Memoirs of the Court of Queen Elizabeth

He afterwards proceeded to accuse sir Robert Cecil of having affirmed that the title of the Infanta was equally well founded with that of any other claimant. But the secretary here stepped forward to entreat that, the prisoner might be obliged to bring proof of his assertions; and it thus became manifest, and in the end was confessed with contrition by the earl himself, that he had advanced this charge on false grounds.

It was with better reason that he reproached Francis Bacon, who then stood against him as queen's counsel, with the glaring inconsistency between his past professions and his present conduct. This cowardly desertion of his generous and affectionate friend and patron,—or rather this open revolt from him, this shameless attack upon him in the hour of his extreme distress and total ruin,—forms indeed the foulest of the many blots which stain the memory of this illustrious person: it may even be pronounced, on a deliberate survey of all its circumstances, the basest and most profligate act of that reign, which yet affords examples, in the conduct of its public men, of almost every species of profligacy and baseness. That it continued to be matter of general reproach against him, clearly appears from the long and labored apology which Bacon thought it necessary, several years afterwards, to address to lord Montjoy, then earl of Devon;—an apology which extenuates in no degree the turpitude of the fact; but which may be consulted for a number of highly curious, if authentic, particulars.

The earl of Southampton likewise pleaded Not guilty, and professed his inviolate fidelity towards her majesty: he excused whatever criminality he might have fallen into by the warmth of his attachment for Essex, and behaved throughout with a mildness and an ingenuous modesty which moved all hearts in his favor. After a trial of eleven hours, sentence of Guilty was unanimously pronounced on both the prisoners. Southampton in an affecting manner implored all present to intercede for him with her majesty, and Essex, with great earnestness, joined in this petition of his unfortunate friend: as to himself, he said, he was not anxious for life; wishing for nothing more than to lay it down with entire fidelity towards God and his prince.—Yet he would have no one insinuate to the queen that he despised her mercy, though he believed he should not too submissively implore it; and he hoped all men would in their consciences acquit him, though the law had pronounced him guilty. Such was the lofty tone of self-justification assumed by Essex on this memorable occasion, when his pride was roused and his temper exasperated, by the open war of recrimination and reproaches into which he had so unadvisedly plunged with his personal enemies; and by the cruel and insolent invectives of the crown lawyers. But he was soon to undergo on this point a most remarkable and total change.

The mind of the earl of Essex was deeply imbued with sentiments of religion: from early youth he had conversed much with divines of the stricter class, whom he held in habitual reverence; and conscious in the conduct of his past life of many deviations from the Gospel rule of right, he now, in the immediate prospect of its violent termination, surrendered himself into the hands of these spiritual guides with extraordinary humility and implicit submission. To the criminality of his late attempt, his conscience was not however awakened; he seems to have believed, that in contriving the fall of his enemies, he was at the same time deserving the thanks of his country, oppressed by their maladministration; and he repelled all the efforts of Dr. Dove, by whom he was first visited, to inspire him with a different sense of this part of his conduct. Cut his favorite divine, Mr. Aston,—who is described by a contemporary as "a man base, fearful and mercenary," in whom the earl was much deceived,—practised with more success upon his mind. By an artful pretext of believing him to have aimed at the crown, he first drew him into a warm defence of his conduct on this point; then by degrees into a confession of all that he had really plotted, and the concurrence which he had found from others. This was the end aimed at by Aston, or by the government which employed him: he professed that he could not reconcile it to his conscience to conceal treasons so foul and dangerous; alarmed the earl with all the terrors of religion; and finally persuaded him, that a full discovery of his accomplices was the only atonement which he could make to heaven and earth. The humbled Essex was brought to entreat that several privy-councillors, of whom Cecil by name was one, should be sent to hear his confessions; and so strangely scrupulous did he show himself to leave nothing untold, that he gave up even the letters of the king of Scots, and betrayed every private friend whom attachment to himself had ever seduced into an acquiescence in his designs, or a nice sense of honor withheld from betraying them.

