Chapter II: Part 2

ATTORNEY--Raleigh must have his part of the Money, therefore he
is now a traitor. The crown shall never stand one year on the
head of the king (my master) if a traitor may not be condemned
by Circumstances: for if A tells B and B tells C and C D, etc.,
you shall never prove treason by two Witnesses.

_Raleigh's Examination was read._

He confesseth Cobham offered him 8,000 crowns, which he was to
have for the furtherance of the peace between England and Spain,
and that he should have it within three days. To which he said,
he gave this answer; When I see the Money, I will tell you more:
for I had thought it had been one of his ordinary idle conceits,
and therefore made no Account thereof.

RALEIGH--The Attorney hath made a long narration of Copley, and
the Priests, which concerns me nothing, neither know I how
Cobham was altered. For he told me if I would agree to further
the Peace, he would get me 8,000 crowns. I asked him, Who shall
have the rest of the money? He said, I will offer such a
nobleman (who was not named) some of the Money. I said, He will
not be persuaded by you, and he will extremely hate you for such
a motion. Let me be pinched to death with hot irons, if ever I
knew there was any intention to bestow the money on discontented
persons. I had made a discourse against the peace, and would
have printed it; if Cobham changed his mind, if the Priests, if
Brook had any such intent, what is that to me? They must answer
for it. He offered me the Money before Aremberg came, that is
difference of time.

SERJ. PHILIPS--Raleigh confesseth the matter, but avoideth it by
distinguishing of times. You said, it was offered you before the
coming of Aremberg, which is false. For you being examined
whether you should have such money of Cobham, or not, you said,
Yea, and that you should have it within two or three days. _Nemo
moriturus praesumitur mentiri._

LORD HENRY HOWARD--Alledge me any ground or cause, wherefore
you gave ear to my lord Cobham for receiving pensions, in
matters you had not to deal with.

RALEIGH--Could I stop my lord Cobham's mouth?

LORD CECIL--Sir Walter Raleigh presseth, that my lord Cobham
should be brought face to face. If he asks things of favour and
grace, they must come only from him that can give them. If we
sit here as commissioners, how shall we be satisfied whether he
ought to be brought, unless we hear the Judges speak?

LORD CHIEF-JUSTICE--This thing cannot be granted, for then a
number of treasons should flourish: the Accuser may be drawn by
practice whilst he is in person.

JUSTICE GAWDY--The Statute you speak of concerning two Witnesses
in case of Treason, is found to be inconvenient, therefore by
another law it was taken away.

RALEIGH--The common trial of England is by Jury and Witnesses.

LORD CHIEF-JUSTICE--No, by examination: if Three conspire a
Treason, and they all confess it; here is never a Witness, yet
they are condemned.[16]

JUSTICE WARBURTON--I marvel, sir Walter, that you, being of such
experience and wit, should stand on this point; for so many
horse-stealers may escape, if they may not be condemned without
witnesses. If one should rush into the king's Privy Chamber,
whilst he is alone, and kill the king (which God forbid), and
this man be met coming with his sword all bloody; shall not he
be condemned to death? My lord Cobham hath, perhaps, been
laboured withal; and to save you, his old friend, it may be
that he will deny all that which he hath said.

RALEIGH--I know not how you conceive the Law.

LORD CHIEF-JUSTICE--Nay, we do not conceive the Law, but we know
the Law.

RALEIGH--The wisdom of the law of God is absolute and perfect:
_Haec fac et vives_, etc. But now by the Wisdom of the State, the
Wisdom of the Law is uncertain. Indeed, where the Accuser is not
to be had conveniently, I agree with you; but here my Accuser
may; he is alive, and in the house. Susanna had been condemned,
if Daniel had not cried out, 'Will you condemn an innocent
Israelite, without examination or knowledge of the truth?'
Remember it is absolutely the Commandment of God: If a false
witness rise up you shall cause him to be brought before the
Judges; if he be found false, he shall have the punishment which
the accused should have had. It is very sure for my lord to
accuse me is my certain danger, and it may be a means to excuse
himself.

LORD CHIEF-JUSTICE--There must not such a gap be opened for the
destruction of the king, as would be if we should grant this.
You plead hard for yourself, but the laws plead as hard for the
king. I did never hear that course to be taken in a case of
Treason, as to write one to another, or speak one to another,
during the time of their imprisonment. There hath been
intelligence between you; and what under-hand practices there
may be, I know not. If the circumstances agree not with the
Evidence, we will not condemn you.

