Produced by Al Haines
[Frontispiece: Le Prince Rupert. Duc de Baviere et Cumberland. From
the portrait by Honthorst in the Louvre Paris.]
RUPERT
PRINCE PALATINE
BY
EVA SCOTT
Late Scholar of Somerville College
Oxford
WESTMINSTER
ARCHIBALD CONSTABLE & Co.
NEW YORK
G. P. PUTNAM'S SONS
1900
SECOND EDITION
{v}
PREFACE
It is curious that in these days of historical research so little has
been written about Rupert of the Rhine, a man whose personality was
striking, whose career was full of exciting adventure, and for whose
biography an immense amount of material is available.
His name is known to most people in connection with the English Civil
War, many have met with him in the pages of fiction, some imagine him
to have been the inventor of mezzotint engraving, and a few know that
he was Admiral of England under Charles II. But very few indeed could
tell who he was, and where and how he lived, before and after the Civil
War.
The present work is an attempt to sketch the character and career of
this remarkable man; the history of the Civil War, except so far as it
concerns the Prince, forming no part of its scope. Nevertheless, the
study of Prince Rupert's personal career throws valuable side-lights on
the history of the war, and especially upon the internal dissensions
which tore the Royalist party to pieces and were a principal cause of
its ultimate collapse. From Rupert's adventures and correspondence we
also learn much concerning the life of the exiled Stuarts during the
years of the Commonwealth; while his post-Restoration history is
closely connected with the Naval Affairs of England.
The number of manuscripts and other documents which bear record of
Rupert's life is enormous. Chief amongst them are the Domestic State
Papers, preserved in the Public Record Office; the Clarendon State
Papers, and the Carte Papers in the Bodleian Library, Oxford; the
Lansdowne Manuscripts in the British Museum, and the Rupert {vi}
Correspondence, which originally comprised some thousands of letters
and other papers collected by the Prince's secretary. The collection
has now been broken up and sold; but the Transcripts of Mr. Firth of
Balliol College, Oxford, were made before the collection was divided,
and comprise the whole mass of correspondence. For the loan of these
Transcripts, and for much valuable advice I am deeply indebted to Mr.
Firth. I also wish to acknowledge the kind assistance of Mr. Hassall
of Christchurch, Oxford.
Some of the Rupert Papers were published by Warburton, fifty years ago,
in a work now necessarily somewhat out of date. But there is printed
entire the log kept in the Prince's own ship, 1650-1653, which is here
quoted in chapters 13 and 14; also in Warburton are to be found the
letters addressed by the Prince to Colonel William Legge, 1644-1645.
The Bromley Letters, published 1787, relate chiefly to Rupert's early
life, and to the years of exile, 1650-1660. The Carte Papers are
invaluable for the history of the Civil War, and of Rupert's
transactions with the fleet, 1648-50; and in the Thurloe and Clarendon
State Papers much is to be found relating to the wanderings of Rupert
and the Stuarts on the Continent.
With regard to the Prince's family relations, German authorities are
fullest and best. Chief among these are the letters of the Elector
Charles Louis, and the letters and memoirs of Sophie, Electress of
Hanover, all published from the Preussischen Staats-Archieven; also the
letters of the Elector's daughter, the Duchess of Orleans, published
from the same source. Besides these, Hauesser's "Geschichte der
Rheinischen Pfalz", and Reiger's "Ausgeloschte Simmerischen Linie" are
very useful.
Mention of the Prince is also found in the mass of Civil War Pamphlets
preserved in the British Museum and the Bodleian Library, and in
contemporary memoirs, letters and diaries, on the description of which
there is not space to enter here.
CONTENTS
Page
CHAPTER I. THE PALATINE FAMILY . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
" II. RUPERT'S EARLY CAMPAIGNS. FIRST VISIT TO
ENGLAND. MADEMOISELLE DE ROHAN . . . . . . . 20
" III. THE SIEGE OF BREDA. THE ATTEMPT ON THE
PALATINATE. RUPERT'S CAPTIVITY. . . . . . . . 34
" IV. THE PALATINES IN FRANCE. RUPERT'S RELEASE . . . 48
" V. ARRIVAL IN ENGLAND. POSITION IN THE ARMY.
CAUSES OF FAILURE. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 59
" VI. THE BEGINNING OF THE WAR. POWICK BRIDGE.
EDGEHILL. THE MARCH TO LONDON . . . . . . . . 85
" VII. THE WAR IN 1643. THE QUARREL WITH HERTFORD.
THE ARRIVAL OF THE QUEEN . . . . . . . . . . . 101
" VIII. THE PRESIDENCY OF WALES. THE RELIEF OF
NEWARK. QUARRELS AT COURT. NORTHERN
MARCH. MARSTON MOOR . . . . . . . . . . . . . 128
" IX. INTRIGUES IN THE ARMY. DEPRESSION OF RUPERT.
TREATY OF UXBRIDGE. RUPERT IN THE MARCHES.
