conspirators, touched by a moment's misgiving, was hovering round,
seeking in vain for an opportunity of giving him warning; that even
then his chamberlain and kinsman, Sir Robert Stewart, was enabling
the traitors to place boards across the moat for their passage,
and to remove the bolts and bars of all the doors in their way.
And the Highland woman was at the door, earnestly entreating to
see the king if but for one moment! The message was even brought
to him, but alas! he bade her wait till the morrow, and she turned
away, declaring that she should never more see his face!
And now, as before said, the feast was over, and the king stood,
gayly chatting with his wife and her ladies, when the clang of arms
was heard, and the glare of torches in the court below flashed on
the windows. The ladies flew to secure the doors. Alas! the bolts
and bars were gone! Too late the warnings returned upon the king's
mind, and he knew it was he alone who was sought. He tried to
escape by the windows, but here the bars were but too firm. Then
he seized the tongs, and tore up a board in the floor, by which he
let himself down into the vault below, just as the murderers came
rushing along the passage, slaying on their way a page named Walter
Straiton.
There was no bar to the door. Yes, there was. Catherine Douglas,
worthy of her name, worthy of the cognizance of the bleeding heart,
thrust her arm through the empty staples to gain for her sovereign
a few moments more for escape and safety! But though true as steel,
the brave arm was not as strong. It was quickly broken. She was
thrust fainting aside, and the ruffians rushed in. Queen Joan stood
in the midst of the room, with her hair streaming round her, and
her mantle thrown hastily on. Some of the wretches even struck and
wounded her, but Graham called them off, and bade them search for
the king. They sought him in vain in every corner of the women's
apartments, and dispersed through the other rooms in search of
their prey. The ladies began to hope that the citizens and nobles
in the town were coming to their help, and that the king might
have escaped through an opening that led from the vault into the
tennis-court. Presently, however, the king called to them to draw
him up again, for he had not been able to get out of the vault,
having a few days before caused the hole to be bricked up, because
his tennis-balls used to fly into it and be lost. In trying to
draw him up by the sheets, Elizabeth Douglas, another of the ladies,
was actually pulled down into the vault; the noise was heard by
the assassins, who were still watching outside, and they returned.
There is no need to tell of the foul and cruel slaughter that
ensued, nor of the barbarous vengeance that visited it. Our tale
is of golden, not of brazen deeds; and if we have turned our eyes
for a moment to the Bloody Carnival of Perth, it is for the sake of
the king, who was too upright for his bloodthirsty subjects, and,
above all, for that of the noble-hearted lady whose frail arm was
the guardian of her sovereign's life in the extremity of peril.
THE BRAVE QUEEN OF HUNGARY
By Charlotte M. Yonge
Of all the possessions of the old kingdom of Hungary, none was more
valued than what was called the Crown of St. Stephen, so called from
one which had, in the year 1000, been presented by Pope Sylvester
II to Stephen, the second Christian Duke, and first King of Hungary.
A crown and a cross were given to him for his coronation, which
took place in the Church of the Holy Virgin, at Alba Regale, also
called in German Weissenburg, where thenceforth the kings of Hungary
were anointed to begin their troubled reigns, and at the close of
them were laid to rest beneath the pavement, where most of them
might have used the same epitaph as the old Italian leader: "He rests
here, who never rested before." For it was a wild realm, bordered
on all sides by foes, with Poland, Bohemia, and Austria, ever
casting greedy eyes upon it, and afterwards with the Turk upon the
southern border, while the Magyars, or Hungarian nobles, themselves
were a fierce and untamable race, bold and generous, but brooking
little control, claiming a voice in choosing their own sovereign,
and to resist him, even by force of arms, if he broke the laws. No
prince had a right to their allegiance unless he had been crowned
with St. Stephen's crown; but if he had once worn that sacred
circle, he thenceforth was held as the only lawful monarch, unless
he should flagrantly violate the Constitution. In 1076, another
crown had been given by the Greek emperor to Geysa, King of Hungary,
and the sacred crown combined the two. It had the two arches of
the Roman crown, and the gold circlet of the Constantinopolitan;
and the difference of workmanship was evident.