RALEIGH--The king desires nothing but the knowledge of the
truth, and would have no advantage taken by severity of the law.
If ever we had a gracious king, now we have; I hope, as he is,
such are his ministers. If there be but a trial of five marks at
Common Law, a witness must be deposed. Good my lords, let my
Accuser come face to face, and be deposed.

LORD CHIEF-JUSTICE--You have no law for it: God forbid any man
should accuse himself upon his oath!

ATTORNEY--The law presumes, a man will not accuse himself to
accuse another. You are an odious man, for Cobham thinks his
cause the worse that you are in it. Now you shall hear of some
stirs to be raised in Scotland.

_Part of Copley's Examination._

'Also Watson told me, that a special person told him, that
Aremberg offered to him 1000 crowns to be in that action; and
that Brook said, the stirs in Scotland came out of Raleigh's
head.'

RALEIGH--Brook hath been taught his Lesson.

LORD HENRY HOWARD--This examination was taken before. Did I
teach him his lesson?

RALEIGH--I protest before God, I meant it not by any
privy-counsellor; but because money is scant, he will juggle on
both sides.

_Raleigh's Examination._

'The way to invade England, were to begin with Stirs in
Scotland.'

RALEIGH--I think so still: I have spoken it to divers of the
lords of the Council, by way of discourse and opinion.

ATTORNEY--Now let us come to those words, 'of destroying the
king and his cubs.'

RALEIGH--O barbarous! If they, like unnatural villains, should
use those words, shall I be charged with them? I will not hear
it; I was never any Plotter with them against my country, I was
never false to the crown of England. I have spent 4000 pounds of
my own against the Spanish Faction, for the good of my country.
Do you bring the words of these hellish spiders, Clark, Watson,
and others against me?

ATTORNEY--Thou hast a Spanish heart, and thyself art a Spider of
Hell; for thou confesseth the king to be a most sweet and
gracious prince, and yet hast conspired against him.

_Watson's Examination read._

'He said, that George Brook told him twice, That his brother,
the lord Cobham, said to him, that you are but on the bye, but
Raleigh and I are on the main.'

_Brook's Examination read._

'Being asked what was meant by this Jargon, the Bye and the
Main? he said, That the lord Cobham told him, that Grey and
others were in the Bye, he and Raleigh were on the Main. Being
asked, what exposition his brother made of these words? He said,
he is loath to repeat it. And after saith, by the Main was meant
the taking away of the king and his issue; and thinks on his
conscience, it was infused into his brother's head by Raleigh.'

_Cobham's Examination read._

'Being asked, if ever he had said, "It will never be well in
England, till the king and his cubs were taken away"; he said,
he had answered before, and that he would answer no more to that
point.'

RALEIGH--I am not named in all this: there is a law of two sorts
of Accusers; one of his own knowledge, another by hear-say.

EARL OF SUFFOLK--See the Case of Arnold.

LORD CHIEF-JUSTICE--It is the Case of sir Will. Thomas, and sir
Nicholas Arnold.

RALEIGH--If this may be, you will have any man's life in a week.

ATTORNEY--Raleigh saith, that Cobham was in a passion when he
said so. Would he tell his brother anything of malice against
Raleigh, whom he loved as his life?

RALEIGH--Brook never loved me; until his brother had accused me,
he said nothing.

LORD CECIL--We have heard nothing that might lead us to think
that Brook accused you, he was only in the surprizing Treason:
for by accusing you he should accuse his brother.

RALEIGH--He doth not much care for that.

LORD CECIL--I must judge the best. The accusation of his brother
was not voluntary; he pared everything as much as he could to
save his brother.

_Cobham's Examination read._

'He saith he had a Book written against the Title of the King,
which he had of Raleigh, and that he gave it to his brother
Brook: and Raleigh said it was foolishly written.'

ATTORNEY--After the king came within 12 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.

RALEIGH--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,[17] and for that I did intend to answer
it, I resolved to leave my estate settled, therefore I laid out
all my loose papers, amongst which was this Book.

LORD HOWARD--Where had you this Book?

RALEIGH--In the old Lord Treasurer's Study, after his death.

LORD CECIL--Did you ever shew or make known this Book to me?

RALEIGH--No, my lord.

LORD CECIL--Was it one of the books which was left to me or my
brother?

