II.
On the 17th of October, 1558, a fortnight's truce was proclaimed. Both armies remained encamped on their own territories, while the two Kings withdrew respectively to Arras and Beauvais. The next day the Commissioners met at one o'clock in the Duchess's lodgings. The Prince of Orange, Alva, Ruy Gomez, Arras, and Viglius, the President of the Council, represented Philip; while the Constable, the Cardinal of Lorraine, St. André, the Bishop of Orleans, and Secretary l'Aubespine, were the five French deputies. Stroppiana represented the Duke of Savoy, and the English deputies, Lord Arundel, Dr. Wotton, and Thirlby, Bishop of Ely, arrived a few days later. The Duchess welcomed the Commissioners in a brief speech, explaining that, as for several years past she had endeavoured to make peace between these two illustrious monarchs, it was their pleasure that she should continue her good offices, adding that she would count herself too happy if her services could help to attain this blessed end, and relieve the people of both countries from the awful miseries of war.[541]
Oct., 1558] PEACE NEGOTIATIONS
During the next fortnight conferences were held daily in the presence of Christina, who herself read aloud each different proposal that was made, and showed infinite tact in smoothing over difficulties and suggesting points of agreement. Each morning the deputies met at Mass in the parish church, and often discussed separate questions after service. In the evenings, private interviews took place in Christina's rooms, and the Prince of Orange held long conversations with Montmorency and the Cardinal, which contributed not a little to their mutual understanding. "Loving entertainments," in Suriano's phrase, "were exchanged," and one night the Duchess gave a banquet in honour of the Constable's wife and daughter, who paid a visit to Cercamp. As the Cardinal complained jestingly, Montmorency was too good a Christian and all too ready to make peace with his country's enemies. But King Henry supported him secretly, and sent private notes and messages, telling him to take no notice of the Guises, and do all he could to make peace.[542]
The great difficulty which had hitherto stood in the way of all attempts at negotiation was the restitution of Savoy. The Constable now proposed that the Duke should marry the King's sister, Madame Marguerite, with a dower of 300,000 crowns, and be placed in possession of the chief portion of his dominions. At first the Duke demurred to this offer, and begged that the King's daughter Claude should be substituted for her aunt, who was five years his senior. But the Cardinal replied that this Princess was already pledged to his nephew, Charles of Lorraine, and laid stress on Margaret's charms and learning. The Duke yielded, and a long wrangle ensued as to the towns and citadels to be retained by the French. But there was a still more thorny question to be decided. This was the restoration of Calais, which the English demanded with the utmost pertinacity, while the French were no less determined to keep their conquest. The English pleaded that they had held the town during two centuries; the French replied that it had been unjustly snatched from them in the first place. Old treaties, going back to the days of the Black Prince, were produced, and Arras and his colleagues supported the English claim loyally, knowing that, if Philip consented to abandon Calais, he would lose all hold on his wife's subjects. In vain Christina proposed that, as the marriage of the French King's elder daughter with the Infant Don Carlos had been agreed upon, Calais should form part of Elizabeth's dower. The Cardinal told the Duchess that the possession of the town, which his brother had conquered, touched his honour too closely for him to agree to the surrender, and King Henry sent word that he would rather lose his crown than give up Calais. So stern and intractable were the French that the only thing to be done was to adjourn the Conference and refer the matter to the two monarchs.[543]
Sept., 1558] DEATH OF MARY OF HUNGARY
The Constable was allowed to go to Beauvais with the Cardinal to consult King Henry, Alva and Orange went to Brussels to see Philip, and Christina took three days' holiday with her children at Douai. Before she went to Cercamp, a report of Charles V.'s death had reached Brussels. Now this was confirmed by letters from St. Yuste, announcing that the great Emperor had passed away on the 21st of September. The sudden death of his sister Eleanor, seven months before, had been a great shock to him, and when the Queen of Hungary entered his room without the accustomed figure at her side he burst into tears. The recent events of the war, and Philip's difficulties in the administration of the provinces, troubled him sorely, and he was very anxious for Mary to resume the office of Regent. When, in August, the Archbishop of Toledo brought a letter from the King, imploring the Queen to come to his help, Charles used all his influence to induce her to consent. In vain Mary pleaded her advancing years and failing health; the Emperor replied that her refusal would bring ruin and disgrace on their house, and adjured her by the love of God and her sisterly affection to do him this last service. This appeal decided the noble woman. On the 9th of September she wrote to tell Philip that, in obedience to his father's orders, she would start for the Netherlands as soon as possible. The knowledge of the Queen's decision was a great consolation to Charles in his last moments, and as soon as she had recovered from the first shock of his death she prepared to obey his last wish. But before she embarked at Laredo, a fresh attack of the heart trouble from which she suffered ended her life, and on St. Luke's Day she passed to her well-earned rest.[544]
Her death was deeply lamented throughout the Low Countries, where her return had been daily looked for, and no one mourned her loss more truly than the niece to whom she had been the best of mothers. It was with a sad heart that Christina came back to Cercamp to preside at the second session of the Conference, which opened on the 7th of November. Alarming accounts of their mistress's health now reached the English Commissioners, and Count Feria, whom Philip sent to London, wrote that the Queen's life was despaired of, and that Parliament was in great alarm lest, if she died, the King would cease to care for the recovery of Calais. But, although Arras and Alva still declared that they would never consent to any treaty which did not satisfy the English, the French remained obdurate, and the Commissioners were at their wits' end. The Bishop of Ely was in tears, and on the 18th of November Lord Arundel wrote home that
"it seemed very hard that all others should have restitution of their owne, and poore England, that began not the fray, should bear the burthen and loss for the rest, and specially of such a jewel as Calais."[545]
The next day came the news of the Queen's death. The French, who, Wotton remarked, "have ears as long as those of Midas," were the first to inform Her Majesty's Envoys that their mistress had breathed her last, on the morning of the 17th of November, after sending a message to Elizabeth, recognizing this Princess as her successor, and begging her to maintain the Catholic religion. The new Queen at once sent Lord Cobham to announce her accession to Philip, and assure him of her resolve to hold fast the ancient friendship between England and the House of Burgundy.
