CHAPTER I.
DEATH OF THE EARL OF SUFFOLK--HIS ADDRESS TO THE HEADS OF HOUSES--THE OPPORTUNITY SEIZED UPON BY THE KING TO MAKE BUCKINGHAM CHANCELLOR--INDIGNATION OF THE HOUSE OF COMMONS--INJUDICIOUS CONDUCT OF THE KING, VEHEMENT DEBATES--SIR DUDLEY DIGGES AND ELIOT SENT TO PRISON--BUCKINGHAM’S MOTIVES FOR ENGAGING IN A WAR WITH FRANCE--HE ENDEAVOURS TO SEND AWAY THE QUEEN’S SERVANTS--HIS FEAR OF LOSING HIS INFLUENCE--ARRIVAL OF SOUBISE AND ROHAN--THE DUKE GOES TO DOVER--TO PORTSMOUTH--LETTERS FROM THE DUCHESS--FROM HIS MOTHER--HE SETS SAIL FOR ROCHELLE--HIS FIRST OPERATIONS SUCCESSFUL--CARE TAKEN BY HIM OF HIS TROOPS--1626-1627.
LIFE AND TIMES OF
GEORGE VILLIERS.
CHAPTER I.
Whilst these matters were in agitation, the death of the Earl of Suffolk, Chancellor of the University of Cambridge, afforded the King an opportunity of evincing his unbounded favour to the Duke of Buckingham, even whilst he lay under the very shadow of a parliamentary impeachment.
A few years previously, the unpopularity of the Duke at Cambridge had been manifested by a play, in which his measures were satirized, and which had been acted by the scholars of Ben’et College.
The ancient discipline of the University appears, indeed, to have so greatly relaxed, that in 1625-6--in compliance with a letter from the King--Lord Suffolk had found it expedient to address the Heads of Houses, whom he styled “Gentlemen, and my loving friends,” exhorting them to restore order and “consequent prosperity to their University.”
The last sentence had an ominous sound, for there were few cases in which the King thought it necessary to interfere, in which Buckingham did not prompt the royal mind to active measures.