CHAPTER III.

FELTON--HIS CHARACTER--UNCERTAINTY OF HIS MOTIVES--CIRCUMSTANCES UNDER WHICH HE WAS BROUGHT INTO CONTACT WITH BUCKINGHAM--MOTIVES OF HIS CRIME DISCUSSED--THE REMONSTRANCE--THE FATE OF LA ROCHELLE--BUCKINGHAM’S UNPOPULARITY--RETURNS TO RHE--MISGIVINGS OF HIS FRIENDS--INTERVIEW WITH LAUD--WITH CHARLES I.--HIS FAREWELL--HE ENTERS PORTSMOUTH--FELTON--THE ASSASSINATION--ORIGINAL LETTERS FROM SIR D. CARLETON AND SIR CHARLES MORGAN--THE KING’S GRIEF.

CHAPTER III.

Whilst all these events were pending, dark designs were being formed and cherished in the distempered mind of one far from the Court, and probably wholly forgotten by him to whose destiny he gave the final stroke.

Hitherto Buckingham had escaped all bodily harm. He had rallied speedily from illness, and was in the full vigour of his life; he had returned unhurt from the perilous service at Rhé; he had repeatedly crossed the Channel, and tracked even the great ocean when the science of navigation, as well as of ship-building, was imperfect, and when a thousand dangers encompassed his course: he had escaped the pestilence by which the army lost many of its best men. And yet his days were numbered.

In the remote county of Suffolk the unhappy John Felton was born. He was the youngest son of an ancient family, and in somewhat narrow circumstances, and had been a lieutenant in a regiment of foot, under the command of Sir John Ramsey, in the expedition against Rhé. He was a man of great reserve, which, though he had long led a soldier’s life, in the course of which he appears to have risen from the ranks, was still silent and gloomy. In person he was diminutive, with a meagre form, and a face rendered almost ghastly from the expression of that deep, habitual, and apparentlycauselesscauselessmelancholy to which we give the term morbid; and thus singularly did these outlines of his character correspond with the circumstances of his daily life. So strange was it to discover in the young soldier the characteristics attributable to a cloister rather than to a camp, that one turns to the mournful plea of insanity for explanation. But no defence of that nature, or on that ground, was ever attempted for Felton; unhappily, so much has lunacy increased in modern times, that it forms now one point in almost every case of unaccountable crime. In the days of our ancestors it was different. Such an excuse was rare, and only applied to imbecility, or to mania, when too apparent to be disputed.

To this day, indeed, there has been found no adequate motive for the deed, which Felton long contemplated in the depths of a soul that never gave utterance to its joys or sorrows, and exchanged no sympathies with others. Whatever “may have been the immediate or greatest motive of that felonious conception,” Sir Henry Wotton declares, “is even yet in the clouds.”[110]The origin of that dark design has, nevertheless, been referred to a disappointment in Felton’s military career. This he subsequently denied, by saying that the Duke had always shown him respect. Whilst at Rhé, Felton’s captain having died in England, he naturally applied to Buckingham for promotion. The Duke, however, consulted the colonel of the regiment, and, by his suggestion, gave the company to an officer named Powell, who happened to be lieutenant of the colonel’s company, and a man of great bravery; and Felton himself acknowledged the justice and expediency of this preference of Powell to himself. So that, to follow the same authority, the idea of any rancour being harboured, owing to this arrangement, can have no foundation.[111]But the notion has been taken up by historians adverse to Buckingham--and such are in the majority--ratherto heighten the impression that he suffered for an act of injustice, for which his death was, more or less, a retribution, than from any certain conviction on the point.

There was also another cause assigned for the crime which Felton meditated. In his native county there was a certain knight whom the Duke had latterly favoured; and between this individual and Felton there “had been ancient quarrels not yet healed,” which might be festering within his breast, and worked up by his own grievance into frenzy. But this explanation is also rejected by Sir Henry Wotton, whose evidence is the best that can be given, as proceeding from a man of principle, and a contemporary and friend of Buckingham’s.

Three hours before his execution, however, Felton, either as a palliation to others, or to excuse the deed to himself, alleged that the book written by Dr. Egglisham, King James’s Scottish physician, in which the Duke was portrayed as one of the foulest monsters upon earth, unfit to live in a Christian court, or even within the pale of humanity, had a great effect upon his mind, in inciting him to what he deemed an act of heroic virtue. The fact, indeed, it is plain, was, that his religious convictions had an all-powerful influence upon his judgment, which waswarped by the gloomy bigotry which casts a shadow over the noblest and most encouraging hopes of the Christian. The tenor of this unhappy man’s life had been marked by seriousness and religious observances; but it was the religion which condemned all who differed--the religion, not of love, but self-righteousness and hatred.

