Chapter II: Part 2

This Discourse of Western Planting therefore, and the voyage of Amadas and Barlow, in 1584, at the instigation and expense of Raleigh, based on a thorough knowledge of the Huguenot and Spanish expeditions to Florida in 1562-1568, are all parts of Virginia history, and therefore are preliminary to Hariot’s Report. It should be borne in mind that these terms Florida and Virginia as used by the Spaniards, French, and English, included the whole country from the point of Florida through the Carolinas and Virginia to the Chesapeake Bay, or perhaps even to Bacalaos.

Raleigh’s patent, in which all interests were thus consolidated, came before Parliament in the Autumn of 1584 well fortified in its historical and geographical bearings by Hakluyt’s learned Discourse. In the House of Commons the matter was adroitly referred to a Commitee of which Walsingham and Sir Philip Sidney, Sir Christopher Hatton and Sir Francis Drake were members. The bill having passed the House was sent up to the Lords, and there read the first time on Sunday the 19th of December 1584, as appears by the following entry in the Lords’ Journal, volume ii, page 76. ‘Hodie allatae sicut a Dome Communi 4 Billae; _Prima,_ For the Confirmation of the Queen’s Majesty’s Letters Patents, granted to Walter Raughlieghe, Esquire, touching the Discovery and Inhabiting of certain Foreign Lands and Countries, quae ia _vice_ lecta est.’ It does not appear precisely at what date the Bill received the Queen’s signature, but probably as early as Christmas or New Year.

Having now early in 1585 secured the Confirmation of this much coveted patent which liberally permitted him in the name and under the aegis of England to plant a ‘colonie’ and found an English empire in the New World at his own expense of money, men, and enterprise; having pocketed the geographical results and valuable experience of the French in Florida and Canada; having vainly attempted a visit to Newfoundland in 1578, and having succeeded to the rights and privileges of his noble half-brother Sir Humphrey Gilbert; having received by the return in September of his two reconnoitring barks favorable reports as to the properest place to begin his Western Planting in Wingandacoa ; and being thoroughly supported by the good wishes and hearty co-operation of the Queen and many of her prominent and influential subjects, Raleigh rose superior to all jealousies and opposition.

This lasted as usual just so long as he was successful and no longer. But he was blessed in his household, or at his table, or in his confidence, with four sterling adherents who stuck to him through thick and thin, through prosperity and adversity. These were Richard Hakluyt, Jaques Le Moyne, John White and Thomas Hariot. When Wingandacoa makes up her jewels she will not forget these Four, whom it is just to call Raleigh’s Magi.

With marvellous energy, enterprise, and skill Raleigh collected and fitted out in an incredibly short time a fleet of seven ships well stocked and well manned to transport his ‘first colonie’ into the wilds of America. It was under the command of his valiant cousin, Admiral Sir Richard Grenville, and sailed from Plymouth on the 19th of May 1585. Never before did a finer fleet leave the shores of England, and never since was one more honestly or hopefully dispatched. There were the ‘Tyger’ and the ‘Roe Buck’ of 140 tons each, the ‘Lyon’ of 100 tons, the ‘Elizabeth’ of 50 tons, the ‘Dorothea’, a small bark, and two pinnaces, hardly big enough to bear distinct names, yet small enough to cross dangerous bars and enter unknown bays and rivers. In this splendid outfit were nearly two hundred souls, among whom were Master Ralfe Lane as governor of the colony. Thomas Candish or Cavendish afterwards the circumnavigator, Captain Philip Amadas of the Council, John White the painter as delineator and draughtsman, Master Thomas Hariot the mathematician as historiographer, surveyor and scientific discoverer or explorer, and many others whose names are preserved in Hakluyt.

The fleet had a prosperous voyage by the then usual route of the West Indies and fell in with the main of Florida on the 20th of June, made and named Cape Fear on the 23d, and a first landing the next day, and on the 26th came to Wococa where Amadas and Barlow had been the year before. They disembarked and at first mistook the country for Paradise. July was spent in surveying and exploring the country, making the acquaintance of the natives, chiefly by means of two Indians that had been taken to England and brought back able to speak English. On the 5th of August Master John Arundel, captain of one of the vessels, was sent back to England, and on the 25th of August Admiral Grenville, after a sojourn of two months in Virginia, took his leave and returned, arriving at Plymouth on the 18th of October. There were left in Virginia as Raleigh’s ‘First Colonie,’ one hundred and nine men. They remained there one whole year and then, discontented, returned to England in July 1586 in Sir Francis Drake’s fleet coming home victorious from the West Indies.

One of these 109 men was Thomas Hariot the Author of the Report of Virginia. Another was John White the painter. To these two earnest and true men we owe, as has been said, nearly all we know of ‘Ould Virginia.’ Their story is briefly told by Hakluyt.

Sir Francis Drake in the true spirit of friendship went out of his way to make this call on the Colony of his friend Raleigh. He found them anything but contented and prosperous. They had long been expecting supplies and reinforcements from home, which not arriving, on the departure of Drake’s fleet becoming dejected and homesick, they petitioned the Governor for permission to return. Immediately after their departure a ship arrived from Raleigh, and fourteen days later Sir Richard Grenville himself returned with his fleet of three ships, new planters and stores of supplies, only to find the Colony deserted and no tidings to be had. Leaving twenty men to hold possession the Admiral made his way back to England.

