patent for the monopoly of sweet wines, declaring that "the ungovernable beast must be stinted in his provender." This last act of severity deeply wounded the haughty spirit of Essex, and caused him to abandon all hope of regaining the royal favour. His rage and despair seem to have brought him almost to the verge of insanity. Among other rash sayings, he declared that "the queen was cankered, and that her mind had become as crooked as her body," a speech which Sir Walter Raleigh affirms cost him his head. He listened to the rash and desperate advice of some of his associates to remove his enemies by force from the queen's council, and made his house the resort of all who were dissatisfied with the government. A summons to appear before the council, 7th February, 1601, brought matters to a crisis, and induced him to adopt a course characterized by almost incredible madness and folly. At the head of about three hundred gentlemen and retainers, he marched next day into the city, and attempted to create an insurrection in his favour, but not one man would take up arms. He therefore returned to Essex house, but after a short defence was compelled to surrender, and was committed to the Tower. He was brought to trial on a charge of treason on the 19th of February, condemned, and executed on the 25th.
Thus perished, in the thirty-fourth year of his age, the victim of his own ill-regulated passions and misdirected ambition, a nobleman who has been justly termed "the ornament of the court and of the camp, the model of chivalry, the munificent patron of genius, whose great virtues, great courage, great talents, the favour of his sovereign, the love of his countrymen, all that seemed to insure a happy and glorious life, led to an early and an ignominious death." He was frank, generous, amiable, and affectionate; his personal accomplishments were of the highest order; and he was not only the best of all Elizabeth's favourites, but by far the most attractive hero of her reign. But his many great and good qualities were marred by his pride, vanity, ambition, and rashness. He enjoyed the rare distinction of being at once the favourite of the sovereign and the idol of the people. His death embittered the brief remainder of Elizabeth's reign, and in the opinion of not a few about her, shortened its duration. Essex left by his wife three sons—two of whom died in their infancy—and two daughters. His eldest son—
Robert Devereux, third earl of Essex, was born in 1592. He was educated first at Eton, and then at Merton college, Oxford, where the learned Sir Henry Saville, the warden, took charge of his education. On the accession of James in 1603, the young earl was restored to his hereditary honours, and was made the companion of Prince Henry, both in his studies and his amusements. On the 5th of January, 1606, he was married to Lady Francis Howard, daughter of Lord Suffolk. Owing to the extreme youth of the couple, it was arranged that the earl should spend a year or two on the continent before settling in life. When he returned to claim his wife in 1611, he found that during his absence she had contracted a violent passion for Robert Carr, Lord Rochester, afterwards earl of Somerset, the notorious favourite of King James, and refused to cohabit with her husband, until compelled to do so by her father. She lavished upon Essex the coarsest reproaches; employed magic philtres and potions, furnished by the infamous poisoner, Mrs. Turner, to further her views; and at last instituted proceedings against Essex, praying for a dissolution of their marriage, on the ground of his alleged impotence. A divorce was ultimately obtained through the influence of the king, who was anxious to gratify his worthless favourite, and the countess was soon after married to Rochester—(see Sir Thomas Overbury). Disgusted with the treatment he had received, Essex retired to his house at Chartley, where he lived in seclusion until the breaking out of the Thirty Years' war, when he raised a company and joined the volunteers who in 1620 went to the assistance of the elector palatine, the king's son-in-law. Essex returned to England in the winter for the purpose of obtaining reinforcements; but failing in this object, he went to serve as a volunteer under Maurice, prince of Orange, in Holland, and gained considerable distinction as a gallant soldier. A few months after the death of James, Essex was invited to England to take the command of a regiment, and was appointed vice-admiral of a fleet which was employed in an unsuccessful expedition against Spain. In 1630 he ventured to marry a second time, but the result was again unfortunate. His new countess, a daughter of Sir William Paulet, bore him one son, who died in infancy; but