<172>The young man’s dream which had lighted Charles and Buckingham on their way to Madrid, had been pleasant enough while it lasted. 1623.Charles and Buckingham in Spain.All difficulties, personal and political, were to vanish away before the magic of 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, had been the first to discover the mistake. 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 Infanta, if they delivered her over at all, only upon conditions which would be insupportable to the English people. Whilst Charles had been hanging about Philip’s court, and promising anything short of his own apostasy, Buckingham had been quarrelling with the Spanish ministers, and urging the Prince to return to England as soon as possible.
When at last Charles had convinced himself that his concessions had been made in vain, and that, whatever he might do, he would not be allowed to carry the Infanta with him to England, his faith in Buckingham was more strongly confirmed <173>than ever. Buckingham’s life was so completely bound up with his life, and Buckingham’s objects were for the most part so Their warlike designs.fully served by promoting his young master’s wishes, that differences of opinion were seldom likely to arise between them. Now that a difference had arisen, Charles had proved to be in the wrong, whilst Buckingham 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 had come 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 very easy. In fact, the enterprise was one of exceeding difficulty. Not only was the position of Spain and the Imperialists exceedingly 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.
The first task, however, which offered itself to Buckingham was harder in appearance than in reality. It might seem easier James determined to regain the Palatinate.to drag Theseus from his seat of pain than to move James to a declaration of war. A lover of peace by temperament and by force of reason, he knew too well what faults had been committed on both sides to be eager to join in the doubtful fray. Great, too, as was the influence exercised over him by his favourite and his son, it is hardly likely that this alone would have sufficed to overcome his reluctance 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. 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 he was driven to acknowledge that that path was no <174>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 ask himself, therefore, was whether he was willing to abandon all hope of its recovery, and this he was decidedly not prepared to do. The abandonment of his daughter and her children, from considerations of state policy, was so grievous to him, that, though Buckingham would doubtless 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 himself into the hands of Buckingham. The marriage ceremony at Madrid 1624.January.Diplomatic preparations.had been postponed under circumstances which made it almost a matter of certainty that it would never be heard of again. Bristol, the chief supporter of the alliance, was recalled from his embassy in Spain, and the Earl of Oxford, who had been confined in the Tower for nearly two years on account 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 Republic of Venice. Sir Robert 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 attractive by a letter in which Conway was allowed impudently to represent the plot which had been hatched between Buckingham and Gondomar for the partition of the territory of the Republic as a mere unauthorised suggestion of Spanish iniquity.[293]
These steps, important as they were, formed only part of the <175>great plan which Buckingham had conceived. Ever since the war Hopes of a French alliance.had broken out in Germany, 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 be changed. While Charles was still at Madrid, an English friar named Grey had formed the wild project of converting him; and, when he found that he had no chance of success, had talked with Buckingham of his own influence with Mary de Medicis, and of the probability that she might be induced to offer her youngest daughter, the Princess Henrietta Maria, as a substitute for the Infanta. How far Buckingham gave heed to the friar’s prattle it is hard to say. At all events Grey made his way to Paris, saw the Queen Mother, and 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 Tillières, the French ambassador in London, both Mary and Buckingham thought it expedient to disavow all knowledge of the intrigue;[294] but the seed was already sown. James agreed to take up the project as soon as the treaty with Spain was definitely disposed of. In the meanwhile it was arranged that Lord Kensington should be sent over to Paris to feel the ground, and to lay the foundations of a complete friendship between the two courts.
Although James had thus given his consent to the opening of a negotiation which would leave little room for any further understanding with Spain, Jan. 13.Offer of the Spanish ambassadors.his resolution 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, assured him of their master’s anxiety to do all that was possible 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 James himself, for the settlement of all <176>other points at issue. Some middle course was indicated 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 the Emperor, was ready to engage to do anything else in his power to bring about a favourable result.[295]
Much to Buckingham’s disgust, James thought the offer worth listening to, at least so far that he agreed to consult the Commissioners for Spanish affairs The Commissioners for Spanish affairs to be consulted.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 the negotiation 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.[296]
When the Commissioners met, two questions were laid before them. In the first place:— Had the King of Spain seriously Jan. 14.Questions proposed to them.intended to give his sister to the Prince? In the second place:— Did his conduct about the Palatinate deserve a declaration of war?[297] When the votes were taken, three only were given in favour of war:— <177>those of Buckingham himself, of Carlisle, who hated Spain as much as his placable disposition would allow him to hate anything, and of Conway, who would doubtless have voted the other way if his patron had desired him to do so, but who was only in this case following his own instincts in opposing Spain. They ask for information.The 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. One of them turned to the Prince, who was present amongst them, and pointedly asked him whether, when he swore to the marriage treaty in Spain, it had been agreed upon that the restitution of the Palatinate was to precede the marriage. Charles kept silence for a while, and then replied that in such matters he had no will but his father’s.[298]
Buckingham was very angry. He sprang from his seat, pouring out on the nine Commissioners the most unmeasured abuse as Buckingham’s anger.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.’[299] 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?”[300] 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 Royston. From whatever motive, James had no desire to see the whole secret of Jan. 20.The King supports him.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, <178>Charles, leaving Buckingham to keep guard over his father, returned to London. He assured the Commissioners that he would never think again of a marriage with the Infanta. All through the remainder of the week the discussion continued with unabated vigour. The Commissioners were unanimous in wishing to see the marriage treaty at an end, though many of them still shrank from giving an opinion in favour of war upon the slight information vouchsafed to them.[301]
Of the nine who had originally voted against Buckingham, five — Calvert, Weston, Arundel, Williams, and Middlesex — had already Nature of the opposition.declared against the summoning of a Parliament, and were all, for various reasons, the advocates of peace. Pembroke, Chichester, Hamilton, and Lennox had always been counted as opponents of the Spanish alliance; but they agreed with the other five in thinking that if Frederick’s son could be removed from his father’s influence, and educated, not indeed at Vienna, but at the English Court, his claims to the succession of the Palatinate might perhaps be acknowledged by Spain and the Emperor.[302] In Pembroke’s case, 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 exclusive 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 Buckingham’s career with deep distrust. Only a few months before, he had been required, as a Privy Councillor, to swear to the observance of the Spanish treaty, and to take part in the negotiations which followed for a peaceful settlement of the Continental dispute. He was now expected, without being told the reason why, to swing round with his eyes shut in the other <179>direction. Was he without inquiry to give his vote for a war which might possibly be justifiable, but which, 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.’ He confided to Inojosa his hope that Buckingham might, with the help of the King and of the coming Parliament, be stripped of that power which he had so grievously misused.[303] 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.[304]
Pembroke, however, was not a man to persist long in opposition. His character was wanting in that robustness which is needed for Pembroke gives way.such a task. Again and again in the course of his career we find him clashing with Buckingham; but a few words from the King or the Prince were always enough to soothe his easy temper, and he would be again on the old footing, giving the support of his respected name to a policy which he distrusted.
