Chan. You may be confident of my affection and love to you; and I desire you to be a friend to my countrymen in England, and to take upon you their patronage in all just causes.
Wh. I shall be ready upon all occasions to perform all good offices to your Excellence and to your family, and to all of this nation; and shall satisfy the Protector of your affections for him, and of your kindness to his servant.
Chan. I am now an old man, and whilst I continue alive I shall do all that lies in my power to serve the Protector and the Commonwealth of England, and shall embrace your Excellence with a special bond of friendship, and will leave it in charge to my sons, when I am dead, to do the same.
Wh. I shall also enjoin my children to continue that obligation of friendship which I have contracted with your Excellence and your family.
Chan. I shall but add this further, to pray to God that of His mercy He would vouchsafe to you a prosperous return to your own country, and that you may find there all your family and friends in a comfortable and happy condition.
Takes leave of Oxenstiern. Thus the Chancellor and Whitelocke took leave of one another with as much kindness and respect as could be expressed.[283]
Whitelocke being returned to his house, Grave John Oxenstiern came to visit him; and having heard that Whitelocke took it ill that he had put off a visit desired by Whitelocke to this high Grave, yet now he was pleased to descend to excuse it to Whitelocke, because his lodging was strait and inconvenient, not fit to receive a person of Whitelocke’s quality, and his lady was at that time very much indisposed in health.
The Senator Benk Schütt came in the evening to visit Whitelocke, and discoursed freely with him touching the Queen’s resignation and their new King, and did not testify much of respect to the Chancellor by informing Whitelocke that yesterday, at the castle, there was a great rub, as he called it, given by the Queen to the Chancellor before the Prince and the rest of the Senators; the occasion whereof was about the island of Elsey, which the Queen desired as part of her provision, to which the Chancellor said, that it was worthy the consideration; the Queen replied, “What! is my integrity then questioned?” The Chancellor answered, that he did not question her Majesty’s integrity, but spake only for her security and better satisfaction in what she desired. The Queen said, “I understand Swedish well enough, and it was not becoming you to question my integrity at all.” Schütt said, that at this passage the rest of the senators were pleased, and that the Prince seemed in this, and all other occasions, to be of the Queen’s mind, and to grant her more rather than less of what she desired, which was wisdom in him.
Senator Vanderlin visited Whitelocke, and, among other discourses, acquainted him the passages of the proposal for the Queen to have married the Prince; that for this purpose the Prince was sent for out of Germany, and the Queen seemed inclinable to the match; yet, after the Prince was come, she used him with a strangeness which was occasioned by the whisperings of Grave Magnus de la Gardie to the Queen, that when the Prince was in Germany he was too familiar with some ladies; at which information, he said, the Queen was so enraged that the Prince should go to other women, that she thereupon resolved not to marry him, but was otherwise very courteous and full of respect to him. Whitelocke did not dispute the authenticness of this relation, but wondered at it from a senator, touching him who was to be a king, and to use so much freedom on such a subject to a stranger.
General Douglas, the Ricks-Admiral, and Senator Bielke, also visited Whitelocke this evening while Vanderlin was with him; they discoursed of the discontent which the Dutch Resident expressed before his going away, because more respect was shown to Whitelocke by the Queen and Prince, and by the Senators and great men here, than they had shown to the Dutch Resident, who said he was a public minister as well as the English Ambassador. Whitelocke said it was true, as the Dutch Resident had remembered, that he was a public minister; and it might be supposed, that being so, he should understand the difference between a Resident and an Ambassador Extraordinary; and also between the Commonwealth of the United Provinces of the Netherlands, and that of England, Scotland, and Ireland. The Swedish Lords replied, that if the Dutch Resident did not understand it, nor himself, that yet it was sufficiently known in this place, and that the Resident was but laughed at for his exceptions, as being without cause, and showing his want of experience in matters of this nature.