Sir Henry Nevil, for having only concealed projects in which he had absolutely refused to concur, was thus exposed to the loss of his appointment of ambassador to France; to imprisonment, and to a long persecution;—and lord Montjoy might have suffered even capitally, had not his good and acceptable service in Ireland induced the queen to wink at former offences. Cuff, the secretary of the earl, whom he sent for to exhort him to imitate his sincerity, sternly upbraided his master with his altered mind, and his treachery towards those who had evinced the strongest attachment to his service: but the earl remained unmoved by his reproaches, and calmly prepared for death in the full persuasion that he had now worked out his own salvation.

Elizabeth had behaved on occasion of the late insurrection with all her wonted fortitude; even at the time when Essex was actually in the city and a false report was brought her of its revolt to him, "she was never more amazed," says Cecil in a letter to sir George Carew, "than she would have been to have heard of a fray in Fleet-street." But when, in the further progress of the affair, she beheld her once loved Essex brought to the bar for high-treason and condemned by the unanimous verdict of his peers; when it rested solely with herself to take the forfeit of his life or interfere by an act of special grace for his preservation,—her grief, her agitation and her perplexity became extreme. A sense of the many fine qualities and rare endowments of her kinsman,—his courage, his eloquence, his generosity, and the affectionate zeal with which he had served her:—indulgence for the youthful impetuosity which had carried him out of the path of duty, not unmixed with compunction for that severe and contemptuous treatment by which she had exasperated to rebellion the spirit which mildness might have softened into penitence and submission;—above all, the remaining affection which still lurked at the bottom of her heart, pleaded for mercy with a force scarcely to be withstood. On the other hand, the ingratitude, the neglect, the insolence with which he had occasionally treated her, and the magnitude of his offences, which daily grew upon her by his own confessions and those of his accomplices, fatally united to confirm the natural bias of her mind towards severity.

At this juncture Thomas Leigh, one of the dark and desperate characters whose service Essex had used in his criminal negotiations with Tyrone, by an atrocious plot for entering the palace, seizing the person of the queen and compelling her to sign a warrant for the release of the two earls, renewed her fears and gave fresh force to her anger. Irresolute for some days, she once countermanded by a special messenger the order for the death of Essex; then, as repenting of her weakness, she signed a second warrant, in obedience to which he was finally, on February 25th, brought to the scaffold.

The last scene was performed in a manner correspondent in all respects to the contrite and humiliated frame of mind to which the noble culprit had been wrought. It was no longer the brave, the gallant, the haughty earl of Essex, the favorite of the queen, the admiration of the ladies, the darling of the soldiery, the idol of the people;—no longer even the undaunted prisoner, pouring forth invectives against his enemies in answer to the charges against himself; loudly persisting in the innocence of his intentions, instead of imploring mercy for his actions, and defending his honor while he asserted a lofty indifference to life;—it was a meek and penitent offender, profoundly sensible of all his past transgressions, but taught to expect their remission in the world to which he was hastening, through the fervency of his prayers and the plenitude of his confessions; and prepared, as his latest act, to perform in public a solemn religious service, composed for his use by the assistant clergy, whose directions he obeyed with the most scrupulous minuteness. Under a change so entire, even his native eloquence had forsaken him. Sir Robert Cecil, who seems to have been a cool and critical spectator of the fatal scene, remarks to his correspondent that "the conflict between the flesh and the soul did thus far appear, that in his prayers he was fain to be helped; otherwise no man living could pray more christianly than he did."

