THE EVE OF THE WAR
I
Some happy wind over the ocean blow
This tempest yet, which frights our island so.
EDMUND WALLER
On July 23rd, 1637, the new liturgy, which the care of Archbishop Laud had
provided for the Scottish Church, was to be read for the first time in the
Church of St. Giles in Edinburgh. The clergyman entered the reading-desk
and the service began. But before he had read many words a tumult, in which
a crowd of women of the lower class took a prominent part, arose. National
feeling and religious feeling were alike outraged by the introduction of
the new Mass-book from England,[202] and the assembly, which had been
called together for public worship, broke up in wild confusion. That local
riot, which seemed but an ebullition of temporary fanaticism and
discontent, was in reality the symptom of a grave disease in the body
politic. It meant for Scotland the beginning of a civil war, which soon was
to cross the border and to break up in the sister kingdom the long internal
peace which had made her the envied of Europe. It meant for Henrietta Maria
and her husband the end of their happy, careless years, and the entering
upon a series of misfortunes, the number and bitterness of which are almost
unparalleled even in the annals of the House of Stuart.
After the riot events moved quickly, for behind the rioters was the virile
force of the Scottish nation. Charles was unwilling to give way, and by
November his northern subjects were almost in open revolt.
It was an unfortunate moment. The English Puritans, who were irritated by
their own grievances, showed an indecorous satisfaction in the Scottish
events, as shrewd observers, such as Salvetti, the Florentine envoy in
London, were not slow to observe. The King had no money to meet expenses,
and no means of getting any, except the objectionable one of calling a
Parliament. Abroad the outlook was no better, and Charles and Henrietta
ought to have known, if they did not, that they had no friend upon whom
they could rely in such a strait.
They were to find that it was not for nothing that they had scouted the
threats and warnings of Richelieu. That old man, sitting in his study in
the Palais Cardinal in Paris, held in his frail hands the threads of all
the diplomacy of Europe. He had long looked with no favourable eye upon
England, for the alliance which he had himself brought about had proved one
of his greatest disappointments. The union of the crowns of England and
Scotland had deprived France of a warm and constant ally,[203] and it was
to counterbalance this loss that Henry IV had planned, and Richelieu had
carried out, Henrietta's marriage. The Cardinal had not reckoned upon the
indeed somewhat unlikely contingency that a royal marriage should also
become a marriage of affection and community of interest. The first step in
his defeat was the dismission of the French in 1626, and this insult, which
circumstances did not permit him to avenge at once, was never forgiven to
its author the King of England, whom he also hated, because, in the words
of Madame de Motteville, he believed him to have a Spanish heart, and
because Queen Anne was allowed to carry on her Spanish correspondence by
way of England. Of Henrietta he had hardly a better opinion. She had
fulfilled none of the purposes for which he had sent her into England, and
though originally she had unwillingly submitted to her husband's will in
the matter of her servants, in later days she had made no great effort to
recall them. She had done little to cement an alliance between the two
kingdoms, and the English Catholics, whom she had been specially
commissioned to win over, remained, for the most part, obstinately attached
to the interests of Spain. Their relations had been, moreover, severely
strained by the Chateauneuf episode, and they were further embittered by
the disgrace and exile of Mary de' Medici, which her daughter rightly
attributed to Richelieu, whose conduct in the matter she considered an act
of the blackest ingratitude towards the woman who had made his fortune.
Nevertheless, about this time Richelieu made a final attempt to win the
personal favour of the Queen of England. He dispatched the Count of
Estrades on a special mission to England, of which no inconsiderable part
was to discover the sentiments of the Queen, and he told Bellièvre, the
French ambassador in London, that he believed her to be friendly towards
France, and requested him to treat her with kindness and sympathy. Neither
of the envoys met with much success. Estrades found Henrietta so forbidding
that he did not dare to deliver the letter which Richelieu had confided to
him, and which he had charged him to give or retain, according to the
disposition of the royal lady to whom it was addressed.[204] Bellièvre was
rather better received, but though the Queen showed herself willing to talk
with him and expressed general goodwill towards the Cardinal, the
diplomatist soon discovered that all she desired was help in a private
matter which he waived aside, but in which Richelieu determined to gratify
her, as he saw in it a means of ingratiating himself with her at small
cost.
The Chevalier de Jars, since his dramatic reprieve on the scaffold, had
languished in the Bastille. He had good friends both in England and in
France, but none more persevering and faithful than the Queen of England,
who never forgot a friend in trouble. Over and over again she pleaded with
Richelieu on his behalf, but for a long while he turned a deaf ear to her
appeals, answering her letters on the subject almost rudely. But in the
beginning of 1638 his attitude changed, and he intimated that a little more
persuasion on the part of Henrietta would result in the fulfilment of her
desire.
