Part 10

RALEIGH--What infer you upon this?

ATTORNEY--That your treason hath wings.

RALEIGH--If Cobham did practice with Aremberg, how could it not but be known in Spain? Why did they name the Duke of Buckingham with Jack Straw's treason, and the Duke of York with Jack Cade, but that it was to countenance his treason? Consider, you Gentlemen of the Jury, there is no cause so doubtful which the king's council cannot make good against the law. Consider my disability and their ability; they prove nothing against me, only they bring the accusation of my lord Cobham which he hath repented and lamented as heartily, as if it had been for an horrible murder: for he knew that all this sorrow that should come to me, is by his means. Presumptions must proceed from precedent or subsequent facts. I have spent 40,000 crowns against the Spaniards. I had not purchased £40 a year. If I had died in Guiana, I had not left 300 marks a year to my wife and son. I that have always condemned Spanish faction, methinks it is a strange thing that now I should affect it! Remember what St. Austin says, Sic judicate tanquam ab alio mox judicandi; unus judex, unum tribunal. If you will be contented on presumptions to be delivered up to be slaughtered, to have your wives and children turned into the streets to beg their bread; if you will be contented to be so judged, judge so of me.

SERJ. PHILIPS--I hope to make this so clear, as that the wit of man shall have no colour to answer it. The matter is treason in the highest degree, the end to deprive the king of his crown. The particular treasons are these: first, to raise up rebellion, and to effect that, to procure money; to raise up tumults in Scotland, by divulging a treasonable Book against the king's right to the crown; the purpose, to take away the life of his majesty and his issue. My lord Cobham confesseth sir Walter to be guilty of all these treasons. The question is, whether he be guilty as joining with him, or instigating of him? The course to prove this was by my lord Cobham's accusation. If that be true, he is guilty, if not he is clear. So whether Cobham say true, or Raleigh, that is the question. Raleigh hath no answer but the shadow of as much wit as the wit of man can devise. He useth his bare denial; the denial of a defendant must not move the jury. In the Star Chamber, or in the Chancery, for matter of title, if the defendant be called in question, his denial on his oath is no evidence to the court to clear him, he doth it in propria causa; therefore much less in matters of treason. Cobham's testification against him before them, and since, hath been largely discoursed.

RALEIGH--If truth be constant, and constancy be in truth, why hath he forsworn that that he hath said? You have not proved any one thing against me by direct proofs, but all by circumstances.

ATTORNEY--Have you done? The king must have the last.

RALEIGH--Nay, Mr. Attorney, he which speaketh for his life, must speak last. False repetitions and mistakings must not mar my cause. You should speak secundum allegata et probata. I appeal to God and the king in this point whether Cobham's accusation is sufficient to condemn me.

ATTORNEY--The king's safety and your clearing cannot agree. I protest before God, I never knew a clearer treason.

RALEIGH--I never had intelligence with Cobham since I came to the Tower.

ATTORNEY--Go to, I will lay thee upon thy back, for the confidentest traitor that ever came at a bar. Why should you take 8,000 crowns for a peace?

LORD CECIL--Be not so impatient, good Mr. Attorney. Give him leave to speak.

ATTORNEY--If I may not be patiently heard, you will encourage traitors and discourage us. I am the king's sworn servant, and must speak; if he be guilty, he is a traitor; if not, deliver him.

(Note.--Here Mr. Attorney sat down in a chafe and would speak no more until the commissioners urged and intreated him. After much ado, he went on, and made a long repetition of all the evidence for the direction of the jury; and at the repeating of some things, sir Walter Raleigh interrupted him and said he did him wrong.)

ATTORNEY--Thou art the most vile and execrable traitor that ever lived.

RALEIGH--You speak indiscreetly, barbarously, and uncivilly.

ATTORNEY--I want words sufficient to express thy viperous treasons.

RALEIGH--I think you want words indeed, for you have spoken one thing half a dozen times.

ATTORNEY--Thou art an odious fellow, thy name is hateful to all the realm of England for thy pride.

RALEIGH--It will go near to prove a measuring cast between you and me, Mr. Attorney.

