Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 43.djvu/54

 the king of Spain, and went to reside at Brussels. His name appears in the list of English exiles in Flanders who refused to sign the address of the English fathers of the Society of Jesus (Douay Diaries, p. 408). With his habitual treachery, he continued his correspondence with Queen Elizabeth's government. To Secretary Cecil he wrote on 26 Dec. 1597: ‘I am incited to boldness with you by your favour to my nephew Paget, and the good report I hear of your sweet nature, modesty, and wisdom. I desire ardently to do a service agreeable both to the queen and the king of Spain. I am under obligation to the one as an English subject, and to the other as a catholic prince who has relieved me in my banishment.’ He added that ‘His Highness’ was willing to treat with allies, and particularly with the queen, that the crowns of England and Spain might return to their old amity (State Papers, Dom. Eliz. vol. cclxv. art. 63). On 27 April 1598 he wrote from Liège to Thomas Barnes in London: ‘I am unspeakably comforted that the queen inclines to listen to my humble suit. The profits of my land are worth 200l. a year to myself; it is a lordship called Weston-upon-Trent. … I cannot capitulate with the Queen; but the greater my offence has been, the greater is her mercy in pardoning and restoring me to my blood and living, showing the liberality which makes her famous, and obliging me to spend my life at her feet’ (ib. vol. cclxvi. art. 116).

The English catholic exiles eventually split into two parties—one, called the Spanish faction, supporting the claims of the infanta to the English crown; while the other, denominated the Scottish faction, advocated the right of James VI of Scotland. Paget was the acknowledged head of the Scottish faction, and in 1599 he threw up his employment under the king of Spain, and returned to Paris (ib. vol. cclxxi, art. 74). Among the State Papers (vol. cclxxi. art. 74) is a letter from a catholic in Brussels to his friend, a monk at Liège, giving a detailed account of Paget and his ‘practices.’ The writer says that ‘from the first hour that his years permitted him to converse with men, he has been tampering in broils and practices, betwixt friend and friend, man and wife, and, as his credit and craft increase, betwixt prince and prince.’

Animated by intense hatred of the Spanish faction, Paget lost no time after his arrival at Paris in putting himself in communication with Sir Henry Neville [q. v.], the English ambassador, who forwarded a detailed account of the circumstances to Sir Robert Cecil in a despatch dated 27 June (O.S.) 1599. Cecil seems to have been by no means anxious to encourage Paget, but Neville was more favourable to him. Paget said he felt himself slighted by the English government, but he nevertheless seems to have given from time to time important intelligence to Neville and to Ralph Winwood [q. v.], the succeeding ambassador at the French court. His attainder appears to have been reversed in the first parliament of James I, probably by the act restoring in blood his nephew William, lord Paget, and it is presumed that he returned to England. His paternal estate, including the manor of Weston and other manors in Derbyshire, was restored to him on 13 July 1603; and on 18 Aug. in the same year James I granted him 200l. per annum, part of a fee-farm rent of 716l. reserved by a patent of Queen Elizabeth, bestowing the lands of Lord Paget on William Paget and his heirs. He died, probably in England, about the beginning of February 1611–12, leaving a good estate to the sons of one of his sisters.

His works are: 1. A proposition for calling the jesuits out of England, by means of the French king, during the treaty, and entitled ‘A Brief Note of the Practices that divers Jesuits have had for killing Princes and changing of States,’ June 1598. Manuscript in the State Papers, Dom. Eliz. vol. cclxvii. art. 67. 2. ‘Answer to Dolman [Robert Parsons] on the Succession to the English Crown,’ Paris, 1600. John Petit, writing from Liège to Peter Halins, 25 July (O.S.) 1600, remarks: ‘A book has come out in answer to that one on the succession to the crown of England, which is all for the Scot, but I cannot get sight of it. Clitheroe was the author, and he being dead, Charles Paget has paid for its printing’ (Cal. State Papers, Dom. Eliz. 1598–1601, pp. 456, 460). It appears that the latter part of the book was written by Paget. 3. ‘An Answere made by me, Charles Paget, Esqvier, to certayne vntruthes and falsityes, tochinge my selfe, contayned in a booke [by Robert Parsons] intitled a briefe Apologie or defence of the Catholicke Hierarchie & subordination in Englande, & cet.’ Printed with Dr. Humphrey Ely's ‘Certaine Briefe Notes vpon a Briefe Apologie set out vnder the name of the Priestes vnited to the Archpriest,’ Paris [1603], 8vo.

[Bacon's Letters (Spedding), i. 195; Birch's James I, i. 161; Collins's Peerage (Brydges), v. 185–7; Froude's Hist. of England, 1893, xi. 379, xii. 130; Hardwicke State Papers, i. 213, 214, 218, 224, 247; Harl. MS. 288, ff. 161, 165, 167; Harleian Miscellany (Malham), i. 535, ii. 81; Holinshed's Chronicles, quarto ed. iv. 608–11;