In the year 1439 died King Albert, who had been appointed King of
Hungary in right of his wife, Queen Elizabeth. He left a little
daughter only four years old, and as the Magyars had never been
governed by a female hand, they proposed to send and offer their
crown, and the hand of their young widowed queen, to Wladislas, the
King of Poland. But Elizabeth had hopes of another child, and in
case it should be a son, she had no mind to give away its rights
to its father's throne. How, then, was she to help herself among
the proud and determined nobles of her court? One thing was certain,
that if once the Polish King were crowned with St. Stephen's crown,
it would be his own fault if he were not King of Hungary as long
as he lived; but if the crown were not to be found, of course he
could not receive it, and the fealty of the nobles would not be
pledged to him.
The most trustworthy person she had about her was Helen Kottenner,
the lady who had the charge of her little daughter, Princess
Elizabeth, and to her she confided her desire that the crown might
be secured, so as to prevent the Polish party from getting access
to it. Helen herself has written down the history of these strange
events, and of her own struggles of mind at the risk she ran, and
the doubt whether good would come of the intrigue; and there can
be no doubt that, whether the queen's conduct were praiseworthy or
not, Helen dared a great peril for the sake purely of loyalty and
fidelity. "The queen's commands," she says, "sorely troubled me;
for it was a dangerous venture for me and my little children, and
I turned it over in my mind what I should do, for I had no one to
take counsel of but God alone; and I thought if I did it not, and
evil arose therefrom, I should be guilty before God and the world.
So I consented to risk my life on this difficult undertaking; but
desired to have some one to help me." This was permitted; but the
first person to whom the Lady of Kottenner confided her intention,
a Croat, lost his color from alarm, looked like one half dead, and
went at once in search of his horse. The next thing that was heard
of him was that he had had a bad fall from his horse, and had been
obliged to return to Croatia, and the queen remained much alarmed
at her plans being known to one so faint-hearted. However, a more
courageous confidant was afterwards found in a Hungarian gentleman,
whose name has become illegible in Helen's old manuscript.
The crown was in the vaults of the strong castle of Plintenburg,
also called Vissegrad, which stands upon a bend of the Danube,
about twelve miles from the twin cities of Buda and Pesth. It was
in a case, within a chest, sealed with many seals, and since the
king's death, it had been brought up by the nobles, who closely
guarded both it and the queen, into her apartments, and there
examined and replaced it in the chest. The next night, one of the
queen's ladies upset a wax taper, without being aware of it, and
before the fire was discovered, and put out, the corner of the
chest was singed, and a hole burnt in the blue velvet cushion that
lay on the top. Upon this, the lords had caused the chest to be
taken down again into the vault, and had fastened the doors with
many locks and with seals. The castle had further been put into
the charge of Ladislas von Gara, the queen's cousin, and Ban, or
hereditary commander, of the border troops, and he had given it
over to a Burggraf, or seneschal, who had placed his bed in the
chamber where was the door leading to the vaults.
The queen removed to Komorn, a castle higher up the Danube, in
charge of her faithful cousin, Count Ulric of Eily, taking with
her her little daughter Elizabeth, Helen Kottenner, and two other
ladies. This was the first stage on the journey to Presburg, where
the nobles had wished to lodge the queen, and from thence she sent
back Helen to bring the rest of the maids of honor and her goods
to join her at Komorn. It was early spring, and snow was still on
the ground, and the Lady of Kottenner and her faithful nameless
assistant travelled in a sledge; but two Hungarian noblemen went
with them, and they had to be most careful in concealing their
arrangements. Helen had with her the queen's signet, and keys; and
her friend had a file in each shoe, and keys under his black velvet
dress.