It has already been stated how and under what circumstances the epitome of the labours and surveys of Hariot came to be printed, but it may be well to show how it came to be united with John White’s drawings and republished a year or two later as the first part of De Bry’s celebrated collections of voyages. Hakluyt returned to Paris at the end of 1584. and remained there, perhaps with an occasional visit to London, till 1588, always working in the interests of Raleigh. In April 1585, a month before the departure of the Virginia fleet, he wrote to Walsingham that he ‘was careful to advertise Sir Walter Raleigh from tyme to tyme and send him discourses both in print and in written hand concerning his voyage.’ Rene Goulaine de Laudonnière’s Journal had fallen into Hakluyt’s hand, and he induced his friend Basanier the mathematician to edit and publish it. This was done and the work was dedicated to Raleigh and probably paid for by him. Le Moyne the painter and mathematician who had accompanied the expedition, one of the few who escaped into the woods and swamps with Laudonnière the dreadful morning of the massacre, was named by Basanier. He also mentions a lad named De Bry who was lucky enough to find his way out of the clutches of the Spanish butchers into the hands of the more merciful American Savages. This young man was found by De Gourgues nearly three years later among the Indians that joined him in his mission of retribution against the Spaniards, and was restored to his friends well instructed in the ways, manners and customs of the Florida Aborigines.

This journal of Laudonnière carefully edited by Basanier was completed in time to be published in Paris in 1586, in French, in octavo. It was dedicated to Sir Walter Raleigh. Hakluyt translated it into English, and printed it in small quarto in London the next year and it reappeared again in his folio voyages of 1589. The French edition fell under the eye of Theodore De Bry the afterwards celebrated engraver of Frankfort, formerly of Liege. Whether or not this engraver was a relative of young De Bry of Florida is not known, but we are told that he soon sought out Le Moyne whom he found in Raleigh’s service living in the Blackfriars in London, acting as painter, engraver on wood, a teacher and art publisher or bookseller.

De Bry first came to London in 1587 to see Le Moyne and arrange with him about illustrating Laudonnière’s Journal with the artist’s maps and paintings, and remained here some time, but did not succeed in obtaining what he wanted, probably because Le Moyne was meditating a similar work of his own, and being still attached to the household of Raleigh was not free to negotiate for that peculiar local and special information which he had already placed at Raleigh’s disposal for his colony planted a little north of the French settlement in Florida, then supposed to be in successful operation, but of which nothing had yet been published to give either the world at large or the Spaniards in the peninsula a premature clue to his enterprise.

There is still preserved a good memorial of De Bry’s visit to London in the celebrated funeral pageant at the obsequies of Sir Philip Sidney in the month of February 1587, drawn and invented by T. Lant and engraved on copper by Theodore de Bry in the city of London, 1587. A complete copy is in the British Museum, and another is said to be at the old family seat of the Sidneys at Penshurst in Kent, now Lord de L’lsle’s; while a third copy not quite perfect adorns the famous London collectionof Mr Gardner of St John’s Wood Park.

LeMoyne died in 1588, and De Bry soon after came to London a second time and succeeded in purchasing of the widow of Le Moyne a portion of the artist’s drawings or paintings together with his version of the French Florida Expeditions. While here this time De Bry fell in with Richard Hakluyt, who had returned from Paris in November 1588, escorting Lady Sheffield.

Hakluyt at the end of this year, or the beginning of 1589, was engaged in seeing through the press his first folio collection of the voyages of the English, finished, according to the date in the preface, the 17th of November, though entered at Stationers’ Hall on the strength of a note from Walsingham the first of September previous. Hakluyt with his mind full of voyages and travels was abundantly competent to appreciate De Bry’s project of publishing a luxurious edition of Laudonnière’s Florida illustrated with the exquisite drawings of Le Moyne. Ever ready to make a good thing better, Hakluyt suggested the addition of Le Moyne’s and other Florida papers; and introduced De Bry to John White, Governor of Virginia, then in London.

White, an English painter of eminence and merit, was as an artist to Virginia what Le Moyne his master had been to Florida. Le Moyne had twenty years before mapped and pictured everything in Florida from the River of May to Cape Fear, and White had done the same for Raleigh’s Colony in Virginia (now North Carolina) from Cape Fear to the Chesapeake Bay. Le Moyne had spent a year with Laudonnière at Fort Caroline in 1564-65, and White had been a whole year in and about Roanoke and the wilderness of Virginia in 1585-86 as the right hand man of Hariot.

Together Hariot and White surveyed, mapped, pictured and described the country, the Indians, men and women; the animals, birds, fishes, trees, plants, fruits and vegetables. Hariot’s Report or epitome of his Chronicle, reproduced by the Hercules Club, was privately printed in February 1589. A volume containing seventy-six of White’s original drawings in water colours is now preserved in the Grenville library in the British Museum, purchased by the Trustees in March 1866 of Mr Henry Stevens at the instigation of Mr Panizzi, and placed there as an appropriate pendant to the world-renowned Grenville De Bry. This is the very volume that White painted for Raleigh, and which served De Bry for his Virginia. Only 23 out of the 76 drawings were engraved, the rest never yet having been published. Thus Hariot’s text and map with White’s drawings are necessary complements to each other and should be mentioned together.

Knowing all these men and taking an active part in all these important events, Hakluyt acted wisely in inducing De Bry to modify his plan of a separate publication and make a Collection of illustrated Voyages. He suggested first that the separate work of Florida should be suspended, and enlarged with Le Moyne’s papers, outside of Laudonnière. Then reprint, as a basis of the Collection, Hariot’s privately printed Report on Virginia just coming out in February 1589, and illustrate it with the map and White’s drawings. Hakluyt engaged to write descriptions of the plates, and his geographical touches are easily recognizable in the maps of both Virginia and Florida.

