CHAPTER XXXII--ENGLAND UNDER JAMES THE FIRST
CHAPTER XXXII--ENGLAND UNDER JAMES THE FIRST
'Our cousin of Scotland' was ugly, awkward, and shuffling both in mindand person. His tongue was much too large for his mouth, his legs weremuch too weak for his body, and his dull goggle-eyes stared and rolledlike an idiot's. He was cunning, covetous, wasteful, idle, drunken,greedy, dirty, cowardly, a great swearer, and the most conceited man onearth. His figure--what is commonly called rickety from hisbirth--presented a most ridiculous appearance, dressed in thick paddedclothes, as a safeguard against being stabbed (of which he lived incontinual fear), of a grass-green colour from head to foot, with ahunting-horn dangling at his side instead of a sword, and his hat andfeather sticking over one eye, or hanging on the back of his head, as hehappened to toss it on. He used to loll on the necks of his favouritecourtiers, and slobber their faces, and kiss and pinch their cheeks; andthe greatest favourite he ever had, used to sign himself in his lettersto his royal master, His Majesty's 'dog and slave,' and used to addresshis majesty as 'his Sowship.' His majesty was the worst rider ever seen,and thought himself the best. He was one of the most impertinent talkers(in the broadest Scotch) ever heard, and boasted of being unanswerable inall manner of argument. He wrote some of the most wearisome treatisesever read--among others, a book upon witchcraft, in which he was a devoutbeliever--and thought himself a prodigy of authorship. He thought, andwrote, and said, that a king had a right to make and unmake what laws hepleased, and ought to be accountable to nobody on earth. This is theplain, true character of the personage whom the greatest men about thecourt praised and flattered to that degree, that I doubt if there beanything much more shameful in the annals of human nature.
He came to the English throne with great ease. The miseries of adisputed succession had been felt so long, and so dreadfully, that he wasproclaimed within a few hours of Elizabeth's death, and was accepted bythe nation, even without being asked to give any pledge that he wouldgovern well, or that he would redress crying grievances. He took a monthto come from Edinburgh to London; and, by way of exercising his newpower, hanged a pickpocket on the journey without any trial, and knightedeverybody he could lay hold of. He made two hundred knights before hegot to his palace in London, and seven hundred before he had been in itthree months. He also shovelled sixty-two new peers into the House ofLords--and there was a pretty large sprinkling of Scotchmen among them,you may believe.
His Sowship's prime Minister, CECIL (for I cannot do better than call hismajesty what his favourite called him), was the enemy of Sir WalterRaleigh, and also of Sir Walter's political friend, LORD COBHAM; and hisSowship's first trouble was a plot originated by these two, and enteredinto by some others, with the old object of seizing the King and keepinghim in imprisonment until he should change his ministers. There wereCatholic priests in the plot, and there were Puritan noblemen too; for,although the Catholics and Puritans were strongly opposed to each other,they united at this time against his Sowship, because they knew that hehad a design against both, after pretending to be friendly to each; thisdesign being to have only one high and convenient form of the Protestantreligion, which everybody should be bound to belong to, whether theyliked it or not. This plot was mixed up with another, which may or maynot have had some reference to placing on the throne, at some time, theLADY ARABELLA STUART; whose misfortune it was, to be the daughter of theyounger brother of his Sowship's father, but who was quite innocent ofany part in the scheme. Sir Walter Raleigh was accused on the confessionof Lord Cobham--a miserable creature, who said one thing at one time, andanother thing at another time, and could be relied upon in nothing. Thetrial of Sir Walter Raleigh lasted from eight in the morning until nearlymidnight; he defended himself with such eloquence, genius, and spiritagainst all accusations, and against the insults of COKE, the Attorney-General--who, according to the custom of the time, foully abused him--thatthose who went there detesting the prisoner, came away admiring him, anddeclaring that anything so wonderful and so captivating was never heard.He was found guilty, nevertheless, and sentenced to death. Execution wasdeferred, and he was taken to the Tower. The two Catholic priests, lessfortunate, were executed with the usual atrocity; and Lord Cobham and twoothers were pardoned on the scaffold. His Sowship thought it wonderfullyknowing in him to surprise the people by pardoning these three at thevery block; but, blundering, and bungling, as usual, he had very nearlyoverreached himself. For, the messenger on horseback who brought thepardon, came so late, that he was pushed to the outside of the crowd, andwas obliged to shout and roar out what he came for. The miserable Cobhamdid not gain much by being spared that day. He lived, both as a prisonerand a beggar, utterly despised, and miserably poor, for thirteen years,and then died in an old outhouse belonging to one of his former servants.