During the leisure of peace--if peace that can be called in which all the elements of civil war were being engendered--the Petition of Right--that great measure, which even Clarendon allows, "was of no prejudice to the Crown"--received the King’s assent. Not contented with what they found might prove a bare declaration of the law, the Commons drew up a Remonstrance, addressed to the King, in order that the too great power of Buckingham might be diminished. The promotion of Papists, the protection of Arminians, under the patronage of Neal and Laud, were the chief subjects, and were calculated to arouse and inflame the passions of a fanatic, like Felton, and to have suggested the reasoning that was soon warped, by prejudice and hatred, into the form and conception of guilt. There were other subjects of complaint in that celebrated Remonstrance, which touched him also--the standing commission of general continued to Buckingham in time of peace, the dismissal of faithfulofficers from various places of trust, the failures at Cadiz and at Rhé--these were but a small part of that important document, but they were the portion most likely to excite such a mind as that of Felton. He stated, indeed, that the idea of assassination, which he had repelled by stern efforts of conscience--for he was a man misled and mistaken, but not devoid of certain principles, and he dared to make use of that solemn and misguiding word, conscience--was revived, with irresistible force, by the Remonstrance. Never, hitherto, had the members most distinguished for oratory in parliament reasoned with so much force, and so much research, and so great a depth of legal argument, as on the Petition of Right, and its successor, the Remonstrance. It was the era of good taste and profound argument in that great assembly.[112]All tended to strengthen Felton in the conviction that the Duke was a traitor and oppressor, whom any patriot would do well to assassinate.

Then he read works which maintained the lawfulness of ridding a nation of an oppressor; and the voice of conscience was heard no more--a false heroism was thenceforth the spectre that lured him onwards. Never was there a more striking instance of the influence of one mindover another than that which the books of the day had over the mind of Felton; never was there a more prominent exemplification of the responsibilities of a writer, even if his words chance to have only an ephemeral reputation, than this man’s crime.

The resolution was then formed--Buckingham’s life was to be sacrificed for the public good. Sir Henry Wotton seems to think that every plea adopted by Felton in explanation of this design was to be distrusted. “Whatever were the true motives, which, I think, none can determine but the Prince of Darkness itself, he did thus prosecute the effort.”

He bought for tenpence, in a cutler’s shop on Tower Hill, a knife--that instrument, the blow of which paralyzed England--and sewed the sheath into the lining of his pocket, so that he could at any time draw out the knife with one hand--his other being maimed and powerless.

Being thus provided, he watched in gloom and privacy (for he was very poor) the opportunity over which he brooded.

Meantime, Buckingham was mingling, in the full confidence of his fearless nature, in the affairs of that world which he was so soon to quit for ever. His unpopularity was at its acmé, and if he feared not for himself, there were friends who trembled for his safety. Sir Clement Throgmorton,a man of great consideration and judgment, one day asked a private conference, and advised the Duke to wear a coat of mail underneath his his outer garment. The Duke received the suggestion very kindly, but gave this reply, “Against popular fury a coat of mail would be but a weak defence, and with regard to an attack from any single man, he conceived there was no danger.” "So dark," says Wotton, “is destiny.”

This consciousness of being the object of universal hatred probably increased the keen desire which now possessed the Duke’s mind of retrieving the discredit into which his failure had plunged him. During the whole of the spring, preparations for a fresh descent on La Rochelle had been in contemplation. As good a squadron as that which Admiral Pennington had previously commanded was ready at Plymouth by the end of February, ten ships having been pressed into the service. Several new vessels were built, notwithstanding that the workmen of the navy at Chatham complained that they had not received any pay for seven months. Buckingham was, at one time, on the point of visiting Plymouth, but went to Newmarket instead.[113]During the session of Parliament his brother-in-law, the Earlof Denbigh, was dispatched with a fleet to the relief of La Rochelle, which was blockaded by the French, but he returned without even attempting to effect anything; and the unfortunate town was left to its fate. Richelieu, besieging it by circumvallations, constructed a mole across the mouth of the harbour, leaving room only for the ebb and flow of the sea; and destruction seemed inevitable. It was, therefore, a very probable means of recovering his credit at home, for the Duke again to attempt the relief of those who, as Protestants, represented a cause dear to English hearts. Independently of this, it is not unlikely that old rivalship with the sagacious Cardinal may have influenced Buckingham to undertake a second expedition to La Rochelle.[114]It is, perhaps, not to be wondered at that Buckingham’s name should be covered with so much opprobrium after his death, when the fate of the heroes who defended La Rochelle is remembered. In the October of the year in which the Duke perished, La Rochelle, long refusing to yield, was forced to submit. The inhabitants surrendered at discretion--even with an English fleet, commanded by Lord Sidney, in sight. Of fifteen thousand men who had been enclosed in the town, only four thousand survived famine and fatigue, to laydown their arms before the generals sent by Richelieu.

To make a last effort for these valiant sufferers was, therefore, the wisest determination that Buckingham could form. The fleet which Lord Denbigh had commanded was in good condition, and all at home had learned experience through failure. He had taken that severe lesson to his own heart. Had Buckingham been spared to relieve La Rochelle, and to recover for England the honour of her sullied reputation, his errors would doubtless have been forgiven.

Before leaving London, the Duke went to take leave of Laud, then Bishop of London. Laud had now, both in civil and ecclesiastical matters, a great influence over the King: of this Buckingham was fully sensible.

Sir Henry Wotton, who had made some inquiries whether the Duke had had any presentiment of his death, relates a touching scene between the Duke and Laud.

“My Lord,” Buckingham said, “you have, I know, very free access to the King, our sovereign; let me pray you to remind his Majesty to be good to my poor wife and children.”

At these words, or perhaps rather on looking at the expression of countenance with which they were uttered, the Bishop, with some uneasiness,asked the Duke whether he had any forebodings in his mind which he did not like to betray?

