Page:The Green Bag (1889–1914), Volume 18.pdf/543

 THE GREEN BAG that of a writer of some brilliancy and con siderable popularity at that time, Sir Thomas Overbury, author of two books which were much admired in their day and still find readers; one a poem of some merit, called "The Wife" and the other a collec tion of prose essays called "Characteristics." Overbury, following the usual custom of writers of his time, had attached himself to Viscount Rochester, whom he selected as his Patron, and seems to have become warmly and sincerely attached to him. Overbury seems to have been a man of sterling integrity but of rough and arrogant temper, who would brook no restraint on his free use of tongue and pen, and had made many enemies by the bitterness of his satire. Bacon seems to have much disliked him. At this juncture Overbury set himself with all his might to prevent his patron from contracting a marriage which he regarded as both foolish and wicked, and seems for a time to have succeeded in making Somerset hesitate. This excited the intense hostility of the young Countess, who resolved to be revenged on Overbury for his attacks upon her plan. She succeeded in imbuing her lover, and her uncle, the Earl of Northamp ton, with the same feeling, and obtaining their aid in the extraordinary and cruel scheme which was devised to rid them of Overbury. The first step was a false accu sation of treasonable practices brought against Overbury, based on the alleged publication by him of certain State secrets contained in papers Somerset claimed to have entrusted to him. He was also charged with a contempt to the Crown in refusing to accept a mission by which it was at first intended to get him out of England. On these charges Overbury was committed to the Tower, and the marriage took place without hindrance. Although the lady was thus wedded to her beauteous lover her desire for revenge was not appeased, and the scheme was concerted by her desire of killing poor Overbury by slow poison, so that his condemning voice should be for

ever hushed. All this was successfully accomplished; the Governor of the Tower and the servants in attendance on Overbury were changed, and while a prisoner in the Tower he succumbed at last to the re peated doses of poison which were supplied to him. Then suddenly the national con science was aroused, the minor culprits, the keepers, guards, and servants were arrested and, some confessing, the truth came out. These underlings and subordinates were duly tried and hanged without much delay, and the guilty Earl and Countess of Somer set also arrested and imprisoned. It was then, in the early part of 1616, that the re sponsibility of their prosecution fell upon Sir Francis Bacon, who had succeeded Yelverton as Attorney General. If he had been the stern lover of justice, who had felt it his painful duty to bring to the scaf fold his best friend for rash and imprudent conduct which he construed as treason, there would seem to have been no reason why he should not have proceeded without fear or favor against these illustrious mur derers, who had first abused the law's process to confine their victim, and then, while he was under the law's protection awaiting trial, put an end to his life by the lingering torture of a great variety of poisons. King James's ardent affection for Somerset had by this time somewhat cooled, and Sir George Villiers had become prime favorite, but the King still retained some tenderness for Carr, and did not desire his punish ment. There was also some secret between the King and Somerset, which was known to Bacon, but the nature of which can now only be conjectured, which made the King most anxious that Somerset should not be pushed to extremity, lest he should make disclosures, which should involve the throne in disgrace. There is no difficulty in following Bacon's action in the case, for in a series of letters to the King and Villiers, which have come down to us with the King's comments en dorsed on them, the whole disgraceful