Memoirs of the Court of Queen Elizabeth

by Lucy Aikin

Such in fact was the apparent cordiality between the deputy and the marshal, that a proposal passed for the marriage of Philip Sidney to the lady Penelope Devereux daughter of the earl: but if this friendship were ever sincere on the part of sir Henry, it was at least short-lived; for, writing a few months after Essex's death to Leicester respecting the earl of Ormond, whom the favorite regarded as his enemy, he says.... "In fine, my lord, I am ready to accord with him; but, my most dear lord and brother, be you upon your keeping for him; for, if Essex had lived, you should have found him as violent an enemy as his heart, power and cunning would have served him to have been; and for that their malice, I take God to record, I could brook neither of them both[79]."

Ireland was, during the whole of Elizabeth's reign, that part of her dominions which it cost her most trouble to govern, and with which her system of policy prospered the least. Without a considerable military force it was impossible to bring into subjection those parts of the country which still remained in a state of barbarism under the sway of native chieftains, or even to preserve in safety and civility such districts as were already reclaimed and brought within the English pale. But the queen's parsimony, or, more truly, the narrowness of her income, caused her perpetually to repine at the great expenses to which she was put for this service, and frequently to run the risk of losing all that had been slowly gained, by a sudden withdrawment, or long delay, of the necessary supplies. Her suspicious temper caused her likewise to lend ready ear to the complaints, whether founded or not, brought by the disaffected Irish against her officers. Sir Henry Sidney himself, the deputy whom she most favored and trusted, and continued longer in office than any other, supported as he was at court by the potent influence of Leicester and the steady friendship of Burleigh, had many causes offered him of vexation and discontent; and those who held inferior commands, and were less ably protected from the attacks of their enemies, experienced almost insupportable anxieties from counteractions, difficulties and hardships of every kind. Of these the unfortunate earl of Essex had his full share.

The hopes of improving his fortune, with which he had entered upon the service, were so far from being realized that he found himself sinking continually deeper in debt. His efforts against the rebels were by no means uniformly successful. His court enemies contrived to divert most of the succours designed him by his sovereign, and the perplexities of his situation went on accumulating instead of diminishing. The bodily fatigue which he endured in the prosecution of his designs, joined to the anguish of a wounded spirit, undermined at length the powers of his constitution, and after repeated attacks he was carried off by a dysentery in September 1576.

Essex was liberal, affable, brave and eloquent, and generally beloved both in England and Ireland. The symptoms of his disease, though such as exposure alone to the pestilential damps of the climate might well have produced, were also susceptible of being ascribed to poison; and one of his attendants, a divine who likewise professed medicine, seeing him in great pain, suddenly exclaimed, "By the mass, my lord, you are poisoned!" The report spread like wild-fire. To common minds it is a relief under irremediable misfortune to find an object for blame; and accordingly, though no direct evidence of the fact was produced, it was universally believed that some villain had administered to him "an ill drink."

As Leicester was known to be his enemy, strongly suspected of an intrigue with his wife, and believed capable of any enormity, the friends and partisans of Essex seem immediately to have pointed at him as the contriver of his death; yet I find no contemporary evidence of the imputation, except in the conduct of sir Henry Sidney on this occasion, which indicates great anxiety for the reputation of his patron and brother-in-law.

The lord-deputy was unfortunately absent from Dublin at the time of the earl of Essex's death, and before he could institute a regular examination into the manner of it, a thousand false tales had been circulated which were greedily received by the public. On his return, however, he entered into the investigation with great zeal and diligence:—the decisive test of an examination of the body was not indeed applied, for it was one with which that age seems to have been unacquainted; but many witnesses were called, reports were traced to their source and in some instances disproved, and the result of the whole was transmitted by the deputy to the privy-council in a letter which appears satisfactorily to prove that there was no solid ground to ascribe the event to any but natural causes. That the deputy himself was convinced of the correctness of this representation is seen from one of his private letters to Leicester, published long after in the "Sidney Papers."

In all probability, posterity would scarcely have heard of this imputation on the character of Leicester, had not his marriage with the widow of Essex served as corroboration of the charge, and given occasion to the malicious comments of the author of "Leicester's Commonwealth." This union, however, was not publicly celebrated till two years afterwards; and we have no certain authority for the fact of the criminal connexion of the parties during the life of the earl of Essex, nor for the private marriage said to have been huddled up with indecent precipitation on his decease.

Walter earl of Essex left Robert his son and successor, then in the tenth year of his age, to the care and protection of the earl of Sussex and lord Burleigh; but Mr. Edward Waterhouse, a person of great merit and abilities, then employed in Ireland and distinguished by the favor both of lord Burleigh and sir Henry Sidney, had the immediate management of the fortune and affairs of the minor. Of this friend Essex is related to have taken leave in his last moments with many kisses, exclaiming, "O my Ned, my Ned, farewell! thou art the faithfulest and friendliest gentleman that ever I knew." He proved the fidelity of his attachment by attending the body of the earl to Wales, whither it was conveyed for interment, and it was thence that he immediately afterwards addressed to sir Henry Sidney a letter, of which the following is an extract.

"The state of the earl of Essex, being best known to myself, doth require my travel for a time in his causes; but my burden cannot be great when every man putteth to his helping hand. Her majesty hath bestowed upon the young earl his marriage, and all his father's rules in Wales, and promiseth the remission of his debt. The lords do generally favor and further him; some for the trust reposed, some for love to the father, other for affinity with the child, and some for other causes. All these lords that wish well to the children, and, I suppose, all the best sort of the English lords besides, do expect what will become of the treaty between Mr. Philip and my lady Penelope.

"Truly, my lord, I must say to your lordship, as I have said to my lord of Leicester and Mr. Philip, the breaking off of this match, if the default be on your parts, will turn to more dishonor than can be repaired with any other marriage in England. And I protest unto your lordship, I do not think that there is at this day so strong a man in England of friends as the little earl of Essex; nor any man more lamented than his father since the death of king Edward[80]."