STRUGGLE WITH DIGBY. BATTLE OF NASEBY . . . 154
" X. RUPERT'S PEACE POLICY. THE SURRENDER OF
BRISTOL. DIGBY'S PLOT AGAINST RUPERT. THE
SCENE AT NEWARK. RECONCILIATION WITH
THE KING. THE FALL OF OXFORD . . . . . . . . 177
" XI. THE ELECTOR'S ALLIANCE WITH THE PARLIAMENT.
EDWARD'S MARRIAGE. ASSASSINATION OF
D'EPINAY BY PHILIP . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 205
" XII. CAMPAIGN IN THE FRENCH ARMY. COURTSHIP
OF MADEMOISELLE. DUELS WITH DIGBY AND
PERCY . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 213
" XIII. RUPERT'S CARE OF THE FLEET. NEGOTIATIONS
WITH SCOTS. RUPERT'S VOYAGE TO IRELAND.
THE EXECUTION OF THE KING. LETTERS OF
SOPHIE TO RUPERT AND MAURICE . . . . . . . . . 222
" XIV. THE FLEET IN THE TAGUS. AT TOULON. THE
VOYAGE TO THE AZORES. THE WRECK OF THE
"CONSTANT REFORMATION." ON THE AFRICAN
COAST. LOSS OF MAURICE IN THE "DEFIANCE."
THE RETURN TO FRANCE . . . . . . . . . . . . 241
" XV. RUPERT AT PARIS. ILLNESS. QUARREL WITH
CHARLES II. FACTIONS AT ST. GERMAINS.
RUPERT GOES TO GERMANY. RECONCILED
WITH CHARLES . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 265
" XVI. RESTORATION OF CHARLES LOUIS TO THE
PALATINATE. FLIGHT OF THE PRINCESS LOUISE
FROM THE HAGUE. RUPERT'S DEMAND FOR AN
APPANAGE. QUARREL WITH THE ELECTOR . . . . . 283
" XVII. RUPERT'S RETURN TO ENGLAND, 1660. VISIT TO
VIENNA. LETTERS TO LEGGE . . . . . . . . . . 293
" XVIII. RUPERT AND THE FLEET. PROPOSED VOYAGE TO
GUINEA. ILLNESS OF RUPERT. THE FIRST DUTCH
WAR. THE NAVAL COMMISSIONERS AND THE
PRINCE. SECOND DUTCH WAR. ANTI-FRENCH
POLITICS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 302
" XIX. RUPERT'S POSITION AT COURT. HIS CARE FOR
DISTRESSED CAVALIERS. HIS INVENTIONS. LIFE
AT WINDSOR. DEATH . . . . . . . . . . . . . 332
" XX. THE PALATINES ON THE CONTINENT. RUPERT'S
DISPUTES WITH THE ELECTOR. THE ELECTOR'S
ANXIETY FOR RUPERT'S RETURN. WANT OF
AN HEIR TO THE PALATINATE. FRANCISCA
BARD. RUPERT'S CHILDREN . . . . . . . . . . 344
INDEX . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 369
[Illustration: Genealogical chart]
{1}
RUPERT, PRINCE PALATINE
CHAPTER I
THE PALATINE FAMILY
"A man that hath had his hands very deep in the blood of many innocent
people in England," was Cromwell's concise description of Rupert of the
Rhine.[1]
"That diabolical Cavalier" and "that ravenous vulture" were the
flattering titles bestowed upon him by other soldiers of the
Parliament.[2] "The Prince that was so gallant and so generous," wrote
an Irish Royalist.[3] And said Cardinal Mazarin, "He is one of the
best and most generous princes that I have ever known."[4]
Rupert was not, in short, a person who could be regarded with
indifference. By those with whom he came in contact he was either
adored or execrated, and it is remarkable that a man who made so strong
an impression upon his contemporaries should have left so slight a one
upon posterity. To most people he is a name and nothing more;--a being
akin to those iron men who sprang from Jason's dragon teeth, coming
into life at the outbreak of the English Civil War to disappear with
equal suddenness at its close. He is regarded, on the one hand, as a
blood-thirsty, plundering ruffian, who endeavoured to teach in England
lessons of cruelty learnt in the Thirty Years' War; {2} on the other,
as a mere headstrong boy who ruined, by his indiscretion, a cause for
which he exposed himself with reckless courage. Neither of these views
does him justice, and his true character, his real influence on English
history are lost in a cloud of mist and prejudice. His character had
in it elements of greatness, but was so full of contradictions as to
puzzle even the astute Lord Clarendon, who, after a long study of the
Prince, was reduced to the exclamation--"The man is a strange
creature!"[5] And strange Rupert undoubtedly was! Born with strong
passions, endowed with physical strength, and gifted with talents
beyond those of ordinary men, but placed too early in a position of
great trial and immense responsibility, his history, romantic and
interesting throughout, is the history of a failure.
