THE KING’S PROJECTS—A JOURNEY TO SCOTLAND—OBSTACLES TO THAT
INTENTION—WANT OF MONEY—£100,000 RAISED IN THE CITY—DISLIKE OF THE
PEOPLE TO THIS JOURNEY, ON ACCOUNT OF EXPENSE—JAMES SETS OUT, MARCH
13TH, 1616-1617—HIS ATTENDANT COURTIERS, SIR JOHN ZOUCH, SIR GEORGE
GORING, SIR JOHN FINETT—CHARACTERISTICS OF EACH—SURPASSING QUALITIES
OF BUCKINGHAM—OBJECTS OF JAMES’S JOURNEY TO EDINBURGH—ANECDOTE OF
LORD HOWARD OF WALDEN—DISPUTATIONS AT ST. ANDREWS—THE KING KNIGHTS
MANY OF THE YOUNG COURTIERS—OFFENCE GIVEN AT EDINBURGH BY LAUD—A
PROJECT TO ASSASSINATE BUCKINGHAM SUSPECTED—JAMES’S PROGRESS
CONCLUDED—HIS VISIT TO WARWICK—AFFAIRS RELATING TO SIR EDWARD COKE
AND HIS FAMILY—BASE CONDUCT OF ALL THE PARTIES CONCERNED—MEANNESS OF
BACON—HIS LETTERS—FRANCES HATTON—CONTRAST BETWEEN HER AND THE EARL
OF OXFORD BROUGHT FORWARD BY LADY HATTON—COKE RESTORED TO
FAVOUR—MARRIAGE OF FRANCES HATTON TO LORD PURBECK.
=CHAPTER IV.=
Early in the year 1616-17, James determined to visit Scotland—a
resolution which was opposed, somewhat to the displeasure of the King,
by Buckingham. But the King was soon pacified, and the journey was
decided upon. Some obstacles existed; for instance, the want of money,
which was to be borrowed from rich citizens before the monarch’s project
could take place; then it was expected to prove a “hard journey,” for it
was thought the Court would reach the North before there would be grass
for their horses; and even the Scots expressed a wish that the
visitation might be deferred.[155]
Footnote 155:
Nichols, iii., p. 245.
The entertainment given to Monsieur de la Tour, the Ambassador
Extraordinary from the French King, delayed somewhat this freezing
expedition. At length, it was decided that James should set out on the
twenty-second of February; though money came in slowly; and it was found
extremely difficult to raise the sum of 100,000_l._ in the metropolis.
“Yet,” observes a contemporary, “there is much urging, and in the end it
must be done, though men be never so much discouraged.” To propitiate
the presiding Lord Mayor, he was knighted, and received, with his
companions, the King’s thanks for the 100,000_l._ in prospect, which
was, however, to be raised, _nolens volens_, whilst men of low condition
were called in to bear the burden.
It was not until the thirteenth of March that the King and Queen, with
Prince Charles, removed to Theobalds, preparatory to the progress of
James northwards. Never was undertaking so much disliked by the
generality of the people, chiefly on account of the immense expense
which it involved. It was now fourteen years since his Majesty had
visited his Scottish dominions. “He began the journey,” says Wilson,
“with the spring, warming the country, as he went, with the glories of
the Court;” and carrying with him those boon companions who best could
shorten the way, and consume the nights by their pranks and buffoonery.
These were Sir George Goring, Sir Edward Zouch, and Sir John Finett—men
“who could fit and obtemperate the King’s humour;” and it may,
therefore, be readily supposed what description of gentlemen they were.
Sir George Goring was a native of Hurst-per-point, in Sussex, in which
county his descendants still flourish. He had been brought up in the
Court of Queen Elizabeth, his father being one of the gentlemen
pensioners; and had been gentleman in ordinary to Prince Henry. He now
went as lieutenant of the gentlemen pensioners, and accordingly was
despatched with others of that hand by sea.[156] Goring had attracted
the regard of James by his sound sense and vein of jocular humour; like
Sir Edward Zouch and Sir John Finett, he was the “chief and master fool”
of the Court—sometimes “presenting David Dromore and Archie Armstrong,
the King’s fools, on the back of other fools, till they fell together by
the ears, and fell one over another.” Goring, like his colleagues in his
respectable employment, is said to have got more by his fooling than
other people did by their wisdom; he was, indeed, regarded as a sort of
minor favourite, yet Buckingham evinced no jealousy of him, and procured
him, in 1629, the title of Baron Goring, of Hurst-pierre-point.[157]
Finett and Zouch were equally expert with Goring in “antick” dances,
disguises in masqueradoes, and extemporary foolery; but in this last
accomplishment Sir John Millicent, whose name is not among the King’s
retinue in Scotland, excelled them all; and was the “most commended for
notable fooling.”[158] It was found, however, impossible to surpass
Buckingham in the accomplishment of dancing. His grace, and the fondness
he showed for the pastime, brought it into fashion. “No man,” writes an
historian, “dances better; no man runs or jumps better; and, indeed, he
jumps higher than ever Englishman did in so short a time—from a private
gentleman to a dukedom.”[159] He now reigned sole monarch in the King’s
favour; and everything he did was admired “for the doer’s sake.” The
king was never contented, except when near him; nor could the Court
grandees be well out of his presence; all petitions, therefore, “whether
for place or office, for Court or Commonwealth, were addressed to him.”
Footnote 156:
Nichols, vol. iii., p. 243.
Footnote 157:
In 1645, he was advanced to the Earldom of Norwich. He died in 1662,
leaving his title to George Goring, the celebrated loyalist, of whom
so masterly a portrait has been drawn by Clarendon.
Footnote 158:
Nichols, ii. p. 38, note; apud Sir Anthony Weldon.
Footnote 159:
Kennet’s England, vol. ii. p. 708.
The King proceeded by easy journeys of ten, twelve, and seventeen miles
a day northwards. It is curious to find him resting a day and a night at
the home of Sir Oliver Cromwell of Hinchinbrook, near Huntingdon.[160]
At Lincoln, he healed fifty persons of the Evil, a gracious act which
was succeeded by an attendance upon a cock-fighting, at which His
Majesty was very merry. This diversion was varied by horse-racing.
Footnote 160:
Nichols, iii., p. 258.
On his arrival near Edinburgh, the King took up his arrival at Seton
House, the seat of the Earl of Wintoun, whose family continued to be
faithful to the descendants of James during the calamitous contest
between the modern Stuarts and the Hanoverians. James remained in
Scotland until the fifth of July, when he returned by the west coast of
Scotland to Carlisle.
