to call on his wife, who always received her kindly. ‘I am come,’ she
said, ‘to ask you to help me. My husband is killing himself, poring over
those dreadful folios, and making himself ill. We are both very grateful
for the permission granted that he should have the use of his own
library, but lately he has been working his brain, and tiring his head
over those tremendously heavy volumes, heavy in every sense of the word,
I want to send them away, and get others lighter and smaller. Now, of
course, your word is as good as that of your husband in his absence. Do
me the kindness to order your men to carry down the chest as usual to
the water’s edge, and not demur because it is extra heavy. I have a
perfect spite against those bulky volumes.’ The vice-regent of the
commandant, ‘dressed in a little brief authority,’ made use of it to
oblige her friend, and gave the order willingly. Maria went back to her
own quarters. ‘Mother, dear,’ said Cornelia, the eldest of her children,
‘did you not say to-morrow was the Fair at Gorcum, and that you were
told on such occasions even exiles and outlaws might appear in the town?
Why should not dear father go there in that case?’ Surely out of the
child’s mouth came a word of wisdom; she little knew that her remark was
hailed as an omen by her parents. Maria von Grotius next sent for her
maid, and asked her the startling question, ‘If we can conceal your
master in the book-chest, will you take charge of it to Gorcum, and
incur the whole risk?’—which was indeed great. The loving wife would
gladly have undertaken the task herself, but she judged it would be more
likely to avert suspicion if she remained in the castle. The brave girl
pledged herself to carry out the directions of her mistress to the
letter, and the two women began their arduous and dangerous
preparations. It was the beginning of the week, and the month March
1621, that Grotius rose early and, kneeling down by the side of the
empty trunk, prayed fervently for the success of the hazardous
enterprise. He was dressed in soft linen and underclothing, and got into
the chest, which was only four feet long, and narrow in proportion, he
being a tall and strongly built man. His wife helped him to coil himself
up, and then placed a large Testament as a pillow for the beloved head,
the position of which she arranged so that the mouth should come
opposite the small holes she had drilled to admit a little air. She
closed the chest and sat on the top for a considerable time, to
ascertain if her husband could possibly endure the confinement. Then
lifting the lid once more, she knelt down and took a solemn farewell of
him she best loved on earth, kissed him tenderly, locked the box, and
gave the key to the maid. We can only guess at the feelings of anguish
and tenderness which convulsed the heart of that noble woman at that
supreme instant. Then she arranged her husband’s day-clothes on the
chair, with his dressing slippers, and drew the curtains closely round
the bed, into which she got hastily. After that she rang the bell, and
when the servant who usually waited on them answered the summons, she
looked out and said she was so sorry she could not go to Gorcum that day
for she was not well herself, and did not like to leave her husband who
was very ill; throwing out at the same time a hint that he was feverish,
and there might be fear of infection. The servant said it was all the
better she should not go, for the river was swollen and the wind was
high, and in fact it was almost dangerous. ‘That is unfortunate,’ she
said, ‘for my husband resolved that these heavy folios should go to-day;
however, my maid is no coward, and she will take charge of them, even if
the ferry should be rough.’ She then bade him go and summon the soldiers
whom Madame Deventer had told off to carry the chest. They came, and on
lifting it one of them said, ‘I believe the Arminian is inside, it is so
confoundedly heavy.’