In his portraits, of which a great number are in existence, the story
may be read. We see him first a sturdy, round-eyed child, looking out
upon the world with a valiant wonder. A few years later the face is
grown thinner and sadder, full of thought and a gentle wistfulness, as
though he had found the world too hard for his understanding. At
sixteen he is still thoughtful, but less wistful,--a gallant, handsome
boy with a graceful bearing and a bright intelligent face, just touched
with the melancholy peculiar to the Stuart race. At five-and-twenty
his mouth had hardened and his face grown stern, under a burden which
he was too young to bear. After that comes a lapse of many years till
we find him embittered, worn, and sad; a man who has seen his hopes
destroyed and his well-meant efforts perish. Lastly, we have the
Rupert of the Restoration; no longer sick at heart and desperately sad,
but a Rupert who has out-lived hope and joy, disappointment and sorrow;
a handsome man, with a keen intellectual face, but old before his time,
and made hard and cold and contemptuous by suffering and loneliness.
{3}
The first few months of Rupert's existence were the most prosperous of
his life, but he was not a year old before his troubles began. His
father, Frederick V, Elector Palatine of the Rhine, had been married at
sixteen to the famous Elizabeth Stuart, daughter of James I of England;
the match was not a brilliant one for the Princess Royal of England,
but it was exceedingly popular with the English people, who regarded
Frederick with favour as the leader of the Calvinist Princes of the
Empire. Elizabeth was no older than her husband, and seems to have
been considerably more foolish. Her extravagancies and Frederick's
difficult humours were the despair of their patient and faithful
household steward; yet for some years they dwelt at Heidelberg in
peaceful prosperity, and there three children were born to them,
Frederick Henry, Charles Louis, and Elizabeth.
But the Empire, though outwardly at peace, was inwardly seething with
religious dissension, which broke out into open war on the election of
Ferdinand of Styria, (the cousin and destined successor of the
Emperor,) as King of Bohemia. Ferdinand was a staunch Roman Catholic,
the friend and pupil of the Jesuits, with a reputation for intolerance
even greater than he deserved.[6] As a matter of fact Protestantism
was abhorrent to him, less as heresy, than as the root of moral and
political disorder. The Church of Rome was, in his eyes, the fount of
order and justice, and he was strongly imbued with the idea, then
prevalent in the Empire, that to princes belonged the settlement of
religion in those countries over which they ruled.
But it happened that the Protestants of Bohemia had, at that moment,
the upper hand. The turbulent nobles of the country were bent on
establishing at once their political and religious independence; they
rose in revolt, threw the Emperor's ministers out of the Council
Chamber window at Prague, and rejected Ferdinand as king.
{4}
The Lutheran Princes looked on the revolt coldly, feeling no sympathy
with Bohemia. They believed as firmly as did Ferdinand himself in the
right of secular princes to settle theological disputes. They were
loyal Imperialists, and hated Calvinism, anarchy and war, far more than
they hated Roman Catholicism.
With the Calvinist princes of the south, at the head of whom stood the
Elector Palatine and the Landgrave of Hesse Cassel, the case was
different. Fear of their Catholic neighbours, Bavaria and the
Franconian bishoprics, made them war-like; they sympathised strongly
with their Bohemian co-religionists, they longed to break the power of
the Emperor, and were even willing to call in foreign aid to effect
their purpose. Schemes for their own personal aggrandisement played an
equal part with their religious enthusiasm, and their plots and
intrigues gave Ferdinand a very fair excuse for his unfavourable view
of Protestantism.
For a time they merely talked, and on the death of Matthias they
acquiesced in the election of Ferdinand as Emperor: but only a few days
later Frederick was invited by the Bohemians to come and fill their
vacant throne.
Frederick was not ambitious; left to himself he might have declined the
proffered honour, but, urged by his wife and other relations, he
accepted it, and departed with Elizabeth and their eldest son, to
Prague, where he was crowned amidst great rejoicings.
Among the Protestant princes, three, and three only, approved of
Frederick's action; these were Christian of Anhalt, the Margrave of
Anspach and the Margrave of Baden. Maurice of Hesse-Cassel, on the
contrary, though a Calvinist and an enemy of the Imperial House,
strongly condemned the usurpation as grossly immoral; and in truth the
only excuse that can be offered for it is Frederick's belief in a
Divine call to succour his co-religionists. Unfortunately he was the
last man to succeed in so difficult an enterprise; yet for a brief
period all went well, and at Prague, November {5} 28th, 1619, in the
hour of his parents' triumph, was born the Elector's third son--Rupert.
The Bohemians welcomed the baby with enthusiasm; the ladies of the
country presented him with a cradle of ivory, embossed with gold, and
studded with precious stones, and his whole outfit was probably the
most costly that he ever possessed in his life. He was christened
Rupert, after the only one of the Electors Palatine who had attained
the Imperial crown. His sponsors were Bethlem Gabor, King of Hungary,
whose creed approximated more closely to Mahommedanism than to any
other faith; the Duke of Wuertemberg, and the States of Bohemia,
Silesia, and Upper and Lower Lusatia. The baptism was at once the
occasion of a great feast, and of a political gathering; it aggravated
the already smouldering wrath of the Imperialists; a revolt in Prague
followed, and within a year the Austrian army had swept over Bohemia,
driving forth the luckless King and Queen.
Frederick had no allies, he found no sympathy among his fellow-princes,
on the selfish nobility and the apathetic peasantry of Bohemia he could
place no reliance; resistance in the face of the Emperor's forces was
hopeless;--the Palatines fled.
