1. .i M!-- ijf^i^-Si:"-' ■::i Miiata, S7em ^arh CORNELL UNIVERSITY LIBRARY 3 1924 088 000 561 Cornell University Library The original of tiiis book is in tine Cornell University Library. There are no known copyright restrictions in the United States on the use of the text. http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924088000561 HISTORY TEACHING IN SCHOOLS. '//* course of publication, each volume iiifcp. 8yo. complete in itself, EPOCHS OP HISTORY; A SERIES OF BOOKS TltEATING OF THE HISTOEY OF ENGLAND AND EUROPE At Successive Epochs Subsequent to the Christian Era. EDITED BY EDWARD E. MORRIS, M.A. of Lincoln College, Oxford. Late Master of the Bedfordshire Middle-Class Public School. ri'HE conviction has long been growing that for schools in general small and cheap ■ -»- books, if carefully prepared, are better than those which are larger and more costly. The difficulty in applying this idea to books of history is the risk of spoiling the interest by diminishing the detail. But it is generally allowed that the complete picture of any short period is of more value, in an educational point of view, than a mere outline of the history of a nation; and the practice, dictated by the course of many public examinations, of reading periods of history, seems to suggest a way in which it may be possible to secure in handy and cheap volumes that fulness without which nistory is unprofitable. For schools the study of elaborate histories is, and must remain, an impossi- bility ; and generally, it may be safely said that in school routine time cannot be found for going through the complete continuous history of more than one or two countries at most. But it is not possible to understand thoroughly the history of even one country, if it be studied alone. A knowledge of the condition of surrounding countries i.s of at least equal importance with its own previous history. It is, so to speak, a horizontal rather than a vertical study of history. It is proposed, therefore, by publishing a series of books rela.ting only to definite periods of history, to meet a want which cannot be met by continuous histories of any one country. The series will by no means be confined to the history of England, but will deal also with European history ; and where the course of events in England may give to the epoch its name and character, care will be taken to trace the connexion of English history with that of the continental nations, and with the pro- gress of ideas at work among them. Great as the improvement has been in the. histories prepared of late years for the use of schools, much still remains to be done before we can have manuals thoroughly adapted for boys and girls, whose memories cannot retain mere names, or retain them at the cost of efforts which weaken their powers in other directions. In school histories no reference should be made to events of which some clear idea London, LONGMANS & CO. EPOCHS of HISTORY— Prospectus continued. /■'•■ cannot be laid before the reader, and no names mentioned of actors in tiie history, unless enough can be said to exhibit them as living men. To this rule the con- tributors to the present series will, so far as practicable, strictly adhere. In short, it will be their object, not to recount all the events of any given epoch, but to bring out in the clearest light those incidents and features on which tke mind of the young most readily fastens, and all those characteristics which exhibit the life of a people as .well as the policy of their rulers, special attention being paid to the literature, manners, and state of knowledge during each epoch. With each volume a Map or Maps will be given, one, if necessary, representing the state of Europe during the period of which it treats ; and a Chronological Analysis, shewing the relation of English and foreign events. Lists of authorities consulted and of books suitable for further study will be given in a Preface. Foot- notes will be avoided. Lastly, the first volume of the series will have an introductory chapter, sketching the previous history of Europe so far as may be requisite to make the succeeding chapters intelligible. In the other volumes an introductory chapter, when it seems necessary, will be inserted in order to connect the book with earlier epochs treated n the series. The work, when complete, will thus form a series of consecutive olumes, which will give the reader, it is hoped, a full and accurate view of the history of England and Europe from the days of Charles the Great and Alfred to the present time. Epochs selected, and Authors : — I. Tbe Era of tiie Protestant Revolution. By P. Sbebohm, Author of * The C ' Reformers- Colet, Erafluns, More.' "With 4 Coloured Maps and 12 Diagrams on "Wood. '^js. 6d II. The Crusades. By the Eev. G. W. Cox, M.A. late Scholar of Trinity Colle of the * Aryan Mythology ' &c. "With a Coloured Map. Price 2s. 6d, III. TheThurty Yeai-s' "War, 1618-1648. By Samuel Rawron Sardiker, latt ' ''h. Ch. Author of ' History of England from the Accession of James I. to th ^ jeof Chief Justice Coke ' &c. With a Coloured Map. Price '2s. 6d. IV. The Houses of Lancaster and York ; with the Conquest and Loss of France. By James GAlHDNEn, of the Public Record OtBce ; Editor of ' The Paston Letters ' and of ' Letters and Papers illustrative of the Reigns of Richard HI, and Henry VII.' in the Rolls Series. "With 5 Coloured Maps, Price 2s. Gd. V. Edward III. By the Eev. "W. "Wakburtos, M.A. late Fellow of AH Souls College, Oxford ; Her Majesty's Senior Inspector of Schools. "With Coloured Map. Price 2s. 6d. The Beginning of the Middle Ages ; Charles the Great and Alfred ; the History of England in its connexion with that of Europe in the Ninth Century. By the Very Rev. E. "W. Church M.A. Dean of St. Paul's. The Norman Kings and the Feudal System. By the Eev. A. H. Johnson, M.A. Fellow of All iSouls College, Oxford. The Early Plantagenets and their relation to the History of Europe ; the foundation and growth of Constitutional Government. By the Rev. "William Stubbs, M.A. &o. Regius Professor of Modem History in the University of Oxford ; Editor of ' Select Charters of English Con- stitutional History from the Earliest Times to the Eeign of Edward I.' and of several Chronicles and Memorials of this period in the Bolls Series. The Age of Elizabeth. By the Eev. M. Creigbton, M.A. Fellow of Merton College, Oxford. The Stuarts and the Puritan Revolution. By J. Langtost Sanforo, Author of ' Studies' and lUustrations of the Great Rebellion," ' Estimates of the English Kings,' &c. The Fall of the Stuarts ; and "Western Europe from 1678 to 16D7. By the Eev. BnwARn Halh M.A. Assistant-Master at Eton. .^.aun, The Age of Anne. By BnwARD E. Morris, M.A. Editor of the Series. ■^ri^?d **"* *^'°'" ™* *''° ^^™ ^^™' ^"' ^^ ^' ^" '^""S'''^. of Balliol CoUege, The War of American Independence. By John Malcolm Ludlow, Bai-rister-at-Law A„fhnv p{ ' A SSetch of the History of the United States from Independence to SSmi,' S I^ondon, LONGMANS & CO. mSTOEY OF ENGLMD 1624-1628 VOL. I. Lt)SDON : Pinsricn by tiTTIS^VOOnE AND CO., NEW-STHEET SQUAR3 AXD PAUI,I.\.MEST BTKEKT LonHmt, Zotupnarvs & Co. HISTOKY OF ENGLAJNfD UNDER THE DUKE OF BUCKINGHAM AND CHAELES I. I 624- I 628 SAMUEL EAWSON GAEDINEE LATE STUDENT OF CHRIST CHDROH COimESPONDING MEMBER OP THE UASSACHUSETTTS HISTORICAL SOCIETY AUTHOR OF *A HISTOKY OF EXOLAND FROM THE ACCESSION OF JAMES I. TO THH DISGRACE OF CHIEF JUSTICE COKE' *PniNCE CHARLES ANIXTHE SPANISH MARRIAGE* AND ' THE THIRTY YBAHS' WAR ' IN THE EPOCHS OF HISTORY SERIES IN TWO VOLUMES VOL. I. LONDON LONGMANS, GEEEN, AND CO. 1875 A All rigltts veser ved PREFACE. The present volumes are intended to form, together with the ' History of England from the accession of James I. to the disgrace of Chief Justice Coke,' and ' Prince Charles and the Spanish Marriage,' a connected history which now extends from the death of Elizabeth in 1603 to the assassination of Buckingham in 1628. I believe that much is gained for the understanding of the events of which I am now treating by telling the story of the last year of James's reign in close con- nection with the first years of his son. To make the division at the accession of Charles is to separate effect from cause, and to account for the reaping of the whirl- wind without taking into consideration the sowing of the wind. The five years, too, which, followed the return of Charles from Madrid stand apart from those before and after them as a war period ; for if peace with France and Spain was not at once concluded when Eochelle was taken, hostilities practically came to an end when Llndsey's fieet returned from the French coast without accomplishing anything. These years of war bear specially the impress of Buckingham's activity. Writers not unfrequently speak of Buckingham's asceu- VI PREFACE. dency as commencing at a much earlier period. But this is altogether a mistake, if, at least, these writers mean anything hke the ascendency which he possessed after his return from Madrid. Influence he had long had with James in everything, and in matters of per- sonal favour he had more than ordinary influence ; but up to the end of 1623 James decided his own pohtical course. From that date to his death Buckingham was • the ruler of England. When I first undertook to investigate the history of this momentous period, I felt a certain hesitation. Libraries positively bristled with the names of great writers who had given their thoughts to the world on the subject of these years. But I was not long in dis- covering that there was still room for further investiga- tion. We have had historians in plenty, but they have been Whig historians or Tory historians. The one class has thought it unnecessary to take trouble to under- stand how matters looked in the eyes of the King and his friends ; the other class has thought it unnecessary to take trouble to understand how matters looked in the eyes of the leaders of the House of Commons. I am not so vain as to suppose that I have always succeeded in doing justice to both parties, but I have, at least, done my best not to misrepresent either. Another material objection to the works of recent authorities is the brevity with which they pass over the foreign relations of the kingdom. It was not so once. Carte, for instance, takes pains to tell as much as he can on this subject ; but the very fact that attention has been more exclusively drawn to Parliamentary history, PREFACE. vil and that great discoveries have been made iu this branch of the subject, has led to the neglecting of investigation into those diplomatic and military relations with other countries which need to be taken into consideration if we are to understand whether the Commons were right or wrong in refusing a subsidy or in impeaching a minister. Fortunately, new sources of information are now opening up to those who turn their attention in this direction. The French despatches of the period have long been in more than one copy in the Museum hbrary, though they have never been submitted to a thorough and searching investigation. The Dutch despatches of Caron and Joachimi are also in copy in the same- repository. The greater part of the Venetian despatches have been, through the kindness of Mr. Eawdon Brown, sent over either in copy or in translation to the Public Eecord Office. A visit to Brussels has enabled me to elucidate some obscure points of Spanish policy, though it is not to be expected that in war time much interesting matter would be. left on record. Having failed to meet with any important despatches relating to the last year' of James during my visit to Simancas, I have not thought it necessary to make any fresh attempt, as there seems no likelihood that any good result would be secured, as there was no Spanish ambassador in England during the first four years of Charles's reign. In addition to the despatches of the ambassadors of other nations, the foreign series of State papers in the Eecord Office has been most useful. I trust that I have thus succeeded in disentangling the course of negotiations with France, a knowledge of which is as important to a proper Viu PREFACE. understanding of English history in these years as a knowledge of the course of affairs in Germany is to a proper understanding of English history in the earlier period. The negotiations with France fall under two distinct heads — those preceding Charles's marriage, and those which come after his accession. The first period has been treated of by M. Guizot in his 'Projet dc Mariage Eoyal,' and by Mr. Bruce in an unprinted fragment of history which will one day, I trust, be made publip. But, though both these narratives contain much that is valuable and interesting, neither of them is founded on any comprehensive view of the entire evidence. M. Guizot had before him some of the despatches of the French ministers, which he inter- preted with the help of such fragmentary materials as were already in print on the English side, not being aware apparently, or at all events not making use, of some of the most interesting parts of the correspondence even of theFrench ambassadors. Mr. Bruce, on the other hand, based his narrative entirely upon the English despatches which he found amongst the State papers, supplemented by remarks drawn from his extensive knowledge of the period, without any reference to the correspondence of Tillieres and Efiiat which was to be found in the Museum library. It seems obvious that a story founded upon all the letters written on both sides will have more chance of giving a correct account of these transactions than that which is avowedly based upon the unchecked assertions of a single party to the negotiations. The later negotiations have remained almost wholly PEEFACE. ix unknown. The romantic idea that the war of 1627 was brought about simply and solely by the persistence of Buckingham in forcing his presence upon the French Queen has seemed so satisfactory that many writers have not only neglected to enquire whether anything more than this is to be discovered, but they have even allowed to drop out of sight facts such as those of the contraband trade of Calais, which were per- fectly well known to Carte. Mr. Forster was the first to turn enquiry somewhat in this direction by his in- vestigation into the cases of Pennington's fleet and of the ' St. Peter ' of Havre de Grace ; and though a further examination of the sources of information has led me to the discovery of unexpected disclosures in the foriner affair, and to asciibe less importance to the latter than Mr. Forster has done, it must not be forgotten that Mr. Forster led the way in the enquiry into the sub- ject. Nov is it only the history of England which is affected by the narrative. As far as I am aware, French writers know nothing of the abortive peace agreed upon between the French Government and the Huguenot deputies on July 15, 1625 ; and they are content to tell the story of the peace patched up with Spain in 1626, without a suspicion that the conduct of the English Court had a great deal to do with inducing Richeheu to give his consent to it. If the harvest to be gathered from a diligent use of materials proved sufficient inducement to me to embark upon the present undertaking, I was certainly not pre- pared for the wealth of new material relating to those very Parliamentary contests, the documents relating to PREFACE, which seemed to have been so completely ransacked by my predecessors. The Parliaments of 1624 and 1626, indeed, stand mainly on their old basis as far as the House of Commons is concerned, though even here I have met with some materials not hitherto used, and 'Nicholas's Notes for 1624' throw some additional light upon discussions which are given very fully in the two reports in the journals. But for the House of Com- mons in 1625 we have, in addition to Eliot's 'Negotium Posterorum,' which we owe to Mr. Forster, theFawsley/ MS., which I was lately allowed by the kindness of Sir Eainald Knightley to edit for the Camden Society. It is, however, the history of the great session of 1628 which gains most from the new light shed upon it. The de- bates heretofore were in a state of chaos, two or three speeches, often placed out of order, having frequently to do duty for a whole day's discussion. The first light I was able to throw upon the matter arose from a study of 'Nicholas's Notes,' written in that peculiar semi-short- hand of his which seems to have repelled previous inves- tigators. But the knowledge derived from Nicholas was far surpassed by that which was gained from the admir- able report, Harl. MSS. 4771, which, strangely enough, ^'^ lurked unknown in that well-ransacked collection till I was fortunate enough to light upon it. The history of the struggle which led to the Petition of Eight is thus at last made clear, and the part taken by the various leaders be- comes more intelligible. Wentw orth's character especially receives fresh elucidation, and we come to understand, when the evidence is sifted, how he came to take ser- vice under the King without being an apostate. It is PREFACE. xi a new fact, too, that the Petition of Eight was preceded by a bill for the liberty of the subject, for which the pe- tition was finally substituted in consequence of the King's refusal to accept any serious limitation of his powers. If the debates in the Commons have not hitherto been fully known, the debates in the Upper House have been shrouded in utter darkness. The kindness of Colonel Carew in lending the ' Elsynge Notes ' has at last dissi- pated the darkness for every session dealt with in the present volumes, excepting that of 1625, which was probably the least interesting of the four as far as the Lords were concerned. The details of the way in which the Peers dealt with Buckingham's impeachment are of considerable interest. But the most striking revelation is that of their mode of dealing with the questions arising out of the Petition of Eight. Writers have hitherto been content to guess what passed in the House of Lords, and have frequently guessed wrong. Especially is this the case with respect to Bishop Wil- liams, who turns out to have had nothing to do with the additional clause reserving sovereignty to the Crown, which is usually attributed to him, and to have been totally innocent of those intrigues against the petition which have called forth such denunciations of his conduct. My thanks are especially due to Mr. Forster for the kindness with which he allowed me the use of his copy of Eliot's 'Negotium Posterorum,' and to Lord St. Germans for having, at Mr. Forster's request, lent to me a volume of notes in Eliot's hand, which I have quoted as ' Eliot Notes.' I am under the greater obligations XU PREFACE. to Mr. Forster, as he was quite aware that my view of many matters differed from his considerably, and was not likely to sympathise with much that I have thought fit to say. It is needless to say how much knowledge I have gained from the speeches and other documents published in his ' Life of Sir John Eliot.' In conclusion, I would say that I have intentionally abstained from noticing some matters, such as Cosin's ' Book of Devotions,' and Williams's decision on • the position of the communion-table at Grantham, which, though they fall chronologically within the limits of these volumes, are better treated of in connection with the debates of the following session. On the other hand, there are some matters which fall chronologi- cally within the next period, which, if the popular ac- count is to be believed, may be quoted against the opinion which I have formed of Charles's conduct in the session of 1628. I may therefore say that, as far as I have yet seen, I can find no ground for supposing that Charles, in the time which elapsed between the two sessions, broke the Petition of Eight in the sense in which he understood it, and that it is not true that in the printed copy of the petition he substituted the first for the second answer. What he did was to print both answers together with his speech at the close of the session, as may be seen in the copy of the edition of the statutes of 1628 which is still preserved in the Museum hbrary. CONTENTS THE FIRST VOLUME. CHAPTER I. THE LAST PARLIAMENT OF JAMES I AND THE DISSOLUTION OF THE SPANISH TREATIES. FAGB 1623 The return from Madrid ....... 1 Warlike designs of Charles and Buclsingham ... 2 1624 Parliament summoned . . . _ . . . . 4 A French marriage talked of 4 Spanish offers 5 The Commissioners for Spanish affairs consulted . . 6 They ask for further information 7 Opposition to Buckingham in the Commission . . 8 Delia Kota's negotiation 10 The question of hrealring the Spanish treaties referred to Parliament 10 The elections 11 Parliament opened 12 The King's speech . .13 Buckingham's narrative 15 Sir John Eliot 16 His speech on Parliamentary privilege .... 17 The Spanish ambassadors complain of Buckingham . . 19 The Lords condemn the treaties 20 Kudyerd's declaration of policy 20 Feeling of the Commons about Spain and Germany . 22 Petition of the Commons answered by the King . . 23 Buckingham expostulates with the King ... 24 XIV CONTENTS OF 1624 Diflference between the King and the Commons about the mode of carrying on the war 25 The Prince explains away the Klng'a answer ... 26 Address of the Houses and reply by the King ... 27 Dissatisfaction of the Commons and Buclsingham's remon- strance 28 The Prince declares his father to be ready to go to war . 29 Debate on supply 80 Subsidies voted for four objects 32 The King declares himself ready to dissolve the treaties . 32 Public rejoicings 35 Lafuente robbed of his despatches 36 James informs the Spanish ambassadors that negotiations are at an end 37 Spanish intrigues against Buckingham .... 39 Recall of the despatch announcing the dissolution of the treaties 41 The Spanish intrigues detected by Williams ... 42 The Spanish treaties dissolved 45 CHAPTER II. BUCKINGHAM'S ASCENDENCY. 1624 Kensington's mission to Paris Writes hopefully of the French alliance Doubts of Sir Edward Herbert .... French policy with respect to Germany French designs upon the Valtelline Mansfeld's visit to France Charles pledges himself not to favour the Recusants Mansfeld arrives in England James's conditional engagement with him Nomination of a Council of War .... James promises to mate no engagement for the Catholics the marriage treatji Inojosa complains of Buckingham .... James refuses to listen to him .... Middlesex supports the Spanish ambassador Impeachment of Middlesex His sentence Bristol's return and confinement .... The Monopoly Act Parliament prorogued Proceedings against Bristol 48 60 61 '62 63 66 56 66 67 68 69 60 61 62 64 65 66 67 69 70 THE FIRST VOLUME. xv rAOB 1624 He refuses to agree to a compromise .... 71 Siege and capture of Ormuz 72 Bucliingham's claims against the East India Company . 73 Further demands of James 75 Money extorted from the Company .... 76 The massacre of Amboyna ....... 77 Treaty -with the Dutch for sending regiments to the Nether- lands 79 Coloma's protests 80 Inojosa leaves England 81 The Dunkirk ships in the Downs 81 The programme of the Commons carried out . , . 82 Emhassies to Denmark and Sweden 83 Wake's mission to Venice and Savoy .... 84 Carlisle sent to Paris to negotiate a marriage treaty . . 85 CHAPTER III, The FRENCH MARRIAGE TREATY. 1624 Carlisle and Herbert on the French alliance . . i 86 The French demand terms for the English Catholics . , 88 La Vieuville's diplomacy ...... 89 French preparations for war 90 Effiat in England 91 La Vieuville's disgrace i . 92 Richelieu demands an article for the English Catholics . 93 James and Charles refuse to assent , . ; , . 95 Buckingham's intervention 96 Richelieu draws up an article ...... 97 Difference of opinion between Carlisle and Kensington . 98 Lewis promises to support Mansfeld ..... 99 Buckingham gained over by Effiat . . _ . . . 100 James persuaded to put the article in the form of a letter . 101 Favour shown to the Catholics . . . . i 102 Further prorogation of Parliament f . . . . 103 Refusal of the Council of War to supply Mansfeld . . 104 Richelieu's views about the Valtelline and the Palatinate . 105 Negotiations between England and France about the support of Mansfeld 106 The French refuse to commit themselves in writing . . 107 Buckingham urges concession to France . . . 108 Charles supports Buckingham 109 James agrees to sign a secret engagement to favour the English Catholics .....<■ 109 VOL. I. a xvi CONTENTS OF PAGE 1624 Signature of the marriage treaty HI Difficulty of finding money for Mansfeld . • . 112 The chances against him H" Frankenthal demanded from the Infanta ... 115 Verbal promise of Lewis XIII. that Mansfeld shall be allowed to land in France H" The French wish to employ Mansfeld for the relief of Breda 117 Objections of James 11° The marriage treaty sworn to at Cambridge . . . 119 The Recusancy laws suspended 120 Value of Richelieu's success 121 CHAPTER IV. THE LAST DAYS OF JAMES I. 1624 Proposal that Mansfeld shall pass through Flanders . Misunderstanding between Buckingham and the French . Wretched condition of Mansfeld's troops at Dover 1625 The French propose to send them to the Netherlands Buckingham's dissatisfaction Mansfeld forbidden to land in France .... He is allowed to go to the Netherlands, but forbidden to re^ lieve Breda Arrives at Flushing Mortality amongst the troops James repeats his refusal to allow their employment at Breda The army wastes away 1624 Christian IV. and the North German Bishoprics Anstruther's negotiation in Germany and Denmark Character and plans of Gustavus Adolphus Negotiations between Brandenburg and Sweden 1625 Conditions on which Gustavus will undertake war in Ger- many .......... James shrinks from the expense ..... Conditions laid down by Christian IV. .... Difference between the plans of Gustavus and those of James, Gustavus relinquishes the German war .... 1624 Proposed attack by an English fleet upon Genoa Plan for sending a fleet against Spain .... The French Huguenots rise against Lewis 1625 Aid promised to Lewis by England and the Netherlands Final arrangements for the marriage . , , . 122 123 124 127 128 129 130 131 132 133 134 136 137 138 141 144 143 144 145 146 147 148 150 151 162 THE FIRST VOLUME. XVU FAQB 1625 Strong position of Buckingham at Court .... 164 Advice of Williams to him 158 Illness of the King 159 Lady Buckingham offers him remedies .... 160 His last hours 161 Death of James 1 162 CHAPTER V. MILITARY AND DIPLOMATIC PROJECTS OF THE NEW REIGN. 1625 Character of Charles I He assumes the government His anxiety to meet Parliament .... Good order kept at Court Mansfeld allowed to assist the Dutch Equipment of the fleet Plan of a campaign in Flanders .... The King's marriage celebrated by proxy . Carlisle vrarns the King not to expect much from France Buckingham prepares to go to France . Agreement to lend English vessels to France . Change in the treatment of the English Catholics Buckingham in Paris His main demands refused He makes love to the Queen Henrietta Maria in England First domestic difficulties Morton's mission to the Netherlands .... Surrender of Breda — Wretched state of Mansfeld's army Large sums of money needed 165 167 169 170 172 173 174 176 176 177 178 179 180 181 182 183 184 185 186 187 CHAPTER VI. THE FIRST PARLIAMENT OF CHARLES I. AT WESTMINSTER. 1626 Opening of Parliament 189 The King's speech 190 Feeling against the Catholics 161 Proposal for an adjournment rejected .... 192 Petition on the Recusancy laws moved by Seymour . . 194 Eliot's speech on religion 195 Recusancy petition sent up to the Lords .... 197 Motion of Sevmour for a small supply .... 198 xvm CONTENTS OF 1625 1624 1625 PAGE Vote of two subsidies ^^ Charles reluctantly accepts the vote . . ■ ■ 20i Wentworth's election 20ci Contrast between Eliot and Wentworth . . • 204 Montague's New Gag for an Old Goose . . . • 206 Abbot's interference -. . . . • • • 208 Appello CcBSarem 209 English Calvinism 210 Reaction against Calvinism , 212 Report of the Commons' Committee on Montague's books 216 The Commons declare against Montague .... 218 Laud's 0. and P. list 220 Tonnage and Poundage Bill 221 Charles determines to ask for more money . . . 223 Eliot's interview with Buckingham 224 Further supply asked for ...... 228 The demand not accepted by the Commons . . . 230 The Houses adjourned to Oxford 231 Opposition of Williams 232 CHAPTER Vn. THE LOAN OF ENGLISH SHIPS TO THE KING OF FRANCE 1625 Charles's domestic troubles His treatment of the English Catholics Concessions to the French ambassadors . The ships under Pennington lent to the King of France Charles's double dealing Pennington at Dieppe His return to England Negotiations between Lewis XHI. and the Huguenots Pennington's orders Mission of Edward Nicholas Resistance of the crews Secret instructions to Nicholas and Pennington . Pennington returns to Dieppe .... Nicholas prepares a mutiny Mutiny in Pennington's ship . . Peace agreed upon in France The ships surrendered to the French Condition of the English Catholics .... The Houses reassemble at Oxford 233 234 235 234 237 238 239 240 241 243 244 245 247 248 250 251 254 256 256 THE FIRST VOLUME. XIX CHAPTER Vm. THE FIRST PARLIAMENT OF CHARLES I. AT OXFORD. PAGE 1625 The Commons complain of favours shown to the Catholics . 257 Buckingham resolves to throw over the Catholics . . 258 Montague's case again 259 Question of the responsihility of the King's ministers . 260 Report of the bishops on Montague's books . . . 261 Who was to decide on Church questions ? . . . 263 The King in Christchurch Hall 264 Financial statement by Conway and Sir J. Coke . . 266 Debate on the King's demands 268 Seymour attacks the foreign policy of the Crown . . 269 May's reply - . . . .270 Phelips asks for a change of counsellors .... 271 Governmental responsibility demanded .... 273 Heath's defence of the Government, and Alford's reply . 274 Terms offered to Buckingham 275 Attempted compromise 276 Rich's five propositions ....... 277 Buckingham urged to accept the compromise . . 279 Buckingham resolves not to give way .... 280 Declares that the engagement with France about the Catho- lics had never been taken seriously 281 Defends his policy before the two Houses . . . 282 Unsatisfactory nature of his defence ..... 283 Charles demands an immediate grant of supply . . 287 Phelips puts the question of confidence .... 288 Mansell appealed to 289 Wentworth's view of the case 290 Mansell's testimony unfavourable to Buckingham . . 292 Buckingham attacked by name ...... 293 A dissolution resolved on 294 Heath's reply to Mansell 295 Protestation of the Commons 296 Dissolution of Parliament 297 Leadership of Phelips characterised .... 298 Attitude of the King 299 Conflict between the Crown and the House of Commons begun .......... 300 XX CONTENTS OF CHAPTER IX. THE EXPEDITION TO CADIZ. PAGB 1625 Buckingham's intentions 302 Breach of the engagements between Lewis XITT. and the Huguenots 303 Determination of Charles to send out the fleet . . . 304 The Queen at Lichfield • 305 The treaty of Southampton 307 Open breach with Spain 808 Buckingham to go to the Hague ..... 309 The Essex trained bands at Harwich . . . . 310 Death of Sir A. Morton — Sir J. Coke Secretary . . 311 Sir E. Cecil appointed to command the expedition against Spain 312 He reports on the deficiencies of the troops . . . 313 Cecil created Viscount Wimbledon 314 The fleet driven back by a storm 315 It puts to sea 316 Arrives at Cadiz . . . ... . . . 317 Attack on Fort Puntal 319 Surrender of the fort 820 Wimbledon's march to the bridge 321 Failure of the expedition 222 The look-out for the Plate fleet 323 Return of the fleet to England . . . . . 324 No serious investigation into the causes of failure . . 326 CHAPTER X. GROWING ESTRANGEMENTS BETWEEN THE COURTS OF ENGLAND AND FRANCE . 1625 Blainville's proposals 327 Buckingham's intention to visit France .... 328 Objections of Lewis 329 Blainville's interview with Charles and Buckingham . . 331 Views of the French Government 332 The Peers of the Opposition 332 Dismissal of Williams 334 Coventry Lord Keeper 330 The Opposition leaders of the Commons made sheriffs . 837 The Dunkirk privateers 338 THE FIRST VOLUME. XXI 1625 Buckingham visita the Hague and proposes to attack Dunkirk ........ The Congress of the Hague .... Treaty of the Hague Prospect of war with France .... Difficulties about the Queen's household Difficulties about the law of prize Sequestration of the money on board the French prizes Orders given for the sale of prize goods Blainville protests Reprisals in France followed by an order for the restitu- tion of the 'St. Peter' 1628 Mission of Holland and Carleton .... Charles determines to relieve Rochelle The prize goods sold • The ' St. Peter ' rearrested Interference of Charles in French politics The Queen refuses to be crowned .... Charles's coronation An agreement come to between Lewis and the Huguenoti The Huguenots look to Charles for support Richelieu proposes to join England against Spain . Charles rejects his overtures Fresh dispute between Charles and the Queen Blainville ordered to absent himself from Court PAGE 339 340 341 342 343 344 345 346 347 348 349 350 351 362 353 354 365 357 368 359 360 363 365 Map OS Cadiz HAEBOuJi To face Title Page. En-ata. Page 28, line 6, for ' hoped to call them together again in the autumn ' read 'intended to call them together 'at Michaelmas, or within a few days after.' ' „ 69 „ 14, after ' prorogued ' read ' to November 2.' „ 103 „ 3, ,, 'November' insert foot-note: 'On March 14 (p. 28) James had promised to summon Parliament at Michaelmas or shortly after. On March 23 (p. 33) Tie had declared that the business of considering the course of the war should be taken in hand at the next session, and the actual prorogation had fixed the meaning of "few days after Michaelmas" to No- vember 2.' 114 note 1, line 2 from bottom, /or 'attached' read 'attacked.' 137 „ 1, last line, for ' Niedersachsische ' read ' Niedersachsische.' 143, line 2 from bottom, /or ' coasts ' read ' courts.' 206 „ 6 „ after ' know,' read ' not.' 205 „ 8 „ and side note, for ' Stamford ' read ' Stanford.' 220 „ 8 „ for ' he ' read ' Buckingham.' 231 second side note, for ' House ' read ' Houses.' 244 second side note, for ' enemy ' read ' crews.' 246 note 3, line 2 from bottom, /or ' the 18th' read ' July 18.' 316 line 5 from bottom, /or ' Cecil ' «ai^ ' Wimbledon.' 336 „ 1 6, /or 'Shelton' reat? 'Shilton,' ENGLAND TTKBER THE DUKE OF BUCKINGHAM AND CHARLES I. CHAPTEE I. THE LAST PARLIAMENT OF JAMES I. AND THE DISSOLUTiaN OP THE SPANISH TREATIES. The young man's dream which had lighted Charles chap. and Buckingham on, their way to Madrid, was pleasant enough while it lasted. All difficulties, personal and r^^^.^^' political, were to vanish away before the magic of "«y *? their presence. The King of Spain would, for the sake of his future son-in-law, compel the Emperor to surrender the Palatinate, and the strife which had desolated Germany for five years would be composed as easily as a lovers' quarrel. The King's sister, brought up in the most bigoted attachment to the faith of her childhood, would give her heart as well as her hand to the heretic prince whose person she loathed, and whose religion she detested. Of the two, Buckingham, not being himself in love, was the first to discover the mis- take which had been committed. Quick to take offence at the slightest discourtesy offered to him, he was not long in perceiving that the Spaniards meant to make the most of their opportunity, and to deliver over the VOL. I, B 2 THE LAST PARLIAMENT OF JAMES I. CHAP. Infanta, if they delivered her over at all, only upon ■ — r — - conditions which v?ould be insupportable to the En- ^ ^^' ghsh people. Whilst Charles was hanging about Philip's court, and promising anything short of his own apostasy, Buckingham was quarrelling with the Spanish ministers, and urging the Prince to return to England as soon as possible. deslgM^f When at last Charles had convinced himself that andBuck- ^^ concessious had been made in vain, and that, what- mgham. gygj. j^g might do, he would not be allowed to carry the Infanta" with him to England, his faith in Buckingham was more strongly confirmed than ever. Buckingham's life was so completely bound up with his life, and Buckingham's objects were for the most part so fully served by promoting his young master's wishes, that differences of opinion were seldom hkely to arise be- tween them. And now that a difference had arisen, Charles had proved to be in the wrong, whilst Buck- ingham had proved to be in the right, and that too on a point on which Charles might well think that his friend had been more jealous for his honour than he had been himself. Both Charles and Buckingham came back with the full persuasion that they had been duped by the Spaniards, and with a full determination to take their revenge. To the heated imagination of the youthful politicians, the re-conquest of the Palatinate seemed so very easy. And yet it was far from being easy. Not only was the position of Spain and the Imperialists ex- ceedingly strong, but there were elements of disunion at work amongst the opponents of the house of Austria which would go far to make the task of organising a successful resistance impossible. James dc- The first difficulty, however, which Buckingham needed to confront, was greater in appearance, than in BUCKINGHAM'S WAELIKE DESIGNS. 3 reality. It might seem easier to drag Theseus from his chap. bed of pain than to move James to a declaration of • — ^ — - war. A lover of peace by temperament and by force ^ . ^?' jr •> J. J regain the of reason, he knew too well what faults had been com- Palatinate, mitted on both sides to be eager to join in the doubt- ful fray. Great, too, as was the influence exercised over him by his favourite and his son, it is hardly hkely that this alone would have sufficed to overcome his reluc- tance to embark on so arduous an undertaking. In 1620, in spite of his unwillingness to displease those with whom he was in continual intercourse, Charles and Buckingham, backed by the almost unanimous voice of his Council and his Court, had in vain urged him to take part in the strife. But at the close of 1623 he was no longer in a position to offer resistance. His plan for settling the affairs of Germany with the help of Spain had broken down completely. Even James was driven to acknowledge that that path was no longer open to him, and that if the Palatinate was to be recovered at all, it must be recovered by force of arms. The only question for him to decide, therefore, was whether he was willing to abandon all hope of its recovery or not. And this he was decidedly not pre- pared to do. The abandonment of his daughter and her children from considerations of state policy, was so grievous to him, that, though Buckingham would doubt- less have much moral and physical inertness to combat, he could always make use of the King's real desire to recover the Palatinate as a lever to move him in the direction of decisive action. In January 1624, James to a great extent yielded oili^^f^i^ himself into the hands of Buckingham. The marriage p^p"*" ceremony at Madrid had been postponed under cir- cumstances which made it almost a matter of certainty • that it would never be heard of again. Bristol, the B 2 4 THE LAi5T PARLIAMENT OF JAMES I. CHAP, chief supporter of the alliance, was recalled from his > — 'r — • embassy in Spain, and the Earl of Oxford, who had j^"^' been confined in the Tower for nearly two years on ac- count of a violent attack upon Gondomar's influence, was set at liberty. Writs were issued for a new Parliament. Once more, as in 1620, ambassadors were ordered to make ready to start in every direction. This time they were to be the messengers, not of peace, but of war. Sir Isaac Wake was to stir up the Duke of Savoy and the Eepublic of Venice. Sir Eobert Anstruther was to wait upon the Princes of Northern Germany and the King of Denmark. Sir James Spens would do the like office with the King of Sweden. The States General were invited to send commissioners to negotiate a close alliance, and the invitation was made more at- tractive by a letter in which Conway was allowed im- pudently to represent the plot which had been hatched between Buckingham and Gondomar for the partition of the territory of the Eepublic as a mere unauthorised suggestion of Spanish iniquity.^ Hopes of a Yet tlicsc stcps, important as they were, formed only liance. part of the great plan which Buckingham had con- ceived. Ever since the war had broken out in Ger- many, France had given a passive, but not the less a real, assistance to the Emperor. Now, however, hints had reached Buckingham that all this might yet be changed. While he was still at Madrid, an EngHsh friar named Grey had formed the wild project of con- verting the Prince ; and, when he found that he had no chance of success, had talked with Buckingham of his influence with Mary de Medici, and of the proba- bility that she might be induced to ofler her youngest daughter, the Princess Henrietta Maria, as a substitute ' Conway to the Prince of Orange, Conway to Cavleton, Jan. j\, (-S. P., Ilulkmd). Compare I'rince Charles and the Spanish Marriage, i. 334. A FRENCH MARRIAGE SUGGESTED. for the Infanta. How far Buckingham gave heed to chap. the friar's prattle it is hard to say. At all events Grey • — ^— ^ made his way to Paris, saw the Queen Mother, and ^j^' was sent on by her to London, after the Prince's return, to explain to Buckingham her readiness to assist in forwarding the suggested marriage. It is true that when the affair came to the ears of Tillieres, the French ambassador in London, both Mary and Buckingham thought it expedient to disavow all knowledge of the intrigue.^ But the seed was already sown. James agreed to take up the project as soon as the treaty with Spain was definitively disposed of. In the mean- while it was arranged that Tjord Kensington should be sent over to Paris to feel the ground, and to lay the foundations of a complete friendship between the two courts. James had thus given his consent to the opening of Jan. 13. a negotiation which would leave little room for any Spanish further understanding with Spain. But his resolution d™rs.*^'*" was not so fixed as to be entirely beyond the influence of a specious offer from the other side. On January 13, the Spanish ambassadors, Inojosa and Coloma, as- sured him of their master's anxiety to do everything in his power to regain his friendship. Before the end of August, they asserted, all that part of the Palatinate which was occupied by Spanish troops should be placed in his hands. Negotiations should be opened, at a time to be fixed by himself, for the settlement of all other points at issue. Some middle course was in- dicated as likely to obviate the difficulty about the education of Frederick's sons ; and Philip, though he still refused to promise, as he had once promised in a moment of forgetfulness, to draw his sword against > Tilliere.s to Puisieux ^^ Jan. {i, l|; Had. MSS. 4593 J f"l- h i6, 25, b. 6 ■ THE LAST PARLLVMENT OP JAMES I. CHAP, the Emperor, was ready to engage to do anything else " — '•■ — ' in his power to bring about a favourable result.^ Hn-ts. Much to Buckingham's disgust, James thought the mu*sioneA ofier worth listening to. But James had not made up Iffafratobe ^^^ ^^^^ either way, and he agreed to consult the consulted. Commissioners for Spanish Affairs before taking a final decision. The body thus appealed to consisted of twelve of the leading Privy Councillors, and may perhaps be regarded as the germ of our modern cabinets. It had been called into existence in 1617, to discuss the marriage treaty with Spain, as soon as it was openly taken in hand. Its numbers had been constantly filled up as vacancies occurred. As it had recently, by a majority of seven to five, approved of the issue of writs for a new Parliament, Buckingham had good reason to expect its support in his present difficulties.^ Jan. 14. When the Commissioners met, two questions were proposed to laid before them. In the first place : — Had the King of Spain seriously intended to give his sister to the Prince ? In the second place : — Did his conduct about the Palatinate deserve a declaration of war?' When the votes were taken, three only, those of Buckingham himself, of Carlisle, who hated Spain as much as his ' Compare Valaresao's Despatches, Jan. ||, ^5^, ■with Siri, Memorie Mecondite, v. 568; and Chamberlain to Carletot, Jan. 17; Cmirt and Times, ii. 446. « Salvetti's Mwsletter, 5^ ' Jan. a. ' The two questions are abbreviated from the form given by Hacket (i. 167.) He says they -were put immediately after the King's arrival at Whitehall, i.e. after Dec. 24. As I find no trace of such consultations elsewhere, I suspect he confused them with a discussion whether writs should be issued for a Parliament. Alter the King left Whitehall, i.e. on Jan. 13, we do hear of consultations in Chamberlain's letter of Jan. 31, for instance, S. P. Dom., clviii. 72. There is a curious draft of a letter {8. P. Spain), perhaps drawn up by Bucliingham, as what he wished the King to say, and act aeuepted by James. ham's anger. OPPOSITION TO BUCKINGHAM. J placable disposition would allow him to hate anything, chap. and of Conway, who would doubtless have voted the • — ^ — other way if his patron had desired him to do so, Kut ^^^"^ who was only m this case following his own instincts They ask j; . . „ ° for infor- m opposing opam, were given in favour of war. The mation. other nine members of the Commission stated that they had not sufficient information before them, and asked permission to make a thorough examination of all the despatches bearing upon the subject.^ Buckingham was very angry. He sprung from his Bucking- seat, pouring out the most unmeasured abuse of the Commissioners as he strode out of the room, ' as a hen that hath lost her brood and clucks up and down when she hath none to follow her.' ^ Taking the Prince with him, he hurried down to Newmarket to complain to the King. " What," he said to Chichester, who was passing near him as he left Whitehall, " are you turned too ? " ^ It was Buckingham's greatest misfortune in life that he never could understand that it was possible •/ for men to differ from him without some sinister motive. Divergence of opinion was ever with him a thing not to be met with argument, but to be overcome by violence. Buckingham met with better success at Eoyston. Jan.- 20. From whatever motive, James had no desire to see the supports^ whole secret of the past negotiation unfolded before the Commissioners. He wrote to inform them that their request could not be granted, but that they must nevertheless tell him what they thought of the Spanish offer. On the 20th Charles, leaving Buckingham to keep guard over his father, returned to London. He assured the Commissioners that he would never think ' Tillierea to Puisieux, Jan \y : Harl. MSS., 4593 ; fol. 26, b, " JSacke.t, i. 169. ' Oliichester to Buckingham, Jan. 25. Cabala, 197. 8' THE lIsT parliament of JAMES I. CHAP, again of a marriage with the Infanta. All through • — r — - the remainder of the week the discussion continued Jan^M ^^'■^ unabated vigour. The . Commissioners were unanimous in wishing to see the marriage treaty at an end, but many of them still shrank from giving an opinion in favour of war upon so little information as that which had been vouchsafed to them.^ ttie^onpo/ Of the nine who had originally voted against Buck- sition.- ingham, five, Calvert, Weston, Arundel, Williams, and Middlesex, had already declared against the summoning of a Parliament, and were all for various reasons the advocates of peace. Pembroke and Chichester, Hamilton and Lennox, had always been counted as the opponents of the Spanish alliance. In Pembroke's c«ise, especially, the hesitation to support Buckingham was so unexpected that it was accounted for at the time as proceeding from jealousy of the favourite's ex- clusive influence with the Prince. There may have been some truth in this, but motives of public policy may have had still more to do with his behaviour. Himself a man without ambition, the richest peer in England, and universally regarded as the model of a chivalrous English gentleman, he had watched Buck- ingham's career with deep distrust. Only a few months before, he had been required, as a Privy Councillor, to sw«ar to the observance of the Spanish treaty, and to take part in the negotiations which followed for a peaceful settlement of the Continental dispute. And now he was expected, without being told the reason why, to swing round with his eyes shut in the other direction. Was he without enquiry to give his vote for a war which might possibly be justifiable, but which, 1 Tilli6res to Puisieux, J,K^; Harl. MSS. 4593, fol. 35. Vala- ressu'a Despatch, ^"^^. Hacket's list of the .Commissioners is incorrect. PEMBROKE AND BUCKINGHAM. to all appearance, was being urged on by Buckingham's temper rather than by his reason ? No wonder that he was heard to say that ' if the Spaniards performed the conditions agreed on, he saw not how the King, in honour, could fall from the conclusion, nor himself in conscience ; being sworn to see all observed in his power.' To the Venetian ambassador, who exhorted him to make up his differences with Buckingham for the sake of the common cause of all European states, he replied that internal enemies must be dealt with before external ones. The cause which they had both at heart would be better served without Buckingham than with him.^ Pembroke, however, was not a man to persist long Pembroke • . . _--. . . giveaway. m opposition. - His character was wanting in that robustness which is needed for such a task. Again and again, in the course of his career, we find him clashing with Buckingham. This time, at least, it seemed that they would be open enemies. But a few words from King or Prince were always enough to soothe his easy teinper, and Pembroke would be again on the old footing, giving the support of his respected name to a policy which he distrusted. So it was now. In a few days, he and the rest of Answer of . . . 'hfi Coin- the Commissioners had agreed in a temporising answer misaioners. to the effect that they did not see that the King ought to be contented with the Spanish answer about the Palatinate, or to amuse himself any longer about the mar- riage. The original question concerning the propriety of going to war was left unanswered.^ It was not long before the Prince used his authority to reconcile Pem- broke and Buckingham ; and before the session opened ' Chamberlain to Cavleton, Jan. 31 ; S. P. Dom., clviii. 72; Vala- resso's Despatch, j^, Feb. —. ■ » Tillieres to Puisieux, f^; Harh.MSS. 4593/f'^l- 35- ' lO THE LAST PARLIAMENT OF JAMES I. CHAP, the malcontent Earl had changed into an unwavering > — I — ■ supporter of the Government. ^jtn^' Charles, too, had, on the whole, good reason to Negotk- be satisfied with his father's conduct. There were from tion of Delia Rota, time to time, indeed, fits of hesitation and reluctance ; and rumours reached the ears of those interested in such tidings, that James had declared himself to be tired of Buckingham.^ But such rumours, if there was any truth in them at all, did not reveal the whole truth. The moment that James gave a serious thought to the matter, he knew that if he was to recover ■ the Palatinate, Buckingham's way was the only way open to him, and that the Spanish proposals had but to be fully stated to be rejected. Just at this time the same proposals which had been made by Spain in the preceding autumn were brought before him from another quarter. A Capuchin friar, travelling under the assumed name of Francesco della Eota, appeared in England, with ofiers from the new Elector of Bavaria. The Elector, just like the Emperor, was ready to yield much for the sake of peace. The only difference in their terms was, that whilst Ferdinand required that Frederick's son and heir should be edu- cated at Vienna, Maximihan required that he should be educated at Munich. Of course there was much said about offering all possible safeguards for the boy's religion. But what was the value of such safeguards to a youth brought at the most impressionable age within the circle of the ideas of the Catholic priesthood ? The breach To this plan, at Icast, James gave a distinct refusal. with Spam „ . . „ , . ° , referred to But it was casicr for him to see what was not to be ment. donc than to decide, for himself and others, what he wished to do. As the Commissioners would not settle Valaresso^s Despatch, ''^—^ ^ Rusdovf, Memotres, i. 156-239. PARLIAMENTARY ELECTIONS. II his difficulties for him, the whole question was referred chap. to the coming Parliament. ■ ^; By the time the consultations of the Commissioners ^^''^' were brought to a close the elections were almost com- The eieo- 1 T T T • 1 tions. pleted. in ordmary times the House of Commons was brought into existence under very composite in- fluences. In the counties the choice of the great land- owners weighed heavily upon the freeholders. In the smaller boroughs the owner of some neighbouring manor, to whom the citizens were bound by the obli- gations of ancestral courtesy, or immediate interest, could often dispose of the seat at his pleasure. The Government, too, was not without its influence. The boroughs of Lancashire and the sea-coast towns of Kent, for instance, were in the habit of returning nominees of the Chancellor of the Duchy, or of the Lord War- den of the Cinque Ports. In this way the House came to represent not merely the mass of electors, but also the effective strength of the nation. The men who took part in its debates were men who were accustomed as magistrates, or in other ways, to take their share in the business of government. They were in the habit of acting under responsibility ; in the habit, too, of thinking of their actions as subservient to the national good. Their election was very far from being a mere form. Again and again, in spite of the lack of reporters, when measures are proposed in the course of this and the following years, the leaders of the assembly make use of the argument, " What will our constituents say ? " as the best rejoinder possible. For some years, as political excitement had increased, there had been a tendency in the electors to shake off the control to whicli they had hitherto to some extent submitted, and to require in- dependence as the one thing needful. And now, in many places candidates supported by Buckingham, OT 12 THE LAST PARLIAMENT OF JAMES I. CHAP, even by the Prince, were left unchosen, and tlie name ■ — i^ — ■ of courtier was the surest passport to rejection.^ 1624. jjj ^^Q ^j^ggg James was desirous of overruling Coke and indirectly the choice of the constituencies. He had a Sandys. jj^gj^y recoUection of Coke's attitude in the last Par- liament, and he seriously designed to get rid of the old lawyer by sending him to Ireland, as member of a commission appointed to investigate the state of that country. He destined for the same employment Sir Edwin Sandys, whose opposition to the Court was of earlier date than Coke's. Such a step, however, was too palpably unwise to be insisted on, and both Coke and Sandys were allowed to take their seats.^ Feb. 16. Parliament had been summoned for February 1 2, Lennox, but was put off till the 1 6th, because, as men amused themselves by saying, the King had not yet made up his mind what to reply to the Spanish ambassadors.^ On the 1 6th it was again postponed, on account of the death of James's old friend and kinsman, the Duke of Lennox.* Feb. 19. The speech with which James opened his last Par- pS-^ °' hament was couched in a tone of unusual hesitation, ment. ijij^g ^-^^ sclf-confldence with which, in his happier days, he had sought to school his hearers into submission, had entirely left him. Convinced at. last that peace could no longer be maintained unless the object for which he had striven so long was abandoned as unattainable, and yet shrinking with his whole soul from opening the floodgates of war, he was equally ' Valarcsso's Despatch, Feb. jj. ^ These are the only Parliament names in the commission (JRymcr, xvii. 531), or in Chamberlain's contemporary letters. ' Sttlvetti's Newsletter, Feb. -Jf. * Hacket is fuite mistaken in supposing (i. 174) that there is an error in the date of the curious letter in ■which Williams advised Buckijighnm to accept the oflrce of Lord Steward. It was written after Hamilton's death in 1625, and will be noticed in its proper place. OPENINa or PAELIAMENT. 1 3 unwilling to turn his back upon his old policy, or to chap. enter heartily upon a new one. Casting himself upon - — '. — - the compassion of his hearers, he pleaded before them The king's the anxiety with which he had striven to deserve his ^^^^ ' people's love ; and told the Houses how, as a pledge of his confidence in them, he was come to ask their advice in the greatest matter that ever could concern any king. He had hoped to settle peace abroad and at home. But he now knew what the pretensions of Spain really were. The whole story should be told them by his Secretaries, who would be assisted by the Prince and Buckingham. " When you have heard it all," he added, " I shall entreat your good and sound advice, for the glory of God, the peace of the king- dom, and weal of my children. Never king gave more trust to his subjects than to desire their advice in matters of this weight ; for I assure you ye may freely advise me, seeing of my princely fidelity you are invited thereto." Having thus removed the prohibition which had Explains brought about the dissolution of the last Parliament, haTdone James turned to a subject on which his hearers were ca'thoUcs. peculiarly sensitive. " I pray you," he said, " judge me charitably as you will have me judge you ; for I never made public nor private treaties, but I always made a direct reservation for the weal public and cause of religion, for the glory of God and the good of my subjects. I only thought good sometimes to wink and connive at the execution of some penal statutes, and not to go on so rigorously as at other times ; but to dis- pense with any, to forbid or alter any that concern rehgion, I neither promised nor yielded. I never did think it with my heart, nor speak it with my mouth. It is true a skilful horseman doth not always use the spur, but must sometimes use the bridle, and sometimes 14 THE LAST PARLIAMENT OF JAMES I. the spur. So a king that governs evenly is not bound to carry a rigorous hand over his subjects upon all occasions, but may sometimes slacken the bridle, yet so as his hands be not off the reins." How far guch words Were very far from being a full and was this •' • • T> 1 statement fair representation of the past negotiations, iiut they were at least in accordance with what James had wished to do, and were not very far from that which, by some stretch of imagination, he may have fancied himself to have done. They give an accurate account of his first offers to Spain in 1620 ; and when, in 1623, he went much farther, he had at least reserved to himself, by a protest, the right of cancelhng his obhga- tions, if reason of state should so require.^ It is hardly likely, however, that the Commons, if they had known the whole story, would have told it in the same way. Arrange- After & fcw more words, James retired from the ments for ' _ Bucking- scene. He had thrown down the reins of government, pearance. and there was one standing by who was eager to take them from his failing hands. James, it is true, had told the Houses that the information for which they were looking would be communicated to them by his Secretaries, with the assistance of Buckingham and the Prince. But so subordinate a part would hardly have suited Buckingham. Before the appointed day arrived it was understood that the communication would be made by the Duke, and that the Secretaries, and even the Prince himself, would be content to give him what assistance he might need. The Houses were to assemble, not as usual in the Painted Chamber, but in the great hall of the palace, where they were accustomed to wait upon the King. If Buckingham had said, " I am the ' Conway to Buckinghani, July 23, 1623. Hardmcke iSt. P., i. 430, Compare Prince Chmien and the Spanuh Marriage, ii. 363. . BUCKINGHAM'S STATEMENT. 1 5 King," he could not have expressed himself more chap. plainly. King, Prince, and State were all merged in that -^^^t. imposing personality. We can well imagine how he B"ckmg- i- o 1 J r> ham s nar- looked as he stood there, with head erect and flashing ""awve. eye, to disclose those secrets of which so much was suspected, and so little was really known. The tale which he told is easy to criticise, and it has been judged again and again with unmeasured reprobation. But, after all, as far as it is possible to test it, its fault lay rather in its omissions than in its assertions. Over much of which the historian is bound to take account — over the folly of the journey itself— over Charles's reticence, as long as reticence was possible, with respect to his personal religion — over his solemn promises to make impracticable concessions, Buckingham threw the discreet veil of total silence. But tlie evidence which he produced to show that the Spanish ministers had never seriously intended giving effect to their master's rash promise to aid with his arms in the recovery of the Palatinate was entirely conclusive ; and the narra- tive, taking it all in all, bears the aspect not so much of a deliberate falsehood, as of the outpouring of a heart upon which fancy and passion had impressed their glowing pictures. When Buckingham ended by asking whether the Spanish diplomacy should still be listened to, or whether, these treaties being ' set aside, his Majesty were best to trust to his own strength, and to stand upon his own feet,' he was sure to carry his hearers with him, and to sit down the most popular man in England.^ One effect at least of the Spanish treaties was in- ^^^^^^^^ delibly imprinted on the English mind. Bringing into '^j^^*^"' prominent relief the connection between the English ' Lords' Joiivnnls, iii. 220. 1 6 THE LAST PARLIAMENT OF JAMES L CHAP. Catholics and the great Spanish monarchy, they had *'- — '- — - served to whet the spirit of intolerance. Almost the ^'^ first work to which the Commons- addressed themselves was a bill for increasing the penalties on recusancy.'^ Feb. 27. On the 27th Weston, the Chancellor of the Ex- EHot°™ chequer, was to deliver the formal report of Buck- ingham's narrative to the Lower House. Before he had time to rise, he was interrupted by Sir John Eliot, a member whose parliamentary experience had been con- fined to the few weeks of the abortive session of 1614. When he sat down at the end of his maiden speech, he must have made himself a name as the foremost political orator of the time. Early in fife he had accompanied Buckingham, then an unknown youth, on a Continental tour, and had received from him, when he rose to be Lord High Admiral of England, the appointment of Vice-Admiral of Devon. During his patron's absence in Spain, he had been imprisoned on an unjust charge springing out of his unwearied performance of the duties of his ofiice, and his libera- ^tion, which was almost coincident with the Duke's return, was doubtless owing to his powerful interposi- tion. But, warm and affectionate as Eliot's nature was, he was not the man to allow any tie to an individual, to fetter him in the performance of a public duty ; and though there was, for some time to come, no actual estrangement between hmi and Buckingham, it is pro- bable that the retirement of the King to give place to the minister left a disagreeable impression on his mind. He was to the bottom of his heart an idealist. To him the Parliament was scarcely a collection of faUible men, just as the King was hardly a being who could by any possibility go deliberately astray. If he who wore ' Commoni Journnh, i. 718. SIR JOHN ELIOT. 17 the crown had wandered from the right path, he had chap. but to hsten to those who formed, in more than a ^' rhetorical sense, the collective wisdom of the nation. ^^^^4- Whoever stepped between King and people, whoever tendered other counsel than the House of Commons had to offer, was a divider and a traitor. The time had not yet come when EHot was to His moral breathe his own lofty and resolute spirit into the con- ^"^ *' sultations of those around him. But from the beginning, great as his intellectual powers were, it was not by mere force of intellect that he won his way to distinction. It was the moral nature of the man, his utter self- forgetfulness, which made him what he was, which taught him to risk his whole life and fortunes for the chance of flinging his protest into the air against securely placed iniquity in high places, and which made him as gentle and placable as the saintly men of old in the presence of opposition the motives of which he believed to be pure. This time Eliot rose to beg the House not to forget. His speech in the midst of their fresher interests, to vindicate that of speech. freedom of speech which had been refused them at tlie close of the last Parliament. The privileges of the Commons, he argued, could not be derogatory to the King's honour. " The business," he said, " is the King's. The kingdom hath its representative in the King. In him our resolutions rest. We are only called hither upon either the general affairs of the kingdom, or the special propositions of his Majesty, and thereon to deliberate and consult, not to conclude." The Parliament, he went on to say, was the body ; the King the spirit by which it was moved. " He is, in the metaphor, the breath of our nostrils, and the bond by ' which we are tied one to another. Then can it not be we VOL. I. c i8 THE LAST PAELIAMENT OF JAMES I. CHAP. I. 1624. Feb. 27. Compari- son be- tween Bacon and Eliot. Eliot on liberty of speech. The ques- tion re- ferred to a Committee. should attempt against, or in anything neglect, the honour of him who is so much our own." ^ Such language might have been Bacon's language. But the spirit in which the words were uttered was not the spirit of Bacon. To both Eliot and Bacon the Crown and the ParUament were not contracting parties, each of which was to follow its separate interest, but members of one common body, each fulfilling its func- tions for the benefit of the whole. But whilst Bacon specially idealised the Crown, Eliot specially idealised the Parliament. When the separation threatened to Gome at last, Bacon clung the more closely to the active ruling power, whilst Eliot trusted with unshaken con- fidence to the body in which popular instincts were refined under the influence of word and thought. Viewing from afar the follies and errors of the court, he learned to beheve, as no other man believed before or after him, in the representatives of the nation. For him history and philosophy concurred in bearing witness to the greatness of Parhaments, the living mirror of the perpetual wisdom of a mighty nation. For the sake of the King, Eliot now argued, the counsel of Parliament should be offered freely and without restriction. " More for his sake than for ours," he said, " it behoved that such hberty be allowed." Freedom of speech was the indispensable condition of trustworthy advice.^ The question thus raised could hardly be passed over in silence. But the leaders of the House were too anxious to get to the important work before them to give it much encouragement. The whole subject was referred to a Committee, and was never heard of again.^ ' FoTster, Sir J. Eliot, i. 70, 71. ^ Forster, &> J. Eliot, i. 135. ' Mr, Forster thinks {Sir J. Eliot, i. 143) that the speeches of Alford BUCKINGHAM S POPULARITY. 19 Weston was at last able to proceed with his report, chap. If there had ever been any hesitation in accepting •- — ^^ — • Buckingham's narrative, there was none now. Inojosa ^^^^f and Coloma had done their best to convert him into a compiaiut national hero. Hurrying to James, they assured him Spanish that if one of their master's servants had spoken of the dors King of England as Buckingham had spoken of the Bucidng- King of Spain, he would have paid the penalty with the loss of his head. James's only thought in the presence of the fiery Spaniards was to shift the burthen of a reply to other shoulders. He had not been pre- sent at Whitehall, he said, when Buckingham's narrative was delivered, and he must therefore leave it to those who heard it to justify or to condemn him. In the House of Lords, Pembroke, who had now thrown him- self unreservedly on Buckingham's side, led the way in exculpating him, and a motion in his favour was unani- mously carried. In the Commons the excitement was far greater. " In the way that Buckingham holds," said Phehps, "I pray that he shall keep his head on his shoulders to see thousands of Spaniards' heads either from their shoulders or in the seas." " And shall he lose his head?" cried Coke. " Never any man deserved better of his King and country." A vote as unanimous as that of the Lords, cleared Buckingham from blame in the words that he had used.^ and Phelips leave little doubt that they had received private communi- cations from Buckingham. It is quite possible that some understanding had been arrived at, probably through Pembroke ; but there is no proof of this and there is no necessity to resort to this explanation. According to Nicholas's notes (S. P. Bom., clix), of which Mr. Forster has made no use Phelips said that ' since this motion is on foot, he thinks it should not rest unresolved,' which looks as if he at least expected something to come of the Committee. > Coloma to the King, ^rf; Harl.MSS. 1 583, fol. 329 ; Valaresso's Despatch, March /g ; Eldng's Notes; Lords' Journals, iii. i. 233; Com^ mens' Journals, i. 721. c2 20 THE LAST PARLIAMENT OF JAMES L CHAP. I. 1624. Feb. 27. The trea- ties con- demned by the Lords, Feb. 28. March i. Eudyerd'a declaration of policy. In the afternoon the Lords took the Spanish treaties into consideration. Not a voice was raised in their favour. After two days' debate, the Bishops having specially distinguished themselves by their warlike zeal, it was resolved that, unless the Commons should show cause to the contrary, the King should be asked to break off' all negotiation with Spain, both for the mar- riage and for the restoration of the Palatinate.'^ The Commons were hardly likely to show cause to the contrary. The great debate was opened on the ist of March in the Lower House by Sir Benjamin Eudyerd, whose oificial position as Surveyor of the Court of Wards, together with his close connection with Pem- broke, made him a fit exponent of the coalition which had sprung up between Buckingham and the popular lords.^ At the same time, his own tried devotion to the anti-Spanish policy was likely to secure for him the respectful attention of his hearers. Eudyerd, even at his best, was apt rather to skim over the surface of an argument than to penetrate to its depths, and those who look coolly back at the events of that momentous year may be inclined to ask whether it necessarily followed, because the Palatinate was not to be regained by negotiation, that an attempt should' be made to regain it by war. That such doubts were felt by a few who sat there, by Weston and Wentworth for instance, is all but certain. But Weston had sur- rendered himself body and soul to Buckingham, and Wentworth, haughty and defiant as he was, was too much of a practical statesman to resist the majority of a popular assembly by argument. Those who on this ' Eldng\ Notes. ' There is no direct evidence of this ; but the fact that he opened the three debates of March i, 11, and 19, and that the greater part of his advice -was adopted by the King, leaves no reasonable doubt that he spoke ■with authority. RUDYERD'S PROPOSITIONS. 2 1 occasion shared his opinions could probably be counted chap. on the fingers. The objection did not come within the • — ^-' domain of practical politics, and Eudyerd, of all men, j^^^^^'^^ was the least likely to conceive its very existence. Eor him it needed no argument to prove that a breach of the negotiations was tantamount to a declaration of war, and he advised the House to 'petition, that his Majesty would enter into a confederacy with his friends abroad, and endeavour to re-collect and re-unite that scattered and broken party of the religion in Ger- many ; that he would strengthen his forts within this kingdom ; that he woidd send out a competent number of ships to discover and resist such danger as may happen ; that he would really and roundly assist the Low Coun- tries ; and whensoever he intends to make war for the Palatinate, that he would make it near hand by way of diversion to save charges, whither every younger brother that had but 20I. in his purse may go stocked for a profession and course of life ; and where the Low Countries, no doubt, will be willing and ready to assist us for their own interest, which is the motive of all States. ' ^ So much was said, at the commencement of the next ^1,^^ ^j^ reign, about an alleged breach of the understanding f^J^^f come to in this session between the House of Commons and the Crown, that it is worth while to pause for a moment to ask what was the nature of the demand made by Eudyerd, undoubtedly with the assent, if not at the instigation,' of Buckingham and the Prince.^ Nothing can be plainer than that the idea of a Con- tinental war was placed in the background, if not negatived altogether. Diplomatic intervention there 1 Rudyerd's speech, S. P. Bom., clx. 8. = In the next year he stated that he had not received instructions from either- Probably his intercourse was with Pembroke. 2 2 THE LAST PARLLVMENT OF JAMES I. CHAP, was to be in Germany, accompanied, perhaps, with some — ; — • aid in money from the English exchequer, in order to M^rdit ™^^ ^^ opposition to the Spanish and Imperiahst armies. But Enghsh military operations were to be confined to the Low Countries, and whatever more was done was to take the form of a diversion, that is to say, the form of an attack by sea upon the Spanish fleets and the Spanish Indies. A new generation of Drakes and Ealeighs was to be called into existence, to con- tinue the work, half patriotic, half piratical, which filled so large a space in the minds of Englishmen of that day. Feeling of But if any doubt of Eudyerd's meaning were mons about possible, there could be no doubt of the feeling of the ''*"■ House. Of Germany and of German politics the Commons knew very little, had no chance of knowing anything accurately. But they did know that Spain had been specially prominent in the first attack upon the Palatinate, and they knew that Spain had been meddling in their own domestic aSairs to an extent which had roused the disgust of all Protestant English- men. That they greatly overrated the strength of Spain in Germany, and as greatly underrated the strength of the Emperor and the Elector of Bavaria, is evident to all who know anything about the condition of Germany at the time ; and they were thus easily led to imagine that a blow struck at Spain would have far more important results upon the Rhine than was at all likely to be the case. Though it would be unfair to say that they disregarded the miserable con- dition of the Palatinate, it is certain that Germany held but a secondary place in their thoughts. It was against the intrigues of Gondomar rather than against the arms of Spinola and Tilly that their indignation was specially directed, Spain, and Spain almost alone, ATTACK UPON THE EECUSANTS. 23 was ever present to their vision. "War with Spain was chap. regarded as a good thing in itself, needing no further • — ^ justification. In the debate which followed Eudyerd's ^^^^^^ speech, whilst the hint which he had thrown out about Popularity the lormation of a Protestant confederacy in Germany with Spain, fell flat upon the House, his proposal to attack Spain was received with rapturous applause.. " He that shall go out of the way that Sir Benjamin Eudyerd hath set down," said Phelips, " shall work in a maze, and must return thither again." " War only," cried Eliot, " will secure and repair us." The fleet, he added, might be fitted out by the help of " those penalties the Papists have already incurred," a proposal which, if it had been translated into figures, would have organised a tyranny too monstrous to be contemplated with equanimity.-^ The feeling which thus prevailed found its expression The peti- in the petition which the Commons drew up for pre- commons, sentation to the King. The Lords had been content to assign as their reason for recommending that the negotiations should be broken off", the impossibihty of placing further confidence in the Spanish Government. The Commons went over the whole history of the past dangers of Protestantism in England and in Europe, and found special fault with the late alliance with Spain as leading to an increase in the number of the English Catholics.^ The petition prepared in this spirit was adopted by March 3. the Upper House, and was ready for presentation on the objeotsTf 3rd. But the King had a bad cold, and refused to ''' receive it. The petition, in fact, sounded very like a covert attack upon himself, and the attempt to convert the proposed war into a religious crusade against Spain must have been most distasteful to him. Buckingham • Commons' Jownab, i. 674, 722 ; Nichola^s Notes. * Lords' Journals, iii. 246. 24 CHxVP. I. 1624. March 3. Bucking- ham expos- tulates. And sug- gests the answer to be given. THE LAST PAELIAMENT OF JAMES I. had no such scruples. " la obedience to your com- mands," he wrote, with that insolence which long familiarity had taught him, " I will tell the House of Parhament that you, having been upon the fields this afternoon, have taken such a fierce rheum and cough as, not knowing how you will be this night, you are not yet able to appoint them a day of hearing : but I will forbear to tell them that, notwithstanding your cold, you were able to speak with the King of Spain's instruments, though not with your own subjects." ^ This strange letter was, in all probability, accom- panied by a paper in which Buckingham had jotted down the heads of the answer which he wished James to make to the Houses.'-^ The King, he suggested, should say that he was grateful for the answer given him, and that he did not expect any rebukes from them till he had made up his mind whether he would accept their advice or not. If he became engaged in a war in consequence of his taking that advice, he would not make peace without first consult- ing them ; and finally he would allow them to choose a Committee ' to see the issuing out of the money they give for the recovery of the Palatinate.' Even this last suggestion, James condescended to ' Buckingham's letter {Hardwiche St. P., i. 46\) is undated, but the reference to the cold authorises me to place it here. On the 6th of March TillLeres writes that the King had received the petition, "ayant retards deux jours a les voir, s'excusant sur un rheum." (Sari. MSS. 4593, fol. 128 b.) : and Salvetti, in his Newsletter of the 5th, refers to the same circumstance. ^ It is printed {Hardwidke St. P.) as a postscript to a letter with which it has no connection, except that it has been placed next to it by the col- lector or binder of the volume in which it was found {Harl. MSS. 6987). The suggestion of a plan for paying subsidies elsewhere than into the ex- chequer, must have been made before the King's speech of the 5th, in which that suggestion was adopted. If, therefore, it did not actually ac- company Buckingham's letter, it must have beea sent about the same time. THE KING'S DEMANDS. 25 accept. Four proposals of Eudyerd's, that the fortifi- chap. cations should be repaired, a fleet fitted out, Ireland re- ■ — k — • inforced, and the Dutch Eepublic succoured, he adopted ^^^^^' as his own, if indeed they had not been originally The King's made with his approbation. But a comparison between the debate in the Lower House and this reply of James's reveals a radical difierence between their respective plans for the future. Whilst the Commons Different . , , , , . viewsofthe Wished to do as much as possible against Spain, and King and as little as possible in Germany, James wanted to do mons. as much as possible for the Palatinate, and as little as possible against Spain. " As Moses," he said, " saw the land of promise from a high mountain, so would it be a great comfort to me that God would but so pro- long my days as, if I might not see the restitution, yet at least to be assured that it would be." He would not own ' one furrow of land in England, Scotland, or Ireland without restitution of the Palatinate.' In this mind he would live and die. But he could not declare war till he knew what means he should have to support it. He was himself miserably in debt. He would allow the money voted for the war, to be placed in the hands of treasurers appointed by the House. But he hoped that over and above this they would give him something for himself In one thing only did he speak of the war difierently from the plan expounded by Eudyerd. Eudyerd had suggested the promotion of union amongst the German Princes. James went a step further, and proposed to send them actual aid.^ The demand for money for payment of the King's March n. debts, and the demand for money for a war in Ger- Sie'cMn" many, found no response in the House of Commons. '"™'- In vain Weston unrolled the whole list of the past expenses of the Crown. Eudyerd, in moving for a ' Lords' Journals, iii. 253. 2& THE LAST PAELIAMENT OF JAMES I. CHAP. I. 1624. March 11. The Prince's ex. planatione to the Lords. conference with the Lords, proposed to ask their ad- vice on the defence of Ireland, the repair of the forts, the setting out of a fleet, and the aid to be given to the Dutch — the four points, as men soon began to call them— but said nothing either of the King's debts or of the German Princes, an omission which can hardly have been accidental. In the debate which followed, no one rose to recommend a war in Germany.^ Eng- land, said Coke, never prospered so well as when she was at war with Spain. If Ireland were secured, the navy furnished, the Low Countries assisted, they need not ' care for Pope, Turk, Spain, nor all the devils in hell.' A resolution was finally passed that, as soon as his Majesty declared the negotiations at an end, he should be assisted in a parliamentary way. The Commons seem to have taken for granted that James's demand for payment of his own debts would not be pressed. In the Lords the matter was taken more seriously, and doubts were expressed whether it would be possible to raise subsidies enough for this purpose and for the war as well. The Prince of Wales, now a constant attendant upon the debates, was in his place when these words were spoken. He had long lost all patience with his father's doubts and hesitations, and he was too ardent in the cause which he had adopted to reflect that by bringing royalty into con- tempt he was menacing an authority of which he would one day be himself the appointed guardian. Without waiting to consult any one, he boldly explained away his father's words. The King, he said, merely meant to let it be known that he was in want of money. But ' There are two reports of this session in the Journals. According to the second, Wentworth of Oxford spolce of Germany (i. 732). But the first report (i. 692) substitutes ' The Low Countries,' and is evidently right in doing so. INTERFERENCE OF THE PRINCE. 27 he did not mean to ask for help himself till after the chap. safety of the kingdom had been provided for.^ The — ^.^ effect of this marvellous commentary was immediate, all „^^f '^^ T. 1 1 -1-. ■ March ir. the more because the rrmce sought out the leaders of the Commons, and told the same tale to them.