CHAPTER V. LIFE OF ROBERT, EARL OF ESSEX - continued. WESTMINSTER HALL AT THE TRIAL OF ESSEX AND SOUTHAMPTON. -THEIR ARRAIGNMENT. CONFESSIONS OF THEIR COMPANIONS. - BACON'S SPEECH AND BEHAVIOUR.—ESSEX'S SPEECH, AND CONDEMNATION.― MR. ASHTON OBTAINS A CONFESSION. — CHAM BERLAIN'S ACCOUNT. - LADY ESSEX'S LETTER TO CECYLL, WHO RELENTS.—RALEGH'S LETTER, URGING THE DEATH OF ESSEX.THE STORY OF THE RING CONSIDERED, WITH THE SUBSEQUENT REGRET OF ELIZABETH. — THE QUEEN'S INDECISION. -ORDER OF EXECUTION SENT.-LAST HOURS AND DEATH OF ESSEX. THE 19th February, 1601, was appointed for the arraignment of the Earls of Essex and Southampton. For their trial a court was made in Westminster Hall: a raised platform, about two yards high and six yards square, was erected at the upper end of the hall; the seat of the Lord Steward on the west side towards the King's Bench; on each side seats covered with green cloth for the Peers; in the middle a table covered with green cloth, after the manner of the Exchequer, with seats round it for the Judges and Counsel; on the north side a little square space was cut for the Serjeant of the Mace; at the east end was the bar where the prisoners stood. Lord Buckhurst, the Lord High Steward for the time being, preceded by the King of Arms bearing the white staff, and accompanied by seven Serjeants with maces, having taken his seat, the Constable and the Lieutenant of the Tower produced the prisoners, who were preceded by a porter bearing the axe, with its edge turned from them. On meeting at the bar the Earls kissed each other's hands, and embraced cheerfully. Silence having been proclaimed, the Clerk of the Crown read the commission, and the precept containing the names of the Peers of Robert, Earl of Essex, and Henry, Earl of Southampton. Proclamation being then made that all Earls, Viscounts, and Barons summoned do answer to their names, the Lords were called as follows: Edward, Earl of Oxford. Henry, Lord Stafford. Thomas, Lord Grey de Wilton. Thomas, Lord Lumley. Thomas, Lord Burghley. Thomas, Lord Howard de The Judges were the Lord Chief Justices Popham, and Anderson, L. C. Baron Sir William Periam, Justices Gawdie, Fenner, Walmesley, Warburton, Kingsmill, and Mr. Baron Clarke. Essex asked the Chief Justice whether, like any common person, they might challenge those of the Peers whom they knew to be their professed enemies : being answered in the negative, he said he was contented when the Lord Grey was called, he pulled Southampton by the sleeve and laughed.1 They were then ordered to hold up their hands while the indictment was read: the Earl of Essex first cast up his hand with a bold countenance, and said, "I have held it up to a better purpose, and thought to have done so again." During the reading of the indictment, to which he paid great attention, “he did very often show divers gestures "with much smiling in countenance, and often whis"pering to his companion; acting also a vehement passion of admiration, with holding up his hands "and shaking his head, blessing himself, as it were, "at the strangeness of those accusations, though "silent the whole time, not uttering one word of in"terruption." Serjeant Yelverton opened the prosecution in a speech of great moderation, showing that whoever is guilty of rebellion is guilty of an intention to seek the death of the Prince, which is treason, and that the punishment of treason is death. He ended his 1 Lord Grey had been committed to the custody of the Marshal, while in Ireland, for having given some orders to a colonel of horse, without permission of Southampton, General of the Horse. This bred a quarrel ; but the Queen prevented a duel, and commanded them not to meddle with each other; notwithstanding which Grey set upon Southampton in the Strand, one day in January, 1600; the former having many followers, the latter only a footboy, who lost his hand in the encounter; nevertheless Southampton contrived to defend himself till succour arrived. For this Lord Grey was committed to the Fleet. speech with a prayer, that God might long preserve Her Majesty, and guard her from her enemies; to which Essex and Southampton replied, "Amen, and "God confound their souls that ever wished other"wise to her sacred person.' The Attorney General, Sir Edward Coke, succeeded, who, in his usual coarse and brutal style, endeavoured to aggravate the offence of the pri soners. The declaration of the Lord Keeper, Lord Chief Justice, and Earl of Worcester, was read and attested by the two latter, and the examination of one Henry Witherington, who had accompanied the Earls into the city, and left them there, was also proved. Essex said that they were charged by the Attorney with having dealt with Papists: he desired to assure their Lordships that Papists had been hired and suborned to bring him into danger, and that his handwriting had been counterfeited with the like purpose. The last assertion referred to the following circumstance. While Essex was in the custody of the Lord Keeper, the Countess gave a casket of letters (for purpose of concealment in case her husband's papers should be seized) to the wife of one John Daniel, who had been her gentlewoman, to keep them for her. Jane Daniel says1, that about the 18th October, In a MS. book written by Jane Daniel, and entitled "Daniel's Disasters," which has lately been discovered in the Chapter House, Westminster, with a privy seal attached, authorising the printing of the said book, in the reign of James I., it appears that Jane Daniel was the daughter of François Kethulle, Lord of Ryhove, in Flanders, Governor and Highbailiff 1599, the Countess of Essex committed to her charge a "casket of a reasonable bigness," keeping the key herself, and saying there were only letters therein. About the 7th January, 1600, Lady Essex sent for the casket again: "the next day after the casket "was delivered, her L. came to my house and told me that she missed some of her letters out of it; "and being answered by me that I never touched แ แ any of her letters, my husband was called forth of "his bed, and after some conference between them, "she desired that we would make some search in the "house among the servants; and went away de"livering some expressions of discontent against my "husband." On the 24th February, Lady Essex wrote to Mrs. Daniel, that she understood her husband had the letters, adding, "let him bring them to แ me, and my Lord and I will be better and more "kind to him than ever we were;" and, in a postscript, desires her to use her best endeavour with her husband: which, says she, "I did, but, if the depth of this matter were well known, I received "the like success that Volumnia had in persuading "her son Coriolanus to raise the siege from Rome, "for he whom I persuaded to shun Scylla fell upon "Charybdis." Daniel was at the time on duty at the Court in some post which doubtless was obtained for him by the master he was betraying. He wrote of Ghent and Dendermond, who, meeting with misfortunes, partly on account of his religion, died in poverty, and his daughter was taken into the service of Lady Essex, at that time wife to Sir Philip Sidney; and remained with her until she became the wife of John Daniel, of Deeresbury, or Dewsbury, in Cheshire, who was in Essex's service. 66 |