[155]. “A Royal Cavalier: The Romance of Rupert, Prince Palatine.” Mrs Steuart Erskine.
The coronation of Charles II. took place on St George’s Day, 23rd April, the culmination of the Restoration rejoicings, but the month of May was to see the withering of the first flower of the royal stem.
PRINCE RUPERT
The little Duke of Cambridge, round whose cradle such a storm of passion had raged, died on the 5th. Pepys spitefully volunteers the opinion that the poor baby’s death, he believes, “will please everybody, and I hear that the Duke and his lady themselves are not much troubled at it”[[156]]; a conclusion which seems, on every ground, very unlikely. James was to prove himself a deeply affectionate father, and Anne’s strength and tenacity of feeling were not likely to fail in this direction, though it is quite possible that she made little demonstration outwardly of grief.
[156]. “Diary of Samuel Pepys,” notes by Lord Braybrooke, 1906.
Worthington’s “Diary and Correspondence.” 14th May 1661.—S. Hartlieb to Dr Worthington: “I know not whether I told you before that the Duke of York’s only child is dead and buried.”
During this year the King’s aunt Elizabeth, the “Winter Queen,” was at last suffered to revisit her native country after so many stormy years. She had been passionately desirous to do so, though England could have been little more than a memory. But at one time she had been enshrined in the hearts and imaginations of the English, some of whom would have willingly set aside her brother’s children and accepted her son, Charles Louis, as king. No doubt the knowledge of this lingered in the Queen’s mind when she set sail once more for her early home, but as happens to many in like circumstances, it meant disillusion. The radiant Queen of Hearts, whom Christian of Anhalt and many another chivalrous warrior had adored, was no more the same, and she came back, we fear, to find herself forgotten.[[157]] Only Craven was left, to whom she had been the one and only star, a few—very few—faithful friends, and her gallant son Rupert. At first she stayed at Drury House, the guest of Lord Craven, but later she removed to a house of her own in Leicester Field. Here, only a few months after, she died, in February 1662.[[158]]
[157]. Sir Henry Wotton’s famous lyric, “Ye Meaner Beauties of the Night,” was addressed to Elizabeth.
[158]. “A Royal Cavalier: The Romance of Rupert, Prince Palatine.” Mrs Steuart Erskine.