The matter was conducted with a studied picturesqueness of detail which was
carefully arranged by Richelieu to gratify the vanity of the woman he
wished to please. It was taken out of the hands of the English ambassador,
the Earl of Leicester, and arranged by Walter Montagu, who was at the
Queen's side in London, and by his personal friend Sir Kenelm Digby, who
was staying in Paris, in a private capacity, enjoying the society of his
many learned and scientific friends who resided there. Montagu and Digby
exchanged many letters, and the latter had several interviews with
Richelieu. During one of these he presented to the Cardinal a letter which
the Queen had requested him to deliver. The old man read it with great
satisfaction, though he had to request Sir Kenelm to help him in
deciphering several words, for Henrietta's writing was always very
illegible. When he had finished he laid it down, and looking hard at his
visitor, said in a meaning tone, "I am much pleased with the Queen's
letter, and you may assure her that she shall soon have cause to be pleased
with me."[205]
A few days later, about eight o'clock in the morning, a coach stopped at
the door of Sir Kenelm's lodgings, from which descended Chavigny, the
Secretary of State, and the Chevalier de Jars. Chavigny, after he had
greeted the astonished knight, waved his hand towards his charge and said,
in the courtly accents of a French diplomatist, "Monsieur, I have the
orders of the King and of M. le Cardinal to place this gentleman in your
hands. He is no longer the prisoner of the King of France, but of the Queen
of England."[206]
"It is to be hoped," Montagu had written a few weeks earlier to a member of
the French Government, "that the end of this affair will be the beginning
of that end to which we have always looked, namely, a good understanding
between the Queen and M. le Cardinal."[207] This hope was not fulfilled.
Henrietta was indeed greatly pleased at her friend's release, and she
cannot have failed to admire the graceful manner in which the great man had
granted his favour, but a single act of kindness on the one hand and a
single sentiment of gratitude on the other could not overcome the mutual
distrust of years. Moreover, events were even then occurring which were
destroying any good feeling of which the incident may have been productive.
For some years Mary de' Medici had been casting her eyes upon England as a
possible refuge. She disliked the Low Countries, where she was living, and
as she felt no desire to return to her native Florence, which was the place
of retirement selected for her by Louis XIII, or rather by Richelieu, she
thought that it might be wise to take advantage of the kindness which her
son-in-law, the King of England, had always felt for her. Her presence was
not desired in England; she was considered, with some justice, a
quarrelsome and mischief-making old lady, and her bigoted religious
attitude, joined with the favours which she showed to Spain, were
sufficient to make her unpopular among the people. Charles, however much he
might pity her as the victim of Richelieu, dreaded, short of money as he
was, so expensive and inconvenient a guest. Even Henrietta, with the
thought of her childhood in her mind, was afraid of her mother's arbitrary
interference. "_Adieu ma liberté_," she sighed. Perhaps the Queen-Mother
gathered that she would not be welcome, for the project seems to have been
in abeyance when England was startled by the arrival of another exiled lady
whose character and career presented even more of excitement and variety.
[Illustration: THE DUCHESS OF CHEVREUSE
AFTER THE PICTURE BY MOREELSE ONCE IN THE POSSESSION OF CHARLES I]
Madame de Chevreuse, on arriving in Madrid, had been received with great
kindness, as was only to be expected, for she had been a good friend to
Spain. But after some years of residence in the Spanish capital she found
that, owing to the war between the two countries, communication with France
was extremely difficult. She also began to think of England, where she had
spent some happy days of her earlier life. She felt sure of a good
reception, for she was united to the King by their common political
sympathy with the Spanish, and the Queen, in the past, had regarded her
with much affection. Her intention was quickly acted upon. She set sail
from Corunna in May, 1638, and after a successful voyage landed in England.
She had not deceived herself. The reception given to her by her royal hosts
was worthy of her rank as the wife of a kinsman of the King of England and
of her position as a personal friend of his Queen. Charles and Henrietta,
who were never wanting in hospitality, bade her heartily welcome, and even
invited her to be present at Windsor on the occasion of the little Prince
of Wales' investiture with the insignia of the Order of the Garter, an
attention which was due to the fact that her husband was himself a knight
of that noble order.[208] Nevertheless, the arrival of this factious lady
at so critical a moment was part of that tragic ill-luck of the King and
Queen of England on which their contemporaries remarked.
In London Madame de Chevreuse found many friends, among whom were her
former lover, the Earl of Holland, and Walter Montagu, whose early devotion
to her time had not destroyed. With the latter she at once began to scheme
for the coming of Mary de' Medici, and though for a while it seemed
unlikely that her plans would succeed, owing to the opposition of the King
and the whole nation, yet such was the effect of her skill and persistency
that, a few months after her own arrival, she witnessed the entry into
London of that unfortunate royal lady, in whose sojourn in England must be
sought one of the immediate contributory causes of the Civil War. Well
might Richelieu write on this occasion, with even more truth than he knew,
that "there is nothing so capable of destroying a state as evil minds
protected by their sex."[209]
Mary de' Medici arrived in the end unexpectedly. One Sunday afternoon a
gentleman of her suite arrived at the Court and announced that she had
already put to sea, and would land at Harwich that same evening if she were
assured of a welcome. Neither the King nor the Queen was pleased, but
Charles was too true a gentleman and Henrietta too affectionate a daughter
not to receive her with all honour. The King rode out into the country to
meet her, and escorted her through London amid official rejoicings,
described by a French gentleman in an elaborate account which reflects his
satisfaction.[210] Henrietta awaited her mother at St. James's Palace,
where she received her affectionately, settling her in the pleasant rooms
which had been there prepared, whence the old lady could look out upon the
deer park, and upon the beautiful terrace, which formed the favourite
promenade of the Court.
Meanwhile, Scottish affairs were going from bad to worse. "They growl, but
I hope they will not bite,"[211] wrote a courtier. They were to bite only
too soon. In February, 1638, thousands of Scots were signing the National
Covenant. A few months later the General Assembly of the Kirk sitting at
Glasgow abolished episcopacy, and followed up this act of defiance by
refusing to dissolve at the command of the King's commissioner. Charles
began to appreciate that his northern subjects were in open rebellion,
whose due chastisement was the sword.