This plot got rid of, and Sir Walter Raleigh safely shut up in the Tower,his Sowship held a great dispute with the Puritans on their presenting apetition to him, and had it all his own way--not so very wonderful, as hewould talk continually, and would not hear anybody else--and filled theBishops with admiration. It was comfortably settled that there was to beonly one form of religion, and that all men were to think exactly alike.But, although this was arranged two centuries and a half ago, andalthough the arrangement was supported by much fining and imprisonment, Ido not find that it is quite successful, even yet.
His Sowship, having that uncommonly high opinion of himself as a king,had a very low opinion of Parliament as a power that audaciously wantedto control him. When he called his first Parliament after he had beenking a year, he accordingly thought he would take pretty high ground withthem, and told them that he commanded them 'as an absolute king.' TheParliament thought those strong words, and saw the necessity of upholdingtheir authority. His Sowship had three children: Prince Henry, PrinceCharles, and the Princess Elizabeth. It would have been well for one ofthese, and we shall too soon see which, if he had learnt a little wisdomconcerning Parliaments from his father's obstinacy.
Now, the people still labouring under their old dread of the Catholicreligion, this Parliament revived and strengthened the severe lawsagainst it. And this so angered ROBERT CATESBY, a restless Catholicgentleman of an old family, that he formed one of the most desperate andterrible designs ever conceived in the mind of man; no less a scheme thanthe Gunpowder Plot.
His object was, when the King, lords, and commons, should be assembled atthe next opening of Parliament, to blow them up, one and all, with agreat mine of gunpowder. The first person to whom he confided thishorrible idea was THOMAS WINTER, a Worcestershire gentleman who hadserved in the army abroad, and had been secretly employed in Catholicprojects. While Winter was yet undecided, and when he had gone over tothe Netherlands, to learn from the Spanish Ambassador there whether therewas any hope of Catholics being relieved through the intercession of theKing of Spain with his Sowship, he found at Ostend a tall, dark, daringman, whom he had known when they were both soldiers abroad, and whosename was GUIDO--or GUY--FAWKES. Resolved to join the plot, he proposedit to this man, knowing him to be the man for any desperate deed, andthey two came back to England together. Here, they admitted two otherconspirators; THOMAS PERCY, related to the Earl of Northumberland, andJOHN WRIGHT, his brother-in-law. All these met together in a solitaryhouse in the open fields which were then near Clement's Inn, now aclosely blocked-up part of London; and when they had all taken a greatoath of secrecy, Catesby told the rest what his plan was. They then wentup-stairs into a garret, and received the Sacrament from FATHER GERARD, aJesuit, who is said not to have known actually of the Gunpowder Plot, butwho, I think, must have had his suspicions that there was somethingdesperate afoot.
Percy was a Gentleman Pensioner, and as he had occasional duties toperform about the Court, then kept at Whitehall, there would be nothingsuspicious in his living at Westminster. So, having looked well abouthim, and having found a house to let, the back of which joined theParliament House, he hired it of a person named FERRIS, for the purposeof undermining the wall. Having got possession of this house, theconspirators hired another on the Lambeth side of the Thames, which theyused as a storehouse for wood, gunpowder, and other combustible matters.These were to be removed at night (and afterwards were removed), bit bybit, to the house at Westminster; and, that there might be some trustyperson to keep watch over the Lambeth stores, they admitted anotherconspirator, by name ROBERT KAY, a very poor Catholic gentleman.
All these arrangements had been made some months, and it was a dark,wintry, December night, when the conspirators, who had been in themeantime dispersed to avoid observation, met in the house at Westminster,and began to dig. They had laid in a good stock of eatables, to avoidgoing in and out, and they dug and dug with great ardour. But, the wallbeing tremendously thick, and the work very severe, they took into theirplot CHRISTOPHER WRIGHT, a younger brother of John Wright, that theymight have a new pair of hands to help. And Christopher Wright fell tolike a fresh man, and they dug and dug by night and by day, and Fawkesstood sentinel all the time. And if any man's heart seemed to fail himat all, Fawkes said, 'Gentlemen, we have abundance of powder and shothere, and there is no fear of our being taken alive, even if discovered.'The same Fawkes, who, in the capacity of sentinel, was always prowlingabout, soon picked up the intelligence that the King had prorogued theParliament again, from the seventh of February, the day first fixed upon,until the third of October. When the conspirators knew this, they agreedto separate until after the Christmas holidays, and to take no notice ofeach other in the meanwhile, and never to write letters to one another onany account. So, the house in Westminster was shut up again, and Isuppose the neighbours thought that those strange-looking men who livedthere so gloomily, and went out so seldom, were gone away to have a merryChristmas somewhere.