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

LORD CECIL--After my father's decease, sir Walter Raleigh
desired to search for some Cosmographical descriptions of the
Indies, which he thought were in his Study, and were not to be
had in print; which I granted, and would have trusted sir Walter
Raleigh as soon as any man: though since for some infirmities,
the bands of my affection to him have been broken; and yet
reserving my duty to the king my master, which I can by no means
dispense with, by God, I love him, and have a great conflict
within myself: but I must needs say, sir Walter used me a little
unkindly to take the Book away without my knowledge:
nevertheless, I need make no apology in behalf of my father,
considering how useful and necessary it is for privy-counsellors
and those in his place to intercept and keep such kind of
writings; for whosoever should then search his study may in all
likelihood find all the notorious Libels that were writ against
the late queen; and whosoever should rummage my Study, or at
least my Cabinet, may find several against the king, our
Sovereign Lord, since his accession to the throne.

RALEIGH--The Book was in Manuscript, and the late Lord Treasurer
had wrote in the beginning of it with his own Hand, these words,
'This is the Book of Robert Snagg.' And I do own, as my lord
Cecil has said, that I believe they may also find in my house
almost all the Libels that have been writ against the late
queen.

ATTORNEY--You were no privy-counsellor, and I hope never shall
be.

LORD CECIL--He was not a sworn counsellor of state, but he has
been called to consultations.

RALEIGH--I think it a very severe interpretation of the law, to
bring me within compass of Treason for this Book, writ so long
ago, of which nobody had read any more than the Heads of the
Chapters, and which was burnt by G. Brook without my privity;
admitting I had delivered the same to my lord Cobham, without
allowing or approving, but discommending it, according to
Cobham's first Accusation: and put the case, I should come to my
lord Cecil, as I have often done, and find a stranger with him,
with a packet of Libels, and my lord should let me have one or
two of them to peruse: this I hope is no Treason.

ATTORNEY--I observe there was intelligence between you and
Cobham in the Tower; for after he said it was against the king's
Title, he denied it again.

SIR W. WADE--First my lord Cobham confesseth it, and after he
had subscribed it, he revoked it again: to me he always said,
that the drift of it was against the king's Title.

RALEIGH--I protest before God, and all his works, I gave him not
the Book.

(_Note._--Sir Robert Wroth speaketh, or whispereth something
secretly.)

ATTORNEY--My lords, I must complain of Sir Robert Wroth; he says
this Evidence is not material.

SIR R. WROTH--I never spake the words.

ATTORNEY--Let Mr. Serjeant Philips testify whether he heard him
say the word or no.

LORD CECIL--I will give my word for sir R. Wroth.

SIR R. WROTH--I will speak as truly as you, Mr. Attorney, for my
God, I never spake it.

LORD CHIEF-JUSTICE--Wherefore should this Book be burnt?

RALEIGH--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.

RALEIGH--Here is a Book supposed to be treasonable; I never read
it, commended it, or delivered it, nor urged it.

ATTORNEY--Why, this is cunning.

RALEIGH--Every thing that doth make for me is cunning, and every
thing that maketh against me is probable.

ATTORNEY--Lord Cobham saith, that Kemish came to him with a
letter torn, and did wish him not to be dismayed, for one
witness could not hurt him.

RALEIGH--This poor man hath been close prisoner these 18 weeks;
he was offered the rack to make him confess. I never sent any
such message by him; I only writ to him, to tell him what I had
done with Mr. Attorney; having of his at that time a great pearl
and a diamond.

LORD H. HOWARD--No circumstance moveth me more than this. Kemish
was never on the rack, the king gave charge that no rigour
should be used.

COMMISSIONERS--We protest before God, there was no such matter
intended to our knowledge.

RALEIGH--Was not the Keeper of the Rack sent for, and he
threatened with it?

SIR W. WADE--When Mr. Solicitor and myself examined Kemish, we
told him he deserved the Rack, but did not threaten him with it.

COMMISSIONERS--It was more than we knew.

_Cobham's Examination read._

He saith, Kemish brought him a Letter from Raleigh, and that
part which was concerning the Lords of the Council was rent out;
the Letter contained that he was examined, and cleared himself
of all; and that the lord H. Howard said, because he was
discontent, he was fit to be in the action. And further, that
Kemish said to him from Raleigh that he should be of good
comfort, for one witness could not condemn a man for treason.

LORD CECIL--Cobham was asked whether, and when, he heard from
you? He said, every day.

RALEIGH--Kemish added more, I never bade him speak those words.

(_Note._--Mr. Attorney here offered to interrupt him.)

LORD CECIL--It is his last discourse; give him leave Mr.
Attorney.