The three great objects of his Majesty’s journey to Scotland, were the
extension of episcopal authority; the establishment of some ceremonials
in religion; and the elevation of the civil above the ecclesiastic
authority.[161] It does not, however, appear that Buckingham took any
active part in these designs, or that he was at this period regarded in
any other light than as one of the ministering agents to the amusement
of James’s vacant hours. It is possible that he may have viewed Scotland
with that prejudice with which the English at that time regarded that
nation. The revenues of that country being then insufficient to maintain
the Government, Buckingham probably deemed it, as others did, nothing
but a drain upon the resources of England—a barren ground from which “a
beggarly rabble (like a fluent spring),” to use the words of Osborne,
“was for ever to be found crossing the River Tweed.”[162] The national
prejudice was likewise considerably strengthened by the King’s
favourite, but abortive scheme of union between the two crowns; thus
dividing the kingdom into halves, so that he, “a Christian king under
the gospel, should no longer be a polygamist to two wives, under which
discreditable imputation he conceived that the partition of the kingdom
placed him.”[163] Whether Buckingham may have been propitiated by the
hospitality of the Scots or not, or whether he thought with Sir Anthony
Weldon that “the country was too good for them that possess it, and too
bad for others to be at the charge to conquer it,” does not appear. In
some passages of the Royal Progress it is most likely that the young
courtier found but little delight. At St. Andrews, disputations in
divinity, and at Stirling in philosophy, were honoured by the King’s
presence. They were delivered by some members of the University of
Edinburgh, and were to have been held in the college there, had not
public business interfered.”[164]
Footnote 161:
Hume’s Hist. of England, iii., 83.
Footnote 162:
Osborne’s Tradit., Memorials of King James, p. 422.
Footnote 163:
Somers’s Tracts, 83
Footnote 164:
The subjects were these:—First, That sheriffs and other inferior
magistrates should not be hereditary. With this, James was so well
pleased that he turned to the Marquis of Hamilton, Hereditary Sheriff
of Clydesdale, and said, “James, you see your cause is lost.”
Secondly, On the rate of locomotion. The respondent in this
disputation quoting Aristotle, the King remarked, “These men know the
mind of Aristotle as well as he did himself when alive.” Thirdly, On
the origin of fountains or springs.
For a time the presence of James in Scotland produced all the good
effects which the aspect of royalty generally ensures. The English
became extremely popular in the northern capital, then rarely visited by
the great and fashionable. “We hear little out of Scotland,” writes Mr.
Chamberlain to Sir Dudley Carleton, “but that the Parliament is now
beginning, and that our English are extraordinarily respected, and
friendly to the nobles, to whom the King makes much caresses, and
receives them as his guests. The Earl of Buckingham is made one of the
council there, and takes his place above the rest as Master of the
Horse. They speak that he shall be made Marquis of Scotland, and the
Lord Compton an Earl, to counterpoise the Scotch that have been ennobled
here.”[165] James was indeed profuse beyond measure in his titles during
this progress.
Footnote 165:
Nichols’s Progresses, vol. iii., 367.
“All our peers’ sons that went with the King,” adds the same writer,
“were knighted there that were undubbed before, and all the gentlemen of
Yorkshire, so that there is scarce left an esquire to uphold the race,
and the order is descended somewhat lower, even to Adam Hill, that was
the Earl of Montgomery’s barber, and to one Jeane, husband to the
Queen’s laundress, our host of Doncaster; and to another that lately
kept an inn at Rumford; and a youth, one Conir, is come into
consideration as to become a prince of favourites, brought in by the
Earl of Buckingham, and the wags talk as if he were in possibility to
become Viscount Conir. All the mean officers of the household are also
said to be knighted, so that ladies are like to be in little
request.”[166]
Footnote 166:
State Paper Office, Domestic, 1616-1617.
But it was not in the nature of things that affairs should go on without
some inconveniences and apprehensions, and great offence was given in
Scotland, when, at the funeral of one of the guard, who was buried after
the English ritual, Laud, then Dean of St. Paul’s, desired those
assembled to join him in recommending the soul of his deceased brother
to Almighty God. He was afterwards obliged to retract, and to say that
he had done this in a sort of civility rather than according to rule.
Another exception was taken at his putting on a white surplice just at
that part of the funeral service when the body was going to be put into
the ground. The Dean of the royal chapel in Edinburgh also refused to
receive the communion whilst Dr. Laud was kneeling.[167]
Footnote 167:
Letter from Mr. Chamberlain to Sir Dudley Carleton. Domestic, June 21,
1621. State Paper Office.
During his residence in Edinburgh, the life of Buckingham was said to be
endangered by a plot to assassinate him, a prelude, as it seemed, to the
tragic doom which he afterwards encountered. In a letter from Sir Thomas
Lake to Sir Ralph Winwood, dated from Brougham Castle, and written on
the seventh of August, 1617, he thus refers to the peril which
threatened the favourite:—
“All the news which is here, is that many lords have been busied about a
fellow who, in his drink, spake some words as though he had an intention
to kill my Lord of Buckingham. He is one of the guard of Scotland, his
name is Carre, and said his intention was for that his lordship was the
cause of Somerset’s dismission. He has, since his being sober, confessed
his words to my Lord of Lennox. I came out from the last house before
some of the old lords of Scotland had done with him, and therefore can
yet say no more to you. The words were spoken in Scotland. Some of my
Lord of Buckingham’s friends do doubt Carre was but set on.”
On the twenty-seventh of the same month, the culprit had, it appears,
proceeded far on his journey southward, as a prisoner, to take his trial
in London for his meditated crime. “On Saturday last,” writes Mr.
Chamberlain to Sir Dudley Carleton, “here past, by Ware, one Carre, a
Scottish gentleman, being suspected and charged (together with four
others of that family and name) to have conspired the death of the Earl
of Buckingham, at his coming out of Scotland, and so was apprehended
near Carlisle.”[168]
Footnote 168:
Letter from Mr. Chamberlain to Sir Dudley Carleton, August 27, 1617,
dated, Ware Park. No mention is made of this attempt in any of the
biographies of Buckingham. State Paper Office, Domestic.
No further notice of this affair occurs in the correspondence from which
it is derived; and it is possible that the plot was inferred from the
hasty expressions of offended clansmen, and was found, on investigation,
to be without sufficient proof to bring it into a court of law.
Among the English peers who visited Scotland, the least popular was Lord
Howard of Walden, eldest son of the Earl of Suffolk. This nobleman
enjoyed the especial favour of King James; his name occurs in most of
the courtly festivities of the day, as one appointed to appear foremost
in all stately revels, and he received a more substantial proof of royal
preference in being called to the House of Lords in the lifetime of his
father. In the north, however, he was detested, chiefly on account of
his ill usage of his wife, Elizabeth, daughter of George, Lord Harris,
Earl of Dunbar, and likewise from his accustomed boasting of his
influence with Buckingham, for it was a favourite saying of Lord
Howard’s, “that he, and none other, had an especial interest in the
favourite.”
