It may seem that, when Newcastle himself married a girl who was not an heiress, he must have lost the match-making instincts which he had inherited from his grandmother; but in justice to his memory let it be remembered that no heiresses were then to be had at the impoverished Court of the English Queen in France; and that, as Margaret’s father had been a very wealthy man, in the case of a royal restoration it was just possible that there might yet be some useful pickings.
CHAPTER XVI.
Although Queen Henrietta Maria had disapproved of Newcastle’s marriage with her maid-of-honour, she showed him considerable kindness. She invited him to a great Council which was held at St. Germains, attended by the Prince of Wales, Prince Rupert, the Marquesses of Worcester and of Ormond, the Earl of St. Albans, Lord Jermyn and others. At the Council, Newcastle[130] “delivered his sentiment, that he could perceive no other probability of procuring Forces for His Majesty, but an assistance of the Scots; But Her Majesty was pleased to answer my Lord, That he was too quick”. An unpleasant expression; but Her Majesty was quite right! For the King, unfortunately, did seek “an assistance of the Scots,” with a result only too well known.
[130] The Cavalier in Exile, p. 59.
The Queen did Newcastle a much greater service than the empty compliment of an invitation to a Council at which he was snubbed. She gave him £2000! Fortunately at that time, she still had some money. She received 12,000 crowns a month from Anne of Austria, and she obtained help from some of her relations; but she sent very large sums to her husband in England, and she made handsome donations to distressed cavaliers—such as Newcastle—in France and Belgium, selling her jewels for the same purposes. When the wars of the Fronde began, those who were helping her became in want themselves, and they could do nothing more for her. She then found herself in sore straits.
Mademoiselle de Montpensier says in her Memoirs: “The Queen of England appeared, during a little while, with the splendour of royal equipage, she had a full number of ladies, of maids of honour, of running footmen, coaches and guards. All vanished, however, by little and little, and at last nothing could be more mean than her train and appearance.” And so things went on, from bad to worse, until, about three years after the time with which we are now dealing, Cardinal de Retz found her, with her last loaf eaten, her last faggot burned, and her little daughter in bed at mid-day, because there was no fire on the hearth and snow was falling heavily.
Things were a long way from being so bad as that, however, when she gave Newcastle £2000. Having got that money, and having squeezed a little more cash out of his creditors, instead of economising, Newcastle left his lodgings and took a good house, resolving, as his wife says, “for his own recreation and divertisement in his banished condition, to exercise the Art of Mannage, which he is a great lover and Master of”. He gave £160 for one horse, and what is now vulgarly termed an “I.O.U.” for £100, for another. To estimate these prices as £480 and £300 of our money would be to undervalue them. But men in debt always seem to buy the longest-priced horses.
Soon after he had made these purchases, the Queen desired Newcastle to go to the Prince of Wales in Holland; but his ungrateful creditors made a difficulty about their debtor leaving Paris, whereupon the Queen most generously made herself responsible for his Parisian debts. On the morning of the day on which he left Paris, his creditors, says his wife, showed “so great a love and kindness for him” that they came to “take their farewell of him”. No wonder! It is easy to understand that they would be anxious, to have a few words with him—perhaps a good many words—and to come to a very clear understanding, before losing sight of him. Love and kindness indeed!