The Book of Princes and Princesses

It was high summer before Blanche reached Cologne, for travelling was slow in those days, and many times she stopped to rest and to receive guests who came to give their homage to the daughter-in-law of the emperor. But at length the town was in sight, and a halt was called, so that Blanche might be gaily dressed in one of her grand new dresses, while her golden coronet was placed upon her flowing hair and her collar of pearls was hung round her neck. Then she mounted the white horse with silver trappings which had been sent expressly for her, and wondered as she did so what Philippa would have thought of him. The emperor was not present at Cologne, for business had kept him elsewhere, but his son Lewis, the bridegroom, was awaiting her at the gate, with an escort of nobles behind him. He looked, as Philippa had said, good and kind and very pleased to see her, and that was all that Blanche cared for, as, unlike queen Isabel, she had no wish to be 'a great lady.' But her attendants felt that a slight had been put on their king and their country, and murmured among themselves at the emperor's absence. However they were wise enough to hold their peace in the presence of the Germans, and not to mar the wedding festivities with cross faces. And Blanche was married three days later in Dick Whittington's famous gold brocade, and once more she gave away the prizes at a tourney.

Perhaps the feelings of the English might have been soothed if they had seen the welcome given their princess by the emperor in his palace of Heidelberg, and his admiration of her beauty. She touched his heart by her modesty and unselfishness, and he felt he had done well in choosing his son's wife. Blanche was grateful for his kindness, and soon loved him and her husband dearly, while she was never tired of standing at the windows of the castle, whose ruins you may see to-day, looking over the broad Rhine and the vine-clad mountains. Here she had more time for reading, too, as there were no great Court ceremonies that needed her presence, and her husband would tell her tales of bygone emperors, and teach her how to speak his native tongue, which she found much more difficult than French.

'How can I remember all those different endings?' she cried, 'and by the time I come to the verb, I have quite forgotten what I was going to say! and Lewis – who bade her call him 'Ludwig' – would laugh, and relate to her the brave deeds of Henry the Fowler, or recite some verses of the 'Lay of the Nibelungs,' till Blanche would stop her ears at the cruelties of Brunhilda and Chriemhild. Or if the days were fine the husband and wife would go out together, and visit some church or citizen's house that was being built, and Lewis, who had much skill in these things, would show Blanche the wonderful carving or bid her mark the fine proportions of the architecture. Blanche – the 'electoral princess' – would have liked to stay in Heidelberg, but after awhile she was obliged to leave Cologne to go to Alsace, and preside over a Court again. She always did what came in her way pleasantly and graciously, but she was very sorry to give up her happy life, with its books and music and church-building, and pass her time in public ceremonies, even though the little Court of Alsace was much quieter and more homely than that of either Richard II. or her own father. But the climate did not agree with her, and as she grew older she also grew more delicate. This she managed to conceal from her husband who was busy with many things, fearing to distress him, and she kept gay words and a smile for everyone as long as she possibly could. But at length she grew too weak to ride or walk, and by-and-by lay amongst pillows at her window gazing at the mountains, and now and then saying a word to her husband, who never left her when he could help it.

One day, early in May, when the birds were singing and the streams gurgling, he returned from a long journey to find Blanche lying with a little son beside her and a look of rapture on her face.

'Ah, you will get better now!' he cried joyfully, noting the happiness in her eyes; but she said nothing, only kissed his hand, and drew it towards the baby. And she was right: from that moment she grew worse, and a few days later she was dead, leaving this one child behind her. Hardly sixteen! yet how well and nobly she had filled the place and done the duties that had been given her!

The news of Blanche's death was a terrible grief to her father in England, and to her sister Philippa, who had been for nearly three years queen of Denmark. It was not that they ever saw her – perhaps they never would – but they felt she was there, thinking about them and caring for them; and what joyful days those were when a special courier or travelling knight brought them letters from her! Yet as she read with streaming eyes what her brother-in-law, 'the lord Lewis,' had written, Philippa's heart ached for herself, as well as for the dead girl. Blanche's life at least had been happy from first to last, but to Philippa some bad days had already come, and others were casting shadows before them.

