Sir Walter Raleigh was a captive in the Bloody Tower from 1604-1616, and in its chambers he wrote the portion of his _History of the World_ that he was able to finish before his later troubles and death put an end to his labours. It is pleasant to hear of Raleigh spending his days, with his great work to cheer him, at one time sitting in the Constable’s garden, at another conversing from the walls with those who passed to and fro below. But his writings were not sufficient to satisfy the energies of this son of an energetic age. He set up a laboratory, with retorts and furnaces, and made chemical experiments; and so it happened that at this time, to quote the elder Disraeli, “Raleigh was surrounded, in the Tower, by the highest literary and scientific circle in the nation.” These men of mark in the earlier years of the first Stuart King came as guests to the Tower, or had the misfortune to be detained there “during the King’s pleasure.” Raleigh’s wife and son lived with him, and they had their own servants to wait on them. But the Lieutenant of the Tower, Sir George Harvey, with whom Raleigh had spent long evenings and with whom he had made warm friendship, was succeeded by Sir William Waad, who seems to have taken a personal dislike to Sir Walter, and contrived to make his life as miserable as possible. In 1610 Raleigh was kept a close prisoner for three months, and his wife and child, no longer allowed to share his captivity, were “banished the Tower”--a decree that would prove only too welcome to many--and lived for some time in a house on Tower Hill. In 1615 the King consented to release Raleigh, and allow him to command an expedition to El Dorado, which set off in 1617. What the result of that unfortunate voyage was all know: mutiny and despair may best describe its end. The King was furious; his greed for Spanish gold was unsatisfied; Spain demanded the head of “one who had been her mortal enemy.” A decision had to be made whether Raleigh should be delivered to the Spaniard or put back in the Tower. His wife planned escape for the husband she had sacrificed every comfort to aid. On a Sunday night, when Sir Walter was detained in the City--in his wife’s house in Broad Street--he put on disguise, crept through the narrow lanes to Tower Hill, went down by Allhallows Church to Tower Dock, where a boat was waiting to receive him and take him to a ship at Tilbury. But when the watermen put out into the river they saw a second boat following them closely; Sir Walter was betrayed by a man he had trusted, and found himself a prisoner in the Tower once again. He was shut up in the Brick Tower, where he awaited his trial, then removed to the Gate House, by Westminster Hall. When his sentence was passed and he had but a few days to live, his wife remained with him, and they parted at the midnight before execution. In the morning the Dean of Westminster gave him his last Communion, and at eight o’clock he went