be contracted, his tongue
and speech affected; he spoke feebly, and feared he might altogether
lose the power of utterance. An application had therefore been made for
his removal from his damp, cold lodging in the Tower, to a little room
in the garden, which he had himself built, close to his laboratory, or,
as it was styled, his stilhouse.[245]
Footnote 245:
Letter in the State Paper Office, no date. See Life of Sir Walter
Ralegh, by the author. Appendix, p. 395.
But the time was at hand when his spirit should breathe in a freer
atmosphere; and all that man could do to him should cease to be of a
source of dread. “The world,” he calmly observed, “was but a large
prison, out of which some were daily selected for execution.”
On the twenty-eighth of October, he was tried, and of course, condemned,
in the King’s Bench. Henry Yelverton, then attorney-general, could not
help again, in his address for the Crown, describing the prisoner as one
who, for his parts and quality, was to be pitied; “one who had been a
star, yea, and of such nature, that shineth far; but out of the
necessity of state, like stars when they trouble the sphere, must indeed
fall.” It is remarkable that Yelverton, who had been patronised by
Somerset, did himself, in after days, fall, having incurred the enmity
of Villiers.
The King, and of course Buckingham, were at this time in Hertfordshire,
on the Royal progress, which was always a scene of festivity and
amusement. The warrant for Ralegh’s execution was, however, produced
directly after the sentence had been passed, dated the same day, signed,
and addressed to Lord Bacon. The sentence was commuted from hanging to
beheading: but no other favour was granted. James and his courtiers
feared the effect of public indignation; no time, therefore, was
allowed; on the day after his sentence, Ralegh met his death with
simple, decorous tranquillity; as one who was going to take a long
journey, for which he was well prepared. The streets were then thronged
with the gay followers of the annual pageantry; and, amid the din of
trumpets, and shouts of the people, the noble spirit of Ralegh passed to
a better world. Perhaps, had he sued for life to Gondomar, as his friend
Lord Clare recommended, the boon might have been granted. But those who
loved his memory had not this act of humiliation to recall, as casting
one shadow over the brightness of his departure from among them. “I am
neither so old, nor so infirm,” was his reply, when urged to make this
appeal to the Spaniard, “but that I should be content to live; and,
therefore, this would I do, were I sure it would do my business; but if
it fail, then I shall lose both my life and my honour; and both those I
will not part with.”[246]
Footnote 246:
Oldys’s Life of Ralegh, folio viii., p. 729.
Since it was understood that Ralegh’s death was a sacrifice to Spanish
councils, owing to a disputed territory, there can be no doubt but that
this event embittered the minds of the public against the cherished
schemes which James and Villiers had for some time conceived with regard
to the Spanish alliance. Whilst all bore a smiling aspect, various
sources of discontent were ready to break forth; and it was generally
reported that James had, to his infinite disgrace, somewhat insisted on
the sentence of hanging being put into execution, and that he could with
difficulty be brought to consent to its being commuted.[247]
Footnote 247:
State Papers. Domestic. 1618-19.
One circumstance which somewhat disturbed the minds of the Court
revellers, yet seemed not to lessen the number of the revels, was the
fatal illness of the Queen. At the Christmas of 1618-19, the physicians
began to speak doubtfully, and the courtiers to plot for leases for her
lands, for the keeping of Somerset House, and for a division of the
spoil of her furniture and personalities, whenever her death should take
place, so confidantly was it expected. Meantime, the festivities of the
season went on as usual, Hatton House being the centre of all that was
gay and great, and the lady of the mansion the deepest of domestic
politicians. During the Christmas she gave a grand supper, with a play,
and invited all the gallants and great ladies about the Court to grace
it; but the Howards, especially, were solicited and caressed, for it was
Lady Hatton’s aim to “solder and link them fast again” with the Marquis
of Buckingham; and to see if he would cast an eye towards Diana
Cecil,[248] the second daughter of William, second Earl of Salisbury.
This young lady was made, in order to attract the greater notice,
Mistress of the Feast; but the bait proved unsuccessful. Many,
doubtless, were the parents who were not unwilling to match even the
fairest of their daughters with the young Marquis, “for it is like,”
writes Mr. Chamberlain, “there will be much angling after it, now it is
decided the King wishes him to take a wife, which of divers is diversely
constructed.”[249]
Footnote 248:
Her mother was a Howard—the sister of the infamous Lady Somerset.
Footnote 249:
Nichols, iii., 521.
Twelfth Night was celebrated with a masque, in which Prince Charles,
Buckingham, and several young noblemen and gentlemen, to the number of
twelve—amongst whom young Maynard “bore away the bell” for
dancing—enacted. This masque was one of Ben Jonson’s compositions; but
whether it was the “Vision of Delight” repeated, or “Pleasure Reconciled
to Virtue,” is not determined.[250] Six days afterwards, the Banqueting
House at Whitehall, in which these revels had taken place, was burned
down, owing, it was supposed, to the neglect of women who were appointed
to sweep the room, and who held their candles too near to some of the
oiled cloths and devices for the masque, which had been left by the
King’s orders to be ready for Shrove Tuesday.[251]
Footnote 250:
Bishop Goodman’s Letters, ii., 188
Footnote 251:
The fire happened in the day time, at eleven, and lasted only an hour.
Lord Chancellor Bacon was among those high personages who by his
presence attempted to ensure order; but there was much spoliation even
in the face of day. The hall was re-erected three years afterwards.
This ancient building might, it is thought, have been saved; but two
men, who saw the flames break out, went away for fear of being blamed.
The Queen had been some time ill, but hopes were entertained of her
recovery until within a very short period of her death. When the danger
increased, Dr. Mayerne, according to a promise he had given her, told
her, twenty-four hours before her decease, that she could not recover.
It was then too late for the Queen to make a will; but she wished to
leave all that she possessed, with the exception of a jewel to the King
of Denmark, and a casket to the Princess Elizabeth, to her son Charles,
adding an assurance that her faith was free from Popery. Although, when
asked if she wished to leave all she had to her son, she answered, and
had again, “Yes,” her possessions were so valuable, that the people
about the Court did not expect that her wishes would be followed out
without the usual formalities. Meantime, whilst her body lay at Denmark
House, her funeral was delayed, because the Master of the Wardrobe would
not pay double prices, usually then charged when ready money could not
be produced. Crowds thronged round Denmark House; and far more curiosity
was expressed to see her after her death than had ever been testified
during her life. The ladies were weary of waiting till the money could
be raised to carry to the grave one who had left 400,000_l._ in jewels,
90,000_l._ in plate, 80,000 Jacobuses in ready money, besides a costly
wardrobe.[252] “The will,” says the precise Mr. Chamberlain, in a letter
to Sir Dudley Carleton, “proves to be nothing.”[253] The King, meantime,
was dangerously ill, of an agonising disease, and obliged to be carried
part of the way to Theobalds in a Neapolitan portative chair, given him
by Lady Hatton; weak as he was, and even whilst the Queen was unburied,
he would have his deer brought before him, that he might enjoy his
wonted pleasures. The lady mourners were, meantime, quarrelling by the
funeral bier for precedency at the approaching ceremonial; and, amongst
the foremost of the combatants was the Countess of Nottingham, who
claimed, as one of the two conditions of Nottingham’s giving up the post
of Lord High Admiral, that he should be the first Earl of England, and
that she, as first Countess, should step out before all others on this
occasion. The expenses of the funeral were to exceed those of Queen
Elizabeth’s, although money was so scarce, that some of Queen Anne’s
plate would have to be coined three times to pay them. There was not
even money to put the King’s and Prince’s servants in mourning; and,
though Anne died on the twenty-first of March, the twenty-seventh of
March found her still in ghastly state at Denmark House.[254] At length,
on the fourteenth of May, the corpse, with Prince Charles riding before
it, was carried to its resting place. The chariot and six horses, on
which the Queen’s effigy was placed, and the hearse itself, were very
stately, yet the funeral was pronounced to be a “poor, drawling sight.”
Two hundred and fifty indigent women followed the hearse. The Countess
of Arundel claimed and obtained her privilege to follow as first
Countess; whilst Buckingham’s place, as pall-bearer, was supplied by the
Earl of Rutland.
Footnote 252:
State Papers. Calendar, vol. cvii., No. 7.
Footnote 253:
Ibid, 52.
Footnote 254:
State Papers, vol. cviii., No. 85. Calendar.
The Queen’s death took away all chance of that counter-influence which
it is possible that Anne might have sought to exercise when the conduct
of Buckingham became, as it eventually did, oppressive and overbearing.
It left, also, her son, whose affectionate nature had found a return in
his mother’s partiality for him, dependent wholly upon Buckingham as a
mediator with his father. Shortly afterwards, one of the effects of this
state of affairs was exhibited. The King, upon the Prince’s suit,
granted the Marquis of Buckingham an estate of twelve hundred a year,
that had belonged to the Queen; and to requite this service, Buckingham
sued the King for an addition of 5,000_l._ a year to the Prince’s former
allowance, which was also granted. It appears, however, that the estate
assigned to Buckingham was given, ostensibly, for the care which the
favourite had bestowed on His Majesty during a severe illness which had
followed closely upon the death of Queen Anne.[255]
Footnote 255:
Nichols, iii., 546.
Hitherto, the young favourite had proved himself possessed of no higher
qualities than those which a courtier’s life requires. He was now placed
in a situation which drew forth abilities of which his enemies and his
friends were alike ignorant. On the thirtieth day of January, 1618-19,
Buckingham was created Lord High Admiral; a post which he at first
refused to accept on account of his youth and inexperience. James would,
however, admit of no excuse, and the aged Earl of Nottingham resigned
that pre-eminent place, alleging as a reason, his advanced years, but,
actually, for a “consideration.” According to one authority, the
compensation was a pension of six hundred a year to his lady, of five
hundred to his son, Charles Howard, and of two hundred and fifty to his
daughter, to commence from the death of the Earl; or, as another
statement gives it, the compact was made for certain benefits; namely,
“a good round sum of ready money, and 3,000_l._ yearly pension during
the Earl’s life; and after his decease, 1,000_l._ pension to his lady,
and 500_l._ a year to his eldest son by her, which was to be doubled to
him at his mother’s death.”[256]
Footnote 256:
Letter from Sir Edward Harwood to Sir Dudley Carleton. State Paper
Office. Domestic, 1618-19.
The office of High Admiral was enjoyed by Buckingham to the close of his
short life; and was maintained by energy such as had not been witnessed
in the administration of naval affairs since the days of Queen
Elizabeth. Little credit has been assigned to him hitherto by historians
for his unwearied endeavours, not only to restore, but actually to
create a navy; but the recent discoveries in the State Paper Office
place his merits in this important sphere beyond dispute, as will
hereafter be shown.[257]
Footnote 257:
Birch’s MSS., British Museum, 4173. Letter of Oct. 3, 1618.
He served, indeed, a master, whose confidence in him, based, perhaps, on
more solid grounds than have been allowed, it was no easy task to
disturb.
Buckingham would have acted wisely, had he, at this most critical period
of his life, remembered the counsels given by Bacon in his famous
“Letter to Sir George Villiers.” “You are as a new risen star, and the
eyes of all men are upon you; let not your own negligence make you fall
like a meteor.” But his youth, his sudden rise to fortune, his mother’s
influence, and his own desire to elevate his family—an aim which
militated against disinterested conduct—all contributed to smother the
naturally generous impulses of his heart.
The King’s partiality was manifested both publicly and privately.
Buckingham had been his attendant in illness; he was now his consoler in
affliction; for the King was not insensible to the loss of a wife to
whom, in spite of “some matrimonial wrangling,”[258] he had been an
indulgent husband. Accordingly, when the funeral made for the Queen took
place, Buckingham remained at Theobalds with his royal master.[259] His
great object appears, at this period of his career, to have been the
aggrandisement of his family. He had secured the prosperity of his elder
brother, Sir John Villiers, by his marriage with the daughter of Sir
Edward Coke; he now determined to effect that of his youngest brother,
Sir Christopher Villiers, not by marrying him to the niece of a rich
alderman, but by other methods. Already had he availed himself of his
empire over the actions of Bacon,[260] to procure for his relatives one
of those profitable sinecures which abounded in that reign. This was a
monopoly for the licensing of ale houses, which Buckingham desired to
engross, conjointly with Mr. Patrick Maule, for his brother. But there
was an impediment—the monopoly had been deemed a grievance, and in 1617,
Bacon had replied to Buckingham’s application for it in the following
terms:—
“I have conferred with my Lord Chief Justice and Mr. Solicitor
thereupon, and there is a scruple in it that it should be one of the
grievances put down in Parliament; which, if it be, I may not, in my
duty and love to you, advise you to deal in it; if it be not, I will
mould in the best manner and help it forward.”[261] In a subsequent
letter, three years afterwards, Bacon again discourages the continued
solicitude expressed by Buckingham for the patent; for, in alluding to
the patents “as like to be stirred in the lower house of parliament,” he
mentions among them that of the ale houses; and recommending, through
the “singular love and affection he bore to Buckingham,” that his
Lordship, “whom God hath made in all things so fit to be beloved, would
put off the envy of these things,” which, according to Bacon’s judgment,
“would bear no great fruit, and rather take the means for ceasing them,
than the note for maintaining them.”[262]
Footnote 258:
Miss Strickland’s Life of Anne of Denmark.
Footnote 259:
Nichols, iii. 539.
Footnote 260:
Made Chancellor on the 4th of January, 1617.
Footnote 261:
Bacon’s Works, vol. ii., p 201, note.
Footnote 262:
Bacon’s Works, p. 225.
It was probably, on finding his first application, though assisted by
his mother, useless, that Buckingham contrived a match between Sir
Sebastian Harvey’s[263] only daughter and Sir Christopher Villiers. “The
match,” writes Mr. Chamberlain, “being not to the joy of the poor
father, so much against the old man’s stomach, as the conceit thereof
hath brought him near his grave already, if at least the world mistake
not the true cause of his sickness.”[264]
Footnote 263:
The Lord Mayor.
Footnote 264:
Nichols, 548.
The marriage was urged on, nevertheless, by the Countess of Buckingham,
who found, however, that Sir Sebastian, then the Lord Mayor, a wilful
and dogged man, could not by any means, either foul or fair, be brought
to yield; in the agony of his spirit, the old man wished himself and his
daughter dead, rather than be compelled to comply. The truth is, the
young lady was only in her fourteenth year, and very small in stature,
and her father did not wish her to be married until four or five years
afterwards. He was, nevertheless, incessantly annoyed with messages from
the King; and these he took so much to heart that he was brought to
death’s door, although Buckingham and others were sent to comfort him.
The Lord Mayor and aldermen had not been present at the Queen’s funeral;
and the King, wishing to please Harvey, and to atone for this apparent
insult, ordered that St. Paul’s Cross should mourn on Trinity Sunday,
and that the Mayor and Corporation should go there as mourners; but
Harvey, “sick and surfeited”, declined attendance; nor, when his
Majesty, on the fifth of June, made his triumphant entry into London,
was he well enough to receive him. In truth, the honest pride of
Englishmen began to revolt against having the relatives of the favourite
forced upon them as sons-in-law. The King, however, entered in state,
attended by Prince Charles and all the nobility—Buckingham, of course, a
conspicuous object amid the throng. James, on this melancholy occasion,
looked “more like a wooer than a mourner.” He had already laid aside his
weeds for Queen Anne. A fresh suit of “watchet satin, laid with a blue
and white feather,” rejoiced the eyes of the company, who were glad to
see him so gallant; and ill accorded with the expected appearance of an
embassy of condolence from the Duc de Lorraine, with two or three
thousand persons all in deep mourning.[265] And when it was remembered
that the King had, not long ago, formally recommended, as on his
death-bed, his son, his favourite, and Lord Digby—who had suffered, he
said, in popularity, for the Spanish match—to his council, and had
expected his decease shortly, there was something almost ludicrous in
the contrast.
Footnote 265:
State Papers, vol. cix; No. 76. Calendars.
The desired match did not, however, prosper, not withstanding a visit
from James to the Lord Mayor’s own residence, soon afterwards, to
expostulate with the old man. He also sent for Sir Sebastian, his wife,
and daughter, from their dinner, in Merchant Taylor’s Hall, in order to
recommend Sir Christopher as a suitor; but all was in vain, Buckingham
was defeated, and the young lady was eventually united to the eldest son
of Sir Francis Popham.[266]
Footnote 266:
Nichols, vol., iii. p. 556.
Disappointed in this matter, Buckingham now manifested his intentions of
improving his own fortunes by a successful marriage; various objects of
attraction had been offered to his gaze, but they wanted, probably, that
which his extravagance rendered essential—fortune. On one occasion, we
find him, with the King, visiting a house in order to admire the beauty
of one of his god-daughters, but no result followed. The world, too, now
talked loudly of the marriage of Lady Diana Cecil with the Earl of
Oxford, whilst a richer bride was given, by common report, to
Buckingham. This was the Lady Katherine Manners, the only daughter of
Francis, sixth Earl of Rutland, a nobleman of great wealth; the lady was
also endowed with other attractions besides fortune, proving a woman of
many attainments and great spirit.
This marriage was, in every respect, desirable. It produced, amongst one
of its advantages, an alliance in blood with the illustrious Sydneys.
Roger, fifth Earl of Rutland, the brother of Earl Francis, having
married Sir Philip Sydney’s daughter and heiress.[267] It cemented a
union with a house already favoured by King James, who visited Belvoir
Castle repeatedly, and who had constituted its two last lords
successively Chief Justices in Eyre of all his forests and chases north
of the Trent, beside conferring other distinctions; lastly, it offered
to Buckingham a prospect of domestic happiness with a lady of
considerable wit and spirit, and one whose affectionate attachment to
her husband was amply testified by her letters and conduct during their
union.
Footnote 267:
Brydges’s Peers of James I.
One drawback, however, existed. The Lady Katherine was a Roman Catholic;
and, although passionately attached to Buckingham, she, for some time,
refused to go to church. Through the exertions, however, of the
celebrated Williams, then Dean of Salisbury, and afterwards Lord
Chancellor, she was ultimately converted. It was for her benefit that he
composed his work, entitled, “A Manual of the Elements of the Orthodox
Religion, by an old Prebend;” only twenty copies of which were printed,
and these were all presented to the Marquis of Buckingham.[268] Such was
the success of Williams’s arguments, or the influence of the young
lady’s affection for her suitor, that, shortly before her marriage, a
public profession of the reformed faith was made by Lady Katherine, on
her partaking of the Holy Communion at the altar of a Protestant
church.[269]
Footnote 268:
Nichols, vol. iii., p. 589.
Footnote 269:
Ibid, vol. iv., p. 606.
Various were the rumours at Court concerning the progress of the
engagement, which went on “untowardly;” amongst others, that the
Countess of Buckingham, having taken the young lady away from her home,
the Countess of Rutland, Lady Katherine’s step-mother, had refused to
receive her back: the King was said to be in the plot.[270]
Footnote 270:
State Papers, vol. cxiii., No. 38.
The future Duchess of Buckingham was the only child of the Earl of
Rutland, by his first wife, Frances, the widow of Sir William Bevile, of
Kilkhampton, Cornwall;[271] and, during the lifetime of her mother, she
was regarded as the sole heiress of all the wealth of her father. Upon
the death of the first Countess of Rutland, the Earl married again, his
second lady being the daughter of the Earl of Thanet, and the widow of
Sir Henry Hungerford. Two sons were the offspring of this union, but
before the courtship of Buckingham, death removed them from being
obstacles to Lady Katherine’s prosperity. They died in their infancy,
from the effects, as it was believed in those credulous days, of wicked
practices and sorcery.[272] It was this celebrated case which is said to
have convinced King James, before sceptical on the subject, of the
existence of witchcraft, of the real agency of the power of
darkness.[273] The instruments of the foul fiend were three women in the
service of the Earl of Rutland, Joan Flower, and her two daughters, who
were stated to have entered into a formal contract with the devil, and
to have become “devils incarnate themselves.” Being dismissed from
Belvoir Castle, on account of bad conduct, they made use of all the
enchantments, spells, and charms that the black art comprised.
Footnote 271:
Which afterwards came to the Granvilles, hence the name of Bevile
Granville.
Footnote 272:
This lady is said to have died in consequence of some medicine given
her by Sir W. Ralegh;—a slanderous accusation.
Footnote 273:
Granger, from Howell. Art. Rutland.
Henry Lord Roos, the eldest born of the house of Rutland, sank under the
effects of these demoniacal influences, or rather, probably, from
childish terrors, in 1613.[274]
Footnote 274:
State Papers, vol. cxii., No. 104.
The Lady Katherine did not escape their machinations, having, with her
brother Francis, been tortured by Flower and her accomplices.[275] Five
years after the supposed exercise of their witchcraft, these wretched
women were apprehended, and upon being rigidly examined by Lord
Willoughby d’Eresby, Sir George Manners, and others, were committed to
Lincoln gaol. Joan died on her way to prison, whilst wishing the bread
and butter which she was eating, might choke her if she were guilty. The
two daughters were tried, confessed their guilt, and were executed at
Lincoln.
Footnote 275:
Even King James, it is said, was not exempt from the designs of the
wicked. In the State Paper Office is the following entry:—“A man named
Peacock, a schoolmaster, to be committed to the Tower and tortured,
‘for practising sorcery on the King, to infatuate him in Sir Thomas
Lake’s business.’”
By the death of her brother, Lady Katherine, whose more advanced years,
and probably, whose courage and sense enabled her to master the dark
terrors of the wicked Joan and her daughters, became a personage of no
little importance in those venal times, when even a show of affection
was scarcely thought necessary for the preliminary arrangements of the
nuptial tie. Belvoir, her father’s proud possession, stands upon the
eminence, the fine prospect from which gave it the name it bears, in all
its stately antiquity.[276] It was built in the time of the Conqueror,
by Robert de Belvedeir, standard-bearer to the monarch. The edifice is
seated on the confines of the counties of Lincoln and Leicester,
Nottingham and Rutland, and it commanded, in the time of Francis
Manners, until the present day, fourteen lordships.[277] Of this domain,
Lady Katherine was now sole heiress. Repeated visits had been made by
King James to it, and, indeed, a sojourn at Belvoir was always a
principal feature in a royal progress. A singular custom was formerly
observed on the occasion of a royal visit to this castle. A family in
Nottinghamshire, who held the Manor of Staunton, by the office of castle
guard of the strong hold of Belvoir Castle, called the Staunton Tower,
were required to present the keys of that tower to the monarch, in the
same manner as the keys of a town are offered. The tenure required, in
feudal times, that—
“Unto this forte with force and flagge,
The Staunton’s stock should sticke,
For to defende against the foe,
Which at the same might kicke.”[278]
Footnote 276:
The interior was destroyed by fire, in 1816; it has been rebuilt in a
style of great magnificence.
Footnote 277:
The present Duke of Rutland traces his descent in direct line from the
founder of the castle, Robert de Belvedeir.
Footnote 278:
In January, 1814, when George IV., then Prince Regent, was received at
Belvoir Castle, the key of Staunton Tower, of gold, and beautifully
wrought, was presented to him in the drawing-room, on a gold cushion,
by the Rev. Dr. Staunton, with a suitable address. Nichols’s Progress,
vol. ii., p. 458.
The office of castle guard has long become a sinecure, but the
importance of maintaining all those forms was such, that in 1618 a writ
of inquiry was issued to show why the Castle of Belvoir should not fall
into the king’s hands, on account of some alienation. “This,” says a
modern writer, “might appear an ungrateful return to the earl for his
hospitality; but it was
the customary process when property held under the crown became, on any
occasion, alienated.”[279]
Footnote 279:
The whole of the castle stands in Leicestershire.
At Belvoir, James made, on one occasion, a considerable number of
knights, and, notwithstanding his writ of inquiry, he visited the
hospitable palace every second or third year, from 1612 to 1621. In
1612, Henry, Prince of Wales, met his father at Belvoir Castle, riding
thither from Richmond in two days, and received “very honourable
entertainment” from Francis, Earl of Rutland, who, but a fortnight
before, had attended the funeral of his brother at Bottesford.[280]
Footnote 280:
Note in Nichols’s Progresses, vol. i., p. 490.
In August, 1619, the king again visited Belvoir, but it does not appear
certain that Buckingham accompanied his royal master. Probably, the
preliminaries to the union which subsequently took place, may have been
entered into on that occasion. Early in the following year, the marriage
contract was signed, a ceremonial which generally preceded the completed
marriage by a period of forty days. In this instance, that event did not
take place until the sixteenth of May.
In the interim, Buckingham, either through the impatience of a lover,
or, what is more likely, fearful of losing, from objections, the heiress
of Belvoir, took a step which cannot be condemned without a full
knowledge of every circumstance connected with it; but which seemed, on
the first view, alike discreditable to the lover and to his mistress. He
induced the Lady Katherine to leave her father’s house, and conveyed her
to his own apartments at Whitehall. Of this transaction, an account is
given by Arthur Wilson, whose puritanical principles caused him to
regard Buckingham with dislike, and perhaps to misrepresent his conduct,
and Buckingham is stated to have kept the lady there for several days,
and then to have returned her to her father. “The stout old earl,”
pursues the same writer, “sent him this threatening message, ’That he
was too much of a gentleman to suffer such an indignity, and if he did
not marry his daughter, to repair her honour, no greatness should
protect him from his justice.’” It is conjectured that this elopement
may have been contrived by Buckingham, in order to extort from the Earl
of Rutland an unwilling consent. He quickly, therefore, says Wilson,
“salved the wound before it grew to a quarrel; and if this marriage
stopped the current of his sins, he had the less to answer for.”[281]
Footnote 281:
Wilson’s Life of James I., p. 149.
