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[Illustration: SIR WALTER RALEGH]
GREAT RALEGH
BY
HUGH DE SELINCOURT
WITH SIXTEEN ILLUSTRATIONS
NEW YORK: G. P. PUTNAM'S SONS
LONDON: METHUEN & CO.
1908
TO
MURIEL LEE MATHEWS
_High Cross_
PREFACE
This book has been written for the general reader. Caveat scholasticus.
My aim has been to make the character of Ralegh live again, and to draw
a picture of the times in as lively a manner as I see it. England in
Elizabeth's maturity touched greatness; in Elizabeth's old age and
during the reign of King James, England declined. Ralegh embodied the
greatest qualities of the great days, and survived to carry on the
Elizabethan tradition when the great Elizabethans had passed away.
The books to which reference has been made are too many to need mention
in a book of this kind: dramatists, poets, pamphleteers, memoirists have
been freely pillaged. But I should like to acknowledge here my extreme
indebtedness to the works of Major Martin Hume, Mr. T. N. Brushfield,
and the late Mr. Edward Edwards, and to thank again Miss Janet Wheeler
for her kind help, notably in that arduous task--the making of an Index.
H. DE S.
CONTENTS
CHAPTER I
BIRTH PAGE
The spread of news--Birth--Influence of birthplace--His
father--His mother 1
CHAPTER II
EARLY DAYS
His early going to Oxford--Old Ascham on quick wit and
education--Life at a University--The Queen at Oxford--To
the wars in France--Henry Champernoun--Stories of the wars 11
CHAPTER III
TOWARDS MANHOOD
Friendship with George Gascoyne--Its importance--Ralegh
in London--The arch-gossip Aubrey--Elizabethan London--
Ralegh and Sir Humfrey Gilbert--The beginning of the great
enterprise 21
CHAPTER IV
THE ARRIVAL
In Ireland--The state of the country--Cruelty of the
wars--At Rakele--Illustrative anecdotes--Smerwick--
Ralegh's initiative--Lord Grey de Wilton--Exploit at
Bally--In touch with the home authorities 33
CHAPTER V
QUEEN'S FAVOURITE
Court life--The Queen's position--Her character--She takes
notice of Ralegh--Robert Dudley, Earl of Leicester--Sir
Philip Sidney--Burghley, the Lord High Treasurer, and
Walsingham--Robert Cecil--The dress of the courtier--The
language of the courtier--The other side, and the other
Queen--Mary, Queen of Scots--The great intrigue--Its
discovery--Death of Queen Mary 44
CHAPTER VI
THE GREAT ENTERPRISE
Scheme of colonization--Preparation--The sailing--Queen's
interest--Death of Sir Humfrey Gilbert--Another charter
obtained--King Wingina--Hospitality--Sir Richard
Grenville--Difficulties of first colonists--Personal
outfit--Misfortune 71
CHAPTER VII
BUSINESS MAN
The Stannaries--His grasp of detail--"Do it with thy
might"--Estimate of squadron--Scheme of coast defence--
The clash-mills of Mr. Crymes--Irish plans 88
CHAPTER VIII
AGAINST SPAIN
Spain's enmity--The Armada--Ralegh's opinion of tactics--
With Sir Francis Drake and Sir John Norreys--The privateers 97
CHAPTER IX
RALEGH AND SPENSER
Rise of Essex--Ralegh retires to Ireland--At Kilcolman--
At Youghal--Friendship with Spenser--Brings Spenser to
Court--Their dreams 106
CHAPTER X
EVIL TIMES
Ralegh and the Puritans--John Udall--Blount--Ralegh's
marriage--Queen's anger--In the Tower--His sincerity--The
Episode in the "Faerie Queene"--_Madre de Dios_--Robert
Cecil--Sherborne 114
CHAPTER XI
THE KINGDOM IN GUIANA
Ralegh leaves England--Arrives at Trinidad--Taking of S.
