belonging to Mr. Herbert and Sir William St. John, who, it seems, had formerly shared in the spoils of this unhappy hero. On Greenwich bridge, Stucley advised Captain King that it would be advantageous to Sir Walter, that King should confess that he had joined with Stucley to betray his master; and Rawleigh lent himself to the suggestion of Stucley, of whose treachery he might still be uncertain; but King, a rough and honest seaman, declared that he would not share in the odium. At the moment he refused, Stucley arrested the captain in the king's name, committing him to the charge of Herbert's men. They then proceeded to a tavern, but Rawleigh, who now viewed the monster in his true shape, observed, "Sir Lewis, these actions will not turn out to your eredit;" and on the following day, when they passed through the Tower-gate, Rawleigh, turning to King, observed, "Stucley and my servant Cotterell have betrayed me. need be in no fear of danger, but as for me, it is I who am the mark that is shot at." Thus concludes the narrative of Captain King. The fate of Rawleigh soon verified the prediction. You This long narrative of treachery will not, however, be complete, unless we wind it up with the fate of the infamous Stucley. Fiction gives perfection to its narratives, by the privilege it enjoys of disposing of its criminals in the most exemplary manner; but the labours of the historian are not always refreshed by this moral pleasure. Retribution is not always discovered in the present stage of human existence, yet history is perhaps equally delightful as fiction, whenever its perfect catastrophes resemble those of romantic invention. The present is a splendid example. I have discovered the secret history of Sir Lewis Stucley, in several manuscript letters of the times. Rawleigh, in his admirable address from the scaffold, where he seemed to be rather one of the spectators than the sufferer, declared he forgave Sir Lewis, for he had forgiven all men; but he was bound in charity to caution all men against him, and such as he is! Rawleigh's last and solemn notice of the treachery of his "kinsman and friend" was irrevocably fatal to this wretch. The hearts of the people were open to the deepest impressions of sympathy, melting into tears at the pathetic address of the magnanimous spirit who had touched them; in one moment Sir Lewis Stucley became an object of execration throughout the nation; he soon ob tained a new title, that of "Sir Judas," and was shunned by every man. To remove the Cain-like mark, which God and men had fixed on him, he published an apology for his conduct; a performance which, at least for its ability, might raise him in our consideration; but I have since discovered, in one of the manuscript letter-writers, that it was written by Dr. Sharpe, who had been a chaplain to Henry Prince of Wales. The writer pleads in Stucley's justification, that he was a state-agent; that it was lawful to lie for the discovery of treason; that he had a personal hatred towards Rawleigh, for having abridged his father of his share of some prizemoney; and then enters more into Rawleigh's character, who "being desperate of any fortune here, agreeable to the height of his mind, would have made up his fortune elsewhere, upon any terms against his sovereign and his country. Is it not marvel," continues the personifier of Stucley, "that he was angry with me at his death for bringing him back? Besides, being a man of so great a wit, it was no small grief that a man of mean wit as I should be thought to go beyond him. No? Sic ars deluditur arte. Neque enim lex justior ulla est quam necis artifices arte perire sua. [This apt latinity betrays Dr. Sharpe.] But why did you not execute your commission bravely [openly]?-Why? My commission was to the contrary, to discover his pretensions, and to seize his secret papers," &c.* But the doctor, though no unskilful writer, here wrote in vain; for what ingenuity can veil the turpitude of long and practised treachery? To keep up appearances, Sir Judas resorted more than usually to court; where, however, he was perpetually enduring rebuffs, or avoided, as one infected with the plague of treachery. He offered the king, in his own justification, to take the sacrament, that whatever he had laid to Rawleigh's charge was true, and would produce two unexceptionable witnesses to do the like. Why, then," replied his majesty, "the more malicious was Sir Walter to utter these speeches at his death." Sir Thomas Badger, who stood by, observed, "Let the king take off Stucley's head, as Stucley has done Sir Walter's, and let him at his death take the sacrament and his oath upon it, and I'll believe him; but till Stucley loses his head, I shall credit Sir Walter Rawleigh's bare affirmative before a thousand of Stucley's oaths." 66 * Stucley's Humble Petition, touching the bringing up Sir W. Rawleigh, 4to. 1618; republished in Somers' Tracts, vol. iii. 751. When Stucley, on pretence of giving an account of his office, placed himself in the audience chamber of the lord admiral, and his lordship passed him without any notice, Sir Judas attempted to address the earl; but with a bitter look his lordship exclaimed-" Base fellow! darest thou, who art the scorn and contempt of men, offer thyself in my presence ? Were it not in my own house, I would cudgel thee with my staff for presuming on this sauciness." This annihilating affront Stucley hastened to convey to the king; his majesty answered him-"What wouldst thou have me do? Wouldst thon have me hang him? Of my soul, if I should hang all that speak ill of thee, all the trees of the country would not suffice, so great is the number!" 