In this way De Bry was induced to make Hariot’s Virginia the First Part of his celebrated PEREGRINATIONS, with a dedication to Sir Walter Raleigh. Florida then became the Second Part. The first was illustrated from the portfolio of John White, and the second from that of Jaques Le Moyne. Both parts are therefore perfectly authentic and trustworthy. Thus the famous Collections of De Bry may be said to be of English origin, for to Raleigh and his magi De Bry owed everything in the start of his great work. Being thus supplied and instructed, De Bry returned to Frankfort, and with incredible energy and enterprise, engraved, printed, and issued his VIRGINIA in four languages, English, French, Latin and German, in 1590, and his Florida in Latin and German, in 1591. The bibliographical history of these books, the intimacy and dependence of the several persons engaged; and the geographical development of Florida-Virginia are all so intertwined and blended, that the whole seems to lead up to Thomas Hariot, the clearing up of whose biography thus becomes an appropriate labor of the Hercules Club.

Little more remains to be said of Raleigh’s Magi who have been thus shown to be hand and glove in working out these interesting episodes of French and English colonial history. To Hakluyt, Le Moyne, White, De Bry and Hariot, Raleigh owes an undivided and indivisible debt of gratitude for the prominent niche which he achieved in the world’s history, especially in that of England and America ; while to Raleigh’s liberal heart and boundless enterprise must be ascribed a generous share of the reputation achieved by his Magi in both hemispheres.

Of Hakluyt and De Bry little more need be said here. They both hewed out their own fortunes and recorded them on the pages of history, the one with his pen, the other with his graver. If at times ill informed bibliographers who have got beyond their depth fail to discern its merits, and endeavour to deny or depreciate De Bry’s Collection, charging it with a want of authenticity and historic truth, it is hoped that enough has been said here to vindicate at least the first two parts, Virginia and Florida. The remaining parts, it is believed, can be shown to be of equal authority.

Whoever compares the original drawings of Le Moyne and White with the engravings of De Bry, as one may now do in the British Museum, must be convinced that, beautiful as De Bry’s work is, it seems tame in the presence of the original water-colour drawings. There is no exaggeration in the engravings.

Le Moyne’s name has not found its way into modern dictionaries of art or biography, but he was manifestly an artist of great merit and a man of good position. In addition to what is given above it may be added that a considerable number of his works is still in existence, and it is hoped will hereafter be duly appreciated. In the print-room of the British Museum are two of his drawings, highly finished in water-colours, being unquestionably the originals of plates eight and forty-one of De Bry’s Florida. They are about double the size of the engravings. They came in with the Sloane Collection. There is also in the Manuscript Department of the British Museum a volume of original drawings relating chiefly to Florida and Virginia (Sloane N° 5270) manifestly a mixture of Le Moyne’s and White’s sketches. They are very valuable. There is also in the Museum library a printed and manuscript book by Le Moyne, which speaks for itself and tells its own interesting story. It is in small oblong quarto and is entitled ‘La/ Clef des Champs,/ pour trouuer plusieurs Ani-/maux, tant Bestes qu’Oyseaux, auec/ plusieurs Fleurs & Fruitz. . . / Anno. I586./ ¶ Imprimé aux Blackfriers, pour Jaques/ le Moyne, dit de Morgues Paintre/’. The book consists of fifty leaves, of which two are preliminary containing the title and on the reverse and third page a neat dedication in French ‘A Ma-dame Madame/ De Sidney.’/ Signed’ Voftre tres-affectionne,/ JAQVES LE MOINE dit

de/ MORGVES Paintre.’/ This dedication is dated ‘Londres/ ce xxvi. de Mars.’/ On the reverse of the second leaf, also in French, is ‘¶ A Elle Mesme,/ Sonet’ with the initials I.L.M.

Then follow forty-eight leaves with two woodcuts coloured by hand on the recto of each leaf, reverse blank. These ninety-six cuts sum up twenty-four each of beasts, birds, fruits and flowers, with names printed under each in English, French, German and Latin. Although the book is dated the 26th of March 1586, it was not entered at Stationers’ Hall until the 31st of July 1587. It there stands under the name of James Le Moyne alias Morgan. Madame Sidney is given as Mary Sidney. She was sister of Sir Philip, countess of Pembroke, ‘Sidney’s sister, Pembroke’s mother.’ There is no allusion to Sir Philip in the dedication, and therefore we may infer that it was penned before the battle of Zut-phen. Both the dedication and the sonnet show the artist’s intimacy and friendship with that distinguished family.

There are two copies of this exceedingly rare book in the British Museum, both slightly imperfect, but will together make a complete one, but the more interesting copy is that in 727 c/2 31, in the Sloane Collection. It has bound up with it thirty-seven leaves on which are beautifully drawn and painted flowers, fruits, birds &c. There can be little doubt that these are Le Moyne’s own paintings. It is curious to find that all these scattered works in the different departments came in with the Sloane Collection which formed the nucleus of the British Museum. It is to be hoped that other samples of Le Moyne’s art may be found or identified, and that all of them may be brought together or be described as the ‘Le Moyne Collection.’ How Sir Hans Sloane became possessed of them does not yet appear.

Capt. John White’s name in the annals of English art is destined to rank high, though it has hitherto failed to be recorded in the art histories and dictionaries. Yet his seventy-six original paintings in water-colours done probably in Virginia in 1585-1586 while he was there with Hariot as the official draughtsman or painter of Raleigh’s ‘First Colonie’ entitle him to prominence among English artists in Elizabeth’s reign. There are some other works of his in the Manuscript department mingled with those of his friend and master Le Moyne.

As Raleigh’s friend and agent White’s name deserves honorable mention in the history of ‘Ould Virginia.’ He was an original adventurer in the ‘First Colonie’ and was one of the hundred and nine who spent a whole year at and about Roanoke and returned with Drake in 1586. He went again to Virginia in April 1587 as Governor of Raleigh’s’ Second Colonie,’ consisting of one hundred and fifty persons in three ships, being the fourth expedition. Raleigh appointed to him twelve assistants ‘to whome he gave a Charter, and incorporated them by the name of Governour and Assistants of the Citie of Raleigh in Virginia,’ intended to be founded on the Chesapeake Bay. It never became more than a ‘paper city.’

