Footnote 461: Ibid, 249. After the important matter of the jewels had been discussed, Charles received from his father a few lines, protesting, on the word of a King, that whatsoever his son should promise in his name should be punctually performed. Charles had asked for something explicit under His Majesty’s own hand,[462] to show that he had full powers; the request was presumptuous, but Charles, who wrote it, and Buckingham, who advised it, knew to whom they applied. “It were a strange trust,” the King answered, “that I wold refuse to putte upon my owne son, and upon my best servante.” Footnote 462: Ibid, 857. This servant he was now resolved to honour above all other great ones of the land, by creating him a Duke. Buckingham had probably been desirous of obtaining this honour ever since his being created Marquis, and had been employing every means of compassing his ends, by the aid of his dependents and partisans at home. Through the exertions of Secretary Conway, he had been addressed as “your Excellency.” Since that distinction is only applied to ambassadors, it is possible that Bristol may have considered it an infringement on his province to give it to Buckingham. It was, however, one of Buckingham’s most cherished objects of ambition to assert a pre-eminence over Bristol at the Court of Spain. There was, at this time, no English dukedom; that of York having merged into the title of Prince of Wales. The Duke of Lennox, the King’s near relation, was the only Scottish nobleman who bore the title; and he had, for forty years, held this distinction. In order to avoid placing the new duke above this nobleman, Lennox was created Earl of Newcastle-upon-Tyne, and Duke of Richmond, on the seventeenth of May, and Buckingham was raised to the dukedom on the eighteenth. It was at the same time in contemplation to create two more Dukes; the Marquis of Hamilton was to be Duke of Cambridge; the Earl of Arundel, Duke of Norfolk, that nobleman refusing anything less than the restitution of that title. These creations did not take place, partly owing to the pride of the Duchess of Lennox, who wished to stand alone, and partly to that of Buckingham, whose letter to the King, on this occasion, shows his great ambition, and proves his audacity and influence. It had been at first proposed to make him Duke of Buckingham and Clarence, thus reviving in his person a title used hitherto only by the Princes of the blood. “DEAR DAD AND GOSSOPE,[463]