“No,” replied the Duke; “but I think some adventure may kill me as much as any other man,”

The day before he was assassinated, the Duke being ill, Charles the First visited him whilst he was in bed. After a long and serious conversation in private, they separated, Buckingham embracing the King “in a very unusual and passionate manner;” and he also showed great emotion on taking leave of Lord Holland, “as if his soul had divined he should see them no more.”

The twentieth of August was his birthday. He had completed his thirty-sixth year--that period which has been marked by a great writer as the departure of youth[115]--it might have been, perhaps, in Buckingham’s case, the beginning of wisdom extracted from experience.

It was the age of omens and other superstitious weaknesses; and supernatural warnings were not wanting to heighten the effect of the tragedy that was soon to be acted. Neither did they who foreboded evil to the Duke wait until after the event to bring forth their ghostly revelations. One day, some little time before the Duke’s death, he was playing at bowls with the King in Spring Gardens.Buckingham, as he usually did,even in Charles’s presence, kept his hat on, a piece of presumption which irritated a Scotsman named Wilson, who, in his wrath, tossed off the Duke’s hat, and declared he would punish impertinence wherever he met it in the same way. On looking round for this man, he had vanished, and was nowhere to be found. The courtiers marvelled at the incident, and regarded it as ominous of the Duke’s fate; but he laughed at them for their folly, and showed no fear.[116]

His indifference was regarded as infatuation; in fact, it proves that the Duke was, in some respects, superior to those whom he most respected. There was no lone spinster in the country more given to believe in dreams and omens than Laud; and his diary contains perpetual references to his dreams. Every slight incident had its peculiar meaning, foreshadowing some great event. Nor does Lord Clarendon rise above the tone of the times, in his relation of that famous ghost story which forms one of the most prominent incidents of Buckingham’s latest days.

Old Sir George Villiers had now been dead eighteen years, and perhaps few of his family, and certainly not his wife, who had been twice married, ever wished to see him again.There was a certain Mr. Nicholas Towse, however, living in Bishopsgate Without, London, to whom the aged knight appeared in the spirit, during the year 1627, making choice of that individual as the depositary of secrets beyond the grave, because he had known him whilst he was a boy at school in Leicestershire, near Brookesby. As a mark of friendship, therefore, the apparition of Sir George favoured Mr. Towse with his revelations, and stood one night at the foot of his bed, dressed in the costume of the time of Elizabeth. There was a candle in the room, and Mr. Towse was perfectly wakeful. On beholding Sir George, he uttered, according to his own account, the natural inquiry, “What he was, and whether he was a man?” To which the apparition answered, “No.” Then Towse, in considerable emotion, asked, “Was he a devil?” To which the apparition still answered, “No.” Then Mr. Towse, with increasing agitation, said, “In the name of God, tell me what you are?”

"I am," replied the spectre, in doublet and hose, “the spectre of Sir George Villiers, the father of the Duke of Buckingham;” adding, that because he believed Mr. Towse loved him, and was sensible of the former kindness that he had shown him, he had selected him as the bearer of a message to the Duke of Buckingham, warninghim in such a manner as to prevent much mischief and present ruin to the Duke.

Whilst the apparition was speaking, Towse became more and more convinced of his identity, and more fully conscious that the long defunct master of a noble house stood before him; nevertheless, he refused to do Sir George’s bidding, saying that it would bring ridicule on him to carry to the Duke such a message. But the ghost earnestly entreated him to comply, assuring him, after the manner of ghosts, that there were certain passages in the Duke’s life known only to himself and his son, and that the revelation of these would plainly show the Duke it was no “distempered fancy, but a reality, that he wished to disclose.”

That night was one of irresolution, if not of incredulity; but, on the next, the unhappy Towse, thus picked out for so ghostly a service, promised to go to the Duke. He went, indeed, and found out Sir Thomas Freeman and Sir Ralph Bladden, the Duke’s chamberlains, by whom he was presented to the Duke. Then followed some private and agitated interviews between Buckingham and Towse, and the cautions of the ghost were fully and forcibly communicated: they related chiefly to Buckingham’s patronage of Laud, and suggested some popular acts which the Duke was to perform in Parliament--and, in short, containedadvice that any reasonable man might have offered. But nothing that was said by Mr. Towse made the slightest impression on the Duke, except, when certain passages of his life were referred to, with which the ghost had primed Mr. Towse, he owned he had believed “that no living creature knew of them but himself, and that it must be either God or the devil that had revealed them.” The Duke then offered to get Mr. Towse knighted, and to have him made a burgess in the forthcoming Parliament. But Mr. Towse, finding that the obstinate favourite was deaf to his advice, left him, prognosticating that the Duke’s death would happen at a certain time--which prognostic was fulfilled.

Mr. Towse then returned to Bishopsgate Without; and, there is much reason to believe, laboured under mental malady; for the visits of the apparition were now so frequent that he grew familiar with him, “as if it had been a friend or acquaintance that had come to visit him.” And from this very unpleasant guest Towse learned to see in perspective many events that had not then dawned on England; more especially the troubles of Prynne, who was Towse’s father-in-law--which was contrary to all rule, as a ghost should keep to one subject. On the day of Buckingham’s death, also, Mr. Towse and his wife being at WindsorCastle, where Towse had an office, they were sitting in company, when he started up, exclaiming, “The Duke of Buckingham is slain!” At the very moment that these words were uttered the blow had been given. Towse dying soon after, also foretold his own death.

