Raleigh's chief occupations seem to have been those of a favoured courtier, an active member of Parliament, and a large sharer in those naval enterprises and privateering expeditions against Spain, which, as Hume observes, were scarce ever intermitted by the "Queen or her subjects during one season.'* As was to be expected, he experienced considerable vicissitudes, in respect of loss and gain, in these uncertain adventures. In some curious papers of accounting, preserved in the British Museum, it appears that he complained bitterly of the shares assigned to him, even in cases where the Queen herself had been a joint adventurer.† Neither the wealth nor the morals of the country were much benefited by these plundering expeditions. They were strongly condemned even by some men of the sword who lived near the time. They indeed occasioned,' says Sir William Monson, great loss and 'damage to the Spaniards, but no profit or advantage to the English. There are not three men in this kingdom who can 'boast they have succeeded their fathers in any quantity of goods so gotten.' The attempt to take vengeance on Philip by placing Don Antonio on the throne of Portugal, was an adventure of a nobler and more romantic description; and Raleigh, with some other distinguished men, was honoured by the Queen with a gold chain, in token of her approval of his services in this memorable but unsuccessful expedition.

One of the most pleasing incidents of this period of his life was his meeting with Spenser, during a sort of compulsory visit to Ireland, occasioned by some temporary eclipse of his favour at court. They are supposed to have become acquainted before, during the rebellion of the Desmonds; but their subsequent intercourse led to a friendship which proved as beneficial to the poet, as the exercise of his patronage was honourable to Raleigh. This meeting is beautifully described by Spenser himself, in the pastoral of Colin Clout,' which he represents in his dedication to Raleigh who is figured as the shepherd of the Ocean'-as agreeing with the truth in circumstance and fact.' Spenser was then residing at Kilcolman, an ancient castle of the Desmonds, situate on the banks of the Mulla; and the scene which he delineates in the opening of the piece is in the highest degree interesting and pleasing; but it is still more agreeable to find him recording the fact of his introduction and recommendation to the Queen by Raleigh, after his restoration to favour.

Hist. England, c. 43.

Burghley Papers, Bibl. Lansdown., vol. 70, No. 94. Ibid. vol. 73, Nos. 10 and 11.

Naval Tracts, in Churchill's Coll., vol. iii, pp. 211-12.

The Shepherd of the Ocean

Unto that Goddess' grace me first enhanced,
And to mine oaten pipe inclined her ear,
That she therein thenceforth 'gan take delight,
And it desired at timely hours to hear.'

The mind dwells with satisfaction on such bright spots in Raleigh's ambitious and troubled career, where his native generosity, unobscured and unobstructed by any adverse feeling, exerts itself in acts entitling him to our unmixed approbation and esteem. He had another opportunity of showing the friendliness of his disposition, and his congenial admiration of superior merit, as well in arms as in letters, by the account which he published in 1591, of the unparalleled sea-fight at the Azores, maintained for fifteen hours in a single ship, commanded by Admiral Sir Richard Grenville, against a Spanish fleet of fifty-three sail, manned with ten thousand men! His description of the action, in which the enemy's numerous fleet formed a circle around the ship of the death-devoted Admiral, who, pierced with mortal wounds, continued to fight her till her ammunition was exhausted, when he commanded the master-gunner-a kindred spirit to sink her, that nothing might remain of glory or victory to the Spaniard '--and which command would have been obeyed but for the interference of the remainder of the mutilated crew-presents a view of perhaps the most astonishing naval conflict ever delineated by any pen. Of this recital it may without hyperbole be said, as was by Sir Philip Sydney said of 'the old song of Percie and Douglas,' that it more moves the heart than a trumpet.' It is written with great clearness and vigour, and breathes a spirit of loyalty and patriotism truly admirable, especially in its indignant reprobation of the conduct of Spain for her bloody and injurious designs, purposed and practised against Christian princes, over all of whom she 'seeks unlawful and ungodly rule and empery.'

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The man who could sound such thrilling and patriotic notes, was sure to advance himself more and more in the good graces of Elizabeth; but the course of royal favour was turned aside by an act which, for some time, put an end to all personal intercourse with his hitherto partial sovereign; and led him to enter upon a new and romantic scene of adventure, from which his subsequent history derives much of its peculiar interest and colouring. This reverse was occasioned by an amour and private marriage with one of the maids of honour,-Elizabeth, daughter of Sir Nicolas Throgmorton. All who are acquainted with the history of this reign know, that the intercourse between the Queen and her favourites generally wore the appearance of a commerce of love; and that she was addressed by them, down to the

VOL. LXXI. NO. CXLIII,

B

last day of her life, in terms of gallantry and ardent personal devotion. Thus her foibles, or softnesses,' as Bacon chooses to designate them, concurring with her arbitrary maxims of government, led her to view Raleigh's conduct as both personally and politically offensive and reprehensible-personally, as interfering with that exclusive devotion to herself which she exacted from her favoured knights; politically, as interfering with her prerogative, which required that her consent to the marriage should have been asked and obtained. The offending couple were accordingly committed to the Tower; and Raleigh was deprived of the offices which gave him the privilege of free access to his sovereign. No man knew better the weaknesses of his royal mistress; and no one could be less scrupulous as to using any expedients, however ignoble, by which her wrath might be appeased. No knight of romance, banished from the presence of the goddess of his vows, ever surpassed the fantastic tricks' which he now exhibited, or the fulsome rhapsodies which he indited. Without adverting to his theatrical struggles to obtain a view of his peerless princess, we may notice as curiously descriptive of the parties, a letter addressed to Cecil, but evidently designed for the eye of the Queen; in which he represents himself as cast into the depth of misery from being deprived of the delight of seeing her '-' her that he had been wont to 'behold riding like Alexander, hunting like Diana, walking like Venus the gentle wind blowing her fair hair about her pure 'cheeks, like a nymph; sometimes sitting in the shade like a goddess-sometimes singing like an angel, sometimes playing like Orpheus! Notwithstanding every allowance that can be made for the occasional follies of the wise, and the influence of times and circumstances, it would be difficult to regard this tawdry and unmanly exhibition without feelings approaching to contempt. Yet let us in extenuation recollect, that Henry the Fourth, in order to conciliate Elizabeth's favour, condescended to demean himself in a similar strain, when, on being shown a miniature of her Majesty by her Ambassador, he protested, in presence too of the fair Gabrielle, that to possess the good graces of the original, he would forsake all the world, and hold himself most happy!'*