Such is one account of the obstacles which impeded that good
understanding which afterwards existed between the Earl of Rutland and
his son-in-law. It appears, however, from an unpublished document in the
State Paper Office, that Buckingham’s exorbitant demands had disgusted
the Earl; these were, 20,000_l._ in ready money, 4,000_l._ in land a
year, and, in case of Lord Roos’s death, 8,000_l._ in land. On this
account, at first, had the match been broken off, but renewed upon the
death of the son and heir, an event which some ascribed to witchcraft,
others to the falling sickness, to which the poor youth was subject.
Rumour also attributed the interruption of the marriage-treaty to the
religious scruples of Buckingham.[282]
Footnote 282:
Letter from Mr. Chamberlain to Sir Dudley Carleton. Inedited State
Papers, March 11th, 1619-20.
After his daughter had left his house, the Earl wrote a letter, half
indignant, half relenting, to Buckingham. In this epistle, the feelings
of a father’s struggle with the offended honour of the man. “I confess,”
he writes to Buckingham, “I took no great council in this business, for
nature taught me that I was to advise my daughter to avoid the occasion
of ill, as confidently as I assure myself she _is of ill_.” The
aggrieved and unhappy parent had perhaps, afterwards, reason to retract
that bitter expression. “I confess,” he adds, “I had noble offers from
you, but I expect real performance, which I hope in the end will bring
comfort to us both.” “His daughter,” he touchingly remarks, “deserves no
so great a care from a father whom she little esteems,” as he had shown
her; “yet,” adds the Earl, “I must preserve her honour, if it were with
the hazard of my life. And for calling our honours in question,” he
proceeds, “pardon me, my lord, that cannot be any fault of mine; for you
would have me think that a contract, which, if you will make it so, be
it as secret as you will, this matter is only at an end; therefore, the
fault is only your lordship’s if the world talk of us both.”
All that the father demanded was, to use his own words, addressing
Buckingham, as follows, “proof that she is yours, and then you shall
find me tractable, like a loving father; although she is not worthy in
respect of her neglect to me; yet, it being once done, her love and due
respects to your lordship shall make me forget that which I confess I
now am too sensible of.” “To conclude, my lord, this is my resolution,
if my conscience may not be fully satisfied she is yours, take your own
courses; I must take mine, and I hope I may arm myself with patience,
and not with rage. Your lordship shall even find I will be as careful of
your honour as I shall be tender of mine own; and this is my
resolution.”[283]
Footnote 283:
From Court and Times of King James. Bishop Goodman, vol. ii., p. 189.
To this searching letter, wrung from a father, uncertain how far his
daughter had for ever exposed herself to shame, hoping, yet fearing,
lest it might not prove so, and that she had fallen into honourable
hands, Buckingham thus replied:—
“MY LORD,
“Your mistaking in your fashion of dealing with a free and honest heart,
together with your froward carriage towards your own daughter, enforced
me the other day to post to Hampton Court, and there cast myself at His
Majesty’s feet, confessing freely unto him all that hath ever passed in
privacy between your lordship and me concerning your daughter’s
marriage, lest otherwise, by this, your public miscarriage of the
business, it might by other means, to my disadvantage, have come to his
knowledge. And now that I have obtained my master’s pardon for this, my
first fault, for concealing, and going further in anything than His
Majesty was acquainted with, I can delay no longer of declaring unto you
how unkindly I take your harsh usage of me and your own daughter, which
hath wrought this effect in me; that, since you esteem so little of my
friendship and her honour, I must now, contrary to my former resolution,
leave off the pursuit of that alliance any more, putting it in your free
choice to bestow her elsewhere, to your best comfort; for, whose fortune
it shall ever be to have her, I will constantly profess that she never
received any blemish in her honour but which came by your own tongue. It
is true I never thought before to have seen the time that I should need
to come within the compass of the law, by stealing of a wife against the
consent of the parents, considering of the favours that it pleaseth His
Majesty, though undeservedly, to bestow upon me. So leaving this to you
and your wife’s censure,
“I rest,
“Your lordship’s servant,
“BUCKINGHAM.”[284]
These protestations on the part of Buckingham, that the honour of Lady
Katharine was untouched, are confirmed by the following extracts from
certain letters relative to the affair, by which it is evident, first,
that James himself promoted the abduction of the young heiress, and,
secondly, that the Countess of Buckingham, whilst she favoured her son’s
schemes, never suffered the reputation of her daughter-in-law to be
injured, since she did not, for an instant, permit her to leave her
presence during the temporary absence from her father’s house.
Footnote 284:
From Harleian, 1581, p. 134.
“There is an accident happened which breeds great stir in town, which is
concerning the taking away of the Earl of Rutland’s daughter, by my Lady
Buckingham. Nobody knows what to think of it, but, in my opinion, the
King is in the plot, for, with all his arts, he could not persuade her
to go to church, to which it may be, they think, she refuses to come by
reason of her mother and father. Now, you may remember what my lord said
to your lordship, that he would not marry one who did not come to
church. She loveth him, and I think now he makes trial of her, whether
she will forsake all the world for his sake.”[285]
“But the Lady Buckingham sayeth her father desired her to take her
abroad with her, which she did, having his fatherly love imposed on her
that she should not go out of her sight. She fell ill towards night, and
rather than send her home with waiting gentlewomen, kept her that night
to lie with herself, and brought her home the next day; her mother
refusing to take her, so she went back, and there abided.”[286]
Footnote 285:
Buckingham.
Footnote 286:
Inedited State Papers. Letter from Sir Edward Zouch to Lord Zouch,
February 5th, 1619-20. Domestic. Sir Edward Zouch was a much esteemed
wit and courtier. His family is now nearly, if not wholly
extinct.—Brydges’s Peers of King James, p. 71.
Another account states that the “Lady of Buckingham” fetched the young
lady away one Sunday, without her father’s either leave or liking, “so
that the next day he refused to receive her back, and Lady Katherine was
obliged to take refuge with her uncle, being her nearest relation.”
Neither party, it was observed, gained by this mode of dealing, which
was “subject to much construction.”[287]
It is touching to find the Earl of Rutland, some years afterwards,
excusing himself from visiting the Court, that he might bear his
daughter company in her solitude at Burleigh, during the long interval
in which Buckingham, attending on the King at Windsor, left her in that
then remote country seat, in retirement.[288]
Footnote 287:
Inedited State Papers. Letter dated March. 20th, 1619-20.
Footnote 288:
State Papers. Letter from the Earl of Rutland. Domestic. 1625.
A coolness, however, continued for some time between these two noblemen;
for on St. George’s day, which was observed with much solemnity at
Greenwich, the now haughty Buckingham showed his resentment against the
Earl of Rutland by refusing to be consorted with him in one mess; and,
coupling himself with the Earl of Leicester, left his future
father-in-law alone, “and yet,” as a contemporary relates, “the opinion
is, the match must go on with his daughter, or else do her great wrong
as well in other respects; so, for his sake and his mother’s, she is to
be converted and receive the communion this Easter.”[289]
Footnote 289:
Nichols, iv., 606.
The marriage took place eventually, at Lumley House, a mansion built in
the time of Henry the Eighth, by Sir Thomas Wyatt, on the site of the
ancient Monastery of Crutched Friars, near Tower Hill.[290] The
ceremonial was conducted with great privacy, probably on account of the
vexatious and awkward circumstances which had previously occurred.[291]
Footnote 290:
This house was afterwards inhabited by the Lumley family. The navy
office was once here, until removed to Somerset House. The immense
warehouses belonging to the East India Company, now cover the spot
where Buckingham’s nuptials took place.—See Pennant’s London, p. 237.
Footnote 291:
Nichols, vol. iv., p. 607.
It does not appear to which of his magnificent mansions the Marquis of
Buckingham took his bride, after he had at last obtained possession of
her hand. The man who only four years previously had appeared before a
host of scoffing courtiers, in a thread-bare black suit, and whose
slender allowance scarcely kept him from absolute penury, was now the
owner of several stately residences. His apartments at Whitehall were
held by virtue of his various offices near the King’s person. That
palace was the constant residence of James the First when in London. It
was, at this time, in a very ruinous state, and the Banqueting House had
been recently burned down. Inigo Jones[292] was, indeed, employed in
rebuilding it upon an extensive plan, only a portion of which was
completed. It is, therefore, very unlikely that the honeymoon would be
passed in the midst of noise and dust, although Whitehall, partially
surrounded, as it was, by beautiful gardens, was not, by any means,
devoid of that rural beauty for which the denizens of a royal
metropolitan palace may now look in vain. Wanstead House, in Essex,
which had escheated to the crown in 1606, upon the death of Charles
Blount, Earl of Devonshire, was the first residence that Buckingham
could properly call his own. He obtained it by a royal grant, and the
King seems to have been well repaid for that act of generosity, by the
pleasure which he took in visiting his favourite there.
Burleigh-on-the-Hill, or Burleigh Harrington, so called to distinguish
it from Burleigh Stamford, had been bought by Buckingham from the
heir-general of the Harrington family, into whose possession it had come
by purchase in the time of Queen Elizabeth. It was seated upon a hill,
rising abruptly from the vale of Catmore, commanding a view of the
country around, and protecting the village of Burleigh. At
Burleigh-on-the-Hill, King James was entertained during his first
journey into England; there he was received by Sir John Harrington, who
was then its owner.
Footnote 292:
He was called by the Earl of Pembroke, “Iniquity Jones.” It is said,
in that nobleman’s MS., that he had 16,000_l._ a year for keeping the
King’s houses in repair.—Walpole’s Anecdotes of Painting, vol. ii., p.
271.
After Burleigh had become the possession of the Marquis of Buckingham,
he made it one of the most splendid seats in the island, until it not
only rivalled, but, in some respects, excelled, Belvoir.[293] Both the
Marchioness of Buckingham and the Countess took a great interest in the
place. In one of her letters to her husband, the Marchioness writes
thus: “For Burly Shaw the wall is not very forward yett, and my lady”
(her mother-in-law, the Countess of Buckingham) “bid me send you word
that shee is gon done to look how things ar ther. Shee ses shee is about
making a litell river to rune through the parke. It will be about xvi.
foote broode. But shee ses shee wants money.”[294]
Footnote 293:
Wright’s History of Rutland, 1684, p. 30.
Footnote 294:
Nichols, vol. iv., p. 778.
This magnificent structure, in which many a revel took place, and
beneath whose roof many a masque was enacted, was not destined to remain
a monument of Buckingham’s splendour. Its very strength proved its
destruction; for it was, on that account, selected, during the
Rebellion, as a garrison for the Parliamentarian troops, in order that
they might, from that commanding station, at once harass the surrounding
country, and protect their county committee. But they were unable to
maintain the long line of defence which the extensive buildings
presented, and therefore set them on fire, and thus, destroying the
house and furniture, they deserted Burleigh.
The stables alone remained; and these alone perpetuated the magnificence
of their first owner, being the finest in England. The ruins of Burleigh
long served as a memento of the devastations of civil war, for the son
and successor of George Villiers was unable to restore them. The estate
was sold eventually to Daniel, Earl of Nottingham, who rebuilt the
house, but of the structure which the princely taste of Buckingham
planned, and which his lady mother embellished with her taste, little or
no trace remains.[295]
Footnote 295:
York House was not at present in his possession.
Newhall, in Essex, was another residence of the Marquis of Buckingham’s.
This property was purchased after Burleigh, in 1622, and was considered
a great bargain, the money paid for it being twenty thousand pounds, for
which there was a return of 1,200_l._a year in land, whilst the wood was
valued at about 4,000_l._ or 5,000_l._ The house, which cost originally
14,000_l._ in building, was immediately put under the hands of Inigo
Jones, the King’s surveyor, “to alter and translate” according to the
modern fashion.[296] It is described by Evelyn, who visited it in 1656,
in the following terms:—“I saw New Hall, built in a park, by Henry VII.
and VIII., and given by Queen Elizabeth to the Earl of Sussex, who sold
it to the late great Duke of Buckingham; and since seiz’d on by O.
Cromwell (pretended Protector). It is a faire old house, built with
brick, low, being only of two stories, as the manner then was; ye
gatehouse better; the court large and pretty, the staircase of
extraordinary wideness, with a piece representing Sir F. Drake’s action
in the year 1580, an excellent sea-piece; ye galleries are trifling; the
hall is noble; the garden a faire plot, and the whole seate well
accommodated with water; but, above all, I admir’d the fine avenue,
planted with stately lime trees, in foure rowes, for neere a mile in
length. It has three descents, which is the only fault, and may be
reform’d. There is another faire walk of ye same at the mall and
wildernesse, with a tennis-court, and a pleasant terrace towards the
park, which was well stor’d with deere and ponds.”[297]
Footnote 296:
Nichols, p. 881, from Harleian MSS., 6987.
Footnote 297:
For a fuller history of Newhall, see Nichols’s Progresses of Queen
Elizabeth, vol. i., p. 94-6.
Our ancestors understood well the adaptation of what may be called
landscape gardening, to the style of their stately edifices; and
Buckingham appears to have displayed in his improvements the magnificent
and refined taste of a man whose nature was noble, and who was intended
for a holier career than that of a royal favourite.
Buckingham’s delight in improving his estates soon found scope here. “I
have not beene yet att New Hall,” wrote his lady to him, in 1623, when
he was in Spain, “but I do intend to go shortly to see how things ar
ther. The walk to the house is done, and the tenis-court is all most
done, but the garden is not done, nor nothing to the bouling greene, and
yett I told Totherby, and he tould me he would sett men a worke
presently; but I warant you they will all be redey before you come.” In
a letter from the Countess of Denbigh, she informs her brother that
there is one of the finest approaches to the house made that she ever
saw. Buckingham, on his return from Spain, seems to have enjoyed
thoroughly the sight of Newhall, in all its freshness, and to have
gloried in its sylvan beauties. “I have found this morning,” he writes
to the King, “another fine wood that must go in with the rest, and two
hundred acres of meadows, broomes, closes, and plentiful springs running
through them, so that I hope Newhall shall be nothing inferior to
Burleigh. My stags are all lusty, my calf bold, and others are so too.
My Spanish colts are fat, and so is my jovial filley.”[298] How gladly
must he have returned to those more innocent pursuits of a country life,
that formed so strong a contrast to the harassing existence of a
courtier.[299]
Footnote 298:
Harleian MSS., 6987., quoted in Nichols’s Progresses of King James.
Footnote 299:
Newhall is now a nunnery.
Another place much coveted by Buckingham was stoutly refused, even to
the all-powerful favourite. This was Beddington Hall, in Surrey, then
possessed, and still inhabited, by the ancient family of Carew, on whom
it was bestowed, having been before a royal manor, by Queen Elizabeth.
It was, probably, its vicinity to London which increased Buckingham’s
desire to possess this fine old house, with its stately precincts.
“The Marquis,” as we learn from a private letter of the day, from
London, “would settle himself hereabout, and is much in love with
Beddington, near Croydon, having won over the King, Prince, and others,
to move Sir Nicholas Carew about it; but it seems he will not be
removed, by reason his uncle bestowed it so frankly on him, with purpose
to continue his memory there, and to that end caused him to change his
name. If his lordship would have patience, he would soon find out many
places convenient enough, or, at farthest, stay for Gorhambury, whereof
(they say) he hath the reversion after my Lord Chancellor’s life, but
upon what terms and conditions is only between themselves.”[300]
Footnote 300:
Inedited Letters in the State Paper Office, Mr. Chamberlain to Sir
Dudley Carleton, July 31, 1619.
Wanstead House was another seat of Buckingham’s. The village which bears
that name is situated on the borders of Waltham Forest; it commands a
view of London and of Kent; the prospect stretching over a fertile and
beautiful country. The manor of Wanstead had passed through various
possessors to Sir John Heron, whose son, Sir Giles, being attainted, it
was seized by the Crown. It was then granted to Robert, Lord Rich, who
built the Manor House, then called Naked Hall House. The son of Lord
Rich sold it to Robert Dudley, Earl of Leicester; and it thus became
eventually the residence of two royal favourites. The unscrupulous
Dudley owned it for some years. He enlarged and improved the house; and
here his marriage with the Countess of Essex was solemnised in 1578.
At his death, Wanstead passed into the hands of his widow, Lady Essex;
and the Earl being much involved in debt, an inventory was made of his
property, real and personal. The furniture at Wanstead was valued at one
hundred and nineteen pounds, six shillings, and sixpence; the pictures
at eleven pounds, thirteen shillings, and fourpence. Such is the small
amount of that which was reckoned costly in those days; yet there were
in this collection original portraits of Henry the Eighth, of his
daughters, and Lady Cartmills, Lady Rich, and thirty-six others not
particularized. The library, consisting of an old Bible, of the Acts and
Monuments, old and torn, of seven Psalters and a Service book, was
valued at thirteen shillings and eightpence. The horses, however, were
rated at three hundred and sixteen pounds and threepence.
The Countess of Essex married Sir Christopher Blount, and by some family
arrangements the house was conveyed to his son, Charles Blount, Earl of
Devonshire. At his death it was escheated to the Crown, and became the
property of Buckingham. In 1619, he sold it to Sir William Mildmay;[301]
and in our days this once noble possession, which has fallen, like its
possessors, to ruin and destruction, came into the family of the present
Earl of Mornington.[302]
Footnote 301:
Wright’s Hist. of Essex, vol. ii., p. 502-3.
Footnote 302:
Nichols, vol. iii., p. 364.
A mineral spring was about this time discovered at Wanstead, and there
was such “running there” by lords and ladies, that the spring was almost
“drawn dry,” “and if it should hold on,” writes Mr. Chamberlain, “it
would put down the waters at Tunbridge, which, for these three or four
years, have been much frequented, specially in summer, by many great
persons, insomuch that they who have seen both, say it is not inferior
to the Spa for good company, numbers of people, and other
appearances.”[303]
Footnote 303:
Sir William Mildmay’s descendants conveyed it to Sir Joseph Child,
whose son Richard, afterwards created Earl of Tilney, built Wanstead
House, well known in modern days, on the site of the mansion which had
been the home of Leicester and of Buckingham. The new house was
erected in 1715. It descended, in due time, to Miss Tilney Long, who
married the Hon. Wellesley Pole, now Earl of Mornington. In 1825 she
died, and Wanstead House was sold in lots under the hammer. The park
is now let out for grazing cattle. The ancient church of Wanstead has
also been pulled down, and a new one erected; so that those who look
for any traces of Leicester and Buckingham will not find them at
Wanstead.—_Note in Wright’s “Essex,”_ p. 1150.
To one or other of these stately abodes Buckingham perhaps conveyed his
bride; although the custom of travelling immediately after marriage is
one of more recent, date. Such, however, were the future homes of the
young Marchioness.
The year succeeding the nuptials of the Marquis was passed by him and
his bride in a constant round of courtly revels. During these
festivities, various incidents, of little import in themselves, marked
the determination of James to accomplish the marriage which he now had
at heart between his son and the Infanta of Spain. The slightest
objection to that desired event was dangerous to the meanest of his
subjects. A man named Almed, who held a subordinate situation, having
presented the Marquis of Buckingham with a treatise against the match,
was cast into prison by the King’s express commands.[304] Secretary
Naunton was suspended from his situation for treating with the French
ambassador concerning a union between the Prince and Henrietta Maria,
and was obliged to write an humble acknowledgment of his errors to
Buckingham, and to address to James an epistle penned, as he expressed
it, “in grief and anguish of spirit.”[305] Buckingham interposed in his
behalf, and prevented the secretary’s being turned out of his lodgings
at Whitehall, by which many, looking upon Naunton as a ruined man, for
having lent an ear to the proposal of France, were already
intriguing.[306] The infatuation of James, promoted, it was believed, by
the counsels of Buckingham, brought infinite disgrace upon the English
court, and was repaid by the haughty Spaniards, acting through the
crafty Gondomar, with contempt.
Footnote 304:
Nichols, v. 699.
Footnote 305:
Bishop Goodman, ii., 228.
Footnote 306:
Bishop Goodman, 243.
Even the pulpits were _tuned_, as Queen Elizabeth would have said, to
one key. “The King,” Mr. Chamberlain wrote to Sr Dudley Carleton,
“ordered the Bishop of London to warn his clergy not to preach against
the Spanish match, but they do not obey.”[307]
Footnote 307:
State Papers, Calendar, vol. cxviii., No. 29.
The resolution taken by James to withhold assistance to the Bohemians in
their revolt against the power of Austria, and his determined refusal to
give to his son-in-law, who had been made King of Bohemia, any higher
title than that of Prince Palatine, were resented by the jealous people
whom James was so incapable even of comprehending, and his English
subjects regarded his neutrality with disgust. “The happiness and
tranquillity of their own country,” remarks Hume, “became distasteful to
the English when they reflected on the grievances and distresses of
their Protestant brethren in Germany.” Prince Charles besought his
father on his knees, and with tears, to take pity upon his sister
Elizabeth and her family, and to suffer himself no longer to be abused
with treaties. The young and generous Prince entreated the King, since
His Majesty was himself old, to allow him to raise a royal army, and to
permit him to be the leader of it, being assured that his subjects would
be ready to follow him. To this James replied, “that he would hear once
more from Spain, and that if he had not satisfaction, he would give his
son and the state leave to do what they would.”[308]
Footnote 308:
Letter in Bishop Goodman’s Life, vol. ii., p. 215, from Mr. Mead to
Sir M. Stuteville.
Still James was deaf alike to arguments and to parental affection, and
defended his pacific measures upon the notion that Austria, swayed by
his justice and moderation, would restore the Palatinate, which had been
wrested from Frederic, his son-in-law, by Spinola, especially if his
son’s marriage with the Infanta were effected. He was blind to the fact
that his powers of negotiation would be wholly unable to achieve this
end, nor when it was achieved, would the result be such as his hopes
anticipated. His reluctance to engage in war, his want of courage in
avowing to his subjects the measures which he meant to pursue, were
alike indicative of that pusillanimous spirit which exposed him to the
contempt of foreign courts, and rendered him unpopular at home.
Not having called a parliament for seven years, he now sent forth a writ
of summons in the beginning of the year 1621; an event from which all
men “who had any religion,” as Sir Symonds D’Ewes expressed it, “hoped
much good, and daily prayed for a happy issue; for both France and
Germany needed support and help from England, or the true professions of
the Gospel were likely to perish in each nation under the power and
tyranny of the anti-Christian tyranny.”
The opening of Parliament was graced by a splendid procession from
Whitehall to Westminster; but although the progress was short, it was
varied by several significant circumstances. Prince Charles appeared, on
this occasion, riding on horseback between the Sergeants-at-arms and the
Gentlemen Pensioners, with a rich coronet on his head. Next before his
Majesty rode Henry Vere, Earl of Oxford, Lord Great Chamberlain of
England, with Thomas Howard, Earl of Arundel, Earl Marshal. These
noblemen were bare-headed. Then appeared James, with a crown on his
head, “and most royally caparisoned.” But the personage who excited the
most general interest was Edward Seymour, Earl of Hertford, a man only
sixty-three years of age, but accounted in those days—such is the
increased value of life in ours—“decrepit with age.” This nobleman, the
son of the Protector Somerset, was dear to the people as the relative of
Lady Jane Grey, whose sister, the Lady Catherine, he had married; an act
for which he had incurred a long and unmerited imprisonment in the time
of Elizabeth. He died shortly after the opening of parliament.
The King was now manifestly broken and infirm; the disease, then deemed
incurable, which caused him intense agony, softened his petulance, and
produced a courtesy that touched the bystanders with pity. As he rode
along, he spoke often and lovingly to the crowd three-fold thick;
calling out, with more good-will than kingly dignity, “God bless ye, God
bless ye”—a striking contrast to his usual practice, or, to use the
words of D’Ewes, to his “hasty and passionate custom, which often, in
his sudden distemper,” would bid a plague upon those who flocked to see
him.
Such was one of the remarks made on this day. Another was, that whilst
the windows of Whitehall were crowded by the great and fair, James
saluted none of them as he passed along, except the Marchioness of
Buckingham and her mother-in-law.
He was observed to speak often and particularly to Gondomar, and his
whole demeanour was, for some time, kindly and cheerful.
On a sudden, however, his gracious countenance became overcast. On
gazing up at one window, he observed it to be full of gentlewomen and
ladies, all in yellow bands: this fashion had been discountenanced at
Court ever since the trial of the Countess of Somerset; her accomplice,
Mrs. Turner, having been hanged, by sentence, “in her yellow tiffany
ruffs and cuffs,” she being the first inventor of the yellow
starch.[309] But certain “high-handed women,” as King James termed them,
chose, it seems, perhaps out of despite to Buckingham, to retain what
was conceived to be a memento of the Somerset faction. No sooner did the
King perceive them than he cried out “a plague take ye—are ye there?”
and immediately the ladies, in alarm, vanished from the window. James
was so much exhausted by his exertions this day, and by a speech of an
hour long, in which nevertheless he commended brevity, that he was
obliged to be carried in a chair from the Abbey, where he attended
service, to the Parliament House.
Footnote 309:
Nichols, iv., 630; and iii., 120.
By these and other symptoms, the people saw too plainly that the
interests of Spain were adopted by the Favourite. Parliament, opened
with so much state and promise, was opposed to the King’s wishes, and
deprecated the Spanish alliance. Declamations against the growth of
Popery were continually heard in that assembly, and formed a constant
feature in its discussions during the reign of the Stuarts; these
invectives were now exasperated by the treaty with Spain, and the
indifference of James to the sufferings of the Protestant cause on the
Continent. In the House of Lords, the presence of Prince Charles, around
whom all the bishops, and most of the courtiers, flocked, was supposed
to overawe the debates. All this time, James had “engaged his crown,
blood, and soul,” such were his expressions, for the recovery of the
Palatinate. Nevertheless, he dissolved Parliament early in the ensuing
year; and the fruitless treaties and debasing intrigues went on as
usual.[310]
Footnote 310:
Wilson, Hume, Oldmixon.
