CHAPTER IX
THE QUEEN AND THE LORD HIGH-ADMIRAL
At the time of the much-discussed clandestine marriage between Thomas Seymour and Katherine Parr, the Princess Elizabeth was a precocious girl of fifteen, not beautiful, but tall for her age, well developed, and of elegant figure. The aquiline features, which age was to harshen, were softened at this early period by the roundness of youth; and the brilliant complexion stood in no need of the artificial assistance to which the Queen so freely resorted in her later life. The splendid auburn hair—its colour may have owed something to a touch of henna—considerably heightened charms not the least striking of which were a pair of small but black and penetrating eyes, inherited from her mother, Anne Boleyn.[129] Unmindful of the fact that a girl of fifteen is not precisely a baby, the Queen had encouraged the Admiral to romp with “our Eliza” in the garden and even in her bedroom. Seymour was notoriously devoid of any sense of delicacy or chivalry, and there can be very little doubt that the object of his play with his illustrious stepdaughter was to kindle a passion which might serve his purpose in case the Queen, already advancing in pregnancy, should die in childbirth—a not improbable contingency, considering her age and the fact that she had never borne a child before. At a much later date Mrs. Ashley, the Princess’s governess, deposed as follows before the Privy Council: “At Chelsea Manor,[130] after my Lord Thomas Seymour was married to the Queen, he would come many mornings into the said Lady Elizabeth’s chamber before she was ready, and sometimes before she did rise, and strike her familiarly on the back, and so go forth to his chamber, and sometimes go through to her maidens and play with them. And if the Princess were in bed, he would put open the curtains and bid her good morrow, and she would go further in the bed. And one morning he tried to kiss the Princess in the bed and I was there, and bade him go away for shame. At Hanworth, for two mornings, the Queen was with him, and they both tickled my Lady Elizabeth in her bed. Another time, at Hanworth, he romped with her in the garden, and cut her gown, being of black silk, into a hundred pieces; and when I chid Lady Elizabeth, she answered, ‘She could not strive with all, for the Queen held her while the Lord Admiral cut the dress.’ Another time, Lady Elizabeth heard the master-key unlock, and knowing my Lord Admiral would come in, ran out of her bed to her maidens, and then went behind the curtains of her bed and my Lord Admiral tarried a long while, in hopes she would come out.” Upon Mrs. Ashley’s begging the Admiral to be more circumspect, because his tomfooleries were giving the Princess a bad reputation, he answered, with an oath, “I will tell my Lord Protector how I am slandered; and I will not leave off, for I mean no evil.” “At Seymour Place,” continues Mrs. Ashley, “when the Queen slept there, he did use awhile to come up every morning in his night-gown and slippers. When he found Lady Elizabeth up and at her book, then he would look in at the gallery-door, and bid her good morrow and so go on his way; and I did tell my Lord it was an unseemly sight to see a man so little dressed in a maiden’s chamber, with which he was angry, but left it. At Hanworth, the Queen did tell me ‘that my Lord Admiral looked in at the gallery-window, and saw my Lady Elizabeth with her arms about a man’s neck.’ I did question my Lady Elizabeth about it, which she denied, weeping, and bade us ‘ax all her women if there were any man who came to her, excepting Grindal.’ [This gentleman was her tutor.] Howbeit, methought the Queen, being jealous, did feign this story, to the intent that I might take more heed to the proceedings of Lady Elizabeth and the Lord Admiral.”[131] Mr. Ashley, husband of the above deponent, and also in Princess Elizabeth’s service, concurred in his wife’s opinion that the Admiral was going too far, and that the Princess was “inclined” towards him, for whenever the Admiral was mentioned “she was wont to blush to her hair-roots.” That Elizabeth herself was alarmed is proved by the fact that she told Parry, her cofferer, “that she feared the Admiral loved her but too well, and that the Queen was jealous of them both; and that Her Majesty, suspecting the frequent access of the Admiral to her, came upon them suddenly when they were alone, he having her in his arms. The Queen was greatly offended, and reproved Mrs. Ashley very sharply for her neglect of duty in permitting the Princess to fall into such reprehensible freedom of behaviour.” The scandalous conduct of her husband at last roused not only the jealousy but the apprehensions of Queen Katherine. She feared some misfortune might befall the Princess at her tender age, and felt that in such a case the blame very naturally, and not unjustly, would be cast on her; and she would be generally regarded as the author of her stepdaughter’s ruin. Very quietly, therefore, Her Majesty suggested the departure of the Princess, who was forthwith sent back to Hatfield, attended by her governess and servants. Elizabeth seems to have borne her late hostess no ill-will on account of this banishment, and a few months later we see her affectionately concerned about Her Grace’s health, and greatly rejoiced at the news that she had been safely delivered. Evidently a letter from the Admiral, received some days before the event, had assured her the expected child would be a boy, and it must have been on receiving this expression of opinion that the Princess indited the following quaint epistle to her stepmother:—
“Although Your Highness’s letters be most joyful to me in absence, yet, considering what pain it is for you to write, Your Grace being so sickly, your commendations were enough in my Lord’s letter. I much rejoice at your health, with the well liking of the country, with my humble thanks that Your Grace wished me with you till I were weary of that country. Your Highness were like to be cumbered, if I should not depart till I were weary of being with you; although it were the worst soil in the world, your presence would make it pleasant. I cannot reprove my Lord for not doing your commendations in his letter, for he did it; and although he had not, yet I will not complain of him, for he shall be diligent to give me knowledge from time to time how his busy child doth; and if I were at his birth, no doubt I would see him beaten, for the trouble he hath put you to. Master Denny and my lady, with humble thanks, prayeth most entirely for Your Grace, praying the Almighty to send you a most lucky deliverance; and my mistress [Mrs. Ashley] wisheth no less, giving Your Highness most humble thanks for her commendations. Written, with very little leisure, this last day of July.—Your humble daughter,
Elizabeth”
The phrase, “If I were at his birth, no doubt I would see him beaten, for the trouble he hath put you to,” is as quaint as any metaphor in Shakespeare. This letter was dispatched some six weeks before the Queen’s confinement. About the same time Katherine received a friendly missive from the Princess Mary, congratulating her on the rumour she hears concerning her good condition, and assuring her she will pray Almighty God to help her in her hour of hope and danger.