In the hasty flight the poor baby was forgotten; dropped by a terrified
nurse, he was left lying upon the floor until the Baron d'Hona,
chancing to find him, threw him into the last coach as it left the
courtyard. The jolting of the coach tossed the child into the boot,
and there he would have perished had not his screams attracted the
notice of some of the train, who rescued him, and carried him off to
Brandenburg after his mother.
Elizabeth had sought shelter in Brandenburg because the Elector of that
country had married Frederick's sister Catharine. But George William
of Brandenburg was a Lutheran, and a prudent personage, who had no wish
to embroil himself with his Emperor for a cause of which he thoroughly
{6} disapproved. He gave his sister-in-law a cold reception, but,
seeing her dire necessity, lent her his castle of Custrin, where, on
January 11th, 1621, she gave birth to a fourth son. Damp, bare and
comfortless was the castle in which this child first saw the light, and
mournful was the welcome he had from his mother. "Call him Maurice,"
she said, "because he will have to be a soldier!" So Maurice the boy
was named, after the warlike Prince of Orange, the most celebrated
general of that day.[7]
To the Prince of Orange the exiles now turned their thoughts. Return
to their happy home in the Palatinate was impossible, for Frederick lay
under the ban of the Empire, and his hereditary dominions were
forfeited in consequence of his rebellious conduct; therefore when, six
weeks after the birth of her child, George William informed Elizabeth
that he dared no longer shelter her, she entrusted the infant to the
care of the Electress Catharine, and taking with her the little Rupert,
began her journey towards Holland.
Maurice, Prince of Orange and Stadtholder of Holland, was the eldest
son of William the Silent, and brother of Frederick's mother, the
Electress Juliana. He had strongly urged his nephew's acceptance of
the Bohemian crown, and it seemed but natural that he should afford an
asylum to those whom he had so disastrously advised. He did not shrink
from his responsibility, and the welcome which he accorded to his
hapless nephew and niece was as warm as that of the Elector of
Brandenburg had been cold. At Muenster they were met by six companies
of men at arms, sent to escort them to Emerich, where they met their
eldest son, Henry, who had been sent to the protection of Count Ernest
of Nassau at the beginning of the troubles; there also gathered round
them the remnants of their shattered court, and it was with a shadowy
show of royalty that they proceeded to the Hague.
{7}
Nothing could have exceeded the kindness of their reception, princes
and people being equally anxious to show them sympathy. Prince Henry
Frederick of Orange, the brother and heir of the Stadtholder, resigned
his own palace to their use, and the States of Holland presented
Elizabeth with a mansion that stood next door to the palace. The
furniture necessary to make this house habitable, Elizabeth was
enforced to borrow from the ever generous Prince Henry. For all the
necessaries of life the exiles were dependent upon charity, and, but
for the generosity of the Orange Princes, supplemented by grants of
money from England and from the States of Holland, they would have
fared badly indeed.
Thenceforth Elizabeth dwelt at the Hague, while the Thirty Years' War,
of which her husband's action had lit the spark, raged over Germany.
Slowly and reluctantly a few of the Protestant Princes took up arms
against the Emperor. James I sent armies of Ambassadors both to Spain
and Austria, and offered settlements to which Frederick would not, or
could not agree, but he lent little further aid to his distressed
daughter. He regarded his son-in-law's action as a political crime,
which had produced the religious war that he had striven all his life
to avoid, therefore, though he tacitly permitted English volunteers to
enlist under Frederick's mercenary, Count Mansfeld, he would not
countenance the war openly. Indeed he deprecated it as the chief
obstacle to the marriage of Prince Charles with the Spanish Infanta, on
which he had set his heart. The English Parliament, on the contrary,
detested the idea of a Spanish alliance, and eagerly advocated a war on
behalf of the Protestant exiles.
But if her father would not fight on her behalf Elizabeth had friends
who asked nothing better. For her sake Duke Christian of Brunswick,
the lay-Bishop of Halberstadt, threw himself passionately into the war.
He and Mansfeld having completed between them the alienation of the
other Princes, {8} by their lawless plunderings, were defeated by the
Imperialist General, Tilly. The Emperor settled the Upper Palatinate
on his brother-in-law, the Duke of Bavaria, and, though the Lower
Palatinate clung tenaciously to its Elector, Frederick was never able
to return thither, until, many years later, the intervention of the
quixotic King of Sweden won him a brief and evanescent success.
Thus in trouble, anxiety and poverty passed the early youth of the
Palatine children. In the first years of the exile only Henry and
Rupert shared their parents' home at the Hague; Charles and Elizabeth
had been left in the care of their grandmother Juliana, who, when
Heidelberg became no longer a safe place of residence, carried them off
to Berlin, where Maurice had been left with his aunt.
