and insisted on either staying to share his peril or on his going with CAMEO XII. her. This decision hampered him, and when the Bohemian nobles urged on him to hold out the old town till their friends outside, or Bethlem Gabor from Hungary, should come to their aid, he could not resolve on endangering her, or on exposing the place to the miseries of a siege. Then it was proposed that he should go no farther than to Glatz, a strong castle where he could rally his forces; but solicitude for Elizabeth made him hurry away at once. He sent to beg that twenty-four hours might be allowed him, but only eight were granted. Count Thurm offered to defend the bridge for a whole day against the enemy to secure their retreat, but the poor King and Queen, who, if not wise, were at least unselfish, would not hear of this sacrifice. Off they set with 300 carriages, and multitudes on horseback and on foot; for all their German friends, and all the chief insurgent Czech nobility, went with them. The ladies wept and wailed, and Elizabeth's dignified fortitude was much admired; but she had been throughout unconsciously most injurious to her husband's welfarefirst by her eagerness to grasp at the Bohemian crown, next by her want of sympathy with the people, then by attracting him from the post of danger when his presence there was most important. The fugitives made for Breslau, sometimes in danger from troops of Cossacks then belonging to Hungary and in Buquoi's army, and often impeded by falls of snow or bad roads, where Elizabeth was sometimes forced to ride on a pillion behind a young English gentleman named Hopton. From Breslau, Frederick sent an express to ask his brother-in-law, the Elector of Brandenburg, to receive his wife, for there was no longer any home for her at Heidelberg. The Elector was absent, and his council discouraged her coming, lest the Emperor should be offended and refuse their master the investiture of the Duchy of Prussia. However, Elizabeth set out with sixty horse, commanded by Baron d'Hona, and safely reached the fortress of Custrin-while her husband betook himself to Moravia and Silesia to try to retrieve his cause. The English were alarmed about her, for in Holland and the Netherlands everybody believed that she had died from grief and fatigue, and engravings of her hearse were sold at Antwerp; but these were groundless reports; Elizabeth was a vigorous woman, and on the 6th of January gave birth to a son whom she named after his great-uncle, Maurice of Orange. Wit was unpitying on the misfortunes of the homeless wanderers. Placards were posted at Antwerp advertising for a lost King, lately run away, young, healthful, and rosy, with the first down on his cheeks, not of bad disposition, but coveting a kingdom at the instigation of others. A German song was made, the burden of which was"O if you know, now tell to me, Where the lost Palatine can be?" Flight of Frederick. 1620. CAMEO XII. Wanderings The pair were represented as marching about, he with a staff, she with a cradle, like beggars, and the more elegant effusions called the of Frederick unfortunate Frederick the Snow King, or the Winter King, who had and Elizamelted away. Well would it have been if the wreck of the youthful beth. happiness of the princely pair had been the only misery caused by their rashness, but sorrows and crimes innumerable were in store for the unhappy Germans. THERE was great pity and enthusiasm throughout England for the princess and her husband, who were popularly regarded as champions of the Protestant cause. The being driven from the throne of Bohemia might be only the failure of an ill-concerted attempt; but the forfeiture of the hereditary dominions, and the being driven to wander as beggars, derided by every one, stirred the hearts of all the English, and they expected the King to send forth a grand expedition for the rescue of his daughter. James was in many minds, and probably expressed his strongest sentiment when he told the Spanish ambassador, Count Gondomar, that the Palsgrave was a villain and a usurper. So timid a man was sure above all to hate the person who had been the means of bringing him into a difficulty. And a very great difficulty it was, for, even if James had not been most unwilling to offend the great House of Austria in Germany, the Netherlands, and Spain, and thus to lose all chance of his son's marriage with an Infanta, it was impossible to make war without money; and though he had contrived for six years to get on after a fashion by the help of Star Chamber penalties, forfeitures, fines on Roman Catholics and Nonconformists, customs, the sale of baronetcies and knighthoods, fees for offices of all kinds, the amount thus raised only just served to pay a small proportion of the government expenses in time of peace, besides that a good deal was swallowed up by grants to the Marquess of Buckingham and other favourites. A Parliamentary grant was an absolute necessity even to pay the present debts, and it was thought that in the present temper of the English they would make it freely for the sake of assisting their princess. So a Parliament was summoned to meet in the January of CAMEO English Perplexities. САМЕО Attack on the Favourites. 1621. 