United States or Senegal ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
In the twenty-first year of Henry VIII. an act was passed, rendering it high-treason: those found guilty of it, were to be boiled to death. One of the first in point of date, and hardly second to any in point of atrocity, is the murder by this means of Sir Thomas Overbury, which disgraced the court of James I, in the year 1613.
If Frances Howard was a virgin, what reason was there for fearing anything Overbury might have said? What knowledge had he against the suit that put Rochester and the Howards in such fear of him that they had to confine him in the Tower under such miserable conditions?
The estimation in which the tinker and his occupation were held, in the seventeenth century, may be learned from the quaint and humorous description of Sir Thomas Overbury.
When Lady Agatha had suggested to him that he might give a week to Hazels before the summer was done, he had been eager about it, had even suggested dropping some of his other engagements. But that she would not hear of. She seemed to take an odd pride and pleasure in the way he had conquered the world best worth conquering. "What!" she had said. "Drop Sir Richard Greville and Lord Overbury!
As a sample of the suppression of which Coke was guilty I may put forward the fact that Somerset's note to his own physician, Craig, asking him to visit Overbury, was not produced. Yet great play was made by Coke of this visit against Somerset. Wrote Somerset to Craig, ``I pray you let him have your best help, and as much of your company as he shall require.
For me, in this story of Rochester, Overbury, Frances Howard, and the rest, the point of tragedy, the most poignant of the issues, is the betrayal by Robert Carr of Overbury's friendship. Though this story is essentially, or should be, that of the two women who were linked in fate with Rochester and his coadjutor, I am constrained to linger for a moment on that point.
But beyond the coalition for mutual help that existed between Overbury and Carr, an arrangement which might have thrived on a basis merely material, there was a deep and splendid friendship. `Stuffed shirt' or not, Robert Carr was greatly loved by Overbury. Whatever Overbury may have thought of Carr's mental attainments, he had the greatest faith in his loyalty as a friend.
In the mean time, the insidious Rochester wrote the most friendly letters to Overbury, requesting him to bear his ill-fortune patiently, and promising that his imprisonment should not be of long duration; for that his friends were exerting themselves to soften the King's displeasure.
My Lord Walterton is as keen as ever and Sir James Overbury would brave the devil for a night at hazard. A message to them and we'll have a crowd every night." "'Tis well thought on, Editha," he said approvingly. "But we must not delay. Will you go to London to-morrow?" "An you approve." "Aye! you can take the Dover coach and be in town by nightfall.
While the British court was occupied with the foul details of the Overbury murder and its consequences, a crime of a more commonplace nature, but perhaps not entirely without influence on great political events, had startled the citizens of the Hague. It was committed in the apartments of the Stadholder and almost under his very eyes.
Word Of The Day