leigh, and other brave commanders, with 18 of the Queene's ships, and many English merchants' ships, and twelve Hollander shippes, made a warlike voiage to the Isles of Terceiras.

1599. On Michaelmas even, Robert, Earl of Essex, LieutenantGenerall for Ireland, having secretly returned into England, came to the court at Nonesuch, and spake with the Queene, and on the 2nd of October was, for contempt, &c., committed to the Lord Keeper. On the 29th of November the Lord Keeper and other Lords of the Council in the Star Chamber persuaded against rumourous talke of the Earle of Essex. 1600. The 5th of June, the Earl of Essex was called before the Lords of the Counsell at the Lord Keeper's, where, for matters laid to his charge, he was suspended from use of divers offices, and, till her Majesty's pleasure to the contrary, to keepe his house as before.

About the last of August, Robert, Earl of Essex, was set at liberty.

1601. Sonday, February the 8th, about ten of the clocke, before noone, Robert Devereux, Earl of Essex, assisted by sundry noblemen and gentlemen, in warlike manner entered the City of London at the Temple Barre, crying for the Queen till they came to Fenchurch Street, and there entered the house of Master Thomas Smith, one of the Sherriffes of London, who, finding himself not master of his owne house, by means of the strength the Earl brought with him, and being ignorant of his intent and purposes, conveyed himself out at a back gate to the Mayor, whereupon the Earl with his troupe turned into Gracechurch Street, and there perceiving himself with his assistants to be proclaimed traitors, also the citizens to be raised in

arms against him, he, with his followers wandering uppe and downe the citie, towards evening would have passed at Ludgate, which was closed against him, so that he was forced to returne to QueeneHithe, and from thence, by water, to his house by the Strand, which he fortified; he understanding that great Ordnance was brought to have beat it downe, he yielded, and was conveyed to the Tower about midnight.

1601. Thursday, the 19th of February, the Earle of Essex and the Earle of Southampton were both arraigned at Westminster, and found guilty of high treason, when sentence was pronounced.

Ash-Wednesday, the 25th of February, the Earl of Essex was beheaded in the Tower between the hours of seven and eight of the clocke in the morning, being present the Earls of Hartfort and Cumberland, the Lord Thomas Howard, Constable of the Tower for that time, and not passing 60 or 70 persons

more.

13th March. Sir Gilly Mericke, Knt., and Henry Cuffe, Gent., were hanged at Tiborne as being actors with the Earl of Essex.

18th March. Sir Charles Danvers and Sir Christopher Blunt, Knights, were, upon the new scaffold, upon Tower Hill, beheaded.

1603. Thursday, the 24th of March, about two of the clocke in the morning, deceased Queen Elizabeth at her manor of Richmond, in Surry, being then aged 70 years, and had reigned 44 years, 5 months, &c. The 10th of April, divers prisoners were discharged out of the Tower, among whom the Earl of Southampton was the chiefest.

The 2nd of July, the King solemnised the feast of St.

g

George at Windsor, and installed Prince Henry, Knight of the Garter. There were also made Knights of the Garter with Prince Henry, the Duke of Lenox, the Earle of Southampton, the Earle of Marre, and the Earle of Pembroke.

1603. The 21st of July, at Hampton Court, Henry Wriothesley, Earl of Southampton, was created and restored by patent.

FROM NICHOLLS.

Hemminge and Condell, in the engraved portrait of Shakespeare (by Martin Droishout) affixed to the edition of Shakespeare's Plays published by them in 1623, seem to have preferred the picture which they did engrave, to the more splendid (original) portrait by C. Janson, which it is highly probable was in the possession of the Earl of Southampton, and painted for him; but it is a question whether they thought that portrait attainable by them.

With a disregard of the poet's original devotion of his whole time and labours to that nobleman, they dedicated their publication not to him, but, perhaps with an interested view, to the Lord Chamberlain of that day, William, Earl of Pembroke, and his brother Philip, Earl of Montgomery, Gentleman of his Majesty's bedchamber. Whether Lord Southampton expressed any displeasure at this preference we are not told, it is most probable that he felt it; he no doubt sent for the work when it appeared in 1623, and by an eager perusal revived the pleasure he had enjoyed in the original performance of these dramas, bringing to mind the delightful and grateful humble servant whom he had lost; and closed the volume

as to himself for ever:-for in the following year, 1624, he accepted a military command in the Low Countries. He was seized with a fever, and died at Bergen-op-Zoom on the 10th of November, in that year, aged 52, at which age (eight years preceding) his favourite poet had dropt into the grave. Southampton had largely contributed to the ease and comfort of Shakespeare's retirement.

Henry Wriothesley, third Earl of Southampton, K.G., succeeded his father in that title in 1581. He was an intimate friend of Essex, who made him General of the Horse in Ireland. Having united in that Earl's insurrection he was sent to the Tower in 1598, but one of the first events after James's accession was his release. He was presently honoured with the Garter and the Captaincy of the Isle of Wight, and, in 1605-6, the king stood god-father to his eldest son. It was not, however, till 1619 that he was called to the Council Board; and when there, his independent opinions proved rather troublesome than serviceable. In the House of Lords, also, his patriotism induced him to be free of speech, and he was for some time under restraint after the Parliament of 1621.

In 1624 he went colonel of one of the four regiments sent for the defence of the Palatinate; and there, having first lost his son, Lord Wriothesley, his own life also was sacrificed, dying at Bergen-op-Zoom, Nov. 10th in that year. This noble-spirited Peer is also memorable as a patron of Shakespeare: and as one of the founders of Virginia, where Southampton River, and other local names, are derived from him.

Portraits by Pass, by Jenner, on horseback, with the

Earl of Oxford in the Low Countries; and from
Mirevelt, in Lodge.

FROM NICHOLAS.

On the 19th Feb., 1601, they were brought to trial before their Peers, and convicted of high treason in conspiring against the Queen, and breaking out into open rebellion.

Essex was beheaded in the Tower on the 25th of the same month (February).

What punishment befel the Earl of Southampton does not appear, save that all his honours were forfeited : they were restored to him in 1603 (1st of James), and on the 21st of July in that year he was created Earl of Southampton, with the same rights and privileges as he formerly enjoyed, K.G., &c.

Henry Wriothesley, third Earl of Southampton, succeeded his father in 1581-was attainted in 1598, when all his honours became forfeited-restored in 1603-created by a new patent, dated 21st July, 1603, Earl of Southampton, with the same rights and privileges as he formerly enjoyed, K.G.; ob. 1624. The title became extinct upon the demise of his son, S. P. M., Thomas, fourth Earl, in 1667.

FROM LODGE'S ILLUSTRATIONS.

Of Lord Southampton's literature and connection with literary men, little is known but from the doubtful testimony of poets of all degrees of merit, by whom he was loaded with adulation. Shakespeare's two short dedications, however, of the poems of Venus and Adonis, and the Rape of Lucrece, addressed to him when a very young man, are so strongly marked, particularly the second, with the simple features of