On arriving in the evening, they found that the Burggraf had fallen
ill, and could not sleep in the chamber leading to the vault, because
it belonged to the ladies' chambers, and that he had therefore
put a cloth over the padlock of the door and sealed it. There was
a stove in the room, and the maidens began to pack up their clothes
there, an operation that lasted till eight o'clock; while Helen's
friend stood there, talking and jesting with them, trying all the
while to hide the files, and contriving to say to Helen: "Take care
that we have a light." So she begged the old housekeeper to give
her plenty of wax tapers, as she had many prayers to say. At last
every one was gone to bed, and there only remained in the room
with Helen, an old woman, whom she had brought with her, who knew
no German, and was fast asleep. Then the accomplice came back through
the chapel, which opened into this same hall. He had on his black
velvet gown and felt shoes, and was followed by a servant, who,
Helen says, was bound to him by oath, and had the same Christian
name as himself, this being evidently an additional bond of fidelity.
Helen, who had received from the queen all the keys of this outer
room, let them in, and, after the Burggraf's cloth and seal had been
removed, they unlocked the padlock and the other two locks of the
outer door of the vault, and the two men descended into it. There
were several other doors, whose chains required to be filed through,
and their seals and locks broken, and to the ears of the waiting
Helen the noise appeared fatally loud. She says: "I devoutly prayed
to God and the Holy Virgin, that they would support and help me;
yet I was in greater anxiety for my soul than for my life, and I
prayed to God that He would be merciful to my soul, and rather let
me die at once there, than that anything should happen against His
will, or that should bring misfortune on my country and people."
She fancied she heard a noise of armed men at the chapel door, but
finding nothing there, believed that it was a spirit, and returning
to her prayers, vowed, poor lady, to make a pilgrimage to St. Maria
Zell, in Styria, if the Holy Virgin's intercessions obtained their
success, and till the pilgrimage could be made, "to forego every
Saturday night my feather bed!" After another false alarm at a
supposed noise at the maidens' door, she ventured into the vault
to see how her companions were getting on, when she found they
had filed away all the locks, except that of the case containing
the crown, and this they were obliged to burn, in spite of their
apprehension that the smell and smoke might be observed. They then
shut up the chest, replaced the padlocks and chains with those
they had brought for the purpose, and renewed the seals with the
queen's signet, which, bearing the royal arms, would baffle detection
that the seals had been tampered with. They then took the crown
into the chapel, where they found a red velvet cushion, so large
that by taking out some of the stuffing a hiding-place was made in
which the crown was deposited, and the cushion sewn up over it.
By this time day was dawning, the maidens were dressing, and it was
the hour for setting off for Komorn. The old woman who had waited
on them came to the Lady of Kottenner to have her wages paid, and
be dismissed to Buda. While she was waiting, she began to remark
on a strange thing lying by the stove, which, to the Lady Helen's
great dismay, she perceived to be a bit of the case in which the
crown was kept. She tried to prevent the old woman from noticing
it, pushed it into the hottest part of the stove, and, by way of
further precaution, took the old woman away with her, on the plea
of asking the queen to make her a bedeswoman at Vienna, and this
was granted to her.
When all was ready, the gentleman desired his servant to take the
cushion and put it into the sledge designed for himself and the
Lady of Kottenner. The man took it on his shoulders, hiding it
under an old ox-hide, with the tail hanging down, to the laughter
of all beholders. Helen further records the trying to get some
breakfast in the market-place and finding nothing but herrings,
also the going to mass, and the care she took not to sit upon the
holy crown, though she had to sit on its cushion in the sledge.
They dined at an inn, but took care to keep the cushion in sight,
and then in the dusk crossed the Danube on the ice, which was
becoming very thin, and half-way across it broke under the maidens'
carriage, so that Helen expected to be lost in the Danube, crown
and all. However, though many packages were lost under the ice,
her sledge got safe over, as well as all the ladies, some of whom
she took into her conveyance, and all safely arrived at the castle
of Komorn late in the evening.
The very hour of their arrival a babe was born to the queen and
to her exceeding joy it was a son. Count von Eily, hearing "that
a king and friend was born to him," had bonfires lighted, and
a torchlight procession on the ice that same night, and early in
the morning came the Archbishop of Gran to christen the child. The
queen wished her faithful Helen to be godmother, but Helen refused
in favor of some lady whose family it was probably needful to
propitiate. She took off the little princess Elizabeth's mourning
for her father and dressed her in red and gold, all the maidens
appeared in gay apparel, and there was great rejoicing and
thanksgiving when the babe was christened Ladislas, after a sainted
king of Hungary.