This time at least, it seemed as if Pembroke had made up his mind to resist to the end. Yet in a few days, he and the rest of the Commissioners agreed in Answer of the Commissioners.a temporising answer, 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 marriage. The original question concerning the propriety of going to war was left unanswered.[305] It was not long before the Prince used <180>his authority to reconcile Pembroke and Buckingham; and before the session opened the malcontent earl had changed into an unwavering supporter of the Government.
Between James and his son, the difference was one as well of principle as of temperament. Charles, entirely devoid as he was of Charles eager for war.any general conception of the course of European politics, had no eyes for anything except the insults to which he had been subjected in Spain, and the miserable condition of his sister. The only remedy, he bade Lennox assure his father, was war. James could at least regard the question from a higher point of view, if he could not succeed in discovering a fitting solution. “God be my witness,” he said to Lennox, who had brought this message from the Prince, “that I never did, nor ever can desire anything, except my salvation, so much as the peace of Christendom and the good of my kingdom; and these can only be secured by the Spanish marriage.” When the reply was conveyed to Charles, the Prince told one of his confidants, that he could never forget the dishonour which he had received in Spain. It was his father’s fault that he had not yet taken complete vengeance. He hoped this would soon be rectified: if not, he should be king one day, and he would then give himself no rest till he had completely ruined Spain.[306] On the whole, however, Charles had good reason to be satisfied with his father’s conduct. There were from 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.[307] 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 <181>brought before him from another quarter. A Capuchin friar, travelling under Negotiation of Della Rota.the assumed name of Francesco della Rota, appeared in England, with offers from the new Elector of Bavaria. The Elector, 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 educated at Vienna, Maximilian required that he should be educated at Munich, or, if James preferred it, under some Catholic prince elsewhere. 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?[308]
To this plan James gave a distinct refusal; but it was easier for him to see what was not to be done than to decide, The breach with Spain referred to Parliament.for himself and others, what he wished to do. As the Commissioners would not settle his difficulties for him, the whole question was referred to the coming Parliament.
By the time the consultations of the Commissioners were brought to a close the elections were almost completed. In The elections.ordinary times the House of Commons was brought into existence under very composite influences. In the counties the choice of the great landowners weighed heavily upon the freeholders. In the smaller boroughs the owner of some neighbouring manor, to whom the citizens were bound by the obligations of ancestral courtesy, or immediate interest, could often dispose of the seat at his pleasure. The Government, too, was not without 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 Warden 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 <182>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 attempting to render their actions subservient to the national good. Their election was very far from being a mere form. When measures are proposed in the course of this and the following years, the leaders of the assembly, again and again, in spite of the lack of reporters, 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 which they had hitherto to some extent submitted, and to require independence as the one thing needful. In the present instance the name of courtier was the surest passport to rejection, and in many places candidates supported by Buckingham, or even by the Prince, were left unchosen.[309]
In two cases James was desirous of overruling indirectly the choice of the constituencies. He had a lively recollection of Coke and Sandys.Coke’s attitude in the last Parliament, 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. The step, however, was too palpably unwise to be insisted on, and both Coke and Sandys were allowed to take their seats.[310]
Parliament had been summoned for February 12, but was put off till the 16th, because, as men amused themselves by saying, Feb. 16.Death of Lennox.the King had not yet made up his mind what to reply to the Spanish ambassadors.[311] On the 16th it was again postponed, on account of the death of James’s old friend and kinsman, the Duke of Lennox.[312]
<183>The speech with which James opened his last Parliament was couched in a tone of unusual hesitation. The old self-confidence with which, Feb. 19.Opening of Parliament.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 he abandoned as unattainable the object for which he had striven so long, and yet shrinking with his whole soul from opening the floodgates of war, he was The King’s speech.equally unwilling to turn his back upon his old policy, or to enter heartily upon a new one. Casting himself upon the compassion of his hearers, he pleaded before them 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 would 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 kingdom, 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 brought about the dissolution of the last Parliament, James turned to a subject Explains what he has done about the Catholics.on which his hearers were 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 <184>to dispense with any, to forbid or alter any that concern religion, 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 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.”
Such words were very far from being a full and fair representation of the past negotiations. But they were at least in accordance with How far was this statement true?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 cancelling his obligations, if reason of state should so require.[313] It is hardly likely, however, that the Commons, if they had known the whole story, would have told it in the same way.
After a few more words, James retired from the scene. He had thrown down the reins of government, and there was one standing by Arrangements for Buckingham’s appearance.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 King,” he could not have expressed himself more plainly.