Henry was old enough to feel the separation from his brother and
sister, to whom he was much attached. "I trust you omit not to pray
diligently, as I do, day and night, that it may please God to restore
us to happiness and to each other," he wrote with precocious
seriousness to Charles, "I have a bow and arrow, with a beautiful
quiver, tipped with silver, which I would fain send you, but I fear it
may fall into the enemy's hands."[8] In another letter he tells
Charles that "Rupert is here, blythe and well, safe and sound," that he
is beginning to talk, and that his first words were "Praise the Lord",
spoken in Bohemian.[9] In the following year, 1621, Rupert was very
ill with a severe cold, and Henry wrote to his grandfather, King
James:--"Sir, we are come from Sewneden to see the King and Queen, and
my little brother Rupert, who is now a little sick. But my brother
Charles is, God be thanked, very well, and my sister Elizabeth, and she
is a little bigger and stronger than he."[10] A quaint mixture of
childishness and precocity is noticeable in all his letters. "I have
two {9} horses alive, that can go up my stairs; a black horse and a
brown horse!" he informed his grandfather on another occasion.[11]
Frederick, an affectionate father to all his children, was especially
devoted to his eldest son, whom he made his constant companion. Of
Rupert also we find occasional mention in his letters. "The little
Rupert is very learned to understand so many languages!"[12] he says in
1622, when the child was not three years old. In another letter, dated
some years later, he writes to his wife: "I am very glad that Rupert is
in your good graces, and that Charles behaves so well. Certes, they
are doubly dear to me for it."[13]
But the Queen, so universally beloved and belauded, does not appear to
have been a very affectionate mother. A devoted wife she
unquestionably was, but she did not exert herself to win her children's
love. "Any stranger would be deceived in that humour, since towards
them there is nothing but mildness and complaisance,"[14] wrote her son
Charles in after years; and, though Charles himself had little right so
to reproach her, there was doubtless some truth in the saying. She had
not been long at the Hague before she obtained from the kindly
Stadtholder the grant of a house at Leyden, "where," says her youngest
daughter, Sophie, "her Majesty had her whole family brought up apart
from herself, greatly preferring the sight of her monkeys and dogs to
that of her children."[15]
Having thus successfully disposed of her family, Elizabeth was able to
live at the Hague with considerable satisfaction, surrounded by the
beloved monkeys and dogs, of which she had about seventeen in all. Nor
was she without congenial society. At the Court of Orange there were
{10} no ladies, for both the Princes were unmarried; but very speedily
a court gathered itself about the lively Queen of Bohemia. English
ladies flocked to the Hague to show their respect and sympathy for
their dear Princess. Nobles and diplomates, more especially Sir Thomas
Roe and Sir Dudley Carleton, the last of whom was English Ambassador at
the Hague, vied with one another in evincing their friendship for the
Queen; and hundreds of adventurous young gentlemen came to offer their
swords to her husband and their hearts to herself. "I am never
destitute of a fool to laugh at, when one goes another comes,"[16]
wrote Elizabeth, _a propos_ of these eager volunteers, who had dubbed
her the "Queen of Hearts."
Soon after they were settled at Leyden, Henry and Rupert were joined by
the sister and brothers hitherto left at Berlin, and their society was
further augmented by other children, born at the Hague, and despatched
to Leyden as soon as they were old enough to bear the three days'
journey thither. To the youngest sister, Sophie, we owe a detailed
description of their daily life. "We had," she wrote, "a court quite
in the German style; our hours as well as our curtsies were all laid
down by rule." Eleven o'clock was the dinner hour, and the meal was
attended with great ceremony. "On entering the dining-room I found all
my brothers drawn up in front, with their gentlemen and governors
posted behind in the same order, side by side. I was obliged to make a
very low curtsey to the Princes, a slighter one to the others, another
low one on placing myself opposite to them, then another slight one to
my governess, who on entering the room with her daughters curtsied very
low to me. I was obliged to curtsey again on handing my gloves over to
their custody, then again on placing myself opposite to my brothers,
{11} again when the gentlemen brought me a large basin in which to wash
my hands, again after grace was said, and for the ninth, and last time,
on seating myself at table. Everything was so arranged that we knew on
each day of the week what we were to eat, as is the case in convents.
On Sundays and Wednesdays two divines or two professors were always
invited to dine with us."[17]
All the children, both boys and girls, were very carefully instructed
in theology, according to the doctrine of Calvin, and, observed the
candid Sophie, "knew the Heidelberg Catechism by heart, without
understanding one word of it."[18] According to the curriculum
arranged for them, the boys enjoyed four hours daily of leisure and
exercise. They had to attend morning and evening prayers read in
English; the morning prayer was followed by a Bible reading, and an
application of the lesson. They were instructed also in the terrible
Heidelberg Catechism, in the history of the Reformers, and in religious
controversy. On Sundays and feastdays they had to attend church, and
to give an abstract of the sermon afterwards. They learnt besides,
mathematics, history, and jurisprudence, and studied languages to so
much purpose that they could speak five or six with equal ease.[19] To
their English mother they invariably wrote and spoke in English, but
French was the tongue they used by preference, and amongst themselves;
a curious French, often interpolated with Dutch and German phrases.
