Arrival of James VI. of Scotland—Ralegh in immediate disfavour—Gondomar comments on James—Ralegh accused of treason—Cobham and Brooke—Ralegh attempts suicide—Cobham's retractions—November 17—And the trial's infamy.

Slowly King James moved on his royal progress to London to the acclamation of the people of all the towns through which he passed. "The Council of State and the Nobility, no doubt assisted with the Spirit of Truth, considering the infallible right of our Sovereign Lord, King James, took such order that the news of the Queen's death should no sooner be spread to deject the hearts of the people, but, at the instant, they should be comforted with the Proclaiming of the King." The people were intoxicated with the prospect of the new king coming peaceably to reign over the kingdom, for the fear of a civil war had been imminent and universal. The country burst into a salvo of welcome; a new era of peace and prosperity was to be inaugurated. Scotland now joined to England lessened the fear of invasion. "They now began duly to think upon his unmatched virtues, which never the most malicious enemy could impeach ... they now considered his affability mercy justice and magnanimity." The hopes of every party ran high. The Catholics knew that he was inclined towards friendliness; the Churchmen felt sure that they who had been chief instigators in bringing him to the throne of England, could rely upon his support. The Puritans had heard of his godliness and his tolerance to their views. Each vied with the other in sounding the praises of the new King. "But our King coming through the North," writes Mr. Arthur Wilson, "(Banquetting and Feasting by the way) the applause of the people in so obsequious and submissive a manner (still admiring change) was checkt by an honest plain Scotsman ... with a propheticall expression. This people will spoil a gud King. The King as unused, so tired with multitudes, especially in his Huntinge (which he did as he went) caused an inhibition to be published, to restrain his people from hunting him. Happily being fearful of so great a concourse, as this novelty produced, the old hatred betwixt the Borderers not yet forgotten, might make him apprehend it to be of a greater extent: though it was generally imputed to a desire of enjoying his recreations without interruption."

Few kings have received such a welcome; few kings have proved themselves so unworthy as the event proved James. But the prestige of his welcome and his rescue from the Gunpowder Plot hid his true character for many years from the people under the obscuring cloud of sentiment.

"Now expectation, tickling skittish spirits
Sets all to hazard."

Every one connected with the Court and Court appointments hastened to meet him and win his good will: and James was lavish in his treatment. He created innumerable knights, and raised so many to the peerage that "some unhappy fancy pasted up a Pasquil in Pauls, wherein he pretended an art to help weak memories to a competent knowledge of the names of the Nobility." Sir Robert Cecil was created Baron of Essingdon and soon after Viscount Cranborn and Earl of Salisbury. Lord Henry Howard was made Earl of Northampton.

During the Queen's last illness Ralegh was in Devonshire. Directly he heard of the news of her death he hastened with Sir Robert Cross to pay his respects to the new sovereign. Cecil advised him to spare himself the trouble; but he did not listen to Cecil's advice. He came to the King at Burghley House, trusting in his power to impress himself favourably upon the King. But James had been too carefully primed against him. Old Aubrey's gossip bears the stamp of truth; it is so characteristic of James, that he should have met the great Ralegh with a pun upon his name—"I have heard but rawly of thee." Ralegh spoke with James about business connected with the Duchy of Cornwall; he wanted a royal letter authorizing the continuance of legal process, and a warrant to stop "the waste of woods and parks" which he said was due to Lord Treasurer Buckhurst's heedlessness. James listened, and gave instructions to his secretary, Sir Thomas Lake, to write the necessary letters as quickly as possible, that he might be rid of the man whom he feared and disliked. "Let them be delivered speedily that Ralegh may be gone again."

James was not slow in compassing Ralegh's downfall. Two weeks passed by and Ralegh was summoned to the Council Chamber, where the Lord President informed him that James no longer desired his services as Captain of the Guard; that the honour had been conferred upon the King's countryman, Sir Thomas Erskine, to whom Ralegh was bidden to hand all appurtenances of the office.

Ralegh had increased James's dislike of him by suggesting that articles should be framed which should prevent the King's countrymen from devouring the kingdom like locusts. The advisability of such a measure became manifest to all later, when it was too late. Naturally the first man to suffer was Ralegh himself. But the indignity was glossed over—not for Ralegh's sake so much as to hinder unpleasant gossip about the new appointment—by increasing Ralegh's salary as Governor of Jersey by three hundred pounds per annum. Ralegh's loss was directly due to Cecil, to whom James had given the disposal of the office, and who gained new favour with James by electing a Scotchman. For seven weeks Ralegh enjoyed the added emolument.

His last interview with James took place at Beddington Park, in Surrey, which was the seat of his uncle, Sir Nicolas Carew. There Ralegh, anxious to prove his loyalty to the King, gave him his "Discourse touching a War with Spain, and of the protecting of the Netherlands," and offered to carry on his enterprises against Spain (he always had his great Guiana scheme in the front of his mind) by offering "to carry two thousand men to invade him without the King's charge." He could not have made a more inauspicious suggestion to the timorous James; but Ralegh did not realize how the King was influenced against him to such an extent that he would be quick to think that the man who could raise so many men to fight the Spaniard, could at less expense raise them to fight his own Majesty. Moreover, James, from no high motives, but merely from terror at the sight even of a drawn sword, hated war and fighting of any kind, and distrusted, as is shown by his choice of favourites, the quality of bravery in others. All Ralegh's grip of a situation, his clearness of exposition, his courage would be against him in a conference with James. The standard by which a man was judged had changed, now that the great Queen was in her grave. The clever Gondomar summed James up to a nicety when he wrote, without any need (for once) of diplomacy, "James has a vanity so enormous that, in order to make him play his adversary's game, you have simply to let James believe that it is from himself that the adversary has learnt to know how to play." His favourites were men who were more adroit in the use of poison than in the use of the sword. It is easy to imagine what were the feelings of James as Ralegh propounded his masterly exposition of the Spanish situation, and offered his own services. There would be something burlesque in this interview between the brave man and the coward, if absolute power of life and death were not in the hands of the coward, and if the coward had not already determined to use his power to the detriment of the brave man.