Except for parting from Blanche, Philippa had also had a happy childhood, and she being very lively and full of plans, nobody ever felt dull in her presence. No sooner had Blanche set out on her journey to Cologne than Henry was obliged to go into Wales, and he left Philippa and her second brother, John, duke of Bedford, together with the children of the late earl of March, under the care of Sir Hugh Waterton at Berkhamstead Castle. It was summer, and the pretty Hertfordshire commons were golden with gorse and sweet with bushes of wild roses and honeysuckle, and, strictly guarded though they were, Philippa and the rest had many a merry gallop over the grass, for her love of horses had become a passion with her. Sometimes, when they were tired of playing, she and John used to walk soberly up and down the alleys in the castle garden, talking of their new stepmother – for even before the departure of Blanche Henry had been married 'by proxy' to the widowed duchess of Bretagne, Jane of Navarre.

'She sounded kind in the letter she wrote,' said Philippa in a doubtful tone, 'and if Blanche had been here I should not have been afraid. But suppose she should be like the stepmothers in the nursery tales, and send me down into the kitchen to do scullion's work!'

'And do you think the king would not miss you and bring you back?' asked John mockingly. 'Oh, Philippa, what nonsense you talk, and what a bad scullion you would make!' and they both laughed, and Philippa's tears, which had been very near her eyes, went back to their proper place. 'Besides,' continued John, 'remember that she will not be here for many months yet, and during all that time you will have to take Blanche's place, and preside at the pageants and tourneys. And then, when she does come, she will bring her daughters, the ladies Blanche and Marguérite, with her.'

'Just like the nursery tales,' thought Philippa to herself; but before she could say more the little Mortimers ran up to say that the sun was now sinking, and they could have a game of hoodman blind without getting too hot. And in chasing her cousins all over the garden Philippa forgot the terrors of a stepmother.

She need not, however, have been afraid. When queen Jane and her daughters arrived at Winchester, wearied with their long, cold, and muddy ride all the way from Falmouth, their hearts warmed to the handsome, bright-faced child standing a little behind her father in the hall of the castle. Philippa's own fears melted away like snow as she saw how pale and tired they all looked, and with genuine kindness (mixed perhaps with a feeling of importance) she ordered hot possets to be brought instantly to warm them, and begged them to be seated in the great chimney-place till supper was ready.

Though her new subjects never forgave queen Jane for having a large train of French people ever about her, which was foolish and ill-judged on her part, she always showed great wisdom in her dealings with her husband's daughter. She knew that, owing to her mother's early death and her sister's marriage, Philippa had had a great deal more liberty than most princesses of her age, and that it would be very hard for her to be banished from court festivities, or to remain in the background like her own little girls. Perhaps she, too, had read some of the nursery tales, which are the same all over the world, and remembered about cruel stepmothers and ill-treated stepdaughters; but at any rate, as far as possible, she left Philippa alone, and the child saw this and was grateful. She was quite content with her life and her playfellows, and tried to forget the marriage which had been arranged for her at Berkhamstead, and which threatened to put an end to it all!

While they had been living in Hertfordshire an embassy had arrived from Margaret, queen of Norway, Sweden, and Denmark, seeking a wife for Eric, her great-nephew and successor. Considering that it was only six years since the three kingdoms had been united in one, and that Eric, changeable, weak and hasty, showed small signs of following in his aunt's footsteps, and being able to hold the kingdom together, we cannot help wondering why Henry did not refuse Margaret's offer and wait for a better match. But, curiously enough, he seemed quite satisfied, and only stipulated that three years should pass before the contract was fulfilled. Philippa breathed a sigh of thankfulness. There was so little traffic with the North in those days that it seemed strange and far away; and besides, she was very happy as she was, and did not want to be married at all. But three years! Oh, that was an eternity! and as at present the marriage only meant, as far as she was concerned, the title of 'Queen of Denmark' and an establishment of her own, with as many horses as she could wish for, she enjoyed the pleasures she had, and shut her eyes to the price that must be paid for them. By-and-by there came the moment when her trousseau had to be got ready, but Philippa took far more heed of the housings and trappings of her horses, and of the cushions for her coaches, than of her own gowns, which queen Jane, whose taste was not bound down by strict fashion, ordered after her own fancy. In those days court dresses were embroidered with precious stones, and cost immense sums, and Philippa's wedding dress of cloth of gold, with the stomacher of pearls, cost the enormous sum of 250l. She was surprised and delighted when she saw it, and only wished Blanche could see it too, for she thought, though she was not quite sure, that it was even finer than the gold brocade of Master Whittington.