Rupert early evinced his independence of character by revolting against
the strict course laid out for him. "He was not ambitious to entertain
the learned tongues.... He conceived the languages of the times would
be to him more useful, having to converse afterwards with divers {12}
nations. Thus he became so much master of the modern tongues that at
the thirteenth year of his age he could understand, and be understood
in all Europe. His High and Low Dutch were not more naturally spoken
by him than English, French, Spanish and Italian. Latin he
understood."[20] He showed, moreover, a passion for all things
military. "His Highness also applying himself to riding, fencing,
vaulting, the exercise of the pike and musket, and the study of
geometry and fortification, wherein he had the assistance of the best
masters, besides the inclination of a military genius, which showed
itself so early that at eight years of age he handled his arms with the
readiness and address of an experienced soldier."[21]
Occasionally their mother would summon the children to the Hague, that
she might show them to her friends; "as one would a stud of
horses,"[22] said Sophie bitterly. The life at Leyden was also varied
by the visits of the Elector Frederick, who was occasionally
accompanied by Englishmen of distinction.
In 1626 came the great Duke of Buckingham himself. James I was dead,
and Charles I reigned in his stead, but the brilliant favourite
Buckingham ruled over the son as absolutely as he had ruled over the
father before him. He was inclined now to take up the cause of the
Palatines, and, as the price of his assistance, proposed a marriage
between the eldest prince, Henry, and his own little daughter, the Lady
Mary Villiers. Frederick, knowing his great power, listened
favourably, and Buckingham accordingly visited the children at Leyden,
where he treated his intended son-in-law with great kindness. Henry
remembered the Duke with affection, and addressed some of his quaint
little letters to him, always expressing gratitude for his {13}
kindness. "My Lord," he wrote in 1628, "I could not let pass this
opportunity to salute you by my Lord Ambassador, for whose departure,
being somewhat sorrowful, I will comfort myself in this, that he may
help me in expressing to you how much I am your most affectionate
friend.--Frederick Henry."[23] But ere the year was out the Duke had
fallen under the assassin's knife, and the little Prince did not long
survive him.
The Stadtholder Maurice had died in 1625, bequeathing to Elizabeth,
amongst other things, a share in a Dutch Company which had raised a
fleet intended to intercept Spanish galleons coming, laden with gold,
from Mexico. In January 1629 this fleet returned triumphant to the
Zuyder Zee. To Amsterdam went Frederick, accompanied by his eldest
son, now fifteen, to claim Elizabeth's share of the spoil. "For more
frugality"[24] the poverty-stricken King and Prince travelled by the
ordinary packet-boat, They reached Amsterdam in safety, but on the
return journey, the packet-boat was run down by a heavy Dutch vessel,
and sank with all on board. Frederick was rescued by the exertions of
the skipper, but young Henry perished, and his piteous cry, "Save me,
Father!" rang in the ears of the unhappy Frederick to his dying day.[25]
Miseries accumulated steadily. The poverty of the exiles increased as
rapidly as did their family, and at last they could scarcely get bread
to eat. The account of their debts so moved Charles I that he pawned
his own jewels in order to pay them, after which, the King and Queen
retired to a villa at Rhenen, near Utrecht, where they hoped to live
economically. There Elizabeth was, to a great extent, deprived of the
society which she loved; but she found consolation in hunting, a sport
to which she {14} was devoted. Sometimes she permitted her sons to
join her, and on one such occasion a comical adventure befell young
Rupert. A fox had been run to earth, and "a dog, which the Prince
loved," followed it. The dog did not reappear, and Rupert, growing
anxious, crept down the hole after it. But, though he managed to catch
the dog by the leg, he found the hole so narrow that he could extricate
neither his favourite nor himself. Happily he was discovered in this
critical position by his tutor, who, seizing him by the heels, drew out
Prince, dog, and fox, each holding on to the other.[26]
To Frederick the sojourn at Rhenen was very agreeable. Failing health
increased his natural irritability, and he ungratefully detested the
democratic Hollanders. "Of all _canaille_, deliver me from the
_canaille_ of the Hague!"[27] he said. "It is a misery to live amongst
such a people."[28] At last, in 1630, a ray of hope dawned upon him.
Gustavus Adolphus, King of Sweden, resolved to assist the Protestants
of Germany, and, encouraged by France, launched himself into the
Empire. In 1631 he gained the battle of Leipzig, and success followed
success, until the Lower Palatinate was in the Swedish hero's hands.
Then Frederick, provided, by the Stadtholder, with L5,000, set out to
join Gustavus, but ere his departure, paid a farewell visit to Leyden.
There he attended a public examination of the University Students, in
which Charles and Rupert won much distinction. The visit was his last.