Lord Howard seems to have been a mark at which the courtiers aimed their
shafts of wit and ridicule; it was during the journey into Scotland that
he came into collision with a nobleman of a very different character,
James, second Marquis of Hamilton. This nobleman enjoyed, in a very
uncommon degree, the confidence and esteem of his royal master, who was
accustomed to call him familiarly by his Christian name. He held the
office of Lord Steward of the Household, and Privy Councillor; and, in
that capacity, was doubtless often surprised, if not irritated, by the
precedence and latitude given to Buckingham. By his countrymen, the
Marquis was considered “to be the gallantest gentleman in all Scotland.”
The following account is characteristic of the mingled idleness and
dissension of a courtier’s life:—[169]
“Riding one day with the king, a-hunting, he, Lord Howard of Walden,
asked the Marquis of Hamilton whether he were ever in love. He answered,
Yes. What effects wrought it? saith he. His answer was, It made him fat,
saucy, and ignorant. Other speeches passed just like this, but I proceed
to the quarrels he had with him. The Marquis of Hamilton hath a page,
whom my Lord Hay did liken, for his fairness of face, to the second
daughter of the Lord Burghley, Mrs. Diana Cecil, admired so much by the
Lord Walden, except he were unmarried. After my Lord Hay’s departure
thence, the Marquis, the Favourite, and Lord Walden being at dinner
together, and the boy waiting at the table, the Marquis and my Lord
Buckingham whispered and laughed, to which my Lord Walden said he knew
what they laughed at, and that he, that said that, was but a fool. To
which the Marquis replied that, ‘were he a roaring boy, he would have
flung a glass of wine in his face.’ It was my Lord Hay had said it. He
was his friend, and a noble gentleman, whom, in his absence, he would
not have wronged, and, therefore, bid him, before he should answer it,
draw his sword. But my Lord of Buckingham so talked with these lords
that after dinner he did reconcile this business, the Lord Walden
acknowledging him now, upon better consideration, to be a noble
gentleman, and that he knew no other of my Lord Hay. This business fell
out nigh a month before the king’s coming from Scotland, though it came
not to my knowledge since a week before the king’s departure there, at
what time the Marquis Hamilton was on the point to be sworn a
councillor. The Lord Walden, remembering some of these former passages,
and thinking to stop the conferring of this honour upon him, as is said,
did acquaint Sir Edward Villiers, that the Marquis should say that if my
Lord of Buckingham did not dispatch that business for him, of conferring
the councillorship, that he would cut his throat, wishing him to tell it
his brother, which he did; so that, when he met the Marquis, the Lord of
Buckingham questioned him of that, who presently demanded the author,
which he told him. Then the Marquis departed, and presently sent the
Lord Buckhurst to seek out the Lord Walden, with a challenge as was
thought, but he could not be found. In the end he came to my Lord of
Buckingham’s chamber, where, it is said, he lamented by ill fortune to
have these words spoken again, and from thence did not depart until by
acknowledgments the quarrel was reconciled.”
Footnote 169:
Letter from George Garrard to Sir Dudley Carleton, London, August
18th, 1617, from inedited State Papers. See also Brydges’s Peers of
James I., p. 160.
Buckingham appears, on this occasion, to have acted a kind and sensible
part. His utmost discretion was soon called upon in an affair upon which
the annals of the time ring changes, and the details of which present
the most curious combat of worldly passions, and the most fatal results
of misdirected influence, that can be conceived.
In spite of a “fearful dream” of Queen Anne’s, reported to James as a
warning, his progress was not shortened. He spent several days at
Brougham Castle, the residence of Francis Clifford, fourth Earl of
Cumberland, whose daughter, the celebrated Anne Clifford, afterwards
repaired the castle, which suffered during the civil wars; but which, so
vain were her exertions, has since been permitted to fall into ruins.
The expenses entailed by the king’s visit, including the music performed
in his presence, were considerable, and helped to ruin the lord of the
castle, an easy, improvident man, whose allusion to the tax imposed by
this royal visitation is almost touching. “I fynde plainly,” he thus
wrote to his son, “upon better consideration, that the charge for that
entertainment will grow very great, besyde the musick, and that instead
of lessening, my charge in general encreaseth, and new paiments come on
which without better providence hereafter cannot be performed.”[170] In
his progress from one mansion or manor-house to another, James visited
several of those families whose names became afterwards distinguished
among the adherents of his unfortunate son. At Hoghton Tower, in
Lancashire, at that time the principal seat of the Hoghton family, but
now unhappily a ruin, still containing an apartment called King James’s
room; where the monarch is said to have conferred the honour of
knighthood, which he had dispensed very freely during his progress upon
his subjects, on the loin of beef, that act being also one of the last
achievements of his journey. He visited also Lathom House, the seat of
the Stanleys; and was received with great demonstrations of respect and
joy at Stafford, where the Earl of Essex, who lived in an honoured
retirement at Chartley Castle, rode before him into the town. At
Warwick, he was entertained by Sir Fulke Grevill, who was then the
master of Warwick Castle, which he had found, on taking possession of
it, in a ruinous state, and used as a county jail.[171] In the hall of
Leicester Hospital, that charitable foundation, endowed by Robert
Dudley, Earl of Leicester, for twelve Brethren, James was entertained
with a supper; an event of which a tradition still remains attached to
the half-monastic institution in which it occurred. Sir Fulke Grevill
had his own private motives to induce him to extend his marks of respect
to Buckingham, as well as to the king; for, shortly afterwards, we find
him a suitor to the niece of Buckingham, Lady Anderson, for her
hand.[172] There can be no doubt, but that James and Buckingham visited
Warwick Castle, but were not entertained there on account of its ruinous
condition.
Footnote 170:
Nichols, vol. iii., p. 392, from Whitaker’s Hist. of Craven.
Footnote 171:
Nichols, iii., p. 434. In the harangue addressed to the king on his
entrance into Warwick, there is this passage:—“This castle, alsoe
moste desirous to receive you, the greatest guest that ever she
entertained, would speake in noe lower key, but that her late disgrace
abateth her courage. After shee became the jaylor’s lodge,
interchanging the goulden chaines of her noble erle’s with the iron
fetters of wretched prisoners, given over to be inhabited by battes
and owles, she is ashamed to speake before you.” Nichols’s, vol. iii.,
p. 431.
This speech was transcribed for Nichols’s Progresses, by the late
William Hamper, Esq., F.S.A., from the Black Book of Warwick, a book
preserved by the corporation.
Sir Fulke Grevill spent 20,000_l._ in restoring the Castle with its
pleasaunce and gardens. To his care the preservation of that
interesting structure is due.
Footnote 172:
Birch’s MSS., 4173.
Whilst Buckingham was in Scotland, overtures were made to reconcile
certain differences between him and Sir Edward Coke, then Lord Chief
Justice in England. In order to comprehend the conduct which the
favourite pursued in relation to that celebrated man, it becomes
necessary to review a series of occurrences which had happened
previously to the Scottish journey; to enter, likewise, into the topics
of the day; and, above all, to refer to the prejudices of the king, and
the resistance made to them by an honest, though a harsh, individual.
