And
Bacon acquiesced in the demand, apparently without surprise. No record
remains to show that he felt any difficulty in playing his part. He had
persuaded himself that his public duty, his duty as a good citizen to
the Queen and the commonwealth, demanded of him that he should obey the
call to do his best to bring a traitor to punishment.
Public duty has claims on a man as well as friendship, and in many
conceivable cases claims paramount to those of friendship. And yet
friendship, too, has claims, at least on a man's memory. Essex had been
a dear friend, if words could mean anything. He had done more than any
man had done for Bacon, generously and nobly, and Bacon had acknowledged
it in the amplest terms. Only a year before he had written, "I am as
much yours as any man's, and as much yours as any man." It is not, and
it was not, a question of Essex's guilt. It may be a question whether
the whole matter was not exaggerated as to its purpose, as it certainly
was as to its real danger and mischief. We at least know that his
rivals dabbled in intrigue and foolish speeches as well as he; that
little more than two years afterwards Raleigh and Grey and Cobham were
condemned for treason in much the same fashion as he was; that Cecil to
the end of his days--with whatever purpose--was a pensioner of Spain.
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