After an imprisonment of some weeks, the Queen relented so far that she gave him liberty; without, however, allowing him to approach the court, and bless himself with the view of the

gentle wind blowing her fair hair about her pure cheeks.' But his exertions in Parliament on behalf of the Crown, upon

* Murdin's State Papers, p. 718.

occasions when subsidies were in question, could not but prove acceptable to Elizabeth; and it would indeed appear, that in no long time he had so far re-established himself in her favour, as to contrive, through her interference, to obtain a grant of the manor of Sherborne, in Dorsetshire ;-a possession which belonged to the Church, and the alienation of which seems to have been attended with great obloquy. It would appear, too, that there were strong apprehensions amongst his enemies of a complete restoration to favour and place; for, in a letter of the period, expressed with extreme rancour and bitterness, the writer says,It is now feared of all honest men, that Sir Walter Raleigh 'shall presently come to the court; and yet it is well withstood. God grant him some farther resistance, and that place he better deserveth, if he had his right." Such, we fear, are the feelings which, in all ages, fill the bosoms of rival courtiers and statesmen! The wishes of his enemies, in as far as regarded his banishment from court, were gratified for a season; during which he seems to have partly employed himself in making improve ments at Sherborne; which,' according to the traditions of the times, he beautified with gardens, and orchards, and groves of much variety and delight.' But his mind was not of a cast to remain satisfied with such ordinary occupations. They ministered in no degree to his stirring and grasping ambition; and being now expelled from every royal avenue to distinction, and impatient alike of obscurity and inaction, he resolved to cut out for himself a new path of adventure, which, as he fondly imagined, would conduct him both to glory and to wealth. It was during this interval of obscuration, in a word, that he devised that famous voyage in quest of El Dorado, from which undoubtedly he reaped a certain fame, but which has left his name more in question, both for judgment and veraeity, than all the other questionable acts of his varied life put together. As the enquiries connected with this celebrated voyage are extremely curious, and have been almost wholly overlooked -at any rate poorly treated-by his biographers, we propose to notice them at some length.

Raleigh was more deeply read, perhaps, than any man of his country and times in the histories of the Spanish discoveries and conquests in the new world. They presented scenes, occurrences, and objects of the greatest interest to a congenial spirit like his. It was in this course of reading that he found accounts of the existence of an undiscovered sovereignty, teeming with the precious metals, which had long been sought for in vain by the

* Birch's Mem. Eliz. vol. i. p. 151.

most enterprising and resolute of the Spanish adventurers. Their expeditions in quest of it had, latterly, been directed to the interior of the vast region lying between the Orinocco and the Amazons, or Guiana. The rocks were represented as impregnated with gold, the veins of which lay so near the surface as to make it shine with a dazzling resplendency. The capital, Manoa, was said to consist of houses covered with plates of gold, and to be built upon a vast lake, named Parima, the sands of which were auriferous. This sovereignty, called El Dorado, became the seat of an aggregation of fables, which all concurred to magnify its importance, and to throw a sort of enchantment around it. Its magnificence was partly ascribed to the flight, at the time of the Spanish Conquest, of a younger brother of the last Inca of Peru, who, accompanied by multitudes from that and the adjacent countries, and laden with treasures, was believed to have here established himself. The retreat of Manco-Inca, brother of Atahualpa, to the regions east of the Cordilleras, probably gave rise to this tradition. Fiction placed another imaginary kingdom to the south of New Mexico, called the Great Quivira, supposed in like manner to have been founded by those who escaped from the ruins of the empire of Montezuma. † Such fables found a ready assent amongst minds fashioned to credulity by the wonders of the new world, and the obscurity in which much of it long remained involved. They who could believe in the existence of a fountain whose waters had the virtue of restoring to youth and beauty the old and decrepid who bathed in them, could have no difficulty in giving their faith to the golden wonders of El Dorado ;-a region only differing from others as being infinitely more prolific of that metal than any they had yet discovered. Poets ‡ have celebrated, and historians § detailed the numerous expeditions in quest of it; and its locality has engaged the serious attention and enquiries of some of the most eminent geographers and travellers of modern times.

It is impossible not to entertain some curiosity as to the origin of a fable which led to such results. With respect to this, it may first of all be mentioned, that the term El Dorado was not originally used to designate any particular place; it signified

*Gumilla, tom. ii. pp. 146-7-French Trans.-Humboldt's Per. Nar. vol. v. pp. 854-5-English trans.

† Fevjoo, Theatro Critico, tom. iv. p. 262.

Castellanos, Primera Parte de las Elegias de Varones illustres de

Indias.

§ Herrera-Piedrahita-Pedro Simon.

Gumilla Caulin-Condamine-Humboldt.