opening of the parliament. The king's second son, by reason of his tender age, would be absent, and it was resolved that Percy should seize or assassinate him. The Princess Elizabeth, a child likewise, was kept at Lord Harrington's house, in Warwickshire; and Sir Everard Digby was to seize her, and immediately proclaim her queen.

The day for the sitting of parliament now approached. Never was treason more secret, or ruin more apparently inevitable; the hour was expected with impatience, and the conspirators gloried in their meditated guilt. The dreadful secret, though communicated to above twenty persons, had been religiously kept during the space of nearly a year and a half; when all the motives of pity, justice, and safety, were too weak, a remorse of private friendship saved the kingdom.

r Sir Henry Percy, one of the conspirators, conceived a design of saving the life of Lord Mounteagle, his intimate friend and companion, who also was of the same persuasion with himself. About ten days before the meeting of parliament, this nobleman, upon his return to town, received a letter from a person unknown, and delivered by one who fled as soon as he had discharged his message. The letter was to this effect:-" My lord, stay away from this parliament; for God and man have concurred to punish the wickedness of the times. And think not slightly of this advertisement, but retire yourself into your country, where you may expect the event in safety. For though there be no appearance of any stir, yet 1 say they will receive a terrible blow this parliament; and yet they shall not see who hurts them. This counsel is not to be contemned, because it may do you good, and can do you no harm. For the danger is past as soon as you have burned the letter."

The contents of this mysterious letter surprised and puzzled the nobleman to whom it was addressed; and though inclined to think it a foolish attempt to affright and ridicule him, yet he judged it safest to carry it to Lord Salisbury, secretary of state. Lord Salisbury too was inclined to give little attention to it, yet thought proper to lay it before the king in council, who came to town a few days after. None of the council were able to make any thing of it, although it appeared serious and alarming. In the universal agitation between doubt and apprehension, the king was the first who penetrated the meaning of this dark epistle. He concluded that some sudden danger was preparing by gunpowder; and it was thought advisable to inspect all the vaults below the houses of parliament. This care belonged to the Earl of Suffolk, lord chamberlain,

1605.

who purposely delayed the search till the day before the meetNov. 5, 5ing of parliament. He remarked those great piles of faggots which lay in the vault under the house of peers, and seized a man preparing for the terrible enterprise, dressed in a cloak and boots, and a dark lantern in his hand. This was no other than Guy Fawkes, who had just disposed every part of the train for its taking fire the next morning, the matches and other combustibles being found in his pockets. The whole design was now discovered: but the atrociousness of his guilt, and the despair of pardon, inspiring him with re solution, he told the officers of justice, with an undaunted air, that had he blown them and himself up together, he had been happy. Before the council he displayed the same intrepid firmness, mixed even with scorn and disdain, refusing to discover his associates, and shewing no concern but for the failure of his enterprise. But his bold spirit was at length subdued: being confined to the Tower for two or three days, and the rack just shewn him, his courage, fatigued with so long an effort, at last failed him, and he made a full discovery of all his accomplices.

Catesby, Percy, and the conspirators who were in London, hearing that Fawkes was arrested, fled with all speed to Warwickshire, where Sir Everard Digby, relying on the success of the plot, was already in arms. But the country soon began to take the alarm, and wherever they turned they found a superior force ready to oppose them. In this exigence, beset on all sides, they resolved, to about the number of eighty persons, to fly no farther, but make a stand at a house in Warwickshire, to defend it to the last, and sell their lives as dearly as possible. But even this miserable consolation was denied them: a spark of fire happening to fall among some gunpowder that was laid to dry, it blew up, and so maimed the principal conspirators, that the survivors resolved to open the gate, and sally out against the multitude that surrounded the house. Some were instantly cut to pieces; Catesby, Percy, and Winter, standing back to back, fought long and desperately, till in the end the two first fell covered with wounds, and Winter was taken alive. Those that survived the slaughter were tried and convicted; several fell by the hands of the executioner, and others experienced the king's mercy. The jesuits, Garnet and Oldcorn, who were privy to the plot, suffered with the rest; and, notwithstanding the atrociousness of their treason, Garnet was considered by his party as a martyr, and miracles were said to have been wrought by his blood,

A. D.

The sagacity with which the king first discovered 1612. the plot, raised the opinion of his wisdom among the the people; but the folly with which he gave himself up to his favourites, quickly undeceived the nation. In the first rank of these stood Robert Carre, a youth of a good family in Scotland, who, after having passed some time in his travels, arrived in London, at about twenty years of age. All his natural accomplishments consisted in a pleasing visage; and all his acquired abilities in an easy and graceful demeanour. This youth was considered as the most rising man at court; he was knighted, created Viscount Rochester, honoured with the order of the garter, made a privy-counsellor, and, to raise him to the highest pitch of honour, he was at last created Earl of Somerset.

This was an advancement which some regarded with envy; but the wiser part of mankind looked upon it with contempt and ridicule, sensible that ungrounded attachments are seldom of long continuance. Some time after, being accused and convicted, from private motives, of poisoning Sir Thomas Overbury, in the Tower, he fell under the king's displeasure; and, being driven from court, spent the remainder of his life in contempt and self-conviction.