RALEIGH--I am accused concerning Arabella, concerning Money out
of Spain. My Lord Chief-Justice saith, a man may be condemned
with one witness, yea, without any witness. Cobham is guilty of
many things, _Conscientia mille testes_; he hath accused
himself, what can he hope for but mercy? My lords, vouchsafe me
this grace: Let him be brought, being alive, and in the house;
let him avouch any of these things, I will confess the whole
indictment and renounce the king's mercy.

LORD CECIL--Here hath been a touch of the lady Arabella Stuart,
a near kinswoman of the king's. Let us not scandal the innocent
by confusion of speech: she is as innocent of all these things
as I, or any man here; only she received a Letter from my lord
Cobham, to prepare her; which she laughed at, and immediately
sent it to the king. So far was she from discontentment, that
she laughed him to scorn. But you see how far the count of
Aremberg did consent.

_The lord Admiral (Nottingham) being by in a Standing, with the
lady Arabella, spake to the court_: The lady doth here protest
upon her salvation, that she never dealt in any of these things,
and so she willed me to tell the court.

LORD CECIL--The lord Cobham wrote to my lady Arabella, to know
if he might come to speak with her, and gave her to understand,
that there were some about the king that laboured to disgrace
her; she doubted it was but a trick. But Brook saith his brother
moved him to procure Arabella to write Letters to the king of
Spain; but he saith, he never did it.

RALEIGH--The lord Cobham hath accused me, you see in what manner
he hath forsworn it Were it not for his Accusation, all this
were nothing. Let him be asked, if I knew of the letter which
Lawrency brought to him from Aremberg. Let me speak for my life,
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[18] was not denied to have his accusers face to face.

LORD CHIEF-JUSTICE--Since he must needs have justice, the
acquitting of his old friend may move him to speak otherwise
than the truth.

RALEIGH--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.

ATTORNEY--He is a party, and may not come; the law is against
it.

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

LORD CECIL--I am afraid my often speaking (who am inferior to my
lords here present) will make the world think that I delight to
hear myself talk. My affection to you, sir Walter, was not
extinguished, but slaked in regard to your deserts. You know the
law of the realm (to which your mind doth not contest) that my
lord Cobham cannot be brought.

RALEIGH--He may be, my lord.

LORD CECIL--But dare you challenge it?

RALEIGH--No.

LORD CECIL--You say that my lord Cobham, your main accuser,
must come to accuse you. You say he hath retracted: I say, many
particulars are not retracted. What the validity of all this is,
is merely left to the jury. Let me ask you this, If my lord
Cobham will say you were the only instigator of him to proceed
in the treason, dare you put yourself on this?

RALEIGH--If he will speak it before God and the king, that ever
I knew of Arabella's matter or the money out of Spain, or of the
surprizing treason; I put myself on it, God's will and the
king's be done with me.

LORD H. HOWARD--How! If he speak things equivalent to that you
have said?

RALEIGH--Yes, in the main point.

LORD CECIL--If he say, you have been the instigator of him to
deal with the Spanish king, had not the Council cause to draw
you hither?

RALEIGH--I put myself on it.

LORD CECIL--Then, sir Walter, call upon God and prepare
yourself; for I do verily believe that my lords will prove this.
Excepting your faults (I call them no worse), by God I am your
friend. The heat and passion in you, and the Attorney's zeal in
the king's service, make me speak this.

RALEIGH--Whosoever is the workman, it is reason he should give
an account of his work to his workmaster. But let it be proved
that he acquainted me with any of his conferences with Aremberg:
he would surely have given me some account.

LORD CECIL--That follows not: if I set you on work, and you give
me no account, am I therefore innocent?

ATTORNEY--For the lady Arabella, I said she was never
acquainted with the matter. Now that Raleigh had conference in
all these treasons, it is manifest. The jury hath heard the
matter. There is one Dyer, a pilot, that being in Lisbon met
with a Portugal gentleman, who asked him if the king of England
was crowned yet: to whom he answered, 'I think not yet, but he
shall be shortly.' Nay, saith the Portugal, that shall never be,
for his throat will be cut by Don Raleigh and Don Cobham before
he be crowned.

_Dyer_ was called and sworn, and delivered this evidence.

DYER--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 shortly. Nay, saith he, he
shall never be crowned; for Don Raleigh and Don Cobham shall cut
his throat ere that day come.

RALEIGH--What infer you upon this?

ATTORNEY--That your treason hath wings.