<185>King, Prince, and State were all merged in that imposing personality. We can well imagine how he looked as he stood there, Feb. 24.Buckingham’s narrative.with head erect and flashing 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. On the other hand the 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. Taking it all in all, the narrative bears the aspect not so much of a deliberate falsehood, as of the outpourings of a heart upon which fancy and passion had impressed their glowing pictures. When Buckingham ended by asking whether 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.[314]
One effect at least of the Spanish treaties was indelibly imprinted on the English mind. Bringing into prominent relief Feb. 26.Bill against the recusants.the connection between the English 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.[315]
On the 27th Weston, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, was to deliver the formal report of Buckingham’s narrative to the Lower House. Before he had time to rise, he was interrupted by Sir John Eliot, a member whose parliamentary experience <186>had been confined to the few weeks of the abortive session of 1614. When he sat down at the end of his maiden speech, Eliot must have Feb. 27.Sir John Eliot.made himself a name as the foremost political orator of the time. Early in life 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 office; and his liberation, which was almost coincident with the Duke’s return, was doubtless owing to his powerful interposition. 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 him and Buckingham, it is probable 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 fallible men, just as the King was hardly a being who could by any possibility go deliberately astray. If he who wore the crown had wandered from the right path, he had but to listen to those who formed, in more than a rhetorical sense, the collective wisdom of the nation. Whoever stepped between the 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 Eliot was to breathe his own lofty and resolute spirit into the consultations of those around him; His moral weight.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 compelled 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, in the <187>midst of their fresher interests, to vindicate that freedom of speech His speech on freedom of debate.which had been refused them at the 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 should attempt against, or in anything neglect, the honour of him who is so much our own.”[316]
Such language might have been Bacon’s language. But the spirit in which the words were uttered was not the spirit of Bacon. Comparison between Bacon and Eliot.To both Eliot and Bacon the Crown and the Parliament were not contracting parties, each of which was to follow its separate interest, but members of one common body, each fulfilling its functions for the benefit of the whole. But whilst Bacon specially idealised the Crown, Eliot specially idealised the Parliament. When the separation threatened to come at last, Bacon clung the more closely to the active ruling power, whilst Eliot trusted with unshaken confidence 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 believe, 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 Parliaments, 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. Eliot on liberty of speech.“More for his sake than for ours,” he said, “it behoves that such liberty be allowed.” Freedom of speech was the indispensable condition of trustworthy advice.[317]
<188>Although the question thus raised could hardly be passed over in silence, the leaders of the House were too anxious to get to The question referred to a committee.the important work before them to give it much encouragement. The whole subject was referred to a committee, and was never heard of again.[318]
Weston was at last able to proceed with his report. If there had ever been any hesitation in accepting Buckingham’s narrative, Feb. 26.Complaint of the Spanish ambassadors against Buckingham.there was none now. Inojosa and Coloma had done their best to convert him into a national hero. Hurrying to James, they assured him that if one of their master’s servants had spoken of the King of England as Buckingham had spoken of the 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 than his own. He had not been present 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, Feb. 27.Buckingham supported by Parliament.who had now thrown himself unreservedly on Buckingham’s side, led the way in exculpating him, and a motion in his favour was unanimously carried. In the Commons the excitement was far greater. “In the way that Buckingham holds,” said Phelips, “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.[319]
<189>In the afternoon of the 27th the Lords took the Spanish treaties into consideration. Not a voice was raised in their favour. Feb. 28.The treaties condemned by the Lords.After two days’ debate, in which the Bishops 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 marriage and for the restoration of the Palatinate.[320]
The Commons were hardly likely to show cause to the contrary. The great debate was opened on March 1 in the Lower House by March 1.Rudyerd’s declaration of policy.Sir Benjamin Rudyerd, whose official position as Surveyor of the Court of Wards, together with his close connection with Pembroke, made him a fit exponent of the coalition which had sprung up between Buckingham and the popular lords.[321] 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.
Rudyerd, 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 surrendered himself body and soul to Buckingham, and Wentworth, haughty and defiant as he was, had too much good sense to resist the majority of an excited assembly by argument. Those who on this occasion shared his opinions could probably be counted on the fingers. The objection did <190>not come within the domain of practical politics, and Rudyerd, of all men, was the least likely to conceive its existence. For 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 Germany; that he would strengthen his forts within this kingdom; that he would 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 Countries; 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 20l. 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.’[322]
So much was said, at the commencement of the next reign, about an alleged breach of the understanding come to in this session What did Rudyerd ask for?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 Rudyerd, undoubtedly with the assent, if not at the instigation, of Buckingham and the Prince.[323] Nothing can be plainer than that the idea of a Continental war was placed in the background, if not negatived altogether. Diplomatic intervention there was to be in Germany, accompanied, perhaps, with some aid in money from the English exchequer, in order to raise an opposition to the Spanish and Imperialist armies. But English 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 Raleighs was to be called into existence, to continue <191>the work, half-patriotic, half-piratical, which filled so large a space in the minds of Englishmen of that day.