This narrative, thought worthy of insertion by Clarendon, and therefore not to be completely disregarded in any biography of Buckingham, is taken, however, from a letter penned at Boulogne, by one Edmund Wyndham, in 1672, twenty years after the event.[117][118]According to Lord Clarendon, Buckingham, after hearing Towse’s revelation, was observed ever afterwards to be very melancholy. That he had misgivings as to his return, we have seen; but there are few men so insensible, at such a moment, as to be quite free from presentiment of evil--more especially one on whom the eyes of the country were directed in resentment, and regarding whom the Commons was then preparing a Remonstrance.[119]

Felton, meantime, was intent on pursuing hisscheme. The frank and kindly manner of the Duke towards his officers and soldiers at Rhé, his personal courage, and his participation in the hardships all had undergone in that expedition, had failed to propitiate the assassin, who was, in fact, stimulated by the fiercest of all incentives--political hatred, justified by the plea of religion. He set off, therefore, to Portsmouth, and, partly on horseback, and partly on foot, accomplished that journey; and perhaps the desperate state of his fortunes added to his gloomy views and reckless designs, into which one thought of self-preservation never entered. At a few miles from Portsmouth he was seen sharpening the fatal knife on a stone; he arrived at that city with the determination that, should his scheme of assassination fail for want of opportunity, he would enlist as a volunteer, in order to accomplish it eventually.

There was, of course, considerable bustle in the town; and on entering it, when the ghastly murderer stood unobserved amongst the crowd, there was too numerous a train about the Duke for Felton to reach him. Fearful of observation, he kept himself indoors one morning after his arrival; but, on the ensuing day, repaired to the house where Buckingham was staying. The Duke was at that time at breakfast, and little attention was paid by a number of suitors and applicants whowere waiting for him in the antechamber, to the diminutive being who was watching, with his dark purpose, among the unconscious crowd. As there were several military men, amongst whom was the Duc de Soubise, with Buckingham, as well as Sir Thomas Fryer, much animation pervaded the conversation, in consequence of a report having reached Portsmouth that La Rochelle had been relieved. Soubise and his followers believed that this report was set on foot by some agents of the French, in order to induce the English to relax in their preparations, until the mole, which it was Richelieu’s plan to form at the mouth of the harbour, should be completed. He and the other foreigners spoke with vehemence, and in tones which the English, who were listening, deemed to be those of anger. The Duke, it appeared, was inclined to believe the report, and the eagerness of Soubise was not, therefore, to be matter of surprise, since his interests, and those of his adherents, were irrevocably engaged in the approaching expedition. At length, however, the conference ended; Soubise took his leave, and Buckingham rose to quit the chamber where he had breakfasted.

It was, probably, with a pre-occupied mind that he thus prepared to go out; and it is very possible that he scarcely observed a small figure, whichhe may not even have recognized, which was lifting up, as he passed on, the hangings between the room and the antechamber. This was Felton. Buckingham, on his way, stopped an instant to speak to Sir Thomas Fryer, one of his Colonels, who was a short man--so that, in order to hear his reply, the Duke bent down his head somewhat. Fryer then drew back, and, at that moment, Felton, striking across the Colonel’s arm, stabbed Buckingham a little above the heart. The knife was left in the body; the Duke, with a sudden effort, drew it out, and exclaiming, “The villain has killed me,” pursued the assassin out of the parlour into the hall or antechamber, where he sank down, and, falling under a table, drew a deep breath, and expired.

Then the utmost confusion ensued. The English, misled by what had passed at breakfast, accused Soubise and his followers of the murder; and they would have been instantly sacrificed to the fury of the populace, had not some persons of cooler feelings interposed in their behalf. No one had seen the murderer; he had come in unnoticed, and had withdrawn in like manner. At this moment, a hat, into which a paper was sewn, was found near the door; it was eagerly examined, and some writing on the paper read with avidity, and these words were deciphered:--

“That man is cowardly, base, and deserves neither the name of a gentleman nor soldier, who will not sacrifice his life for the honour of God, and safety of his prince and country. Let no man commend me for doing it, but rather discommend themselves; for if God had not taken away our hearts for our sins, he could not have gone so long unpunished.”Jno. Felton."[120]

”Jno. Felton."[120]

Whilst the bystanders were reading these words, the body of the Duke had been conveyed to the inner apartment, from which he had issued, having been first laid on the table of the antechamber, or hall; and in this inner chamber it was left, without a single person, even a domestic, to watch over his remains, or to give him that tribute of sorrowing respect which is due to the poorest. And this singular neglect has been regarded as a proof of indifference in those who, but a few minutes previously, were crowding round the powerful Minister and General. But it was, in fact, one of those accidents which often bear a very different construction, when they are considered relatively to the circumstances of the hour, to thatplaced on them. Sir Henry Wotton, to whom the fact was mentioned by one of the Duke’s friends, speaks of it as “beyond all wonder;” but accounts for it by the horror which the murder had excited, added to the astonishment at the sudden disappearance of the murderer, who had glided from the terrible scene like an actor who has done his part, and makes his exit. For a time, however, whilst high words were heard between the Frenchmen and their accusers, whilst murmurs from the street below, of the eager and infuriated crowd, were changed into yells of vengeance, that cold corpse lay unheeded; “thus, upon the withdrawing of the sun, does the shadow depart from the painted dial.”[121]All were, indeed, in the house, occupied in asking again and again the question, Where could the owner of the hat be?--for he, doubtless, was the assassin. Whilst they were thus talking, a man without a hat was seen walking with perfect composure up and down before the door. “Here,” cried one of the crowd, “is the man who killed the Duke,” upon which Felton calmly said, “I am he, let no person suffer that is innocent.” Then the populace rushed upon him with drawn swords, to which Felton offered no defence, preferring rather to die at once, than to abide the issueof justice. He was, however, rescued by others less violent--a circumstance which was thought very fortunate for the popular party, on whom a stigma might have rested had the murderer been killed; and Felton being secured, was conveyed to a small sentry-box; he was instantly loaded with heavy irons, which prevented his either standing upright or lying down in that narrow prison, where he remained sometime, whilst the mob were raging without in the streets.[122]