^ An address, March 14. embodying the ideas expressed in debate, was at once promS^ agreed to ; and on the 14th it was presented to the King at Whitehall by the Archbishop of Canterbury, in the name of the two Houses. Even if James had not taken offence at his son's The King's reply. unexpected interference, he may well have hesitated when called upon to sanction a plan of operations so different from his own. At all events his reply was not that which the Houses had expected to receive. He took especial offence at a phrase in the address condemning the insincerity of the Spaniards. He had not yet, he said, delivered his opinion on Buck- ingham's relation. He had come to no conclusion on the sincerity or insincerity of those with whom he had to deal. When Jupiter spoke, he was accustomed ' to join his thunder with it ; and a king should not speak except to maintain it by action.' Then, having got rid of his iU-humour, his speech took a more practical turn. Thanking the Houses for their promise to grant him money, he pressed for more definite information on the amount they were prepared to give. " I must not only deal," he said, " with my own people, but with my neighbours and allies, to assist me in so great a business as the recovery of the Palatinate." In other words, whilst the Houses were proposing to fight Spain at sea or in the flats of Brabant, James was proposing a great Continental alliance for a war in Germany. For this purpose, he said, he should need five subsidies and ten fifteenths, adding, in spite of his son's declara- -• Eking' 8 Notes. ^ Valaresso's Despatch, March ||. 28 THE LAST PARLIAMENT OF JAMES I. CHAP. I. 1624. March 14, Dissatisfac- tion of the Commons. Bucking- ham's letter to the King. tion, that he hoped they would give him another sub- sidy and two more fifteenths for himself. He had almost made up his mind to break off relations with Spain. He trusted they would pass as many good bills as possible, and he hoped to call them together again in the autumn.^ This hesitating utterance — in all probability it was nothing more — was understood by the Commons to imply that there would be no war after all. They left the presence without the usual cry of " God save the King !" The Prince showed his annoyance at his father's disavowal of his words by remaining in sullen silence for the remainder of the day, whilst, the friends of Spain went joyously about with smiling faces.^ Buckingham, unlike the Prince, was not likely to take refuge in silence. It was probably a day or two before this that he had written to James another of those strange and insolent letters in which the position of master and servant was completely inverted. " I beseech you," he wrote, "send me your plain and resolute answer whether, if your people so resolve to give you a royal assistance, as to the number of six subsidies and fifteens, with a promise after, in case of necessity, to assist you with their lives and fortunes ; wliether then you will not accept it and their counsel to break the match with the other treaties, and whether or no, to bring them to this, I may not assure some of them underhand, because it is feared that when your turns are served you will not call them together again to reform abuses, griev- ances, and the making of laws for the good govern- ment of the country : that you will be so far from that, that you will rather weary them with it, desiring nothing more than their loves and happiness, in which your own is included. Sir, I beseech you think seri- ' Lords' JmtrnaU. lii, 265. ' D. Carleton to Carleton, Sir R. Cotton to T. Cotton, March 17 8. P. Bom. clx. 19, 20; Contm-ini'a Despatch, March |f. BUCKINGHAM'S URGENCY WITH THE KING. 29 ously of this, and resolve once constantly to run one chap. way. For so long as you waver between the Span- • — I; — • iards and your subjects to make your advantage of ^^^^^ both, you are sure to do it with neither." ^ Full of these thoughts, Buckingham now sought Bucking- ham's in- an interview with the King. Throwing himself upon t^rview with James. his knees he besought him to give satisfaction to his subjects. But if Buckingham was anxious to gain from the unwilling King a declaration of war, his idea of what that war should be approached far more nearly to the views of James than to the views of the House of Commons. If the Commons were for a war at sea, and James was for a war on land, Buckingham was for a war both by land and sea. He now dwelt upon the favourable prospect of obtaining French co-operation. The Spanish marriage treaty, he said, had been 'prejudicial to the present government here, in press- ing the abrogation of many good laws, and being con- trary to the conscience of the people.' The same con- ditions, replied James, would be demanded in any other Eoman Catholic marriage. Against this conclusion Buck- ingha,m argued, and suggested that the Houses should send him a petition, asking him not to consent to the Spanish conditions with any other Popish Prince. Under these persuasions James gave way once March 15, morCj and consented to- allow Buckingham and his son to explain away his answer. The next day, ac- cordingly, Charles was able to assure the Houses that his father had no further doubts about the justice of the war, and that he would apply to that object the whole sum of six subsidies and twelve fifteenths, if they chose to grant it to him. Buckingham then proceeded ' Hardwicke St. P. i. 466. The letter is undated, but must have been ■written before the 20th, when a smaller sum than six subsidies was offered by the Commons ; and I think before the 14th, when the King seems to have accepted the proposal of six subsidies from Buckingham. The King's answer ex- plained. THE LAST PARLIAMENT OF JAMES L CHAP. I. 1624. March 15. Prospect of a French marriage. March 19. Debate on supply. to unfold the Kistory of his conversation of the pre- vious night, and for the first time revealed the secret of the French marriage. It was possibly upon perceiving some signs of dissatisfaction around him that Charles added in a low voice, " My father has a long sword. If it is once drawn, it will hardly be put up again." ^ Whether dissatisfaction was expressed or not, there can be no doubt that it was felt. " I confess," wrote a member of the House, about a fortnight later, " that my heart beats still as you know it hath done ever, and goeth not with this match neither, and I find so many of the same pulse here, that I am sorry my noblest Lord '"^ is employed in the business." ^ Nevertheless the hint thrown out called forth no open expression of disapprobation. In the long debate which followed on the grant of supply, only one member alluded to it, by proposing that the King should be asked to break ofi" all other treaties, as well as the Spanish, that might be prejudicial to rehgion. On the prospect opened to them of a Continental war they were more outspoken. Sir Francis Seymour touched the question to the quick. He had heard ' wars spoken on,' he said, ' and an army ; but would be glad to hear where. The Palatinate was the place intended by his Majesty. This we never thought of, nor is it fit for the consideration of the House in re- gard of the infinite charge.' Not a word was uttered in opposition to the view thus taken by Seymour. The House was looking in another direction than the Pala- tinate. " Are we poor," cried Eliot, " Spain is rich. ' Lords' Journals, Hi. 266. FntoreWsJDespaicA, March §|, Account of a conversation bet-ween the King and Buckingham ; S.P. Dom., clx. 80. ' C arlisle, who was to go as ambassador to negotiate it. * Nethersole to Carleton, March 31 ; S. P. Dom., clxi. 61. FINANCIAL PROPOSALS. 3^ There are our Indies. Break with them ; we shall chap. break our necessities together." ^ « — ^ — . In fact, the Commons were in a very difficult posi- Marcht tion. The task before them was no longer to oppose ■'^^tion of their own resolution to the inertness of the King. Thev ^^^ ^°^- o ./ mons. were called upon to decide between two opposite schemes of political and miHtary action. Instead of looking forward to a war Umited in extent and lucra- tive, as they fondly hoped, in its results, they were called upon to provide for a vast Continental alliance, cemented by a marriage which, taken at its best, would go far to encourage the hopes of that Church which they most detested, and relying for its support upon an expenditure of Enghsh blood and treasure so great that they could hardly contemplate the prospect with equanimity. For, as Coke explained to them, six su.bsidies and twelve fifteenths would bring them in 780,000?., and the six subsidies which might be ex- pected from the clergy would raise the grant to 900,000/., an amount which, however small it may sound in the reign of Victoria, was utterly unprece- dented in the reign of James. Even the officials in the House did not venture to support the demand in full. Eudyerd, who had again opened the debate, had contented himself with asking that the subsidies should be in principle voted ; part of them being held back to be levied at some future time. Later in the debate, how- ever, Edmondes, Privy Councillor as he was, professed himself to be staggered by the greatness of the demand, and recommended three subsidies as sufficient. Weston too, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, acknowledged that the sound of six subsidies was ' very fearful ; ' whilst Vane and Conway only ventured to urge the consideration of ' Commons' JoutTiah, i. 740. Nicholas's Notes. 32 THE LAST PARLIAMENT OF JAMES L CHAP. I. 1624. M arch 20. Objects of the giant. March 22. Its word- ing altered. March 23. James de- clares the treaties dissolved. Eudyerd's original proposal, according to which the fiill levy would be contingent on the renewed approbation of the House. In the end three subsidies and three fifteenths, or about 300,000^., were voted. The money was to be paid to treasurers appointed by Parhament within one year after James had declared the negotia- tions with Spain to be at an end.^ The address from both Houses with which this resolution was accompanied plainly declared the ob- jects for which it was intended. They were stated to be ' the support of the war which is likely to ensue, and more particularly for those four points proposed by your Majesty ; namely, the defence of this realm, the securing of Ireland, the assistance of your neigh- bours the States of the United Provinces and others of your Majesty's friends and allies, and the setting forth of your Eoyal Navy.' ^ Before this address was presented it was privately shown to James. To one passage, in which it was said that the war was to be waged ' for the conservation of the true religion of Almighty God,' he took ob- jection, as making it difficult for him to find allies beyond the limits of Protestantism. The objection was admitted as valid, and the phrase was cancelled. The address itself, unlike the last one, was gra- ciously received. The King said that he was willing to take the advice of Parliament ' in the annulling and breaking of those two treaties, both of the match and ' The comparison sometimes made between the incidence of a sub- sidy and that of our present income-tax, is altogether misleading. As far as land was foncemed, a subsidy was a tax upon rental, which would often be little more than nominal, the chief profit being made by the fines levied as the leases fell in, which would not be touched by the sub- sidy. The gradual decrease of subsidies in value was generally attributed at the time to the collusion of the collectors. Is it possible that there was also a practice of increasing the fines at the expense of rental P * Lords' Journals, iii. 275. THE KING'S OFFERS. 33 of the Palatinate.' In all his negotiations he had only aimed at the recovery of the Palatinate. " I am old," he added, " but my only son is young, and I will pro- ^arch t mise, for myself and him both, that no means shall be unused for the recovery of it ; and this I dare say, as old as I am, if it might do good to the business, I would go in my own person, and think my travail and labour well bestowed, though I should end my days there." Not a penny of the money now offered, he declared, should be spent but upon this work, and that too by their own treasurers. In the address, the subsidies had been spoken of as a ' first fruits,' and there had been a further assurance of more to come when he was actually engaged in war. He took the Houses at their word, " In the next session," he said, " you will consider how this hath been husbanded, and according to that, think what is next to be done ; and it will spur you the more to enable me for the rest whereof I spake to you before." For advice about the conduct of the future war, however, he must be de- pendent not upon Parliament, but upon mihtary men who would form a Council of War. His plans ' must not be ordered by a multitude,' for so his ' designs might be discovered beforehand.' Without the con- sent of their Commissioners he would not touch a penny of their money. " But whether," he said, " I shall send twenty thousand or ten thousand, whether by sea or land. East or West, by diversion or other- wise, by invasion upon the Bavarian or the Emperor, you must leave that to the King." What, then, was the meaning of the engagement what did thus taken ? On the one hand Parliament, with the * '"^''" exception of the vague clause about assisting ' other your Majesty's friends and allies,' distinctly intimated that the money was to be employed solely on the four VOL, I. D 34 THE LAST PARLIAMENT OF JAMES I. CHAP, points originally proposed. Even if that clause were • — ^ — ■ to receive the widest possible interpretation, it could March23. ^ever be seriously contended that out of 300,000/. there would be enough left, when the expenditure authorised in the address had been met, to provide for any extensive mihtary outlay. James, in talking of sending twenty thousand men or ten thousand men, was clearly not referring to anything connected with the present vote, but to the use to be made of the further subsidies which he expected in the autumn. He had already promised to call Parliament together for pur- poses of domestic legislation. He now promised to give an account at the same time of the expenditure already agreed on, and to ask the sanction of the Houses to the further prosecution of the war. He would thus have time to ascertain the feeling of the various Euro- pean courts in which he hoped to find allies. But he honestly told Parliament that when he proceeded to make war in earnest, he should be guided by military, not by political, far less by religious considerations. What he wanted, in short, was to get back the Palati- nate, not to punish Spain for its past conduct, or to join in a Protestant crusade. Neither Evidently, therefore, neither party was in any way bomd for bouud to anything beyond the expenditure of the 300,000/. already agreed to be voted. When the next session began it would be open to the King to say, if he thought fit, tha,t he had found the enterprise more arduous than he had expected ; and it woidd be equally open to the Commons to say that they declined to sup- port any particular pohcy which the Crown had resolved to adopt. The bhnd confidence which Charles afterwards demanded, was neither ofi'ered nor assumed on either side, even in the event of the autumn session taking place. Still less could it be fairly expected, if the future. POPULARITY OF THE KING'S DECLARATION. 35. the meeting of the Houses were delayed, that the chap. Commons should sanction without enquiry any further ^' re- expenditure on which the Crown miejht have entered ^Z^^"^' '■ . o March 23. upon its own responsibility. For the present, -however, there was little thought PubUc of future complications. On the afternoon after the ■'"""'S'- King's declaration, the streets were filled with happy faces. As soon as darkness fell, bonfires were blazing on every side. At last the long weary burden of years had been thrown off. Whatever else might happen, it would not be a Spanish Princess who would be nearest and dearest to the future King of England, and mother to the future Prince of Wales. Neither Gondomar nor his master would again find an excuse for meddling with the administration of English law, or for thrusting aside statutes which, whatever we may now think of them, were at that time regarded as the bulwark of our religion and our hberty. Whilst the bonfires were blazing in the streets, some P^ . , " . Spaniards of the servants of the Spanish embassy m the Strand insulted, were foolish enough to crowd to the window to see what was going on. As might have been expected, they were received with jeers by the crowd below, and stones and firebrands were flung towards them. The next day, on Buckingham's motion, the Lords resolved March 24. that an attempt should be made to discover the offen- ders. In the Commons other feelings prevailed. Two March 2s. members of the House reported that they had been in the Strand on, the evening in question and had not witnessed anything improper. On this negative evidence the Commons thought themselves justified in treating the whole story as a pure invention.^ If Buckingham had still some regard for decorum, The Prince Charles shared the popular feeling to the full. Whilst present 1 Lords' Journals, iii. 280 ; Commons' Journah, i. 750. D 2 36 THE LAST PAKLIAMENT OF JAMES I. .CHAP. I. 1624. March 18. from the Countess Olivarea. March 17. Lafuente robbed of his de- spatches. James's decision was still hanging in the balance, three cartloads of fruits and sweetmeats were driven up to the gate of St. James's Palace, at that time the residence of the Prince of Wales. They were a present from the Countess of Olivares, prepared in happier days. Charles would not even vouchsafe to look at them. Turning to Cottington, he bade him divide the good things as he pleased amongst his attendants.^ A King's son, it would appear, could be lament- ably deficient in the elements of good breeding. The day before this scene there had been a deed done in France by which still greater obloquy was brought upon the English name. The Spanish Government, in the hope of obtaining better terms from James, had despatched Gondomar's confessor, Lafuente, to England, trusting that his discreet character and his accurate knowledge of the Court might procure him a hearing where the impatient Inojosa and the blunt soldierlike Coloma had failed. As he was travelling near Amiens, Lafuente's coach was surrounded by a number of men armed with pistols and disguised with false beards. His baggage was searched with the utmost minuteness, and even the leaves of his breviary were eagerly turned over. His assailants were evidently no common robbers, for, though they carried off every scrap of paper in his possession, they left his money and all his valuable pro- perty untouched. The affair was never subjected to any serious investigation, but Lafuente beheved that the culprits were Frenchmen employed by the Marquis of Hamilton, whose intimacy with Buckingham made it unUkely that the outrage had been committed with- out the knowledge of the Lord Admiral.^ • Chamberlain to Oavleton, March 20, S. P, Doni., clxi. 4 ; Salvetti'a ' Francisco de Jesus. 97. LAFUENTE IN ENGLAND. 37 If, as was supposed in England, Lafuente had chap. brought instructions to make fresh proposals about the - — ^— Palatinate, the loss of his papers must have been very M^rchlig. serious to him. On the 29th he was admitted to the Thetrea- King's presence together with the two ambassadors, spain de- but he had no credentials to present, and a letter from the King of Spain which he had with him when he left Madrid was equally missing. He was therefore com- pelled to stand by in silence whilst James was informing the ambassadors that all negotiations with Spain were at an end. According to the jest of the day he had only Gome to give extreme unction to the dying treaties."^ At last James seemed to have made up his mind. Reception ^ . of the As soon as the Spaniards left the room, their places uutcii were taken by the Dutch Commissioners, who had come sioners. over to discuss the terms on which Enghsh military assistance should be given to the States General. Their reception was eminently favourable. The King assured them of his strong desire to maintain the independence of their country, and to regain the lost Palatinate.^ The Commons had now leisure to turn their atten- Bitter feei- tion to the subject to which, next to the war with Spain, SfS"-' they attached the greatest importance. The treaties ''°^" which had just been set aside had done much to repress the growth of a tolerant spirit in England. The men^ who, like Bacon and Bristol, rose to power in the earher years of James's reign, were capable of embracing something of the idea of toleration. The men who were looked up to in the Parliament of 1621 and 1624, Pym, Eliot, and Phelips, closed their hearts against the very thought. The reason of this difference it is not difBcult to discover. The Eoman Catholic creed was ' Valaresso's Despatch, April ^. 2 Ibid.-' 38 THE LAST PARLIAMENT OF JAMES L CHAP, no longer a mere religious error, endangering, accord- — r — ' ing to the common belief, the souls of men, but accom- March%. panied by no very evident political danger. It was now once more aggressive both on the Continent and in England. Every step which had been gained by its champions in Germany, every blow which had been struck upon the Danube or the Ehine, had found an echo in English hearts, more especially as the detested creed had gained vantage ground in the concessions which Spain had wrung from the impolitic comphance of an English sovereign. And so the mischief which had been quietly grow- ing, had produced another mischief in return. Because James had allowed the reins of government to hang loosely in his hands, and had not repelled with scorn the pretensions of an alien ruler to interfere with the domestic affairs of England, therefore the best and wisest spirits of the age were crying out not merely for the exclusion from England of Spanish influence, but for the administration of the English law, as far as their Eoman Catholic fellow-subjects were concerned, in a harsh and intolerant spirit. Aprils- On the 3rd of April a petition was sent up to the against the Lords asking for the full execution of the penal laws against the Eecusants, and a request was added to it ' that upon no occasion of marriage or treaty, or other request on that behalf from any foreign Prince or State whatsoever,' his Majesty ' would take away or slacken the execution of his laws against the Popish Eecusants.' ^ James's ob- To the last clause James had no objection to make. jections. ^ -I T ■ He had learned something from past experience, and he had resolved not to compUcate the French treaty with any of those stipulations for the English Cathohcs ' Lords' Journals, i. 289. JAMES'S HESITATION. 39 which had hampered him so terribly in his negotiations chap. with Spain. But the demand for the ftdl execution of ^' the penal laws annoyed him. If he had no well- ^^','*' defined theory on the subject of toleration, and if his ^' ^' practice on this as in many other matters was very much influenced by the special circumstances of the moment, he shrank from avowing an intention to deal harshly with the Recusants at a time when he was persuaded that the Palatinate could only be recovered with the assistance of France and other Roman Oathohc countries. As often happened with James, his vexation threw He recaiu hiin violently into a course opposite to that which he spatcl" had previously taken. He ordered the courier who had off thelrea- already started for Madrid with a despatch announcing *'*^' the breach of the negotiations, to be overtaken and brought back. He must now, he said, consult more fully with his son. " Ye know," he wrote to Conway in a letter conveying these directions, " my firm reso- lution not to make this a war of religion."^ All this may easily be accounted for by the dislike Spanish iu- which James reasonably entertained for the intolerant '"^ues. policy which the Commons were urging him to adopt. But it may be acknowledged that other causes may have contributed to rufile his temper. The Spanish ambassadors, ignorant, like the rest of the world, of the deep hold which the loss of the Palatinate had taken upon James's mind, saw, in the repulse which they had met, nothing more than the result of the overbearing self-will of Buckingham. It was not hard for them to construct out of rumour, partly true and partly false, the idea that the King was held in moral, if not in actual physical durance, by the arts of his ' The King to Conway, April 3. Printed without a date in Smh- worth, i. 140. 40 THE DISSOLUTION OF THE SPANISH TREATIES. CHAP, favourite and his son, and they imagined that if they - — r — • could only succeed for an instant in getting the ear of Maichto James, the whole monstrous edifice which Buckingham had constructed would topple down of itself The King Their first difficulty arose from their knowledge Carondeie? that they Were never allowed to see James in private, in private, -^j^g^ ^.j^gy. ^gj.g admitted to an audience Buckingham was always present, ready to remove any impression they might chance to make, the moment they had left the room. This hindrance to freedom of speech they determined to 'break through at the earliest oppor- tunity.' On March 29, the day on which they were summoned to hear from the King's lips the announce- ment that negotiations were at an end, whilst Coloma engaged the Prince and Buckingham in conversation, Inojosa offered James a paper which he requested him to put in his pocket till he found himself alone. The paper, when opened, proved to contain a request that Caronde- the King would give a private audience to Carondelet, agalnV^^ the Archdcacou of Cambrai, who was acting as Coloma's ha"ra.'"^' secretary. The audience was granted, and Carondelet made use of it to tell the King that he was little better than a prisoner in Buckingham's hands, and was being used as a tool for the satisfaction of the private ani- Apru 3 mosities of his favourite. On the morning of April 3 Carondelet returned, bringing Lafuente with him.^ This time a written charge against Buckingham was placed in James's possession, accusing him of having formed a plot to transfer the government out of his master's hands to those of the Prince, whilst James was to be graciously allowed to pass the rest of his life in the full enjoyment of the sports of the field. The soldiers who would be levied as soon as war was ' Valaresso's Despatch, April j|. INOJOSA'S INTEIGUES. 41 declared would be used to bring the King to submis- chap. sion. Already Buckingham had been speaking dis- ■ — i^ respectfully of his sovereign, and had been doing his ^Z^!"^' 1 11- T • 1 1 March 29. best to make him unpopular with the nation. If the King would but cast off his favourite, Spain would undertake to procure the restitution of the Palatinate in three months. The alleged intention to dethrone the King had doubtless no foundation in fact. But it is likely enough that Buckingham had spoken of the King in his conversation at least as disrespectfully as he had written to him in his letters. At all events, there was enough of general truth in the charge to make James excessively uncomfortable. He must have known that even if it was not true that he was being dragged against his will by Buckingham into a course of action which he disliked, he had at least entered upon a path which, but for Buckingham, he would never have chosen. He now expressed, in bitter words, the usual dissatisfaction of a man who finds out that he is being led by others. His son, he said, before his visit ' to Spain, was as well affected towards that nation as heart could desire, and as well disposed as any son in Europe, but now he was strangely carried away with rash and youthful counsels, and followed the humour of Bucking- ham, who had he knew not how many devils within him since that journey.' That afternoon the despatch for Spain was recalled, James as has been already told.-' The fate of the negotiations was once more exposed to doubt. But the story told by Carondelet was so monstrous that James hesitated to accept it. If the Spaniards, he replied, expected him 1 p. 39. 42 THE DISSOLUTION OF THE SPANISH TREATIES. CHAP, to take any steps against the Duke, they must first ■ — '>■ — ' prove their allegations.^ April 3. Carondelet fancied that the secret of his interview betravedto ^'^^ the King was in safe keeping. But in spite of his Williams, clerical character his morals were loose.'-' His mistress was in the pay of Williams, who, provided that he could get important information, cared httle what means he employed to obtain it. To Williams the discovery afforded a splendid opportunity to strengthen his inte- rests at court. It was true that Buckingham had assured him that his conduct in opposing the war with Spain would be passed over. But since he had given offence no opportunity had been afforded him of exhibit- ing his devotion. wiuiims' Williams went first to the Prince. " In my studies mforms the of divinity," he said, after explaining how he had come by his knowledge, " I have gleaned up this maxim. It is lawful to make use of the sin of another. Though the devil make her a sinner, I may make good use of her sin." " Yea," answered Charles with a smile, " do you deal in such ware ? " " In good faith," said Williams, " I never saw her face." ' There are two abstracts of tte account of these transactions, given afterwards by Carondelet to Williams {Cabala, 275, and Sachet^ i. 195). If, as I suspect, they are both taken at different times from the same conversation, though the notes given by Hacket are treated by him as an abstract of the paper given by Inojosa to James, Hacket's story, as usual, is in miserable confusion. He fancied that he knew better what happened than appears on the face of the documents he printed, and transferred to the beginning of April events which took place long after- wards when the King was at Windsor, which will he given in their proper place. " The Spanish embassy stood in no good repute since Inojosa's arrival. TilliSres is not a very satisfactory authority against it. But even his outrageous statement about Inojosa that 'n'^tant pas content de debaucher les filles et femmes Oatholiques, il a fait servir des prStres et confesseurs de maqueraux,' throws some light on the probability of the truth of the story about Carondelet. TilliSres to Ville-aux-Clercs, Feb. jV, Harl. MiSS. 4593, fol. 46, b. WILLIAMS AJSID CARONDELET. 4^ After^ some consideration, it was resolved that chap. Buckingham should go to Theobalds to feel his ground ^: _- with the King/ whilst Williams remained in London to '^^4- probe Carondelet's secret to the bottom. He ordered atilslm- the immediate arrest of a priest whom he knew to be mation "" specially intimate with Coloma's secretary. As he ex- ronddet pected, Carondelet was not long in asking leave to plead for his friend's Hfe. Late at night, to escape observa- tion, he came to the Deanery at Westminster. At first he found WiUiams obdurate. How could mercy be shown whilst ParHament, with its watchful eye, was still in session ? Carondelet caught at the word Parlia- ment. He knew that Williams had opposed Buckingham at the beginning of the year. He did not know how ready he was to desist from a fruitless opposition. "Let not," he said, " the dread of this Parliament trouble you. I can tell you, if you have not heard it, that it is upon expiration." Then, fancying from Williams's answers that he had found a confederate, he unfolded the whole tale of his secret audiences.^ As soon as Carondelet was gone, Williams sat down BucUng- and wrote off for Buckingham an account of all that foraea!' ' Hacket gives a ■wrong date and senda Buckingham to Windsor in- stead of Theobalds. From the Lords' Journals we know that Bucking- ham was in his place in the morning of the 5th, and was absent on the 6th and 7th. Conway, in a letter written to Aston on the 7th (S. P. Spain), speaks of him as being then at Theobalds. ' Haehet, i. 198. Mr. Tierney, in his edition of Dodd, argues that the story of the priest arrested is untrue, because an account (Cabala, 275), sent off at once to Buckingham by Williams, contains a heading — " The end, as was conceived, of Don Francisco's desiring this conference." I do not see that this necessarily follows. Williams may very well have omitted the story of the priest, which was only needed to show why Carondelet came to his house. What had to be accounted for was, how Carondelet came to confer with Williams on such secret matters ; what was his end in " desiring this conference," whether he were already in the Deanery or not. Hacket is most confused in dates, and often mixes up different stories. But I do not think him, or Williams, likely to invent such a story as this. 44 THE DISSOLUTION OF THE SPANISH TREATIES. CHAP, had passed.! ^ fg^ evenings later Carondelet returned — ?,— with further information, and Williams was able to ^^^4- take credit to himself for having fathomed so deep a ^" " mystery. Yet before Buckingham had time to receive the information, he had recovered his mastery over the mind of James. On April 6, the day before Caron- delet's first interview with WiUiams, the delayed despatch announcing the final breach of the negotia- tions with Spain was at last sent ofi"— a step which would hardly have been taken if the impression made by Carondelet and Lafuente on the King had not been already removed.''^ ' Cabala, 275. ^ Williams did not write his notes till two o'clock on the morning of the 8th, and that morning Buckingham was in his place again in the House of Lords. The following account by Williams of a further conference between himself and Carondelet, is given in Birch's transcripts. Add. MSS., 4164, fol. 280, as taken from JIarl. MSS., 7000, where I have not been able to find it. Dr. Birch's name is, however, a sufficient guarantee that the reference only is incorrect. " He was very inquisitive if I had already or intended to impart what he had told me in secret the night before to any man ; to the which he did add a desire of secrecy, because (i) the King had charged him and the friar to be very secret ; (2) the ambassadors did not know that he had imparted these things unto me ; (3) the paper was secret instructions which they gave the friar to urge and press the same points which him- self had done, unto the King. " 2. He confessed that the greatest part of the friar's instructions was to do all the worst offices he could against the Duke, and to lay the breach of the marriage and disturbance of the peace upon him. " 3. He excused his bringing the copy of that paper unto me, because the Marquis (i.e. Inojosa) had got it in his custody ; but said he would procure it with all speed. I desired him to do it, the rather because, besides my approbation of the form and manner of writing, I might be by it instructed how to apply myself to do his Majesty service therein, as I found by that conference his Majesty's bent and inclination. " 4. He having un derstood that there was, though [P not] a close, yet an indissoluble friendship between the Duke and myself, desired me to show some way how the Duke might be won unto them, and to continue the peace. 1 answered I would pursue any fair course that should be pro- posed that way; but for myself, that I never meddled with matters of JAMES BREAKS WITH SPAIN. 45 This despatcli, written and rewritten several times, chap. announced that the proposition made in January by the ■ — ij — - Spanish ambassadors could not be accepted. James '^.^■*- would never consent to his grandson's education at the Breach of ■n > ^^ • ^ T • ^ tbenegoti- Jlimperor s court, nor would he be satisfied with any- ation with thing less than a direct engagement that Spain would nounoedby assist his son-in-law by force of arms if diplomacy should faU. The two Houses of Parliament, he added, 'have given us their faithful advice to dissolve both the treaties, as well of the marriage as of the Palatinate. To which we have given our consent, having not found any exam- ple that any king hath refused the counsel of the whole kingdom composed of faithful and loving subjects.' So far the letter was all that Buckingham could have desired. But a passage followed in which James again pressed Philip to aid him, or at least not to oppose him, in his efforts to obtain the restitution of the Palatinate. And though he allowed the Prince to cancel this last clause,^ he did not countermand the sending of a letter of Conway's which was to go in the same state of this nature, but was only employed before this joxirney of the Prince's in matters of mine owne court and in the pulpit. " 5. He desired to know if they might rely upon the King, whom only they found peaceably addicted, otherwise they would cease all mediation and prepare for war. I answered that he was a King that never broke his word, and he knew best what he had said unto them. " 6. He commended much the courage and resolution of the Lord Treasurer, which I told him we all did, as a probable sign of his inno- cence. " 7. He said the Marquis had despatched three correos, and expected of large propositions from Spain to be made unto his Majesty concerning the present restitution of the Palatinate, and that if these failed they were at an end of all treaty, and the ambassadors would forthwith return home." " Indorsed : — Bishop of Lincoln's Relation of SpSeches passed between his Lordship and Don Francisco. — 11 April, 1623." [Sic]. ' In the draft the passage is scored out, and a note in Charles's hand is appended to it — " These two last are thought best to be left out." The King to Aston, April 5. S. P. Spam. 46 THE DISSOLUTION OF THE SPANISH TREATIES. CHAP, packet, in which the ambassador at Madrid was ■ — 'r — • directed to assure Philip that, though James had April's, promised to hsten to the advice of his Parhament, he had never promised to follow it.^ Nature of Such a reservation could have but little result, ham's in- The One fact of importance was that the Spanish in- overjames. triguc had failed, and the treaties were at last aban- doned. In all that had passed the weakness and hesitation . of James had been most manifest. He had been half driven, half persuaded, to place himself in hostility to Spain. It had not been without many- backward glances that he had taken the required step, glances which the Spaniards interpreted as meaning much more than they really did. For it was surely not merely owing to the personal ascendancy of Buckingham that James at last shook off the influence of the Spanish ambassadors. Here, at least, Buckingham had the advantage of a good cause. If he dazzled James by his vigour and audacity, he was also able to con- vince his intellect. After all that had passed it was impossible even for James to maintain seriously that it would be wise to look again to Spain for the recovery of the Palatinate. Difficulties Buckingham's sanguine and incisive temper had still to be • 1 1 • P 1 1 P TT7- 1 1 • 1 • m met. carried him saiely thus lar. Would it serve him equally well when he came to proceed to positive action ? It is far easier to put an end to negotiations than to conduct a war. And he would now no longer have the full assurance of the support of the House of Commons. If he had been on the side of Parliament against the King in wishing to make the breach with Spain com- plete, he was on the side of the King against Parliament in wishing to make a close alliance with France the ' Oonway to Aston, April 3. Date corrected to April 8. S. P. Spain. BUCKINGHAM'S DIFFICULTIES. 47 main feature of his foreign policy. That he was chap. II. in the right in shrinking from going to war without French aid cannot reasonably be doubted. But it ^ ^^^^ remained to be seen at what price that aid was to be purchased. 48 CHAPTEE IT. BUCKINGHAMS ASCENDANCY. CHAP. II. ^^. — , * 1624. Feb. 15. Kensing- ton in Paris. La Vien- ville's Ministry. Heney Eich, Viscount Kensington, had arrived in Paris on February 15, charged with a confidential mission. Without making any absolute overtures, he was to sound the disposition of the French court towards a marriage between Charles and the Princess Henrietta Maria, the youngest sister of Lewis XIII. Unlike his elder brother the Earl of Warwick, the speculator in buccaneering adventures in the reign of James I. and the pious Lord Admiral of the Common- wealth, Kensington had been fitted by nature for those successes in the drawing-room which were denied him in the senate and the field. Without force of character or intellectual abihty, he had early taken his place in that train of flatterers whose ready services were so pleasing to Buckingham, and were of so little value in the hour of trial ; and to the satisfaction which he thus gave to his patron he owed his high position at court, his peerage, and at last his selection as the mes- senger of love to the French Princess. Kensington's journey was extremely well timed. Lewis had at last taken alarm at the position which Spain and the allies of Spain occupied on his frontiers. The golden flag of Philip waved from the Netherlands in the North over an almost uninterrupted series of fortifications, through the Palatinate, Franche Comt^, the Milanese Duchy, Naples, Sicily, and Sardinia, to the FRANCE AND SPAIN. 4y spot wliere the Pyrenees lower their crests as they chap. sink towards the waters of the Atlantic. And behind >_ V' — this martial barrier was now arising once more the 'Ij,'*' shadowy form of the old Empire which had been quickened into life by the success of Spinola and Tilly. Lewis had felt that it was no longer a time to be guided solely by his religious instincts. Devoted Catholic as he was, he was a still more devoted French- man, or rather, it would perhaps be more correct to say, he was still more devoted to the maintenance of his own authority, in which, for him, the interests of France were comprehended. Yet though Lewis was by no means a cypher in French politics, he was too sluggish and unfamiliar with business to trouble himself with the actual direction of affairs. A minister he must have who would be content to carry out his ideas, except so far as he might be able to mould his master's plans in accordance with his own. He now announced the change which had come over him by dismissing his foT-mer ministers who were on friendly terms with Spain and the Emperor, and by calling to his counsels the Marquis of La Vieuville who was pledged to a contrary course. With the higher political questions which were Kensing- likely to arise out of this change, Kensington had ce^s^t"'' neither the authority nor the desire to meddle. Easy and graceful in his manners, he had little difficulty in winning his way amongst the ladies and gay gentlemen of the Queen Mother's court. Mary de" Medici, at this time under the guidance of the sagacious EicheHeu, at once treated the handsome Enghshman as a friend. She gladly caught at the idea of making her daughter Princess of Wales, especially as she hoped by this means to obtain a cessation of the persecution of the English Catholics, and thus to do more for her Church VOL. I. B court. 50 BUCKINGHAM'S ASCENDANCY. CHAP. II. 1624. Feb. The Prin- cess Henri- etta Maria. Kensing- ton's ideas about the alliance. than Philip of Spain and his sister had succeeded in accomphshing. This feeling was shared by her son, and Kensington was able to send home the most glowing description of his reception at Paris. Though he was told that no serious negotiations could be opened till his master had openly broken with Spain, nothing was left undone to give him confidence in the eventual suc- cess of his mission. With the Queen Mother he was soon at home, chattering gaily in broken French, and whis- pering airy compliments in the ears of the ladies around her. The day after his arrival he was able to report that he had seen the Princess, a quick, bright-eyed girl in her fifteenth year. " My Lord," he wrote to Buck- ingham, " she is a lovely sweet young creature. Her growth is not great yet, but her shape is perfect." She had seldom, he had been informed, ' put on a more cheerful countenance than that night.' " There were some," he added, " that told me I might guess the cause of it." Of soft glances and merry speeches Kensington was an apt reporter. It was not long before he had to turn his attention to more serious work. Ill- advised as any marriage with a Eoman Catholic would have been in the existing state of English public feeling, both James and Buckingham wished this marriage to be at least the seal of an eifectual military alliance, and they expected to proceed simultaneously with the two negotiations. Kensington soon made himself the mouth- piece of the French court in advising the contrary course. " For I doubt," he wrote, " whether it may not be thought a little dishonourable for this king to give his sister conditionally that, if he will make war upon the King of Spain his brother, we will make the alhance with him. . . . But if we fall speedily upon a treaty and conclusion of a marriage, the which will KENSINGTON AT PAEIS. 5 I find, I am persuaded, no long delays here, neither wiU chap. they strain us to any unreasonableness in conditions for - — ^ — • our Catholics, as far as I can find ; then will it be a fit ^^^^' time to conclude a league, the which they will then for certain do when all doubts and fears of faUing off" are by this conjunction taken away." ^ It was truly a golden prospect. But even to Charles March 3. it did not seem quite satisfactory after his experience in charies." Spain. The Prince wished the general league of friend- ship to precede the negotiation of the marriage treaty.^ Kensington characteristically replied by assuring Charles that aU would come right in the end, by praising the Princess, who was ' for beauty and goodness an angel,' and by recounting how she, having borrowed a luiniature of the Prince which hung about his neck, ' opened it with such haste as showed a true picture of her passion, blushing in the instant of her own guilti- ness.' ^ All this was very delightful to a lover, but it would April 13. not go far to help on the pohtical alliance between the opinion on two kingdoms. Sir Edward Herbert, who had been of FrancI for some years the English ambassador in France, and who knew the country too well to be deceived by the gossip of the Queen Mother or the blushes of a girl of fourteen, formed an opinion very different from that of Kensington. The object of the French he thought was to make themselves arbiters between England and the house of Austria ; he therefore advised his master to bring them ' to some real and infallible proofs' of their intention to assist England ' in 1 Kensington to Buckingham, Feb. i6, Feb. 26 (both letters printed without a date). Cabala, 290, 286. Kensington to Conway, March 4. 8. P. France. ' We learn tbe Prince's opinion from Kensington's answer to Buck- ingham's letter of March 3. It is dated March 9. S. P. France. ' Kensington to the Prince, March 9. Cabala, 288. E 2 Germany ? 52 BUCEINGHAM'S ASCENDANCY. the recovery of the Palatinate at the same time or- before ' the marriage treaty was discussed. Otherwise they would ' want no excuse to keep themselves in peace of neutrality.' Herbert was the more confirmed in this view of the case by his knowledge that Lewis was anxious to send a diplomatic agent to the Elector of Bavaria. So unpalatable was the remonstrance made against this proposal by the English ambassador^ that means were taken to induce James to recall him ; and in fact the letter ordering him to return home had been already despatched before his last note of warning reached England.^ Was France Herbert had been guilty of seeing too clearly where help m " the real difficulty lay. Whatever interest Lewis had in the matter lay in opposing Spain, and Spain alone. As a devout Catholic he would naturally wish to confine his operations in Germany within the narrowest possible limits. To send an embassy to the Elector of Bavaria was precisely the step likely to be taken by a man in his position. The victories of Tilly and the League would have been positively gratifying to him if only they could be dissociated from the formidable growth of the Spanish power. To join James in driving out Catholic rule and Catholic worship from the Palatinate' might possibly be regarded by Lewis in the light of a political necessity, but it would never be considered by him as desirable in itself. The overtures which had been made to James in vain through Francesco della Eota, were certain to be acceptable to Lewis as placing the education of Frederick's children in Maximilian's hands, and leading almost certainly to a rivalry between him and the house of Austria. ' Herbert to Calvert, Jan. 26, Feb. 6, March 10. Herbert to the King, April 13. & P. France. Tilli^rea to Ville-aux-Clercs, 'f^V Harl. MSS., 4593, fol. 194, b. THE STRUGGLE FOR THE VALTELLINE, 53 Nor was the divergence of the views of the two chap. kings about the Palatinate the only difficulty in the way of a cordial co-operation between France and England. \^^' Lewis had a Palatinate of his own in the Valtelline, TheFrench ' anxious that long and narrow valley which, stretching from the jj)™* '.'^^ o •' . ° Valtelline. Lake of Como to the Tyrolese mountains, offered the only way of communication by which Spanish armies could pass from Italy into Germany without en- croaching upon the possessions of states more or less openly hostile. It was now in the grasp of Spain by a very questionable title. The Eoman Catholics, who formed almost the entire population, had been treated with extreme harshness by the Protestant Grison Leagues, the masters of the whole valley. In 1620 the people of the Valtelline rose against their oppressors, massacred the few Protestants upon whom they could lay their hands, and called the Spanish governor of Milan to their help. In spite of the remonstrances of France, the Spaniards took the aggressive and carried fire and sword into the heart of the Grison mountains. At last a league of resistance was formed between France, Venice, and Savoy, and in the spring of 1623 Spain nominally relinquished its authority over the Valtelline and entrusted the valley to the Pope. But Spanish garrisons still occupied the principal fortified posts, and the King of Spain refused to withdraw them unless the right of passage through the Valtelline were secured to his soldiers by treaty. In 1624 matters were stiU unchanged, and French politicians were looking forward to a war for the recovery of the Val- telline as eagerly as English politicians were looking forward to a war for the recovery of the Palatinate. Here at least there was no risk that success would be attended with any danger to the interests of the Eoman Catholic Church. If the Palatinate were reconquered 54 , BUCKINGHAM'S ASCENDANCY. CHAP, by the German Protestants, even with French aid, it ■ — ^ — ' would be very difficult for Lewis to secure the hold April.' which the priests of his religion had taken upon the country. If the Valtelline were reconquered by the petty Grison states with the help of France, Venice, and Savoy, it would be easy enough for those who gave the assistance to take effectual steps for the cessation of persecution for the future. ^^°ser rf Here then, as Herbert perceived, and Kensington aUiance ^[^ not pcrceivc, lay the danger in the course which France. the EngUsh Government was bent on pursuing. The general direction of the policy of the two countries was the same, but the secondary objects at which they aimed were different. It was a case in which England had every reason to keep up a good understanding with its powerful neighbour, but in which an attempt to form too close an alliance would almost inevitably lead to mutual irritation, if not to an open breach. Expecta- Unhappily, great as was the difference of character England, of the thrcc men at the head of affairs in England, they were all equally sanguine that others would do that which they wished them to do. The hesitating James, the reticent Charles, the hasty Buckingham, had no idea that they were in any respect unreason- able in asking the French Government to do precisely that which they wanted done, in the precise way in which they thought best. The French on their part nourished the deception. They too had their own ends to serve, and in the eagerness with which the English court was seeking their friendship they saw a ready means of gaining their own objects whilst giving as little as possible in return. French ijo Fraucc then, for the present,'' the German war view of the ^ ^ ^ ' warinGer- -^pag sccondary to the project for the recovery of the Valtelline. All that was wanted in Germany was to create a disturbance which would be sufficient to pre- LULL IN THE THIRTY YEARS* WAH. 55 vent the armies of Italy from coming to help the chap. Spanish forces in the Italian valley. When the Val- . ^i . telhne was recovered, then, and not before, would be '^^4- the time to consider what was to be done in Germany. To any one with an eye to see it was obvious, from Mansfeu •' •' in Holland. the shape which the first project of French co-opera- tion with England took, that nothing more was meant. If there was a man in Europe who was unfit to stand at the head of any serious movement in Germany, that man was Mansfeld. That unscrupulous adventurer knew how to plunder friend and foe better than he knew how to conduct war. By the Catholics he was regarded with a well-deserved ferocity of hatred, whilst aU Protestants who had anything to lose shrgnk from him as they would shrink from the plague. He had not even the merit of success. To send Mansfeld into Germany was to invite defeat by the provocation which his mere presence would give to all peaceable citizens. Early in the spring, Mansfeld was once more in Holland looking out for an employer. The great German war, for a moment, had sunk down into quietude, and it seemed as if the Emperor's authority would be acknowledged from the North Sea to the Alps. At this moment Du Maurier, the French am- bassador in Holland, advised Mansfeld to go to France. Upon his arrival Lewis, for form's sake, refused to see JUs visit him, but Mansfeld was informed that he might be em- ployed in an attack upon Franche Comt^ in order to divert the Spanish troops in the Netherlands from sending reinforcements to the Valtelline.-' As soon as Mansfeld's assent was gained he was sent over into 1 " Se non si tro vasse modo d'aggiustaie negotio della Valtellina dovera essere impiegato dalla Francia all' invasione della Borgogna Contesa." Siri, Mem. Bee. v. 526. Siri wrote from the despatch of the Florentine agent in Paris. 56 BUCKINGHAM'S ASCENDANCY. CHAP. II. 1624. April. April 5. Charles's pledge about bis marriage. April 14. Mansfeld in England, April 16. England in order to persuade James to take upon him- self a share of the expenses of the undertaking. As the reconquest of the Valtelline would have an appre- ciable effect in diminishing the power of the house of Austria, it cannot be said that the scheme was one of purely French interest. But it is certain that neither James nor the Bnghsh Parliament were likely to con- template with satisfaction such a use of English troops or of English money. The difficulties in the way of the French alliance were not confined to these military questions. On the 5th of April, when the Commons sent up to the Lords their petition against the Eecusants, Charles went out of his way to swear that, ' whensoever it should please God to bestow upon him any lady that were Popish, she should have no further liberty but for her own family, and no advantage to the Eecusants at home.' The enforcement of the laws against the English Catholics was thus, in Charles's mind, a policy likely to be entirely unobjectionable to the French King whose alliance he was courting. On the 14th of April Mansfeld arrived in London. By the Prince he was eagerly received. He talked confidently of seizing Franche Comt^ and then falling upon the Austrian lands in Alsace and Swabia.^ Apartments were as- signed to him in St. James's Palace, the very room being given him which had been prepared for the Infanta. Whenever he appeared in the streets the people followed him with shouts of applause. On the 1 6th he was taken to see James at Theobalds. He touched the heart of the old King by the fluency with which he spoke of the recovery of the Palatinate as a ' This must be meant by his offer ' d'attaquer les pais h&Sditaires de la Maison d'Autriche.' Tillieres to Ville-auxT-Clercs, April |§. Sari. MSS., 4523, fol. 239. him. MANSFELD IN ENGLAND. 57 thing not so very hard to be accomplished. If his chap. Majesty, he said, would give him 10,000 infantry and ■ — ; — - 3,000 horse, six guns, and 20,000^. a month, he would . .ft; - ' o ' ' ' April 16. need no more. With such a force he would levy con- tributions to make up all deficiencies. France, Venice, and Savoy would assist if it were merely on account of the interest which they took in the Valtelline, but it was absolutely necessary that a commencement should be made in England.^ James was evidently pleased. The Palatinate, he Apru is. repeated for the hundredth time, must be recovered, ment with whatever its recovery might cost. But he had not abandoned his usual caution. He entered into an engagement to furnish Mansfeld with the thirteeen thousand men, and the 20,000^. a month for which he asked. But he accompanied his engagement with Ap 1 25. a declaration that his promise would only be vahd if the King of Erance would entrust the German com- mander with a similar force. The joint army woidd then be used " for the recovery and recuperation of the Palatinate and the Valtelline." ^ On the 25th Mansfeld left England. The few Mansfield days which he spent in London had been passed in a }and!^^"^' whirl of popularity. Men pressed forward to have the honour 'of touching the edge of his cloak; the Arch- bishop of Canterbury received him as he stepped out -of his boat on the Surrey side of the Thames, and the Earl of Carhsle conducted him in state as far as Eochester.^ ' D. Carleton to Elizabeth, April 24. S. P. JDom., clxiii. 48. ^ Mansfeld'a engagements, April 18, 24; the King's Declaration, April 25. S. P. Germany. Rusdorf to Frederick, April; MSmoires de Rusdorf, i. 283. 3 Eusdorf to Frederick, ^^f ; Ibid. i. 289. The estate gianted to Mansfeld, according to some Continental writers, has no existence in reality. 58 BUCKINGHAM'S ASCENDANCY. CHAP. II. 1624. April 15. English prepara- tions for war. April 18. April 21. The Coun- cil of War. April 23. Answer to the Recu- sancy pe- tition. He was able to take with him the news that pre- parations for war were being carried on in earnest in England. On the 1 5 th, the day after his arrival, Com- missioners had been at last appointed to treat with the Dutch about sending troops to their assistance. On the 1 8th orders had been given to fit out twelve ships of the Eoyal Navy.^ On the 21st a Council of War had been appointed, and the names of its members were such as to give every assurance that its deliberations would be conducted with ability. Lord Grandison, who, as Sir Ohver St. John, had crowned a long mili- tary career by services as Lord Deputy of Ireland ; Lord Carew, the Master of the Ordnance, and former President of Munster ; Lord Brooke, the Fulke Gre- ville of Sydney's days ; Lord Chichester, the soldier and statesman ; Sir Edward Conway, Sir Edward Cecil, Sir Horace Vere, Sir John Ogle, and Sir Thomas Button, formed a group which comprised all the available military knowledge of the time, whilst Sir Eobert Mansel held a high place for acquaintance with mari- time aflairs.^ It would be some time before James could hear how his proposal to assist Mansfeld would be re- ceived in France. But two days before Mansfeld went away James had used words which were not likely to help on the negotiation. In answering the Commons' petition against the Eecusants he expressed himself favourably to the request laid before him. He con- sidered himself unfortunate, he said, to need a spur to do that which his conscience and duty bound him to do. His heart had bled when he had heard of the increase of Popery. If he had known any way better ^ Commission, April IS; S. P. Holland; Warrant, April 18, S, P, Doni., clxiii. 4. * Warrant, April 21. S, P. Bom., clxiii. 18. THE KING AND THE ENGLISH CATHOLICS. 59 than another to hinder its growth he would have taken chap. it. Yet he had abstained from persecution, nothing ■ ^^ being more likely to increase a religion. He was now A^^fl; ready to banish the priests, and to direct the Judges to put the penal laws in execution. His subjects should be forbidden to frequent the houses of foreign ambas- sadors, or to bring up their children in the Koman Catholic faith. As for the request that no immunity for the English Catholics should be included in any treaty for his son's marriage, he heartily assented to it. " Now," he said, " for the last part of your petition. You have therein given me the best advice in the Noconcu- world ; for it is against the rule of wisdom that a king catiioiicsto should suffer any of his subjects to be beholden and treaty!''^ depend upon any other prince than himself ; and what hath any king to do. with the laws and subjects of another kingdom ? Therefore assure yourselves that, by the grace of God, I will be careful that no such condition be hereafter foisted in upon any other treaty whatsoever ; for it is fit that my subjects should stand or fall to their own lord." ^ James most likely meant all this at the time. The i^g^aJj'^;, increase which had lately taken place in the numbers If^^^ ^ of the Catholics, and which was doubtless in the main ^"y- to be attributed to the readiness with which timid or half-hearted converts declare themselves as soon as per- secution has ceased,^ was as formidable to him as it was to the House of Commons, and he was especially dis- inclined to make concessions to France after his past experience of the Spanish treaty. The answer thus ' Lords' Journals, iii. 317. ' Mr. Peacock's Idst of Roman Catholics in the County of York in 1604 is very instructive on this point. The recusancy of great numbers dates from James's accession ; that is to say, from the time when the fear of the penal laws was for a time removed. 6o BUCKINGHAM'S ASCENDANCY. Inojosa's fresh com- plaints against Bucking- ingham. Bucking- ham's ill- humour. given was generally regarded as satisfactory. The adoption by James of his son's promise about the French marriage treaty was especially grateful, though most of those who heard him would have been better pleased if he had announced that there would be no French marriage at all. ' In a wondrous fine speech,' Eliot pro- posed that the thanks of Parliament should be given to the King and the Prince ; and, though the motion was not adopted, the House gave a practical form to Eliot's expression of feeling by pushing on the subsidy bill as fast as possible.-^ At that very moment a fresh attempt was being made by Inojosa to shake the constancy of James. Seeking an audience, the Spanish ambassador repeated with his own mouth the charges against Buckingham which had formerly been brought by Lafuente and Carondelet. It was true, he insisted, that the favourite had conspired with Parliament to dethrone the master to whom he owed everything, in case of his refusal to make war upon Spain. If the King wished to test the truth of the assertion, let Buckingham's friends be asked, upon their oath, whether he had not made the proposal in their hearing. Tlie words so confidently spoken could not fail to make an impression upon the King. As soon as Inojosa left him he set out for Windsor, stopping at St. James's on his way, where Charles came out to meet him with Buckingham at his side. The tears stood in James's eyes as he repeated what the Spaniard had said. Charles accompanied his father. But Buck- ingham, though invited, remained behind. He must have justice, he said, against his slanderers. Till his innocence had been acknowledged, Windsor was no Nethersole to Carleton, April 25 ; S. P. Dom., clxiii. 50. INOJOSA'S ATTACK UPON BUCKINGHAM. 6 1 place for Mm. He would rather betake himself to the chap. . II Tower, and deliver himself up as a prisoner.^ ■ — ^ — - Inojosa next presented a paper to the King, A^^i'l' in which he admitted that his charges were ' not Further o statement such as could be made to appear by legal and by inojosa. judicious proofs.' Men, he said, were too much afraid of Buckingham to teU the truth. Then followed a long tirade against the misdeeds of the favourite, which, even if it contained no exaggeration, was entirely irrelevant to the point at issue.^ Inojosa had not improved his position. On the Maya. 2nd of May the members of the Privy Council were council''^ called upon to answer a series of interrogatories which ^"™™""^ ■ had been prepared in order to sift the matter to the bottom. One by one the councillors swore that they had never heard any traitorous expression proceed from Buckingham's mouth. Inojosa's attempt to con- jure with the wand of Gondomar had failed entirely. When he came the next day to present his letters of recall, James refused to accept them. He must see him again, he said, before he left England. Some who were present hinted that there were precedents for calling ambassadors to account before the House of ' Valaresso's Despatch, ^^ ; Conway's Note, April 25 ; S. P. Bom., clxiii. 51 ; Rusdorfto Frederick, ^^^, May j\; Mimoires, i. 289, 294. Tillieres to Ville-aux-Clercs, ^f; Sari. MSS., 4593, fol. 2, 65. " Amongst Valaresso's despatches is a copy of this paper in Latin, probably the language in which it was presented. Copies in different languages are to be found almost everywhere in Europe. In the Cabala there is an English translation (ed. 1691, 252). In 1813, Mr. L3'sons printed it again in the ArchrD UPON THE COMPANY. 75 It is possible that the first suggestion that the fleet chap. should be arrested had proceeded from some indepen- ■ — ^-^ ■ dent member of the Lords' Committee. But the ,/^?4- March lo. couicidence of the motions in the two Houses made it ^'''^ com- hard to persuade the Company that this was the case. cha>ge'i And a few days later he struck another blow in the piracy, quarrel. To the argument that no tenths were due because there had been no letters of marque, the rejoinder was easy that if there had been no letters of marque there had been an act of piracy. A suit was accordingly commenced against the Company in the joint names of Buckingham and the King. The damages were laid at 15,000^., and that too without prejudice to further claims.^ In vain the Company begged for mercy. " Did I ^^^/^(. dehver you," said James, " from the complaint of the lemma. Spaniards, and do you return me nothing ?" He was no tyrant, and they might have the benefit of the law if they pleased. But if they did not wish to try their case against him, he must have io,oooZ. for himself, as Hede- well as 10,000/. for Buckingham. To justify his S>!^. demand he proceeded to propound a dilemma. The goods, he said, were taken either justly or unjustly. If unjustly, the whole was forfeited. If justly, the Lord Admiral's tenth must be paid. Apparently the inference was that the Company was to pay the King on the ground that they had been taken unjustly, and Buck- ingham on the groimd that they had been taken justly. The Company' were in great straits. Their ships were still under embargo in the Thames. A few more days' delay would lose them the monsoon, and ruin Court Minutes, Marcli J, vi. 439- The motion made by Buckinghnm isgiven by Elsing as part of a report from a committee. The notice of the fleet may therefore have been taken in the committee by some other person. 1 Admiralty Court Eecords, 'No. 158; Book of Ads, fol. 204. paid. 76 BUCKINGHAM'S ASCENDANCY, CHAP, their prospects for a year. Necessity had no law, and > — -^ — ' io,oooZ. was offered to the King ' to shut up all jiinfe' businesses.' The money But this would uot do. James said that he must have as much for Buckingham. There was nothing for it but to submit. The whole 20,000^. was paid, and the fleet was allowed to sail. It seemed, as some one observed at the Company's meeting, as if ' ships stayed upon pretence of state might be released for money.' ^ Such was the mode in which Buckingham, this time with the full co-operation of the King, exercised the duties of his oJ0S.ce. Something, no doubt, was to be said against the Company on every count. The siege of Ormuz and the capture of the goods was an act of violence. The ships sailing to the East Indies might doubtless be called upon before they went to contribute their fair proportion to the defence of the realm. That .which admits of no justification is the way in which every argument was pushed just so far as suited the immediate purposes of the men in power and no further. There was enough legality about the • East India Cmnpany's Court Minutes, vt. 466-555. The receipt drawn up for Buckingham's signature ■was 'for io,oooZ. to the Lord Admiral, in full satisfaction for all pretences of right as Lord Admiral, for all actions past in the Indies, by sea or land, to the 30th of April last.' The King's receipt was — ' for 10,000?. now to be paid to the King, much challenged by his Majesty for freeing the Company's ser- vants out of prison, and the Company from the complaint of the Spanish ambassador, and the Company's ships outward bound released, which were secured by order of Parliament, until upon promise thereof they were afterwards released." Buckingham afterwards stated that he had lent 9,8ooZ. of the money for the equipment of the fleet, and this is corroborated by a letter written by him to Conway on the 14th of June in which he says, " I hope this morning will put an end to the business of the East India merchants for the moneys to be disposed to Mr. Oliver for the Navy.' Tanner MSS., Ixxiii. 447. Besides, the exact sum appears on a warrant from the Council of War, dated July 31, and was then probably repaid to Buckingham. THE MASSACRE OF AMBOYNA. 'j'j capture to extort one sum of money ; enough illegality oh.vp. to extort another. The Portuguese, who were the main — ^^ — - sufferers, were never thought of, save that the English \^-4- T June. ambassador was directed to inform the government at Madrid that the assailants at Ormuz had acted under compulsion from the Shah.^ It was probably only by coming to some under- 1623. standing with the other European powers for a terri- intheEfut. torial limitation between the trading grounds of the various nations, that such collisions as that which had taken place at Ormuz could be avoided for the future. Further to the East the experiment of a close combina- tion with the Dutch, which had been tried under the treaty of 1619,^ was already breaking down. Never had the feeling between the merchants of the two nations been more embittered than it was when they were bound to live at the same ports, and to share between them the same commerce in certain fixed pro- portions. As the most numerous and powerful body, the Dutch treated the English with studied unfairness, and the English gave vent to their feelings in such language as Englishmen are wont to use when they discover that they are being cheated. Early in 1623 the slumbering hatred burst into a Feb. n. flame. The castle of Amboyna, the main seat of the cie^of'Am-' clove trade, was guarded by the Dutch with peculiar "™''' jealousy. The English factory was only permitted to establish itself outside the fortifications ; and a body of Japanese soldiers in the Dutch service were equally excluded. On the night of the nth of February, however, one of the Japanese approached the Dutch sentinel, and asked some questions about the state of the defences. He was at once seized and put to the 1 Conway to Acton, June 27 ; S. P. Spain. * Prince Charles and tlie Spanish Marriage, i. 232, ii 292. 78 BUCKINGHAM'S ASCENDANCY. CHA?. torture. In his agony he confessed that his country- "—7 — ' men designed to surprise the castle. They, too, were jiay." tortured, and declared, or were made to declare, that the English were privy to the conspiracy. A drunken English surgeon, also under torture, acknowledged the truth of the charge. Nine other Englishmen, almost the whole of the English population of the town, were next subjected to the most horrible torments, and six others, residing at more distant stations, were sub- sequently sent for to be dealt with in the same bar- barous manner. Of course some of them gave way before their tortures, and confessed anything that was required of them. In the end ten of the sufferers were set aside for execution, and were beheaded without further evidence.^ The news News in thosc davs was lone in reaching England received iQ •/ o o c:* England, from the East. The massacre of Amboyna remained unknown till May 1624. At the meetings of the East India Company the tale gave rise to the greatest indig- nation. The story, as it was received from the Dutch, was in the highest degree incredible. The whole Eng- lish population inculpated amounted to no more than twenty men, who were hardly likely, in the face of past experience, to attempt to right themselves against the overwhelming forces of their opponents. But the case of the Company against its Dutch rival did not end here. Even if the unfortunate men had been guilty of all that they had admitted under torture, the governor of Amboyna would not have been justified in touching a hair of their heads. By the treaty of 16 1 9, all disputes between the nations were to be referred to the mixed Council of Defence ; and, if they could not be settled in this way, were to be referred * Brookedon and others to the Company ; E, I. C. Orig, Coir., lo, II, 30; Ptuc/ias,ii. 1853. 4 ENGLAND AND THE DUTCH GOVERNMENT. 79 home for negotiation between the two Companies, or, chap. in the last resort, for negotiation between the two ^ V" — Governments.^ 1624. There has seldom been a moment in our history Compara- when such an outrage would not have roused England iaEngUuI from one end to the other. But, when the news ar- rived, the nation was in no mood to listen to charges against the enemies of Spain. At first, indeed, there seems to have been some little excitement. But it quickly died away.^ The time had not yet come when the commercial difierences with the Netherlands would seem greater than the rehgious differences with Spain ; and by the middle of July revenge for the massacre of Amboyna appears to have been no longer thought of by the mass of men. The King was more deeply affected by the sad Juiy. story than any one else. He was the author of the mZif^ treaty which, by bringing his subjects into such close ''''^' neighbourhood with the Dutch, had made the massacre possible. He now told Caron, the Dutch ambassador, that, if justice were not done by the 1 2th of August, he would take his own measures to enforce it.^ Yet how was England, at such a moment, to Junes. quarrel with her neighbours in Holland? The STDurcilI' alliance with the Dutch had been the corner-stone of the pohcy of the House of Commons, and, though ' The treaty must be interpreted by the agreement between the Com- panies appended to it. * Chamberlain to Carleton, June 5, June 19; D. Carleton to Carle- ton, June 26 : S. P. Dom. clxvii. 16, clxviii. 8,48 ; Dutch Commissioners to the States General, June ^; Add. MSS., 17, 677, k, fol. 369. But, as early as the 31st of May, we hare a statement that 'it is said that the Company is much blamed by some, for that now, in a time when his Majesty had resolved to aid the Dutch, the Company had published the putting of ten Englishmen to death ; ' E. I. C. Court Minutes, x. 541. ' Caron to the States General, July 16; Add. MSS., 17, 677, k, fol. 576. 8o BUCKINGHAM'S ASCENDANCY. James was unwilling to limit the war within the narrow bounds which seemed sufficient to the Lower House, he had fully accepted its designs, so far as they went. On the 19th of May an order had been given to equip thirty merchant vessels in addition to the twelve ships of the Eoyal Navy which were already in an advanced stage of preparation.^ Directly after the prorogation the negotiation with the Dutch Commissioners was Junes- taken up warmly, and on the 5th of June a treaty was signed by which . England agreed to pay, for two years, a body of six thousand volunteers to be sent over to aid the States General in defending their in- dependence.^ James seemed to be going fairly on in the way in which Buckingham would lead him, and there is no reason to suppose that he was in any way half-hearted in what he was doing. But he was less able than ever to perceive the necessary consequences of his actions. He thought that he could send troops to the aid of the Dutch, and fit out his navy, without breaking abso- lutely with Spain. Coioma'a Of coursc the Spanish ambassadors could not see things in this light. Coloma protested warmly against the levies as an infraction of existing treaties. On the other hand Inojosa intimated that he had fresh proposals to make about the restitution of the Palatinate. He was told that James would not see him, but that he might tell his secret to any Privy Councillor he chose. Ino- josa refused to address himself to any one but the King; upon which he was informed that the sooner he and Coloma left England the better it would be. Coloma replied that he was under orders to remain till his suc- cessor arrived. Inojosa was only too glad to escape. ' Signet Office Docquets, May 19. ' Treaty, June 5 ; S. P. Holland. protests. ENGLAND AND SPAIN. 8 I There were fresh insults in store for him. No carriages chap. were provided to take him to Dover. Even his request - — i^ — • for the protection of a Eoyal ship against the Dutch j^^^^e cruisers was refused, and it was only after a delay of Jnojosa ' .; •; leaves Eng- some days that he was allowed to take his passage in i™'^- one of the merchant vessels which had been recently taken into the King's service, and which was conse- quently entitled to carry the Eoyal colours. On the day of his departure James wrote to complain to PhiUp of his ambassadors' conduct, requesting that they might be punished for their misdemeanour.^ Coloma had indeed a thankless task in remaining in Bickerings England. Every day some new cause of offence was spain™nd brought before his notice. At sea, so at least it was ^"s'and. believed in England, Spaniards were already engaged in plundering English vessels. In Spain an embargo had been laid upon the goods of English merchants, and their ships were being confiscated, on the charge of having Dutch goods on board. Nearer home the Dunkirk privateers were making prize of English vessels engaged in trade with Holland ; and, pushing up towards the mouth of the Thames in search of their enemies, had committed hostilities as high as Queenborough. Nor was it only from private and unauthorised attacks that danger was apprehended. A large fleet was fitting out in Spain, the destination of which was carefully concealed.^ Part of this fleet, how- The Dnn- ever, was placed by accident in the hands of the Eng- fn*hf '^* lish government. A squadron setting out from Dun- °°"''^- kirk to join the rendezvous in Spain was chased by the Dutch, and four of its galleons took refuge in the 1 Coloma to the King, ^S; The King to Aston, June 26; S. P. Spain; Conway to Oarleton, June 12; S. P. Holland; Salvetti's News- letters, June |i, If. ' Conway to Acton, June 27 ; Acton to Conway, July i ; S. P. Spain. VOL. I. G 82 BUCKINGHAM'S ASCENDANCY. CHAP. Downs. James refused to treat them as enemies. But — r^ — ■ neither would he accede to Coloma's request that he Oct! would grant them the usual privileges of neutrality, Three of ^ud would aUow them to sail with the advantage of tnem es- o cape. two tides.^ For three months the weary crews waited for deliverance till the equinoctial gales at last set them free. Putting to sea in the height of the tempest, three of the ships succeeded in regaining Dunkirk. The fourth was attacked by a Dutch vessel, and blew up, together with its assailant.^ June. Short, therefore, of an actual declaration of war gramme of with Spain, Buckingham had succeeded in carrying ofCom™^ James with him in the fulfilment of the programme riTd out"^ laid down in the Subsidy Act. The reinforcements to the Dutch and the equipment of the fleet had received prompt attention. The repair of the forts and the sending of reinforcements to Ireland waited only till money came in. Even the King's hesitation to declare war against Spain was at this time ascribed by one who had good opportunities of knowing the truth, not so much to any hankering after his old alliance with Phihp, as to his high estimate of the risks of such a war if it were entered upon without alhes. " The King," wrote Nethersole a fortnight after the proroga- tion, " is resolved not to break with Spain, nor to give them any occasion to break with him, until he be secure that France will join very close with him, and other CathoUc Princes and States which have the same interest against the greatness of Spain ; as being of opinion that all the Protestants in Europe would be too weak a party to oppose it, and that if they should 1 Many of Coloma's letters on the subject are in the State Papers (Spain), and there are frequent notices of it in the Domestic series, and amongst Salvettis Newsletters. " Salvetii s Newsletters, Oct, j\, |§. JAMES'S DIPLOMACY. 83 join against Spain without the drawing of other Ca- chap. tholic Princes into the action, it would be understood - — ^i — - to be a war of religion, which would leave no ^^^'^' _. . . o ' June. Catholic Fnnce neuter, but cause them all to join with Spain."! No one who has seriously studied the course which PoUcy of history took during the next quarter of a century will be inclined to doubt the wisdom of James's hesitation. The power to which he was opposed was too firmly rooted in the ideas of men to be overthrown by such means as seemed sufl&cient to the House of Commons. If Protestantism was to defend itself it must be by ceasing to be aggressive, and by appeaUng to the political sympathies of CathoUc States. The policy of James was in the main the policy which, in after years, crowned Eichelieu with glory. Yet to the one man it had brought nothing but defeat and shame, to the other it was to bring success and honour. Where James knew but how to dream, Richelieu knew how to act. Of the various parts of the enterprise upon which Embassies James had embarked the negotiation with the Pro- md s^""" testant powers presented the least inherent difficulty. ^^°' In the beginning of June Sir Patrick Spens was despatched to the King of Sweden, and Sir Eobert Anstruther to the King of Denmark and the North German Princes.^ If, when Parliament met in the winter, assurances could be given to it that a strong Protestant force was ready to take the field, the House of Commons might perhaps be induced to reconsider its determination against sharing in the German war ; and, should this prove not to be the case, James would be clearly absolved fi-om any engagement to carry on 1 Nethersole to Carleton ; S. P. Bom., clxvii. 28. * Instructions to Spens, June 6 ; S. P. Sweden. Instructions to An- struther, undated ; S. P. Denmark. G 2 84 BUCKINQPIAM'S ASCENDANCY. CHAP. II. 1624. June. The nego- tiation with France. Views of Guslavus Adolphus. Mission of Wake. further a war which, with insufficient means, could only end in disaster. Far more difficult was the task of treating with the Catholic opponents of Spain. For in nothing is diplo- matic skill so necessary as in a negotiation between governments whose general interests coincide, whilst each has particular objects in view. James was anxious to recover the Palatinate. France was anxious to re- cover the ValteUine. The danger was great lest the French Government should use England for its pur- poses, and then kick away the ladder by which it had risen. And yet the offer of French aid was too tempt- ing to be rejected. The wisest pohcy was doubtless that which was laid down not many months afterwards by Gustavus Adolphus. The great Swedish King held, that the attack upon the house of Austria should be made by a Protestant alliance. Those who had a common cause would be able without difficulty to stand shoulder to shoulder in the fight. There was no reason, however, that advantage should not be taken of the divisions amongst the CathoHc States. Let France, Venice, and Savoy be invited to join, if they would, against Spain and the Emperor. But let not the union be too close. Eather let France and its Cathohc allies be invited to fight in Italy or the south of Germany, whilst England and its Protestant allies were fighting in the north of Germany.