The carefully planned toils were closing round Ralegh. Copley was arrested in Sussex, and in consequence of his first examination, which was dated July 12, George Brooke was arrested two days afterwards, and orders were given for the arrest of Lord Grey and Sir Griffin Markham. On the 14th or 15th, Cobham, George Brooke's brother, was examined by the Council. They were accused of complicity with the "Treason of the Priests." Now, treason at that time was formidable, and it was necessary to treat it in a summary fashion. In every nation there must be a large number of discontented people who would combine if there was a man of sufficient influence to lead them in any way; very little was known in spite of spies; man dealt with man; there was no proper way of gauging public opinion; a spark might set all the disaffected into a dangerous fire. Now discontent is aired in the newspapers; every one can read what happens in Parliament. Treason is no longer a thing to dread. But then it was a constant danger, and the least suspicion of treasonable practices was sufficient to condemn a man to a death of horrible ignominy. Justice was swift but not unerring. A man had not only to keep clear of treason, but must have the wit to avoid even the suspicion. It is easy to see how the power thus put into the hands of the Government, though such power was essential to its safety and the welfare of the citizens, could be abused. And there is probably no instance in history where its abuse is more conspicuous than in the treatment of Ralegh. Cecil feared Ralegh; James feared Ralegh. There is nothing so unscrupulous, nothing so dangerous and so cruel as fear. The world lay obscured by the dark cloud of Time and of Space; and terrible scope was given to fear by the insuperable darkness.

The suspected man was shut up alone, and a Bishop or a Judge or a Councillor was told off to examine him; and the man knew quite well that his answers might be made more satisfactory by the help of the rack, and that his examiner would earn reward and distinction by discovering treason and his associates in treason. The promise, too, of a pardon was often dangled before his eyes to loosen his tongue. Such promises were not often kept. Brooke implicated Cobham, and Cobham implicated Ralegh.

George Brooke, Cobham's brother, was a light-hearted fellow, who was drawn into listening to the priest's conspiracy, because he had been disappointed of some small office upon which he had set his heart. To Bishop Bancroft was assigned the task of examining him. Large rewards were offered the Bishop if he were successful in finding out the details of the conspiracy. "The only way to procure favour is to open all that possibly you can" were the words with which the good Bishop began his inquiry. And gradually he played upon the fears and hopes of the prisoner to such an extent that the wretched man burst into a kind of rapture of confession, stating all he knew and all he imagined to be fact, about the treason against King James. Day after day the examination was continued relentlessly; statements made by other prisoners, or said to have been made, were told him; lists of written questions were given him. It would have taken a man of extraordinary strength and control to have kept his balance under such circumstances. George Brooke was a very ordinary man. On July 17 he said: "The conspirators among themselves thought Sir Walter Ralegh a fit man to be of the action." The good Bishop did not leave such an important statement undeveloped; under his careful management the statement by the end of August had grown; Brooke was ready to swear that Ralegh and Cobham had resolved to kill the King and his cubs.

Cobham, too, was examined in the same relentless manner. He was a little stronger than his brother, George Brooke, but no match for the examiners. He began by steadfastly denying everything; his nerves, however, could not bear the terrible suspense. He had been suddenly removed to solitary confinement; the horror of a dreadful death loomed over him. He did not know who might be arrested, who might desire his death. At length some of the confessions of his brother were disclosed to him; but the examiners named Ralegh, not Brooke, as the authority; and Cobham, knowing that Ralegh must have invented or guessed at such things, broke into an outcry of disgust (who can blame him!), "Oh traitor, oh villain! I will now tell you all the truth." And he said that he had never entered into these courses but by Ralegh's instigation, and that Ralegh would never let him alone. It was very cleverly done by the examiner. Cobham was led into confessing, helped by questions from George Brooke's statements, that "he had conferred with Arenberg about procuring 500,000 or 600,000 crowns from the King of Spain; and that nothing should be done with the money until he had spoken with Sir Walter Ralegh, for distribution of the money to them which were discontented in England." Then part of a letter from Ralegh to Cecil—for Cecil knew much of the intercourse between Arenberg and England in his official capacity—was shown to Cobham, in which it was written, "If da Renzy were not secured, the matter would not be discovered, for da Renzy would fly; yet if he were then apprehended, it would give matter of suspicion to Lord Cobham." Naturally Cobham, reading such words at the moment when they were shown him, constructed them into his death sentence, and broke out into fury of denunciation sufficient for the bad purpose of the examiners—to close the net round Ralegh. Lord Henry Howard justly remarks in his "Adversaria," "It is an old observation of jugglers to make others give fire to the piece after they themselves have charged it, and thereby put them into the peril of recoil or breaking, if any mischief follow." Lord Henry Howard may be taken as an authority on this subject.