Dec., 1558] THE EMPEROR'S FUNERAL
The news of Mary's death decided the Commissioners to adjourn the Conference. The truce was prolonged for two months, and on the 2nd of December they all left Cercamp. Arundel had already started for England, and Wotton was longing to get away, saying "that he was never wearier of any place than he was of Cercamp, saving only of Rome after the sack." The Constable was set at liberty, and received a promise that his 200,000 crowns ransom should be reduced by half, if peace were finally made. Arras, Alva, and Orange, went to the Abbey of Groenendal to see Philip, who had retired to pray for his father's soul, and there received the tidings of his wife's death. Christina returned to Brussels to assist at a succession of funerals. On the 22nd of December a requeim for the Queen of England was chanted in S. Gudule, the Duke of Savoy acting as chief mourner in the King's absence, and on the following day solemn funeral rites for the late Queen of Hungary were performed in the Court chapel, which she and the Emperor had built and adorned. The Duchess of Lorraine was present at this service, together with the Duke of Savoy, the Prince of Orange, and all the chief nobles and Crown officials, while the palace gates were thronged with a crowd of sorrowing people.[546] But the grandest funeral ceremonies ever known in Brussels were those that were celebrated on the 29th of December, in memory of the late Emperor.
Jan., 1559] CHARLES'S WEDDING
Great preparations had been made for this solemnity during the last few weeks. A chapelle ardente was erected in S. Gudule, rising in tiers to the lofty roof, adorned with golden diadems and shields emblazoned with the dead monarch's arms and titles, and lighted with 3,000 candles. Here, on a couch draped with cloth of gold, an effigy of the Emperor was laid, clad in robes of state and wearing the collar of the Order. On the morning of the 29th a long procession wound its way through the narrow streets leading from the palace on the heights of the Caudenberg to the cathedral church, and a stately pageant unfolded the glorious story of Charles of Austria's deeds. A richly carved and gilded ship, drawn by marine monsters, bore the names of his journeys and battles and armorial bearings of the kingdoms over which he reigned, while banners of the Turks and of the other foes whom he had vanquished were plunged in the waves below, and white-robed maidens sat in the stern, bearing the cross and chalice, the symbols of the faith by which he had conquered the world. This imposing group was followed by a representation of the Pillars of Hercules with Charles's motto, Plus oultre, and twenty-four horses decked in coloured plumes and trappings to match the banners of his different States. Each of these pennons was borne by a noble youth, while four Princes supported the great standard of the Empire. Then came the officers of the imperial household, leading Charles's war-horse, and bearing his armour and insignia; the Prince of Orange with his master's sword, Alva with the orb of the world, and the Grand Commander of Castille with the imperial crown. Last of all King Philip himself appeared on foot, clad in a mourning mantle five yards long, and followed by the Duke of Savoy and a long train of Knights of the Golden Fleece, Councillors and Ministers, with the Archers of the Guard bringing up the rear. The procession left the palace at nine, and the funeral service, which included a lengthy oration by the Bishop of Arras's coadjutor, Abbé Richardot, was not over till five o'clock. The next day Philip and all his nobles attended High Mass, and at the end of the celebration the Prince of Orange, standing before the funeral pile, smote his breast three times, repeating the words: "He is dead, and will remain dead; and there is another risen up in his place, greater than ever he has been." So the solemn function ended.
"It was a sight worth going 100 miles to see," wrote Richard Clough, an English apprentice who had been sent by Sir Thomas Gresham from Antwerp, and counted himself fortunate to witness this imposing ceremony. "The like of it, I think, hath never been seen. The Lord give his soul rest!"[547]
The Duchess of Lorraine had been anxious that her son should attend his great-uncle's funeral, but the tardy invitation which Philip sent to Nancy arrived too late, and the young Duke could not reach Brussels in time to take part in the ceremony. To console herself for this disappointment, Christina went to meet Charles at Treves on the 6th of January, and spent two days in his company, before he returned to France for the wedding. His loyal subjects presented him with a marriage gift of 200,000 crowns, double the amount which any Duke of Lorraine had received before. Charles who inherited his mother's lavish generosity, spent most of the money in costly jewels for his bride, and presented the King and Dauphin, Vaudemont and the Guises, with superb robes embroidered with the arms of Lorraine and lined with lynx fur. The wedding was solemnized at Notre Dame on the 22nd of January, with as much splendour as that of the Dauphin in the previous spring. The Guises held open house for ten days in their palatial abode, the "Hôtel de Lorraine et de Sicile," near the royal palace of Les Tournelles, and gave a grand tournament in which the young Duke appeared at the head of a troop splendidly arrayed in corslets of gold and silver, with the alérions, or eagles, of Lorraine on the crest of their helmets. Ronsard celebrated the union of the eagles of Lorraine and the golden lilies of France, and sang the praises of the "Fair Maid of Valois and her bridegroom, the beautiful Shepherd who feeds his flock in the green pastures along the banks of Meuse and Moselle."[548]
The French King and Queen had invited the Duchess in courteous and affectionate terms to be present at the wedding, but she declined on the plea of her deep mourning, as well as of the promise which she had made to preside at the Peace Conference, which was shortly to meet again.[549]