-' If such a plan as this had been adopted, it is possible that the French alliance might have ended less dis- astrously than it did. The military situation would have corresponded with the political situation. Account would have been taken of the prominent fact that the King of France and the Protestant sovereigns were Oxensljerna to Cameiariu.s, Aug. 24; Moeer, Patriotisches Archiv V. 42. CARLISLE'S MISSION. 85 only half agreed. The friction certain to ensue upon chap. such co-operation would have been diminished to a ■ — ^ — • minimum. But unhappily the three men who directed ^^ ^^ the course of afiairs in England were notoriously in- chned to close their eyes to unpleasant facts. Already Mansfeld had been despatched to France with pro- posals for a joint mihtary undertaking. Then followed Sir Isaac Wake, on his way to Italy to stir up Venice and Savoy. On May 17 Carlisle set out for Paris to Carlisle tie the knot between the two kingdoms by the flowery ^^"^^'^ bonds of a matrimonial alhance. James, Charles, and. Buckingham agreed in looking for the closest possible unity of action between France and England. 86 CHAPTER III. THE PKENCH MARRIAGE TREATY. James Hay, Earl of Carlisle, has been chiefly known in modern times as a spendthrift and a lover of the plea- 'jj^'*' sures of the table. Yet he was in many respects well Carlisle as a qualified to conduct the delicate negotiation with which negotiator. ^ t/-s t-ti he was entrusted. Compared with the courtly and volatile Kensington, with whom he was ordered to act, he may well rank as a statesman. His tried courtesy, and his special friendhness towards France, made him an acceptable person in the Court to which he was accredited, whilst he had a strong regard for his master's dignity, and a sympathy for the Protestant feeling in England, which would prevent him from be- coming, as his colleague had become, a mere echo of the sentiments to which it might please the Queen Mother and her ladies to give utterance. When he arrived he was received with open demonstrations of satisfaction from all, with happy glances from the bright eyes of the Princess, and with friendly words from the King.^ jnne. Herbert, however, who was still in Paris, doubted dou'btt ' whether all this meant much. " They do not spare," he wrote to James, " to profess openly that they have no disposition to come to a manifest rupture with Spain. Notwithstanding which, they have promised thus much already, that, in all that can be done by other means ' Carlisle and Kensington to Conway, May 27; S.P. France. NEGOTIATIONS WITH FRANCE. 87 than coming to an entire breach they will not fail to chap. give yonr Sacred Majesty contentment."^ ■ — ■ — - The first difficulty of the negotiation, however, May." turned upon the marriage treaty. Both James and rf^eTreaty Charles had assured Parhament that there would be no Enghsh article in favour of the English Catholics, and for the CathoUcs. present both James and Charles intended to keep the promise which had been given. Carlisle was instructed by James to say that ' the constitution of our estate cannot bear any general change or alteration in our ecclesiastical or temporal laws touching religion for so much as concerns our own subjects.' • Even for the Catholics themselves it would be better that they should rely on his own clemency than on a treaty with any foreign power. " For when," he added, " they shall have the reins loosed to them, they may, by abuse of favom" and liberty, constrain us, contrary to our natural afiections, to deal with them with more rigour than we are inchned to ; so as we may not article for dispensation and liberty to our Eoman Cathohc ■ subjects, but hold the reins of those laws in our own gracious hands. And you may assm'e that King and his ministers that, in contemplation of that marriage, we shall be the rather inclined to use our subjects Eoman Catholics with all favour, so long as they shall behave themselves moderately ; and, keeping their con- sciences to themselves, shall use their conversation without scandal." ^ May 31. The first meeting between the ambassadors and the the French commissioners named by Lewis took place on May 3 1 . without As was often the case in those days the progress of theEngiSI business was stopped by a question of precedence. Eichelieu was one of the commissioners, and claimed • Herbert to the King, June 2 ; 8. P. France. ' Instructions to Carlisle and Kensington, ffarl, MSS., 1584, fol. 10, 88 THE FRENCH MARRIAGE TREATY. honours as a cardinal, which the representatives of Pro- testant England were unwiUing to concede. At last the difficulty was got rid of by Eichelieu's taking to his bed under pretence of illness. He would thus cease to enter into competition with those who were seated round a table in the sick man's chamber. The next dispute was more serious. The EngHsh ambassadors oflFered to take up the treaty which had been sketched out in 1613, when a marriage had been contemplated between Charles and the Princess's elder sister Christina, and in which there was no mention of toleration except for the bride and her household. The French commissioners at once replied that this would not do. On their side they had drawn up articles framed upon the model of the Spanish treaty, and one of them contained an express engagement on the part of the King of England that no Catholic in his dominions should be molested on account of his religion. Further discussion did not tend to remove the diffi- culty. " ]!fo meia," said the ambassadors, " shall be per- secuted for being a Catholic. But if he goes to mass he wiU be punished for disobeying the law." After this it is not strange that an assurance that James should give a verbal promise of his intention to show favour to the Catholics made but little impression on Lewis. Nothing less than a written engagement, he informed Carlisle, would be satisfactory. James might keep this engagement secret if he pleased. But it was indis- pensable that it should be in writing.^ June. Whatever might be the value of the French alliance, drawsback. it ought to havc been evident that it was not worth purchasing on these terms. It was better to go to war without the help of France than to go to war without ' Ville-aux-01erc8 to Tilli6res, June i ; Lewis XIII. to Tillieres, June /^ ; ITarl. MSS. 4594, fol. 41, 64, b. FRIENDLINESS OF LA VIEUVILLE. 89 the help of the English Parliament. And if the pro\ chap. mises solemnly given by King and Prince were to be ^ — • heedlessly flung aside, it would be hopeless to expect ^ ^'^' the support of the House of Commons. Not indeed, that, at first, it seemed hkely that these promises would be broken, Tillieres, as soon as he was apprised of the difliculties raised in Paris, reported that, though James's scruples might perhaps be overcome, nothing was to be expected from Charles. The Prince was ' very hard,' having ' little inclination to satisfy France in these essential points.' He was surrounded by Puritans, and would soon be a Puritan himself.^ If Lewis's demand had been pressed in the harsh ^ Jjjne- 1 ■ 1 • • • 11 . . ^^ Vieu- terms in which it was onginally couched, the negotiation viue lunts ' o that the de- would probably have been strangled at its commence- mand was ment. But La Vieuville, with wisdom beyond that of to please his master, was little sohcitous for an engagement which " "^^' it was as impolitic to exact as to give, and he was very anxious to secure the practical co-operation of England in his resistance to Spain. But La Vieuville's wisdom was for others rather than for himself, and in pursuance of his own objects he allowed himself to use words which Lewis was certain to disavow as soon as they came to his ears. " Give us," he said to the English ambassador, " some stuff with which we may satisfy the Pope, and we will throw ourselves heart and soul into your interests." " They do here," wrote Carlisle, June 14. " let faU unto us that though they are bound to make these high demands for their own honour, the satisfac- tion of those of the Catholic party, and particularly for the facilitating of the dispensation at Eome, yet it will be always in your Majesty's power to put the same in execution according to your own pleasure ; and they do also with strong protestations labour to persuade us > Tillieres to Ville-aux-Clercs, June ^ ; Sari. MSS. 4594, fol. 59. 90 THE FRENCH MARRIAGE TREATY. CHAP, that when the articles of marriage shall be signed, they ■ — ^ — will enter into treaty for the making of a strict con- juu^ junction with your Majesty for the redress of the general affairs of Christendom, and will declare them- selves to espouse your Majesty's interests, so as both the treaties shall be ratified together." ^ French pre- To give Weight to thcsc words the French prepara- for Vm"" tions for war were hurried on. Already on the 31st of May a treaty had been drawn up by which France engaged to assist the Dutch with large sums of money, and immediately afterwards Venice and Savoy were asked to join in the support of Mansfeld. On the 19th of June three French armies were ordered to prepare themselves for active service. Two of these were posted respectively in Picardy and at Metz, whilst the third, being stationed on the frontier towaxds Franche Comte and Savoy, would be equally available for an attack upon the Palatinate, or for an attack upon the Valtelline.2 ' Carlisle to the King, June 14; S. P. France. The person from whom the idea about the Pope came is not mentioned in this letter. But in a later despatch (Carlisle and Holland to Conway, Oct. 9, S. P. France), the words given above are quoted as La Vieuville's — " Donnez nous de faate pour contenter le Pape, et nous nous jetterons dans vos in- tSrets a corps perdus." At a time when Charles had the greatest in- terest in showing that Lewis or Richelieu had encouraged the idea that the engagement was only offered to satisfy the Pope, with the express understanding that it might be disregarded in England, no one ever ventured to state that they personally had done so. The charge was always made impersonally, and had its foundation, I believe, upon these overtures of La Vieuville. Richelieu, indeed, when pushed hard, may have said, that without the engagement the Pope would not consent, and may have made civil speeches about his readiness to oblige the King of England if it were not for the Pope ; or even said that the King would not be bound in case of actual danger to the State from the Catholics. But I do not believe that he ever used words to imply that the whole engagement was a sham one, got up for the purpose of deceiv- ing the Pope. * Siri, Mem. Pec, v. 603; Kensington to Conway, June 15 ; S. P. France, EFFIAT IN ENGLAND. gi As far as it is now possible to ascertain the truth, chap. these measures made httle impression on James. He ^-^ • ordered the Judges to see to the execution of the penal DissaHs"^' laws.^ The French alhance suddenly ceased to form ^<="™ i° the staple of conversation at Court, and those who were behind the scenes began to make inquiries about the good looks of marriageable Princesses in Germany.^ La Vieuville saw that something more must be done LaVieu- if the negotiation was to be saved. He begged Ken- aie'couSe^" sington to return to England to propound a middle course. If James objected to sign an engagement, he would perhaps not object to write a letter containing the promise required. To give greater effect to this proposal, Tillieres, who had never given more than a half-hearted support to the marriage, was recalled. His successor was the Marquis of Effiat, a man endowed with much of the Effiat sent tact and ability of Gondomar. He had not been in .sadTto*" England many days before he found his way to the ^"s'™*"- heart of James by eagerly listening to his long stories about his triumphs in the hunting field. But he was too clear-sighted not to perceive that his chief effort must be made in another direction. Buckingham, now re- covered from his illness, was again at Court, and who- ever could gain the ear of Buckingham had gone far to secure the approbation of his master. The French demands which had startled James and July, his son, had not startled Buckingham. To embark ha"m gamed with all his heart upon some darling scheme, to cast ^ aside all obstacles as not existing, was the course dic- tated to Buckingham by his sanguine and energetic nature. He was now bent on chastising Spain and re- conquering the Palatinate. These objects he believed 1 Salvetti's Newsletter, June ||. = Nethersole to Carleton, June 25 ; S. P., Bom. clxviii. 40. 92 THE FRENCH MARRIAGE TREATY. CHAP, pould only be attained witli French aid ; if so, we may ■ -^ — imagine him arguing, the terms laid down by France j^^' must be complied with. When Europe was at his feet, who would think of reminding him of the Eoyal pro- mise that those terms should not be granted? He assured Effiat that he would stake his personal reputa- tion on the success of the marriage negotiations. He was ready to row in the same boat with him. If the marriage did not take place it would be his ruin.^ LaVieu- It was a momeutous resolution- — how momentous posai^ac™ for himself and for England, Buckingham little knew. JameB.**^ Bcfore Effiat's courteous flattery all difficulties faded away, and though the ambassador had not himself been entrusted with the secret of La Vieuville's suggestion, his presence was none the less favourable to its recep- tion. And after all, to write a letter could hardly be a breach of the Eoyal promise. When Kensington returned to Paris he carried with him the news that James was ready to embody in a letter his already declared resolution to show favour to his Catholic sub- jects. Aug. 2. James had taken but a little step in advance ; he Disgrace of r ' viJ'^" doubtless intended that the letter should not contain any binding engagement, but he had left the firm ground on which he had hitherto stood, and if he once began to discuss with a foreign sovereign the administration of the English law, it would be hard for him to know where to stop. Before long, he had to face the alterna- tive of going further or of drawing back altogether. When Kensington reached Paris he found that he had toiled in vain. La Vieuville's proposal about the letter had been made without his master's knowledge, in the belief that the thing when once done would be accepted ' Effiat to Lewis XHI., July j\ ; Harl. MSS., 4594, fol. i ij. RICHELTEU IN POWEE. 93 with gratitude. As soon as the truth came to the ears chap. of Lewis, he dismissed his too independent minister and • — r^ — ■ placed the direction of the government of France in August, the hands of Eicheheu. Whether Eicheheu concurred in the stringent Kieteiieu's o policy only demands which he was now instructed to put forward, '" beknown ., - bycorjec- it IS impossible to say. In the memoirs which he left tum behind, it was his studied object to falsify history in order to show that everything actually done proceeded from his own deliberate judgment. The real facts can often be shown, and still oftener suspected to have been very different from the representation which he has given of them. Instead of being the author of all that was done in his name, he was in these early years of his ministry the servant of a jealous master, who was careless indeed of details, and ready to leave high autho- rity in the hands of one capable of exercising it, but who took good care to exact submission to his general views. And for the present Lewis had made up his mind to demand from England, as the price of his sister's hand, concessions to the English Catholics which would make that alhance thoroughly unstable. This was the mistaken poUcy of which Eichelieu, willingly or unwillingly, made himself the mouthpiece. It is possible that, unversed as he was in Enghsh Parliamentary politics, he may have believed that the relaxation of the penal laws would be more easily attainable than it really was. At all events he had hardly any choice. If he refused his concurrence in the designs of Lewis he would fall as La Vieuville had fallen before him. The clergy, backed by a power- ful party at Court and in the country, would have stood up as one man to advocate the resumption of the old Aug. 4, friendly relations with Spain. Eicheheu, therefore, if Jem'lnlS'an he was to hold his ground, must speak plainly to the fteEnJ^h English ambassadors. He would preserve all forms of Cathohcs. 94 THE FRENCH MARRIAGE TREATY. courtesy, but they must understand that the concession demanded was a serious matter. Eichelieu, in fact, was not hkely to fall into La Vieuville's mistake of fancying his power greater than it was. He understood that the need of satisfying the Pope should still be pleaded for the unwelcome require- ments of Lewis. But he would take care that the Pope should be really satisfied. The King assured the ambassadors with studied politeness that the word of his dear brother would content him as well as either article or oath. But it would not content the Pope. The ambassadors betook themselves to the Cardinal. Was this the reply, they asked, which they were to deliver to their master. " Assuredly," answered Eiche- lieu, " if the King said there must be an article, an article there must be." " Is this, then," they asked again, " the answer we are to give?" " Yes," he re- A"s- 5- phed, " for you will find no other." The next day he spoke with the same resolution. " On my salva- tion," he said, " we must have either an article or a writing — baptize it by what name you will — signed and sworn to, so as to oblige the good faith of your King." Carlisle and Kensington betook themselves to the Queen Mother. " We let her know," to use the words of their own narrative, " the impossibility of it, both in regard of the engagement of his Majesty's Eoyal word to his Parliament to the contrary, and that upon the motion and prayer of the Prince his son ; and of the necessity of keeping himself free in that point to en- tertain good intelligence betwixt him and his subjects for the better enabling him to the common good." The ambassadors further reported that the Queen answered not a word, though she contrived, with all the grace of RICHELIEU'S TERMS. 95 her southern breeding, to look as if she would gladly chap. have satisfied them if she could.^ • — ^ — - Both James and Charles, who were together at Z^^"^' ^ Aug. 12. Rufford when the despatches announcing the new pro- Refusal of -^ '-' ^ James and posai reached them, agreed in rejecting the demand of his son to i- 1 All , . 1 T n agreetothe an article. A letter, they probably argued, would change, simply announce their intention of showing favour to the Catholics ; an article constituted an obligation. Conway was therefore directed to inform Effiat that if the arrangement made with La VieuviUe was to be dis- avowed, the negotiation must be considered as broken off.^ Charles was as decided as his father. " If," he ^"g- ^3- wrote to Carlisle, " you perceive they persist in this new way that they have begun, in making an article for our Eoman Cathohc subjects, dally no more with them, but break off the treaty of marriage, keeping the friend- ship on as fair terms as you can. And, believe it, ye shall have as great honour with breaking upon these terms as with making the alhance. Yet use what in- dustry you can to reduce them to reason, for I respect the person of the lady as being a worthy creatm-e, fit to be my wife ; but as ye love me, put it to a quick issue one way or other." ^ Effiat felt that his diplomacy would be tested to the Effiat ap- uttermost. His only hope lay in Buckingham, who was Bucking- drinking the waters at "Wellingborough, the curative ''*"■ properties of which had recently come into repute. Buckingham's aid was easily obtained, and he offered at once to accompany the Frenchman to the Court, which had by this time removed to Derby. On their Aug. 14. way they met a courier with despatches for the ambas- 1 Carlisle and Kensington to Conway, Aug. 7 ; S. P. France. ^ Conway to Carlisle and Kensington, Aug. 12; Sardw. St. P., i- 523. 3 Charles to Carlisle, Aug. 13; & P. France. 96 THE FEENCPI MARRIAGE TREATY. CHAP. III. 1624. Aug. 14. James gives way to some ex- tent. Aug. 16. Bucking- ham's let- ter to Lewis. Aug. Richelieu not con- tent. sadors in France. At EfEat's suggestion, Buckingham asked for the packet, broke the seal, and, having as- certained its contents, carried it back with him to James to demand its alteration. When he reached Derby, the whole Court was astir. The news that the marriage had been broken oflF was in every mouth. All that evening Buckingham was closeted with the King and the Prince. What passed between them we have no means of knowing, but the result was that Buckingham sent back the despatch to EfRat with about two-thirds marked for omission. Yet the French- man was far from having everything his own way. James still positively refused to concede the article which Eichelieu demanded. He told Effiat that in the face of Parliament such an article could never be admitted. But the promise which he would give in his letter should be so worded as to guarantee the Catholics against persecution.^ Would a mere alteration in the wording of the pro- posed letter be sufficient to satisfy the French Govern- ment? Buckingham at least hoped so, and wrote to Lewis, assuring him that his master could yield no further, and adding that, in his poor opinion, more could not reasonably be asked of him.^ To fancy, however, that such concessions would content the French Government was to mistake the meaning of the late change of ministry. La Vieuville's policy had been the policy of Protestant alliances in Germany, and he had fallen because neither the Queen Mother nor Lewis himself was ready for so starthng an innovation. What Mary de Medici aimed at by favouring her daughter's marriage with the Prince of 1 Effiat to Lewis XIII., Aug. II; fiiiW. Af *■ ^- -'^'■'»«««- ' " Ou " i.e. in Parliament, " il ee trouve a present en ombrages, pour n'avoir pas tenu ses paroles contre les dita Catholiijues. " THE FRENCH DEMANDS SUPPORTED BY CHARLES. lot man's hands the despatches of Carlisle- and Kensington chap. almost as soon as they were received. And it was not ^ — ^ — • long before he gained over the Prince, whose mind was ^g^^^" always fertile in excuses for doing that which at the Ti-a Pnnce '' ^o gamed moment he wished to do. <>''^^- The old King was thus isolated. For two whole -o^^iinot days he resisted the united pleadings of his favourite •''"""• and his son. On the third day he gave way so far as to accept the formula offered by the French. But he saved his conscience by insisting that it should take the shape of a letter and not of an engagement, either in the contract or out of it.^ "The business," wrote Sept. 9. Charles to Carlisle, forgetful of his decision taken less tion of the than a month before, " is all brought to so good an issue that, if it is not spoiled at Eome, I hope that the treaties will be shortly brought to a happy conclusion, wherefore I pray you warn your Monsieur that the least stretching more breaks the string, and then Spain will laugh at both."^ One formality remained to be fulfilled. It was the The treaty custom in England, as Buckingham explained to Effiat, to the to submit treaties either to the Privy Council or to a °"°° ' select committee of its members. It was the more necessary to take this course now as he had little doubt that in the approaching session of Parliament an attack would be made upon him for advising the King to stop the execution of the Eecusancy laws. If the Privy Councillors could be made partakers in the offence, they would be unable to open their mouths against him ^ as members of either House. What passed in the Council we do not know. Such a consultation, invited only after the King's mind had I Effiat to Ville-aux-Clercs, Sept. ii; Earl. MSS., 4595, fol. 317; Conway to Carlisle and Kensington, Sept. i| ; S. P. France. * The Prince to Carlisle, Sept. 9 ; S. P. France. » Effiat to Ville-aux-Clercs, Sept. ii ; Hart MSS., 4595, fol. 317. I02 THE FRENCH MARRIAGE TREATY, CHAP, been made up, can scarcely have had any real value except for the purpose indicated by Buckingham. The \^l' resolution taken was conveyed to the ambassadors in English '''^ Paris. ".His Majesty," wrote Conway to them, "cannot Govern- be won to any more in largeness of promise or any other form, it being apparent to all this kingdom what promise the Prince hath made and the King approved, not to enter into articles or conditions with any other Prince for the immunities of his subjects Eoman Catholics, that being indeed to part his sovereignty, and give a portion to another king." ^ It was a poor shred of comfort for James to wrap himself in. A letter engaging that the Enghsh Cathohcs should have as much freedom in the secret exercise of their religion as they would have had by the treaty with Spain might not form part of the contract, but its difference was not great, excepting that a promise given in a letter might be broken with a little less reluctance than a promise given in a contract. Sept. James began to act on the assumption that everv- ton created thing was Settled. Kensington, whose facile compliance Holland, with the Frcnch demands had endeared him more than ever to Buckingham, was raised to the Earldom of Hol- land in approbation of his conduct. Suppres- The Privy Council had consented, not merely to the proceed- form of the treaty, but also to that which was its neces- thf £"-'' sary consequence, the suspension of the laws against the Eecusants.^ The immediate result was most dis- astrous to a good understanding between the King and his people. Whether the promise given by James 1 Conway to Carlisle and Kensington, Harl. MSS., 1593, fol. 266. The letter is undated, but was probably written on Sept. j. " Effiat to Lewis Xin.,^1^; HarhMSS., 1596, fol. 17, b. Effiat speaks of a svpersedeas under the great seal, of which no trace is to be found on the Patent rolls. Probably there is some mistake arising from a foreigner's ignorance of legal forms. sants. PROSPECTS OF THE WAE. IO3 and ids son about the Catholics had been broken or chap. not, it was certain that the promise about summoning --^V"^. Parhament in November could not now be kept. How ^^^4- would it be possible to face the Commons? When Patiiament once the bride was in England it would be too late to ''""^"^ ' remonstrate on the conditions on which she had come. But if Parliament met before the step had been irre- vocably taken, who could answer for the consequences ? The Houses were therefore prorogued to the 26th of February, on the transparent pretext that London had become too unhealthy to be a safe place of meeting. Care was taken to. insert in the proclamation a state- ment that this course had been adopted in pursuance of the advice of the Council.^ The chances of winning over the hard heads of the Backing- House of Commons to an iTnpopular doBOiestic policy policy, with the aid of the charms of the young Queen were not very great. IJnless Buckingham could escape the consequences of his actions in a blaze of nadKtary glory, he was plainly doomed to be taunted with apostasy from the cause which he had voluntarily adopted. To some extent the news which reached him from the Continent sounded' hopefully in his ears. The Kings of Sweden and Denmark were bidding against one another for Enghsh support, and the Duke of Savoy was eager to make use of the English navy for designs of his own against Genoa. It was true that Buckingham ' Proclamation, Oct. i, Jtyiner, xvii. 625. The proiogation was really ordered ' for many weighty considerations, but principally this, that the respect of the Princess of France, and the reverence which will be given to her person when she shall be here, for those graces and virtues that shine in her, as likewise for the love and duty home to the Prince, being all joined in her, will not only stay the exorbitant or ungentle mo- tions that might otherwise be made in the House of Parliament, but will facilitate in his Majesty's proceedings those passages of favours, grace, and goodness which his Majesty hath promised for the ease of the Roman Catholics.' Buckingham to Nithsdale, Oct. (?) ; Ellis, ser. i, iii, 179. I04 THE FRENCH MARRIAGE TREATY. CHAP, had no money with which to pay the fleets and armies • — r-^— ' which he was busily organizing in his imagination. The ^^l^' supplies voted in the last session had been devoted to special objects, and he had just cut off for five months aU possibihty of obtaining more from a legitimate source. But financial considerations seldom obtruded themselves upon Buckingham. If the war were only once begun on a scale large enough to dazzle the world, he might safely, he fancied, throw himself upon the patriotism of the Enghsh nation. Jniy. It was a hazardous policy. Armies set on foot the counca upou the chance of future supphes are apt to be less supply dangerous to the enemy than to their own commanders. Mansfeid. ^^^ ^^^ -what else was to be done ? An attempt had been made in vain to divert some of the subsidy money to the support of Mansfeid. The CouncU of War had replied by asking whether the King would give them a written declaration that he needed the money ' for one of those four ends mentioned in the statute.' Weston, who had been sent to ask for the money, could not say that, but he knew ' that it was both his Majesty's and the Prince's pleasure.' He was told distinctly that without ' some particular warrant in writing nothing could be done.' ^ Questions ^^^ gveu if Buckingham had been able to raise the arising out " of Mans- monev which he needed, was it hkely that Mansfeld's feld 8 em- '' . „ , . , pioyment. armament would gain for him the good will of the House of Commons ? If the force which it had been proposed to levy had been directed towards the Pala- tinate, such an employment would have been entirely outside the circle of ideas within which the Lower House had been moving. But by this time Bucking- ham had reason to question whether Prance was ' Weston to Conway, July 31 ; S.P, Dom., clxx, 82. RICHELIEU'S PLANS. 105 disposed to give even that amount of satisfaction to the chap. wishes of the King of England. On the 26th of August - ■ "/' -< a league was signed between France, Venice, and Savoy l^^% for the recovery of the YalteUine: and in order to The League "^ ' . . for the re- prevent the Spatiish Government from bringing up coveryof fresh troops to resist the attack, it was arranged that iine. the Duke of Savoy, with the aid of a French force, should make an attack upon Genoa, and that Mansfeld should throw himself upon Alsace and the Austrian possessions in Swabia.^ ■ Whilst James and Buckingham, therefore, were Richelieu fondly hoping to make use of Richelieu for the recon- many. quest of the Palatinate, Eicheheu was planning how to make use of James and Buckingham for the reconquest of th.e ValteUine. Although the result of Marescot's embassy to Germany had been discouraging, Richelieu had assured the Elector of Bavaria that he need have no fear of an attack from France for at least a year, and Effiat was instructed to lay before James a plan for the pacification of Germany which bore a very close resemblance to those unsatisfactory overtures which had been made by Francesco della Rota in the preceding winter.^ RicheUeu was probably right in judging that this was as much as he could persuade his master to do for some time to come ; perhaps also in judging that it would be unwise for France to embark in open war tiU it was clear that she could find allies who could be trusted. But when Buckingham passed his neck under the yoke of the imperious Cardinal, he had certainly expected more than this. Towards the end of September Mansfeld was once Sept. ■^ Mansfeld again in ' Siri, Mem, Sec, v. 639, 680. England. ' Richelieu, M4m., ii. 405 ; Lewis XIII. to Etliat, Sept. j^ ; Sari. MSS., 4595; fol- 307- Io6 . THE FEENCH MAREIAGE TREATY. CHAP, more in England, to ask again for men and money. His "'--■< — ' English troops, if he persuaded James to entrust him ^Sept ^^^^ ^^J^ would be allowed to land between Calais and Gravelines close to the Flemish frontier.^ The King of France, he announced, was rieady to allow him to levy thirteen thousand men, and would, in con- junction with his allies, supply him with money for the purpose.^ But the French ministers, who had so pertinaciously demanded the strictest acknowledgment of the rights of the English Catholics, refused to bind themselves to any definite course in their military operations by a single line in writing. In the mean- while, Lewis wrote to Effiat informing him that what was given to Mansfeld was given ' for the afiairs of our league,' that is to say, for the support of his operations in the Valtelline. If the men could also be useful to the King of England and his son-in-law, he should be glad. After the marriage had been agreed upon, he would be able to deliberate further.^ Oct. Such was the position of afiairs at the time when A written ,_^. t-i-« engage- thc Eughsh Parliament was prorogued. Buckmgham, manded it would secm, had sold his master's honour for naught. frnm ^ France. To his thinking, indeed, the only course left to him was to push blindly on. If he had had his way, 20,oooZ. would have been placed at once in Mansfeld's hands. James listened, well pleased, to the talk of the adventurer, and amused him by recommending him to ask leave of the Infanta to pass through the Spanish Netherlands on his way to the Palatinate.* But there was still some prudence left in the English Court. The Council recommended a short delay till Lewis had 1 Lewis XIII to Effiat, ?^^; Harl. MSS., 4595, fol. 369. " Effiat to Lewis XIII.,^jff-; Sari. MSS., 4596, fol. 17, b. » Lewis XIIL to Effiat, |^; JTarl. MSS., 4596, fol. 33. ^ Rusdorf to Frederick, Oct. j\ ; Mdm., i. 377. . MANSFELD AND THE FRENCH. 107 given a written promise to allow Mansfeld's troops to chap. enter France, and to permit their employment for the > - ".''•-> recovery of the Palatinate. In the meanwhile Mansfeld ^^^^4- was to go to Holland to muster some Germans who were to take part in the expedition.^ In a few days James learned that he had reckoned The French without the French in respect both of the marriage and givTon^ of Mansfeld's army. CarUsle and Holland were plainly told that their master's letter, even if countersigned by the Prince and a Secretary of State, would not suffice, and were informed at the same time that there could be no offensive league for the present. " To capitulate in writing," said the French ministers, " would but cast rubs in the way of their dispensation, and make it alto- gether impossible ; since it must needs highly offend the Pope to hear they should enter into an offensive league with heretics against Cathohcs, and was like so far to scandalize the Cathohc Princes of Germany, as this King should lose all credit with them, whom yet he hoped to win to their better party." In vain the ambassadors remonstrated. Not a line in writing could be drawn from the French ministers. 'They could not,' they said, ' condescend to anything in writing ; but if the King's faith and promise would serve the turn, that should be renewed to us here, and to his Majesty likewise by their ambassador in England, in as full and ample manner as we could desire it.' A long altercation followed, and the English ambassadors broke off the interview in high dudgeon, saying that ' they knew not whether when the King their master should hear of this their proceeding he might not open his ear to new counsels, and embrace such offers as might come to him from other parts, and leave them 1 Eiisdoif to Frederick, Oct. ^^ A; M4m., i. 379, 381 ; Conway to Carlisle and Holland, 5ar*"• joined in urging his father to make the required con- cession. " Your despatch," he wrote to Carlisle, " gave us enough ado to keep all things from an unrecoverable breach. Tor my father at first startled very much at it, and would scarce hear reason, which made us fear that his averseness was built upon some hope of good overtures from Gondomar, who, they say, is to be shortly here, though I believe it not ; which made me deal plainly with the King, telHng him I would never match with Spain, and so entreated him to find a fit match for me. Though he was a little angry at first, yet afterwards he allowed our opinions to be reason, which before he rejected." ^ It was like Charles to suppose that his father could not be really influenced by the motives he professed, and to fancy that it was impossible for any one to differ from himself with any semblance of reason. Yet if the concession which he was now recommending had been laid before him six months before, he would doubtless have started back with amazement and horror. He had directly engaged that his marriage should bring ' no advantage to the Eecusants.'^ As for James, a loop-hole was still left to him. He had promised that ' no such condition ' should be ' foisted in upon any other treaty whatsoever.'^ He was not asked to do precisely that. 1 The Prince to Carlisle, Oct. 19 ; S. P. France, 2 P. 56. ' P. 59- no THE FRENCH MARRIAGE TREATY. CHAP. He was to keep his word in tlie letter, whilst breaking ■ — r-^— - it in its spirit. The article, separate from the treaty, ^ol^' "was to be called a private engagement. But it was to be made as binding as possible by his own and his son's signature, attested by that of a Secretary of State. Surely this was enough to startle James without its being necessary to seek for an explanation of his reluctance to give his assent in some imaginary over- tures from Gondomar. James gives To his own disgrace Charles had his way. James ^^■' had not strength of mind enough to break up the alliance on which he had counted for the restoration of The French the Palatinate. Orders were sent to the ambassadors iDCTfand to accept the French proposals. But what was James Mansfeid. ^^ ^^-^^ • ^^ retum ? The verbal promise • of support to Mansfeld, which was all that Lewis offered, was plainly not worth having. "We think it not fit," wrote CarHsle and Holland, " to express by writing the sense we have of the proceedings of the French." ^ Lewis, in fact, had agreed to declare his intention of continuing his contribution to Mansfeld for six months, and of allowing it to be used for the recovery of the Palatinate^ If, however, ' the affairs of the Palatinate were not settled within this time, his Majesty would continue in every way which he might consider most fitting, to testify to his brother the King of Great Britain his desire that he might receive contentment in the matter of the Palatinate.'^ Against this wording the ambassadors protested. Instead of declaring that he would aid ' in every way which he might consider most fitting,' Lewis might at least say that he would aid in every way that was most fitting. They were told that this could not ' Carlisle and Plolland to Conway, Oct 28 ; S. P. France. » Ville-nux-Clercs to Effiat, ^^f ; Harl. MSS., 4596, fol. 45. SIGNATURE OF THE TREATY. Ill be. In that case, they rephed, they would rather not chap. listen at all to so illusory a promise. Acting, no doubt, - — r-^— ' in pursuance of orders from England, they said that ^octt they would be content with a simple promise to pay Mansfeld for six months. To this Lewis cheerfully con- sented, and, in giving the promise, added a few words still vaguer than those to which objection had been taken. " As to the continuance of my assistance for the Palatinate," he said, " let my good brother the King of Great Britain confide in my afiection, which I will show by my deeds and acting rather than by my words and promises."^ On these terms the marriage treaty was signed by Nov. lo. the ambassadors on November lo. It needed only the rfage treaty ratification of the King of England and the grant of the Papal dispensation to be carried into efiect. What was now to be done for Mansfeld ? Was he, something without any real understanding with France, to be forMans- launched into the heart of Germany ? And if a scheme so rash was to be persisted in, where was the 20,000^. which James would be called upon to pay month by month. The exchequer had not in it a farthing ap- plicable to the purpose. The Council of War had shown by its former answer that its members did not believe that the subsidies were intended to be expended in such a way, and without an order from the Council of War the Parliamentary Treasiurers could give nothing. But for the tiirn which the marriage arrange- ments had taken. Parliament would by this time have been in full session, able either to grant the sum re- quired or to give the King plainly to understand that no further subsidies would be forthcoming for the purpose. 1 Carlisle and Holland to Conway, Oct. 28, Nov, 12; Hardw. St. F, i, 523 ; S, P. France, 112 THE FRENCH MAERIAGE TREATY. CHAP. In default of Parliament, application had again been ^- — r-^— ' made to the Council of War. Payments for such an ^^^^^' expedition as Mansfeld's were perhaps covered by the Where was letter of the Subsidy Act, as being intended to assist money to j ? o be found? « other his Majesty's friends and allies,' but they were certainly in contravention of its spirit. Besides, even if this had not been the case, there was no money really applicable to the purpose. It would tax all the powers of the Treasurers to meet the demands made upon them for the four points expressly named in the Act, and it was only by neglecting one or other of them that it would be possible to divert something for Mansfeld. By what arguments the Council of War was swayed we do not know. But on October 4 a warrant, Nov. 24. followed up by another on November 24, was issued oufrfThe by that body to empower the Treasurers to advance subsidies. jj^qooZ. for the expenses of levying troops for Mans- feld, and 40,000^. to pay his men for two months.^ Oct. 29. On October 29 orders had been given to levy Nov. 4. 12,000 pressed men for this service.^ On November England.'" 4 Mausfcld landed at Margate on his return from IJoUand. On the 7th he received a comission em- powering him to take command of the troops. He was to use them for the recovery of the Palatinate, doing nothing against the King's friends and allies, He is not to especially doing nothing against 'the lands and do- Sp"!ui'ish minions of .which the King of Spain our very dear territory, 'brother, and the Infanta, have a just and legitimate possession.'^ ' Abstract of the warrants of the Council of War, June 1625 ; S. P. Dom., Charles I., Addenda. * Signet Office Docgttets, Oct. 29, ' Rusdorf to Frederick, Nov. 5 : The King to Mansfeld, Nov, 7 ; Rusdorfs Mem., i. 390, 392. MANSFELD'S PROSPECTS. Ilj The troops, in short, were to be used for the pur- chap. poses for which they were intended, and for nothing -- else. If a war with Spain must come, let it come ^^^^' after due deliberation, and not as the result of one of those raids which Mansfeld knew so well how to plan and to execute. Assuredly reasons were not wanting to justify Little pros- James in the policy of carrying the war into Germany cess. • rather than against Spain. But there is nothing to be said for the means which he adopted to secure his end. Mansfeld himself was a man upon whom no dependence could be placed. Even in the little Court which gathered round the exiles at the Hague, he was no longer regarded with favour. Camerarius, one of the ablest of Frederick's counsellors, predicted that no good would come of his employment. " From this," he wrote, " the restoration of the Palatinate is not to be expected. Indeed I see many other objections ; and if Mansfeld has with him foreign soldiers, instead of an army for the most part composed of Germans, the whole Empire wiU be leagued against him. I fear, too, that Duke Christian ^ may combine with him, and he is alike hateful to God' and man. The time requires not such defenders." Broken and divided as Germany was, there was still some national feehng left. To fling a couple of ad- venturers with an army of foreigners into the heart of the country was not the way to conciliate this feeling. And as yet no arrangement had been come to with the German Princes. It was not upon any understanding with them that Mansfeld's projects were based. Nor, even if the chances of a foreign invasion had been greater than they were, was this invasion one which > i.e., Christian of Brunswick, the late Administrator of Halberstadt. VOL. I. I 114 THE FEENCH MARRIAGE TREATY. CHAP, could be regarded hopefully. For, of the two govern- •^ — r^ — ■ ments by which it was to be supported, one was anxious 'nov **^ employ the troops against Spain, whilst the other was anxious to employ them in Germany. There were, in fact, two policies, each of which was not without its merits. A close alliance with France to attack Spain would probably not have been without its fruits in- lightening the weight which pressed upon the German Protestants. On the other hand a close alliance with Sweden, Denmark, the Dutch Eepublic, and the Princes of North Germany would probably have been more directly effectual for the recovery of the Palatinate. In the first case the co-operation of the Northern Protestants ; in the second case the co-operation of France, would have to be regarded as of secondary importance. The course which was actually taken was the result of the several faults of James and Buckingham. It satis- fied the King's caution by the appearance of strength which he saw in an alliarice reaching from Stockholm to Paris. It satiefied Buckingham's impetuosity, because England in reahty stood alone, and was preparing to throw her only army into the toidst of Europe without any trustworthy or ascertained aUiance on any side. James's notion that it was possible to treat the question of the Palatinate apart, without giving offence to Spain, was one which could hardly bear the test of conversion into practical action.^ He had thought to mingle in a strife in which the passions of men were deeply engaged, without taking account of any- thing but their reason, and he had fancied that he could measure their reason by his own. He had expected his son-in-law to forget his injuries, and to consent to ' The impossibility of Spain remaining neutral if the Palatinate were attached, is clearly put in a letter from the Infanta Isabella to Philip IV., April j»5. Brussels MSS. PROMISES OF THE FRENCH GOVERNMENT. II5 take his place again at Heidelberg as a peaceable sub- chap. ject of the Empire. He had expected the King of Spain, • ^ — ■• in spite of the deep distrust which he entertained of ^■^^^' Frederick, to help him back into his old position. And Franken- he now expected the Infanta Isabella to surrender manded Frankenthal to an English garrison according to the inTnu! treaty made in the spring of the preceding year.^ The Infanta replied that she was quite ready to give up the town to an English garrison if James would send one to the gates ; but she declined to assure that garrison against the probable danger of an attack from the Imperialist forces in the neighbourhood. Clearly the Spaniards were not about to assist in the recovery of the Palatinate. Would France be more hkely to help than Spain France had been ? For a moment James and Buckingham §111 "^^ were able to flatter themselves that it would be so. On November 18 it was known in London ^ that, when the marriage treaty was signed, Lewis had promised with his own Eoyal mouth that Mansfeld should have liberty to land at Boulogne or Calais ; that the letters of exchange for the French share of his expenses had actually been seen by the ambassadors ; and that Eiche- lieu had assured CarHsle and Holland that ' they had not so much linked together two persons as two Crowns, and that the interest of the Palatinate was as dear to them as to the English.^ At the news that the treaty had been signed the Nov. 21. bells of the London churches rung out their merriest inSS peals, and healths were drunk to the future Queen of England around bonfires in the streets.* And yet the 1 Prince Charles and the Spanish Marriage, ii. 367. 2 Rusdorf to Frederick, Nov. 20 ; Mem., i. 394. " Carlisle and Holland to Conway, Nov. 12 ; S. P. France. *■ SalveUi's Newsletter, ^^. I 2 1 1 6 THE FRENCH MARRIAGE TREATY, CHAP. French Court had already made up its mind to draw- back from the shght engagement into which Lewis had j^^^^^- entered a few days before. The preparations for the vkw^'f attack upon the ValtelHne were now complete; and, Mansfeid's though it could not be known in Paris that the French force which had started from Coire on November 1 5 would sweep all opposition before it, there could be no doubt that the result would be determined long before Spanish troops could reach the scene of action from Flanders. So far as the Valtelline was concerned, therefore, there was no further need of Mansfeid's as- sistance. What steps Lewis and Kicheheti intended to take with respect to Germany in the next summer's campaign it is impossible to say. Most probably they did not know themselves. But we may be quite sure that they never seriously entertained the idea of allowing Mansfeld to pass through France to attack the Imperial garrisons in the Palatinate, whilst England remained at peace with Spain. To those who are desirous of abandoning their engagements a good excuse is seldom wanting. The Spanish Government at this time combined a full ap- preciation of the benefits of peace, with a firm deter- mination not to make those concessions which would alone make peace possible. In the past winter and spring Philip and Olivares had been quite in earnest in desiring to make peace in Germany, upon terms which would have secured the triumph of their own religion ; and in the spring they had been equally in earnest in desiring to make a final peace with the revolted Nether- lands, if only they could secure the opening of the Scheldt to the commerce of Antwerp, by which means, as the Infanta Isabella assured her nephew, the trade of Amsterdam would be entirely ruined. On July 3, the THE SIEGE OF BREDA. 117 day after her letter was written, news arrived in Brus- chap. sels that her overtures had been rejected at the Hague, — -^— ' and that the Dutch had entered into a league with France ^^^'f on the I ith. Spinola, who had remained inactive since The sie-e his failure at Bergen-op-Zoom in 1622, marched at the ° head of his army ^ to lay siege to Breda. To the Prince of Orange, Breda was no common town. In it was the house in which his ances- tors had dwelt whilst as yet the seventeen Provinces reposed peacefully under Spanish rule. Its- recovery from the enemy had been his own earliest mihtary exploit. Upon the ramparts and inundations by which Breda was guarded, he had lavished all the resources of his own consummate skill as a military engineer. " Have you seen Breda ? " he used to say to travellers who spoke boastfully of this or that fortress which they had visited. And now, as he was himself wasting away with enfeebled health and forced inac- tion, this town, so dear to him as a man and as a soldier, was in danger. The forces of the Bepublic were not sufficient to justify him in running the risk of an attempt to save it.' During his last visit to Holland, Mansfeld had The French suggested to Maurice that the English troops entrusted pioy aians- to him might be employed in reheving Breda.^ Lewis, Breda, too, who was sending over the secretary Ville-aux- Clercs to receive James's oath to the engagement he was to take about the Catholics, instructed him to argue that Mansfeld would be far better employed in suc- couring Breda than he would be in Alsace or Franche- Comte, especially as it would be impossible for him to march into the Palatinate in the winter.^ In fact, if > The Infanta Isabella to Philip IV., July j%, j\, 1| ; Brussels MSS. ' Villermont, K de Mansfeldt, ii. 240. » Instructions to Ville-aux-Clercs, Nov. ^ ; Harl. MSS., 4596, fol. 106. ii8 THE FRENCH MARRIAGE TREATY. CHAP. III. 1624. Nov. Unwilling- ness of James. Mansfeld was not to be used at Breda, it was difficult to say how he could be used at all.^ Even if the French had been more than half-hearted in the matter, it would have been premature to send him into Ger- many without any previous arrangement with the German Princes. And why, the French ministers might well argue, should James obj ect ? Six thousand soldiers were already serving in his pay under Maurice against Spain, and why should not twelve thousand under Mansfeld do the same ? It was perhaps hard to meet the logical difficulty. But James drew a line between assisting the Dutch against Spain, and sending an independent force with the same object. He had fallen back upon the belief that he could escape a war with Spain after all. The fleet, which in the beginning of the summer had been gathering in the Spanish harbours, had been called off across the Atlantic by the news that San Salvador, in BrazU, had been captured by a Dutch force, and there had, in consequence, been the less necessity for proceeding hastily with the equipment of the English navy. Lest Spain should take umbrage at what little had been done, James explained to the Infanta's agent that the ships which he was preparing were intended to convoy the French Princess to England, and to make reprisals on the Dutch East India Company for the massacre of Am- boyna. At the same time he repeated his assurance that Mansfeld should not attack Spanish territory.^ ' The Infanta Isaljella, writing to Philip IV., Nov. §§, argued that the troops must be intended for Breda, for it was not the season of the year te begin war in Germany. The greater part of the troops would perish before they could reach that country. Brussels MS8. ' This was probably said about Nov. 19. The declaration is printed without a date by Villermont, E. de Mansfeldt, ii. 242. The order for reprisals on the Dutch had really bean given. Conway to Carle ton Nov. 4 ; S. P. Holland, THE PEIVATE ENGAGEMENT. II9 . When Ville-aux^Clercs arrived, his first task was to obtain the ratification of the marriage treaty. The King was at Cambridge, sufiering from a severe attack of the gout. His hands were so crippled that, hke Themar- <-' rr ' nage treaty Henry VHI. in his old age, he had been obliged to ratiued. make use of a stamp from inability to sign his name. On December 12, however, though still sufiering, he was sufficiently recovered to be able to join his son in ratifying the articles of marriage. Much to the discon- tent of the Privy Councillors, not one of the number, excepting Buckingham and Conway, were allowed to be present at the ceremony. There remained the private engagement to be The private signed : " I the undersigned Charles, Prince of Wales," ment. so ran the words finally agreed upon, " after having seen the promise of the Most Serene King of Great Britain, my very honoured Lord and father, and in conformity with it, promise on the faith and word of a Prince, both for the present and the future, in every- thing that is and shaU be in my power, that, in contemplation of the Most Serene Princess Madame Henrietta Maria, sister of the Most Christian King of Prance, I will promise to all the Eoman Catholic subjects of the Crown of Great Britain the utmost of liberty and franchise in everything regarding their religion, which they would have had in virtue of any articles which were agreed upon by the treaty of marriage with Spain, not being willing that the aforesaid Eoman Catholic subjects should be disquieted in their persons and goods for making profession of their afore- said religion, and for living as CathoHcs, provided, however, that they use the permission modestly, and render the obedience which as good and true subjects they owe to their King. I also promise, through kind- ness to them, not to constrain them to any oath contrary I20 THE FRENCH MARRIAGE TREATY. CHAP, to their religion, and I wish that my engagement, which in. I now sign, should be attested by a Secretary of State." ^ Tiee^ii Then followed the signatures of Charles and Con- charies's way. It was not a transaction upon which they had motives, any reason to be proud. The edifice of toleration, founded upon a breach of one promise, might easily be overthrown by the breach of another. But in truth neither Charles, nor Buckingham, who was the main instigator of his offence, cared about toleration at all. W-hat they wanted was to make the French marriage and the French alliance possible, and we may well believe that they swallowed the necessary conditions without enquiring too closely into the possibility of fulfilling them. The explanation which Charles after- wards gave, that he had signed the engagement without intending to keep it, because he was aware that the King of France wished him to do so in order to deceive the Pope, finds no countenance from any source of information now open to us. Whatever Charles's motives may have been, the French ministers required him to act at once upon the Dec. 24. engagement he had taken. On December 24 the rfthe Ee°° Courts werc forbidden to admit any further prosecution Lawr^ of the Eecusants under the Penal laws.^ On the 26th an order was issued to the Lord Keeper to set at liberty all Eoman Catholics in prison for offences connected with their religion. At the same time the two Arch- bishops were directed to stop all proceedings against them in the Ecclesiastical Courts, and the Lord Treasurer was commanded to repay all fines which had been levied from them since the last Trinity Term. For the future the fines, instead of passing into the Exchequer in the ordinary course, were to be paid over to two ' Secret engagement, Sari. MSS., 4596, fol. 144. ' Conway to Williams, Dec, 30 ; S. P. Dotn., olxxvii. 39. RICHELIEU AND OLIVAEES. 121 persons especially appointed for the purpose, who chap. would of course repay the money at once to those • — ^-^— from whom they received it. In this way it would ^^l^' look as if the fines were still being paid, whilst nothing of the kind was really being done. Nor was this the only deception practised upon the nation. These special orders were only made known to those specially interested in them. But another order directing the banishment of the priests then in prison, which, as there was now nothing to prevent them soon returning in security as soon as they had crossed the sea, can only have been intended to throw dust into the eyes of the world, was passed under the great seal, and enrolled on the latent EoUs for all who chose to examine.^ If Charles had not strengthened his position by Viiiueof^ the step which he had taken, EicheUeu had stiU less success.'' cause to congratulate himself. He had indeed gained a great diplomatic success. All that he had asked for had been conceded to him. But the very concession was fraught with future evil to France as well as to England. If neither he nor Lewis had aimed at so much as had been aimed at by Ohvares and Philip ; if France had been content with the protection of the English Eoman Catholics, whilst Spain aimed at the restoration of the Papal authority in England, even the lesser demand was more than one sovereign could wisely make to another. It introduced an element of discord between the two nations which would more than counterbalance the family connection which was about to join the two kings. The marriage treaty was the first fink in the chain of events which in two short years was to lead to war between Prance and England . ' The King to the Archbishop of Canterbury, Dec. 26; The King to the Lord Keeper, Dec. 26 ; the King to the Lord Treasurer and the Chnncellor of the Exchequer, Dec. 29 ; S. P. Dom., clxxvii. 25, 29, 37 j Banishment of Priests, Dec. 24; Rymer, xvii. 644. 122 Bents, CHAPTEE IV. THE LAST DAYS OF JAMBS I. CHAP. To obtain from James the ratification of the marriage ' — 7 — ' treaty was only part of Ville-aux-Clercs' mission. He Dec. 1. had also to obtain permission for Mansfeld to attempt cierestoSk to succour Breda, and to contrive if possible to embroil feid might' J^'i^ss in open war with Spain.^ James, indeed, had throuo-h already taken one step in the direction in which the Flanders. Frenchman wished to guide him. On the 14th of James con- December he had issued an exposition of his former prohibition to Mansfeld. That commander was to ask leave from the Infanta to enter Flanders, but, in the event of a refusal, he was to force his way through the Spanish territory.'^ Further de- As yet the name of Breda had not been mentioned France. either by Ville-aux-Clercs or James, though the relief of Breda was plainly intended by the French. James's difficulties were only beginning. He had been given to understand that Mansfeld would land in French territory, and that he was to march at once to the French frontier in order to demand a passage. But now Eichelieu took alarm, or pretended to take alarm, at James's former declaration that Mansfeld should not enter the Spanish Netherlands. Before the interpreta- > Ville-aux-Clercs and Effiat to Lewis XIII., Dee. j\, Sari. MSS., 4596, fol. 144. » Explanation by the King, Deo. |*P Ibid, fol, 187. IV. 1624. Dec. DIFFICULTIES "WITH FRANCE. 1 23 tion had been given on the 14th, orders had already chap. been issued in the name of Lewis to Ville-aux-Clercs and Effiat to inform James that Mansfeld could not be permitted to land in France unless the English Govern- ment distinctly authorised his passage through the Spanish Netherlands. The alternative offered was that Mansfeld should go by way of Holland. Mansfeld would certainly not be permitted to march a hundred miles on French territory.^ As usual, the French ambassadors applied to Dec. is. Buckingham for support. The exact nature of the standing" conversation between them cannot now be discovered. BucMng- The Frenchmen were under the impression when they thrpreuch. left him, that Mansfeld, if the passage through Flanders seemed undesirable, might take any other route he pleased, on the sole condition that the French cavalry, which was to take part in the expedition, should accompany the English infantry. They therefore wrote at once to Mansfeld, strongly urging him to convey his men through HoUand,^ instead of through France and Flanders. Such, however, was not the understanding of Buckingham. Perhaps, as Ville-aux-Clercs thought afterwards, he was so confident of his influence over Mansfeld that he assented to the proposal that the commander might take any route he pleased, without duly considering all that might be implied in those words.^ Perhaps, when he came to speak to the King, 1 Lewis Xin. to VUle-aux-Clercs and Effiat, Harl MSS., 4596, fol. 200 b. " They told Mansfeld that the English would give him entire liberty ' de prendre tel parti que vous estimerez le plus avantageux sans de- mander de nous autre condition que la cavallerie Franjais prendra meme route, et sera embarqn^e pour passer avec leur infanterie.' — ^Ville-aux- Clercs and Effiat to Mansfeld, Dec. ||, Sari. MSS., 4596, fol. 212 b. ' Memoires de Srienne, i. 394. 124 THE LAST DAYS OF JAMES t CHAP, and to find how reluctant James was to give his con- sent to the course proposed, he may have found it ex- Dec^^s pedient to disavow the promise which he had heedlessly given, and it is certain that he afterwards assured Ville- aux-Clercs that he had never mentioned the possibility of Mansfeld's passing through Holland to the King. In fact something very different from a mere military question was at issue. James wished to obtain the open complicity of France in the coming war. Lewis wished to involve James in hostilities with Spain whilst himself remaining at peace. If English troops landed at Calais, and then, accompanied by French cavalry, crossed the frontier into Flanders or Artois, it would be very diflS.cult for Lewis to wash his hands of the whole matter ; whereas if a small body of cavalry joined Mansfeld's army in Holland, whatever Mansfeld chose to do might be set down to his own wrong- headedness, or to the orders of his English superiors. Therendez- Iq the mcauwhile, the unlucky men whose destina- vous at 1 1 • p 1 • 1 ■ Dover. tiou was the object of such contention, were gathermg to their rendezvous at Dover. The aid of English troops was not to be despised. The Prince of Orange, who knew them well, used to say that when English- men had got over their first sufferings, they were the bravest men in his motley army. The ten thousand who had gone out in the summer had been received by the Dutch with open arms. But they had advan- tages which Mansfeld's troops would never have. They were volunteers, not pressed men. They had been incorporated in the Dutch army, and had gradually learned their work in the strictest school of discipline then existing in the world. They would be well clothed and well fed. There may have been an ex- aggeration in the popular saying that an Englishman could not fight without his three B's, his bed, his beef, MANSFELD'S AEMY AT BOVEE. I25 and his beer, but it was exaa;seratioa which contained chap. a certain amount of truth.^ - — ,-^— - All that went to the making of an army was ^^l^' wanting to Mansfeld's compulsory levies. His men, ^„'^fj"''* pressed against their will, had little heart for the ser- °^ *•>« ™™- vice. The county officials, whose duty it had been to select them, had too often laid their hands upon those who were most easily within reach, rather than upon those who were fittest for the work. " Our soldiers," wrote one who saw a number of them pass on their way, " are marching on all sides to Dover. God send them good shipping and success ; but such a rabble of raw and poor rascals have not lightly been seen, and go so unwillingly that they must rather be driven than led." "It is lamentable," wrote another in the same strain, " to see the heavy countenances of our pressed men, and to hear the sad farewells they take of their friends, showing nothing but deadly unwillingness to the service ; and they move pity almost in all men in regard of the incommodity of the season, the un- certainty of the employment, and the ill terms upon which they are like to serve, whereof I know not how discreetly I should do to tell you all that I hear spoken ; but it may suffice that 1 say the whole busi- ness is generally disliked, and few or none promise either honour to our nation by this journey, or any- thing but wretchedness to the poor soldiers." ^ Whether a real army could ever have been consti- They are tuted out of such unpromising materials may admit of paid, doubt. As it was. the men had not fair play. Mans- feld, accustomed as he was to live at free quarters, was not in the habit of paying much attention to his 1 Relazioni Venete. Inghilterra, 75, 233. ' Chamberlain to Carleton; D. Carleton to Carleton, Dec. 18; 8. P. Dom., clxxvi. 65, 66. 126 THE LAST DAYS OF JAMES I, CHAP. IV. 1624. Dec. Dec. 25. Mutiny of the sol- diers. 1625. Jan. I. Martial law. commissariat. Money difficulties, too, were not long in presenting themselves to him. He had received i5,oooZ. for the expenses of levying and arming the men, and 40,oeoZ. for their payment during the months of October and November. He now, though the men were only just gathering at Dover, asked for another 2o,oooZ. for the current month of December. But the resources of the Parliamentary Treasurers were ex- hausted, and it was only after some delay that the Prince was able to borrow the money on his own personal security.-' What chance was there that the further sum, which would soon become due for January, would ever be forthcoming ? Whilst Mansfeld was disputing with the Govern- ment over the accounts, the men were left to shift for themselves. When they reached Dover they found that but few vessels had been collected to carry them over, and that the state of the tides was such that even those few were unable to enter the harbour. Neither food nor money awaited the troops. As a natural consequence the men roamed about the country, steal- ing cattle and breaking into houses. Their ranks were thinned by frequent desertions, and those who re- mained at Dover threatened to hang the mayor and burn the town.^ To send down a commission for putting martial law in force was the first thought of the Council. To those who were on the spot it seemed a very insufficient remedy. " If there be not order to pay the soldiers," wrote Hippesley, the Lieutenant of Dover Castle, " all ' Burlamachi's accounts, 1625 ; S. P. Qermany, Chamberlain- to Carleton, Jan. 8 ; 8. P. Dom., clxxxi. 29. " Hippesley to the Privy Council, Dec. 25 ; the Mayor of Dover and Hippesley to the Privy Council, Dec. 26 ; Wilsford to Nicholas, Deo. 27 ; S. P. Dom., clxxvii. 17, 18, 33. MUTINY IN MANSFELD'S ARMY. 1 27 the martial law in the world will not serve the turn." chap. When the commission was read, one of the mutineers • — ^^^ shouted out, " If you hang one you must hang us all." ^j^^^^" The man was seized and condemned to death. But the officers, who knew how much the men were to be pitied, were not anxious to carry out the sentence, and they contrived to find an excuse for setting the prisoner free.^ In order to obtain vessels in greater numbers, an Jan. 3. embargo was laid on several Hamburg ships which ships put were lying in the Downs.^ But the removal of the bargo.' physical difficulty in the way of the passage only served to bring the political difficulty into greater prominence. James and Buckingham, whatever may have been the real nature of their communications with the ambassadors, still flattered themselves that whether the troops passed through the Spanish Nether- lands or not, they would at least be allowed to make a French port the starting point of their enterprise, so as to establish the complicity of Lewis in the undertaking. This was, however, precisely the thing which the rrencii ne- French had determined should not be. Villeaux- with the Clercs and Effiat had gained over Mansfeld, and Es- pesses, the French ambassador at the Hague, was busily employed in urging the States General to con- sent to the landing of Mansfeld somewhere near Bergen- op-Zoom. In spite of the advocacy of the Prince of Orange, who was ready to risk anything to save his beloved Breda, Espesses found it hard work to gain the consent of the States General. Mansfeld was better known than liked by them. Their towns, they said, in which there was neither forage nor victual, * Hippesley to Nicholas, Jan. 2 ; Hippesley to Buckingliam, Jan. 3 ; S. P. Bom., clxxxi. 10, 11. ' Embargo by the Council, Jan. 3 ; S. P. Germany. 128 THE LAST DAYS OF JAMES I. CHAP. IV. 1625. Jan. Jan. 2. Mansfeld speaks of liis change of plan. Jan. 6. Bucking- ham's dis- satisfac- tion. could not receive his troops, and to quarter them on the peasants could not be suffered. If, indeed, they were regularly paid by the King of England, and com- missioned by him to serve against Spain, and if the promised French cavalry were allowed to accompany them, it would be another matter.^ Before this hesitating acceptance of the plan reached England, Mansfeld had taken it for granted that it would be adopted by the Dutch. He sent orders to the Ger- man troops which were waiting for him in Holland, to remain where they were, and he began to drop mys- terious hints of his intentions. When his shipping was ready, he informed Conway, he would take the course which the winds allowed him, and which was most proper and suitable to his designs, mentioning also certain vessels which would be required for the embarkation of the French cavalry. Conway replied that he.,did not understand his meaning. He thought it had been arranged that the army should land in France, and march by land.^ Upon this Mansfeld spoke out plainly, and declared his intention of carry- ing his army to Flushing.^ Buckingham, perhaps with some uneasy remem- brance of a consent half given in his conversation with the ambassadors, attempted to argue with Mans- feld. The winds would be contrary, the rivers would be frozen, the States General would be quarrelsome; there were no ships to bring over the French. cavalry, so that his Majesty would be obliged to make war alone, and to this he would never consent. The sooner ' Carleton to Conway, Jan. 6; S. P. Holland. Villel'lliont, E. de Mnnifeldt, ii. 26. Rusdorf to Frederick, Dec. §| ; Mem. i. 399. ' Mansfeld to Conway, Jan. 3 ; Conway to Mansfeld, Jan, i,\ S.P. Germany. ' This is implied in Buckingham's letter of the 7th. MAJSrSFELD'S HESITATIONS. 129 Mansfeld sailed for Calais the better. A few days kter Buckingham spoke more impatiently. The Prince chimed in, " What he wishes," he said, " is impossible. The best thing he can do is to land at Calais, or France ThTprin^ce Will not be engaged. Erom Calais he can go by any way he Hkes. What has he to do at Flushing ? " ^ " France will not be engaged." There was the root of the matter now. Two thousand French horse, and such shadow of a French aUiance as might rest upon the expedition by its being permitted to land at Calais, was all that remained of the grand scheme for the co-operation of the two nations in the recovery of the Palatinate. James's displeasure was stiU more out- spoken. He sent Sir John Ogle and Sir William St. Leger to Dover, to enquire into the condition of the troops. If they found Mansfeld bent on taking ways of his own, they were to dismiss the transports which had been collected with so much difficulty, and to send the men back to their homes. The men had no such good fortune before them. Jan- 19- Mansfeld, well aware that any attempt to land in forbidden France would be fruitless, replied that he would do Fian"e.''' his best to place his troops on French soil, and that he would allow himself to be stopped by nothing short of a direct prohibition from Lewis. Such a prohibition was of course forthcoming, and on the 19th of January was placed in Mansfeld's hands, in the presence of Ogle and St. Leger. By this time his men were on board, and he talked of crossing over, to Calais, though it was St. Leger's opinion that 'a very small matter would send him back.' ^ ' Buckingham to Mansfeld, Jan. | ; Rusdorf to Mansfeld, Jan. |§ ; Harl M8S., 4596, fol. 230, 231. * Ogle and St. Leger to Conway; St. Leger to Conway, Jan. 19; S. -P. Bom., clxxxii. 15, 16; Mansield to Buckingham, Jan. 19; S. jp. Qermany. VOL. I. K I30 THE LAST DAYS OF JAMES I. CHAP. The experiment was not made. Buckingham was - — r^ — ■ anxious to get Mansfeld off on any terms. He told Jan. 19. Effiat that, if the prohibition to land were persisted in, Bucking- James would allow him no choice but to disband the nam gives ^^ ■"^y- army. Would it not be possible, he asked, to allow Mansfeld to go on shore at Calais only for a few hours ? If this could not be, if only he could be assured that the French cavalry would reaUy join the expedition, he would do his best to satisfy the King.^ Jan. 23. To the Prince Buckingham gave his reasons for consenting to the passage through Holland. The op- position to the landing, he said, doubtless proceeded from the Jesuit party in Prance. Was it, however, worth while to strive against it ? Would it not be better, as matters stood, to send Mansfeld through Holland to the ecclesiastical territories on the Ehine ? If the Prench cavalry were with him, Lewis would be as much engaged in the quarrel as if Mansfeld had landed in France. Such an arrangendent as this would in aU appearance advance more the main ends of recovering the Palatinate, having the States at their back, and the Princes of Germany about to move if they were encouraged.^ The march to the Palatinate therefore, not the re- hef of Breda, was uppermost in Buckingham's mind. i^"-f;A On the 26th he wrote to Mansfeld that, against his Mansfeld ' S forbidden own judgment, he accepted his opinion in favour of the Breda. march through HoUand, whilst on the same day Con- way issued directions from the King to the colonels of the army, forbidding them to obey their general if he attempted to employ them at Breda.^ 1 EfBat to Lewis XIIL '^f ; Harl. MSS., 4596, fol. 2956. ' Buckingham to the Prince, Jan. 23 ; S. P. Dom., clxxxii. 96. ' Conway to the Colonels, Jan, 26 ; Minute in Conway's letter-book, p. eSSj-S. P. Bom. MANSFELD AT FLUSHING. 131 At last, on the 31st of January, the sorely tried chap. army was able to leave Dover. As had been foreseen, • A — - the port of Calais was closed against them. The ,^^^^" ^ o Jan. 31. French cavalry, which had been placed under the com- i^J^^^""" "' mand of Christian of Brunswick, was not ready to start. Mansfeld passed on his way without any accession of strength, and on the ist of February the vessels which Feb. i. bore the EngUsh army cast anchor oflF Flushing.^ Flushing. What good could come of an armament of which the commander was bent upon one line of action, whilst the officers were under strict orders to pursue another? But even before this difficulty could be faced there were many hardships to be endured. The Hardships provisions brought from England would only last for from%"nt four or five days, and who could say how soon the °^'^^"''- scanty stock would be replenished ? Mansfeld knew full well that not a single penny would be forthcoming from the English exchequer for some time to come. And even if, by some strange good fortune, the men succeeded in reaching Germany without being starved on the way, what possibility was there that these raw levies, without food or money, could stand against Tilly's veterans for a day ? Mansfeld, however, had plainly no intention of leading his men against Tilly. And even if he had wished to do so, a plan which would have left Breda unrelieved was not likely to find favour with the States General, and without the good will of the States General there was no obtaining the means of transport Want of which he needed. In Holland at least, it was firmly '^*"*''"' " believed that the rehef of Breda was the first step needful to success in Germany. It was " the common ' Carleton to Conway, Feb. 3 ; S. P. Holland. Villermont, E. de Mansfeldt, ii. 283. K 2 132 THE LAST DAYS OF JAMES I. CHAP, opinion that if the Palatinate be only fought in the • — r-^— - Palatinate, it would never be recovered." Siukn^f ^®* *^^ troops could ill support delay. The men breaks out. "were ' poor and naked.' At Flushing they had re- mained for some days closely packed on board the vessels which brought them over. Then they were transferred to boats which were to carry them to Ger- truidenberg, a town not far from Breda. Three regi- ments reached the place of their destination. The other three had gone but a few miles when the frost came down upon them and made further passage im- possible. Exposed to the cold blasts and the driving snow, sickness broke out amongst them. The exhaus- tion from which they had already suffered unfitted them to bear up against fresh hardships. When they left Flushing they had not tasted food for eight -and- forty hours. But for the aid of the Dutch Government they would all have perished from starvation. At Gertruidenberg matters were no better. No preparation had been made to provide food for such a multitude. " All day long," wrote Lord Cromwell, who had come out in command of a regiment, " we go about Great mor- for victuals and bury our dead."^ Forty or fifty deaths " ' ^' were recorded every night. At last Count Frederick Henry, the brother and heir of the Prince of Orange, came to the relief of the suffering Englishmen. He sent them meat and bread, and provided them with straw to cover their freezing limbs as they lay in their boats. The account which Carleton gave of their sufferings ended in a cry for money. Mansfeld had brought with him merely 2,oooZ. He was not a man, the English ambassador thought, to care much for the welfare of his troops. He would prefer filling up the > Cromwell to ? Feb. 26; 8. P. Holland. WAS BEEDA TO BE RELIEVED? 1 33 vacancies with new levies to taking reasonable care of chap. the old ones.^ IV. What possible use could be made of this ill-starred j^^^^^' force ? The way to the Palatinate was barred against ^^l"^ ^"^ •' a refuses to them by Imperialist armies hurried up to oppose them, employ the and James persisted in his refusal to allow of their em- Breda, ployment at Breda. If they were able to march up the Ehine, the diversion might be usefiil to the Dutch. But James had no money to send. He argued that the French, who had caused all the mischief, ought to supply the deficiency. If this could not be done, the States might perhaps advance the 20,000?. a month which he had bound himself to pay to Mansfeld.^ The Dutch were not quite inexorable. They The Dutch allowed their credit to be used to raise a loan of money. 20,000/.® They perhaps hoped that James would get over the difficulty by accepting a proposal which had been made for placing Mansfeld under Frederick's orders, who would not be bound by the King of Eng- land's engagement. " His Majesty," they were told, March 21. " cannot yet be moved to think it fit to break it by equivocations, or by changing of forms and names."* James's last words in this matter — for they were James's his last — were entirely in consonance with his earlier SiansfeWs ones. The Palatinate, and the Palatinate alone, was the ^p®''"'""- object at which he aimed. War with Spain was to be avoided as long as possible. Impartial posterity will perhaps be inclined to think that he was wise in look- ing to the recovery of the Palatinate, rather than to vengeance' upon Spain, as the true object of the war. But his mind, indolent in itself, and becoming more in- ' Carleton to Con-way, Feb. 14, 18, March 1 ; S, P. Holland. ' Conway to Carleton, March 4; Aid. ' Memorial of Money raised for Mansfeld, Aug. ? Ibid. * Rusdorf, Mem., i. 498-510. Conway to Carleton, March 21 ; S. P. HoUand, 134 THE LAST DAYS OF JAMES I. CHAP, dolent as years rolled by, shrank from the fatigue of • — r-^ — ■ planning a large scheme of foreign policy as a whole, March ^^^ ^® ^^^ ^°* ^®^ *^^* *^® enmity of Spain was the inevitable result of any serious attempt to recover the Palatinate. And even if he had been right in thinking it possible to interfere in Germany without provoking Spain, it would have been a grave mistake to pursue this object in so close connection with France and Holland. For the first interest of France and Holland was to diminish the power of Spain, and not to recover the Palatinate. Whilst the Governments were disputing, the sol- Thearmy dicrs wcre dying. In little more than a week after away. James's last refusal was given, out of a force of 1 2,000 men, barely 3,000 were capable of carrying arms. The French cavalry was equally thinned by sickness and desertion. When at last Christian of Brunswick brought his troops from Calais only a few hundreds out of the two thousand men originally under his orders were disembarked on the Dutch coast.^ Whilst Mansfeld's prospects of finding his way into Negotia- Germany were becoming more hopeless every day, Germany, whcrc Were thosc allics upon whom James ought to have been able to reckon before he allowed a single Englishman to take part in an enterprise for the re- covery of the Palatinate ? What had been done to en- gage the assistance of the North German States, or with the Kings of Denmark and Sweden ? When Anstruther unfolded his master's plans in 1624. Aug. August to Christian IV. of Denmark, the King thCT's™" answered that he was quite ready to take arms, but that he must first be assured of the support of England and of the Protestant States of North Germany. It was therefore arranged that Anstruther should visit ' Villermont, S. de Mansfeldt, ii. 285. mission. NOKTH GERMANY. I 35 the Princes who had most to fear from the progress of chap. the Imperiahsts, and that Christian would give him a • — T^ — • final answer on his return.