“I can easily enter by the gate yonder, and with the aid of a dozen men carry off the princess, while the rest catch her attendants,” were words heard by the children one day while playing near the high road. It was clear she must be taken away at once.
“No, I can never leave my dear Henry,” cried the child, when told they must part, and so tightly did she cling to him, that it was with difficulty her arms were unclasped.
Soon after this a suite of rooms were fitted up for her at court, and there for a short time she enjoyed the splendours of court life. But when only fourteen, little more than a child, a husband was chosen for her from a foreign country. Frederick, the future Elector Palatine, was only sixteen himself, when he was sent for to come over to England and marry the Princess Elizabeth.
The whole family were assembled to welcome him when he arrived.
Elizabeth stood by her brother Henry on a raised platform, her eyes fixed on the ground, while Frederick with a firm step and beaming face walked up the long hall. When he reached the king and queen, Elizabeth looked up to see a dark handsome boy with a pleasant face and manly figure. He bowed very low and kissed her hand, and apologized in broken English for appearing in his travelling clothes and not in court dress.
The month before her marriage her brother Henry was seized with a severe fever, and it soon became evident that he could not live. Elizabeth was in despair, she refused to obey the order not to enter the sick room of her beloved brother, and one evening she stole away from the festivities of the court, disguised herself, and hurried eagerly to him, but only to be sent back by the watchful attendants, who were more anxious for her safety than pitiful of her sisterly love. “Do not be so cruel. Take me to him, if only for a minute.” There was a hungry, yearning look in her brown eyes, the tears rolled down her cheeks, and it was hard to refuse such a request. But the guards were firm.
“Oh, where is my dear sister?” were Henry’s last words. This was the first great sorrow in Elizabeth’s life, and the beginning of the darker days in store for her, which were to bring out all the courage of her womanly nature.
On St. Valentine’s Day, 1613, the wedding took place. Prince Frederick was dressed in cloth of silver embroidered with diamonds; his bride wore cloth of silver too, shining with pearls and diamonds, and her long and beautiful hair hung over her shoulders to her waist.
After a few months of English festivities the young couple made their way to their new home at Heidelberg, where they were received with great joy.
Now Frederick was, by his father’s death, Elector Palatine, that is, he ruled over part of Germany under the Emperor. The Emperor had made a cousin of his King of Bohemia, but that cousin was a Roman Catholic, and the people of Bohemia did not like him, so they dethroned him, and sent to Frederick to ask him to come to help them and be their king. It was a critical position for Frederick; he saw it might, and probably would, lead to war; his mother begged him to refuse, but his wife Elizabeth would not hear of such a thing. The sparkle of a crown glittered before her eyes; she trusted Frederick to keep peace and reign well over the people who had chosen him as king. “I had rather feed on a dry crust at a king’s table than feed on dainties at that of an elector!” cried Elizabeth. Thirty years later she knew what it was to eat a dry crust, but not at a king’s table.