These considerations are mixed up with matters of apparently private
interest; yet are necessary to be unfolded, when the conduct of
Villiers, and the history of his family, are the subject of narrative.
It will be remembered that the chief interest which James derived from
the representation of the play of “Ignoramus” had arisen from the
ridicule cast upon the practice of the common law. In several passages
of that drama, Sir Edward Coke was supposed to be particularly alluded
to.[173] This great lawyer had, in various ways, given offence; he had
termed the royal prerogative, in one of his speeches in Parliament, “a
great overgrown monster;” and he had displayed a courage which redeemed
his character from many of its demerits, by insinuating that the common
law of England was in charge of being perverted. On two other notable
points Coke had also offended the king; the one being the famous dispute
respecting the Court of Chancery; the other, the still more celebrated
case of the Commendams.[174] In the former matter, the conduct of Coke
is allowed to have been highly discreditable to him and his associates;
in the latter, to have merited the warmest admiration.
Footnote 173:
Nichols, vol. iii., p. 90.
Footnote 174:
“The Court of Chancery,” says the author of the Life of Sir Edward
Coke (published for the Society for the Diffusion of Useful
Knowledge), “had long exercised a jurisdiction, which had formed one
of the articles against Wolsey, of revising and correcting judgments
which had been obtained in the courts of common law.” It was not until
the reign of James, that this privilege had been called into question.
Sir Edward Coke, who was tenacious of the authority of the Common Law
Courts, and the twelve judges, gave it as their opinion, that Chancery
had no such power; and that an appeal from a judgment at law could not
be made except to Parliament. To this decision proceedings were
instituted against the judges in the Star Chamber. The conduct of the
judges and of the chief-justice in this matter, has been generally
condemned.
Whatever view the public may have taken of these transactions, they
formed the first plea for that ruin of Coke to which Buckingham is said
to have given an impetus, by the intrusion of his own interests upon the
royal ear,[175] at this crisis of Coke’s destiny. The King, summoning
the Lord Chief Justice and the twelve judges to the council at
Whitehall, delivered his opinions concerning their conduct in an
harangue, in which he declared “that ever since his coming to the crown,
the popular sort of lawyers had been the men that most effrontedly had
trodden upon his prerogative;”[176] and, having expatiated upon their
offences with his usual pedantry and prolixity, he dismissed them,
declaring “that in his protection of them, and expediting of justice, he
would walk in the steps of the ancient and best of kings.” The firmness
with which Coke conducted himself during the whole of this affair,
whilst it won him a popularity which he would never otherwise have
acquired, prepared the way for those who, from interested motives,
sought his ruin, and, combined with his zeal and acuteness in the trial
of Lord and Lady Somerset—an acuteness which the King, it is rumoured,
had secret reasons to dread—completely undermined his credit at court.
Footnote 175:
See an able Life of Sir Edward Coke, published by the Society for the
Diffusion of Knowledge, p. 8. Also, Lord Campbell’s Lives of the Chief
Justices, Art. Coke, vol. i., p. 287.
Footnote 176:
Ibid.
In the intrigues which tended to ruin Coke, Buckingham certainly
participated.[177] The first instance of rapacity in the young favourite
is discernible at this period. Sir Henry Roper had for many years
enjoyed the place of Chief Clerk for enrolling the pleas of the King’s
Bench; it was supposed to be worth 4000_l._ per annum. Being advanced in
age, Sir Henry was disposed to relinquish the appointment, on condition
of being made Lord Teynham, receiving the salary during his life.
Buckingham seized this opportunity of improving his fortunes. He applied
for the reversion of this office to be granted to two of his trustees
during their lives—an application which had been successfully made by
the Earl of Somerset formerly.[178] But the Lord Chief Justice stood in
the way of this surrender on the part of Roper, and also of the proposed
arrangement. He answered, upon first being solicited, “that he was old,
and could not struggle”—a reply which was regarded as a compliance.[179]
But when Sir Henry Roper actually surrendered the situation, and was
created Lord Teynham, Coke changed his tone, and stated that, since the
salaries of the judges in his court were very low, it would be desirable
to increase them by the revenues of this office, which was at his
disposal. Upon this, it was resolved by the King and his favourite to
remove him, and to substitute on the Bench a more compliant judge. The
avowed plea of this iniquitous proceeding was the conduct of Coke in the
affair of the Commendams; but its real cause was his non-compliance with
the views of Buckingham. Bacon, with his usual subserviency, augmented
by his hatred of Coke, wrote to Villiers: “For Roper’s place, I would
have it by all means despatched, and therefore I marvel it lingereth.”
The “thing,” he declared, was so reasonable, “that it ought to be done
as soon as said.” Unhappily for Coke, he thought otherwise.
Footnote 177:
Bacon’s Letters, vol. ii., p. 85; taken from the Introduction to
Bacon’s Works by Stephens, p. 47.
Footnote 178:
Biographia, Art. Coke.
Footnote 179:
Biographia, Art. Coke, from Bacon’s Works.
It is hardly possible to conceive a line of conduct more degrading than
that which Buckingham pursued in the whole of this affair. He forfeited
by it all the credit due to him for the rejection of Sherborne, and the
principle of which he had boasted, that he would not rise upon the ruins
of others, was already effaced from his memory. Upon the third of
October, 1616, Coke was desired to desist from the service of his
place.[180] This intimation of a disgraceful act had come suddenly, for,
on the week before, the King had been at a great entertainment, given by
Lord Exeter at Wimbledon, and the Lady Hatton, the wife of the Lord
Chief Justice, was there, and “well-graced, for the King had kissed her
twice:” but this, it seems, was “but a lightening.” On the following
Sunday, Sir Edward Coke was sequestered from the council table, and
prohibited from riding his circuit, his place being supplied by Sir
Randolph Crew. “Some that wish him well,” adds a contemporary, “fear the
matter will not end here, for he is wilful and will take no counsel, and
not seeking to make good his first errors, runs in worse, and entangles
himself more and more, and gives his enemies such advantage to work upon
the King’s indignation towards him, that he is in great danger.” Others
scrupled not to say that he had been too busy in the late business (of
Somerset), and had dived into secrets further than there was need. “It
happens, also, that he had not carried himself advisedly and dutifully
to His Majesty.”[181] All these assigned causes are points which tend
somewhat to mitigate the censures which must be cast on Buckingham in
this affair. Lady Hatton, too, a Cecil, but not endowed with the
prudence of that sagacious family, and one of the fiercest of her sex,
contributed to the downfall of her husband, by carrying herself very
indiscreetly to the Queen, who forbade her the court. “The story,” adds
the same chronicler, “were long to tell; but it was about braving and
uncivil words to the Lady Compton, George Villiers’ mother, and vouching
the Queen for her author.” As usual,[182] to women was attributed all
the far-spreading evil which comes out of contention.
