your own matter, but you fare ill because you have chosen me for your mean and dependence; you have spent your time and thoughts in my matters. I die if I do not somewhat towards your fortune; you shall not deny to accept a piece of land which I will bestow upon you.' Bacon told the earl that it was not well for him to turn his estate into obligations, for he would find bad debtors. As Essex continued to press the gift, Bacon accepted it. 'My lord,' he said, 'I see I must be your homager and hold land of your gift; but do you know the manner of doing homage in law? Always it is with; a saving of his faith to the king and his other lords; and therefore, my lord, I can be no more yours than I was, and it must be with the ancient savings.'
The land which Bacon received was probably in Twickenham Park, and was afterwards sold by him for 1,800l. The manner in which the gift was made and received was characteristic of both parties.
Bacon's next letter to Essex contained a warning similar ro that which he had given in conversation: 'I reckon myself as a common — and as much as is lawful to be enclosed of a common, so much your lordship shall be sure to have.' He seems to have begun to think that Essex was too self-willed and impetuous to be the instrument for the public good which he had hoped that he would be. Before the end of the year 1595, however, Essex had fully recovered the queen's good graces, and Bacon employed himself in drawing up a 'device' to be presented by Essex on the anniversary of her accession.
In the letter just quoted Bacon expressed a wish to retire from the practice of the law, and to devote himself to philosophy. His pecuniary embarrassments, which were the greater from his long expectancy of office, probably stood In the way. The queen was at least sufficiently favourable to him now to employ him as one of her learned counsel. Though Essex warmly recommended him in May 1596 for the mastership of the rolls, he did not himself make suit for it after his late disappointment.
The year 1596 marks the highest point in the life of Essex. In the capture of Cadiz he acquitted himself well in every respect. On his return home he showed himself captious and jealous of his fellow commanders, whilst the favour which he acquired in the eyes of soldiers and sailors might easily make him a dangerous man to a queen who had no standing army on which to rely. It was to this latter point especially that Bacon applied himself in a letter of advice written to Essex on 4 Oct., a letter in which Bacon unintentionally displays the worst side of his character as fully as he did afterwards in the 'Commentarius Solutus' of 1608. At the bottom the advice given is thoroughly sound. Essex is to convince the queen that he is not a dangerous person by avoiding further connection with military enterprises, and by shunning all suspicion of popularity, that is to say, of courting the people with the object of obtaining an independent position in opposition to the government. All this, however, is fenced about with recommendations to use a variety of petty tricks, to make agreeable speeches, and to appear otherwise than he is. No doubt the character of Elizabeth has to bear much of the blame for the possibility that such advice could be given, but Bacon cannot be altogether cleared. Firm as a rock on the principles on which he acted, he had learned early and too well the lesson that it was only by personal flattery and petty hypocrisies that he could hope to accomplish his ends.
It was at this time that Bacon was preparing for publication the shrewd observations on men and affairs which appeared under the name of the 'Essays.' The dedication to his brother Anthony in the first edition is dated 30 Jan. 1597, and a copy was sold on 8 Feb. One passage has a special pathos in it: 'There is little friendship in the world, and least of all between equals, which was wont to be magnified, whose fortunes may comprehend the one the other, In his letter of advice Bacon had written to Essex that 'your fortune comprehendeth I mine.' In the 'Essays' he shows his belief that the obligation of friendship ought to be mutual, though it looks also as if he were longing for a friend who might give him counsel as well as receive it. If he had this feeling, it would explain his dedication to his brother instead of the earl better than other reasons which have been suggested. His relations with his brother seem to have come nearer to his ideal of friendship than anything which he found elsewhere.
If Bacon wanted friendship, he also wanted money. In the spring of 1597 he obtained, in vain, the good word of Essex to help him to a marriage with a rich young widow, Lady Hatton, and about the same time he offered a reversion of the clerkship of the Star Chamber, which had been given him some time before by the queen, to lord keeper Egerton for his son, on condition of arriving through his mediation at the mastership of the rolls. The mere proposal would properly shock us at the present day; and if, as seems probable, Bacon's second letter of 12 Nov., in which
