It is hardly possible to conceive a line of conduct more degrading than that which Buckingham pursued in the whole of this affair. He forfeited by it all the credit due to him for the rejection of Sherborne, and the principle of which he had boasted, that he would not rise upon the ruins of others, was already effaced from his memory. Upon the third of October, 1616, Coke was desired to desist from the service of his place.[180] This intimation of a disgraceful act had come suddenly, for, on the week before, the King had been at a great entertainment, given by Lord Exeter at Wimbledon, and the Lady Hatton, the wife of the Lord Chief Justice, was there, and “well-graced, for the King had kissed her twice:” but this, it seems, was “but a lightening.” On the following Sunday, Sir Edward Coke was sequestered from the council table, and prohibited from riding his circuit, his place being supplied by Sir Randolph Crew. “Some that wish him well,” adds a contemporary, “fear the matter will not end here, for he is wilful and will take no counsel, and not seeking to make good his first errors, runs in worse, and entangles himself more and more, and gives his enemies such advantage to work upon the King’s indignation towards him, that he is in great danger.” Others scrupled not to say that he had been too busy in the late business (of Somerset), and had dived into secrets further than there was need. “It happens, also, that he had not carried himself advisedly and dutifully to His Majesty.”[181] All these assigned causes are points which tend somewhat to mitigate the censures which must be cast on Buckingham in this affair. Lady Hatton, too, a Cecil, but not endowed with the prudence of that sagacious family, and one of the fiercest of her sex, contributed to the downfall of her husband, by carrying herself very indiscreetly to the Queen, who forbade her the court. “The story,” adds the same chronicler, “were long to tell; but it was about braving and uncivil words to the Lady Compton, George Villiers’ mother, and vouching the Queen for her author.” As usual,[182] to women was attributed all the far-spreading evil which comes out of contention. Footnote 180: Note to Bacon’s Works, vol. ii., p. 85. Footnote 181: Nichols, vol. ii., p. 178; from Birch’s MSS., vol. iv., p. 173. Footnote 182: Bishop Goodman, vol. ii., p. 166.