All these things and a great many more having been prepared for her benefit, Philippa set out to pay some farewell visits to the friends and relations she was never likely to see again. Between each visit she went back to her father at Eltham, for she wished to spend as much time as possible with him and the queen, who was now very lonely, as her own two daughters had returned to Brittany. Philippa's very last visit was to the bishop of Durham, and after that was ended the king and his four sons, together with the Swedish ambassadors who had been sent to escort the bride, took her to Lynn in Norfolk. From here, says the chronicler Stow, 'in the month of May, 1406, dame Philip, the youngest daughter of king Henry, accompanied by divers lords spiritual and temporal, was shipped to the North and so conveyed to Denmark, where she was married to the king of that country in a city called London.' The vessel in which Philippa sailed was, of course, very different from anything we can imagine, and even when fitted up for a princess must have been very uncomfortable. It was the largest in the English navy, but would have looked very small in our eyes, and must have rolled terribly. The admiral of the North Sea was in command, and he placed on board some of the unwieldy cannon then used, in case pirates or foreign ships should be met with; but no mishap of any sort occurred, and Philippa landed safe in Sweden, where queen Margaret and the young king Eric gave her a hearty welcome. After a short rest they journeyed to Lund (or 'London' as Stow calls it), the old Swedish Capital in the very south of the country, where Philippa's marriage and her coronation took place.

From the day that Philippa set foot on board the vessel she left her childhood behind her. She felt that she was going, alone and for ever, to a land of which she knew nothing, with a language and customs entirely strange to her. It was enough to make a brave man sad, and Philippa was barely thirteen, yet she dared not show her grief or her fears for the sake of her father and brothers who were watching her anxiously. So she smiled and chattered up to the very last moment, and then came a storm of tears, as she clung silently to one after the other. However, she had contrived to banish all traces of sorrow by the time she reached Sweden, and queen Margaret saw with pleasure the good sense and dignity which marked her behaviour. A girl who cared only for amusement would have been a bad wife for the young king, and have encouraged him to be more idle than he was already. But Philippa, she was sure, was made of different stuff, and would some day walk in her own footsteps – if only she was sensible and would listen to her counsel! Philippa did listen, and it speaks highly for her that, though for the last five years she had been suffered to do very much as she liked, and had lived more with horses than with books, she now, by the queen's wish, went meekly back to her lessons, and spent several hours a day in learning the history and Sagas (old stories) and languages of the three countries over which she was now queen. Margaret herself, queen of all three kingdoms, taught her the special laws and customs of each, and Philippa, to her surprise and delight, took an interest in everything, and tried with all her might to do the things that Eric her husband left undone – which were many. Very soon the people came to know this, and they thanked her in their hearts and loved her dearly.

So matters went on for six years, and though Philippa was not very happy with her husband, and had no children to comfort her, there was always queen Margaret to go to for help, and consolation. But in 1412 Margaret died, and then Philippa felt lonely indeed. However, she still strove to help her subjects, and had more power than most queens, because the king was always fighting with his neighbours, and left her to rule as she thought best. When her cares pressed heavily she used to go for a holiday to a Swedish convent, and there got strength to carry on her work. And thus, in harness, she died in 1430 at the age of thirty-seven; and nine years later king Eric, who had at last wearied out the patience of his people, was driven from the throne.

THE TROUBLES OF THE PRINCESS ELIZABETH

'What reign in English history do you like best to read about?'

I think that if you were to put this question to twenty children you would get the same answer from at least fifteen.

