THE MARCH TOWARDS ENGLAND
But these are chimes for funerals: my business
Attends on fortune of a sprightlier triumph;
For love and majesty are reconciled,
And vow to crown thee Empress of the West.
FORD.
The royal party returned to Edinburgh, where the nuptials of Richard of
England and the Lady Katherine were celebrated with splendour.
Festivities of all kinds, tournaments, hunting parties, balls, succeeded
to each other; but far beyond every outward demonstration was the real
happiness insured by this marriage. Graced by Katherine, the little
English court became a paradise. The princess assumed her new character
among the exiles with facility; yet the phrase is bad, for Katherine
could assume nothing, not even a virtue, if she had it not. In every
position she was not princess, queen, patroness, or mistress; but woman
merely--a true-hearted, gentle, refined woman. She was too young for
the maternal character to be appropriate to her, yet the watchfulness
and care she had for all resembled it. Her new subjects felt as if
before they had been a disconnected, vagabond troop, and that dignity
and station were assigned to them through her; through her the charities
and elegances of life hallowed and adorned them. The quality most
peculiarly her own was the divine simplicity which animated her look,
her manners, her acts. Taintless simplicity, that best of fascinations,
whose power is not imperious and sudden, but gradual and changeless,
where every word spoken is but the genuine interpreter of the feelings
of the heart, to which not only falsehood, but even the slightest
disguise or affectation, is wholly foreign; and which is the more
delicate, winning and kind, from being spontaneous--so that, as in
describing her, her royal cousin had said, "you almost questioned her
authority from its want of pretension, yet yielded to it in all its
extent."
Richard's political position stood higher than ever. The ever-watchful
duchess of Burgundy had sent a renowned Burgundian captain, Sir
Roderick-de-Lalayne, with two hundred German mercenaries. The king of
France, at the request of Henry the Seventh, had despatched an embassy
to King James, to advise a peace between England and Scotland. The
ambassador was the Sire de Concressault, York's ancient friend, who
continued to espouse his cause warmly, and gave it all the grace and
honour of his high influence. King James was eager to collect his army,
and to prepare for an invasion. If Richard had lost any part of his
open-hearted confidence and personal friendship, he had gained in his
esteem and consideration. The change that had been operating was
imperceptible to York, who naturally found in his marriage a barrier to
the hourly intercourse they had formerly had, when both were free. Yet
change there was, greater even than the king himself suspected; the
causes were easily traced.
The Tudor party in Scotland, instigated by bribes and large promises,
were very active in their enmity to the White Rose. They had been obliged
to let the torrent of royal favour force its headlong way, but they
watched the slightest pause in its flow, to throw impediments in the way
of the abundant stream. Soon after his return from the North, it became
apparent that the king continued no unsuccessful suitor to the Lady Jane
Kennedy. This a good deal estranged him from his English friend, who no
longer reproved, but whose tacit condemnation he feared, as well as that
of his fair cousin. Nay, more, Lady Jane had drawn from him the cause of
their transient quarrel, and, now that she had yielded, felt angry and
disdainful at the attempt made to estrange her lover. One of those lower
eddies or currents of intelligence, so in use at courts, had reported an
angry expression of hers to the earl of Buchan, one of York's most
active enemies. This grasping-place in their difficult way was eagerly
laid hold of by the conspirators. A coalition was formed between Lady
Jane and this party, which insured the aggravation of any ill-feeling
that might arise between the late brothers in heart. Soon after another
agent or tool was added to their number.
The most subtle, the most politic, the most wily, are sometimes the
slaves of impulse; nay, very often those who fancy that they measure
their actions the most narrowly by the rules, either of self-interest or
ambition, are more easily influenced to unwise passion by any obstacle
thrown in their path. The Secretary Frion had hitherto considered
himself of primal import to the English prince: no project was
conceived, that was not first concocted in his brain, and insinuated by
him; every new partizan had been enticed by his silvery speeches;
whatever of difficult, crooked, and hidden was to be done, Frion was
consulted, and employed, and deeply trusted in its accomplishment. On
his first arrival in Scotland, the intimacy between the king and York
destroyed half his influence. James's discernment and experience was not
duped by the insinuating flatteries of Frion: as a proud man he
disdained, as a conscientious and pious one, he disliked him. It was
worse when Katherine's influence became paramount; she put him exactly
in his right place, yet was so kind that there was no room for
complaint: all his former patrons were her worshippers; her praises were
re-echoed from all; and assuredly no intrigue could exist where she was.