By November 1632 his troubles were over, and the weary, anxious,
disappointed king lay dead at Mainz, in the thirty-sixth year of his
age. The immediate cause of his death was a fever contracted in the
summer campaign; but it was said that his heart had been broken by the
death of his eldest son, and that all through his illness he declared
that he heard {15} the boy calling him. The death of Gustavus Adolphus
in the same month checked the victorious progress of the Swedish army,
and, consequently, the hopes of the Palatines. Frederick had been
loved by his sons, and his loss was keenly felt by those of them who
were old enough to understand it. The misfortune was, however, beyond
the comprehension of the five-year-old Philip, who evidently had learnt
to regard military defeat as the only serious disaster. "But is the
battle then lost, because the king is dead?" he demanded, gazing in
astonishment at Rupert's passionate tears.[29] More than a battle had
been lost, and forlornly pathetic was the letter indicted by the elder
boys to their uncle, King Charles:
"We commit ourselves and the protection of our rights into your
gracious arms, humbly beseeching your Majesty so to look upon us as
upon those who have neither friends, nor fortune, nor greater honour in
this world, than belongs to your Royal blood. Unless you please to
maintain that in us God knoweth what may become of your Majesty's
nephews.
"CHARLES.
"RUPERT. "MAURICE.
"EDWARD."[30]
Hard, in truth, was the position of Elizabeth, left to struggle as she
might for her large and impecunious family. She had lost, besides
Henry, two children who had died in infancy. There remained ten, six
sons and four daughters, the eldest scarcely sixteen, and all wholly
dependent on the generosity of their friends and relations. The States
of Holland at once granted to the Queen the same yearly sum which they
had allowed to her husband, and while her brother, Charles I,
prospered, and the Stadtholder {16} Henry still lived, she did not
suffer the depths of poverty to which she afterwards sank. Yet money
was, as her son Charles put it, "very hard to come by";[31] they were
always in debt, and it is recorded by another son, that their house was
"greatly vexed by rats and mice, but more by creditors."[32]
Happily for herself, Elizabeth was possessed of two things of which no
misfortune could deprive her, namely, a buoyant nature and a perfect
constitution. "For, though I have cause enough to be sad, I am still
of my wild humour to be merry in spite of fortune," she once wrote to
her faithful friend, Sir Thomas Roe.[33] And her children inherited
her high spirits. "I was then of so gay a disposition that everything
amused me," wrote Sophie; "our family misfortunes had no power to
depress my spirits, though we were, at times, obliged to make even
richer repasts than that of Cleopatra, and often had nothing at our
Court but pearls and diamonds to eat."[34] And as it was with Sophie
so it was with the others; despair was unknown to them, and for long it
was their favourite game to play that they were travelling back to the
lost Palatinate, and had entered a public-house on the way.[35] Nor did
they less inherit their mother's iron constitution. "Bodily health is
an inheritance from our mother which no one can dispute with us,"
declared Sophie; "the best we ever had from her, of which Rupert has
taken a double share."[36]
Thus, in spite of poverty, misfortune, and the learning thrust upon
them, the children grew up gay, witty, as full of tricks as their
mother's cherished monkeys, and all distinguished for personal beauty,
unusual talents, strong {17} wills, and a superb disregard of the
world's opinion. Charles, called by his brothers and sisters, "Timon",
on account of his misanthropic views and bitter sayings, was not a whit
behind Rupert in learning, and far his superior in social
accomplishments. He was his mother's favourite son. "Since he was
born I ever loved him best--when he was but a second son,"[37] she
wrote once; to which replied her correspondent: "It is not the first
time your Majesty has confessed to me your affection to the Prince
Elector, but now I must approve and admire your judgment, for never was
there any fairer subject of love."[38] Elizabeth, named by the rest "La
Grecque," was considered, later in life, the most learned lady in all
Europe; and the merry Louise was an artist whose pictures possess an
intrinsic value to this day. Her instructor in the art of painting was
Honthorst, who resided in the family. He often sold her pictures for
her, thus enabling her to contribute something to the support of the
household. So it happens that some of the pictures now ascribed to
Honthorst, are in fact the work of the Princess Louise.
Sophie has left us a description of all her sisters: "Elizabeth had
black hair, a dazzling complexion, brown sparkling eyes, a well-shaped
forehead, beautiful cherry lips, and a sharp aquiline nose, which was
apt to turn red. She loved study, but all her philosophy could not
save her from vexation when her nose was red. At such times she hid
herself from the world. I remember that my sister Louise, who was not
so sensitive, asked her on one such unlucky occasion to come upstairs
to the Queen, as it was the usual hour for visiting her. Elizabeth
said, 'Would you have me go with this nose?'--Louise retorted, 'What!
will you wait till you get another?'--Louise was lively and unaffected.
Elizabeth was very learned; she {18} knew every language under the sun
and corresponded regularly with Descartes. This great learning, by
making her rather absent-minded, often became the subject of our mirth.
Louise was not so handsome, but had, in my opinion, a more amiable
disposition. She devoted herself to painting, and so strong was her
talent for it that she could take likenesses from memory. While
painting others she neglected herself sadly; one would have said that
her clothes had been thrown on her."[39]
Rupert, nicknamed "Rupert le Diable" for his rough manners and hasty
temper, was himself no mean artist, but of his especial bent something
has been said already. Of the younger children we know less. Maurice
is chiefly distinguished as Rupert's inseparable companion and devoted
follower. Like Rupert, he seems to have been of gigantic height, for
we find Charles, at eighteen, boyishly resenting the imputation that
"my brother Maurice is as high as myself," and sending his mother "the
measure of my true height, without any heels," to disprove it.[40]
Edward must have been unlike the rest in appearance, for Charles
describes him as having a round face, and fat cheeks, though he had the
family brown eyes.[41] He shared the wilfulness of the rest, but never
especially distinguished himself. Henriette was fair and gentle, very
beautiful, but less talented than her sisters. She devoted herself to
needlework and the confection of sweetmeats. Poor, fiery Philip,
valiant, passionate and undisciplined, came early to a warrior's grave.
