much attached to his wife, and, though fretting at the loss of power and position, full of schemes of an active character.

I propose in this chapter to examine the Ralegh poems in the light of this correspondence and the known circumstances of Ralegh's life.

It is reasonable, indeed only rational, to expect that the character and intellectual equipment of a writer will be found the same in all essential features in his correspondence as in his works. If, for example, there were in existence any letters of Shakespeare, we should expect, if only from the prose writings in his plays, to find them as conspicuous for clarity of thought, philosophic outlook, wit, and wealth of illustration, as his prose and poetry. Some examples of Shakespeare's prose are quoted in this work, and another may be given as showing what he was able to do in the way of a State dispatch, of its kind a model document, and revealing (as presumably would be allowed in the case of any other writer than Shakespeare) the practised hand :

Macbeth's letter to Lady Macbeth

They met me in the day of success; and I have learned by the perfectest report, they have more in them than mortal knowledge. When I burned in desire to question them further, they made themselves air, into which they vanished. Whiles I stood rapt in the wonder of it, came missives from the king, who all-hailed me "Thane of Cawdor"; by which title, before, these weird sisters saluted me, and referred me to the coming on of time, with "Hail, king that shalt be!" This have I thought good to deliver thee, my dearest partner of greatness, that thou mightst not lose the dues of rejoicing, by being ignorant of what greatness is promised thee. Lay it to thy heart, and farewell.

(i. 5.)

So also in the case of Spenser, though no letters of his exist, we may judge from the View of the Present State of Ireland by what facility and wealth of matter they would have been characterised. Such a correspondency between

1 See, for instance, pp. 291, 292, 331.

the works and the letters we find, in fact, in the case of Milton, and of every poet of importance where documents have been preserved; this is so well known that it is unnecessary to particularise. In the case of Ralegh, however, there is no such correspondency; on the contrary, the character of the writer, his style and his mental equipment, are one in the letters and quite another in the poems. It is impossible within the limits of a work of this kind to illustrate this in great detail, but I shall endeavour, by some extracts from the correspondence and a brief commentary, to bring out certain points which justify this view, and which otherwise bear on the inquiry as to the authorship of these poems.

The correspondence (which is to be found in the second volume of the Life by Edwards) begins with five letters from Ireland of the year 1581, before Ralegh had been taken up by the Queen. They are interesting as evidence of Ralegh's energy and independence of character. In passing, it is worth noting that they are all signed "W. Rauley." Sent over with dispatches in December 1581, Ralegh won the Queen's favour shortly afterwards. The next letter is from the Court at Richmond, dated March 1583, and the signature is "W. Ralegh." From 1584 onwards the signature is always Ralegh," and the change may have been made by Ralegh on his elevation by the Queen, and as a result of the researches of the antiquaries referred to in Chapter XIV. It is worth noting that Essex, in a dispatch written during the "Island" expedition of 1597 (after a quarrel with Ralegh), refers to him as "Sir Walter Rauley." This may have been done with intention, disparagingly. He is also referred to as "Sir Walter Rawley" in a letter of the Privy Council in 1617 (Edwards, i. 613).

The following letter (which I give in full) written to the Earl of Leicester, then in the Netherlands, in 1586, when Ralegh was at the height of his power, is a good example of his usual style. Mr. Edwards says that it is evident from the autographs that "he wrote habitually in a very hurried manner" (i. 138), and he describes the

earlier MSS. as "scrawls" (ii. 258). The style in itself indicates this feature. The letters are few and for the most part rather brief, and they are, to my mind, clearly not those of a man accustomed to much writing. (There are, however, a few exceptions to this, to be noted in their place.)

To Robert Dudley, Earl of Leicester
[From the original.]

My very good Lorde-You wrate unto me in your laste letters for pioners to be sent over1; wher uppon I moved her Majestye, and found her very willing, in so mich as order was geven for a cummission; but since, the matter is stayd. I know not for what

cause.

