Henrietta Maria

by Henrietta Haynes

For the army plot sealed Strafford's fate. The misgivings of the Puritans were becoming terror as they appreciated that the King of England would shrink from no means which might make him supreme. The more well-informed among them knew that Richelieu wished them well, but there were those who saw in the welcome which the Cardinal extended to the English exiles an indication that the influence of France would be thrown on the side of the King, and there were rumours abroad that Strafford, once rescued from prison, would find a refuge across the Channel. The Earl's position was rendered still worse when the Lieutenant of the Tower declared that he had been offered a large bribe to favour his prisoner's escape. There was now no room for compromise. Strafford had to pay the penalty of the greatness which made him feared, and on May 8th, the very day on which the army plot became known, the Bill of Attainder passed both Houses of Parliament.

Then followed four agonizing days. The King, who had given Strafford a solemn promise that he should not be harmed, became more and more terrified (not so much for himself as for those whom he loved, for he was no coward) as he realized the implacability of those who sought his faithful servant's life. On the other hand, he felt the shame of the descendant of a long line of kings at the very thought of breaking his royal pledge. In his struggle he knew not where to turn for help or comfort. Strafford himself, imitating the heroic conduct of the simple priest John Goodman, wrote to Charles, begging to die rather than that his safety should prejudice the King's interests. As for Henrietta, at this crisis she had no strength to supplement her husband's weakness. She sat shivering at Whitehall, feeling around her the atmosphere of hatred, and hearing at last that most terrible of all sounds, the howling of an infuriated mob. Long Charles hesitated, but at last he dared do so no longer, for he believed that his wife and his children would pay the ransom of Strafford. Impelled by fear, justified by subtle counsellors, he seized his pen and signed the fatal death-warrant; "and in signing it he signed his own,"[252] commented a Frenchman many years later.

Strafford did not fear death. His state of health was such that probably in any case his remaining days would have been few. With one bitter comment, "Put not your trust in princes," he turned resolutely to the regulation of his temporal affairs and to preparation for death. His last day on earth was troubled by the well-meant solicitude of certain Catholics who, by some means, gained access to him, but when they found their efforts unavailing they departed, and he was left in peace. The fatal twelfth of May dawned. He was led out to meet first the blessing of his fellow-prisoner, Archbishop Laud, and then the angry faces of the populace, which he despised to the end, but to which was passing the power he was unable to hold. There were a few moments of tension, of waiting for death; then the axe fell, and the one man who might have saved Charles' throne was for ever beyond the reach of warring factions. "They have committed murder with the sword of justice,"[253] cried out one Englishman, expressing the silent thoughts of others less courageous than himself.

"The people," commented Salvetti, who was not unworthy to be the countryman of Machiavelli, "now that it knows its own strength, and that nothing is denied to it, will not stop here, but will claim more."[254] Indeed, the revolution came on apace. The power was in the hands of Pym and his friends, and behind them were the London mob and the Scotch army. The abolition of the Star Chamber and High Commission Courts was only one among the many blows which were shattering Charles' throne.

These were some of the darkest days of Henrietta's life. She was fully aroused from the levity of her youth, but at this first touch of adversity she had not learned the courage and resignation of later times. Strafford had no truer mourner than she, unless, indeed, it were her husband. Then there were griefs more personal to herself. Some of those whom she had most trusted, such as Lady Carlisle and the Earl of Holland, turned against her, and she still believed that her enemies meant to humiliate her by an impeachment. She had to see the Catholics hated and persecuted as they had not been since the days of the Powder Plot, finding only a sorry consolation in the heroism which kept most of the priests at their post of danger. It added to her misery that she had to bear it alone. Even the Bishop of Angoulême left his royal mistress, for somewhat characteristically he discovered the urgent need of his presence in Paris. One of a braver spirit remained as ever faithful, but Father Philip, who was specially obnoxious to the Puritans, because being a subject of the King of England he came within the scope of the recusancy laws, found his constancy rewarded by a severe interrogation before the House of Commons and a short sojourn in the Tower. It was, however, no doubt a satisfaction, both to him and to the Queen, that Richelieu, whose name had been freely mentioned in the examination, expressed himself much annoyed at the liberty which the leaders of Parliament had taken.[255]