Essex had requested of the queen that he might be put to death in a private manner within the walls of the Tower, fearing, as he told the divines who attended him, that "the acclamations of the citizens should have hoven him up." His desire in this point was willingly complied with; but about a hundred nobles, knights and gentlemen witnessed the transaction from seats placed near the scaffold. Sir Walter Raleigh chose to station himself at a window of the armory whence he could see all without being observed by the earl. This action, universally imputed to a barbarous desire of glutting his eyes with the blood of the man whom he hated and had pursued with a hostility more unrelenting than that of Cecil himself, was never forgiven by the people, who detested him no less than they loved and admired his unfortunate rival. Several years after, when Raleigh in his turn was brought to the same end in the same place, he professed however, and perhaps truly, that the sorrowful spectacle had melted him to tears: meantime, he at least extracted from the late events large gratification for another ruling passion of his breast, by setting to sale his interest in procuring pardons to gentlemen concerned in the insurrection. Mr. Lyttleton in particular is recorded to have paid him ten thousand pounds for his good offices, and Mr. Bainham a sum not specified. The life of the earl of Southampton was spared, at the intercession chiefly of Cecil, but he was confined in the Tower till the death of the queen: others escaped with short imprisonments and the imposition of fines, few of which were exacted; sir Fulk Greville having humanely made it his business to represent to the queen that no danger was to be apprehended from a faction which had lost its leader. Four only of the principal conspirators suffered capitally; sir Christopher Blount and sir Charles Davers, both catholics, sir Gilly Merrick and Henry Cuff.

Those ambassadors from the king of Scots on whose co-operation Essex had placed his chief reliance, now arrived; and finding themselves too late for other purposes, they obeyed their master's instructions in such a case by offering to the queen his warmest congratulations on her escape from so foul and dangerous a conspiracy. They were further charged to make secret inquiry whether James's correspondence with Essex and concurrence in the late conspiracy had come to her knowledge; and whether any measures were likely to be taken in consequence for his exclusion from the succession. The confessions of Essex to the privy-councillors had indeed rendered Elizabeth perfectly acquainted with the machinations of James; but resolute to refrain during the remnant of her days from all angry discussions with the prince whom she saw destined to succeed her, she had caused the earl to be not only requested, but commanded, to forbear the repetition of this part of his acknowledgements on the scaffold. She was thus left free to receive with all those demonstrations of amity which cost her nothing the compliments of James; and she remained deliberately ignorant of all that he desired her not to know. The Scottish emissaries had the further satisfaction of carrying back to their master assurances of the general consent of Englishmen in his favor, and in particular a pledge of the adherence of secretary Cecil, who immediately opened a private correspondence with the king, of which lord Henry Howard, who had formerly conducted that of Essex, became the willing medium.

There is good evidence that the peace of Elizabeth received an incurable wound by the loss of her unhappy favorite, which she daily found additional cause to regret on perceiving how completely it had delivered her over to the domination of his adversaries; but she still retained the resolution to pursue with unabated vigor the great objects on which she was sensible that the mind of a sovereign ought to be with little remission employed. The memorable siege of Ostend, begun during this summer by the archduke Albert, fixed her attention and that of Europe. The defence was conducted by that able officer sir Francis Vere at the head of a body of English auxiliaries, whom the States had enlisted with the queen's permission, at their own expense. Henry IV., as if for the purpose of observing more nearly the event, had repaired to Calais. The queen of England, earnestly desirous of a personal interview, wrote him two letters on the subject; and Henry sent in return marshal Biron and two other ambassadors of rank, with a train of three or four hundred persons, whom the queen received with high honors, and caused to accompany her in her progress. During her visit of thirteen days to the marquis of Winchester at Basing, the French embassy was lodged at the house of lord Sandys, which was furnished for the occasion with plate and hangings from Hampton-court; the queen defraying all the charges, which were more than those of her own court at Basing. She made it her boast that she had in this progress entertained royally a royal ambassador at her subjects' houses; which she said no other prince could do. The meeting of the two sovereigns, in hopes of which Elizabeth had actually gone to Dover, could not for some unknown reason be at last arranged; but Henry, at the particular instance of his friend and ally, sent Sully over in disguise to confer confidentially with her respecting an important political project which she had announced. This was no less than a plan for humbling the house of Austria, and establishing a more perfect balance of power in Europe by uniting into one state the seventeen Flemish provinces. It was an idea, as Sully declared to her, which had previously occurred to Henry himself; and the coincidence was flattering to both; but various obstacles were found likely to retard its execution till a period to which Elizabeth could scarcely look forward. One advantage, however, was gained to the queen of England by the interview;—the testimony of this celebrated statesman, recorded in his own memoirs, to the solidity of her judgement and the enlargement of her views; and his distinct avowal that she was in all respects worthy of the high estimation which she had for more than forty years enjoyed by common consent of all the politicians of Europe.