The unpleasant rumours as to the behaviour of “my Lord Admiral” and Elizabeth were soon well known all over London, and caused much spiteful gossip. It was currently reported that when the Princess left the Queen’s house she had betaken herself to some out-of-the-way dwelling at Hackney, where a mysterious infant had been born.[132] This story was so generally believed that it had an echo even during the great Queen’s reign. In the twenty-first year of Elizabeth (1579), a youth who appeared at Madrid asserted himself to be the Queen’s son by the Lord Admiral, and was accepted as such by the Spanish King and Court. The Lord Admiral certainly made a great impression on the young girl’s heart, for long after her accession, Elizabeth, very reticent, as a rule, concerning events connected with her childhood and youth, would, in the privacy of her closet, confide to the ladies she admitted to her intimacy that “the Lord Admiral had been the only man she had ever loved; and the handsomest she had ever seen.”
Perhaps the departure of Princess Elizabeth left the Queen more leisure to look after her other charge, the Lady Jane Grey, who had been removed from Seymour Place to the Manor House, Chelsea. Katherine, on account, it may be, of the restlessness sometimes observed in ladies in her condition, moved about a great deal during this period. Sometimes she addresses her letters from Hanworth, sometimes from Oatlands. Then, as political events rendered her husband’s position less and less secure, she determined to retire to Sudeley Castle, Seymour’s lately acquired seat in Gloucestershire, and to lie-in there. The journey from Hanworth must have been a troublesome one for a woman in her state of health. She travelled with her husband, Lady Jane Grey,[133] Lady Tyrwhitt, six other ladies, and two chaplains. She herself was in a waggon, comfortably lined and cushioned, no doubt, and with every possible precaution to ensure her comfort, but the roads were atrocious, and the journey lasted six days. Yet the weary traveller’s patience must have been amply rewarded, for Sudeley Castle in those days was one of the most splendid houses in England—a gem of Gothic architecture, furnished in the most sumptuous style. The Queen’s apartments had been fitted up with as much magnificence as she would have enjoyed if she had still been Queen-Consort of England and about to present the realm with an expected heir. Her bedchamber was hung with costly tapestry, specified, in an inventory still preserved at Sudeley, as consisting of “six fair pieces of hangings illustrating the history of the Nymph Daphne.” The bed had a tester and curtains of crimson taffeta, with a counterpoint of silk serge. There was another bed for the nurse, hung with “counterpoints of imagery to please the babe”—probably some stuff such as was common in those days embroidered with animals, birds, and little men. The outer chamber had been arranged as a day nursery, and was hung with “a fair tapestry” representing the twelve months of the year. In it was set a “chair of state” covered with cloth of gold—all the other seats were stools—and a bedstead with tester curtains and rich counterpoints, or counterpanes, as they are now called. There is still a lovely oriel window of Tudor architecture at Sudeley popularly called “the nursery window,” but this cannot be the window of the nursery that was prepared for Katherine Parr’s babe, for the inventory distinctly says “carpets for four windows in the nursery.” This other “nursery window” looks out upon one of the most lovely scenes in England—the chapel where Katherine Parr sleeps in peace after her chequered life, the garden in front of it, while beyond, the lovely green of the famous woods of St. Kenelm soften into the haze of the distant horizon.
Lady Jane’s room, beyond Queen Katherine’s, was also splendidly furnished, and adorned with tapestries representing the history of St. Catherine. The bed was hung with blue silk, and a large piece of Turkey carpet[134] covered the floor.
Queen Katherine’s life at Sudeley must have been very quiet and peaceful. Local tradition tells us that she was wont, with her young charge and her ladies, to visit the poor and take an interest in her gardens. Divine service according to the rites of the Church of England was said regularly twice a day in the beautiful chapel by one of her chaplains, Coverdale or Parkhurst, and sermons were preached at least three times a day. The Lord Admiral’s ostentatious absence from these pious exercises was a matter of great vexation to the Queen, and gave rise to a report that his Lordship was an atheist.[135]
The return of the Lord Protector from his campaign in Scotland boded no good for the Lord Admiral; the brothers had a bitter quarrel, and on this occasion it was that Seymour departed with the Queen for Sudeley. Edward had been writing to Somerset, calling him “his dearest uncle” and saying that he was well pleased with his many victories, and on the warrior’s return the Admiral found himself quite driven into the shade. However, about a month before the Queen’s confinement, he made a hurried journey to London, hoping to induce the young King to write a letter complaining of the treatment his younger uncle and the Queen were receiving from the Protector. Edward was easily persuaded to write the letter, but before the plot was thoroughly matured it was betrayed to the elder Seymour, and Thomas, arrested by the Lord Protector’s order, was taken before the Council to answer for his behaviour. Threatened with imprisonment in the Tower, he made a sort of submission to Somerset, and a hollow reconciliation took place, the Protector adding a sum of £800 per annum to Sudeley’s appointments in the hope of conciliating his unruly brother, who hurried back to Sudeley, where he felt himself comparatively safe; for so long as the Queen lived he could defy his foes, his wife’s great rank and the well-known affection entertained for her by the boy-King sufficing to screen him even from the vengeance of the infuriated head of the house of Seymour.