Footnote 180:
Note to Bacon’s Works, vol. ii., p. 85.
Footnote 181:
Nichols, vol. ii., p. 178; from Birch’s MSS., vol. iv., p. 173.
Footnote 182:
Bishop Goodman, vol. ii., p. 166.
A letter addressed by Coke to Buckingham, before his final removal from
his pre-eminent station, must, one would imagine, have touched a harder
heart than that of Villiers. Coke’s words are described as “now being
humble enough.” His letter, though supplicatory, was not abject. He
thanked Buckingham for having, by his honourable means, obtained a
hearing for him. He entered manfully into the defence of his book of
reports, to which objections had been made, which were the plea of his
suspension from his usual judicial duties, “assuring his Lordship that
never any book was written of any human learning that was not in some
part or other subject to exception.”[183]
Footnote 183:
Bishop Goodman, vol. ii., p. 166.
This remonstrance was dispatched to Buckingham at a time when the heart
of the favourite might have been softened by his own elevation, and by
the general joy. It reached him just before the creation of Charles,
Prince of Wales, and contained a request that the deeply-humbled Coke
might be permitted to attend that ceremonial.[184] There is no record
that the entreaty was acceded to.
Footnote 184:
Ibid.
Until the end of November (1616) the fate of the Lord Chief Justice was
undecided. The Queen, to her credit, and the Prince Charles, were urgent
in his behalf. And a rumour now first began to prevail that the younger
brother of the favourite, Sir John Villiers, who had an appointment in
the Prince’s household, was to marry Sir Edward Coke’s daughter, with a
dowry of 900l. in land from her father, and 2,100_l._ in land from Lady
Hatton, together with Lord Teynham’s office; but, in the meantime, the
Lord Chief Justice was, in his fortunes, affected as it were with an
“ague,” which has an alternate bad and good day.[185] The next report
was that Coke was “quite off the hooks,” and that orders had been sent
to give him a _supersedeas_. The jest of the day was that four P’s had
lost him his place—Pride, Prohibitions, Præmunire, and Prerogative.[186]
Shortly afterwards he was superseded, and had the mortification of
knowing that Sir Henry Montagu, who was appointed in his stead, went
with great pomp to Westminster Hall, accompanied by many noblemen, to
the number of “fifty horse, the whole fry of the Middle Temple, and
swarms of lawyers and officers.”[187] That was a day of triumph for
Buckingham.
Footnote 185:
Nichols, from Birch’s MS., p. 4172.
Footnote 186:
Ibid.
Footnote 187:
Ibid, p. 227.
The character of the most famous of English lawyers rose under this
unmerited injury.[188] He bore his misfortune with calm dignity. It is
related of him that when the new Chief Justice sent to buy from him his
collar of S.S., he answered that he would not part with it, but would
leave it to his descendants, that they might know that one day they had
a Chief Justice to their ancestor. A remarkable popularity followed his
degradation. Sir Edward Coke was the first judge that had set the
example of independence on the bench; and his refusing to be tampered
with in the disposal of a lucrative office caused him to be regarded as
a martyr. Even the King, when he intimated at the Privy Council his
intention to supersede Coke, did it with a sort of half shame, declaring
that he thought him “in no way corrupt, but a good justice,” and adding
“as many compliments as if he had meant to hang him with a silken
halter.”[189] Such was the corruption of the times, such the utter want
of all honourable principle, that it was well known that, had Coke been
wise enough to take advantage of the proposed match between his daughter
and Sir John Villiers, “he would have been that day Lord Chancellor.”
His avarice had been the impediment to that marriage. A dowry of
10,000_l._ had been asked with his daughter—he had offered 10,000 marks,
and “he had stuck at 1,000_l._ a year during his life,” letting fall
certain idle words, that he would not buy the King’s favour too dear,
“being so uncertain and variable.”[190]
Footnote 188:
Amos’s Great Oyer of Poisoning, p. 418.
Footnote 189:
Nichols, p. 227.
Footnote 190:
Ibid, p. 225.
The public were at no loss, as Lord Campbell remarks, to account for the
disgrace of Coke, when they knew that his successor, before accepting
his office, was obliged to bind himself to dispose of the chief
clerkship for the benefit of Buckingham, and when they saw two trustees
for Buckingham admitted to the place as soon as the new Chief Justice
was sworn in.
Such had been the state of affairs before James and Villiers set out for
Scotland; during their absence, the world was alternately amused and
disgusted by the proceedings of Sir Edward Coke and his lady, regarding
the match proposed between Sir John Villiers and their daughter.
This celebrated judge was peculiarly unhappy in his domestic life. Lady
Elizabeth Hatton, his second wife, the sister of Thomas Burleigh, Earl
of Exeter, and the widow of Sir Thomas Hatton, had brought him, along
with a large fortune, the unpleasant acquisition of a partner violent,
litigious, and unscrupulous. The very commencement of the inauspicious
nuptials had been attended with trouble, the parties subjecting
themselves to many inconveniencies from the irregularity of their
marriage, which took place in a private house, without bans or licence.
From the moment that the knot was tied, Coke found in this new
connection nothing but misery. Neither in private nor in public could
his wife and he abstain from the sharpest contentions.
Their daughter—that object which should most surely have cemented a
union—soon proved a new source of the bitterest feuds.
When Buckingham was in Scotland, an overture was made to him on the part
of Sir Edward Coke, relating to the marriage of his youngest daughter to
Sir John Villiers, the elder brother of the favourite. The proposal was
made through Secretary Winwood, the friend of Coke, and was, at first,
eagerly accepted by Buckingham; but, although it had these good
auspices, there were obstacles which prevented its favourable course.
One of these was the dislike of the young lady to her appointed suitor,
who was diseased, and troubled with a humour in his legs, and accounted
not a long-lived man; so that, as was observed by Mr. Chamberlain,
“there needed so much ado to get him a wife.” Another was the jealousy
of Lady Hatton. Incensed that her husband should dare to dispose of her
daughter without her consent, she carried her off, and secreted her in
the house of Sir Edmund Withipole, near Oatlands, in Surrey. From that
retreat, the young lady was removed to the residence of Archibald,
seventh Earl of Argyle, near Hampton Court.
Lady Hatton immediately hired a lodging in the town of Kingston; whence
she was permitted to visit her daughter, but not to sleep under the same
roof with her. “She kept her, however,” observes a contemporary writer,
“such company, that none else could have access to her.”[191] This
access was moderated, and her creatures, whom she had employed to take
her daughter away, were questioned and committed. Finding herself
forsaken by her friends, “who dared not show themselves too far in the
business, and seeing,” adds the same authority, “that she struggled in
vain, Lady Hatton began to come about.” At this juncture, Buckingham
interfered. He wrote a letter which calmed the fury: she returned him an
answer, “that if this way had been taken with her at first, they might
have proceeded better.”[192] Her husband was, however, now incensed
beyond control. He procured a warrant from Secretary Winwood, and
fetched away his daughter from Hampton Court, exceeding, indeed, the
terms of his warrant, for he is said to have broken open the doors of
the house to obtain her. Lady Hatton was quickly engaged in pursuit of
him; and “had not her coach tired,” as it is related, “there would soon
have been strange tragedies.”[193]
Footnote 191:
Mr. Chamberlain to Sir Dudley Carleton. State Paper Office. London,
August 9th, 1617. Inedited.
