The Curious Case of Lady Purbeck

Table of

by far the lo

te, but they de

an, xi

was not even introduced to the royal presence until several weeks after the accession. Bacon, then a K.C., held no office during the first four years of the new reign; but his literary fame and his skilful advocacy at the Bar excited the jealousy of Coke. On one occasion, Coke grossly insulted him i

Coke said to him: "Thou art the most vile and execrable traitor that ever lived. I want words sufficient to express thy viprous treasons." When Sir Everard Digby confessed that he deserved the vilest death, but humbly begged for mercy and some moderation of justice, Coke told him that he ought "rather to admire the great moderation and mercy of the King, in that, for so exorbitant a crime, no new

risoners under torture, in Coke's own handwriting, are still preserved at the State Paper Office, which, says Campbell, "sufficiently attest his zeal, assiduity and hard-heartedness in the service.... He scrupulous

and it was a parallel case to the widow Jones, after she had married Smith, insisting upon still calling herself Mrs. Jones. Lady Elizabeth defended her conduct on this point as follows:[3] "I returned this answer: that if Sir Edward Cooke would bury my first husband accordinge to his own directions, and also paie such small legacys as he gave to divers of his frie

sing or by selling, obtained possession of the property. As it stood but three or four miles to the north of Windsor, the situation was excellent.[5] Sir Edward's London house was in the then fashionable quarter of Holborn, a place to which dwellers in the city used to go for change of air.[6] As Coke and his wife generally quarrelled when together, the husband was usually at Holborn[7] when the wife was at Stoke, and vice-versa. It was almost impossible that Miss Frances should not no

othing could have been farther from reproach than the marital fidelity of Lady Elizabeth, but it must have gratified Bacon to annoy the man who had crossed and conquered him in love, or in what masqueraded under that name, by fanning the flames of Lady Elizabeth's fier

tion, and suggested that the King ought to have the privilege of "judging whatever cause he pleased in his own person, free from all ri

of this your realm of England, and I crave leave to remind your Majesty that causes which concern the life or inheritance, or goods or fortunes of your subjects are not to be decided

ge and said: "Then am I to be under t

e Braxton: 'Rex non debet esse su

ting law required amendment. A reply was drawn up by Coke, in which he said: "The King, by his proclamation or otherwise,

ench-a promotion, it is true, but to a far less lucrative post. This greatly annoyed Coke, who, on meeting Bacon, said: "Mr. Attorney, this is all your doing." For a time Coke counteracted his fall in James's favour by giving

acon wrote to the judges that it was "his Majesty's express pleasure that the farther argument of the said cause be put off till his Majesty's farther pleasure be known upon consulting him." In a reply, drawn up by Coke and s

n their knees and all were submissive except Coke, who boldly said that "obedience to his Majesty's com

t of King's Bench, a sinecure worth ￡4,000 a year, was falling vacant, and Villiers wished to have the disposal of it. The office was in the gift of Coke, and, when Bacon asked that its gift should be placed in the hands of Villiers, Coke flatly refused and thus offended the most powerful man in England. Nothing then became bad enough for Coke and n

yourself, it proceedeth from love and a true desire to do you good, that you, knowing what the general opinion is may not altogether neglect or contemn it, but mend what you may find amiss in yourself.... First, therefore, behold your Errors: In discourse you delight to speak too much.... Your affections are entangled with a love of your own arguments, though they be the weaker.... Secondly, you cloy your auditory: when you would be observed, speech must either be sweet, or short. Thirdly, you converse with Books, not Men ... who are the best Books. For a man of action & employment you seldom converse, & then but with underlings; not freely but as a schoolmaster with his scholars, ever to teach, never to learn.... You should know many of these tales you tell to be but ordinary, & many other things, which you repeat, & serve in for novelties to be but stale.... Your too much love of the world is too much seen, when having the livi

to injury, surely this piece of canting im

TNO

y H.W. Woolrych. London: J. &

Antiquities of the Co. of B

ke Pogis the scene of his famous El

, Vol. XIV. Art

born to the Duke of Lennox, for ￡12,000." Another letter (ib. 26th February, 1628) says that "Lady Hatton complained so much of her bargain with the Duc

t should the King lie; but

le. See D'Israeli's Chara

nd Government. In Letters of Illustrious Persons, e