What then must have been his delight when,—whilst attending a sermon at Paul’s Cross,—word was brought to him which gave hope of a discovery of SOMERSET’S most secret correspondence? The pending proceedings had stirred men’s minds in city and suburb, as well as at Court. A London merchant had been asked, a little while before, to take into his charge a box of papers. The depositor was a woman of the middle class, with whom his acquaintance was but slight. At that time there was nothing in the incident to excite suspicion. But, at a moment when strange rumours were afloat, the depositor suddenly requested the return of the deposit. The merchant bethought himself that the circumstances now looked mysterious. If the papers should chance to bear on matters of State, to have had any concern with them, howsoever innocent, might be dangerous. He carried the box to Sir Edward COKE’S chambers. Not a moment was lost in apprising the absent lawyer of the incident. Such news was of more interest than the sermon. Probably, the preacher had not finished his exordium, before all the faculties of COKE and of a fellow-commissioner were bent on the letters which had passed between SOMERSET and NORTHAMPTON. If GONDOMAR is to be believed, some secret papers belonging to King JAMES himself were part of the precious spoil.[9] As usual, there are two accounts of the original secretor of the papers so opportunely discovered. According to one of them, the box was delivered by SOMERSET’S own order to the woman by whom it was carried to the London merchant. [Sidenote: COTTON’S DEALINGS WITH SOMERSET’S CORRESPONDENCE.] [Sidenote: 1615.] According to another, SOMERSET entrusted the papers to COTTON; and the latter, anticipating the search and sealing up of his library, gave them to a female acquaintance with whom he thought they would remain in safety, but whose own fears led her to shift their custody, in her turn. That the letters which NORTHAMPTON had received from SOMERSET—containing, amongst many other things, numerous references to the imprisonment of OVERBURY in the Tower—had been in Sir Robert COTTON’S hands is unquestioned. After NORTHAMPTON’S death, COTTON, to use his own words, had been ‘permitted to peruse and oversee all the writings, books, &c. in the Earl’s study.’ In the course of this examination he proceeds to say, ‘I had collected thirty several letters of my Lord of SOMERSET to the Earl of Northampton, which, upon request, I delivered to my Lord Treasurer [the Earl of SUFFOLK,] who sent them to the Earl of SOMERSET.’ SUFFOLK, it is to be remembered, was NORTHAMPTON’S heir. Thus far, no charge rests upon COTTON in relation to this correspondence. What he did in disposing of SOMERSET’S letters was done by order of the representatives of their deceased owner. It is far otherwise with respect to their treatment after they had repassed, by SUFFOLK’S gift, into the hands of SOMERSET, their writer.