Joseph--Interviews with Berreo--Dealings with natives--
Starts up the river in boats--Dangers overcome--
Adventures--They reach River Amana--Indian village--
Within sight of Guiana--Toparimaca--Beauty of the land--
Falls of the Caroli--The return--Voyage home--Arrival in
England 127
CHAPTER XII
CADIZ AND FAYAL
Division of command--Ralegh's delay--Unwillingness of men
to serve--Disputes--Ralegh's wise plan of action--The
attack--The sack--Ralegh wounded--His small share of
spoil--Return home--Sends ship to Guiana--Death of Lady
Cecil--Robert Cecil's policy--Expedition to Azores--
Fayal--Quarrel with Essex 150
CHAPTER XIII
THE UNDERMINING
Robert Cecil in power--Downfall of Essex--Ralegh's opinion
of Essex--Governor of Jersey--Peril imminent 167
CHAPTER XIV
SUCCESSION PLOTS
Possible successors to Elizabeth--Lord Henry Howard--
Spies--Ralegh's position--The net is drawn round him--
Letter of Cecil--Last illness and death of Elizabeth--
Carey's ride to the North 178
CHAPTER XV
THE TRIAL
Arrival of James VI. of Scotland--Ralegh in immediate
disfavour--Gondomar comments on James--Ralegh accused of
treason--Cobham and Brooke--Ralegh attempts suicide--
Cobham's retractions--November 17--And the trial's infamy 195
CHAPTER XVI
THE KING'S FARCE
Comments on Ralegh's fall--In the prison at Winchester--
Ralegh begs mercy--His attitude explained--The King's own
farce--Ralegh removed to London 227
CHAPTER XVII
THE LONG IMPRISONMENT
Ralegh's efforts to avert complete ruin--True greatness--
Keeps in touch with life--First two years--The history--
The first sentence--Reasons for incompleteness--James's
dislike of the work--Its greatness 238
CHAPTER XVIII
THE LAST JOURNEY
Ralegh's influence with Queen and Prince Henry--Death of
Robert Cecil--Rise of Villiers--Liberty--The undying
endeavour--Anecdote--Preparations for expedition--Delays
and uncertainty--The King's treachery--The expedition
starts--Further delays--Storms--Captain Bailey--Ralegh's
illness--At Terra de Bri--His son's death--Return of
Keymis--Suicide of Keymis--Mutiny--The return 253
CHAPTER XIX
DEATH
His reception--Arrest--Journey from Plymouth--Stukeley
and Manourie--The final scene 287
INDEX 305
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
SIR WALTER RALEGH _Frontispiece_
FACING PAGE
THE BIRTHPLACE OF SIR WALTER RALEGH, BUDLEIGH-SALTERTON 6
_From a Photograph by F. Frith & Co., Ltd._
FRANCIS BACON 14
MAP OF LONDON 26
_By kind permission of Dr. F. J. Furnivall_
QUEEN ELIZABETH 46
WILLIAM CECIL, LORD BURGHLEY 54
MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS 68
A SAILING SHIP IN THE TIME OF RALEGH 78
GENERAL VIEW OF LONDON 100
_From Thornton's "London_," 1784
ROBERT CECIL 124
KING JAMES I. 195
COUNT ARENBERGH 206
HENRY PRINCE OF WALES 254
PHILIP III. OF SPAIN 260
SIR WALTER RALEGH 270
_From an Engraving by Vaughan_
TRAITOR'S GATE 294
GREAT RALEGH
CHAPTER I
BIRTH
The spread of news--Birth--Influence of birthplace--His
father--His mother.
Life is a series of accidents more or less controlled; the play of
circumstances upon character infinitely various and infinitely involved.
Elizabethan life was superb for the reason that there were fewer men,
and they had the immense advantage of realizing their power and of
possessing scope for their energy. It was the age of discovery, not only
of new lands, but of discovery in every branch of life. Now, a man may
grow old before he has acquired an inkling of what has been found out,
before he has read what has been written finely. The world stands at
ease uneasily, and has time for shuffling and discontent. Vitality and
opportunity then worked in wonderful harmony. We are not less vital, but
our energy is apt to be stifled. Everything is so easy. We read day by
day what has happened throughout the world. There is nothing surprising
except our friends and ourselves--and they are apt to surprise us too
much. Effort begets effort, and effort, strength. The Elizabethan,
without railways, without posts, without telegraphs, was bound to rely
upon himself for everything.