The poor wife trembling behind the closely drawn curtains made some tame
jest about the relative weight of a man and those horrid books, and then
the precious load was carried out of the room. But Lieschen had many
terrible moments yet to come. The soldiers maintained, nothing but a man
could weigh so heavily, and one of them said he would get a gimlet and
run it into the Arminian, and another told anecdotes of how malefactors
had been smuggled out of prison in a like manner. Poor Lieschen had to
jest, while her heart quaked: ‘Your gimlet must be a long one,’ she
said, ‘to reach my master in his bedroom in the castle.’ Then followed
the awful question, whether Madame Deventer would consider it necessary
to inspect the contents of the chest, which she fortunately declined. So
on the soldiers went, grumbling at their heavy load, and when they
arrived at the wharf, the maid entreated that a double plank might be
placed to carry the chest on board, for, said she, ‘those books are to
be returned to a learned Professor, and I shall never be forgiven if any
mischance should befall them.’ At length the transport was effected, and
the large box deposited on the deck beside Lieschen. The river was much
swollen, the wind was raging, the vessel heeled over to one side, and
the girl had to beseech the skipper to have the box secured with ropes,
and down she sat beside it in an agony of terror, both for herself and
her precious charge. She then threw a white handkerchief over her head
and let the ends flutter in the breeze, the signal that had been agreed
on between her and her mistress to show so far all was well and the
vessel in motion; for a servant in the castle had added to the women’s
accumulated terror by predicting that the captain would not embark in
such a storm.
The unhappy wife was straining her eyes, dimmed by tears, between the
bars of the window, while the maid sat shivering with cold and fear, her
head between her hands; and on the top of the chest an officer of the
garrison had taken up his post, and drummed and pommelled with his feet
against the sides, and she dared not bid him desist from doing so—for
what reason could she assign for interference? At last she bethought
herself to ask him to get off, as there were not only books but fragile
china in the chest, and he might break it by that constant shaking. The
longest voyage, like the longest day, will have an end, and surely that
voyage from Loevenstein to Gorcum must have seemed like one round the
world to the terrified girl; yet her fears did not deaden her woman’s
wit, and she was always ready with an answer. She bribed the skipper and
his son to transport the chest themselves to its destination on a
hand-barrow, beside which she walked. ‘Do you hear what my boy says?’
observed the captain; ‘he declares there is some living thing in your
trunk, Miss.’ ‘No doubt,’ was the answer, with a forced laugh; ‘don’t
you know that Arminian books are alive, full of motion and spirit?’ In
this manner the three companions, with the fourth concealed, threaded
the dense crowds of the fair at Gorcum, and made their way to a
warehouse which Lieschen indicated. It belonged to a well-to-do
tradesman (relative of a learned professor, a friend of the prisoner’s),
and the wife was one of those whom Maria von Grotius frequently visited
on her marketing expeditions to Gorcum. The bearers of the chest were
exorbitant in their demands, but Lieschen was very anxious to be
relieved of their presence, and made little haggling about the price. No
sooner had they departed than the poor girl hastened into the shop where
the ribbon-dealer and his wife were busy selling their wares, and
stepping noiselessly up to the latter, whispered the truth in her
astonished ear. The startled Vrouw became deathly pale, and seemed like
to faint, but she left the shop with Lieschen, and then what a moment of
condensed and mingled hope and terror! Lieschen kneeled down and
knocked. ‘Master, dear master,’ she exclaimed. No answer. ‘Oh my God, he
is dead,’ cried the girl, while her companion stood quaking with terror
and calling out it was a bad business. But hark! A feeble cry from the
inside, ‘Open quick, I was not sure of your voice.’ The chest was
opened, and Grotius arose, almost as from a tomb. The still terrified
shopwoman took Lieschen and her master into an upper room through a
trap-door, and then began to tell him how alarmed she was, and that she
feared, if he were found, her husband would be imprisoned in his stead,
and all their property forfeited. ‘No, no,’ said Grotius, ‘before I got
into this trunk I prayed earnestly to God, who has preserved me
hitherto, but rather than ruin you and your husband, I would get into
the box again, and go back to Loevenstein.’ ‘Oh no,’ said the
kind-hearted woman, ‘we will do all in our power to serve you’; and off
she flew to her brother-in-law, a clothier of Gorcum, whom she found in
conversation with the very officer who had been Lieschen’s
fellow-passenger, and who had annoyed her by sitting on the trunk.
Drawing her relative aside, the mercer’s wife explained the whole state
of the case, and bade him follow her to the warehouse without a moment’s
delay, when she would introduce him to the fugitive.