[Illustration: THEN HE OFFERED A FERVENT PRAYER OF THANKS]
The peril was, however, far from ended; for many of the Magyars
had no notion of accepting an infant for their king, and by Easter,
the King of Poland was advancing upon Buda to claim the realm to
which he had been invited. No one had discovered the abstraction
of the crown, and Elizabeth's object was to take her child to
Weissenburg, and there have him crowned, so as to disconcert the
Polish party. She had sent to Buda for cloth of gold to make him a
coronation dress, but it did not come in time, and Helen therefore
shut herself into the chapel at Komorn, and, with doors fast
bolted, cut up a rich and beautiful vestment of his grandfather's,
the Emperor Sigismund, of red and gold, with silver spots, and
made it into a tiny coronation robe, with surplice and humeral (or
shoulder-piece), the stole and banner, the gloves and shoes. The
queen was much alarmed by a report that the Polish party meant to
stop her on her way to Weissenburg; and if the baggage should be
seized and searched, the discovery of the crown might have fatal
consequences. Helen, on this, observed that the king was more
important than the crown, and that the best way would be to keep
them together; so she wrapped up the crown in a cloth, and hid it
under the mattress of his cradle, with a long spoon for mixing his
pap upon the top, so, said the queen, he might take care of his
crown himself.
On Tuesday before Whitsunday the party set out, escorted by Count
Ulric, and several other knights and nobles. After crossing the
Danube in a large boat, the queen and her little girl were placed
in a carriage, or more probably a litter, the other ladies rode,
and the cradle and its precious contents were carried by four men;
but this the poor little Lassla, as Helen shortens his lengthy
name, resented so much, that he began to scream so loud that she
was forced to dismount and carry him in her arms, along a road
rendered swampy by much rain.
They found all the villages deserted by the peasants, who had fled
into the woods, and as most of their lords were of the other party,
they expected an attack, so the little king was put into the carriage
with his mother and sister, and the ladies formed a circle round it
"that if any one shot at the carriage we might receive the stroke."
When the danger was over the child was taken out again, for he
would be content nowhere but in the arms of either his nurse or
of faithful Helen, who took turns to carry him on foot nearly all
the way, sometimes in a high wind which covered them with dust,
sometimes in great heat, sometimes in rain so heavy that Helen's
fur pelisse, with which she covered his cradle, had to be wrung
out several times. They slept at an inn, round which the gentlemen
lighted a circle of fires, and kept watch all night.
Weissenburg was loyal, five hundred armed gentlemen came out to
meet them, and on Whitsun Eve they entered the city, Helen carrying
her little king in her arms in the midst of a circle of these five
hundred holding their naked swords aloft. On Whitsunday, Helen rose
early, bathed the little fellow, who was twelve weeks old that day,
and dressed him. He was then carried in her arms to the church,
beside his mother. According to the old Hungarian customs the choir
door was closed,--the burghers were within, and would not open
till the new monarch should have taken the great coronation oath
to respect the Hungarian liberties and laws.
This oath was taken by the queen in the name of her son, the doors
were opened, and all the train entered, the little princess being
lifted up to stand by the organ, lest she should be hurt in the
throng. First Helen held her charge up to be confirmed, and then
she had to hold him while he was knighted, with a richly adorned
sword bearing the motto "Indestructible," and by a stout Hungarian
knight called Mikosch Weida, who struck with such a good will that
Helen felt the blow on her arm, and the queen cried out to him not
to hurt the child.
The Archbishop of Gran anointed the little creature, dressed him
in the red and gold robe, and put on his head the holy crown, and
the people admired to see how straight he held up his neck under
it; indeed, they admired the loudness and strength of his cries,
when, as the good lady records, "the noble king had little pleasure
in his coronation, for he wept aloud." She had to hold him up for
the rest of the service, while Count Ulric of Eily held the crown
over his head, and afterwards to seat him in a chair in St. Peter's
Church, and then he was carried home in his cradle, with the count
holding the crown over his head, and the other regalia borne before
him.