Man brought news to man by word of mouth, without warning or previous
discussion, or the help of photography. An errand-boy can now know more
easily what is happening in the whole world than a wise man could then
know of what was happening in his county. You did not know of a battle
till you saw the wounded fighters.
They were shut out from the outside world, and from time to time
dramatically news fired their imagination and minds. And their minds
were trained so that they did not gape and wonder. Their minds were
stored with the wisdom of the Greeks and Romans, and were thrilled as
only trained minds can be thrilled, and roused to a veritable storm of
energy by the huge possibilities of life. The difficulties to be
overcome were material and romantic, and triumphs were more easily
attained. Life was as adventurous as the true tales of adventure that
were circulated at every fireside.
Nowhere were these tales more frequent or fresher than near the great
sea-ports in Devonshire, where Walter Ralegh was born. The farmhouse
still stands, at Hayes, near Budleigh-Salterton. The country-side has
remained strangely the same in its appearance, a little more populous,
and, after waking to the arrival of trains, has sunk back to its long,
prosperous sleep, contented. No longer do strange ships with stranger
tidings disturb its rest; they are watched for and quietly expected; the
sailors land to learn news, and can tell little but gossip in return. No
longer do horses carry messengers on the Queen's service with packets
marked "_Haste_," "_Post Haste_," "_For Life_," galloping to the Queen's
Chief Secretary, in London.
News was spread slowly; its effect must have been incredibly impressive.
In the year 1552 Walter Ralegh was born. He was the second son of his
father's third wife, and so the universal accident of birth seems in his
case to be intensified. It was the sixth year of Edward VI.'s reign, and
an astrologer has noted that year as "a year remarkable in our
chronicles, first, for that strange shoal of the largest sea-fishes
which, quitting their native waters for fresh and untasted streams,
wandered up the Thames so high, till the river no longer retained any
brackishness; and, secondly, for that it is thought to have been
somewhat stained in our annals with the blood of the noble Seymer, Duke
of Somerset--events surprisingly analogous both to the life of this
adventurous voyager, Sir Walter Ralegh, whose delight was in the
hazardous discovery of unfrequented coasts, and also to his unfortunate
death."
It is not possible to determine exactly the effect of these largest "sea
fishes" on his after-life; their coming may have been mere coincidence,
or it may have been that the same element of an unknown power that sent
the fishes hurrying to untasted streams, made Ralegh restless as the
fish. The point lends itself to straining by its nature, though it is
staidly mentioned by the staid biographer who has been quoted.
The dominating influence of his life was not the date of his birth, but
his birthplace in the quiet of the country, and yet within the easiest
reach of the fabulous outside world. That influence cannot be
exaggerated.
Old sailors, who, as young men, had sailed with Jaques Carthier, of St.
Malo, must have stirred the boy's mind with the stories of their
adventures up the river of Canada to Saguenay, where there was gold and
silver and red copper; how they visited the town of Hochelaga, their
captain very gorgeously attired; and how, when their guides had led them
to the midst of the town, they were saluted by the women first and then
by the men; and a comedy was rehearsed for their amusement until, borne
on ten men's shoulders, Agouhanna, the lord and king of the country,
wearing the skins of red hedgehogs in place of a crown, was brought in
and placed by the side of their captain, on a great stag's skin; and how
their captain, seeing the people's misery, read them in a loud, clear
voice the first chapter of St. John's Gospel. Tales, too, young Ralegh
would hear of other wild men and of their prodigious wealth, which they
knew not the value of; of rubies and of pearls bartered for iron and
toys; of the great creatures morses or sea-oxen, "which fish is very
big, and hath two great teeth, and the skinne of them is like Buffe's
leather, and they will not go away from their young ones." And at
Bristol was living Mr. Alexander Woodson, an excellent mathematician and
skilful physician, and he, writes Hakluyt, "shewed me one of these
beast's teeth which were brought from the isle of Ramea in the first
prize, which was half a yard long or very little less; and assured mee
that he had made tryall of it in ministring medicine to his patients,
and had found it as soveraigne against poyson as any Unicornes horne."