The clothier was nothing loath to be instrumental in the escape of a man
whom he greatly admired, being himself no mean scholar, and well
acquainted with the writings of Grotius, on entering whose presence, he
thus addressed him, ‘Are you, sir, that man with whose name the whole of
Europe is now ringing?’
‘I am Hugo Grotius,’ was the reply, ‘and into your hands I commit my
safety and my life.’
No time was lost. The clothier, who was acquainted with every one in
Gorcum, found the man he could trust, a mason working on a scaffolding
in the town. He beckoned him down, and told him there was an errand of
mercy to be performed, to which a large reward was appended, and asked
if he would undertake the task. The mason answered in the affirmative,
and was then directed to procure a set of working-men’s clothes, which
unfortunately proved too scanty for Grotius, and thus occasioned a new
difficulty; the trunk-hose and sleeves were too short, the latter
revealing the finely shaped white hand, whose hardest labour had
hitherto been the work of the pen. The two women had much ado to patch
up and lengthen out, and with dirt and clay, putty and plaster, they
smeared the hands of the great philosopher, and sent him forth with fear
and trembling, to run the gauntlet of many dangers. Next door was a
library, which was the resort of learned professors, and book-lovers of
all kinds, to many of whom Grotius was known by sight. He slouched his
felt hat over his eyes, took his measuring-wand in his hand, and
followed the mason through the streets to the bank of the river, where
the friendly clothier met them. The weather was still boisterous, and
the boatmen refused to ply, till the mason urged on them the necessity
he was under of fulfilling a contract for buying stone for a large
building at Altona, and assured them he would be a considerable loser by
delay. These arguments were backed by the clothier, who put his hand
into his pocket, and drew forth the most convincing of all arguments in
the eyes of the boatmen. And at length the embarkation was effected; the
ferry crossed in safety, and then the two masons walked to a
neighbouring town, where they hired a carriage, and entering into
confidential talk with the driver, informed him that the taller of the
two was a disguised bankrupt flying from his creditors into foreign
territory, and this, they said, would account for his wish to avoid
observation as they passed through the towns. On went the little
carriage, the driver of which was not long before he set down Grotius as
a fool who soon ‘parted with his money,’ for of its value he showed a
profound ignorance. In this respect we see that the driver differed in
opinion from the rest of the world. They travelled through the night,
and on the morrow, arriving early within a few leagues of Antwerp, they
were met by a patrol of soldiers, who challenged them, asked for their
passport, and inquired to whose service they belonged. Grotius evaded
the question, and added jestingly, ‘As to my passport, that is in my
feet.’ They fraternised, and the fugitive had now not only a military
escort, but a good horse provided for his own riding; and in this manner
entered the city of Antwerp. He alighted at the house of a banished
friend, who proved to be in great anxiety on account of his wife’s
illness, so the daughter of the family informed him; but no sooner did
her parents learn the name of their unexpected visitor, than not only
the master of the house, but the invalid herself hastened down to bid
him welcome. The meeting was indeed a happy one, and although secrecy
was deemed prudent, yet the news spread among a few compatriots, under
the same sentence of proscription, who all flocked to the house, where a
joyous little banquet was prepared, at which the illustrious journeyman
mason, still in his working clothes, presided. Conversation flowed, and
glasses clinked merrily that night to the health of Grotius and his
gallant Maria, not forgetting the brave and faithful handmaiden. In the
meantime how went affairs at Loevenstein? Madame Grotius had given out
that her husband’s illness was infectious; but no sooner was she
apprised of his safety, than she laughed her gaoler and his guards to
scorn. ‘Here is the cage,’ she said merrily, ‘but the bird has flown!’
The commandant rained curses on her head, and increased the rigour of
her imprisonment. He went across the river to browbeat the good
shopwoman and her husband, but all this fuming and fretting did not
bring back the prisoner. Madame Grotius sent a petition to the
States-General and to the Stadtholder, to which neither were insensible.