If any doubt of Rudyerd’s meaning were possible, there could be no doubt of the feeling of the House. Of Germany and Feeling of the Commons about Spain.of German politics the Commons knew very little, and had no chance of knowing anything accurately. They knew, however, that Spain had been specially prominent in the first attack upon the Palatinate, and that she had been meddling in their own domestic affairs to an extent which had roused the disgust of all Protestant Englishmen. 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 condition 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, was ever present to their vision. War with Spain was regarded as Popularity of a war with Spain.a good thing in itself, needing no further justification. In the debate which followed Rudyerd’s speech, whilst the hint which he had thrown out about the formation of a Protestant confederacy in Germany 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 Rudyerd 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 created a tyranny too monstrous to be contemplated with equanimity.[324]
<192>The feeling which thus prevailed found its expression in the petition which the Commons drew up for presentation to the King. The petition of the Commons.The Lords had been content to assign as their reason for recommending that the negotiations should be broken off, the impossibility 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.[325]
The petition prepared in this spirit was adopted by the Upper House, and was ready for presentation on the 3rd; but the King had March 3.The King objects to it.a bad cold, and refused to receive it. It sounded, in fact, 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 had no such scruples. “In obedience to your commands,” he wrote, with that insolence which long familiarity had taught him, “I will tell Buckingham expostulates,the House of Parliament 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.”[326]
This strange letter was, in all probability, accompanied by a paper in which Buckingham had jotted down the heads of the answer which he wished James to make to the Houses.[327] <193>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 and suggests the answer to be given.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 consulting 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 accept. On March 5 he received the deputation from the Houses at Theobalds, March 5.The King’s answer.and gave his answer to their petition. Four proposals of Rudyerd’s — that the fortifications should be repaired, a fleet fitted out, Ireland reinforced, and the Dutch Republic succoured — he adopted as his own, if indeed they had not been originally made with his approbation. But a comparison between the debate in the Lower House and this reply of James’s reveals a radical difference between their respective plans for the future. Whilst the Commons wished Different views of the King and Commons.to do as much as possible against Spain, and as little as possible in Germany, James wanted to do 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 prolong 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 Parliament, but he hoped that, over and above this, they would give him something for himself. In one thing only <194>did his language about the war differ from the plan expounded by Rudyerd. Rudyerd had suggested the promotion of union amongst the German Princes. James went a step further, and proposed to send them actual aid.[328]
To a war with Spain, James was strongly averse. To Carondelet, the Archdeacon of Cambrai, who was the frequent bearer of March 9.James’s conversation with Carondelet.communications to him from the Spanish ambassadors, he complained bitterly of the rash utterances of his son. Charles, he said, continued to talk as lightly as on his first arrival of the ease with which he could conquer Spain. His young companions had put this folly into his head. As for Buckingham, he did not know what devil had entered into him. He was himself most anxious to remain at peace with Spain, but it would be impossible for him to resist his Parliament unless Philip would come to his aid, by giving full and prompt satisfaction to his demands for the restitution of the Palatinate.[329]
Two days after this conversation with Carondelet, the Commons took into consideration the speech which James had delivered on the 5th. March 11.Debate in the Commons.Neither his demand for money for the payment of his debts, nor his demand for money for a war in Germany, found any response in the House. In vain Weston unrolled the whole list of the past expenses of the Crown. Rudyerd, in moving for a conference with the Lords, proposed to ask their advice 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.[330] England, said Coke, never prospered so well as when she was at war with Spain. If <195>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. The Prince’s explanations to the Lords.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 contempt he was menacing an authority of which he would one day be himself the appointed guardian. Buckingham, it is said,[331] had been taught by Conway to look with envy upon the financial resources of the Dutch Republic, and had recently assured <196>Charles that if he would only put himself forward as the leader of a popular war, he would, when his time came to reign, make himself a more powerful sovereign than any former king of England. It was impossible to maintain a great war by means of subsidies alone, and it would therefore be necessary to introduce new taxes, like those paid in the Dutch Republic. These taxes might easily be made permanent, especially if the ports were fortified and garrisoned, and if foreign troops were introduced into England, to take part in its defence against a Spanish invasion. Of holding such far-reaching views Charles for the present gave no sign. Without waiting to consult anyone, 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, and did not mean to ask for help himself till after the safety of the kingdom had been provided for.[332] The effect of this marvellous commentary was immediate, all the more because the Prince repeated it to the Commons on the following day.[333] March 14.Assistance promised.An address embodying the ideas expressed in debate, was at once 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 unexpected interference, he may well have hesitated when called upon The King’s reply.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 Buckingham’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 ill-humour, his speech took a more practical turn. Thanking the Houses <197>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 on 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 declaration, that he hoped they would give him another subsidy 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 intended to call them together at Michaelmas, or a few days later.[334]
This hesitating utterance was understood by the Commons to imply that there would be no war after all. They left the presence Dissatisfaction of the Commons.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.[335]
Buckingham, unlike the Prince, did not take refuge in silence. It was probably a day or two before this that he had Buckingham’s letter to the King.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; whether 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,— <198>because it is feared that when your turns are served you will not call them together again to reform abuses, grievances, and the making of laws for the good government 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 seriously of this, and resolve once constantly to run one way. For so long as you waver between the Spaniards and your subjects, to make your advantage of both, you are sure to do it with neither.”[336]
Full of these thoughts, Buckingham now sought an interview with the King. Throwing himself upon his knees he besought him Buckingham’s interview with James.to give satisfaction to his subjects. Yet if Buckingham was anxious to gain from the unwilling King a declaration of war, his idea of what that war should be differed alike from the views of James and from 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 cooperation. The Spanish marriage treaty, he said, had been ‘prejudicial to the present Government here, in pressing the abrogation of many good laws, and being contrary to the conscience of the people.’ The same conditions, replied James, would be demanded in any other Roman Catholic marriage. Against this conclusion Buckingham argued, and suggested that the Houses should draw up a petition, asking the King not to consent to the Spanish conditions with any other Popish prince.