With only a little less eagerness and a wiser discrimination between
fact and fable would the elders of the great Devonshire families, with
many of whom the Raleghs were connected, hear the news and plan schemes
for outwitting their rivals on the sea--the Spaniards--and perhaps
foresee the great part their sons would play in gaining for their
country prestige in this unclosing of the outside world. They would
spare no pains to make the youngsters worthy to carry on the great
tradition of Devonshire gentlemen under the splendid new conditions,
which were daily becoming more apparent.
A fine stock were the Devonshire gentlemen who watched over the years of
Walter Ralegh's boyhood, whetting no doubt by their interest his
keenness in Latin and Greek, in fencing and riding, and training his
knowledge of men. Among the Gilberts and Champernounes and Raleghs and
Carews, there would be men as skilful in the handling of a ship as in
the proper management of a farm, and to all would young Ralegh listen
with his mind feverishly alert for information, and from all he would
learn what each could teach him.
Old John Hooker, who lived at Exeter, and helped to write the
continuation of Holinshed's chronicle, knew the boy and took an interest
in him; as is easy to see from his proud reference to the Raleghs'
illustrious descent--royal even he would have it in despite of Sir
William Pole--and from his fine warning to young Ralegh when he was
emerging into distinction to remain worthy of it. "These all," he
writes, "were men of great honour and nobility whose virtues are highly
recorded sparsim in the Chronicles of England. But yet, as nothing is
permanent in this life and all things variable under the sun, and Time
hath devoured and consumed greatest men and mightiest monarchs and most
noble communities in the world--according to the old country saying, 'Be
the day never so long, yet at length it will ring to even-song'--so
this honourable race ... continued in great honour, nobility and
reputation, yet in process of time seemed at length to be buried in
oblivion.
"Now it hath pleased God to raise the same even from the dead.... And
whereof cometh this that the Lord hath so blessed you, but only that you
should be beneficial and profitable to all men?" And he ends his
discourse, in which a note of almost fatherly concern is heard, with an
apt euphuism about the bee, to clinch his argument and perhaps to show
his knowledge of courtly style (did not he too go to London as member
for Exeter?) "As the bee is no longer suffered to have a place in the
hive than whiles he worketh, no more is that man to have place in the
public weal than whiles he doth some good therein."
His father, too, was a man to know and appreciate his son's worth. He
had led no uneventful life, though he was, for the most part,
sequestered in the country. He took a leading part in the affairs of the
little town of Budleigh-Salterton. In the great Rising of the West, in
1549, he came perilously near to losing his life. He was riding with
some mariners from Hayes to Exeter, when he came upon an old woman
telling her beads; he stopped to ask her why she defied authority by
telling beads, and the old woman, furious, rushed into the church of
Clyst St. Mary, and inveighed against the gentlemen who would burn the
houses of poor folk over their heads. Ralegh had ridden on towards
Exeter; a body of insurgents overtook him, and he was saved from being
murdered only by hastening into a chapel by the road-side. But he went
on his way again, and again fell into the hands of the rebels; and this
time he did not manage to escape, but was shut up in the tower of a
church at St. Sidwell's--a suburb of Exeter in the hands of the
rebels--until Lord Grey of Wilton won the great battle of Clyst Heath,
in which four thousand perished, and relieved the siege of Exeter. The
incident serves to show the calibre of the father.