Immediately after Cobham's outbreak, Ralegh was arrested and sent to the Tower, to await the slow, strange process of justice. His arrest took place at the beginning of August. Almost immediately the Government of Jersey was transferred to Sir John Peyton, Governor of the Tower. James in his grant stated that the post was forfeited by Sir Walter Ralegh through the grievous treason against the Crown. With the King thus quickly convinced of his guilt, Ralegh knew that he had small chance of proving his innocence. Dismay came upon him and despair. His hopes fell from a great height and were broken. Suddenly shut closely in by four stone walls, he was obliged to wait the slow approach of an ignominious death—a death which would involve the ruin of his family, and the immediate disgrace of his name. He was a man of action; he could not sit and do nothing but think. Despair brought madness to him; he tried to kill himself in a fit of impotent despair. This is the way in which Cecil, once Ralegh's friend, writes of it. "Although lodged and attended as well as in his own house, yet one afternoon, while divers of us were in the Tower examining these prisoners, Sir Walter Ralegh attempted to have murdered himself. Whereof, when we were advertised, we came to him and found him in some agony, seeming to be unable to bear his misfortune, and protesting innocency, with carelessness of life. In that humour he had wounded himself under the right pap, but no way mortally; being in truth rather a cut than a stab."

On August 13, Ralegh was examined about Cobham's negotiations with Arenberg. His statement was: "Lord Cobham offered me 10,000 crowns of the money, for the furthering of the Peace between England and Spain; and he said that I should have it within three days. I told him, 'When I see the money I will make you an answer.' For I thought it one of his ordinary idle conceits, and therefore made no account thereof. But this was as I think before Count Arenberg's coming over." And in a letter written to the Lords of the Council a few days after this examination, in which he proclaims his innocence of any treasonable practice, he breaks out, after enumerating his exploits against Spain, in bitterness at the irony of the charge. "Alas, to what end should we live in the world if all the endeavours of so many testimonies shall be blown off with one blast of breath, or be prevented by one man's charge."

Lord Cobham had made several retractions of his outburst against Ralegh, both at Ralegh's instigation and on his own initiative. Sir George Harvey, the Governor of the Tower, was discreet enough to keep back the latter retraction until one month after the trial, when he showed Cecil a letter in which Cobham wrote of his accusation, "God is my wittness, it doth troble my contiens." Terror had unhinged Cobham's mind, he accused Ralegh and retracted his accusations in such a way that one retraction more or less mattered little; Sir George Harvey's sense of duty, however, is significant.

The indictment was drawn up at Staines on the 21st of September. Three months were allowed to elapse before the trial took place. Meanwhile, Sir Francis Godolphin, High Sheriff of Cornwall, was authorized to take the muster of the county, "the Commission of Lieutenancy granted to Sir Walter Ralegh being become void and determined." In October Arenberg left England for Flanders, overwhelmed with evidence of the King's favour. The plague was raging in London, and accordingly the trial was to be held at Winchester. Sir William Waad was ordered to bring Sir Walter Ralegh to Wolvesey Castle—the episcopal palace of Winchester. Waad wrote to Cecil, "It was hob or nob whether Ralegh should have been brought alive through such multitudes of unruly people as did exclaim against him. We took the best order we could in setting watches through the streets, both in London and the suburbs. If one hare-brain fellow amongst so great multitudes had begun to set upon him—as they were very near to do it—no entreaty or means could have prevailed; the fury and tumult of the people was so great." Ralegh was driven in his own carriage; he faced the mob with disdain.

On the 17th of November the trial began; and the after comment of one of "these my judges" was true: "That trial injured and degraded the justice of England." The Commissioners were eleven in number: Thomas Howard, Earl of Suffolk, who had fought with Ralegh at Cadiz; Charles Blount, Earl of Devonshire; Lord Henry Howard; Robert Cecil, Earl of Salisbury; Edward, Lord Wotton of Morley; Sir William Waad; Sir John Stanhope, Vice-Chamberlain; the Lord Chief Justice of England, Popham; the Lord Chief Justice of the Common Pleas, Anderson; Mr. Justice Gawdie and Mr. Justice Warburton. Coke, as Attorney-General, conducted the prosecution, and was assisted by Serjeant Hale. The Clerk of the Crown Office, having read the commission of Oyer and Terminer, the prisoner was bidden to hold up his hand, and then the indictment was read, the gist of which is as follows:—

That he did conspire and go about to deprive the King of his government, to raise up sedition within the realm, to alter religion, to bring in the Roman superstition, and to procure foreign enemies to invade the kingdom. That the Lord Cobham, the 9th of June last, did meet with the said Sir Walter Ralegh, in Durham House, and then and there had conference with him how to advance Arabella Stuart to the crown and royal throne of this kingdom. And that then and there it was agreed that Cobham should treat with Arenberg, ambassador from the Archduke of Austria, to obtain of him 600,000 crowns to bring to pass their intended treason. It was agreed that Cobham should go to the Archduke Albert to procure him to advance the pretended title of Arabella. From thence, knowing that Albert had not sufficient means to maintain his own army in the Low Countries, Cobham should go to Spain, to procure the king to assist and further her pretended title. It was agreed, the better to effect all this conspiracy, that Arabella should write three letters, one to the Archduke, another to the King of Spain, and a third to the Duke of Savoy, and promise three things—

First.—To establish a firm peace between England and Spain.

Secondly.—To tolerate the popish and Roman superstition.

Thirdly.—To be ruled by them in contracting of her marriage.

And further, that Cobham and his brother Brooke met on the 9th of June last, and Cobham told Brooke all these treasons; to the which treasons Brooke gave his assent and did join himself to all these. And after, on the Thursday following, Cobham and Brooke did speak these words, that there would never be a good world in England till the King (meaning our sovereign lord) and his cubs (meaning the royal issue) were taken away.