But then, as ever, he was crippled by lack of money, and one of the means
which was taken to procure it was another of those acts by which he and his
wife set themselves against the will and sentiment of their people, and
thus prepared the way for their own final ruin, though, in this case, the
blame fell chiefly upon Henrietta, and it is doubtful whether Charles'
share in the transaction was known to the Puritans.[212]
The English Catholics had enjoyed for many years an unprecedented peace and
liberty, which now, owing to the kindness of the King and the Court for the
fascinating Con, had reached such a pitch that England appeared to
foreigners almost like a Catholic country. The recusancy fines, which were
still exacted in a modified form, kept up a certain feeling of irritation,
but on the whole the Catholics were loyal. They felt much gratitude towards
the Queen, on whom their prosperity depended, and when the Scotch rebellion
broke out they would have liked to bear arms in the King's service. Con,
who believed that Charles would willingly have employed them, assured him
that few of his subjects would fight for him as loyally as those of the
ancient faith. The King possibly believed him, but true to his cautious
nature he preferred to ask for a present of money, which the envoy, who,
notwithstanding his short sojourn in England, had a minute acquaintance
with the persons and circumstances of the English Catholics, set himself to
procure. As a first step he called together representatives both of the
clergy and of the laity, and laid before them the royal request.
He had undertaken no easy task. Some of the Catholics, to whom sad
experience had taught prudence, were alarmed at the idea of helping the
King to rule without the need of calling Parliament. Others, going to the
opposite extreme, offered their contributions separately, hoping thus to
gain the royal favour. Worst of all, the ill-feeling between the secular
and regular clergy made any cooperation between the two bodies a matter of
great difficulty. From meetings lasting many hours, at which he had
attempted to weld together these discordant elements, and from still more
fatiguing private audiences, Con, ill and suffering as he then was, came
away weary and dispirited, complaining bitterly of the "obstinate prudence"
of the Jesuits and of the self-seeking of all. "This kingdom," he wrote on
one of these occasions to Cardinal Barberini, "has no men who are moved by
the common good, but each one thinks only of his private interest."[213]
At first the Queen's name appears little, but she watched the negotiations
carefully, and in their latter stages she sent Montagu and Father Philip to
attend the meetings on her behalf, and to bring her news of an undertaking
in whose success she was deeply interested, and in which, for
constitutional reasons, she was now actively to intervene.
The fears of the more timid Catholics were not idle, but showed a truer
political insight than either Charles or Henrietta possessed. It was
necessary to reassure them without allowing the King's name to appear. The
best expedient which could be devised was to make the contribution appear
as a gift, which at the Queen's instigation was offered to her by her
co-religionists. Henrietta had at her side the ingenious Montagu and the
fantastic Sir Kenelm Digby, who was always pleased to adventure himself in
any new enterprise. These two gentlemen now issued a joint appeal to the
Catholics of England, asking, in the Queen's name, for liberal
contributions, and to this appeal she herself prefixed a dignified letter
urging her co-religionists to contribute liberally to the King's expenses
in the northern expedition, "for we believed that it became us who have
been so often interested in the solicitation of their benefits, to show
ourselves now in the persuasion of their gratitudes."[214] These letters,
together with one from the ecclesiastical authorities, were circulated
throughout the land; for each shire of England and Wales one or more
collectors was appointed from among the Catholic gentry.[215]
The Queen had already asked the Catholics to fast every Saturday "for the
King's happy progression in his designs, and for his safe return," and
special services were held in her chapel for the same intention. This was
very well, but it was a different matter when money was asked for from
those who for years had borne more than their share of taxation. In spite
of the zeal of the promoters of the scheme, the money came in but slowly.
The difficulties of collection were great, and though individuals, such as
the Dowager Countess of Rutland, who cheerfully gave £500, were generous,
the general response was not hearty. The Queen, whose sanguine disposition
often caused her to be disappointed, was distressed at the smallness of the
sum which she would be able to offer to the King, and her fertile brain
devised another expedient by which she hoped to increase the £30,000[216]
she had received from the Catholics to £50,000; £10,000 she laid aside out
of her own revenue, and the remainder she hoped to raise among the ladies
of England, "as well widows as wives." Her own friends, the great ladies of
the Court, offered each her £100 with due _empressement_, but outside that
circle the project was not a success, and Henrietta and her advisers were
left to lament once more the lack of loyalty in those whose pleasure they
considered it should have been to contribute to their sovereign's need.
In April Charles set out for Scotland. He left his wife almost regent in
his absence, for he had ordered the Council to defer to her advice.