Under these persuasions James gave way once more, and consented to allow Buckingham and his son to explain away his answer. March 15.The King’s answer explained.The next day, accordingly, 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 <199>subsidies and twelve fifteenths, if they chose to grant it to him. Buckingham then proceeded to unfold the history of his conversation of the previous night, and for the first time revealed the secret of the proposed 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.”[337]
Whether dissatisfaction was expressed or not, there can be no doubt that it was felt. “I confess,” wrote a member of the House, Prospect of a French marriage.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[338] is employed in the business.”[339]
Nevertheless the hint thrown out called forth no open expression of disapprobation. In the long debate which followed on March 19.Debate on supply.the grant of supply, only one member alluded to it, by proposing that the King should be asked to break off all other treaties, as well as the Spanish, that might be prejudicial to religion. 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 regard 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 Palatinate. “Are we poor,” cried Eliot, “Spain is rich. There are our Indies. Break with them; we shall break our necessities together!”[340]
In fact, the Commons were in a difficult position. The <200>task before them was no longer to oppose their own resolution Difficult position of the Commons.to the inertness of the King. They were called upon to decide between two opposite schemes of political and military action. Instead of looking forward to a war limited in extent and lucrative, 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 English blood and treasure so great that they could hardly contemplate the prospect with equanimity. As Coke explained to them, six subsidies and twelve fifteenths would bring in 780,000l., and the six subsidies which might be expected from the clergy would raise the grant to 900,000l., an amount which, however small it may sound in the reign of Victoria, was utterly unprecedented in the reign of James. Even the officials in the House did not venture to support the demand in full. Rudyerd, 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, however, 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 Rudyerd’s original proposal, according to which the full levy would be contingent March 20.on the renewed approbation of the House. In the end three subsidies and three fifteenths, or about 300,000l., were voted. The money was to be paid to treasurers appointed by Parliament at such periods that the whole of it would be in the Exchequer within one year after James had declared the negotiations with Spain to be at an end.[341]
<201>The address from both Houses with which this resolution was accompanied plainly declared the objects for which it was intended. Objects of the grant.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 neighbours the States of the United Provinces and others of your Majesty’s friends and allies, and the setting forth of your Royal Navy.’[342]
Before this address was presented it was privately shown to James. To one passage, in which it was said that the war was March 22.Its wording altered.to be waged ‘for the conservation of the true religion of Almighty God,’ he took objection, 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 thus amended, unlike the last one, was graciously received. The King said that he was willing to take the advice of Parliament ‘in March 23.James declares the treaties dissolved.the annulling and breaking of those two treaties, both of the match and 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 promise, 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 by the Houses, 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 ‘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 <202>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 dependent not upon Parliament, but upon military 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 consent of their treasurers he would not touch a penny of the money now offered. “But whether,” he said, “I shall send twenty thousand or ten thousand, whether by sea or land, east or west, by diversion or otherwise, by invasion upon the Bavarian or the Emperor, you must leave that to the King.”
What, then, was the meaning of the engagement thus taken? On the one hand Parliament, with the exception of the vague clause What did it mean?about assisting ‘other your Majesty’s friends and allies,’ distinctly intimated that the money was to be employed solely on the four points originally proposed. Even if that clause were to receive the widest possible interpretation, it could never be seriously contended that out of 300,000l. there would be enough left, when the expenditure authorised in the address had been met, to provide for any extensive military 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 purposes 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 European 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 Palatinate,— not to punish Spain for her past conduct, or to join in a Protestant crusade.
Evidently, therefore, neither party was in any way bound to anything beyond the expenditure of the 300,000l. already <203>offered. When the next session began it would be open to the King to say, if he thought fit, that he had found the enterprise more arduous than he had expected; and it would be Neither party bound for the future.equally open to the Commons to say that they declined to support any particular policy which the Crown had resolved to adopt. The blind confidence which Charles afterwards demanded was neither offered nor assumed on either side, even in the event of the autumn session taking place. Still less could it be fairly expected, if the meeting of the Houses were delayed, that the Commons would sanction without inquiry any further expenditure on which the Crown might have entered upon its own responsibility.
For the present, however, there was little thought of future complications. On the afternoon after the King’s declaration, Public rejoicings.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 bulwarks of religion and liberty.
Whilst the bonfires were blazing in the streets, some of the servants of the Spanish embassy in the Strand were foolish enough The Spaniards insulted.to crowd to the windows 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 March 24.Buckingham’s motion, the Lords resolved that an attempt should be made to discover the offenders. In the Commons March 25.other feelings prevailed. Two 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.[343]
<204>If Buckingham had still some regard for decorum, Charles shared the popular feeling to the full. Whilst James’s decision was still March 18.The Prince rejects a present from the Countess Olivares.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.[344]
A king’s son, it thus appeared, could be lamentably deficient in the elements of good breeding. The day before this exhibition of discourtesy March 17.Lafuente robbed of his despatches.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 Lafuente was travelling near Amiens, his 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 property untouched. The affair was never subjected to any serious investigation, but Lafuente believed that the culprits were Frenchmen employed by the Marquis of Hamilton, whose intimacy with Buckingham made it unlikely that the outrage had been committed without the knowledge of the Lord Admiral.[345] If so, and if Lafuente’s instructions were in <205>Buckingham’s hands on the 19th or 20th; and if again, as there can be no doubt was the case, they contained no offer that Philip would draw sword in defence of Frederick’s rights in the Palatinate, we have a sufficient explanation of James’s announcement on the 23rd that the treaties were to be dissolved. He had hesitated as long as he thought it possible that Lafuente, whose coming had been for some time expected, might bring the engagement which he hoped. When he knew that nothing of the kind was to be expected, it was impossible for him any longer to resist the wishes of his son and his Parliament.
On the 29th Lafuente was admitted to the King’s presence together with the two ambassadors, but he had no credentials to present, and The treaties with Spain denounced.a letter from the King of Spain which he had with him when he left Madrid was equally missing. He, therefore, contented himself with inveighing against Buckingham’s insolence in Spain, without saying anything about the present intentions of his master. According to the jest of the day, he had only come to give extreme unction to the dying treaties.[346] To the ambassadors James spoke at some length. He told them that the negotiation had been broken off because the Spanish offers were vague and insufficient. If even now, at the last moment, Philip would promise to support with his arms a fair settlement in the Palatinate, such an offer would be thankfully accepted, whether the Parliament were pleased or not. The Prince, who was well aware that Philip would never give such a promise, expressed himself satisfied with this announcement, whilst Buckingham in vain challenged Lafuente to declare the substance of the instructions which he had lost.[347]
The inability of the Spaniards to give hopes of their master’s armed intervention in the Palatinate seems to have removed the last hesitation from James’s mind. As soon as they left the room their places were taken by Dutch commissioners, who <206>had come over to discuss the terms on which English military Reception of the Dutch commissioners.assistance should be given to the States-General. Their reception was eminently favourable. The King assured them of his strong desire both to maintain the independence of their country, and to regain the lost Palatinate.[348]
The Commons had now leisure to turn their attention to the subject to which, next to the war with Spain, they attached the Bitter feeling against the Catholics.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 earlier years of James’s reign, were capable of embracing samething of the idea of toleration. The men who were looked up to in the Parliaments of 1621 and 1624 — Pym, Eliot, and Phelips — closed their hearts against the very thought. The reason of this difference is not difficult to discover. The Roman Catholic creed was no longer a mere religious error, endangering, according to the common belief, the souls of men, but accompanied 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 in its favour upon the Danube or the Rhine, had found an echo in English hearts, more especially as it had gained vantage-ground in the concessions which Spain had wrung from the impolitic compliance of an English sovereign. 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, the best and wisest spirits of the age were crying out, not merely for the exclusion of Spanish influence, but for the administration of the English law, as far as their Roman Catholic fellow-subjects were concerned, in a harsh and intolerant spirit.