And the more to disable and deprive the King of his crown, and to confirm the said Cobham in his intents Ralegh did publish a book falsely written against the most just and royal title of the King, which book Cobham after that received of him, and did deliver unto Brooke. And further by the traitorous instigation of Ralegh, Cobham did incite Brooke to move Arabella to write to the three forenamed princes to procure them to advance her title. Further, Cobham, by the instigation of Ralegh did write letters to the Count Arenberg for the obtaining of the 600,000 crowns, which money by other letters Count Arenberg did promise to perform the payment of. And then did Cobham promise to Ralegh that when he had received the said money he would deliver 8000 crowns to him.

To the indictment Sir Walter Ralegh pleaded NOT GUILTY. Sir Walter Ralegh was then asked whether he would take exception to any of the jury; and he made answer, "I know none of them; they are all Christians and honest gentlemen. I except against none." He did not know that the original jurymen had been changed; he did not know that the names of three near servants to the Queen Elizabeth had been erased from the panel overnight, being thought unsuitable for their purpose.

Earl Suffolk.—You, gentlemen of the King's learned counsel follow the same course as you did the other day.

Ralegh.—My lord, I pray you I may answer the points particularly as they are delivered, by reason of the weakness of my memory and sickness.

Lord Chief Justice Popham.—After the King's learned counsel have delivered all the evidence, Sir Walter, you may answer particularly to what you will.

Then spake the King's Serjeant at Law, by name Hele; of this man Edwards points out that "he was more notable as a brawler and a buffoon—and also as a moneylender, in which capacity he hoped to win a very large stake by the ruin of Lord Cobham—than as a lawyer." The tone of his short speech may be gathered from this typical sentence at the conclusion. "It appears that Cobham took Ralegh to be either a god or an idol. Cobham endeavours to set up a new king, or governor: God forbid mine eyes should ever see so unhappy a change! As for the Lady Arabella, she, upon my conscience hath no more title to the crown than I have, which before God I utterly renounce. Cobham, a man bred in England, hath no experience abroad; but Ralegh, a man of great wit, military and a swordman. Now whether these things were bred in a hollow tree, I leave to them to speak of, who can speak far better than myself."

Sir Edward Coke, the King's Attorney, then rose to his feet. It is well to remember that it was Coke's business, as the King's Attorney, to prove Ralegh guilty of treason, and that as he had almost no evidence in his support, his business was one of extreme difficulty. Cobham's accusation was his only evidence, and that must be used with caution, owing to Cobham's retractations. The trial was of the utmost importance; his professional reputation was at stake; the very difficulty put him on his mettle. He rose magnificently to the occasion. With such evidence at his disposal he could not quietly prove Ralegh's guilt. His chief weapons were the appeal to the jury's loyalty and abuse of the prisoner—especially abuse, by which he hoped to brow-beat him. His speech was long and learned. He began by dividing the mischief of treason into three divisions—imitation, supportation, and defence, and by enlarging upon the main conspiracy of the priests Watson and Copley, with which, as Ralegh pointed out, he was in no way connected, even in the indictment. Undeterred, Coke continued his oration. He gave instances of treason, he defined treason at length, and then he suddenly began to praise the character of King James, and, turning angrily to Ralegh, exclaimed: "To whom Sir Walter did you bear malice? To the royal children?" To which Ralegh answered: "Master Attorney, I pray you to whom or to what end speak you all this? I protest I do not understand what a word of this means, except it be to tell me news. What is the treason of Markham and the priests to me?"

Coke. "I will then come close to you. I will prove you to be the most notorious traitor that ever came to the bar."

Ralegh. "Your words cannot condemn me; my innocency is my defence. Prove against me any one thing of the many that you have broken, and I will confess all the Indictment, and that I am the most horrible traitor that ever lived."

Coke. "Nay I will prove all. Thou art a monster; thou hast an English face, but a Spanish heart."

Then Coke proceeded to give a minute account of Cobham's plots in such a way that, as Edwards notes, only the most unprejudiced and attentive listener would fail to be trapped into thinking that he was relating the plots of Ralegh. The device was clever, but it was unscrupulous. Ralegh, in spite of his recent imprisonment and his imminent danger, remained master of himself and of the situation. He withstood Coke's implications as resolutely as he withstood Coke's abuse. "What is that to me?" he asked the Court, after Coke had ended his clever recital of Cobham's practices. "What is that to me? I do not hear yet that you have spoken one word against me. Here is no treason of mine done. If my Lord Cobham be a traitor, what is that to me?"

At this the King's Attorney broke into savage abuse. "All that he did was by thy instigation, thou viper; for I thou thee, thou traitor! I will prove thee the rankest traitor in all England."

But Ralegh was not to be inveigled into losing his presence of mind by Coke's insults, as Coke, of course, knowing Ralegh's temperament, intended him to do. Never did Ralegh show greater proof of his power than at this his trial, when circumstances were pressing most hardly upon him; he answered—there is the suavity of strength in his answer—"No, no, Master Attorney, I am no traitor. Whether I live or die I shall stand as true a subject as ever the King hath. You may call me a traitor, at your pleasure; yet it becomes not a man of quality or virtue to do so. But I take comfort in it. It is all that you can do, for I do not yet hear that you charge me with any treason."

