erself: she liked it, cheerfully writ it out with her own
hand, subscribed it, and returned it to me. 3. The end justifies--at
least excuses--the fact: for it was only to hold up my daughter's mind
to her own choice that she might with the more constancy endure her
imprisonment--having this only antidote to resist the poison--no
person or speech being admitted to her but such as spoke Sir John
Villiers' language. 4. Be it that I had some tall fellows assembled to
such an end, and that something was intended, who intended this?--the
mother! And wherefore? Because she was unnaturally and barbarously
secluded from her daughter, and her daughter forced against her will,
contrary to her vows and liking, to the will of him she disliked."

She then goes on to describe, by way of recrimination, Sir Edward
Coke's "most notorious riot, committed at my Lord of Argyle's house,
where, without constable or warrant, well weaponed, he took down the
doors of the gatehouse and of the house itself, and tore the daughter
in that barbarous manner from her mother--justifying it for good law:
a word for the encouragement of all notorious and rebellious
malefactors from him who had been a Chief Justice, and reputed the
oracle of the law."

A _State Paper_ (_Dom._, James I., 19th July, 1617, John Chamberlain
to Sir Dudley Carleton) tells us what followed. As correspondence with
Sir Dudley Carleton will be largely quoted in these pages, this
opportunity may be taken of observing that he was Ambassador, at
various times, in Savoy, in the Low Countries, and in Venice, that he
became one of Charles the First's principal Ministers of State, and
that he was eventually created Viscount Dorchester.

"The next day being all convened before the Council, she" [Frances the
daughter] "was sequestered to Mr. Attorney, & yesterday, upon a
palliated agreement twixt Sir Edward Coke & his lady, she was sent to
Hatton House, with order that the Lady Compton should have access to
win her & wear her." One wonders whether the last "&" was accidentally
substituted for the word "or," by a slip of the pen. In any case to
"wear her" is highly significant!

"It were a long story to tell all the passages of this business, which
hath furnished Paul's, & this town very plentifully the whole week."
[One of the ecclesiastical scandals of that period was that the nave
of St. Paul's Cathedral was a favourite lounge, and a regular exchange
for gossip.] "The Lord Coke was in