An embassy extraordinary from the French King, who had visited Calais,
proved the touchstone of much latent jealousy. An attendance of fifty or
sixty persons of rank, and a retinue of three hundred, gave to the
Marquis de Cadenat, brother to the Duc de Luisues, the favourite of the
King of France, all the dignity that so numerous a company of the flower
of their country could ensure. The ambassador and his suite were met at
Gravesend by the Earl of Arundel, and conducted to Denmark House, where
the Earl, merely accompanying the Marquis to the foot of the first stair
which led to his lodgings, took his leave, saying that there were
gentlemen there who would show him to his apartments. This was a decided
slight. Shortly afterwards, an affront was given by the Countess of
Buckingham, owing to her having placed the Marquise de Cadenat and her
niece, Mademoiselle de Luc, at a ball at Whitehall, beneath her own
daughter-in-law, the Marchioness of Buckingham.
On the eighth of January, a tilting match was performed, to entertain
the French Marquis, wherein Prince Charles broke a lance with great
success. Amongst the tilters was the “beloved Marquis of Buckingham,” so
called by Sir Symonds D’Ewes, who thus describes the appearance of the
Favourite on the occasion:—
“Seeing the Marquis of Buckingham discoursing with two or three French
monsieurs, I joined to them, and most earnestly viewed him for about
half-an-hour’s space at the least, which I had the opportunitie the more
easilie to accomplish, because he stood all that time he talked,
bareheaded. I saw everything in him full of delicacie and handsome
features; yea, his hands and face seemed to me especiallie effeminate
and curious.” The contrast with the homely-featured foreigners who
surrounded him seems to have struck this not very good-natured observer.
“It is possible,” he adds, “he seemed more accomplist, because the
French monsieurs that invested him weere verie swarthie, hard-featured
men.”
All irritation seems to have subsided by this time, and the natural
hospitality of well-bred Englishmen to have reappeared. In the midst of
the business and pleasure which occupied the English Court, the
unpopularity of the Spanish match was, however, so apparent that
Gondomar begged to retire to Nonsuch Palace, to avoid the “fear and
fury” of Shrove Tuesday.
In the summer of this year,[311] James visited his Favourite at
Burleigh, when he was so much pleased with his entertainment, that he
could not forbear expressing his contentment in certain verses, in which
he said “that the air, the weather, and everything else, even the stags
and bucks in their fall, did seem to smile.” The chief diversion
prepared for His Majesty was a masque by Ben Jonson, entitled “The
Metamorphosed Gipsies;” it was acted first at Burleigh, then at Belvoir,
and lastly at Windsor, within the course of a few months.
Footnote 311:
1620.
Buckingham employed the poet’s pen at his own expense, and himself
enacted the Captain of the gipsies; and, in his disguise, marching up to
the King, he thus addressed him, with the freedom of his lawless tribe:—
With you, lucky bird, I begin:
I aim at the best, and I trow you are he,
Here’s some luck already, if I understand
The grounds of mine art; here’s a gentleman’s hand,
I’ll kiss it for luck sake; you should, by this line,[312]
Love a horse and a hound, but no part of a swine;[313]
To hunt the brave stag, not so much for the food
As the weal of your body and wealth of your blood.
Footnote 312:
The line of life in Palmistry is the line encompassing the ball of the
thumb.—See, for this masque, Gifford’s edition of Ben Jonson.
Footnote 313:
James’s known dislike of pork was one trait of his Scottish descent.
In this fashion did Buckingham flatter the tastes of James, who, priding
himself on his prowess in the chase, which he followed in a ruff and
trowsers,[314] was charmed with any allusion to his favourite diversion.
Footnote 314:
Grainger.
As the Captain of the Gipsies further pursued the telling of the King’s
fortune, his verse changed its metre, and touched on more serious
themes:—
Could any doubt that saw this hand,
Or who you are, or what command
You have upon the state of things?
Or would not say you were let down
From Heaven, on Earth, to be the Crown
And top of all your neighbour Kings?
In another verse, he gracefully referred to the royal bounty to
himself:—
Myself a gipsy here do shine,
Yet are you maker, sir, of mine.
Oh! that confession should content
So high a bounty, that doth know
No part of motion but to flow,
And giving, never to repent.
These poetical addresses were interspersed with dances and songs. After
the second dance, a gipsy, supposed to be Viscount Purbeck, the brother
of the Marquis, paid a tribute to Prince Charles:—
As my Captain hath begun
With the sire, I take the son!
Your hand, sir!
Of your fortune be secure,
Love and she are both at your
Command, sir!
See what states are here at strife,
Who shall tender you a wife,
A brave one?
And a fitter for a man
Than is offered here, you can
Not have one.
She is sister of a Star,
One, the noblest that now are,
Bright Hesper;
Whom the Indians in the East,
Phosphor call, and in West,
Hight Vesper.
Courses even with the sun
Doth her mighty brother run
For splendour.
—alluding to the boast of the Spaniards that the sun never sets on their
King’s dominions.
The Marchioness of Buckingham was next addressed, in these terms:—
But, lady, either I am tipsy,
Or you are in love with a gipsy;
Blush not, Dame Kate,
For early or late,
I do assure you it will be your fate,
Nor need you once be ashamed of it, madam,
He’s as handsome a man as e’er was Adam.
The fortunes of Cecily, Countess of Rutland, the stepmother of the
Marchioness, of the Countess of Exeter, and of the Countess of
Buckingham, were then told. In the verses addressed to the last
mentioned, the beauty and attractions of the lady were thus alluded to:—
Your pardon, lady, here you stand,
If some should judge you by your hand,
The greatest felon in the land,
Detected.
I cannot tell you by what arts,
But you have stol’n so many hearts,
As they would make you at all parts
Suspected.
The Lady Purbeck was the next theme:—
Help me, woman, here’s a book,
Where I would for ever look;
Never yet did Gipsy trace
Such true lines in hands or face.
Venus here doth Saturn move,
That you should be Queen of Love,
Only Cupid’s not content;
For, though you do the theft disguise,
You have robb’d him of his eyes.
The fair, frail being, whose loveliness was thus panegyrized, fled from
her husband’s house three years afterwards, never to return. “She was,”
says the historian Wilson, “a lady of transcending beauty.” Ben Jonson’s
lines on her face:—
Though your either cheek discloses
Mingled baths of milk and roses;
Though your lips be banks of blisses,
Where he plants and gathers kisses—
were not, therefore, greatly exaggerated.
Her mother—the mother who had bartered her at the altar—was next
flattered:—
Mistress of a fairer table,
Hath no history or fable;
Others’ fortunes may be shewn,
You are builder of your own,
And whatever Heaven hath gi’n you,
You preserve the state still in you.
Here ended the fortune-telling. And now, a dance of clowns, “Cockrel,
Clod, Town’head, and Puffy,” each personated by knights, delighted the
company with a colloquy in prose, and in their hands the conduct of the
piece remained until the Gipsies, metamorphosed, “appeared in rich
habits, to close the whole with a eulogy upon King James.”
A song was introduced just before the conclusion:—
Oh, that we understood
Our good!
There’s happiness indeed in blood,
And store—
But how much more When virtue’s flood
In the same stream doth hit!
As that grows high with years, so happiness
With it!
Thus ended this masque, which furnishes, in the estimation of a great
critic, “specimens of poetic excellence, injurious flattery, and adroit
satire.”
James was delighted with his cheer at Burleigh.[315] Before departing
for Belvoir, he noticed, with much satisfaction, that there was a
prospect of there soon being an heir to the house of Villiers; and,
after uttering a fervent wish that all might prosper, he called upon the
Bishop of London, by way of amen, to give the young couple a blessing in
his presence on the interesting expectation.[316]
Footnote 315:
Gifford.
Footnote 316:
Nichols, vol. iv., p. 710.
This gay scene was followed by some mischances. James, riding out after
dinner, from Theobalds, early in the next year,[317] was thrown into the
New River;[318] the ice broke, and he fell in, nothing appearing above
the water except his boots. Buckingham, who was not with him, was sent
for from Hertfordshire, and posted away to attend his royal master. The
King recovered from this accident, but his infirmities increased daily;
he was confined for some time at Theobalds, “by reason of a defluxion,”
which, setting in his leg, assumed the form of gout; and he was obliged
to be carried out in a litter when he went to see the deer.
Footnote 317:
1622.
Footnote 318:
Or, as it was called, Middleton’s Water, from the great contriver of
that inestimable improvement, the introduction of water into the
metropolis, Sir Hugh Middleton.
Preparations were now made for that event to which James had referred
when he had called the Bishop of London to bless the parents of the babe
yet unborn. Yet, contrary to His Majesty’s expectations, it did not
prove to be a “fine boy.” Early in the year 1622, a daughter, afterwards
christened Mary, gladdened the hearts of the young and happy parents. On
the twenty-seventh of March, the Marchioness was sufficiently recovered
to be churched in the King’s chamber, where she dined, notwithstanding
that the King was in bed. The Duchess of Lennox accompanied her on this
occasion. This lady, was recently married, for the third time, to the
Duke of Lennox, her first husband having been Henry Purnell, Esq.; her
second, Edward Seymour, first Earl of Hertford. Ludowick, Duke of
Richmond and Lennox, her husband, was a cousin of the King’s,[319] being
grandson to John D’Aubignie, who was brother to Mathew, Earl of Lennox,
grandfather of His Majesty. The Duke of Lennox deservedly enjoyed a
great share of the King’s confidence; and it was a proof of the highest
consideration for the young Marchioness of Buckingham, that his duchess
should be her companion at the ceremony of churching. The Duchess
attended her also in her sickness, and was rewarded for “her great pains
and care in making broths and caudles” for the invalid, by a present
from the King of a fair chain of diamonds, with his picture suspended to
it, Prince Charles and the Marquis of Buckingham being charged to convey
it to the Duchess, who, henceforth, came to be “in great request, and to
be much courted and respected by the Prince.”[320]
Footnote 319:
Granger’s Biography, Reign of King James, vol. i., p. 237.
Footnote 320:
Nichols’ Progresses, vol. iv., p. 756.
CHAPTER VI.
REVIEW OF THE STATE OF POLITICAL AFFAIRS—DISSOLUTION OF
PARLIAMENT—PROTEST—JAMES TEARS IT OUT OF THE JOURNALS OF THE HOUSE
OF COMMONS—ACTS OF OPPRESSION—CASE OF THE EARL OF OXFORD—OF LORD
SOUTHAMPTON—PERSECUTION OF SIR EDWARD COKE—THE CONDUCT AND
IMPEACHMENT OF LORD BACON—THE PART TAKEN BY BUCKINGHAM IN THIS
AFFAIR—THE ABUSES OF MONOPOLIES—CASE OF SIR GILES MOMPESSON—OF SIR
FRANCIS MICHELL—BACON’S LETTERS TO PARLIAMENT—HIS ILLNESS—THE
GREAT SEAL TAKEN FROM HIM—JAMES’S RELUCTANCE TO ACT WITH
VIGOUR—SHEDS TEARS UPON THE OCCASION—BACON STILL PROTECTED BY
BUCKINGHAM—WILLIAMS, BISHOP OF LINCOLN, IS MADE CHANCELLOR—HIS
CHARACTER, BY BISHOP GOODMAN.
=CHAPTER VI.=
It is now necessary to make a short review of the state of political
affairs coëval with these successive manifestations of a blind
partiality shown by James to Buckingham.
The autumn of 1621 had witnessed the dissolution of the Parliament. This
step, which was imputed to the advice of Buckingham, was hastened by a
protest from the two houses of commons, declaring “that the liberties,
franchises, and jurisdictions of Parliament are the ancient and
undoubted birthright of the subjects of England;” asserting the point
that the arduous affairs of state, the making of laws and redress of
grievances, are the proper subjects of debate in Parliament; and
maintaining the privilege of each member to enjoy entire freedom of
speech.
This protest, which James and his son would have done well to have for
ever remembered, was drawn forth by the King’s resentment at the
interference in the Spanish marriage.[321] “He considered it,” he said,
“presumptuous in the Parliament humbly to beseech him to permit his son
to marry a Protestant Princess; and he intimated that if they had fixed
upon any person or place, he should have thought it high treason.”
Footnote 321:
Oldmixon.
The proclamation which announced the dissolution was ascribed to the pen
of Archbishop Laud, who now exercised an ascendancy over Buckingham; and
the King, hastening to London, called a Privy Council, and, sending for
the journal of the House of Commons, declared the protest void, and tore
it from the book with his own hands.[322]
Footnote 322:
Ibid.
These rash and blamable measures were resented by the whole kingdom.
They were followed by acts of oppression and injustice. The first object
of the King’s wrath was Henry Vere, Earl of Oxford. This young nobleman,
who was endowed with great ability, courage, and high reputation, was
one of those young and daring aspirants whose honours were not only
inherited from a long series of noble progenitors, but by merit made
their own.[323] He had already distinguished himself in the cause that
was dearest to the hearts of the English—that of the Palatinate, and had
extorted from the King one regiment to employ in the service of his
son-in-law, Frederic. The body of men whom he led to the unequal
contest, was, says a contemporary, “the gallantest for the persons and
outward presence of men,” that, “in many ages, ever appeared at home or
abroad.” It consisted almost entirely of gentlemen, the flower of the
commoners of England, who went to improve themselves in the art of war,
to which the English had for years been strangers. Oxford, with his
noble associates and brave soldiers, did all that was possible for man
to do; and then, finding that there was no support from England,
returned, hopeless, but not disgraced.
Footnote 323:
Brydges’s Peers of James I.
Here was one of those “gallant spirits who aimed at the public liberty
more than at their own interest; and who yet, when the Government which
they served, or the prerogative which they held sacred, was attacked,
were fierce in defence of the King and his authority; supporting,” says
Arthur Wilson, “the old English honour, they would not let it fall to
the ground.”[324]
Footnote 324:
Wilson, p. 162.
In spite of this acknowledged loyalty, the Earl of Oxford was accused by
a man named White, henceforth called Oxford-White, of having spoken
against the King; and was committed to the Tower, where he was long
imprisoned, until, on account of his known bravery, he was made one of
Buckingham’s Vice-Admirals on the English coast. A letter, addressed to
Buckingham, whilst the Earl was under this disgrace, appealing to the
King, to the favourite’s own conscience, whether he had ever harboured
any treasonable thoughts, obtained for him, perhaps, this tardy
justice:—“If it shall please the King,” wrote the gallant Vere, “to line
me out my path to death (the period we must all travel to) by
imprisonment, I shall be far from repining at the sentence, but with all
humbleness will undergo it, and employ my heartiest prayers for the long
continuance of his health and happiness.”[325]
Footnote 325:
Cabala.
The persecution of Vere reflects infinite dishonour upon Buckingham—but
that bright star was fast losing the purity of its lustre. Buckingham
was an altered man. Unbounded prosperity was changing the once generous
foe into an avenger.
Henry Wriothesley, the Earl of Southampton, was the next subject of the
Marquis’s wrath. Upon this brave peer the King’s favours had hitherto
been showered down, and he had been endeared to the people by his
friendship for the unfortunate Earl of Essex, on whose account he had
suffered confinement in the reign of Elizabeth. On the accession of
James, Lord Southampton was brought from “the prison to the
palace.”[326] His lands had been forfeited to the crown: they were
immediately restored. On the meeting of the first Parliament called by
James, the Earl was restored by a bill, read after the recognition of
the King, to his titles.[327] The rest of this nobleman’s life was spent
in promoting worthy objects, to some of which even the lettered attached
ridicule. For instance, his patronage of colonization, his sending ships
to America for the purpose of discovery and traffic, excited the
ridicule of some of the caustic geniuses of the day. Yet Lord
Southampton received many tributes from the learned; and such was his
protection of letters, that he was called “learning’s best
favourite.”[328] It was, however, his highest praise that he was the
patron and friend of Shakspeare.
Footnote 326:
Brydges’s Peers of James I., p. 324.
Footnote 327:
Ibid, 326.
Footnote 328:
By Richard Braithwayte in the dedication of his Scholar’s Medley.—See
Brydges’s Peers, p. 325.
It was upon this popular nobleman that the ire of Buckingham next fell.
It must, however, be acknowledged, that Lord Southampton’s credit at
Court had been on the decline previous to the altercation which took
place between him and Buckingham in the House of Lords; the Earl having
incurred the royal displeasure on several occasions, especially in
opposing illegal patents, a tender subject which had lately been under
the consideration of Parliament. Under these circumstances, when he
called the Favourite to order in a debate of the House of Lords, he only
rekindled the embers of former animosities. Prince Charles attempted,
indeed, successfully, to check the dispute; nevertheless, Southampton
sustained an imprisonment of twelve days upon the adjournment of
Parliament. He was allowed, on the eighteenth of July, to go to his own
house at Titchfield, where he was, however, a prisoner.[329] The famous
Selden, Pym, and Sir Robert Philips, were imprisoned in the Tower of
London for freedom of speech;[330] in short, during this Parliament,
were the seeds of that arbitrary disposition, which afterwards
manifested itself so calamitously, first ripened. It was not among the
least sources of public regret, that the heir-apparent should have
witnessed, and in some measure participated in, these flagrant
oppressions.
Footnote 329:
Oldmixon, p. 56.
Footnote 330:
Lord Southampton died in a foreign service, that of the
States-general, in the defensive alliance at Bergen-op-Zoom in 1624.
His family fell into the deepest pecuniary distress, and afterwards
solicited the aid of Buckingham.—_See_ “_Cabala_,” p. 299.
Buckingham either perceived that these infringements upon the liberty of
the subject had been permitted to go far enough, or his native good
nature prevailed over the virulence of party and the love of power; for
on the nineteenth of July he came to London, visited the Earl of
Northumberland in the Tower, passed two hours with the Earl of
Southampton at Westminster, and with the Earl of Oxford at Sir Thomas
Cockaine’s. “This was taken,” writes Mr. Chamberlain, “for a good
presage, like the coming of St. Elmo after a tempest.”[331] Two days
afterwards, the Lord Keeper Williams took the Earl of Southampton to
Theobald’s where the king was. A long conference ensued; the Lord
Keeper, the Marquis of Buckingham, and Southampton being the only
persons admitted to the royal presence. On the following day,
Southampton, was set at liberty.[332]
Footnote 331:
Nichols, iv., 670.
Footnote 332:
Oldmixon says not until the 1st of September (see p. 56); but Mr.
Chamberlain’s information is more precise and impartial.
Sir Edward Coke was likewise among those who incurred the displeasure of
James for freedom of speech. Imprisonment in the Tower followed his
offence. The locks and doors of his chambers in the Temple were sealed
up, and several securities for money taken away. Immured in prison, his
family not being suffered to approach him, he had yet another trial to
encounter. James, whose meanness equalled his improvidence, took this
base occasion to sue Coke for an old pretended debt due from Sir
Christopher Hatton to Queen Elizabeth. The reply of the
Solicitor-general, Sir John Walter, when the brief of this iniquitous
case was sent to him, is worthy of a nobler character of mind than that
usually imputed to the English lawyer of that period. “Let my tongue,”
he answered, “cleave to the roof of my mouth whenever I ope it against
Sir Edward Coke;” yet the suit was rigorously prosecuted. “That spirit
of fiery exhalation”[333] was not daunted even by this petty and
malignant persecution. It was observed of him that he lost his
advancement in the same way that he got it[334]—by his tongue. To the
last, he steadily resisted the oppressions of the crown, and his
character, odious as it was to his contemporaries, odious when we
reflect upon him as the vituperative judge of Ralegh, and too justly
censured by Bacon “for insulting misery,”[335] has received the respect
and gratitude of posterity for its general political independence.
Footnote 333:
Wilson.
Footnote 334:
Life of Sir Edward Coke, published by the Society for the Diffusion of
Knowledge, p. 22.
Footnote 335:
“Perhaps,” says Mr. Amos, “Sir Edward Coke never descended lower in
point of wit and insult of misery, than when he told Cuffe, when under
trial for high treason, ‘that he would give him a cuff that should let
him down by-and-by.’”—Grand Oyer of Poisoning, p. 460.
The fate of Bacon himself excited a still more mournful interest in good
minds, than the injuries inflicted upon Coke.
It becomes necessary for the biographer of Villiers, to examine into the
circumstances of an affair with which, as with every public event of the
day, he was intimately connected. Bacon, in afterwards addressing James,
alludes to Buckingham when he imputes his degradation to the personal
views of some secret foe. “I wish that, as I am the first, so I may be
the last of sacrifices in your times; and when, from private appetite,
it is resolved that a creature shall be sacrificed, it is easy to pick
up sticks enough from any thicket, whither he has strayed, to make a
fire to offer it with.”[336]
Footnote 336:
Life of Bacon, by Basil Montague. Preface, p. 9.
In the early period of his career, Buckingham had owed much to the
countenance, and more to the advice, of Bacon. The author of the _Novum
Organum_ seems to have been among the first to discern that remarkable
association of personal and mental qualities in Villiers, which promised
to secure him an ascendancy over James. Bacon lent the lustre of his
name to shine upon the young courtier, and expected in return that aid
which Buckingham, he soon perceived, would have it in his power to
bestow. A mutual dependence was established; Buckingham existed on the
capital of Bacon’s intellect; Bacon throve on the inferiority of the
youth, conscious of his defects, and wise enough to remedy his own
weakness by the strength of another.
No greater proof of confidence in a friend can be given than to seek his
advice, and Villiers paid Bacon that tribute. He requested him “to
instruct him how to fulfil his high station, how to serve the King, how
to conciliate the people.” In consequence of this, Bacon had addressed
to the Favourite a letter of advice,[337] “such,” observes the
biographer of Bacon, “as is not usually given in courts, but of a strain
equally free and friendly, calculated to make the person to whom it was
addressed good and great, and equally honourable to the giver and the
receiver; advice which contributed not a little to his prosperity in
after life.”[338]
Footnote 337:
The essay or letter treated of the following subjects:—1. Matters that
concern religion, and the Church, and Churchmen. 2. Matters concerning
justice, and the laws, and the professions thereof. 3. Councillors,
and the council-table, and the great offices and officers of the
kingdom. 4. Foreign negotiations and embassies. 5. Peace and war, both
foreign and civil, and in that the navy and forts, and what belongs to
them. 6. Trade at home and abroad. 7. Colonies, or foreign
plantations. 8. The court and curialty.
Footnote 338:
Life of Lord Bacon, by Basil Montague, p. 181.
This manual of a courtier’s duty, it must be owned, was sadly at
variance with the practice that followed these nobly conceived
instructions on the part of him who gave them.
“You are,”—Bacon thus addressed Villiers—“as a new risen star, and the
eyes of all are upon you; let not your own negligence make you fall like
a meteor.” “Next to religion,” he adds elsewhere, “let your care be to
promote justice. By justice and mercy is the King’s throne established.”
“And as far as it may rest in you, let no arbitrary power be intended.
The people of this kingdom love the laws thereof, and nothing will
oblige them more than a confidence of the free enjoying of them.” “Your
greatest care must be,” he adds, towards the conclusion, “that the great
men of the court—for you must give me leave to be plain with you, for so
is your injunction laid upon me—yourself in the first place, who are
first in the eye of all men, give no just cause of scandal either by
light, vain, or by oppressive carriage.”[339]
Footnote 339:
Lord Bacon’s Works, i., p. 518-19.
Notwithstanding these admirable precepts, the years during which Lord
Bacon held the Great Seal, and during which Villiers ruled predominant,
were, as it has been justly observed, “the darkest and most shameful in
English history.”[340] The domestic government of James and his
favourite, in weakness and want of high principle, corresponded but too
mournfully with their foreign policy; with their indifference to the
great struggle for the interests of liberty and of Protestantism in
Germany; with their vacillating and cowardly counsels. Whilst the
continental nations were venting their surprise and indignation in
sallies of ridicule directed against England, the King, who had nothing
to bestow in the aid of a loyal cause in which the welfare of his own
child was bound up, resorted at home to the most disgraceful expedients
in order to exalt his favourite. During this period, Buckingham held an
absolute empire over the actions of Bacon. A system of persecution
against Coke had followed the disgraceful affair of Sir John Villiers’
marriage. In an unlucky hour, Bacon interfered between Lady Hatton and
her injured husband; he even descended to lend himself to the low
affairs of these vulgar great, and to take part against his enemy, Coke,
and with his arrogant wife. This was during the King’s absence in
Scotland: as matters then stood, this proceeding on the part of the Lord
Keeper militated against the marriage which Buckingham had at heart.
Bacon was soon taught, therefore, to see his error. The Favourite
resented his interference, and refused to be pacified. In vain did the
Lord Keeper stay certain proceedings against Coke which had been
instituted in the Star Chamber; in vain did he hasten to testify his
submission to Buckingham. Two successive days he went to the stately
apartments of the Favourite; waited meekly in an ante-chamber, seated on
an old box, with the Great Seal of England at his side. At length, when
he was admitted, he threw himself at the feet of Buckingham, and swore
never to rise thence till he had received the pardon of the lofty
personage whom he had once instructed in the art of conducting himself
with dignity.[341]
Footnote 340:
Macaulay’s Essay on Bacon in the _Edinburgh Review_.
Footnote 341:
Sir Anthony Weldon’s Court and Character of King James.
