Part 21 (1/2)
[Sidenote: _Manourie_]
Stukely closed his sales, and set off, we are told, on July 25, though an soh, and Lady Ralegh, with their servants, King, and a Frenchular warrant Manourie, who had been long settled in Devonshi+re, has been variously described as a physician and as a quack Two centuries and a half ago the distinction between charlatans and experih seems to have suspected that he was a spy, but to have believed in his skill The man may not have been the medical impostor popular resentreedy, and a perfidious rogue From the first he laid traps He reported to Stukely, or invented, an ejaculation by Ralegh, on hearing of the orders for London: 'God's wounds! Is it possible that ain?' He told how Ralegh cried as they rode by Sherborne Park: 'All this wascould be more true
[Sidenote: _The Counterfeit Disease_]
They had slept on the night of July 26 at the house of old Mr Parham, who lived, with his son, Sir Edward Parham, close to Sherborne Next day, July 27, they journeyed to Salisbury by Wilton On the hill beyond Wilton, Ralegh, as he walked down it with Manourie, asked hiood,' Manourie asserted that he said, 'to evacuate bad huain time to work my friends and order my affairs; perhaps even to pacify his Majesty' The suh knew that, in pursuance of its prograht at Salisbury he turned dizzy Notwithstanding, or because he desired to spare her a discreditable scene, in the h, with her retinue of servants, continued her journey to London King went too He was to hire a boat, which was to lie off Tilbury According to hih should stop in France till the anger of Spain was lulled
After their departure a servant of Ralegh's rushed to Stukely with the news that his master was out of his wits, in his shi+rt, and upon all fours, gnawing at the rushes on the boards Stukely sent Manourie to him Manourie administered the emetic, and also an ointht out purple pustules over the breast and arle visit Stukely too, were afraid to approach Lancelot Andrewes, then Bishop of Ely, happened to be at Salisbury He heard, and compassionately sent the best three physicians of the town None of them could explain the sickness For four days the cavalcade halted Ralegh subsisted on a clandestine leg of e to Guiana_, from which I have already drawn for his view of disputed facts Manourie he employed to copy his manuscript The wish to compose the narrative is believed by some to have been the sole motive of his artifice His own subsequent account of it was that he had speculated on an intervieith the King With that view he had compassed a delay How an apparent attack of leprosy should have helped hiible Chah had no audience of Ja motive of the co up his narrative, which he wildly hoped hehis sojourn at Salisbury That was the audience he really desired As soon as the treatise ritten he recovered Not now or afterwards was he at all asha hi to use his drugs in order to gain a few quiet literary days He justified his pretence by the example of David: 'David did make himself a fool, and suffered spittle to fall upon his beard, that he ht escape the hands of his enemies'
[Sidenote: _Consistency of his Position_]
The statement which he had stolen a respite to write has been considered by Mr Gardiner, in his _Prince Charles and the Spanish Marriage_, an aggravation of his guilt The clai Spaniards out of his way to the Mine, is treated as an admission that he had founded his enterprise on a lie, and that his sin had found him out Mr Gardiner adds he ht Apparently this means that he had asserted, or had fraudulently suffered James to infer, that no Spaniards were settled in the vicinity of Keymis's Mine, or were in the least likely to withstand in arms his approach to it; or that he had made a promise, of which the resistance of his men to the Spanish attack was a breach, in no circuh, who constitutionally took his instructions froiven, or been asked for, any positive pledge that in no circumstances would he force his way into the interior of Guiana The warlike equipment of his fleet, and of the ency of a collision with armed Spanish shi+ps and soldiers was contemplated by the Government and prepared for The nature of the business on which James had despatched hiy_ He was sent to work a mine on the Orinoko, where the whole commercial world knew that Spaniards were settled James must have known it from many sources He knew it definitely froainst the expedition were based particularly on it Any 'guilt' of Ralegh's for letting his followers run the gauntlet of the San Thoo with an armed squadron to the Orinoko at all
[Sidenote: _Manourie's Story_]
On the first of August, when the _Apology_ was already co arrived at Salisbury It is not knohether Ralegh succeeded in having the co saw it, we may be certain that it exerted upon the royal mind the precise reverse of the conciliatory effect the writer anticipated Orders ih should h bribed him with twenty crowns, and an offer of 50 a year, to aid his escape On the sa, and uttered 's Tilbury project He said he must fly, for 'a man that fears is never secure' Further, he asserted his conviction that the courtiers had concluded a them 'a man must die to reassure the traffic which he had broken in Spain' Manourie pretended Ralegh handed to him jewels and h acknowledged he had told Stukely he hoped to procure payment of his debts Any offers beyond this he denied At Staines Manourie left He said to Ralegh, who to prison and death, that he did not expect to see hiure cannot be wholly obliterated froly huents_]