1621, the King issuing directions to the sheriffs and mayors only to let safe, loyal, and obedient men be elected as members, such men in fact as would vote all the supplies that he wanted without asking inconvenient questions about what he called the arcana imperii, or making any demands in return. On the 30th of January the Parliament assembled, and James made a speech denying all negotiations for the Spanish match, and describing the miscarriage of the "Addled Parliament" to "a strange kind of beasts called undertakers." Then he asked for money for the war on behalf of his daughter. The first thing, however, that the Commons did was to petition him to banish all Popish recusants to the distance of ten miles from London and to prohibit them from hearing mass at their own houses or in the ambassador's chapels, also to put into execution all the penal laws against them. This intolerant petition was no doubt prompted by the view that they would take part with the enemy in the religious war that was anticipated. Next they complained of the imprisonment of the members after the last Parliament, and the King was forced to apologise and declare their right to freedom of speech. Then they granted him two subsidies, which they purposely made small that he might be obliged to keep the Commons together and listen to them. He received the grant politely, declaring that he preferred it to millions less freely given, encouraged them to attend to the abolition of grievances, and declared that he should always be ready to do more than meet them half way. Probably he was sincere, for his views were generally just in the abstract, and the Commons appointed a Committee to inquire into national abuses. The first was into patents for monopolies. Among them there were three, for licensing alehouses, inspecting hostelries, and for manufacturing gold and silver thread. These were held by Sir Giles Mompesson and Sir Francis Mitchell, who had obtained them by the intercession of Buckingham's brother, Sir Edward Villiers, with whom the profits were shared, and the favourite himself had been bribed. The gold thread had been made from imported material; and the licences and inspection of alehouses and inns, which properly belonged to the justices of the peace, had been made the pretext of cruel exactions, the monopolists and their agents concealing the real powers granted to them by the patent, and fining, ruining, and imprisoning thousands of persons. Buckingham, on finding his brother attacked, proposed to the King to dissolve the Parliament; but an exceedingly clever clergyman, Dr. Williams, Dean of Westminster, made him understand what a fatal policy this would be, and as Sir Edward Villiers was safe abroad, trying to secure a retreat for the Queen of Bohemia, the prosecution was allowed to continue. Sir Giles Mompesson also made his escape out of the custody of the Sergeant-at-arms, and only Mitchell remained to endure the sentence passed by the Lords, that both should be degraded from knighthood, imprisoned for life, be fined heavily, and all their goods and chattels forfeited to the King. Mompesson was to remain in perpetual banishment, and Ben Jonson exhibited him in a satirical comedy as Sir Giles Overreach. The Parliament, encouraged by Sir Edward Coke, now flew at higher game, namely, the Lord Chancellor, Sir Francis Bacon, who had been recently created Viscount St. Albans. Few men were ever more full of ability or more disappointing in character. His works are masterpieces in ethics and philosophy, and have constantly risen in fame and importance for nearly three centuries, so that he is in some measure an English Aristotle; but while his theory was well-nigh perfect, his practice was that of a mean, selfish lawyer. It was said of him that no man of any profession or business ever talked with him without learning more of it than he knew before, and his genius anticipated many discoveries in the sciences. Modern times have even devised an idea that he was more likely to have been the real author of Shakespeare's dramas than the runaway play-actor of Stratford ! All Bacon's great gifts had not, however, prevented him from indulging in great and vain expenses. His appearance in Court pageants was as sumptuous as might have befitted a mignon of Henry III., his gardens at Twickenham were a perfect paradise, and his town abode at York House equally beautiful. When he kept his sixtieth birthday there in the January of 1621, Ben Jonson addressed him in a poem beginning.— "Hail, happy Genius of this ancient pile ! Whose even thread the Fates spin round and full All this expenditure had been maintained by an undue use of Bacon's powers as an officer of the law. Precedent had in some degree justified him, for it seems to have always been the custom that the Lord Chancellors should receive presents from the persons who had suits in their courts or who wanted to have the Great Seal affixed to documents on their behalf. Irregular and insufficient payment to officials, left to be supplemented by payments from suitors, has prevailed in most countries in their growth into civilisation, and a parsimonious monarch like Elizabeth would have thought it quite fair that her ministers should be partly paid by those whom they served. The opening given for bribery was not then perceived, and in James's time corruption was so universal that only personal animosity would direct the attack on any person in particular. Bacon had, however, for a consideration, sealed the patents for Mompesson and his companions, and this seems to have enabled his enemy Coke to direct the storm upon him. Twenty-two cases were CAMEO Impeachment of Bacon. 1621. |