For your Lordship, I do think myself more beholding to you than to any man.
And I say, I reckon myself as a _common_ (not popular but _common_); and as much as is lawful to be enclosed of a common, so much your Lordship shall be sure to have .-- Your Lordship's to obey your honourable commands, more settled than ever." It may be that, as Bacon afterwards maintained, the closing sentences of this letter implied a significant reserve of his devotion.

But during the brilliant and stormy years of Essex's career which followed, Bacon's relations to him continued unaltered.

Essex pressed Bacon's claims whenever a chance offered.

He did his best to get Bacon a rich wife--the young widow of Sir Christopher Hatton--but in vain.

Instead of Bacon she accepted Coke, and became famous afterwards in the great family quarrel, in which Coke and Bacon again found themselves face to face, and which nearly ruined Bacon before the time.