Yet it was neither comprehensible, nor to be endured, that this banished
prince and his friends should walk straight forward in their allotted
route, unaided by plot or manœuvre. The subtlety of the man quickly
revealed to him the existence of the opposing party; he was ready to
foment it, were it only to gain reputation afterwards by its
destruction. He made one step, and became the confidant of Balmayne, and
apparently the tool of the higher confederates: at first he rather
perplexed than served them, spinning spiders' webs in their way, and
elevating himself in their eyes by brushing them off at his pleasure. He
was exactly the man to shine in a dark conspiracy: soon nothing could be
done but by his advice, nothing known but as he informed them, nothing
said but as he dictated. Balmayne, who, fierce and moody, entered more
zealously into these discontents than any other, yet took his
counsel--little knew they Maître Etienne Frion: he only watched the
while, sage fisher of men as he was, for the best opportunity of
betraying them for his own advantage. In the midst of festivity, of
gallant, warlike preparation, Frion had, like a witch gathering
poisonous herbs by the silvery light of the quiet moon, sought to
extract all that was baleful in what, but for the uses to which he
strove to put it, had died innocuous.
The winter grew into spring: these were the happiest months of young
Richard's life. He had traversed many a pass of danger and tract of
sorrow--falsehood had blotted--loss of friends, who had died for him,
had darkened the past years: often during their course he had believed
that he gave himself up to despair; he had fancied that he had doubted
every one and every thing; he imagined that he was tired of
existence--vain ideas! Sanguine, confiding, full to the very brim of
that spirit of life which is the happiness of the young, he sprang up a
fresh Antæus, each time that Fortune with Herculean power had thrown
him to the earth. And now he congratulated himself even on every misery,
every reverse, every sentiment of despondency that he experienced: they
were so many links of the chain that made him what he was--the friend
of James, the husband of Katherine. It was this best attribute of
sunny-hearted youth, this greenness of the soul, that made Richard so
frank, so noble, so generous; care and time had laboured in vain--no
wrinkle, no deforming line marked his mind, or, that mind's interpreter,
his open, candid brow.
With the spring the Scottish troops drew together, and encamped near
Edinburgh. The occasion seemed seasonable; for news arrived of
disturbances which had taken place in England, and which had caused
Henry the Seventh to recall the earl of Surrey (who was conducting an
army northward to oppose the expected attack from Scotland), to check
and defeat enemies which had arisen in the west of his kingdom. The
inhabitants of Cornwall, vexed by increasing taxes, had long been in a
state of turbulence; and now, instigated by two ringleaders from among
themselves, combined together, and rose in open and regulated
rebellion--sedition, it might have been called; and had perhaps been
easily crushed, but for the interference of one, who acted from designs
and views which at first had made no part of the projects of the
insurgents.
Lord Audley had not forgotten the White Rose. On his return westward,
however, he found all so quiet, that no effort of his could rouse the
rich and satisfied men of Devon, from their inglorious repose. His
imprudence attracted attention; he had notice of the danger of an
arrest, and suddenly resolved to quit the post he had chosen, and to
join the duke of York in Ireland. He came too late; the English squadron
had sailed; and he, changeful as the winds and as impetuous, despising a
danger now remote, resolved to return to England, and to Devonshire. His
voyage from Cork to Bristol was sufficiently disastrous; contrary and
violent winds drove him from his course into the Atlantic; here he beat
about for several days, till the wind, shifting a point or two to the
west, he began to make what sail he could in the opposite direction.
Still the weather was tempestuous, and his skiff laboured frightfully
amidst the stormy waves; not far from them, during the greatest fury of
the gale, was a larger vessel, if such might be called the helmless,
dismasted hull, tossed by the billows, the sport of the winds, as it
rose and fell in the trough of the sea. At length the wind lulled; and
the captain of the caravel, which indeed might be called a wreck,
lowered a boat, and came alongside Lord Audley's vessel, asking whither
he was bound? To England, was the answer; and the vast reef of clouds
lifted on the southern horizon, and showing beyond a streak of azure,
gave promise of success in their voyage. The questioner, who spoke
English imperfectly, went on to say, that in spite of the miserable
state of the caravel, he was resolved not to desert her, but to carry
her, God willing, into the nearest French port he could make. But there
was on board one sick, a woman, whom he wished to spare the dangers and
privations of the voyage. Would the commander take her to England, and
bestow her in some convent, where she might be tended and kept in
honourable safety? Lord Audley gave a willing consent, and the boat went
off speedily, returning again with their stranger passenger. She was in
the extremity of illness, even of danger, and lay, like a child, in the
arms of the dark, tall, weather-beaten mariner, who, though squalid in
his appearance from fatigue and want, stood as a rock that has braved a
thousand storms; his muscles seemed iron--his countenance not stern,
but calm and resolved--yet tenderness and softness were in the
expression of his lips, as he gazed on his fragile charge, and placed
her with feminine gentleness on such rude couch as could be afforded;
then addressing Lord Audley, "You are an Englishman," he said, "perhaps
a father?"