Sophie lived to be the mother of George I of England, and was famous
for her natural intelligence, learning, and social talents. Little
Gustave died at nine years old, after a short life of continual
suffering.
As the boys and girls grew up they were withdrawn from Leyden to the
court at the Hague. The Queen of {19} Bohemia's household was a
singularly lively one, abounding in practical jokes and wit of a not
very refined nature, so that the young princes and princesses had to
"sharpen their wits in self-defence."[42] It was a fashion with them
to run about the Hague in disguise, talking to whomever they
met.[43]--Private theatricals were a favourite form of amusement, and
the Carnival--their Protestantism notwithstanding--was kept with
hilarious rejoicing. The Dutch regarded them with kindly tolerance.
The English Puritans were less phlegmatic; and a deputation, happening
to come over with "a godly condolence" to Elizabeth, in 1635, retired
deeply disgusted by the "songs, dances, hallooing and other
jovialities" of the Princes Charles, Rupert, Maurice and Edward.[44]
[1] Hist. MSS. Commission. 12th Report. Athole MSS. p. 30.
[2] Calendar of Domestic State Papers. Wharton to Willingham, 13 Sept.
1642.
[3] Carte's Original Letters. Ed. 1739. Vol. I. p. 59. O'Neil to
Trevor, 26 July, 1644.
[4] Hist. MSS. Commission. 8th Report. Denbigh MSS. p. 5520.
[5] Calendar Clarendon, State Papers, 27 Feb. 1654.
[6] Gardiner's History of England. 1893. Vol. III. Chap. 29. pp.
251-299.
[7] Green, Lives of the Princesses of England. 1855. Vol. V. p. 353.
[8] Benger's Elizabeth Stuart. Ed. 1825. Vol. II. p. 255
[9] Ibid. II. p. 257.
[10] Hist. MSS. Com. Report 3. Hopkinson MSS. p. 265a.
[11] Green's Princesses, Vol. V. p. 408, note.
[12] Bromley Letters. Ed. 1787. p. 21.
[13] Bromley Letters, p. 38.
[14] Ibid. p. 178.
[15] Preussischen Staatsarchiven. Bd. 4. Memoiren der Herzogin
Sophie, pp. 34-35.
[16] Letters and Negotiations of Sir T. Roe, p. 74. Elizabeth to Roe,
19 Aug. 1622.
[17] Publication aus den Preussischen Staatsarchiven. Bd. 4. Memoiren
der Herzogin Sophie, pp. 34-35.
[18] Ibid.
[19] Hauesser, Geschichte der Rheinischen Pfalz. Vol. II. p. 510.
[20] Lansdowne MSS. 817. Fol. 157-168. Brit. Mus.
[21] Warburton, Rupert and the Cavaliers, Vol. I. p. 449.
[22] Memoiren der Herzogin Sophie, p. 35. Publication aus den
Preussischen Staatsarchiven.
[23] Harleian MSS. 6988. Fol. 83. British Museum.
[24] Howell's Familiar Letters. Edition 1726. Bk I. p. 177. 25 Feb.
1625.
[25] Strickland's Elizabeth Stuart. Queens of Scotland, Vol. VIII. pp.
134, 161. Green's Princesses. V. 468-9.
[26] Warburton, Vol. I. p. 49, _note_.
[27] Strickland, Elizabeth Stuart, p. 138.
[28] Bromley Letters, p. 20.
[29] Spruener's Pfalzgraf Ruprecht, p. 17. Staatsbibliothek zu Muenchen.
[30] Green, English Princesses, Vol. V. p. 515.
[31] Bromley Letters, p. 124.
[32] Dict. of National Biography. Art. Elizabeth of Bohemia.
[33] Letters and Negotiations of Roe, p. 146.
[34] Memoiren der Herzogin Sophie, p. 43.
[35] Spruener, p. 15. MSS. der Staatsbibliothek zu Muenchen.
[36] Briefwechsel der Herzogin Sophie mit Karl Ludwig von der Pfalz, p.
309.
[37] Dom. State Papers. Chas. I. Vol. 325. Fol. 47. Eliz. to Roe, 4
June, 1636.
[38] Ibid. Roe to Eliz., 20 July, 1636. Vol. 329. fol. 21.
[39] Memoiren der Herzogin Sophie, pp. 38-39.
[40] Bromley Letters, p. 97.
[41] Forster's Statesmen, Vol. VI. p. 81, _note_
[42] Memoiren der Herzogin Sophie, pp. 36-37.
[43] Memoirs of the Princess Palatine. Blaze de Bury. p. 112.
[44] Strickland, Elizabeth Stuart, p. 174.
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