The Lord Chief Justice Popham was here obliged to come to the help of the King's Attorney, who was finding the case more difficult than he expected. It was important that the people present, by whom the news of the trial would be spread through England, should not be impressed in the prisoner's favour. He said, realizing that Coke's last coup had been a failure: "Sir Walter Ralegh, Master Attorney speaks out of the zeal of his duty for the service of the King, and you for your life; be patient, on both sides."

Then Coke proceeded: "I charge Sir Walter Ralegh with contriving and conspiring all this that I have recited. And now I will read my proofs for it." He did so. That is to say, he read the most incriminating of the confessions which the distraught Lord Cobham had made. While Coke read this Declaration, there was silence in the hall—certainly a haunting silence. Then Ralegh spoke. "This is absolutely all the evidence that can be brought against me. But now I beseech you, hear me. I was examined at Windsor touching the Surprising Treason; next of plotting for Arabella; thirdly of practices with the Lord Cobham. From all which God knows I was free, for I never was privy to any of them. It is true that I suspected that the Lord Cobham kept intelligence with D'Arenberg. For I knew that long since—in the late Queen's time—he held that course with him in the Low Countries, as was well known to my Lord Treasurer, and to my Lord Cecil. La Renzi being a man also well known to me, I, seeing him and the Lord Cobham together, thought that was the time they both had been to Count D'Arenberg. I gave intimation thereof. But I was willed by my Lord Cecil not to speak of this; because the King, at the first coming of D'Arenbergh, would not give him occasion of suspicion. Wherefore I wrote to the Lord Cecil that if La Renzi were not taken, the matter would not be discovered. Yet if he were then apprehended, it would give matter of suspicion to the Lord Cobham. This letter of mine being presently showed to the Lord Cobham, he presently entered into a rage against me and spake bitterly and railingly of me; yet ere he came to the stairs'-foot, he repented him, and, as I heard, acknowledged that he had done me wrong."

Ralegh paused: up till now he had been speaking to the Court and to the jury, quietly replying to the charges that had been brought against him. Now he turned to Sir Edward Coke, the King's Attorney, and made this speech, magnificent in its effect even in the version of the reporter, even after more than three hundred years, now when no one feels anything but great friendliness towards Spain; you can see the man draw himself up to his full height, the man who had risked his life for his country—Spain's most dreadful enemy, as he faced the attorney whose business it was to brow-beat him to ruin.

"Master Attorney, whether to favour or to disable my Lord Cobham you speak as you will of him; yet he is not such a babe as you make him. He hath dispositions of such violence, which his best friends could never temper. But it is very strange that I, at this time, should be thought to plot with the Lord Cobham knowing him a man that hath neither love nor following; and myself, at this time having resigned a place of my best command, in an office I had in Cornwall. I was not so bare of sense but I saw that, if even this State was strong, it was now that we have the kingdom of Scotland united whence we were wont to fear all our troubles; Ireland quieted where our forces were wont to be divided; Denmark assured whom before we were always wont to have in jealousy; the Low Countries our nearest neighbours. And, instead of a Lady whom Time had surprised, we had now an active King who would be present at his own businesses. For me at this time to make myself a Robin Hood, a Watt Tyler, a Kett, or a Jack Cade! I was not so mad! I knew the state of Spain well—his weakness, his poorness, his humbleness at this time. I knew that six times we had repulsed his forces: thrice in Ireland, thrice at sea—once upon our coast, twice upon his own. Thrice had I served against him myself at sea, wherein for my Country's sake, I had expended of my own property forty thousand marks. I knew that where beforetime he was wont to have forty great sails, at the least, in his ports, now he hath not past six or seven. But for sending to his Indies, he was driven to have strange vessels—a thing contrary to the institutions of his ancestors who straitly forbade that, even in case of necessity, they should make their necessity known to strangers. I knew that of twenty-five millions which he had from his Indies, he had scarce any left. Nay, I knew his poorness to be such at this time, as that the Jesuits, his imps, begged at his church-doors; his pride so abated that, notwithstanding his former high terms, he was become glad to congratulate His Majesty and send unto him. Whoso knew what great assurances he stood upon with other States, for smaller sums, would not think he would so freely disburse to my Lord Cobham six hundred thousand crowns! And, if I had minded to set my Lord Cobham awork in such a case, I would have given him some instructions how to persuade the King. For I knew Cobham no such minion that could persuade a King that was in want to disburse so great a sum, without great reason and some assurance for his money. I knew the Queen of England lent not her money to the States, but she had Flushing, Brill, and other towns, in assurance for it. She lent not money to the King of France without she had Newhaven for it. Nay, her own subjects, the merchants of London, did not lend her money, without they had their lands to pawn for it. And to show I am not Spanish—as you term me—at this time I had writ a treatise to the King's Majesty of the present state of Spain, and reasons against the Peace."

So spake Sir Walter Ralegh, summing up the whole question of policy which was occupying the minds of all men, and drawing attention to the great part which he had played in gaining naval supremacy for England.

He then went on to explain that the business which had brought him of late years so much in Cobham's company was of a private nature, concerning the improvement of Cobham's estate, and the purchase of a fee-farm from the Duke of Lennox. He showed that Cobham was a wealthy and prosperous man, not one who could easily be moulded to treason from despair at his poverty.