Henrietta was thus in a position of greater importance and authority than
ever before, and she had the satisfaction of feeling that her influence
over her husband was steadily increasing. The difficult circumstances, now
beginning to entangle her as in a net, were developing that love of
intrigue which had already shown itself in happier times. She had,
moreover, no mean instructors in the art of diplomatic chicanery in two
women who at this time were together at her side exercising a considerable
influence over her. Madame de Chevreuse and Lady Carlisle, since the
arrival of the former in England, had joined hands in a friendship which
had its origin, perhaps, in a common hatred of Richelieu, but which might
be easily accounted for by similarity of character and aims. Madame de
Chevreuse could, indeed, boast a wider experience, for she had taken all
Europe for her stage, while Lady Carlisle was content to play her part in
the comparative obscurity of the British Isles; but a restless love of
power and domination, which expressed itself in a determined effort to
influence by womanly charms those who by force of intellect or by accident
of birth were making the history of the time, was common to both, as also
was a real talent for intrigue, which enabled these society ladies so far
to conquer the disadvantages of their sex as to become of considerable
importance in affairs. Of such teachers Henrietta was a willing learner and
in some sense an apt pupil. She, too, learned to plot and to scheme, to
play off enemy against enemy, and to attempt to win over a chivalrous foe
by honeyed words. But she never became in any real sense a diplomatist. Her
brain, quick to seize a point of detail and sometimes sagacious in weighing
the claims of alternate courses of action, had not sufficient grasp to take
in the broad outlines of a complicated situation, nor the judicial faculty
which can calmly appraise even values which are personal. It is the
misfortune of the great that they breathe an atmosphere of fictitious
importance which induces a mental malady, whose taint infects all but the
strongest intellects and the largest hearts. From the worst forms of this
disease, as it appears, for instance, in Louis XIV, who at the end of his
life believed himself to be almost superhuman, Henrietta escaped, by the
strong sense of humour which was her father's best legacy to her. However
obsequious her attendance and however regal her robes, she knew at heart
that she was but a woman of flesh and blood as the rest; but the more
subtle workings of the poison of flattery she could not escape, and the
great weakness of her diplomacy--a weakness which that of her husband
shared to the full--was her inability to appreciate that things precious to
her were not necessarily so to other people, and that her friends and her
foes were likely to be influenced by self-interest not largely coloured by
a romantic sympathy with her misfortunes.
Henrietta's regency came to an end before she had much opportunity for
action, for by July her husband was back in London. This is not the place
to tell the story of the disastrous Scotch expedition; it suffices to say
that Charles returned nominally a conqueror,[217] but in reality defeated,
and with the bitter knowledge that he could only overcome his rebellious
subjects in Scotland by asking the help of his discontented people in
England.
Nevertheless, there was an interval of a few months before the next act of
the tragedy was played, and during it were celebrated some of the last of
those splendid festivities for which the Court of the Queen of England was
renowned. A particularly splendid masque, which was played at Whitehall on
January 21st, 16-39/40, deserves mention on account of the tragic
discrepancy between the spirit of triumphant rejoicing and secure
prosperity breathed by it, and on the one hand the discontent which,
outside the brilliantly lighted rooms, was surging through the winter
darkness of the city, and on the other the anxiety which was gnawing at the
heart of some of those who appeared among the gayest and most careless of
the revellers. The masque was got up by the Queen, whose fondness for such
amusements did not decrease with age, and who found in the hard work which
such a task involved a welcome diversion from her anxieties. It bore the
name of _Salmacida Spolia_,[218] and was written by Sir William D'Avenant,
the reputed son of Shakespeare, who had succeeded Ben Jonson as laureate,
and who was specially devoted to Henrietta's service. The scenery and
decorations, so important to the success of a masque, were supplied by
Inigo Jones, who had before now co-operated with D'Avenant, while for the
musical part of the entertainment Lewis Richard, Master of His Majesty's
Musick, was responsible. Henrietta had considerable difficulty with her
troupe,[219] which included not only the King but a number of ladies and
gentlemen of the Court, and great annoyance was caused by Lady Carnarvon,
who showed symptoms of the invading Puritan spirit in refusing to take part
in the masque unless she were assured that the representation would not
take place on a Sunday. However, all difficulties were smoothed over by the
Queen, who was usually compliant in small matters, and the play was a
notable success, though the Earl of Northumberland, who was not acting,
wrote to his sister that "a company of worse faces was never assembled than
the Queen had got together."[220] The royal pair alone might have given the
lie to the Earl's ungallant words. King Charles, whose splendid looks have
entered, through the genius of Van Dyck, into the heritage of the nation,
played his part with the external dignity in which he was never lacking;
while his wife displayed her still abundant charms to great advantage in an
"Amazonian habit of carnation, embroidered with silver, with a plumed Helme
and a Bandricke with an antique Sword hanging by her side, all as rich as
might be." Her attendant ladies were similarly dressed, and it is perhaps
not surprising that the strangeness of these habits was even more admired
than their beauty.
The theme was designed, in reference to recent public events, to flatter
the King, who played the part of Philogenes triumphing over Discord, which,
"a malicious Fury, appears in a storme, and by the Invocation of malignant
spirits proper to her evill use, having already put most of the world into
discord, endeavours to disturb these parts, envying the blessings and
Tranquillity we have long enjoyed."
"How am I griev'd,"
she cries out,
"The world should everywhere
Be vext into a storme save only here,
Thou over-lucky, too much happy Ile!
Grow more desirous of this flatt'ring style
In thy long health can never alter'd be
But by thy surfets on Felicitie."[221]
After these words, which surely might have been spoken by the lying spirit
in the mouth of the prophets of Ahab, the Queen came forward to be greeted
by an outburst of triumphant loyalty:--
"But what is she that rules the night
That kindles Ladies with her light
And gives to Men the power of sight?
All those that can her Virtue doubt
Her mind will in her face advise,
For through the Casements of her Eyes
Her Soule is ever looking out.
"And with its beames, she doth survay
Our growth in Virtue or decay,
Still lighting us in Honours way!
All that are good she did inspire!
