as if he thought Raleigh sincere, but somewhat mad: and yet honest
Gorges has a good right to say a bitter thing; for after having been
'ready to break with laughing at seeing them two brawl and scramble
like madmen, and Sir George's new periwig torn off his crown,' he
sees 'the iron walking' and daggers out, and playing the part of him
who taketh a dog by the ears, 'purchased such a rap on the knuckles,
that I wished both their pates broken, and so with much ado they
staid their brawl to see my bloody fingers,' and then set to work to
abuse the hapless peacemaker. After which things Raleigh writes a
letter to Cecil, which is still more offensive in the eyes of
virtuous biographers--how 'his heart was never broken till this day,
when he hears the Queen goes so far off, whom he followed with love
and desire on so many journeys, and am now left behind in a dark
prison all alone.' . . . 'I that was wont to behold her riding like
Alexander, hunting like Diana, walking like Venus, the gentle wind
blowing her fair hair about her pure cheeks,' and so forth, in a
style in which the vulturine nose must needs scent carrion, just
because the roses are more fragrant than they should be in a world
where all ought to be either vultures or carrion for their dinners.
As for his despair, had he not good reason to be in despair? By his
own sin he has hurled himself down the hill which he has so painfully
climbed. He is in the Tower--surely no pleasant or hopeful place for
any man. Elizabeth is exceedingly wroth with him; and what is worse,
he deserves what he has got. His whole fortune is ventured in an
expedition over which he has no control, which has been unsuccessful
in its first object, and which may be altogether unsuccessful in that
which it has undertaken as a pis-aller, and so leave him penniless.
There want not, too, those who will trample on the fallen. The
deputy has been cruelly distraining on his Irish tenants for a
'supposed debt of his to the Queen of 400 pounds for rent,' which was