It was on this occasion that Prince Maurice (who was not wont to measure
his words) made the ungallant speech—‘I thought that _black pig_ would
outwit us.’ We can fancy he said it with a grim smile, for very shortly
afterwards Madame Grotius found herself at liberty, with the permission
to carry away all that belonged to her in Loevenstein. Grotius, on his
part, addressed a letter to the States-General before leaving Antwerp,
in which he maintained that he had done his duty as Pensionary of
Rotterdam, in the measures he had advocated, thereby incurring their
censure, and he proceeded at length to propound his political views, and
to offer suggestions for the restoration and maintenance of internal
peace, concluding by justifying the means he had used for escape, having
employed ‘neither violence nor corruption.’ And he furthermore declared
that the persecutions he had suffered, and the hardships to which he had
been exposed, could never diminish his love for his country, for whose
prosperity he devoutly prayed.
Grotius remained some time at Antwerp, and then determined on proceeding
to France, where his wife and family were allowed to join him; and
Lieschen, good, brave Lieschen, who would not rejoice to hear that her
fate was one usually reserved for the last page of a story-book—‘she
lived happy ever afterwards,’ becoming the wife of her faithful
fellow-servant, who had learned the rudiments of law from his master
during their captivity,—a study which the good man continued on leaving
Loevenstein, and rose step by step until he became a thriving and
respected advocate in the tribunals of Holland.
But to return to Grotius: On his arrival in Paris he was kindly received
by the French King, who granted him a provisional pension (very
uncertain, by the way, in payment). In a pleasant country-house which
had been lent him, in the environs of Senlis, he resumed his literary
labours with great assiduity, working first at his ‘Apology,’ which he
wrote in his mother-tongue, and sent off to Holland as soon as
completed. This was a full and detailed exposition of the motives which
had actuated his conduct, and of his religious and political sentiments.
It produced the greatest possible excitement in Holland. The Government
designated it as a foul and slanderous libel, reflecting on the honour
of the States, of the Stadtholder, and all manner of bodies magisterial
and municipal. The publication was interdicted, and every person
forbidden, on pain of death, to retain it in their possession. In the
meantime the ‘Apology’ was published, and eagerly read in Paris, and
Grotius now set to work on his famous treatise on the Rights of Peace
and War.
The pretty country-house in which he lived was the resort of men of
letters, and among his frequent visitors was the learned De Thou, who
gave him the free use of his valuable library. In 1625, on the death of
Prince Maurice, the exile wrote to the new Stadtholder, Frederic Henry,
asking permission to return, but without success. He then sent his wife
into Holland, and through her judicious management and the exertions of
his friends, the reversal of the decree of confiscation was obtained,
and his property and effects were restored to him. At length he ventured
back to his own country in person, and first proceeded to Rotterdam,
where he was cordially received in private, but the authorities would
not sanction his appearance in public, and the same reception awaited
him at Amsterdam and Delft. The States-General, of whom he disdained to
ask pardon (‘for,’ said he, ‘in what have I offended?’) were exasperated
at his boldness in venturing back without permission, and orders were
given to seize his person, and give notice to the Government, while a
reward of 2000 florins was offered for his capture; but Grotius was too
much beloved; no one was found to betray him. Still his position was
undoubtedly perilous, and joining his wife on her return from Zeeland,
they took up their abode for the summer and winter in or near the town
of Hamburg.