The Duchess of Buckingham was in an upper room of that house in which the husband whom she had “loved,” to use her own words, “as never woman loved man,” was murdered. She had not, when it happened, risen from her bed.[123]

The following very graphic account, written by a very devoted friend of Buckingham, Sir Dudley Carleton, presents, in several details, a somewhat different delineation of this scene of murder, to that which has been related, collected from various sources, although, in various instances, it is confirmatory of the statements usually received.[124]

"Sr--If yeill newes we have heard (doe not astheir use is) out flye these lres,[125]they will bring you yeworst of yestrangest I think you ever received: sure I am, whatever passed my pen. Our noble Duke in yemidst of his army he had ready at Portsmouth as well shipping as land forces, in yeheight of his favour with our Gracious Master, who was herd by at this place and in the greatest joy and alacrity I ever saw him in my life at yenewes he had received about of yeclock in yemorning on Saturday last of yerelief of Rochell, in that fort, that yeplace might well attend his coming, wherewith he was hastening to yeKing, who that morning had sent for him by me upon other occasions;--at his going out of a lower parlour where he usually sat, and had then broken his fast in presence of many standers by (Frenchmen with Monsieur de Soubise, officers of his army and those of his own Trayns) was stabbed unto yeheart a little above yebreast with a knife by one Felton, an Englishman, being a Reformed Lieutenant, who hastening out of yedoore and yeduke having pulled out yeknife which was left in yewound and following him out of yeparlour into yehall, with his hand putt to his sword, there fell down dead with much effusion of bloud at his mouth and nostrils.The Lady Anglesea,[126]then looking down intoyeyehall out of an open Gallery, which crossed yeend of it, and being spectator of this tragical fight, went immediately with a cry into yeDuchesses Chamber, who was in bed, and then fell down on yefloor, so surprized yepoor Duchesse with this sad ... matin....[127]The murderer in yemidst of yenoise and tumult, every man drawing his sword and no man knowing whom to strike, nor from whom to defend himself, slipt out into yekitchen and there stood with some others unespyed, when a voyce being currant in the court to wchyewindow and doore of yekitchen answered (a Frenchman, a Frenchman), and his guilty conscience making him believe it was “Felton, Felton” (who being otherwise unknown and undiscovered might well have escaped) he came out of yekitchen with his sword drawn, and presenting himselfe, said, I am the man: some offering to assayle him and one running at him with a spit, he flung down his sword and rendered himselfe to yecompany, who being ready to handle him as he deserved by tearing him in pieces I took him from them, andhaving committed him to yecustody of some officers, when I had taken yebest order I could for other affairs in so great confusion, jointly with Secretary Cooke I examined yeman and found he had no particular offence against yeDuke, more than all others for want of some small entertayments were owing him: but he grounded his practise upon yeParliament’s Remonstrance as to make himselfe a Martyr for his Country, which he confessed to have resolved to execute yeMonday before, he being then at London, and came from thence expressly by the Wednesday morning, arriving at Portsmouth yevery morning, not above half an hour before he committed it. We could not then discover any complices, neither did we take more than his free and willing confession: but now His Majestie hath ordayned by Commission yeLord Treassurer, Lord Steward, Earl of Dorset, Secretary Cooke and myselfe to proceed with him as yenature of yefact requires, and wee shall begin this afternoon: meane while I would not but give you this relation to yeend you may know yetruth of this bloudy act, which will flye about the world diversly reported to you, and you should not find it strange such a blowe to be struck in yemidst of yeDuke’s friends and followers: you must know yemurderer took his time and place at yepresse nearyeissue of yeroom, and many of us were stept out to our horses, as I my selfe was to go to Court with the Duke. The murderer gloryed in his acte yefirst day; but when I told him he was yefirst assassin of an Englishman, a gentleman, a soldier, and a protestant, he shrunk at it, and is now grown penitent. It seems this man and Ravillac were of no other Religion (though he professeth other) thanassassanisme; they have the same maxims as you will see by two writings were found sowed in his hat, wchgoe herewith.“From Lord Viscount Dorchester to” [not addressed.][128]

“From Lord Viscount Dorchester to” [not addressed.][128]

In another letter, addressed to the King of Bohemia by Sir Charles Morgan, it was also shown in what sanguine spirits the Duke was, and how he was forming good resolutions, when he received the fatal blow which cut him off from all hope of retrieving the errors he so candidly confessed, or of completing the work of reformation, in various departments, which he hoped to accomplish. Although we may feel assured that the blow was suffered to fall for some purpose of mercy, yet never did any sudden death seem more untimely.