In all that was happening 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 <207>repulse which they had met, nothing more than the result of the overbearing self-will of Buckingham. It was not hard Spanish intrigues.for them to construct out of rumour, partly true and partly false, the idea that the King was held in actual physical durance, by the arts of his favourite and his son, and they imagined that if they could only succeed for an instant in gaining the ear of James, the whole monstrous edifice which Buckingham had constructed would topple down of itself.
Their first difficulty arose from their knowledge that they were never allowed to see James in private. When they were 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 The King is asked to see Carondelet in private.they determined to ‘break through at the earliest opportunity.’ On March 29, the day on which they were summoned to hear from the King’s lips the announcement that negotiations were at an end, whilst Inojosa engaged the Prince and Buckingham in conversation, Coloma 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 the King would give a private audience to Carondelet, who had already served as a medium of the secret communications between the King and the ambassadors. The audience was granted on April 1, and April 1.Carondelet’s audience.James explained to Carondelet, as he had explained to the ambassadors before, that he had no thought of breaking with Spain if he could have the assurances for which he had persistently asked. Nothing that Carondelet could say had any effect to draw him from this position. The restitution of his children, he said, was of all things next to his heart. He was engaged to effect it by his honour, his reputation, and his promises. If the King of Spain would not comply with his request, he must use the forces which God had put into his hands to effect his object. “In no way,” James ended by saying, “will I suffer any further delay. I wish to be prepared for peace, if it is possible to have it, and also for war, if it is forced upon me. With Spain I do not at <208>all wish to fight, but rather to keep up a good correspondence and friendship with her.” The Spanish delays, he added, were what they had always been. The King of Spain and his ministers would one day be sorry that they had let slip the opportunity of the Prince’s visit to make a firm alliance with England. Carondelet was glad to turn the conversation, and contrived before he left to assure James 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 animosities of the favourite.[349]
On the morning of April 3, Lafuente saw the King. He dwelt, as Carondelet had done, on Buckingham’s overbearing conduct, April 2.Lafuente’s audience.and uttered loud warnings against the folly of embarking on a war in which England was unlikely to meet with the success which she sanguinely expected.[350]
There was enough of general truth in the charge to make James excessively uncomfortable. He must have known that, even if it were 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 Buckingham, who had he knew not how many devils within him since that journey.’
The proceedings in Parliament added to the King’s vexation. On April 3, the day on which Petition against the recusants: James’s objections.he had received Lafuente’s complaint against Buckingham, a petition was sent up by the Lords asking for the full execution of the penal laws against the recusants, and a request was added to it, ‘that upon no occasion of marriage or <209>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 recusants.’[351]
To the last clause James had no objection to make. He had learned something from past experience, and he had resolved not to complicate the French treaty with any of those stipulations for the English Catholics which had hampered him so terribly in his negotiations with Spain; but the demand for the full execution of the penal laws annoyed him. He had no well-defined theory on the subject of toleration, and as his practice in 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 Catholic countries.
As often happened with James, his vexation threw him violently into a course opposite to that which he had previously taken. He recalls his despatch breaking off the treaties.He ordered the courier who had 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 resolution not to make this a war of religion.”[352]
Although the decision which James appeared to have taken, to put an end to the negotiation with Spain, was thus once more exposed to uncertainty, he was not prepared to give full credence to the charges brought by Carondelet and Lafuente. He informed the Spanish ministers that, if they expected him to take any steps against the Duke, they must first prove their allegations.[353]
<210>Carondelet fancied that the secret of his interview with the King was in safe keeping; but in spite of his clerical character April 3.Carondelet betrayed to Williams.his morals were loose.[354] His mistress was in the pay of Williams, who, provided that he could get important information, cared little what means he employed to obtain it. To Williams the discovery afforded a splendid opportunity of strengthening his interests at Court. It was true that he had been assured by Buckingham 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 exhibiting his devotion.
Williams went first to the Prince. “In my studies of divinity,” he said, after explaining how he had come by his knowledge, “I have April 5.Williams informs the Prince.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.”
After some consideration, it was resolved that Buckingham should go to Theobalds, to feel his ground with the King,[355] whilst Williams remained in London, to probe Carondelet’s secret to the bottom. He ordered the immediate arrest of a <211>priest whom he knew to be specially intimate with the archdeacon. April 7.Gains further information from Carondelet.As he expected, Carondelet was not long in asking leave to plead for his friend’s life. Late at night, to escape observation, he came to the Deanery at Westminster. At first he found Williams obdurate. How could mercy be shown whilst Parliament, with its watchful eye, was still in session? Carondelet caught at the word Parliament. 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.[356]
As soon as Carondelet was gone, Williams sat down and wrote off for Buckingham an account of all that had passed.[357] Buckingham informed.A few evenings later Carondelet returned with further information, and Williams was able to 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, April 6.The final breach with Spain.the day before Carondelet’s first interview with Williams, the delayed despatch announcing the final breach of the negotiations with Spain was at last sent off — a step which would hardly have been taken if the <212>impression made by Carondelet and Lafuente on the King had not been already removed.[358]
This despatch, written and rewritten several times, announced that the proposition made in January by the Spanish ambassadors could not be accepted. James would never consent to his grandson’s education at the Emperor’s court, nor would he <213>be satisfied with anything less than a direct engagement that Spain would assist his son-in-law by force of arms if diplomacy should fail. 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 example that any king hath refused the council 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,[359] he did not countermand the sending of a letter of Conway’s in the same packet, in which the ambassador at Madrid was directed to assure Philip that, though James had promised to listen to the advice of his Parliament, he had never promised to follow it.[360]
Such a reservation could have but little result. The one fact of importance was that the Spanish intrigue had failed, and Nature of Buckingham’s influence over James.the treaties were at last abandoned. In all that had passed the 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. Yet it was surely not merely owing to the personal ascendency of Buckingham that James at last shook off the influence of the Spanish ambassadors. <214>What he asserted in his despatch was nothing more than what he had said plainly to Carondelet. He broke off the treaties because the King of Spain had given him no reason to suppose that he intended to assist him in the forcible recovery of the Palatinate. James may perhaps have retained a lingering hope that Philip might still be moved to give the required promise, but to all except himself the breach thus made was final and irreparable.