It was the beginning of February, sixteen hundred and five, when Catesbymet his fellow-conspirators again at this Westminster house. He had nowadmitted three more; JOHN GRANT, a Warwickshire gentleman of a melancholytemper, who lived in a doleful house near Stratford-upon-Avon, with afrowning wall all round it, and a deep moat; ROBERT WINTER, eldestbrother of Thomas; and Catesby's own servant, THOMAS BATES, who, Catesbythought, had had some suspicion of what his master was about. Thesethree had all suffered more or less for their religion in Elizabeth'stime. And now, they all began to dig again, and they dug and dug bynight and by day.
They found it dismal work alone there, underground, with such a fearfulsecret on their minds, and so many murders before them. They were filledwith wild fancies. Sometimes, they thought they heard a great belltolling, deep down in the earth under the Parliament House; sometimes,they thought they heard low voices muttering about the Gunpowder Plot;once in the morning, they really did hear a great rumbling noise overtheir heads, as they dug and sweated in their mine. Every man stoppedand looked aghast at his neighbour, wondering what had happened, whenthat bold prowler, Fawkes, who had been out to look, came in and toldthem that it was only a dealer in coals who had occupied a cellar underthe Parliament House, removing his stock in trade to some other place.Upon this, the conspirators, who with all their digging and digging hadnot yet dug through the tremendously thick wall, changed their plan;hired that cellar, which was directly under the House of Lords; put six-and-thirty barrels of gunpowder in it, and covered them over with fagotsand coals. Then they all dispersed again till September, when thefollowing new conspirators were admitted; SIR EDWARD BAYNHAM, ofGloucestershire; SIR EVERARD DIGBY, of Rutlandshire; AMBROSE ROOKWOOD, ofSuffolk; FRANCIS TRESHAM, of Northamptonshire. Most of these were rich,and were to assist the plot, some with money and some with horses onwhich the conspirators were to ride through the country and rouse theCatholics after the Parliament should be blown into air.
Parliament being again prorogued from the third of October to the fifthof November, and the conspirators being uneasy lest their design shouldhave been found out, Thomas Winter said he would go up into the House ofLords on the day of the prorogation, and see how matters looked. Nothingcould be better. The unconscious Commissioners were walking about andtalking to one another, just over the six-and-thirty barrels ofgunpowder. He came back and told the rest so, and they went on withtheir preparations. They hired a ship, and kept it ready in the Thames,in which Fawkes was to sail for Flanders after firing with a slow matchthe train that was to explode the powder. A number of Catholic gentlemennot in the secret, were invited, on pretence of a hunting party, to meetSir Everard Digby at Dunchurch on the fatal day, that they might be readyto act together. And now all was ready.
But, now, the great wickedness and danger which had been all along at thebottom of this wicked plot, began to show itself. As the fifth ofNovember drew near, most of the conspirators, remembering that they hadfriends and relations who would be in the House of Lords that day, feltsome natural relenting, and a wish to warn them to keep away. They werenot much comforted by Catesby's declaring that in such a cause he wouldblow up his own son. LORD MOUNTEAGLE, Tresham's brother-in-law, wascertain to be in the house; and when Tresham found that he could notprevail upon the rest to devise any means of sparing their friends, hewrote a mysterious letter to this lord and left it at his lodging in thedusk, urging him to keep away from the opening of Parliament, 'since Godand man had concurred to punish the wickedness of the times.' Itcontained the words 'that the Parliament should receive a terrible blow,and yet should not see who hurt them.' And it added, 'the danger ispast, as soon as you have burnt the letter.'