This Second Colony landed at Roanoke the 20th of July, but finding themselves disappointed and defeated in all points, the colonists joined in urging the Governor to return to England for supplies and instructions. He reluctantly departed the 27th of August from Roanoke, leaving there his daughter, who was the mother of the first child of English parents born in English North America, Virginia Dare. He intended immediately to return to Virginia with relief, but the embarrassments of Raleigh, the stirring times, and the ‘Spanish Armada’ defeated Sir Walter and frustrated all his plans.

On the 20th of November 1587 Governor White having reached home apprised Raleigh of the circumstances and requirements of the Colony. Sir Walter at once ‘appointed a pinnesse to be sent thither with all such necessaries as he vnderstood they stood in neede of,’ and also ‘wrote his letters vnto them, wherein among other matters he comforted them with promise, that with all conuenient speede he would prepare a good supply of shipping and men with sufficience of all thinges needefull, which he intended, God willing, should be with them the Sommer following.’ This promised fleet was got ready in the harbor of Bideford under the personal care and supervision of Sir Richard Grenville, and waited only for a fair wind to put to sea. Then came news of the proposed invasion of England by Philip King of Spain with his ‘invincible armada,’ so wide spread and alarming that it was deemed prudent by the Government to stay all ships fit for war in any ports of England to be in readiness for service at home ; and even Sir Richard Grenville was commanded not to leave Cornwall.

Governor White however having left about one hundred and twenty men, women and children in Virginia, among whom were his own daughter and granddaughter, left no stone unturned for their relief. He labored so earnestly and successfully that he obtained two small ‘pinneses’ named the ‘Brave’ and the ‘Roe,’ one of thirty and the other of twenty-five tons, ‘wherein fifteen planters and all their provision, with certain reliefe for those that wintered in the Countrie was to be transported.’

The’ Brave’ and the ‘Roe’ with this slender equipment passed the bar of Bideford the 22nd of April, just six months after the return of the Governor, a small fleet with small hope. Had it been larger its going forth would not have been permitted. The Governor remained behind, thinking he could serve the Colony better in England. But the sailors of the little ‘Brave’ and ‘Roe’ had caught the fighting mania before they sailed, and instead of going with all speed to the relief of Virginia, scoured the seas for rich prizes, and like two little fighting cocks let loose attacked every sail they caught sight of, friend or foe. The natural consequence was that before they reached Madeira (they took the southern course for the sake of plunder) they had been several times thoroughly whipped, and ‘all thinges spilled’ in their fights. ‘By this occasion, God iustly punishing the theeuerie of our euil disposed mariners, we were of force constrained to break of our voyage intended for the reliefe of our Colony left the yere before in Virginia, and the same night to set our course for England.’ In a month from their departure they recrossed the bar of Bideford, their voyage having been a disgraceful failure, yet the doings of these two miniature corsairs are recorded in Hakluyt manifestly only as specimens of English pluck, a British quality always admired, however much misdirected. Meanwhile no tidings of the ‘Second colonie’ and worse still, no tidings or help had the Second Colony received all this long time from England. And even to this day the echo is ‘no tidings’ and no help from home. This then may be called the first and great human sacrifice that savage America required of civilized England before yielding to her inevitable destiny.

And so it was that Virginia and the Armada Year shook the fortunes of Raleigh and compelled him to assign a portion of his Patent and privileges under it to divers gentlemen and merchants of London. This document, in which are included and protected the charter rights of White and others in the ‘City of Raleigh,’ bears date the 7th of March 1589. Matters being thus settled, with more capital and new life a ‘Fifth Expedition’ was fitted out in 1590 in which Governor White went out to carry aid, and to reinforce his long neglected colony of 1587. Not one survivor was found, and White returned the same year in every way unsuccessful. He soon after retired to Raleigh’s estates in Ireland, and the last heard of him is a long letter to his friend Hakluyt ‘from my house at Newtowne in Kylmore the 4th of February 1593.’

Raleigh’s Patent, like that of Gilbert, would have expired by the limitation of six years on the 24th of March 1590 if he had not succeeded in leading out a colony and taking possession. His first colony of 1585 was voluntarily abandoned, but not his discoveries. His second colony of 1587 was surrounded with so much obscurity that though in fact he maintained no real and permanent settlement, yet it was never denied that he lawfully took possession and inhabited Virginia within the six years and also for a time in the seventh year, and therefore was entitled to privileges extending two hundred leagues from Roanoke. As long as Elizabeth lived no one disputed Raleigh’s privileges under his patent, though partly assigned, but none of the Assignees cared to adventure further. The patent had become practically a dead letter. As late however as 1603 the compliment was paid Raleigh of asking his permission to make a voyage to North Virginia. As no English plantation between the Spanish and the French possessions in North America at the time of the accession of James was maintained the patent was allowed nominally to remain in force. But no one claimed any rights under it. It has been stated by several recent historians that the attainder of Raleigh took away his patent privileges, but evidence of this is not forthcoming. It is manifest that James the First, who had little regard for his own or others’ royal grants or chartered rights in America, considered the coast clear and as open to his own royal bounty as it had been long before to Pope Alexander the Sixth. It was easier and safer to obtain new charters than to revive any questionable old ones.

But to all intents and purposes the interesting history of Virginia begins with Raleigh. Whence he drew his inspiration, how he profited by the experience of others, how he patronized his Magi and bound them to himself with cords of friendship and liberality; how by his very blunders and misfortunes he transmitted to posterity some of the most precious historical memorials found on the pages of English or American history, we have, perhaps at unnecessary length, endeavoured to show in this long essay on the brief and true Report of Thomas Hariot, his surveyor and topographer in Virginia, which must ever serve as the corner-stone of English American History, by a man who, though long neglected and half forgotten, must eventually shine as the morning star of the mathematical sciences in England, as well as that of the history of her Empire in the West.