"I am an English noble," replied the other; "confide in my care, my
honour; but, to be doubly sure, if you feel distrust, remain with us;
yonder wreck will not weather another night."
"She has seen the suns of two worlds," said the sailor, proudly, "and
the blessed Virgin has saved her at a worse hazard. If she perish now,
it were little worth that her old captain survived: better both go down,
as, if not now, some day we shall, together. I will confide my poor
child to you, my lord. If she recover, she has friends in England; she
would gain them, even if she had them not. Not one among your boasted
island-women is more lovely or more virtuous, than my poor, my
much-suffering Monina."
Lord Audley renewed his protestations. De Faro listened with the
ingenuous confidence of a sailor; he placed several caskets and a
well-filled bag of gold in the noble's hand, saying, "The Adalid fills
a-pace. You but rob the ocean. If my child survives, you can give her
the treasure you disdain. If she does"--and he bent over her; she
almost seemed to sleep, so oppressed was she by feebleness and fever. A
tear fell from her father's eye upon her brow: "And she will: Saint Mary
guide us, we shall attain."
Suck was the strange drama acted on the wide boundless sea. Such the
chances that restored the high-minded Andalusian to England, to the
White Rose, to all the scenes, to every hope and fear which she had
resolved to abandon for ever. For good or ill, we are in the hands of a
superior power:
"There's a divinity that shapes our ends,
Rough-hew them how we will."
We can only resolve, or rather endeavour, to act our parts well, such as
they are allotted to us. Little choice have we to seek or to eschew our
several destinations.
With Monina at his side, and his own restless ambition as a spur, it may
be easily imagined what Lord Audley's projects were in joining the
Cornish insurgents. He led them from the western extremity of the
island towards Kent, where he hoped to find the seeds of rebellion to
Lancaster, which he had sown the year before, ripened into harvest. News
of the unimpeded march of the insurgents from Cornwall to the
neighbourhood of London was brought to Edinburgh, freshening the zeal
and animating the preparations for war.
Already the Scottish army was encamped south of Edinburgh. The English
troops set up their tents among them. The day was fixed for the
departure of the king, the prince, and the noble leaders. They quitted
Edinburgh in all the pompous array of men assured of victory. James
loved the hopes and stirring delights of war: Richard saw his every good
in life dependent on this expedition, and fostered sanguine expectation
of triumph. The burning desire of asserting himself, of rewarding his
faithful friends, of decorating Katherine with the rank and honours due
to her--the belief that he should achieve all this--gave dignity and
even gladness, to his last adieu to his lovely wife. Her heart mirrored
his hopes; not that she entertained them for her own, but for his sake:
yet the quicker sensibilities of a woman imparted fears unknown to him.
She concealed them, till when, as her last office and duty, she had
fastened an embroidered scarf around him. Softly, whisperingly, as
fearful of paining him, she said, "You will return--you have a kingdom
here: though England prove false, you must not disdain to be sole
monarch of Katherine."
These words had been spoken--earl, baron, and gallant knight thronged
the courts of Holyrood. There was the sound of warlike trump and the
streaming of painted banners, among which, that of the White Rose waved
conspicuous. The king vaulted on his saddle; the prince of England rode
at his side. He was surrounded by the rude northern warlike chiefs,
ancient enemies of his native land, whose fierce eyes were lighted up by
the expectation of meeting their old adversaries in the field. Could he
fancy that, through such aid, he might win back the crown usurped from
him?
King James and Richard rode side by side. At this moment, when the one
was spending the riches of his kingdom and the lives of his subjects for
the other's sake, while the hearts of both were softened by regret for
their abandoned home, and both anticipated the joys of victory or perils
of defeat to be shared between them, the sentiment of friendship was
rekindled. Never had they been more cordial, more confidential, more
happy in each other's society. After several hours' ride, the short
spring day declined to evening, which was accompanied by a drizzling
rain: the bad roads and the darkness impeded their progress; and it was
night before the twinkling camp-lights appeared in the distance and the
hum of men was heard. To the right of the camp, surrounded by the tents
of his nobles, the royal pavilion was pitched. On their arrival, the
earl of Buchan was in readiness to hold the king's stirrup. "Nay," said
James, "first we will see our royal guest lodged; where is the tent of
his grace of England? we commanded it to be pitched in close
neighbourhood to our own?"
"Please you, my liege," said Buchan, "Lord Moray, gave direction it
should be placed out of our line; it is set up a mile eastward of us."
"My uncle forgot himself; and you also, sir earl, were bound rather to
obey our order," said the king.
"There were reasons," returned Buchan: "your majesty, I dare aver, will
approve the change, and his highness of England also. There was a brawl
between the Scottish borderers and the English; blood has been shed. We
feared that the peace of the encampment, not to say the life of his
highness, would be endangered if he were in the midst of our savage
Southrons."