RALEIGH--If Cobham did practice with Aremberg, how could it not
but be known in Spain? 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? Consider, you
Gentlemen of the Jury, there is no cause so doubtful which the
king's council cannot make good against the law. Consider my
disability and their ability; they prove nothing against me,
only they bring the accusation of my lord Cobham which he hath
repented and lamented as heartily, as if it had been for an
horrible murder: for he knew that all this sorrow that should
come to me, is by his means. Presumptions must proceed from
precedent or subsequent facts. I have spent 40,000 crowns
against the Spaniards. I had not purchased L40 a year. If I had
died in Guiana, I had not left 300 marks a year to my wife and
son. I that have always condemned Spanish faction, methinks it
is a strange thing that now I should affect it! Remember what
St. Austin says, _Sic judicate tanquam ab alio mox judicandi;
unus judex, unum tribunal_. If you will be contented on
presumptions to be delivered up to be slaughtered, to have your
wives and children turned into the streets to beg their bread;
if you will be contented to be so judged, judge so of me.

SERJ. PHILIPS--I hope to make this so clear, as that the wit of
man shall have no colour to answer it. The matter is treason in
the highest degree, the end to deprive the king of his crown.
The particular treasons are these: first, to raise up rebellion,
and to effect that, to procure money; to raise up tumults in
Scotland, by divulging a treasonable Book against the king's
right to the crown; the purpose, to take away the life of his
majesty and his issue. My lord Cobham confesseth sir Walter to
be guilty of all these treasons. The question is, whether he be
guilty as joining with him, or instigating of him? The course to
prove this was by my lord Cobham's accusation. If that be true,
he is guilty, if not he is clear. So whether Cobham say true, or
Raleigh, that is the question. Raleigh hath no answer but the
shadow of as much wit as the wit of man can devise. He useth his
bare denial; the denial of a defendant must not move the jury.
In the Star Chamber, or in the Chancery, for matter of title, if
the defendant be called in question, his denial on his oath is
no evidence to the court to clear him, he doth it _in propria
causa_; therefore much less in matters of treason. Cobham's
testification against him before them, and since, hath been
largely discoursed.

RALEIGH--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.

ATTORNEY--Have you done? The king must have the last.

RALEIGH--Nay, Mr. Attorney, he which speaketh for his life, must
speak last. False repetitions and mistakings must not mar my
cause. You should speak _secundum allegata et probata_. I appeal
to God and the king in this point whether Cobham's accusation is
sufficient to condemn me.

ATTORNEY--The king's safety and your clearing cannot agree. I
protest before God, I never knew a clearer treason.

RALEIGH--I never had intelligence with Cobham since I came to
the Tower.

ATTORNEY--Go to, I will lay thee upon thy back, for the
confidentest traitor that ever came at a bar. Why should you
take 8,000 crowns for a peace?

LORD CECIL--Be not so impatient, good Mr. Attorney. Give him
leave to speak.

ATTORNEY--If I may not be patiently heard, you will encourage
traitors and discourage us. I am the king's sworn servant, and
must speak; if he be guilty, he is a traitor; if not, deliver
him.

(_Note._--Here Mr. Attorney sat down in a chafe and would speak
no more until the commissioners urged and intreated him. After
much ado, he went on, and made a long repetition of all the
evidence for the direction of the jury; and at the repeating of
some things, sir Walter Raleigh interrupted him and said he did
him wrong.)

ATTORNEY--Thou art the most vile and execrable traitor that ever
lived.

RALEIGH--You speak indiscreetly, barbarously, and uncivilly.

ATTORNEY--I want words sufficient to express thy viperous
treasons.

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

ATTORNEY--Thou art an odious fellow, thy name is hateful to all
the realm of England for thy pride.

RALEIGH--It will go near to prove a measuring cast between you
and me, Mr. Attorney.