This was not such conduct as would entitle a man to respect even from
him on whom he cringed. Yet Bacon, in one of his letters addressed to
Buckingham, declares him to have been the “truest and perfectest mirror
of friendship that ever was in a court;” and protests that “he should
count every day lost in which he should not study his well-doing in
thought, or do his name honour in speech, or perform service for him
indeed.”[342] Nor is the statement given by Weldon, of the manner in
which the seals were offered to Bacon by Buckingham, credible. According
to that writer, the Favourite, when he sent to proffer them to Bacon,
accompanied them with an insulting message, saying, that whilst he knew
him to be a man of excellent parts, he was also aware “that he was an
errant knave, apt, in his prosperity, to ruin any that had raised him in
his adversity;” yet from regard to his master’s service, he had obtained
the seals for him; but with this assurance, that if he ever should act
to him as he had done to others, he would be cast down as much below as
he was now above any honour that he had expected,[343] alluding to the
flagrant ingratitude and perfidy of Bacon to Essex. But this story,
supported by no evidence, is at variance with probability; and since it
rests upon the authority of one who is always inveterate against
Buckingham, it may be discarded as wholly unworthy of belief.
Footnote 342:
Biog. Brit. Art. Bacon, note.
Footnote 343:
Bacon’s Works, ii., p. 201.
That Buckingham knew well the character of the Lord Keeper before he
promoted him to the Chancellorship—that he calculated on his
subservience to himself, expressed in his letters, so that posterity may
judge of Bacon’s professions—that he had discovered that the doctrine of
expediency influenced the practice of Bacon, is almost certain; for he
did not hesitate to sway him to the most disgraceful countenance of
abuses for which the whole country was crying out for redress.
Amongst the grievances most disliked were those of monopolies; and
amongst the most detested of detestable patents was that for the
exclusive manufacture of gold and silver lace. It had been conjointly
granted to Sir Giles Mompesson, who is supposed to have been the
original of Sir Giles Overreach, and to Sir Frances Michell, who is said
to have suggested the character of Justice Greedy. Sir Giles was a
Wiltshire knight, patronised by Buckingham; or, as it was the fashion of
the day to speak, “a creature of the Favourite’s;” and was concerned,
not only in the patent of gold and silver lace, but in forming the
monopolies styled the patents of “Inns and Osteries.” In this affair
Michell assisted him.[344]
Footnote 344:
Nichols’s Progresses, vol. iii., p. 297.
To render Bacon justice, he had formerly, when applied to with regard to
these patents on behalf of Sir Christopher Villiers, advised Buckingham
not to have anything to do with them.[345] He declared them to be one of
the grievances which Parliament ought to put down; but avowed his
readiness, should it not be done away with, “to mould it in the best
manner, and help it forward.”[346]
Footnote 345:
Biographia Britannica, Art. Bacon, note.
Footnote 346:
Bacon’s Works, ii., p. 20.
The latter course was preferred by Buckingham, and was therefore
adopted. The result was not only that the manufacture of gold and silver
thread was adulterated, for that would have been a matter of
comparatively little consequence, but that an inquisitorial jurisdiction
was exercised by the patentees of the Inns and Osteries, who were armed
with as great powers as had ever been granted to the farmers of the
revenue. The abuses which resulted cried for redress; and, during the
session of 1620, Parliament took the matter up. It became the province
of the Lord Keeper to interpose, and he decided that it should be
settled with all convenient speed. “The meaning of this was,” writes
Lord Macaulay, “that certain of the house of Villiers were to go halves
with certain of the house of Overreach and Greedy in the plunder of the
public.”
Petitions were sent up to Parliament by persons who had suffered under
these exactions, and the whole affair was thoroughly “ripped up.”[347]
Footnote 347:
Oldmixon, p. 52.
The odium of these abuses fell upon Buckingham; the blame upon the Lord
Keeper, who had not restrained these patents. Sir Edward Villiers, who
was thought to be as “deep in the mire” as Mompesson and Michell, was
sent on an embassy for safety. Mompesson was, on the third of March,
1621, summoned to appear before Parliament: he had fled, assisted,
according to common report, by Buckingham, who dreaded further exposure,
for Mompesson’s neck was in danger. On the twenty-seventh of the same
month, the King went to Parliament, and pronounced sentence on Sir
Giles, the dignity of his wife remaining untainted.[348] Michell, a
newly-made knight, was brought to his trial on the third of May, and
suffered the singular sentence of degradation, with all “the ceremonies
of abasement,” “but that,” observes Arthur Wilson, “being most proper to
his nature, he was but eased of a burthen, his mind suffered not.”[349]
He was made incapable of holding office, fined 1,000_l._, and ordered to
be imprisoned in Finsbury Prison during the King’s pleasure. The
ceremonial was rendered sufficiently effective, and Buckingham, with the
highest persons of the realm, witnessed the process. The “old justice,”
as Michell was called, was brought by the Sheriffs of London to
Westminster Hall, on the last day of Term, when the sentence of
Parliament was read before him by a pursuivant, in an audible voice. His
spurs were then broken in pieces by the servants of the Earl Marshal,
and thrown away; the silver sword was taken from his side, broken over
his head, and thrown away. Last of all, he was pronounced no longer a
knight, but a knave; Garter, Clarencieux, Norroy sitting at the feet of
the Commissioners.[350]
Footnote 348:
Nichols, iv., 660.
Footnote 349:
Ibid, note.
Footnote 350:
Nichols, vol. iv., p. 660.
Sir Giles Mompesson, meantime, having contrived to elude the sergeants
who had him in charge, was safe abroad; but a proclamation was out
against him. The Prince and Lords promised to do all they could to
ensure his being apprehended: the ports were guarded. Buckingham,
meantime, declared in the House that he had no hand in the matter, but
that the blame rested with the referees who had tested the lawfulness of
these patents.[351] Sir Giles was heavily fined; an annuity of 200_l._
on the new waterworks being all that was reserved for Lady Mompesson and
her child.
Footnote 351:
State Papers, vol. cxx., No. 13.
Two years afterwards he was, however, allowed to return to England for
three months, though under some risk; for the people did not forget that
the two words, “no Empsons,” formed his anagram, and he was only
permitted to land in England on the petition of his wife.[352]
Footnote 352:
State Papers, cxxii., No. 8.
With what sensations Buckingham, who had certainly regarded the
peculation permitted by these patents as a family perquisite, must have
witnessed these proceedings, it is not easy to say. His once generous
character was gaining in hardness, and losing the traces of its delicacy
and scrupulousness every day.
But evils of a more stupendous character were soon to be detected and
avenged by a people who, Bacon truly said, “loved the law of their
land.” The Lord Keeper had reckoned for a long time that the protecting
hand of the Favourite could cover his venial proceedings. On the
twenty-seventh of January, 1620, he was created Viscount St. Albans,
with plenary investiture. The Lord Carew carried his robe before him;
the Marquis of Buckingham held it up. The prosperous Lord Keeper gave
the King most hearty thanks for each successive step of his preferment.
1st, for making him his solicitor; 2nd, his attorney; 3rd, a privy
councillor; 4th, Keeper of the Great Seal; 5th, chancellor; 6th, Baron
Verulam; 7th, Viscount St. Albans;—honours and emoluments which had been
procured for him entirely through the influence of Buckingham. The
envious world wondered, according to Sir Symonds D’Ewes, at the
gratification of Bacon’s pride and ambition. His estates in land were
thought, at that time, not to be more in value than four or five hundred
pounds yearly; his debts were supposed to amount to 30,000_l._ He was
then known to receive bribes in all cases of moment that came before
him.[353] The hour of reckoning, however, eventually arrived.
Footnote 353:
Harl. MSS. 646—See Nichols, vol. iv., p. 649, note.
The disgraceful transactions which brought this tardy justice on the man
so pre-eminent in letters, so debased in honourable principle, had been
a frequent source of complaint in parliament. Thus, as a modern writer
observes, “was signally brought to the test the value of those objects
for which Bacon had sullied his integrity, had resigned his
independence, had violated the most sacred objects of friendship and
gratitude, had flattered the worthless, had persecuted the innocent, had
tampered with judges, had tortured prisoners, had plundered suitors, had
wasted on paltry intrigues the power of the most exquisitely constructed
intellect that had ever been bestowed on any of the children of
men.”[354] It is of no avail to say that the custom of the day
authorized the receiving of bribes and presents; or to justify the mean
subservience of the Lord Chancellor by blaming the interference of
Buckingham. That interference may be justly censured; but it forms no
ground of acquittal to Bacon.
Footnote 354:
Macaulay.
In the letter of advice addressed by this most inconsistent man to
Buckingham, when Sir George Villiers, he counsels him by no means ever
to be persuaded to interpose himself, “either by word or letter, in any
cause depending, or likely to be depending, in any court of justice, nor
suffer any other great man to do it where he could hinder it, and by all
means to dissuade the King from it.” “If it prevail,” he adds, “it
prevents justice; but if the judge be so just, and of such courage, as
he ought to be, as not to be inclined thereby, yet it always leaves a
taint of suspicion behind it. Judges must be chaste as Cæsar’s
wife—neither to be, nor to be suspected to be, unjust; and, sir, the
honour of the judges in their judicature is the King’s honour, whose
person they represent.”[355]
Footnote 355:
Advice to Sir George Villiers.
Shortly after Bacon had become Lord Keeper, a series of letters was,
nevertheless, commenced on the part of Buckingham in favour of persons
who were likely to come into chancery.[356] And it is related in
Hacket’s Life of the Lord Keeper Williams, the successor of Bacon, that
there was not a cause of moment, but that, as soon as it came to
publication, one of the parties concerned in it brought letters from
this mighty peer and the Lord Keeper’s patron.[357] A committee was
appointed by the House of Commons to inquire into the proceedings of the
courts of justice. Two charges of corruption were brought against the
Lord Chancellor; the one in the case of a man named Aubrey, who had been
advised to quicken a suit in chancery by the bribe of a hundred pounds.
The money was presented, through the medium of Sir George Hastings,
directly to the Lord Chancellor at his lodgings in Gray’s Inn, and when
Sir George came out from the chambers, he told Aubrey that his “Lordship
was thankful, and assured him of good success in his business, which,
however, he had not.”[358] The other case was that of Mr. Egerton, who
mortgaged his estate for four hundred pounds; a sum which Bacon at first
refused, saying it was too much, but accepted at last. These charges
were eventually preferred before the House of Lords, and when the
complaint was made in that assembly, it devolved on Buckingham, in the
absence of the Chancellor, who was sick, to present a letter praying for
time for the privilege of cross-examining witnesses; and requesting that
if there came up any more petitions of the same nature, their Lordships
would not take any prejudice at their numbers, considering that they
were against a judge that made two hundred and forty decrees in a
year.[359] During this interval, Bacon was assured of the sympathy of
James and the intercession of Buckingham. The King shed tears on hearing
of his dilemma, and procured a recess of parliament, in order to give
him time for defence. It was, however, judged best by the Chancellor,
notwithstanding all this powerful patronage, not to attempt a defence,
but to throw himself upon the mercy of the House. That, in spite of this
confession, Bacon still continued to enjoy the protection of Buckingham,
is evident, for the heir to the crown presented Bacon’s memorable
letter, full of eloquence, and expressed with the inimitable address
which he knew so well how to employ. This submission was not deemed
enough; a full confession was required. It was given by one sunk in
character and broken in spirit, and was received by the House. Prince
Charles was then requested to intercede with His Majesty that he would
sequester the Great Seal, to which James assented, declaring it was his
resolution to fill up the place of Chancellor forthwith. Bacon was
summoned before the House; he excused himself on the plea of sickness,
and sentence was passed upon him in his absence. He was decreed to pay a
fine of 40,000_l._, to be imprisoned in the Tower during the King’s
pleasure, and declared incapable of ever either sitting in Parliament
again, or of holding any office or employment; he was even forbidden to
come within “the verge”—that is, within twelve miles of the Court.[360]
Footnote 356:
Mr. Montagu’s Life of Bacon, note.
Footnote 357:
Bishop Hacket’s Life of Williams.
Footnote 358:
Biog. Brit. Art. Bacon.
Footnote 359:
Biog. Brit. Art. Bacon.
Footnote 360:
Biog. Brit. Art. Bacon.
The condition of Bacon’s mind and body under this severe disgrace seems
to have been truly melancholy. One moment he was merry, and declared
that he believed he should be able to ride safely through the tempest.
When passing through the hall of his stately abode at York House, on his
servants rising at his presence, he said, “Sit down, my friends; your
rise has been my fall.” Upon one of his friends observing, “You must
look around you,” he answered, “I look above me.” At other times his
despair broke out in words that, although somewhat abject, were touching
in the extreme. As he lay in his bed, his frame swoln with disease, he
bade none of his gentlemen come near him, nor take any notice of him,
but altogether to forget him, not hereafter to speak of him, nor
remember that there was such a being in the world.
In this extremity of sorrow, Buckingham visited the fallen one. Already
had Bacon written to him in the following terms:—“Your Lordship spoke of
purgatory; I am now in it; but my mind is in a calm, for my fortune is
not my felicity. I know I have clean hands, and a clean heart, and I
hope a clean house for friends or servants. But Job himself, or whoever
was the justest judge, by such hunting for matters against him as hath
been used against me, may, for a time, seem foul, especially in a time
when greatness is the mark, and accusation is the game. And if this be
to be a Chancellor, I think, if the Great Seal lay upon Hounslow Heath,
nobody would stoop to take it up.” What marvellous self-deception, or
consummate duplicity! Owing to Buckingham’s mediation, a letter was
given to the King, from Bacon; in this he again asserted that innocence
to which he had solemnly renounced all claim before, in his submission
to Parliament.
“And now for the briberies and gifts wherewith I am charged; when the
book of hearts shall be opened, I hope I shall not be found to have the
troubled fountain of a corrupt heart, in a depraved habit of taking
rewards to pervert justice, however I may be frail, and partake of the
abuses of the times.”[361]
Footnote 361:
Montagu’s Life, p. 332.
On the nineteenth of March, Bacon addressed a letter to the House of
Lords, contending, he said, that charges of bribery were brought against
him; he prayed that they would not prejudge him for absence, having been
ill, and preparing for a higher tribunal; that they would give him
leisure to make his defence, which would be plain and ingenuous; also,
that they would not be prejudiced against him by the number of petitions
brought against a man who gives two hundred decrees and orders a year,
exclusive of causes. He did not, he said, desire to make greatness a
subterfuge for guiltiness.[362]
Footnote 362:
State Papers, vol. cxx., No. 28.
Notwithstanding a message from James to Parliament, saying that he had
refused the tender of the Great Seal from the Lord Chancellor, and hoped
that they would give him a patient hearing, “but to judge him as they
thought fit, if matters prove foul,”[363] Bacon was suspended. He wrote
a pitiful, specious letter to the House of Lords, in which he “rejoiced
that in the midst of his profound afflictions the greatness of a
magistrate was no shelter for crime.” His only justification, he said,
was his non-concealment of his offences. He did not mean to reply to
particular questions, nor cavil at witnesses, nor urge extenuations. He
submitted to their judgment and mercy, but hoped that the loss of his
soul might be sufficient expiation for his faults. He pleaded for
compassion, by the example of the King’s clemency, and their own fellow
feeling for him.[364]
Footnote 363:
State Papers, vol. cxx., No. 97.
Footnote 364:
Ibid, No. 104.
Until the first of May, 1621, Bacon remained Lord Chancellor of England.
On the afternoon of that day, the Lord Treasurer, Viscount Mandeville,
the Duke of Lennox, Lord Steward of the King’s Household, the Earl of
Arundel, Earl Marshal of England, the Earl of Pembroke, and the Lord
Chamberlain of the Household, repaired to York House. They were
introduced into the presence of Bacon, and then told him “that they were
sorry to visit him on such an occasion, and wished it had been better.”
“No, my lords,” he replied, “the occasion is good.” He then delivered to
them the Great Seal, saying, as he gave it up, “It was the King’s favour
that gave me this, and it is my fault that he hath taken it away.” The
seal was conveyed to Whitehall, and restored to the King, who exclaimed,
on receiving it, “Now, by my soul, I am pained at my heart where to
bestow this; for, as for my lawyers, they are all knaves.”[365] But
Buckingham had provided against this difficulty, and the high office
which Bacon had so greatly abused was bestowed upon Williams, Bishop of
Lincoln, who was now the chief adviser of the Marquis, and to whose
counsels much that had been done was attributed.
Footnote 365:
Nichols, from Sir Symonds D’Ewes’s Diary.
The choice of Williams, for this high office, reflected no discredit
upon Buckingham. Bishop Goodman terms this prelate “a man of as great
wit and understanding as ever I knew any man.” “And truly,” he adds,
endeavouring to rebut Weldon’s charge of a mean birth, “he was as
well-descended and had as good kindred as any man in North Wales, none
beyond him. He had a very quick apprehension, and for the discharge of
the Lord Keeper’s Office, he was never taxed with any insufficiency. I
have heard him make his reports in the Lord’s House of Parliament, and
answer such petitions, that in truth we did wonderfully commend
him.”[366] To these essentials Williams added the popular qualities of
hospitality and liberality; in this respect he resembled Laud. “There
was not a man in England,” says Bishop Goodman, “that kept a more
orderly house than Laud did, or bred up his servants better. But I will
join these two celebrities together for the great hospitality which they
kept, inviting and entertaining strangers.” With regard to liberality,
the erection of St. John’s College, Cambridge, the foundation there of
several scholarships and fellowships, the library at Westminster, the
library at Lincoln, the repairs of Westminster Abbey, and the care which
Williams took, even when he was Lord Keeper, of the young scholars at
Westminster, sufficiently attest his great and salutary views.
Footnote 366:
Goodman’s Life, i., p. 285.
Whilst he was Proctor at Cambridge, he conducted a magnificent
entertainment, given to the Lord Chancellor Egerton, and to the Spanish
ambassadors, on which occasion Egerton told him that he “was fit to
serve a king,” and afterwards introduced him at court.[367]
Footnote 367:
Grainger, chap, iv., t. 1.
The chief circumstance that brought Williams into notice was his
figuring at Cambridge in a disputation, before Prince Charles, in
1612-13,[368] when he was made a Bachelor of Divinity by special grace,
in order that he might become a disputant in the Theological
Controversy.[369]
Footnote 368:
Nichols, vol. iii., p. 589.
Footnote 369:
Ibid, vol. ii., Appendix.
Still, great subserviency was expected even from the Lord Keeper in
those days of despotic rule. The industrious letter writer, John
Chamberlain, who supplies us with all the gossip and news which, in
those days, had no outlet in the public press, writes of this new
appointment in these terms:—
“The King has made the Dean of Westminster Lord Keeper for a year and a
half; if he behave well, he is to retain office for a year and a half
longer, and then to surrender it: he is to consult one of the Chief
Justices in all cases of importance.”[370]
Footnote 370:
Chamberlain to Carleton.—State Papers, vol. cxxiii., No. 23.
He quietly adds, immediately afterwards, that the Bishop of Bangor had
been sent to the Fleet for disputing “malapertly” with the King on the
Sabbath; and that Dr. Price had shared the same punishment for his
sermon at Oatlands. The “Prevaricator” of Cambridge was expelled the
University for saying, at a banquet that he gave, that he would have all
sorts of instruments except Gondomar’s pipe.[371] The Lord Keeper’s
“good behaviour,” therefore, meant an absolute subjection of reason and
understanding; and, more especially, an entire adherence to that line of
politics which might happen to be agreeable at the time to the King.
Footnote 371:
Chamberlain to Carleton, State Papers, vol. cxxii.,No. 23.
The Great Seal, when it had been fetched from the miserable Bacon, was
delivered by the King, in presence of the Prince and the Privy Council,
to Williams, and was received with a short speech, “marvelling at His
Majesty’s benignity,” and promising to be pastor of the sheep. In his
first speech in the Court of Chancery, the Lord Keeper vindicated the
principle on which the King had determined to fill up the post with one
who was not a lawyer.[372]
Footnote 372:
State Papers, vol. cxiii., No. 18.
A few months before Buckingham, who, as “Steward of the City and College
of Westminster,” was patron of the Deanery, had made the young disputant
Dean of Westminster. Williams, nevertheless, abstained from paying any
court to the Favourite; his pride and honesty kept him aloof. “For he
had observed,” says Bishop Hacket, “that the Marquis was very apt
suddenly to look cloudy upon his creatures, as if he had raised them up
on purpose to cast them down.” One day, however, whilst the Dean was
attending upon King James, in the absence of the Marquis, the Monarch
suddenly inquired, without any relation to the previous discourse, “when
he was at Buckingham?” “Sir,” replied Williams, “I have had no business
to go to his lordship.” “But,” rejoined the King, “you must go to him
about my business,” and Williams accordingly sought an interview with
the Marquis. The Favourite and the Dean were thus brought into contact,
and the result was favourable to both. To Buckingham it procured an able
and, for the time, a zealous friend, to whom he owed the great service
which Williams afterwards performed in converting Lady Katherine Manners
from Popery; and Williams obtained, for his part, a munificent and
deserving patron. A different version of the causes of Williams’s
elevation was given by a scandalous historian. According to Sir Anthony
Weldon, it was owing to the hopes which the Countess of Buckingham
entertained of becoming, in her third nuptials, the wife of Williams,
who is said to have “thought otherwise of that marriage when he was Lord
Keeper Williams, than he had done as Dean of Westminster,”[373] “which,”
he adds, “was the cause of his downfall.” But this report was wholly
without foundation. “Williams was generally beloved by his neighbours,”
says Bishop Goodman, “and for that report, that he should be great with
Buckingham’s mother, it is an idle, foolish report, without any colour
of truth.”[374] His appointment as Lord Keeper gave, however, great
offence to the members of the bar. It was loudly resented that the
highest post in the law should be bestowed upon a doctor of divinity;
and this step was, it was supposed, preparatory to filling all the
courts of judicature with churchmen. Williams, nevertheless, proved
himself to be admirably adapted for the office. He had already gained
general confidence by persuading the King to suffer Parliament to sit,
and to go on, in opposition to those who, being afraid of exposure, had
endeavoured to prejudice Buckingham and his royal master against that
assembly.[375] As a chancellor, he was acknowledged, even by the most
distrustful, to be a faithful counsellor; and by the friendship and
instruction of the Lord Chancellor, Egerton, to whom he had been
domestic chaplain, he had been prepared for the great duties of his
legal office. Egerton, on his death, had addressed to Williams these
words:—“If you want money, I will leave you such a legacy as shall
furnish you to begin the world like a gentleman. I know,” he added, “you
are an expert workmen. Take these tools to broach with: they are the
best I have.” He then gave him some books and papers, which he had
written with his own hand, being directions concerning the regulation of
the High Court of Parliament, the Court of Chancery, and the Star
Chamber, for the dying Chancellor foresaw that his chaplain might, in
the course of his career, require such materials.[376]
Footnote 373:
Oldmixon, 53.
Footnote 374:
Goodman, vol. i., p. 286.
Footnote 375:
Note to Biog. Brit. Art. Bacon.
Footnote 376:
Oldmixon, p. 53.
The promotion of Williams involved very important consequences to the
English Church. It was by his instrumentality that Bishop Laud was first
brought forward at the Court of James.
Williams foresaw the rise of that eminent and unfortunate man, but few
persons could have predicted his fall.
An accidental circumstance drew upon Laud the attention which his
learning, his zeal, and his ardent piety, tainted as it was by bigotry,
might not have procured him. Bishops, and even archbishops, in those
days, were, as we have seen, by no means restricted from the diversions
of the hunting-field, nor even, if occasion occurred, from martial
exploits. Archbishop Abbot, among the rest, had been a jovial huntsman.
The practice was, it is true, forbidden by the canons of the church, but
those had not been admitted by the law of the land. There was a high and
violent party in the church, who were eager that Abbot should be
deprived of his ecclesiastical dignities, on account of the accident in
which he shot a keeper, a mishap which the worst construction could only
render into justifiable homicide. Laud was amongst the most vehement of
these, and his views of the case were so rigid, that he did not consider
the orders which Archbishop Abbot conferred afterwards to be valid.
There were others who judged differently, and amongst the rest, the
justly celebrated Lancelot Andrews, who maintained that since Bishop
Juxon was famous for breeding the best dogs in England, and was yet
worthy to be promoted to a see, Abbot was excusable.
But the resistance of Laud was agreeable to Buckingham, who already had
constituted himself his patron. By his influence, Williams was induced
to get Laud made Bishop of St. David’s, and Laud afterwards acknowledged
that and other obligations by exclaiming, “My life will be too short to
repay his Lordship’s goodness.” Yet he lived to change his opinion.
The rise of Laud at Court may be traced by distinct, steps. In 1621-2,
we find him preaching at Court, on the day of the King’s accession,[377]
and “commanded to print.”[378] Shortly afterwards the King sent to Laud,
to converse with him about the Countess of Buckingham, who was wavering
on the subject of her faith. Several interviews succeeded, and in
consequence, it may be presumed, of Laud’s exertions in that cause, he
became chaplain to the Marquis of Buckingham. For a time, his efforts at
conversion appear to have been crowned with success. The Countess
consented to receive the sacrament in the King’s chapel, and received a
present, according to common report, of 2,000_l._ for her
conformity.[379] Sometimes religious discussions took place before His
Majesty, and on one occasion, the answer of Laud to the nine articles,
delivered in a book from Fisher, the Jesuit, was read and argued upon at
Windsor, in the presence of James, his son, Buckingham, his mother, and
his lady. These endeavours proved futile; the Countess became eventually
confirmed in the Church of Rome, and retreated to her house at Goadby,
to enjoy the exercise of her persuasion, undisturbed by the observations
of the world. Hitherto, she had been one of the most brilliant leaders
of fashion; her retirement from the Court was therefore the theme of
much remark. Her compliance with the King’s wishes in receiving the Holy
Communion was said to have been prompted by her dread of banishment from
that sphere in which she had figured.[380] It was during the following
year that she relapsed to Popery, and after she was, as Mr. Chamberlain
declared, _sent_ from Court, either on that account, or perhaps on
account of a quarrel with her daughter-in-law.[381]
Footnote 377:
March 24th.
Footnote 378:
Nichols, vol. iv., p. 754.
Footnote 379:
Ibid, p. 769.
Footnote 380:
State Papers, vol. cxxxi., No. 24.
