Sir Walter Raleigh was executed on the twenty-ninth day of October, 1618, in the Old Palace Yard. He died with Christian heroism. Distinguished as a navigator and discoverer, a naval and military commander, an author in prose and verse, a wit, a courtier, a statesman and philosopher, there is perhaps in English history no name associated with such lofty and versatile genius, so much glorious action, and so much wise reflection. He was indeed proud, fond of splendor, of a restless and fiery ambition, sometimes unscrupulous. An ardent imagination, excited by the enthusiasm of an extraordinary age, infused an extravagance and marvellousness into some of his relations of his voyages and discoveries, that gave some occasion for distrust. The ardor of his temperament and an over-excited imagination involved him in several projects that terminated unhappily. But with his weaknesses and his faults he united noble virtues, and Virginia will ever be proud of so illustrious a founder.[136:B] The Queen Anne, of Denmark, who had in vain employed her kind offices in his behalf, did not long survive him; she died in March, 1619. Without any extraordinary qualities, she was accomplished, distinguished for the easy elegance of her manners, amiable, and the generous friend of the oppressed and unfortunate. FOOTNOTES: [136:A] Miss Strickland's Lives of Queens of England, vii. 357. [136:B] Oldy's Life of Raleigh, 74; Belknap, i. art. Raleigh, 289, 370; "A Brief Relation of Sir Walter Raleigh's Troubles," Harleian Mis., No. 100. There are also lives of Raleigh by Birch, Cayley, Southey, and Mrs. Thompson. CHAPTER XI. 1619. Sir Edwin Sandys, Treasurer of London Company--Powell, Deputy Governor--Sir George Yeardley, Governor--First Assembly meets--Its Proceedings. SIR THOMAS SMITH, Treasurer or Governor of the Virginia Company, was displaced in 1618, and succeeded by Sir Edwin Sandys.[138:A] This enlightened statesman and exemplary man was born in Worcestershire, in 1561, being the second son of the Archbishop of York. Educated at Oxford under the care of "the judicious Hooker," he obtained a prebend in the church of York. He afterwards travelled in foreign countries, and published his observations in a work entitled "Europæ Speculum, or a View of the State of Religion in the Western World." He resigned his prebend in 1602, was subsequently knighted by James, in 1603, and employed in diplomatic trusts. His appointment as treasurer gave great satisfaction to the colony; for free principles were now, under his auspices, in the ascendant. His name is spelt sometimes Sandis, sometimes Sands. Sir Thomas Smith was shortly after reappointed, by the Virginia Company, President of the Somers Islands.