Also, according to your Lordshipe desired, I spake for one Jukes for the office of the back-house, and the matter well liked. In ought else your Lordshipe shall finde me most assured to my pouere to performe all offices of love, honor and service toward you. But I have byn of late very pestilent reported in this place to be rather a drawer bake, than a fartherer of the action wher you govern. Your lordshipe doth well understand my affection towards Spayn, and how I have consumed the best part of my fortune, hating the tirrannus sprosperety of that estate, and it were now strang and monnsterous that I should becum an enemy to my countrey and conscience. But all that I have desired att your Lordship's hands is, that you will evermore deal directly with mee in all matters of suspect dublenes, and so ever esteme me as you shall finde my deserving, good or bad. In the mean tyme, I humblie beseich you, lett no poeticall scribe work your Lordshipe by any device to doubt that I am a hollo or could sarvant to the action, or a mean well-willer and follower of your own. And yeven so, I humblie take my leve, wishing you all honor and prosperety. From the Court, the xxix of March, 1586.-Your Lordships, to do you service,

W. RALEGH.

[Postscript.] The Queen is on very good tearms with you, and, thank be to God, well pacified; and you are agayne her "Sweet Robyn." 2

The expression "poeticall scribe" evidently means an untruthful romancer.

1 To the Netherlands.

2 Edwards, Life, ii. 33.

To Lord Burghley, 1587

I am bold to write my simple oppinion playnly unto your Lordshipe.1

Compare Life, p. 115, Letter to the Council, "in my simple judgement." These are the only instances which I have noticed of the use of this phrase in Ralegh's correspondence. As I have pointed out, it is so frequent with Bacon as to have been a mannerism.

To his cousin, Sir George Carew, 27th Dec. 1589

For my retrait from the Court it was uppon good cause to take order for my prize.2 [Evidently in contradiction of the rumour that he had been driven from the Court through the rivalry of Essex.8]

The Queen thincks that George Carew longes to see her; and therfore see her. [Evidence of Ralegh's attitude as a courtier.]

We come now to the period of Ralegh's marriage and the loss of the Queen's favour, which appears to form the main theme of the poems. And at this point it will be convenient to give some account from contemporary writers of Ralegh's personality and his extraordinary rise to fortune. Aubrey gives the following account of his first rise:

1 Edwards, Life, ii. 37.

2 Ibid. p. 41.

3 "My Lord of Essex hath chased Mr. Ralegh from the Court and hath confined him into Ireland."-Letter of Sir F. Allen to Anthony Bacon, 1589. 4 Edwards, Life, ii. 42.

6 For information about Ralegh's early life see pp. 372, 373.

• Aubrey's authority has, in my opinion, been undervalued. It is customary to allude to him as "gossiping," or "old gossiping" Aubrey. But it is evident that he took the greatest pains in making some of his collections, notably in the cases of Hobbes, Bacon, Ralegh and Milton. He was a contemporary of the latter, and, being born in 1626, the year of Bacon's death, he had opportunities of hearing facts in the cases of Bacon and Ralegh from those who remembered them or were told about them at first hand. Such evidence, in days when documents were rarer and not accessible as they are now, and when oral testimony was more habitually preserved, is obviously of importance. Moreover Aubrey was not "old" when he began his Brief Lives, being forty-three. As he continued to write them to within a year of his death at the age of seventy-one, they cannot all be regarded as unsifted compilations.

He went to Ireland, where he served in the warres, and shewed much courage and conduct, but he would be perpetually differing with . . . (I thinke, Gray) then Lord Deputy; so that at last the hearing was to be at the councell table before the queen, which was that he desired; where he told his tale so well and with so good a grace and presence that the queen took especiall notice of him and presently preferred him.

Aubrey has two interesting notes about Ralegh's character and personal appearance :

He was a tall, handsome, and bold man: but his neave was that he was damnable proud.

He had a most remarkeable aspect, an exceeding high forehead, long-faced, and sour eie-liddid, a kind of pigge-eie.

This can be seen in the full-length portrait reproduced in Edwards's Life giving him a somewhat forbidding appearance. See also the portrait at the beginning of Hannah's volume. Other accounts confirm the statement about his pride, and the correspondence shows evidence of it. For this and other reasons Ralegh was a very unpopular man, except among the west country men, especially the seamen, who were devoted to him as a leader, and it was not until after his death, and owing to the way in which he met it, that his real greatness of mind was generally appreciated. Aubrey quotes an epitaph of eight lines made on him, two of which run:

Hee living was belov'd of none,
Yet in his death all did him moane.

And in the margin: "Horat. ep. 1, lib. 2 :-Extinctus amabitur idem."

The following account of him from Naunton's portraitgallery of Queen Elizabeth's favourites1 is also interesting:

Sir Walter Rawleigh was one, that (it seems) Fortune had picked out of purpose, of whom to make an example, or to use as her Tennis-Ball, thereby to shew what she could doe; for she tost him up of nothing, and too and fro to greatnesse, and from thence down to a little more than to that wherein she found him,

1 Fragmenta Regalia.