Buckingham’s sanguine and incisive temper had carried him safely up to this point. Would it serve him equally well when Difficulties still to be met.he came to proceed to positive action? It is far easier to put an end to negotiations than to conduct a war. He would 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 complete, he was on the side of the King against Parliament in wishing to make a close alliance with France the main feature of his foreign policy. That he was 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.
[293] Conway to the Prince of Orange, Conway to Carleton, Jan. 9⁄19, S. P. Holland.
[294] Tillières to Puisieux, Dec. 30⁄Jan. 9, Jan. 8⁄18, 17⁄27, Harl. MSS. 4593, fol. 3, 16, 25 b.
[295] Inojosa to Philip IV., Jan. 13⁄23, 14⁄24, Madrid Palace Library. Compare Valaresso to the Doge, Jan. 16⁄26, Jan. 23⁄Feb. 2, Venice Transcripts, with Siri, Memorie Recondite, v. 568; and Chamberlain to Carleton, Jan. 17; Court and Times, ii. 446.
[296] Salvetti’s News-Letter, Dec. 26⁄Jan. 5.
[297] 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. After the King left Whitehall, i.e. on Jan. 13, we know that consultations took place. There is a curious draft of a letter (S. P. Spain), perhaps drawn up by Buckingham, as what he wished the King to say, and not accepted by James.
[298] Inojosa to Philip IV., Jan. 14⁄24, Madrid Palace Library. Tillières to Puisieux, Jan. 17⁄27, Harl. MSS. 4593, fol. 26 b.
[299] Hacket, i. 169.
[300] Chichester to Buckingham, Jan. 25, Cabala, 197.
[301] Tillières to Puisieux, Jan. 31⁄Feb. 10, Harl. MSS. 4593, fol. 35. Valaresso to the Doge, Jan. 30⁄Feb. 9, Ven. Transcripts. Hacket’s list of the Commissioners is incorrect.
[302] Inojosa to Philip IV., Jan. 21⁄31, Madrid Palace Library.
[303] Inojosa to Philip IV., Jan. 29⁄Feb. 8, Madrid Palace Library.
[304] Chamberlain to Carleton, Jan. 31, S. P. Dom. clviii. 72. Valaresso to the Doge, Jan. 30⁄Feb. 9, Feb. 6⁄16, Ven. Transcripts.
[305] Tillières to Puisieux, Jan. 31⁄Feb. 10, Harl. MSS. 4593, fol. 35.
[306] Inojosa to Philip IV., Feb. 10⁄20, Madrid Palace Library.
[307] Valaresso to the Doge, Jan. 30⁄Feb. 9, Ven. Transcripts.
[308] Rusdorf, Mémoires, i. 156–239. Inojosa to Philip IV., Feb. 12⁄22, Madrid Palace Library.
[309] Valaresso to the Doge, Feb. 6⁄16, Ven. Transcripts.
[310] These are the only Parliament names in the commission (Rymer, xvii. 531), or in Chamberlain’s contemporary letters.
[311] Salvetti’s News-Letter, Feb. 13⁄23.
[312] Hacket is quite mistaken in supposing (i. 174) that there is an error in the date of the curious letter in which Williams advised Buckingham to <183>accept the office of Lord Steward. It was written after Hamilton’s death in 1625, and will be noticed in its proper place.
[314] Lords’ Journals, iii. 220.
[315] Commons’ Journals, i. 718.
[316] Forster, Sir J. Eliot, i. 70, 71.
[317] Forster, Sir J. Eliot, i. 135.
[318] Mr. Forster thought (Sir J. Eliot, i. 143) that the speeches of Alford and Phelips leave little doubt that they had received private communications 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. Dom. clix.), of which Mr. Forster 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.
[319] Inojosa to Philip IV., Feb. 26⁄March 7, Madrid Palace Library. Coloma to <189>the King, Feb. 28⁄Mar. 9, Harl. MSS. 1583, fol. 329. Valaresso to the Doge, March 5⁄15, Ven. Transcripts. Elsing’s Notes (1624–6) 2. Lords’ Journals, iii. i. 233; Commons’ Journals, i. 721.
[320] Elsing’s Notes (1624–1626), 5.
[321] There is no direct evidence of this; but the fact that he opened the three debates of March 1, 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.
[322] Rudyerd’s speech, S. P. Dom. clx. 8.
[323] In the next year he stated that he had not received instructions from either. Probably his intercourse was with Pembroke.
[324] Commons’ Journals, i. 674, 722; Nicholas’s Notes.
[325] Lords’ Journals, iii. 246.
[326] Buckingham’s letter (Hardwicke S. P. i. 460) is undated, but the reference to the cold authorises me to place it here. On March 6, Tillières writes that the King had received the petition, “ayant retardé deux jours à les voir, s’excusant sur un rheum.” (Harl. MSS. 4593, fol. 128 b.); and Salvetti, in his News-Letter of the 5th, refers to the same circumstance.