The ministers and courtiers made out that his Sowship, by a directmiracle from Heaven, found out what this letter meant. The truth is,that they were not long (as few men would be) in finding out forthemselves; and it was decided to let the conspirators alone, until thevery day before the opening of Parliament. That the conspirators hadtheir fears, is certain; for, Tresham himself said before them all, thatthey were every one dead men; and, although even he did not take flight,there is reason to suppose that he had warned other persons besides LordMounteagle. However, they were all firm; and Fawkes, who was a man ofiron, went down every day and night to keep watch in the cellar as usual.He was there about two in the afternoon of the fourth, when the LordChamberlain and Lord Mounteagle threw open the door and looked in. 'Whoare you, friend?' said they. 'Why,' said Fawkes, 'I am Mr. Percy'sservant, and am looking after his store of fuel here.' 'Your master haslaid in a pretty good store,' they returned, and shut the door, and wentaway. Fawkes, upon this, posted off to the other conspirators to tellthem all was quiet, and went back and shut himself up in the dark, blackcellar again, where he heard the bell go twelve o'clock and usher in thefifth of November. About two hours afterwards, he slowly opened thedoor, and came out to look about him, in his old prowling way. He wasinstantly seized and bound, by a party of soldiers under SIR THOMASKNEVETT. He had a watch upon him, some touchwood, some tinder, some slowmatches; and there was a dark lantern with a candle in it, lighted,behind the door. He had his boots and spurs on--to ride to the ship, Isuppose--and it was well for the soldiers that they took him so suddenly.If they had left him but a moment's time to light a match, he certainlywould have tossed it in among the powder, and blown up himself and them.
They took him to the King's bed-chamber first of all, and there the King(causing him to be held very tight, and keeping a good way off), askedhim how he could have the heart to intend to destroy so many innocentpeople? 'Because,' said Guy Fawkes, 'desperate diseases need desperateremedies.' To a little Scotch favourite, with a face like a terrier, whoasked him (with no particular wisdom) why he had collected so muchgunpowder, he replied, because he had meant to blow Scotchmen back toScotland, and it would take a deal of powder to do that. Next day he wascarried to the Tower, but would make no confession. Even after beinghorribly tortured, he confessed nothing that the Government did notalready know; though he must have been in a fearful state--as hissignature, still preserved, in contrast with his natural hand-writingbefore he was put upon the dreadful rack, most frightfully shows. Bates,a very different man, soon said the Jesuits had had to do with the plot,and probably, under the torture, would as readily have said anything.Tresham, taken and put in the Tower too, made confessions and unmadethem, and died of an illness that was heavy upon him. Rookwood, who hadstationed relays of his own horses all the way to Dunchurch, did notmount to escape until the middle of the day, when the news of the plotwas all over London. On the road, he came up with the two Wrights,Catesby, and Percy; and they all galloped together into Northamptonshire.Thence to Dunchurch, where they found the proposed party assembled.Finding, however, that there had been a plot, and that it had beendiscovered, the party disappeared in the course of the night, and leftthem alone with Sir Everard Digby. Away they all rode again, throughWarwickshire and Worcestershire, to a house called Holbeach, on theborders of Staffordshire. They tried to raise the Catholics on theirway, but were indignantly driven off by them. All this time they werehotly pursued by the sheriff of Worcester, and a fast increasingconcourse of riders. At last, resolving to defend themselves atHolbeach, they shut themselves up in the house, and put some wet powderbefore the fire to dry. But it blew up, and Catesby was singed andblackened, and almost killed, and some of the others were sadly hurt.Still, knowing that they must die, they resolved to die there, and withonly their swords in their hands appeared at the windows to be shot at bythe sheriff and his assistants. Catesby said to Thomas Winter, afterThomas had been hit in the right arm which dropped powerless by his side,'Stand by me, Tom, and we will die together!'--which they did, being shotthrough the body by two bullets from one gun. John Wright, andChristopher Wright, and Percy, were also shot. Rookwood and Digby weretaken: the former with a broken arm and a wound in his body too.
It was the fifteenth of January, before the trial of Guy Fawkes, and suchof the other conspirators as were left alive, came on. They were allfound guilty, all hanged, drawn, and quartered: some, in St. Paul'sChurchyard, on the top of Ludgate-hill; some, before the ParliamentHouse. A Jesuit priest, named HENRY GARNET, to whom the dreadful designwas said to have been communicated, was taken and tried; and two of hisservants, as well as a poor priest who was taken with him, were torturedwithout mercy. He himself was not tortured, but was surrounded in theTower by tamperers and traitors, and so was made unfairly to convicthimself out of his own mouth. He said, upon his trial, that he had doneall he could to prevent the deed, and that he could not make public whathad been told him in confession--though I am afraid he knew of the plotin other ways. He was found guilty and executed, after a manful defence,and the Catholic Church made a saint of him; some rich and powerfulpersons, who had had nothing to do with the project, were fined andimprisoned for it by the Star Chamber; the Catholics, in general, who hadrecoiled with horror from the idea of the infernal contrivance, wereunjustly put under more severe laws than before; and this was the end ofthe Gunpowder Plot.