ntagonism to Essex, he was aware, had created a strong
repulsion against him in the King's mind. But he overrated the amount of
the resources at his disposal for his protection from the weight of
aversion he had excited. He equally underrated the inveteracy of the
dislike, and the degree of additional suspicion which his measures of
self-defence would awaken. James had long looked forward to a day when
he should 'have account of the presumption of the base instruments about
the Queen who abused her ear.' That was his way of thinking of the
Queen's favourite councillors. Cecil knew how to purchase his pardon.
Ralegh, gathering strength about him to render his friendship worth
buying, only deepened the king's conviction that he could be
mischievous; he did not implant a conviction that he was a desirable
auxiliary. The 'consultations of Durham House' became notorious. They
alarmed both Howard and James just sufficiently to induce them to
temporise. They fixed the resolution sooner or later to ruin the
promoter. The Duke of Lennox came to London in November, 1601. He
cultivated Ralegh's acquaintance through Sir Arthur Savage. James
characterized Savage in a letter of 1602 to Howard as 'trucheman,' or
interpreter, 'to Raulie, though of a nature far different, and a very
honest plain gentleman.' Terms were offered by the Duke which Ralegh
boasted he had rejected. To Cecil he protested that he had been
over-deeply engaged and obliged to his own mistress to seek favour
anywhere else. According to Howard, Ralegh asked Cecil to divulge this
to the Queen; but Cecil, with good sense, represented to him that the
Queen 'would rather mark a weakness than praise his resolution.'

[Sidenote: _Lord Henry Howard._]

Whatever he had done or left undone, whatever promises had been made,
and however they had been entertained, the end would have been the same.
Henry Howard inflamed the instinctive aversion which James had long felt
for Ralegh. Howard hated Ralegh with a virulence not easily explicable,
which appeared to be doubled by its abatement towards Cecil. He had
resolved to destroy both Ralegh and Cobham. On the testimony of his own
letters it is clear he did not mind how tortuously and perfidiously he
worked. He calculated upon Cobham's weakness, and upon the inflammation
of Ralegh with 'some so violent desire upon the sudden as to bring him
into that snare which he would shun otherwise.' He poisoned James's mind
incurably against '