It remains now to give some personal account of Thomas Hariot, whose first book as the first of the labors of the hercules club has been reproduced. Every incident in the life of a man of eminent genius and originality in any country is a lesson to the world’s posterity deserving careful record. Hitherto dear quaint old positive antiquarianly slippery Anthony à Wood in his _Athenes Oxoniensis_ embodies nearly all of our accepted notions of this great English mathematician and philosopher. Anthony was indefatigable in his researches into the biography of Hariot who was both an Oxford man and an Oxford scholar. He happily succeeded in mousing out a goodly number of recondite and particular occurrences of Hariot’s life. He managed, however, to state very many of them erroneously ; and he drew hence some important inferences, the reverse, as it now appears, of historical truth. This naturally leads one to inquire into his authorities. Wood’s account of Hariot appeared in his first edition of 1691, and has not been improved in the two subsequent editions. For most of his facts he appears to have been indebted to Dr John Wallis’s Algebra, first published in 1685, though ready for the printer in 1676 ; and for his fictions to poor old gossiping Aubrey; while his inferences, in respect to Hariot’s deism and disbelief in the Scriptures, are probably his own, as we find no sufficient trace of them prior to the appearance of his Athenæ, unless it be in Chief Justice Popham’s unjust charge at Winchester in 1603, when he is said to have twitted Raleigh from the bench with having been ‘bedeviled’ by Hariot. Dr Wallis appears to have obtained part of his facts from John Collins, who had been in his usual indefatigable manner looking up Hariot and his papers as early as 1649, and wrote to the doctor of his success several letters between 1667 and 1673, which maybe seen in Professor Rigaud’s Correspondence of Scientific Men of the Seventeenth Century, 2 vols, Oxford, 1841, 8°.

Since 1784, from time to time, several other writers have partly repeated Wood’s estimate and added several new facts, as will be shown further on. But it has been reserved for the Hercules Club, now just three hundred years after Hariot left the University, to bring to light new and important contemporary evidence, sufficient, it is believed, to considerably modify our general estimate of Hariot’s life and character, and to raise him from the second rank of mathematicians to which Montucla coolly relegated him nearly a century ago to the pre-eminence of being one of the foremost scholars of his age, not alone of England but of the world. Had he been walled around by church bigotry like his friend and contemporary Galileo he would unquestionably by the originality and brilliancy of his observations and discoveries have rivalled, or perhaps have shared that philosopher’s victories in science. At all events it is believed that the new matter is sufficient to reopen the courts of criticism and revision in which some of the decisions respecting the use of perspective glasses, the invention of the telescope, the discoveries of the spots on the sun, the satellites of Jupiter and the horns of Venus may be reconsidered and perhaps reversed. It is believed that in logical analysis, in philosophy, and in many other departments of science few in his day were his equals, while in pure mathematics none was his superior.

Thomas Hariot was born at Oxford, or as Anthony à Wood with more than his usual quaint-ness expresses it, ‘tumbled out of his mother’s womb into the lap of the Oxonian muses in 1560.’ He was a ‘bateler or commoner of St Mary’s hall.’ He ‘took the degree of bachelor of arts in 1579, and in the latter end of that year did compleat it by determination in Schoolstreet.’ Nothing of his boyhood, or of his family, except a few hints in his will, has come to light.

It is not known precisely at what time Hariot joined Walter Raleigh, who was only eight years his senior. From what their friend Hakluyt says of them both, their intimate friendship and mutually serviceable connection were already an old story as early as 1587. On the eighth calends of March 1587, that is on the 22d of February 1588, present reckoning, Hakluyt wrote from Paris to Raleigh in London,

‘To you therefore I have freely desired to give and dedicate these my labors. For to whom could I present these Decades of the New World [of Peter Martyr] more appropriately than to yourself, who, at the expense of nearly one hundred thousand ducats, with new fleets, are showing to us of modern times new regions, leading forth a third colony [to Virginia], giving us news of the unknown, and opening up for us pathways through the inaccessible ; and whose every care, and thought, and effort tend towards this end, hinge upon and adhere to it ? To whom have been present and still are present the same ideas, desires, & incentives as with that most illustrious Charles Howard, the Second Neptune of the Ocean, and Edward Stafford our most prudent Ambassador at the Court of France, in order to accomplish great deeds by sea and land. But since by your skill in the art of navigation you clearly saw that the chief glory of an insular kingdom would obtain its greatest splendor among us by the firm support of the mathematical sciences, you have trained up and supported now a long time, with a most liberal salary, Thomas Hariot, a young man well versed in those studies, in order that you might acquire in your spare hours by his instruction a knowledge of these noble sciences ; and your own numerous Sea Captains might unite profitably theory with practice. What is to be the result shortly of this your wise and learned school, they who possess even moderate judgment can have no difficulty in guessing. This one thing I know, the one and only consideration to place before you, that first the Portuguese and afterwards the Spaniards formerly made great endeavours with no small loss, but at length succeeded through determination of mind. Hasten on then to adorn the Sparta[Vir-ginia] you have discovered; hasten on that ship more than Argonautic, of nearly a thousand tons burthen which you have at last built and finished with truly regal expenditure, to join with the rest of the fleet you have fitted out.’

