Whatever we may think of the Chancellor's advice, it was unquestionably sincere. Hyde was not the man to make a show of severity merely in order to clear himself of the suspicion of being privy to the plot. It is hardly necessary to say that, as a practical matter, his advice was extravagantly absurd. Charles's sense of humour, if nothing else, would have saved him from any such proposal. The day was gone when the machinery of English law could be used to magnify an intrigue of gallantry into the dignity of tragedy. Anne Hyde's head was perfectly safe; and had any other suggestion ever been made public it would have been laughed out of Court. Her character might, indeed, have been ruined; she might have been denied recognition as a wife; and steps might have been taken for her quiet seclusion from public life. But a State trial would have been a grotesque absurdity; and Charles was acute enough to take the frenzied advice of his honest Minister at its just value.
Meanwhile the Chancellor tried to put into operation within his own house his drastic views of parental authority. His daughter was commanded "to keep her chamber, and not to admit any visitors." Even the remonstrances of the King and the Duke of York did not avail to make him abate this exercise of his rights. It is not surprising that his severity was rendered nugatory, and that his daughter found means of admitting her husband's visits "by the administration" (as Hyde quaintly puts it) "of those who were not suspected by him, and who had the excuse, that they knew that they were married." Lady Hyde evidently thought that there were better ways of arranging matters than the dungeon and the block.
But there were other exalted personages to be placated, and they were less likely to take a lenient view. The Princess of Orange could scarcely be expected to see with equanimity her protégée and maid of honour advanced to a position superior to her own. Queen Henrietta was not apt to tolerate any invasion of her rights. Both these ladies were soon to visit England, and between them poor Anne Hyde stood little chance of a welcome within the guarded circle of royalty.
It was partly to smooth the way for the alliance, and partly out of no unnatural gratitude, that Charles now declared his intention of conferring a peerage on the Chancellor, and gave him a grant of £20,000 out of the amount which Parliament had sent to him at the Hague. Hyde had previously refused the peerage, as likely to provoke jealousy; but now the juncture seemed opportune, and he accepted it with gratitude. On November 6th, he took his seat in the House of Lords as Baron Hyde of Hindon. [Footnote: Hindon is a small village in Wilts, surrounded by down lands, and situated a few miles from Hatch House, the home of Lawrence Hyde, and from Dinton, the Chancellor's birthplace. Until the Reform Bill of 1832, it returned two members to Parliament.]
But this moderate step of advancement in no way mitigated the sense of the degradation of the alliance felt by the Princess and the Queen. Henrietta was not in the habit of veiling her feelings in any language of moderation; and her anger was shown at once, by action and by words. Once more she allowed full swing to the fury of her temper against the Chancellor, who had experienced it before. Her irritation was speedily observed, and the baser spirits that haunted the Court readily discerned and welcomed a means by which they could earn a degrading gratitude. Scandals were soon propagated against the virtue of Anne Hyde, and they were forced upon the ears of the Duke by those who were his intimate and trusted friends, and who professed themselves impelled, forsooth, by conscience and loyalty, to betray to him their own share in the infidelities of his wife. It is a picture of revolting turpitude, and not the least strange feature about it is the tolerance with which that turpitude was treated, in a society, and at a Court, where honour and manliness were professedly esteemed, and where, even if morality was little regarded, a standard of polite manners was supposed to be observed.
According to Hyde's own account, there was one man only who took upon himself the degrading task of fabricating lies which might satisfy the prejudices of the Queen, and might afford to the Duke a convenient pretext for breaking his plighted faith. This was Sir Charles Berkeley, [Footnote: Sir Charles Berkeley was the nephew of Sir John Berkeley, created Lord Berkeley of Stratton (see ante, p. 40). This Charles Berkeley received, by the doting favour of the Duke, promotion of which he was entirely unworthy. He was given high command in the Fleet, and created first Lord Hardinge, and then Earl of Falmouth. Few regretted the cannon-ball that ended, in 1665, his brief and ignoble career.]captain of the Duke's guard, and notable, even in that dissolute Court, for his pre-eminence in licentious disorder. He, at least, was prepared to publish himself in two of the most contemptible characters which human nature knows—the seducer who proclaims his stolen love, and the wretch that accepts the cast-off mistress of his patron. The author of the "Mémoires de Grammont," adds Lord Arran, [Footnote: With regard at least to Lord Arran, the son of Hyde's own chosen friend, Ormonde, we prefer to believe that the Grammont scandal is a falsehood.] Jermyn, Talbot and Killigrew—whom he characterizes as "all gentlemen of honour"—in making up a vile crew of conspirators. But whether the infamy was that of one man, or was shared amongst these gentlemen of honour, it prevailed for a time to shake the faith of the Duke, who was further persuaded, against the evidence of his own ears, that it was the Chancellor's intention to insist upon his daughter's rights, and to appeal to Parliament. That threatened opposition, the Duke met by cowardly bluster, which the Chancellor was easily able to rebuff by an indignant denial of such tales. For the injury the Duke had done him, he said, he was answerable to "One Who is as much above him as his highness was above him." The Chancellor's sense of proportion is curious, but may perhaps be condoned as of a piece with the fulsomeness of the day.
