CHAPTER VI.
DISGUISES ASSUMED BY, OR IN BEHALF OF, ROYALTY.
Disguise of Achilles—Of Ulysses—Of Codrus—Fiction employed by Numa Pompilius—King Alfred disguised in the Swineherd’s Cottage—His Visit, as a Harper, to the Danish Camp—Richard Cœur de Lion takes the Garb of a Pilgrim—He is discovered and imprisoned—Disguises and Escape of Mary, Queen of Scots—Escape of Charles the Second, after the Battle of Worcester—Of Stanislaus from Dantzic—Of Prince Charles Edward from Scotland—Peter the Great takes the Dress of a Ship Carpenter—His Visit to England—Anecdote of his Conduct to a Dutch Skipper—Stratagem of the Princess Ulrica of Prussia—Pleasant Deception practised by Catherine the Second of Russia—Joan of Arc—Her early Life—Discovers the King when first introduced at Court—She compels the English to raise the Siege of Orleans—Joan leads the King to be crowned at Rheims—She is taken Prisoner—Base and barbarous Conduct of her Enemies—She is burned at Rouen—The Devil of Woodstock—Annoying Pranks played by it—Explanation of the Mystery—Fair Rosamond.
“Uneasy lies the head which wears a crown,” are the emphatic words of Shakspeare; and that a penalty of no light sorrow is often attached to the pomp and grandeur of royalty, is a fact which receives confirmation from the earliest traditionary accounts we have of the histories of kings and princes.[8]
To avoid the dangers inseparable from war; or, during war, to overpower an enemy by guile, as well as by force of arms; or, in political troubles, to seek a temporary concealment; have been occasionally the objects of men celebrated in after-times as heroes, and as examples worthy and proper to be followed by such as aimed at future conquest or greatness.
Thetis, knowing that her son Achilles was doomed to perish, if he went to the Trojan war, privately sent him, it is said, to the court of Lycomedes, where he was disguised in a female dress; but, as Troy could not be taken without him, Ulysses went to the same court in the habit of a merchant, and exposed jewels and arms for sale. Achilles, neglecting the jewels, generally more attractive to female eyes, and displaying a certain skill in handling the weapons, inadvertently discovered his sex, and, challenged by Ulysses, was obliged to go to the war, in which he ultimately perished. The truth of this story cannot perhaps be safely asserted, especially as the introduction of the goddess Thetis is evidently poetical; but the tradition of it and the two following are quoted, to show that such impostures and concealments were not considered derogatory to the courage or good conduct of the greatest heroes of antiquity; and it is also probable that such facts, stripped of their poetical dress, did really take place.
Ulysses had pretended to be insane, that he might not be obliged to leave his beloved Penelope; and had yoked a horse and bull together, ploughing the sea-shore, where he sowed salt instead of corn. This dissimulation was discovered by Palamedes, who placed Telemachus, the infant son of Ulysses, before the plough, and thus convinced the world that the father was not mad; as he turned the plough from the furrow, to avoid injuring his son.
Codrus, the last king of Athens, from a nobler motive concealed his dignity, and saved his country, by sacrificing his own life; for, when the Heraclidæ made war against Athens, the Delphian oracle was consulted about the event: the Pythoness declared, that the Peloponnesians would be victorious, provided they did not kill the Athenian king. This response being promulgated, Codrus, in the heroic spirit of the age, determined to sacrifice his own life for the benefit of his country. Disguising himself, therefore, as a peasant, he went to the outpost of the enemy, and, seeking an occasion to quarrel, he was killed. When the real quality of the person slain became known, the Heraclidæ, believing their fate sealed if they remained, quickly retreated to their own country.
Numa Pompilius, at the death of Romulus, was unanimously elected king of Rome, and accepted the office after the repeated and earnest solicitations of the senate and people. Not, like Romulus, fond of war and military expeditions, he applied himself to tame the ferocity of his subjects, by inculcating a reverence for the deity. He had the discretion to see that, if he could bring them to the belief that he was aided by higher powers, his own regulations would be better attended to. He, therefore, encouraged the report which was spread, of his paying regular visits to the goddess-nymph Egeria; and he made use of her name to give sanction to the laws and institutions which he had introduced, and he informed the Romans that the safety of the empire depended upon the preservation of the sacred ancyle, or shield, which it was generally believed had dropped from heaven.