Grotius was now overwhelmed with proposals of employment, and overtures
of all descriptions from foreign powers—Spain, Poland, the Duchy of
Holstein, and the hero Gustavus Adolphus, King of Sweden, for whom our
philosopher had the profoundest veneration. With this monarch’s envoy at
the French Court, Benedict Oxenstiern, a relative of the celebrated
Chancellor, Grotius had formed an intimate friendship, and when they
were both residing at Frankfort, they became almost inseparable. The
King of Sweden died, and was succeeded by his daughter, the eccentric
Christina, whose admiration for the fame of Grotius even exceeded that
of her father. Through the medium of Oxenstiern she made him numerous
offers, but Grotius declined all but one employment. He volunteered to
return to Paris as the Swedish Ambassador, provided the Queen would
allow him a sufficient salary to maintain his position as her
representative, which nomination was most distasteful to Richelieu, who
was then Prime Minister. But after a time his opposition was overruled,
and Grotius made his public entry into the French capital, where the
crooked and tortuous policy pursued by Richelieu, and continued by his
successor, Cardinal Mazarin, was most distasteful to Christina’s envoy,
added to which he was weary of politics, diplomacy, and Court life, and
earnestly solicited his recall. Christina acquiesced in the demand, but
desired him to repair to Stockholm, where she joined him. Her Majesty
did all in her power by promises of provision and favour for himself,
his wife, and family, to induce Grotius to become a resident in her
country. But he withstood all her tempting offers. Many difficulties to
his departure were thrown in his way, but at last he embarked on a
vessel bound for Lubeck. He had not been long at sea before a tremendous
storm arose, and after three days continual tossing, and constant danger
of shipwreck, the passengers landed on the coast of Pomerania, about
fourteen miles from Dantzig. Grotius was far from well when he left
Stockholm; the climate had proved too cold for him. He had been very ill
on the voyage, and after travelling sixty miles in an open wagon,
exposed to violent wind and rain, he arrived at Rostock in a most
enfeebled condition. No sooner had he arrived than he sent for the
doctor and the clergyman, who thus describes his interview in a letter:
‘If you are anxious to know how that Phœnix of literature, Hugo Grotius,
behaved in his last moments, I will tell you. He sent for me at night. I
found him almost at the point of death, and told him how deeply I
regretted that I had never seen him in health, to benefit by his
conversation. “God has ordered it otherwise,” he said. I then bade him
prepare for a happier life; to acknowledge and repent his sins, and,
chancing to allude to the Pharisee and the publican, “I am that
publican,” he exclaimed. When I told him to have recourse to Jesus
Christ, without whom is no salvation, he answered: “In Him alone I place
my trust.” Then I repeated aloud the German prayer that begins, “Herr
Jesu.” He followed in a low voice with clasped hands. I inquired if he
understood all, and he said, “Quite well.” I continued to read passages
of the Word of God for dying persons.’ Thus expired this great and good
man, far from the kindred he loved, his heart still true to the country
which had rejected and expelled him, his deathbed watched by strangers.
His body was embalmed and transported to his native city of Delft, where
it was interred with great pomp by his fellow-citizens, who at first
proposed to erect a statue in his honour, similar to that of Erasmus at
Rotterdam, but the idea was abandoned. It was reserved for his
descendants to raise a monument to his memory in the said church. We
transcribe the modest epitaph written by Grotius on himself—
GROTIUS HIC HUGO EST, BATAVUM CAPTIVUS, ET EXUL
LEGATUS REGNY REGNI SUECIS MAGNAFUI.
-------
No. 6. THE HONOURABLE ANDREW NEWPORT.
_In armour. Light brown sleeves. Rich lace cravat. Long hair._
BORN 1622, DIED 1699.
BY SIR GODFREY KNELLER.
HE was the son of Lord Newport, the noted Royalist, by Rachel, daughter
of Sir John Levison, Knight, of Harington, County Kent, and sister of
Sir Richard Levison, Knight of the Bath, of Trentham, County Stafford.
Andrew was Commissioner of Customs to Charles the Second. He was M.P.
for Shrewsbury from 1689 to 1698. Died unmarried, and was buried at
Wroxeter. He bequeathed his manor of Dythan, County Montgomery, and
other estates in the same county, and in that of Salop, to his nephew
Richard, Lord Newport, son of Francis, Earl of Bradford. Lord Clarendon,
in his _History of the Civil Wars_, makes frequent mention of Andrew
Newport.
-------
No. 9. THOMAS WENTWORTH, EARL OF STRAFFORD, AND HIS SECRETARY.
_Black dress._
BORN 1594, EXECUTED 1641.
AFTER VANDYCK.