Ireland was still a source to Elizabeth of anxiety and embarrassment. In order to sustain the expenses of the war, she suffered herself to be prevailed on to issue base money for the pay of the troops;—a mortifying circumstance, after the high credit which she had gained by that restoration of the coin to its original standard which was one of the first acts of her reign. Montjoy in the meantime was struggling with vigor and progressive success against the disorders of the country. With the assistance of sir George Carew president of Munster, and other able commanders, he was gradually reducing the inferior rebels and cutting off the supplies of Tyrone himself: but the courage of this insurgent was still supported by the hope of aids from Spain; and during this summer two bodies of Spanish troops, one of four thousand, the other of two thousand men, made good their landing. The larger number, under Aquila, took possession of Kinsale; the smaller, under Ocampo, was joined by Tyrone and other rebels with all their forces. The appearance of affairs was alarming, since the catholic Irish every where welcomed the Spaniards as deliverers and brethren: but Montjoy, after blockading Aquila in Kinsale, marched boldly to attack Ocampo and his Irish allies; gave them a complete defeat, in which the Spanish general was made prisoner and Tyrone compelled to fly into Ulster; and afterwards returning to the siege of Kinsale, compelled Aquila to capitulate on condition of a safe conveyance to their own country for himself and all the Spanish troops in the island.

The state of the queen's mind while the fate of Ireland seemed to hang in the balance, and while the impression made by the attempt of Essex was still recent, is depicted in the following letter by sir John Harrington with his usual minuteness and vivacity.

To sir Hugh Portman knight. (Dated October 9th 1601.)

"…For six weeks I left my oxen and sheep and ventured to court.... Much was my comfort in being well received, notwithstanding it is an ill hour for seeing the queen. The madcaps are all in riot, and much evil threatened. In good sooth I feared her majesty more than the rebel Tyrone, and wished I had never received my lord of Essex's honor of knighthood. She is quite disfavored141 and unattired, and these troubles waste her much. She disregarded every costly cover that cometh to the table, and taketh little but manchet and succory pottage. Every new message from the city doth disturb her, and she frowns on all the ladies. I had a sharp message from her, brought by my lord Buckhurst, namely thus. 'Go tell that witty fellow my godson to get home; it is no season now to fool it here,' I liked this as little as she doth my knighthood, so took to my boots, and returned to the plough in bad weather. I must not say much even by this trusty and sure messenger, but the many evil plots and designs hath overcome all her highness' sweet temper. She walks much in her privy chamber, and stamps with her feet at ill news, and thrusts her rusty sword at times into the arras in great rage. My lord Buckhurst is much with her, and few else since the city business; but the dangers are over, and yet she always keeps a sword by her table. I obtained a short audience at my first coming to court, when her highness told me, if ill counsel had brought me so far from home, she wished heaven might mar that fortune which she had mended. I made my peace in this point, and will not leave my poor castle of Kelston, for fear of finding a worse elsewhere, as others have done. I will eat Aldborne rabbits, and get fish as you recommend from the man at Curry-Rival; and get partridge and hares when I can; and my venison where I can; and leave all great matters to those like them better than myself.... I could not move in any suit to serve your neighbour B. such was the face of things: and so disordered is all order that her highness hath worn but one change of raiment for many days, and swears much at those that cause her griefs in such wise, to the no small discomfiture of all about her, more especially our sweet lady Arundel, that Venus plus quam venusta."