^ ^^^^' • ' Aug. The position of the King of Denmark was a typical one. Like the other Princes of North Germany he had looked with disfavour upon Frederick's Bohemian enterprise. But he looked with equal disfavour upon christian the establishment of a strong Imperial authority, and ecciesiasti-^ his zeal for Protestantism was quickened by the know- tories™' ledge that whether the secularised ecclesiastical posses- sions held by his house in Germany were held legally or not, no doubt existed in the Emperor's mind that they were still rightftdly the property of the Church. His personal interest in the great question of the eccle- siastical lands was by no means slight.. His younger son Frederick had the dioceses of Bremen, Verden, and Halberstadt either in possession or reversion. As usual, personal and pohtical objects were closely intertwined with objects which were neither personal nor pohtical. These North German Sees were occupied The North by Protestants, who though they called themselves bishoprics. Bishops, or sometimes more modestly Administrators, were simply lay Princes, like the Dukes and Counts around them, the only difference being that, instead of holding their rank by hereditary right, they were elected for life by the Chapters of the dioceses, the Chapters themselves often consisting, at least in part, of aristocratic sinecurists like themselves. It was quite ' Anstruther, in his account of his negotiations, March P 1625, S. P. Denmark, says ' that the King did ingenuously advise me, and did not forbear to second me by invitation of the Electors of Saxe and Brandenburg and others, by his own particular letters by me sent, and since again by letters of the King of Great Britain.' Droysen {Gtistaf Adolf, i. 207-224), not being aware of this evidence, fancied that Chris- tian assented to take part in the war at a later period through jealousy of Gustavus. 136 THE LAST DAYS -OF JAMES I. CHAP, natural that Catholics should regard such an arrange- >■ ' — • ment as wholly indefensible, and, if no more had been Au/' ^^ ^*^^® *^^^ *^® ^^^^ ^y *^® neighbouring Princes of so rich a provision for their younger sons, the sooner a change came the better for Germany. The restdts of the forcible dispossession of the Pro- testant Administrators would, however, have been far Danger to more widely felt. Their lands were inhabited by a Germany. Protsstant population which would at once have been doomed to compulsory reconversion. Their fortresses would have been occupied by troops hostile to the order of things estabhshed in the neighbouring terri- tories, and their revenues would have served as a bait held out to those Protestants who were anxious to make provision for their families, and who might per- haps not be slow to learn that Canonries and Bishoprics would fall into the lap of any ardent convert to the doctrines of the Emperor and the Pope. Were the North German Princes so very steadfast that they could be trusted to withstand the temptation ? Wh9t was It is hardly too much to say that the fate of German at stake. Protestantism was at stake. And with the fortunes of German Protestantism would come at last to be in- volved the fortunes of German nationahty. The intel- lectual giants who since the days of Lessing and Gothe have overshadowed Europe, have all sprung up on Protestant soil ; and men of the generation which has only just passed away could tell of the peaceful con- quest over the ignorance of Cathohc Germany which was achieved at the beginning of this century by the men of the Protestant North,^ and which paved the way for that pohtical unity which is at last healing the wounds inflicted in the great war of the 1 7 th century. ' See especially the life of Friederich Thiersch, by his son, Dr. H. Thiersch. THE EMPEROR AND THE ADMINISTRATORS." 137 The Emperor had accepted the agreement made at chap. IV Miihlhausen in 1620, by which the Protestant Admini- • — .-^ strators were declared safe from attack as long as they ^ ^^', ~ " "" I the peror expressed whether he would keep, in the days of his ^^fl *» i Jr' ^ reclaii remained obedient subjects. But doubts were freely ^^p^' " - . . - . . . - - - . j.|^^j^^; reclaim the prosperity, the promise which he had made in the hour bisboprfcB. of adversity. And even if scant justice were probably done to Ferdinand in this surmise, he might fairly be expected to lu-ge that the diocese of Halberstadt was no longer under the protection of the agreement of Miihlhausen. Its Administrator, Christian of Brims- wick, had certainly not been an obedient subject to the Emperor. He had now abdicated in the hope that the Chapter would choose a Protestant successor. But in the eyes of the Emperor such an election would have no legal basis. Christian's treason, he would argue, had replaced the See in the position in which it was before the agreement of Miihlhausen, and the Chapter was therefore bound to elect a real Cathohc Bishop, instead of a cavalry officer who called himself a Bishop in order that he might enjoy the revenues of the See. And there were other ways, besides that of force, by which Protestantism could be undermined in the Bishoprics. If a majority of a Chapter could be gained over, a Cathohc Bishop would be chosen at the next election. Many of the Canons were Cathohcs still, and, with the help of an armed force, it was easy to find legal grounds for turning the minority into a majority. In this way Osnabriick had lately been won from Pro- testantism, and other Sees might be expected, unless something were done, to foUow soon.-^ At such a time Anstruther had not much difficulty Anstm- in gaining the ear of most of the Princes to whom he successful negotia- ' On the position of these Bishoprics, and of Halberstadt especially, '"*"' see Dr. Opel's Niedersachsische Ddnische Krieg. 138 THE LAST DAYS OF JAMES I. CHAP, addressed himself. The Elector of Saxony, indeed, continued to stand aloof. But in other quarters the Aug^' EngHsh ambassador found no lack of readiness to stand up against the Emperor, if he could engage to bring into the field a force large enough to give promise of success. "Whilst Anstruther was passing from one German state to another, Spens was engaged in making similar Gustavus advances to the Eing of Sweden. Gustavus Adolphus was bound by every conceivable tie to the Protestant cause. He had to fear a Catholic pretender to the Swedish Crown in the person of his cousin Sigismund. If the Emperor extended his authority to the shores of the Baltic, the throne of Gustavus and the national in- dependence of Sweden woidd be exposed to serious danger. The dominion over the Baltic was for him a question of life or death. Yet it would be in the highest degree unjust to speak of him as taking merely a selfish or even a national view of the work of his fife. Pohtics and religion were closely intertwined in the minds of the men of his generation. To him, the con- summate warrior and statesman, the defence of Protes- tantism was no empty phrase. It filled him with- the consciousness that he was sent forth upon a high and holy mission. It taught him to believe that in prose- cuting the aims of his own poHcy he was a chosen in- strument in the hands of God. His posi- For Sweden he had abeady done much. Succeed- 1624. ing to his father in an hour of desperate trial, when the armies of Christian of Denmark were sweeping over the desolate land, the youthful hero had stemmed the tide of invasion at its highest, and had wrung from the in- vader a peace which had preserved the independence of the country. He had since driven back the Eussians from the coast of the Baltic, and was able to boast that the subjects of the Czar could not launch a boat on its GUSTAVUS ADOLPHUS. 1 39 waters without the permission of the King of Sweden, chap. He had struggled not unsuccessfully against his Polish ■ — ^Z-^ rival. But his eye had never been removed from the ^^^'^' strife in Germany. To drive back the Imperial armies from the North, if not to overthrow the House of Austria altogether, was the object of his ambition. But no man was less likely than Gustavus to interpret the conditions of success by his wishes ; and it was certain that he would never throw himself, as Frederick of the Palatinate had done, into the labyrinth of a desperate enterprise, on the. complacent assiurance that what he was desirous of doing was certaia to obtain the ap- proval and the support of Heaven. Already, the year before, Gustavus had made pro- posals to the exiled Frederick for a general Protestant league. Those proposals had been, with the consent of the States General, communicated to the Prince of Wales, and when Spens arrived at Stockholm in August Mission of 1624, he brought with him, in addition to his public ^^^'"' instructions from James, verbal directions from Charles and Frederick to come to an understanding with Gus- tavus respecting the proposed alliance. Gustavus was pian of not long in sketching out his programme. The time for half measures he held to be passed. There must be a common understanding between all Protestant states. He, if properly supported, would make his way, through Poland and Silesia, into Bohemia. England and Holland could do much to help. Spain woidd have to be kept in check as well as the Emperor to be beaten back. The assistance of Cathohc powers, France, Venice, and Savoy, was not to be despised. But let them find their own field of operation for them- selves. They might attack Bavaria, or might make war in Italy at their pleasure.^ ' Oxenstjerna to Camerarius, Aug. 24 ; Moser's Patriotisches Archiv, V. 42. HO THE LAST DAYS OF JAMES I. CHAP. The view taken of the war by the Swedish King - — -p — ' was certainly very different from that taken by James. j^j,^ ■ Moderation, fairness, and conciliation, admirable as they Its merits. a.re whilst a friendly settlement is still possible, or when it once more becomes possible after victory hks been won, must be flung aside when hostilities have been once commenced. The spirit must be aroused which alone gives endurance to the warrior. The watchword must be spoken for which men's hearts will beat. To place poor, vacillating Frederick once more in his Electoral seat was not an. object for which nations would care to fight, least of all if it were to be accompUshed with the aid of a marauder Hke Mansfeld. But if it once came to be beheved that Protestantism was in danger, it would be a very different thing. Then, indeed, an irresistible force could be gathered to make head against Imperial aggression. And with strength would come again the possibility of modera- tion. The leader of an army such as Gustavns would have gathered under his standards would enforce disci- pline and spare the towns and fields of Germany from indiscriminate plundering. More than this, if he could give assurances that he was fighting in defence of his own religion without any intention of proscribing that of his opponents, he might gain help from those who from political motives were hostile to the House of Austria. Was it not AH this Gustavus was one day to accomplish. Was it not premature in 1624? Until men have actually felt the weight of evil, they are hard to rouse to a course so revolutionary as that which, in the opinion of Gustavus, would alone be of service to them. The Lower Saxon circle was threatened by Tilly. But it had not yet been invaded. The fertile plains of Northern Germany had not yet been wasted by the premature ? SWEDEN AND DENMARK. 141 armies of the South. The mischief was threatening chap. IV enough. But the bolt had not yet fallen. The iron — ^ — - had not yet entered into the soul of the peasants of l^^^. Pomerania or the burghers of Magdeburg. There was another risk, too, not unforeseen by Risk from Gustavus himself. If he was not at war with Denmark the fires of the old rivalry still smouldered on. What if Christian should fall upon Sweden when the King was in the heart of Silesia or Bohemia? And Den- mark was not then the petty realm which modern events have made it. Its king reigned in Norway, ruled in Schleswig, and in part of Holstein, and held lands beyond the Sound which are now counted as the southern provinces of Sweden. Sq certain was Gusta- vus that no good could come from Denmark, that he demanded that his allies should join him in forming a fleet to guard the Baltic against a Danish attack in his absence. Before long Gustavus was compelled to modify his plan in a way which was certain to give offence to Christian. The Elector of Brandenburg sent an am- „??.?'-, ° Bellm at bassador, Bellin, to Stockholm, to offer to the King of Stockholm. Sweden his aid in placing him at the head of a league of North German Princes. But the Elector coupled his offer with the condition that the war should be carried on as far as possible from Brandenbiirg. In- stead of directing his course through Silesia into Bohe- mia, Gustavus was to ascend the valley of the Weser, and to cut his way to the Palatinate.^ Before these representations Gustavus consented to abandon his original plan. But though he was ready to act in any way which might, at the time, seem advisable, he was not ready to act at all excepting ' Oxenstjerna to Camerarius, Sept. 10 j Moser's Pati-iotisches Archiv, V. S6, 58. H2 THE LAST DAYS OF JAMES I. CHAP, under conditions whicli would give Mm a fair prospect > — ^ — ' of success. When therefore Spens and Bellin presented ^jan themselves in England to declare the intentions of the King of Sweden, those who heard them were fairly Demands astouished at the magnitude of their demands. Gusta- VU3. vus, the ambassador said, was ready to lead an army of 50,000 men to the Palatinate. Of these he would fur- nish 16,000 himself, leaving the remaining 34,000 to be provided by his alhes. He was ready to meet one third of the expenses of the war, but another third must be borne by England, and the remainder by the German Princes. There must be something more than mere talk of finding money. Gustavus had no intention of throwing himself upon a friendly country, like Mansfeld or Christian of Brunswick, on the mere chance of beiog able to pay his way. Four months' wants must be supplied in hard cash before he would stir. When he did stir, he would not encounter the dangers of a divided command. The whole direction of the war must be placed in his own hands. That he might be secured against a possible attack in the rear from Poland or Denmark, a fleet of twenty-five ships must be stationed in the Baltic, and the German ports of Wismar and Bremen must be temporarily surrendered to him to give him a firm basis of operations. In order to discuss these propositions, a congress of the powers friendly _to the operation was to be held as soon as possible.^ Jan. 2. If there was to be war at all, the best policy for the shrinks Enghsh Government would probably have been to ^xi^ns^'e! place itself unreservedly in the hands of Gustavus. But Gustavus was as yet but httle known in England ; and as matters stood, with Mansfeld's expedition swallowing up ' Rusdorf, M^moires, i. 438, 439. JAMES AND GUSTAVUS. I43 all the little money which remained in the exchequer, chap. and with no Parliamentary grant possible for many a • — r-^ — - month to come,- the magnitude of the Swedish demands j\q^|' only inspired alarm. " I am not so great and rich a Prince," said James, " as to be able to do so much. I am only the king of two poor little islands." The yearly expense in fact, which he was asked to meet, would have exceeded 400,000^., and he had already engaged to pay nearly 100,000/. a year for the troops which he had sent to the help of the Dutch, and 240,000^. a year for Mansfeld's army. As the discussion went on, a natural anxiety was Denmark expressed by the Enghsh Government to see Sweden to join? ^ and Denmark acting in concert. Why, said Conway, should not Christian be asked to bear part of the burthen ? If neither of the kings would serve under the other, might not the supreme command be given to the Elector of Brandenburg ? ^ Day by day the financial difiiculties appeared in a jan. 17. stronger light. At last Buckingham assured Bellin that brcm-'" though he would spare neither life nor honour in the ^^*^^' cause, he must first hear what the Kings of Denmark and Prance would do. BelHn had better go on to Paris to consult Lewis. As he had done in the case of Mansfeld, James was at last brought to promise that he would do as much as the King of France would do. Christian might be asked to leave the direction of the war to Gustavus, and a congress could meet at the Hague on the 20th of April. On his arrival at the French Court, Bellin found Beiiin in no difficulty in obtaining a promise of assistance. A French emissary, La Haye, had visited 'the coasts of Copenhagen and Stockholm, and, though he does not > Rusdorf to Frederick, Jan. A' is (probably misprinted ||) ; M&mmres i. 420, 430, 144 THE LAST DAYS OP JAMES I. CHAP, IV. Offers of Christian IV. Feb. 20. James pro- mises to ally himself with Den- mark. seem to have had any definite overtures to make,^ it is probable that EicheUeu was now hoping to obtain his sovereign's consent to a more active intervention in Germany. But BelHn was told that help would be given only on the understanding that the conditions of peace to be demanded after the war were to be settled by the Kings of France and England. Whether Gustavus would have consented to take money on such terms may reasonably be doubted.^ Before Bellin returned to England, important de- spatches were received from Anstruther.* Christian, en- couraged by the reports which the English ambassador had brought from the North German Courts, and possibly urged to exertion in the hope of outbidding the King of Sweden, now professed himself ready to embark on the war with less extensive preparations than those which seemed indispensable to Gustavus. Instead of asking for 50,000 men, he thought that 30,000 would be sufiicient. If England would sup- port 6,000 foot and 1,000 horse at the expense of 1 70,000^. or 1 80,000^. a year, he would be perfectly satisfied. As his own dominions lay on the south side of the Baltic, he could secure a basis of operations without asking for the surrender of German ports. Finally, he made no request for the provision of pay- ment in advance.* To a Government without money in hand these considerations were decisive. But in England it was not understood that the acceptance of Christian's offers • Notes of a letter from Anatruther to Carlisle, Jan. ; Mdmoires de Rusdurf, i. 478. Oxenstjerna to Oamerarius, Jan. 23. Moser, v. 94. ' Rusdorf to'Frederick, Feb. || ; Memoires de Rmdorf, i. 480. ^ They arrived between the 9th and 20th of Feb., as I judge from two letters written by Conway on those dates ; S. P, Denmark. * Substance of Anstruther's despatch, Jan. 13. Memoires de Rusdorf, I 472. GUSTAVUS ADOLPHUS. 145 involved the rejection of the Swedish plan. The chap. rivalry between the two Kings, it was thought, would — ^Z^ • be put an end to by the decision of the Congress when „ ^^,^5- ■j. J. 1TT1T1 March 15. It met at the Hague. In the meanwhile Spens was to Gustavus go back to persuade Gustavus to enter upon the stage co-operate. in conjunction with Christian. The offer of Denmark, he was directed to say, ' stood upon shorter ways and less demands, and if not so powerful, yet feasible, and held sufficient for the present.' ^ The task of reconcihng the two Kings was not so Aims of easy as it seemed to the English Government. There ^''''*™'' was jealousy of long standing between Sweden and Denmark. Nor was the enterprise to which Christian and Gustavus were invited, one to be lightly undertaken. Though the North German Princes were alarmed for the future, they were not yet reduced to desperation. But there can be no doubt that Gustavus alone per- ceived the conditions indispensable to success. In the first place, a military force strong enough to defy opposition must be brought together. In the second place, within the larger league of the political oppo- nents of the House of Austria, there must be a narrower league of those who specially aimed at a Protestant restoration in Germany, which would be able to speak with the authority of conscious strength if any attempt were made by Prance to snatch from them in the hour of victory the object on which their hearts were set. In England, for different reasons, neither James Of James, nor Buckingham were capable of taking so broad a view of passing events. James, wishing to recover the Palatinate with as little cost as possible to his im- poverished exchequer, was drawn on, half against his will, from one step to another, always selecting that ' Rusdorf to Frederick, March 19; Memoires de Rusdorf, i. 510. * Instructions to Spens, March 19; S. P. Sweden. VOL. I. L 146 THE LAST DAYS OF JAMES I. CHAP. IV. 1625. March. And of Bucking- ham. Gustavns turns against Poland. Bucking- ham's fur- ther scliemes. policy which would involve him as little as possible in the war, and which would spare him something at least of those terrible demands upon his purse which even the most economical mode of conducting military operations was certain to make. Buckingham, on the other hand, with Charles following in his wake, desired a vigorous and all-embracing war. Yet for the very reason that he had no idea of the strength gained by the concentration of effort in one direction, he shrunk almost as much as James had shrunk from the large demands of Gustavus. If war was to be carried on here, there, and everywhere, it must of necessity be starved in each sepa- rate locality. If Gustavus stood alone in perceiving the way to victory, he also stood alone in resolutely refusing to take part in a war in which the probabilities of victory appeared to him to be small. As soon as the English resolution was reported to him, he informed Spens that he would take no part in the German war on such conditions. Those who thought it so easy a task to overpower the resistance of the House of Austria might do their best.-^ The negotiation was thus brought to a close. When the spring came to an end, Gustavus embarked to carry on his hereditary feud with the King of Poland, hoping at least to prevent the Poles from coming to the assistance of the Emperor. Even if Buckingham's policy had been far surer of a favourable reception in Parliament than it was, the demands for money for Mansfeld, for the Netherlands, and for Germany, would have strained his late popula- rity to the uttermost. But these projects, involving as they did an annual expenditure of more than 500,000?. formed only a part of the magnificent schemes upon which Buckingham was launching the English nation. ' Gustavus Adolphus to Spens, March 13 ; S. P. Sweden. This charac- teristic letter will be published in the next volume of the Camden Society's Miscellany. BUCKINGHAM'S EXTENSIVE PLANS. 1 47 After all, if he was not a great military commander, chap. even in his own eyes, he was Lord High Admiral • — r-^ — ■ of England, and the war would be sadly incomplete ^ ^'^' if the navy were to take no part in it. Though the armament of the fleet had been postponed from want of money, and on account of the cessation of any fear of an attack from Spain, orders had been given which pointed to the employment of the ships in the following spring.^ What was the exact use to which these ships were May. to be put was still undecided. When Wake had set atuicknpou out in May for Turin, he had carried with him instruc- ^^°''*' tions to sound the Duke of Savoy on the subject of the co-operation of an English fleet with a French and Savoyard army in an attack upon Genoa similar to that which had been suggested by Ealeigh before he started on his expedition to Guiana. When Wake Aug. arrived at his destination, he found Charles Emmanuel already prepared with a design of his own. Let the King of England, he said, lend him twenty ships of war, and pay twenty thousand soldiers for three months. The whole expense would be about 1 26,000/. In return for this, James should have a third part of the booty ; or, if he preferred certainties to uncertainties, the Duke would engage to pay him 900,000/. after the surrender of the city. Genoa had so notoriously merged its interests in _ Oct. 1 • 1 1 1 m 1 • 1 • •! Hesitation those of Spam, that it could hardly claim the privilege in England, of neutrahty. But as soon as the Duke's proposition reached England, doubts were expressed, from a finan- cial point of view, of the soundness of the proposed investment. Wake was told to ask the Duke what were his grounds for thinking the enterprise an easy 1 Surrey of the Fleet, Aug. 31, 1624; S. P. Bom., clxxi. 36. 148 THE LAST DAYS OF JAMES I. CHAP. IV. 1624. Oct. Lesdi- guiferes' oiFers. Deo. Dutch and English ships to be lent for the attack. The fleet for Spain. one, but at the same time to assure him that it would be seriously taken into consideration if he could succeed in showing it to be feasible.^ By this time, however, a French army under the command of old Marshal Lesdiguieres was preparing to take part in the attack upon Genoa, as a diversion in favour of the troops invading the Valtelline, and Lesdiguieres, sorely in need of a naval force, had des- patched agents to England and Holland to recommend the plan in another shape. He now proposed that the fleet should sail in the name of the King of France, though it was to be composed of English and Dutch vessels. They would simply be hired by Lewis as he might hire them from a merchant, and if neither James nor the States General would be able to lay claim to any share of the splendid profits which the Duke of Savoy had held up to the English Government, neither would they have been called upon to take any part in the expense. To this plan the Dutch at once gave their consent, and agreed to lend twenty ships for the purpose.^ In England Buckingham warmly supported Lesdiguieres' agent, and persuaded James to follow the example set by the States General. It was therefore understood that the French commander would have twenty English ships at his disposal. Merely to lend a few vessels, however, was a trifle hardly worth mentioning in the midst of Buckingham's far-reaching schemes. In the course of a conversation with Ville-aux-Clercs and Effiat on the subject of this arrangement, he flashed before their eyes the grand pro- ject which, in the following summer, was to occupy so large a space in the thoughts of men. Another fleet, he ' Wake to Conway, Aug. 9 ; Conway to Wake, Oct. 20 ; & P. Savoy. ' Treatj with M. de Bellujon, Dee, 14; S. P. Holland. THE PROPOSED FLEET. 1 49 said, there must he. It should be sent to sea in the chap. name of the King of Bohemia. It would carry a land '- / -' army strong enough to seize some fortified post on the ^g^/' Spanish coast, after which the ships could look out for the treasure ships which annually returned to Spain with their precious freight from the mines of America. When that was taken — and there could be no real diffi- culty in the, way — the power of Spain would be crushed. Mansfeld and the Prince of Orange — at the time when Buckingham was speaking, Mansfeld was still in Eng- land — would have an easy task ; France and England would be the joint arbiters of Europe.^ Truly it was a bright and glorious vision. When Backing- 00 ham s self- Genoa had been taken, when Mansfield had won his confidence. victorious way into the heart of Germany, when city after city of the Spanish Netherlands was surrendering to the armies of the Dutch Eepublic, then, even if the wealth of the Indies had not been there to pay for all, Buckingham would have had small need to fear the persistent opposition of the House of Commons. It was true that he had made no allowance for difficulties or even for accidents. But how could difficulties or acci- dents be thought of whenhewas there to guide the State? Buckingham's vainglorious forecast had been uttered Dimcuitiea in the middle of December. A month later he learned that even his path was beset by obstacles. By that time he knew that Gustavus at least did not think victory so very easy of attainment. He knew that- the French had ideas of their own about Mansfeld's employment. And he knew, too, that if they liked to control the march of Enghsh troops according to their own convenience, they were quite ready to appeal to England for the aid which they needed in their own domestic difficulties. 1 Ville-aux-Clercs and EiRat to Lewis XIII., Dec. §| ; Harl. MSS., 4596, fol. 208, b. ISO CHAP. IV. 1624. Dec. The French Huguenota. £ncroach' ments of the French Govern- ment. THE LAST DAYS OF JAMES I. For a long time the condition of the Huguenots had been such as to forebode a catastrophe. Too weak to trust themselves to the protection of the common laws of the realm, they had yet been strong enough to wrest from their sovereign the right of maintaining carrisons in certain strong places, so as to secure at least a local independence. Such a situation was full of danger. To surrender their privileges was to place their rehgion at the mercy of a jealous, perhaps of a bigoted, master. To keep them, was to exist as a state within a state, and to flaunt the banners of a group of urban republics in the face of the growing popularity of a monarchy which had undertaken the task of founding the unity of France upon the ruins of a self- seeking aristocracy. Whatever may have been the right solution of the problem, the French Government, before Eichelieu's accession to power, made no attempt to discover it. The Peace of Montpellier, by which the last civil war had been brought to a conclusion, had been violated again and again. Amongst other promises the King had engaged to pull down Fort Louis, a fortress erected during the war to command the entrance to the port of Kochelle. But the Eochellese knew only too well that the walls and bastions thus solemnly devoted to destruc- tion in word, were being strengthened under their eyes. Marshal Lesdiguieres is reported to have said that either the Eochellese must destroy the fort, or the fort would destroy Eochelle. Eichelieu, there is little doubt, would have counselled the fulfilment of the terms of the treaty in order that France might have her arms free to operate against Spain. But Eichelieu had to consult his master's mood, and he would find it hard to wring from Lewis a consent to an act which looked like the abandonment of all control over a French city. THE FRENCH HUGUENOTS. 151 At last, whilst the more prudent among the Hugue- chap. nots were still counselling submission, two brothers, the ^^' Dukes of Eohan and Soubise, both of them alike am- r.^^^'^' . . ' Deo. 26. bitious and incompetent, resolved upon once more souMse SG1Z65 tll6 trying out the old quarrel in arms. On the 26th of I'^^ch December Soubise sailed into the harbour of Blavet in Brittany, and, capturing six vessels of war, carried his prizes safely to EochcUe. The seafaring population of the great city welcomed him as their deliverer, and the civil war once more began. Great was the indignation at the French Court when Eicheiieu the' news was told. Yet how was Lewis to take ven- fromEng- geance on the rebels without a larger navy than that the Nether- which, after Soubise's captures, he had at his dis- '*°'^^" posal ? Eicheheu as usual came to the rescue in the hour of difficulty. Whether he wished to see the demands of the Huguenots conceded or not, he was not the man to deal hghtly with rebellion. If England and the States General, he argued, had been ready to lend ships to Lesdiguieres for an attack upon Genoa, why should they not lend ships to Lewis to be used against that perfidious city which was holding him back from the flilfilment of his obligations to favour their interests against Spain. The Dutch Government had scarcely a choice, ctntent^of' They could not afford to offend the sovereign with the ^^^ °"''=J'' help of whose subsidies they were making head against their oppressor. Eichelieu's request, therefore, was at once granted at the Hague. In England the preparations for the great naval ex- ^°'^j."^*® pedition against Spain were in full swing. Twelve Govem- n 1 T T 1 • ment. ships of war and a hundred transports were being pre- pared for sea,^ and Buckingham was only waiting to J The King to the Council of War, Dec. 1624 ; S. P. Dom., clxxvi, 58, i. 152 THE LAST DAYS OF JAMES I. CHAP, hear once more from Lesdiguieres in order to get ^- — r^-' ready the ships intended for Genoa. To him, there- ^an. ' ^<^^^' news which made it likely that there would be any obstacle in the way of the French co-operation on which he counted was most unwelcome. He at once informed Effiat that the demand made by his master should be complied with, and, without going through the form of consulting James, he gave orders that the ships required should be fitted out immediately.-^ Not that James was likely to throw any obstacle in the way. When he first heard what had taken place, and before Effiat had had time to ask for the use of his ships, he expressed himself strongly on the subject. " If Soubise," he said, " or any one else takes upon him- self to commit such follies in your master's dominions, I will give every kind of assistance against him, in men, in ships, and in any other way in my power." When he heard what Effiat wanted, he had no objec- tions to make. " If those rascally Huguenots," he said, " mean to make a rebellion, I will go in person to ex- terminate them." ^ Bucking- The French alliance was stiU regarded at the Eng- ham to go ... to France. Jish Court as worth making sacrifices for, in spite of the misunderstanding which had by this time arisen about Mansfeld's destination. It was known in December that the dispensation for the marriage had been granted at Eome ; and, as it was believed that the Princess would be in England before the end of January, Buckingham, who was to hold the Prince's proxy at the ceremony, began his preparations for the journey. Charles indeed had been eager to go in > Effiat to Lewis XIIL, Jan. }}, H §| ; Had. MS8., 4596, fol. 258, b, 277, b, 290, b. ' Effiat to Ville-aux-Clerc9, ^ ; Effiat to Lewis XIIL, |^ Feb. 11 ; Harl. MSS., 4596, fol. 295, b, 298, b, 327. THE pope's demands. I 53 person to Paris, as he had gone to Madrid ; but, upon a chap. note from Lewis that his presence in France was not ■ — ^~- desired, he had been forced to abandon the idea.^ ^^^^5- Jan. 19. January, however, passed away without the arrival ^™'"|*p of the dispensation ; and with the delay came the liament. necessity for a further prorogation of Parliament,^ a prorogation which deferred for a yet longer time the possibility 01 obtaining money with which to meet the wants of Mansfeld's starving soldiers. Eichelieu had taken every means in his power to 1624. Aug. induce the Pope to grant the dispensation. Ira- and the" mediately upon the fall of La Vieuville, he had Son™^*" despatched Father BeruUe to Eome to expound to the Pope the advantages which would accrue to the Catholic Church from the Enghsh marriage. But he had taken care to reinforce the pleadings of the gentle enthusiast by plain speaking at Paris. He declared openly that if the dispensation did not come quickly, they would proceed to the marriage without it.^ Eicheheu's attitude had the desired effect. The Nov. dispensation was granted on the 21st of November, in the con- But when it arrived in Paris it appeared that the Pope manded by had only given way conditionally upon certain changes *'** ^°^' being made in the wording of the agreement between the two Kings. Amongst other demands, he asked that, instead of the private engagement taken by James and his son, there should be a public instrument assuring ^ Chamberlain to Carleton, Dec. 4, 8. P. Dom., clxxvi. 15; Ville- aux-Clercs and EfEat to Lewis XIII., Dec. §§ ; Lewis XIII. to Effiat, Jan. |§ ; Harl. MSS., 4596, fol. 157, 262. ^ Proclamation, Jan. 19; Mymer, xvii. 648. * Richelieu, wrote Langerac, the Dutch ambassador at Paris, on PiXig. -2-, ' verclaert dat indien deselve dispensatie niet haest en compt, dat men daerom niet laeten en sal met het huwelick voorts te procederen.' I owe this quotation, taken from tlie despatch at the Hague, to the kindness of Dr. Goll, of Prague. 154 THE LAST DAYS OF JAMES I. CHAP. IV. 1625. Feb. They are rejected by James. March 21. The mar- .riage finally agreed upon. Strong po- sition of Bucking- liam at Court. His oppo- nents at bis feet. freedom of worship to the Catholics, of which all the world might take cognisance.^ Some of the French ministers fancied that even this concession might be wrupg from James. But they forgot that pubhcity had never been required before, and Effiat soon convinced himself that the Pope's wishes had no chance of being complied with in Eng- land. And this time James had Eichelieu on his side. On the 2ist of March a promise was signed on behalf of the King of France to the effect that if the Pope's demands were not withdrawn within thirty days, the marriage should take place without any dispensation at all.2 Whether the French alliance would be able to stand the strain which the divergent views and interests of the two nations were certain to put upon it might perhaps be doubted. But there could be no doubt that as far as position at Court went, both Buckingham and Eichelieu were the stronger for the successful ter- mination of the controversies which had sprung out of the marriage treaty.. Of Buckingham it might truly be said that he held the government of England in his hands. Whatever wild scheme crossed his brain was accepted with docility by the Prince, as if it had been the highest effort of political and military wisdom ; and, when Charles and Buckingham were agreed, James was seldom capable of offering any serious opposition to their impetuous demands. Until Parliament met, therefore, Buckingham had nothing to fear. It is true that there had been mur- murs in high places at his tergiversation with respect to the English Cathohcs, and there can be Httle doubt ' Carlisle to Bucltingham, Feb. 16; Hardw. St. P., i. 551. ' Carlisle and Holland to Buckingham, Feb. 24; S. P. France. Effiat to Lewis XIIL, March A; Harl. MSS., 4596, fol. 359, b. BRISTOL S CONFINEMENT. 1 55 that the greater part of the old nobihty regarded him chap. IV. with aversion as an upstart. But such opposition he ■ — • could afford to disregard. The Privy Council and the jj^„ government offices were filled with his creatures, or with men who found it expedient to bear themselves as though they were his creatures. No man except Middlesex and Bristol had ventured to stand up against him. Middlesex, though upon his humble submission Middlesex ° ^ and Bristol. he had been liberated from the Tower, and had been excused the payment of a large part of his fine, was hopelessly excluded from public hfe. Bristol was less yielding than Middlesex. To a fresh demand that he ^^^- ^■ should acknowledge that he had been guilty of errors in judgment in his embassy at Madrid, he replied by a re-statement of his own view of the matter, accom- panied by a letter which, though humble enough, did not contain any acknowledgment that he had been in the wrong. ^ An acknowledgment that he had been in the wrong was however the one thing upon which Buckingham insisted, and unless Bristol was much mis- ' " Hoping that your nobleness and equity will lie such as a true and clear answer will be more acceptable to your Grace than an unjust acknowledgment, I have entreated Sir Kenelm Digby to deliver unto your Grace my answers unto the propositions which he brought unto me from you, and humbly beseech your Grace to cast your eyes over them, and if there shall be anything wherein your Grace shall rest unsatisfied, I entreat your Grace to give me leave to attend you, where I shall en- deavour not only to satisfy you in these particulars, but that I truly and unfeignedly seek your Grace's favour, to which, if I may upon fair and noble terms be admitted, your Grace shall find me for the future a faithful and real servant to you to the utmost of my power. But if I must be so unhappy as these my humble seekings of your Grace may not find acceptance — although I conceive my ruin an easy work for your greatness — ^I shall with patience and humility endeavour to bear what- soever God shall be pleased to lay upon me as punishments for other sins committed against him, but not against my master, whom I take God to record I have served both with exact fidelity and affection," — Bristol to Buckino-ham. £arl of Bristol's Defence, Pref. xxiii. Camden Mitcel- lawj, vi. 156 THE LAST DAYS OF JAMES I. taken, lie was debarred from appearing at Court by an order issued by the favourite in the King's name, with- out the consent of James. The Duke, said Bristol, in the account which he subsequently gave of the matter, ' moved his Majesty that I might first make an ac- knowledgment of my fault, which his Majesty refused to compel me unto ; saying he might then be thought a tyrant to force a man to acknowledge that which he was not guilty of; and his Majesty sent me word that I should make no acknowledgment unless I would freely confess myself guilty. Yet the Duke caused a message to be sent me that his Majesty expected that I should make the said acknowledgment, and confess myself guilty.'^ wSton^' Others were more supple than Bristol. Williams andCai- and Wcstou had convinced their patron that thev vert. Till would b^ ready to carry out his wishes ; whilst Calvert, who was secretly a convert to the Church of Eome, and had long been aixxious to escape from the entangle- ments of office, had laid his secretaryship at the Duke's feet, telling him plainly that he intended to live and die in the religion which he professed. Buckingham, who had spoken hard things of Calvert a few months before, was always inclined to deal gently with opposi- tion of this submissive kind, and assured the secretary that he should come to no harm by his avowal. He was therefore allowed, according to the custom of the time, to bargain with his successor for 6000Z. to be paid to him as the price of his withdrawal from office, and he was soon afterwards created Lord Baltimore in the Irish peerage.^ Calvert's successor was Wotton's nephew, Sir ' Ibid. xxiv. » Salvetti's Newsletter, j|^^; Chamberlain to Carleton, Feb. 12; -S. P, Bom., clxxxiii. 43. -, COURT PROMOTIONS. 157 Albertus Morton. He had formerly been secretary to chap. Elizabeth, when she was still at Heidelberg. For the ^^' first time since the office had been divided, both the ^t^^" . ^^b. 9. secretaries were thoroughgoing opponents of Spain ; Morton 00 D IT JT I ' secretary in and though neither of them was likely to be more than Caivert's an exponent of Buckingham's policy, the indication of ^ '"'^' the views now prevailing at Court is not to be neglected. A few weeks later, the other secretary. Sir Edward March 23. Conway, received the reward of his obsequious devo- made a" tion to Buckingham, ' his most gracious patron,' as he '^^^'^' always called him, and was raised to the peerage as Lord Conway. The treasurership, which had been in commission since the fall of Middlesex, had recently been placed in the hands of Chief Justice Ley, who ac- J'624. quired a peerage witli the title of Lord Ley. If he Leytrea- knew nothing of finance, he has at least Milton's high testimony to his personal integrity. After all, if Buck- ingham was to spend money at anything like the rate he was inclined to do, it hardly mattered much whether Ley knew anything of finance or not. A Colbert or a Peel would under the circumstances have failed in guarding the exchequer against an enormous deficit. In the course of the past year, Buckingham had Bucking- added another office to those which he alr^dy held, de^ofthe' Having received the reversion of the Wardenship of pS* the Cinque Ports, he persuaded the Warden, Lord Zouch, to surrender the post to him at once, by an offer of 1000/., and a pension of 500/. a year.^ Such arrangements were too common at the time to call forth much remark, and but for subsequent events it is probable that we should have heard no more of it 1 Aoreement between Buckingham and Zouch, July 17, 1624. State- ment relating to the Cinque Ports, Nov. 11. S.P, Dom,, clxx. 16, clxxir. 71. Grant of Office, Patent Rolls, 22 Jac. I. duct. 158 THE LAST DAYS OF JAMES I. CHAP, than we have heard of the very similar transaction '^--r-^ — ■ between Calvert and Morton, or than we heard, till pjp ■ within the last few years, of the sums of money which passed from hand to hand whenever an officer in the army thought fit to sell his commission, rfhis toS-^ Buckingham afterwards declared that in accepting this office he was solely actuated by consideration for the public welfare. In the approaching war, it would be highly inconvenient if one part of the coast were to be under the jurisdiction of the Lord High Admiral, and another part under the jurisdiction of the Warden of the Cinque Ports ; and future genera- tions, by reducing the Warden's office to a dignified sinecure, were to afibrd testimony to the Duke's fore- sight in this particular. But however this may be, there is no reason to doubt his sincerity. For, about the same time Buckingham refused to accept an office of still greater dignity which James pressed upon him. He declines It was proposed that he should be named Lord Lieu- Lieuten- tcuaut of Ireland, and should execute the functions of Ireland. government by deputy. It is said that his refusal to decorate himself with the title caused great annoyance to his enemies, who hoped to profit by the disrepute into which his acceptance of the ofier would have brought l^im.^ 1625. In truth, it was not so much from the number of Advice'^of officcs which he held that Buckingham was likely to lose the popularity which he had gained in the preced- ing spring, as by the superiority which he assumed over the holders of all offices. Wilhams, whose cautious prudence always led him to avoid extreme folHes, but whose want of tact was continually leading him to for- get that good advice is not always palatable, contrived ' Pesaro'a despatch, Nov. §f, Dec. §|, 1624. Williams. A SICKLY YEAB. 1 59 to give dire offence to his patron by recommending chap. him to retire from his dangerous prominence. The Marquis of Hamilton, the Lord Steward of the House- ^J^^' hold, had just died, and Wilhams at once wrote to Buckingham advising him to give up the Admiralty and to become Steward of the Household. In time of war, it was a necessity for the Admiral ' either to be employed abroad personally, or to live at home in that ignominy and shame as' his Grace ' would never endure to do.'i It was good advice enough, but hardly likely to commend itself to a man who fancied himself equally capable of commanding a fleet and of governing a state. Williams had only succeeded in injuring him- self. Hamilton was but one of the many men of note Deaths of who had fallen victims to that sickly winter. In the note. Low Countries, Southampton, the patron of Shake- speare in early life, sunk under the fatigue of his duties as colonel of one of the regiments which had gone out in the summer to maintain the cause of Dutch indepen- dence. At home Caron, for thirty years the represen- tative of the States in England ; Chichester, the soldier statesman, who had ruled Ireland so wisely ; and Not- tingham, the Admiral whose flag had floated over the fleet which drove the Armada to its destruction, sunk one after another into the grave. Kife as disease had been, no apprehension had been niness of entertained of any danger to the King's hfe. At the * ^ '^' beginning of the year he had recovered from the severe attack of the gout from which he had suffered at the time of Ville-aux-Clerc's visit in December, and he • Williams to Buckingham, March 2, 1625 ; Cabala, 280. This is the true date. Hacket, fancying the letter related to the death of Lennox, supposed it to have been written the year hefore. l6o THE LAST DAYS OF JAMES I. CHAP, was again able to take his usual interest in current IV . 1 • — r-^ — • affairs. On the ist of March he was at Theobalds, in March" ^^^ favouritc deer park. On the 5th he was attacked by a tertian ague, and, although those around him did not think that anything serious was the matter, he was himself prepared for the worst. Hamilton's death affected him greatly, the more so- as there were wild rumours abroad that he had been poisoned, or that he had been converted on his death-bed to the Eoman Church, rumours which, however destitute of truth, made some impression at the time on the popular mind. To James the loss of Hamilton was the loss of a per- sonal friend. ' I shall never see London more,' he said, as he gave dhections for the funeral ; and he gravely re- proved his attendants who sought to cheer him with the popular saying, ' An ague in the spring is physic for a . king.' He had never been a good patient, and he now refused to submit to the prescriptions of his physicians, who would consequently be all the more likely to take offence if irregular treatment were applied.^ March 12. On the 1 2 th James was beheved to be convalescent, rentreco- and was preparing to move to Hampton Court for '^*'^' change of air. Anxious to improve his condition still further, he remembered or was reminded that when Buckingham had been ill in the spring, he had been benefited by some remedies recommended by a country doctor hving at Dunmow. Under the directions, it Lady would scem, of Buckingham's mother, a messenger was Bucking- ' cj ^ o ham's despatched to Dunmow, and the result was a posset doctoring. .^ . .,,. ^ ■■■ drmk given by the Duke himseii, and some plaster ap- plied to the King's stomach and wrists by the Countess, with all the zeal which elderly ladies are apt to throw ' Chamlierlain to Carleton, Feb. 26 ; 8. P. Dom., clxxxiv, 47. ^ Chamberlain to Carleton, March 12; ibid, clxxxv. 48. Chambermayd to Elizabeth, March 27 ; S, P. Bom., Charles I., i. 2. THE KING'S LAST ILLNESS. l6l into the administration of remedies suggested by them- chap. IV. selves. The remedies may have been, and probably were, harmless. But they were given just as the hour ^^^^^f came round for the returning fit, and this time the fit The King o ' _ _ worse. was worse than ever. The regular physicians found out what was going on, and were highly indignant. They refused to do anything for the patient till the plasters were removed. After this fit the King's condi- tion again improved. But on the 2 1 st he again asked for Lady Buckingham's remedies, and^ though Bucking- ham appears to have remonstrated, the wilful patient insisted on having his way. The next fit was a very bad one. Again the physicians remonstrated. One of the number, Dr. Craig, used exceedingly strong lan- guage, and was ordered to leave the Court. But Craig's tongue was not tied, and it soon became an article of belief with thousands of not usually credulous persons that the King had been poisoned by Buckingham and his mother.^ The next day, when the fit was over^ Pembroke was March 22. about to leave Theobalds. But James could not bear to part with him. " No, my lord," he said, remembering the rumours that had been spread of Hamilton's change of religion ; " you shall stay till my next fit be passed ; and if I die, be a witness against those scandals that may be raised of my religion, as they have been of others." The King had asked for Bishop Andrewes. But March 23. ° -, T-iT T Williams Andrewes was too ill to come, and Williams had been s^t for- sent for to administer spiritual consolation to the sick man. On the road he met Harvey, the discoverer of 1 l^te Trials, ii. 1319; Fuller, Church Higtory, v. 568. The evidence is worthless in itself, and the only ground for supposing it to have any value is cut away when once it is undei-stood that Buckingham had no object in poisoning the King. Except in the single matter of the relief of Breda, he had had his way in everything. VOL. I. M l62 THE LAST DAYS OF JAMES I. CHAP. IV. 1625. March 24. James re- ceives the Commn- nion. March 27. His death and charac- ter. the circulation of the blood, who expressed his fears that the patient would not recover. WiUiams found the King's spirits low ; and the next morning he ob- tained the Prince's leave to tell his father that his end was near. James bore the tidings well. "I am satis- fied," he said ; " and I pray you assist me to make ready to go away hence to Christ, whose mercies I call for, and I hope to find them." Till the end came, Williams was by the sick man's side whenever he was awake, ' in praying, in reading, most of all in discoursing about repentance, faith, remission of sins, and eternal life.' On the 24th, James, after making at some length a confes- sion of his faith in the presence of his son and the prin- cipal attendants on his person, received the Communion from the hands of Williams. After this his strength gradually sunk, and on the 27th he died.^ James was in his fifty-seventh year when, already an old man in constitution, he was taken away from a world which he had almost ceased even to attempt to guide. The last years of his life had not been happy. Nor was the promise of the future brighter. He had raised expectations which it would be impossible to satisfy, and it was certain that any credit which might accrue to him would be attributed by the popular voice to others than himself It is but just to ascribe to him a desire to act rightly, to see justice done to all, to direct his subjects in the ways of peace and concord, and to pre- vent rehgion from being used as a cloak for polemical bitterness and hatred. But he had too little tact, and too unbounded confidence in his own not inconsiderable powers, to make a successful ruler, whilst his constitu- tional incapacity for taking trouble in thought or action gave him up as an easy prey to the passing feelings of ^ Hachet, i. 222. of Charles I., i. I. Conway toCarleton, March 31. Court and Times DEATH OF JAMES I. 1 63 the hour, or to the persuasion of others who were less chap. enhghtened or less disinterested than himself. His own ■ — r^ — • ideas were usually shrewd ; and it is something to say of March 27. him that, if his ideas had been reahsed, both England and Eiurope would have been in far better condition than they were. The Pacification of Ireland and the Colonisation of Ulster were, together with the effort which he made to effect a more perfect union with Scotland, the acts which did him most credit. And if in late years his attempts at pacification in Germany had covered him with ridicule, and his attempts at forming a great continental alliance as the basis of war seemed likely to end in failiu-e, it was not because his views were either unwise or unjust, but because either the obstacles in his way were too great, or he was himself deficient in the vigour and resolution which alone would have enabled him to overcome them. Keenness of insight into the fluctuating conditions of succesSj and firinness of will to contend against difficulties in his path, were not amongst the qualities of James. The irony of flattery which in his lifetiine had flisfunerai named him the British Solomon, was continued after his death. Wilhams, to whom the best points of the late King appeared so admirable in contrast with the rash, headstrong violence of his successor, |)i"oclaimed in his funeral sermon the comparison between James and the wisest of the Hebrew kings ; and, either by the wish of Charles or by James's own desire, the body of the first of the Scottish line in England was not to he apart as Elizabeth lay in her own gloryj The vault in which reposed the remains of Henry VII. and EUza- beth of York was opened. The occupants of the tomb were thrust aside, and room was made for the cofiin in which was the body of him who was proud of being their descendant. To unite England and Scotland in M 2 1 64 THE LAST DAYS OF JAMES I. ^?v^' peace justly seemed to James to be as great an achieve- ■ — 7 — ment as to unite the rights of York and Lancaster, and 1625. ° , , March, to closc the long epoch of civil war. But the com- parison which was thus invited could not but bear hardly upon the memory of the late sovereign. Henry, by his mingled vigour and prudence, laid the founda- tion of the strong monarchy of the Tudors ; James sowed the seeds of revolution and disaster.-^ ' There is an account of the opening of the tomb in Dean Stanley's Memorials of Westminster Ahhey. Curiously enough, James was defied even in the tomb. Close by the coffin of the author of the ' Counterblast to Tobacco' was found a pipe, probabl}' dropped by a workman. i65 CHAPTEE V. MILITARY AND DIPLOMATIC PROJECTS OP THE NEW EEIGN. The news that Charles had succeeded to his father was chap. received with general satisfaction. " The joy of the ■ — ^ — - people," as a contemporary expressed it, " devoured ^ }' their mourning." ^ Of the character of the new King, General ■ satisfaction silent and reserved as he was, little was known, and with the still less had reached the public ear of his questionable proceedings in the negotiation of the marriage treaty. It was enough that, ever since his return from Madrid, he had been the consistent advocate of war with Spain. When Ville-aux-Olercs went back to France with vuie-aux- the marriage treaty, Eicheheu asked him what he opinion of thought of Charles. " He is either an extraordinary <^''*'^'^- man," was the shrewd reply, " or his talents are very mean. If his reticence is affected in order not to give jealousy to his father, it is a sign of consummate pru- dence. If it is natural and unassumed, the contrary inference may be drawn." ^ The extreme reserve of the young King was doubt- His reti- less closely connected with that want of imaginative power which lay at the root of all his faults. With all his confidence in his own thoughts, he failed to give to his ideas an expression which was satisfactory to others ' Tilman to D'Ewes, April 8 ; EUis, ser. 2, iii. 243. ' M6moires de Brienne, i. 399. cence. 1 66 PROJECTS OF THE NEW REIGN. CHAP. V. 1625. March 21. His defects as a ruler. or even to himself. His father's rapid utterance had swept his slow conceptions away as with a torrent before he could find out what he reaUy meant to say, and he did not like to be contradicted. The man who is too vain to bear contradiction and not sufficiently brilliant or wise to overpower it, must of necessity take refuge in silence. Unfortunately the defect which hindered him from being a good talker hindered him also from being a good ruler. The firm convictions of his mind were unassailable by arguments which he was unable to understand, and unaltered by the impression of passing events which slipped by him unnoticed. The wisest of men, the most decisive of facts, were no more to him than the whistling of the storm is to the man who is seated by a warm fireside. They passed him by ; and, if he heeded them at all, it was only to wonder that they did not conform to his own beneficent intentions. "I cannot," he said on one occasion, " defend a bad, nor y|eld. in a good cause." ^ Conscious of the purity of his own motives he never ceased to divide mankind into twq simple classes — into those who agreed with him, and those who did not ; into sheep to be cherished, and goats to be rejected. Such narrowness of view was no guarantee for fixity of purpose. Whenever the mo- ment came at last for the realities of fife to break through the artificial atpaosphere in which he had been living, when forms unkno-vyn and unimagined before crowded on his hiewildered vision, it was too late to gain a knowledge tl^e acquisition of which had been deferred too long, or to exercise that strength of will which is only to be found where there is an intelhgent perception of the danger to be faced. The same explanation will prqbably in a great 1 Laud's Diary, Feb. I, 1623. . ACCESSION OF CHARLES I. 1 67 measure account for the special fault which has more chap. than any other cost Charles the respect of posterity. The • — ^ — • truthful man must be able to image forth in his own ^^,011^2 mind the effect which his words have upon others. He How far he ^ _ was un- must be able to represent to himself the impression truthful. his engagements leave upon those with whom they were made ; and he must either keep them in the sense in which they are understood by others, qr he must openly and candidly show cause why it is wrong or impossible so to keep them. The way in which Charles gave and broke his promises was the very reverse of this. He looked too much into his own mind, too little into the minds of those with whom he was bargaining. When he entered into an engagement he either formed no clear conception of the circumstances under which he would be called to fulfil it, or he remembered too clearly this or that consideration which would render his promise illusory, or wpi4d at least, if it had been spoken out, have prevented those with whom he was dealing from accepting his word. When the time came for him to fulfil an engagement he could think of nothing but the Hmitations with which he had surrounded it, or with which he fancied that he had surrounded it, when his word had been given. Sometimes he went still further, apparently thinking that it was lawful to i;se deception as a weapon against those who had no right to know the truth. Of the defects in Charles's character, the nation was Beginning as yet profoundly ignorant. AU that was known of "^^Z"""^ him was to his advantage. James died a little before noon. After spme hours spent in private, the young ging — he vas but in his twenty-fifth year — came up from Theobalds to St. James's. The next morning The Privy he gave orders that all his father's officers of state should retain their places. With the exception of the i68 PROJECTS OF TIIE NEW REIGN. CHAP. V. 1625. March 28. Charles and Buck- ngham. Williams objects to the pre- parations for war. Catholic Lords, Wotton and Baltimore, who were excluded, the new Privy Council was identical with that which had existed at the close of the last reign. For though the names of Suffolk, Wallingford, Middle- sex, Bristol, and Bacon were also removed, those who bore them had long ceased to appear at the board. The only addition to the number was Sir Humphrey May, the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster, a man of some abihty and of a very conciliatory disposition.^ The remainder of the week was passed by Charles in seclusion at St. James's. Buckingham, who was alone admitted to share his privacy, ' lay ' on the ' first night of the reign in the King's bedchamber, and three nights after in the next lodgings.'^ There is nothing to show that this was any way unpopular at the time. The transactions relating to the French treaty were as yet involved in mystery. Of aU men living Eliot was least open to the charge of undue subserviency. Yet Eliot wrote to Buckingham that he hoped to become ' wholly devoted to the contemplation of his ' excellence.'^ If the outer world was satisfied for a time, there were those at Court, who knew too much to be at ease. Williams had instinctively shrunk from the unpopularity ' Prqceedjngs of the Privy Council, J^arcli 28 ; Chamberlain to Carleton, April 9 ; S. P. Dom., i. 5, 46. Council Register, March 29. ' Neve to HoUonde, April 5 ; Court and Times, i. 3. ' Eliqt to Buckingham, April i ; JTorster's Eliot, i. 1 1 1 . Eliot had been coming to London to attend Buckingham on his visit to France, and Mr. Forater regards the order, which met him, to remain in the West, as evidence of some intrigue countenanced by the Duke. But the order ( Council Register, March 28) was plainly a bond fide one, giving him special duties to fulfil. In fact, Eliot was not wanted to accompany Bucking- ham, simply because Buckingham's journey was indefinitely postponed. When the Duke went it was under other circumstances, and the suite which he proposed to take was left behind. There was no slight what- ever put upon Eliot. As I shall hereafter show, the breach between Eliot and Buckingham cannot be proved to have taken place till much later than Mr. Forster supposes, PREPARATIONS FOR WAR. 1 69 which was sure to result as soon as the concessions chap. made to the Cathohcs were known, and he had too ■ — ^- — • much common sense to look with favour on Bucking- MMch^k ham's mihtary projects, which he knew to be far too extensive for the means at his disposal. When he was first admitted to th« Eoyal presence, he found Charles bent upon summoning Parliament immediately, to enable him to go on with his preparations by sea and land. The King even asked why the old Parliament of the preceding year might not be called without the delay of fresh elections. Williams told him that this would be distinctly illegal, and hinted that it would be well to afford time to canvass the constituencies in favour of candidates of the right sort. But Charles was in no mood to hear of difficulties. Let the writs, he said, be de- spatched forthwith. Let not a day be lost. The fleet was to go forth in the summer. War with Spain must be carried on vigorously. Williams did not venture to argue with his new master. But the few words which he spoke were not sufficiently enthusiastic. The King turned his back upon him and dismissed him.^ In the Council too voices were raised against pro- March 29 ceeding with the marriage treaty as it stood. But to the '""^ matters had gone too far to admit of hesitation now, ""'"^s^- and all opposition was put down by Buckingham with a high hand.^ A week after his father's death, Charles removed to April 3. Whitehall, walking without state across St. James's wwtS^. Park. His demeanour gained general approbation. His face was serious and pale. His attention to the services of religion was the object of almost universal remark. Men told one another with satisfaction that the new King was ' very attentive and devout at prayer • Hachet, ii. 4. » Effiat to Lewis XIII., April 3|; Harl. MSS., 4597, fol. 36. 170 PROJECTS OF TPIE NEW REIGN. CHAP, and sermons,' and were especially pleased to hear that ^ — • he had refused to make the customary present of AprM^Q mourning to a single recusant. A few weeks later the newsmongers reported that, as an Irish Earl was talking in a loud voice in a room next to that in which the King was at prayers, Charles sent to him to leave off prating and come to prayers. " His Majesty," said the Irishman, " knows well enough that I do not come to his prayers." " If he will not come to my prayers," replied Charles, " let him get out of my house." ^ Order at Such anecdqtes were sure to be favourably received. Nor was the restoration of the state which had been observed at Court in the days of Elizabeth likely to injure him in the popular opinion. Almost any one with a courtier's introduction could gain access to James ; Charles directed that no one should be admitted to his presence without special directions from himself.'^ Amongst those who were thus excluded was one who might have hoped for better treatment. Sir Francis Cottington had been Charles's secretary when he was Prince of Wales, and had served him faithfully in that capacity. But it was well known that, having fallen sick at Madrid, he had declared himself to be a Eoman Cathohc, at least tiH his recovery, and he had since protested, as Bristol had protested, his behef that the restoration of the Palatinate was to be hoped for from the Spanish ministers. He was now not only stripped of his official position and emoluments, but forbidden to appear at Court. Cottington, like a man of the world as he was, went straight to the Duke, asking him ' whether it could not be in his power, by all dutiful apph cation andaU possible service, to be restored to the ' Neve to HoUonde, Aprils; Obamberlaia to Carle ton, April 9; Meade to Stuteyille, May 6 ; Cmurt and Times, i. 3, 6, 20. ' Salvetti's Newsletter, April |f. BUCKINGHAM AND COTTINGTON. 171 good opinion his- Grace had once vouchsafed to have of chap. him, and to be admitted to serve him ? ' Buckingham — Z^ — ■ had at least the merit of speakins out his thoughts. He Jf^^l toid Uottington ' that he would deal very clearly with him ; that it was utterly impossible to bring that to pass which he had proposed ; that he was not only firmly resolved never to trust him, or to have to do with him, ' but that he was and would be always his declared enemy; and that he would do always whatsoever should be in his power to ruin and destroy him, and of this he might be most assured.' Cottington, seeing that all chance of advancement was at an end, replied that ' he hoped from his justice and generosity, that he would not suffer himself to gain by his loss,' adding that he had not only by the Duke's command laid out money in jewels and pictures, but had once ' in hope of his future favour ' made him a present of a suit of hangings worth 800^. Buckingham told him that he should be at no loss. If he would send in his account, every penny should be repaid.^ Such an anecdote as this points to the special dan- ger of the new reign so far as it was to be influenced by' Buckingham. Generosity there would be above mere personal meanness. But whether any one was to be treated as a friend or as an enemy would depend entirely on the accordance of his political views with those prevalent for the time at Court. There would be no largeness of mind, no readiness to hear all sides of disputed questions. Charles's heart was set upon greater things than on committee the restoration of etiquette. On the 9th he directed the affaire!^" formation of a Committee of the Privy Council to advise him on foreign affairs. Buckingham, of course, was one of the selected number. Of the other four • Clarendon,!. 33. 172 PROJECTS OF THE NEW REIGN. CHAP. V. 1625. April. Mansfeld allowed to assist the Dutch. May 26. Money sent to the King of Denmark. April. The fleet got ready. members, Pembroke, Brooke, Ley, and Conway, Pem- broke was the only one who had ventured to differ from Buckingham, and even he had never difiered from him for any length of time.^ The first result of the consultations of this body was the removal of the bar to the employment of Mansfeld at Breda. The States General were again applied to for money, and they consented to give their security to a loan of 40,000/. raised at Amsterdam. The English Government hoped that this sum would be sufficient to enable Mansfeld to take his way towards the Palatinate as soon as the fate of the besieged town was decided.?. The demands of the Northern Powers were next taken into consideration. It appeared that the Congress at the Hague could not be brought together as sopn as was expected, and Charles therefore entered into a separate agreement with the King of Denmark. He "offered to furnish him vfith 30,000/.^ a month, and before May was at an end he paid over 46,000/. on account. He did not, however, abandon the hope that the co-operation of Gustavus might^till be secured.* If Charles was anxious for the success of Mansfeld and Christian, he was still more anxious for the success of his own fleet, which, thanks to a timely loan of 30,000/. from Buckingham, was being rapidly prepared for sea. His first recorded appearance in public after his father's death was on the occasion of a visit to the shipping at Blackwall.' It had been finally settled that * The King to Ley and othep, Aprjl 9 ; S. P. Dum., i. 43. * Conway to Carleton, April 19; Carleton to Conway, April 19; S. P. Hollamd. ' Enrolments of Privy i^pfils, May 26 ; Anstruther to Carleton, May 28 ; S. P. Holland. Ley to Conway, June II ; S. P. Dom., iii. 52. * Declared Accounts, Treasurer of the Navy. Audit Office. ' Meddus to Mead, April 22 ; Cowrt and Times, i. 11. EQUIPMENT OF THE FLEET. 1 73 twelve ships of the Eoyal Navy, twenty armed mer- ;chap. chantmen, and fifty colliers, to act as transports, should ^— r^ — • rendezvous at Plymouth in June. Something more ^^^^^ than ordinary sea service was intended, and on May i ^and . •' _ ' •' soldiers to the Privy Council ordered that 10,000 landsmen should be pressed. be pressed to accompany the fleet as soldiers. Of these, 8,000 were to be at Plymouth on May 25. The re- maining 2,000 were to be sent over to the Netherlands there to be exchanged, if the consent of the States General could be obtained, for the same number of disciplined men from the English regiments in the Dutch service. By this means some steadiness might be imparted to the raw levies who were but too likely to be the mere offscouring of the streets sent by jus- tices of the peace to serve his Majesty because they were troublesome to their neighbours at home.^ The application made at the Hague for discipUned _ April. ^ J^ . ° 111 ^"^ Dutch soldiers had been accompanied by a proposal that the asked to Dutch should take an active part in the expedition itself. When the demand reached the Netherlands the soldier who had guided the Republic since the death of Barneveld had died after a lingering i-Uness. In his nl^t'^o?' brother, Frederick Henry, who succeeded him as Prince „? oSigt of Orange, and as Stadtholder of five out of the seven Provinces, the States were eventually to find a soldier of a quality equal to that of Maurice. But he was as yet untried in his high post, and, with the fate of Breda trembling in the balance, the States General naturally demurred to Charles's request to be allowed to select two thousand picked men from all the English regi- ments in their service. Whatever men he took, they said, he must take by whole companies, the good and the bad together. But they had no objection to his » Enrolments of Privy Seals, Dec. 23, Feb. 2 ; Reply to Carleton'a Memorial, April 17; S. P. Holland. Council Register, May i, 16. 174 PROJECTS OF THE NEW EEIGN. CHAP. V. 1625. April 17. Reply of the Dutch. May. Bucking- ham to command the expedi- tion. Plan of a campaign in Flan- ders. Necessity of consult- ing France. invitation to share in a maritime attack upon Spain, and they agreed to furnish twenty ships to the proposed expedition. At the same time they expressed their desire to bring to trial the perpetrators of the massacre of Amboina, and, for the time at least, this cause of dissension was removed.^ The discussion then turned on the further arrange- ments to be made for the expedition. For some reason or another, perhaps to avoid subjecting England to re- prisals from Spain,''' Charles was unwilling actually to declare war, and it was arranged that Buckingham should take the command in person, but that he should receive his commission from Frederick, the titular King of Bohemia.^ Where was the thunderbolt to fall ? The intention had originally been to direct it towards the coast of Spain, to occupy some fortified town there, and to watch for the treasure-ships returning from Mexico. But an idea dropped in conversation by some one in authority at the Hague was now taken up by Buck- ingham with characteristic warmth. The fleet and army might, he thought, be more usefully employed in an attack upon the ports of Flanders in combination with the Dutch forces. If those nests of privateers were taken and .destroyed, both England and the Netherlands would be the better for the operation.* Before such a scheme as this could be finally adopted it was necessary to obtain the approbation, if not the co-operation, of the French Government. Up to this ' Reply to Carleton'a memorial, April 17 ; S. P. Holland. " That there was any wish to avoid attacking Spain, is a theory im- possible to maintain in the face of the evidence of the French amlbassa- dors and others, who were watching Charles from day to day. ' Bucliingham to Carleton, May 4 ; S. P. Holland. * Compare Richelieu, Mimoires, ii. 461-4, with Morton's instructions, June 14; S. P. Holland. THE king's marriage. 1 75 time Charles had scrupulously carried out his engage- chap. ments to Lewis. By mutual consent the term within -- which the marriage was to be celebrated had been ^^^^' prolonged for a month as soon as James's illness was known to be serious, and before the month came to an end, the Pope, discovering that no attention would be paid to his remonstrances, ordered his Nuncio at Paris to deliver up the dispensation without waiting for further concessions from the English. The marriage Mayi. was accordingly celebrated by proxy on May i, in oft?e""°" front of the great west door of Notre Dame, after the mk"riage precedent set at the marriage of Margaret of Valois ''^p™^''- with the Huguenot Henry of Navarre.^ On the same day Ctiarlefs |];ave directions to the Favours to ^ ^ ^^ 1 1 . , , theCatho- Lord Keeper to carry out the engagement which he lics. had taken as Prince to remove the burdens weighing upon the Catholics in England. " We will and require you," he wrote, " to give order to all such our officers to whom it may appertain, that all manner of prosecution against the said Eoman Catholics, as well on their persons as goods, for the exercise of the said religion, be stayed and forborne, provided always that they behave themselves modestly therein, and yield us that obedience which good and true subjects owe unto their King." 2 Charles was represented at the marriage ceremony BueWng- by the Duke of Chevreuse, a distant kinsman of his po™ted'to own,^ who had attached himself warmly to the English [he Quern? alliance. As soon as the death of James had opened a prospect of greater poHtical activity in England, Buck- ingham abandoned the idea of visiting Paris as proxy for his sovereign, and, setting himself down to the work • Siri, Memorie Recondite, v. 835, 847. '' The King to Williams, May i; S. P. Bom., ii. i. ' Through his great-grandmother, Mary of Guise. 176 PROJECTS OF THE NEW REIGN. CHAP. V. 1625. May I. Doubts around the French alliance. April 21. Carlisle's warnings. before him, looked forward, at the most, to saihng across the Straits in command of the fleet which was to fetch home the young Queen.^ It is not hkely that either Charles or Buckingham, in their sanguine optimism, foresaw the storm which they were raising in England by their concessions to the Catholics. But they were beginning to doubt whether they would have anything except the person of the bride to show in return for what they had done. The^ league offensive and defensive between England and France, once promised as the crowning ornament of the marriage, had vanished amidst a cloud of com- pliments. And now, before the end of April, had come a letter from Carlisle, arguing that, for Charles's own sake, the less he said about such a league the better. No one could tell on which side the weight of the French monarchy would ultimately be thrown. On the one hand French troops were co-operating with the Duke of Savoy against Genoa. On the other hand, no peace had yet been made with Soubise and the Hugue- nots of Eochelle, The Pope had despatched his nephew. Cardinal Barbarini, to Paris to mediate an agreement between France and Spain. Under these circumstances CarUsle doubted the wisdom of urging a stricter alliance upon the French. "I am infinitely apprehensive," he wrote, " of adventuring my gracious young master's virgin reputation to a refusal." The French, he argued, would break a treaty as easily as they would break their word. If they continued adverse to Spain they would of their own accord seek aid from England. If they made peace with Spain they would expect ' Salvetti's Nmosletters, April i, 29, May 6. That his final resolution to go to Paris was a sudden one, is plainly stated in n letter from Con- way to Carleton, May 24; S. P. Holland. This explains why Eliot was not and could not be asked to attend. See p. 168, note 3, BUCKINGHAM'S JOURNEY TO FRANCE. 1 77 England to aid them against the Huguenots, a thing to chap. which it would be impossible for the King of England - — I- — • to consent.^ ? .,5" April 4. It was excellent advice, such as Carhsle, mere Bucking- courtier and spendthrift as he is generally represented, atodon"" was usually accustomed to give. But how was *'°''*' it possible for Buckingham to follow it ? This policy of waiting till France made up her mind which side she would take, he had long ago impetuously dashed aside. For the sake of the closest union with France he had sacrificed his own consistency ; and with it, though as yet he knew it not, his popularity with the English nation. Buckingham could not bear that doubt should be He deter- thrown upon the hopes on which he had buoyed him- toTrance!" self up so long. One chance yet seemed to remain to him. Forgetting how little his personal presence in Spain had availed him, he would try whether his per- sonal presence in France would not clear all difficulties away. It was certain that he would not come empty- handed. The great English fleet and army was not to be despised. If he offered to attack the Spanish Netherlands by sea and land from the north in con- junction with the Dutch, whilst Lewis, taking up in earnest his father's last enterprise, directed his armies upon them from the south ; if he promised that the Spanish province of Artois should be surrendered to Lewis as his share of the spoils, what French heart could turn away from so much glory, combined with so much sohd advantage to the monarchy ? For the sake of such an alliance ag this, Lewis could hardly object to grant acceptable conditions to the Huguenots.^ 1 Carlisle to Buckingliam, April 21 ; 8. P. France. = There are no despatches from Buckingham giving an account of his mission. But its main objects are to be found in Richelieu's Memoirs VOL. I. ^ 178 CHAP. V. 1625. May. The Eng- lish vessels for Eo- chelle. They are not to serve against the Hugue- nots. PKOJECTS OF THE NEW REIGN. With these hopes and fears Buckingham had ceased to wish to give English aid to France against Eochelle. He would rather, as far as we can judge from his acts, see Lewis pardon the Huguenots in order that he might make war, than help Lewis to subdue the Huguenots with the same object. A few days before James died, the contracts had been signed which made over to the King of France the ' Vanguard,' a ship of the Eoyal Navy, together with seven merchant vessels hired for the purpose from their owners. They were to be placed under the command of Pennington, the companion of Ealeigh in his last voyage to Guiana, and were to be at the service of Lewis for a time varying at his discretion from six to eighteen months. It was expressly stated that the vessels might be used ' against whomsoever except the King of Great Britain.' ^ On the 8th of May the ships were ordered to cross the Channel, but on the i8th, a few days after Buck- ingham had left England, Sir John Coke, who was the leading spirit amongst the Commissioners of the Navy, and was deep in Buckingham's confidence, wrote to Pennington directing him in no way to meddle with the civil wars of France, or to take part in any attack upon Protestants there or elsewhere. The true intention of his employment was to serve against (ii. 459), and his statement is confirmed, so far as relates to the proposed league, by Rusdorf (Rusdorf to Frederick, ^^; M&moires,\. 578); and as far as relates to the attack upon Flanders, we know, from Morton's instructions referred to at p. 186, that such a project was in contempla- tion. The proposal about the Huguenots is noticed in Langerac's de- spatch of May II, an extract from which has been communicated to me by Dr. Goll. ' Contracts, March 25 ; S. P. France. When Glanville afterwards stated that the vessels had been pressed, he probably meant, not that they had been pressed for the King of France, but that they had been first pressed for the service of the King of England, and then transferred to France. COOLNESS BETWEEN ENGLAND AND FRANCE. 179 ' the foreign enemies of France and England.' These chap orders, in flagrant contradiction with the letter and , ^- '_ spirit of the contract, were said to be for its ' better ^^^S- understanding.' ^ This change of front in the matter of the ships was May. accompanied by a change of front in the matter of the theTr^a" Eecusancy laws. On the nth of May the EngUsh caThoifc?" Catholics were full of hope. The order sent to Wil- hams on the ist^ was, as they believed, to be carried out. Three thousand letters to the Judges, the Bishops, and other official personages, commanding them to desist from any further execution of the penal laws, were ready to be sent out. Before the 23rd the Catholics were told that they must wait a httle longer. It would be unwise to fly so openly in the face of the coming Parliament. When the session was at an end their demands might be attended to.