From this extract one might perhaps reasonably infer that Hariot went directly from the University in 1580 at the age of twenty into Raleigh’s service, or at latest in 1582 when Raleigh returned from Flanders. As our translation of this important passage is rather a free one the old geographer’s words are here added, in his own peculiar Latin. Hakluyt in his edition of Peter Martyr’s Eight Decades, printed at Paris in 1587, 8°, writes of his young friend Hariot in his dedication to his older friend Sir Walter Raleigh, as follows :—

Tibi igitur has meas vigilias condonatas & confecratas efle volui. Cui enim potius, quàm tibi has noui Orbis Decades offerem, qui centum ferè millium ducatoru impenfa, nouis tuis clafsibus regiones nouas, nouam iam tertiò ducendo coloniam, notas ex ignotis, ex inaccefsis peruias, nouifsimis hifce teporibus nobis exhibes ? Cuius omnes curse, cogitationes, conatus, hue fpeflant, haec verfant, in his inhaerent. Cui cum Illuftrifsimo illo herôe, Carolo Hovvardo, altcro Oceani maris Neptuno, Edoardi Staffbrdij, noftri apud regem Chriftianifsimum oratoris prudentifsimi fororio, eadem ftudia, eaedem voluntates, iidem ad res magnas terra maríque aggrediendas funt & fuerunt ani-morum ftimuli. Cùm vero artis nauigatoriæ peritia, præcipuum regni infularis ornamentum, Mathematicarii fcientiaru adminiculis adhibitis, fuu apud nos fplendore poffe cofequi facile per-fpiceres, Thomas Hariotum, iuuenem in illis difciplinis excellente, honeftifsimo falario iamdiu donatum apud te aluifti, cuius fubndio horis fuccefsiuis nobililsimas fcientias illas addifcercs, tuique familiarcs duces maritimi, quos habes non paucos, cum praii theoria non fine fructu incredibili coiungeret. Ex quo pulcherrimo & fapientifsimo inftitutotuo, quid breui euentutum fit, qui vel mediocri iudicio volent, facilè proculdubio diuinare poterunt. Vnum hoc fcio, vnam & vnicam rationem te inire, quaæ primò Lufitani, deinde Caftellani, quod antea toties cum no exigua iactura funt conati, tandem ex animoru votis perficerut. Perge ergo Spartam quam nactus es ornare, perge nauem illam plufquam Argonauticam, mille cuparum fere capace, quam fumptibus plane regiis fabricatam iam tadem foelicitcr abfoluifti, reliquae tuae clafsi, quam babes egregiè inftructam, adiungere.

From this early time for nearly forty years, till the morning of the 29th of October 1618, when Raleigh was beheaded, these two friends are found inseparable. Whether in prosperity or in adversity, in the Tower or on the scaffold, Sir Walter always had his Fidus Achates to look after him and watch his interests. With a sharp wit, close mouth, and ready pen Hariot was of inestimable service to his liberal patron. With rare attainments in the Greek and Latin Classics, and all branches of the abstract sciences, he combined that perfect fidelity and honesty of character which placed him always above suspicion even of the enemies of Sir Walter. He was neither a politician nor statesman, and therefore could be even in those times a faithful guide, philosopher, and friend to Raleigh.

In the year 1585, as has already been stated above, Hariot, at the age of twenty-five, went out to Virginia in Raleigh’s « first Colonie’ as surveyor and historiographer with Sir Richard Grenville, and remained there one year under Governor Ralph Lane, returning in July 1586, in Sir Francis Drake’s home-bound fleet from the West Indies. During the absence of this expedition Raleigh had received triple favors from Fortune. He had entered Parliament, been knighted, and had been presented by the Queen with twelve thousand broad acres in Ireland. These Irish acres were partly the Queen’s perquisite from the Babington ‘conspiracy.’ Other royal windfalls had considerably increased Sir Walter’s expectations, and aroused his ambition. Hariot is known to have spent some time in Ireland on Raleigh’s estates there during the reign of Elizabeth, but it is uncertain when. It may have been between the autumn of 1586 and the autumn of 1588. He was in London in the winter of 1588-89 in time to get out hurriedly his report in February 1589. It is possible, however, that he went to Ireland after his book was out. He was probably the manager of one of the estates there as Governor John White was of another in 1591-93.

The next early author whom we find speaking of Hariot is his lifelong friend and companion Robert Hues or Hughes in his ‘Tractatus de / Globis et eo- / rvm vsv, / Accommo-datus iis qui Lon-/dini editi funt Anno I593,/ / fumptibus Gulielmi Sanderfoni / Ciuis Londinienfis/Confcriptus a Ro-/bertoHues./ Londini/ In ardibus Thomae Dawfon. / 1594.’ / 8°

In his dedication to Sir Walter Raleigh the author says :

Borealiora Europae noftrates diligentimme luftrarunt. Primo Hugo Willoughby eques Anglus & Richardus Chanceler has oras apperuerunt. Succedit eis Stephanus Borough, vlterius pro-grefsi funt Artunis Pet & Carol. Iackman. Sufceptæ funt hae nauigationes, inftigante Sebaftiano Caboto, vt, fiquâ pofset fieri traiectum in regiones Synanum & Cathayac breuimmum confequeremur, at irreto haec omnia conatu, nifi quod his medijs firmatum eft commercium cum Mofchouitis. Hâc cum non fuccederet, inftitutx funt nauigationes ad Borealiora Americæ;, quas primo fuscepit Martinus Frobifher, fecutus eft poftca Ioannes Dauis. Ex his omnibus nauigationibus multi antiquiorum errores,magna eorum ignorantia detectacft. Atque his conatibus minus fuccedentibus, gens noftra nauibus abundans otij impatiens, in alias paries fuas nauigationes inftituerunt. Humphredus Gilbert Eques, Americæ oras Hifpanis incognitas, magno animo & viribus, fucceffu non aequali noftris aperire conatus eft. Id quod tuis poftea aufpicijs (vir honoratifsime) felicius fufceptum eft quibus Virginia nobis patefacta eft, præefecto clafsis Richardo Grinuil nobili equite, quam diligentifsime luftrauit & defcripfit Thomæ Hariotus.

