“In appearance what manner of man was Raleigh when in Ireland? There was much change, of course, from the dashing captain of eight and twenty, when he was putting the unarmed men to the sword and hanging the women in Dingle Bay, to the admiral of sixty-five who, between the Tower and the scaffold, visited his old haunts in the county of Cork for the last time in the three summer months of 1617.

“But all accounts agree in giving him a commanding presence, a handsome and well-compacted figure, a forehead rather too high; the lower part of his face, though partly hidden by the moustache and peaked beard, showing rare resolution. His portrait, a life-sized head, painted when he was Major of Youghal, was recently presented to the owner of his house, where it had been years ago, by the senior member for the county of Waterford; and another original picture of him when in Ireland is in the possession of the Rev. Pierce W. Drew of Youghal. Both these Irish pictures show the same lofty brow and firm lips. There is an old and much-prized engraving by Vander Werff of Amsterdam that seems to combine all his characteristic features—the extraordinarily high forehead, the moustache and peaked beard, ill-concealing a too determined mouth. The likeness is most striking.”

“He was a tall, handsome, and bold man; but his nÆve was, that he was damnably proud.... In the great parlour at Downton, at Mr. Ralegh’s, is a good piece (an originall) of Sir W. in a white sattin doublet, all embroidered with rich pearles, and a mighty rich chaine of great pearles about his neck. The old servants have told me that the pearles were neer as big as the painted ones. He had a most remarkable aspect, an exceedingly high forehead, long-faced, and sourlie-bidded, a kind of pigge-eie.... He spake broad Devonshire to his dye-ing day. His voice was small, as likewise were my schoolfellowes, his gr. nephews.”

“In all the pictures we have of him, there is almost nothing to suggest the typical Englishman. Burly and robust. About six feet in height, he is rather thin than corpulent, and in the vivacity of expression and the nervous cast of his features he resembles rather the modern New-Englander than the old-time Englishman. He was nineteen years younger than Elizabeth, and had, as Naunton describes him, ‘a good presence in a handsome and well-compacted person.’ Fuller has already told us that at the time of his entrance at the court his clothes made a ‘considerable part of his estate.’ He seems to have had an innate love for the luxury and splendour of dress. He lived at a period when gentlemen as well as ladies indulged in all the glory of gay colours. Edwards, describing some of the more noted pictures of him, says: ‘In another full-length, which long remained in the possession of his descendants, he is apparelled in a white satin pinked vest, close sleeved to the wrists with a brown doublet finely flowered and embroidered with pearls, and a sword, also brown and similarly decorated. Over the right hip is seen the jewelled pommel of his dagger. He wears his hat, in which is a black feather with a ruby and pearl drop. His trunk hose and fringed garters appear to be of white satin. His buff-coloured shoes are tied with white ribbons.’”