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named, were pardoned when their heads were on the block; and they, together with Raleigh, were ordered to the Tower, where the latter remained a prisoner for twelve years, with the sentence of death hanging over his head. At the solicitation of his wife, she and her son were permitted to remain with him in prison, and a few friends were occasionally admitted to visit him. The fate of that false and silly old man, Lord Cobham, the cause of all Raleigh's calamities, is stated to have been peculiarly miserable. After being confined many years, he was enlarged only to die of starvation in a garret, where he was harboured by a poor man who had formerly been his servant at court.*

When twelve years had passed away, with little hope of a release, which had often been solicited, the rise of a new favourite, Villiers, Duke of Buckingham, and the subsequent discovery of the murder of Overbury by the Earl of Somerset and his infamous Countess, which led to their condemnation and disgrace, revived the hope and redoubled the exertions of Raleigh to obtain his release. The Queen of James was favourably disposed towards him, for his kind and valuable instructions imparted to her late son Henry, his constant and almost daily visitor during his confinement in the Tower. Raleigh had invented a quack medicine, which went by the name of his cordial; and when the Prince, who had contracted a particular esteem for Raleigh,

* Tytler, from Weldon.

fell into his last illness, "the Queen sent to Sir Walter Raleigh for some of his cordial, which she herself had taken in a fever, with remarkable success. Raleigh sent it, together with a letter to the Queen, wherein he expressed a tender concern for the Prince; and, boasting of his medicine, stumbled unluckily upon an expression to this purpose-that it would certainly cure him or any other of a fever, except in case of poyson. The Prince dying, though he took it, the Queen, in the agony of her grief, showed Raleigh's letter, and laid so much weight on the expression about poyson, that to her dying day she could never be dissuaded from the opinion, that her beloved son had foul play done him."* To her and to Secretary Winwood he, unfortunately, was induced to renew his proposal for the settlement of Guiana, on condition that the expense should be borne by himself and his friends, and that the king should receive a fifth part of the bullion brought home. When the prospect of great treasure was the point at issue, James could not easily resist ; but on the present occasion his resolution was shaken by the remonstrances of Gondomar, the Spanish ambassador, and by the fear of offending Spain; considerations which got the better of even his avarice. But Raleigh, who well knew the corruption of the court, succeeded in bribing Sir William St. John and Sir Edward Villiers, the uncles of the Duke of Buckingham, with the sum of fifteen * Camden.

hundred pounds. "In this way," says Mr. Tytler, "success was at length obtained, and the monarch, who had for twelve years steeled his heart against all the demands of truth and justice, yielded at once to the desires of a capricious and venal favourite."

In March, 1615, Sir Walter was liberated from confinement, without the King's pardon being announced or signified; but the temptation of the wealth, to be brought from the gold mines of Guiana, prevailed on James to give Raleigh a commission to go into the south parts of America, or elsewhere in America, possessed and inhabited by heathen and savage people, to discover, &c.* He stubbornly refused, however, to grant him a pardon; but it is said that a pardon was offered to Raleigh on payment of 7007. Nor is this at all unlikely, for money, in that corrupt reign, was able to purchase almost any favour; he was persuaded, however, to decline it, by his friend Sir Francis Bacon, who said-"Sir, the knee-timber of your voyage is money. Spare your purse in this particular; for, upon my life, you have a sufficient pardon for all that is past already: the King having, under his broad seal, made you admiral of your fleet, and given you power of martial law over your officers and soldiers." Bacon's law, however, as it will be seen, was unsound, or at least was overruled, and Raleigh prepared for his voyage.

* Rymer's Fœdera.

By virtue of his commission, and on the credit of his reputation and merit, Raleigh was enabled to engage several persons of quality, and private adventurers, in the design, by whose subscriptions, added to what he could advance from his private fortune, a sum of money was raised sufficient to fit out a fleet of twelve ships, ten of which, after a long and tedious passage, arrived at Trinidad, where he found the Spaniards fully apprized of his design, who had, consequently, made provision for opposing him. Sir Walter had been betrayed by the King he was ordered to give a plan of his design, with the number of his men, the burden of his ships, the country and river he was to enter, and other particulars, which the King promised to keep secret ; but it got into the hands of Gondomar, from him went to Spain, and thence to the Indies, before Raleigh had left the Thames: a most cruel and atrocious breach of faith, but in those days not a solitary

one.

Sir Walter, nevertheless, resolute in pursuing his design, made sail for the coast of Guiana, anchored at the mouth of the river Coliana, where he landed the sick, set up the barges and small craft, and took in a sufficiency of fresh water, with the assistance of the Indians, some of whom had formerly known Sir Walter. He himself having long suffered from sickness, and being scarcely able to move, was rendered utterly incapable of being present at the attempt of getting to the mine, and therefore appointed five of

the smallest of his ships to enter the Orinoco, having Captain Keymis for their pilot, with orders to proceed to the mine. Five foot companies, one of them commanded by Captain Walter Raleigh, the General's eldest son, were embarked-all of them stated to be gentlemen of great valour and endless patience in suffering hunger, heat, and labour. Major Pigot died on the passage, and Lieutenant-Colonel Sir Warham St. Leger lay so sick as to be unable to proceed up the river, so that the command devolved on George Raleigh, the General's nephew, who, it is said, had not that degree of authority that was required.

In Raleigh's instructions to Keymis, he says, "If the passages be already forced, so that, without manifest peril of my son, yourself, and other captains, you cannot pass towards the mine, then be well advised how you land; for I know what a scum of men you have, and I would not, for all the world, receive a blow from the Spaniards to the dishonour of our nation. Let me hear from you as soon as you can: you shall find me at Punto Gallo, dead or alive, and if you find not my ships there, yet you shall find their ashes. For I will fire with the galleons, if it come to extremity, but run away I will never."

As they passed up the river the Spaniards fired at the ships both with ordnance and muskets; but they pushed on and landed their forces near the town of St. Thomas, charged the enemy to the

very

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