“Dame, doe ye knowe me?”
There was no reply at once, and he repeated the appeal more than once before, seemingly, it reached the deafened ears and failing comprehension. At last she collected herself.
With much strivings she said faintly “Aye.” After a little respite she took a little courage, and with what vehemency and tenderness she could, she said: “Duke, Duke, death is terrible—death is very terrible!”[[286]]
[286]. “Verney Memoirs.” Dr Denton to Sir Ralph Verney: “By ye best and truest intelligence she did not dy a Papalina, but she made no profession or confession either way.” Cf. “Sir John Reresby: Memoirs,” ed. 1734: “This day dyed Anne, Duchess of York, with her last breath declaring herself a Papist.”
The voice, so greatly beloved in the past, if not in the present, had for the moment summoned her back, but if it was only to utter those last most pitiful words, it surely had been better speechless. The breathing grew shorter—stopped.
Then silence—and so vanished away Anne Hyde.
Margaret Blagge, who as we know had nursed her “with extraordinary sedulity” and had stood by her to the last, has set down this sorrowful, awestruck record: “The Duchess dead, a princess honoured in power, had much witt, much money, much esteeme. She was full of unspeakable torture, and died (poore creature) in doubt of her religion, without the Sacrament or divine by her side, like a poore wretch. None remembered her after one weeke, none sorry for her; she was tost and flung about and every one did what they would with that stately carcase.”[[287]]
[287]. “Life of Mrs Godolphin,” by John Evelyn, edit, by E. W. Harcourt, 1888.
This irreverent and revolting neglect must be ascribed to the ill conduct of the servants and apothecaries, who according to custom were responsible. Neither the Duke himself nor the ladies of the Duchess can be blamed, for they would at once have left the room.
The foregoing testimony, by the way, would seem to establish the fact that Anne did not receive the consolations of religion from any priest; and for the rest, Margaret’s words “none sorry for her” are borne out by those of Burnet, who says she “died little beloved. Haughtiness gained many enemies” and her “change of religion made her friends think her death a blessing at that time.”