Footnote 381:
Ibid, vol. cxxxiii., No. 24.
Whatsoever may have been the reason for the retirement of this ambitious
woman, one may easily imagine with what mingled emotions of chagrin and
triumph she returned to the scene of her early married life; her sons,
already great, were ennobled, and influential; her title and fortune
formed a striking contrast between the all-powerful mother of a royal
favourite, and the lowly serving maid in the household of an obscure
Leicestershire country gentleman; yet there were, as it so appears,
clouds overshadowing even the brightness of her destiny, and darkening,
eventually, the close of her singularly prosperous career.
CHAPTER VII.
THE SPANISH TREATY—NEGOTIATIONS BETWEEN THE DUKE OF LERMA AND LORD
DIGBY—THE INFANTA DESCRIBED BY LORD DIGBY—HER GREAT BEAUTY, PIETY,
AND SWEETNESS—THE DESCRIPTION OF HER BY TOBY MATHEW—SHE IS DISPOSED
TO RECEIVE CHARLES’S ADDRESSES—GONDOMAR—ATTENTIONS SHOWN TO HIM IN
ENGLAND—ELY HOUSE ALLOTTED FOR HIS RECEPTION—JEALOUSY OF THE
PROTESTANTS AT THE FAVOUR SHOWN HIM—FIRST NOTION OF CHARLES’S
JOURNEY TO SPAIN SUGGESTED BY BUCKINGHAM—HIS ARGUMENTS IN FAVOUR OF
IT—OBSTACLES TO THE PRINCE’S MARRIAGE WITH THE INFANTA—BUCKINGHAM’S
DEBTS AND DIFFICULTIES—INTERVIEW BETWEEN GONDOMAR AND THE DUKE OF
LENNOX—JOURNEY OF CHARLES AND BUCKINGHAM INTO SPAIN—THEY STOP IN
PARIS—LOUIS XIII.—ANNE OF AUSTRIA—HENRIETTA MARIA—THEY PROCEED TO
MADRID—RECEPTION THERE—ENTRANCE IN STATE INTO THAT CITY—COUNTESS OF
PHILIP IV.—FESTIVITIES IN HONOUR OF THE PRINCE—THE KING’S LETTERS TO
HIM.
=CHAPTER VII.=
1622.
In the midst of all the difficulties and differences of opinion which
embarrassed the question of assisting the Palatinate, or of leaving the
darling of her country, Elizabeth of Bohemia, to her fate, that
cherished project, known at the time as the Spanish treaty, was brought
under consideration.
Little more than two years had elapsed after the death of James’s
first-born, Prince Henry,[382] when the Duke of Lerma, the minister of
Philip the Third of Spain, opened a negotiation with Digby, then
ambassador at Madrid, the object of which was to arrange a marriage
between Prince Charles and Donna Maria. This princess was the sister of
Philip the Fourth of Spain, and her elder sister being married, was
styled the Infanta.
Footnote 382:
Hacket’s Life of Williams, p. 114.
In June, 1622, Charles wrote to Lord Digby, desiring to hear speedily
upon the subject which the young prince had nearest his heart—whether
the King of Spain were really affected to the marriage or not, and
intended to proceed in it; in which case, Digby’s instructions were to
perfect all the capitulations, and to agree that the journey of the
Infanta to England should take place during the ensuing spring.[383]
Footnote 383:
Letter from Lord Digby to Charles, dated Madrid, 30th June,
1622.—Inedited State Papers.
Lord Digby, as he now informed Charles, had first availed himself of all
the secret means he could devise, of discovering the wishes of his
Spanish Majesty; and on conversing with his ministers afterwards, had
received from them every possible encouragement. In the long and
interesting letter in which he replied to the young Prince’s inquiries,
Digby described an interview with the Infanta, to whom he begged to
address himself in the name of her young and royal suitor, and to
deliver to her a message. The King gave him permission to see the
Infanta, and with his own lips to enter on the subject; Digby having
represented to that Monarch, that Charles, being now twenty-one years of
age, was desirous of bringing matters to a conclusion, and that His
Majesty, King James, having but one son, was anxious “not to delay
longer the bestowing of him.” The King of Spain, in return, assured his
British Majesty that there was no less affection to the match in him,
than there had been in his father. “I can frame,” writes Digby to the
Prince, “no opinion but upon these exterior things, and men that do
negotiate with great princes must rely upon the honour and truth of
their words and propositions, especially in a case of this nature.”[384]
Much was expected from the return of Count Gondomar from England to
Spain; his coming was, as Digby declared, to be of great use, “for he
holds,” adds that nobleman, “great credit here, and will be able to
clear away all difficulties, being extremely affectionate to the
business.” Gondomar, it appears, had then already landed at Bayonne.
Footnote 384:
Letter from Lord Digby to Charles, dated Madrid, 30th June,
1622.—Inedited State Papers.
Digby next expatiated at length upon the perfection of the Infanta. This
princess appears to have presented a rare instance of great personal
attraction, combined with sweetness of disposition, sensibility, and
piety. That she was not eventually united to Charles must, in spite of
the calculations of politicians, ever be a subject of regret. Her good
sense might have acted beneficially upon the well-intentioned but
mistaken Monarch, who was fatally swayed by the counsels of Henrietta
Maria.
Lord Digby, experienced in courts, thus expressed himself with regard to
Donna Maria.
“For the person of the Infanta, this much:—I will presume to say unto
your highness, that I have seen many ladies attending when I had my
audience with the Queen and Infanta, but she is by much the handsomest
young lady I saw since I came into Spain; and for her goodness and
sweetness of her disposition, she is by the whole Court generally
commended.”
In subsequent letters, Lord Digby was still more explicit, although he
knew, he said, that expectations generally exceed reality; yet should
the Prince, on seeing the Infanta, not “judge her to be a beautiful and
dainty lady, he shall be single in his opinions and from all who have
ever seen her.[385]”
Footnote 385:
Dated Madrid, February 22, 1622-23.—Inedited State Papers.
These praises of Lord Digby’s are borne out by other testimonies; that,
more especially, of Toby Mathew, who followed the Prince into Spain, and
who calls the Infanta, then in her eighteenth year, as “fair in all
perfection;” her face without one “ill feature,” presenting that contour
which “shews her to be highly born.” The expression of her countenance
peculiarly sweet; and her figure, concealed as it was by the close ruffs
and cuffs then worn by the Spanish ladies, was declared to be perfect;
her head was well set upon her neck; “and so,” adds the minute observer,
“are her hands to her arms; and they say that before she is dressed, she
is incomparably better than after.”[386]
Footnote 386:
Description of the Infanta of Spain, by Toby Mathew. Dated June, 28,
1623.—Inedited State Papers.
Lord Digby protested also to Charles that his future bride, as she was
then esteemed, had “the fairest hand that he had ever seen, that she was
very straight and well-bodied, and a likely lady to make the Prince
happy.”
This portraiture was calculated to increase the ardour of the thoughtful
and enthusiastic Charles; whilst the character drawn of the Infanta
tended to raise the sentiment of admiration into one of respect. Brought
up, as Lord Digby relates, with great care, and in retirement, there
might be more gravity and reserve than were usual in English ladies, in
her deportment; but this was a “fault easy mended.” Having asked every
possible question of her childhood and youth, the ambassador protested
that “never heard he so much good of any one as of the Infanta.” To this
testimony may be again added that of Toby Mathew, who portrays her so
free from pride and worldliness, “that she seemed to shine from her soul
through her body;” the beauty of her mind very far exceeding that of her
person. Everyday this young Princess passed in prayer three or four
hours, and then occupied herself in making something which might be sold
for the benefit of the sick and wounded in the hospitals, or busied
herself in drawing lint out of linen for their use. She spent, in her
charities, a hundred pounds a month, appropriating what was allowed her
for recreation to these good deeds. Each returning Wednesday and
Saturday found her in the confessional, or communicating, “for she
carrieth,” relates Toby Mathew, “in particular, a most tender devotion
to the Blessed Sacrament, and the Immaculate Conception of our Blessed
Lady.” This deep sense of her responsibilities, this earnest piety,
alarmed the English Puritans, who forgot that whilst no one was more
steadfast to her faith than Katharine of Arragon, there existed not a
more tolerant being, as far as we have the means of judging, nor sat
upon the throne of the Queen’s-Consort of England, one more beloved by
all sects and classes of the people than that ill-used and ill-fated
foreigner. They remembered, perhaps, that whilst the Romish persuasion
acted benignantly on her mind, on that of her daughter it engendered
bigotry, and caused persecution.
Professing this earnest piety, Donna Maria appears also to have been
free from the imprudence of giddy coquetry, to which her sister, Anne of
Austria, was prone. “She was of few words, but free and affable with her
ladies,” and though at first sight she gave no indications of quickness
of mind, those who knew her well respected her judgment, while they
admired that freedom from personal vanity, so rare in the young and
flattered. “Of her person, and beauty, and dressing,” writes Toby
Mathew, “she is careless, and takes what they bring her without much
ado.” Her courage and calmness under trying circumstances were also
commended—the annalist thought it worth while to specify that “thunder
and lightning affrighted her not,” “and when, at Aranjuez, the Queen had
made a public entertainment for the King, and the scaffolding fell, and
boughs fell in and caught fire, and all the company fled, Donna Maria
remained calm and collected, only calling for the Condé di Olivarez to
keep her from the crushing of the people: retiring at her usual pace,
without any sign of agitation.” This happened when she was only sixteen
years of age.
Between the Infanta and her royal brother, Philip IV., the greatest
affection subsisted. Not a morning passed that he did not visit her in
her apartments, and wait whilst she prepared to go abroad. Yet, in spite
of this partiality, she made a point of never interfering in public
business. In one respect she resembled Katharine of Arragon; although
deeply sensible of any unkindness, she was one who would never
expostulate with the unkind, but grieved in secret. Here was true
heroism: the power to suffer, the wisdom to forbear: the greatness of
mind, not, in family disputes, to challenge sympathy, is a quality of
inestimable importance, both in private and public life.
A portion only of the careful eulogium passed on the Infanta reached
Charles, whilst he was as yet contemplating a journey to see the rare
being upon whom his hopes of felicity were placed: but a description was
sent by Digby of the interview which took place between him and the
Infanta. “After I had secluded her from His Majesty,” wrote the
ambassador, “I told her that I had likewise a message to deliver her,
with her permission, from another cavalier, the Prince of Wales. She
blushed, and told me, ‘I might;’ whereupon” Digby said, “that in regard
to the desire which King James had to unite these kingdoms in nearer
friendship, by way of marriage, there was nothing the Prince had so much
at heart.” “So you hoped,” he added, addressing Charles, “it was
agreeable unto her, and that she likewise wished well, and would aid in
the effecting of it.”
At this interrogation the Infanta “blushed extremely, and asked
particularly of the Prince’s health, and how,” adds Digby, “I had left
you; and told me she gave me great thanks for the favour you did her. I
will set down the very words in Spanish, for I think your Highness
should be angry with me for the omission of any word in this
particular:—‘Agradesco mucho al Principe de Inglatierra, la merced que
me hazo.’”
Lord Digby inclosed also letters in Spanish, addressed to Charles. The
Infanta having heard that her suitor was studying her native language
spoke to Digby on the subject. “He doth it,” was the reply, “whereby to
use with you a style of more familiarity.”[387]
Footnote 387:
Letter of Lord Digby, before quoted.
These particulars are interesting, as proving that it was not without
some inquiry and deliberation that Charles undertook to procure, in
person, a knowledge of the young Princess to whom his hand was destined.
The Condé de Gondomar, one of the most astute diplomatists of his time,
had now been accredited to England for the last three years. His object
in coming was to give satisfaction to the King and Court on the subject
of the marriage, but the feeling of the people was against him. It was
his arrival that had precipitated the fall of Ralegh. It was from his
influence that any toleration to the oppressed Catholics would be dated.
Ely House, once the residence of the Bishop of Ely, but given by Queen
Elizabeth to her favourite, Hatton, was the tenement destined to receive
the ambassadors of Spain; although the envoys from the Palatinate were
then in England, and “no one knew,” as it was said, “how two buckets
could go down into the well at once.”[388] But it was soon seen which
“bucket was to go down;” for, whilst he was waiting in expectation of
Gondomar’s arrival, James had coldly dismissed Baron Dona, the Prince
Palatine’s envoy, saying that he disapproved of his son-in-law’s
election to the throne of Bohemia as factious; and refusing to embark
his subjects, “who were as dear to him as his children,” in a war. This
indifference to his daughter’s condition, and the outrage offered to
public opinion in allowing mass to be celebrated in what had once been
the private chapel of the Bishop of Ely, scandalized all staunch
Protestants, and Gondomar was constrained to open a back door in Ely
House to let in Catholics to worship. Nevertheless, the virago, Lady
Hatton, who lived almost next door to the Spaniard, threw every
hindrance in her power in the way of that arrangement; yet, in the very
face of honest Protestant scruples, the Ladies of the Court were invited
to witness the ceremonies at Ely House; and, doubtless, found it not
inconsistent with their conscience to comply.[389]
Footnote 388:
Letter from Dr. Joseph Hall to Carleton.
Footnote 389:
State Papers, vol. cxxviii., p. 96.
It was at this juncture that Buckingham is said first to have proposed
to Charles to evade open censure by making a journey, incognito, to
Spain. Nor were such expeditions unknown in those times. Buckingham well
knew, in this instance, the tone of argument most appropriate to address
to a prince whose blameless career, untainted by dissipation, had not
seared one of the best safeguards of youth—romance. The Prince was
accessible to the influence of that which Mackenzie calls “a higher
sense of virtue.” A lover of the refined and beautiful, he shrank from
the notion of a mere political union; the suggestions which were thrown
out from motives of Statecraft were received in a spirit of trust and
hope, and sank instantly into a mind of delicacy and feeling.
Buckingham drew a picture, it is stated, of a marriage contracted on
public grounds alone. He pointed out the miseries of such an alliance;
he referred to the indifference, if not loathing, with which a bride so
selected would view the object, not of her own choice, but of that of
the State, for reasons with which she had no sympathy.
He portrayed the misery of one who could deem herself nothing but a
victim, and who could not fail to view with disgust a bond which brought
her from a beloved home to a foreign court, where every early enjoyment
of her youth must be forgotten, every cherished association and
remembrance abandoned.
Buckingham found an attentive auditor. He represented to Charles that by
accomplishing a journey to Madrid, and seeking an interview with his
promised bride, he might create an interest in her affections, and, by
the attentions of a lover, gain even the coldest heart. The delicacy of
the compliment would be felt also in the Court of Madrid; it would
resemble the fictions in which the Spaniards delighted; it would present
him to the young Princess under the aspect of a devoted suitor; it would
expedite the conclusion of those negotiations concerning the Palatinate
which had languished so long. These representations were heightened by
Murray, the Prince’s tutor, who, some insinuated, was instigated by the
cunning Gondomar.[390] Murray reminded his royal pupil that his father
had gone to Denmark to fetch his wife; that his grandfather, “living in
the heart of England,” went into Scotland to marry: especially that his
great grandfather, James V., went into France several times—first, to
woo the daughter of the French King, the Lady Mary of Lorraine: that
interviews between kings and princes were customary; and that no
occasion could be so suitable as a negotiation of marriage. “God,” added
Murray, “had blessed the Prince with an able body, fit for any exercise
and recreation: with great intellectuals, fit to enter into any treaty
himself; God had blessed him with a civil carriage, mild and
temperate—no way passionate, as some princes were;” and thus, being
fitted for the enterprise, the sagacious Scot thought that a journey
would improve the Prince’s abilities, and exhibit them to the
world.[391]
Footnote 390:
This affair, as Mr. Brewer observes, “was something of a counterpart
to his son’s knight-errantry.”—Bishop Goodman’s Life, note, vol. i.,
p. 363.
Footnote 391:
Bishop Goodman, vol. i., p. 364.
The Court, watchful of what was passing, could only guess by certain
indications of the probability of the projected journey into Spain
taking effect. About nine weeks previous to the commencement of the
Spanish journey, Charles was observed to hold a long conference in his
royal father’s bedchamber. The door was closed; but the Prince opened
and closed it at times; as if he were looking into the adjoining
ante-chamber to see if there was anybody there who could listen to what
was going on. James, in the course of that interview, broke into loud
cries of passion. About a month afterwards, a report ran through the
Court that Buckingham was to go to Spain on a solemn embassy. This
rumour, however, was set afloat merely that it might be discovered how
the people stood affected to the Spanish marriage. A dispensation from
the Pope was necessary as a preparatory step; and James was heard to
lament that he could not match his heir without a dispensation from his
enemy, which would be acknowledging the Papal power. Yet he took every
means to compass the marriage treaty; and even Dr. Hakluyt, one of
Prince Charles’s chaplains, who had circulated a pamphlet against the
Spanish marriage, was sent away from Court. Still there were innumerable
difficulties in the way of negotiation. It appears, indeed, from various
petitions, that, though Popery was considered to be on the increase in
England, the recusants founded their strongest hopes on the Spanish
match. In December, 1621, a petition had been presented to the King,
complaining of the printing of Papistical books, the “swarming in of
Jesuits,” and purposing to obviate the impending evils—first, by helping
the King of Bohemia, then by marrying the Prince to one of his own
religion.[392] The King replied, saying that he had heard that his
detention from Parliament, from ill health, “had led some fiery spirits
to meddle with matters far beyond their capacity, and intrenching on the
prerogative.” He forbade any further meddling with state mysteries: such
as the Prince’s match, or attacks on the King of Spain; he resolved to
punish all insolence in Parliament; and would not deign to hear or to
answer the proposed petition, if it touched on the points forbidden. “He
would,” he graciously added, “make this a session, if good laws be
devised.” To this extraordinary answer, which was not published in the
journals,[393] the commons returned a firm but respectful rejoinder; but
were shortly advised that the King was pledged to the Spanish match, and
blamed their interfering with it at all.[394]
Footnote 392:
State Papers, vol. cxxiv., No. 3.
Footnote 393:
Ibid, No. 8.
Footnote 394:
Ibid, No. 27.
So great were the impediments to the Spanish treaty, that, since it
seemed difficult to brave opinion, a means was resorted to of evading
any outbreak of the growing national discontent.
Meantime, about this juncture, the first intimation appears of the
difficulties into which the extravagance of Buckingham had plunged him.
Facts stated by the Court Chronicle speak for themselves. Lord
Mandeville, then Lord President, had, it appears, lent him ten thousand
pounds. In compliance with the venal spirit of the day, the promise of a
payment was made contingent on Lord Mandeville’s consent to the marriage
of his eldest son with Mistress Susan Hill, a relation of Buckingham’s,
and probably an humble relation, since he gave the bride not only
10,000_l._, which was to be considered as discharging his debt, but also
promised to promote the Lord President, and to give him ten dishes at
court. It was rumoured that Buckingham even promised an additional sum
of 5,000_l._ to Mandeville. The marriage seems to have been hastened, in
order that it might take place before the Prince’s secret journey into
Spain, for it was performed in the presence of the King, who was ill,
and in bed, but who showed his delight at the nuptials by blessing the
bride with one of his shoes. The match was said to have been an
indifferent one for the bridegroom, who could have had 25,000_l._ with
Lord Craven’s daughter.[395]
Footnote 395:
State Papers, vol. cxxxviii., No. 23.
The next affair which produced many days of wonder was the Prince’s
journey, a project which had been broached, early in the course of his
diplomatic negotiations, by Gondomar.
He had already sought an interview with the most esteemed personal
friend of the King’s, Ludowick, Duke of Richmond and Lennox, a kinsman
of the Monarch’s.[396]
Footnote 396:
This nobleman died suddenly in 1623, universally respected.—Grainger’s
Peers of James I., chap. ii.
On this occasion, after many compliments on both sides had been
exchanged, the Duke said very earnestly to the ambassador, “My lord, I
pray deal plainly with me, shall we have a match or no?” To this
inquiry, Gondomar replied that the King did his master great wrong if he
doubted his intention, since he had already gone so far in the business;
“and where,” adds the crafty Spaniard, “would my master in all
Christendom match his daughter to greater advantage, either to a greater
prince, or one who may be more helpful or needful to him, or with whom
he should hold more correspondency than with the heir to the English
crown?” He stated, nevertheless, certain objections: the danger there
would be to the Infanta of incurring the penalties of recusancy, for it
was then death for a priest to say mass in England.[397] Toleration
must, therefore, be one stipulation of the treaty. A million of money
was to be bestowed upon the young princess for her dowry; but before
this was given, a certainty must be obtained that the marriage would
prove a source of amity, instead of disunion. These points being
decided, the treaty would be concluded. The Duke of Lennox, on hearing
these proposals, decided in his own mind that the marriage ought never
to take place, for that it could not stand with the laws and safety of
this kingdom to permit a toleration of religion.[398]
Footnote 397:
Life of Bishop Goodman, vol. i., p. 36.
Footnote 398:
Life of Bishop Goodman, vol. i., p. 36.
The journey of the young prince was, meantime, retarded by the
reluctance of the King. James justly considered that continental nations
might impugn his natural affection, as well as his judgment, in
permitting the heir-apparent to quit the kingdom, and to leave his royal
father childless, for Elizabeth of Bohemia had taken refuge in the Dutch
states, and had not then looked to England as her exile. He considered
the danger, writes a contemporary historian, “himself being now aged, if
he should die, what then might befall his children.”[399] How little
could he foresee the extremities to which his princely son, then the
idol of the nation, would be hereafter reduced, owing partly to the
false system and erroneous notions implanted within his mind at this all
important season of his youth. The greatest peril that James feared, was
the journey through France, at that time full of straggling soldiers,
several armies having been recently disbanded. But it was argued by the
eager advocates of the Spanish journey, that in France, although highway
robberies were frequent, banditti in multitudes were rare. The Prince
was to travel with a numerous retinue, he was to keep to the main roads,
and there would be no fear of robbery or violence. Persuaded at length
by these arguments, the King gave way upon a Monday, the seventeenth of
February, 1622-23. He went to Newmarket; “there,” writes Sir Robert
Carey, the Prince’s chamberlain, “the Prince appointed myself and the
rest of his servants to meet him two days after. But the first news we
heard was that the Prince and my Lord Duke were gone to Spain. This made
a great hubbub in our Court, and in all England besides.”
Footnote 399:
Goodman.
It was at first hoped that the Prince had gone anywhere but to Spain,
“but those who so believed,” had, it was said, no ground but
desire.[400] The truth was soon circulated.
Footnote 400:
Letter from Mr. Meade to Sir Martin Stuteville.—Ellis’s Letters
Illustrative of English History, vol. iii., 1st series, p. 216.
There had, it appears, been a formal leave-taking between the Prince and
his father, and this scene was witnessed by the able shipwright, Phineas
Pette.
Phineas had been in the service of Prince Henry, and had constructed a
small vessel for the amusement of that royal youth, and he was now
permitted to be present at the leave-taking between Charles, or, as his
father styled him, “Babie,” and the King. “At their taking horse,” he
related, “I kissed both their hands, and they only gave me an item to
that I should shortly go to sea in the _Prince_.”[401]
Footnote 401:
Nichols, vol. i., p. 807.
The King, after making some stipulations as to the day of the return of
his precious travellers, parted from them composedly; “he did then,”
says Goodman, “express no passion at all, for he was an excellent master
of his own affections, if you would give him a little respite, and not
take him suddenly. He carried himself as though there were no such thing
intended, and so he took his journey through Kingston and Newmarket.”
“For want of better matter,” writes Mr. Chamberlain, “I send you here
certain verses made upon Jack and Tom’s journey (for the Prince and Lord
Marquis went through Kent under the names of Jack and Tom Smith). They
were fathered at first upon the Prince, but, I hear, were only corrected
and amended by him.”[402]
Footnote 402:
Inedited State Papers, Domestic. March 8. 1623.
“They wore fair riding coats,” he continues, “and false beards, one of
which fell off before they arrived at Gravesend, and caused suspicion.”
Messengers were therefore sent after the fugitives; and they were
overtaken near Sittingbourne, where one of their horses failed; they
were detained at Canterbury, but got away; but were again stopped at
Dover by order of the Privy Council, where they gave some “secret
satisfaction” to the authorities of that port.
This enterprise, so consistent with Charles’s character, so agreeable to
Buckingham’s high spirits, had not been made known to the Privy Council.
The King sent a message to them to say it was the Prince’s doing, and
not that of Buckingham; and that the Council was not told of the scheme
because “secrecy was the soul of the business.” The Council was ordered
to “stay,” by a proclamation, the “amazement of the people,” who began
to conclude that the Prince would be married “at a mass.” It appears,
however, without any doubt, that the whole was a plot of James’s; for
the Treasurer of the Household, Lord Brooke, the Chancellor of the
Exchequer, Heriot the jeweller, and others, had been commanded by His
Majesty, when he was at Newmarket, to go to the Tower and select some
fine jewels, suitable to wear in hats, and “the best rope of pearls,”
and some fine jewels, fit for a woman, for His Majesty to choose, which
he will send abroad. They were not all for presents, but some to be lent
to the Prince, and restored on his return home.[403] Buckingham, we hear
from the same authority, took Sir Paul Pindar’s great diamonds,
promising “to talk with him about paying for them.”
Footnote 403:
State Papers, vol. cxxxix., No. 16.
A more detailed account of the commencement of this singular journey
than the preceding may, however, be collected from other services.
