"If your lordships will look back to a period of the English history, in which the circumstances are reversed, in which the Spaniards were the complainants, you will see how differently they succeeded: you will see one of the ablest men, one of the bravest officers this or any other country ever produced (it is hardly necessary to mention the name of sir Walter Raleigh) sacrificed by the meanest prince that ever sat upon the throne, to the vindictive jealousy of that haughty court. James the First was base enough, at the instance of Gondomar, to suffer a sentence against sir Walter Raleigh, for another supposed offence, to be carried into execution almost twelve years after it had been passed. This was the pretence. His real crime was, that he had mortally offended the Spaniards, while he acted by the King's express orders, and under his commission."