Of that poetry, which extorted such profuse praise, the only verses that will bear reading, are a song to be found in Walton's Complete Angler, if Raleigh, indeed, be the author of it. The rest is like the poetry of most patrons, all our knowledge of which is derived from the poets who commend it. However profane the offering, it is commonly all that poets have to give; and posterity ascribes to gratitude what the patron received for truth. If Raleigh failed in poetry, he was but too successful in love. That which the Queen overlooked in Leicester and Essex; in Raleigh, who was not so much of a favourite, she justly and severely punished. Having had an affair of gallantry with a maid of honour, the beautiful daughter of Sir Nicholas Throgmorton, the Queen's ambassador to Scotland; they were dismissed the court, and Raleigh was thrown into prison. He made the only reparation in his power to the Queen and the injured lady; with whom he lived in conjugal harmony, and from whom in his misfortunes, he received the most tender and faithful services.

Being impatient of his disgrace, and relying upon the magnanimity of his royal mistress, and his own extensive and intrepid genius, he determined to extend still further his fame, in the province of discovery, and to improve his fortunes from the treasures of the new world. In the pursuit of an object which might at once fill his capacious mind, dazzle his romantic fancy, exhaust his daring spirit of enterprize, and put his fortitude to the severest test, he selected the extentive, magnificent and unexplored region of Guiana. The Spaniards were under the impression, that an empire richer than either Mexico or Peru, was yet to be explored; in whose capital of El-Dorado, every thing glistened with gold, from the idols in the temple to the utensils of the kitchen. Various expeditions had been fitted out by private adventurers, immense sums of money expended, incredible labours achieved, dreadful sufferings endured, of famine, storms, shipwrecks and pestilence, and lives prodigally expended in the vain pursuits. These accounts, with which Raleigh was familiar, only quickened his ardour and hardened his courage. The natives upon the coast had frequently spoken of this golden region, and the better opinion seems now to be, that they had indistinct notions of the empire of Peru, rather than designed to mislead and bewilder the Spaniards, with lying accounts of an imaginary empire. Raleigh, in the confidence of his genius, or under the delusions of a romantic temperament, seems to have believed that this discovery and conquest was reserved for him, and that he was destined like Cortes, or Pizarro, to add a golden empire to his country, and to pour

into the lap of his royal mistress, those treasures which would enable her to contend with Spain on the theatre of the world; and at length from this foothold, to extend the arin of conquest over the Indies-the envy, the pride, the glory, and the strength of Spain. For Raleigh thought that the kingdoms which the 'King of Spain had endangered, the armies, garrisons and navies 'he maintains, the great losses he has sustained of 100 sail of great ships in his Armada (after which he begins again like a storm to threaten shipwreck to his enemies); that all these 'great abilities did not arise from the trades of sack and seville 'oranges, nor from ought else that either Spain, Portugal, or any of his Provinces produce, but from his Indian gold that ' endangers and disturbs all the nations of Europe, creeps into 'their councils, purchases intelligence, and sets bound loyalty ' at liberty, in the greatest monarchies thereof.'

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With such views, Raleigh fitted out a fleet chiefly at his own expense, being aided only by Lord Howard the Admiral, and Sir Robert Cecil. He commanded in person, and sailed for Trinidad, where, after collecting his ships before proceeding to the continent in order to gain the hearts of the Indians, he attacked the city of St. Joseph, where he found several caciques in chains, whom he released, while he made a prisoner of the governor, who had been engaged in making inquiries about the country, and obtained from him all the knowledge in his posses

sion.

Having manned his boats with one hundred men, he determined, notwithstanding the lateness of the season, to explore the country. He met with great difficulties at the onset from the shallows and the mazy streams, upon the coast; but at length, he got into the great Amana, a branch of the Orinoque. Rowing against a rapid current and exposed to the fires of the line, with provisions at first stale, then corrupt, and at length totally inadequate, the ardour of his men was quite exhausted; and it was only by the indomitable spirit of Raleigh, and his submission to every privation, and his ingenious artifices to lead them on, that they were induced to persevere, until happily they arrived at a beautiful and plentiful country, where their senses were cheered with the landscape, and their appetites gratified with the fruits of a tropical clime. Raleigh in his glowing pictures has, no doubt, indulged his fancy; but the country presented every thing that could put it into action. The sky, the forests, the streams, the flowers, the fruits, the birds, the beasts, the fish, even the reptiles and insects, of an equatorial region, had a novelty and splendour, that appeared like enchantment to a northern imagination. Instead of that VOL. IV.-No. 8. 57