The travellers slept one night at Newhall; on the following day[404]
they were accompanied by Sir Richard Graham, Master of the Marquis’s
Horse, and his own earliest friend, adviser, and confidant.[405] They
set off with a very small retinue, some of which they dismissed at
various places, upon some idle pretence or another, but only to get rid
of them. Thus they proceeded towards Gravesend; but, on crossing the
river, a difficulty occurred. They had no small pieces of silver about
them; and for want of them, were obliged to give the boatman, who rowed
them across, a piece of twenty-two shillings; which, as Sir Henry Wotton
relates, “struck the poor fellow into such melting tenderness, that so
good gentlemen should be going (for so he suspected) about some quarrel
beyond seas,” that he thought it right to acquaint the officers of the
town with his suspicions. A message was instantly despatched to detain
the travellers at Rochester; but they had passed through the city before
it arrived.
Footnote 404:
Feb. 18th.
Footnote 405:
Reliquiæ Wottonianæ.
The peril of discovery had not yet passed. As the Prince and his
companion ascended the hill above Rochester, they beheld, to their great
consternation, the equipage of the French ambassador, attended by one of
the royal carriages, approaching them in state. “This,” says Wotton,
“made them baulk the beaten road, and teach post hackneys to leap
hedges.” “It seemed, however,” says the same writer, “as if a voice had
run before them; for at Canterbury, as they were preparing to take fresh
horses, the Mayor of the town came up, and declared, with very little
ceremony, first, that he had an order from the Privy Council to arrest
them; next, on finding them incredulous, from Sir Lewis Lewkners, Master
of the Ceremonies; and, thirdly, from Sir Richard Mainwaring, then
Lieutenant of Dover Castle.” Buckingham had no leisure “to laugh” at
this occurrence; but, taking off his disguise, he told the Mayor that he
was going “covertly with such slight company,” to take a survey of the
fleet of the narrow seas, which was then in preparation. Thus, this
obstacle was with some difficulty overcome; but the disguise still
puzzled the worthy man in office. The travellers journeyed onwards, but
met with a fresh recognition from the boy who carried their baggage, and
who had been at Court, and had a suspicion who the party were; but it
was not difficult to ensure his silence. Owing to bad horses, and these
hindrances, it was six in the evening before the party reached Dover.
Here they met the two gentlemen who were alone in their confidence. One
of them was Sir Francis Cottington, who was selected not only for his
intimate knowledge of Prince Charles’s affairs, but from his
acquaintance with the Spanish Court, “where he had,” says Sir Henry
Wotton, “gotten singular credit, even with that cautious nation, by the
temper of his carriage.” He was, indeed, a prudent man, well acquainted
with business, and conversant with Spanish and French. He had been
created a baronet only two days before this journey, his family holding
a respectable rank at Godmanstown, Somersetshire.
At his first entrance into the world, Cottington had only fulfilled the
post of Gentleman of the Horse to Sir Philip Stafford, Vice-Chamberlain
to Queen Elizabeth; but he was afterwards attached to the embassy in
Spain, and in 1621, was made secretary to Prince Charles. He was
considered to know the politics of the Spanish Court “to a hair.”
Charles, in spite of the jealousy afterwards manifested by Buckingham
towards this gentleman, who had protested strongly against the Spanish
journey, never forgot his early companionship in an undertaking of some
risk. He promoted him in various ways, and, in 1631, created him Baron
Cottington, of Hanworth, and Lord Cottington enjoyed several high
offices, from which he was driven when the troubles began in 1640.
Charles, however, trusted him to the last, and, when his failing cause
detained him at Oxford, made Cottington High Treasurer of his diminished
resources.
It was the fate of this loyal man to follow the fortunes of Charles
the Second into exile: thus performing, faithfully, two high, but
different functions—the one to attend a youth in the height of power
and prosperity on his chivalric enterprise; the other to solace
privation, and to console the young and wandering exile under his
difficulties.[406]
Footnote 406:
Nichols, iv., p. 806.
The other chosen attendant was Endymion Porter, who had been bred up in
Spain from a boy, and was familiar with the language. From Spain he was
taken into the service of Edward Villiers, was brought to England, and
introduced before the time when Buckingham or his family was acceptable
at Whitehall.
These five persons composed, in the first instance, the whole of the
party, Porter fulfilling the office of Bedchamber-man to the
Prince.[407]
Footnote 407:
Porter, as it appears by a letter in the State Paper Office, addressed
by him to his wife, was at this time a married man, and his wife,
Olivia Porter, was a relation of the Marchioness of Buckingham.
For some time after the departure of the Prince, no precise news of his
movement was received at Court.
“We have little certainty of the Prince’s journey since his going
hence,” writes Mr. Chamberlain, “but only that they landed at Boulogne
the Wednesday, and rode three posts that night. On Friday they came to
Paris, very weary, and, resting there on Saturday, went away early on
Sunday morning. Some gave out that during their abode there, they saw
the King[408] at supper, and the Queen[409] practising a ball, with
divers other ladies. Which, though it be somewhat confidentially
affirmed, yet I think it not probable, by reason it was their first
Saturday in Lent. We have had since many rumours that they were stayed,
but now they say a post should come yesternight, with news that they are
past Bayonne, and that my Lords Digby and Gondomar, with I know not how
many litters and coaches, were ready at the frontiers to receive them,
which sounds as unlikely as most of the rest. Sir Edward Herbert, our
ambassador, knew nothing of their being at Paris till the Lord of
Carlisle’s coming. All in a manner agree that either the French King had
notice of it before their arrival, or time enough to have detained him,
had he been so disposed. Divers of their servants and followers are gone
after them by land, and more preparing to go by sea.”
Footnote 408:
Louis XIII.
Footnote 409:
Anne of Austria.
It appeared afterwards that the passage to Boulogne was stormy,
nevertheless, the Prince and his followers landed there two hours after,
in the afternoon of the nineteenth of February. They reached Montreuil
on the same night, “like men of dispatch,” and Paris on the second day
afterwards.
Up to this time they escaped detection; although, three posts before
they entered Paris, they encountered some German gentlemen, whom they
had met at Newmarket, who suspected that the disguised and hurried
travellers were no less important personages than the Prince and the
Favourite; but these Germans were “outfaced by Sir Richard Graham, who
would needs persuade them that they were mistaken.”[410]
Footnote 410:
Reliquiæ Wottonianæ.
At Paris the travellers passed one day only; but that day was the
forerunner of signal events, and pregnant with important consequence,
both to Buckingham and to his royal charge.
Meantime, King James, in spite of his fears at home, was madly jealous
of any surmise respecting Spain, or the Catholic religion.
On the Sunday after the Prince’s departure, we are told by Mr.
Chamberlain, “that all the Council about the town came to Paul’s Cross,
when it was expected somewhat would have been said; but the preacher had
his lesson in _hæc verba_, only to pray for the Prince’s prosperous
journey and safe return, and the next day the Bishop, convening all his
clergy, gave them the same charge; but some of them had anticipated the
commandment and proceeded further, whereof one desired God to be
merciful unto him now that he was going to the House of Rimmon.” But all
were not so careful; old Dr White, Prebend of St. Paul’s, was dismissed
for praying that the King and Prince might be preserved from any that
should “go about to withdraw them from their first love, and natural
religion.” This was interpreted as a sort of libel.[411]
Footnote 411:
Inedited Letter in the State Paper Office, from Mr. Chamberlain to Sir
D. Carleton, 1623.
And now Buckingham was, for the second time, in the great centre of all
civilization. Paris was probably unchanged; but few persons who had
known the Court of France in the days of the great Henry could have
recognized it during the weak rule of his successor. Henry IV., adding
another instance in corroboration of the remark, that during five
hundred years not one of the French monarchs had attained the age of
sixty, had now been dead twelve years.[412] To that manly and powerful
monarch, bred up in the house of a peasant, his iron nerves braced by
hazards almost incredible; his courage proved in battles a hundred and
twenty-five in number; his hardihood so great that for two years he was
never seen unbooted; being perpetually in the exercise of war and
hunting—to this hero, as prudent and sagacious as he was brave, had
succeeded a dull and heavy boy, slow in speech, yet quick to avenge, on
any of his young companions, petty or imagined slights. Timid and even
dastardly by nature, the early pusillanimity of Louis the Thirteenth had
attracted the notice of his father. “Faut-il donc que je sois père d’un
poltron!” was the involuntary exclamation of Henry of Navarre. Such was,
however, his successor, who had, in truth, far more of his mother’s
disposition than of his father’s frank and princely nature. He had the
Medicean fierceness and imperiousness of character, coupled with an
abject spirit, which was fostered, whilst cramped, by the potent
dominion of his mother over his mind.[413]
Footnote 412:
He was killed on May 10th, 1610.—See Sir George Carew’s Relation of
the State of France under Henry IV., in Birch’s Negotiations, p. 481.
Footnote 413:
Birch’s Negotiations, p. 492.
Marie de Medici, the queen-mother, had obtained the highest reputation
for sanctity, charity, and prudence. Of her beauty, those charms which
could rival the attractions of the famed Gabrielle d’Estrées, the
chroniclers of the day speak loudly. In the affections of her royal
husband she had, however, suffered, not so much from the influence of
her rival’s comeliness, as from the wit and vivacity of Gabrielle’s
conversation. Like her son, Marie de Medici was slow in speech, and the
French accounted her dull and uninteresting; but, for the “main grounds
of attending to her profit or her power,” she was, writes an eye-witness
of her career for four years,[414] “provident enough, and her commanding
and high spirit, caused her to be obeyed in all in which she was
permitted to meddle.”[415] And the event justified this opinion. Her
daughter-in-law, Anne of Austria, daughter of Philip the Third of Spain,
had been several years the wife of Louis the Thirteenth, when Charles
and Buckingham saw her in all the perfection of her youthful loveliness
at Paris. Born in the year 1602, Anne must have been at this time in her
twenty-second year. She is described as having been, at the age of
fifteen, when (having been married the year previously by proxy) she was
first introduced to her royal consort, singularly attractive. An ancient
lady of the court drew a lively picture of her appearance to Madame de
Motteville. “The first time that she saw the Queen,” said that
chronicler of other days, “she was seated upon cushions, after the
Spanish fashion, surrounded by a number of ladies; she was dressed in
green satin, embroidered with gold and silver; her sleeves hanging, but
caught up on the arm with immense diamonds, serving as buttons. She had
on a close ruff; and on her head a small hat, of the same colour as her
gown, from which hung a plume of Heron’s feathers, adding, by their dark
hue, to the beauty of her hair, which was extremely light, and frizzed
in large curls.”[416] Such, in early youth, was the appearance of that
Princess whose attractions proved eventually a source of peril and
discredit to Buckingham. Her portraits give us no idea of a beauty so
commanding as that which is implied by the extraordinary influence of
her attractions; but it is probable that, like that of most Spanish
women, it faded prematurely, and that her great charm consisted in the
gaiety of her temper; in her sweetness and generosity of character; and
in a certain sentimental turn of gallantry, which she conceived not to
be incompatible with female virtue. At the period of Charles’s first
visit to Paris, Marie de Medici still ruled paramount over the weak
character of her son. It had been her aim, even before the death of
Henry the Fourth, to win the cold affections of her only offspring, as
well as those of the son of her rival, the Marquis de Verneuil, to
herself. At the time when Anne of Austria, a child, gave her hand to
Louis, a child also—for their ages tallied—there was an evident
disposition on the part of the former to attach herself to the partner
to whom the decree of state policy had joined her compulsorily. She felt
no disgust at his appearance, for, though greatly inferior to the Duc de
Vendome and the Marquis de Verneuil in manly beauty, the young King was
tall and well-formed; and the darkness of his countenance was no
disparagement in the eyes of a Princess who had been accustomed to the
rich tint of Moorish and Spanish complexions.[417] Upon the death of the
Duc de Luisnes, the favourite of Louis, in 1621, Marie de Medici was
left with no other rival in her maternal influence over her son, than
his young wife. By a fatality such as too often attends royal marriages,
it was henceforth decreed that the young couple were not to love each
other. Anne, it appears plainly from her own confession, might have done
so, had she been left to herself;[418] and the young King, it was also
alleged, admired the beauty of his wife and respected her amiable
qualities; but it was not the policy of Marie de Medici, nor afterwards
that of Cardinal de Richelieu, that these natural affections should have
their course. The King was known to avow to a confidant, that whilst he
was attracted to his wife, he dared not avow it either to his mother or
to Richelieu, whose counsels and services, he added, were of far more
importance to him than the affection of his wife.[419]
Footnote 414:
Sir George Carew.
Footnote 415:
Birch’s Negotiations.
Footnote 416:
Memoirs of Madame de Motteville, vol. i., p. 8.
Footnote 417:
Madame de Motteville.
Footnote 418:
Ibid, p. 8.
Footnote 419:
Madame de Motteville, p. 32.
Such was the state of domestic affairs at the court of Louis, when the
Prince and Buckingham beheld, for the first time, those who were
destined to awaken in the one an honourable and enduring attachment, in
the other a mad and criminal passion.
They still maintained their disguise, nor was it difficult, for, as Sir
Henry Wotton observes, “the impossibility to conceive so great a Prince
and favourite suddenly metamorphosed into travellers, with no greater
train, was enough to make any man living unbelieve his five senses.” In
order to add to their disguise, Buckingham bought periwigs, to
overshadow their foreheads; and thus provided, they spent a day in
viewing the city and the court, which Buckingham had visited before,
when in training for his courtier destiny, but which to Charles was an
object of novel and peculiar interest, France being “neighbour to his
future estates.”[420]
Footnote 420:
Madame de Motteville, p. 32.
Fortune favoured their curiosity. From a gallery in the royal palace,
they were so favoured as to see the King, solacing himself with familiar
pleasures; the queen-mother, at her own table; nor were they discovered
even by Monsieur de Cadenat, who had so lately visited England as
ambassador, and who must well have known their features. Towards the
evening, by an apparent chance, though, as Sir Henry Wotton observes,
“underlined with a Providence,” the travellers had a full view of the
young queen, and of Henrietta Maria, the future queen of England. These
princesses were, with the ladies of the Court, practising a dance and
masque, but the diversion appears to have been held in private. The
travellers, however, hearing two gentlemen talk of going to witness it,
pressed in after them, and were admitted by the Duc de Montbazon, the
Queen’s Chamberlain, from courtesy to strangers, when, at the same time,
many of the French, who wished to be spectators, were rejected. “Note
here,” observes Wotton, “even with the point of a diamond, by what
oblique steps and imaginable preparatives the High Disposer of princes’
affections doth sometimes conceive the secrets of his will.” It was
afterwards found that the young face which Vandyck has so often depicted
on his canvas, surrounded as it was by maturer beauties, made an
impression upon the imagination of Charles which only required certain
circumstances to be heightened into love.[421]
Footnote 421:
Reliquiæ Wottonianæ.
Anne of Austria, nevertheless, bore away the palm in the eyes of
Buckingham, and even of his princely charge. Whilst they remained at
Paris, the King wrote to them to the following effect:—
“Sweett boyes: the newes of youre going is allreaddie so blowin abroade
as I am forced for youre safetie to poste this bearare after you who
will give you his best advyce and attendance in youre journey. God
blesse youe both, my sweete babes, and sende you a safe and happye
returne.
“JAMES.”[422]
Footnote 422:
Harleian MSS., 6987.
On their part, the travellers thus wrote:—
“SIR,
“Since the closing of our last, we have been at Court againe (and, that
we might not nowe hold you in paine, we assure you that we have not been
knowen), where we saw the young queene, littell Monsieure and Madame, at
her practising of a maske that is intended by the Queene to be presented
to the Kinge, and in it there danced the Queene and Madame, with as
mannie as made up nineteen faire dancing ladies, amongst which the
Queene is the handsomest, which hath wrought in me a great desire to see
her sister. So, in haste, going to bed, we humblie take our leaves, and
rest
“Your Majestie’s most humble and obedient
“sone and servant,
“CHARLES;
“and your humble slave and doge,
“STEENIE.”
On the following day, February the twenty-third, the Prince and
Buckingham left Paris at the early hour of three, and proceeded
towards Bayonne. Their journey, meantime, had become the theme of
conversation in England, and even on the day on which the Prince set
sail, it was the theme of general discussion;[423] yet, abroad, so
slowly did tidings travel in those days, they were still able to
preserve their incognito.
Footnote 423:
Nichols, vol. iv., p. 809, note.
At Bordeaux, however, they nearly revealed their secret. Tired,
probably, of their peasant suits, they bought fine riding coats,
“all of one colour and of a noble simplicity,” and the proud
demeanour of Buckingham, and the high-bred grace of the Prince,
could no longer be concealed.
They were invited by the Duc d’Epernon to be his guests, and
Cottington was employed to refuse the invitation, so as to avoid
exciting suspicion. He was therefore obliged to tell the Duke that
he and his party were “gentlemen of mean degree, and formed to
little courtship,” and the excuse was received; otherwise, the Duke,
being, as Sir Henry Wotton observes, “no superficial man in the
practices of the world, might have pierced somewhat deeper than
their outsides.”[424]
Footnote 424:
Reliquiæ Wottonianæ, p. 216.
The season of Lent was now advanced, and the travellers could obtain
no meat in the inns. Sir Henry Wotton relates an anecdote, which, as
he remarks, is characteristic of the Prince, who is the chief hero
of the little incident.
“There was, near Bayonne, a herd of goats with their young ones,
upon which sight, Sir Robert Graham tells the Marquis he would snap
up one of the kids, and make some shift to carry him close to their
lodging; which, the Prince overhearing, ‘Why, Richard,’ says he, ‘do
you think you may practise here your old tricks again upon the
border?’ Upon which words, they first give the goatherd good
contentment, and then, while the Marquis and his servant (being set
on foot) were chasing the kid about the stack, the Prince, from
horseback, killed him in the head with a Scottish pistol.”[425]
Footnote 425:
Reliquiæ Wottonianæ.
The lofty bearing of Buckingham, and courteous demeanour of Charles,
were not unnoticed by the Count de Grammont, the Governor of
Bayonne, that “jealous key,” as Sir Henry Wotton terms it, of
France. He perceived that they were gentlemen of much more
consequence and higher station than their dress implied;
nevertheless, he permitted them, courteously, to pass forward.
Philip IV., at whose court they were soon to present themselves, was
now only in his nineteenth year. Like his weak father, he had thrown
the reins of government, soon after his accession,[426] into the
hands of an unworthy favourite. The Condé de Olivares, who had been
a gentleman of the bed-chamber to Philip, when the Prince of
Asturias was the haughty ruler over the destinies of the Spanish
nation. Corrupt, yet able, he is stated to have increased the
revenues of the crown, and, so far, to have served his sovereign by
several severe but salutary measures. Having, however, acquired some
credit for these reforms, he gave loose to his own rapacity, whilst
he checked that of others. He even surpassed his predecessors in
acts of corruption; his heart was depraved; his selfish ambition
boundless; and his private character was suspected, not without just
cause, to have been stained with the darkest crimes.[427] Such was
the minister to whom Charles and Buckingham were now to bend, as
suppliants and suitors; for Philip,[428] imbecile and indifferent,
and plunged into degrading vices, was wholly a cipher in the profuse
and stately Court over which he was the nominal ruler.
Footnote 426:
In 1621.
Footnote 427:
History of Spain and Portugal.—Cabinet Cyclopædia, vol. i., pp.
91, 92.
Footnote 428:
Of his illegitimate children, the most famous was the celebrated
Don Juan, surnamed of Austria, believed to be the son of an
actress of Madrid. “On this son the choicest favours of the crown
were conferred.”—Ibid, 99.
Throughout the rest of the journey, the travellers did not pass
entirely unknown; but were, as a writer of the day informs us,
“offered great honour, would they have yielded to have been
publickly known,” or in case of their return by the same route.
The Lords Andover and Kensington had gone twelve days previously in
the same direction; and, in short, about two hundred nobles and
gentlemen had set sail at Portsmouth, intending to land at St.
Sebastian’s, and to ride overland to Madrid.[429] Meantime, the King
desired his clergy not to “prejudicate the Prince’s journey, either
in their sermons or prayers; but yet to pray to God to preserve him
in his journey, and grant him a safe return to us”—not in more, he
ordered, “nor in any other words than those.”[430]
Footnote 429:
Ellis’s Letters, vol. iii., p. 132, 1st series.
Footnote 430:
Ibid, 124.
The appearance of these two adventurous travellers at Madrid was far
from agreeable to Lord Digby, who would have prevented it if he had
had the power. One consideration in the mind of that ambassador was
a fear lest the arrival of the lavish favourite should increase the
pecuniary difficulties in which he was himself involved. Twenty
thousand pounds had been allowed for his embassage, but that sum was
already exceeded by some thousands.[431] James chose to say that
much expense would be saved by the Lord Admiral’s dexterous
management, but Bristol answered, “Not one penny.” All, the
ambassador declared, should be done for his royal master’s honour,
but everything was to go on privately until the Papal dispensation
should arrive. Even at this early period, the journey of the Infanta
to England was discussed. By land it would, it was thought, be “very
chargeable,” and extraordinary inconvenient. The Spaniards, too,” as
the Earl stated, “thought the portion demanded by the English very
exorbitant, and only to be expected had the Infanta been either
deformed or of mean birth.”[432]
Footnote 431:
Letter from the Earl of Bristol to King James. Madrid, Feb. 22,
1623-4.—State Papers, Foreign.
Footnote 432:
Letters from the Earl of Bristol to King James. Madrid, Feb. 22,
1623-4. Inedited State Papers.
In the midst of these negotiations, the ill-timed arrival of the
Prince and Buckingham came, not to obviate obstacles, but to
multiply them. Digby, now Earl of Bristol, whose jealousy of
Buckingham may be detected throughout all his correspondence, was
greatly discomposed by their appearance at Madrid. Nor was this a
sentiment confined to Digby. Howell, who perfectly understood
Spanish affairs, observes in his letters:—
“And others were of the same opinion as the ambassador, namely, that
the journey was ill-advised, hazardous, undisguised, and unpopular.”
The King, however, was still delighted with the momentous frolic. On
the twenty-sixth of February he wrote from Newmarket, telling the
Prince and Marquis what lords were to follow them to Spain. “Their
poor old dade,” he added, “was lamer than ever he was, both of his
right hand and foot and wryttes all this out of his naked
bedde.”[433] The King having, in fact, encountered a very serious
accident during the previous year, his health was daily becoming
more feeble. It is, therefore, almost touching to find the
kind-hearted, weak Monarch, prematurely aged as he was, entering
most heartily into all that concerned his two absent treasures, of
whose enjoyment he thought, it is obvious, far more than the welfare
of his subjects. The Prince had left instructions that sixteen of
his suite should follow him, with his jewels and other articles. The
King, however, complains in his letter that the “imperfect note my
babie had left” put him into a great deal of pain, “for ye left,” he
says, “some necessary servants out, in the opinion of all your
principal officers, and ye ken, as I was forced to add those, then
everie man ranne upon me for his freende, so I was torn in peecis
amongst thamme. I have no more to saye,” he thus concludes, “but
that I weare Steenie’s picture in a blew ribben under my wastcoate,
next my hearte.”[434]
Footnote 433:
Nichols, 811.
Footnote 434:
Harl. MSS., 389. Quoted in Nichols’s Progresses, vol. iii., p.
808.
The following letter gives a characteristic account of the Prince
and Steenie:—
“DEAR DAD AND GOSSOPE,
“On Friday last (March seventh) wee arrived here at five
o’clock at night, both in perfect helth. The caus whie wee
advertised you of it no soner, was that wee knew you would be glad
to hear as well of the maner of oure reception as of oure arrivall.
First, wee resolved to discover the woer,[435] becaus upon the
speedie opening of the ports we fond (found) posts making such hast
after us, that we knew it would be discovered within twelve hours
after, and better wee had the thanke of it then a postillion. The
next morning wee sent for Gondamar, who went presentlie to the Condé
of Olivares, and as speedilie gott me your (Doge Steenie) a private
audience of the Kinge.
Footnote 435:
To throw off Charles’s disguise.
“When I was to returne backe to my lodging, the Condé of Olivares,
himself alone, would needs accompanie me backe againe to salute the
Prince in the King’s name.
“The next day (March 9, Sunday, O.S.) wee had a private visit of the
Kinge, the Queene, the Infanta, Don Carolus, and the Cardinal, in
sight of all the world; and I may caule it a private obligation,
hidden from nobodie, for there was the Pope’s Nuntio, the Emperor’s
Imbassador, the French, and alle the streets fild with gards and
other people. Before the King’s coch went the best of his
nobilities; after followed all the Ladies of the Court. Wee sate in
an invisible coch, becaus nobodie was suffered to take notice of it,
though seen by all the world. In this forme they passed three times
by us, but before wee could get away, the Condé of Olivares came
into our coch, and convaied us home, where he tould us the King
longd and died for want of a nere sight of our woer. First he took
me in his coch to goe to the Kinge. We found him walking in the
streets with his cloke throne over his face, and a sword and buckler
by his side. He leped into the coch, and away he came to find the
woer in another place appoynted, where there past much kindnes and
compliment one to another. You may judge by this how sensible the
Kinge is of your sone’s journie, and if wee can eyther judge by
outward shoes (shows) or generall speeches, we have reason to
condeme your Imbassadors for righting tow (writing too) sparinglie
then tow much.
“To conclude, we finde the Condé of Olivares so overvaluing of our
journie, that he is so full of reall courtesie that we can doe no
less than beseech your Majestie to right the kindest letter of
thanks and acknowledgement you can unto him.
“He said no later unto us than this morning, that if the Pope would
not give a dispensation for a wife, they would give the Infanta to
the (thy) son’s Babie as his wench, and has this day righten
(written) to the Cardinall Ludovicio, then Pope’s nephew, that the
Kinge of England hath put such an obligation upon this Kinge in
sending his Sone hether that he intreats him to make hast of the
dispensation, for he can denie him nothing that is in his kingdome.
We must hould you thus much longer to tell you the Pope’s Nuntio
works as maliciouslie and as activelie as he can against us, but
reseves such rude answers that we hoep he will soon werie on’t.
