BOOK I, THE COL LECTOR OF Domestic Corresp., 1621, 21 July. (R. H.) error. of Earl Marshal of England, although he had been made | one of six Commissioners for the discharge of its duties in October, 1616. The baton was at length (29th August, DELIAN MSS. 1621) delivered to him at THEOBALDS. The King,' wrote John CHAMBERLAIN to Sir Dudley CARLETON, when com- 1 municating the news, would have given him £2000 a year pension withal, but-whatsoever the reason was—he would accept but the ordinary fee, which is twenty pounds per annum.' It is plain, however, that this assertion was an According to the ancient constitution of the Earl Marshal's office there were certain fees accruing from it which were now, under new regulations, to cease. The question arose, Shall the Earl Marshal be compensated by pension, or (according to a pernicious fashion of the age) by the grant, or lease, of a customs duty upon some Minutes of largely vended commodity? The 'impost of currants' was eventually fixed upon. But the Earl had subsequent occasion to adduce evidence before a Committee of the Privy Council, that the rent paid to the King sometimes exceeded Books (C.O.). the aggregate duty collected from the merchants.* Correspond ence in Sec. Conway's Letter Book; (R. H.) and Council There is some uncertainty as to the date of the earliest of Lord ARUNDEL's many visits to the Continent. According to Sir Edward WALKER, he was in Italy in 1609. But that statement is open to doubt. There is proof that in 1612 he passed some time in Florence and in Siena. With * The question was complicated by opposition offered by the Lord Keeper Williams to the terms in which Lord Arundel's patent was originally drawn. The relations between Arundel and Buckingham were never cordial, and the Lord Keeper seems to have profited by that circumstance to make his opposition to the pension effectual. It is probable that he had good grounds for so much of his objection as related to certain powers proposed to be vested in the Earl Marshal's court. But on that point Arundel's views eventually prevailed-until the time of the Long Parliament. The Lord Keeper's letter is printed in Cabala, p. 285. Chap. IV. THE COL Siena, as a place of residence, he was especially delighted. BOOK I, Of the foundation of his collections-to which his Italian journeys largely contributed-there are no distinct records until the following year. THE ARUN- Arundel to Rochester, Titus, B. vii, OF THE COLLEC TIONS. The tour of 1613, followed immediately upon the marriage of the Princess ELIZABETH with FREDERICK, Count Palatine of the Rhine. The royal pair were escorted into Germany by both Lord and Lady ARUNDEL, who soon left BEGINNINGS the Rhine country on a new visit to Italy, and remained ARUNDELIAN there until nearly the close of 1614. During that long residence the Earl established a wide intercourse with the most distinguished artists and archæologists of Italy, and made extensive purchases. The fame of his princely tastes was spread abroad. It soon became notorious that by this open-handed collector marbles, vases, coins, gems, manuscripts, pictures, were received with equal welcome. And from this time onwards many passages occur in his correspondence which indicate the keen and minute interest he took in the researches of the agents who, in various parts of the Continent, were busy on his behalf. The pursuit did not lack the special zest of home rivalry, as will be seen hereafter. Not the least singular incident in the early part of Lord ARUNDEL'S life was his commitment to the Tower, at a moment when his favour with King JAMES was at its height. In one of the many impassioned parliamentary debates which occurred during the session of 1621 an allusion was 1621, May. made by Lord SPENCER to the unhappy fate of two famous THE ancestors of the Earl of ARUNDEL, and it was made in a BETWEEN way which induced the Earl to utter an unwise and unjust retort. The matter immediately under discussion was a QUARREL LORDS ARUNDEL AND SPENCER. Book I, THE COL LECTOR OF THE ARUN very small one, but it had grown out of the exciting question of monopolies, and it was mixed up with the yet more exciting question of the overweening powers entrusted by DELIAN MSS. the King to BUCKINGHAM. In the course of an examination at the bar of the House of Lords about the grant of a patent for licensing inns, Sir Henry YELVERTON had made a furious attack upon the Duke. The attack was still more an insult to the House, than to the King's favourite, and it had been repeated. It was proposed, on a subsequent day, to call Yelverton to the bar for the third time, in order to see if he would then offer the apology which before he had refused. ARUNDEL opposed the motion. We have his words; we need hear no more,' he said. Lord SPENCER rose to answer: I