But the king had not been so improvident as to part with one favourite until he had provided himself with another. This was George Villiers, a youth of one-and-twenty, the younger brother of a good family, who was returned about that time from his travels; and whom the enemies of Somerset had taken occasion to throw in the king's, way, certain that his beauty and fashionable manners would do the rest. Accordingly, he had been placed at a comedy full in the king's view, and immediately caught the monarch's affections.

In the course of a few years, he created him Viscount Villiers, Earl, Marquis, and Duke of Buckingham, knight of the garter, master of the horse, chief justice in Eyre, warden of the cinque ports, master of the King's Bench office, steward of Westminster, constable of Windsor, and lord high admiral of England. .. The universal murmur which these foolish attachments produced, was soon after heightened by an act of severity, which still continues as the blackest stain upon this monarch's memory. The brave and learned Raleigh had been confined in the Tower almost from the very beginning of James's accession, for a conspiracy which had never been proved against him; and in that abode of wretchedness he wrote several valuable performances, which are still in the highest esteem. His long sufferings, and his ingenious writings, had now turned

the tide of popular opinion in his favour; and they who once detested the enemy of Essex, could not now help pitying the long captivity of this philosophical soldier. He himself still struggled for freedom; and perhaps it was with this desire that he spread the report of his having discovered a gold mine in Guiana, which was sufficient to enrich not only the adventurers who should seize it, but afford immense treasures to the nation. The king, either believing his assertions, or willing to subject him to farther disgrace, granted him a commission to try his fortune in quest of these golden schemes; but still reserved his former sentence as a check upon his future behaviour.

Raleigh was not long in making preparations for this adventure, which, from the sanguine manner in which he carried it on, many believe he thought to be as promising as he described it. He bent his course to Guiana, and remaining himself at the mouth of the river Oroonoko, with five of the largest ships, he sent the rest up the stream, under the command of his son, and Captain Keymis, a person entirely devoted to his interest. But, instead of a country abounding in gold, as the adventurers were taught to expect, they found the Spaniards had been warned of their approach, and were prepared in arms to receive them. Young Raleigh, to encourage his men, called out that "that was the true mine," meaning the town of St. Thomas, which he was approaching; "and that none but fools looked for any other:" but, just as he was speaking, he received a shot, of which he immediately expired. This was followed by another disappointment; for when the English took possession of the town, they found nothing in it of any value.

Raleigh, in this forlorn situation, found now that all his hopes were over; and saw his misfortunes still farther aggravated by the reproaches of those whom he had undertaken to command. Nothing could be more deplorable than his situation, particularly when he was told that he must be carried back to England, to answer for his conduct to the king. It is pretended that he employed many artifices, first to engage them to attack the Spanish settlements at a time of peace; and, failing of that, to make his escape into France. But all those proving unsuccessful, he was delivered into the king's hands, and strictly examined, as well as his fellow-adventurers, before the privy-council. Count Gondemar, the Spanish ambassador, made heavy complaints against the expedition; and the king declared that Raleigh had express orders to avoid all disputes and hostilities against the Spaniards. Wherefore, to

give the court of Spain a particular instance of his attachment, he signed the warrant for his execution; not for the present offence, but for his former conspiracy. This great man died with the same fortitude that he had testified through life; he observed, as he felt the edge of the 'axe, that it was a sharp but a sure remedy for all evils; his harangue to the people was calm and eloquent; and he laid his head down on the block with the utmost indifference.

A. D. 1618.

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But there soon appeared very apparent reasons for James's partiality to the court of Spain. This monarch had entertained an opinion which was peculiar to himself, that in marrying his son Charles, the Prince of Wales, any alliance below that of royalty would be unworthy of him; he therefore was obliged to seek, either in the courts of France or Spain, a suitable match, and he was taught to think of the latter. Gondemar, who was an ambassador from that court, perceiving this weak monarch's partiality to a crowned head, made an offer of the second daughter of Spain, to Prince Charles; and, that he might render the temptation irresistible, he gave hopes of an immense fortune which should attend the princess. However, this was a negotiation that was not likely soon to be ended; and, from the time the idea was first started, James saw five years elapsed without bringing the treaty to any kind of conclusion.

A delay of this kind was very displeasing to the king, who had all along an eye on the great fortune of the princess; nor was it less disagreeable to Prince Charles, who, bred up with the ideas of romantic passion, was in love without ever seeing the object of his affections. In this general tedium of delay, a project entered the head of Villiers, who had for some years ruled the king with absolute authority, that was fitter to be conceived by the knight of a romance, than by a minister and a statesman. It was projected that the prince should himself travel in disguise into Spain, and visit the princess of-that country in person. Buckingham, who wanted to ingratiate himself with the prince, offered to be his companion; and the king, whose business it was to check so wild a scheme, gave his consent to this hopeful proposal. Their adventures on this strange project would fill novels; and have actually been made the subject of many. Charles was the knight-errant, and Buckingham was his 'squire. The match, however, broke off, for what reasons historians do not assign; but, if we may credit the novelists of that time, the prince had already fixed his affec