“Wee make this collection of it, that the Pope will be verie loth to
grant a dispensation, which if he will not doe, then wee would
gladlie have your directions how fare wee may ingage you in the
acknowledgement of the Pope’s spirituall power, for we allmost find,
if you will be contented to acknowledge the Pope’s cheefe Hed under
Christ, that the mach will be made without him. So craving your
blessing, wee rest
“Your Ma’ties humble, obedient sone and servant,
”CHARLES.
“Madrill, the 10th of March, 1623.
“Your humble slave and doge,
“STEENIE.
“For the best of Fathers and Masters.”
On another sheet, written at the same time, but signed by “Steenie”
alone, and perhaps written without the Prince’s knowledge, he
says:—“The cheefest advertisment of all wee omitted in oure other
letter, which was to let you know how we like your daughter, his
wife, and my ladie mistris. Without flatterie, I think there is not
a sweeter creature in the world. Babie Charles himself is so touched
at the hart, that he confesses all he ever yett saw is nothinge to
her.”
The King, in his answer to this letter, dated March twenty-fifth,
says:—“I have written a letre to the Condé d’Olivares, as both of
you desired me, as full of thankes and kyndnes as can be desyred, as
indeed he well deserves.“
“I know not,” says the King, in reply, “quhat ye meane by my
acknowledging the Pope’s spirituall supremacie. I am sure ye wolde
not have me to renounce my religion for all the world; but all I can
guess at your meaning is, that it may be ye have an allusion to a
passage in my booke against Bellarmine, quhaire I offer, if the Pope
wold guyte his godheade, and usurping over Kings, to acknowledge him
for the Cheefe Bishoppe, to whom all appeals of churchmen ought to
lye _en dernier ressort_; the verie wordes I sende you heere
inclosed, and that is the furthest my conscience will permit me to
goe upon this pointe, for I am not a Monsieur, quho can shifte his
religion as easilie as he can shifte his shirte quhen he commeth
from tennice.”
The passage in his hook, which the King fancied Buckingham might
allude to (though he more probably had never read it), is thus
written, in the King’s own hand, on a separate slip of paper: “And
for myselfe, if that were yett the question, I wolde with all my
hairte give my consent that the Bishoppe of Rome showlde have the
first seate. I, being a Western king, wolde go with the Patriarche
of the West. And for his temporall principalities over the
seignorie of Rome, I do not quenell it nether, lett him in God’s
name be primus Episcopus inter omnes Episcopos et Princeps
Episcoporum, so it be no other wayes but as St. Peter was
_Princeps Apostolorum_.”[436]
Footnote 436:
Harleian MSS., 6987.—Printed at length in Nichols.
To these letters, Endymion Porter added an account in a letter to
his wife, that the Prince and Duke were “most handsomely received.
The King, Queen, and Infanta,” he adds, “drove out yesterday[437] in
a coach, when the Prince, in another coach, saw his mistress, and
was much stricken with her beauty.”[438]
Footnote 437:
March 10, 1622-23.
Footnote 438:
State Papers.
It was soon found necessary to retrench the numbers that were to go
to Spain, that the ships “might not be pestered;” no lord was to
have had more than four men, no gentleman more than two. Even this
seems to us rather a full complement in the present day; but, when
it is remembered what an extraordinary number of jewels were worn in
the dresses of that day, it will not appear too many to take care of
the valuables conveyed by each peer, or to maintain the dignity and
state so much insisted on at that period.
Amongst other personages who followed Charles, or, as he was called
in Spain, “the wooer to the Spanish Court,” was Archy, King James’s
fool, who must needs also have his attendant, which was at first
refused, but afterwards allowed. By April, the Prince’s household,
jewels, apparel, and the robes for St. George’s Day, were gone;
tilting armour, caparisons, and horses, asked for by Charles and
Buckingham, were also to follow. “The dispensation,” Conway wrote,
from Spain, to Sir Thomas Wentworth, “will soon be there, and
nothing but either the desperately envious, or vile almanack-makers,
arguing from conjunction of planets, now talk of delay.”
It is curious to remark how eager those about the Court, and above
all, those dependant on Buckingham, were for the marriage, and how
little it was wished for by the majority of the people.
Ten ships were to set out in April, to bring back by the end of May
their rich charge; such were the expectations cherished in England.
Digby, a sceptical looker on, did not think that the match would be
advanced by the Prince’s arrival; whilst at home, difficulties arose
as to the condition of the ten ships intended to be sent with the
horses; the _Prince Royal_, built for Prince Henry, was found to be
in so damaged a state that she was not sea-worthy; this vessel was
repaired, in order to bring back Buckingham, who was expected home
before the Prince, and was victualled for the voyage to Spain; but
the King, with characteristic calculation, expected that the “King
of Spain, who so magnificently feasted the Prince, would surely give
the ships fresh victuals for their homeward journey,” which action,
however, seems never to have occurred to his Spanish Majesty.[439]
Lord Carey, chamberlain to the Prince, received a commission to
execute martial law, during the voyage to Spain, over the Prince’s
household, but his powers were not to extend to the captains or to
the crew, nor to be exercised till the vessel was out at sea. No sad
apprehensions were, however, to be allowed during Charles’s absence;
“where philosophy fails,” wrote Sir Thomas Edmondes,[440] “faith
must begin.” All things had been prepared for the Infanta’s
departure from her native country, and June was the latest month
stated for her arrival in this, but still the Earl of Bristol,
whilst protesting that the Spaniards would be the most perfidious
wretches alive if they did not restore the Palatinate, for “they say
that they would rather throw the Infanta into the sea, than marry
her to our Prince, when his sister and her children are deprived of
their patrimony,” still, he feared there was “mischief brewing”
about the Electorship.
Footnote 439:
State Paper Office, vol. cxliii., No. 41.
Footnote 440:
From London. March 18.
Meantime, all was gay, all was gracious, at Madrid. According to a
more detailed account than their own, the Prince and Buckingham rode
into that city about eight o’clock in the evening of the seventh of
March, attended by a postilion only, having previously ridden post
three days; they alighted at the house of the Earl of Bristol,
Buckingham entering first, with a portmanteau under his arm,
announcing himself as “Mr. Thomas Smith;” then “Mr. John Smith” (the
Prince), was sent for; he had remained standing on the other side of
the street. Lord Bristol, in amazement, took the prince to his
bedroom, where Charles called for pen and ink, and despatched a
letter to England, to inform His Majesty how, after a journey of
sixteen days, he had reached Madrid in safety. The next day,
Endymion Porter and Sir Francis Cottington, who had been purposely
left half a day’s journey behind, came also; and it was soon
rumoured that some great man was come from England, and reports were
even circulated that it was the King.[441] The Condé de Gondomar
was, however, soon apprised of the truth. He hastened to present
himself to the Prince, and, falling flat on his face, the artful
Spaniard exclaimed “_Nunc dimittis!_” as if the climax of human
felicity had come to pass. The next day was Sunday, and, since the
forms of the Spanish Court did not admit of an immediate
presentation, it was agreed that the first meeting should take place
by a kind of premeditated chance, so to speak—the Prince retaining
his disguise. Charles, with the ardour of a young and romantic man,
had entreated Gondomar to procure him an immediate “sight of the
Infanta,” which the Condé promised to do; reminding the Prince that
it was Lent, which was, of course, an obstacle to a public
reception. The King afterwards promised Charles that though it were
Lent, it should not be “Lent to him;” and that he should have all he
would, and all that the country should afford.”[442] In the evening
of Saturday, Buckingham went in a close coach to Court, where he had
a private audience of King Philip, and also of the Condé Olivares,
who accompanied him back to the Prince, whose hand he kissed,
kneeling, clasping his arms also round Charles’s legs. Endymion
Porter was the interpreter, on this occasion, between the Prince and
Olivares.[443]
Footnote 441:
Howell’s Letters, p. 116.
Footnote 442:
The account of the Prince’s reception in Spain is chiefly taken
from “A True Relation and Journal of the Arrival and Entertainment
given to the High and Mighty Prince Charles, by the King of
Spain.”—Printed in Nichols’s Progresses, vol. iii., p. 818.
Footnote 443:
Howell.
On Sunday afternoon, Charles, for the first time, saw the young
Princess towards whom he afterwards played so unworthy a part. It
was in the park of Madrid. The Infanta was seated in the boot of the
carriage, with a blue ribbon round her arm, in order that the Prince
might distinguish her. A grand _cortége_, composed of the chief
nobility of that proud Court, followed the royal carriages. Charles,
disguised, with Buckingham by his side, Gondomar and Sir Walter
Aston being in the same carriage, went in the Duke de Cea’s coach.
It had been settled that no recognition should take place. The
Infanta, as her royal suitor passed her, could not conceal her
agitation; the colour came into her face; neither could her brother
and Charles help exchanging salutations, as they drove repeatedly
past each other, both in the town and Prado. Evening drew on, and
the King and the royal party returned home by torch-light, the
effect of which was magnificent.
Still, it was thought due to the observance of Lent, as well as
agreeable to etiquette, that private interviews only should take
place, especially before Charles had made his public entrance. That
same evening, therefore, the King, after many punctilios, in which
the soul of Spanish honour and politeness was displayed, met the
Prince again in the park, taking him into his own coach, and placing
him at his right hand. On parting, there was an embarrassing
ceremonial—the King insisting on conducting Charles back to his
carriage, Charles not suffering it. So they parted midway on the
road.
Charles’s days passed, indeed, in a manner peculiarly agreeable to
one of his disposition. On one occasion, having first seen the King
ride through the streets on horseback to a monastery called La
Merced, where the King had rooms furnished for occasional residence,
he went afterwards to take the air by the fields on the river’s
side; another day, he repaired to the palace, and was conducted by
Olivares through the back way. “Your babie,” Buckingham wrote to the
King, “desired to kiss his (the King’s) hands privatelie in the
pallace, which was granted him, and thus performed. First, the King
would not suffer him to come to his chamber, but met him at the
stare-foote; then entered in the coch, and walked into the parke.
The greatest matter that passed between us at that time was
complements and particular questions of all our journaie; then, by
force, he would needs convaie him half way home; in doing which they
were almost overthrone in brick pits.”[444]
Footnote 444:
Note from Harl. MSS., 6987.—Nichols, p. 823.
Many were the resources to which Charles turned for relaxation
during this interval of expectation. His mornings were spent in his
private affairs, among which we may reckon the cultivation of his
taste for pictures; in the afternoon, accompanied by his beloved
Steenie, he went forth into the fields, where Bristol attended on
him with his hawks; or he visited a country house of the King’s,
called Caso del Campo, where, meeting Philip and his brothers, Don
Carlos and Don Fernando the Cardinal, they diverted themselves by
watching “men placed there to shoot at such kinds of game as were
found in the place;” hares were started, partridges sprang up, and
other fowl, all of which were killed, after the custom of that day,
as they went running or flying by the marksmen. Sometimes the King,
with the old Spanish courtesy, sent the Prince two horses, desiring
him to choose the best for himself, and to leave him the worst to
ride out on; then Charles would order the steeds to be exercised in
a garden near the Earl of Bristol’s house, and, not to be outdone in
politeness, he would himself try them both, and send the best back
for the King’s use.
At length the day arrived when Charles made his solemn entry into
Madrid, under circumstances of interest which almost superseded even
the imposing magnificence of the ceremonial. On the sixteenth of
March, he received the Inquisitor General, and all the different
Councils of the kingdom—the Corregidores and the Regidores of
Madrid—at the Monastery of San Geronimo, whence the Kings of Spain
always make their public entrance. These public functionaries
endeavoured, on being presented to the Prince, to kiss his hand, but
Charles resisted this demonstration, considering that it was due
only to the lawful sovereign of the realm.
The magnificence of the procession that ensued owed much of its
picturesque beauty to its being on horseback. As they approached the
immediate precincts of Madrid—Charles riding on the right of
Philip—they were met by four and twenty Legidores of the town—whose
office it was to carry over the King’s head a canopy of tissue,
lined with crimson cloth of gold. The King then took the Prince
under the canopy, still keeping him on his right hand; before them
rode the Ministers of Justice, next the grandees, sumptuously clad,
for it is an old saying, that no one dresses so plainly every day,
nor so gorgeously on occasions, as the Spaniards.[445] Their
picturesque costumes, their grave and stately bearing, their gallant
steeds—so famed throughout Europe—must have made this band of nobles
one of the fairest spectacles of the time.
Footnote 445:
Howell’s Letters.
They were apparelled, as the chronicler expresses it, “in colours
and great bravery,” their servants, in rich liveries, attending.
After the King and Prince came Buckingham and Olivares, in their
respective offices of Master of the Horse, each of them with a horse
of state, as the ensign of the place he enjoyed. The canopy held
over these two favourites and ministers was afterwards presented to
Buckingham, as well as all other fees belonging to the Master of the
Horse—because he served that day the Prince in whose honour the
procession took place. Then came Lord Bristol, Sir Walter Aston, and
the Council of State, with the gentlemen of the King’s bedchamber;
and a part of that “goodly guard,” called “de los archeros, bravely
clad and arrayed.”
This unrivalled procession passed along through streets hung here
and there with rich draperies, or adorned with curious pictures, and
“sprinkled” with scaffoldings, on which stood the chief magistrates
of Madrid; in some streets, also, there were dancers, comedians, and
musicians, to amuse the royal pair as they rode gracefully onwards.
At length, the King and Charles reached the palace, where some time
was consumed by ancient ceremonials, each contending for the
hindmost place; but, “in fine,” writes the chronicler, “they went
hand-in-hand, or rather, with their arms round each other, until
they came into the presence of the Queen.”
Her Majesty was seated under a cloth of state, at the extremity of a
large room, where the chairs were placed. This apartment was
superbly furnished; but the chief riches, it is said, consisted in
that “living tapestry of ladies, and of the children of noblemen who
stood near the walls.” The Queen, not awaiting the approach of
Charles, went forward to welcome him; he was then conducted to the
apartments destined for him, the Queen herself, with the King,
seeing him to the very doors, where her royal brothers-in-law stood
to receive him. There was then a courteous dispute, the Prince
wishing to attend His Majesty back to his own part of the palace;
Philip insisting that Charles should only make one step in that
direction. Scarcely an hour had elapsed, before a great basin of
massive gold, carried by two men, and containing an embroidered
nightgown, laid double in it, was brought—a present from the Queen
to Charles; besides which, she sent him two large trunks, bound in
hands of pure gold, and thickly stuck with gold nails—with a gold
lock and key; the coverings of the trunks were of amber leather,
whilst their contents consisted of curious linens and perfumes. In
addition to these, there was also presented a rich desk, every
drawer of which was full of rarities; Buckingham, at the same time,
receiving a “noble present” from the Condessa Olivares. That night
the old town was illuminated both with torches and fireworks, which
were kept up for eight days.
Such was the commencement of Charles’s residence in Spain. It was
decreed that he should be attended only by nobles, and served and
addressed as a King; The Condé de Gondomar and the Condé de Plueba
were to act as Majordomos; the Condé de Monterey, brother-in-law of
Olivares, was to be his chief Majordomo. The most delicate attention
of all was, however, the King’s giving two gilt keys to the Prince,
requesting him to present one of them to those of his attendants
whom he most preferred, in order that the whole of the palace might
be open to him or his retinue. The keys were, of course, given to
Buckingham and Bristol.
Whilst such delicate hospitality was being manifested in Spain,
James, at home, was collecting all the jewels he could with any
propriety send, and some which he had no right to give away, to add
to the grandeur of Babie and Steenie. His letter, on this occasion,
is most characteristic of his infatuation for the Spanish match, and
of his easy conscience on matters connected with religion.[446]
Footnote 446:
Nichols, 832, note.
He writes thus:—
“MY SWEETE BOYES,
“I wrytte nou this sevint (seventh) letre unto you upon the
sevinteent of March,[447] sent in my ship called the Adventure, to
my tuo boyes, adventurers, quhom God ever blesse! And now to
beguinne with Him:—A Jove principium—I have sent you, my babie, two
of youre Chaplains, fitted for this purpose, Mawe and Wrenne,
together with all ornaments and stuffe fit for the service of God. I
have fullie instructed them in all theyre behavioure, and theyre
service shall, I hoape, prove decent and agreeable to the puritie of
the Primitive Churche, and yett as near the Romane forme as can
lawfullie be done, for it hath ever been my way to goe with the
Church of Rome, _usque et aras_. All the particulars hereof I
remitte to the relation of youre before-named chaplens.”
Footnote 447:
17th March, 1622-23.
The King then mentions that he sent the robes of the Order of the
Garter. “Quhache,” he says, “you must not forgette to wear on St.
George’s Day, and dine together in thaime,” if they arrived in time,
which he hoped to God would be the case, for it would be “a goodlie
sight for the Spaniards to see my two boyes dine in thaime.”
The King next enumerates the jewels he despatched:—
“For my babies’ presenting his mistresse, I sende an olde double
crosse of Lorraine, not so rich as anciente, yet not contemtible for
the valewe: a goodly looking-glasse, with my picture in it, to be
hung at her girdle, quhiche ye must tell her ye have caused it so to
be enchawnted by a vile magike, as, quhensoever she shall be pleased
to look into it, she shall see the fairest ladie that ather her
brother’s or youre father’s dominions can afforde.[448] Ye shall
present her also,” James continues, “two faire long dyamonts, sett
lyke an anker, and a faire pendant dyamont hanging at thaime; a
goodlie roape of pearles,” a collar, or carcanet, of thirteen great
ballas rubies, and thirteen knots or cinques of pearls; together
with a “head-dressing, and two-and-twentie great pear pearls;” also,
three pear-shaped diamonds, the largest of which was to be worn “at
a needle,” in the middle of her forehead, and one in each ear.
Footnote 448:
Thus described in the list:—“A looking-glasse set in goulde, the
backside richly garnished with faire dyamondes, and six peeces of
chayne to hange it, garnished with dyamondes on both sydes.”
His “babie,” the King decreed, was to have his own round brooch of
diamonds, and he sent also a famous jewel called the “Three
Brethren,” consisting of a great pointed diamond, with three great
pearls attached to it, and a large pendent pearl; also, the “Mirror
of France,” “the fellowe of the Portugal Dyamont,” which, says the
King, “I would wishe you to weare alone in your hatte, with a little
blakke feather. Ye have also,” he adds, “goode dyamont buttons, of
your own, to be sett to a doublett or jerkin. As for your =Ｔ=, it
maye serve for a present to a Don.”[449]
Footnote 449:
A jewel in the form of a =Ｔ=.
Steenie was furnished with a fair table diamond, which the King
wanted to have given him before, but Buckingham had refused it; to
this a “faire pewre pearl” was now suspended, “for wearing,” said
the thoughtful monarch, more occupied with these details than with
the good of England, “in thy hatte, or quhaire thow plessis; and if
my babie will spaire thee the two long dyamonts in form of an anker,
with the pendant dyamont, it were fitt for an admirall to weare, and
he hath enough better jewels for his mistresse.”
Then follows a trait of the gentle Marchioness, quite in keeping
with the whole of her character:
“Thow hes of thyne owne thy goode olde jewell, thy three pindars
dyamonts, the picture-cace I gave Kate, and the greate dyamont
chaine I gave her, quho wolde have sent thee the best paire she
hadde, if I hadde not stayed her.”
Divers other jewels were to be sent with the fleet for presents,
“for saving of chairges quhair have too much nede.” These were to be
presents to Spanish grandees.
The King then concludes:—
“Thus ye see how, as long as I want the sweete comfort of my boyes’
conversation, I ame forced, yea, and delytes, to converse with
thaime by long letres. God bless you both, my sweete boyes; and
sende you, after a successful journey, a joyful and happie returne
in the armes of your dear dad,
“JAMES R.
“Dated from Newmarket, on Saint Patrick’s Day, quho of olde was too
well patronized in the cuntrey ye are in.”
A few kind and amiable expressions from the Marchioness of
Buckingham to her husband reached him too at this time.[450] “I
thanke you for sending me so good nuse of our younge mistres. I am
very glad she is so delicat a creaturr, and of so sweett a
disposicion. Indeed, my Lady Bristol sent me word she was a very
fine lady, and as good as fine. I am very glad of it, and that the
Prince liks her so well, for the King ses (says) he is wonderfully
taken with her. It is a wonderfull good hairing, for it were great
pettye but the Prince should have on (one) he can love; because I
thinke he’ll make a very honest husband, which is the greatest
comfort in this world, to have man and wife love truly. I tould the
King of the private message the Infanta sent to the Prince, to wear
a great rouffe (ruff). He laft heartely, and seed (said) it was a
very good sign.”
Footnote 450:
Nichols, 817, note.
The Prince and Buckingham adopted a practice of writing joint
letters; for which Charles, in the next dispatch, apologized. “I
hope in writing jointly as we doe,” the Prince wrote, “we plase you
best, for I assure your Majesty it is not for saving paines.”[451]
To which James answers:—“I wonder quhy ye shoulde aske me the
question if ye should send me any more jointe letters or not. Alace!
sweet hairts, it is all my comforte in your absence that ye wrytte
jointe unto me, besides the great ease it is both to me, and ye
neede not doubte but I will be wairie enough in not acquainting my
counsel with any secrete in your letres. But I have been troubled
with Hamilton,[452] quho, being presente by chawnce at my ressaving
both of your firste and seconde paquette out of Madrid, wold needs
peere over my shoulder quhen I was reading them, ofring ever to help
me to reade any harde words, and, in good faith, he is in this
busynesse, as in all things else, as variable and uncertaine as the
Moone.”
Footnote 451:
Nichols, 835. Note from Harleian MSS., 6987.
Footnote 452:
James Hamilton, second Marquis of Hamilton, in Scotland, upon whom
James had conferred, in 1619, the Earldom of Cambridge, a title
formerly borne by King Edward IV., before his accession to the
Throne. The Marquis was Steward of the Royal Household.—Burke’s
Extinct Peerage.
A hint from Charles showed that he both feared his father’s
indiscretion, and also apprehended opposition from the Council. “I
beseech your Majesty,” he now wrote, “advyse as little with your
counsel in these busineses as you can.”
James, indeed, had the unthankful task of extorting, from unwilling
hands at home, money for those abroad.[453]
Footnote 453:
Nichols, p. 840.
“But, in earniste, my babie,” he afterwards wrote, “ye must be as
spairing as ye can in your spending thaires, for youres.”
Amongst the jewels transmitted to Spain was a collar of gold,
weighing thirteen great ballaces, and thirteen pieces of gold, with
thirteen links of pearl between them. This valuable was, in 1606,
annexed to the crown of England, or, as it was stated in the deed,
“to the kingdoms of this realm.” It is evident that James had
incurred some censure for sending what was not his own property
away, for he seems to have exercised greater caution afterwards. The
demands from Spain were, indeed, insatiable. Charles modestly wrote
to his father thus:—[454]
“Sir,—I confess that ye have sent more jewels than at my departure I
thought to have had use of; but, since my coming, seeing manie
jewels worne heere, and that my braverie can consist of nothing else
besydes;—that sume of them which ye have appointed me to give the
Infanta, in Steenie’s oppinion and myne, ar nott fitt to be given to
her; therefore I have taken this bouldness to intreate your Majesty
to send more for my owen wearing and for giving to my mistress; in
which I thinke your Majestie shall not doe amiss to take
Carlile’s[455] advyce.”
Footnote 454:
Ibid, p. 845.
Footnote 455:
The Earl of Carlisle.
This letter was in the Prince’s hand-writing.
Buckingham’s less humble spirit was shown in the following
postscript, which was in his own hand, and forms a singular contrast
with the respectful tone of that of the Prince on the same topic:—
“I, doge; ye sayes you have manie jewels neyther fit for your one
(own), your sone’s, nor your daughter’s[456] wearing; but verie fitt
to bestow of those here, who must necessarilie have presents, and
this way will be least chargeable to your Majestie in my poore
opinione.”[457]
Footnote 456:
Referring not to Elizabeth of Bohemia, but to the Infanta.
Footnote 457:
Nichols, p. 846.
Three days after, the Duke wrote again in a still more insolent
tone; and gave His Majesty his “poore and sausie opinion of what
would be fittest to send.”
Hitherto, the Marquis said, the King had been so sparing, that when
he thought to have sent the Prince sufficient for his own use, and
for presents to the Infanta, and to lend to himself, he, on the
contrary, had been forced to lend jewels to the Prince.[458]
Footnote 458:
Nichols, vol. ii., p. 847, dated March 25, 1623.
“You neede not aske,” Buckingham continued, “who made me able to do
it. Sir, he hath neither chaine nor hat-band, and I beseech you
consider how rich they are in jewells here. Then what a poore
equipage he came in, how he hath no other meanes to appear as a
King’s sonne, how they are usefullest at such a tyme as this, when
they may doe yourselfe, your sonne, and the nation’s honor: and
lastlie, how it will neyther caust nor hasard you anie thinge. These
resons, I hope, since you have ventured allreadie your chiefest
jewel, your sonne, will serve to persuade you to let louse theese
more after him: first, your best hat-band; the Portingall diamond;
the rest of the pendant diamonds to make up a necklace to give his
mistress; and the best roape of pearls, with a rich chaine or tow,
for himselfe to waire, or else your doge must want a collar,[459]
which is the readie way to put him into it. There are manie other
jewells which are of no mean qualitie, as they deserve not that
name, but will save much in your purs, and serve very well for
presents. They had never so good and great an occasion to take the
aire out of their boxes as at this time. God knowes when they shall
have such another, and they had need sometimes to get near the
sonne, to continue them in there perfection.
“Madrid, 25th of Aprill, 1623.”
Footnote 459:
Alluding to having lent the Prince his own jewels.
In a postscript, Buckingham announced that he had sent the King four
asses, five camels, and one elephant, “which,” he adds, “is worth
your seeing, and a Barbarie horse from Walter Aston.” The animals
Buckingham sent he had “imprudentlie begged for:” and he promised
“to lay waitte for all the rare color birds” that could be heard of.