"burnt up zone," which the ancients thought it unsafe even to approach, nature seemed as from a warm embrace, to have produced what eye before had not seen, nor ear heard, and which almost surpassed the conception of an Europeau intellect. After having refreshed themselves at one of the Indian villages, they came upon the steps of some Spaniards, who had been in pursuit of gold and found some of the ore. Raleigh pursuaded himself, that he was in the neighbourhood of gold mines, and obtained some information which might afterwards be useful; but the season would not, with his limited force, allow him to explore them at this time. He, therefore, continued to ascend the river, and after a few days, passed into the waters of the great Orinoque. For many days he prosecuted his voyage up this magnificent river, and at length arrived at the Province of Aromia, at the distance of six hundred miles by the course of the river from the sea. There he was visited by the aged King Topiowary, who not only brought him provisions, but some of that fruit, the pine-apple, which King James afterwards, in his admiration of its exquisiteness, and his zeal for the palates of kings, declared was "too delicious for a subject to taste of." When this savage king whom Raleigh extols, "for his gravity, judgment, and good discourse, without the help of learning or breeding," and other native Princes understood the cause of his coming, which it seems was no other than to deliver them from the tyranny of the Spaniards; it is not surprising, that they should not only tell him all they knew, of Guiana, but something more, and entertain him not merely with golden opinions, but with the story of a tribe or nation, who had their eyes in their shoulders, and their mouths in their breasts; and of the Amazons who differed only from the sisterhood in Asia, by preserving the right breast. Raleigh was engaged in matters of too much moment to go in quest of these monsters. He does not say that he saw any of them. Indeed, he expressly says: ' for my own part, I saw them not, but am resolved that so many people did not all combine or forethink to make the report. His faith in the Amazons was confirmed by his learning; for in his History of the World, in the chapter in which "it is showed by way of digression, that such Amazons have been and are;" after citing the authorities of J. Solinus. Pomponius Mela, Ptolemy, Pliny, Claudian, Diodorus Siculus Herodotus, Ammianus Marcellinus and Plutarch, among the ancients; and Orellana as reported by Francis Lopez and Ulricus Schmidel among the moderns, he concludes; I have ' produced these authorities in part to justify my own relation of these Amazons, because that which was delivered to me

'for truth by an ancient cacique of Guiana, now upon the river ' of Pahamena, since the Spanish discoveries, called Amazons, ' that these women still live and govern, was held for a vain and unprofitable report.'

Upon a second conference with Topiowary, Raleigh was advised, from the distance of Guiana, and the smallness of his party, to make no attempt upon it this year, and, indeed, not to renew his efforts until he had secured the alliance of the neighbouring tribes. He still, however, kept up the search for gold, and found upon inquiry, that the plates of gold worn by the natives, were from the sands of the streams, and that there was also a mine, some of the ore of which he obtained. Keymis, a confidential officer, was sent in pursuit of it, and believed, and led Raleigh to believe, that he had been in the neighbourhood of it.

The real riches of Guiana, if he did not overlook, he seems not to have valued as they deserved: for in point of fertility of soil it rivals Egypt itself. For twelve feet in depth, the earth is a stratum of pure manure, and as such, has been actually carried to Barbadoes. In some parts, thirty crops of rice may be raised in succession. Nor are these forbidden treasures, for the climate of Guiana is the mildest and most salubrious of any tropical country hitherto inhabited by Europeans. After encountering a violent storm upon the coasts, the boats returned to the ships; but one man having died during the expedition, and scarcely any suffered from sickness. He concluded his enterprize as he had opened it, by burning a Spanish town. Most of these voyages of discovery were enriched by some prize from the Spaniards, or graced with some infliction upon her colonies. The latter always insured the adventurers a favourable reception from the Queen, a politic princess, who carried on hostilities against her arch enemy as much by private, as public forces. The cupidity and malignity of her subjects supplied the place of a public treasure. Upon his return to England, Raleigh prepared an account of his exploration; and that the public might not be disappointed, he not only gave a most accurate description (as Camden admits) of the countries he had seen, but of those that he desired to see, particularly "a relation of the great and golden city of Manoah, called by the Spaniards, El Dorado." This, we may presume, was by way of preparing his countrymen for the exploit he had reserved for another voyage, that after this fair vision they might not be too much dazzled with the brilliant reality.

It appears to have met with most favour from the poets, for it gave rise to, not only a Latin copy of verses, but an heroic

poem in English, of near two hundred lines. The versifier, confounding the prophetical with the poetical character, fore'tells the prosperity and splendour of the new colony of New Britannia

"On smooth Guiana's breast."

But the Queen had neither leisure nor money for such expensive projects; and Raleigh was left to prosecute his discoveries and combat the enemies to them, by himself. Though he had neither got to El Dorado, nor brought back anything but some marcasite and a small specimen of golden ore, the jealousy of his rivals would not admit that even this gold was Guianian; and they charged him with purchasing it on the African coast. Surely the singularity of that device (says Raleigh) I do not well comprehend; for my own part, I am not so much in love with long voyages, as to devise thereby to cozen myself'

He still determined to keep up an intercourse with the country, and in six months after his return, he despatched Keymis with two ships. Keymis brought the intelligence of the disappointment of the Indians, who had expected a visit from Raleigh with a greater force; and reported that he had seen from afar the mountain adjoining the gold mine, which had been pointed out to him before; but though he was but fifteen miles at one time from it, he returned without any farther exploration.

In the meantime Raleigh had gone against Cadiz as the second in command, Drake and Hawkins being now dead. The Spaniards, after the death of these gallant seamen, having threatened an invasion, the Queen resolved to encounter their fleet in their own ports. The English fleet, with a detachment from Holland, sailed for Cadiz, with ten thousand soldiers on board. The enterprize was entrusted to Lord Admiral Howard and the Earl of Essex, with a council of war, of which Raleigh was the second in nomination. Raleigh, as admiral, also commanded a squadron. The fleet arrived off Cadiz before any intelligence of their sailing had reached the enemy. It was determined, during Raleigh's absence from the bay of St. Sebastian's, on the service of intercepting the Spanish ships that were escaping from Cadiz, to attack the town first with the land forces, and the Earl of Essex had commenced the debarkation of his soldiers in boats, in the face of a raging sea, by which some of them had been destroyed, when Raleigh came on board of the Earl's ship and protested against the rash step. Essex ascribed it to the admiral, who had refused to enter the harbour with the fleet, until the town was taken by the army, and requested Raleigh to move him to change his determination. Raleigh promptly