[327] It is printed (Hardwicke S. P. i. 467) as a postscript to a letter with which it has no connection, except that it has been placed next to it by the collector 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 <193>exchequer, must have been made before the King’s speech of the 5th, in which that suggestion was adopted. If, therefore, it did not actually accompany Buckingham’s letter, it must have been sent about the same time.
[328] Lords’ Journals, iii. 253.
[329] Carondelet’s Report, March 9⁄19, Madrid Palace Library.
[330] There are two reports of this session in the Journals. According to the second, Wentworth of Oxford spoke of Germany (i. 732). But the first report (i. 692) substitutes ‘The Low Countries,’ and is evidently right in doing so.
[331] “Una de las cosas con que Boquingan ha ganado al Principe ha sido con decille quo quiere hacelle el mos poderoso Rey que aya tenido Inglaterra, y la forma que le ha propuesto para ello, ayudado del Secretario Conue, qu’es muy platico de las cosas de Olanda, es que se procure quel Parlamento aconseje la guerra como ya lo ha hecho, con que sera mayor la obligacion que le correra de dar para ella, y que se comiençe a levantar gente y fortificar los puertos y guarneçellos y prevenir armada, y que no bastando como no bastaran los subsidios con que sirven en tales ocasiones para guardar estos Regnos y divertir a V. Magd. y sustentar un exercito para la recuperacion del Palatinado, sera facil cosa despues, con pretexto de acudir a todos estos, reducir al Reyno como quien persuadio la guerra, à que se introdúzgan sobre los bastimientos, haciendas y mercaderias al exemplo de lo que han hecho en Olanda las mismas scissas que allí y con que podra quedalle esta renta perpetua, fortificarse y sobralle dineros para lo que quisiere intentar, y para mantener un golpe de gente estrangera en este Reyno con que tener en freno à los dèl y los Puritanos, sin subjetarse como ay esta el Rey à ellos, y ha que para qualquiera poca ayuda se aya de poner en manos del Parlamento. El Principe lo ha creido y lo tiene por muy reuscibile.” — Inojosa to Philip IV., March 7⁄17, Madrid Palace Library.
[332] Elsing’s Notes (1624–1626), 25.
[333] Valaresso to the Doge, March 19⁄29, Ven. Transcripts. Prince’s speech to the Commons, March 12, Madrid Palace Library.
[334] Lords’ Journals, lii. 265.
[335] D. Carleton to Carleton, Sir R. Cotton to T. Cotton, March 17, S. P. Dom. clx. 19, 20; Valaresso to the Doge, March 19⁄20, Ven. Transcripts.
[336] Hardwicke S. 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.
[337] Lords’ Journals, iii. 266. Valaresso to the Doge, March 19⁄29, Ven. Transcripts. Account of a conversation between the King and Buckingham, S. P. Dom. clx. 80.
[338] Carlisle, who was to go as ambassador to negotiate it.
[339] Nethersole to Carleton, March 31, S. P. Dom. clxi. 61.
[340] Commons’ Journals, i. 740. Nicholas’s Notes.
[341] The comparison sometimes made between the incidence of a subsidy and that of our present income-tax, is altogether misleading. As far as land was concerned, 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 subsidy. The <201>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?
[342] Lords’ Journals, iii. 275.
[343] Lords’ Journals, iii. 280. Commons’ Journals, i. 750.
[344] Chamberlain to Carleton, March 20, S. P. Dom. clxi. 4. Salvetti’s News-Letter, March 26⁄April 5.
[345] Lafuente to Philip IV., March 21⁄31, Madrid Palace Library. Francisco de Jesus, 97.
[346] Valaresso to the Doge, April 2⁄12, Ven. Transcripts.
[347] Inojosa to Philip IV., March 29⁄April 8. Lafuente to Philip IV., March 30⁄April 9, Madrid Palace Library.
[348] Lafuente to Philip IV., March 30⁄April 9, Madrid Palace Library.
[349] Carondelet’s Report, April 1⁄11, Madrid Palace Library. Valaresso to the Doge, April 1⁄11, Ven. Transcripts.
[350] Lafuente to Philip IV., April 4⁄14, Madrid Palace Library.
[351] Lords’ Journals, i. 289.
[352] The King to Conway, April 3. Printed without a date in Rushworth, i. 140.
[353] There are two forms of the account of these transactions, which was given afterwards by Carondelet to Williams (Cabala, 275, and Hacket, i. 195). I suspect them both to relate to the same conversation, though the notes given by Hacket are treated by him as an abstract of the paper subsequently given by Inojosa to James. Hacket’s story, as usual, is in <210>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 afterwards, when the King was at Windsor, which will be given in their proper place.
[354] The Spanish embassy stood in no good repute since Inojosa’s arrival. Tillières is not a very satisfactory authority against it. But even his outrageous statement about Inojosa that ‘n’étant pas content de débaucher les filles et femmes Catholiques, il se fait servir des prêtres et confesseurs de maqueraux,’ throws some light on the probability of the truth of the story about Carondelet. Tillières to Ville-aux-Clercs, Feb. 7⁄17, Harl. MSS. 4593, fol. 46 b.
[355] Hacket gives a wrong date, and sends Buckingham to Windsor instead of Theobalds. From the Lords’ Journals we know that Buckingham was in his place on 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.
[356] Hacket, 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 had already been brought to the Deanery by other affairs was unimportant. Hacket is most confused in dates, and often mixes up different stories, but I do not think that either he or Williams were likely to invent the story.
[357] Cabala, 275.
[358] 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 Harl. 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 (1) 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 himself 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 understood that there was, though [?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. I answered I would pursue any fair course that should be proposed that way; but, for myself, that I never meddled with matters of state of this nature, but was only employed before this journey of the Prince’s in matters of mine own 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 innocence.
<213>“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 Speeches passed between his Lordship and Don Francisco. — 11 April, 1623.” [Sic].
[359] 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. Spain.
[360] Conway to Aston, April 3. Date corrected to April 8. S. P. Spain.