owing to some alleged familiarities between her and Mr. Uvedale, a young courtier, a separation ensued, after their union had lasted for six years. In 1639, when the Scottish nation took up arms in defence of their rights against the ecclesiastical innovations of Charles and Laud, Essex was made lieutenant-general of the army which the king levied for the purpose of suppressing the northern insurrection. A truce was, however, speedily concluded, "and Essex, who," says Clarendon, "had merited very well throughout the whole affair, and had never made a false step in action or in council, was discharged in the crowd without ordinary ceremony;" and soon after an additional affront was put upon him by Charles, who seems to have inherited his father's dislike of the cold, stern, and stately general. Essex was one of the twelve peers, who in 1640 signed a petition to the king that he would summon a parliament for redress of the public grievances. He was also one of the commissioners appointed to treat with the Scots at Ripon; and when, after the downfall of Strafford, Charles wished to conciliate the parliament, he made Essex lord-chamberlain. The earl, however, had no reason to favour the court; and when matters came to extremity between the king and the parliament, he cast in his lot with the movement party. Charles, on leaving London suddenly, after the failure of his insane attempt to arrest the five members, called upon Essex to follow him, and, enraged at his refusal, instantly deprived him of all his offices. The earl, whose popularity and influence were now very great, was appointed general of the parliamentary army, 12th July, 1642, and was in consequence proclaimed a traitor by the king. He commanded at the indecisive battle of Edgehill, 23rd October, 1642; in the following year took Reading, raised the siege of Gloucester, and fought the bloody battle of Newbury, in which Falkland was killed. In the campaign of 1644, in compliance with the decision of a council of war, he marched into Cornwall in the hope of obtaining recruits; and being followed and hemmed in by the king at the head of a greatly-superior army, he was obliged to make his escape by sea from Fowey, while his infantry capitulated. His cavalry, however, forced their way through the king's army. The languid proceedings of the parliamentary generals were now loudly condemned; and the extreme party soon after succeeded in carrying the "self-denying ordinance," which excluded the members of either house of parliament from holding any command in the army. Essex on this resigned his office of general (2nd April, 1645); and the parliament resolved that for his services he should receive £10,000 a year, and be raised to the rank of a duke. He did not long survive his retirement, having died of a fever, 14th September, 1646, in the fifty-fifth year of his age. He was interred with great state in Westminster abbey. Clarendon says, Essex "was of a rough, proud nature, the most popular man of the kingdom, and the darling of the swordmen;" and admits that he was a man of incorruptible integrity, constant in his friendships, and faithful to his trust, but accuses him of vanity, ambition, and weakness of judgment. His military talents were not of a high order. He had little energy, and no originality. He was a timid politician, and probably from that cause was a dilatory, hesitating, and inefficient general, At his death the title became extinct.—J. T.
ESSEX. See Capell.
ESSEX, James, an English architect, son of a carpenter at Cambridge, born in 1723; died in 1784. He was educated at the school of King's college, where, by frequent contemplation of the chapel of that institution, he contracted that love of Gothic architecture which distinguished his career. He was employed by Bentham in 1757, to make drawings for his work on Ely cathedral, the choir and other parts of which, as will be seen by a reference to Bentham's work, he altered in 1770 and following years. He repaired Lincoln minster, and erected there a stone altar-piece of his own designing. Besides executing some repairs at King's college chapel, his proposals for publishing the plans and sections of which are contained in Gough's Brit., he effected extensive alterations in several of the colleges at Cambridge, constructed a monumental cross at Ampthill in memory of Catherine of Arragon, and carried out improvements in the ancient mansion at Maddingley in Cambridgeshire. His designs for new buildings at King's, Benet (Corpus Christi), and Emmanuel colleges, and for a new public library at Cambridge, were engraved in 1739-1752. Essex pursued archæological studies with great ardour, and numbered among his friends Gray the poet, Horace Walpole, Gough, and Tyson. As a mem-
