was created Earl of Somerset on 3 Nov. 1613 (Patent Rolls, James I, Part 5, No. 20, misdated in Nicolas, Hist. Peerage), and on 23 Dec. he received a commission as treasurer of Scotland (Paper Register of the Great Seal, Book I, No. 214, communicated by T. Dickson, esq., chief of the historical department of the Register House, Edinburgh), and on 26 Dec. he was married in state to the murderess. Courtiers vied in making costly presents to the pair.
Somerset was now trusted with political secrets above all others. His head was turned by his rapid elevation, and he threw himself without reserve into the hands of Northampton and the Spanish party. At first he advocated a plan for marrying Prince Charles to a Savoyard princess, but as soon as Sarmiento, the Spanish ambassador, whose later title was Count of Gondomar, arrived in England, he made overtures to the new envoy to secure an alliance with Spain.
In the parliament of 1614 Somerset's vote was given, as might have been expected, against any compromise with the commons in the dispute on the impositions, and a few weeks after the dissolution he was made lord chamberlain, a post which brought him into immediate connection with the king.
Somerset's importance might seem the greater as Northampton had just died. He was acting lord keeper of the privy seal in Northampton's place on 30 June 1614. His arrogance, combined with his open adoption of the principles of the Spanish party, set against him the statesmen, such as Ellesmere and others, who wished to maintain a close connection with the continental protestants. By these men a new candidate for the post of favourite, George Villiers, who first saw the king in August 1614, was brought to court. Though James in November 1614 showed that he had no intention of abandoning Somerset, the fact that he made Villiers a cupbearer so irritated the favourite that he grew morose and ill-tempered even to James himself.
James was much hurt. Early in 1615 he pleaded with Somerset, entreating him to continue to return his friendship (James to Somerset, Halliwell, Letters of the Kings, ii. 126), and in April he consented to place in Somerset's hands the negotiation which was going on with Spain on the subject of the prince's proposed marriage with the Infanta Maria, taking it from the ambassador at Madrid, Sir John Digby, to whom it had been originally entrusted.
Though it was not likely that Somerset's adversaries were aware of this secret trust, they must have perceived signs of James's continued favour towards him, and obtaining the support of the queen, who was personally jealous of the favourite, they persuaded James, on April 13, to make Villiers a gentleman of the bedchamber. Whatever may have been the exact reason of James's conduct, he had no intention of abandoning Somerset, and possibly only meant to warn him against persistence in his harsh and unreasonable temper. Somerset, exposed as he was to hostility both as a Scotchman and as a favourite, was made by his sense of insecurity more querulous than before. In July James refused to make an appointment at Somerset's entreaty (Chamberlain to Carleton, July 15, Court and Times of James I, i. 364), and about the same time sent him a letter in which his dissatisfaction was expressed. ‘I have been needlessly troubled this day,’ he wrote, ‘with your desperate letters; you may take the right way, if you list, and neither grieve me nor yourself. No man's nor woman's credit is able to cross you at my hands if you pay me a part of that you owe me. But how you can give over that inward affection, and yet be a dutiful servant, I cannot understand that distinction. Heaven and earth shall bear me witness that, if you do but the half your duty unto me, you may be with me in the old manner, only by expressing that love to my person and respect to your master that God and man crave of you, with a hearty and feeling penitence of your by-past errors’ (James to Somerset, Halliwell, Letters of the Kings, 133).
The knowledge of the existence of bad feeling between the favourite and his master made Somerset's enemies more hopeful of effecting his overthrow. Somerset accordingly directed Sir Robert Cotton to draw out a pardon sufficiently large to place him in safety. Upon the refusal of Yelverton, the solicitor-general, to certify its fitness for passing the great seal (Cotton's Examinations, Cotton MSS. Tit. B vii. 489), Somerset ordered a still larger pardon to be drawn up, which Ellesmere, the lord chancellor, refused to seal. On 20 July 1615 the matter was fully discussed at the privy council in the presence of the king, and at the end of the debate James insisted upon Ellesmere's sealing the pardon. After the king had left the council, however, private influence was brought to bear on him, and the pardon was left unsealed (Sarmiento to Lerma, 29 July–8 Aug. Madrid Palace Library MSS. 20–30 Oct. Simancas MSS.)
Not many weeks after this scene information that Overbury had been murdered was brought to Winwood, the secretary of state, who was one of Somerset's opponents. Helwys, the lieutenant of the Tower, hearing that
