pace!
There was a maid that eat an apple,
When she eat two--she eat a couple!
There was an ape sat on a tree,
When he fell down--then down fell he!
There was a fleet that went to Spain,
When it returned--it came again!

Another expedition to Rochelle, under the Earl of Denbigh, was indeed of
a more sober nature, for the earl declined to attack the enemy. The
national honour, among the other grievances of the people, had been long
degraded; not indeed by Buckingham himself, who personally had ever
maintained, by his high spirit, an equality, if not a superiority, with
France and Spain. It was to win back the public favour by a resolved and
public effort, that Buckingham a second time was willing to pledge his
fortune, his honour, and his life, into one daring cast, and on the dyke
of Rochelle to leave his body, or to vindicate his aspersed name. The
garrulous Gerbier shall tell his own story, which I transcribe from his
own hand-writing, of the mighty preparations, and the duke's perfect
devotion to the cause; for among other rumours, he was calumniated as
never having been faithful to his engagement with the protestants of
Rochelle.

"The duke caused me to make certain works, according to the same model
as those wherewith the Prince of Parma blew up, before Antwerp, the main
dyke and estacado; they were so mighty strong, and of that quantity of
powder, and so closely masoned in barks, that they might have blown up
the half of a town. I employed therein of powder, stone-quarries, bombs,
fire-balls, chains, and iron-balls, a double proportion to that used by
the Duke of Parma, according to the description left thereof."[241]

"The duke's intention to succour the Rochellers was manifest, as was his
care to assure them of it. He commanded me to write and to convey to
them the secret advertisement thereof. The last advice I gave them from
him contained these words, 'Hold out but three weeks, and God willing I
will be with you, either to overcome or to die there.' The bearer of
this received from my hands a hundred Jacobuses to carry it with speed
and safety." The duke had disbursed threescore thousand pounds of his
money upon the fleet; and lost his life ere he could get aboard. Nothing
but death had hindered him or frustrated his design, of which I am
confident by another very remarkable passage. "The duke, a little before
his departure from York House, being alone with me in his garden, and
giv