Then another examination of Cobham was read, in which a second time he had exclaimed, "O wretch, O traitor." The trickery is absurdly patent. It resembles a game of chess in which one player as often as his black queen is taken, hastily substitutes another black queen in its place. At this juncture the foreman of the jury, Sir Thomas Fowler, was ill-advised enough to ask a simple question. "I desire to understand of the Court the time of Sir Walter Ralegh's first letter, and of the Lord Cobham's accusation." The Court looked at him in amazement, and Lord Cecil rose to his feet and immediately began a long and cunning speech. "I am divided in myself and at great dispute what to say of this gentleman at the bar. For it is impossible, be the obligations never so great, but the affections of nature and love will show themselves. A former dearness betwixt me and this gentleman tied upon the knot of his virtues, though slacked since by his actions, I cannot but acknowledge; and the most of you know it." The speech was cunning and involved. He made no mention of time; he harped upon his personal sorrow in being obliged to speak against a man whom he once loved; his personal loyalty, which was stronger than his affection had ever been, alone compelled him. Two dates were all that were wanted; they could not be given. So Cecil gave vent to his sorrow. Hypocrisy could go no further.

Directly that Lord Cecil had finished, Sir Edward Coke, the King's Attorney, continued his accusation, trying to turn Ralegh's great outburst about the state of Spain to Ralegh's disadvantage, trying to prove it only another instance of his treachery. "Methinks it would have been better for you to have stayed in Guiana than to be so well acquainted with the state of Spain. As to the six overthrows of the King of Spain, I answer 'he hath the more malice' because repulses breed desire of revenge. As for you writing against the Peace with Spain, you sought but to cloak a Spanish traitor's heart," and more to the same effect.

When he had finished Ralegh rose to make his last claim on justice. "My lords," he said, "I claim to have my accuser brought here to speak face to face. Though I know not how to make my best defence by law, yet, since I was a prisoner, I have learned that by the Law and Statutes of this realm in case of treason a man ought to be convicted by the testimony of two witnesses. I will not take upon me to defend the matter upon the Statute of the twenty-fifth of Edward the Third, though that requires an overt act. But remember I beseech your Lordships, the Statute of the first of Edward the Sixth which saith: 'No man shall be condemned of treason, unless he be accused by two lawful accusers.' And by the Statute of the fifth and sixth of Edward the Sixth, those accusers must be brought in person before the party accused, at his arraignment if living!" He continued to instance other laws; he pointed out that Cobham was not only living but in the same town, in the same palace. He called to mind the case of Fortescue, who had condemned a woman to death on the witness of one man for the murder of her husband, and who could never forgive himself for the injustice when the servant of the man confessed at length to the murder. He drew instances from the Bible, and the Canon of God, and concluded with this appeal for justice: "If then by the Statute Law, by the Civil Law and by God's Word, it be required that there be two witnesses, at the least, bear with me if I desire one. Prove me guilty of these things by one witness only, and I will confess the Indictment, I stand not upon the niceties of the law. If I have done these things I deserve not to live; whether they be treasons by the law or no. I beseech you then, my Lords, let Cobham be sent for. Let him be charged upon his soul, upon his allegiance to the King; and if he will then maintain his accusation to my face, I will confess myself guilty." The Court were at first taken aback by this unexpected knowledge of the law, but not for long. The Lord Chief Justice Popham, who played the strange triple part of assistant in the examination, of witness for the prosecution, and of presiding judge, explained that such a course was quite out of the question. "The statutes you speak of in cases of treason were found to be inconvenient and were taken away by another law. Those of Edward the Sixth are general, but were repealed by the first and second of Philip and Mary, which you have mentioned, which Statute goes only to the treasons therein comprised, and also appoints the trial of treasons to be as before it was at the Common Law. Now the twenty-fifth of Edward the Third makes declaration what the Common Law was. All is now therefore put to the Common Law. And by the Common Law one witness is sufficient and the accusation of confederates or the confession of others is full proof." And Mr. Justice Warburton went one further in making this point strong for the prosecution; he added the personal touch of insult, which is characteristic of the trial. "I marvel, Sir Walter," he said, "that you, being of such experience and wit, should stand on this point. For many horse-stealers should escape, if they may not be condemned without witnesses. By law a man may be condemned upon presumption and circumstances without any witness to the main fact. As, if the King, whom God defend, should be slain in his chamber and one be shown to have come forth of the chamber with his sword drawn and bloody. Were not this evidence both in law and opinion, without further inquisition?"

The point was discussed at some length, and then it became time again to bring forward accusations of Cobham, which were accordingly read; this time also depositions of Copley, Watson, and George Brooke were also read to the effect that somebody had heard from somebody else how Cobham and Ralegh stood for the Spanish faction. Again Ralegh pointed out that this had nothing to do with his charge, and again asked, "Good, my Lords, let my accuser come face to face and be deposed." But that was not permitted.

Coke. "Now let us come to the words of destroying of the 'King and his cubs.'"

Ralegh. "O barbarous! if they like unnatural vilains spoke such words, shall I be charged with them? I will not hear it! I was never false to the Crown of England. I have spent £40,000 of mine own against the Spanish faction for the good of my country. Do you bring the words of those hellish spiders Clarke, Watson, and others against me?"

Coke. "Thou hast a Spanish heart and thyself art a spider of hell. For thou confessest the King to be a most sweet and gracious prince, and yet thou hast conspired against him."

The reading of Cobham's examination was continued, wherein Cobham said he had a book "written against the title of the king which he had of Ralegh, and that he gave it to his brother Brooke, and Ralegh said it was foolishly written.

Coke. "After the king came within twelve miles of London, Cobham never came to see him; and intended to travel without seeing the queen and the prince. Now in this discontentment you gave him the book, and he gave it his brother."

Ralegh. "I never gave it him, he took it off my table. For I well remember a little before that time I received a challenge from Sir Amias Preston, and for that I did intend to answer it, I resolved to leave my estate settled, therefore laid out all my loose papers, among which was this book."