ATTORNEY--Well, I will now make it appear to the world that
there never lived a viler viper upon the face of the earth than
thou.--And there withal he drew a letter out of his pocket
saying further--My lords, you shall see this is an agent that
hath writ a treatise against the Spaniard, and hath ever so
detested him; this is he that hath spent so much money against
him in service; and yet you shall all see whether his heart be
not wholly Spanish. The lord Cobham, who of his own nature was a
good and honourable gentleman, till overtaken by this wretch now
finding his conscience heavily burdened with some courses which
the subtlety of this traitor had drawn him into, my lords, he
could be at no rest with himself, nor quiet in his thoughts,
until he was eased of that heavy weight: out of which passion of
his mind and discharge of his duty to his prince and his
conscience to God, taking it upon his salvation that he wrote
nothing but the truth, with his own hands he wrote this letter.
Now sir, you shall see whether you had intelligence with Cobham
within four days before he came to the Tower. If he be wholly
Spanish, that desired a pension of L1500 a year from Spain, that
Spain by him might have intelligence, then Raleigh is a traitor:
he hath taken an apple and pinned a letter into it and threw it
into my lord Cobham's window, the contents whereof were this,
'It is doubtful whether we shall be proceeded with or no,
perhaps you shall not be tried.' This was to get a retractation.
Oh! it was Adam's apple whereby the devil did deceive him.
Further he wrote thus, 'Do not as my lord of Essex did; take
heed of a preacher, for by his persuasion he confessed and made
himself guilty.'[19] I doubt not but this day God shall have as
great a conquest by this traitor, and the Son of God shall be as
much glorified as when it was said _Vicisti Galilaee_; you know
my meaning. What though Cobham retracted, yet he could not rest
or sleep until he had confirmed it again. If this be not enough
to prove him a traitor, the king my master shall not live three
years to an end.

(_Note._--Here Mr. Attorney produced the lord Cobham's letter,
and as he read it, inserted some speeches.)

'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. Raleigh, four days before I came from
the Tower, caused an apple' (Eve's apple) 'to be thrown in at my
chamber window; the effect of it was, to intreat me to right the
wrong that I had done him, in saying, "that I should have come
home by Jersey"; which under my hand to him I have retracted.
His first Letter I answered not, which was thrown in the same
manner; wherein he prayed me to write him a Letter, which I did.
He sent me word, that the Judges met at Mr. Attorney's house,
and that there was good hope the proceedings against us should
be stayed: he sent me another time a little tobacco. At
Aremberg's coming, Raleigh was to have procured a pension of
L1500 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. He told me, the States had audience
with the king.'--(_Attorney._ 'Ah! is not this a Spanish heart
in an English body?') 'He hath been the original cause of my
ruin; for I had no dealing with Aremberg, but by his
instigation. He hath also been the cause of my discontentment;
he advised me, not to be overtaken by preachers, as Essex was;
and that the king would better allow of a constant denial, than
to accuse any.'

ATTORNEY--Oh, damnable atheist! He hath learned some Text of
Scripture to serve his own purpose, but falsely alledged. He
counsels him not to be counselled by preachers, as Essex was: He
died the child of God, God honoured him at his death; thou wast
by when he died: _Et lupus et turpes instant morientibus Ursae_.
He died indeed for his offence. The king himself spake these
words: 'He that shall say, Essex dies not for Treason, is
punishable.'

RALEIGH--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 I will die,
that he hath done me wrong: Why did not he acquaint him with my
dispositions?

LORD CHIEF-JUSTICE--But what say you now of the Letter, and the
Pension of L1500 per annum?

RALEIGH--I say, that Cobham is a base, dishonourable, poor soul.

ATTORNEY--Is he base? I return it into thy throat on his behalf:
but for thee he had been a good subject.

LORD CHIEF-JUSTICE--I perceive you are not so clear a man, as
you have protested all this while; for you should have
discovered these matters to the king.

(_Note._--Here Raleigh 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; the effect of it was as
follows:)

_Cobham's Letter of Justification to Raleigh._

'Seeing myself so near my end, for the discharge of my own
conscience, and freeing myself from your blood, which else will
cry vengeance against me; I protest upon my salvation I never
practised with Spain by your procurement; God so comfort me in
this my affliction, as you are a true subject, for any thing
that I know. I will say as Daniel, _Purus sum a sanguine hujus_.
God have mercy upon my soul, as I know no Treason by you.'

RALEIGH--Now I wonder how many souls this man hath. He damns one
in this Letter and another in that.

(Here was much ado: Mr. Attorney alledged, that his last Letter
was politicly and cunningly urged from the lord Cobham, and that
the first was simply the truth; and lest it should seem doubtful
that the first Letter was drawn from my lord Cobham by promise
of mercy, or hope of favour, the Lord Chief-Justice willed that
the Jury might herein be satisfied. Whereupon the earl of
Devonshire delivered that the same was mere voluntary, and not
extracted from the lord Cobham upon any hopes or promise of
Pardon.)

This concluded the evidence, and the jury having retired for less than a quarter of an hour, they returned, and brought in a verdict of Guilty.