In the English edition of Robert Hues’ work, London, 1638, this very interesting but somewhat irrelevant passage appears as follows:

Among whom, the first that adventured on the discovery of these parts, were, Sir Hugh Willoughby, and Richard Chanceler: after them, Stephen Borough. And farther yet then either of these, did Arthur Pet, and Charles Lackman discover these parts. And these voyages were all undertaken by the instigation of Sebastian Cabot: that so, if it were possible, there might bee found out a nearer pafsage to Cathay and China : yet all in vane ; fave only that by this meanes a course of trafficke was confirmed betwixt us and the Mofcovite.

When their attempts fucceeded not this way ; their next designe was then to try, what might bee done in the Northern Coasts of America : and the first undertaker of these voyages was Mr. Martin Frobisher: who was afterward feconded by Mr. Iohn Davis. By meanes of all which Navigations, many errours of the Ancients, and their great ignorance was discovered.

But now that all these their endeavours fucceeded not, our Kingdome at that time being well furnished in fhips, and impatient of idlenefse : they resolved at length to adventure upon other parts. And first Sir Humphrey Gilbert with great courage and Forces attempted to make a discovery of those parts of America, which were yet unknowne to the Spaniard : but the successe was not answerable. Which attempt of his, was afterward more prosperously prosecuted by that honourable Gentleman Sir Walter Rawleigh: to whose meanes Virginia was first discovered unto us, the Generall of his Forces being Sir Richard Greenville : which Countrey was afterwards very exactly furveighed and described by Mr. Thomas Harriot.

This William Sanderson, the patron of Mollineux, Hood, and Hues, was a rich and liberal London merchant, who had married a niece of Raleigh. He contributed largely to Sir Walter’s first reconnoitring expedition in 1584 under Amidas and Barlow, and was afterwards a liberal adventurer and supporter of Raleigh in all his colonial schemes. He was fond of the science of geography, and contributed largely to the preparation and publication of the globes of Mollineux, and the Descriptions of them by Hood and Hues in 1592 and 1594. He was also a good friend of all Raleigh’s friends, and acted as Sir Walter’s fiscal agent in regard to the Wine monopoly. On being called upon for a settlement of the large amount due, as Raleigh supposed, after his imprisonment in the Tower, Sanderson denied his indebtedness, was sued, cast into the debtors’ jail, and died in poverty. His son published severe comments against Raleigh.

Robert Hues, who was an intimate friend and associate of Hariot, was born at Hertford in 1554. He became a poor scholar at Brazen nose, and was afterwards at St Mary’s Hall with Hariot. He took his degree of A.B.in 1579. He is said to have been a good Greek scholar, and after leaving the University travelled and became an eminent geographer and mathematician. He attracted the attention, probably through Raleigh, of that noble patron of learning Henry Percy, 9th Earl of Northumberland, who took him into his service, made him one of his scientific companions while in the Tower, supported him partly at Sion, intrusted him to instruct his children, and finally sent him to Oxford as tutor at Christ Church of his eldest surviving son, Algernon Percy, who on the death of his father on gunpowder treason day 1632, became the 10th Earl of Northumberland. Hues died at Oxford the 24th of May, 1632, and was buried in the cathedral of Christ Church, according to the inscription on his monument. He is mentioned by Chapman in his translation of Homer’s Works [ 1616 ] as ‘another right learned, honest, and entirely loved friend of mine.’ See infra, p. 183.

In 1595 Hariot was mentioned as a distinguished man of science in his Seaman’s Secrets by Captain John Davis the navigator, a friend and partner of Raleigh.

On the eleventh of July 1596 Hariot under peculiar circumstances wrote a long and confidential letter to Sir Robert Cecil, Chief Secretary of State, in the interests of Raleigh’s Guiana projects. The letter is here given in full, as it shows better than anything else the close and confidential relations existing between Sir Walter and Hariot at that time. Raleigh had returned from Guiana, his first El Dorado expedition, in August 1595, and had in the mean time employed such energy and enterprise that within about five months he had fitted out and dispatched his second El Dorado fleet under his friend Captain Keymis. This second expedition returned to Plymouth in June 1596, a few days after Raleigh had gone with Essex and Howard of Effingham on that world-renowned expedition against Cadiz. Sir Walter appears to have left his affairs in the hands of his ever faithful Hariot, and hence this sensible and timely letter in the absence of his patron. There appears to have been no complaint against Keymis; but the master of his ship, Samuel Mace, seems to have been less discreet. The letter tells its own story, and gives a vivid picture of the intelligent earnestness of Sir Walter respecting Guiana, and at the same time the earnest intelligence of Hariot during Raleigh’s absence in Spain.

It has been denied that Raleigh really expected to find the El Dorado in either his first expedition of 1595 or last in 1617, but this letter goes to show that both he and Hariot had firm faith in the scheme. Indeed in a German book of travels just published, entitled ‘Aus den Llanos. Schildenung einer naturwisscn-schaftlichen Reise nach Venezuela, Von Carl Sachs, Leipzig, 1879,’ the writer states that the export of gold from Spanish Guiana in 1875 was 79,496 ounces. He says that the richest mine, that of Callao, has of late years returned as much as 500 per centum. After briefly narrating the expeditions of Raleigh, which had been preceded by various Spanish expeditions, he adds: ‘Now at this day, after nearly three centuries, the riches sought for have been actually found In the very country where these unfortunate efforts were made.’ Hariot’s letter is as follows:

LETTER OF THOMAS HARIOT TO MR. SECRETARY

SIR ROBERT CECIL.

