and firmly in the interest of Government. Neither his wife, his mother, nor any of his relations or friends were suffered to see him after he went to the Tower, or have any communication with him. It was industriously published by the Court, that the earl especially desired to have a private execution; but the fact was, that the ministers took all means to prevent the earl speaking on the scaffold except just what they wanted. The day before the execution, Cecil, Egerton, and Buckhurst wrote to Lord Thomas Howard, Constable of the Tower, forbidding him to admit a single individual except such as they furnished with an order; some seven or eight noble men, they informed him, Her Majesty wished to be there whom she would name, and two "discreet" divines, who would bring an order from the Archbishop of Canterbury. The constable and lieutenant were to take all possible care and circumspection that the earl should confine himself exclusively in his speech to his confession of his treason, his offences to God, and his repentance. If he attempted to break off into any other particulars they were at once to stop him. These are amply sufficient proofs that the earl's confession was not his free and honest declaration, and that it was in his power to say things most damning to the queen and Government. When Elizabeth's ambassador informed Henry IV. that Essex had petitioned to die in private, he exclaimed, "Nay, rather the contrary, as he desired nothing more than to die in public." Being thus gagged, the earl was allowed to say that his offence was a great, bloody, crying, and infectious sin, and to ask pardon of God and the queen, and his head was severed at three strokes from his body. He was buried in the Tower chapel, near the Duke of Norfolk and the Earl of Arundel. Raleigh says, he witnessed his execution from the armoury, as he did also those of Sir Christopher Blount and Sir Charles Davers on the 17th of March, and Sir Walter made a very profitable merchandise in the pardons of others of Essex's followers.
Essex was only thirty-three years old at his death. The character of this extraordinary man—for such he was, both in his virtues and defects—essentially unfitted him for a court. He had all the impulses and aspirations of a hero. He was generous, impulsive, and open in his disposition. Nature inspired him with the noblest sentiments, the most disinterested spirit, and unconquerable thirst of glory. As a commander, or even a statesman, in better times, he would have made the most distinguished figure. In all his military commands he was restricted by colleagues, carefully chosen, to restrain his impetuosity, or he was tied down by the caution of a Court most grovelling in its policy; yet, in almost every instance, he at once carried all opposition before him by the rapidity and enthusiasm of his actions, and won the respect and admiration of his enemies by his justice and magnanimity. The very glory which he acquired by his victory and his nobility amongst the Spaniards whom he vanquished, deepened the serpentine jealousy of his mean rivals at home. In Ireland he went to conquer by the sword, but saw at once that the natives needed not crushing but conciliating. "The Irish," he said, "are alienated from the English as well for religion as government. I would achieve pacification there by composition rather than by the sword." But this, by the Court which he served, which could not understand aims of policy so elevated, was treated as a crime, and was punished as such. He was, in that most intolerant age, a firm friend to religious toleration. Roman Catholic or Puritan were alike in his eyes Christians, and were welcomed to his house and his councils as men sincere in their own views, and, therefore, trustworthy. "The Catholics," says Carte, "venerated him for his extreme aversion to put any one to death on account of his religion." His literary genius and taste were of a high order, and make us regret that he did not rather cultivate them than the more ordinary ones of diplomacy in a period when diplomacy was one of the meanest and most dishonest of crafts. Those who would form a true estimate of his writings should consult Ellis's "Original Letters." The greatest men of his age, Shakespeare and Bacon, were his friends. He was the man who first took the great revolutionist of science, the great and little-minded Bacon, by the hand, to receive from that hand a deadly blow in his last days of mortal peril. Southampton, the friend of Shakespeare, was his most intimate associate, and risked death on his account. In person he was not distinguished by his grace or dignity; he stooped forward, danced awkwardly, and despised the elegancies of dress; yet, by the fire and brilliancy of his mind and conversation, he captivated the queen of many lovers, when age was creeping over her frozen bosom and her deadly and unforgiving disposition. The temper of Essex, like that of many men of genius, was extremely sensitive; he felt keenly and resented deeply. The sense of unadmitted wrong drove him into rash measures, which his cool and calculating rivals are said to have artfully stimulated by their spies; and he fell where such a man could only fall, because, hating disguise, he was open to attack; despising meanness, he was certain to excite its hatred. In a nobler arena Essex would have burned forth one of the fairest lights of history. As it was, the people felt and acknowledged his rare merits—those of a high-hearted, honest, and honourable man, far before his period in the breadth of his moral horizon. They seemed to desert him at the last hour because his attempt was hopeless; but they remembered him with affection, and with him departed the waning popularity of the queen. When she appeared again in public she was no longer followed by acclamations, but by a moody silence; and her ministers, who had laboured so zealously for the destruction of her noblest servant, were pursued by the undisguised scorn and abhorrence of the people.
The Government endeavoured to put down all expression of such feeling; and on the last day of February a young man named Woodhouse was hanged for speaking against the apprehension and treatment of Essex. On the 13th of March, Cuffe, the false secretary, and Merrick, the steward of Essex, were butchered at Tyburn in the usual horrid manner, as traitors. Sir Charles Davers, or Danvers, was beheaded on Tower Hill on the 18th, dying with great courage; and as soon as his body was removed Sir Christopher Blount, Essex's step-father, suffered the same fate. Sir John Davies received a year's imprisonment; Baynham purchased his life of Sir Walter Raleigh for a large sum; Lyttleton paid a fine of £10,000, and surrendered an estate of £7,000 per annum, and then only received the mitigation of being removed from Newgate to the King's Bench prison, where