When asked whether he had anything to say why judgment should not be passed upon him, Raleigh said that he had never practised with Spain, that he never knew that Cobham meant to get there ('I will ask no mercy at the king's hands, if he will affirm it'), that he never knew of the practice with lady Arabella, that he knew nothing of Cobham's practice with Aremberg, nor of the surprising Treason.

The Lord Chief-Justice replied that he was persuaded that Cobham had accused him truly, and reminded him that he had been offered a pension to act as a spy for Spain. Raleigh answered that he submitted himself, and his 'son of tender years, unbrought up,' to the king's mercy.

LORD CHIEF-JUSTICE--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 had brought yourself into a good state
of living; if you had entered into a good consideration of your
estate and not allowed your own wit to have intrapped yourself,
you might have lived in good comfort. 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. It was the Poesy of the wisest and
greatest Counsellor of our time in England, _In media spatio
mediocria firma locantur_. You might have lived well with L3000
a year, for so have I heard your revenues to be. I know nothing
might move you to be discontented: but if you had been down, you
know fortune's wheel, when it is turned down, riseth again. I
never heard that the king took away anything from you but the
Captainship of the Guard, which he did with very good reason, to
have one of his own knowledge, whom he might trust, in that
place. You have been taken for a wise man, and so have shewed
wit enough this day. Again for Monopolies for Wine, etc., if the
king had said, It is a matter that offends my people, should I
burden them for your private good? I think you could not well
take it hardly, that his subjects were eased, though by your
private hindrance. Two vices have lodged chiefly in you; one is
an eager ambition, the other corrupt covetousness. Ambition, in
desiring to be advanced to equal grace and favour, as you have
been beforetime; that grace you had then, you got not in a day
or year. For your covetousness, I am sorry to hear that a
gentleman of your wealth should become a base Spy for the enemy,
which is the vilest of all other; wherein on my conscience,
Cobham hath said true: by it you would have increased your
living L1500 a year. This covetousness is like canker, that eats
the iron place where it lives. Your case being thus, let it not
grieve you if I speak a little out of zeal, and love to your
good. 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 know what men said of Harpool. You
shall do well, before you go out of the world, to give
satisfaction therein, and not 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 any thing to a Preacher, telling
him an example of my lord of 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 for confessing, that we may be
absolved in 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 to 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.

_The Judgment._

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 a 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.

The execution of sentence on Raleigh was deferred, and he was committed to the Tower, where he remained as a State prisoner for the next thirteen years, engaged in philosophic and scientific pursuits and the education of Prince Henry, the then Prince of Wales. All this time, however, he remained a person of considerable political importance, owing to the assistance which the opponents of the proposed marriage between Prince Charles and the Spanish Infanta hoped to derive from his general popularity, and his reputation as the leading representative of English hatred of Spain. At last, in 1616, he was released from custody, though he was still technically a condemned man, and allowed to prepare his expedition in search of the gold-mine which he believed to exist in Guiana, on the banks of the Orinoco. The expedition was in fact promoted by Winwood, then Secretary, and Villiers, who was at the moment in the hands of the enemies of Somerset and the Spanish faction, and was always intended by them as an act of hostility to Spain. How far Raleigh entered into it in the spirit in which he represented it to the King, may be judged of from the fact that he was ready at one time to direct it against the Spaniards in Genoa, as a relief to the Duke of Savoy, with whom they were then at war, and at another against the French, to support a rebellion against the Queen-Mother, then in power. He had also entered into negotiations with the French Court to bring his ships back to France rather than England when its end was accomplished. What Raleigh's actual intentions were when he started, it is impossible to say. But they were all frustrated when a force which he sent up the Orinoco was disastrously defeated in January 1617, in an attack on a Spanish settlement, which was unexpectedly discovered between the sea and the supposed situation of the mine. Raleigh returned a ruined man. He wished himself to go to France, but his crew forced him to promise to obtain their pardon from the King before he brought his ship into port. In the end, after having touched at Kinsale, he persuaded his men to sail for Plymouth. On landing he set out for London, but on the way met his cousin, Sir Lewis Stukely, Vice-Admiral of Devon, charged with orders to arrest him. Returning to Plymouth, he found means to put himself into communication with the captain of a French ship, lying in the Sound. Preparations were made for his escape in her, but Raleigh changed his mind when he was actually in a boat on his way to board her, and returned to land. Soon after orders came that he should be brought up to London; but he managed to procure a little more time by feigning illness at Salisbury. Here he attempted to bribe Stukely to allow him to escape; but this proving in vain, he sent King, one of his captains, to hire a vessel at Gravesend to await him till he could go on board. The master, however, communicated the plan to a captain of one of the King's ships, who passed it on to Stukely, who thereupon communicated both attempts to the King. The next day Stukely sent the further information to the Court, that Le Clerc, the agent of the King of France, had offered Raleigh a passage on a French ship, and letters which would procure him an honourable reception in France, which Raleigh had refused on the ground that his escape was already provided for. Stukely was accordingly ordered to feign friendship with Raleigh, and to aid his attempt to escape, arresting him at the last moment; the object being to gain as much information as to his designs as he could from Raleigh, and possibly to obtain papers which would contain evidence against him and his confederates. Raleigh was thereupon taken to his own house in Bread Street, where he received a visit from Le Clerc, who repeated his offers, which were accepted, and he was finally arrested the next morning as he was escaping in a boat with Stukely and King, and brought back once more to the Tower. Here Sir Thomas Wilson, an old spy of Queen Elizabeth's, was set to extract from him, if he could, an acknowledgment of the true character of his dealings with the French; and at length Raleigh wrote to the King admitting that he had sailed with a commission from the French admiral, and that La Chesnee, the interpreter to the French Ambassador, had offered to assist in his escape. Meanwhile a commission had been sitting to advise the King as to the best course for him to follow. In the end they reported that Raleigh could not be tried for any offence of which he had been guilty as an attainted man, that if he were executed at all, he must therefore be executed upon the old judgment, and that it would not be illegal to send him to execution on a simple warrant. At the same time, they recommended that he should be allowed something as near a trial as the circumstances admitted of; that there should be a public proceeding in which the witnesses should be publicly called, and that Raleigh should be heard in his own defence.