^ It was hardly wise of Buckingham to offer so Danger of openly to the French Government the alternative ham'svfsit between a complete alliance with England and an open *° ^'''°°°' rupture. For Eichelieu, anxious to' lead his sovereign in the path in which Buckingham desired him to tread, the advent of the impetuous young man must have been a sore trial. He knew that Lewis, balancing as he was between two opinions, loathing the domination of Spain and the independence of his own Protestants almost equally, would be thrown ofi" his balance by the slightest semblance of a threat on either side. And how was it to be expected that the headstrong EngHsh- 1 Warrant from Buckingiiam, May 8 ; Coke to Pennington, May i8 ; S. P. Dom., ii. 37, 74. I must ask those who think that Coke's letter ■was written to throw dust in the eyes of Pennington, to suspend their judgment till I have told the whole story. 2 P. 175. » The English Catholics to Ville-aui-Clercs, May 1 1, 23 : Harl. MSS., 4597, 140, b, 170, b. N 2 l8o PROJECTS OF THE NEW REIGN. CHAP, man, whose whole political position was endangered, ■ — ^ — - should abstain from threats ? ^ May 14 ^^ ^^ ^4*^ °^ '^^1-: Buckingham arrived in Paris. He arrives To the world in general he appeared to have set his whole soul on displaying his handsome person and his jewelled attire at the Court festivities.^ But those who knew that he was accompanied by the new secre- tary, Sir Albertus Morton, might suspect that he had more serious work in hand.^ Peace to be Of his negotiations at Paris we merely learn that, the Hugue- with EicheHeu's warm support, the King sent a noble- man to Epchelle to invite the Huguenots to send deputies to Paris to treat for peace.* After some delay caused by the state of the King's health, the Court set out for Compiegne, where Lewis was to take leave of his sister. Buckingham employed the two days which were spent there in urging the French Government to * Richelieu's position is clearly defined in Langerac's despatch of j™° ^ . He was always urging the King to war without and peace with- in. The same ambassador, writing on June |y, says that Buckingham told the Queen Mother that the Huguenots must seek peace on their knees, with rapiers in their hands. As far as I can gather Buckingham's in- tentions, he seems to have come over in much the same spirit, though pro- bably he thought less of the rapier at the beginning, and more at the end, of his mission. * The list of his clothes and attendants, printed in EUis, ser. i, iii. 189, of which so much use has been made by Buckingham's biographers, is not a list of what he really had with him, but of what he intended to take if he had gone as proxy at the marriage. Instead of the long train there set down, only Montgomery, Morton, and Goring accompanied hiui {Sal- vetti's Newsletter, May ||). He left England in such haste that he had to send back a gentleman " pour lui apporter ses nouveaux riches habits, afln qu'il se puisse montrer en ses vanitSs ' (JRusdorf, i, 579). Under these circumstances Eliot, of course, did not accompany him. The story told by "Wotton how he dropped a diamond in Paris which he subse- quently recovered, is, I suspect, the origin of the incredible tale that he purposely left his diamonds so loosely fastened on as to fall off, and that he then refused to take them back from those who picked them up. 3 Salvetti's Newsletter, May |f. * Langerac's Despatch, May |§. BUCKINGHAM'S RECEPTION IN FRANCE. l8i join England in a declared war against Spain. But chap. either the Duke's manner was distasteful to Lewis, or ■ ^^^— he shrunk from taking so decided a part. He would "^^5- neither bind himself to reject any pacific overtures Bucking- which might come from Spain, nor would he engage to mands a 1 o o strict alii take open part m a war for the recovery of the Palati- anoe. nate. Even the profiered bribe of the annexation of Artois to France was not enough to move him. He would give 100,000/. towards the expenses of the King of Denmark, and he would continue his share of Mansfeld's pay for seven months longer, and would reinforce the Count's shattered army with two thousand additional French horse.^ More than this he would not do.^ By a statesman accustomed to take hard facts as Bucking- they were, the result of Buckiogham's mission would failure, not have been regarded as so very pitiful. It was something that the French Court should show a dis- position to treat with the Huguenots and to oppose Spain in its own time and its own way. But Buck- ingham had staked his reputation on far more than this. Nothing but the most brilliant success would save his conduct with respect to the Cathohcs and Mansfeld's expedition from the gravest animadversion in the coming Parliament. He went to France with • The destination of the French horse is not mentioned in the de- spatch of Chevreuse and Ville-aux-Clercs which refers to the oifer Cj-^^i Sari MSS; 4597, fol. 193). But Lorkin tells Conway, in a letter of June 22 {S. P. France), that Richelieu had informed him that ' he had offered further a new succour of 2,000 horse for Count Mansfeld.' In his letter of Aug. 18, Lorkin further says that Richelieu, in conversa- tion, told him ' that at Compiegne they had offered a million towards the King of Denmark's entertainment, 2,000 horse towards the setting up of Mansfeld's army again, and to continue their wonted pay for seven months longer, but could never, in all this time, get answer from England.' S. P. F)-ance, ' Richelieu, Memoires, ii. 461. 1 82 PROJECTS OF THE NEW REIGN. CHAP, inflated hopes of unbounded success ; he returned ^— r-^ — ' bitterly disappointed. It is hardly too much to say ^' that his visit to Paris in 1625 cut the ground from under his feet as completely as his visit to Madrid iu 1623 had cut the ground from under the feet of James. He had yielded much, and had nothing to show for it in return. Is it wholly impossible that Buckingham's vexation at his political failure may have vented itself in the extravagance of which he was guilty a few days later ? Though Lewis went no further than Oompiegne, his mother and his wife accompanied the young Queen of England some stages further. At Amiens Buckingham spoke bitterly to Mary of Medici. The Huguenots, he said, might come to Paris to ask for peace upon their knees, but they must bring their swords in their hands.^ Bucking- Quccn Auue he addressed in terms of such passionate theQu"en dcvotion as they were walking together in the shades of France. ^^ evening, that she was forced to call her attendants to her help. That the handsome EngHshman had made an impression upon the poor young wife who had been treated with complete neglect by her husband, there can be no doubt whatever. And Buckingham was not the man to restrain himself from taking advantage of June 7. her weakness. After he had taken leave, he met a courier at Abbeville with directions to impart certain information to the French Government. Hurrying back to Amiens, he informed Mary de Medici of the State secret confided to him, and then asked for an audience of the young Queen. Being introduced, as was the fashion of those days, into the chamber in which Anne was in bed with her attendant ladies around her, he threw himself on his knees, and kissing the coverlet ' Langerac'a Despatch, aa quoted at p. i8o. HENRIETTA 1L\RIA IN ENGLAND. 1 83 over her, poured forth a torrent of impassioned words chap. such as would have beseemed a lover restored after long separation to the sight of his phghted mistress, j^^^^' Vanity and licentiousness were deeply rooted in Buck- ingham's nature. But were vanity and licentiousness sufficient to account for conduct so strange ? May there not have mingled with unchastened desire some feeling of pleasure at the affront which he thus put upon the man who had thwarted his pohcy, by paying his addresses thus pubUcly to his wife ? ^ Whilst Buckingham was making love or weaving political schemes at Amiens, the innocent pledge of the tottering alliance was continuing her journey. On june 12. June 1 2 she landed at Dover. Charles, at the urgent MariT*** entreaty of his mother-in-law, had retired to Canter- Doverf bury, in order that he might not set eyes on his bride till she had recovered from the effects of sea sickness. The next morning he rode over to Dover and took her June 13. by surprise. Eunning down stairs as soon as she heard sight of that he had come, she offered to kiss his hand. He caught her in his arms and kissed her. " Sire," she said, as soon as she was able to speak, " I am come to this country to be used and commanded by Tour Majesty." By-and-by, seing that she reached to his shoulder, Charles, who had heard much of her short- ness of stature, glanced downwards to see if her feet were raised by artificial means. " Sire," she said with ' The scene is described substantially in the same way in the Memoirs of Madame de Mottevilte, and in the Memoirs of Brienne. There is no very clear account of the despatch which reached Buckingham at Amiens. It seems to have been connected with the Duke of Savoy (Ville-aux- Clercs to Lewis XIIL, ^^If , and the subsequent correspondence : Karl. MSB., 4597, fol. 192, 213, b.). Buckingham appears to have added a re- quest that the 2,000 horse, instead of being placed under Mansfeld, should be lent to Charles to do what he pleased with them, probably to use them for the attack upon Flanders. 184 PROJECTS OF THE NEW REIGN. the ready -wit of her nation, " I stand upon my own feet ; I have no helps by art. Thus high I am, and am neither higher nor lower." ^ Such passages between a sharp, bright-eyed girl of fifteen and a husband of twenty-four could not do more than gloss over the inherent difficulties of the situation. The young wife had been taught to regard herself as entrusted with the mission of comforting and protecting the persecuted members of her own Church. She had not crossed the sea forgetting her own people and her father's house. Nor was Charles likely to fill a large space in her imagination. Affectionate himself towards her, he was eager for her affection in return. But he expected to be obeyed without showing that superiority which secures voluntary obedience. He was punctilious, harsh when contradicted, and without re- Difficuity source in moments of emergency. Petty difficulties about . . Madame de soou arose. Henrietta Maria had grown up under the care of Madame de St. Georges, and she could not bear to be separated from her as she drove with her husband from Dover to Canterbury. But she was told that the lady's rank was not high enough, and Buckingham's mother and sister, together with the Countess of Arundel, were allowed to seat themselves in her stead in the Eoyal carriage. The first matrimonial conflict, rising at times almost into the dignity of a diplomatic dispute, arose out of this question of precedence. The French ladies of the Queen's suite took good care to keep the quarrel open, and to teach her to regard everything Enghsh with contemptuous dislike.^ June 16. On the 1 6th the King and Queen entered London the^King by the highway of the river. The rain was falling and Queen into ) London. 1 Mead to Stuteville, June 17 ; EU%», ser. i, iii.- 196, 197. ^ Chevreuse and Ville-aux-Olercs to Lewis XIII., undated ; Harl. MSS., 4597, fol. 181. THE KING AND QUEEN IN LONDON. 1 85 fast. But they kept the windows of their barge open, so chap. that they might be seen by the multitude which awaited ■ — i- — ■ them. They were received with the utmost euthu- june^i4. siasm. The tops of the houses, the decks of vessels and lighters, were covered with a shouting crowd. Deeply laden wherries gave hfe to the surface of the river. The ordnance of the fleet at BlackwaU, and after that the Tower guns, discharged a thundering welcome. The Queen, as she landed at Denmark House — the Somerset House of an earHer and a later generation — seemed to be well pleased with her recep- tion. The London crowd knew no ill of her, and those who gathered to. se& her as she passed had it not in their hearts to be uncivil to one so young and fair. It was rumoured too that there were hopes of her con- version. Perhaps she had herself unwittingly given rise to the report. Some one had impertinently asked her whether she could abide a Huguenot. "Why not ? " she quickly replied ; " was not my father one?"^ Charles might well look merrily around him. as he led his wife to his home. But for those terrible reli- gious and political questions behind, he had no need to be alarmed at the little disagreement about Madame de St. Georges' precedence, or the important discovery of the French ladies in waiting that their mistress had to sleep in an old-fashioned bed which had done ser- vice in the days of Queen Elizabeth. But already, two days before the royal entry into London, the first stroke had been aimed at the French alliance of which Henrietta Maria was the living symbol. On June 14 Morton's Morton was despatched to the Netherlands to urge the Se^Nether- Dutch to co-operate with England in the attack upon '^""^ 1 to , June 17 ; Com-t and Times, i. 30. i86 PROJECTS OF THE NEW REIGN. CHAP. V. 1625. May 26. Surrender of Breda. June. Deplorable condition of Mans- feld's troops. Handers, which Lewis had refused to share.^ If this project should be adopted, the war would assume a more exclusively Protestant character, and poor Hen- rietta Maria's marriage would, politically at least, have lost its meaning. For the moment, however, this risk was averted. It was by no means a propitious time for inviting the States General to take part in so hazardous an enter- prise. On May 26 Breda had surrendered, and there was nothing so stable in the military or financial strength of England as to induce the cautious Dutch Government to abandon its defensive pohcy for an attack upon the enemy in the very centre of his power, especially as there was every reason to suppose that the project was not regarded with favour at Paris. If indeed a warning were needed to keep the Dutch from placing too great confidence in the overtures of England, it was not far to seek. The condition of Mansfeld's troops was more deplorable than ever. As soon as Breda was lost, the States, anxious to be rid of him without delay, had done their best to forward him on his way towards the Palatinate. But the attempt was no sooner made than its impracticability appeared. Beyond the frontier 19,000 of the enemy's troops were waiting to swoop down upon him the moment that he abandoned the protection of the Dutch fortresses. In spite of the money which Carleton had succeeded in raising upon the security of the States, the men had, as usual, been infamously neglected. Four days passed after their arrival at the frontier before even a piece of bread was served out to the famished soldiers. The peasants, fearing the consequences of the irruption of a starving mob, had fled at their approach. Of the whole force. Instructions to Morton, June 14; S, F. Holland. MANSFELD'S DISASTERS. 187 English,French,aiid Germans together, but 6,000 march- chap. ing men were left. " Our General," wrote Lord Crom- • — Z^ — • well on June i, " studies his profit and how to ruin us, j^^J' I think ; else he would give us that which might make us hve Uke poor Christians, and as the King's subjects. I desire nought in this world but an honest life, and so doth my Lieutenant-Colonel, your servant. Let us but command men that may not die as if we •had killed them by giving them neither meat nor money, and we wiU go anywhere where our noble con- ductor dare send us ; but to command a regiment starved, now not 220 men, I scorn it." ^ Such was the position of England on the Continent June 18. when, on June 18, Parhament met at last. The only anddTp^o- diplomatic effort and the only mihtary effort which had m^e. been seriously taken up had ended in failure. The French alliance had produced no visible results. The men who had followed Mansfeld in January were either lying under the green sod in the fields of Holland and Brabant, or were cowering for shelter under the guns of the Dutch forts. The projects for the future Necessities were uncertain, hazardous, and enormously expensive, {itme. In the course of the next year 360,000/. would be required for the King of Denmark, 240,000/. for Mans- feld, 100,000/. for the regiments in the Low Countries, and some 300,000/. for the fleet, making in all a sum of 1,000,000/., or more than three times the amount of the subsidies which had been granted in 1624 as an unprecedented contribution. Yet it is probable that the mere extent of the Probable demand would not have stood in the King's way if the feeii^ng in hearts of the Commons had been with him. But, unless S c?m"^^ the new Parhament abandoned the position taken up ™™'' 1 Cromwell to CarletoD, June 7 ; S. P. Holland. t88 PROJECTS OF THE NEW REIGN. CHAP, by the old one, this was more than unlikely. At all events, in 1624 neither the close alliance with France, ^^' nor the embarkation of England upon a Continental war on a large scale, had been approved of by the Lower House. It remained to be seen whether the Commons of 1625 would be of a diflferent opinion. 1 89 CHAPTER VI. THE FIRST PARLIAMENT OF CHARLES I. AT WESTMINSTER. Never within living memory had there been such chap. competition for seats in the House of Commons. -- — r-^ — - Never had the members chosen attended so numerously j^^^^g on the first day of the session. Something there was Numerous ■^ 1 T . (> attendance doubtless of a desure to welcome the young King, of at the ■, . -, ^ T ^ ■ opening whom nothing but good was as yet known ; something Pariic- too, it may be, of curiosity to learn the secret of the ™ destination of the ships which were gathering, and of the diplomatic messages which had been speeding back- wards and forwards over Europe. Nor is it at all unlikely that many at least were anxious to hear from the King's lips some explanation of the way in which his promise had been kept to the former Parliament, some assurance, if assurance were possible, vj;hat the English Catholics had £0± benefited by the King's marriage) The presence of the members in London was not The piague Avithout risk to themselves. The Plague, that scourge of crowded and ill-ventilated cities, had once more settled down upon the capital. In the first week of April twelve deaths from this cause had been recorded. By the middle of June, just as Parhament was meeting, the weekly mortahty was one. hundred-and_^istyrfive.^ Seldom has any sovereign had a harder task before Charles him than was before Charles when he stood up to per- uament. ' Salvetti weekly records the numbers. The number last given is from a letter from Mead to Stute-ville, June i8 ; Court and Times, i. 32. igo FIRST PARLIAMENT OF CHARLES I. AT WESTmNSTER. ;CHAP. suade the Commons to vote him unheard-of sums of ■ r^ — ■ money in order that he might carry out a policy on Junris. which their opinion had never been asked, and of which they were almost certain to disapprove. But it is very unhkely that Charles felt at all embarrassed, or that the idea that any reasonable man in that great assembly could possibly disagree with him, even entered into his mind.'' His speech. The busiucss to be treated of, said the King, needed no eloquence to set it forth. He had nothing new to say. The advice which the Houses had given to his father had been taken, and he had but to ask for means to carry it stUl further into execution. " My Lords and Gentlemen," he then went on to say, "I hope that you do remember that you were pleased to employ me to advise my father to break both those treaties that were then on foot, so that I cannot say that I come hither a free, unengaged man. It is true that I came into this business willingly, freely, hke a young man, and consequently rashly ; but it was by your entreaties, your engagements. . . I pray you remember that this being my first action, and begun by your advice and entreaty, what a great dishonour it were both to you and me if this action so begun should fail for that assistance you are able to give me." After a few more words urging his hearers to haste on account of the plague, and protesting his desire to maintain true religion intact, he left it to the Lord Keeper to signify his further pleasure.^ • Of course some will take the view that the speech was deliberately drawn up so as to avoid mention of the difficulties of the case. What I have said ahove, however, seems to me far more in consonance vTith Charles's character. " In addition to the scanty notices in the Journals, we have for this Parliament Eliot's Negotium Posterorum, and the Fawsley MS. belonging to Sir R. Knightley, which I hayo edited for the Camden Society. I THE KING'S SPEECH. I9I Williams had not much to say/ and his hearers chap. were doubtless thinking more of the young King's first ■ — ^ — - appearance than of the Lord Keeper's rhetoric. If we jj j^gjo^ can trust to the subsequent recollection of Eliot, the made by ■■• ' the speech. impression made by Charles was pleasing. It was natural that he should not himself go into details, and the House might reasonably expect to hear more, in due course of time, from the Lord Treasurer or from a Secretary of State. Men were tired of the long speeches of the late King, and there was a general disposition to trust to the good intentions of his suc- cessor. There was one point, however, on which the Com- Feeling mons had made up their minds. Whatever Charles or cathoUcs his ministers had yet to tell them about the war, they meant to hold him to his promise about the Cathohcs. Any concession to them they regarded as dangerous to the security of the realm. When the Speaker, Sir Thomas Crew, was pre- expressed sented to the King, he took the opportunity of ex- speaker, pressing the general opinion of the House on this subject. The King, he trusted, would be able to recover the Palatinate, and also ' really to execute the laws against the wicked generation of Jesuits, seminary priests, and incendiaries, ever lying wait to blow the shall refer to the latter as Camden Debates. Unless there is any special necessity for referring to one particular source, it will be understood that what I say in the text is founded on these authorities. The further volume of notes taken by Eliot I shall give as Eliot Notes. > I am unable to discover the enormity of Williams's suggestion, that if subsidies were too slow in coming in, Parliament might find some other way of hastening their grant, as that could not "be unparliamen- tary which is resolved by Parliament." Eliot's account of this session is so interesting that one is apt to forget that it was vmtten some years after the event, and coloured by the recollection of all that had passed since. I may say at once that I do not believe that there was no feeling against the King till after the second application for supply. 192 FIRST PARLIAMENT OF CHARLES I. AT WESTMINSTER. CHAP. VI. 1625. June 21, No definite demand of supplj' made. Adjourn- ment pro- posed by Mallorv and Went- worth. Went- ■worth'a policy. coals of contention.' To this exhortation Williams, by the King's command, replied vaguely that speedy sup- plies were urgently needed, and that the House might trust his Majesty to choose the proper means of de- fending his religion. On the 2 1st the Commons proceeded to business. There could be no doubt that precedent as well as ordinary courtesy demanded an explicit statement on the King's behalf of the amount of the proposed expenditure and of the reasons upon which the demand was founded. With the last Parliament James had entered into a direct engagement to take the Commons into his con. fidence when they next met. Whether, if Charles had told the truth, he would have satisfied the Houses, may well be questioned. It is certain that he did not tell them anything at aU. Not a minister rose in his place in Lords or Commons to say how much was wanted, or to explain in what way the surplus voted would be spent. Charles threw the reins about the neck of Parliament, and expected it to follow his call. Silence such as this, whether it was the result of a deliberate purpose, or, as is more likely, of mere youthful inexperience and ignorance of human nature, was in itself the worst of policies. Above all things assemblies of men ask to be led ; and to this assembly no guidance was offered. Whilst the House was still hesitating what to do, an unexpected motion was brought forward. Mallory, the member for Eipon, proposed that the King should be asked to adjourn the session to Michaelmas on account of the prevailing sickness. The motion was warmly supported by Sir Thomas Wentworth. It is easy to understand why it should have found favour in his eyes. To him the war with Spain was sheer folly. King and Parliament, he thought, had gone mad together the year before. The duty of PROPOSED ADJOURNMENT, 193 England, he considered, was to attend to its own chap. business, to amend its laws, and improve the adminis- -- ^}' — tration of justice, leaving the Codtinent to settle its i'^^\- 1 1 . . June 21, troubles m its own way. When he had heard of the prorogation of Parliament in October, he had been beyond measiu-e dehghted. " For my part," he had written to a friendj " I take it well, and conceive the bargain wholesome on our side, that we save three other subsidies and fifteenths." ^ An adjournment to Michaelmas now, which would save more subsidies still, would, we may readily conjecture, be equally agreeable in his eyes;^ That Yorkshire members, whose antagonism with Spain was less pronounced than that of the counties, and above all, of the port towns of the south, should wish to dispose for three months of the King's demand for subsi- dies, is easily intelligible. It is far more significant that The ad- Phelips, to whom Spain was as hateful as the principle iupported of evil itself, should have risen in support of the pro- ^ * ^' posal. There was matter of fear, he said, in every part of the State. Before they thought of giving, they ought to take an account of that which was last given, and as by reason of the plague there could not possibly be found time enough then for such an enquiry, they should ask his Majesty that it might be referred to some other time.' ^ ' Strafford Letters, i. 24. ^ Eliot ascribes Wentworth's support of the motion to' Lis desire io postpone an impending enquiry into the validity of his election. But Eliot could know nothing of Wentworth's motives ; and, even if it were worth Wentworth's while to put off an investigation vvhich must have taken place whenever the House met again, his was the character to court rather than to shun enquiry. ' Camden Debates, 7. The omissien of all reference in Eliot's narra- tive to the part taken by Phelips, is enough to put us on onr guard against trusting it too implicitly as a complete authority,' Phelips'a speech is mentioned in the Journals,' though not in a satisfactory manner, VOL. I. 194 FIRST PARLIAMENT OF CHARLES I. AT WESTMINSTER. CHAP. VI. ^..: I— m^ 1625. June 21. And rejec- ted by the House. Jnne ss. Cconinittee for grie- vances not appointed. Petition on the Eecu- sancy laws proposed by Sey- inour. How far these words of the impetuous orator ex- pressed the floating opinion of the House, must be left to conjecture. But, whatever members might thiak, they were not prepared to drive the King to extremities, and Mallory's motion was without difficulty rejected. Something, however, must be done, if it were only to occupy the time of the House. If the Commons had voted ten or twelve subsidies without asking questions, they would have given great pleasure to Charles and Buckingham, but they would have pleased no one else. At the next sitting, therefore, after a proposal for the appointment of the usual Committee for grievances, came a motion from Alford ' for a Committee ' to con- sider of what course we shall take in all business this Parliament.' To these naotions Eudyerd rose. After a studied panegyric on the King, he adjured the House not to be led a way into enquiries which might lead to con- tention so early in the reign. Sir Edward Coke professed himself content that there should be no Committee for grievances, on the understanding that an answer would be given to those which had been presented the year before ; and Coke's suggestion was ultimately adopted. A new turn to the debate was given by Sir Francis Seymour.^ Their duty to God, he said, must not be forgotten. Let them ask the King to put in execution the laws against priests and Jesuits. After an animated discvission, in which member after member expressed himself in accordance with Seymour's proposal, the and the Miot Notes have the following after Mnllorv's motion : ' Seconded hy Sir Ro. Phelips, in consideration of the dangers, either for adjorn- ment to another time or place.' We have therefore Eliot's own hand- writing in favour of the coriectness of the Camden Debates on this point. ' Doubtless the old member, who again sat for Colchester in this Parliament, though his name is omitted by Willis. " Mr. Forster ascribes this do Pym ; but Eliot does not give his name, and the Journals and the Camden Debates agree on Seymour. ELIOT ON RELIGION. ige question was referred to a Committee of the whole chap House. ^^^^ The most remarkable feature of this debate was the j'^^^5- complete silence of the Privy Councillors in the House. sii™ce?f It was only at its close that Heath, the Solicitor- couJ"^ General, promised that an answer should be given to the grievances of 1624. On the general policy of the government, it would seem, no man was commissioned to say a word. The next day the House went into Committee on religion and supply, ' wherein religion was to have the first place.' The key-note of the debate was struck by EHot. " Eeligion it is," he said, " that keeps the sub- june 23. jects in obedience, as being taught by God to honour fpeech on his vicegerents. A religando it is called, as the com- '^'^ion. mon obligation among men ; the tie of all fi:iendship and society ; the bond of all office and relation ; writing every duty in the conscience, which is the strictest of all laws. Both the excellency and necessity hereof the heathens knew, that knew not true religion ; and therefore in their politics they had it always for a maxim. A shame it were for us to be less intelligent than they ! And if we truly know it, we cannot but be affectionate in this case. Two things are considerable therein — the purity and the unity thereof; the first respecting only God, the other both God and man. (For where there is division in religion, as it does wrong Divinity, so it makes distractions among men.3 It dis- solves all ties and obhgations, civil "and natiu-al, the observation of heaven being more powerful than either policy or blood. For the purity of religion in this place I need not speak, seeing how beautiful the memories of our fathers are therein made by their endeavours. For the unity, I wish posterity might say we had preserved for them that which was left to us." 2 196 FIRST PARLIAMENT OF CHARLES L AT WESTMINSTER. To this lack of unity Eliot now addressed himself. Arguing that those who had fallen away from it were a constant danger to the State, he urged that, if neces- rsary, the Recusancy laws should be amended, or, if \ that could not be, that the existing laws should be put in execution. Meaning of Eliot's sDcech is the more noteworthy as it an- tne speech. '■ ^^ • r. nounced the complete adhesion of a man who was no Puritan to the Puritan opposition against Eome. In Ehot's cdrriposition there was nothing of the dogmatic orthodoxy of Calvinism, nothing of the painful intro- spection of the later Puritans. His creed, as it shines clearly out from the work of his prison hours, as death was steahng upon him — ■'■ The Monarchy of Man ' — was the old heathen philosophic creed, mellowed and spiritualised by Christianity. But between such a creed and Eome there was a great gulf fixed. In- dividual culture and the nearest approach to individual perfection for the sake of the State and the Church, formed a common ground on which Eliot could stand with the narrowest Puritan. All superstitious exalta- tion of the external ordinances of the Church, of human institutions which gave themselves out to be divine, was hateful to both aHke. Tlie Calvinist creed he could ennoble to his own uses ; the Eoman creed he could have nothing to do with. For the sake of the English nation it was to be proscribed and trodden under foot. There must be unity and purity of faith, and that faith must be one which brought man face to face with his Maker. Eecusanoy The result of this debate was a petition drawn up Srawn'up. bj Pjon ^ and Sandys, and altered to some extent in committee. The King was asked to execute the penal laws in all their strictness, and to take other measures ' Mr. P. in the Camden Debates is surely Pym. THE RECUSAJSrCY PETITION. 1 97 to prevent the spread of the doctrines of the Koman chap. CathoHc Church. Nor did the Commons trust only in ■ — ^ — - coercive measures. They desired that silenced ministers, ' ^^' who would engage not to attack the government of the Church, should again be allowed to preach ; that a restraint might be put upon non-residence, plurahties, and other abuses ; and that some scheme might be drawn up for increasing the income of the poorer clergy. It is easy for us to condemn the readiness with which Eliot and Pym called in the authority of the State to repress a rehgion of which they disapproved. But it is impossible to use their shortcomings as a foil for Charles's virtues. He, at least, had no more idea than Charies not they had of opposing rehgious error' by moral force, peraecu- But for the disturbing influence of his marriage, he would have been quite as ready as they were to put the laws in force against the Eecusants. His difficulty was not that of a man who is asked to do what he thinks wrong, but rnerely that of a man who is en- tangled by two contradictory promises, and who sees the time approaching when one, if not both of them, must be broken. When on June 30 the petition was sent up to the June 30. Lords for their approval, it had been still further tionLllt modified. The request that the silenced ministers "p- should be readmitted to their pulpits had given place to a request that a fresh effort would be made to reduce them to conformity. It would still be some time before the petition on Seymour'? religion reached the throne. What Charles expected a smau the Commons to do as soon as they had relegated their religious grievances to the House of Lords, it is impos- sible to say. Supply stood next in order to be treated of ; but |;hough twelve days of the session had passed away, giving him time to reflect on the attitude pf the 198 FIRST PARLIAMENT OF CHARLES I. AT WESTMINSTER. Commons, he had taken no steps to explain to them the real meaning of the vague demands which he had made in his opening speech. If he expected that, when once the petition on reli- gion was cleared out of the way, the Commons would lay at his feet the vast treasures which he needed, but the amount of which he had not ventured to specify, he was soon bitterly undeceived. Scarcely had the petition left the House, when Sir Francis Seymour rose and proposed the grant of one subsidy and one Importance fifteenth, or about ioo,oool. Seldom has a motion moUon. more simple in appearance been more momentous in its consequences. The vote proposed was as nearly as possible one tenth of the sum which Charles re- quired to fulfil his engagements. It therefore imphed, under the most courteous form possible, a distinct resolution of the House to give no adequate support to the war in which the King was engaged. Consis- Seymour gave no reasons for his abrupt interven- tencyof - . « ^ -, . . Seymour, tion. As far as he is personally concerned, it is not difficult to find an explanation of his conduct. He had been one of the most eager in the last Parliament to engage England in a war with Spain, one of the most decided in protesting against any attempt to involve Parliament in extensive military operations on the Continent.^ He was therefore only consistent with himself in refusing the supply necessary to carry out a policy of which he disapproved. The Court The Court party was taken by surprise. Many party taken _ -T •' . by surprise, of its :|Tigmbers wcre abscnt from the House: all of ' 0-0 the 19th of March, 1624, he had said that he had heard 'wars spoken on apd an army ; but would be glad to hear where. The Pala- tinate was the place intended by his Majesty. This we never thought of, nor is it fit for the consideration of the House, in regard of the in- finite charge.' THE COMMONS DO NOT PROVIDE FOR THE WAR. 199 them had been left without instructions how such an emergency was to be met. Eudyerd alone, facile speaker as he was, was prepared to say something, and he dwelt at some length upon the recent expenses of the Crown, the sums of money which would be required for the payment of debts inciu-red in bury- ing King James, for the entertainment of foreign am- bassadors, for the approaching coronation, and for the war. The navy was to be got ready ; the Dutch, the King of Denmark, Mansfeld, to be assisted. But whatever Eudyerd might say, he had not been em- powered to ask for any definite sum of money, and the combined vagueness and magnitude of his demands was not likely to concihate men who felt themselves drifting into a war the duration and extent of which were beyond calculation. The most dangerous temper in which an assembly can be found is that which arises when it believes that it has not been treated with con- fidence ; and though we have no means of knowing whether the House was in such a temper when Sey- mour rose, it certainly was not for want of a cause, if no such feeling existed.' The existing dissatisfaction, whatever may have Speech of been the extent to which it had spread, found full ^ ^' expression in Phelips. Now, it would seem, h,e was less isolated than when at the beginning of thp ses- sion he had risen to support the motion for an immediate adjournment. After a few wprds, which to Charles at least must have sounded like bitter irony, in which he described the proposed grant as an expression of the aflfections of the subject, he went on ' I am sorry to say that I am forced to treat tlje situation as though the Negotium Posterorum had never been written. Eliot was so little able to place himself back in past days, that he reasons as if the vote passed were an adequate supply. 200 FIRST PARLIAMENT OF CHARLES L AT WESTMINSTER. CHAP, to complain, in somewhat exaggerated terms, of the • — r^ — ' state of the kingdom as it had been left by James. June ^o Then, coming to the point at issue, he aimed straight at the argument upon which Charles had relied in his opening speech. It was not true, he said, that Parliament was bound by any engagement to the King. " The promises made," he explained, " were in respect of a war. We know yet of no war, nor of any enemy." Then, touching on still more delicate ground, he referred to the late disasters. No account had been given of the expenditure of the last subsidies. But even if that were in readiness, " What account is to be giyen of twenty thousand men, and of many thousand pounds of treasure, which have been ex- pended without any success of honour or profit." ^ Such failures, he added, had not been usual in the 4ays of Ehzabeth. Lqt them press upon the King the necessity of taking these things to heart, and beg him f to proceed in his government by a grave and wise counsel.' He would vote, however, for rather more than Seymour had proposed. He thought they might give two subsidies without any fifteenths, that is to say, about 140,000/. He hoped no man would press for more. If any man put forward the King's merit as a reason for a higher grant, he missed the right way. "For other argument," he ended, "we know what can be said, and hope that at the return of the navy there will be better inducements." In the end Grant of Phelips's amendment was carried, and two subsidies two subsi- , ^ dies. were voted. Charles's want of confidence in the House was thus 1 The 20,000 men are either a slight orjitoijcal exaggeration, or include the French and Germans who -jyere \f ith Mansfeld. Bljot makes Phelips speak of millions of treasure, which is too absurd, one wqul(i ^hink, even for an orator. I have followed the Camden Debates, OPPOSITION BETWEEN THE KING AND THE COMMONS. 20I met by a vote which was practically a vote of want chap. of confidence in his advisers. Phelips's main position - — ^ — ■ was unassailable. It was not true that even if the ' ^^' Jane 30. existing Parliament were bound by the vote of the last How far . o •' . were the one, it was under any engagement to the King, except Commons to take into consideration his proposals relating to the right, war. When he came before the Houses without any definite demands, they could but judge him by the result of his actions, and those actions had been so thoroughly unsuccessftd that they furnished no induce- ment to trust him blindly in the future. Yet though the step taken by the House under the guidance of Seymour and Phelips was certainly justi- fiable, it is impossible not to regret the manner in which the thing was done. An event of such his- torical importance as a breach between the Crown and the House of Commons should not have been allowed to take place upon a sudden and unexpected motion, followed by a hasty vote. The House, in all proba- bility, would have failed in any case to estabhsh satis- factory relations with Charles. But it would have spared itself much obloquy in the future and would have conciliated much popular feeling at the time, if it had condescended to put its views and intentions into an address which would have vindicated its thoroughly legitimate position. That there was no ill intention is probable enough- Men who disliked voting money for questionable objects would be glad enough to escape from tlie iiecessity of entering into controversy with their sovereign, and would doubtless flatter them- selves that, in voting two subsidies, they had done the King considerable service.^ 1 This view of the case is that which finds a reflection in Eliot's nar- rative. As a key to the situation it is quite worthless, but I do not doubt that it is not without foundation in the feeling which existed at the time. session. 20 2 FIRST PARLIAMENT OF CHARLES I. AT WESTMINSTER. CHAP. The vote of so inadequate a supply was a bitter ■ — r^ — • pill for Charles to swallow. His first impulse was Charles *^ reiBonstrate against the measure which had been thinks of dealt out to him. Instructions were given to one remonstra- ° _ ting- of the Ministers to press the Commons to increase July 4. ^ . , But their vote.^ But the intention was soon abandoned. endihe The Solicitor-Gencral was ordered to lay before the House the answer to the grievances of the last Par- liament, and the Lord Keeper at the same time informed the House that the King was sorry ' for the great danger they were in by reason of the sickness, and that ' he was prepared to end the session as soon as they were ready.^ In these words the Common's naturally discovered an intimation that they were to hear no more of the demand for money. The plague ' One is always loth to challenge any assertion of the late Mr. Bruce, but it is clear to me that the provisional instructions calendared under July 8 (S. P. Bom., iy. 26) must have been written before July 4, as they contain a direction that the person to whom they are addressed should, if the main object failed, urge the House to turn their resolution into a Subsidy Bill, which was what they did on the 4th of July, with- out pressing, ' Eliot says that the message was " that his Majesty received great satisfaction and contentment in their gift, both for the form and matter, it coming as an earnest of their love." On this Eliot founds an argument, that the King having accepted the gift was precluded from asking for more. We have, however, three separate reports of the message : that of the Lords' Journals, that in Coke's statement in the Commons' Journals, and that in the Camden Debates. lu none of these do any such words occur. Something of the sort may be implied from the fact that the King did propose to close the session, and Eliot may have taken that which was implied as actually said. The Lord Keeper may, on the other hand, have said something which, as not forming part of his message, may not have been formally reported. At all events, Eliot cannot be relied on for details. He says that the Subsidy Bill " being passed the House of Commons, and that intimated to the King, it produced a message." As a matter of fact the Bill had not even been read a first time when the message was delivered. Since this note was written, I am able to bring Eliot's own testimony against the Neyotium. The report in the Eliot Notes, like that in the Camden Debates, is silent on any word in the mes- sage about accepting the eubsidiesi election. THE YORKSHIRE ELECTION CASE. 203 was raging terribly in London. Men were counting chap. up the growing death-rate with perplexed faces. The ■ — .^ — - members, believing that all serious business was at ^ ^^' T • 1 1 • Membera an end, slipped away in crowds to their homes, leaving go home 1 xi i. 1 p ,1 • , , • , '1 crowds. less than a lourth part or their number to bring the session to a close. Already, in spite of the preoccupation of the House june. with other matters, a question had been decided of ^rth^s some interest in itself, and of still greater interest as bringing into collision two men who more than any others were to personify the opposing views of the parties in the approaching quarrel, and who were both to die as martyrs for the causes which they respectively espoused. At the beginning of the session Sir Thomas Wentworth took his seat as member for Yorkshire. But his rival. Sir John Savile, accused the sheriff who had returned him of conducting the election so irregu- larly as to make a fresh appeal to the electors a matter of necessity. According to Savile, the sheriff, being a friend of Wentworth, interrupted the pelhng when he saw that it was likely to go against the candidate whom he favoured. The sheriff, having been summoned to give an account of his proceedings, explained that when the poll was demanded it was past eleven in the morning, and that he had doubted whether it could legally be commenced at so late an hour. He had, however, given way on this point, but he beheved that no one who had not been present when the writ was read had a right to vote, and consequently when some of Savile's men broke open the doors in order to force their way to the poll, he had put a stop to the voting and had declared Wentworth to be duly elected. In the discussions which followed in the House, not only were the facts of the case disputed, but there was 204 FIRST PARLIAMENT OP CHARLES L AT WESTMINSTER. CHAP, considerable difference of opinion as to the proper pro- - — r^ — ' cedure at elections. Wentworth himself bore himself j^^^' as haughtily as usual. Not only did he state his case ^rth-s proudly and defiantly, but, in opposition to the rules of advocacy the Housc, he Omitted to withdraw when it was under of nis own . . . -. case. investigation, and rose again to answer the arguments which had been urged against him. Eliot at once rose to denounce the offender, comparing him to a Catiline who had come into the senate in order to ruin it. Before this invective Wentworth was compelled to leave the House, though he was afterwards permitted to return and to state hjs case once more.^ Compari- It was uo mere personal rivalry, no casual difference, twee^n' which divided Wentworth and Eliot. With Wentworth ^d°:^ot!'' good governinent was the sole object in view. Every- thing else was mere machinery. Conscious of his own powers, he was longing for an opportunity of exercising them for the good of his fellow countrymen. But, excepting so far as they could serve his ends, he cared nothing for those constitutional forms which counted for so much in the eyes of other men. The law of election was there, one may suppose him to think if not to say, for the purpose of sending Sir Thomas Went- worth to Pa:phament. He was himself arrogant and overbearing tp all who disputed his will. It is certain that in private he expressed the utmost contempt for his fellow members,'^ and it is not Ukely that he had ' Mr. Forster (Sir J. Eliot, j. i6o), after giving Eliot's speech from the Negotium, proceeds as follows : " ' Yet hear me first,' cried Wentworth, as ■tjrith a general feeling unmistakeahly against him, he rose to leave. He sppke briefly and without interruption." This implies that Went- worth succeeded in setting the rules of the House at defiance. The Eliot Notes do not agree with this view pf the case. After referring to Eliot's appeal to the privileges of the House, they say " W. sent out again. After, the motion being renewed upon question, W. admitted to be heard." Wentworth therefore was specially authorised to speak. ' Strafford Letters, i. 24. ELIOT AND WENTWORTH. 205 any higher respect for his constituents. He was an chap. outspoken representative of that large class of politi- -~ — r^ — - cians who hold that ability is the chief requisite for juiy^^' government, and who look with ill-concealed contempt upon the view which bases government upon the popular will. Ehot stood at the opposite pole of pohtical thought. EUot's To him the attempt to convert Parliamentary elections '^p™"*^- into a sham was utterly abhorrent. In them he saw the voice of the nation speaking its mind clearly, as he saw in the representatives of the nation once chosen the embodirtieilt of the liiajesty of England. Out of the fulness of his heart he reproved the man who held both the House and its constituents in contempt. The majority sided with EUot. Glanville, whose Julys- authority was great on all questions of this nature, pro- tion de- duced precedents to show that a poll when demanded must be granted, whether it was after eleven or before, and that electors had a right to vote even if they had not heard the writ read. Wentworth's election was declared voidj and the doors of the constitution were opened more widely than they had been before.^ Few as were the members remaining at Westminster during the last days of the session, they had still matters of unusual importance to discuss. Some three years 1622. before, Richard Montague, the Eectoi* of Stamford at°stam-^ Eivers, in Essex, found in the hands of some of his ''*'"^^'^^"* parishioners a paper drawn up by a Eoinan Catholic missionary, which contained the usual arguments against those Calvinistic tenets which, at the close of the preceding century, had been the accepted doctrines of the great majority of the clergy, and which were therefore attacked as if they formed the accepted ' t'orster, Sir J. Eliot, i. 153 ; bamden Debates, I3, 36, 44. 2o6 FIRST PARLIAMENT OF CHARLES L AT WESTMINSTER. CHAP, doctrine of the English Church. Montague, who ■ — r-^^ belonged to a differenl school, and who found support for his opinions in those formularies of his Church which reflected the belief of an earlier generation, determined to frame a reply which should base its repu- diation of the Eoman doctrine upon grounds very different from those which were popular amongst the clergy and laity. He was not unversed in contro- versy, having already entered the lists against Selden himself, whose History of Tithes he had unsparingly condemned. 1624. The result of Montague's meditations was that The A New Gag Gag for the new Gospel — such was the quaint name of Goose the paper which had aroused his indignation — received a reply under the equally quaint name of A New Gag for an old Goose. It is unnecessary to say that it was deformed with that scurrility from which few contro- versies in that age were free. But, as far as the matter of the volume is concerned, an impartial judgment will probably consider it as a temperate exposition of the reasons which were leading an increasing body of ^scholars to reject the doctoines of E^me and oLGeneva alike. To the Calvinistic doctrine of predestination Montague entertained an insuperable objection. He refused to speak of the Eoman Church as indi;bitably Antichrist, or of the Pope as the man of sin.^ Those ' The passage about the Roman Church is a quotation from Cassan- der : " Et quamvis preesens bnee eccleaia Roniana non pavum in morum et disciplinse sinceritate, ab antiqua ilia unde orta et derivata est, discesse- rit, tamen eodem fundamento doctrinse, adde etiam in doctrinse sinceri- tate et sacramentorum a deo institutorum firma semper constitit, et communionem cum antiqua ilia et indubitata Christi Ecclesift agnoscit et colit. Quare alia et diversa ab ilia non potest, tametsi multis in rebus dissimilia sit. Manet enim Christi Ecclesia et spnnsa, quamvia multis erroribus et vitiis sponsum suum irritaverit, quamdiu a Christo suo sponso non repudietur, tametei multis flagelli» ab eo castigetur." New Gag, 53. MONTAGUE'S NEW GAG. 207 who remained under his authority formed a part of chap. the Church of Christ, corrupt and unsound in the ■ — -^ — ■ highest degree, but not utterly apostate. Of the more ^^^'^' pecuHar doctrines sanctioned by Papal authority he spoke in a way very different from that in which the majority of Protestant Englishmen were accustomed to express themselves. He denied the right of the clergy to enforce upon the people the practice of compulsory auncular confessio n.^ But he held that in cases where the mind was perplexed or the conscience burthened with sin, the person so troubled might be invited, or even exhorted, to come voluntarily to the Christian minister, and to seek for advice and consolation, and for the declaration of divine pardon to the repentant offender. He denied that the bread and wine in the Lord's Supper underwent any substantial change. But he asserted that Christ was therein present to the faithful receiver in some mysterious way which he did not venture to define.'^ Pictures and images, he said, might not be made the object of worship or even of veneration. But there was no reason why they should not be used, even in churches, to biing the persons and actions of holy men of old before the minds of the ignorant, and so to excite devotion in those upon whose ears the most eloquent sermon would fall flat ; if, in short, they could be used much in the same way as the pictures in illustrated Bibles, or in painted church windows, are used in our own time.^ Finally, Montague argued that prayers to the saints were to be rejected, 1 New Gag, 83. » Ibid. 258. ' " Images have three u.=ie8 assigned by your schools. Stay there, go no further, and we charge you not with idolatry ! Insiitutionem rudium, commonefactionem historic, et excitationem devotionis. . . . Not the making of images is misliked, not the having of images is condemned, but the profaning of them to unlawful uses in worshipping and adoring them." New Gag, 300, 303. 2o8 FIRST PARLIAMENT OF CHARLES L AT WESTMINSTER, CHAP, not because he doubted that the holy dead retained a 1624. loving sympathy with those who were yet living, but because he was unconvinced that there was any way of reaching their ears so as to excite their pity, and further, because ' we may well be blamed of folly for going about, when we may go direct ; unto them, when we may go to God.' ^ The Com- Such opinious were ndt likely tt) pass long unchal- the°book*to lenged. Two clerg3mien, Yates and Ward, complained to a Committee of the Commons in the last Parliament of James, and, as the session was drawing to a close, the Commons referred their complaint to the Arch- bishop of Canterbury. Abbot's "With the objections takerL to the New Gag, Abbot proceed- '^ ^ . ings. warmly sympathised. But he did not much like the responsibility thrust upon him by the House of Com- mons. If the ideiaj prevalent with modern writers, that he was still under disgrace in consequence of the accidental homicide committed by him in Iiord Zouch's park, finds little countenance from contemporary evidence, it is certain that James far preferred the chatty, secular-minded Williams, to the Calvinistic, clerical Archbishop; Abbot therefore thought it best, as soon as he had read the book, to ask James what he had better do, and was recommended to send for the author. Heremon- Abbot took the hint. "Mr. Montague," he said, Montague. " you profcss you hate Popery, and no way incline to Arminianism. You see what disturbance is grown in the Church and the Parliament House by the book by you lately put forth. Be occasion of no scandal or .offence ; and therefore this is my advice unto you. Go home, review over your book. It may be divers things ' Neio Gag, 229. MONTAGUE AND ABBOT. 209 have slipped you, which, upon better advice, you will chap. reform. If anything be said too much, take it away ; if anything be too little, add unto it ; if anything be ^^^^' obscure, explain it ; but do not wed yourself to your own opinion, and remember we must give an account of our ministry unto Christ." Such advice, which might perhaps have been of some avail with a young man whose opinions were as yet unformed, was of course thrown away upon a practised writer who was simply asked to cast the whole treasure of his intellect in a new mould. Mon- tague too went to the King, and found in James a sympathising auditor. " If that is to be a Papist," said James, " so am I a Papist." By the King's permission Appdio he prepared a second book, entitled Appello Ccesarem, ^'^''""'• in which he vindicated more fiercely than ever his claim to be the true exponent of the doctrine of the Church ; and this book, having been referred by James to Dr. White, Dean of Carlisle, was by him declared to contain nothing but what was agreeable to the public faith, doctrine, and discipline of the Church of England, and was accordingly licensed for the press. Before it was ready for publication, James died, and it was issued with a dedication to his successor. And now, on July i, as soon as the question of 1625. supply had been settled, the Commons sent a deputa- The 60m- tion to Abbot to know what steps he had taken. The toTbtot.'^ deputation found him much vexed. After telling them all that had happened, he complained that he had not even been informed of the intended publication of the second book till it was actually in the press. But he had no legal jurisdiction over Montague on the mere complaint of the House of Commons. All that he could say was 'that he would gladly give his judgment VOL. I. F 2IO FIRST PARLIAMENT OF CHARLES L AT WESTMINSTER. CHAP. VI. 1625. July I. The books referred to a Com- mittee. Englisli Calvinism, Story of Baxter. upon the Appello Ccesarem whenever he should be ' orderly directed to it.' The attempt of the Commons to obtain the unoffi- cial support of the Archbishop having thus fairly broken down, they referred the whole subject to the Committee by which the petition on Eecusancy had been prepared. That the report of the Committee would be adverse to Montague was clearly to be foreseen. His opinions had made but little way amongst the lawyers and country gentlemen — the two most conservative classes in the nation— of whom the House was mainly composed. Nor indeed was it to be expected that the prevaiUng Calvinism would surrender its ground without a struggle. It had done great things for Europe. At a time when the individual tendencies of Protestantism threatened to run riot, it had given to men a consistent creed and an unbending moral discipline, whicli was yet Protestant to the core, because it was built upon the idea of the divine choice resting upon the individual soul, without the intervention of any priest or ecclesias- tical society. Wherever the struggle with Eome was the deadliest, it was under the banner of Calvinism that the battle had been waged. Wherever in quiet villages, or in the lanes of great cities, any one woke up to the consciousness that a harder battle with sin was to be waged in his heart, it was in the strength of the Calvinistic creed that he had equipped himself for the contest. Alone with his God, the repentant struggling sinner entered the valley of the shadow of death. Alone with his God he stepped forth trium- phantly to hold out a hand to those who had passed through the like experience with himself. The strength of the Enghsh Calvinists lay mainly in the humble peaceable men who found in it a safe- guard against a life of sin. Such a one was the father ENGLISH CALVINISM. 211 of Eichard Baxter. Around his Shropshire home, in chap. the last ten years of James's reign, there was but little — J^ — ■ preaching at aU. In one village there were 'four j^j^.^^' readers successively in six years' time,' ignorant men, and two of them immoral in their Uves ! In another ■ ' there was a reader of about eighty years of age that never preached.' He said the Common Prayer by heart, and got a day-labourer or a stage-player to read the psalms and lessons. These were succeeded by others, one of whom obtained a living in Staffordshire, and, after preaching for twelve or sixteen years, was turned out on the discovery that his orders were forged. Then came an attorney's clerk who was a drunkard, and who took orders, or pretended to have done so, because he could not make his hving in any other way. On Sundays and hohdays these men read prayers, ' and taught school and tippled on the week days,' often getting drunk and whipping the boys. The villagers did not prosper under such shepherds. As soon as the hasty service was over on Sunday morning, they gathered round the maypole on the green and spent the rest of the day in dancing and jollity. To take no share in these riotous amusements was to incur the mockery of the little community, and to be called a Puritan, a word which then carried the deadhest re- proach. Not that the elder Baxter had any wish to separate himself from the Church. He ' never scrupled Common Prayers or ceremonies, nor spoke against Bishops, nor ever so much as prayed but by a book or form, being not ever acquainted then with any that did otherwise ; but only for reading Scripture when the rest were dancing on the Lord's Day, and for praying — by a form out of the end of the Common-Prayer Book — in his house, and for reproving drunkards and swearers, and for talking sometimes a few words of p 2 212 FIRST PARLIAMENT OP CHARLES I. AT WESTMINSTER. Reaction against Calvinism, Not a popular movement. Scripture and the life to come, he was reviled commonly by the name of Puritan, Precisian, and hypocrite.' ^ For most of those who took part in the conflict with Bome and the conflict within themselves, there was no disposition to shake ofl" the Calvinistic doctrine. They felt it as a support rather than an incumbrance. They had no wish to probe it to its depths or to search out its weak points. Its moral strength was enough for them. Yet this could not last for ever. There was sure to come a time in every land when this feeUng that rehgion was a conflict would die away, at least with some; when those who grew up strengthened by the surrounding influences of habitual piety would look to their religion rather as an intellectual framework to the quiet morality of their Hves than as a struggle or an effort. In England it had come when men like Laud and Montague set themselves free from the bonds of Calvinistic dogmatism. They claimed to think for them- selves in cases in which no decision had been pro- nounced, and to search for goodness and truth on every side. They were ofiended not merely by this or that doctrine of Calvinism, but with its presumption in repelling half the Christian Church of the present, and almost all the Christian Church of the past, from parti- cipation in the divine favour. They were ofiended with its dogmatism, with its pretensions to classify and arrange men's notions of mysteries which eye hath not seen nor ear heard, and they claimed the right to say that there were things on which the popular religion had pronounced clearly, which were nevertheless beyond the domain of human knowledge. Even if, like the Arminians of the Netherlands, the rebellion against Calvinistic dogmatism had taken a ' Baxter's Life, I. OPPOSITION TO CALVINISM. 2 1 5 merely doctrinal form, the supporters of that rebellion chap. would have had but little chance of taking hold of the ■ — r^ — • popular mind. The objections which they felt were IJ/i only likely to occur to men of culture and education. It was ahke their weakness and their strength that the movement was emphatically a learned movement, a movement springing from those who had outgrown the leading strings which were necessary to guide the steps of others, and who could look without shrinking at the fact that religion was a subject upon which human reason could, to a very limited extent, exercise its powers. They were intellectually the liberal church- men of the age. They stood between two infallibili- ties — the infallibility of Calvinism and the infalhbihty of Eome — asking for evidence and argument at each step which they took, and daring to remain in uncer- tainty when reason was not satisfied.' Evidently such a standing point as this was not likely to be received with popular applause ; and the difficulty before these men was considerably in- creased by the fact that they did not content themselves with merely doctrinal differences. It is a necessity of Necessitj- human nature that for every plunge which it makes to the ™ forward into the untried sea of free thought, it must ^"'^'" attach itself all the more closely in some other direc- tion to the firm ground of orderly systematic belief. ' There is a passage in the conference held in the following year on Montague's books, which seems to me to embody the spirit of the move- ment more than any other which I have seen. The question asked was whether General Councils could err. To this Buokeridge and Cosin re- plied : " All assemblies of men in sensu divino, and confederated merely as men, may err. in the weightiest matters of faith : but all assemblies of men having atiffident ability of learning to Judge, and whn with prayer and pious affection endeavour to vinderstand heavenly truth by the rule of God's Word, all such assemblies of men shall not err, becftuse God hath promised the assistance of His Heavenly Spirit to deliver them from fun- damental error." Cosin's Works, ii. 24. taken by it. 214 FIRST PARLIAMENT OP CHARLES L AT WESTMINSTER. CHAP. Lutber, as he struck boldly out from tlie Church in- • — v^ — • stitutions of his day, saved his creation from falling July f ^^^^ chaos by clinging with almost convulsive grasp to the institutions of the State. Calvin, in fixing his eyes upon the individual salvation of the man predestined to glory, took care to surround the future saint with the strictest discipline and with the iron bonds of a theology which was for him to be ever unquestioned. In our day those who trust most to their own powers of reason are the loudest in proclaiming the forces of universal law, and in expounding the necessities of a fixed order in the universe. Position For men like Montague and Laud the order of Eome and the order of Calvinism were alike impossible. Never again would they bend their necks under either yoke. But in the earlier days of the English Eeforma- tion, in the days when Calvinism was but stealing in, they found exactly what they needed. The theology of Cranmer, fixing itself upon the principle that aU practices were to be maintained, aU doctrines held, which could not be proved false by the authority of Scripture and the custom of the early Church, suited them exactly. It gave them a rational ground on which to stand. It gave enjployment to minds to which the history, especially the ecclesiastical history, of the past was an attractive study. It appealed to the poetic and artistic instincts which were almost smothered un,der the superincumbent weight of dogmatic theology. It fenced them in with naemories of the past, and cere- monial forms in the present. Their life was more sympathetic, more receptive of a higher culture, but at the same time weaker, and less fit to take the lead in any crisis through which the nation might be called upon to pass, all the more so because these ideas were not originally arrived at by themselves, but partook CEREMONIALISM. 215 to a great extent in the weakness whicli attends the chap. revival of the system of an earher age. That which in ■ — ^^— - Cranmer was the forward movement of the present, j^,,^^" became in Laud a looking back to the dry bones of the past. It was natural that the outward ceremonialism of the men should attract more notice than that principle of intellectual liberalism which, though yet in its germ in their minds, brings them into connexion with modern thought. And it was natural too that they should be accused of inclining towards Eome. They How far it attached weight to external acts and ceremonies, which STned" they venerated in common with the Eoman Chm-ch. gj^ef^ Their whole way of regarding the spiritual life of man was, if not Eoman, distinctly not Protestant. Luther and Calvin, differing in much, had agreed in this, that the relation between the individual soul and God came first, and that all Church arrangements were secondary matters. The new school of English Churchmen brought forward the Church arrangements into fresh prominence. Uniformity was to be maintained as the surest preservative of unity. From the cradle to the grave man's life was to be surrounded with a succes- sion of ecclesiastical acts influencing his soul through the gates of the senses. The individual was cared for by the Church. He stepped from the first to the second place. It is impossible to deny that even the modified per- mission to men to think as they pleased on matters on which the Church had not pronounced her decision arose rather from a feeble grasp of speculative truth than from any broad view of the necessity of liberty to its cultivation. When they repudiated, as most of them did, the epithet of Arminian which was hurled in their faces by their opponents, they were guilty of no 2l6 FIRST PARLIAMENT OF CHARLES I. AT WESTMINSTER. CHAP, hypocrisy. They did not much care whether any "- — ^ — particular view of predestination were true or false. Jui^ I What they did care for was that men should be honest and virtuous, and live peaceable and orderly lives under the care of the proper authorities in Chiu'ch and State. And if it is true that this view of life deserved to be held in due regard, it is also true that without - the stern self-denying striving after truth which was the characteristic of the opposite party, Ufe tends to become more like a stagnant pool, breeding all manner of foulness and corruption. Such a system might be regarded as holding a middle place between Eome and Calvinism. But it might also be regarded as a mere feeble copy of Eome. Those who valued the independent reasoning and the freedom of enquiry upon which it was based would take the more favourable view. Those to whom freedom of enquiry was an object of terror, would have nothing to say to it. They would desert ■ it for the infalhbility of Eome, or they would attack it in the name of Calvinism. Between the negation of individual religion and the assertion of individual religion, a compound of free thought and ceremonial observance was likely to have a hard time before it could estabhsh itself in the world. As yet, however, the ceremonial part of the con- troversy had hardly engaged the attention of observers. It was with Montague's doctrinal positions that the Commons' Committee was principally engaged. How- ever orthodox a Committee of the House of Commons might be, it was certain to be influenced by thoughts which would have no weight with a Synod of Dort or July 7. a Scottish General Assembly. Those who drew up its the'com- report did their best to conceal from themselves the "" fact that they were advising the proscription of THE COMMONS' COMjNnTTEE ON MONTAGUE. 2 1 7 certain theological opinions. They said that ' though chap. there be tenets in that first book contrary to the — — ^ — - Articles of Eeligion established by Act of Parliament, j„j^^' yet they think fit for the present to forbear till some , more seasonable time to desire a conference with the Lords that course may be taken to repair the breaches of the Church and to prevent the like boldness of private men hereafter.' All direct action against the opinions contained in the book, therefore, was to be postponed for the time. But the author was not to be allowed to escape so easily. The powers of the House in dealing with theological belief might be doubted. Its right to interfere in matters of State could not be doubted. Montague was accordingly accused of dishonouring the late King, of disturbing Church and State, and of treating the rights and pri- , vileges of Parliament with contempt. Of these three charges the first was absolutely Montague ludicrous. To accuse a man of treating James with differing" disrespect by publishing a book of which James had james."^ expressed his approbation, simply because certain opinions were controverted in it which James had advocated in early life, was not only absurd in itself, but would have led to conclusions which the Commons would have been the first to repudiate. For if a man was to be prosecuted for disagreeing with James on a point of theology, why might he not much more be prosecuted for disagreeing with Charles ? The real weight of the accusation, however, fell upon Of sowing th e second h ead. The unity of religion which Eliot had so enthusiastically praised had its advantages. Statesmen as well as theologians might look with apprehension on the day when Protestantism was to embark upon the raging waves of internal controversy, and when, as it 2l8 FIRST PAELIAIMENT OF CHARLES I. AT WESTMINSTER. CHAP. VI. 1625. July 7- Of treating the House of Com- mons with contempt. Debate in the House. might be feared, the Jesuits would be enabled to sing triumphant songs of victory whilst their antagonists were fleshing their swords in mutual slaughter. Even if that were not to be the case, the entrance of religious strife would open a sad and dreary perspective of bitterness and wrangling, of seared consciences, and of polemical abihty rearing itself aloft in the place which shoidd have been occupied by moral suasion. And it must be acknowledged that, if Montague was far less scurrilous than Milton was a few years later, his tone was by no means calm. He had used expressions which might occasionally give offence. Above all, he had spoken of his adversaries as Puritans, a term which is now generally apphed to the whole Calvinistic party, but was then looked upon as a disgraceful epithet, only applicable to those who refused conformity to the Prayer Book. The third charge carried the question into the region of law and privilege. Montague had pre- sumed to print his second book before the Commons had concluded their examination into the first, and had attacked Yates and Ward, who, as complainants, were under the protection of the House. As soon as the report of the Committee had been read a debate arose in which the charge of differing from King James seems to have been treated with silent con- tempt. The second charge found more ready accept- ance. A small minority indeed argued that Montague's opinions had never been condemned by the Church of England. Even amongst those who scouted this view of the case there appears to have been a feehng that there- was no wisdom in approaching so nearly to a theological discussion. Coke, however, had no such hesitation. To him the Common Law was all in all, and he quoted Fleta to prove ' that the civil courts THE COMMONS DECLARE AGAINST MONTAGUE. 219 ought to have a care of the peace of the Church.' chap. Others again argued that the complaint was not —^ — ■ made ' directly for the doctrine, but for the sedition ;' J^^^S- that the meaning of the Articles was plain, and that they only asked that the law should be put in execu- tion. In the end it was resolved that a committee should be appointed to examine Montague's books, and that when Parliament next met the whole subject should be brought before the Lords. There remained the question of privilege. Sandys indeed, with the support of Sir Humphrey May, took the common-sense view, that there had been no contempt of. the House. All that had been done in the former Parliament, they said, had been to refer the case to the Archbishop ; and as the Archbishop had not thought proper to treat Montague as a delinquent, he had not put him upon his trial. And it was well known that a man not upon his trial was not precluded from replying to his op- ponents. The House seems to have been divided between its respect for these arguments and its wish not to allow Montague to escape altogether. He was committed to the custody of the sergeant-at-arms, but a hint was given him that he would be allowed to go at liberty upon giving a bond to the sergeant for his reappearance when the Commons met again. ^ A breathing time was thus afforded to Charles to what was consider what part he would take in the controversy, to do ?°^ The importance of the question before him was more momentous even than that of the direction of the war. Whatever the Commons might think, it was clearly to the advantage of the nation that the men who thought " The bond was to be given to tbe sergeant, because it was affirmed by Sir Ed. Coke ' that the House could not take a recognisance.' Camden Debate-i, 53. Subsequent practice has decided against Coke. HatseU's Precedents, iv. 276. 2 20 FIRST PARLIAMENT OF CHARLES L AT WESTMINSTER. CHAP, with Montague should not be condemned to silence, and - — r^ — • that there should be room found outside the pale of Eome July 7 ^'^^ those who had revolted against the dogmatic tyranny which was supported by the House of Commons. For a great statesman like Barneveld the work would have had its attractions, though he would have known that he was treading on dangerous ground, in which a slip might be fatal to himself, even if his cause was certain of ultimate success. But difficult as the task of finding room for differences of opinion was, its difficulty was immeasurably increased by the tone of Montague and his friends. They did not ask for liberty of speech or for equal rights with others. They and they only were the true Church of England. Their teaching was legal and orthodox, whilst the opinions of their oppo- nents had been cast upon the Church ' hke bastards upon the parish where they were born, or vagabonds on the town where they last dwelt.' Charles made no attempt to save these men from their own exaggerations. His own sympathies were en- tirely with those who resembled himself in their love of art, in their observance of ceremonial order, and in their reverence for the arrangements of Church and State. He listened to Laud as his father never had listened to him. That pushing, bustling divine was convinced even more clearly than Montague that his system was the only true system for all men and for all times. Scarcely had Charles ascended the throne when he ap- plied to Laud to draw up a list of the principal clergy, Laud's 0. suitable or unsuitable for promotion. A long catalogue was soon handed in, duly marked with 0. and P., the Orthodox as fit for reward, the Puritan to be treated with neglect. It was the beginning of a fatal course. Calvinism had too much vitality in England, and was too thoroughly identified with the struggle with Eome and F. list. THE TONNAGE AND POUNDAGE BILL. 221 and Spain, to be borne down by a partial distri- chap. bution of Court patronage. The power of the Crown ■ .^ — - counted still for much. But its strength had rarely ^ ^4- been tried as Charles would try it, if he attempted to impose his own rehgious opinions upon an unwilling nation. Eehgion was to be Charles's main difficulty in the future. His main difficulty in the present was want of money. And he now saw questions stirred in the Lower House which might seriously impair even his existing revenue. Ever since the days of Julys- Henry VI. the duties on exports and imports known andpfun- under the name of tonnage and poundage had been ^^^' granted by Parliament for the hfet ime of each succes- sive sovereign in the first session of his reign. The grant now for the first time met with opposition. The usual formula was that the supply was ofiered to provide means for guarding the seas. Sir Walter Erie, who, as member for Dorsetshire, would know something of what was passing in the Channel, reminded the House that during the last few weeks English vessels had been captured off" the Scilly Isles by rovers from Sallee, and that even the Channel itself was not adequately guarded. And Erie had more to say than this. In James's reign certain duties had been levied under the name of pretermitted customs, which were alleged by the Crown lawyers to be included in the Parliamentary grant, a view of the case which found no favour in the eyes of those who were called upon to pay them. Erie now proposed that in order to give proposal to time for the examination of the point, the grant should g™ntto*a be limited to one year. ''^'"■' Matters were not likely to rest here. Phelips, who Question . T 1 T 1 • 1 • imposi- succeeded Erie, carried the debate into another region, tions. He moved that the bill ' might so be passed as not to 2 22 FIRST PARLIAMENT OF CHARLES I. AT WESTMINSTER. CHAP, exclude the question of other impositions.' The old • — r^ — • quarrel which had been smothered in 162 1 and 1624, July 7 when the Commons were looking forward to co-operation with the Crown in war, was certain to break out afresh when there was no longer any such prospect. And even if there had been no change in this respect, it is hard to see how the question could have been avoided when the beginning of a new reign opened up the whole subject by the introduction of a new bill for the grant of tonnage and poundage. Phelips took up a position which was logically unassailable. If the King, he said, possessed the right of imposing duties upon merchandise at his own pleasure, why was Parliament asked to grant that" which belonged already to the Crown ? ^ In spite of Heath's opposition, the House resolved to grant tonnage and poundage for one year only. There would thus be time to consider the questions which had been raised. The bUl thus drawn was carried up to the House of Lords and was there read once. It is not necessary to suppose a deliberate intention to defeat The bill it. But neither, it would seem, was there any desire to the^^ouse hurry it on, and the bill was swept away by the tide of Lords. q£ events which brought the session to a hurried close.^ A few days more, and the members of the House would be dispersed to every part of England. V/ith the plague demanding its victims in London alone at the rate of 370 a week, more than a third of the total death rate,^ the Commons could afford to wait for a ' " Kings ever received it as a gift of the subject, and were therewith contented, without charging them with any other way of imposition. For if they had any such power it were altogether unneedfnl to pass." Camden Debates, 43. The speech is toned down in the Journals. " The speeches in the Camden Delates seem to me to warrant the conclusion that far mere than a mere adjustment of rates was at issue. * Mead to Stutevillt', July 2 ; Court and Times, i. 39. CHAKLES ASKS FOR A FURTHER SUPPLY. 