[Illustration: THE BIRTHPLACE OF SIR WALTER RALEGH, BUDLEIGH, SALTERTON]
But when young Ralegh was a boy, his father's adventurous days were
over; and in 1561 he is mentioned as churchwarden of East Budleigh
parish, and no doubt led his family regularly each Sunday to the family
pew, on which the family arms are still discernible, though much
disfigured--probably too at the command of King James I. of England, who
feared his too ambitious subject even after his death. Little the father
thought of that as he watched the little boy to see that he behaved with
propriety in church and did not sleep or play as little boys are wont to
do during a sermon. Old Ralegh, remembering the terrible reaction during
Mary's reign, would be specially punctilious in such matters; and
fathers then were not lenient to their children. Young Peter Carew, when
he played truant at Exeter Grammar School, was leashed to a great hound
by his father: and we are not told whether Peter and the dog were on
friendly terms. They may have become so; we will hope for Peter's sake
that they did. Certainly, with three young Gilberts, young Walter's
step-brothers--sons of Otho Gilbert--and a family of Raleghs of all
ages, there would be need for stern discipline in church as well as out
of church, and there is little reason for doubting of its existence,
though no account has been handed down of severity as ingenious as that
shown by Peter Carew's honest father. Probably, in young Walter's
upbringing, there was a touch of the ewe lamb, that would account in a
measure for the "naeve of pride" which was such a conspicuous feature of
his developed character. Not that he was spoiled; but his parents had a
soft place in their hearts for him, which he well would know of, and he
was not suppressed so rigorously as he would have been otherwise ... but
this is pleasant conjecture.
His mother was a woman of character: "a woman of noble wit, and of good
and godly opinions," writes John Foxe of her, and proceeds to tell how
she visited poor Agnes Prest when she was in prison for having
Protestant opinions (that was when Mary was on the throne, and Philip
of Spain was powerful in England), and conversed with her before she was
burned at the stake on Southernhay. "Mistress Ralegh came home to her
husband and declared to him that in her life she never heard any woman,
of such simplicity to see, to talk so godly and so earnestly; insomuch
that if God were not with her she could not speak such things. I was not
able to answer her: I, who can read, and she cannot."
The story does not relate what answer Mistress Ralegh wanted to give; it
does not necessarily show her a Catholic in sympathy, though she
probably did not sympathize with Agnes Prest's desire for martyrdom, and
wanted to prevent the old woman from losing her life in such a terrible
way. The story illustrates how inextricably religion was bound up with
patriotism, and what a quandary the ordinary peace-loving gentlefolk,
whose wish was to serve God and their country, must have been in, when
the interests of either changed with the sovereign. That was why
Elizabeth, by her policy of gradually cutting the ties that linked
England to the Pope and the countries under his authority, gave such
immense strength to the English; she united, as it were, the strength
drawn from patriotism and the strength drawn from religion, by forcing
England to rely on herself alone; and so she overcame the countries
weakened by the constant antagonism between the welfare of their
religion and the welfare of their state. She saw, as her father Henry
had seen, the value of religion as a political asset; and with cold
common sense she used that asset for all its peculiar worth. Her policy
is more praiseworthy than her religion. Never was woman less religious;
few women have been dowered with her state-craft. Religion and
patriotism became practically identical: their interests were no longer
conflicting.
The Pope and his followers became, for adventurous Englishmen,
comfortingly akin to the devil and the devil's workers, to have at whom
has always been the privilege of good men since the world began.
Moreover, in this case the powers of evil were wealthy and pompous, but
unwarlike; and wealth is a pleasant perquisite to virtue.
The time did not lend itself to contemplation. There was too much to be
done. It was a time of action. The material world, with all its
tremendous possibilities, was opening out before the astonished gaze of
Englishmen, and left but little time for the exploration of the
spiritual world. Men of action and men of art passed on their way
triumphantly, "if not to heaven--then hand in hand to hell."
Young Ralegh would accept his religion from his parents much as he
accepted his sword, resolved to keep both bright and becoming a
gentleman. He was a man of the world; and the world then was boisterous
and unruly. Men revelled in life like boys; their code of honour was as
chivalrous and strange as that of boys. They lived, and they relished
living.
Into this world young Ralegh went to make his way. He was poor, but had
friends who had caused the spirit of life to thrive in him, who had
nurtured his own belief in himself, and showed him what the world had in
store for the courageous and skilful man. He was proud and ambitious,
and few men have had better reason for pride, or have carried out their
ambition with such success as he. He was always an aristocrat; so
distinguished that ostentation became him, which, on a meaner man, would
have passed into vulgarity. He was the most romantic figure of the most
romantic age in the annals of English history.
His life was fuller of great accidents than life is wont to be, and all
these accidents of good fortune and of bad he used to the full extent of
a man's power, and by so doing he controlled them and became the master
of his fate.