CHAP. X. He had turned back all he met on the road from Dartmouth or Plymouth. He could smell them almost; such had been the spoils of amber and musk among them. 'I fear that the birds be flown, for jewels, pearls, and amber; yet I will not doubt but to save her Majesty that which shall be worth the journey. My Lord, there never was such spoil! I will suppress the confluence of the buyers, of which there are above 2000.' He adds: 'I found an armlet of gold, and a fork and spoon of crystal with rubies, which I reserve for the Queen. Her Majesty's captive comes after me, but I have outrid him, and will be at Dartmouth before him.'

At Dart mouth.

Ralegh never grudged praise. He testified freely to Cecil's zeal. He wrote on September 21 from Dartmouth: 'I dare give the Queen £10,000 for that which is gained by Sir Robert Cecil coming down, which I speak without all affection, or partiality, for he hath more rifled my ship than all the rest. ' Cecil in turn, though in a more qualified tone, commended Ralegh's exertions, in a very interesting letter to Sir Thomas Heneage: 'Within one half hour Sir Walter Ralegh arrived with his keeper, Mr. Blount. I assure you, Sir, his poor servants, to the number of 140 goodly men, and all the mariners, came to him with shouts of joy; I never saw a man more troubled to quiet them. But his heart is broken, as he is extremely pensive, unless he is busied, in which he can toil terribly. The meeting between him and Sir John Gilbert was with tears on Sir John's part. But he, finding it is known that he has a keeper, whenever he is saluted with congratulations for liberty, doth answer, "No, I am still the Queen of England's poor captive." I wished him to conceal it, because here it doth diminish his credit, which I do vow to you before God is greater among the mariners than I thought for. I do grace him as much as I may, for I find him marvellous greedy to do anything to recover the conceit of his brutish offence.'

Cecil, Raleigh, and William Killigrew were appointed joint commissioners. They examined even Burgh's chests. They paid the mariners their wages. They gave 20s. in addition to

the Spoil.

each from whom they had taken pillage. On August 27, Ralegh CHAP. X. and Hawkins had jointly written to the High Admiral, asking for convoy for the carack. They computed it worth £500,000. About the middle of September Ralegh wrote to Burleigh from the Tower, that its value he estimated at £200,000. It turned out to be £141,000. Whatever it was, the general rule for distributing the value of privateer prizes was a third to the owner, a third to the victuallers, a third to the officers and crew. Elizabeth contributed 1100 tons of shipping out of 5000, and £1800 out of £18,000. So she was entitled Division of to a tenth, that is, from £20,000 to £14,000. Ralegh was ready, after negotiation with Sir George Carew, to add £80,000 for the Queen. Four score thousand pounds is more than ever a man presented her Majesty as yet. If God have sent it for my ransom, I hope her Majesty of her abundant goodness will accept it. If her Majesty cannot beat me from her affection, I hope her sweet nature will think it no conquest to afflict me.' Finally £36,000 was allowed to Ralegh and Hawkins, who between them had, they said, spent £34,000. To Lord Cumberland, who had spent only £19,000, was awarded £36,000, and £12,000 to the City of London, which had spent £6000. Ralegh, who was, he boasted, 'the greatest adventurer,' grievously complained to Burleigh. He asserted also that, while he had deprived Spain in 1591 of £300,000, he had lost in Lord Thomas Howard's voyage £1600. He reckoned up, besides, the interest he had been paying on £11,000 since the voyage began. The Queen was grasping in such matters. So, too, was her Lord Treasurer. Sir John Fortescue, Chancellor of the Exchequer, had to remonstrate: 'It were utterly to overthrow all service if due regard were not had of my Lord of Cumberland and Sir Walter Ralegh, with the rest of the Adventurers, who would never be induced to further adventure if they were not princely considered of.' He added in a courtly strain: 'And herein I found her Majesty very princely disposed.'

CHAP. XI.

CHAPTER XI.

AT HOME; AND IN PARLIAMENT. (1592-1594.)