ATTORNEY--Well, I will now make it appear to the world that there never lived a viler viper upon the face of the earth than thou.--And there withal he drew a letter out of his pocket saying further--My lords, you shall see this is an agent that hath writ a treatise against the Spaniard, and hath ever so detested him; this is he that hath spent so much money against him in service; and yet you shall all see whether his heart be not wholly Spanish. The lord Cobham, who of his own nature was a good and honourable gentleman, till overtaken by this wretch now finding his conscience heavily burdened with some courses which the subtlety of this traitor had drawn him into, my lords, he could be at no rest with himself, nor quiet in his thoughts, until he was eased of that heavy weight: out of which passion of his mind and discharge of his duty to his prince and his conscience to God, taking it upon his salvation that he wrote nothing but the truth, with his own hands he wrote this letter. Now sir, you shall see whether you had intelligence with Cobham within four days before he came to the Tower. If he be wholly Spanish, that desired a pension of £1500 a year from Spain, that Spain by him might have intelligence, then Raleigh is a traitor: he hath taken an apple and pinned a letter into it and threw it into my lord Cobham's window, the contents whereof were this, 'It is doubtful whether we shall be proceeded with or no, perhaps you shall not be tried.' This was to get a retractation. Oh! it was Adam's apple whereby the devil did deceive him. Further he wrote thus, 'Do not as my lord of Essex did; take heed of a preacher, for by his persuasion he confessed and made himself guilty.' I doubt not but this day God shall have as great a conquest by this traitor, and the Son of God shall be as much glorified as when it was said Vicisti Galilæe; you know my meaning. What though Cobham retracted, yet he could not rest or sleep until he had confirmed it again. If this be not enough to prove him a traitor, the king my master shall not live three years to an end.

(Note.--Here Mr. Attorney produced the lord Cobham's letter, and as he read it, inserted some speeches.)

'I have thought fit to set down this to my lords, wherein I protest on my soul to write nothing but the truth. I am now come near the period of my time, therefore I confess the whole truth before God and his angels. Raleigh, four days before I came from the Tower, caused an apple' (Eve's apple) 'to be thrown in at my chamber window; the effect of it was, to intreat me to right the wrong that I had done him, in saying, "that I should have come home by Jersey"; which under my hand to him I have retracted. His first Letter I answered not, which was thrown in the same manner; wherein he prayed me to write him a Letter, which I did. He sent me word, that the Judges met at Mr. Attorney's house, and that there was good hope the proceedings against us should be stayed: he sent me another time a little tobacco. At Aremberg's coming, Raleigh was to have procured a pension of £1500 a year, for which he promised, that no action should be against Spain, the Low Countries, or the Indies, but he would give knowledge beforehand. He told me, the States had audience with the king.'--(Attorney. 'Ah! is not this a Spanish heart in an English body?') 'He hath been the original cause of my ruin; for I had no dealing with Aremberg, but by his instigation. He hath also been the cause of my discontentment; he advised me, not to be overtaken by preachers, as Essex was; and that the king would better allow of a constant denial, than to accuse any.'

ATTORNEY--Oh, damnable atheist! He hath learned some Text of Scripture to serve his own purpose, but falsely alledged. He counsels him not to be counselled by preachers, as Essex was: He died the child of God, God honoured him at his death; thou wast by when he died: Et lupus et turpes instant morientibus Ursæ. He died indeed for his offence. The king himself spake these words: 'He that shall say, Essex dies not for Treason, is punishable.'

RALEIGH--You have heard a strange tale of a strange man. Now he thinks, he hath matter enough to destroy me; but the king and all of you shall witness, by our deaths, which of us was the ruin of the other. I bid a poor fellow throw in the Letter at his window, written to this purpose; 'You know you have undone me, now write three lines to justify me.' In this I will die, that he hath done me wrong: Why did not he acquaint him with my dispositions?

LORD CHIEF-JUSTICE--But what say you now of the Letter, and the Pension of £1500 per annum?

RALEIGH--I say, that Cobham is a base, dishonourable, poor soul.

ATTORNEY--Is he base? I return it into thy throat on his behalf: but for thee he had been a good subject.

LORD CHIEF-JUSTICE--I perceive you are not so clear a man, as you have protested all this while; for you should have discovered these matters to the king.