The King was only about six miles from Portsmouth,whence he intended doubtless to witness the departure of a friend whom he never ceased to lament. He was at prayers when Sir John Hippesley came suddenly into the Presence Chamber, where service was that day performed, and whispered the news into his Majesty’s ear. Charles did not permit a single feature of his face to express either astonishment or distress; and, when a deep pause ensued, the appalled chaplain thinking to spare his Majesty the distress of remaining during the service, he calmly ordered him to proceed with the prayers--and, until those were concluded, preserved the same undisturbed demeanour. Some there were who argued, from this perfect mastery over his feelings, that the King did not regret the death of one who had rendered him so unpopular, and from whom he could not unloose the bonds which early habit and youthful friendship had drawn so closely as to convert them into shackles. But the deep sorrow which Charles felt was shown in his affectionate care of those whom his favourite loved; nor was it, as some supposed, without a stern effort that he controlled his emotions whilst he remained amid those assembled in prayer. No sooner was the service over, than he suddenly departed to his chamber, and, throwing himself on his bed, gave full vent to a passionof grief, and, weeping long and bitterly, paid to the poor Duke the tribute of his anguish,--lamenting not only the loss of an excellent friend and servant, but “the terrible manner of the Duke’s death.” And he continued for many days in the deepest melancholy.[129]

Of course, in those days, this fearful event was said to have been foretold, not only by a ghost, but in dreams, and by presentiments. Sir James Bagg, one of the Duke’s most trusted servants, has left the following proof of his belief in dreams:--

"Right Honorable--Hand in hand came to my unfortunate hand yo Expps.[130]and my noble friend Mr. Secretarie Cooke’s, and yorHonors leynes could not be but welcome although they brought vnto mee the sadd and heavy newes of that damnable act of that accursed ffelton, wchhath so seated itself in my heart as it will hould memorie there, of the untymilie losse of my deere and gracious Lord to my unpacified sorrow untill my Death; for as I partook wthhim of his comforts living, I will have a share of his sorrowes after him. Oh my Lord! his end was upon Satterdaumorning.morning.The daie of his dissolving tould mee by a dreame, discribed in all. It wanted but the damned name of Felton.But that fiende unworthy of it was entituled by the name of Souldier. This Dreame tould my Wife and dearest friends, did not a little trouble mee, but now the trueth thereof torments me."Yo leynes my only comforte brought wththem his Mat[131]commands. In all I doe obey them," &c., &c.

"Yo leynes my only comforte brought wththem his Mat[131]commands. In all I doe obey them," &c., &c.

The letter is addressed thus from Sir James Bagg--“For his Lordship,” and dated, “Augt. 28th, 1628.”[132]

Amongst the Duke’s relations the Countess of Denbigh was most beloved by him, and his affection was warmly returned. On the very day of his death he wrote to her. Whilst she was penning her answer, her paper was moistened with her tears, in a passion of grief so poignant and so despairing, that she could only account for it by believing those transports of sorrow to have been prophetic. She wrote to him these words:--

“I will pray for your happy return, which I look to with a great cloud over my head, too heavy for my poor heart to bear without torment. But I hope the great God of Heaven will bless you.”[133]

On the day after the Duke’s death, the Bishop of Ely, who was the devoted friend of Lady Denbigh, being considered the fittest person to break the intelligence to her, went to visit her, but hearing that she was asleep, waited until she awoke, which she did in all the perturbation produced by a terrible dream. Her brother, she said, had seemed to pass with her through a field, when, hearing a sudden shout from the people, she had asked what it meant, and was told that it was for joy that the Duke of Buckingham was ill. She was relating this dream to one of her gentlewomen when the Bishop entered her chamber. The scene that followed may be easily conceived. Whatever were the ill-starred Duke’s failings, he died beloved by those most dear to him.

His sister’s apprehensions were, indeed, perfectly justifiable, and they might well intrude into those hours of silence in which thoughts of the absent or unhappy most frequently trouble our minds. Had the Duke again been saved from the chances of war, what might have been his fate at home in case of his return unsuccessful? Already had he hardly escaped from the indignation of the people: even then, in the remote county of Carmarthen, they were raising reports that the King had been poisoned by the Duke--reportsthat had been believed by the simple inhabitants of Wales. The fury of party had much to answer for in the excitement of bad passions, the end and mischief of which can never be foreseen.

The greatest obscurity hung over the motives which prompted the act, unless it be explained by the practical aberration of a mind which, still bearing the outward semblance of reason, has evil thoughts, fostered by strong passions. The connections of Felton were not only poor--his mother appears to have been illiterate. To them, probably, his designs were never imparted, although they lived in the metropolis; yet it is evident, from several circumstances, that they knew of his animosity to the Duke, and were, to a certain extent--without any complicity--prepared to hear of some fearful act on the part of their unhappy relative.

Whilst the Duke’s family were overwhelmed with anguish, another humble mourner almost sank under the blow. This was Elianore Felton, the mother of the assassin. She was a native of Durham, of which city her father had once been mayor, but she was then residing in London. On the 24th of August, in the church in St. Dunstan’s, in the Strand, an aged woman and her daughter attended afternoonservice. These poor women were Elianore Felton and Elizabeth Hone, the mother and sister of Felton.

During the singing of the psalms, whilst the congregation were standing up, some disturbance took place in the church. Elianore Felton, turning to a gentleman near her, inquired what was the cause? She was told that the Duke of Buckingham was killed; upon which, although the name of the assassin was not then mentioned to her, the unhappy woman fainted.