"He was not concerned," he added, "to vindicate his daughter from any of the most improbable scandals and aspersions; she had disobliged and deceived him too much for him to be over-confident that she might not deceive any other man, [Footnote: Brabantio's words were doubtless ringing in his ears: "She has deceived her father, and may thee.">[ and therefore he would leave that likewise to God Almighty, upon Whose blessing he would always depend, whilst himself remained innocent and no longer."
The Duke had the grace to see that he was in the wrong, and that, whatever the truth of Berkeley's story, he had no grievance against the Chancellor.
Anne Hyde's attraction consisted, not in personal charms, but in a sprightliness of humour, and in no inconsiderable mental gifts; and she certainly played her cards well at this juncture. When her fate was at its crisis; assailed by the vilest and most unscrupulous calumny; the object of her father's indignation, and of her husband's suspicion; the mark of the Queen's violent jealousy—she kept her head, and managed to reach harbour safely. The royal family was visited by other griefs. The Duke of Gloucester and the Princess of Orange both died of smallpox within a few days of one another. Queen Henrietta found that her comfortable return to France was unlikely, if she came back in avowed hostility with her sons. For her, even the violence of her temper never obscured what was for her personal advantage; and her jealousy of a plebeian daughter-in-law began to wane. She no longer swore that "when that woman entered Whitehall by one door, she would leave it by another." By degrees she became less obstinate; and the propagator of the scandal found that his lies were likely to cost him dear. With the changed atmosphere, Berkeley learned that safety lay in recantation; and, with undiminished shamelessness, he now sought reconciliation with the new Duchess, the victim of his doubly loathsome lies. With craven hypocrisy he represented to the Duke that these lies had been the fruit only of over-eager solicitude for his master's peace. Now that the marriage was to be recognized, he confessed the baselessness of his charges, and made his humble amends to the Duchess and her father. The Duchess received him graciously; "he came likewise to the Chancellor, with those professions that he could easily make; and the other was obliged to receive him graciously." A reconciliation was patched up between the Queen and the Chancellor. All agreed that the best must be made of what was a bad business; and the Chancellor was content to find that he could drag himself out of a degrading business with his personal honour unassailed, and that his power was confirmed by the failure of his enemies' intrigues. In April, 1661, he was raised to the further dignities of Earl of Clarendon, and Viscount Cornbury. [Footnote: Evelyn tells us "that his supporters were the earls of Northumberland and Sussex; that the Earl of Bedford carried the cap and coronet, Earl of Warwick the sword, and the Earl of Newport the mantle," The new earl did not look amongst his oldest comrades for those who were to assist him in his accession to new rank. His new title was taken from the famous Royal domain of Clarendon, near Salisbury, of which a lease had been granted to Hyde. He appears never to have held the fee simple of the manor from which he drew the title by which he is known to history.
His second title of Viscount Cornbury was taken from the Manor of Cornbury, in the Royal forest of Wychwood, in Oxfordshire, of which Clarendon was made Ranger, on August 19th, 1661. Cornbury Park had been occupied in the past by men great in English history, including Elizabeth's favourite, the Earl of Leicester. Some parts of the house date from the sixteenth century. Hyde planned, and began, large additions, which were not completed until after his death, and no part of which he ever saw. The architect was Hugh May, who was employed in the repairs of Old St. Paul's. The stone of the Cornbury quarry was of peculiar excellence, as is shown in the present fabric. May, no doubt, used the stone which he had there tested, for St. Paul's, as well as for Clarendon House, in St. James's; and this easily gave rise to the scandal that Clarendon had used the stone intended for St. Paul's for his own residence.