Footnote 192:
Nichols, iii., p. 371.
Footnote 193:
Letter from Mr. Chamberlain, before quoted.
Coke then conveyed his daughter to the care of Lady Compton Villiers,
but the next day the clerk of the council was sent to take the custody
of her, in his own house. The affair was heard before the Privy Council,
when a violent contention amused the indifferent spectators, and
aggravated the hatred of the parties concerned. Lady Hatton, in her
vehemence, is said to have declaimed with a force worthy of Burbage,
then the most popular actor of the day. At last, after much wrangling, a
reconciliation was effected. Lady Hatton was induced, upon some
conditions, to double the portion which her husband had offered, “and to
make up the match and give it her blessing.” Lady Compton Villiers and
her sons repaired to Kingston, where they remained two or three days,
“which,” adds the writer, “makes the world think they grow to
conclusion.” The fact was, that finding she had no power to resist, Lady
Hatton thought proper to give in with a good grace; thus commanding
better terms with Coke than a further resistance would have procured,
“and so,” adds Mr. Chamberlain, “defeat her husband’s purposes, towards
whom, of late, she had carried herself very strangely, neither like a
wife nor a wise woman.”[194]
Footnote 194:
Letter from Mr. Chamberlain, before quoted.
Thus, Coke’s “curst heart,” as his wife termed it, was forced to yield
to terms which he had never contemplated. The matter ended with the
young lady’s being sent to Hatton House, with orders that “Lady Compton
and her son should have access to win and wear her.” Meanwhile, all the
world expected that King James, whose minute interference in the affairs
of his courtiers equalled that of Henry the Eighth, would have mediated
a peace between Sir Edward Coke and his wife; but James forbore,
declaring that it “was a thing of more time and more care than he could
afford to give the matter.”
In this transaction, there is not a single individual who does not
appear to have harboured some unworthy motive. Coke, notwithstanding the
failure of his own matrimonial schemes, was ready to wed his daughter to
Sir John Villiers, without the slightest regard to her wishes and
affections.[195] Buckingham, his mother, and his brother were actuated
by the most mercenary considerations. Lady Hatton and her daughter were
aiming at a younger son of the Earl of Suffolk, Sir Robert Howard, who
was subsequently prosecuted for a criminal intrigue with Frances Hatton,
after she had become the wife of Sir John Villiers.
Footnote 195:
Stephens’s Introduction to Bacon’s letters, p. 42. Also Inedited
Letters in the State Paper Offices, Domestic, 1616, 17.
During the height of her opposition, the friends of Lady Hatton
published a contract, said to have been signed, in the presence of her
mother, by Frances Coke; and whether real, or merely contrived for the
purpose of preventing the marriage with Sir John Villiers (a precontract
being in those days as great an obstacle as a previous marriage), it is
highly characteristic of the parties concerned in it. This curious
document, from a young lady of the seventeenth century, is as follows:—
“I vow before God, and take the Almighty to witness, that I, Frances
Coke, younger daughter of Sir Edward Coke, late Lord Cheife Justice of
England, doe give myselfe absolutely to wife, to Henry Vere, Viscount
Balboke, Earl of Oxenford, to whom I plight my fayth, and inviolate
vows, to keepe myselfe till death us do part; and if ever I break off
the least of these, I pray God damme me body and soule in hell fyre in
the world to come. And in thys worlde, I humbly beseech God the earth
may open and swallowe me up quicke to the terror of all fayth breakers
that remayne alive. In witness thereof, I have written all thys with my
owne hand, and sealed yt with my own seale (a hart crowned), which I
will ware till you returne to make it good that I have sent you; and for
further assurance, I here underneath sett to my name,
“FRANCES COKE,
“in the presence of my deare mother,
“Elizabeth Hatton.
“July 10th, 1617.”[196]
Footnote 196:
Now first published from the State Paper Office. Domestic, July 10,
1617.
But the meanest actor in this whole affair was Francis Bacon. His
jealousy and hatred of Coke impelled him to oppose the marriage; but he
made the greatest profession of forwarding it. He wrote on the subject
to Buckingham, in these terms:—
“MY VERY GOOD LORD,
Since my last to your lordship I did first send to Mr. Attorney General,
and made him know that since I heard from court, I was resolved to
further the match and conditions thereof, for your Lordship’s brother’s
advancement, the best I could.”
He then details his further exertions in the matter; his apprising Lady
Hatton and some other special friends that he would in anything declare
for the match; his sending Sir John Bulter[197] to Lady Compton Villiers
to tender his good offices; but even whilst he made these overtures and
promises his courage flinched from abetting an event which would give
such influence to his old enemy, Coke.
Footnote 197:
A kinsman of Buckingham’s.
“I did ever foresee,” he writes, “that this alliance would go near to
lose me your lordship, that I hold so dear, and that was the only
respect particular to myself that moved me to be as I was, till I heard
from you. But I will rely on your constancy and nature, and my own
deserving, and the firm tie we have in respect of the King’s
service.”[198]
Footnote 198:
Nichols, 272.
Well might the writer of this letter complain that Lady Compton Villiers
and her son, Sir John, who saw through all his professions, spoke of him
with some bitterness and neglect. They were, it appeared, under the
influence of Sir Edward Coke, and of Secretary Winwood, the latter of
whom Bacon “took to be the worst of his enemies.” But he resolved “to
bear both with Lady Compton Villiers and her son—with her, as a lady;
with her son, as a lover”—and ended by the exclamation:—“God keep us
from these long journeys and absences, which make misunderstanding, and
give advantage to untruth; and ever prosper and preserve your lordship!”
Nevertheless, Bacon is supposed to have been the instigator of certain
proceedings in the Star Chamber, which were commenced against Sir Edward
Coke, for what was called an outrage; although the carrying his daughter
away were an action justifiable by law; and he quickly showed how
earnest was his determination to prevent the match, by another letter to
Buckingham. In this he complained of the officious busying himself of
Secretary Winwood, and asserted that it was done rather to make a
faction than out of any great affection for Buckingham. “It is true,” he
adds, “he hath the consent of Sir Edward Coke (as we hear) upon
reasonable conditions for your brother, and yet not better than, without
question, may be found in some other matches.” He next states the
objections to the match.
“First, that Sir John Villiers would marry into a disgraced house, which
in reason of state is never held good.
“Next, he shall marry into a troubled home of man and wife, which in
religion and Christian discretion is disliked.