It is probable that, knowing her son’s sentiments towards the Duke, and being aware of Felton’s fanatical opinions and moody temper, a panic, causing that sudden fainting, seized her. Her daughter, also, as the poor mother confessed in her subsequent examination, swooned also. These facts are very remarkable, and seem to show that she and her mother were aware of Felton’s intentions. No further information was gathered from these gentlewomen by those around them, until, in about half-an-hour, upon the church becoming fuller, there ran another whisper through it, purporting that a certain Lieutenant Felton, or Fenton, had killed the Duke. Then, as Elizabeth Hone confessed, she did much weep and lament, supposing that it was her brother that had done the deed. Shehad, however, the presence of mind to conduct her mother home, before she told her that it was her son who had committed murder, and plunged the nation into consternation, and his family into ruin.

No proof whatsoever of any conspiracy was to be elucidated from the unfortunate relations of the culprit. Debt and disappointment had, according to their evidence, driven Felton to desperation. How many of the evil accidents of life issue, as far as one can see, humanly speaking, from pecuniary mismanagement. Felton, on the Wednesday before the Duke was killed, had gone to his mother’s lodging, and told her of his intention to get the money due to him for pay from the Duke; adding, that “he was too deeply in debt to stay longer in town.” Eighty pounds, it appeared, was then owing to him. This, and the loss of his Captaincy, were all that he had alleged to his own family against the Duke; he owned to no other grievance. The mother and sister, and brothers, were, however, committed to prison, although Edmund Felton, the brother of the delinquent, affirmed that he had not seen him for ten weeks previously to the murder; that John Felton had been estranged from him, and did not let him know where he lodged. There was no attempt inthe examination, which took place before Thomas Richardson and Henry Finch, to screen the culprit by a plea of insanity; all his brother said was, that his disposition was “melancholie, sad, and heavy, and of few words.”[134]Alone had he conceived, planned, and put into execution the deed of guilt; yet such was the hard disposition of the times, that it was proposed to extract a confession from John Felton by torture; but Charles interposed, and forbade the application of that horrible test,[135]and it was never again attempted in this country.

The nation was paralyzed by the death of the Minister, Admiral, and General. “During Buckingham’s presence at Court,” as Mr. Bruce, in the preface to the “Calendar of State Papers,” remarks, “he reigned there as the King’s absolute and single Minister. Every act of the Government passed by or through his will. The King was little seen or heard of on State affairs. He seldom ever attended a sitting of the Privy Council, except to carry out some object of his favourite.” The void, the loss, may easily be conceived, after the death of the Duke. Charles, however, not only entered warmly into public affairs, but into the care and concerns ofthose children whom his friend had solemnly bequeathed to his charge.

His first office, however, was to honour the remains of one so suddenly cut off, whilst in the prime of life. The process of embalming was then deemed indispensable; the Duke’s body, therefore, was submitted to that, happily, now disused operation; his bowels were interred at Portsmouth, where Lady Denbigh erected over them a memorial. Thus the place of his death was marked.

The corpse was then conveyed to York House, where all that could be viewed of that once noble form was exhibited underneath a hearse. Eventually it was entombed under a splendid monument in Westminster Abbey, on the north side of Henry VII.’s Chapel; and his Duchess, notwithstanding her second marriage, and his two sons, were buried in the vault beneath the tomb with their father.

The Duchess of Buckingham was near her confinement when this tragedy occurred. When Charles first visited the young widow, he promised her that he would be a “husband to her, and a father to her children.” One son alone was living at the time of the Duke’s decease. This was George, the second Duke of Buckingham of the house of Villiers. The characterof this young nobleman, to whom Horace Walpole imputed “the figure and genius of Alcibiades,” has been “drawn by four masterly hands. Burnet has hewn it out with his rough chisel. Count Hamilton touched it with slight delicacy, that finishes while it seems to sketch. Dryden catched the living likeness. Pope completed the historical resemblance.” Lastly, Sir Walter Scott, in our time, has depicted this singular being with admirable skill, if not with perfect fidelity. He was scarcely a year and seven months old at his father’s death.

One daughter, Lady Mary Villiers, survived the Duke. In the third year of the reign of Charles I., Buckingham having then no male heir, caused a patent to be made, limiting to her the title of Duchess of Buckingham, in default of male issue, his infant eldest son, Charles, having died in 1626, and George not being then born.

Lady Mary’s life, so happy, seemingly, in her infancy, when, as “little Moll,” she was King James’s plaything, was not, in one respect, felicitous. Her first marriage, to Charles Lord Herbert, son and heir of Philip, Earl of Pembroke, was hastened, and performed privately in the chapel at Whitehall, because the young bride had formed an attachment to Philip Herbert, a younger son, who “did more applyhimself to her,” as she stated, than the elder suitor.