_From the original holograph in the Cecil Papers at Hatfield, vol. xliii, At first printed in Edward Edward’s Life of Raleigh, vol. ii, page 420._

Right Honourable Sir,

These are to let you understand that whereas, according to your Honor’s direction, I have been framing of a Charte out of some such of Sir Walter’s notes and writings, which he hath left behind him,—his principal Charte being carried with him, —if it may please you, I do thinke most fit that the discovery of Captain Kemish be added, in his due place, before I finish it. It is of importance, and all Chartes which had that coast before be very imperfecte, as in many thinges elce. And that of Sir Walter’s, although it were better in that parte then any other, yet it was don but by intelligence from the Indians, and this voyadge was specially for the discovery of the same; which is, as I find, well and sufficiently performed. And because the secrecy of these matters doth much importe her Majesty and this State, I pray let me be so bould as to crave that the dispatch of the plotting and describing be don only by me for you, according to the order of trust that Sir Walter left with me, before his departure, in that behalf, and as he hath usually don heretofore. If your Honor have any notes from Sir Thomas Baskerville, if it may please you to make me acquaynted with them, that which they will manifest of other particularytyes then that before Sir Walter hath described shall also be set downe.

Although Captain Kemish be not come home rich, yet he hath don the speciall thing which he was injoined to do, as the discovery of the coast betwixt the river of Amasones and Orinico, where are many goodly harbors for the greatest ships her Majesty hath and any nomber; wher there are great rivers, and more then probability of great good to be don by them for Guiana, as by any other way or to other rich contryes borderinge upon it. As also, the discovery of the mouth of Orinico it self,—a good harbor and free passage for ingresse and egresse of most of the ordinary ships of England, above 3 hundred miles into the contry. Insomuch that Berreo wondred much of our mens comming up so far; so that it seemeth they know not of that passage. Nether could they, or can possibly, find it from Trinidado; from whence usually they have made their discoveryes. But if it be don by them the shortest way, it must be done out of Spayne. Now, if it shall please her Majesty to undertake the enterprise, or permitte it in her subjectes, by her order, countenance, and authority, for the supplanting of those that are now gotten thither, I thinke it of great importance to keepe that which is don as secretly as we may, lest the Spaniardes learne to know those harbors and entrances, and worke to prevent us.

And because I understand that the master of the ship with Captain Kemish is somewhat carelesse of this, by geving and selling copyes of his travelles and plottes of discoveryes, I thought it my dutye to remember it unto your wisdome, that some order might be taken for the prevention of such inconveniences as may thereby follow : by geving authority to some Justice, or the Mayor, to call him before them, and to take all his writinges and chartes or papers that concerne this discovery, or any elce, in other mens handes, that he hath sold or conveyed them into ; and to send them sealed to your Honor, as also to take bond for his further secrecy on that behalf. And the like order to be taken by those others, as we shall further informe your Honor of, that have any such plots, which yet, for myne owne parte, I know not of; or any other order, by sending for him up or otherwise, as to your wisdome shall seeme best.

Concerning the Eldorado which hath been shewed your Honor out of the Spanish booke of Acosta, which you had from Wright, and I have scene, when I shall have that favour as but to speake with you I shall shew you that it is not ours—that we meane—there being three. Nether doth he say, or meane, that Amazones river and Orinoco is all one,—as some, I feare, do averre to your Honor ; as by good profe out of that booke alone I can make manifest; and by other meanes besides then this discovery, I can put it out of all dout.

To be breef, I am at your Honor’s comandement in love and duty farther than I can sodeynly expresse for haste. I will wayte upon you at Court, or here at London, about any of these matters or any others, at any time, if I might have but that favour as to heare so much. I dare not presume of my selfe, for some former respectes. My fidelity hath never been impeached, and I take that order that it never shall. I make no application. And I beseech your Honor to pardon my boldness, because of haste. My meaning is allwayes good. And so I most humbly take my leave. This Sunday, 11th of July 1596.

Your Honor’s most ready at commandement in all services I may,

THO. HARRIOTE.

addressed:

To the right honorable Sir ROBERT CICILL, Knight
Principall Secretary to Her Majesty, these.

Endorsed: 11 July, 1596. Mr Harriott to my Master.

The vigilant Secretary lost no time in acting upon Hariot’s suggestions. On the 31st of July Sir George Trenchard and Sir Ralph Horsey wrote to Cecil from Dorchester in reply to his instructions, that they had seized the charts and books of the ‘India Voyage’ [to Guiana] from one Samuel Mace and William Downe, which they would send up to the Secretary if desired. They were desired, and accordingly sent them by post on the 10th of August. A few days later Raleigh returned to Plymouth with the first glorious news of the success of the English fleet at Cadiz ; which news completely turned the heads of the people of England one way, and those of the Queen and the hungry politicians the other. Poor Mace, to whom Raleigh was much attached, was restored to his confidence. To Raleigh more than to any one man this triumph over Spain was justly due, but in the pitiful squabbles that followed in the apportionment of the honors and the spoils Sir Walter used to aver that his sole gain in this great national enterprise from beginning to end was but a lame leg. He might have added that the business had gained for him the envy, malice and all uncharitableness of those in high places. In worldly wealth he was now comparatively poor, and his fortunes were broken, though the Queen at times, only at times, smiled on him.

At what precise time Hariot, who never deserted Raleigh, became acquainted with Henry Percy, Earl of Northumberland, with whose honored name, next to that of Sir Walter’s, his must ever be associated, does not as yet appear. It is known, however, that there was an intimacy between Raleigh and Percy as early as 1586, when Sir Walter presented Percy with a coat of mail on his going over to Flanders, and soon after a bedstead made of cedar from Virginia ; while the Earl about the same time gave to Sir Walter a ‘stroe coloured velvet saddle.’ From this time to the day of Raleigh’s triumph on the scaffold there exists plenty of evidence of their continued intimacy.