At Brentford a more loyal but as unlucky a Frenchht a e froh The Governnorance, it ht learn h's committal to the Tower It was not at once executed Before he left Salisbury it had been conceded through the by, touched by his apparent infirmities at Salisbury, that he should be conveyed to his own house in Broad-street, for four or five days' rest He now obtained leave to have that arrangement confirmed or resumed Naunton told Carleton that he procured the perht take ht be teive the Governust 7, he arrived in Broad-street, where he found Lady Ralegh On the evening of Sunday, at eight, le Clerc and de Novion ca freely in the presence of eight or ten persons They intiood reception in France
The French interest in Ralegh was an anti-Spanish interest If safe in France he could, it was thought, exercise in solo-Spanish alliance Queen Anne was understood to prefer vehemently a French to a Spanish bride for Prince Charles The French dealings with Ralegh, it was believed at the tih seerateful courtesy, but not to have accepted any offer of French assistance He intended to o in a French vessel
[Sidenote: _Preparations for Flight_]
The plan on which he decided had been concerted with King A for's, called Hart, had a ketch Cottrell, apparently Ralegh's old Tower servant, who had once before borne witness against hi had arranged with Hart through Cottrell that the ketch should be held ready off Tilbury Implicit trust was placed in Cottrell's supposed devotion to Ralegh In reality he and Hart had at once betrayed the whole arrangement to a Mr William Herbert, not the Herbert of the Guiana Expedition Herbert told Sir Williah's liberation St John in company, it would seem from Stukely's subsequent account, with Herbert, had posted off with the news to Salisbury He had shot on the road, and warned the former, who scarcely required the inforh's safety as wholly to delude both hi He had obtained a licence from Naunton to enter, without liability, into any contract, and coh was under his charge in Broad-street, he left hih's own servants were allowed to wait on him
Stukely borrowed 10 of him The pretence was a wish to pay for the despatch into the country of his own servants, that they ht He proh, with all his wit and experience of men, his wife, with her love and her clearness of vision, the shrewd French diplo, were dupes of a ar knaves, like Cottrell and Hart Without the least suspicion of foul play Ralegh on that Sunday night, after le Clerc and de Novion had left, went down to the river side
It was a foolish business Nothing, except success, could have been more woful than all its features and its failure If the atteainst the law, the correctness of the condeht to fly from the injustice of his treatment Had he been of the nature of Socrates he would not have thought of flight His respect for authority was not like that of Socrates His conscience never particularly troubled him for the i hi run froed its shame But his own account of the temptation to which he yielded may be accepted as truthful He told Sir Thomas Wilson his intention was to seek an asylueance, until 'the Queen should have land he was doomed, he foresaw, to death or to perpetual confinement; and he believed he had work in life still to do He feared neither death nor prison for itself In a paroxysm of despair he clutched the only chance he perceived of reserving his powers for the enterprise he had set them, the overthrow of the colonial monopoly of Spain
[Sidenote: _On the Thames_]
[Sidenote: _Stukely Unmasked_]
Therries were hired at the Tower dock Ralegh, attended by one of his pages, Stukely, Stukely's son, King, and Hart, set off Sir William St John and Herbert followed secretly in another boat Ralegh wore a false beard and a hat with a green band Stukely asked King whether thus far he had not acted as an honestreplied by a hope that he would continue to act thus Herbert's boat was seen first e; but finally it returned down the river
Ralegh becah one ca's nao beyond Gravesend Ralegh explained that a brabblinghim to Tilbury to eold pieces
Thereupon Stukely began cursing himself that he should be so unfortunate as to venture his life and fortune with a man full of doubt He swore he would kill the watermen if they did not row on The delays spent the tide, and the
When they were a mile beyond Woolwich, at a reach called the Gallions, near Pluh felt sure he was betrayed, and ordered the men to row back Herbert's and St John's wherryto remain in Stukely's custody, declared himself his prisoner He still supposed the ave theed hi to go to Stukely's house But the other crew landed also Now at last Stukely revealed his true character He arrested Ralegh and King in his Majesty's nae of two of St John's h understood, and said: 'Sir Lewis, these actions will not turn out to your credit' With a generous thoughtfulness for a very different ive hi could not be persuaded Ralegh and he were kept separate till the h was conducted to the Tower As once more he passed within, hewas allowed to attend hih, he wrote after the execution, 'to His tuition hoh's fareords to him were: 'Stukely and Cottrell have betrayed ust 10-October 15)
[Sidenote: _Ralegh's Trinkets_]
On the h finally entered the Tower
This time he was made to feel that he was a prisoner indeed He had meant to transport to France charts of Guiana, the Orinoko, Nuova Regina, and Panama, with five assays of the ore of the Mine They were on him, and they were taken from him He was stripped also of his trinkets, except a spleen stone This and an ounce of aold picture-case set with dianed to the Lieutenant of the Tower
There were other orna, supposed by Naunton to have been a present froh told Sir Tho There were a Guiana idol of gold and copper, and sixty-three gold buttons with sparks of diamonds All these were entrusted to Stukely by the Lieutenant of the Tower It would be strange if some did not stay with their custodian It h admitted the traitor to a last interview in the Lieutenant's lodgings on the Wednesday after his committal We may be sure it was not to affirm, as Stukely declared, that he 'loved him as well as any friend he had in the world'