Page:The house of Cecil.djvu/150

 126 THE CECILS

he should leave that country. 1 The result of this journey was that he became a violent partisan of Spain, and was accustomed henceforward to vilify every other country, including his own. Early in 1611 he was in Paris, whence he carried off Sir Thomas Puckering and his reluctant tutor, the Rev. Thomas Lorkin, on a tour through the Low Countries. Lorkin has given a sad account of his behaviour, which was gross in the extreme and set a very bad example to Sir Thomas. He shows also that Lord Roos was at this time a Catholic, " if they may be accounted of any [religion], which make conscience of none." 2

In 1612 he was employed as Ambassador to the Emperor Matthias, to congratulate him on his accession, and in 1616 the King sent him on a special mission to the Court of Madrid, " osten- sibly to congratulate Philip on the recent marriages of his children, but in reality to plead the cause of the Duke of Savoy, 3 with whom Philip was at war. Lord Roos set out in great style, with six footmen, eight pages, twelve gentlemen, and twenty ordinary servants, and sailed " in a good and fair ship of the King's, called the Dread- nought." 4 He met with a very gratifying reception

1 Winwood's Memorials, III. 104 ; Cal. S. P. Dom., March i3th, 1610 (wrongly calendared 1611) ; May aoth, 1610.

2 Lorkin to Sir Adam Newton, March, 1611 (Harleian MSS., No. 7002). Roos, however, in a letter to Lord Salisbury, thanks him for not believing the rumours of his having turned Romanist, and " hopes he will never so disgrace his parentage " (Cal S, P. Dom., March isth, 1610 (not 1611) ).

3 Gardiner, III. 50.

James I., I. 426).
 * Chamberlain to Carleton, October I2th, 1616 (Court and Times of

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