RALEGH generally could hold his own, even in a bargain with his Queen. In 1592 his hands were tied. He had to use his prize, as he said himself, for his ransom; and it effected his purpose. Once more he was a free man, and he had much to render liberty precious and delightful. He had a bride beautiful, witty, and devoted; and in 1594 a son was born to him, whom he named Walter. He had many pursuits, and wealth which should have been abundant, though all Elizabeth's courtiers were impecunious. An important addition had been made to his possessions shortly before his disgrace. For some time after his rise he had intended to fix his country residence in Devonshire. He is said to have had a house in Mill-street, Ottery St. Mary. In 1584 he Negotiation had asked Mr. Duke, of Otterton, to sell him Hayes. His written request, which Aubrey copied, with omissions and inaccuracies due to the creases and stains undergone by the paper through careless handling, is, on uncertain authority, said to have been at one time preserved at the farmhouse. Subsequently, if not from the first, it was kept at the residence of the Duke family, Otterton House, between two and three miles off. Polwhele saw it at Otterton House shortly before 1793. Afterwards it disappeared. Dr. Brushfield found the original, as he believes, at Plymouth, in the 1888 collection of Armada and Elizabethan relics. It is the property of Miss Glubb, of Great Torrington. The letter was written from the Court, on July 26, 1584, by Mr. Duke's 'very willing frinde in all I shal be able, W. Ralegh,' and runs as follows: 'Mr Duke-I wrote to Mr Prideux to move yow for the purchase

for Hayes.

of hayes a farme som tyme in my fathers possession. I will CHAP. XI. most willingly geve yow what so ever in your conscience yow shall deeme it worth and if yow shall att any tyme have occasion to vse mee, yow Shall find mee a thanckfull frind to yow and yours. I have dealt wth Mr Sprinte for suche things as he hathe at colliton and ther abouts and he hath promised mee to dept wth the moety of otertowne vnto yow in consideration of hayes accordinge to the valew, and yow shall not find mee an ill neighbore vnto yow here after. I am resolved if I cannot 'ntreat yow, to build att colliton but for the naturall disposition I have to that place being borne in that howse I had rather seat my sealf ther then any wher els thus leving the matter att large unto Mr Sprint I take my leve resting reedy to countervail all your courteses to the vttermost of my power.'

Ralegh

His offer was not accepted, the Dukes, it is conjectured by Polwhele, not choosing to have so great a man for so near a neighbour. According to a local tradition, he carried out his alternative project of building at Colaton Ralegh, on land Colaton which he may be presumed to have bought of his father or eldest brother. In the garden of the Place he is said to have planted, as elsewhere, the first potatoes grown in England. But himself he never rooted there, though he was described as ' of Colaton Ralegh' in a deed of 1588. The royal bounty soon tempted him away; and he sold any property which had entitled him to that designation. The estate of Sherborne, which is inseparably connected with his memory, consisted of an ancient castle and picturesque park, together with several adjacent manors. It had belonged to the see of Salisbury since the time of Bishop Osmund, who cursed all who should alienate it, or profit by its alienation. Ralegh was not deterred by the threat. He is rumoured to have been impressed by the charms of the domain as he rode past it on his journeys from Plymouth to London. Towards the close of 1591 the bishopric of Salisbury, which had been vacant for three years, was filled by the appointment of Dr. Coldwell. Dean Bennett of Windsor, and Dr. Tobias Matthew, or Matthews, afterwards Bishop of

Sherborne
Castle.

CHAP. XI. Durham and Archbishop of York, father to the wit and letterwriter, Sir Toby, had declined it on account of a condition that the new Bishop must consent to part with Sherborne. Ralegh subsequently declared that he had given the Queen a jewel worth £250 'to make the Bishop.' He not rarely concerned himself about vacant bishoprics for his own purposes. His present fit of ecclesiastical zeal was explained by Dr. Coldwell's execution of a lease to the Crown in January, 1592, of Sherborne and its dependencies for ninety-nine years. A rent was reserved to the see of £260, which, according to the Bishop, was not regularly paid. The Queen at once assigned the lease to Ralegh. The manor of Banwell, which lay conveniently for the property, belonged to the see of Bath and Wells. Elizabeth demanded this of Bishop Godwin. The Bishop in his gouty old age had contracted a marriage which offended the Queen's notions of propriety, with a rich city widow. This was employed as a lever to oblige him to one of the forced exchanges for Crown impropriations which, though not illegal, friends of the Church styled sacrilege. Sir John Harington, Elizabeth's witty godson, writing in the reign of James, is fond of the term. He admits that he himself conveyed one of the sharp messages by which Elizabeth tried to obtain Banwell. Finally a compromise was effected. Godwin courageously clung to Banwell, but redeemed it by the grant in Ralegh's favour of a ninety-nine years' lease of Wilscombe.

Ralegh found occupation at Sherborne. We know something of his life there. We know, though not nearly enough, much more of it than when Gibbon assigned the absence of the 'details of private life' as a principal reason for the abandonment of his original decision to take Ralegh for his literary theme. It was varied and animated. He pursued amusement and business with equal earnestness. In his - Farewell to the Court, which foreshadows the sentiment of this period, though probably written earlier, he mourns for his 'sweet spring spent,' his 'summer well-nigh done;' but he had energy for other matters than repining at 'joys