This, however, the King would not allow; and on the 28th of October 1618, Raleigh was brought up from the Tower to the King's Bench at Westminster to receive judgment. He was called on to say why execution should not be awarded against him, and pleaded that whereas since judgment he had held the King's commission for a voyage beyond the seas, with power of life and death over others, he was discharged of the judgment; 'but the voyage, notwithstanding my endeavour, had no other success, but what was fatal to me, the loss of my son, and the wasting of my whole estate.'

Sir Edward Coke, now Lord Chief-Justice, ruled that this plea was bad, as the commission had not the effect of a pardon, 'for by words of a special nature, in case of treason, you must be pardoned, and not implicitly.' He then proceeded, not without dignity, to order that execution should be granted.

The night before the Execution, Sir Walter wrote the following
Letters, the one to the King, the other to his Wife:--

_Sir Walter Raleigh's Letter to the King._

'The life which I had, most mighty prince, the law hath taken
from me, and I am now but the same earth and dust out of which I
was made. If my offence had any proportion with your majesty's
mercy, I might despair, or if my deserving had any quantity with
your majesty's unmeasurable goodness, I might yet have hope; but
it is you that must judge that, not I. Name, blood, gentility or
estate, I have none; no not so much as a _vitam plantae_: I have
only a penitent soul in a body of iron, which moveth towards the
loadstone of death, and cannot be with-held from touching it,
except your majesty's mercy turn the point towards me that
expelleth. Lost I am for hearing of vain man, for hearing only,
and never believing or accepting: and so little account I made
of that speech of his, which was my condemnation (as my
forsaking him doth truly witness), that I never remembered any
such thing, till it was at my trial objected against me. So did
he repay my care, who cared to make him good, which I now see no
care of man can effect. But God (for my offence to him) hath
laid this heavy burden upon me, miserable and unfortunate wretch
that I am! But for not loving you (my sovereign), God hath not
laid this sorrow on me; for he knows (with whom I am not in case
to lie) that I honoured your majesty by fame, and loved and
admired you by knowledge; so that whether I live or die, your
majesty's loving servant I will live and die. If now, I write
what seems not well-favoured, most merciful prince, vouchsafe to
ascribe it to the counsel of a dead heart, and to a mind that
sorrow hath confounded. But the more my misery is, the more is
your majesty's mercy, if you please to behold it, and the less I
can deserve, the more liberal your majesty's gift shall be:
herein you shall only imitate God, by giving free life; and by
giving it to such a one, from whom there can be no retribution,
but only a desire to pay a lent life with the same great love,
which the same great goodness shall bestow on it. This being the
first letter that ever your majesty received from a dead man: I
humbly submit myself to the will of God, my supreme lord, and
shall willingly and patiently suffer whatsoever it shall please
your majesty to afflict me withal.

'WALTER RALEIGH.'

_Sir Walter Raleigh's Letter to his Wife._