Lovers are chaste, because they know
It is her will they should be so,
The valiant take from her their Fire!"
The masque "was generally approved of, specially by all strangers that were
present, to be the noblest and most ingenious that hath been done heere in
that kind." When, in future days, some of the company looked back upon that
evening, its festivities must have seemed to them as one of the jests of
him whom Heine called the Aristophanes of Heaven.
But these revels were only an interlude; Charles was not a man to fiddle
while Rome was burning, and he turned to grapple as best he could with the
problem before him. The country was rushing on to meet its fate: the topic
of the hour was that of the Parliament, to the holding of which the King
was finally persuaded by a new counsellor; Strafford[222] had crossed St.
George's Channel and had entered on the last and most remarkable stage of
his career.
It is thought that when years later Milton drew his portrait of the great
apostate of heaven, he had in his mind this man who was to many the great
apostate of earth: that character of inevitable greatness which is in the
Miltonic Satan is also in the royalist statesman, who scorned the weaker
spirits of his time, much as the fiend despised the weaker spirits of
heaven and hell. Neither Charles nor Henrietta had ever truly loved him.
Greatness disturbs and frightens smaller minds, and the Queen had other
reasons to regard him coldly. He was not handsome (though she noted and
remembered years after his death that he had the most beautiful hands in
the world), he was unversed in the courtier-like arts which she loved, he
was the friend of Spain rather than of France, and above all his policy in
Ireland was strongly anti-Catholic. Nevertheless, experience and trouble
were opening her eyes. Lady Carlisle, Strafford's close friend, had done
something to prepare his way with the Queen, and the sense of common danger
was coming to complete her work.
On April 13th, 1640, the Short Parliament met. Charles, for the first time
for eleven years, stood face to face with the representatives of his
people, representatives for the most part hostile, for the elections had
gone badly, and few of his or the Queen's friends had been returned.
Nevertheless, he was hopeful, for he held what he and perhaps what his
advisers believed to be a trump card. He had probably throughout his reign
been aware that France had not forgotten her ancient alliance with
Scotland. He had recently been reminded in a sufficiently startling manner
that Scotland on her side had an equally long memory. He possessed evidence
of a letter written by the rebellious Scots to the King of France, evidence
on which he acted while Parliament was sitting by sending Lord Loudon and
others of the Scotch Commissioners to the Tower. It was not yet forty years
since the union of the two Crowns. The Scotch were unpopular in England,
and the favour shown to them by the King and Queen was resented. Scotland
and France, whose alliance had more than once embarrassed England, were
both old enemies. It argues no special lack of insight in either Charles or
his wife that they thought the discovery of these practices would lead to a
great revulsion of feeling against the Scots in the minds of the English
Puritans. That it did not do so is a remarkable proof of the enlightened
self-interest of the latter, and of their power of setting a religious and
political bond of union above an antiquated national prejudice.
Meanwhile, in this moment of crisis, what were the special interests and
influences surrounding the Queen? It is hardly too much to say that not one
of them did not contribute in some measure to the final catastrophe.
Henrietta had not desired the presence of Mary de' Medici, but when the
poor old lady arrived, wearied by troubles and journeyings, her filial
heart could not refuse her a warm welcome, and, little by little, the sense
of home and kindred, to which she had been a stranger for so many years,
overcame the reluctancy of independence and expediency. Some of her
happiest hours in these troubled days were spent in her mother's pleasant
rooms at St. James's, chatting about her children and her domestic
concerns. It would have been well had this been all, but the exiled Queen
was not a lady to content herself with the rôle of a devoted grandmother.
She felt that she had an opportunity of recapturing the daughter who had
escaped from her influence, and she used it to the full. Henrietta came to
her for advice in many matters, specially those which concerned religion,
and she even allowed herself to be weaned from the fascinating Madame de
Chevreuse.
That restless lady began to feel herself less comfortable in England soon
after the arrival of the Queen-Mother, for whose coming she had wished, but
who, indeed, had never liked the confidante of Anne of Austria. She tried
her hand first at one scheme then at another, now intriguing for Montagu at
Rome, now aiming higher and attempting to render a striking service to
Spain by bringing about an alliance between Strafford and the Marquis of
Velada; but all the while she had an uncomfortable conviction that her
power over the Queen of England, which at the beginning of her visit had
been considerable, was decreasing. Perhaps Henrietta discovered the
duplicity of the woman "who said much good of Spain, and yet to the Queen
called herself a good Frenchwoman."[223] Certainly she was not very sorry
when, in May, 1640, a rumour that the Duke of Chevreuse was coming to
England frightened his wife, who had no wish to meet him, across the
Channel to Flanders. The Duchess, at her departure, still boasted of the
favour of the English Court, and assured her friends that the Queen had
pressed her to return whenever she felt inclined to do so, an invitation
which Henrietta, who had marked her attitude by giving her a costly jewel
as the pledge of a long farewell, somewhat warmly denied. With more truth
she might have boasted of the brilliancy of the escort which set out with
her from London. At her side were the Marquis of Velada, the Duke of
Valette, another victim of Richelieu, whom Charles, against his better
judgment, had been persuaded to receive at his Court, and, as might have
been expected, the faithful Montagu. These gentlemen left her when eight
miles of the road was traversed, but, by the orders of the King himself,
she was accompanied to the shores of Flanders by the Earl of Newport to
ensure her against any annoyance.
