not fit for the part which Bacon urged upon him, that of an obsequious
and vigilant observer of the Queen's moods and humours. As time went on,
things became more and more difficult between him and his strange
mistress; and there were never wanting men who, like Cecil and Raleigh,
for good and bad reasons, feared and hated Essex, and who had the craft
and the skill to make the most of his inexcusable errors. At last he
allowed himself, from ambition, from the spirit of contradiction, from
the blind passion for doing what he thought would show defiance to his
enemies, to be tempted into the Irish campaign of 1599. Bacon at a later
time claimed credit for having foreseen and foretold its issue. "I did
as plainly see his overthrow, chained as it were by destiny to that
journey, as it is possible for any man to ground a judgment on future
contingents." He warned Essex, so he thought in after years, of the
difficulty of the work; he warned him that he would leave the Queen in
the hands of his enemies: "It would be ill for her, ill for him, ill for
the State." "I am sure," he adds, "I never in anything in my life dealt
with him in like earnestness by speech, by writing, and by all the means
I could devise." But Bacon's memory was mistaken. We have his letters.
When Essex went to Ireland, Bacon wrote only in the language of sanguine
hope--so little did he see "overthrow chained by destiny to that
journey," that "some good spirit led his pen to presage to his Lordship
success;" he saw in the enterprise a great occasion of honour to his
friend; he gave prudent counsels, but he looked forward confidently to
Essex being as "fatal a captain to that war, as Africanus was to the war
of Carthage." Indeed, however anxious he may have been, he could not
have foreseen Essex's unaccountable and to this day unintelligible
failure. But failure was the end, from whatever cause; failure,
disgraceful and complete. Then followed wild and guilty but abortive
projects for retrieving his failure, by using his power in Ireland to
make himself formidable to his enemies at Court, and even to the Queen