Cecil and Ralegh equally discerned the certainty. Both acted
accordingly, and each suspected the other's procedure. Both started
evenly with the same stain, in James's eyes, of enmity to Essex. Cecil,
however, had the advantage of partnership with Henry Howard, and Ralegh
the disadvantage of partnership with Cobham. He had to overcome the more
invincible obstacle of his possession of a character, demeanour, and
policy, in good features as well as bad, essentially distasteful to the
Prince he had to conciliate.

[Sidenote: _Prejudices of King James._]

Without Elizabeth's knowledge, Cecil kept up an active correspondence
with the Scottish Court. Ralegh had his concealed relations with it too.
Neither is to be severely blamed for feeling an attraction to the
nearest heir to the throne. Something even of personal enthusiasm at the
prospect was not so absurd a sentiment as it seems to posterity. The
nature of James was not well understood, and hope was placed in his
youth. Contrasts were drawn, as Ralegh expressed it at his trial,
between a lady whom time had surprised, and an active king. Ralegh had
recognised that no other successor was possible. Lord Northumberland,
writing to persuade James to be courteous to him, declared that he 'must
allow Ralegh's ever allowance of the King's right.' Ralegh indeed had
never favoured any rival candidate, Arabella Stuart as little as the
Infanta. About Arabella there is no cause to doubt the veracity of his
assertion, reported by Dudley Carleton, that 'of all women he ever saw
he never liked her.' Simply he had opposed, as Elizabeth herself
opposed, and in his character of her faithful servant, the termination
of the abeyance of the dignity of heir presumptive. In the interest of
her tranquillity he had addressed to Elizabeth a written argument
against the announcement of a successor. Eventually, some time before
Elizabeth's death, he had perceived that it was useless to act as if any
successor but James were possible. With his sanguine temperament he
acquiesced in the inevitable as if it were positively advantageous. He
saw his way to render as excellent service to the State under King James
as he was rendering now. He was conscious of the obstacles in his path;
he was unconscious that they were insuperable. He knew he had been
always ranked as of the anti-Scottish party. He knew the specific
meaning James would put upon his resistance to the formal declaration of
a successor. His a