Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 24.djvu/363

Rh A L W A L 339 not take a degree. He remained abroad during the reign of Mary, and the knowledge of foreign languages he thus acquired is said to have commended him to the notice of Cecil, Lord Burghley. In the parliament which met in January 1558-59 he was returned for Banbury, and in that which met in January 1562-63 for both Banbury and Lyme Regis ; he decided to sit for the latter place. Nothing further is known of his political history, till in 1568 he wrote to Cecil a letter on the Darnley murder, which shows that he enjoyed the confidence of Cecil and the regent Murray, and was fully convinced of Queen Mary s guilt. In the following year Ridolfi, the papal agent, was confined, under suspicion of conspiracy, in Walsingham s house. In August 1570 Walsingham was selected as special ambassador to France in connexion with the negotiations for the toleration of the Huguenots, and in December took up his residence as permanent ambassador at Paris. On the 19th April 1572 he was successful in obtaining the signature of a treaty of peace between England and France, but the beneficial results of his skilful diplomacy in connexion with the negotiations for the Anjou and Alengon marriages were neutralized by the uncertain and changeable moods of Elizabeth, and finally frustrated by the massacre of St Bartholomew. He took his leave of the king of France on 23d May 1573, and on 20th December of the same year he was made secretary of state. On 1st December 1577 he was knighted, and on 22d April of the following year made chancellor of the order of the garter. In June following, along with Lord Cobham, he was sent to the Netherlands to assist in arranging a pacification of the States, but the extra ordinary vacillation of Elizabeth rendered his mission a total failure. In July 1581 he was again sent on an embassy to Paris, but his instructions were of a kind both so dishonourable and so foolish that he said he wished rather the queen had sent him to the Tower. In such circumstances he could only endeavour to temper and qualify the policy of Elizabeth in such a manner as to prevent a fatal breach in the relations between the two countries, and in this he was successful. His embassy to Scotland in 1583 to endeavour to persuade James to dismiss the earl of Arran was also, as he prognosticated, a failure. He therefore recommended that the purpose of Elizabeth should be effected by fostering a conspiracy among the Scottish nobles, but the project was not carried out for some time afterwards. In 1584 Walsingham was appointed custos rotulorum of Hants and recorder of Colchester, and in 1585 high steward of Winchester. On 23d November 1586 he was returned member for Surrey, and again on 29th October 1587. From the first Walsingham, equally with Cecil, Lord Burghley, was strongly hostile to Queen Mary of Scotland. By constant watchfulness and the skilful use of spies he succeeded in discovering the inmost secrets of her policy and plans. He permitted the Babington conspiracy to develop until letters passed between Babington and Mary which, if they are to be accepted as genuine, proved that the scheme for the assassination of Elizabeth had Mary s full approval. Mary and her friends declared that Walsing ham had counterfeited her ciphers ; but that Babington sent her letters informing her of the assassination scheme is beyond denial. Mary s friends, without any proof but her own asseveration, affirm that the letters never reached her, and that Mary s letters in reply, the authenticity of which Babington to the last never doubted, were forged by the agents of Walsingham. The asseveration of Mary is, however, robbed of all value by the fact that, in addition to denying the authenticity of the letters, she denied all knowledge of the Babington conspiracy ; for Mendoza, the Spanish ambassador, while the plot was in progress, wrote to Philip II. that Mary had informed him she was fully acquainted with it. The accusation against Walsingham, that he was an accomplice in bringing Mary to the block on false and forged evidence, cannot thereforebe entertained, although there cannot be any doubt that he regarded her execution as a happy deliverance from a position of great political embarrassment. He was one of the commissioners on her trial, and on Mary hinting that the incriminating letters had been written by him, called God to witness that he &quot; had done nothing unbecoming an honest man.&quot; By becoming surety for the debts of Sir Philip Sidney, Walsingham, on account of a flaw in the power of attorney left by Sidney, found himself on Sidney s death un expectedly involved in pecuniary ruin. But, although one of the ablest and wisest of Elizabeth s councillors, his honesty had frequently ruffled her self-esteem, and she witnessed his embarrassments without deigning to lend him the smallest help. He died at his house in Seething Lane, London, 6th April 1590, in circumstances of so great poverty that his friends buried him in St Paul s at night to save the expense of a public funeral. Walsingham was a Puritan in his religious principles, but was unable to obtain for the Puritans the consideration from Elizabeth he desired. He established in 1586 a divinity lectureship at Oxford ; he was a general patron of learning ; and he encouraged Sir R. Hakluyt and other navigators in their voyages of discovery. By Spenser he is described as &quot;The Great Maecenas of this age As well to all that civil acts professe As those that are inspired with martial rage.&quot; A large number of Walsingham s letters and state documents are in the library of the British Museum and State Paper Office. An account of his embassies to France with letters and despatches is contained in the Compleat Ambassador, edited by Sir Dudley Digges, 1655 ; the Heads of a Conference between James VI. and Sir Frances Walsingham, September 1853,&quot; is published in vol. i. of the lianna- tt/ne Miscellany and his &quot; Journal from December 1570 to April 1583 &quot; is published in vol. vi. of the Camden Miscellany (1871). The Arcana Aitlica, or Waiting ham s Prudential Maxims for the Statesman and the Courtier, London, 1G55, said to have been translated from the Spanish, was probably translated by another Walsingham than Sir Francis. In Sir Robert Cotton s Cottvni Poslhuma is a short article en titled &quot;Sir Francis Walsingham s Anatomizing of Honesty, Ambition, and Fortitude.&quot; WALTHAM, a city in Middlesex county, Massachusetts, United States, like the other so-called cities and towns of New England is in effect a township, containing several bodies of urban population, together with rural districts. It is situated about 9 miles west-north-west from Boston, being in fact a suburb of that city, in a country of rounded hills of glacial gravel. Besides the large village of Waltham, there are comprised in the city five others, viz., Bleachery, Chemistry, New Church, Prospect ville, and Robert s Crossing. These have absorbed nearly all the population of the city, the rural inhabitants being com paratively few in number. The population, by the State census of 1885, was 14,609, about one-fourth being of foreign birth. Waltham is known all over the world for its machine-made watches, of which over 1-iOO are turned out daily. It has also a cotton-mill, a bleachery, and watch-tool manufactories. The present area of Waltham was settled in 1630 by Puritans. In 1783 the town was incorporated, and in 1884 it received a city charter. WALTHAM ABBEY, or WALTHAM HOLY CROSS, a market-town of Essex, England, on the borders of Hertford shire and Middlesex, is situated on the Lea, near the great northern road, and on the Cambridge branch of the Great Eastern Railway, 13 miles north of Liverpool Street station, London. The town lies in a hollow, with streets for the most part crooked and narrow, and although many additions have lately been made it still retains much of the characteristic appearance of an old country town. Of the former magnificent abbey church the only portion of importance now remaining is the nave, forming the present parish church, the two easternmost bays of the nave being converted into the chancel. It is a very fine specimen of