The weakly Charles was four years of age when consigned to the care of Sir Robert Carey. He could not, at this age even, stand alone; his ancles appeared to be out of joint. The King, with his characteristic conceit and want of gentle feeling, was disposed to use the most violent remedies and measures to cure the defects at which his pride was offended. The nostrums which he recommended were worthy of Martinus Scriblerus. But he found a champion of the helpless child in Lady Carey. “Many a battle my wife had with the King, but she still prevailed,” writes Sir Robert Carey.[[136]] The King, nevertheless, wished that the string under the young prince’s tongue might be cut; for the child, it was thought, would never speak. Then he proposed wire boots for his sinews and feet, but Lady Carey stood firm, and the Monarch was obliged to yield to a woman’s arguments.

The boy grew daily stronger, and repaying Lady Carey’s good care, gained health under her mild auspices, “both in body and mind.”[[137]] Still the impediment in his voice continued; his countenance exhibited that mournful expression which was doubtless the natural consequence of a weakly childhood, and of the consciousness of bodily defects, which is the most likely of any circumstances to depress the buoyancy of the young.

To the inevitable solitude of ill-health, Charles probably owed his prudence, his early piety, and his taste for elegant pursuits. Villiers, in after life, found his love of pictures and medals one road to Charles’s affections, by producing a sympathy between himself and the young prince. Charles was also, for his age, an accomplished theologian, and notwithstanding the impediment in his utterance, he could discourse to the admiration of all who heard him, on topics of general interest. With the traveller, the mechanic, and the scholar, he was equally fluent, meeting them on their own subjects, and imparting knowledge to the learned. He improved, too, in those diversions, and exercises which were then considered indispensable to the character of a gentleman. “He rid,” says his tutor, Dr. Pernichief, “the great horse very well; and on the little saddle he was not only adroit, but a laborious hunter or fieldman.”[[138]]

The temper of Charles is said to have been tinctured with obstinacy; and his old Scottish nurse reported him to have been of a very evil nature, even in his infancy; whilst another attendant taxes him with being, “beyond measure, wilful and unthankful.”[[139]] How far, in these uncured qualities, “springing like rank weeds in the heart,” we may trace some of the fatal errors in Charles’s career—his pertinacious adherence, especially when King, to Villiers, whether his favourite was right or wrong, is a matter of curious speculation.

But Dr. Pernichief, who knew Charles well, only allows that his “childhood was blemished with supposed obstinacy, for the weakness of his body inclining him to retirement, and the imperfections of his speech rendering discourse tedious and unpleasant, he was suspected to be somewhat perverse,” a construction often put upon the deportment of a bashful, sad child. Such were his defects; and, as far as his royal father was concerned, they were more offensive to the pride of the king, than painful to the tenderness of a parent. All, however, acknowledged that the youth of the accomplished Charles had hitherto been irreproachable, and that, if he manifested not the powerful intellect and extended views of his late brother, he resembled him in his love of virtue, his sense of honour, and in the difficult task of being dutiful and respectful to parents who were frequently at variance.

He now came, at the age of sixteen, before his future subjects, with this singular disadvantage, that the death of his elder brother was still a subject of lamentation. The clergy, especially, could not forget one whose staunch Protestantism gave them the assurance of a steady friend.

“Henry, Prince of Wales, was still,” says a contemporary writer, “so much in men’s minds, that Andrews, Bishop of Ely, preaching at court, prayed solemnly for him, without recalling himself.”[[140]] The Queen, too, refused to be comforted, and upon the first public occasion on which Charles appeared, declined being present, lest the ceremonial should revive her grief.

Many could remember that at his installation into the Order of the Bath, at four years of age, Charles, unable to walk, was carried in the arms of the Lord High Admiral to the rites which, referring to chivalric observances and martial deeds, seemed a sort of mockery to the infant Prince. Those who recalled that hour, now beheld in the royal youth, who at his creation as Prince of Wales appeared before them, a graceful and manly figure set off to advantage by dress, and other circumstances.

In an old print, engraved by Renold Estraake, he is represented, as Prince of Wales, in a slouched hat with a long falling feather; his juvenile, and very slender form clad in a tight vest; a sash over the right shoulder is tied with a large bow under the left arm, and the ends are fringed with jewels. Around his waist is a scarf, also edged with a fringe of pearls and jewels. A stuffed skirt, richly embroidered and adorned, descends almost to the knee. His boots are apparently of some soft material, being creased; the tops richly decorated with jewels. Thus attired, and mounted on a superb horse, the head of which was adorned with a Phœnix in flames, emblematically complimentary, Charles presented himself to the people. Such was his costume before he visited Spain, and imbibed a love of the graceful cloak, the Spanish hat, and Vandyke collar.

His manners, serious though courteous, were highly acceptable to the majority of those who gazed upon him, when, on the eve of All Saints’ day, October 31st, 1616, Charles was created Prince of Wales. His very stammering began to be approved as a mark of wisdom; and “obloquy, it was said, never played the fool so much as in imputing folly to the heir apparent.”