Madame de Chevreuse was gone, and at an opportune moment; but the evil
effects of her sojourn remained, and manifested themselves specially in a
matter to which the Queen gave considerable attention, and which, like
everything else she touched at this moment, turned to her misfortune.
When death had settled the question of Con's candidature she was not
diverted from her attempt to procure a cardinal's hat for one of her
husband's subjects. Her choice was not a happy one. Walter Montagu, since
his conversion to the Catholic Church, may, as Henrietta claimed, have
lived an exemplary life; but he could hardly be considered suitable for
high ecclesiastical preferment. He was, moreover, a man of many enemies.
Charles disliked him so much that, when Sir Robert Ayton died in 1638, he
told his wife that she might have a Catholic for her secretary provided she
did not choose Walter Montagu.[224] Richelieu's opinion of him was such
that he made him the text of his sweeping generalization: "all Englishmen
are untrustworthy." The Cardinal, indeed, wished to see no subject of the
King of England attain to the coveted honour, and he suggested that the
Bishop of Angoulême, who had the supreme merit of being a subject of the
King of France, was the only suitable candidate; but he would have
preferred almost any one to Montagu, for did he not know that that shifty
person, through the mouth of Madame Chevreuse, was promising complete
devotion to the King of Spain in return for support at Rome? The Queen's
persistence in this matter annoyed the Roman authorities. Cardinal
Barberini, in spite of his personal liking for Montagu, never entertained
for a moment the idea of acceding to her request; indeed, he instructed
Rosetti, who had replaced Con as envoy in England, to tell her frankly that
the thing was impossible. It was an unfortunate moment for the question to
have arisen, for not only was it of great importance to avoid friction with
Richelieu, but the time was coming when Henrietta would have other and more
important requests to make to Cardinal Barberini. That observant politician
had his eyes attentively fixed upon the English troubles, as to whose
progress he was kept well informed by Rosetti. The courtly young envoy--he
was barely thirty and of a noble Ferrarese family--had been charmed on his
arrival not only by the kindness of the King and Queen, but by the liberty
which the Catholics enjoyed. It seemed that permanent communications
between the Court of Rome and the Court of England had been established,
"the King approving and the heretics themselves not objecting";[225] but
stern facts soon forced him to correct his first impressions. The feeling
of the nation was rising against the Catholics, and the flame was fanned by
the injudicious conduct of the Queen-Mother, who greatly patronized Rosetti
as she had Con before him. When, in the Short Parliament, Pym voiced the
religious indignation of the people, the "divinity which hedges a King" was
still strong enough to restrain him in some measure when referring to the
Queen of England. No such scruple deterred him in speaking of a foreign
ecclesiastic and of a foreign Queen, the latter of whom was hated, not only
on religious grounds, but as the recipient of large sums of money--as much
£100 per day--which the country could ill afford.
Henrietta was becoming more and more busy with matters of high politics. It
was evident that the Parliament was a failure, but one gleam of brightness
cheered the darkness of its last days. Strafford, exerting to the utmost
his unrivalled powers, was able to win over in some degree the Upper House,
and the Lords by a considerable majority voted that the relief of the
King's necessities should have precedence of the redress of grievances. It
seemed a great victory, and Henrietta, dazzled by this unexpected success,
recognized at last what the man was whom she had slighted. "My Lord
Strafford is the most faithful and capable of my husband's servants,"[226]
she said publicly, with the generosity of praise from which she never
shrank. Nevertheless, there were those, justified by the event, who doubted
the real value of such a service; the spirit of the Commons was not thus to
be broken, and on May 5th the King dissolved the assembly which is known,
from its twenty-three days of existence, as the Short Parliament.
After the breaking of Parliament the deep discontent of the nation burst
forth in riots and in a flood of scandalous pamphlets directed against
unpopular characters. Henrietta, who was believed to have counselled the
dissolution, lost much of the limited popularity she had hitherto enjoyed,
and behind her again the populace saw the sinister figure of her mother
stirring up strife in England as she had in France. Rosetti, who, as the
symbol of the dreaded approximation to popery, was particularly odious, was
thought to be in such danger of personal violence that Mary de' Medici
offered him the shelter of her apartments. He refused, perhaps wisely; for
a few days later a letter was brought to the King threatening to "chase the
Pope and the Devil from St. James, where is lodged the Queene, Mother of
the Queene." Mary, when she heard of this letter, was so frightened that
she refused to go to bed at all the following night, though she was
protected by a guard, captained by the Earl of Holland and Lord Goring,
which had nothing to do, as the threat proved to be one of those empty
insults of which the times were prolific.
Henrietta, who was not by nature easily alarmed, began to appreciate the
seriousness of the pass to which her husband's affairs had come. She was in
bad health, and she seems already to have thought of retiring to her native
land for her confinement, which was imminent;[227] but weakness of body
could not impair the activity of her brain, and at this time she definitely
entered upon that course of action which, perhaps more than any other, has
brought upon her the adverse judgment of posterity, and which, though its
details were unknown to her enemies, injured the very cause which it was
designed to aid. In an evil hour she opened negotiations with the Papacy,
with a view to obtaining money to be used against her husband's subjects.
Since her marriage she had carried on a somewhat frequent correspondence
with the Pope and with Cardinal Barberini, whose kind letters led her to
believe that she was an object of greater importance in their eyes than was
actually the case. She was further drawn to them by the kindness they had
shown to Montagu, who himself was a little led astray by flattering words.