And in July Henrietta lost another friend. Rosetti had stayed, with admirable courage and almost beyond the limit of safety, but now the condition of affairs was such that the Queen would not even permit Piombini, the humble agent who had been sent to replace him, to remain in England. She and her husband, with desperation in their hearts, held a last interview with the papal envoy. Charles, who in Rosetti's words spoke of the injuries which religion was receiving, "not as a heretic king, but as a Catholic,"[256] was by this time ready to promise, in return for help from the Pope, even liberty of conscience in the three kingdoms, together with the extirpation of Puritanism, thus leaving the field to the Catholics and the Protestants. He was, moreover, willing to forgo any help from Rome until the free exercise of the Catholic religion had been granted in Ireland. These terms, countersigned by his own royal hand, were to be carried across the sea by Mary de' Medici, who was on the point of leaving England, and delivered to Rosetti, who, by that time, would be on the way to Rome.

But the King of England humiliated himself in vain. Rosetti and those who directed him were aware of both the circumstances and the character of the man with whom they had to deal. They knew that only one thing could irrevocably bind Charles to the Catholic cause, and to the performance of his difficult promise. "The true way of getting help from the Holy See," said Rosetti severely, "is the conversion of the King." It was of no avail that Henrietta hastily asserted that such a step was impossible, not from any dislike on her husband's part to their holy religion, but because it would cost him his crown. The King's acts, and not his motives, were the envoy's concern, and he offered no comment on this wifely explanation, but hastened to bid the Queen farewell. He left England immediately, and Henrietta never saw him again.

A month later, in the August of this sad summer, Henrietta wrote a letter to her sister Christine, which is the best description of the despair which was taking possession of her. "I swear to you," so it runs, "that I am almost mad with the sudden change in my fortunes. From the highest pitch of contentment I am fallen into every kind of misery which affects not only me but others. The sufferings of the poor Catholics and of others who are the servants of my lord the King touch me as sensibly as can any personal sorrow. Imagine what I feel to see the King's power taken from him, the Catholics persecuted, the priests hanged, the persons devoted to us removed and pursued for their lives because they served the King. As for myself, I am kept as a prisoner, so that they will not even permit me to follow the King, who is going to Scotland." She goes on to speak of one of the chief aggravations of her misery, the utter helplessness which she felt. "You have had troubles enough," she exclaims to her sister, "but at least you were able to do something to escape them; while we, we have to sit with our arms folded, quite unable to help ourselves. I know well," she adds sadly, commenting on her little daughter's marriage, which might have seemed rather beneath the dignity of the eldest daughter of England, "I know well that it is not kingdoms that give contentment, and that kings are as unhappy and sometimes more so than other people."[257]

During the King's absence in Scotland Henrietta retired to her country house at Oatlands, to find what consolation she could in the society of her children. Even there she was not at peace. The leaders of the Parliamentary party, wishing to gain possession of the young Princes, requested that they might be placed in their hands, for the benefit of their education, and because they feared that the Queen, their mother, would make them Papists. "You are mistaken," replied Henrietta proudly. "The Princes have their tutors and governors to teach them all that is proper, and I shall not make them Papists, for I know that that is not the wish of the King." Nevertheless she was so alarmed at this request that she sent the children to another country house, whence they came to visit her but occasionally. She believed that she herself was in some danger of being carried off by her enemies; at least, that they wished her to think so, in order to drive her from the kingdom. After a while she left Oatlands and went to Hampton Court, where she was in greater safety, and where she was able to work for her husband by winning over some doubtful spirits, of whom the chief was the Lord Mayor of London.

Thus the summer wore on, and with the autumn came another blow. In the early days of November, while Charles was still in Scotland, London was startled by the news of the sudden and horrible rebellion of the long-oppressed Irish Catholics, who rose to avenge upon their Protestant neighbours the wrongs of generations. Stories, not unfounded, of the reckless barbarity of the rebels were in the mouth of every Englishman, and the victorious Puritans found in them an easy means of fanning the popular hatred of the Catholics, which was already at white heat. "This is what they have done in Ireland, this is what they would do, if they had the chance, in England," was a ready and convincing argument. This rebellion added another difficulty to those which were overwhelming the King and Queen; for not only did it thus give a handle to their enemies, but there were those who did not scruple to insinuate that the Queen was concerned in it.