remember that two of the Earl's ancestors-the Earl of SURREY, and the Duke of NORFOLK, were unjustly condemned to death, without being heard.' The implied parallel was a silly one, but its weakness and irrelevancy did not restrain ARUNDEL'S anger. My Lords,' said he, I do acknowledge that my ancestors have suffered. It may be for doing the king and the country good service; and at such time, perhaps, as when the ancestors of the Lord that spake last kept sheep.' The speaker failed to see that by using such words he had committed exactly the same offence as that for which he had, but a moment before, censured the late Attorney-General, and had moved the House to punish him. On all sides, he was advised to apologise. He resisted all entreaty. When committed to the Tower, he still refused submission. Both the King and the Prince of Wales had to intercede for him with the House before he could regain his liberty. With rare exception, the public incidents of Lord BOOK I, Chap. IV. LECTOR OF THE ARUN Arundel's life during the remainder of the reign of JAMES are such as offer little interest, save as illustrations of character. In that respect, many of them testify to the failing which appears so strikingly in the story of the quarrel with DELIAN MSS. Lord SPENCER. Some noble qualities lost part of their real lustre when pride was so plainly seen in their company. All that was best in Lord ARUNDEL revolted at the grossness of the Stuart court. He often increased his own disgust by contrasting what he saw at Whitehall with the memories. of his youth. His office of Earl Marshal precluded him from very long absences. Sometimes, when forced to mingle with courtiers for whose society he had little liking, he rebuked their want of dignity by exaggerating his own dignity into haughtiness. Against failings of this kind we have to set many merits, and amongst them a merit eminently rare in that age. ARUNDEL was free from covetousness-save in that special sense in which covetousness, it may be feared, cleaves to all 'collectorship.' TURE OF ARUNDEL In 1622 some anxiety was occasioned to Lord ARUNDEL ADVENby a singular adventure which befell his wife during her LADY residence in the Venetian territory, whither (in the course AT VENICE. of a long Italian tour) she had gone to watch over the education of their sons; little anticipating, it may well be supposed, that her name and that of Lord ARUNDEL, would be made to figure in Venetian records in connection with the strange story of the conspirator Antonio FOSCARINI. After making some stay in Venice, Lady ARUNDEL had taken a villa on the Brenta, about ten miles from the City. In April, 1622, she was on her way from this villa to the Mocenigo Palace, her residence in Venice, when she was met by the Secretary of Sir Henry WOTTON, English ambassador to the Republic. The secretary said that he was sent by the ambassador to inform her that the Venetian Senate BOOK I, THE COL LECTOR OF. 1622, April. had resolved to command her ladyship to leave their city and territory within a few days, on the ground of a discovery that FOSCARINI had carried on some of his traitorous DELIAN MSS. intrigues with foreign ministers-and more especially with those of the Pope and Emperor-at her house. To this the messenger added, that it was Sir HENRY WOTTON's most earnest advice that Lady ARUNDEL should not return to Venice, but should remain at Dolo, until she heard from him again. Having listened to this strange communication in private, she desired the secretary to repeat it in the presence of some of the persons who attended her. Then she hastened to the ambassador's house at Venice. Her interview with WOTTON is thus, in substance, narrated by Lord ARUNDEL, when telling the story to his friend the Earl of CARLISLE, then ambassador to the Court of France. 'Lady ARUNDEL went immediately to my Lord Ambassador [WOTTON], telling him she came to hear from his own mouth what she had heard from his servant's.' When Sir Henry had repeated the statement of his secretary, the Lady asked him how long the accusation and the resolution of the Senate had been known to him. He replied that reports of the alleged intercourse with FOSCARINI had reached him some fifteen days before, or more; but that of the resolution of the Senate he had heard only on that morning. She asked him why he did never let her understand of the report all that time? He said because she spake not to him of it.' To Lady ARUNDEL'S pithy rejoinder that it would have been hard for her to speak of a matter of which she had never heard the least rumour until that day, and to her further protestation that she had not even seen FOSCARINI since the time of his visit to England, some years earlier, Sir Henry replied, I believe there was no such matter;' but he refused to disclose the name i |