The small acquisitions gained by the sack of St. Thomas discouraged Raleigh’s companions from entering into these views; though there were many circumstances in the treaty and late transactions between the nations, which might invite them to engage in such a piratical war against the Spaniards.
When England made peace with Spain, the example of Henry IV. was imitated, who, at the treaty of Vervins, finding a difficulty in adjusting all questions with regard to the Indian trade, had agreed to pass over that article in total silence.
The Spaniards, having all along published severe edicts against the this silence in their own favor, and considered it as a tacit acquiescence of England in the established laws of Spain. The English, on the contrary, pretended that, as they had never been excluded by any treaty from commerce with any part of the king of Spain’s dominions, it was still as lawful for them to trade with his settlements in either Indies, as with his European territories. In consequence of this ambiguity, many adventurers from England sailed to the Spanish Indies, and met with severe punishment when caught; as they, on the other hand, often stole, and when superior in power, forced a trade with the inhabitants, and resisted, nay, sometimes plundered, the Spanish governors. Violences of this nature, which had been carried to a great height on both sides, it was agreed to bury in total oblivion; because of the difficulty which was found in remedying them upon any fixed principles.
But as there appeared a great difference between private adventurers in single ships, and a fleet acting under a royal commission, Raleigh’s companions thought it safest to return immediately to England, and carry him along with them to answer for his conduct. It appears that he employed many artifices, first to engage them to attack the Spanish settlements, and, failing of that, to make his escape into France: but, all these proving unsuccessful, he was delivered into the king’s hands, and strictly examined, as well as his fellow-adventurers, before the privy council. The council, upon inquiry, found no difficulty in pronouncing, that the former suspicions, with regard to Raleigh’s intentions, had been well grounded; that he had abused the king in the representations which he had made of his projected adventure; that, contrary to his instructions, he had acted in an offensive and hostile manner against his majesty’s allies; and that he had wilfully burned and destroyed a town belonging to the king of Spain. He might have been tried either by common law, for this act of violence and piracy; or by martial law, for breach of orders: but it was an established principle among lawyers,[*] that, as he lay under an actual attainder for high treason, he could not be brought to a new trial for any other crime. To satisfy, therefore the court of Spain, which raised the loudest complaints against him, the king made use of that power which he had purposely reserved in his own hands, and signed the warrant for his execution upon his former sentence.[**] [54]
* See this matter discussed in Bacon’s Letters published by
Dr Birch, p. 181.
** See note BBB, at the end of the volume.
Raleigh, finding his fate inevitable, collected all his courage and though he had formerly made use of many mean artifices, such as feigning madness, sickness, and a variety of diseases, in order to protract his examination, and procure his escape, he now resolved to act his part with bravery and resolution, “‘Tis a sharp remedy,” he said, “but a sure one for all ills,” when he felt the edge of the axe by which he was to be beheaded.[*] His harangue to the people was calm and eloquent; and he endeavored to revenge himself, and to load his enemies with the public hatred, by strong asseverations of facts, which, to say the least, may be esteemed very doubtful.[**] With the utmost indifference he laid his head upon the block, and received the fatal blow; and in his death there appeared the same great, but ill-regulated mind, which, during his life, had displayed itself in all his conduct and behavior.
* Franklyn, p. 32.
** He asserted, in the most solemn manner, that he had
nowise contributed to Essex’s death: but the last letter in
Murden’s Collection contains the strongest proof of the
contrary.
No measure of James’s reign was attended with more public dissatisfaction than the punishment of Sir Walter Raleigh. To execute a sentence which was originally so hard, which had been so long suspended, and which seemed to have been tacitly pardoned, by conferring on him a new trust and commission, was deemed an instance of cruelty and injustice. To sacrifice to a concealed enemy of England the life of the only man in the nation who had a high reputation for valor and military experience, was regarded as meanness and indiscretion; and the intimate connections which the king was now entering into with Spain, being universally distasteful, rendered this proof of his complaisance still more invidious and unpopular.
James had entertained an opinion, which was peculiar to himself, and which had been adopted by none of his predecessors, that any alliance below that of a great king was unworthy of a prince of Wales; and he never would allow any princess, but a daughter of France or Spain, to be mentioned as a match for his son.[*] This instance of pride, which really implies meanness, as if he could receive honor from any alliance, was so well known, that Spain had founded on it the hopes of governing, in the most important transactions, this monarch, so little celebrated for politics or prudence. During the life of Henry, the king of Spain had dropped some hints of bestowing on that prince his eldest daughter, whom he afterwards disposed of in marriage to the young king of France, Lewis XIII. At that time, the views of the Spaniards were to engage James into a neutrality with regard to the succession of Cleves, which was disputed between the Protestant and Popish line;[**] but the bait did not then take; and James, in consequence of his alliance with the Dutch, and with Henry IV. of France, marched[***] four thousand men, under the command of Sir Edward Cecil, who joined these two powers, and put the marquis of Brandenburgh and the palatine of Newbourg in possession of that duchy.
Gondomar was at this time the Spanish ambassador in England; a man whose flattery was the more artful, because covered with the appearance of frankness and sincerity; whose politics were the more dangerous, because disguised under the mask of mirth and pleasantry. He now made offer of the second daughter of Spain to Prince Charles; and, that he might render the temptation irresistible to the necessitous monarch, he gave hopes of an immense fortune, which should attend the princess. The court of Spain, though determined to contract no alliance with a heretic,[****] entered into negotiations with James, which they artfully protracted; and, amidst every disappointment, they still redoubled his hopes of success.[v] The transactions in Germany, so important to the Austrian greatness, became every day a new motive for this duplicity of conduct.