“Thirdly, that he should incur the almost certain loss of friends,
myself only excepted, who, out of a pure love and thankfulness, shall be
ever firm to you.
“And lastly and chiefly, the danger that would be incurred of lessening
Buckingham’s influence with the King.” He therefore recommended
Buckingham to signify unto his mother, who seems to have been the
main-spring in the affair, that his desire was that the marriage should
not be proceeded in without the consent of both parties, thus making use
of a plea in order to sound a retreat from the alliance; but all was in
vain.
Bacon next addressed himself to the King. He touched him in his weak
part. “Your Majesty’s prerogative and authority have risen in some just
degrees above the horizon more than heretofore, which has distilled
vapours; your judges are in good temper; your justices of peace (which
is the great body of the gentlemen of England) grow to be loving and
obsequious, and to be weary of this humour of ruffling; all mutinous
spirits grow to be a little poor, and to draw in their horns, and not
the less for your Majesty’s disauthorising the man I speak of;[199] now,
then, I reasonably doubt that if there be but an opinion of his coming
in with the strength of such an alliance, it will give a downward
relapse in men’s minds unto the former state of things, hardly to be
helped, to the great weakening of your Majesty’s service. He is by
nature unsociable, and by habit unpopular, and too old to take a new
place. And men begin already to collect, yea, and to conclude that he
that raiseth such a smoke to get in, will set all on fire when he is
in.”[200]
Footnote 199:
Coke.
Footnote 200:
These letters are taken from Mr. Montague’s edition of Bacon’s works,
vol. vii., Bacon’s Life, p. 16.
Not content with these remonstrances, Bacon threatened Winwood with a
Præmunire for granting the warrant; but he was speedily checked by the
indignation of Buckingham, and consequently by that of the King. Coke
was reinstated in the favour of the Monarch, and restored to his place
in the Privy Council, September 15, 1617. He joined the Court on its
journey from Scotland at Woodstock, and “as if he were already on his
wings,” to use the expression of Sir Henry Yelverton, in his letter to
Bacon, “triumphed exceedingly.”
The poor puppet, Frances Hatton, whose inclinations, as Lord Campbell
remarks, were as little considered “as if she had been a Queen of Spain
under the influence of a Louis Philippe,” was now commanded by her
mother to write a second letter, consenting to marry one who, in thus
espousing her, proved to be most unhappy.
“MADAM,
“I must now humbly desire your patience in giving me leave to declare
myself to you, which is, that without your allowance and liking, all the
world shall never make me entangle or tie myself. But now, by my
father’s especial commandment, I obey him in presenting to you my humble
duty, in a tedious letter which is to know your ladyship’s pleasure, not
as a thing I desire, but I resolve to be wholly ruled by my father and
yourself, knowing your judgment to be such that I may well rely upon,
and hoping that conscience and the natural affection parents bear to
children, will let you do nothing but for my good, and that you may
receive comfort, I being a mere child, and not understanding the world,
nor what is good for myself. That which makes me a little give way to
it, is that I hope it will be a means to procure a reconciliation
between my father and your ladyship. Also, I think it will be a means of
the King’s favour to my father. Himself[201] is not to be misliked, his
fortune is very good, a gentleman well born * * * * So I humbly take my
leave, praying that all things may be to every one’s contentment,
“Your ladyship’s most obedient,
“and humble daughter, for ever,
”FRANCES COKE.
“Dear Mother,—Believe, there has no violent means been used to me by
words or deeds.”[202]
Footnote 201:
Lord Purbeck.
Footnote 202:
Life of Sir E. Coke, by Lord Campbell.
There now remained nothing but to unite the two young persons whose
affairs had become a matter of public interest. Accordingly, they were
married on Michaelmas day in the royal chapel at Hampton Court, by the
Bishop of Winchester, having been thrice publicly asked in church, the
King giving away “Mrs. Frances Coke the bride:” the Queen was present,
and Sir Edward Coke brought the bride and bridegroom from his son’s
house at Kingston, with eight or nine coaches. The consent of Lady
Hatton was gained; her daughter protesting that, “although she liked Sir
John Villiers better than any one else, she was resolved to keep a
solemn promise made by her to her mother, not to marry without her
consent.”[203]
Footnote 203:
Bacon’s Relics, ii., 29.
This marriage, however, did not pacify Lady Hatton’s haughty and
vindictive spirit. On the wedding-day, she honoured the event, it is
true, by a magnificent entertainment; her husband was not, however,
invited, but was seen dining at the public table in the Temple. Their
enmity endured for four years without mitigation; at the end of that
time, it was subdued by the interference of the King; but was never
wholly subdued.
By the alliance with Frances Coke, the Villiers family received
considerable accession of wealth; for besides the sum of 10,000_l._ paid
in money, Sir Edward and his son, Robert, did, upon the second of
November, _pursuant to directions of the Lords of Council_, assure to
Sir John Villiers an annuity of 2,000 marks per annum during Sir Edward
Coke’s life, and of 900_l._ a year during that of Lady Hatton; besides
the manor of Stoke Pogis, in Buckinghamshire, after their deaths: being
the moiety of those lands which Sir Edward Coke intended to bequeath to
his two daughters. These sums and this estate were settled by good
conveyances, which were certified to his Majesty by Sir Randolph Crewe,
Sir Robert Hitcham, and Sir Henry Yelverton, the King’s sergeants and
attorney; and eventually other possessions, and certain worldly honours,
were added to these acquisitions. But the marriage, notwithstanding the
success of these arrangements, was attended by misery. The young bride,
in spite of her profession at the time of her nuptials, had always
secretly hated the husband thus forced upon her choice. She had long
given a preference to Sir Robert Howard; and the result was such as to
embitter her own existence, and to degrade her into the lowest condition
to which a woman can descend; her husband incurring a heavy penalty for
his own compliance with the ambitious and mercenary views of
Buckingham—that of being wedded to a loathing and, eventually, a
faithless wife.
For some years, indeed, a hollow prosperity deceived superficial judges
of the affairs of life as to the happiness of this ill-fated pair. A
series of magnificent entertainments exalted the favour of Lady Hatton,
one of the most odious female characters of that period, and humiliated
her husband, who partook not of these festivities. All the great, the
gay, the courtly, attended the banquets of this imperious woman: but her
husband was never invited. Hatton House was graced repeatedly by the
King, who knighted there several among the guests who were favoured by
the lady of the mansion. In the words of an eye-witness, he made “four
of her creatures knights,”[204] so resolved was he to mollify this
virago. This shower of favours was the result entirely of the new
connection with the Villiers family; and a marked condescension was
shown on that day to the Lady Compton Villiers and her children, whom
the King “praised and kissed, and blessed all those that wished them
well.”[205]
Footnote 204:
Sir Peter Chapman, that belongs to the Earl of Exeter; Sir Francis
Nedham, an old solicitor betwixt her and Sir Christopher Hatton; Sir
Nathaniel Neil, a kinsman of Sir Robert; and one Withipole, a kinsman
of her own.