'Oh, Queen Elizabeth's, of course!' And in many ways they would be quite right. After the long struggle of the Wars of the Roses, which had, a hundred years before, exhausted the country, the people were losing the feeling of uncertainty and anxiety that had possessed them for so many years, and were eager to see the world and to make new paths in many directions. The young men were so daring and gallant, so sure of their right to capture any ship laden with treasure they might meet on the high seas, so convinced that all other nations – and Spaniards in particular – which attacked them, were nothing but pirates and freebooters, whose fit end was 'walking the plank' into the sea, or being 'strung up on the yard arm,' that, as we read their stories, we begin to believe it too! And when we leave Drake and Frobisher and the rest behind, and turn to sir Walter Raleigh throwing down his cloak in the mud for the queen to tread on, and the dying sir Philip Sidney, on the field of Zutphen, refusing the water he so much needed because the wounded soldier beside him needed it still more, we think that, after all, those days were really better than these, and life more exciting. If, too, we should chance to love books better than tales of war, we shall meet with our old friends again in the beautiful songs that almost every gentleman of those times seemed able to make – Sidney, and Raleigh, and many another knight, as well as Shakespeare, and Marlowe, and Ben Jonson. The short velvet tunics and the small feathered hats, which was the ordinary dress of the young men of the period, set off, as we see in their portraits, the tall spare figures and faces with carefully trimmed pointed beards of the courtiers who thronged about the queen. While the head and crown of them all, restless, energetic, courageous as any man among them, was Elizabeth herself.

Yes, there is a great deal to be said for the children's choice.

But perhaps you would like to hear something of the life the queen led before she ascended the throne, which was not until she was twenty-five. As, no doubt, you all know, Henry VIII. had put away his wife Katharine of Aragon, aunt of the emperor Charles V., in order to marry the beautiful maid of honour Anne Boleyn; and his daughter Mary had shared her mother's fate. It was all very cruel and unjust – and in their hearts every one felt it to be so; but Henry managed to get his own way, and in January, 1533, made Anne Boleyn his wife.

It was on September 7, in that same year, that Elizabeth was born in the palace of Greenwich, in a room that was known as the 'Chamber of the Virgins,' from the stories told on the tapestries that covered the walls. The king was greatly disappointed that the baby did not prove to be a boy, but as that could not be helped he determined to make the christening as splendid as possible. So, as it was customary that the ceremony should take place a very few days after the child's birth, all the royal secretaries and officers of state were busy from morning till night, writing letters and sending out messengers to bid the king's guests assemble at the palace on the afternoon of September 10, to attend 'the high and mighty princess' to the convent of the Grey Friars, where she was to be given the name of her grandmother, Elizabeth of York.

At one o'clock the lord mayor and aldermen and city council dined together, in their robes of state; but the dinner did not last as long as usual, as the barges which were to row them to Greenwich were moored by the river bank, and they knew Henry too well to keep him waiting. The palace and courtyard were crowded with people when they arrived, and a few minutes later the procession was formed. Bishops wore their mitres and grasped their pastoral staffs, nobles were clad in long robes of velvet and fur, while coronets circled their heads. Each took his place according to his rank, and when the baby appeared in the arms of the old duchess of Norfolk, with a canopy over her head and her train carried behind her, the procession set forth, the earl of Essex going first, holding the gilt basin, followed by the marquis of Exeter and the marquis of Dorset bearing the taper and the salt, while to lady Mary Howard was entrusted the chrisom containing the holy oil. In this order the splendid company passed down the road which led from the palace and the convent, between walls hung with tapestry and over a carpet of thickly-strewn rushes.

But in spite of the grandeur of Henry's preparations, the godparents of the baby were neither kings nor queens, but only Cranmer, the newly-made archbishop of Canterbury, the old duchess of Norfolk, and lady Dorset. Henry knew full well that it would have been vain to invite any of the sovereigns of Europe to stand as sponsors to his second daughter: they were all too deeply offended at his divorce from Katharine of Aragon and at the quarrel with the Pope. He did not, however, vex himself in the matter, and took pleasure in seeing that the ceremony was as magnificent as if the child had had a royal princess for a mother, instead of the daughter of a mere country gentleman. At the close of the service the Garter King-at-Arms advanced to the steps of the altar, and facing the assembled congregation cried with a loud voice: 'God of His infinite goodness send a prosperous life and long to the high and mighty Princess Elizabeth of England.' Then a blast of trumpets sounded through the air, and the first act of little Elizabeth's public existence began among the noise and glitter that she loved to the end.