And thus Ladislas became King of Hungary at twelve weeks old, and
was then carried off by his mother into Austria for safety. Whether
this secret robbery of the crown, and coronation by stealth,
was wise or just on the mother's part is a question not easy of
answer--though of course she deemed it her duty to do her utmost
for her child's rights. Of Helen Kottenner's deep fidelity and
conscientious feeling there can be no doubt, and her having acted
with her eyes fully open to the risk she ran, her trust in Heaven
overcoming her fears and terrors, rendered her truly a heroine.
The crown has had many other adventures, and afterwards was kept in
an apartment of its own in the castle of Ofen, with an antechamber
guarded by two grenadiers. The door was of iron, with three locks,
and the crown itself was contained in an iron chest with five
seals. All this, however, did not prevent it from being taken away
and lost in the Revolution of 1849.
A STORY OF CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS FOR LITTLE CHILDREN
By Elizabeth Harrison
Once upon a time, far across the great ocean there lived a little
boy named Christopher. The city in which he lived was called Genoa.
It was on the coast of the great sea, and from the time that little
Christopher could first remember he had seen boats come and go
across the water. I doubt not that he had little boats of his own
which he tried to sail, or paddle about on the small pools near
his home.
Soon after he was old enough to read books, which in those days
were very scarce and very much valued, he got hold of an account
of the wonderful travels of a man named Marco Polo. Over and over
again little Christopher read the marvelous stories told by this
old traveler, of the strange cities which he had seen and of the
dark-colored people whom he had met; of the queer houses; of the
wild and beautiful animals he had encountered; of the jewels and
perfumes and flowers which he had come across.
All day long the thoughts of little Christopher were busy with this
strange far-away land which Marco Polo described. All night long
he dreamed of the marvelous sights to be seen on those distant
shores. Many a time he went down to the water's edge to watch the
queer ships as they slowly disappeared in the dim distance, where
the sea and sky seemed to meet. He listened eagerly to everything
about the sea and the voyages of adventure, or of trade which were
told by the sailors near.
When he was fourteen years old he went to sea with an uncle, who
was commander of one of the vessels that came and went from the
port of Genoa. For a number of years he thus lived on a vessel,
learning everything that he could about the sea. At one time the
ship on which he was sailing had a desperate fight with another
ship; both took fire and were burned to the water's edge. Christopher
Columbus, for that was his full name, only escaped, as did the
other sailors, by jumping into the sea and swimming to the shore.
Still this did not cure him of his love for the ocean life.
We find after a time that he left Italy, his native country, and
went to live in Portugal, a land near the great sea, whose people
were far more venturesome than had been those of Genoa. Here he
married a beautiful maiden, whose father had collected a rich store
of maps and charts, which showed what was then supposed to be the
shape of the earth and told of strange and wonderful voyages which
brave sailors had from time to time dared to make out into the
then unknown sea. Most people in those days thought it was certain
death to any one who ventured very far out on the ocean.
There were all sorts of queer and absurd ideas afloat as to the
shape of the earth. Some people thought it was round like a pancake
and that the waters which surrounded the land gradually changed
into mist and vapor and that he who ventured out into these vapors
fell through the mist and clouds down into--they knew not where.
Others believed that there were huge monsters living in the distant
waters ready to swallow any sailor who was foolish enough to venture
near them.
But Christopher Columbus had grown to be a very wise and thoughtful
man, and from all he could learn from the maps of his father-in-law
and the books which he read, and from the long talks which he had
with some other learned men, he grew more and more certain that the
world was round like an orange, and that by sailing westward from
the coast of Portugal one could gradually go round the world and
find at last the wonderful land of _Cathay_, the strange country
which lay far beyond the sea, the accounts of which had so thrilled
him as a boy.
We, of course, know that he was right in his belief concerning the
shape of the earth, but people in those days laughed him to scorn
when he spoke of making a voyage out on the vast and fearful ocean.
In vain he talked and reasoned and argued, and drew maps to explain
matters. The more he proved to his own satisfaction that this must
be the shape of the world, the more other people shook their heads
and called him crazy.