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The following pages are concerned with James Stuart, and not with the history of England except as it affected James Stuart. It is why the Gunpowder Plot appears only briefly, and the Gowrie Conspiracy at length, for the first was part of his indirect experience, the second of his direct. The Overbury affair, for the same reason, is presented, not chronologically, but as he became increasingly aware of it. The European situation at the end of his life was, no doubt, more important than his knowledge of it, but it is his knowledge which is here the subject. A lucid survey of the whole political situation in England will be found in Mr. Evan John’s King Charles I.

Among the many tales which the gossips have recorded of James one can but exercise an intelligent discretion. I have not omitted anything probable merely because it threw light on a horrid streak in his character, but I have not put in anything improbable merely for that reason. Nor have I included every one even of those which are credible. I should like to think that this book was more than a string of haphazard anecdotes, and that it had a relation to the whole personality of the most grotesque of our Kings. On a score of things it is impossible to feel certain; it is only possible to feel reasonably persuaded. To explain the reasons in more detail than the book itself provides would be to write a different kind of book. This is a book of one kind and not of another.

My gratitude is especially due to Mr. J. D. Meikle for the books he has lent me, and to Mr. R. D. Binfield for his continual vivid assistance.

C. W.