By this time it was growing dark, and everybody was hungry. As the church was not very far from the palace, it might have been expected that the company would return there and sit down to a great banquet; but this was not Henry's plan. Instead, he had ordered that wafers, comfits and various kinds of light cakes should be handed round in church, with goblets full of hypocras to wash them down. When this was over, and the christening presents given, the procession re-formed in the same order, and lighted by five hundred torches set out for the palace by the river side, where their barges were awaiting them.

For three months the baby was left with her mother at Greenwich, under the care of her godmother, the duchess of Norfolk, and lady Bryan, kinswoman to Anne Boleyn, who had brought up princess Mary. After that she was taken to Hatfield, in Hertfordshire, and then moved to the country palace of the bishop of Winchester, in the little village of Chelsea. The bishop's consent does not seem to have been asked, for the king never troubled himself to inquire whether the owners of these houses cared to be invaded by a vast number of strangers. If he wished it, that was enough, and the poor bishop had to give up his own business, and spend all his time in making arrangements for the heiress of England – for so she was now declared to be – the rights of Mary being set aside. Right glad must he have been when the king's restless temper removed the baby again into Hertfordshire, to a house at Langley, and sought to provide her with a husband. The prince chosen, first of a long line of suitors, was Charles duke of Orleans, the third son of Francis I. of France. The match was in some ways a good one; but Henry wanted so many things which the French king could not grant that the plan had to be given up. In any case it could hardly have come to pass, as the boy died before his bride had reached her twelfth birthday.

Having contrived to get rid of one wife when he was tired of her, Henry saw no reason why he should not dispose of his second for the same cause. Therefore, when he took a fancy to wed Jane Seymour, maid of honour to Anne, he thought no shame to accuse the queen of all sorts of crimes. One day the booming of the Tower guns told that the Traitors' gate leading down to the Thames had been opened, and Anne, whose life had been passed in pleasure and gaiety, stepped out of the barge; the laughter had died out of her eyes and the colour from her face. Well she knew the fate that awaited her, and in her heart she felt it was just. Had she not in like manner supplanted queen Katharine, and thrust her and her daughter from their rightful place? Thus she may have thought as her guards led her to her cell, from which she walked on May 19 to the scaffold on Tower Hill.

'The young lady,' says Thomas Heywood, 'lost a mother before she could do any more but smile upon her.' But ten days later her vacant throne was filled by Jane Seymour, whose brothers, Edward earl of Hertford and sir Thomas Seymour, were constantly seen at Court. Elizabeth, no longer heiress of the crown, had been sent down to Hunsdon, in Hertfordshire, under the care of lady Bryan and her kinsman Shelton, and here she was left, forgotten by everyone, and without any money being allowed for her support. As for clothes, she had really none, 'neither gown, nor petticoat, nor no manner of linen, nor kerchiefs, nor rails (or nightgowns), nor sleeves, nor many other things needed for a child of nearly three years old.' Neither, according to the rest of lady Bryan's letter to the king's minister, Thomas Cromwell, does she seem to have been provided with proper food. Lady Bryan evidently did not get on well with master Shelton, who shared her charge, and complains that he knows nothing about children, and wished Elizabeth to dine and sup every day with the rest of the household, and that 'it would be hard to restrain her grace from divers meats and fruits and wines that she would see on the table.' No doubt it was hard, for Elizabeth was always rather greedy, and set much store by what she ate and drank. Just at this time, too, simple food was specially necessary for her, as she had 'great pain with her great teeth which come very slowly forth'; and most likely she was rather cross and fretful, as children are apt to be when they have toothache; so lady Bryan is sorry for her, and 'suffers her grace to have her will,' more than she would give her at other times. But when her teeth are 'well graft,' or cut, her governess trusts to God 'to have her grace after another fashion than she is yet, for she is as toward (or clever) a child and as gentle of conditions as ever I saw in my life.'