Ld. Howard. "Where had you this book?"

Ralegh. "In the old Lord-Treasurer's study, after his death."

Cecil. "Did you ever show or make known the book to me?"

Ralegh. "No, my lord."

Cecil. "Was it one of the books which was left to me or my brother?"

Ralegh. "I took it out of the study in my Lord-Treasurer's house in the Strand."

Then Cecil explained that after his father's death Ralegh was allowed to search in the library for cosmo-graphical descriptions of the Indies. Again he referred to his great love for Ralegh, and said he thought it a little unkindly done on Sir Walter's part to remove the book without his knowledge. It was a book in manuscript on which the Lord-Treasurer had written, "This is the book of Robert Snagg." Brooke burned it; the most was made of this incident.

Popham asked, "Wherefore should this book be burnt?"

Ralegh. "I burned it not."

Serjeant Philips. "You presented your friend with it when he was discontented. If it had been before the queen's death it had been a less matter, but you gave it him presently when he came from the king, which was the time of his discontentment."

Ralegh. "Here is a book supposed to be treasonable; I never read it, commended it, or delivered it, nor urged it."

Coke. "Why, this is cunning."

Ralegh. "Everything that doth make for me is cunning, and everything that maketh against me is probable."

The point was then raised about Captain Keymis, who had been rigorously examined. He was well known to be friendly to Ralegh. He proved, however, a faithful friend. Cobham said that Keymis came to him with a letter torn. But of this nothing came; Keymis had been too staunch to add anything to the truth, and the matter was dropped. More testimony of Cobham was then read concerning letters to Arabella, and again Ralegh insisted on Cobham's presence. "Let me speak for my life," cried Ralegh; "it can be no hurt for him to be brought; he dares not accuse me. If you grant me not this favour, I am strangely used. Campian was not denied to have his accusers face to face."

Popham. "Since he must needs have justice, the acquitting of his old friend may move him to speak otherwise than the truth."

Ralegh. "If I had been the infuser of all these treasons into him—you Gentlemen of the Jury, mark this, he said I have been the cause of all his miseries, and the destruction of his house, and that all evil hath happened unto him by my wicked counsel—if this be true, whom hath he cause to accuse and to be revenged on, but on me? And I know him to be as revengeful as any man on earth."

Coke. "He is a party, and may not come; the law is against it."

Ralegh. "It is a toy to tell me of law; I defy such law, I stand on the fact."

Cecil. "I am afraid my often speaking (who am inferior to my lords here present) will make the world think I delight to hear myself talk. My affection to you, Sir Walter Ralegh, was not extinguished but slaked in regard of your deserts. You know the law of the realm (to which your mind doth not contest) that my Lord Cobham cannot be brought." The King's Attorney, Sir Edward Coke, took up the thread of his much-interrupted discourse, and this time he brought forward a witness, one Dyer, a pilot. Dyer was accordingly sworn, and delivered this evidence: "I came to a merchant's house in Lisbon to see a boy that I had there, there came a gentleman into the house, and enquiring what countryman I was, I said, an Englishman. Whereupon he asked me if the King was crowned. And I answered, no, but that I hoped he should be so shortly. Nay, saith he, he shall never be crowned; for Don Ralegh and Don Cobham will cut his throat ere that day come."

Ralegh naturally asked, "What infer you from this?" And the King's Attorney answered him, "That your treason hath wings." Ralegh had a convincing reply, "Why did they name the Duke of Buckingham with Jack Straw's treason, and the Duke of York with Jack Cade, but that it was to countenance his treason?"

The King's Attorney was worsted in this point; and accordingly Serjeant Philips came to his assistance by repeating, as usual, the gist of Cobham's accusations. To which Ralegh answered, "If truth be constant and constancy be in truth, why hath he forsworn that that he hath said? You have not proved any one thing against me by direct proofs, but all by circumstances."

Coke was becoming more and more impatient. "Have you done?" he cried. "The King must have the last."

Ralegh. "Nay, Master Attorney, he which speaketh for his life must speak last. False repetitions and mistakings must not mar my cause."

Coke. "The King's safety and your clearing cannot agree. I protest before God, I never knew a clearer treason."

The Attorney's impatience grew so much that, in the words of one report, he sat down in a chafe and would speak no more, until the commissioners urged and entreated him. After much ado he went on, and made a long repetition of all the evidence; and at the repeating of some things Sir Walter Ralegh interrupted him, and said he did him wrong.

Coke. "Thou art the most vile and execrable traitor that ever lived."

Ralegh. "You speak indiscreetly, barbarously and uncivilly."

Coke. "I want words sufficient to express thy viperous treasons."

Ralegh. "I think you want words indeed, for you have spoken one thing half a dozen times."

Coke. "Thou art an odious fellow; thy name is hateful to all the realm of England for thy pride."

Ralegh. "It will go near to prove a measuring cast between you and me, Master Attorney."

Coke. "Well, I will now make it appear to the world that there never lived a viler viper upon the face of the world than thou." And he proceeded to work up his speech to his last chief point of all—that was the production of a letter from Cobham, which he read. He interspersed his reading with exclamations of triumph. "I have thought fit to set down this to My Lords, wherein I protest on my soul to write nothing but the truth. I am now come near the period of my time, therefore I confess the whole truth before God and his angels. Ralegh, four days before I came from the Tower, caused an apple (Eve's apple, cried out the King's Attorney) to be thrown in at my chamber window; the effect of it was to entreat me to right the wrong I had done him, in saying, that I should have come home by Jersey, which under my hand to him I have retracted.... At Aremberg's coming Ralegh was to have procured a pension of £1500 a year, for which he promised, that no action should be against Spain, the Low Countries, or the Indies, but he would give knowledge beforehand. (Ah! is not this a Spanish heart in an English body?) He hath also been the cause of my discontentment; he advised me not to be overtaken with preachers, as Essex was; and that the king would better allow of a constant denial, than to accuse any."