Footnote 205:
Nichols, iii. 448.
Amid all this carousing, some mistakes—intentional ones, it may be
suspected—were committed. The Earl of Pembroke, lord chamberlain, was
not invited to the dinner; but, as well as the Earl of Arundel, went
home to dine, and returned to wait upon the King—a trait of Lady
Hatton’s meanness and haughtiness which must have contributed to the
disgust felt for her conduct to her husband, “who was neither invited
nor spoken of, but dined that day in the Temple as usual.”
It is but justice to James to state that he now began to entertain a
serious intention of endeavouring to reconcile Sir Edward Coke to his
lady; but he truly observed that it was a matter of time and difficulty.
A cordial reconciliation had, however, taken place between Lady Hatton
and her daughter.
Beneath all these forced reconciliations and specious protestations, a
deep-seated disease—unsoundness of principle—was latent, only waiting
for time and occasion to give it effect. All, indeed, seemed prosperous;
in June, 1619, two years afterwards, Sir John Villiers was raised to the
dignity of Baron Stoke, in the county of Buckingham, and created
Viscount Purbeck,[206] in the county of Dorset, in spite of much
reluctance on the part of Lady Hatton to give him up Purbeck; in case of
her refusal, he was to have been styled Viscount Beaumont. It was long,
also, before Lady Hatton consented to put Lord Purbeck in possession of
Purbeck.[207] And the honour of being Viscountess of Westmorland was at
the same time offered to Lady Hatton, but was refused, “because she
would not come up to the price.”[208] This bait was held out in order to
induce her to assure to her son-in-law 7,000_l._, in land, a year, so
completely were the King’s interests those of the Villiers family. Had
she been obstinate, it was determined to make her husband a baron to
“spite her.”
Footnote 206:
The Isle of Purbeck belonged to Lady Hatton.
Footnote 207:
Calendar of State Papers for 1619, cix., p. 26.
Footnote 208:
Biog. Brit. Art. Coke.
The termination, however, of this ill-assorted union, thus formed,
proves how impossible it is for the most successful match-makers to
negotiate for happiness. The affection of Lady Purbeck for Sir Robert
Howard had never died away, and it soon showed itself in acts of
indiscretion, which gave occasion to much animadversion. In May, 1620,
Lord Purbeck went abroad, upon pretext of drinking the waters at Spa,
but, according to the account of Camden, to conceal his having “run mad
with pride.” By another writer, his loss of reason is imputed to the
improper support given to his wife in her outrage of public decorum, and
consequent insult to his honour. Whatever may have been the cause of his
infirmity, it is evident that the manœuvres of his family to increase
their wealth and dignity, were by no means conducive to his
felicity.[209]
Footnote 209:
Nichols, iii., 548.
During the whole of this discreditable transaction, and for a
considerable time after it had ceased to amuse the court circles, the
extraordinary influence of an imperious woman shows at once the weakness
of James and the incipient degradation of Buckingham. Whether Lady
Hatton’s influence proceeded from the expectations of further prosperity
to the Villiers family, she having 3000_l._ a year in her own power to
bequeath, or whether there existed in her any peculiar power to charm,
is uncertain. In the inedited State Papers, there are to be found many
scattered notices of the great court paid to this arrogant lady.
On the first of November, 1617, writes Mr. Chamberlain to Sir D.
Carleton, “the streets being full of people, on account of the Lord
Mayor’s passage to St. Paul’s,” the Earl of Buckingham, accompanied by
the Marquis of Hamilton, Lord Compton, and the Lord Hay, “Sir Edward
Cecil, and I know not whom, many more, to the number of twelve coaches,
went to fetch the Lady Hatton from Sir William Craven’s, and brought her
to her father’s, at Cecil House.” Here she remained some time, and went
in “like state to the Court, and there was much graced by the King, who
likewise reconciled her to the Queen, and made, at the same time, an
atonement ’twixt her and the Lady Compton, and a perfect peace ’twixt
her and her daughter, who would not be persuaded that she could forgive
and forget, till, at parting, the King made her swear that she loved her
as dearly as ever.”
During the course of the same month, another mark of favour was
exhibited.[210]
Footnote 210:
Nov. 14, 1617, Sir Nathaniel Brent to Sir Dudley Carleton. Domestic.
“On Saturday last, Lady Hatton entertained the King at dinner. Sir
Edward Coke gave it out it was for the reconciliation of him and his
wife; but it seems he mistook the case, for she gave orders that neither
he nor any of his sons or servants should enter her doors.” Then follows
the contrast, and the poor insulted husband appears on the scene. “His
ordinary residence is at the Temple, where very few come unto him, and
he sendeth for his diet to Goodman Gibbes, a slovenly cook, in Ram
Alley. I believe not that which some confidently report, that he sendeth
his shoes to be cobbled, and that on fasting night, when he meant not to
feast his men, he sent to his neighbour Gibbes for a breast of mutton.”
Upon the death of Secretary Winwood, Lady Hatton, it was supposed, would
have had the nomination of his successor, but the King seized this
opportunity of again marking his regard for the favourite.
“They do all apprehend,” writes Mr. Chamberlain, “how much the Lady
Hatton might prevail if she would set her whole mind and strength to it;
and I think they have and will find means to put her in remembrance; but
the voice goes that the place is not like to be disposed of in haste,
for the King says he was never so well served as when he was his own
secretary, and to that end hath delivered the seals, that were belonging
to Sir Ralph Winwood, to the custody of the Earl of Buckingham, and
there, perhaps, they shall remain till they both grow weary of
them.”[211]
Footnote 211:
Letter from Mr. Chamberlain to Sir D. Carleton, Nov. 8, 1617. Inedited
State Papers.
Sir Thomas Lake, according to the same correspondent, got possession of
the lodging at Court usually assigned to the secretary; and it was said
that he had the seals also, and a warrant for an allowance of 4,100_l._
a year for “intelligence;” but, adds Mr. Chamberlain, it falls not out
so.
Lady Hatton was, it appears, extremely anxious to advance the interests
of Sir Thomas Edmondes,[212] a desire which was doubtless favoured by
Buckingham, to whose interests Edmondes was, at this time, devoted. It
is satisfactory to find, in a subsequent letter, that Lady Hatton’s
ascendancy did not last long. “That first heat being over,” writes a
contemporary, “she may blow her nails twice before it kindle again.” Her
aim, as was acknowledged on all hands, “was rather to pull down her
husband” than to use her power and favour either for her own good, or
her friends.[213] A singular combination of everything that was violent,
and yet intriguing, rapacious, and yet lavish, seems to have been
exhibited in the character of this leader of fashion in the Court of
James the First.
Footnote 212:
See Letter from Nathaniel Brent to Sir D. Carleton.
Footnote 213:
Inedited Letter in the State Paper Office.