(Vol. i., pp. 10. 274.)
It may be interesting to some of the readers of "N. & Q." to peruse the
following observations made by the Venetian ambassador resident in
England in 1606, respecting that "child of woe" the Lady Arabella
Stuart, whose romantic history forms one of the most pleasing of
D'Israeli's _Curiosities of Literature_. The extract I send you is taken
from a little French work, which professes to be a translation from the
manuscript "Italian Relation of England" by Marc-Antonio Correr, the
Venetian ambassador, and was printed at Montbéliard in 1668. The Lady
Arabella is here spoken of as _Madame Isabelle_.
"La personne la plus proche de sang de sa Majesté après ses
enfans, est Madame Isabelle, laquelle descend, ainsi que le Roy,
de Marguerite fille de Henry VII., estant née d'un frère naturel
du père de S. M., par où elle luy est Cousine. Elle est âgée de 28
ans; elle n'est pas bien belle, mais en recompense elle est ornée
de mille belles vertus, car outre qu'elle est noble et dans ses
actions et dans ses moeurs, elle possède plusieurs Langues en
perfection, sçavoir le Latin, l'Italien, le François, et
l'Espagnol; elle entend le Grec et l'Hebreu, et estudie sans
cesse. Elle n'est pas beaucoup riche, car la Reyne deffunte
prenant jalousie de tout le monde, et principalement de ceux qui
avoient quelque pretention à la couronne, luy osta sous divers
pretextes, la plus grand part de ses revenus; c'est pourquoy la
pauvre Dame ne peut pas vivre dans la splendeur, et n'a pas le
moyen de faire du bien à ceux qui la servent, comme elle voudroit.
Le Roy témoigne avoir de l'affection et de l'estime pour elle, le
laissant vivre en cour, ce que la Reyne deffunte ne luy voulut
jamais permettre. Le Roy luy avoit promis de luy rendre ses biens
et de luy donner un mary; elle est neantmoins encore privée et de
l'un et de l'autre."
_Relation d'Angleterre_, p. 82.
_Her Flight._--Phineas Pette, the shipwright at Chatham, received orders
to assist in the capture of the unfortunate lady; and it would appear,
from his manuscript Diary (_Harl. MS._ 6279.), that he did his best to
execute them. His statement is as follows:--
"The 4th of June (1611), being Tuesday, being prepared to have
gone to London the next day, about midnight one of the King's
messengers was sent down to me from the Lord Treasurer to man the
light horsemen [Query, what kind of boats were these?] with 20
musquetteers, and to run out as low as the Noor Head to search all
shipps, barks, and other vessells for the Lady Arabella that had
then made a scape, and was bound over for France; which service I
performed accordingly, and searched Queenborough, and other
vessells I could meet withall; then went over to Lee, in Essex,
and searched the Towne; and when we could hear no news of her went
to Gravesend, and thence took post-horse to Greenwich, where his
Majesty then lay, and delivered the account of my journey to the
Lord Treasurer by his Maj'ties command, and soe was dismissed, and
went that night to Ratcliffe," &c.
The messenger above alluded to, whose name was John Price, received
6_l._ for his pains in making "haste, post-haste," to Gravesend,
Rochester, and Queenborough. (See Devon's _Pell Records_.)
_And Capture._--This honour--or misfortune, rather, as it proved to
be--was reserved for Admiral Sir William Monson, who, in his _Naval
Memoirs_, p. 210., makes this self-satisfied remark:
"Sir W. Monson had orders to pursue her, which he did with that
celerity, that she was taken within four miles of Calais, shipped
in a French bark of that town, whither she was bound."