But her mother chided her out of this fancy, and the wedding took place--the bridegroom dying of small-pox a few weeks afterwards. Lady Mary married, secondly, James, Duke of Richmond and Lennox, by whom she had a son, Esme Stuart, who died in infancy; and thirdly, Thomas Howard, brother of the Earl of Carlisle. She left no children, so that her father’s desire to perpetuate in her his title was not realized. If we may believe the praise of an epitaph which was undisguisedly paid for, we must suppose Lady Mary to have been endowed with all the virtues.[136]

Some months after the Duke’s death, his widow gave birth to a son, named Francis after his grandfather, who provided for him in a fortuneof 1,000l.a-year. When he grew up, however, Francis shared with his brother the misfortune that overshadowed the family, from the unexpected second marriage of their mother to Randolph Macdonald, first Earl and afterwards Marquis of Antrim. It is painful to find the widowed Duchess separated from her children, havingbecome a Roman Catholic; and having incurred in this, and on account of the conduct of her husband in Ireland, under Sir Thomas Wentworth, the King’s displeasure. Charles so greatly disapproved of her marriage, that he refused, for several years, to see her, and, when reconciled, took away her children lest they should be imbued with her religious opinions. The young Duke and his brother Francis were educated, unhappily for themselves, with the Princes,Charles II. and his brothers; and Lady Mary was received in the house of the Earl of Pembroke, her father-in-law. Such are the changes and chances of life, that in 1639 we find Katharine, (still signing herself “Katharine Buckingham”) interceding with Strafford for her husband, Lord Antrim. “Any misfortune,” she writes, “to my lord must be mine.”[137]

For him she had sacrificed indeed the favour of the King, and the guardianship of her children.

In 1648, Lord Francis, who, with his brother, had taken the field against the Parliament, was killed, at about two miles distance from Kingston-on-Thames:standing with his back planted against an oak-tree on the road-side; and, scorning to ask quarter, he met his death gallantly, having nine wounds on his face and body. He is said to have been a most beautiful youth, and was only nineteen when he thus fell. His body was brought by water to York House, then sad and desolate, and was taken thence to be deposited in his father’s vault, with a Latin inscription on the coffin, preserved by Brian Fairfax, a faithful adherent, who thought it a pity that the epitaph should be buried with him; and who has therefore given it in his life of George, the second Duke of Buckingham. The elder brother of Lord Francis, after a life of extraordinary adventure, vicissitude, study, and dissipation, died, in 1688, quietly in his bed--“the fate of few of his predecessors of the title of Buckingham.” His body also lies entombed near his father. “The life of pleasure and the soul of whim,” as Pope describes him, his career furnishes a wide field for reflection and investigation, to those who may dare to dive into a biography so characterized by all the worst parts of the age in which he existed, as that of this profligate man.

Mary, Countess of Buckingham, survived the Duke, her son, four years--when, with her life, her dignity expired.

John Villiers, Lord Purbeck, died in 1657,when the titles which he bore became extinct. He lived, however, to recover his powers of mind, and to act as a friend and guardian to his nephews. Lady Purbeck, his first wife, took the name of Wright, and her son, by Lord Howard, bore that surname. The once flattered heiress, whose follies and misconduct were forgiven, as we have seen, by her father, died in 1645, in the King’s Garrison, at Oxford, and she is buried in the Church of St. Mary’s, in that city.[139]Notwithstanding the misery of his first union, Lord Purbeck married again; but had no issue by his second wife, who was a daughter of Sir William Thugsby, of Kippen, in Yorkshire.

Robert Wright, the illegitimate son of Lady Purbeck, took his wife’s name of Danvers, in order to abandon that of Villiers, so distasteful to the Commonwealth, with which he sided.

His descendants, nevertheless, laid claim to the honours of the first Lord Purbeck--and, although their claim was refused by Parliament, assumed them, until, in 1774, the death of the last pretender to the title, George Villiers, died without issue.

Christopher Villiers, the youngest brother of the Duke, pre-deceased him, dying in 1624. His title became extinct in 1659.

Sir William Villiers, the eldest half-brother of the Duke, had never emerged from his original obscurity; but Sir Edward, his other half-brother, whom Buckingham constituted President of Munster, was highly esteemed for his justice and hospitality, and lamented by the whole province.[140]From him, through his son, who had succeeded his maternal uncle in the title of Viscount Grandison, was descended the famous (or infamous) Barbara Villiers, afterwards Duchess of Cleveland, the mistress of Charles II. Her beauty appears to have been one of the few traits of the Villiers family that she possessed.

It is remarkable that not one of the titles conferred on the family of Villiers by James I. remains to distinguish the descendants of old Sir George of Brookesby. The Earldoms of Clarendon and of Jersey are subsequent creations.[141]

The Duchess of Buckingham, as she still styled herself, appears to have lived occasionally at Newhall, for after her daughter’s marriage she was very desirous of having her with her--but the King would not hear of it; and the soundness of his judgment was proved by the conduct of the Duchess. Her life was henceforth occupied in bringing over converts to the faith she professed; amongst others she succeeded in making a proselyte of the Countess of Newburgh. After the death of her father, in 1632, she inherited the title of Baroness de Ros. It is remarkable that even in her person the honours her first husband had procured for his family did not abide. She, indeed, by courtesy, bore still his title, but was actually Marchioness of Antrim and Baroness de Ros. So extraordinary an acquisition of honours, and so rapid an extinction, are not known in any other family of England, but are peculiar to the House of Villiers.

Few things disappoint the reader more than the unaccountable change in the character of Katharine, Duchess of Buckingham, after she ceased, except by courtesy, to bear that name. She seems to have hastened, not only to plunge into a second marriage, but to have at last avowed, what she had during the whole of her life denied,the tenets of the Church of Rome. Henceforth she was opposed to the monarch by whom her husband, the Duke, had been overwhelmed with benefits. This painful alteration in one so gentle, so forgiving, so affectionate in her earlier life, is one of those anomalies in life that one cannot cease to regret, without being able to explain.

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