"Oh! damnable atheist!" cried Coke. "He counsels him not to be counselled by preachers as Essex was; he died the child of God. God honoured him at his death."

Ralegh. "You have heard a strange tale of a strange man. Now he thinks he hath matter enough to destroy me; but the king and all of you shall witness, by our deaths, which of us was the ruin of the other. I bid a poor fellow throw in the letter at his window, written to this purpose: You know you have undone me, now write three lines to justify me. In this will I die that he hath done me wrong."

Then Ralegh pulled a letter out of his pocket, which the Lord Cobham had written to him, and desired my Lord Cecil to read it because he only knew his hand. Cecil read the letter. "Seeing myself so near my end, for the discharge of my own conscience, and freeing myself from your blood, which also will cry vengeance against me, I protest upon my salvation I never practised with Spain upon your procurement: God so comfort me in this my affliction, as you are a true subject, for anything that I know. I will say as Daniel, Purus sum a sanguine hujus. So God have mercy upon my soul, as I know no treason by you!"

"Now I wonder," said Ralegh, "how many souls this man hath; he damns one in this letter: another in that."

Such were Ralegh's last recorded words before the verdict was given. He had said all that was to be said. He had stood his ground undismayed for many hours, though the chief men in England and the cleverest lawyers in England were set against him. He must gradually have realized that all were resolute to condemn him: he must gradually have realized that all his efforts were futile against such malignant opposition.

The King's Attorney alleged that the last letter was politicly and cunningly urged from the Lord Cobham, and the first was simply the truth. The Earl of Devonshire assured the Lord Chief Justice that Cobham had written the first letter of his own free will, uninfluenced by any hope or promise of pardon. A marshal was sworn to keep the jury private. The jury retired. In less than a quarter of an hour the jury returned and gave their verdict. The verdict was GUILTY. "Sir Walter Ralegh," said the Clerk of the Crown, "thou hast been indicted, arraigned, and pleaded not guilty, for all these several treasons and for trial thereof hast put thyself upon thy country, which country are these who have found thee guilty. What canst thou say for thyself why judgment and execution of death should not pass against thee?"

And Ralegh, now doomed, made answer, "My Lords, the jury have found me guilty, they must do as they are directed. I can say nothing why judgment should not proceed. You see whereof Cobham hath accused me: you remember his protestations that I was never guilty...." And later he said, "I submit myself to the king's mercy. I know his mercy is greater than my offence. I recommend my wife, and son of tender years, unbrought-up, to his compassion."

And then the Lord Chief Justice Popham rose to deliver judgment, which he prefaced by a pompous and insulting speech. "I thought I should never have seen this day, to have stood in this place to give sentence of death against you; because I thought it impossible that one of so great parts should have fallen so grievously. God hath bestowed on you many benefits. You had been a man fit and able to have served the king in good place—you have brought yourself into a good state of living.... It is best for man not to seek to climb too high, lest he fall; nor yet to creep too low lest he be trodden on....

"You have been taxed by the world with the defence of the most heathenish and blasphemous opinions; which I list not to repeat because Christian ears cannot endure to hear them, nor the authors and maintainers of them be suffered to live in any Christian commonwealth.... You shall do well before you go out of the world, to give satisfaction therein, and not to die with these imputations on you. Let not any devil persuade you to think there is no eternity in heaven. For if you think thus you shall find eternity in hell-fire. In the first accusation of my Lord Cobham I observed his manner of speaking: I protest before the living God I am persuaded he spoke nothing but the truth! You wrote that he should not in any case confess anything to a preacher, telling him an example of my Lord Essex, that noble Earl that is gone. Who if he had not been carried away with others had lived in honour to this day among us. He confessed his offences, and obtained mercy of the Lord; for I am verily persuaded in my heart he died a worthy servant of God. Your conceit of not confessing anything is very inhuman and wicked. In this world is the time of confessing that we may be absolved at the day of judgment. You have shewed a fearful sign of denying God in advising a man not to confess the truth. It now comes in my mind why you may not have your accuser come face to face; for such an one is easily brought to retract, when he seeth there is no hope of his own life. It is dangerous that any traitors should have access to or conference with, one another. When they see themselves must die, they will think it best to have their fellow live that he may commit the like treason again, and so in some sort seek revenge.

"Now it resteth to pronounce the judgment which I wish you had not been this day to have received of me.

"For if the fear of God in you had been answerable to your other great parts you might have lived to have been a singular good subject. I never saw the like trial, and hope I shall never see the like again.

"But since you have been found guilty of these horrible treasons, the judgment of this court is, that you shall be had from hence to the place whence you came, there to remain until the day of execution; and from thence you shall be drawn upon an hurdle through the open streets to the place of execution, there to be hanged and cut down alive; and your body shall be opened, your heart and bowels plucked out, and your privy members cut off, and thrown into the fire before your eyes; then your head to be stricken off from your body, and your body shall be divided into four quarters, to be disposed of at the King's pleasure; and God have mercy upon your soul!"

CHAPTER XVI