It is significant that he appears at this time as the Queen's chief
adviser. He executed many of the duties of the secretaryship he was not
allowed to hold, and he was delaying a long-meditated journey to Rome,
where he intended to become a Father of the Oratory, to help his royal
mistress in her troubles and perplexities. Even the fidelity of her
servants turned to the Queen's destruction, for a more injudicious adviser
than Montagu could hardly have been found.
There is another actor whose part is more remarkable: Francis Windbank, who
began his career as a disciple of Laud and was to end it a few years later
in the bosom of the Catholic Church, was no free-lance like Montagu, but a
responsible Secretary of State. His personal relations with the Queen do
not seem to have been very close, but he was in constant communication with
her agent in Rome, Sir William Hamilton. As early as the end of 1638 the
latter wrote to one of the Secretaries of State, who may almost certainly
be identified with Windbank, assuring him that the Pope had expressed
himself anxious to contribute money for the Scotch war if there were need
of it. Charles, to whose knowledge this letter came, was exceedingly angry,
as well he may have been, and threatened to remove Hamilton from his post
if he ever lent ear again to such discourse.[228] But Windbank was no whit
abashed. A few months later he held a remarkable conversation with Con,
who, of course, at once reported it to his superiors in Rome. The
level-headed Scotchman, hardly able to believe his ears, listened to the
Secretary of State propounding his views as to the help which the Pope
ought to send to the King of England. "And what is the smallest sum which
would be accepted?" he asked jokingly, wishing to pass the matter off
lightly. "Well," replied Windbank in deadly earnest, "one hundred thousand
pounds is the least that I should call handsome."[229]
It was not until the spring of 1640, when Con had been replaced by Rosetti,
that a further appeal was made to the Pope for assistance. Windbank again
was the intermediary, but the reply of Cardinal Barberini, which was sent
to Rosetti, was communicated not only to him but to the Queen. Henrietta
was a little out of favour in Rome. Not only had her persistence in the
matter of Montagu's promotion caused annoyance, but her intention of
sending Sir Kenelm Digby, who (not unjustly in the light of future events)
was considered an indifferent Catholic, to take the place of Sir William
Hamilton, was a further disservice both to her and to Montagu, who
supported Digby's candidature, and who had written warmly in his favour to
the Roman authorities; but of the Cardinal's feeling towards her Henrietta
was probably quite unaware. It is not known what part, if any, she took in
Windbank's application, but it is likely that she was both grieved and
surprised when she was informed that Cardinal Barberini, in spite of the
sympathy which he felt with the King and Queen of England in their
troubles, could not hold out the hope of any substantial assistance from
the Holy Father unless Charles became a Catholic. None knew better than she
the improbability of such an event. Nevertheless, she only laid aside for a
while the scheme of papal aid, to take it up again at what she considered a
more favourable moment.[230]
She had much to occupy her mind. The summer of 1640 witnessed the
futilities of the second war against the Scots, to which, in foreboding of
spirit, she saw her husband depart. The state of public feeling was growing
worse and worse, and the King's own servants were not faithful to him, so
that one of the most acute observers then in England wrote that affairs had
come to such a pass that "if God does not lend His help we shall see great
confusion and distraction in this kingdom."[231]
When even the captaincy of Strafford had failed to give victory to the
royal armies, there was a general conviction that another Parliament would
be necessary. Charles, following an archaic precedent, summoned a council
of peers to meet him at York, and some of these noblemen, before setting
out from London, paid a visit to Henrietta. They knew well her power, and
they begged that her influence with her husband might be used for the
calling together of the estates of the realm. Mary de' Medici was present
at this interview, and it is said that she put into her daughter's mouth
the words of conciliation which the latter used. The noble visitors
departed, and then the Queen of England went out and selecting a messenger
to whose fidelity she could trust, she bade him bear to the King her
persuasions for the holding of a Parliament.
Her motive for what is in some respects a strange act is clear. Even now
she did not gauge the depths of the discontent of the nation, and with that
hopefulness which was part of her nature she believed that a Parliament,
without imposing intolerable conditions, would vote sufficient money to
enable the King to deal with the menacing Scots. She was mistaken, as she
so often was. If the English Puritans had not called the ancient enemy into
the land, they had at any rate no desire to see the Scotch army go thence
until it had done its part in putting pressure on a King whom they regarded
with a distrust which was becoming hatred.
But there were those to whom Henrietta's act must have seemed, if they were
aware of it, almost an act of desertion. The Catholics, to whom her love
and honour were pledged, dreaded, and with good cause, nothing so much as a
Parliament. Already their condition was deplorable. They suffered not only
from the hatred of the Puritans, but from the terror of the Protestants,
who attempted to propitiate the people by persecution of the common enemy.
Several priests were thrown into prison, and even the courtier Sir Tobie
Matthew, who, though he posed as a layman, was generally believed to be in
holy orders,[232] was arrested on suspicion. The houses of Catholics were
searched, and on one occasion three cart-loads of Catholic books were
publicly burned. "Nevertheless," wrote Montreuil, the French agent in
London, with an acumen revealed by the event, "it is thought that all the
advantage which the Archbishop will get from this is to set the Catholics
against him without improving his position with the Puritans."[233]
In October Charles returned to London, leaving the Scotch army still in the
land, and with a pledge that its expenses should be paid. On November 3rd
he opened at Westminster that historic assembly which is known as the Long
Parliament.