THE eldest son of Sir William Wentworth of Wentworth Wodehouse, County
York, by Anne Atkinson of Stowel, County Gloucester. He succeeded his
father in his large estates when only twenty-one, being already the
husband of ‘a fair wife.’
Shortly after his succession he was elected M.P. for York and _Custos
Rotulorum_ in place of Lord Savile, superseded on account of misconduct,
an office from which the Duke of Buckingham requested him to retire that
Lord Savile might be reinstated, a proceeding which nettled the high
spirit of Sir Thomas, who wrote a refusal so indignant as to make a
lifelong enemy of the favourite.
Until the accession of Charles the First, Wentworth, although a silent
member of the House of Commons, was a zealous advocate of the Liberal
party and a strenuous opposer of the encroachments of the Court. Through
the instrumentality of Buckingham he was disqualified from voting by
having the post of High Sheriff thrust upon him, and he was soon after
summarily dismissed from his office of _Custos Rotulorum_. In the
ensuing year he was summoned before the Council and sentenced to
imprisonment for refusing to contribute to a loan (levied without the
consent of Parliament), on which occasion he made a noble speech
expressing his loyalty to the person of Charles the First and his desire
to serve him in any way consistent with his duty to his country. On his
release from prison he became a strong leader of the Opposition and an
eloquent advocate of the famous ‘Petition of Rights,’ to which the King
was compelled to yield his unwilling consent. Then suddenly came the
adoption of that line of conduct, so differently judged and so
differently accounted for by different biographers. Wentworth declared
his conviction that the nation might now be content with the concessions
made by the Crown, bade adieu to the party of the ‘Pyms and the
Prynnes,’ walked over to the other side of the House and offered his
services, head, heart, and sword, to the royal cause. By some he was
termed a traitor, a time-server, an apostate, while others upheld the
conduct of a man who chose the moment of impending danger to rally round
the unsteady throne and the unpopular sovereign. Charles naturally
received him with open arms, and loaded him with favours; but his old
ally, Pym, meeting him one day, uttered these ominous words, ‘You are
going to leave us, but I will never leave you while you have ahead on
your shoulders’; words too cruelly redeemed.
The murder of the Duke of Buckingham made way for Wentworth’s
advancement. Raised to the peerage by the title of Viscount Wentworth,
he was appointed Lord-Deputy and Commander-in-Chief in Ireland, and
sailed for that ‘distressful country’ with a code for his own
government, drawn up by himself, in his pocket, from which he never
swerved. Lord Wentworth’s administration of Irish affairs, his transient
popularity, his reforms in matters civil, military, and religious, his
quarrels with the Irish nobles, his punctilio in minute questions of
form and ceremony, his hurried voyages to and from England, are subjects
intimately connected with the history of the times, but too lengthy to
be detailed here. It would have been well for the Lord-Deputy if he had
taken the advice of his lifelong friend and correspondent, Archbishop
Laud, and had curbed his impetuosity on many occasions.
In 1639 he crossed to England, was created Earl of Strafford, gained the
title of Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland, was received into the King’s full
confidence, and was for a time virtually Prime Minister. Not content
with advocating the necessities of raising subsidies, he contributed
£20,000 from his own privy purse (as an example to the nation) towards
the impending war with Scotland. In spite of ill-health and increasing
infirmities, Strafford crossed and recrossed St. George’s Channel to
attend to his duties on either side; the last time in a terrible storm,
and nearly died at Chester, on his road to London. Yet his indomitable
spirit would not yield. He joined the King at York, and found the army
in a sad plight, all hope and spirit fled, and the royal cause ‘in the
dust.’ He became the real, though not the nominal, Commander-in-chief,
and although unable to walk, and scarcely able to sit upright on his
saddle, Strafford rallied the troops, upbraided the sluggishness of the
leaders, and set a brilliant example of energy and courage. But the King
stayed his hand and thwarted his activity, loud all the while in his
praises, and giving him the Garter. Charles also insisted that they
should travel together to London, a proceeding to which Strafford was
strongly opposed,—two victims hastening to their doom.