"I like not this," said James, moodily, "but it is too late to change
to-night. The rain-drops begin to freeze upon my hair; your highness
would rather be in year tent, far though it be from mine, than quarrel
about its position at this inclement hour. Lord Buchan, you will attend
him thither. Prince, goodnight; to-morrow we will be more brotherly in
our fashion; now the fiat of my lord of Moray must be obeyed."
The king dismounted, and entered his pavilion: as the cloth was raised,
a blazing fire, the apparel of silver flagons and golden cups, the trim
appearance of silken-suited pages were visible, making strong contrast
with the cheerless blank without. One slight glimpse revealed the cause,
and partly excused the inhospitality of James, in not inviting his guest
to partake his warm cheer. One in a kirtle sat somewhat retired from
view; the quick motion of her head, the glance of her dark eye, showed
that the monarch had been impatiently expected, and was gladly welcomed
by the lovely daughter of the earl of Cassils.
Lord Buchan accompanied Richard, Lord Barry, and Plantagenet to their
quarters; talking, as he went, of the contention, which had terminated
fatally to several. They rode down the elevated ground on which the
king's tent was placed, over a plashy, low plain, through a little wood
of stunted larch, across a narrow dell, in whose bottom a brook
struggled and murmured, to the acclivity on the other side, on which the
tents of the English troops were pitched; considerably apart from the
rest was Richard's own pavilion: all looked tranquil and even desolate,
compared to the stirring liveliness of the Scotch camp, Richard was
received by Sir George Neville, who looked more than usually cold and
haughty as he bent to Lord Buchan's salutation: the Scotchman uttered a
hasty good night, galloped down the upland and across the dell, and was
lost to sight in the wood.
"What means this, Sir George?" was the prince's first remark: "what
discipline is yours--brawling and bloodshed with our allies?"
"Did your highness name them our enemies," said Neville, "it were more
appropriate. Suspend your displeasure, I beseech you, until I can lay
before you the reality of what you name a brawl; my honour, and I fear
all our safeties are concerned in the discovery. Now, your grace is wet
and fatigued; you will repose?"
Richard desired solitude, not rest: he wished to be alone; for a
thousand intricate ideas possessed him, clamouring to be attended to. He
dismissed his friends. Frion only remained--Frion, who lately had
almost become surly, but who was now smooth, supple as ever; his eye
twinkling as of yore, and his ready laugh--that most characteristic
part of him--again showing the old secretary returned. To the prince's
warm heart, the appearance of discontent and moodiness was peculiarly
grating; the smile or frown even of Frion had power over him; and he
felt grateful to the man for his glossy and satisfactory speeches, now
that, spite of himself, a feeling--it was not fear, but an anticipation
of evil--disturbed his mind.
At length, he dismissed him; yet still he felt utterly disinclined for
sleep. For some time he paced his tent; images of war and battle floated
before him--and then the vision of an angel with golden hair, came, not
to calm, but to trouble him with unquiet regret. In vain he strove to
awaken the flock of gentle thoughts that usually occupied him; his ideas
seemed wolf-visaged; unreal howlings and cries rung in his ears. This
unusual state of mind was intolerable: he folded his cloak round him,
and stepped into his outer tent. Frion, two pages, and his esquire, were
to occupy it; but he found it solitary. This seemed a little strange;
but it was early yet. He lifted the outer cloth; a sentinel was duly at
his post; the prince saluted him and passed on. The fitful winds of
spring had dispersed the storm: the scarcely waning moon, encircled by
the dark clear ether, was in the east; her yellow light filled the
atmosphere, and lay glowing on the trees and little hill-side. The
prince stepped onwards, down the declivity, across the dell, into the
wood. He thought he heard voices; or was it only the swinging branches
of the pines? The breeze raised his hair and freshened his brow. Still
he walked on, till now he came in view of the Scottish camp, which lay
tranquil as sheep in a fold, the moon's bright eye gazing on it. The
sight brought proud Granada and all its towers, with the Christian camp
sleeping at her feet, before his mind; and he still lingered. Now the
tramp of horses became audible: a troop wound down the hill: the leader
stopped exclaiming in some wonder, "My lord of York! does your highness
need any service? do you bend your steps to the royal tent?"
"I blush to answer, Sir Patrick," replied the prince; "for you will
scoff at me as the moon's minion: I came out but to visit her. Yet a
knight need not feel shame at loitering beneath her ray, dreaming of his
lady-love. You are more actively employed?"
"I was on my way to your highness's encampment," replied the knight.
"His majesty is not quite satisfied with Lord Buchan's report, and sent
but now his esquire to me, to bid me visit it. With your good leave, I
will escort you thither."