“But if you doe not send your Babie jewells eneugh,” thus his letter
concludes, “ile stope all other presents; therefore, looke to it.”
The King, taking this impertinence as a joke, thanked his “sweet
Steenie gossip” for his “kind, drolling letter,” and suggested that
should Babie not think it fit to present all the jewels to the
Infanta, they should be brought home again; and ventured to propose
also that with regard to a present to the Condé Olivares, horses,
dogs and hawks, and such like stuff sent out of England, “by the
sweete boyes, would be a far more acceptable present than a jewel.”
He began, perhaps, to feel some remorse at his lavish folly. Prince
Henry’s sword—which another father would have valued, independently
of the costly diamonds with which the handle was set—had been given
to the King of Spain. It was considered next in value to the
Prince’s crown, and bestowed on Prince Henry by his royal mother at
his creation as Prince of Wales; and had been sent in a masque, in
the fanciful fashion of the day, as from Tethys to one of the
Meliades.[460] All these jewels were, however, honourably returned
during the year the Spanish match was broken off.[461]
Footnote 460:
Nichols, 848. Note from Archæologia, vol. xv. p. 18.
Footnote 461:
Ibid, 249.
After the important matter of the jewels had been discussed, Charles
received from his father a few lines, protesting, on the word of a
King, that whatsoever his son should promise in his name should be
punctually performed. Charles had asked for something explicit under
His Majesty’s own hand,[462] to show that he had full powers; the
request was presumptuous, but Charles, who wrote it, and Buckingham,
who advised it, knew to whom they applied. “It were a strange
trust,” the King answered, “that I wold refuse to putte upon my owne
son, and upon my best servante.”
Footnote 462:
Ibid, 857.
This servant he was now resolved to honour above all other great
ones of the land, by creating him a Duke. Buckingham had probably
been desirous of obtaining this honour ever since his being created
Marquis, and had been employing every means of compassing his ends,
by the aid of his dependents and partisans at home. Through the
exertions of Secretary Conway, he had been addressed as “your
Excellency.” Since that distinction is only applied to ambassadors,
it is possible that Bristol may have considered it an infringement
on his province to give it to Buckingham.
It was, however, one of Buckingham’s most cherished objects of
ambition to assert a pre-eminence over Bristol at the Court of
Spain.
There was, at this time, no English dukedom; that of York having
merged into the title of Prince of Wales. The Duke of Lennox, the
King’s near relation, was the only Scottish nobleman who bore the
title; and he had, for forty years, held this distinction. In order
to avoid placing the new duke above this nobleman, Lennox was
created Earl of Newcastle-upon-Tyne, and Duke of Richmond, on the
seventeenth of May, and Buckingham was raised to the dukedom on the
eighteenth. It was at the same time in contemplation to create two
more Dukes; the Marquis of Hamilton was to be Duke of Cambridge; the
Earl of Arundel, Duke of Norfolk, that nobleman refusing anything
less than the restitution of that title. These creations did not
take place, partly owing to the pride of the Duchess of Lennox, who
wished to stand alone, and partly to that of Buckingham, whose
letter to the King, on this occasion, shows his great ambition, and
proves his audacity and influence.
It had been at first proposed to make him Duke of Buckingham and
Clarence, thus reviving in his person a title used hitherto only by
the Princes of the blood.
“DEAR DAD AND GOSSOPE,[463]
“It cannot but have bine an infinite trouble to have written so
longe a letter, and so sone, especiallie at this painfull time of
your armes; yet wish I not a word omitted, though the reading forsed
blouses (blushes), deserving them no better; neyther is it fitt I
should dissemble with my master, wherefore I confess I am not a gott
(jot) sorie for the paines you have taken. This might argue I love
myselfe better than my master: but my disobedience in all my future
actions shall witnes the contrarie; and I can trulie say it is not
in the power of your large bountiful hand and hart, ever hereafter,
eyther to increase my dutie and love to you, or to overvalue myselfe
as you doe by thinking it fitt I should be set so farre above my
fellows. There is this difference betwixt that noble hand and hart:
one may surfitt by the one, but not by the other, and soner by yours
than his one (own). Therefore give me leave to stope with mine that
hand which hath bine but too redie to execute the motions and
affections of that kind obliging hart to me. As for that argument,
that this can be no leading case to others, give me leave to say
it’s trew onele in one (but that’s a greate and the maine) poynt,
for I grant that I am more than confident you will never love moree
of your servants (I will pausie here) better than Steenie.
Footnote 463:
Harl. MSS., 6987. In Buckingham’s own Autograph, quoted by
Nichols, note, p. 854.
“Thus it will be no leadeing, but you can not denie but it may be a
president of emulation hereafter to those that shall succeed you, to
expres as much love as you have done to me, and I am sure they may
easelie find better subjects. So, if it be unfit in respect of the
number (of Dukes that may be created), this way it will be
increased; but I mayntaine it’s unfitt in respect there is not here
(in Spain), as in other places, a distinction between Duckes’ and
Kings’ children, and before I make a gape or a stepe to that paritie
between them, I’le disobey you—which is the most I can say or doe. I
have not so much unthankfulness to denie what your Majesty sayeth,
that my former excus of the disproportion of my estate is taken
away, for you have filled a consuming purse, given me faire howses,
more land than I am worthie, and to maintain both me and them,
filled my coffers as full with patents of honer that my shoulders
cannot bare more. This, I say, is a still great argument for me to
refuse; but have not bine contented to rest here, when I thought you
had done more than enough, and as much as you could; but hath found
out a way which, to my heart’s satisfaction, is far above all, for
with this letter you have furnished and enriched my cabinett with so
precious a witnes of your valuation of me, as in future tymes it
cannot be sayde that I rise, as most courtiers doe, through
importunitie, for which caracter of me, and incomparable favor from,
I will sine (sign) with as contented, nay, as proud a hart, from
your poare Steenie, as Duke of Buckingham.”
Meantime, festivities were carried on in Spain which rivalled the
most brilliant spectacles witnessed in that age of pageantry, during
which chivalric manners and chivalric sports were for the last time
seen in England, since they were never revived after the Rebellion.
On Easter Sunday a masque was performed in honour of the strangers.
The Queen, clad in white, in remembrance of the Resurrection, and
decked in jewels, dined in public, first having duly observed the
solemn religious services of the festival.
Prince Charles also dined in public; the gentlemen-tasters, it is
especially noted, attended, and the Earl of Bristol gave them the
towel.
After vespers, the Court assembled, and the palace was thronged with
strangers from the various provinces, all eager to see the “wooer.”
Charles was then in the full vigour of his youth; he is depicted by
Velasquez, at or about this period, as possessing that bloom which
care so early destroys; his face was ever rather interesting and
picturesque than handsome; but it may easily be imagined how, set
off by the charm of manner, the graces of his person may have been
exaggerated by those who now welcomed him as a suitor to the young
princess. He had, on this occasion, adopted, for the first time, the
Spanish national costume, and was in a black dress, “richly garded,”
after the Spanish fashion, with the George about his neck, hanging
by a watchet ribbon. “The enamelled garter,” so states the Spanish
chroniclers, “exceeded that colour” (the watchet) “in brightness,
and his Majesty might as clearly be discerned as a sun amid the
stars. This being not the meanest action and demonstration of his
prudence, that being a travelling guest, who came by the post, not
being able to shine with equal lustre, he came to participate of the
Spanish sun.”[464]
Footnote 464:
Narrative of Andres of Mendoza. This tract was entered at
Stationer’s Hall, July 5, 1623. There is a copy in the British
Museum, and also in the Bodleian Library. Only two others are
known.—Nichols, 856.
From this observation it appears that the jewels promised by James
had not then arrived. The Prince must, therefore, have acted as a
contrast, though not a foil, to King Philip, who was resplendent in
a dress of ash colour, with an immense Golden Fleece, and a huge
chain, baudrick-wise, around his neck, “robbing,” as the annalist
declared, in his girdle, and other jewels, the “glory of Phœbus’
beams;” in his hat he displayed a large waving plume. Then came
Buckingham, whom the chroniclers of the day style the Admiral, and
Olivares, and they repaired to the Queen’s apartments, where the
Infanta, with her Majesty, came out to receive them. At the
interview which then took place, Sir Walter Aston acted as
interpreter; in that capacity he wished the Queen a happy Easter;
the young and blushing Infanta, standing by, received these
compliments, which were presumed to come direct from Charles, with a
modesty and gravity far beyond her years. Then their Majesties went
to the window of the south gallery to see the trial of arms in the
Court of the Palace.
The whole beauty, rank, and splendour of Spain were assembled in
this gallery, but none were more remarkable for grace, and for the
knowledge of the Court, than the Condessa Olivares—whose name was
afterwards coupled with Buckingham’s in scandalous terms. She is
expressively said to have given “a life to all actions of greatness
and courtship.” She was only exceeded in address by her husband,
between whom and Buckingham a coolness soon afterwards commenced. A
trial of arms, the champions and their attendants being masked, then
took place, beginning from the house occupied by Buckingham, near
the Royal Hospital of Misericordia, and extending to the palace,
upon which were set the cartels of challenge, to which the Marquis
de Alcanizas, on the part of the Spaniards, and Buckingham, on that
of the English, were respondents.
Buckinghams’s “livery,” on this occasion, was very costly. It
consisted of hoods of orange, tawny, and silver cloth, set with
flowers and Romaine devices of black cloth, edged with silver in
circles, with turbans in Moorish fashion, and white plumes. Two
courses were run in the palace-court, the chief masker being the
flattered favourite of King James. Amid the gallant throng, four
maskers, in Turkish costume, attracted especial notice. One of them
was discovered, by the brightness of his hair, and his stateliness
in running at the ring, to be the King, who thus testified the
honour he wished to pay to Buckingham by joining in the same
sport.[465]
Footnote 465:
Nichols, p. 864.
The Bull-fight, or Panaderia, followed the trial of arms, and took
place during Pentecost. This cruel diversion had been repeatedly
prohibited by Papal bulls, but to no purpose. So common was it to
have several men killed during a bull-fight, that priests were
always on the spot, ready to confess the dying; and according to
Howell, who was present on this occasion, it was not unusual to see
a man dangling on each horn of the bull, with his entrails hanging
from him.[466]
Footnote 466:
Howell’s Letters.
The bull-fight at which Charles and Buckingham were present, was
held on the first of June; and scarcely had the day dawned, when a
concourse of nobility rushed to the Panaderia or Bullangerie, as it
is called in the old chronicle; where, in the centre of a space
encircled by twelve arches of unpolished stone, a gilded scaffolding
was erected, the lower part of which was covered with cloth of gold
and silver, mingled with crimson. On either side were smaller
scaffoldings, divided from the principal one by partitions of
crimson cloth, spotted with gold. This erection had only been once
used, when the Duc de Maine had visited Madrid for the espousals, by
proxy, with Anne of Austria. On the left hand there was a portal by
which persons seated on the scaffolding might go in and out of the
scaffolding; and on the summit of all were two canopies of Florence
cloth, of carnation-colour, interspersed with gold rays, with chairs
of cloth of gold and silver underneath them, and hung with rich
tapestry. On these various stages stood the nobility of Spain and
the Council; whilst, beneath the canopy, their Majesties were
seated, the Pope’s Nuncio standing on the right hand, and the
several ambassadors on the left. The Corregidores of Madrid, with
their eight servants and four lacqueys, in “glorious liveries” of
plain black velvet, with embroidered skirts, cloaks of black cloth,
and doublets of black lace, and feathers of a colour “which all the
place admired and wondered at,” received the Council,—“that high
senate,” so writes the chronicler, entering with a wonderful
majesty, and so taking their places.
All the ladies of the Court, the nobility and Council and
Corregidores, being placed according to degree, the Queen and the
Infanta made their appearance, driving to the Panaderia in their
coaches. These two Princesses were dressed in dark grey, embroidered
with _lentils_ of gold, and wore plumes and jewels in their hair.
The Queen’s _carroche_, as it was called in the old language of the
day, was followed by numerous other coaches, in which sat the flower
of the Court, all ladies of the highest rank, who, how sombre soever
the fashion of their dresses, displayed in their equipages the
gayest colours, according well with the rich hues which nature, at
that season, produced. This procession was escorted by the Alcaldes
on horseback, whose troop was augmented by a number of English and
Spanish knights, officers, and grandees. As the Queen and Infanta
alighted, they were conducted by the captain of the guard, clad “in
a brave livery of dark yellow,” and wearing a plume, to their seats.
Amid the escort who did honour to the Queen that day, appeared most
conspicuously the then gay and sanguine Charles the First, in the
brief may-day of his life. He rode on a parti-coloured horse, curbed
with no bit, which seemed, beneath its royal burden, to have laid
aside its high spirit, and to submit to the skilful management of
the young equestrian. The Prince, it is specified, looked “relucent
in black and white plumes;” he accompanied the King, mounted on a
dapple grey, also without the bit. Philip wore the dark-coloured
suit of his country. Then came Buckingham, with the Condé Olivares,
the Master of the Horse, preceding the band of English gentry, and
riding with the Council of State and Chamber of Spain.
Having taken their appointed seats, Charles and his countrymen
beheld, first, fifty lacqueys in high-Dutch costume of cloth of
silver, with caps of wrought silver, follow the Duke de Cea, into
the enclosure. Behind the Duke rode the combatants, distinguished by
great tawny plumes, and hose of tawny cloth, laced with silver. They
were scrupulously alike. Scarcely had this gallant Spanish noble
paid his homage to the royal personages present than the Duke de
Maqueda, looking, says the enthusiastic chronicler, “like one of the
Roman Cæsars,” and followed by many noblemen, attended by a hundred
lacqueys in dark-coloured serge, banded with lace, and relieved with
silver belts and white garters, rode gallantly into the palace.
Next appeared the Condé de Villamor, with his fifty lacqueys in
white printed satin, with doublets of azure, silk, and gold, set out
with tufts of gold and silver lace, with white plumes on their hats;
and amid this gorgeous throng, on a chestnut horse, rode the Condé,
his horse’s main and tail being drawn out with silver twist,
“surpassing even the horses of Phœbus’ chariot.” Such was the
waving of feathers, that it was, says the beholder, like “a moving
garden, or an army of Indians.”
And now came the two combatants—Gaviria and Bonifaz; or, as they
were called, Kill-bulls. They, too, had their lacqueys—Bonifaz in
white plumes, whilst those of Gaviria were distinguished by dark
green suits. Lastly, appeared the Cavalier de la Morzilla, who came
to “try his fortune with lance and target.”
Although by right the office of Marshal, on this occasion, belonged
to the Condé Olivares, it was surrendered to Buckingham, Charles
giving precedence to his favourite; so that it was the proud office
of the once lowly Villiers to appear chief in the court of Spain, as
he had often done in that of England. He stood, therefore, behind
the Infanta, Don Carlos, and by the side of Olivares, who acted not
only as an adviser, but also as interpreter—the Duke, it seems,
having never acquired Spanish. The part thus allotted to Olivares,
though a subordinate one, was performed with due punctilio and
courtesy; and as one sensible of the honour which James had done him
in the “letters, full of wisdom and gravity,” with which he had
honoured him.
Then the lacqueys drew back, and looking in their blue and red
colours like a harvest in June blown about by the breeze, left their
lords to the perilous encounter. The bull-fight witnessed by Charles
and Buckingham differed little from that still unhappily the chief
delight of the Spaniards in our own times, except that, to pay the
more refined tribute to the Prince and his favourite, the combatants
were of high rank. As the Condé de Villamor, to whom the first
encounter was allotted, rode to the assault, his retainers showered
darts on the bull; whose hide resembled, according to the flowery
narrative of Mendoza, a quiver, or recalled “the thorny hedges of
Helvetia;” but the bystanders, seeing the poor animal’s agonies,
took out the arrows with great velocity, although, in so doing, they
were in imminent danger of their lives. De Magueda signalised
himself by many brave attempts; but it was the glory of a combatant
named Cantillana that he killed a bull. Bonifaz and Gaviria made
such desperate attacks on the poor animals, that their assaults
could not be counted; but the greatest praise was due to De Velada;
who overthrew two or three hulls by “dint of sword and gore of
lance,” but having wounded one of these infuriated creatures between
the eyes, ran so great a risk that the King; would not suffer him to
enter a second time into the lists. Numerous, indeed, were the feats
that might incite to poetry, or to song, had not the conflict been
of so cruel and so debasing a nature; so that the valour which was
so largely displayed might even be said to verge upon brutality.
Mendoza enumerates them with a savage enthusiasm. Amid the most
successful of the bull-killers appeared the famous Montezuma, who
did credit to his royal blood and established bravery by putting a
bull to flight, the animal having unaccountably showed signs of
fear; he was pursued by Montezuma, and, struck by a cleaving blow of
the sword, was left for dead. As the fight drew near its close,
Antonio Gamio, the Duke de Cea’s second, made one of the bravest
assaults of the day upon a furious bull, upon which he rushed,
leaving half of his lance within him, whilst cries of delight and
shouts of exultation rang through the air, and the bull fell down
dead by the side of the fearless combatant; the horse stood
perfectly still, showing to what a degree of perfection management
had brought the courser; so intrepid when urged onward, so docile
when occasion required.
The bull-fight being ended, the Queen and Infanta returned, beneath
a shower of rain, which surprised them in that season, to the
palace, where they sought repose after the exciting scenes, in which
even the young and gentle Infanta took a delight apparently
inconsistent with her character. Nothing, indeed, can exceed the
raptures of Andres de Mendoza, from whose animated pages this
narrative is drawn. “Since the report is Festival,” he says,
referring to his own exaggerated descriptions, “it is but like to
that which was to be seen with the eye. You would have said as much
if you had but seen them fight with those furious beasts, showing
themselves the more valiant, in that they were undaunted and
resolved Spaniards.”[467]
Footnote 467:
Narrative of Andres de Mendoza, Nichols, p. 869.
END OF VOL I.
R. BORN, PRINTER, GLOUCESTER STREET, REGENT’S PARK.
ERRATA.
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VOL. I.
Page 12, lines 5 and 16—_for_ Brokesby _read_ Brookesby.
” 13, ” 1—_for_ Brokesby, _read_ Brookesby.
” 43, ” 21—_for_ Lord de Ross, _read_ Lord de Roos.
” 87, —_note_.—_for_ Endysmoir Porter, _read_ Endymion
Porter.
” 92, line 6—_for_ Abbo, _read_ Abbot.
” 97, _delete_ first line.
” 108, line 6—_for_ favours _read_ favour.
” 155, ” 17—_for_ King James’s room; though, _read_
King James’s room, where.
” 163, ” 13—_for_ pours out of contention, _read_ comes
out of contention.
” 172, ” 18—_for_ a young lady of the seven, _read_ a
young lady of the seventeenth
century.
” 186, ” 27—_for_ of his succession, _read_ of his successor.
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Transcriber’s Note
There are several anomolies in the footnoting. In the original,
there is a single footnote 1 in the Preface, and the numbering
begins again at the opening of the first chapter. The sequence
continues to 99, and then restarts with 1. This is repeated several
times. There are also several notes which are denoted only with a
traditional asterisk. On occasion, footnotes appear out of order.
There is no apparent reason for the dual system, and it seems most
likely that the non-numeric references were added later, after the
numbering had been completed, and were used to avoid the need to
re-sequence work already done.
For this text, all footnotes have been re-sequenced numerically
across the whole volume, to assure uniqueness. They will appear in
the correct order.
p. 99 Footnote 112 (‘_Ibid._’) had no anchor in the text, but,
based on the passages in Reliquiæ Wottonianæ referred to in
the prior note, the quoted text would seem to end near the
bottom of the page, and has been added there.
p. 105 There is a anchor to a footnote 119 at ‘benefited his family
more than himself.[119]’ which does not appear on the page.
The same anchor appears on p. 107 along with a footnote
using the same number. The dubious anchor has been removed.
p. 152 Footnote 169 had no anchor in the text, but refers to the
quoted passage. An anchor (169)has been added at that point.
The two spellings of the modern Hurstpierpoint, ‘Hurst-pierre-point’
and ‘Hurst-per-point’, are retained, though the second hyphen in the
latter occurs on a line break.
The text ends with a list of _errata_ which covers many of the
issues listed at the end of this note. The intent of this list has
been honored, and the indicated changes made. Links are provided to
the corresponding item in that list.
The first items of the _errata_ would seem to correct the spelling
of the home of the Villiers from ‘Brokesby’ to ‘Brookesby’. There
are two more instances that were not mentioned, which have been
corrected as well.
Errors deemed most likely to be the printer’s have been corrected,
and are noted here. Given the frequent quotations, it was inevitable
that opening and closing quotation marks would sometimes be lost.
They are placed here where the context or voice makes their position
obvious, or where an inspection of the original sources was possible
and allowed for the proper punctuation.
The paragraph beginning on p. 147 ends with a closing quotation
mark. There is no obvious point at which that quotation might begin.
The mark is retained, in any case.
On p. 338, the sentence ending with a reference to note 403 includes
a closing quotation mark, which has no corresponding open. The note
references _State Papers, vol. cxxxix, No. 16_, which seems to be an
error. The topic can be found discussed in _State Papers, vol.
cxliv, No. 16,_, but only the phrases quoted earlier can be found
there. The closing quotation marks seems an error.
On p. 339, continuing on p. 340 there is an long paraphrased passage
from _Reliquiæ Wottonianæ._, p. 213, which would seem to end at
‘Lieutenant of Dover Castle’. The closing quotation mark has been
added there.
The references are to the page and line in the original. Where three
numbers are referenced, the second refers to a note on that page,
and the third to the line therein.
1.17 BRO[O]KESBY, THE NATIVE PLACE OF GEORGE Added.
VILLIERS
12.5 adding to his name the designation of Added.
“Bro[o]kesby;”
12.16 At Bro[o]kesby, the manorial residence Added.
12.26 now owns the name of Bro[o]kesby. Added.
13.1 The town of Bro[o]kesby has, of late years Added.
13.23 From the retirement of Bro[o]kesby Added.
18.10 On the fourth of January, 1[5/6]05-6, Sir Replaced.
George Villiers died.
22.15 “the conservative qualities and ornaments Added.
of youth.[”]
26.34.7 de survivre trop long tem[p]s a ce bon Added.
roi.
28.3 was Ravaillac[s]’s fatal opportunity Removed.
43.21 to the Lord de Ro[s/o]s Replaced.
46.18 this was Burleigh-on-the[ /-]Hill which Replaced.
she sold
47.54.1 Art[.] Lucy Harrington. Added.
63.21 and to bring Villiers in.[’/”] Replaced.
87.93.3 Endy[smoir/mion] Porter’s letters. Replaced.
90.101.11 D’Ewe[s]’s MS. Journal in Bishop Added.
Goodman’s Life
92.6 which was imperatively due to the Primate, Added.
Abbo[t]
97.1 [way most gratifying to an honourable Removed.
mind.]
107.119.6 who were to be excluded from the Order of Added.
St. George,[”]
108.6 and the noble miscreants be restored to Removed.
favour[s].
126.21 the rich banners and streamers,[”] Removed. No
opening.
128.141.5 “were squires of high degree, for cast and Added. No
bravery;[”] closing.
144.7 the “most commended for notable Replaced.
fooling[,/.]”
146.18 he conceived that the partition of the Added. Probable.
kingdom placed him.[”]
147.6 had not public business interfered.[”] _sic_: opening
quote?
150.18 and so was apprehended near Carlisle.[”] Added.
154.15 the most curious combat of world[l]y Added.
passions
155.17 called King James’s room; [though/where] Replaced.
the monarch is said
163.13 [pours/comes] out of contention Replaced.
166.11 to hang him with a silken halter.[”] Added.
167.20 a partner violent, litigious, and Added.
un[s]crupulous.
167.5 without [bans] or licence _sic_: banns
172.18 a young lady of the seven[teenth century] Added.
175.3 Bacon “took to be the worst of his Added.
enemies.[”]
177.12 will set all on fire when he is in.[”] Added.
186.27 would have had the nomination of his Replaced.
success[ion/or]
188.2 for her own good, or her friends.[”] Removed.
202.4 writes Mr. Chamberlain, merrily, [“]at Added.
Newmarket
232.15 but Harvey, “sick and surfeited[”], Added. Probable.
declined attendance
238.275.6 to infatuate him in Sir Thomas Lake’s Replaced.
business[,/.]
248.9 on the site of the ancient Monast[e]ry of Added.
Crutched Friars
279.22 more than at their own interest;[”] Removed.
286.337.6 [5/6]. Peace and war, both foreign and Replaced.
civil
308.26 than he had done as Dean of Added.
Westminster,[”] “which,” he adds,
321.3 [“]and so,” adds the minute observer Added.
323.23 without any sign of agitation.[”] Added.
333.16 [“]and where,” adds the crafty Spaniard Added.
338.13 restored on his return home.[”] Removed.
339.27 [“]It seemed, however,” says the same Added.
writer
340.6 then Lieutenant of Dover Castle.[”] Added.
340.27 says Sir Henry Wotton, [‘/“]singular Replaced.
credit
357.15 the pecuniary difficult[i]es Added.
358.4 [“]The Spaniards, too,” as the Earl stated Added.
359.14 “imperfect note my babie had[’/”] Replaced.
368.23 The King afterwards promised Charles that Added.
[“]though it were Lent
369.1 In the eve[n]ing of Saturday Added.
369.442.4 by the King of Spain.[”] Added.
372.21 at the Monastery of San Gero[min/nim]o Transposed.
381.8 [“]To which James answers:—“I wonder quhy Removed
ye shoulde
393.17 “a life to all actions of greatness and Added.
courtship.[”]
398.6 his horse’s [main] and tail _sic_: mane
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