have been a breach of his legal duty as a loyal
subject, as his hint to Cecil of the transactions with la Renzi was a
breach of perfect faithfulness to friendship. But there is no sufficient
ground for questioning his own apology, that he regarded the scheme as
the vapouring it for the most part was. Moreover, it is not impossible,
or improbable, that he may, as he stated to the Lords Commissioners,
have endeavoured to dissuade Cobham from plotting. He may have used
threats for the purpose, though he did not carry them out. This would
explain Cobham's alarm, otherwise unintelligible, that Ralegh meant to
inveigle him and other agitators into Jersey, and then give them up.
That he actively abetted a conspiracy, either with Arenberg, or against
James, is in itself as improbable as it is in fact unproved. James, on
his side, may have believed that Ralegh was willing to acquiesce in a
treasonable conspiracy, and to enjoy some of its fruits. In this mode
the King, and Cecil also, would lull their consciences, while they
availed themselves of law for the ruin of one whom they disliked and
dreaded. They acted upon surmises, and historians have followed them.
Honest-minded writers have been ashamed to think the State could have
persecuted an innocent man as it persecuted Ralegh without other
evidence than that it disclosed. They have tried to explain the
incomprehensible by the unknown. Forgetting the characters of James and
his Minister, they have inferred Ralegh's criminality from his
subjection to the treatment of a criminal.

Every effort was made at the time to demonstrate his capital guilt. The
efforts were continued for thirteen years without success. As Ralegh
ironically wrote in 1618, Gondomar's readiest way of stopping the Guiana
expedition would have been, had he been guilty, 'to discover the great
practices I had with his Master against the King in the first year of
his Majesty's reign.' In default of direct testimony, apologists for
Ralegh's condemnation have even attempted to plead a remark by the
French Ambassador, Beaumont, to his Court before the trial that, though
there was no sufficient evidence to sustain a conviction, yet the truth
was 'Cobham with Ralegh had conducted the practices with the Archduke.'
As Hallam observes, Beaumont possessed no more information than the
English Government gave out. He arrived at his conclusion against Ralegh
on the testimony of Arenberg's intercepted letters, which James had