223 more convenient opportunity to discuss the issues chap. raised by Montague's book, or even to settle the vexed -- — ^ — • question of the impositions. But Charles could not j /^' afford to wait. In the full belief that the Commons The King's would grant him, without hesitation, any sum for which drfficuities. he chose to ask, he had entered into the most extensive engagements with foreign powers. Was he now to acknowledge to the King of France and the King of Denmark that he had promised more than he could perform? Was he to disperse his fleet and send his pressed landsmen to their homes ? And yet this and more than this must be done, if no more than a beggarly sum of 140,000^. was to find its way into the exchequer. If on the 4th of July he had submitted to hard fate, and had consented to end the session, further reflection did not render more endurable the rebuff with which he had been met. Who can wonder if he made one more effort to supply his needs ? The King was at Hampton Court, whither he had fled in hot haste as soon as he learned that the plague had broken out amongst his attendants at Whitehall.^ Late on the evening of the 7th Buckingham hurried up He aeter- from York House, assembled his followers, and told ask for a them that an additional supply must be asked for the lx&-aT. next morning.^ It is said that on account of the lateness of the hour many of the leading members of the Court party were absent. At all events when Sir Humphrey May heard on the following morning what Buckingham's intentions were, he resolved to keep back the proposed motion till he had remonstrated with the Duke. 1 Locke to Carleton, July 9 ; 8. P. Dom., iv. 29. * The authority for all this is Eliot's Negutium Poste^-orum. I do not see any reason to suppose that things happened in the main other- wise than he tells them, though his view of the position is evidently coloured by the misconception that the Commons had already done all that the King could reasonably ask, even from Charles's own point of view. 2 24 FIRST PAELIAMENT OF CHARLES I. AT WESTMINSTER. CHAP. VI. 1625. Julys. May sends Eliot to re- monstrate ■with the Duke. Eliot's in- terview with Buck- ingham. His argu- ments. Por the purpose of conveying this remonstrance May selected Eliot, as one who had stood high ir Buckingham's favour, and who was hkely to set forth the arguments against the step which the Duke was taking in the most persuasive manner. That Eliot had already seen reasons to distrust his influential patron is likely enough. But there had been nothing approaching to a breach between them, and there is no reason to suppose that, at this time, Eliot was inclined to go further than May, or that, though he must have thought Buckingham hardly capable of taking the lead in the national councils, he had any wish to bear hardly on him, or to deprive him of the confidence of his sovereign. What followed may best be told in Eliot's own words, written with such recollection of the scene as he was able to command after some years had passed. " Upon this," he writes, speaking of himself in the third person, " he makes his passage and address, and coming to York House finds the Duke with his lady yet in bed. But, notice being given of his coming, the Duchess rose and withdrew into her cabinet, and so he was forthwith admitted and let in." " The first thing mentioned was the occasion, and the fear that was contracted from that ground. The next was the honour of the King and respect unto his safety ; from boih which were deduced arguments of dissuasion. For the King's honour was remembered the acceptation that was made of the two subsidies which were passed and the satisfaction then professed ; which the now proposition would impeach either in truth or wisdom. Again, the small number of the Commons that remained, the rest being gone upon the confidence of that overture, would render it as an ambuscade and surprise, which, at no time, could be ELIOT'S INTERVIEW WITH BUCKINGHAM. 225 honourable towards subjects, less in the entrance of the chap. sovereign. The rule for that was noted. According ^^' to the success of the commencement, is the reputation j_^^^' afterwards.^ The necessity likewise of that honoior was observed without which no Prince was great, hardly any fortunate. And on these grounds a larger superstructure was imposed, as occasionally the conse- quence did require. For his own safety many things were said, some more fit for use than for memory and report. The general disopinion was objected which it would work to him not to have opposed it, whose power was known to all men, and that the command coming by himself would render it as his act, of which imputation what the consequence might be nothing but divinity could judge, men that are much in favour being ob- noxious to much envy." " To these answers were returned, though weak, Bucking- ^ ham 3 an- yet such as implied no yielding : — That the acceptation ^wers. which was made of the subsidies then granted was but in respect of the affection to the King, not for satisfac- tion to his business : that the absence of the Commons was their own fault and error, and their neglect must not prejudice the State : that the honour of the King stood upon the expectation of the fleet, whose design would vanish if it were not speedily set forth. Money there was wanting for that work, and therein the King's honour was engaged, which must outweigh all consi- derations for himself." Evidently the arguments of the two men were moving in different planes. Buckingham beheved the Commons to have been wrong in refusing to vote larger supplies. Eliot, whatever he may have thought, was content to avoid the real point at issue, and only 1 " Ut initia provenient, fama in cssteria est." VOL. I. Q 2 26 FIRST PARLIAMENT OF CHARLES I. AT WESTMINSTER. CHAP. VI. 1625. July 8. Bucking- ham's avowal. Eliot's Burpriss. What did Bucking- ham mean attempted to show tliat it would be inexpedient to ask the House to reverse the decision. It may have been prudent in Ehot to avoid all men- tion of the opinion which the members were doubtless passing on Buckingham's quaUfications as a war minister. But, on the other hand, to ask a man so self- confident as Buckingham to withdraw from a course of action merely on the ground of its inexpediency was to court failure. " This resolution being left," the nar- rative continues, " was a new way attempted, to try if that might weaken it. And to that, end was objected the improbability of success ; and if it did succeed, the greater loss might follow it by alienation of the affec- tions of the subjects who, being pleased, were a fountain of supply, without which those streams would soon dry up. But nothing could prevail, there being divers arguments spent in that ; yet the proposition must pro- ceed without consideration of success, wherein was lodged this project, — merely to be denied." " Merely to be denied." Whatever words Bucking- ham may have used — and he was open enough of speech : — such was the inference which Eliot drew from them. And more too, it seems, was behind. " This secret," Eliot tells us, " that treaty did discover, which drew on others that supported it, of greater weight and moment, shewing a conversion of the tide. Eor the present it gave that gentleman some wonder and astonishment : who, with the seal of privacy closed up those passages in silence, yet thereon grounded his observations for the future, that no respect of persons made him desert his country." What did Buckingham mean when he proposed to press for additional supply, ' merely to be denied ' ? That he wished, from pure gaiety of heart, to engage in a struggle of prerogative against the popular representa- PROBABLE INTENTION OF BUCKINGHAM. 227 tion of the country is an idea which needs only to be chap. mentioned to be dismissed, especially as there is another ■ — ^ — > interpretation of his words which exactly fits the cir- j^^|' cumstances of the case. If Buckingham really thought, as there is every reason to suppose that he thought, that he had been scandalously ill-treated by the House of Commons, that they had, without raising any open charge against him, deserted him in the midst of a war which he had undertaken on their invitation, he may well have believed himself justified in putting the question once more directly to them, with the distinct prevision that if they refused to help him he would stand better with the nation than if he allowed the war to languish for want of speaking a necessary word. Somehow or other the immediate crisis might be tided over, and the military operations on the Continent postponed. Somehow or another the equipment of the fleet might be completed. A great naval success, the capture of the Mexico fleet, or the destruction of some Spanish arsenal, would work wonders. Whatever blot attached to him through past failures — and Bucking- ham's failures were always, in his own eyes, the result of accident, his successes the result of forethought — would be wiped away. A second Parliament would gather round Charles of another temper than his first had been. The King who had done great things could ask, without fear of rebuff, for further means to ac- complish things greater still. If this was Buckingham's intention — and his sub- His over- sequent conduct goes far to show that it was his inten- tasteful to tion — it is easy to understand how Ehot would have ^^""' been shocked by it. Viewing, as he did, the House of Commons with almost superstitious reverence, and pro- bably already inclined to doubt Buckingham's qualifi- cations for rule, he must have regarded with extreme a 2 228 FIRST PARLIAMENT OF CHARLES I. AT WESTMINSTER. CHAP, dislike both the attempt to deal disingenuously with the - — r-'- — - House, and the vaunting language in which Bucking- jni^s" li^^^'s confidences were doubtless conveyed. Bucking- Whatever the exact truth may have been about this ham badly ._ -ni-i >• t -i-n- represented conference With Ehot, Buckingham s immediate diin- House of culty was to find a fit exponent of his policy in the ommons. jj^^^gg q£ Commons. Of the Secretaries of State, Conway was in the House of Lords, and Morton was absent on a mission to the Hague. Sir Eichard Weston, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, would have been naturally selected to bring forward a financial proposal. But, as he was one of those who had originally objected to the war with Spain, Buckingham may have suspected that, supple as he was, his heart was not wholly in the matter. May and Heath, whose tact had hitherto been conspicuous in the debates, would evidently be useless as supporters of a proposal of which they were known to disapprove, jji, ag. The man who had been selected as Buckingham's "u^tedTo mouthpiece was Sir John Coke. Having been from Sir J.Coke, ^he first a leading member of the Navy Commission, he had long taken into his hands the control over matters relating to the fleet. He was versed in the details of his ofiice, and would probably in our days have made a very excellent permanent Under-Secretary. As far as he took any interest in politics at all, his principal charac- teristic was a fixed dislike of everything which savoured of the Papacy.! g^^ -^^ general he was a mere tool, ready to do anything or to say anything as he was bidden by Buckingham and the King. Further As soon as it was known to Buckingham's friends supply ° asked for. i Thus he was one of the instigators of the complaint against Mon- tague in the Conference at York House in 1626, and he did his best in 1628 to lead the House of Commons astray, by* an attack upon the Jesuits. In later years he opposed the Spanish alliance advocated by Weston, Cottington, and Windebank. ' SIR J. COKE'S DEMANDS. 229 in the House that EUot's mission had failed, Coke rose, chap. For the hasty grant of two subsidies before any minister • — ^ — • of state had been heard on behalf of the King, he found J^^^l" a convenient excuse in the eagerness of the House to satisfy his Majesty. He now explained the way in which the subsidies granted in the last Parliament had been expended, said what he could in defence of Mans- feld's failures, and stated that the fleet in preparation would cost 293,000/., or 133,000/. more than the sub- sidies already voted. Besides this would be needed 240,000/. a year for Mansfeld, and the same sum for the King of Denmark. Even this, though the needs of the King of Denmark were understated, was enough to frighten the House, and Coke went on to throw away whatever chance remained to him of persuading the members, by adding that this expenditure ' could not be supported without more help by Parliament, or else some new way.' After this last phrase, which was sure to grate upon the ears of his hearers, he made an appeal to the magnanimity of the House. " The King," he said, " when he was Prince, borrowed 20,000/. for these provisions. The Lord Admiral hath engaged his estate. Other ministers have furnished above 50,000/. Shall it be said that these men are left to be undone for their readiness to the public services ? Shall we proclaim our own poverty by losing all that is bestowed upon this en- terprise, because we cannot go through with it ? What shall we say to the honour of the King ? But that is not all. Even the establishment of his Majesty in his royal throne, the peace of Christendom, the state of religion, depend upon the fleet." Coke's estimates, underrated as they were, were The crown larger than the House cared to face. And even now with the there was no attempt to convince the Commons that it ™"""^ was wise to enter so extensively upon a Continental war. 230 FIRST PARLIAMENT OF CHARLES I. AT WESTMINSTER. CHAP. VI. 1625. Julv 8.- Nature of Coke's demand. It falls flat on the House. And is put aside by Heath. The King takes up Montague's case. It was taken for granted that Chkrles and Buckingham had been in the right in entering into engagements with Mansfeld and the King of Denmark, and the House was merely asked to provide the means for so necessary an expenditure. If the sixty members or so who still remained at Westminster to represent the Commons, cared to please the King without bringing any apparent responsibility upon themselves, the way was made easy before them. Coke did not ask them actually to vote the subsidies. They were only to express their affection to the business, and to give assurance, by some pubhc declaration, that when they returned they would be willing to relieve his Majesty. But they were not so easily entrapped. The whole display of military preparation flashed thus suddenly before their eyes, created astonishment rather than any other feeling. They did not wish to bind their fellow members to answer a demand which had been kept in the background as long as the House was full. Neither did they like to enter into a contest with the King. Scarcely a word was spoken for or against the motion. Heath, seeing that the discussion, if it once began, would take an angry turn, did the best he could for his master by smothering the debate. The House, he said, had already expressed its affection in its previous grant. No man ought to speak but as if the King of Spain were there to hear him. It would be enough if they made it appear that, whensoever they met again, they would bring the hearts of true Enghshmen. In spite of this rebuff Charles kept his temper. To a deputation from the two Houses which carried the petition on religion to Hampton Court, he replied civilly that be would shortly give them an answer. He then called Heath aside and enquired about Montague's ADJOURNMENT TO OXFORD. 03 1 committal. Montague, he said, was now his chaplain, chap. and he had taken the case into his own consideration. ■ — r^ — - " Montague," replied the Solicitor-General, "did not j^^jy^g allege so much for himself. It was hardly known but to very few in the House." " I believe," replied the King, " if they had known it, they would not have pro- ceeded in that manner." He then expressed a hope that the prisoner would be set at liberty, in which case, he said, he would be ready to give them satisfaction. Montague's committal, Heath said, was not for his opinions, but for his contempt of the House. He then gave an account of all that had taken place. Charles ' smiled, without any further reply.' ^ The House, when it heard what had passed, deter- July 9. , ... . . „, . ^ . . The Com- mined to maintain its position. This recent nomination monamain- of Montague to a chaplainship looked very like a position. Court intrigue to screen his conduct from investigation, and the doctrine that the King's servants were re- sponsible to the King alone was not likely to find favour amongst the Commons. On the nth of July the Houses were informed juiyn. that their labours were to come to an end that day, adjourned and that they were to meet again shortly to hear more *° ^^'"'^^ from the King. The Commons then proceeded to the Upper House to hear the Eoyal assent given to the few bills which had been passed. The word " shortly " was then' explained to them by the Lord Keeper. There was to be an adjournment, not a prorogation. They were to meet again at Oxford on the ist of August. They would then receive a particular answer to their Execution petition on religion, and in the mean time his Majesty, cusancy ' by present execution of the laws, would make a real mZir"' rather than a verbal answer to their contentment and the contentment of all the kingdom.' ^ > Camden Debates, 62. * Ibid. 67. 232 FIEST PARLIAMENT OF CHARLES I. AT WESTMINSTER. CHAP. The Lord Keeper had been an unwilUng instrument ^- — '^ — in pronouncing the King's resolution for the adjourn- The step ment to Oxford. Williams, with his usual good sense, taken g^-w that there was little prospect of success in an opposed by r i. . . , . . Williams, attempt to drive the Commons to vote supplies to which they entertained an apparently insurmountable objec- juiy lo. tion. The day before the adjournment he had advised that the Houses should meet not in August but at Christmas. As WUliams did not hope much from the fleet which was preparing for sea, the proposal came natural enough from him. To Buckingham it looked very like treachery. " Public necessity," he said, " must sway more than one man's jealousy." ' Charles sided with his favourite, and the prescient Lord Keeper was reduced to silence. The Houses dispersed, hardly thanking Charles in their hearts for the modi- fied promise which had been given them, and fuU of discontent at the prospect of. meeting again, to be asked once inore for those subsidies which they were so reluc- tant to grant. ' Hacket, ii. 14. 233 CHAPTER VII. THE LOAN OF ESTGLISH SHIPS TO THE KING OF FBANCE. The promise made at the adjournment that the penal chap. laws should be put in execution, was a symptom of a ' — '-—' change which was coming over the minds of the King j^iy fj. and his minister. It was easy to suppose that because JSr"romisf the House of Commons cared a great deal about '» execute o the penal repressmg the Cathohcs they cared for very little else, i^wa. and that if only the penal laws were put in execution the House, at its next meeting, would make no more difficulty about supply. Nor was Charles, in consenting to this course, doing any violence to his own wishes. Ever since Buckingham had reported the failure of his mission in France, there had been growing up at Court a carelessness about the value of the French alhance, and aiL increasing belief that England was being sacri- ficed to the separate interests of Lewis. To these pohtical grievances was added a personal June- grievance still more irritating. The dream of domestic domestic happiness which had floated before Charles, in after life the most uxorious of husbands, was vanishing away. The dispute about the precedence of Madame St. George had embittered the early days of his married life. Other troubles were not long in coming. Henrietta Maria was impetuous and indiscreet. " The Queen," vsrrote one who had seen her, " howsoever little of stature, is of spirit and vigour, and seems of more than 234 LOAN OF ENGLISH SHIPS TO THE KING OF FRANCE. CHAP- ordinary resolution. With one frown, divers of us ■ — -■ — • being at Whitehall to see her, being at dinner, and the July room somewhat overheated with the fire and company, she drove us all out of the chamber. I suppose none but a Queen could have cast such a scowl." ^ It was a scowl which her husband sometimes experienced as well as her courtiers. He did not pay much respect to her priestly attendants. When she heard mass he directed that no Englishman should be present.^ After the Eoyal pair had been a few days at Hampton Court, a deputation from the Privy Council was sent to instruct her about the regulations which the IQng wished to be observed in her household. " I hope," she replied, pettishly, " I shall have leave to order my house as I list myself." Charles attempted to argue the point with her in private, but the answer which she returned was so rude that he did not venture to repeat it to her own mother.^ She regarded herself as in a foreign land, in which everyone was at war with her. Even the exhortations of Eichelieu's kinsman, the Bishop of Mende, who had accompanied her as the head of her train of ecclesiastics, could not induce her to treat the highest personages of the English nobility vdth common civility.* May. Such a misunderstanding between a spirited child and English a punctilious young husband ten years older than herself, is only too easy to explain. Nor was the Queen without ' Mead to Stuteville, July 2 ; Court and Times, i. 39. ' to Mead, June 24; ibid. i. 33. ' Instructions to Carleton, July 12, 16, 26; Ludlovfs 3femmrs, iii. 305. * " II seroit apropos que la Reine traita le Roi et les grands de I'Stat ayec plus de courtoisie, n'ayant personne de quelque quality que ce soit a qui elle fasse aucun compliment, c'est ce que nous ne pouyons gaigner sur elle, et que peut-Stre les lettres deja Reine M6re gaigneront." Decy- phered paper from the Bishop of Mende, inclosed in a letter from Ville- aux-Clercs, Aug. if ; Eini/'s MSS, 137, fol. 52. Catholics. THE QUEEN AND THE CATHOLICS. 235 reason for complaint. She had come to England in the chap. full persuasion that her presence would alleviate the ■ — ^-^ — - lot of the Enghsh Cathohcs. She had scarcely set foot ^ ^^' in the island when she learned how little had been gained for them. The orders which were to have saved them from the penalties of the law had been countermanded. Is it not probable that if the secrets of those early days of married life could be rendered up, we should hear of the young wife's stormy upbraidings of the man who had beguiled her into taking upon herself the marriage vow by promises which he now found it convenient to repudiate ? At all events the French ambassadors, Chevreuse Difficulty and Ville-aux-Clercs, who were in England on special "nlthe^' business, protested loudly. At first they received amb^a. nothing but evasive answers. A few days after Par- '*°"' liament met, they were asked to allow the King to hold out hopes to his subjects that he would put the laws in execution, and to shut their eyes if sentence were passed on one or two Jesuits, on the express un- derstanding that the sentence would not be carried into execution.^ At last the time was come when the ful- filment of Charles's contradictory promises was demanded of him. He would soon find that he must either break his word to his Parliament or his word to the King of France. For the present a way was found by which the difl&culty might be postponed for a little time. Effiat was about to retiu:n to France, as well July 12. as Chevreuse and Ville-aux-Clercs. James had of priests. been in the habit of allowing foreign ambassadors who took leave of him to carry with them large numbers of priests on the understanding that they would not return > Chevreuse and Ville-aux-Clercs to Lewis Xin./j^, %\ 236 LOAN OF ENGLISH SHIPS TO THE KING OF FRANCE. CHAP. YII. 1625. July 12. April. The ships for Eo- chelle. May. Reluctance of the captains to take part in the enterprise. Part taken by Charles and Buck- ingham, to England. Williams was accordingly directed to seal pardons for the priests in confinement at the time. But Williams objected, and it was only by the King's special command that the pardons were issued. That command was given at the Council held on the loth of July to decide upon the adjournment of the Houses.^ The way was thus cleared for the announcement made the next day that the laws would be put in execution. Though there was no real contradiction between the issue of pardon for past offences and the intention to carry out the law in the future, the sight of so many priests coming out of confinement, without any word of explanation being given, was hkely to throw doubt on the honesty of the governing powers. The impossibihty of reconciling engagements made in opposite directions weighed no less heavily on Charles in the matter of the squadron which had been fitted out for the service of the King of France. As early as the nth of April the ' Vanguard' and her seven consorts had been ready for sea,^ but delays had supervened. As soon as the captains and owners of the merchant vessels discovered that they were to be employed against Eochelle, they hung back and did their best to find excuses. One of the captains. Sir Ferdinando Gorges, who was to go as Pennington's Vice- Admiral, kept away from the rendezvous till the end of May, and was only compelled by threats of im- prisonment to take his place with the others.^ The exact part taken by Charles and Buckingham in the affair must always be matter for conjecture. It is probably true that when the contract was signed by ' Haoket, ii. 14. . » Effiat to Ville-aux-Olercs, April ii ; Harl. MSS., 4579, fol. 57. ' Conway to Coke, May 21 P S. P. France, Council Megister, May 29, 31- PENNINGTON'S SQUADRON. 237 which the merchant ships were offered to Lewis for chap. • • VII service against anyone excepting the King of England, - — r-^— the owners were quieted by assurances that they would ^ ^^' not have to fight against the French Protestants.^ At May 18. all events, on the i8th of May Sir John Coke was Untold" employed to write to Pennington to that effect, ^o^^Jnot and this letter of Coke's may be fairly taken as em- \^^^\^^ bodying the sentiments of the Lord Admiral. For ^'°^ Buckingham was already in France with the object of inducing the French Government to make peace vdth the Eochellese, and it was Buckingham's habit to regard as absolutely certain anything which he had strong rea- sons for desiring. That it would be to' his interest that there should be no fighting at Eochelle there could be no doubt whatever. He was still looking hopefully for French co-operation, if not in his projected attack on the Flemish ports, at aU events in some way or other in the Continental war. His original plan had been to lend the ships for the purpose of an attack upon Genoa, and nothing would please him better than to see it carried out. Still the fleet had been offered to the French to be used against all enemies, and Charles found himself, as he had found himself in the matter of the EngUsh Catholics, in a strait between two engagements. To find an issue from such entanglement Charles „May 20. '' . Oharlesa had recourse to that double dealing which was cha- JooWe . • f T • 1 T 1 • • Try dealing. ractenstic of him whenever he was driven into a dim- culty. Through Conway he conveyed orders to the fleet to get ready instantly for sea. Through Coke he intimated to Pennington that he was not to give his ships up to the French till he had used them to convoy ' This was staled by Glanville in Lis speech at the impeachment of Buckingham. 238 LOAN OP ENGLISH SHIPS TO THE KING OF FRANCE. CHAP, the Queen to England.^ Charles's intention was double ■ — --^ less merely to delay the delivery of the vessels till he June 9. heard what turn Buckingham's negotiation had taken. When Buckingham learned in Prance, that, though Lewis would not join England openly in the war with Spain, he had despatched a messenger to offer peace to the Huguenots, there seemed no longer any The ships reasou for delay. On June 9 Pennington sailed with Pennington his eight ships. Ou the 13th he was at Dieppe. Pen- Keppe. nington was an honest sailor, sympatliising doubtless He"find?' '^i''^ the unwillingness of the captains to fight against «ons'^uninI Piotestants, but anxious, above all things, to carry out teiiigibie. jjjg instructions. His main difiiculty was to know what his instructions were. He knew that by the contract he was bound to serve against the Huguenots if the French Government ordered him to do so. He knew that by Coke's letter he was prohibited from doing anything of the sort. When he arrived at Dieppe he found that every Frenchman whom he met told him that his ships were wanted for an attack upon Eochelle. In the midst of these distracting uncertainties he re- solved firmly that he would not allow the command of the squadron to shp out of his hands. When, there- fore, he was requested by the French authorities to take three hundred soldiers on board the ' Vanguard ' and two hundred on board each of the smaller vessels, ' " His Majesty hath been much moved at the delays of Sir F. Gorges, and because it will be the utter overthrow of the voyage if it be not gone away presently, his Majesty hath commanded me to will and re- quire you by all means to hasten it away, or else show the impossibility of it." Conway to Coke, undated, but written on May 20 or 21 ; S, P. France. " Nevertheless, having received a command from his Majesty by Sir J. Colse to detract the time as much as I could for the wafting over of the Queen, for which service I was appointed, though witli privacy, I could not depart without a discharge of that command." Pennington to Conway, May 22 ; S. P. Bom., ii. 83. PENNINGTON AT DIEPPE. 239 he flatly refused compliance. His orders, lie said, chap. authorised him only to take the French Admiral on ^^' board his own vessel, ' with such convenient train as ' he Refusl^to was able to accommodate, and not to admit into the |'];^^'^ merchant ships more than ' half of the numbers of ^^^^^^ "" each ship's company.' ^ Possibly these orders had been given by Buck- JheFrenoh mgham to enable him to retain a hold upon the the ships vessels. J3ut the French refused to . accept them on power, these terms. They had by this time learned enough of the temper of the English sailors to discover that, except under compulsion, they would never fight against their fellow Protestants. Officers and seamen alike, including Pennington himself, had spoken out their minds on this. But the French were aware that their demand was not justified by the letter of the con- tract. All that they could do was to exhort Penning- ton to take a broad view of the case instead of haggling over words, whilst they wrote at once to their ambassadors, who were still in England, to urge Buckingham to alter his instructions.^ With Pennington there was nothing to be done. June 26. Montmorency, the Admiral of France, came in person renoy at to Dieppe to use his influence. But Pennington re- '*'^^^' plied that he was ready to obey orders from his own Government, but that he would not go an inch beyond them. And he soon conveniently discovered that it was impossible to remain much longer in an open roadstead exposed to the violence of the winds. At midnight on .p^"^® ^^ Jutie 27 the whole fleet weighed anchor and took returns to ,..,., England. refuge in Stokes Bay, leaving it to diplomacy to settle what was next to be done. ' Pennington to Pembroke, June 15 ; S. P. Bom., iii. 71. •> D'Ocquerre to Pennington, ^^^ ; S. P. France, D'( Ville-aux-Clercs, June |§; ITarl MSS., 4597, fol. 198. 240 LOAN OF ENGLISH SHIPS TO THE KING OF FRANCE. CHAP. Charles's first impulse was to assert that Pennington - — r-^-^ had been in the right, and even to suggest that the June27 s^vps Were not bound to fight against Eochelle.^ But Eemon- [^ -yy^s impossible for him to maintain this view of the stiances of '^ t i "i the French case in the face of the French ambassadors, who knew ambassa- dors, perfectly well that, whatever the letter of the contract might be, there had been a full understanding that the ships were originally offered for the object of overcoming the resistance of the Huguenots. The conclusion was very hard for him to accept. His feehng that the French had duped him was growing stronger. Just after Pennington arrived in England, however, news June 26. reached Charles which promised better things. Gon- tion°be^ domar had visited Paris on his way to Brussels, had Lewis and taken his leave on the 26th without venturing to make nots^"^*' ^^J direct overtures to the French Government, and on the same day the deputies of the Huguenots, who had come to treat for peace in consequence of the negotia- tions opened whilst Buckingham was in France, were formally received by Lewis. To Lorkin, who after the return of Carlisle and Holland represented Charles in France in the inferior capacity of agent, the French ministers spoke in the most friendly terms. " Peace will be made," said Eicheheu ; " assure yourself of that. If only the King of England will show that he means to assist the King against his rebels, peace will soon be made." ^ According to Kichelieu, therefore, a mere demon- stration against Eochelle in order to help on that paci- fication which he and Charles alike desired, was all that was intended. Charles, obliged to trust him to some extent, and yet unwilling to trust him altogether, » Chevreuse and Ville-aux-Clercs to Lewis XIII., '-^^ ; ibid. fol. 207. ' Lorkin to Conway, ^^ j S. P. France. PENNINGTON'S ORDERS. 24 1 tried to steer a middle course. He informed Penning- chap. VTT ton, through Conway, that his proceedings had been ■ — .-^— well received on the whole. But he had been "wrong ^/^" July 3. in divulging the secret 'that his instructions bound him penning- not to fight against the Protestants. As this had given the/orders. rise to fresh demands, he must return to Dieppe, and take sixty Frenchmen on board the 'Vanguard,' and fifty on board each of the other vessels. He was then to sail against any enemy pointed out to him by the King of France.^ As the number of Frenchmen thus allowed to be New otjec- taken on board was very similar to that to which the French. French authorities had already taken objection, renewed protests were made by the ambassadors. At last on July 10, the day of the Council on which it was resolved to promise the execution of the penal laws, Conway sent a warrant to Pennington to deliver over the ships to the French, and take on board as many Frenchmen as the King of France might order him to receive.^ As far as words could go the question might be regarded as settled. It may be that Charles trusted for the moment to Eichelieu's assurances that there would be no war with the Protestants. But there were those at Court who were not inclined to put too much trust in these assurances. On the nth Sir John July n.' Coke forwarded to Conway, with evident approval, a of th™crse protest from the captains and owners of the merchant- coke.' men. The French, according to this protest, had threatened to take possession of the ships, and to place English sailors under French martial law. "And ' Conway to Pennington, July 3 ; S. P. Bom., Addenda, " Ville-aux-Clercs and Chevreuse to Buckingliam, July ^ ; The same to Lewis XIII., July /gj Harl.MSS. 4597, fol. 207 b, 218 b ; Conway to Pennington, July 10; Pennington to the King, July 27; S. P. Bom., v. 33, 132. VOL. I. K 242 L0AN OP ENGLISH SHIPS TO THE KING OF FRANCE. CHAP, lastly," they said, "for serving against them of our ■ — r^—' religion, it is very well known that our seamen gene- ju^^ii ^^% ^^^ \Ti.o^\ resolute in our profession ; and these men have expressed it by their common petition that they would rather be killed or thrown overboard than be forced to shed the innocent blood of any Protes- tants in the quarrels of Papists, so as they will account any commandment to that end to be in a kind an imposi- tion of martyrdom." Nothing could come of it, as Coke thought, but a quarrel between the two nations, " to which," he said, " if we add the discouragement of oiu- party at home and abroad, the late murmuring against it in Parliament, and the open exclaiming made in the pulpits that this taking part against our own rehgion is one chief cause of God's hand that now hangeth over us, we can hardly balance these conse- quences with any interest or assistance we can have from the French." The difficulty. Coke proceeded to show, lay in the King's promise and in the terms of the contract. It might be argued, he said, that the prohibition to serve against his Majesty included a prohibition to serve against the French Protestants who were his Majesty's liemedy alhcs. But it would pcrhaps be better to order Pen- by him. nington to comply with the French demands, taking care, however, to instruct him that if he could not ' pre- sently obey this direction by reason of any interruption whatsoever,' he was to ' acquaint his Majesty therewith, that he ' might ' give order to remove it, and so take away all excuse for not accomphshing the, intended gratification of his dear brother the French king.' In plain English, if the men were mutinous, Pennington was to represent his difficulties to the King. This would take up time, and it would be possible to spin matters out by retorting upon the French that they SCHEME OF SIR J. COKE. 243 had not made their payments at the proper day, and had chap. not kept their part of the contract. The blame would ^- ^"' -^ thus be thrown upon the French. " Only," added Coke, jj^^; " some care would be taken after his Majesty's letters written, that Sir Ferdinando Gorges, who . . . pur- poseth to go aboard his ship to the rest of the fleet, may receive some directions for the carriage of their answers, that Captain Pennington by the unexpected style of his Majesty's letters may not be surprised." ^ It is hardly likely that Coke would have made so Thepro- •^ , "^ posal con- startlins; a suggestion unless he had been well aware sideredat . . . . Court. that Charles was longmg to be off his bargain. That it was well received is evident. But it was perhaps thought too hazardous to entrust either Pennington or Gorges with the secret, and at all events a more suitable person was at hand. Edward Nicholas, the Lord Juij'is- \. „. „-, - Mission of Admiral s secretary, was one 01 those useful men who Nicholas. are intelligent, busy, and subservient. To his pen we owe much information which would otherwise have been lost on the debates in the Parliaments in which he sat. When Coke was removed to another sphere, the business of the Admiralty, accounts, orders, information, all passed through his hands. He was now selected as the fittest instrument for a delicate mission, as likely to say and do no more than was necessary, whilst his official position would raise him above suspicion. Apparently the next move involved a complete Orders for surrender to the French. Effiat, who was now leaving render of England, was to pass through Dieppe on his way home. ^ ^ '^^' A letter was written to Pennington by Buckingham, ordering him to take the ships to Dieppe and there to give them up to the French, allowing them to ' put into them so many men as they shall think good, and ' Colie to Conway, July 1 1 ; S. P. Dom., iv. 40. K 2 244 LOAN OF ENGLISH SHIPS TO THE KING OF FBANCE. CHAP. Y ll. 1625. July 15. July 16. Bucking- at Koclies- ter. July 18. Kesi-tance of the enemy. dispose of them as ' the King of France might direct. He would receive iu return security from the French for the restitution of the value of the ships in case of their coming to harm/ security which, as Nicholas thought, would be entirely valueless, seeing that it could not be enforced by anything short of war.^ Buckingham, accompanied by Nicholas, went to Eochester to confer with the French ambassadors about the security to be given to the owners. He did his best to play a double part. To the Frenchmen he was all courtesy, and offered to do his best to satisfy them.^ At the same time he warned the shipowners not to ' dehver over their ships imless they had security to their content.' * But if Buckingham counted on any dispute between the shipowners and the French he was disappointed. Security was offered to which Buck- ingham took no exception, preferring perhaps that objection should come from others rather than from himself.® When he first arrived at Eochester Buckingham had reiterated his orders to Pennington to dehver up the ships at Dieppe.* The reply which he received must have sounded like music in his ears. Pennington was at Stokes Bay with the sliips. The other captains were away at Eochester -with the Duke. The crews of the merchantmen refused to stir till their captains re- turned. If they would not come, Pennington wrot&, he would obey orders, and go with only the ' Vanguard.' ' Bucldngham to Pennington, July 15 ; S. P. Dom., iv. 59. ' This does not seem conclusive, as it might be given through an English capitalist. But the objection shows what another of Bucking- ham's entourage thought of the surrender of the ships. Nicholas to Buclringham, July 16; ibid.W. 58. ' Ohevreuse and Ville-aux-ClerCs to Lewis XIII., July |^ ; Sari. MSS., 4597, fol. 220. * Statement by Nicholas, 1626 (?);S. P. Dom,, xliii. 43. ' Burlamachi to Effiat, July 19; S. P. France. " Buckingham to Pennington, July 16; S. P. Dom.,iv. 67. THE SECRET INSTEUCTIONS. 245 By doing so, he and his ship's crew would be as slaves chap, to the French. The business was too difScult for him ^^'' to understand, and he hoped a more competent person ^^ ^^^ would be sent to take his place. "Moreover," he added, " your Grace may be pleased to take notice that I have a strange uproar in my ship amongst my own company upon this news of going over again, I having much ado to bring them to it, though I keep all from them, and make them believe we go over upon better terms than formerly." ^ Pennington's request to be relieved from his trouble- some command was at once refused. Buckingham had taken his course, and before he left Eochester to retiu-u to the Court, Nicholas had been despatched to Dieppe with secret instructions. The instructions, as Nicholas set them down long secret P, -, I. -n instruc- atterwards, were as toliows : — tions to " To employ my best endeavour to hinder or at "" ° ""' least delay the delivery of the ships to the French, but therein so to carry myself as that the ambassador might not discern but that I was sent of purpose, and with full instructions and command, to effect his desire and to cause all the ships to be put into his hands." ^ On the 1 9th news arrived from France that the July 19. terms of peace had been agreed on between the King peace in and the Huguenots. Upon this Buckingham wrote to Nicholas acquainting him with what he had heard, and enjoining upon him the duty of doing all that Effiat might ask, though he expressed a hope that the French would no longer need the ships.^ ' Pennington to Buckingham, July 18 ; S. P. Dom., iv. 78. ^ Account by Nicholas of his employment, ibid, xxvii. 1 1 1. This and the statement formerly quoted were probably drawn up at the time of tlio Duke's impeachment in 1626. We have a letter written by him to Pen- nington, May 6, 1626, S. P. Dum., AMenda (V),cor'iohQX&\Ai\g these state- ments, and valuable as appealing to Pennington's knowledge of their truth. See p. 248, Note 6. * " I having received advice lately from Lorkin that peace is con- France. ?46 LOAN OP ENGLISH SHIPS TO THE KING OF FRANCE. QHAP. VII. - II , 1625. Julj' 20. Secret message to Penning- ton. A mutiny to be got up if neces- sary. The next day he had changed his mind. It may be that he wished to wait yet a few days, to see if the news was really true. Pembroke, -who had been taken into Buckingham's confidence, despatched the following message to Pennington : — " That the letters which Captain Pennington sent the Lord Duke of Buckingham's Grace, to himself and the Lord Conway was the best news that could come to the Court, and that the King and all the rest were exceeding glad of that relation which he made of the discontent and mutinies of his company and the rest ; and that if such a thing had not fallen oiit, they should have been constrained to have sent him advice to have brought some such thing to pass. If the French should accept of the service of that ship alone without the rest, that he should carry it on fairly with them,^ but still to keep himself master of his ship, and if they proceeded so far as to offer to take the possession of her, that then his men should take him prisoner and bring away the ship : and that the said Captain Penning- ton might believe him that he had thus much to deliver, it being the King's will and the rest,^ that it was far from them that any of his ships should go against any of the Protestants." ^ eluded between the Most Christian King and those of the Religion, it may be the Marquis d'Effiat, upon hearing of the same, will easily put an end to all these questions, having not the use expected." Buckingham to Nicholas, July 19 ; S. P. Dom., iv. 80. ^ In the MS. we have — "to have brought such thing to pass if the French should accept of the service of that ship alone without the rest, and that he should carry it on fairly with them." The slight alteration above makes sense of it. ^ Of Buckingham, Conway, &c., I suppose. ' Message sent from Pembroke by Edward Ingham, & P. Dam., iii. 120, undated, and calendared June i P but the date is approximately fixed by the mention of " that ship alone," as coming soon after Penning- ton's letter of the l8th. The following letter from Pembroke to Pen- nington (S. P. Dom., Addenda), written on the 20th, gives it to that day : PENNINGTON'S SECOND VISIT TO DIEPPE. 247 If Pennington had before been anxious to surrender chap. his command, what must have been his feelings when he -^-^^^~^ received instructions in this imderhand manner to get '^^5- " July 20. up a mutmy on board his Majesty's ship entrusted to his charge? Pennington, when Pembroke's message reached him, Juiy 21. was once more at Dieppe with the ' Vanguard,' having ton'^afn brought his own ship away in spite of the murmurs of "' '^"pp''- his men. A day or two later the merchantmen fol- lowed, as soon as their captains came on board.^ When the ' Vanguard ' arrived, Nicholas was already in the town with EfSat. Pennington, although he had not been informed of the real nature of Mcholas's mission, was ready to fall back upon any excuse which would cause delay, and discovered that he had not sufficient warrant to deliver up the ships. He even refused at first to come on shore to confer with Effiat, and said that he could do nothing tiU he had fresh authority from England. Nicholas then took up his cue. He remon- Ju'y ca- strated with Penningtoii in accordance with Effiat's wishes, and arranged with him to send off a message to England. But to his disappointment Effiat would not allow him to go on board.^ At last Pennington con- sented to land and to confer with Effiat, and in spite of the jealousy of the Frenchman, who did his best to prevent any communication between Nicholas and the Admiral, Nicholas contrived to whisper a few words of warning to him, bidding him take heed that he had " I must give you many thanks for your respect to me in so freely acquaint- ing me with all particulars that have happened this voyage. You shall receive directions by this bearer from his Majesty and my Lord Admiral how to carry yourself in this business, which I know you will punctually obey. From me you can expect nothing but assurances of my love, &c." 1 Pennington to Nicholas, July 21 ; S. P. Dom., iv. 97. 2 Pennington to Nicholas, July 21 ; Nicholas to Pennington, July 22 ; Nicholas to Buckingham, July 22 ; S. P. Dom., iv. 97, 100, 104, 105. 248 LOAN OF ENGLISH SHIPS TO THE KING OF FRANCE. CHAP. Y II. 1625. July 22. Appeal to the crews. July 23. Mutiny beginning. Double language of Nicholas. sufficient warrant for delivering up the ships. He had but a letter from Conway, and, in such a case, the King's signature to a warrant might fairly be demanded.^ Nicholas's next step was to address a letter to the officers and crew of the ' Vanguard.' Would they or would they not either dehver up the ship, or receive three hundred Frenchmen on board ? ^ The answer was contained in a note from Pennington. " I pray," he wrote, "let me entreat you to come aboard, for my people are in a mighty mutiny, and swear they will carry me home per force. I know yom- words will do much amongst them, and I have a great desire to give satisfaction to my Lord Ambassador, so far as I may with safety of my hfe."^ Upon this appeal Nicholas was permitted to go on board. Alike in the ' Vanguard ' and the merchant ships he met with opposition. The crew of the ' Vanguard ' would take on board 1 50 imarmed Frenchmen, would carry them to England, ' and there leave the ship to them, so as they may have a good discharge.' The captains of the merchantmen objected to the security agreed upon at Eochester, and said that they could not dehver the ships till this point had been better arranged.* Nicholas, in fact, had made use of this visit to do his master's bidding.^ To ' Account by Nicholas of his employment, 1626 (?), S. P. Dom., zxvii. III. " Nicholas to Pennington and the Ship's Company, July 22 ; S, P. Dom., iv. 102. ' Pennington to Nicholas, July 23 ; S. P. Dom., iv. no. * Answers to Nicholas, July 23; S. P. Dom., iv. 102; S. P. France. ^ When Buckingham was accused the next year of giving up the ships, Nicholas, who seems to have been quite proud of his part in the transaction, wanted to tell the whole truth. On the 6th of May, 1626, he wrote to Pennington {S. P. Dom., Addenda) — "The Vanguard and the six merchant ships are come to Stokes Bay, but you are to satisfy the Parliament by whose and what warrant you delivered them up to the French. The masters of the merchants' ships, have some of them said that it was by my Lord's commaud, and by reason INTRIGUE OF NICHOLAS. 249 Pennington he repeated the warnings wLich lie had chap. addressed to him on shore. With the captains he > — ■ , -^ 1625. of threatening speeches which I used to them by order from my JUI3' 23. Lord, hut this will he, I doubt, disproved by many witnesses, and by some of them when they shall speak on their oaths. It is true that, before the Ambassador or his people, I did often charge them aloud to deliver them over according to my Lord Conway's letter and the King's pleasure ; but I fell from that language when we were private with the masters ; and you may remember how often I told you I had no wan'ant or order from my Lord for delivery over of those ships, and though I did not wish you to go over into England, yet I think you may well remember I told you, you had not warrant, nor could I give you any to deliver them, and that my Lord was absolutely against the de- livery of them. But I pray keep it to yourself until you shall be called on oath and have leave from the King to declare that I told you I came over rather to hinder than further the delivery or loan of those ships." In the statement already quoted, Nicholas writes, after giving the substance of his instructions : — "Accordingly when the Vanguard came into the road of Dieppe, and that Captain Pennington sent for me to come aboard, I acquainted the Ambassador with it, and told him if I went to the Captain, I made no doubt but to persuade him to come ashore with me, notwithstand- ing he was — as the Ambassador had complained to me — so obstinate that he refused to come out of his ship to the Duke de Montmorency, who importuned him there by many kind invitacions and noble messages ; but the Ambassador would not permit me to go aboard, but commanded me to write to Captain Pennington to come ashore, which I did as press- ing as the Ambassador desired, which took effect. When he was come, the Ambassador interposed still between us, so as I could not have a word in private with him, but was forced to let fall a word now and then as I purposely walked by him, to bid him look well whether he had sufficient warrant to deliver the ships : which I did lest the Ambassador, by importunity or artifice, shewing a letter under his Majesty's hand to the French king, which was much more effectual than the warrant from my Lord Conway, should draw a promise or engagement from the Captain to deliver the ships before I sliould have opportunity privately to advertise him to beware how and on what warrant he did surrender the fortresses of the kingdom into the hands of a foreign prince ; for if the^Ambassador should have found him more averse than before, it would have given his Lordship just occasion to be jealous of the intent of the instructions I had received from my Lord. And the Captain kept himself very warily from any engagement, and craved time to speak with the other Captains and his company before he could promise anything, and so got leave to return to his ship. " Afterwards I seemed not forward to go aboard to him, though I much desired it, till the Ambassador wished, and, indeed, pressed me to 250 LOAN OF ENGLISH SHIPS TO THE laNG OF FRANCE. CHAP, held two languages. If there were any Frenchmen ^■ - ^ '— present, he charged them to give up the ships at once. Jttiy 23. When he could speak with them alone he charged them to do nothing of the sort without better warrant. Continued After this Effiat had but little chance of getting resistance. ^ ^ . possession of the ships. Nicholas continued to summon Pennington to do his duty and to surrender the vessels. But as he had previously warned Pennington not to take account of anything which he might write to please the French, his words naturally produced no effect. Pennington excused himself upon the notorious disaffection of his crews. If that was all, EfBat rephed, he would place four hundred Frenchmen on board to put down the mutiny.^ As soon as the sailors heard of go and use means to work him and the rest of the Captains to effect his desire, and to deliver over the ships with all speed. " I told Captain Pennington, as soon as I came aboard his ship and had an opportunity to speak privately with him, that I thought the war- rant from the Lord Conway whicli he showed to me, and whereof I had before seen a copy, was not sufficient for the delivery of the ships. "In all the time of my negotiating this business, I never plainly dis- covered to Captain Pennington what mine instructions were, because I saw he was of himself unwilling to deliver up the ships, and after I had told him I had no warrant for the delivery of them to the French, he was as adverse in it as I could wish him. " I told him also I was by the Ambassador pressed often to write what I intended not, and therefore desired him not to be moved with whatsoever letters he should receive from me touching the delivery of the ships until he spake with me. My Lord, after I went over, never wrought (wrote ?) to Captain Pennington or myself, but in every material and pressing point concerning delivery of the ships, his Lordship referred us to the instructions his Grace had given me for that service ; and when the Captain came to demand a sight or knowledge of my instructions to warrant the surrender of the ships, I told him I had none. '• If I used any pressing course or language to the masters of the ships, it was either in the presence of the Ambassador, or some such of his ser- vants as he sent aboard with me, or else when I perceived them far enough from yielding, thereby the better to disguise and keep unsuspected my instructions." /S. P. -Dom., xxvii. in. ' Nicholas to Pennington, July 24 ; Answer from Pennington, July 24 ; Demands and Answers on board the Vanguard, July 24 ; Nicholas THE CREWS REFUSE TO SURRENDER THE SHIPS. 25 1 the threat, they took the matter into their own hands chap. and stood out to sea. " And when," wrote Pennington, • A — - " I demanded their reason, they told me that they had j„,,f ^' rather be hanged at home than part with your Majesty's ThR'Van- <-' ^ J . . guard puts ship upon these terms. Yet however they did it fsea. without acquainting me, I must confess I knew of it and did connive, otherwise they should never have done it, and I live. For I had rather lose my hfe than my reputation in my command." ^ The merchant ships re- mained at Dieppe. But their captains refused to surrender them to the French.^ Charles and Buckingham had therefore, at whatever expense to their own honour, succeeded in staving off the immediate surrender of the ships. ^ And now at last it seemed that the object of all this trickery was within their grasp. The news from France had been Prospects , . 1 , , , . , -, -, of peace in growmg brighter as each despatch arrived, and there France. was every reason to believe that the ships might now be safely delivered up without any risk of seeing them employed against the Protestants of Eochelle. The plea which Buckingliam had put up for peace june. had been seconded by the Constable Lesdiguieres, who was in command of the French troops which had gone to assist the Duke of Savoy in his attack upon Genoa. But it was hopeless to attack Genoa without the com- mand of the sea, and Lesdiguieres longed for the pre- to Pennington, July 25 ; Pennington to Nicholas, July 25 ; Nicliolas to Buckingham, July 25 ; 8. P. Dom., iv. 106, 115, 117, 119, 120, 122. ' Pennington to the King, July 27 ; S. P. Bom., iv. 132. ' Demands of Gorges and the Captains, July 27 ; S. P. France. ' When the first news of the difficulties at Dieppe reached Charles, he told Conway to inform Buckingham that he had nothing to change in his former orders. "I must," wrote Conway, " in the duty I owe your Grace, say that there is not anything so tender, and to be so dear to you, as the avoiding of that scandal, offence, and hazard of extreme incon- stancy, as if his Majesty's ships should fight against those of the Re- ligion." Conway to Buckingham, July 25 ; S. P. Dom., Addenda. 252 LOAN OF ENGLISH SPHPS TO THE KING OF FRANCE. CHAP. VII. 1625. Jane. Kichelieu and the sence of the ships which Soubise had seized, reinforced if possible by Pennington's Enghsh squadron, which had been originally destined for that service.^ At the French Court, however, there was a strong party urging Lewis to finish with the Huguenots now that he had a chance, and the French clergy were ready to ofi'er large sums to support the holy war. Eichelieu himself wavered — perhaps he only saw iiuguoaots. that if he was to keep his hold upon the mind of Lewis, it was necessary to him to appear to waver. In the beginning of May he had declared that it was impos- sible to wage war with Spain and the Huguenots at once, and recommended, though in a somewhat hesi- tating tone, that peace should be made with Spain, and that the Huguenots should be compelled to submission. In June, when there was a prospect that the Huguenots might be brought to acknowledge their fault, he urged that they should be satisfied as far as possible, but that Fort Louis, at the mouth of the harbour of Eochelle, which had been kept up in defiance of the express words of the last treaty, should not be razed, on the ground that to destroy the fort would look as though the King had granted to rebellion what he had refused to do at the humble petition of his subjects.^ On June 25 the Huguenot deputies arrived at Fon- tainebleau and threw themselves at the feet of the King. If they obtained the concessions which they considered indispensable for their security, they were quite willing to accept it as a Eoyal favour. Their demeanour seems to have made a favourable impression on Eichelieu. If the Eoyal authority was to be acknowledged as the June 25. The Hu- guenot deputies at Funtaine- blcau. ' LesdiguiSres toLewis XIII., June j\ ; S. P. France. " The two discourses are printed by M. Avenel (Lettres de HicheUeu, ii. 77, 98). Tliey are assigned by him to the beginning of May and the middle of June. RICHELIEU DESIRES PEACE WITII THE HUGUENOTS. 253 source of all that was conceded, he would no longer chap. bar the way to peace. In a splendid argument, he s ^^'.^ urged the advantages of making peace at home and of ^^^S- confirming the religious toleration granted by the Edict of Nantes, in order that France might turn its whole attention to. war with Spain.^ Difficulties hindered the final arrangement of peace for some days. At last came news that Soubise had inflicted some loss upon the French Admiral who, with the aid of twenty Dutch ships, was guarding the entrance to the harbour of Eochelle. The party of resistance at Court found that to overpower the great seaport was not so easy as they thought, and, on July 15, the conditions of peace Juiy 15. were mutually agreed on. A form was drawn up in pea™ " which the King was to engage out of his Eoyal goodness "^"'^'^ °°" to dismantle Fort Louis within a year. As the deputies had no power to conclude the peace themselves, the And sent conditions were at once forwarded to Eochelle for tobe"''^"'' ratification.2 ratified. Such was the news which had reached Buckingham July 19. on the 19th, and ■which had caused him for a moment thenewa ■to think of ordering the delivery of the ships. ^ A few ""gham.' days later, Lorkin was able to send better news still. A council had been held at Fontainebleau, and it had been resolved to declare open war against Spain and to encourage the Duke of Savoy to attack the Milanese. In order that there might be no further danger of dis- turbance at home, couriers had been despatched to the French commanders in the south of France to order ' The anonymous discourse, ■whichia eyidently Richelieu's, is -wrongly placed at the end of Jan. 1626 (S. P. France). A translation with notes ■will be found in The Academy for 1874. 2 Lorkin to Conway, June 28, July 15; S. P. France. All this is completely ignored in Richelieu's Memoirs. 3 P. 245. 254 LOAN OF ENGLISH SPIIPS TO THE KING OF FRANCE. CHAP. VII. 1625. July 28. Final orders to Penning- ton. Aug. 5. Surrender of the 'Van- guard.' Aug. 6. And of six of the mer- chantmen. them to abstain from all acts of hostility as soon as the treaty had been ratified by the Huguenots.^ That the ratification wonld follow seemed hardly open to doubt. At all events neither Charles nor Buckingham doubted it. A formal order was issued to Pennington to take back the ' Vanguard,' and to dehver up the fleet at once, and Buckingham gravely informed him that the King had been extremely ofiended at his previous delay. A private letter from Pembroke explained the mystery. " The King," he wrote, "is assured that war will be declared against Spain for Milan, and the peace is made in Prance for the Eehgion. Therefore his pleasure is that you peremptorily obey this last direction without reply." ^ Pennington had at last got orders which he could understand. On August 3 he was again at Dieppe, and on the 5th the ' Vanguard ' was placed in Effiat's hands. Sir Perdinando Gorges, who was in command of one of the merchant ships, continued to refuse to deliver his vessel till better security for its value had been given, and sailed for England in defiance of Pennington and Efliat alike. The other six captains submitted more readily. But if the French got the ships they did not get tlie men. One only of the whole number consented to accept a service in which 1 Lorliin to Bucliingliam, S. P. France. Tbere is no date ; but it was received on, or just before, July 28. See Pembroke to Pennington, S. P. Dom., Addenda. The date of July 18 is given in an incorrect copy, S. P. Bom., iv. 1 34. Lorkin's informant was the Abbot of Scaglia, the Savoyard ambassador in Paris. I have no doubt of the truth of the story, though, as I have said, Richelieu chooses to ignore it all, simply, I believe, because he did not like to acknowledge having furthered a negotiation which afterwards came to nothing. ' The King to Pennington, July 28; Buckingham to Pennington, July 28; S. P. Dom., iv. 136, 137. Pembroke to Pennington; ihid., Addenda. THE SHIPS GIVEN UP TO THE FRENCH. 255 they expected to be employed against their fellow citap. Protestants, and it was believed in England that that - — ^ — one was not long afterwards killed by the accidental ' ^^' explosion of a gun.^ Buckingham therefore had reason to flatter him- self that when Parhament met at Oxford he would be able to give a good account of Pennington's fleet. If he could not openly declare the means by which he had kept it so long out of the hands of the French, he could point to the fact that it had not been sur- rendered till peace had been secured. When the news came that France was at open war with Spain, and that the English vessels were on their way to Genoa, .there would be little disposition to enquire too narrowly into the original engagement by which the ships had been offered to the King of France. As far as their foreign policy was concerned, therefore, Charles and his minister had some ground for the expectation that they would meet with more favourable consideration for their proposals than they had met with at Westminster. But what was to be ^I^'y- Ine rjng- done about the Enghsh Catholics? The engagements lishCat^o- *-' - , lies. which Charles had severally taken to the King of France and to his own Parhament were so flagrantly in contradiction with one another, that no double-tongued Nicholas could by any possibility help him out of this difiiculty. The advice given by Williams was, that, seeing that promises had been made to Lewis, Charles should announce to the Commons that the execution and relaxation of the penal laws was entirely a matter for himself to judge of.^ If he had been able to 1 Pennington to Nicholas, Aug. 3; Gorges to Bucliingham, Aug. 5 ; S. P. Bom., V. 7, 10; Effiat's receipt for the Vanguard, Aug. 5; Agree- ment for the six ships, S. P. France. ^ Hacket, ii. 17. See also the brief of depositions ngainst Williams, June 16, 1637; S. P. Dom., ccclxi. loi. 2^6 PROSPECTS OF PARLIAMENTARY SUPPORT. CHAP, inform the Houses at the same time that peace had ■ — r-^— ' been made in France with the Huguenots, and that ■v^?" there would be no longer any persecution of the Pro- testants there, it is just possible that, with a really effec- tive French alliance to fall back upon, he might have stood his ground, even with the House of Commons. On the other hand, if Charles put the laws in execu- tion to please the Commons he would give deadly offence to Lewis, and would probably render all active French co-operation impossible. Aug. I. By tiiig time the members of the House of Commons biyat were unwillingly preparing to make their way to Oxford. The temper in which they were did not bode much success to the experiment which Charles was about to try. Even the difficultyof obtaining lodgings in a strange place was raised to the dignity of a practical grievance. History was ransacked for in- stances of unlucky Parliaments which had met at Oxford, whilst no one seems to have thought of the glories of that great assembly which gave birth to the Provisions of Oxford. Worse than all, the plague was already breaking out in the town, and there were not a few who shrunk from facing that fell disease away from their homes, and in the midst of a popu- lation swollen by so great a concourse.^ ' Eliot in bis Negotium speaks of cases of the plague as already oc- curring when the Houses were adjourned at Westminster. But the King on the 4th of August expressly stated that this was not the case, and the way in which he ran away from Whitehall may he taken as good evi- dence that for his own sake he would not fix upon an infected place in which to meet Parliament. On the 5th Whistler said there had then Been only six deaths ; a small number if the plague had been there more than three weeks. 257 CHAPTEE VIII. THE FIEST PAHLIAMEXT OF CHARLES I, AT OXFORD. On August I Parliament met at Oxford. Upon the ^Yiii.' motion of Sir Edward Coke it was resolved that a '"TelTT' Committee of the whole House should take an account Aug.i. of the expenditure of the subsidies granted in the last biing of Parliament. He doubtless intended that investigation ment* into the past should form the basis of a decision upon the course to be pursued in the future. If religion had not been first mentioned, the omission was soon repaired. The favours granted to the Catholics ^^''j^" f^ on the supplication of the French ambassadors were not complained likely to pass unnoticed, and Sir Edward Giles held up the copy of a pardon granted to a Jesuit expressed in terms of unusual latitude. The pardon, he ob- served, bore the date of July 1 2, the very day after the promise of a real compliance with their petition had been given. The inevitable inference bore so hard on persons high in office, if not on the King himself, that for some time no one ventured to speak. At last Eliot EUot's rose, ever the first to throw himself into the breach. "^^^'' " I cannot think," he said, " that this pardon we have seen issued from the King; or, if it did, that he rightly understood it. I cannot believe he gave his pardon to a Jesuit, and that so soon upon his promise unto us." Some one must have abused his confidence. VOL. I. s 258 THE FIRST PARLIAMENT OF CHARLES I. AT OXFORD. ^viii"" ^^* ^-^^ ^'^■'^'^ Keeper be asked who gave the warrant ' — 7 — ' for the issue of the pardon. They might then discover Aug. i. who procured it. The ministers present did their best to avert enquiry. Defence of Heath truly asserted that the promise of which the pardon was the fulfilment had been given before July II, the date of the King's answer through Williams, and explained it as a concession to the French am- bassadors. They had only to wait, he said, till they heard the King's answer to their petition on religion, which was certain to give them satisfaction. Heath's mode of meeting the difficulty was the more noteworthy as he was known to be possessed of hWs'in"- Buckingham's confidence. Buckingham, in fact, was t>ntions. making up his mind, if he had not made it up already, to cast to the winds his engagements to France, and to throw himself upon the popular sympathies of the House, by offering up to them the Catholics whom Charles had promised to protect. He did not see that it was too late ; that a man who plays fast and loose with every principle, and who joins each party when it suits him, is certain to be mistrusted by all parties. As the members were arriving at Oxford one of the Duke's confidants told Sir Francis Seymour that if the Commons ' would set upon the Lord Keeper, they should be backed by the greatest men in the kingdom.' Seymour answered sharply, "I find nothing in the Lord Keeper but the mahce of those great men."^ Heath's appeal therefore met with but httle response in the House. Phelips attacked the practice of complying with the demands of -foreign ambassadors, although Answers of the prcsencc of Charles himself at Madrid had not and availed to release a single prisoner from the Inquisition. A further blow came from Sir Henry Marten, who, ' Statement raade by Willinms to the King, Aug. 14 f Haclcet, ii. 18. lEEITATION OF THE COMMONS. 259 old as he was, sat now for the first time in ParUament. chap. As Judge of the Admiralty Court, he was often brought - — ^-^ into coUision with Buckingham, and he may perhaps ^^^^' have had some cause for complaining of him at this moment. Even in former times, he said, when old ambassadors were employed, England had been more sldlled in fighting than in diplomacy. Marten did not go further than this allusion. But his reference to the old ambassadors of former days was understood to imply a reflection upon the young ambassador who had talked so much and had done so little.^ The whole a petition discussion finally resulted in a petition to the King, pared. in which the Lords were asked to join. The first day at Oxford had been devoted to the , Aug. 2. Montagues Catholics. The second was devoted to the High case again. Churchmen. The sergeant-at-arms reported that Montague had written to say that he was too ill to surrender on his bond. Coke at once rose to warn the House of its danger. The ancient Britons had been worsted, according to Tacitus, because there had been no unity in their mode of fighting. So it was now in matters of religion. Permission was given ' to every coke's particular man to put out books of all sorts.' He ubertyT" wished that ' none concerning rehgion might be printed p""'"'^- but such as were allowed by Convocation.' ^ ' Mr. Forster makes Marten draw the contrast himself. " In former times (Sir J. Eliot, i. 199), when old ambassadors of wisdom and ex- perience were employed, our treaties had Koibeen unsuccessful," &c. The Negotium however makes Marten say that they had been unsuccessful. "He showed that in former times, when old ambassadors were employed, where wisdom and experience might give a promise for their works, suc- cess did prove it not the propriety of their nation," &c. Success, as I understand it, here means 'the result' not 'success' in the modern acceptation of the word. I may add that Eliot's description of Carlisle which follows, as ' so ceremonious and affected that his judgment and reality were in doubt,' is unfair to Carlisle. But then Eliot had not read Carlisle's despatches. • « Camden Debates, 69. 26o THE FIRST PARLIAMENT OF CHARLES I. AT OXFORD. CHAP. VIII. 1625. Aug. 2, Heath declares Montague to be the King's chaplain. CLiiins of tlic Com- mons. This was at least plain speaking. It was as well to know what Eliot's magnificent declamation about unity of religion meant in prose. Upon liberty, so far as it imphed the right of each man to enjoy the freedom of person and property according to the law of the land and the decision of the judges,, Coke placed the highest value. For hberty, so far as it meant intellectual freedom, he cared nothing at all. If Charles had possessed a mind of a higher order he might have entered the lists against the legal intolerance of Coke and the dogmatic intolerance of the Calvinistic clergy with a fair prospect of success. If he had failed, at least he would have failed in a noble cause. But Charles was not likely to take his stand upon so broad an issue ; perhaps the time was not yet come when it was possible for any man to take so high a ground, At Hampton Court he had claimed to save Montague from the Commons by declaring him to be his chaplain, and Heath now warned the House against touching a man in his Majesty's service. The challenge was not allowed to pass unquestioned. " All justices of the peace, all deputy-lieutenants," said Alford, " are the King's servants." No man could by any possi- bility commit a public offence but by colour of public employment 9,nd service to the King. If all these were to be freed from Parliamentary enquiry, what would be the condition of future Parhaments ? In spite of the tendency of some speakers to go off upon the merits of Arminianism and the doctrine of the fallibility of grace, the leading members had suffi- cient influence to keep the point raised by Alford in the foreground. Coke, who was allowed to speak a second time, expressly disclaimed any right in the House to meddle with points of doctrine. They had only to deal with Montague for his contempt of the House. They would inform the Lords of his evil MONTAGUE'S CASE AGAIN. 26 1 doctrine, and, as the Bishops had seats in the Upper House, such questions might be resolved there. At the last the sentence would come before the King, who might execute it or remit as he thought fit. There were even precedents of cases in which ParHament had petitioned the King not to use his prerogative of mercy. PheUps closed the debate by reminding the House that in the last Parliament James had already put forth the claim ' that no servant of his should be questioned.' In the end, the sergeant was ordered to bring Mon- tague to the bar, an order which took no efiect, as it was discovered that Montague was really too iU to attend. The question of the responsibility of the King's Question of officers, when once stirred, was certain to recur sooner bimy.""' or later. Coke might strive hard to bring the desire of the House within the formulas of the past. But in itself the question of responsibihty was the question of sovereignty. If all official persons were liable to com- plaint and punishment in Parliament, whether the King liked it or not, Charles might still have functions to perform which would be eminently useful to the Commonwealth. But he would not be a sovereign in the sense in which Henry VIH. and Ehzabeth had been sovereigns. The impeachment of Middlesex and the threatened impeachment of Montague were the signs of a great change in the relations between the Kjng and the House of Commons. The question was raised because the House had ceased to have con- fidence in the King. But the innovation was none the less striking for that. As far as the great religious dispute by which men's view taken minds were agitated was concerned, it mattered little tague'"' whether Montague was the King's chaplain or not. On h™ BisLrs the very day on which the Commons were pronouncing him"'"^ '° strongly against his opinions, the three Bishops by 262 THE FIRST PARLIAMENT OF CHARLES L AT OXFORD. CHAP, whom these opinions were regarded with the greatest favour, were writing to Buckingham in their defence. Aug.^2. ' The Church of England,' said Buckeridge, Howson, and Laud, ' when it was reformed from the supersti- tious opinions broached or maintained by the Church of Eome, refused the apparent and dangerous errors, and would not be too busy with every particular school-point. The cause why she held this moderation was because she could not be able to preserve any unity among Christians if men were forced to sub- scribe to curious particulars disputed in schools.' Some of the opinions for which Montague was. attacked were ' yet only for schools, and to be left at more-liberty for learned mun to abound in their own sense, so they keep themselves peaceable and distract not the Church ; and, therefore, to make any man subscribe to school opinions may justly seem hard on the Church of Christ, and was one great fault of the Council of Trent.' Liberal Evidently the Bishops were more hberal than the BUhops, * House of Commons. Beyond the region of dogmatic teaching they saw a region of mystery into which the eye of reason could hardly pierce, and which might well be reserved for reverent investigation by learned and devout men, whilst it was utterly unsuited for the violent declamation of the popular rhetorician. Un- happily it is by slow steps that the world rises to the height of a great argument. Something had been done for liberty of thought when dogmatism was re- stricted by Laud and his fellows. But what the Bishops gave with one hand they took with the other. It is hard for men who look upon a creed from the out- side to know by how many ramifications its dry pro- positions gather vital strength for the moral life of its believers. It was well to say that grace and predesti- nation were fitter subjects for the schools than for the THE PREDESTINATION QUESTION. 263 pulpit. But, for all that, the fact remained that there chap. were thousands of men in England who thought other- ■- — r-l- wise, and who, if they were not to hear of grace and ^^^^^ predestination, would find that their whole framework of spiritual thought had broken down. When there- conjoined r 1 -n- 1 T T withil- lore the Bishops went on to say, that they could not liberality, conceive what use there was ' of civil government in the Commonwealth, or of preaching and external ministry in the Church, if such fatal opinions as some which are opposite and contrary to those delivered by Mr. Montague are and shall be publicly taught and main- tained,' they were calling upon the King to use his authority to silence opinions which had by long expe- rience become dear to many a pious soul from one end of the land to the other. The Bishops were seeking to accomplish by force that which they might well have striven to accomphsh by example. With this difference of opinion on Church doctrine wiio is to was necessarily connected a difference of opinion on cifurch" Church government. On this head Coke had been q"^»"™=? somewhat hesitating. He would have had books pro- hibited by Convocation. He would have had Montague judged by the House of Lords because it had Bishops amongst its members. The view of the Bishops was clear. " When the clergy," they said, " submitted themselves in the time of Henry VIII., the submission was so made that if any difference, doctrinal or other, fell in the Church, the King and the Bishops were to be judges of it in a National Synod or Convocation ; the King first giving leave, under his Broad Seal, to handle the points in difference." ^ Sucli was the ground thus early taken up by Laud, The King and maintained by him through the whole of his career, vocation. 1 Buckeiidge, Howson, and Laud to Buckingham, Aug. 2 ; LaucPs Works, vi. 244. 264 THE FIRST PARLIAMENT OF CHARLES I. AT OXFORD. It was a claim hard to be met if it were once admitted that the clergy were a body separate from the rest of the nation, and able to bind the nation to the perpetual observance of any compact to which it has once as- sented. But if this be not the case — and the whole spirit of English history is opposed to such a view — then Laud was in the wrong. What was temporary in the settlement of Henry VIII. was the position taken by the King as the head of the clergy. What was permanent was that in so doing Henry VIII. repre- sented the state and nation. Just so long as Charles represented the state and nation would Charles and the Bishops be able to lay down the law as to what was to be taught and what was not. Already the Commons were beginning feebly and incoherently to put in their claim to be the representatives of England. But they, too, would have to learn that the voice of numbers will not suffice to give permanent supremacy. The question of religious differences was coming to the front. Whoso could most wisely solve it, whether King or Commons, would lead the English nation in the ages which were coming. Immense as was the ultimate importance of these religious disputes, they did not form the immediate question of the hour. But the feelings roused by the discussions of the first two days were not favourable to Charles's design of drawing fresh subsidies from the Aug. 3. Commons. The third day, too, kept as a fast on The fast. •" .^,. .,. account 01 the plague, was certam to bnng with it thoughts and feehngs which boded no good to the King who issued pardons to Jesuits and shielded Arminians from punishment. Aug. 4. On August 4 Charles came in from Woodstock, in Christ- whcrc he was staying, and summoned the Houses to ha"r' appear before him in Christchurch hall. He had THE KING IN CHRISTCHUKCH HALL. 265 indeed need of all the eloquence he could command. His exchequer was even at a lower ebb than it had been when he opened Parhament in June. It was only with the greatest difficulty that the necessary pro- visions for the Eoyal Household had been procured.^ And now too, as in June, he had to balance the ad- vantages of making a clean breast of it to Parhament, and telling aU his plans and all his needs, or of content- ing himself with asking only for as much as would be required for the equipment of the fleet, which, as it was to be directed against Spain, was more Hkely to stir the popular feeling than any combination in Germany. As usual, he did not say much. He again reminded His speech, the Houses of their engagement to support him in the war, and begged them to think of the reputation of the kingdom even at the risk of danger to their own per- sons from the plague. His preparations had cost him great sums of money, and it would be better that half the ships should perish at sea than that they should remain at home. In two days, he ended by saying, they should have an answer to their petition on rehgion. Charles had dwelt entirely on the fleet. Conway, conway's who followed, took a wider view of the situation. He said that 30,000/. or 40,000/. were wanted to enable the fleet to start. But he drew a picture in the back- ground of the Continent in flames, and hinted at the large sums needed for keeping the Protestant forces on foot in Germany and the Netherlands. There was thus a discrepancy between the small- ness of the sum named and the largeness of the expen- diture hinted at. To fulfil his engagements, Charles wanted not 40,000/. but some 700,000/. or 800,000/. at ' Conway to Ley, July 24; S. P. Bom., Addenda. 