[Footnote 202: Mme de Motteville records how Henrietta told her that
Charles brought the new Scotch liturgy to her, asking her to read it, that
she might see how similar were their religious beliefs.]
[Footnote 203: Among the archives of the Ministère des Affaires Etrangères
is a document dated 1629 enumerating the reasons why it was desirable to
have an agent in Scotland; one reason given is "to keep the Scotch nobility
in their devotion towards the cause of France."--Aff. Etran. Ang., t. 43.
The great importance the French attached to preserving the good-will of the
Scotch is apparent in the French diplomatic literature concerning the Civil
War.]
[Footnote 204: "L'année ne se passera pas que le roi et la reine
d'Angleterre ne se repentent d'avoir refusé les offres que vous leur aves
faites de la part du roy."--Richelieu to Estrades, December, 1637.
Estrades: _Ambassades et Negotiations_ (1718), p. 13.]
[Footnote 205: Digby to Montagu, March 5th, 1638. Aff. Etran. Ang., t. 47.]
[Footnote 206: _Ibid._, March 19th, 1638.]
[Footnote 207: Montagu to Chavigny, February 14th, 1638. Aff. Etran. Ang.,
t. 4.]
[Footnote 208: The Duke of Chevreuse had been made a Knight of the Garter
at the time of the marriage of Charles and Henrietta.]
[Footnote 209: Avenel: _Lettres de Richelieu_, VI, p. 122.]
[Footnote 210: _Histoire de l'entrée de la reyne mere du roy très-chrestien
dans la Grande Bretaigne._ Par le S^r de la Serre, Historiographe de France
(1639).]
[Footnote 211: Montagu to Digby, June, 1638. Aff. Etran. Ang., t. 47.]
[Footnote 212: Con gives the details, Add. MS., 15,391: Salvetti (Add. MS.,
27,962) says that the King asked for the money, but did not formally
authorize the contribution.]
[Footnote 213: Add. MS., 15,392, f. 75.]
[Footnote 214: Green: _Letters of Queen Henrietta Maria_, p. 25.]
[Footnote 215: Except for Herefordshire, the Isle of Wight, Anglesea, and
Merionethshire, among the collectors' names appear those of members of such
well-known Catholic families as the Englefields, the Howards, and the
Chichesters.]
[Footnote 216: The sum is given as £40,000 in _The Life and Death of that
matchless mirror of Magnanimity and Heroick Vertue, Henrietta Maria de
Bourbon_ (1669).]
[Footnote 217: Mme de Motteville says that Henrietta was averse from making
peace with the Scotch, but whether now or after the second Bishops' War
does not appear.]
[Footnote 218: "Salmacida Spolia, a Masque, Presented by the King and
Queenes Majesties, at Whitehall, on Tuesday, January 21st, 1639."]
[Footnote 219: The names of the masquers:--
The King's Majesty
Duke of Lennox
Earle of Carlisle
Earle of Newport
Earle of Leimricke
Lord Russell
Lord Herbert
Lord Paget
Lord Feilding
Master Russell
Master Thomas Howard
The Queenes Majesty
Dutchesse of Lennox
Countesse of Carnarvon
Countesse of Newport
Countesse of Portland
Lady Andrew
Lady Margaret Howard
Lady Kellymekin
Lady Francis Howard
Mistress Carig
Mistress Nevill]
[Footnote 220: Hist. MSS. Con. Rep. III, p. 79.]
[Footnote 221: Cf. an extract from a letter of M. de Balzac to "M. de
Corznet, gentleman-in-ordinary to the most illustrious Queen of Great
Britain": "If the tempests which threaten the frontiers of Bayou arrive at
us we must think of another way of safetie and resolve (in any case) to
passe the sea and go and dwell in that region of peace and that happie
climate where your divine Princesse reigns."--September 20th, 1636.
_Letters of M. de Balzac_, translated into English by Sir Richard Bahn and
others (1654): a collection of some modern epistles of M. de Balzac, p.
16.]
[Footnote 222: He was made Earl of Strafford January 12th, 1640.]
[Footnote 223: Aff. Etran. Ang., t. 47.]
[Footnote 224: The name of Sir Kenelm Digby was mentioned in connection
with the post, but the Queen's choice fell upon Sir John Winter, a Catholic
gentleman, who was cousin to the Marquis of Worcester.]
[Footnote 225: Father Philip to Barberini: P.R.O. Roman Transcripts.]
[Footnote 226: MS. Français, 15,995, f. 85.]
[Footnote 227: Her son Henry was born July 6th, 1640.]
[Footnote 228: Salvetti. October 22nd, 1638. Add. MS., 27,962.]
[Footnote 229: Add. MS., 15,392, f. 162.]
[Footnote 230: See Rosetti correspondence, P.R.O. Roman Transcripts,
specially Barberini to Rosetti, June 30th, 1640, and Rosetti's answer,
August l0th, 1640. "... de peró quando S. M^{ta} dichiaresse tale
[Catholic] di qua non si guaderebbe a mandarli denari."--Barberini to
Rosetti, June 30th 1640.]
[Footnote 231: Salvetti. September, 1640. Add. MS., 27,962, I, f. 109.]
[Footnote 232: Perhaps justly; among the archives of the See of Westminster
is a certificate of his saying Mass 1630-1; he was thought to be a Jesuit.]
[Footnote 233: Bib. Nat., MS. Français, 15,995.]