SIR FRANCIS BACON WAITING AN AUDIENCE OF BUCKINGHAM. (See p. [470.])
Sir Walter next turned his attention to history, and commenced a History of the World, a gigantic undertaking, but no doubt one that offered great consolation to the mind of a prisoner for life, from the very fact of its immensity, thus promising to him a constant forgetfulness of his captivity, and a busy discursiveness amid the peoples of the whole globe. Such men as Burchill, who was not only a great classical scholar but a distinguished Latin poet, could furnish him with books and translations, by which means he has displayed so vast an acquaintance with Greek and Rabbinical writers. Raleigh commenced his History for the instruction of Prince Henry, who had a high regard for the author, but the death of that prince in 1612, gave a check to the undertaking, and all that Raleigh has completed extends from the Creation to about a century and a half before the Christian era.
The fall of Somerset and the rise of Buckingham awoke new hopes of liberty in Raleigh. His friends made zealous applications to the favourite, which for a time produced little effect because the true persuasive with the greedy Villiers family was not applied. In the meantime, however, Raleigh managed to interest Secretary Winwood in a grand scheme which he had for discovering and working gold mines in Guiana. Raleigh, as our readers are aware, was of a romantic and adventurous turn. The Admirals Drake, Hawkins, and Frobisher, with whom he had had the honour of defeating the Grand Armada, had brought home immense treasures from the Spanish and Portuguese territories of South America. Raleigh himself had been engaged in the scheme of settling Virginia in North America, in the year 1584, when he procured a patent from Elizabeth—a copy of one granted still earlier to his half-brother, Sir Humphrey Gilbert—with full power to discover and settle any heathen lands not already in the possession of any Christian prince. In consequence, he had equipped various expeditions to the coast of Virginia, which, however, had all proved failures, and Sir Humphrey Gilbert, who conducted one of them, lost his life at sea. Sir Walter's enterprises, which had cost him much money, were immediate failures—failures to himself and his associates, but ultimate successes to the country, for they led to the settlement of that great Federated Republic of Northern America.
But still earlier, in 1595, he had made a voyage to Guiana. The glories of Drake and the other piratical admirals, and the wondrous legend of the golden empire of Guiana, with its inconceivable affluence, and the reported splendours of its capital, Manoa, called by the Spaniards El Dorado, or the golden city, inflamed his imagination. He sailed thither, touching at Trinidad, as if on his way to Virginia; and the Spaniards, deluded by this belief, entered into friendly relations and bartered various commodities with him. But suddenly Raleigh, watching his opportunity, fell on the garrison, killed the guard, and secured the person of Berrio the governor, whom he carried away as guide to Guiana, Berrio having already settled a colony there. This transaction, which was in the true spirit of Drake and the rest, who acted in those regions as if the Spaniards were at war, though they were at entire peace with England, was one of the charges afterwards brought against him. To this Raleigh replied that Berrio, at Trinidad, had formerly made prisoners of eight Englishmen, and that to leave him at his back when he was about to ascend the Orinoco, was to have been an ass. Whether the story of the eight Englishmen was true or not, it was clearly no business of Raleigh's, and the real motive was partly the last assigned—to secure so dangerous a person as Berrio, and at the same time so valuable a guide. In fact, Raleigh, with all his genius, was never renowned for very scrupulous ideas of right and wrong, and shared in all the loose maritime notions of the age.
Thus provided, he sailed for the Orinoco and advanced up it three hundred miles in boats. He seemed to have heard many wonderful rumours of gold mines, and cities built of gold and silver and embossed with precious stones; but he discovered no magnificent Manoa, with pinnacles blazing with diamonds and rubies, nor any gold mines, only signs of gold in the mountains beyond the Spanish town of St. Thomas. He gave out to the natives that he was come to relieve them of the Spaniards, and by their assistance explored the country for a month, when the waters of the mighty Orinoco rose so suddenly and with such impetuosity, that they were carried down at the peril of their lives to their ships.
On his return, Raleigh, although he brought no riches, brought marvellous descriptions of them. Though he had seen nothing but a pleasant country and friendly natives, he did not hesitate to publish the most amazing stories to draw fresh colleagues to the enterprise. He described the country and the climate in colours of heaven, and as for its riches, "the common soldier," he said—detailing the discovery of the large, rich, and beautiful empire of Guiana, with relations of the great and golden city, Manoa—"shall here fight for gold, and pay himself, instead of pence, with plates of half a foot broad, whereas he breaks his bones in other wars for provant and penury. Those commanders and chieftains that shoot at honour and abundance, shall find here more rich and beautiful cities, more temples adorned with golden images, more sepulchres filled with treasure, than either Cortez found in Mexico, or Pizarro in Peru."
Probably Raleigh believed all this himself, on the faith of the natives; but though several expeditions went out nothing of the kind was discovered. Yet these failures in no degree abated the enthusiasm of Raleigh. He represented to objectors that the adventurers sent out were ignorant alike of the locality and of the art of conciliating the natives. Were he permitted to go, he would make Guiana to England what Peru was to Spain.