Sir Francis Walsingham’s official title was principal secretary to Queen Elizabeth I, but in fact this pious, tight-lipped Puritan was England’s first spymaster. A ruthless, fiercely loyal civil servant, Walsingham worked brilliantly behind the scenes to foil Elizabeth’s rival Mary Queen of Scots and outwit Catholic Spain and France, which had arrayed their forces behind her. Though he cut an incongruous figure in Elizabeth’s worldly court, Walsingham managed to win the trust of key players like William Cecil and the Earl of Leicester before launching his own secret campaign against the queen’s enemies.
In 1585, war between Spain and Elizabethan England was all but inevitable. Consequently, Queen Elizabeth's spymaster proposed a pre-emptive strike designed to paralyse Spain's economy by striking at the Spanish Main - the heart of her overseas empire. The Elizabethan "Sea Dog" Sir Francis Drake was selected to lead this all-important raid.
Francis M. Rogers, to whom the current volume is in honor of, may be a modest man in principle, but not in his academic pursuits. To call his interests broad in scope is no exaggeration as they cover the fields of linguistics, literature, philology, bibliography, travel narratives and celestial navigation, which is nicely reflected in this volume.
Why was it that Francis Bacon, trained for high political office, devoted himself to proposing a celebrated and sweeping reform of the natural sciences? Julian Martin's investigative study looks at Bacon's family context, his employment in Queen Elizabeth's security service and his radical critique of the relationship between the Common Law and the monarchy, to find the key to this important question.
For a generous commission, ex-prize-winning jockey Jonah Dereham agrees to bid on a special horse for a wealth American lady. Unfortunately, for him, the crunch on his skull after the auction is not the last. There's more in store, until he manages to figure out the real high-stakes game being played....