266 THE FIRST PARLIAMENT OF CHARLES I. AT OXFORD. CHAP, the least. To make up his miDd to forego this and to be content with the smaller sum would probably have Aug 4. been his wisest course, and if he had done this he might perhaps have avoided summoning Parliament at all. But this was precisely what, he was unable to bring his mind to. He therefore, it may be sup- posed, whilst authorising Conway to mention the fact that no more than 30,000^. or 40,000/. was needed for the fleet, allowed his greater expenses to be ex- pounded in the hope of stirring the liberality of the Commons to the uttermost.^ Originally, it would seem, it had been intended to reserve all further observations for a message which Sir John Coke had been directed to deliver to the Commons in their own House.^ But it may have been that signs of impatience were seen amongst the members, or that Charles felt that a mis- take had been committed in allowing Conway to say caiifdn°to ^° ^uch without Saying it more plainly. At all events, the throne, hc bcckoned Cokc to his side, and, after whispering a few words in his ear, sent him into the middle of the hall to do his work at once. Hisexposi- Coke at least did not start with asking for a paltry tion of the o r j state of 40,000/. for the fleet. With all possible emphasis he enlarged upon the greatness of the work before them. 600,000/. a year would be wanted for Mansfeld and the King of Denmark. He argued that though Mans- feld's armament had not been so successful as could have been wished, it had shown that the King of Eng- land was in earnest. The German Princes had been encouraged. The Danes had taken the field. The ^ Conway's speech seems to be very fully given in the Camden De- hates, 73. I gather from it that there is no ground for saying that the King only asked for 40,000?. Conway seems simply to have spoken of that sum as that which was immediately needed for the fleet. ' Instructions for a message, S. P. Dom., v. 14. SIR J. COKE ON THE SITUATION. 567 King of France was aiming at Milan, and had made peace with his Huguenot subjects. It now devolved on ParHament to consider whether they woidd yield his Majesty a convenient help. But even now Coke did not ask for all that was needed. Those who dreaded such an enormous expenditure were reminded of the importance of sending out the fleet. It would not be a constant drain on the nation. When once success had been obtained, that success would help to bear the charge. When the pride of Spain had been quelled, private adventurers could follow to sweep the seas at their own expense. The spirit of the people would be roused, and the whole land would be en- riched at the enemy's cost. Coke's hearers were thus left in uncertainty, an uncertainty which was doubtless shared by the King himself, how much they were really expected to grant. The small sum needed for the fleet was fixed and defi- nite. All else was hazy and impalpable. The success of the fleet would perhaps enable Charles to dispense with almost everything that he now needed. But he did not come forward, as Gustavus had come forward - in the negotiations of the past winter, with a definite demand which he himself recognised as indispensable. He tried to influence the minds of the members with- out first making up his own. Coke was not popular amongst the Commons, and F.eiingsof it was felt as a mark of disrespect that they should be mons." addressed in the King's name by a man who was not a minister of state. Yet, as far as the fleet was con- cerned, he seems to have spoken the whole truth as completely as if he had been a Privy Councillor or a Secretary of State. The Prince of Orange had by this time rejected Morton's proposal for an attack upon the ports of Flanders, and Charles had reverted to his 268 THE FIKST PARLIAMENT OF CHARLES I. AT OXFORD. CHAP. VIII. 1625. Aug. 4. Aug. 5. Propesal to confer with the Lords. Objections raised to it. original scheme of sending his fleet to capture the Spanish ships returning from America.-^ The Commons were fairly puzzled. Though Coke named no sum in particular, it seemed as if he had come round again to Conway's 40,000?. The wildest conjectures were hazarded as to what was really meant. Some thought that the fleet was not to go at all, and that the blame of failure was to be thrown on the House of Commons. Others even thought that a peace had been patched up with Spain. It needed the utmost frankness of explanation on the part of the ministers of Charles to do away with the ill-will caused by the long reticence of the King,, followed by the in- volved and almost unintelhgible demands which had been made at the close of the sittings at Westminster, and which were repeated in a form more involved and unintelligible still at the opening of the sittings at Oxford. When the House met the next morning, Mr. Whistler opened the debate by a proposal which, if it had been met in the spirit in which it was made, might have changed the history of the reign. Let the Com- mons, he said, ask the opinion of the Lords upon the necessity of the action proposed. If they could not get satisfaction there, let them go to the King. Full and complete information upon the intentions of the Government was plainly the only condition upon which the Commons could be justified in acceding to the demands made upon them. But even if Charles had been willing to grant such information, it was one of the evils of the new system of government that there was no one in the House of sufiicient authority to take 1 The Prince's answer is unknown, as it waa given by word of mouth (Morton to Conway, July 13; S. P. Holland), but it may be gathered from that officially made by the States General. Morton and Carleton to Conway, July 4 ; S, P. Holland. SEYMOUR ON FOREIGN AFFAIRS. 269 upon himself the responsibUity of meeting an unex- chap. pected proposal. It was probably from instinct rather than from any knowledge of the King's wishes that Sir xvl - George More replied, with courtier-like facihty, that it was unconstitutional to apply to the Lords on a ques- tion of subsidy. But May, Weston, and Heath sat silent in their places, and before they had time to receive instructions the debate had taken another turn. If there was a man in the House who would be ftSs"the consistent with himself in attacking the foreign policy ^"^^If^^f of the Crown it was Sir Francis Seymour, the proposer the drown, of the restricted supply which had been granted at Westminster. In itself the fact that the Government had entered into engagements' with foreign powers so extensive that it did not venture directly to ask the Commons for the means of fulfilling them was calcu- lated to give rise to the gravest suspicions, and Sey- mour, the old opponent of the system of Continental wars, was not likely to treat such suspicions lightly. This meeting of Parliament, he argued, had been the work of those who sought to put dissensions between the King and his people. It was absurd to suppose that it needed a Parliament to procure 40,000/. for the fleet. As for the rest that had been sai(J, he had no confidence in the advisers of the Crown. He did not beheve that peace had been made in France, and he hoped that Enghsh ships would not be used as abettors of the French king's violence against his Huguenot subjects. Then turning to the past, Sey- mour continued, " We have given three subsidies and three fifteenths to the Queen of Bohemia for which she is nothing the better. Nothing hath been done. We know not oiu: enemy. We have set upon and consumed our own people." What he wished was that they might now ' do somewhat for the country,' and answer. 270 THE FIBST PARLIAMENT OF CHARLES L AT OXFORD. CHAP, they -would then give his Majesty a seasonable and ' — ■— ^ bountiful supply, Aug. s'. Distrust of Buckingham's capacity, perhaps of his integrity, was imprinted on every word of Seymour's May's speech. When May rose to answer him, he knew that the whole foreign policy of the Government needed defence. And if he could not meet all attacks he was able to tell of much that had been overlooked by Sey- mour. It was something that the King of Denmark was on the move. It was something that France was no longer in friendship with Spain. May then went on to relate an anecdote from his own personal know- ledge. When at the end of Elizabeth's reign Mountjoy had been sent into Ireland and was in great danger of defeat. Sir Eobert Cecil had protested beforehand that if disaster followed no imputation could be brought against the Government at home. " My Lord Mount- joy," he had said, " cannot complain of us. He hath wanted nothing from hence. If things miscarry, the blame must be somewhere else." The application of the anecdote was obvious. It was the business of the House to vote supplies and to throw the responsibility off their own shoulders. May had forgotten that the House courted respon- sibihty, and that it was very far from feeling that con- fidence in Buckingham's powers as a minister which Cecil had in Mount] oy's powers as a soldier. He did not acknowledge that times were changed, and. that those who supply the money for war must necessarily ask for a larger share in its management as soon as they have reason to think that the supplies are being 200,000/. squandered or misused. Nor did Edmondes, who fol- by Ed- lowed, mcnd the position of the Government by asking Spicch'of directly for two subsidies and two fifteenths, about Phciips. 200,000^., a sum far too great for supplying the imme- PHELIPS'S GREAT SPEECH. 27 1 diate needs of the fleet, whilst altogether inadequate to chap. meet Charles's engagements on the Continent.^ -— .— If Seymour had hinted at some things which he Aug. 5. could have expressed more clearly if he had thought fit, Phelips, who rose next, was certain to speak out all that was in his heart. And speak out he did. For his part, he told the House, he saw no reason for giving. But neither was there any reason for leaving the work to which they had been so unexpectedly called. Let them stay to do something to make his Majesty glorious. Those who were now urging them to war — so far at least the person intended was suggested rather than expressed — were those who had been foremost in urging on the Spanish marriage, and who had for its sake broken up the Parliament of 1 62 1 , and had thrown members of the House into prison, himself being one of the sufferers, for refusing to hold their tongues. In the Pariiament of 1624 three things had been desired.^ They had asked that the Prince should marry a Protestant lady, that the Dutch Eepublic should be supported, and that rehgion in England should be ' Eliot, as is well known, believed that Buckingham wanted to be denied. I am quite unable to take this view of the case after a full con- sideration of Buckingham's whole proceedings, of which an historian is now able to know much of which Eliot knew nothing. It is likely enough, as I have before said, that he expected to be denied, and that he intended to make use of the impression caused by his being in the right and the Commons in the wrong, when success came. Nor can I see that ■ he only asked for 40,000?. at first. I fancy he simply wanted that at least, and would take as much more as he could get ; a frame of mind the very opposite to that of Gustavus, who at once refused to engage in war except on his own terms. ^ Eliot makes Phelips say that they had been ' desired and promised.' Phelips was an impetuous orator and may have said this. But as it is not true that Charles promised to marry a Protestant lady, I have followed the Camden Debates, 81, giving Phelips the benefit of the doubt. It was, indeed, not strictly true that the House had asked for a Pro- testant marriage. But the desire of the members can hardly have been a matter of doubt, and may have been taken oratorically as equivalent to an actual demand. 272 THE FIRST PARLIAMENT OF CHARLES I. AT OXFORD. preserved. Had this been done ? " What the Spanish articles were," he said, " we know. Whether those with France be any better it is doubted. There are visible articles and invisible. Those we may see, but these will be kept from us." Then, after touching on the sore of the impositions, and of tonnage and poundage, still levied, though the Lords had not yet passed the bill, Phelips went to the root of the matter. " In the government,"he said plainly. Want of « there hath wanted good advice. Counsels and power have been monopolized." Then, with an allusion to the Parhament which, meeting at Oxford, had wrested authority from Henry IH., he said that he did not love the disordered proceedings of Parliaments. In all actions, he cried, " there is a mixture of good and ill. So was it with their forefathers struggling with the pre- rogative. Let us," he cried, " avoid that which was ill, but not that which was good. They looked into the disorders of the time, and concluded with the King for a reformation. Wlien kings are persuaded to do what they should not, subjects have been often transported to do what they ought not. Let us not come too near the heels of power ; nor yet fall so low as to suffer all things under the name of the prerogative. Let us look into the right of the subject. I will not argue whether the fleet is best to go or stay, whether leagues abroad are apt to support such great actions. The match has not yet brought the Prench to join with us in a de- fensive war, or any longer than conduceth to their own ends. The Prench army, which they say is gone, we hear is upon return. In Germany the King of Den- mark hath done nothing. The best way to secure ourselves is to suppress the Papists here. . ' . Let the fleet go on ; and let us not part till his Majesty may see an ample demonstration of our affections. Let us GOVERNMENTAL RESPONSIBILITY DEMANDED. 273 look into the estate and government, and, finding that chap. VTTT which is amiss, make this Parhament the reformer of • — r-^ the Commonwealth." 7^^5- Aug. 5. There was more in Phehps's words than even Effect of distrust of Buckingham's abihty or honesty. Both Buck- ' '" ^^^"'^ ' ingham and Charles had failed to recognise the import- ance of the fact that neither the French alliance nor the intervention in Germany had ever received the appro- bation of the House of Commons. It was enough for them that they judged this policy to be right, and that they promised to themselves great results in the future from it. They would tell the House what they had done, and ask for the means to carry out their designs, but they would not so far demean themselves as to con- sult it upon the direction which their pohcy was to take. To this Phelips's somewhat ironical answer was decisive. The responsibihty must fall upon those by whom that policy had been originated. The Commons would give no support to a course of action which they were unable to understand. They would confine them- selves to those internal affairs which were within the compass of their intelligence, and would content them- selves with criticising the administration of the laws, and the financial and pohtical arrangements of the Govern- ment. Such a speech was an historical event. If Charles speeches of could not make up his mind to discuss with the andCoL. Commons the policy which he had adopted with such headlong rashness, it was useless for Weston, who followed, to try to persuade them that success might still be looked for if money enough were voted, or to frighten them with a prospect of dissolution by saying that, if they refused to give, ' beyond that day there was no place for counsel.' Nor was the speech of Sir Edward Coke much more to the point, as he VOL. I. T 2 74 THE FIEST PARLIAMENT OF CHARLES I. AT OXFORD. CHAP. VIII. .1625. Aug. 5. Heath's offers on the part of theGovern- nient. Alfoi-d says the House never pro- mised to recover the Palatinate. contented himself with caUing attention to the minor causes of the financial embarrassment of the Treasury, without touching upon the question really at issue. The House was all the more attentive when Heath, the Solicitor- General, rose to speak, because he had had time to receive instructions from Buckingham since Phehps sat down, and because he was far too able a man, and had too good an acquaintance with the temper of the House, to fail in giving full weight to any concessions which the Government might be disposed to make. He began by placing the engagement of the Parliament of 1624 on its proper footing. The House, he argued, was bound to follow the King unless he propounded anything to which it was impossible to consent. As they were not engaged to everything, let there be no mis- understanding. Let them ask the King against what enemy he was prepared to fight. He was sure that the King was ready to take measures against the Catholics, ' that they might not be able to do hurt.' It had been said that places were filled by men who wanted experi- ence. He was under great obligations to the person to whom allusion had been made, but if there was any- thing against him he hoped that it would be exa- mined in such a way as that the public good might not suffer. Let the blame, if blame there was, light upon himself, not upon the Commonwealth. Heath had done his best to open the way to a better understanding. But the speaker who followed him, Edward Alford,^ struck at once at the weak point of the case, the fact that objection was taken not merely to Buckingham's management of the war, but to the dimensions which the war was assuming in his hands. " We are not engaged," he said, " to give for the re- covery of the Palatinate. For when it was in the Act • Camden Debates, S8, J 3$, BUCKENGHAM'S HESITATION. 275 of Parliament, as it was first penned, it was struck chap. out by the order of the House, as a thing unfit to en- — ^"^1- gage the House for the recovery of the Palatinate, and l^^^' if possible, yet not without great charge and difiiculty." The full truth was out at last. The House did not mean to support Mansfeld and the King of Denmark, and Buckingham and the King would have to reconcile themselves to the fact. That afternoon Buckingham's agents were busy Discussions amongst the knots of members who were gathering afternoon everywhere to discuss the morning's debate. The greater part had already taken sides, the majority against the Court. Some few alone were accessible to influence. But besides the scenes which were passing in the streets or in the members' lodgings, another scene, it can hardly be doubted, was passing in Buck- ingham's apartments. There were men who wished him well, whilst they disliked his policy, and who were anxious to induce him to give way to the strength of Parhamentary opinion. What was said we do not know, probably shall never know. But no one who reads with attention the com'se of the next day's debate can doubt that an efibrt was being made on the part of his friends to save him from the consequences of his own self-conceit. The next morning, after a brisk passage on a pro- Aug. e. tection accorded by Conway to a Eoman Catholic lady reoSua- in Dorsetshire, the great debate was resumed. The tween*" course which it took was altogether difierent from that hamtnd" of the preceding day. The 5th had been given up to a conflict between the ministers of the Crown and the men who, in modern political language, would be termed the advanced wing of the opposition. On the 6th all is changed. Phehps, Coke, and Seymour are as silent as Weston, Heath, and Edmondes. It looks the House. proposal. 276 THE FIRST PAELUMENT OF CHARLES I. AT OXFORD, CHAP, as if both parties had come to a tacit agreement to ^^ — ^— allow a body of mediators to declare the terms on Aug. 6. which an understanding might yet be effected. Miidmay's Sir Hcnrv Mildmay, who spoke first, was Master of the King's Jewel House, and was on friendly terms with Buckingham. He proposed that the House should ask what sum would be sufl&cient to complete the equipment of the fleet, and that that sum should be granted, not by way of subsidy, but by some other mode of collection, apparently in order that it might be at once brought into the exchequer. Such a course of raising money, he added, being taken in Parliament, will be a Parliamentary course,^ Mildmay had quietly thrown overboard all the Coryton'a King's Continental alhances. He was followed by Coryton, Eliot's friend, who was ready to supply the King, ' if there was a necessity,' but suggested that the state of the King's revenue should be examined, the question of impositions sifted, and a Committee ap- pointed to debate of these ^things,^ ' and especially for reUgion.' Eiiot'a EHot followed. It was his last appearance as a mediator. But it is plain that he had already ceased as completely as Phelips and Seymour to feel any confi- dence in Buckingham. The war, he said, ' extendeth to Denmark, Savoy, Germany, and France.' "If he shall deal truly, he is diffident and distrustful of these things, and we have had no fruit yet but shame and dishonour over all the world. This great preparation is now on the way ; he prayeth it may have a prospe- ' This speecli is substantially the same in the Journals and in the Camden Debates. But see especially the report in the appendix to the latter, 136, ^ " And everyone may contribute his reasons which may do much good," probably means this. Camden Delates, 139. ATTEMPTED COMPROmSE. 277 rous going forth, and a more prosperous return." He did not believe there was any necessity for more money than had been voted at Westminster, and he could not see why, if the seamen were pressed in April and the landsmen in May, the fleet had not been at sea long ago. That the delay had been caused, in part at least, by Buckingham's project of diverting the enter- prise to the coast of Flanders, was of course imknown to Eliot. But though he had spoken thus strongly of the proceedings of the Government, he went on to acquit Buckingham of all personal blame about the fleet. If anything had gone wrong it was the fault of the Commissioners of the Navy. The attack upon the Commissioners called up Sir John Coke, who protested loudly against this imputa- tion upon the office which he held. Strode then fol- lowed, supporting ^ Mildmay's proposal that the money should be raised in some other way than by subsidy, by asking how subsidies payable more than a year hence could supply a fleet which was to go out in a fortnight. After a few words from Sir John Stradling, Sir Nathaniel Eich's five Eich, who even more than Mildmay represented in tiora!^'' the House that section of the Duke's friends which objected to his late proceedings, rose to put Mildmay's proposal in a more definite form. He proceeded to lay down five propositions, which had probably been accepted by Buckingham the evening before. In the first place, he said they must ask the King for an answer to their petition on rehgion. In the second place, his Majesty must declare the enemy against whom he meant to fight, so that the object of the war might be openly discussed, though the special design ' This at least seems to me to be the obvious interpretation of Strode's question. Mr. Forster, if I miderstand him rightly (Sir J. Eliot, i. 226), regards it as an argument against the grant of supply. 278 THE riEST PARLIAMENT OF CHARLES I. AT OXFORD. CHAP. VUI. 1625. Aug. 6. Incident of Clerke's imprison- ment. Kich's scheme approved by Phelips. ought properly to be kept secret. Further, he wished that ' when His Majesty doth make a war, it may be debated and advised by his grave council '^a pro- posal which in the most courteous terms expressed the general wish that the opinion of others than Buckingham should be heard. Besides these three demands, Eich asked that the King's revenue should be examined with a view to its increase, and that a permanent settlement of the vexed question of the impositions should be arrived at.^ Thus far the House had listened to men who, if they were friends of Buckingham, could speak in an indepen- dent tone. But other voices were now raised. Before we give more money, said some one, let us take account from Buckingham of the subsidies voted the year before.'"* Edward Gierke, a man trusted by the Duke as his agent in affairs of questionable propriety, rose to defend his patron. " Bitter invectives," he began, " are unseasonable for this time." There was at once an outcry from all parts of the House, and Gierke was committed to the custody of the sergeant-at- arms. With this scene ended the day's debate. The House was adjourned at Seymour's motion, in order that at the next sitting they might go into committee on the great business. But the members did not separate before Phelips had expressed his decided approbation of ' the platform of Sir Nathaniel Eich.' ^ ' I would refer those who doubt my view of this debate to what I have said in the Preface (xiii) to the Camden Debates. ' This speech, which gave rise to Clerlse's unlucky words, is men- tioned in a letter from the Bishop of Mende. King's MSS., 137, fol. 84. ' Camden Debates, 140. Rich is mentioned by Williams in a paper given in to the King on Aug. 14, as one of those wiio were 'never out my Lord Duke's chamber and bosom.' Ilaclcet, ii. 18. There may have been some exaggeration, but unless there had been friendship, Williams vi'ould not have said this to the King. BUCKINGHAM URaED TO GIVE WAY. 279 Thus ended the discussions of this memorable week. chap. That Saturday afternoon pressure was put upon • — .-^— Buckingham to accept the terms offered by Eich, which ^\ would then without doubt be adopted by the House. Arguments . i. J used wilh " The advice he had, writes EHot, " was much to BucMng- endeavoiu" an accommodation with the Parhament. The errors most insisted on were said to be excusable if retracted. That the disorders of the navy might be imputed to the officers ; that the want of counsels might be satisfied by a free admission to the Board. The greatest difficulty was conceived to rest in religion and the fleet. For the first, the jealousy being derived from his protection given to Montague ; for the latter, that it had so unnecessary preparation and expense ; and yet in both there might be a reconciliation for himself. Sending the fleet to sea and giving others the command, was propounded as a remedy for the one ; having" these reasons to support it, that the design could not be known, nor, if there wanted one, that judged by the success, and the success was answerable but by those that had the action. For the other, it was said that the leaving of Montague to his punishment, and the withdrawing that protection, would be a satisfaction for the present, with some public decla- ration in the point, and a fair parting of that meeting. That the danger of the time^ was a great cause of dislike — that the dislike had ushered in most of those questions that had been raised. Therefore to free them from that danger would dissolve the present difficulties, and facilitate the way to a future temper for agreement. The fleet must needs go forth to colour the preparation, and the return might yield something to ' i.e. from the plague. 280 THE FIRST PARLIAMENT OF CHARLES I, AT OXFORD. '^yl^F- j^^stify the work, at least in excuse and apology for '- ' ' -' himself, by translation of the fault." ^ Aug. 6. If this account of the language used to Buckingham woiHid'"^ has not been distorted in its passage through the sound to medium of other men's minds, it must have been Jiucking- . i.pnl • T • n ham. beyond measure annoying to him. To have it hinted that the fleet which had been for so many months the object of his solicitude was never intended to sail, was not a suggestion to which he was likely to listen with equanimity. The wonder is not that the proposal was ultimately rejected by him, but that he should, even for a moment, have given any hope to his advisers. For he was called not merely to admit himself to be incapable of directing the state, by consenting to place himself under the control of a Council reinforced by men who looked upon him with distrust, but to re- nounce all those long-considered plans which he regarded as of such importance. Already war had broken out in Germany, and the King of Denmark, depending on EngHsh promises, was holding out with difficulty against Tilly. From France every post brought news of preparations for war, and a day or two, he firmly believed, would tell the world that the internal struggle with the Huguenots was at an end. And were Buckingham and his master, in the face of one adverse debate, to fling their engagements to the winds ? Were they to tell Christian that in building on the word of an English king he had been building on the sand? Were they, by teaching Eichelieu that English co-ope- ration was unattainable, to throw France back into the arms of Spain, and to force her to pass once more into the bondage from which she had with such difficulty emancipated herself? ^ ^ Eliot, 2\^cff. Posterorum, ' All these considerations arise out of the facts as we know them, and BUCKINGHAM'S DECISION, 28 1 What wonder therefore if Buckingham resolved to chap. make one more effort to win the Commons to his side ? ' — .— ^ There was one point at least on which he was ready to l^ ^^g give them satisfaction. Neither he nor the Kins cared ^? "^^'f - c o mines to really for the principle of rehgious toleration. They "'^^^ ""« were both of them as ready to execute the penal laws The Catho- against the Catholics, if anything could be gained by so abanden^ed. doing, as they had been to remit the penalties. Yet how could this be done without risk to the French alliance? Would Lewis help Charles to recover the Palatinate, if Charles's promise to protect the English Catholics were treated as if it had been never given ? That Charles and Buckingham should have found excuses for breaking their engagements is no matter for surprise. But no better proof can be found of their incapacity to understand human nature than the ease with which they persuaded themselves that the King of France would be quite content that the engage- ments, by which he set such store, should be broken openly. On Sunday, August 7, there was high debate at Aug. 7. Court. From La Vieuville's unguarded language, from misl to"' Eicheheu's poHte phraseology, Buckingham, with Car- fxpiSned lisle and Holland to back him, drew the astounding "'^''^' inference that the promise, so solemnly signed and attested at Cambridge, had never been anything more than a mere form, adopted with the approval of the French Government, to deceive the Pope.^ For impar- as Buckingham knew them. Eliot's picture of Buckingham is drawn not merely in ignorance of them, but in the belief that things were true which we know were not true. • The Bishop of Mende to Richelieu, received Aug. || ; King's MSS., 137, fol. 84, The Council is here by mistake dated Aug. 9, if this is more than a copyist's error. But the 7th is meant, as it is said to have taken place the day before Buckingham's speech at Christchurch, 282 THE FIRST PARLIAMENT OF CHARLES I. AT OXFORD, CHAP, tial judges it is enough to condemn so monstrous a pro- • --^ position that it was now heard of for the first time, and ' ^^' that Charles had aheady acknowledged by his actions that, when his wife was on her way to England, he considered his engagement to her brother as a reality. This view From tliis time forward it was to become a cardinal r^the^*^ principle at the English Court to disavow all obhgation Council, to the King of France in the matter of the Catholics, and to appeal to words spoken in conversation by the French ministers as if, even if they meant all that Buckingham asserted them to mean, they could outweigh an obhgation formally contracted. The members of the Privy Council had not a word to say in opposition when the revelation, as they supposed it to be, was suddenly made. WiUiams, and perhaps Arundel, may have been displeased at the rashness of the affront offered to the King of France, but they were powerless to resist. Of the others, Pembroke and Abbot werS probably in communication with the leaders of the Commons, and doubtless shared to a great extent the general dissatisfaction. But whatever their exact form of opposition may have been, when once Buckingham had taken his stand, with the King's support, it was useless to raise further questions. Backing- On Monday morning therefore Buckingham ap- christ- peared, radiant with self-confidence, in Christchurch haS"'' hall, and the Commons were summoned to hear from his lips a communication from the King. After a, short preamble from Williams, the Duke stood up as he had stood up at Whitehall eighteen months before, to answer for the government which was in reahty centred in his person. The peti- Flrst he directed the King's answer to the petition religion of rcligioii to be read. All that the Commons had grante . demanded was fully and freely granted. If they BUCKINGHAM'S DEFENCE. 283 thought that the execution of the penal laws against chap. the Cathohcs was an object worth striving for, they - — ^^-^ were to have their wishes. ^ ^^' Aug. 8. Buckingham then proceeded to defend his foreign Bucking- policy. He spoke of the dissolution of the anti- fends Ms Spanish party in Europe at the time when he came p^oiicf? back from Spain. JSTow it was far otherwise. "Now," he said, " the Valtelline is at liberty, the war is in Italy ; the King of Denmark hath an army of 1 7,000 foot and 6,000 horse, and commissions out to make them 30,000 ; the King of Sweden declares himself; the Princes of the Union take heart; the King of France is engaged in a war against the King of Spain, hath peace with his subjects, and is joined in a league with Savoy and Venice. This being the state of things then and now, I hope to have from you the same success of being well construed which then I had ; for since that time I have not had a thought, nor entered into any action, but what might tend to the advance- ment of the business and please your desires. But if I should give ear and credit, which I do not, to rumours, then I might speak with some confusion, fearing not to hold so good a place in your opinion as then you gave me, whereof I have stUl the same ambition, and I hope to deserve it. When I consider the integrity of mine own soul and heart to the King and State, I receive courage and confidence ; where- upon I make this request, that you will believe that if any amongst you, in discharge of their opinion and conscience, say anything that may reflect upon parti- cular persons, that I shall be the last in the world to make application of it to myself, being so well assured of your justice, that without cause you will not fall on him that was so lately approved by you, and who will never do anything to irritate any man to have other 2.84 THE FIEST PARLIAMENT OF CHARLES L AT OXFORD. CHAP. VIII. 1624. Aug. 8. Declares he has acted by counsel. The neces- sity of the fleet. What was intended ? opinion of me than of a faithful, true-hearted English- - man.". Then turning to the demand for more counsel and advice, he declared that he had never acted without counsel. All that he had done or proposed to do had been submitted to the Council of War or to the Privy Council. He himself, when he went to France, had advised the institution of a Committee to give advice on foreign affairs. If therefore the Commons thought that he took too much on himself, they were mistaken. The Council which they demanded was already in existence. Of the suggestion that the fleet was not intended to sail, Buckingham spoke scornfully. "For my part," he said, " I know not what policy my master should have to set out a fleet with the charge of 400,000^. only to abuse the world and lessen his people, and to put you to such hazard. What should my master gain ? Would he do an act never to meet with you again ? Certainly he would never have employed so great a sum of money but that he saw the necessity of the affairs of Christendom require it ; and it was done with an intention to set it out with all the speed that may be." After touching on other less important points, Buckingham spoke of his plans for the future. " Hitherto," he said, " I have spoken nothing but of immense charge which the kingdom is not well able to bear if it should continue : the King of Denmark, 30,000^. a month ; Mansfeld's army, 2o,oooZ. ; the army of the Low Countries, 8,000^. ;^ Ireland, 2,600^.; besides twelve ships preparing to second the fleet. " Make my master chief of this war, and by that 8,.50O?., according to the Lord Treasurer. BUCKINGHAM'S OFFERS. 285 you shall give his allies better assistance than if you chap. gave them 100,000^. a month. What is it for his — ^5!^^,^ allies to scratch with the King of Spain, to win a battle ^^^^g to-day and lose one on the morrow, and to get or lose a town by snatches ? But to go with a conquest by land, the King of Spain is so strong, it is impossible to do. But let my master be chief of the war and make a diversion, the enemy spends the more ; he must draw from other places, and so you give to them." ^ If they wished to know who was their enemy they They might name him themselves. Let them put the sword name their into the Bang's hands, and he would maintain the war,^ enemj. Buckingham's declaration was followed by a state- The Lord ment by the Lord Treasurer, in which the King's debts statement.' and engagements were plainly stated. But the main interest lay in the reception which would be accorded to Buckingham's vindication of himself. That there Bucidng- was intentional deception about his words it is impos- s'ln^rity. sible to imagine. There is a ring of sincerity about . them which cannot be mistaken, and those who are best acquainted with the facts will probably acknowledge that he said exactly what, under the circumstances, he might reasonably be expected to say. But it is one thing to hold that he was sincere ; it is another thing to hold that what he said ought to have given satisfac- But his tion. Doubtless it was perfectly true that he had un^ausfac- appealed from time to time to the Privy Council and ^°'^'' to the Council of War. But had he done his best to fill the Privy Council with men of independent judgment ? Had he not rather given away places at the Board to men who had risen by obsequiousness rather than by merit ? In politics, as in all other actions of hfe, one or two questions, decided one way or another, carry ^ i.e., to the King's (illies. ' Lords' Journals, iii, 479 ; Camden Debates, 95. 286 THE FIRST PARLIAMENT OF CHARLES L AT OXFORD. ™^P- with them the settlement of all other points at issue. ' — ■ — • Buckingham may have asked advice whether the fleet Aug 8. ^^^ *<^ s^^l against Cadiz or Dunkirk, but had he asked advice whether the secret engagement about the French Catholics should be signed, or whether the King of Denmark should be encouraged to take part in a fresh war in Germany by offers of aid from Eng- land ? ^■obabT ^^ Buckingham's defence against the charge of t °him'"if <^6^pis^g counsel was unsatisfactory, his account of his own future designs was more unsatisfactory still. The Commons wished him to abandon his continental alhances, and to be content with attacking Spain. It can surprise no one that Buckingham was unwilUng so hghtly to turn his back upon the efforts of the past year. But when he proceeded to sum up the King's engagements, and when he allowed the Lord Treasurer to restate them in fuller detail, it was only natural to expect that he would urge upon the Commons the absolute necessity of furnishing money to enable the King to carry out his imdertakings. He did nothing of the sort. He suggested that if the fleet were suc- cessful it would do more good to the common cause than if ioo,oooZ. a month were paid to the allies of England on the Continent. The explanation doubtless is that, whilst he could not abandon the world of alliances and subsidies in which he had been living and moving during the past year without a word spoken in their favour, his sanguine mind seized upon the chance that the success of the fleet might make all these subsidies unnecessary. After all, why should he not pay Mansfeld and Christian with gold from the mines of Spanish America rather than from the purses of English citizens and landowners ? EFFECT OF BUCKINGHAM'S EXPLANATION. 287 Such a solution would rid him of his difficulty. It chap. ** TTTTT VIII. would satisfy the King's allies and satisfy the House of Commons as well. ,^ ^ o' Aug. 8. Buckingham's explanation, taken at its best, is fatal '^'^^ ^om- ,° '- mons not to his claims to statesmanship. Either he had pro- ''^«iy.'» , ^ ^ be satisued. mised too much before, or he was asking too httle now. Was it hkely that it would allay the suspicions which were so rife amongst the Commons ? On Wednesday morning the Lower House was to Aug. 10. go into committee on Buckingham's explanation of the meLag'".^ ^ King's demands. Before the Speaker left the chair a message from the King had been delivered by Weston, pressing for an immediate answer, which was demanded alike by the necessity of the case and by the danger to their own health. If the Commons would vote a sup- ply at once, he would pledge his Eoyal word that they should meet in the winter, and should not separate till they had considered the plans which had been sug- gested for the reformation of the Commonwealth. He hoped that'they would remember that this was the first request which he had ever made to them. For some time the debate wavered to and fro. Feeling in There were some who had been carried away by ^''^^''"''^• Buckingham's evident zeal in the cause which was their own. But there were others who disliked his assump- tion of almost regal dignity, and who mistrusted him too much to repose in him the confidence which he required. Even his concession of the execution of the penal laws ofiended some who had been displeased at the countenance before shown to the Eecusants. Men whose religion, if of a somewhat narrow and un- charitable nature, was a reality very dear to their hearts, had no respect for the man who had attempted to prostitute a thing so high and holy to considerations 288 THE FIRST PARLLiMENT OF CHARLES I. AT OXFORD. CHAP. Tin. 1625. Aug. 10. Plielipa puts the question as one of confidence. Mansell to be examined. of State policy, and had made use of religion to support a tottering minister.^ Such men, and they were doubtless many, found an apt spokesman in Phelips. He treated the question as altogether one of confidence. Eeputation, he said, is a great advantage to a king, but it is not built on every action, but only on such as have a sure ground of advice preceding, and a constant apphcation of good counsel, leaving as little as possible to chance. It was no honour to send forth the fleet if it was exposed to so hazardous a return. It was easy to say there was necessity. It was for those who had brought the King to such a necessity to take upon themselves the burthen of their own counsels. In old days there had been Parhaments which had demanded the reformation of abuses and the dismissal of favourites. " We," he said with striking force, " are the last monarchy in Christen- dom that retain our original rights and constitutions. Either his Majesty is able to set out this fleet, or it is not fit to go at all. We ought neither to fear nor to contemn our enemy. If we provide to set it out, we must provide to second it too, for without a second it will do nothing but stir a powerful king to invade us." Everything, as Phehps clearly saw, turned on the question of confidence. Forty thousand pounds might be a little sum for them to give, but it was no light matter to embark on a war with a leader who could not be trusted. Nor was Phelips content with mere declama- tion. He had a practical solution of the difficulty to recommend. Buckingham had declared that the Council of War had authorised his proceedings. But not a single member of the Council of War had come forward to confirm his statement. One of them, Sir ' This seems to Lave been Eliot'a view. WANT OF CONFIDENCE IN BUCKINGHAM. 289 Eobert Mansell, was a member of the House. Let Mansell be asked ' to declare his knowledge with what deliberation and counsel this design hath been managed.' A Committee might also be appointed to inform his Majesty that, though supply would not at once be granted, the House would in due time ' supply all his honourable and weU-grounded actions.' ^ It would perhaps have been well if Mansell had continu- responded at once, ihe KingS claim to be judge of debate, the grounds upon which he demanded supply had been met by the coimter- claim of the House to judge the sufficiency of those grounds before they gave the money. But Mansell held his peace, and the debate went on. The King's cause was feebly defended by May. No one had been authorised to join issue with Phehps. Then came Seymour, still more personal in his attack than Phelips, complaining of peculation in high places, and of the sale of honourable preferments at Court.^ ' Camden Debates, 109 ; Commons^ Joxirnah, i. 814. ' With respect to the alleged speech of Eliot I had better repeat what I have said in the preface to the Camden Debates : — " In the first place I shall have to ask my readers to abandon the notion that the great speech prepared by Eliot in conjunction with Cotton for the debate of the loth of August, was ever really spoken. Mr. Forster was, indeed, perfectly justified in inserting the speech, for not only does it bear throughout the impress of Eliot's mind, but Eliot has inserted it both in ^^Negothim and in his own collection of speeches, and though he does not use his name, he says, after reporting May's speech : — But the esteem of precedents did remain with those that knew the true value of antiquity, whereof a larger collection was in store to direct the resolution in that case, which thus contained both reason and authority. " Then after giving the speech in the Eliot, not in the Cotton form, he goes on : — This inflamed the affection of the House, and pitched it wholly on the imitation of their fathers ; the clear demonstrations that were made of the likeness of the times gave them like reasons who had like interests and freedom. But the courtiers did not relish it, who VOL. I. U 290 THE FIRST PARLIAMENT OF CHARLES I, AT OXFORD. CHAP. The debate was kept up for some time longer. VIII. Amongst the speakers was Wentworth, who had been at once forsook both their reason and their eloquence; all their hopes consisting but in prayers and some light excuses that were framed, but no more justification was once heard of, in which soft way the Chancellor of the Exchequer did discourse, &c. "This certainly is strong evidence, and in the face of it Mr. Forster was quite justified in treating with disdain the fact that nothing of this speech is to be found in the Journals. But the Journals do not now stand alone. We have three reports completely independent of one another, but all agreeing in omitting Eliot's speech, and in substituting one spoken by Sir Francis Seymour. If this were all, those who think Eliot's state- ment enough to counterbalance those of three independent witnesses might still hold that it had not been rebutted. But there is another ar- gument far stronger. Sir Richard Weston, according to all four autho- rities, followed. He does not even allude to one of the arguments which are supposed to have been pouring out from Eliot. He utters no word of remonstrance against his tremendous personal attack upon Buckingham ; but he applies himself very closely to Seymour's argument, and carefully answers it. I cannot believe that anyone who will take the trouble of reading Weston's speech at p. 112, can doubt that Seymour really spoke before him. And if so, where is there any room for Eliot's speech, which is substituted for his in the Negotium ? " The two forms of the speech which have come down to us are, as Mr. Forater has pointed out, substantially the same, but the one is the speech of an orator, the other of an antiquary. Mr. Forster argues, that in the case of Cotton's speech, ' some one finding at the same time,' i.e. after 1651, when the speech was published by Howell in his Cottoni Posthuma, ' a manuscript copy of the speech purporting to have been spoken by Eliot, was misled by Howell into a marginal indorsement of it as " not spoken but intended by Sir John Eliot," and the preservation of the copy in the Zansdowne MSS., so indorsed, adds to the confusion.' " The argument is probably based upon the fact that, at the head of the speech {Lansd. MSS., 491, fol. 138) is written in a difierent hand from the rest of the p.iper ' Sir John Eliot's : this speech was not spoken but intended.' But any argument drawn from the difierence of hand- writing falls to the ground when it is observed that this is merely a copy of a heading which was originally at the top of the page, and the greater part of which has been cut off in the process of binding; enough, however, remains to show that the heading was originally in the same writing as the body of the document. My own belief is that it was a copy taken from Cotton's notes at the very time by some one who knew that Eliot intended to use them but did not. For, in after years, who was likely to call to mind the mere intention to deliver a speech, especially as it was known amongst Cotton's friends as his production ? wentworth's view of the case, 291 re-elected for Yorkshire during the vacation. He had promised to take no part in any personal attack upon the Duke.i He took no interest in the Duke's pro- jects, and the slight put upon the House of which he was a member stung him to the quick. ' He was not,' he said, ' against giving, but against the manner.' He did not like to hear the threat that they must either give or adjourn. ' The engagement of a former Par- liament,' he added, ' bindeth not this.' Not that he seems to have cared much whether the House had confidence in the Duke or not. As far as he was con- cerned, we may safely conjecture, if the subsidies were In a letter written by Sir S. D'Ewes, on the 4th of February, 1626 (Ellis, ser. I, iii. 214), the writer, speaking of the omission of the King to land on his way to his coronation at Sir R. Cotton's stairs, says : — ' I con- ceived the Duke had prevented that act of grace to be done him, by reason of that piece I shewed you, which began, " Soe long as thou at- tendedst our master, now with God," framed by him. You may remember how I told you that I doubted him the author, by reason of the style and gravity of it.' " Curiously enough, the first words here given are not the first words of Cotton's work as it stands in the Coitoni Posihuma and the Lansdoicne MSS. The paper which D'Ewes saw must have omitted the introduc- tion relating to Gierke's censure by the House. On the other hand it was Cotton's, not Eliot's work which he saw. For Eliot began with a verbal difference : ' While thou remainedstin the service of King James.' " The most probable explanation is that the speech is by Cotton; that Cotton shrank from making use of it, and that Eliot, catching it up, breathed into it the fire of his own magnificent imagination, and converted the result of the antiquary's laborious investigation into words inspired with life. "It is easy to find reasons why, after all, Eliot should have pre- ferred silence. In the first burst of his indignation at finding Bucking- ham had broken away from his compact, nothing would seem too hard to say. But when it came to the point, we should only be inclined to think more highly of Eliot if he shrunk backand refused to strike the first blow." ■Since these words were written I have an additional witness to call, and that is no other than Eliot himself. In the notes in his own hand- writing which, through Lord St. Germans' kindness, I have before me, Seymour's speech is given, and not a word is said of any speech of Eliot's own. ' Wentworth to Weston ; Strafford Letters, i. 34. 292 THE FIRST PARLIAMENT OF CHARLES I. AT OXFORD. A benevo- lence sug- gested by Coke. Mausell says he had not approved Bucking- ham's scheme. Adjourn- ment. to be spent in war with Spain, it mattered little whether Buckingham or some more trusted councillors were to have the disposal of them. The internal affairs of England were the prime object of his solicitude from the first day on which he opened his mouth in Parliament. " Let us first," he said, " do the business of the Commonwealth, appoint a Committee for peti- tions, and afterwards, for my part, I will consent to do as much for the King as any other." ^ Other speakers followed with various opinions. Coke strangely enough suggesting a benevolence as the best way out of the difficulty. As a private man he was ready to give i,ooo^., and that willingly, notwith- standing all his crosses. He hoped those of the King's council would do as much. Then at last ManseU rose. Since February, he said, he had not been at any debate of the Council of War. When the proposition had been made for the levy of 10,000 landsmen to go on board the fleet, he ' thought that proposition to no pur- pose, being such as would gall the enemy rather than hurt him.' He had a plan of his own which would be far more useful. Conway had told him that the resolu- tion would admit no debate. The advice of the Council was asked only concerning the arms for 2,000 men. He had answered that he protested against the business itself. Upon this the Committee was adjourned to the next morning. It would be hard for Buckingham to wipe away the impression made by Mansell's words. By this time, too, Pennington and his sailors were back in England. The tale of the delivery of the ships by special orders from Buckingham must have been in every mouth. It was known that the French boasted that they would use them against Eochelle. The un- 1 Camden Debates, 113; Eliot Notes. BUCKINGHAM ATTACKED BY NAME. 293 confirmed assertion of Buckingham that there was chap. viir. peace in France was entirely disbelieved. ^- — ^— Before the debate recommenced on Thursday ^ug^jj morning a letter was read from William Legg, a JJ^fg^*^""^® prisoner to the Moorish pirates at Sallee. He was one, he said, of eight hundred Englishmen captured at sea. Enormous ransoms had been demanded, and those who refused or had been unable to pay had been treated with the utmost cruelty. Some of them had been tortured by fire, some were almost starved, and one poor wretch had been compelled to eat his own ears. Witnesses, too, who had escaped from the pirates were actually in attendance. One had been captured but eight lesCgues from the Land's End. It appeared that great spoil had been committed on the English coast, so that vessels scarcely ventured from port to port. If the West of England cried out against the rovers of Sallee, the East cried out against the Dunkirk privateers. Even the Huguenots of Eochelle had forgotten the respect due to English commerce. They had seized some ships of Bristol for service against the King of France, and had turned the sailors adrift on shore with- out money or provisions. Indignation was fast coming to a head. It was Anger of known that orders given by the Council for the em- ployment of some of the King's ships against the pirates had been countermanded by the Navy Com- missioners. It was replied that the Duke had given directions to Sir Francis Steward, one of the commanders of the fleet, to clear the seas of pirates. The answer was that Sir Francis Steward had looked calmly on whilst a capture was being made near the French coast, on the plea that he had no orders to act in foreign waters. At last Seymour spoke out what was in the mind of all. " Let us lay the fault where it is," he 294 THE FIRST PARLIAHIENT OF CHARLES I. AT OXFORD. CHAP. said. " The Duke of Buckingliam is trusted, and it ^•^ — r-^ must needs be either in him or Ids agents." " It is not Aug.^ii. fi*'" f^ried Phehps, " to repose the safety of the king- ha'?'"^" '^*^™ upon those that have not parts answerable to nameii. their places." A Committee was appointed to frame a petition embodying these complaints. For the first time the Duke had been attacked by name. It was a fitting answer to his assumption of almost regal dignity in Christchurch hall. The man who had assumed to direct all things must bear the responsibility of all things. Mailmen When the House at last went into committee, Sir supply. Henry Marten ^ made one more effort to obtain a grant of supply. But he, at least, was not likely to make much impression on the House. Eightly or wrongly, it was believed that he was trying to wipe off the offence given by liis reference to Buckingham as a young ambassador. He produced so little effect that Seymour, in repeating his advice not to give, did not care to put forward any fresh reasons. After a few more words on both sides, Sir Kobert Killigrew advised that the question should not be put. It would be a greater disgrace to the King to be in a minority than to have the whole House against him.^ Dissolution That afternoon^ the Council met to consider resolved on. whether the House should be allowed to sit any longer. Once more WiUiams pleaded hard against the fatal error of opening the new reign with a quarrel with the House of Commons. And for once Buckingham was ' He, aud not Sir J. Coke, is the 'old artist ' of the Negotium, as ap- pears from what Eliot says, ' Some did imagine that an act, of expiation for tlie former trespass he had done.' ' Camden Debates, 120, ' Bishop of Mende to Richelieu, received Aug. |2; Kini/iMSS., 137, 99. Nethorsole to Oarleton, Aug. 14 ; Camden Debates, 162. A DISSOLUTION RESOLVED ON. 295 on the same side. Throwing himself on his knees he chap. entreated the King to allow the Parliament to continue. ^- ^l"' -> But Charles was immovable, and the dissolution was ^^^^" irrevocably determined on. Buckingham's petition was naturally described by his opponents as a mere piece of acting.^ It may have been so, but it was not in his nature to shrink from opposition. His temper always led him to meet his detractors face to face, certain of the justice of his own cause and of his own ability to defend it. In truth it was Charles's authority as much as Buckingham's which was at stake. The course which the Commons were taking led surely, if indirectly, to the responsi- bility of ministers to Parliament. And the responsi- bility of ministers to Parliament meant just as surely the transference of sovereignty from the Crown to the Parliament. The next morning, before the fatal hour arrived, an Heath attempt was made by Heath to answer Mansell. The Man^u? Council of War, he said, had often been consulted. Chichester, who was dead, bad left papers to show" how far he agreed with the plans proposed. Carew was absent from Oxford ; Harvey had only recently joined the Council. But Lords Graudison and Brooke, the Sir Oliver St. John and Sir Pulk GrevUle of earher days, would come, if they were invited, to tell the House what they knew. As for Mansell, he had a scheme of his own to which no one else would listen, and had consequently refused to attend the CouncU. This account of what had taken place was very likely true, but Heath had not met Mansell's assertion that he had been told that he was not to speak on the scheme itself, but only on its execution. And Mansell, Manaeii 3 who rose in self-defence, did not deny that there had been ' Eliot's JS^effotmn, in Forster,i. 252. answer. 296 THE FIRST PARLIAMENT OF CHARLES L AT OXFORD. CHAP, personal ill-will between himself and Buckingham, • — r— ' but he said that when he laid his own proposal before Ang^i2 *^^ Council, he was told that he must go to Buckingham, ' who only had permission from the King to. consider of new propositions.' To this, which was only what the Commons suspected, no reply was vouchsafed ; the testimony of Brooke and Grandison was neith^ demanded on one side nor pressed on the other. -^ By this time it was known in the House that they had but a few minutes more to sit. The Black Eod was already at the door to summon them to dissolution. Proposed Some wished to petition for delay. But what good deiiy?" '"'^ would delay do them unless they were prepared to abandon their ground ? " Eumours," said Phelips, " are no warrant for such a message. Let them go on with business. When they had notice of the King's plea- sure, it was their duty to obey it." The pro- The House went at once into committee, and adopted a protestation prepared by Glanville, who had taken a prominent part in the debates of the past days. In the following fashion the Commons ap- proached the King : — " We, the knights, citizens, and burgesses of the Commons' House of Parhament, being the representa- tive body of the whole commons of this realm, abundantly comforted in his Majesty's late gracious answer touching religion, and his message for the care of our healths, do solemnly protest and vow before God and the world with one heart and voice, that we will ever continue most loyal and obedient subjects to our most gracious sovereign King Charles, and that we will be ready in convenient time and in a parliamentary way freely and dutifully to do our utmost endeavour to discover and reform the abuses and grievances of the ^ Camden Debates, 122. PROTESTATION AND DISSOLUTION OF THE COMIMONS. 297 realm and State, and in the like sort to afford all necessary- supply to Ms Majesty upon his present and all other his just occasions and designs ; most humbly beseeching our ever dear and dread sovereign, in his princely wisdom and goodness, to rest assured of the true and hearty affections of his poor Commons, and to esteem the same — as we conceive it indeed — the greatest worldly reputation and security a just king can have, and to account all such as slanderers of the people's affections and enemies of the Commonwealth that shall dare to say the contrary." One last effort' was made by Sir Edward Villiers The last RCCT16 to induce the House to reconsider its determination. " We are under the rod," answered Wentworth, " and we cannot with credit or safety yield. Since we sat here, the subjects have lost a subsidy at sea." ^ The protestation was hurried through the necessary forms. Whilst Black Eod was knocking at the door, some one moved that there should be a declaration ' for the acquitting of those who were likely to be questioned for that which they had spoken.' If any one was likely to be questioned it was Phelips. But Phelips would hear nothing of it. " There hath been little effect of such declarations," he said. " The last ParHament but one ^ some went to the Tower, some were banished to Ireland, notwithstanding just ac- quittals. Por my part, if I am questioned, I desire no other certificate but the testimony of my conscience, in confidence whereof I wiU appeal from King Charles misinformed to King Charles rightly informed." At last the doors were opened. The Commons Dissolu- tion. ' The exposure of English commerce to pirates was always a reproach to which Wentworth was extremely sensitive. » The words " but one " are wanting in the report. Camden, De- lates, 127. 298 THE FIRST PARLIAMENT OP CHARLES L AT OXFORD. CHAP. VIII. 1625. Aug. 12. Leadership of Phelips. Justifica- tion of liis want of confidence in Buck- ingliam. were summoned to the Upper House, and in a few minutes the first Parhament of Charles I. had ceased to exist. Such was the end of tliis memorable Parhament — a Parliament which opened the floodgates of that long contention with the Crown, never, except for one brief moment, to be closed again till the Eevolution of 1688 came to change the conditions of government in Eng- land. And, as far as the history of such an assembly can be summed up in the name of any single man, the history of the Parliament of 1625 is summed up in the name of Phehps. At the opening of the session his hasty advocacy of an immediate adjournment met with httle response. But under the pressure of events the House came gradually round to his side, and at Oxford he virtually assumed that unacknowledged leadership which was all that the traditions of Parha- ment at that time permitted. It was Phelips who placed the true issue of want of confidence before the House, and who, by the enquiry which he directed to Mansell, pointed out the means of testing the value of Buckingham's assertions. It is not necessary to defend all that was said, still less all that was thought, in the House about Bucking- ham. No one who has studied the facts of the history in a candid spirit can deny that the speeches of the popular members were full of unfounded suspicions and unreasonable demands. But, for all that, it is im- possible to assert that Buckingham could show any sufii- cient ground for reposing confidence in him. The account which he gave of his proceedings was singularly confused. By his own confession he had entered into engagements wliich he was unable to meet, and which he did not venture to ask the Commons to assist hiiri in meet- ing. And, besides this, the terrible failure of Ma,nsfeld's BUCKINGHAM'S FAULTS, 299 expedition, costing thousands of innocent lives, could chap. VIII. not be explained away. Nor is Buckingham's a case in which further publicity than he was able to appeal ^„^ jj to would present his ability in a better light. For some time he had been occupied in undoing the results of his own mistakes. The engagement about the Catholics and the loan of the sliips to the King of France had been mainly his doing. The manner in which he had extricated himself from those entangle- ments was not known to the House of Commons. But it is known to us ; and we may be sure that if the Commons had known what we know they would have been even more indignant than they were. As it was, the general opinion of moderate Enghshmen was pro- bably well expressed by a foreign diplomatist who took but httle interest in the Parliamentary conflict. Since he had come to England, he said, he had learned Rusdorfa the truth of two paradoxes. Under James, he found "^ that it was better to take a bad resolution than none at aU ; under Charles, that it was better to give effect to a bad resolution with prudence and abihty, than to give effect to a good resolution without fore- thought and consideration.^ The attitude which Charles would take towards Attiuide of this declared want of confidence in his minister would evidently depend upon the amount of confidence which he himself continued to feel in him. And unfortunately there was no chance that his rehance on Buckingham would be shakeu. His own mind had nothing originative about it. When once the brilliant schemes of Buckingham had dazzled his un- derstanding, he adopted them as his own, and fi'om that moment all chance of inducing him to abandon ' Rusdorf to Camerarius, Sept. — ; Comilia et Negotia, 69. 300 THE FIRST PARLIAMENT OF CHARLES L AT OXFORD. CHAP. VIII. 1625. Aug. 12. Conflict between Crown and Parlia- ment. Conserva- tism of the House. them was at an end. He had no power of stepping out of himself to see how his actions looked to other people, especially when, as was certain to be the case, the real objections to his pohcy were mixed up with offensive imputations which he knew to be un- founded in fact. The difference of opinion between the King and the Parliament was thus reduced to a contest for power. The two great elements of the constitution which had worked harmoniously together were brought at last into open conflict. The right of enquiry before subsidies were voted would, if once it were admitted, place the destinies of England in the hands of the House from which subsidies proceeded. But it would be a mistake to suppose that either party in the quarrel were grasp- ing at power for its own sake. Charles believed that he was defending a wise and energetic minister against factious opposition. The Commons believed that they were hindering a rash and self-seeking favourite from doing more injury than he had done already. If neither were completely in the right, the view taken by the Commons was far nearer to the truth than the view taken by Charles. So far as the difference between the King and the House went beyond the mere question of confidence, the Commons stood upon a purely conservative ground. We look in vain amongst their leaders for any sign of openness to the reception of new ideas, or for any notion that the generation in which they lived was not to be as the generation which had preceded it. Their conception of the war was more suited to 1588 than to 1625, and the mazes of European politics formed for them a labyrinth without a thread. In all they had to say about the affairs of the Continent it is hard to find a single word which betrays any real know- CONSERVATISM OF THE COMMONS. 30I ledge of the wants and difficidties of the Protestants of Germany. In home pohtics, too, their eyes were equally directed to the past. The form of religion which had grown up under the influence of the Elizabethan struggle with Spain was to be stereotyped. Differences of opinion were to be prohibited, and the Calvinistic creed was to be imposed for ever upon the English nation. But if the temper of the Commons was thus purely conservative, its conservatism was to some extent justified by the nature of the alternative offered to it. Charles's foreign pohcy was as ignorant as that of the Commons, and far more hazardous. Charles's eccle- siastical poUcy had hardly yet had time to develope itself But signs were not wanting that it would be even more dangerous than that which was secure of the popular favour. If the Commons were ready to proscribe the religious opinions of the few, the men whom the King honoured with his preference were ready to proscribe the religious practices of the many. 302 CHAPTER IX. THE EXPEDITION TO CADIZ. CHAP. The gloomy anticipations of some of the Commons _ ^^' ' with respect to their personal safety were not reaUsed. 1625. phelips and Seymour, Coke and Glanville, returned in The leaders peacc to theiT homes. Mansell indeed was summoned Commons bcforc the Council. But he answered boldly that he untonched, ^^y^^ j^q^ -^q touched without & violation of the liberties of Parhament, and he was dismissed with nothing worse than a reprimand.-^ Bucking- lu fact it was no part of Buckingham's poHcy to tenTioVs" drive the nation to extremity. Full of confidence in himself, he fancied that he had but to use the few months' breathing space allowed him to convince the electors that their late representatives had been in the wrong. The time had come which he had apparently foreseen when he conversed with Eliot at Westminster. He had asked for necessary support, and had been denied. A few days would show the Eang of France at peace at home, turning his sword against Spain and the allies of Spain abroad. A few months would show the great English fleet returning with the spoils of Spanish cities and the captured treasures of the New World. Then a fresh Parhament would assemble round the throne to acknowledge the fortitude of the King and the prescience of his minister. A few days after the dissolution news came from » Johnston, Hist. Jterum Sritannicarwn, 666, TilliSres to Lewis Xni,, Aug. %\; King's MSS., 137. P. 121. THE GIVIL WAR IN FRANCE. 303 France which dashed to the ground the hopes which chap. had been formed of the cessation of the civil war. There were many persons about the Court of Lewis \^^^' who had no liking for Eichelieu's poHcy of toleration. 1\^^^\^^^ The Prince of Cond^, if report spoke truly, sent a hint Huguenots _. , ^ ^ . '- 1 ■ -, comes to to ioiras, who commanded the Prench troops outside nothing. Eochelle, that the peace must in one way or another be made impossible. To carry such counsels into execution presented no difficulties to Toiras. The Eochellese, pleased with the news that peace had been made at Fontainebleau, pressed out without suspicion into the fields to gather in their harvest. Upon the intiocent reapers Toiras directed his cannon. Many of them were slain, and Toiras then "proceeded to set fire to the standing corn. Loud was the outcry of the Aug. 10. indignant citizens within the walls. It was impossible, they said, to trust the King's word. The ratification of the treaty was refused, and it seemed as though the war must blaze up once more with all its horrors.^ It was not long before the burden of war fell upon those who were most innocent. The English ships were now in the hands of the French admiral, and in a naval en- gagement which took place ofi" Eochelle on September 5, sept. 5. Soubise was entirely defeated, and driven to take an soubise. ignominious refuge in an English port. Such a calamity could hardly have been foreseen How it -r. . •. ,1 1 T affected by any one. Jout it was none the less disastrous to Bucking. Buckingham's designs of conciliating the English nation. AH the long intrigue carried on with the as- sistance of Nicholas was rendered useless. The English ships were in French hands, and they would doubtless be used against Eochelle. What a handle this would give to Buckingham's accusers it was easy to foresee. It is probable that this misfortune was already > Resolution of the Town of Rochelle, Aug. |§; Lorkinto Conway, Aug. II; S. P. France. 304 THE EXPEDITION TO OADIZ. Banish- ment of the priests resolved on. The fleet to go, and Privy seals to be issued. The Privy seals de- layed. Charles's domestic troubles. known to Charles when the Privy Council met at Woodstock on the 14th, the Sunday after the dissolu- tion. It was evidently the King's intention to show that, so far as the assent of the Privy Council as it was then composed was worth anything, he would take no serious step without its advice. Its members unanimously approved of a proclamation for the banishment of the Eoman Catholic priests, of the con- tinuance of the preparations for sending out the fleet, and of the issue of Privy seals, to raise what was prac- tically a forced loan, in order to meet its expenses.^ Yet if money had been needed for the fleet alone, there would have been no such pressing need. In addition to the io,oool. borrowed in August, no less than 98,000^. were brought into the exchequer in the months of August and September on account of the Queen's portion,^ and Charles, before August was over, was quietly talking to the French ambassador of divert- ing part of the new loan to some other purpose.* In point of fact the order for preparing the Privy seals was not issued tiU September 1 7,* and the fleet was at sea before a single penny of the loan came into the King's hands. But Charles had many needs, and he may perhaps have thought that there would be less opposition to the loan if he asked for it for the purpose of fitting out the fleet. Charles had thus been able to dismiss his Parr liament and to convince or cajole his Privy Council. But he could neither convince nor cajole his wife. The promises lightly made when hope was young he had • now repudiated and flung aside. He was unable to understand why the Queen, who had upon the faith ' Meautys's Note, Aug, 14, S, P. Dom., v, 41 ; TilliSres to Lewis XIII., Aug. fi; Kinr/'sMSS., 137, p, 121. ' Heceipt Sooks of tJie Exchequer. » TilliSreato Lewis XIIL, Aug, fj; King's MSS., 137, p. iji. " The King to the Council, Sept, 17 ; S.P, Dom., vi, 70. ILL-HTOIOUR OF THE QUEEN. 305 of those promises, consented to leave her mother's care chap. for a home in a strange land, should feel aggrieved ■ A — - when the Catholics, whom she had come to protect, ^^J^' were again placed under the pressure of the penal laws. A few days after the dissolution he was at Beaulieu, hunting in the New Forest, whilst Henrietta Maria was established at Titchfield, on the other side of Southamp- The Queen at Titch- ton Water. There he visited her from time to time ; field, but in the temper in which they both were there was httle chance of a reconcihation. Charles never thought of taking the slightest blame to himself for the estrangement which had arisen between them. It was a wife's business, he held, to love and obey her . husband, just as it was the business of the House of Commons to vote him money. Sometimes he sent Buckingham to threaten or to flatter the Queen by turns. Sometimes he came in person to teach her what her duties were. If he was blind to his own errors he was sharpsighted enough to perceive that his wife's French "attendants were doing their best to keep her displeasure ahve, and were teaching her to regard her- self as a martyr, and to give as much time as possible to spiritual exercises and to the reading of books of devotion.^ To counteract these tendencies in the Queen, Dispute Charles wished to place about her the Duchess of LadiL*Sf Buckingham, the Countess of Denbigh, and the Mar- chioness of Hamilton, the wife, the sister, and the niece of his own favourite minister, and he desired her at once to admit them as Ladies of the Bed- chamber. The demand was not in contradiction with the ' See a curious letter, said to be from a gentleman in the Queen's household (Oct. 15, 8. P. Bom., vii. 85), which looks genuine. Buteyen if it is not, the statements in it are in general accordance ■with what is known from other sources. VOL. I. * X the Bed- chamber. 3Q6 ■ THE EXPEDITION TO CADIZ. CHAP, letter of the marriage treaty.^ But it was in complete • ^ — opposition to its spirit, and the young Queen fired up ^^^^' in anger at the proposal. She told Charles that what he asked was contrary to the contract of marriage. Nothing, she told her own followers, would induce her to admit spies into her privacy. The Eng- The Strife grew fierce. The guard-room at Titch- atTltch-"" field was used on Sundays for the service of the ^^^^' ^nghsh Church, according to the custom which pre- vailed in houses occupied by the King. Against this the Queen protested as an insult to herself, and argued that whilst Charles was at Beauheu, she was herself the mistress of the house. But Lady Denbigh took part against her, and the service was not discontinued. At last the Queen lost all patience, made an incursion into the room at sermon time, and walked up and down laughing and chattering with her French ladies as Practical loudly as possiblc. The preacher soon found himself the-' "^™ a butt for the practical jokes of the Frenchmen of the preac er. ^jQ^ggliold. Ouc day, as he was sitting on a bench in the garden, a gun was fired off behind a hedge close by. The frightened man fancied an attempt had been made upon his life, and pointed to some marks upon the bench as having been made by the shot aimed at himself. Tillieres, who had come back to England as chamberlain to the Queen, was called in to adjudicate, and, having sat down on several parts of the bench, gravely argued that as he could not sit anywhere without covering some of the marks, and as, moreover, the clergyman was very corpulent, whilst he was himself very thin, the shot which had made the marks must certainly ■ By Article il all the attendants taken from France were to be Catholics and French, and all vacancies were to be filled up with Catholics. Lewis had forgotten to provide for the case of Charles wish- ing to add Protestants when there were no vacancies. TREATY WITH THE DUTCH. 307 have passed through the person of the complainant, if chap. his story had been true.^ -■ — '-r^ — ' If Charles was hardly a match for his wife, he had ^^^^' no doubt at all that he was a match for half the Continent. Those vast enterprises which he had been unable to bring himself to disavow in the face of the House of Commons had still a charm for his mind. In Eusdorf vain Eusdorf, speaking on behalf of his master, the charieato exiled Frederick, lu-ged upon him the necessity of con- King of centrating his forces in one quarter, and argued that ^™'"" • the ten thousand landsmen on board the fleet would be useless at Lisbon or Cadiz, but would be invaluable on the banks of the Elbe or the Weser, where Christian of Denmark was with difficulty making head against Tilly.^ The attack upon Spain was the first object with The Dutch Charles, and he therefore listened readily to the Dutch sioners in commissioners, who had come to England in order to '"°*° ' draw up a treaty of alliance. Naturally the Dutch- men cared more about the war with Spain than about the war in Germany, and when the treaty which they came to negotiate was completed it fixed accurately the part to be taken by the two countries in common maritime enterprise, whUst everything relating to hostilities on land was expressed in vague generalities. The States General had already agreed to lend Charles 2,000 English soldiers in exchange for the same number of recruits, and to send twenty vessels to join the fleet at Plymouth.^ By the treaty signed at sept. s. Southampton on September 8 an alliance offensive and Jf'^south-^' defensive was estabhshed between England and the ""p^""- ' Tillieres, Mimoires, 99-104 ; Eusdorf to Oxenstjerna, ^^^°; Metn., ii. 73- = Rusdorfs advice, ^tyJ; Mt/n., i. 611. 3 Agreement, ^^^21 •^«'««'"«) i- 468. x2 30>i . THE EXPEDITION TO CADIZ. States General. The Flemish harbours were to be kept constantly blockaded by a Dutch fleat, whilst the Eng- lish were to perform the same task off the coast of Spain. Whenever a joint expedition was concerted between the two nations the States General were to contribute one ship for every four sent out by England. The details of a somewhat similar arrangement for joint operations by land were left, perhaps intentionally, in some obscurity.^ To Eusdorf the preference shown for maritime Over military enterprise was the death-knell of his master's chances of recovering the Palatinate. Charles was far too sanguine to take so gloomy a view of his Open situation. He had now openly broken with Spain, breachwith ^^ . iiii- -r-. i -, Spain. He had recalled irumball, his agent at Brussels, and he had no longer any minister residing in the Spanish dominions. He had followed up this step by the issue of letters of marque to those who wished to prey on Spanish commerce. But he had no idea of limiting hostilities to a combat between England and Spain. " By the grace of God," he said to a Swedish ambassador who visited him at Titchfield, "I will carry on the war if I risk my crown. I will have reason of the Spaniards, and will set matters straight again. My brother-in-law shall be restored, and I only wish that all other potentates would do as I am doing." ^ In fact it was because Charles had not been con- tent to pursue a mere war of vengeance against Spain, that he had entered upon those extended engagements which more than anything else had brought him into coUision with the House of Commons. Those engage- ments he had no intention of abandoning, and he ' Treaty of Southampton ; ibid. i. 469. ' Ruadorf to Frederick, Sept. |f ; Mem., i. 623. PROJECTED PROTESTANT ALLIANCES. 309. hoped that if some temporary way of fulfilhng them chap. could be found, the success of the fleet would place *- him in a position to claim the gratitude of his subjects, ^g^^^' and that he woidd thus be able to place himself at the head of an alliance more distinctly Protestant than when he had been hampered by the necessity of looking to France for co-operation. In the treaty of Southamp- ton the foundation for such an alliance had been laid, and it now only remained to extend it, with the need- ful modifications, to the King of Denmark and the North German Princes. It was therefore arranged that Buckingham should go in person to the Hague, Bncking- where the long-deferred conference was expected at to^e°^° last to take place. But it was useless for him to go ^"sue. with empty hands. If Charles could not procure the money which he had already bound himself to supply to Christian, it was hardly likely that Christian would care to enter into fresh negotiations with so bad a pay- master. Yet, how was the money to be found ? One desperate resoiurce there was of which Charles had spoken already in a rhetorical flourish, and of which he was now resolved to make use in sober earnest. The The Crown plate and jewels of the Crown, the hereditary possession ^p^ied! ^^ of so many kings, might well be pledged in so just and so holy a cause. In England no one would touch pro- perty to which his right might possibly be challenged on the ground that the inalienable possessions of the Crown could not pass, even for a time, into the hands of a subject.' On the Continent there would be no fear of the pecuhar doctrines of English law. But if once the precious gems were sent to the Continent, there might be some difficulty in recovering them. At last it was decided that the plate and jewels should be carried by Buckingham to Holland. It was probably argued that in that rich and friendly country men Harwich. 