In the month of October 1601, the wants of her treasury compelled the queen to call a parliament. Her procession to the house had something gloomy and ominous; the people, still resenting the death of their favorite, whom they never could be taught to regard as a traitor to his sovereign, refused to gratify her ears as formerly with those affectionate acclamations on which this wise and gracious princess had ever placed so high a value. The house of commons however, in consideration of her extraordinary expenses in the Irish wars, granted a supply large beyond example. Having thus deserved well of her majesty, they ventured to revive the topic of monopolies, the crying grievance of the age, against which the former parliament had petitioned her, but without effect. It was universally allowed, that the granting of exclusive privileges to trade in certain articles was a prerogative inherent in the crown; and though the practice so lavishly adopted by Elizabeth of providing in this manner for her courtiers without expense to herself, had rendered the evil almost intolerable, the ministerial members insisted strongly that no right existed in the house to frame a bill for its redress.

It was maintained by them, that the dispensing power possessed by the queen would enable her to set at nought any statute which could be made in this matter;—in short, that she was an absolute prince; and consequently that the mode of petition, of which the last parliament had proved the inefficacy, was the only course of proceeding open to them. Other members, in whose bosoms some sparks of liberty had now been kindled, supported the bill which had been offered to the house: the event was, that in the midst of the debate the queen sent for the speaker, to inform him that she would voluntarily cancel some of the patents which had excited most discontent.

This concession, though extorted doubtless by necessity, was yet made with so good a grace, that her faithful commons were filled with admiration and gratitude. One member pronounced the message "a gospel of glad tidings;" others employed phrases of adulation equally profane;—a committee was appointed to return their acknowledgements to her majesty, who kneeled for some time at her feet, while the speaker enlarged upon her "preventing grace and all-deserving goodness," She graciously gave thanks to the commons for pointing out to her abuses which might otherwise have escaped her notice; since the truth, as she observed, was too often disguised from princes by the persons about them, through motives of private interest: and thus, with the customary assurances of her loving care over her loyal subjects, she skilfully accomplished her retreat from a contest in which she judged perseverance to be dangerous and final success at best uncertain. In her farewell speech, however, at the close of the session, she could not refrain from observing, in reference to this matter, that she perceived private respects to be masked with them under public pretences. Such was the final parting between Elizabeth and her last parliament!

The year 1602 was not fertile of domestic incident. One of the most remarkable circumstances was a violent quarrel between the Jesuits and the secular priests in England. The latter accused the former, and not without reason, of having been the occasion, by their assassination-plots and conspiracies against the queen and government, of all the severe enactments under which the English catholics had groaned since the fulmination of the papal bull against her majesty. In the height of this dispute, intelligence was conveyed to the privy-council of some fresh plots on the part of the Jesuits and their adherents; on which a proclamation was immediately issued, banishing this order the kingdom on pain of death; and the same penalty was declared against all secular priests who should refuse to take the oath of allegiance.

The queen continued to pursue from habit, and probably from policy also, amusements for which all her relish was lost. She went a-maying to Air. Buckley's at Lewisham, and paid several other visits in the course of the year;—but her efforts were unavailing; the irrevocable past still hung upon her spirits. About the beginning of June, in a conversation with M. de Beaumont the French ambassador, she owned herself weary of life; then sighing, whilst her eyes filled with tears, she adverted to the death of Essex; and mentioned, that being apprehensive, from his ambition and the impetuosity of his temper, of his throwing himself into some rash design which would prove his ruin, she had repeatedly counselled him, during the two last years, to content himself with pleasing her, and forbear to treat her with the insolent contempt which he had lately assumed; above all, not to touch her sceptre; lest she should be compelled to punish him by the laws of England, and not according to her own laws; which he had found too mild and favorable to give him any cause of fear: but that her advice, however salutary and affectionate, had proved ineffectual to prevent his ruin.