66 One of the frequent crimes of that age, ere the forgery of bank-notes existed, was the clipping of gold; and this was one of the private amusements suitable to the character of our Sir Judas. Treachery and forgery are the same crime in a different form. Stucley received out of the exchequer five hundred pounds, as the reward of his espionnage and perfidy. It was the price of blood, and was hardly in his hands ere it was turned into the fraudulent coin of "the cheater!" He was seized on in the palace of Whitehall, for diminishing the gold coin. "The manner of the discovery," says the manuscript-writer, was strange, if my occasions would suffer me to relate the particulars." On his examination he attempted to shift the crime to his own son, who had fled; and on his man, who, being taken, in the words of the letter-writer, was willing to set the saddle upon the right horse, and accused his master." Manoury, too, the French empiric, was arrested at Plymouth for the same crime, and accused his worthy friend. But such was the interest of Stucley with government, bought, probably, with his last shilling, and, as one says, with his last shirt, that he obtained his own and his son's pardon, for a crime that ought to have finally concluded the history of this blessed family.* A more solemn and tragical catastrophe was reserved for the perfidious Stucley. He was deprived of his place of vice-admiral, and left destitute in the world. Abandoned by all human beings, and * The anecdotes respecting Stucley I have derived from manuscript letters, and they were considered to be of so dangerous a nature, that the writer recommends secrecy, and requests, after reading, that "they may be burnt." With such injunctions I have generally found that the letters were the more carefully preserved. most probably by the son whom he had tutored in the arts of villany, he appears to have wandered about, an infamous and distracted beggar. It is possible that even so seared a conscience may have retained some remaining touch of sensi bility. And Camden has recorded, among his historical notes on James the First, that in August, 1620, "Lewis Stucley, who betrayed Sir Walter Rawleigh, died in a manner mad." Such is the catastrophe of one of the most perfect domestic tales; an historical example, not easily paralleled, of moral retribution. The secret practices of the "Sir Judas" of the court of James the First, which I have discovered, throw light on an old tradition which still exists in the neighbourhood of Affeton, once the residence of this wretched man. The country people have long entertained a notion that a hidden treasure lies at the bottom of a well in his grounds, guarded by some supernatural power: a tradition no doubt originating in this man's history, and an obscure allusion to the gold which Stucley received for his bribe, or the other gold which he clipped, and might have there concealed. This is a striking instance of the many historical facts which, though entirely unknown or forgotten, may be often discovered to lie hid, or disguised, in popular traditions. AN AUTHENTIC NARRATIVE OF THE LAST HOURS OF THE close of the life of Sir Walter Rawleigh was as extraordinary as many parts of his varied history; the promptitude and sprightliness of his genius, his carelessness of life, and the equanimity of this great spirit in quitting the world, can only be paralleled by a few other heroes and sages. Rawleigh was both! But it is not simply his dignified yet active conduct on the scaffold, nor his admirable speech on that occasion, circumstances by which many great men are judged, when their energies are excited for a moment to act so great a part, before the eyes of the world assembled at their feet; it is not these only which claim our notice. We may pause with admiration on the real grandeur of Rawleigh's character, not from a single circumstance, however great, but from a tissue of continued little incidents, which occurred from the moment of his condemnation till he laid his head on the block. Rawleigh was a man of such mark, that he deeply engaged the attention of his contemporaries; and to this we owe the preservation of several interesting particulars of what he did and what he said, which have entered into his life; but all has not been told in the published narratives. Contemporary writers in their letters have set down every fresh incident, and eagerly caught up his sense, his wit, and, what is more delightful, those marks of the natural cheerfulness of his invariable presence of mind: nor could these have arisen from any affectation or parade, for we shall see that they served him even in his last tender farewell to his lady, and on many unpremeditated occasions. I have drawn together into a short compass all the facts which my researches have furnished, not omitting those which are known, concerning the feelings and conduct of Rawleigh at these solemn moments of his life; to have preserved only the new would have been to mutilate the statue, and to injure the whole by an imperfect view. Rawleigh one morning was taken out of his bed, in a fit of fever, and unexpectedly hurried, not to his trial, but to a sentence of death. The story is well known.-Yet pleading with "a voice grown weak by sickness and an ague he had at that instant on him,' he used every means to avert his fate: he did, therefore, value the life he could so easily part with. His judges, there, at least, respected their state criminal, and they addressed him in a tone far different from that which he had fifteen years before listened to from Coke. Yelverton, the attorney-general, said-" Sir Walter Rawleigh hath been as a star at which the world have gazed; but stars may fall, nay, they must fall, when they trouble the sphere where they abide." And the lord chief-justice noticed Rawleigh's great work:-" I know that you have been valiant and wise, and I doubt not but you retain both these virtues, for now you shall have occasion to use them. Your book is an admirable work; I would give you counsel, but I know you can apply unto yourself far better than I am able to give you." But the judge ended with saying, "execution is granted." It was |