310 THE EXPEDITION TO CADIZ. CHAP, might be found who would both accept the security • — r^-^ and be faithful to their trust.^ ^^^2" Want of money is a sad trial to any Government, and in one part of England it had already brought Charles into difficulties with his subjects. Towards the end of August serious apprehensions were entertained for the safety of Harwich. It v/as known that Dun- kirk was ahve with preparations for war, and no part of England was so liable to attack as the flat and in- TheEl'cx dented coast of Essex. Orders were therefore issued binds at by the Privy Council to put Landguard Fort in repair, and to occupy Harwich with a garrison of 3,000 men, chosen from the Essex trained bands. So far everything had been done according to rule. Each county was bound to provide men for its own defence. But the Crown was also bound to repay the expenses which it might incur, and this time there was an ominous silence about repayment. Under these circumstances a proposition was made by the Earl of Warwick, Holland's elder brother, who was now in high favour with Buckingham, which looks hke the germ of the extension of ship money to the inland counties. The adjacent shires, he said, were interested in the safety of Harwich. Let them, therefore, be called on to contribute to its defence in men and money. The adjacent shires, however, refused to do anything of the kind ; and the vague promises of payment at some future time, which was all that the Government had in its power to offer, were met by the firm resolution of the Essex men that they, at any rate, would not serve ' The earliest mention of Buckingham's intended journey is, I believe, in Rusdorf's letter to Oxenstjerna,^ept. /j (Mem. ii. 63.) The first hint abont the jewels is in an order from Conway to Mildmay, the Master of the Jewel House, to pive nn account of the plate in his hands. Conway to Mildmay, Sept. 4 ; Conwmj's Letter Book, 227 ; S. P. J)om, THE NEW SECRETARY. 311 at their own charges. Making a virtue of necessity, chap. the Council ordered the men to be sent back to their - ^^' _ - homes, and directed Pennington, who, since his return ^^^S- from Dieppe, had been watching, with a small squadron, the movements of the Dunkirk privateers, to betake himself to the protection of Harwich. Thus ended Charles's first attempt so to construe the obhgations of the local authorities as to compel them to take upon themselves the duties of the central Government.^ With all Charles's efforts to conciUate public opinion by a bold and, as he hoped, a successful foreign policy, there was no thought of throwing open the offices of state to men who were likely to be re- garded with confidence by the nation. And yet it was not long before an opportunity occurred of which a wise man would have taken advantage. On Septem- oeath'of" ber 6 Morton died of a fever which seized him a few Norton. days after his return from the Netherlands. The vacant secretaryship was at once conferred upon Sir sirJoi"! •f i- >■ Coke, secre- John Coke, the only man amongst the Government tary. officials who had incurred the positive dislike of the opposition leaders of the Commons, and whose sub- serviency and want of tact was to do even more damage to his patrons than they had done already. These things were not unnoticed. Lord Cromwell, „Sept. s ^ , , CromweU 3 who had left his service under Mansfeld for a more ie"«r. hopeful appointment in the new expedition, had brought back with him from the Netherlands his old habit of speaking plainly. " They say," he wrote to Bucking- ham, " the best lords of the Council knew nothing of Count Mansfeld's journey or this fleet, which discon- ' Coke to Buckingham, Aug. 25 ; Coke to Conway, Aug. 26 ; Order of Council, Aug. 30 ; Sussex to the Council, Sept. 9 ; Warwick to Con- way, Sept. 10; Warwick to the Council, Sept. iS, 23; The Council to Warwick, Oct. 2 ; S. P. Dom., v. 85, 99 ; vi. 38, 44, 76, 98 ; yii. 4. 312 THE EXPEDITION TO CADIZ. Aug. Bad con- dition of the troops at Ply- moutti. Cecil to command the expedi- tion. tents even the best sort, if not all. They say it is a very great burden your Grace takes upon you, since none knows anything but you. It is conceived that not letting others bear part of this burden now you bear, it may ruin you, which Heaven forbid." ^ The expedition upon which so many hopes were embarked was by no means in a prosperous condition. Eor a long time the soldiers had been left unpaid. Before the end of August there was a new press of 2,000 men to fill up the vacancies caused by sickness and desertion.^ The farmers of South Devon upon whom the soldiers were billeted refused to supply food any longer to their unwelcome guests, as soon as they discovered that their pockets were empty. Like Mans- feld's men eight months before, the destitute recruits made up their minds that they would not die of star- vation. Eoaming about the country in bands, they killed sheep before the eyes of their owners, and told the farmers to their faces that rather than famish they would kill their oxen'too.^ At one time there had been a talk of Buckingham's going himself in command, and a commission had been made out in his name. But he could not be at the Hague and on the coast of Spain at the same time, and he perhaps fancied that he could do better service as a diplomatist than as an admiral. At all events, whilst much to the amusement of the sailors he retained the pompous title of generalissimo of the fleet, he ap- pointed Sir Edward Cecil, the grandson of Burghley and the nephew of Salisbury, to assume the active com- mand with the more modest appellation of general.* ' Cromwell to Buckingliam, Sept. 8 ; S. P. Dom., vi. 30. ' The King to Nottingham and Holderness, Aug. 23 ; ihid. t. 62. ^ Commissioners at Plymouth to the Council, Aug. 12, Sept. i ; jS. P. Bom., vi. 3. * Eliot, Negotium Posterorum. STATE or THE TROOPS AT PLYMOUTH. 313 Cecil had served for many years in the Dutch army, chap. with the reputation of being a good officer. But he was now for the first time to be trusted with an indepen- \^^' dent command, and the selection was the more hazard- ous as he was entirely unacquainted with naval warfare. But he liad from the first attached himself closely to Buckingham, who had in vain supported his claims to the command in the Palatinate in 1620, and who had now sufficient influence to reverse the decision then come to in favour of Sir Horace Vere. The Earl of Essex and Essex, who was to go as Vice-Admiral, knew as little ^" '^ '" of the sea as Cecil himself; and the same might be said of the Eear- Admiral, the Earl of Denbigli, whose only known qualification for the post lay in the accident that he was married to Buckingham's sister. Whatever Cecil's powers as a general may have Sept. s. been, he had at least a soldier's eye to discern the defi- report on ciencies of the troops under his orders, and he pro- " ™°''^' fessed himself as puzzled as the Commons had been to discover why, if no attempts had been made to convert the recruits into trained soldiers, they had been levied in May for service in September. Buckingham too, he complained, had been recommending officers to him who were not soldiers at all, and whom ' he neither could nor durst return.' The arms which the men should have been taught to handle were still on board ship in the harbour. On September 8, only three out of the twenty Dutch ships promised had arrived at Plymouth.^ There was, however, one direction in which Measures Cecil's energy could hardly be thrown away. In against answer to the complaints made in Parhament it had p"**''^- been announced that Sir Francis Steward would be sent out with a squadron to clear the English seas of * Cecil to Conway, Sept. 8 ; S.P, JDotn,, vi. 36. 314 CHAP. IX. 1625. Auff. Sept. g. Argall's cruise. The King and Buck- ingham at Plymouth. THE EXPEDITION TO CADIZ, the Sallee rovers. But Steward's attempt had ended in total faikire. According to the Mayor of Plymouth his ships had been outsailed by the pirates. Accord- ing to his own account the weather had been against him. Parliament, instead of grumbling against the King's officers, ought to have passed an act ensuring them a fair wind.^ The outcry from the western ports waxed louder than ever. It was reported that danger had arisen from another quarter. No less than ten privateers had shpped through the Dutch blockading squadron in front of Dunkirk,^ and were roaming the seas to prey upon English commerce. Cecil, when he heard the news, sent out Sir Samuel Argall in search of the enemy. Argall, after a seven days' cruise, returned without having captured a single pirate or privateer. But he was followed by a long string of French and Dutch prizes, which he suspected of carrying on traffic with the Spanish Netherlands. Amongst these was one, the name of which was, a few months later, to flash into sudden notoriety — the ' St. Peter of Havre de Grace.' ° By this time the King himself had paid a short visit to Plymouth to see the fleet and to encourage the crews by his presence. Buckingham, who came with him, remained behind to settle questions of precedence amongst the officers, and to infuse, if it were possible, some of his own energetic spirit into the commanders. As usual he anticipated certain success, and he was unwise enough to obtain from the King an immediate peerage for Cecil, who was from henceforth to be ' The Mayor &c. to the Council, Axig, 12 ; Steward to Buclcing'liam, Aug. 16; S. P., V. 36,49- - Hippisley to Buckingham, Sept. 9; ibid. vi. 67, 120. ^ Narrative of the expedition, Sept. 16; Examination of the maaters of the prizes; ibid. vi. 67, 120. SAn.ING OF THE EXPEDITION. 315 known as Viscount Wimbledon, on the ground that the chap. . IX additional rank would give him greater authority over « — r^ — • his subordinates. Buckingham seems to have forgotten '^^^J' that honours assumed before success has crowned an undertaking are apt to become ridiculous in case of failure. This was not the only foolish thing done by Buck- Gianvuie ingham at Plymouth. The sight of Glanville, the iioardtho author of the last address of the Commons at Oxford, quietly fulfilling his duties as Eecorder of the Devon- shire port, inspired him with the idea of maliciously sending a Parliamentary lawyer to sea as secretary to the fleet. Glanville pleaded in vain that the inter- ruption to his professional duties would cause him a heavy loss, and that, as no one but his clerk could, even, under ordinary circumstances, decypher his hand- writing, it was certain that when he came to set down the jargon of sailors, even that confidential servant would be unequal to the task.^ At last, on the 5th of October the great fleet put to oct. 5. sea. As it passed out of the harbour and rounded the the fle^et! point where the soft woods of Mount Edgcumbe slope down to the waters of the Sound, the long-expected Dutch ships were descried showing their topsails above the eastern waves, as if, as men said, they had come to escort the English fleet upon its voyage. These fair prospects were soon interrupted. The wind chopped round to the south-west, and began to blow hard. Essex, with the foremost vessels, took refuge in Fal- mouth, but the bulk of the fleet put back to its old it puts anchorage. But Plymouth harbour was no safe Plymouth. refuge in such a gale, in the days when as yet the • Glanville's reasons, Sept. ? "Woodford to Netheisole, Oct. 8 ; S. P. Dom., vi. 132; vii. 44. Was Glanville's objection the origin of the old joke, or did he use it for want of an argument ? 3i6 THE EXPEDITION TO CADIZ. CHAP. IX. 1625. Oct. 6. Wimble- don's de- Bpondency. Oct. 8. The fleet af;ain puts to sea. long low line of the breakwater had not arisen to cnrb the force of the rolling waves. By the next niorn- ing all bonds of discipline had given way before the anxious desire for safety, and the waters of the Sound were covered with a josthng throng of vessels, hurrying, regardless of the safety of others, to the secure retreat of the Catwater. Orders, if given at all, met with but little attention, and Wimbledon himself was forced to get into a boat, and to pass from vessel to vessel, in order to exact the least semblance of obedience. Wimbledon had long ceased to look upon the ex- pedition with his patron's confidence of success. Little good, he thought, would come of a voyage commenced so late in the season. And now the spectacle of dis- order which he witnessed left a deep impression on his mind. The discipline which comes from an energetic and well-arranged organisation was entirely wanting, and it was not replaced by the discipline which springs from old habits of comradeship, or from the devotion which makes each man rekdj to sacrifice himself to the common cause. Buckingham, who in 1624 had fancied that military power was to be measured by the number of enterprises simultaneously undertaken, fancied in 1625 that the warhke momentum of a fleet or army was to be measured by its numerical size. He had yet to learn, if indeed he ever learnt it, that thousands of raw recruits do not make an army, and that thousands of sailors, dragged unwillingly into a service which they disliked, do not make a navy. But Cecil knew it, and the expedition carried with it the worst of omens in a hesitating and despondent commander.^ On the 8th the fleet, laden with the fortunes of Buckingham and Charles, put to sea once more. It ' Cecil to Coke, Oct. 8, undated in Cabala, 370 ; Wimbledon to Buckingham, April 28, Sept. 26, 1626 ; S. P. Bom., Addenda, ARRIVAL OF THE FLEET AT CADIZ. 317 sailed, as it had been gathered together, without any chap. definite plan. There were general instructions that a ■ — V^ — - blow should be struck somewhere on the Spanish coast o^t^g' before the treasure ships arrived, but no special enter- prise had been finally selected. At a council held in the King's presence at Plymouth, San Lucar had been mentioned as a point of attack. But objections had been raised, and the whole question was reserved for further discussion on the spot. As soon, therefore, „ 0'='- =°- t ' ' Tlie cou li- as the fleet rounded Cape St. Vincent, Wimbledon called <^'' of war ^ at sea. a council, and was assured by seamen of experience that it would be dangerous to enter the harbour so late in the year. Upon this Argall observed that an easy landing could be efiected at St. Mary Port in Cadiz Bay. From thence a march of twelve miles would bring the troops to San Lucar, and their object would thus be obtained without difficulty.^ Argall's advice was adopted, and orders were given TiI^^AeeUn to anchor off St. Mary Port. But as the fleet swept up CacUz Bay. to the station a sight presented itself much too tempting to be resisted. Far away on the opposite side of the Bay lay twelve tall ships with fifteen galleys by their side,^ covering a crowd of smaller vessels huddled under the walls- of Cadiz. Essex, who led the way in ' Wimbledon's Journal, printed in 1626, has been usually accepted as tlie authority for the voyage. But it should be compared with his own despatches, and with the letters of other officers, such as Sir W. St. Leger, Sir G. Blundell, and Sir T. Love, which will be found amongst the State Papers. The Journal of the ' Swiftsure ' (S. P. Bom., xi. 22) gives a full narrative of the proceedings of the squadron imder Essex, whilst the proceedings of Denbigh and Argall are specially treated of in an anonymous journal (& P. Dom., x. 67). In Geronimo de la Concep- eion's Cadiz Ilustrada, we have the Spanish story. In the Tanner MSS. (Ixxii. 16) there is a MS. copy of Wimbledon's Journal, annotated by some one hostile to the author, thus bearing witness to the correctness of his assertions where they are not questioned. * There is a discrepancy about the numbers. I take them from Wim- bledon's Journal. 3l8 TIIE EXPEDITION TO CADIZ. CHAP. Argall's ship, the ' Swiftsure,' clashed at once upon the —^ prey. Oct 22 It was not Wimbledon's fault that Essex narrowly- escaped a grave disaster. Sailing through Essex's division, he shouted orders to right and left to crowd all sail after the Vice-Admiral. But he shouted now as vainly in Cadiz Bay as he shouted a few weeks before in Plymouth harbour. The merchant captains and the merchant crews, pressed unwillingly into the service, had no stomach for the fight. Essex was left alone to his glory and his danger, and Wimbledon, who did not even know the names of the vessels under his com- mand, was unable to call the laggards to account. Of all this the Spanish commanders were necessarily Flight of ignorant. Instead of turning upon the unsupported niarda." ' Swiftsure,' they cut their cables and fled up the har- bour. It was a moment for prompt decision. Had a Drake or a Ealeigh been in command, an attempt would doubtless have been made to follow up the blow. But Wimbledon was no sailor, and he allowed his original orders for anchoring to be quietly carried out. At nightfall a council of war was summoned on board the flagship. The project of marching upon San Lucar was tacitly abandoned. Had it been known that a mere handful of three hundred men formed the whole garrison of Cadiz,^ some voices would perhaps have been raised for an immediate attack iipon the town. As it was, the pursuit of the ships was regarded Puntai to as the preferable alternative. But it was resolved first to attack the fort of Puntai which guarded the entrance, barely half a mile in width, leading to the inner harbour where the vessels were. The obstacle did not seem a serious one. " Now," said one of the old sailors, ' Geronimo de la Concepcion, 458. ATTACK ON FORT PUNTAL. 319 seem a serious one. " JSTow," said one of the old sailors, chap. IX. " you are sure of these ships. They are your own. Tliey are in a net. If you can but clear the forts to oct 22. secure the fleet to pass in safely, you may do what you will." Nothing could be easier, it was thought, than to take the fort. Sir WiUiam St. Leger alone protested against the delay. Part of the fleet, he argued, would be sufficient to batter the fort. The remainder might sail in at once against the ships whilst the enemy's attention was distracted. But St. Leger, like his com- mander, was not a sailor, and in a council of war com- posed mainly of sailors, his advice met with no accept- ance. Five Dutch ships and twenty small Newcastle Failure of colliers were accordingly ordered to attack the fort at attack, once. As Wimbledon watched the flashes of the guns lighting up the night, he flattered himself that his orders 00123. had been obeyed. But when morning dawned he learned that the Enghsh colliers had taken advantage of the darkness to remain quietly at anchor, whilst the Dutchmen, overmatched in the unequal combat, had been compelled to draw ofi" at midnight with the loss of two of their ships. A rope at the yard-arm. would doubtless have been Drake's recipe for the disease. Wimbledon was of a milder nature. Eowing from ship to ship, he adjured the cowards to advance for very shame. Finding that he might as well have spoken to the winds, he went on board the 'Swiftsure' and directed Essex to attack. The attack. ' Swiftsure ' was at once placed opposite the enemy's batteries, and was weU seconded by her comrades of the Eoyal Navy. But nothing would induce the mer- chant captains to venture into danger. Clustering timidly behind the King's ships, they contented them- selves with firing shots over them at the fort. At last THE EXPEDITION TO CADIZ. CHAP, one of them clumsily sent a shot right through the IX. stern of the ' Swiftsure,' and Essex, losing patience, Q^^^^' angrily ordered them to cease firing. Surrender Such an attack as this was not likely to compel the ofPuntal. . T 1 1 T garrison to surrender, and it was only upon the landing of a portion of the troops that the fort capitulated. The Spanish commander was struck by the gallant .bearing of the ' Swiftsure,' and asked who was in com- mand. "Do you know," was the reply, " who took Cadiz before ? " " Yes," he said, " it was the Earl of Essex." " The son of that Earl," he was told, is in the ship." " Then," replied the Spaniard, " I think the devil is there as well." A request that he might be allowed to pay his respects to Essex was promptly accorded, and his reception was doubtless such as one brave man is in the habit of giving to another. It was late in the evening before Puntal was in the hands of the English. By that time all hope of taking Reinforce- Cadiz by Surprise was at an end. Whilst Essex was Cadiz. ""^ battering Puntal, Spanish troops were flocking into Cadiz, and that night the town was garrisoned by four thousand soldiers. It was true that the place was only provisioned for three days, but the Spanish galleys soon learned that they could bring in succours in spite of the English, and Cadiz was soon provisioned as well as guarded. For the present, however, the ships at the head of the harbour were the mark at which Wimbledon Oct. 24. aimed. But he contented himself with directing En't"'aftcr Denbigh to see that the work was accomplished. He tiie ships, jjjjnself saw to the landing of the greater part of the troops still on board on the following morning, and called a council of w:ar at noon to decide what was next to be done. The march Scarcclv, howevcr, had the council met, when a northwards. " ' < WIMBLKDON'S MARCH TO THE BRIDGE. 321 scout hurried iu with intellieence that a laree force of chap. IX. the enemy was approaching from the north, where the island, at the southern end of which Cadiz was situated, ^ ^^' ' ' Oct. 24. swelled out in breadth till it was cut off from the mainland by a narrow channel over which a bridge was thrown. Fearing lest he should be taken between this force and the town, Wimbledon gave hasty orders to advance to meet it. But the Spaniards were in no hurry to bring on an action against superior numbers, and prudently drew back before him. After a six miles' march the English discovered that no enemy was in sight. But Wimbledon did not appear to be in the least disconcerted. " It seeraeth," he said to those who were near him, " that this alarm is false. But since we are thus forwards on our way, if you will, we will march on. It may be we may light on some enemy. If we do not, we may see what kind of bridge it is that hath been so much spoken of." ^ Wimbledon, in fact, lighted on an enemy upon The whose presence he had failed to calculate. In the among the hurry of the sudden march no one had thought of '""* seeing that the meu cari'ied provisions with them. Many of the soldiers had not tasted food since they had been landed to attack Puntal the day before. Ever since noon they had been marching with the hot Spanish sun beating fiercely on their heads. Wim- bledon, in mercy, ordered a cask of wine to be brought out of a neighbouring house to solace the fasting men. Even a httle drop would have been too much for their empty stomachs, but the houses around were stored with wine for the use of the West India ' This would be almost incredible, if it did not stand on Wimbledon's own authority. The marginal note in the copy amongst the Tanner MSS. remarks : " The first time an army marched so far to answer a false alarm, and it were fit his Lordship would name those some of the council he spake to, that were not against his going to the bridge." VOL. I. Y 322 CHAP. IX. 1625. Oct. 24. Oct. 25. Eetreat to Puntal. Failure of the attack upon the ships. THE EXPEDITION TO CADIZ. fleets. In a few minutes casks were broached in every direction, and well-nigh the whole army was reduced to a state of raving drunkenness. Interference was useless, and the officers were well content that the enemy was ignorant of the chance ofiered him. Disgraceful as the scene was, it had no appreciable effect upon the success or failure of the expedition. When morning dawned it was evident that the men could not be kept another day without food, even if there had been any object to be gained by remaining where they were.^ Leaving therefore a hundred poor wretches lying drunk in the ditches to be butchered by the Spaniards, Wimbledon returned to Puntal, to learn that the attack which he had ordered upon the Spanish ships had not been carried out. Their commanders had made use of their time whilst the Enghsh were battering Puntal, and, warping their largest vessels up a narrow creek at the head of the harbour, had guarded them by sinking a merchantman at the entrance. Argall, to whom the attack had been entrusted by Denbigh, had only to report that the thing was impracticable. How- ever great may be the risk in forming an opinion on imperfect data and with imperfect knowledge, it is diffi- ' Let Wimbledon be judged by bis own Journal. "Now this dis- order happening," he writes, " made ua of the council of war to corsider that since the going to the bridge was no great design, but to meet with the. enemy and to spoil the country, neither could we victual any men that should be left there, and that the galleys might land as many men as they would there to cut them off : and that when my Lord of Essex took Cadiz, Conyers Clifford was taxed by Sir Francis Vere . . . with mistaking the directions that were given him to go no further from the town than the throat of the land, which is not above two miles, where he might be seconded and relieved, and be ready to relieve others ; but he went to the bridge, which was twelve miles off; so in regard there was no necessity, this disorder happening and want of victuals, we resolved to turn back again, which we did." The marginal note to this is, " Why did his Lordship then go to the bridge without victuals and to lose time, having such a precedent against it P " WIMBLEDON'S RETURN. 323 cult to resist the impression that a combined attack by chap. sea and land would not have been made in vain, and - ^^ - that if Wimbledon, instead of wasting his time in pur- J^^^' suing a flying enemy, had contented himself with acting in conjunction with Argall, a very diiFerent result would have been obtained. But however this may have been, it was now too late to repair the fault committed. A reconnaissance of the fortifications of Cadiz convinced the English com- manders that the town was as unassailable as the ships. The Plate fleet, the main object of the voyage, was now daily expected, and there was no time to linger any longer. . On the 27th the men were re-embarked, oct.27. The next day Puntal was abandoned, and the great re-em^'" armament stood out to sea as majestic and as harmless ^^q^I%s as when it had arrived six days before. On the 4th of November the English fleet arrived at Nov. 4. 7 . , . p , „ The look- its appomted station, stretching out far to seaward from ont for the the southern coast of Portugal. Though no man on board knew it, the quest was hopeless from the begin- ning. The Spanish treasure ships, alarmed by rumours of war which had been wafted across the Atlantic, had this year taken a long sweep to the south. Creeping up the coast of Africa, they had sailed into Cadiz Bay two days after Wimbledon's departure.-^ It may be that fortune was not wholly on the side of Spain. Judging by .the exploits of the merchant captains before Puntal, it is at least possible that instead of the Enghsh fleet taking the galleons, the galleons might have taken the English fleet. At all events, if the Spaniards had trusted to flight rather than lo valour, the English vessels would hardly have suc- ceeded in overtaking them. With their bottoms foul 1 Atye to Acton, 2^; S. P. Spain. 324 CHAP. IX. .1625. Nov. 16. Return to England. Bad con- dition of the ships and men. Bucking- ham's part in tlie matter. THE EXPEDITION TO CADIZ. with weeds, and leaking at every pore from long ex- posure to the weather, they found it hard to keep the sea at all. It had been at first resolved to keep watch till the 20th, but on the 1 6th orders were given to make sail for home with all possible speed. It was indeed time. The officials who had been charged with supplying the fleet had been fraudulent or careless. Hulls and tackle were alike rotten. One ship had been sent out with a set of old sails w^hich had done service in the fight with the Armada. The food was bad, smelling ' so as no dog in Paris Garden would eat it.' ^ The cyder ^ was foul and unwhole- some. Disease raged among the crews, and in some cases it was hard to bring together a sufficient number of men to work the ships. One by one, all through, the winter months, the shattered remains of the once powerful fleet came staggering home, to seek refuge in whatever port the winds and waves would suffer. It was certain that, so portentous a failure would add heavily to the counts of the indictment which had long been gathering against Buckingham. After his defiant challenge to public opinion at Oxford, it would be in vain for him to argue before a new House of Commons that he was not answerable for Wimble- don's neglect of his opportunities at Cadiz, and still less for the accident by which the Plate fleet had escaped. Nor, after all allowances have been made for exagge- ration, is it easy to deny that the popular condemnation was in the main jusL The commanders of the expedition, and the officials at home by whom the preparations were made, were Buckingham's nominees, and the system of personal favouritism, the worst ^ Sir M. Geere to W. Geere, Dec. 1 1 ; S. P. Bom., xi. 49. ^ Beverage, in these letters, means cyder. It is the usual word in Devonshire now for common cyder. CAUSES OF WIMBLEDON'S FAILURE. 325 canker of organisation, had never been more flourishing than under his auspices. Nor was it only indirectly that the misfortunes of the expedition were traceable to Buckingham. If, upon his arrival at Cadiz, Wimbledon had been too much distracted by the multiplicity of objects withiti his reach to strike a collected blow at any one of them, so had it been with the Lord High Admiral at home. Undecided for months whether the fleet was to be the mere auxiliary of the army in the siege of Dunkirk, or whether the army was to be the mere auxiliary of a fleet whose main object was the capture of the Plate fleet, he had no room in his mind for that careful special preparation for a special object which is the main condition of success in war as in everything else. If Wimbledon's errors as a commander were thus the reflection, if not the actual result, of Bucking- ham's own errors, the other great cause of failure, the misconduct of the merchant captains, brings clearly before us that incapacity for recognising the real con- ditions of action which was the fertile source of almost all the errors alike of Buckingham and of Charles. The great Cadiz expedition of which Ealeigh had been the guiding spirit, had been animated, like all other successful efforts, by the joint force of discipline and enthusiasm . A high-spirited people, stung to anger by a lifelong inter- ference with its religion, its commerce, and its national independence, had sent forth its sons burning to requite their injuries upon the Spanish nation and the Spanish king, and ready to follow the slightest command from the tried and trusted leaders who had learned their work through a long and varied experience by sea and land. How different was everything now ! It is hardly possible to doubt that t]]e war of 1625 never was and never could have been as popular as the war of 1588 326 CHAP. IX. 1625. Dec. No serious investiga- tion. THE EXPEDITION TO CADIZ. and 1597. It was a political and religious rather than a national war, awakening strong popular sympathies, indeed, so long as the home danger of. a Spanish mar- riage lasted, but liable to be deserted by those sympa- thies when that danger was at an end. And if the enthusiasm were lacking, its place was certainly not supplied by discipline. The commanders were per- sonally brave men, and most of them were skilled in some special branch of the art of war, but utterly without opportunities for acquiring the skill which would have enabled them to direct the motions of that most delicate of all instruments of warfare, a joint military and naval expedition. It was possible that after eight or ten years of war so great an effort might have been successful. It would have been next to a miracle if it had been successful in 1625. The worst side of the matter was that Charles did not see in the misfortunes which had befallen him any reason for attempting to probe the causes of his failure to the bottom. Some slight investigation there was into the mistakes which had been committed in Spain. But nothing was done to trace out the root of the mischief at home. Sir James Bagg and Sir Allen Apsley, who had victualled the fleet before it sailed, were not asked to account for the state in which the provisions had been found, and they continued to enjoy Buckingham's favour as before. No officer of the dockyard was put upon his defence on account of the condition of the spars and sails. There was nothing to warrant that another fleet would not be sent forth the next spring equally unprovided and ill equipped. In the meanwhile the King and his minister had fresh objects in view, and it was always easy for them to speak of past failures as the result of accident or misfortune. 327 CHAPTEE X. GROWING ESTEANGEMENT BETWEEN THE COUETS OP ENGLAND AND FRANCE. Even if the Cadiz expedition had not ended in so chap. complete a faihire, the difficulties resulting from the - ^' . French alliance would have been likely to cause Charles ^^^S- serious embarrassment. Every step vsrhich he had The French taken since the meeting of his first Parliament had been in the direction of a closer understanding with the Protestant powers. He had begun again to execute the penal laws. He had signed a treaty with the Dutch, and he was about to send Buckingham to the Hague to sign another treaty with the King of Denmark and the Princes of North Germany. When Parliament met again, he hoped to be able to stand forth in the character of a leader of the Protestantism of Europe. At Salisbury, on his way back from his visit to the fleet at Plymoutfi, he was reminded of the old engage- ments which he had contracted with France. Blain- q^.^ g ville, the new French ambassador, presented himself ft g°i^"® before him, and Buckingham, who had already started ^"t- for the Hague, was summoned back to take counsel on the French proposals. Those proposals, as far as the war was concerned. The French ought not to have been unacceptable. Lewis was ''^'"'"^• ready to furnish 100,000^., payable in two years, to the King of Denmark. He would also join Charles in 328 ESTEANGEMENT BETWEEN ENGLAND AND FEANGE. CHAP, giving support to Mansfeld's army, and he consented » — ^ — ■ to an arrangement, already in progress, for transferring ^qH' that force to Germany, and placing Mansfeld under the command of Christian.^ If Lewis, however, was pre- pared to do as much as this, he was prepared to ask for something in return. He could hardly avoid asking for the fulfilment of Charles's promise to free the EngUsh Catholics from the penal laws ; and now that Soubise had been defeated he would be likely to press for the entire submission of Eochelle, though he was ready to promise that the Huguenots should enjoy religious liberty, a privilege, as he wrote to Blainville, which M^as not allowed to the Catholics in England.^ Such questions, however, diflBcult as they were to settle, were far from forming the whole of the barrier which stood in the way of the maintenance of the French alliance. Lewis's idea of that alliance was evidently that of a man who wishes to play the first Buckin - P^^*-" "^"^ Buckingham wishisd to play the first part ham's too. Hc would rcfuse to negotiate on the war with plans. Ti 1 Blainville. He would cross over at once to Holland, and then, when the foundations of a great Protestant alliance had been surely laid, he would pass on to His pro- Paris. Once more he would summon the King of to France. France to join England in open and avowed war against Spain and her allies. And he- would summon him, not as he had done in May, as the representative of England alone, but as the leader of a mighty Pro- testant confederacy, ofiering to France the choice between the acceptance of English leadership or the isolation of neutrality. Buckingham, indeed, had no difiiculty in persuading ' Lewis XIII. to Blainville, ^ f ; Blainville to Lewis XIIL,Oet. fj; King^s MSS., 137, p. 274, 350; Villermont, E. de Mmisfeldt, ii. 321. • ■' Lewis XIII. to Blainville, Oct. |i; King's MSS., 137, p. 385. • BUCKINGHAM'S PROPOSAL TO VISIT FRANCE. 329 himself that the offer which he made was worthy of Lewis's acceptance. The Spanish treasure of which Wimbledon had gone in search was already his by anticipation. When the fleet' returned there would be enough to keep up the war in Germany for many a year, and the Flemish ports, the objects of his desire for so many months, could at last be snatched from Spinola's tenacious hold.^ There were reasons enough why the husband of ^,'=.^'? . , . objects. Anne of Austria should be unwilling to receive a visit from the audacious upstart who had ventured to pay public court to the Queen of France, and Lewis, as soon as he heard of the proposal, peremptorily instructed Blainville to refuse permission to Bucking- ham to enter his kingdom.^ But politics had un- doubtedly as much part as passion in the matter. The ' The views of tie English Government may he gathered from a pas- sage in the instructions dravf n up as a guide to some one whom it was in- tended to send to Gustavus. " And because we are seated most properly and best furnished for maritime actions, we have undertaken that part, though it be of greatest cost, and which will, in a short time, by the grace of God, render all the land service easy and profitable to those that shall attempt it. And therefore we shall expect that both our dear uncle the King of Denmark and the King of Sweden will, upon your reasons heard, go on cheerfully for the stopping of the progress of the enemy's conquests by land, without calling to us for contribution in that, wherein princi- pally must be regarded the present conservation of all the sea towns which might any way give Spain a port of receipt for their ships that may come from thence that may be bought or built in these parts, or may correspond with the ports of Flanders. And it will not be amiss when you shall fall into deliberation with that king, to consult and consider with him the great importance of taking away the harbours of Flanders from the King of Spain, and to prove how far he might be moved to join with us, our uncle of Denmark, and the States, to make one year's trial to thrust the King of Spain from the seacoasts of Flanders." Instructions for Sweden, Oct. 17 ; Rymer, xviii, 212. ' " Je me passionne de sorte pour votre contentement queje ne crains point de vous mander si franchement mon avis, et vous etes assez du monde pour p^nfitrer ce qui ne me seroit pas biens^ant d'^crire," is Ville- aux-Cleres' explanation on giving the orders to Blainville, §^^ ; Kiny's MSS., 137, p. 313- 330 ESTRANGEMENT BETWEEN ENGLAND AND FRANCE. CHAP, question between Lewis and Buckingham was tlie ' — r^ — • question of the leadership of half Europe. And Lewis Q^^j^" had to guard against the interference of England nearer home. Buckingham was instructed, as soon as he reached Paris, to demand the immediate restoration of the English ships which had been used at Eochelle, and to ask that an end should at once be put to the unnatural war between the King and the Huguenots. The demand, that Charles should be empowered to interfere between Lewis and his subjects, was to be made in the most offensive way. Buckingham's instructions ran in the following terms : — "To the end they," that is to say, the French Protestants, " may not refuse the conditions offered them for the only doubt of not having them kept, you shall give them our Eoyal pro- mise that we will interpose our mediation so far as that those conditions shall be kept with them ; and if this will not satisfy them, you shall give them our kingly promise that if by mediation you cannot prevail for them, we will assist them and defend them." In other words, when Lewis had once given his promise to the Huguenots, it was to be considered as given to the King of England, and if any disputes again arose between him and his subjects, the King of England would be justified in intervening in their favour if he thought fit so to do. Buckingham, in fact, not content with taking the lead in Germany, was to dictate to Lewis the relations which were to exist between himself and his subjects; and that too at a moment when the English Govern- ment was fiercely repudiating a solemn contract on the ground that it did not become a king of England to allow a foreign sovereign to intervene between himself and his people. ■'^ ' Conway to Carleton, Oct, 7 ; S. P. Holland. Instructions to Buck- ingham ; Rymer, xviii. BLAINVILLE IN ENGLAND. 33 I On October 1 1 Blainville was admitted to an au- chap. dience. To the Frenchman's remonstrances about the - — ^l— ^ English Catholics, Charles at first replied that he had ^^^^^5- -only promised to protect the Catholics as long as they BiainviuVs '' ^ '■ ^ • ^l• • audience. behaved with moderation. It was for himself to mter- pret this promise, and he took upon himself to say- that they had not behaved with moderation. He then added the now familiar argument that the secret article had never been taken seriously, even by the Frencli Government. The tone of the conversation mutually grew warmer, and a fresh demand of the ambassador did not serve to moderate the excited feelings on either side. Soubise The < st. had brought with him to Falmouth the ' St. John,' a fine Faimouth. ship of the French navyj which he had seized at Blavet.^ This ship Lewis naturally claimed as his own property which Charles was bound to restore. Charles, on the other hand, being afraid lest it should be used, as his own ships had been used, against Eochelle, hesitated and made excuses. The state of the Queen's household, too, ministered xhe occasion of difierence. Charles wished to add English ho"uTehoUi. officials to those which had been brought over from France, and he peremptorily refused to discuss the ques- tion with Blainville. He intended, he said, to be master in his own house. If he gave way, it would be from the love he bore to his wife, and for no other reason. The next day the ambassador waited on Buckingham. The conversation was carried on in a more friendly Biainvuie Visits tone than that of liis conversation with Charles. But BucWng- in other respects it was not more satisfactory. Bucking- ham treated all the subjects in dispute very lightly. If anything had gone wrong tlie fault was in the necessities of the time. Instead of troubhng himself with such trifles, the King of France ought to treat at ' P. 151. 332 ESTRANGEMENT BETWEEN ENGLAND AND FRANCE. CHAP. X. 1625. Oct. Bearing of the French Govern- ment. Sept. The oppo- sition Peers Abbot and Pembroke. oiice for an offensive league against Spain. As for himself, he was said to have ruined himself for the sake of France. He was now going to the Hague to save himself by great and glorious actions. If France - pleased, she might take her place in the league which would be there concluded. If she refused, England would have all the glory. Buckingham, as Blainville pointed out, had two irreconcilable objects in view. On the one hand he wished to ingratiate himself with English public opi- nion by placing himself at the head of a Protestant League. On the other hand he wished to show by driving France to follow his lead on the Continent, that his original overtures to that power had not been thrown away.^ Neither Lewis nor Eichelieu were hkely to stoop as low as was expected of them. Blainville was instructed to announce that the ' Vanguard,' as being Charles's own property, should be given up, but that he had no claim upon the merchant vessels, which had been expressly hired for eighteen months. The Huguenots could not be allowed to carry on a rebellion against their lawful sovereign, and if Charles was so solicitous for rehgious liberty, he had better begin the experiment with his own Catholic subjects.^ Buckingham was too anxious to reach the Hague as soon as possible, to await the issue of these negotiations at Salisbury. But before he left the King, arrange- ments had been made for deahng in various ways with those Peers who had taken part in the opposition in the last Parliament. Of these Abbot might safely be 11 IS • 22> 20 t • Tillieres, Mhnoires, 105 ; Blainville to Lewis XIII., Oct. King's MSS., 137, p. 409, 438. 2 Memoir sent by De Vic, Oct. if ; Lewis XIII. to Blainville, -^'^-»? ; -Km/z's .W of Europe. If they had on board ■ — ^ — - goods which were the property of Spaniards, those ^g^p^^' goods, according to the ideas of the day, would be subject to immediate confiscation. Contraband of war Contra- , ^ , band of agam, bemg carried to Spain or the Spanish Nether- war. lands, would be liable to seizure, whether it was Spanish property or not. But it was by no means a matter of universal agreement what contraband of war was. In the treaty of Southampton indeed, England and the States General had recently agreed upon a sweeping definition, including in that category provisions and the precious metals as well as munitions of war and materials used in shipbuilding,^ and had declared hot only such articles, but even the ships and men engaged in the traffic, to be lawful prize. Such an interpretation of the customary maritime law was not likely to commend itself to a neutral seafaring nation. Even if this knotty point had been settled, there Proof of was another behind it. What evidence was to be tum!""" accepted that the contraband goods were or were not destined for Spanish use. Every one of the eleven French vessels seized had sailed from a Spanish port, and all of them, with one exception, were owned by Calais merchants.* It was, however, notorious that there were men at Calais whose business it was to pass goods as soon as landed over the frontier into Flanders, in much the same way as goods were passed over into Russia from Memel in the time of the Crimean war.^ It happened that Buckingham was at Plymouth The money when the prizes were brought in. Gold and silver s^ques-'* tercd. > Art. 20 of the Treaty ; Bumont, v. 2, 480. ' Examinations of the masters of the prize ships, Sept. 29 ; S. P. Bom., vi. 120. ' Marten to Conway, Nov. 8; Joachimi to ; S. P. Holland. to Quester ; S. P. France. 346 Oct. The prizes Bent to London. Oct. 27. Prize money taken and goods ordered to be sold. ESTRANGEMENT BETWEEN ENGLAND AND FEANGE. being contraband of war, according to the view taken in England, he ordered 9,000^. or 10,000^. which were on board to be sequestered,^ and the remainder of the goods to be placed in safe keeping. A few weeks later the cargoes were stowed again on board, and the prizes brought up to London to pass through a legal investi- gation before the Court of Admiralty. By the begin- ning of November the number of captured French vessels had increased to twenty-two.^ So far there was no reasonable ground of complaint. But in the needy circumstances of the King's treasury the sequestered property was too tempting a bait to be long resisted. In October Buckingham had attempted to borrow 70,000^., in order that he might carry with him something to the Hague for the immediate supply of the armies of Christian IV. and Mansfeld. But the security which Charles could offer fell short of the re- quired sum by 20,000^., and Ley and Weston proposed to fill the gap by giving security upon the first sale of condemned prize goods. The suggestion in itself was innocent enough. But either it was not thought suffi- cient, or Charles fancied that he could do better. On October 2 7 the money from the French ships was taken to be spent on warhke preparations, and on November 5 orders were given to sell goods at once to the required value of 20,000?., without waiting for a sentence from the Court.^ To Charles the difference may have seemed slight. If the decision of the Court was against him he would 1 Minutes by Nicholas, Feb. (?) 1626; S. P. i)o»».,xxi. 99. ' Minute of the replacing of the goods on' board; calendared in Sep- tember, but it was almost certainly in October. Receipt by Marsh, Oct. II : S. P. Dom., vi. 126; xxii. 12, i. Blainville to Lewis XIII., : Joachimi to ; S. P. Holland. 348 ESTEANGEMENT BETWEEN ENGLAND AND FRANCE. Dec. 7. Beprisala in France. Dec. 28. Order in Council for the re- deliverj- of the ' St. Peter.' larger aspects of the case, was eager for instant and sweeping action. " If you shall limit the sales," he wrote to Conway, on hearing th'at some half-measure was in contemplation, " as I hear you intend, to goods which are out of question, I know not what goods can be sold ; since there is neither ship nor particular goods therein to which no man doth pretend."^ Before Charles had made up his mind, the mere announcement of his intention had called forth reprisals in France. Villars, the governor of Havre, was him- self interested in the ' St. Peter ' of that port, and on December 7 he arrested two English vessel's lying at Eouen. A fortnight later it was known in London that the French authorities were contemplating a general embargo upon all English property in France, which was only delayed till there was some certain intelligence of the course finally adopted in England. By this time Buckingham was again at Court, and the acceptance of Eichelieu's overtures had opened a prospect of averting the impending quarrel. "It is necessary for me," said Charles, " to preserve my friends and allies." Just as Holland and Carleton were starting, an Order in Council was drawn up to form the basis of a settlement of the dispute.* According to this order the ' St. Peter of Havre de Grace,' against which the presumptions were less than against vessels belonging to the merchants of Calais, was to be delivered to its owners. Of the remaining ships and their cargoes, whatever was clearly French property should be given up at once. Against what- ever was questionable proceedings should be taken, ' Coke to Conway, Dec. 17 ; S, P. Dom., xii, i. " Commons' Journals, i. 823 ; Palloyseau to Hippisley, 2£SlS ; Harl, MSS., 1583, fol. 171; Joacbimi lo the States General, ^^, Jan. j'^; Add. MSS., 17677, L. fol. 130, 119. ENGLISH AMBASSADORS IN FRANCE. 349 ' without any further restraint of sale, or other pro- chap. ceeding warrantable by law or the course of the - — r — - Admiralty.' 1 '^'^• On January 1 1 the ambassadors had their first Jan. u. interview with EicheUeu. He received them in the between most friendly way ; but he gave it to be understood and the" that till the Huguenot rebellion was at an end there dore.**^* could be no open war with Spain, and that his master could not tolerate the interference of a foreign king between himself and his subjects. But they might rest assured that there was no intention of persecuting the Protestant religion in France. The 'Vanguard' would be restored as soon as Soubise's prize was given "up. The other vessels had been hired from the mer- chants, and as long as Eochelle was in arms it was inipossible to dispense with their services. The irritation at the French Court at the tone Feeling of assumed by Charles was such that no minister could afford to disregard it, and least of all was Eichelieu likely to think lightly of the honour of his sovereign. Lewis himself was particularly displeased at the pro- posal to include him in the treaty signed at the Hague without his concurrence. " The league," he wrote to his ambassador in the Netherlands, "is not aimed at the liberty of the Empire or the abasement of Spain, but at the abasement of the Catholic rehgion and of all the princes who profess it, and particularly of myself." One of his ministers expressed himself in much the same tone. " There is a great difference," he wrote, " between proposing to the King things done or things to be done. To communicate a design and to wish to do nothing without his advice would obhge his Majesty, but to propose to him to take part in a • Order in Council, Dec. 8 ; S. P. Bom., xii. 72. 350 ESTRANGEMENT BETWEEN ENGLAND AND FRANCE. CHAP. X. 1626. Jan. 20. Charles determines to relieve Kochelle. Blainyille . inrormed. matter already arranged would have the contrary effect."! In Lewis's place Charles would have felt precisely in the same manner. But he had not the tact to per- ceive that Concession must be made to the feehngs of others, and, with the consciousness that he had himself contributed, or appeared to have contributed, to the mis- fortunes of Eochelle, he determined to support the town against its sovereign, at whatever cost to the interests of the rest of Europe. Pennington had for some time been getting ready a fleet at Plymouth, which was destined in case of necessity to escort Soubise with provisions for the blockaded Huguenots, and at a council held on January 20 it was resolved that the fleet should be at once despatched. In order to impart greater energy to the crews it was arranged that Buck- ingham should command in person. The deputies from the insurgent city, who were in England seeking for aid, were informed that the fleet would proceed to drive the troops of the King of France out of Ehe and Oleron, if they would consent to the deposit of the islands in Charles's hands till the expenses of the undertaldng had been repaid to him.^ No secret was made of the resolution taken. Buckingham informed Blainville that his master could no longer remain neutral. He had contributed to the ruin of the Protestants by the loan of his ships, and now, with one voice, his Council and his people called upon him to undertake the defence of those whom he had so deeply injured. If war were once ' Extracts given by Vreede, Inlddingtot eene Geschiedeiiis der Neder- landsche Diphmatie,ii.2, S^, 8y. ' Blainville to Lewis XIIL, Jan. 21 j Kini/'B MSS., 138, p. 1206. Conway to Holland and Oarleton, Jan. 21 ; S. P. France. Buckingham to Pennington, Jan, 7; Pennington to Buckingham, Jan, 17 ; S, P.Dom., xviii. 18, 75. THE 'ST. PETER' OF HAVRE DE GRACE. 351 declared he would show the world that he was not chap. so destitute of men and money as was commonly -^ — - supposed.^ ^ ^ ■ The resolution thus taken at Court could not fail to have its eflfects on the prospects of the owners of the French prizes. As far as the ' St. Peter ' was concerned everything had proceeded regularly. Suspicion only attached itself to some hides and a few other articles on board. Bonds were accepted in the Admiralty Court for the payment of their value, in case of their proving to be Spanish property, and on January 26 Marten gave orders for the delivery of ship jan. 26. and cargo to the owners. ae^^estora- The proprietors of the other vessels had before fgrpcter* this fancied that their difficulties were at an end. Soon after the Order in Council of December 28, goods to the value of 30,000/. were given up to them, as being beyond question legitimately French property. But when the news of the difficulties made in France about the surrender of the Enghsh vessels reached England, the Government took another tone. On jan. 24. January 24 the goods were again seized for the King, prize°goods. and out of that part of the cargo which was considered contraband by the Crown lawyers, though it had not yet been condemned by any court of law, property to the value of 7,000/. was sold by auction. Having made up his mind to war, it would seem that Charles no longer thought it necessary to keep terms with the subjects of the King of France.^ With the King and Buckingham in this temper, it was not likely that even the ' St. Peter ' would be • Order for taking bonds, Jan. 21 ; Book of Acts, Admiralty Court, 1 59, fol. 30, b. Order for release, Jan. 26 ; 8. P. Dom., xix. 52. » Joacbimi to ; S. P. Holland. Joachinii t& the States General, Feb. -/j ; Add. MSS., 17677 L., fol. 143. BlainTille to Lewis Xin.,^; Kinff'sMSS., 138, p. 1270, 1273. 352 ESTRANGEMENT BETWEEN ENGLAND AND FRANCE. CHAP, allowed to escape. As soon as the order had been ^ — ^ — • issued for its release, Apsley, the Lieutenant of the ^ ■ Tower, remonstrated with the Lord Admiral, assuring him that he could bring as good evidence against that vessel as against tlie others. To Apsley's state- ments Buckingham gave too easy credence, and on Feb. 4. February 4, having previously obtained the King's Peter' re- conscut, he Ordered the detention of the ship. It is perhaps not an unreasonable conjecture that the real motive in these proceedings was the desire to detain as many pledges as possible for the Enghsh ships at Eochelle, the recovery of which had been the subject of repeated messages to the ambassadors at Paris, Buckingham might well doubt his chances of obtaining from the approaching Parliament a favourable consider- ation of his policy, if Lewis were still engaged in war with the Huguenots with the help of English vessels. All this time the despatches sent to Paris had been Jan. 23. growing more peremptory. On January 23 the am- tions In bassadors were ordered to hasten home if the ships were not surrendered. On the 26th Charles was still unyielding. He had just received a letter from Hol- land and Carleton, telling him that Eichelieu, in his master's name, insisted on the maintenance of the King's garrison in Fort Louis and in the islands of Ehe and Oleron, as well as on the right to send a Eoyal Intendarit of Justice into Eochelle. The Huguenot deputies objected to all three points, and asked for the full execution of the treaty of Montpellier. After a time, however, they expressed their readiness to with- draw their demands. They would reluctantly agree to admit the Intendant, and to allow the garrison to remain in the islands. Even at Fort Louis they would not insist upon an immediate disarmament, if they could hope for its demolition in course of time. 1626. Jan. 26. INTERVENTION IN FRANCE. 35 The ambassadors were satisfied that peace was vir- chap. tually made. But Charles was not satisfied. He thought ^' that the conditions were insufficient for the safety of Eochelle. Nothing less than the terms of the treaty of Montpellier should receive his assent. The ambas- The Eng- sadors were also to ask for the immediate release of the toXt^"^^ ships, and if that were refused, they were to come demanded home at once.^ The error of Lewis was coming home to him. interfer- If he had been faulty in appending to his sister's charLin marriage contract a condition which involved an ia- poutS. terference with the administration of English law, Charles was now interfering far more incisively in French domestic politics. And when once it was under- stood that the Huguenots were to owe their recovered independence to English help, a situation would be created which would be intolerable even to a king of France far less sensitive than Lewis on all matters connected with his personal authority. In the pre- ceding August Eichelieu might wisely have argued that it would be better for him to grant all the de- mands of his Protestant subjects, in order that he might turn his attention to external war. But it was one thing to grant such demands upon conviction ; it was another thing to grant them to the menaces of the King of England. Eochelle, freed from the control of its own sovereign by Charles's interposition, would practically be an independent republic, resting for security upon the support of England. The work of uniting France, handed down as the task of cen- turies from one generation of monarchs to another, would receive a blow from which it would be hard to 1 Buckingham to Holland and Carleton, Jan. 23 ; Holland and Carleton to Conway, Jan, 23 ; Conway to Holland and Carleton, Jan, 19; S, P.France, VOL. I. A A 354 ESTEANGEMENT BETWEEN ENGLAND AND FEANCE CHAP. X. 1626. Jan. 26. The Queen refuses to be crowned. Jon. 21, Charles angry with Blainville. recover. An English Eochelle would be a far more potent instrument of mischief than even an English Calais had ever been. Such a view of the case was not likely to present itself to Charles. All that he saw was that as his ships had been used for the defeat of Soubise, it was his business to take care that the Huguenots suffered no loss. And by this time he had a fresh grievance in his own domestic circle, which kept his mind in a state of irritation. He had arranged that his own corona- tion should take place before the opening of Parliament, and he fondly hoped that the Queen would be at his side on that solemn occasion. To his surprise he found that his young wife had rehgious scruples about taking part in a Protestant ceremony, and he at once appealed to her brother to convince her that she was in the wrong. The coronation, Conway wrote to the ambassadors, was but a form. " Yet," he added, " it is a wonder, it is a disorder, it is a misfortune, so appa- rent a declaration of a difference in judgment, obedience, and conformity." But he got no help from Lewis. The view taken at the French Court was that there would be no harm done if the Queen submitted to coronation, provided that none of the Protestant clergy took any part in the ceremony.^ As this was clearly inadmissible, Charles had to resign himself to be crowned alone. Such a conse- quence he ought to have foreseen when he decided upon marrying a Eoman Cathohc princess. But he was bitterly disappointed, and he threw the whole blame upon the French ambassador. Blainville, according to him, had given himself, since his coming into England, to stirring up ill-will between himself 1 Lewis XIII. to Blainville, Jan, Jf; King's M8S., 138, p. ii2i. Conway to Holland and Oarleton, Jan, 21; 8. P. France. THE CORONATION. 355 and the Queen. Blainville was certainly not concilia- chap. tory in his dealings with a Government against which • — ^ — • he had many and bitter grievances, and he had listened --^ '^ • more sympathizingly than became an ambassador to the Queen's complaints ; but it is undeniable that the Queen's troubles had their root in causes which existed before Blainville set foot in England. The day fixed for the coronation was the 2nd of Feb. 2. February. The curtained seat which had been pre- uon.™""**" pared for Henrietta Maria, at a time when it was still hoped that she might be present as a spectator, if she would not take her part in the ceremony, was empty. Its emptiness must have reminded Charles bitterly of the misery of his home life and of the most conspicuous failure of his political life. Yet there was no want of loyalty in the hearty shout — the echo of that old cry which had once given to English kings their right to sit upon the throne — which greeted him as he stood in the pride of youthful dignity in the face of the assembled multitude. As yet, though the first enthu- siasm which greeted his accession had passed away, no personal unpopularity had gathered round him. What- ever was ill-done was attributed to the influence of Buckingham.^ 1 Mead to Stuteville, Feb. 3 ; D'Ewes to Stute-ville, Feb. 3 ; Ellis, ser. I, iii. 220, 213. Mr. Forster is mistaken in supposing that the inci- dent of Charles's stumbling, and of his answering ' when Buckingham offered to assist him, "I have as much need to help you as you to assist me," ' took place 'when all was over, and the King and the Duke came wearily away.' It really happened before the coronation, and D'Ewes adds that the words were spoken ' with a smiling countenance.' Charles doubtless merely meant that he was able to recover his footing without help. It would not have been worth while mentioning this, but for the doubt which I entertain whether Mr. Forster is right in attributing any sort of foreboding of coming evil to Charles. There is no evidence either way; but my impression, from what I know of Charles's character and actions, is that he never foreboded evil, and that he was so convinced A A 3 X. 1626. Feb. 2. 356 ESTRANGEMENT ^ETWEEN ENGLAND AND FRANCE- CHAP. The new king was thus, to use words spoken by his direction a few days later, married to his people. He chose that day to be clothed in white,^ as the sign of the virgin purity with which he came to play a bride- groom's part, instead of in the purple robe of sovereignty. Amor civiiim, Regis prcesidium was the motto which in trustful confidence he placed upon the coins which still bore the Eoyal arms impressed upon the sails of a ship careering through the waves, the emblem doubt- less of that great naval victory with which he hoped to illustrate the annals of his reign. If Wimbledon had failed at Cadiz, Buckingham, he might think, would hardly fail at Bochelle. Charles, so far as it is possible to judge by the indications which have reached us, was preparing to meet the new Parhament with all the buoyancy of hopefulness. Neither Coke, nor Phelips, nor Seymour would be there to distract the hearts of his faithful Commons with factious opposition. So little did the King suspect that he would meet with New earl- any difiiculty in the Upper House that he neglected the that he was always in the right, that the idea of Parliamentary opposi- tion would not occur to him till he was called to face it. As for the people not shouting at the coronation when Arundel first asked them to do so, I am content with D'E wes's explanation : " Whether some expected he should have spoken more, or others hearing not so well what he said, hindered those by questioning which might have heard, or that the newness and greatness of the action busied men's thoughts, or the presence of so dear a thing drew admiring silence, or that those which were nearest doubted what to do, but not one word followed till my Lord of Arundel told them they should cry out, ' God save King Charles 1 ' upon which, as ashamed of their first oversight, a little shouting followed. At the other sides where he presented himself there was not the like failing." Joaohimi, as Ranke has observed, has no hesitation to tell of. He says the answer was given ' with great cry and shouting.' Joachimi to the States General, Feb. ~; Add. M88., 17,677 L. fol. 148. ' Heylin, life of Laud, 144. After Charles's death, this was pointed to as a presage of the innocence of martyrdom, as was also the text taken by the preacher, "I will give thee a crown of life," NEGOTIATIONS IN FRANCE 357 opportunity which the coronation afforded of raising chap. X. 1626. to the Peerage persons in whom he could confide. No additional votes were gained by the earldoms which he distributed amongst members of the existing peerage, and it was only a matter of personal importance to themselves that Lord Ley, for instance, would for the future be known as Earl of Marlborough, Lord Mande- ville as Earl of Manchester, and Lord Carew as Earl of Totness. There were yet a few days before the meeting of Jan. aj. Parliament, and if Charles had been capable of rising nlnlTe- into a statesmanlike view of his relations with France, LewSxiii. he would have seized the opportunity of reconsidering Huguenots, his position which was offered him during those days. Holland and Carleton had left no stone unturned to bring about a pacification. The stumbling-block was Fort Louis. The French minister frankly averred that unless the King kept up a garrison in it, he could have no security that when he was engaged in war abroad the Eochellese would not rise in insur- rection as they had done the year before. With equal energy the Huguenot deputies argued that unless the fort were demolished, they could have no security for the freedom of their commerce. On the evening of the 25th of January it was beheved on both sides that the negotiation was at an end. The next morning a chosen number of the French Jan. 36. clergy were to be admitted to the King to declare their ment come readiness to open their purses to support him in the holy war which they had done their best to render imminent. But they had reckoned without the Cardinal. Seizing a pretext for deferring the audience for a time, he had proposed a compromise through the English ambassadors. When at last the deputation 358 ESTRANGEMENT BETWEEN ENGLAND AND FRANCE. X. [621 Jan. 26. Terms of CHAP, swept into the Eoyal presence they found that they — -^ — ' were too late. The Huguenot deputies were already jan.^le. 0^ ^^^'^^ knees before the King, and the baffled priests had come only to see the King reconciled at last with his Protestant subjects. Unhappily the terms of reconciliation announced ment^'^^^" On the following day by the Chancellor, were such as by no means to preclude the probabihty of a renewal of the strife at no distant future. Under pressure from Holland and Carleton, the deputies agreed to give up all the points at issue, including the demolition of Fort Louis. In return they were to have from the King an assurance that ' by long services and continued obedience they might expect that which they most desired,' and that ' in fitting time he would listen to their supphcations made with due respect and humility.' ^ Before the words were spoken a private exposition of their meaning was given by the French ministers to the effect that they pointed to the eventual demolition of Fort Louis. Jan. 29. Holland and Carleton had certainly taxed their byThe^ authority as mediators to the uttermost. The deputies throughex- plainly told them that they had agreed to the treaty of EngiSh ' because they might now lawfully accept assistance support. £^Qjj^ jjjg Majesty.' When the ambassadors attended the Protestant church at Charenton on the following Sunday, they found themselves the objects of universal enthusiasm. The preacher took for his text, " How beautiful are the feet of them that preach the gospel of peace." It was all very natural, but it was very dangerous, • Answer of the Chancellor in the nams of the King of Fftince,^^; S. P. France. This date, however, must be merely that on which a written copy of the speech was delivered. It was spoke on ^^^^. 2 Declaration by Holland and Carleton f— ; 8. P. France. PEACE ACCOKDED TO THE HUGUENOTS. 359 To thrust the foreign mediation in the face of Lewis chap. was the very way to disgust him with the arrangement ^ which had been made, and if Charles had been wise ^^^5- he would have kept his part in the treaty in the back- ground. If the French Government were once en- gaged in earnest in the conflict with Spain, any renewal of persecution would be virtually impossible. In such a course Charles would have had every RicheUeu „ . . , . . ^ ready to assistance irom liicheiieu. The treaty was signed on take up the the 28th, and the Cardinal at once assured the ambassa- against dors that the Enghsh ships would be speedily restored, '""°' and that his master would practically, if not in name, join England in the war in Germany. On the 29th Holland and Carleton reported that the French ministers dealt with them more freely than they expected, ' for they have not denied those of the Eeligion any of their demands, so as all parties are satisfied.' ^ On the 5 th of February the ambassadors were able f4ra^maae to write of offers still more definite. Eichelieu had •>? ^™- assured them that his master, besides carrying on the war in Italy, was ready to create a diversion for the King of Denmark by sending into Germany an army nominally commanded by some German prince, but in reality supported jointly by France and England. In addition to this he would give the aid already promised to the King of Denmark. The army thus proposed would not cost Charles a third of the expense of the force which he had proposed to send against Dunkirk, whilst it would be of far greater advantage to the common cause.^ Whether Charles, after his numerous failures, would „ ^?\- ^°- Satisfac- tory pro- ' Holland and Carleton to Conway, Jan. 27, 29; Declaration by speot., Holland and Carleton, ^^^ ; The state of Holland and Carleton's nego- tiation, Aug. (?) ; S. P. France. ' Holland and Carleton to Conway, Feb. 5 ; S, P. France.' 1626. Feb. 10, 360 ESTEANGEMENT BETWEEN ENGLAND AND FRANCE. CHAP, have now been able to persuade his Parliament to ^' grant the supply necessary for this or for any other enterprise, may well be doubted. But it was at least in his power to meet Parliament with the proposal of a definite joint action with France, which was the very object at which he had been so long driving. In a few days the Enghsh ships would have returned and the establishment of peace in France would have justified the policy upon which their loan had originally depended, whilst it might be taken for granted that when once England and France were actively co-ope- rating in Germany, there would be no disposition on the part of the French Government to return to the system of annoyance of which the Huguenots had pre- viously complained, nor even to scrutinise very closely Charles's failure to observe the provisions of his mar- riage contract. Feb. 6. Such however was not the view which Charles factionof took of the situation. On the 6th of February, when Charles. ^j^^ g^^^ news of the agreement had reached England, Conway was directed to write ironically to the ambas- sadors that his Majesty was confident that there must be in the treaty ' some excellent good warrants and reservations provided that are not expressed.' ^ The Feb. 7. next day Charles had an opportunity of reading the treaty itself. " It seems," wrote Conway again, " something strange that your Lordships had concluded the peace with so little surety for those of the Eehgion, for ought appeared here. But his Majesty is persuaded if your Lordships have, as it seems, placed the con- fidence of all those of the Eeligion and those of Kochelle upon him for the maintaining of their surety, that you have some very good grounds that such un- derhand promises as may have been made, which ' Conway to Holland and Carleton, Feb. 6; S. P. France. DISSATISFACTION OF CHARLES, 361 appear not, shall be kept ; or that, now that the King chap. is satisfied in point of honour, of his goodness he will ■ — ^ — • presently withdraw all his forces from Eochelle, and ^^^^^^• will appoint a certain time when he will demohsh the fort. " His Majesty's pleasure is that you protest to that The sin- king and his ministers that, under the hope and con- to protest fidence of the real and present performance of those the treaty, things, you had employed your mediation, and had en- gaged the authority of his Majesty to move and almost constrain the deputies to accept the peace upon these conditions. " And further, you are, by the advice of the depu- ties, to move for such conditions as may be for their surety, and so to carry that business betwixt that king and those of the Eehgion that, if his Majesty's honour must be pledged for the due observation of the treaty, his Majesty may be called and admitted to that office by that king and those of the Eeligion ; and that there may be some ground and possibility for such a surety to be in the power and possession of those of the Eeligion and those of Eochelle, in the strength of which they may subsist until such time as they may make their grievances known to his Majesty, and for him to apply his mediation and set his endeavours on work. But in these things his Majesty can give you no exact limits, but must leave you to that restraint or latitude your Lordships' own wisdom will take in your own negotiation. But it is his Majesty's precise com- mandment that you demand the present restitution of his Majesty's ship, and of the merchants' ships ; and that in that point you admit no delay, but take a delay as a denial." Charles, in short, bhnd to the fact that the force of Charies-s circumstances under Eichelieu's guidance was working 362 ESTRANGEMENT BETWEEN ENGLAND AND FRANCE. CHAP, for him, would be content with nothing less than an ^- — ^ — ' open acknowledgment of his position as mediator '^^'^" between Lewis and his subjects. A few more de- spatches such as this would make even Eicheheu power- less to preserve peace between France and England. Feb. II. Qq tjjQ J J til tijg news of the French offer of co- Charles n* t U tTaWn' '" operation in Germany had reached England, bir J onn ttepffer Cokc was directed to answer as follows : — co-opera- " Concerning the raising of a new English-French cooineas. army,-^which strange overture you have kept afoot by undertaking to procure an answer from hence, — that this may not serve them for any pretence to colour their withdrawing of contribution from the Zing of Denmark and Mansfeld, you are to lay before them his Majesty's great charges both by sea and land, and the impossibility of levying more armies of that kind ; and further directly to profess that if that king per- form not what he hath promised for the support of those forces, his Majesty in like manner will presently hold his hand and employ all his means for the strengthening of his fleet, which he well knoweth to be the best support of his own honour and state, all the rest having a principal relation to his alhes. And, since the diversion in Germany concerneth chiefly the security of France against which the Imperial forces were evidently designed, if the King of Den- mark had sat still ; you are to make them sensible of this interest and of his Majesty's resolution to bear that burthen no longer, if that king shall cast it off, or not contribute at least in an equal proportion."^ hnoSe^ On such tcrms a working alliance was impos- on these giblc. A forsigu government would find now, as conditions. /^ n p domestic parties were to find afterwards, that it was not * Coke to Holland and Carleton, Feb, 11; S.P, France, 1626. Feb. II. CHARLES'S DOMESTIC TROUBLES. 363 enough to give way to Charles in some things, unless chap. it was prepared to give way to him in all. What he asked was merely that a high-spirited and sensitive nation should first submit its domestic aflairs to his arbitration, and should then enter upon a war pre- cisely in such a manner and on such conditions as it pleased him to prescribe. If knowledge of character be worth anything, it is to Charles rather than to Buckingham that these unsatisfactory despatches are to be ascribed. Charles too had annoyances at home which may well have served to put him in a bad temper during the days in which they were dictated. His dissatisfaction with his wife had reached a crisis. Parliament was opened on Feb. e. the 6th, and arrangements had been made for the atthepro^ Queen to witness the procession from one of the win- thfopening dows of the Banqueting Hall at WhitehaU. Charles, ^™*- however, always anxious to separate her from the French attendants, and to bring her as much as pos- sible in communication with the ladies of the Villiers family, expressed a wish that she should take a seat in a balcony occupied by the old Countess of Buckingham. The Queen assented, but when the time came she either saw or fancied she saw that it was raining, and asked to be excused from going out into the street in the wet. Charles, on the other hand, insisted that it did not rain, but finding that his words produced no impression, withdrew from the altercation. Dissatisfied ^|t"^g','°° at his rebuff, — so at least the French accounts of the husband. affair assert, — he betook himself to Buckingham. " How can you expect," said the favourite, " to be obeyed by your Parliament if you cannot secure the obedience of your wife ? " Charles, conscious perhaps of his own inabihty to impress the Queen with sufficient awe of his commands, sent Buckingham to try his powers upon 3^4 ESTEANGEMENT BETWEEN ENGLAND AND FRANCE. Ill-feeling between them. her. Buckingham rated her soundly for her dis- obedience, and as Blainville, who had perhaps objected originally to her showing herself in Lady Bucking- ham's company, now advised submission, she took Buckingham's hand, and was led across the street to the house in which his mother was. Even this act of submission caused fresh umbrage to Charles. The Queen, it would seem, would not obey him, but would obey the French ambassador. With some reminiscence, perhaps, of the ' Taming of the Shrew,' he sent orders to her to come down from the vdndow at which she was, and with these orders Hen- rietta Maria meekly complied. For three days Charles kept entirely aloof from his wife, waiting sulkily till she should come to beg his pardon. At last, weary of his silence, she sought him out and asked in what she had offended him. He expected her, he answered, to acknowledge her error. She was unable, she said, to accuse herself of anything wrong. Would he not tell her what her fault had been ? The question seemed to take him by sur- prise. After some hesitation he answered : " You told me that it rained when I said thafit did not rain." " I should never have thought that to be an offence," she replied ; " but if you think so, I will think so too." Pleased with such evidence of humility, Charles took his wife in his arms, and kissed her.^ ^ Memoires de Tillibres. It seems so unlikely that Charles should have quarrelled with Blainville on this point, that it is as well to give the words of the English narrative : " In the meantime a difference that fell out ahout the place for the Queen to see the King ride to Parliament (she affecting to stand in the Banqueting House, or in the Privy Gallery, when the King had given reasons for her better sight in the house of the Countess, mother to the Duke of Buckingham, next the gate in King Street), was a subject for some discontent, and so far as the Ambassador Blainville seeming to his Majesty to have been the causer of it, had the X. 1626. Feb. lo. BLAINVILLE ORDEKEt) FROM COtJET. 365 The quarrel was over for the time. The Queen had chap. perhaps begun to open her eyes to the truth that with such a character as Charles's the outward appearance of complete and unreasoning obedience is the surest way to mastery in the end. Unhappily this misunderstanding between man and wife became another element in the misunderstanding between two kingdoms. On the day after the offence Feb. 7. was given, the courier who carried the despatch ex- fuses to '*" pressive of Charles's dissatisfaction with the Huguenot fme^^^' treaty, took with him a letter from Charles to Lewis com" *' himself, asking for Blainville's recall, on the ground that he had done everything in his power to bring about a misunderstanding between himself and the Queen. At the same time he directed Conway to in- form the ambassador that he would no longer be per- mitted to appear at Court.^ Such were the conditions under which Charles met ciroum- his second Parliament. A great French minister, under amidst unexampled difficulties, had steered the vessel of charies state on to the track in which it was hereafter to be uament '"^" borne to victory on behalf of a noble cause. In spite of the hesitations of Lewis and of the opposition of the clergy and of a large portion of the aristocracy, Eichelieu had firmly planted the banner of monarchical France on the basis of toleration. He had gained his point by unwearied patience, by yielding in details whilst never losing sight of his main object, by the ap- pearance of being but the servant of his king, whilst in i;eaUty he was bending the king and France itself to next day a message brought him by the Lord Conway." Affair of Blainville. Undated. S. P. France. ' Message sent to Blainville, Feb. 7. The King to Lewis XIIL, Feb, 7. S, P. France, 366 ESTRANGEMENT BETWEEN ENGLAND AND FRANCE. ciiAP. his own ends. One thing he yet wanted, that the >■ — ^ — • ruler whom fortune had placed upon the English ^ ^ ' throne should be capable of understanding his meaning. As long as Charles was King of England no such good fortune was likely to be his. END OF THE FIEST VOLUME. I.ONDON ! PIIISTED DY SPOTTISWOODH AND CO., NEW-STllEKT SQUARE AND PAHLIAMEST STHERT J