Mrs. Lang
The Book of Princes and Princesses
Then Inga went into the church to fast for three days and three nights, and some men fasted with her, and, twelve watched on the outside as before. But on the Wednesday before the trial was to take place Sigar, one of Skuli's men, skilled in learning, came secretly to good man Dagfinn, Hacon's liegeman, and said thus: 'I know your heart is vexed and sore because of this ordeal, but I can promise to make all things right so that the king's mother shall not suffer.'
'How mean you?' asked Dagfinn who was not minded to talk with the man, not liking his face.
'It is in this wise,' answered Sigar with a cunning look; 'I have only to rub this herb over the hand of Inga and the iron will not harm her, however hot it be.'
'I thank you,' said Dagfinn; 'but tell me what name has this herb, and where I may find it.'
'It grows on every house in Bergen,' replied Sigar, who knew well full that there was no virtue in the herb at all, but thought that Dagfinn was with him in the matter, and that together they might proclaim that Inga had sought the aid of leechcraft, and so discredit her in the eyes of all men. But Dagfinn made as though he would spring on him, and bade him begone while he kept his hands off him. After that Dagfinn told the tale to Inga, and warned her lest she should fall into any snares.
Next morning Hacon the king, and Skuli, and the archbishop, and John Earl of Orkney, and many other notable men, went into the church where the priest said the office. Then the piece of holy iron was taken from the great chest and heated in a brazier under the eyes of all, and when it glowed white, so that none could look on it, the priest drew it forth with long pincers and placed it in Inga's hand. As she took it, Hacon shivered, as if the pain had been his. He alone turned his head away; but the rest never lifted their gaze from the face of Inga, which was calm and peaceful as ever.
'It is enough,' said the priest at last, and Hacon sprang forward as if to go to his mother, when the priest stopped him. 'All is not yet finished; back to your place,' and, standing in front of Inga so that no man could behold her hand, he wound a white cloth many times round it. 'Now you may come,' said the priest, and Hacon went with his mother to her house.
For many days they waited, and then the priest sent word to Hacon the king, and Skuli the earl, and the archbishop and the bishops and the nobles, that the following evening they should meet in Christ Church, and he would unbind the hand of Inga. Not one of them was missing, and in the presence and sight of all the priest unwound the linen and stretched out the hand of Inga, and behold! the skin of that hand was whiter and fairer to see than the skin of the other. And the archbishop proclaimed a Thing to be held the next Sunday in the space in front of the church, and there he gave out how that the king's mother had won through the ordeal, and that any who from that day misdoubted Hacon's right to the crown should be laid under the ban of the Church. Also, he said that Hacon the king and Skuli the earl had made a new compact of friendship.
But compacts did not count for much with Skuli, not even when, a year later, Hacon, then fifteen, was betrothed to his daughter Margaret. In this matter the king followed the counsel of his friends, though he himself knew Skuli too well to expect that the earl would suffer a marriage or anything else to bind him. 'It will all come to the same thing, I fear,' he said to his mother, as he set out at Michaelmas for the ceremony at Drontheim. For some reason we do not know the marriage was delayed for six years, and it was not until 1225, when Hacon was twenty-one, that it actually took place. Then, after Easter, Hacon took ship at Tunsberg on the Bay, and sailed for five days till he reached Bergen. As soon as he arrived the preparations for the wedding began, and on Trinity Sunday, when the sun remains in the sky all night long in the far north, Hacon and Margaret were married in Christ Church. Afterwards great feasts were held for nearly a week in the palace. Hacon sat at the high table at the head of the men in the Yule Hall, and Margaret gathered round her the women in the Summer Hall, and the monks and abbots held a banquet in another place.
All the days that Hacon lived Margaret was a good wife to him, and wept sore for the trouble that Skuli, her father, brought on the land. For Hacon the king had been right in his prophecy, and for fifteen years Skuli never ceased from scheming against him, and murdering those that stood in his way, till even his own men grew ashamed and tired of him. Nothing was there which he held sacred, and this brought him more dishonour than all his other crimes. Once Hacon sent Ivar and Gunnar to him with letters. Warm was their welcome from Skuli, and splendid were the presents which he gave them when they left. But secretly he bade men ride after them and slay them where they could find them. Fast rode Skuli's men, but Ivar and Gunnar rode faster, for Hacon had need of them. At length they rested for the night in a farm belonging to the king, and Skuli's men, with Gaut Wolfskin and Sigurd Saltseed at their head, came unawares to the house also. As they entered they beheld Gunnar leaning against the lattice of the window, and they threw open the door and slew him where he stood, but not before many of their band lay dead upon the ground. When Ivar saw that his help could be of no avail he sprung into the loft close by, and, squeezing himself through a narrow opening, leaped to the ground and sought to take refuge in the church, but it was locked. Then he seized a ladder which was standing by and ran up it to the roof, throwing the ladder down when he reached the top. In the dark no man troubled him; but it was November, and the wind was keen, and no clothes had he upon him save a shirt and his breeches. When the sun rose he found that Skuli's men were gathered below, watching that he should not escape; but, indeed, his hands were so frozen with cold that he could have taken hold of nothing. He prayed them to grant him his life; but they laughed him to scorn, and Sigurd Saltseed seized the ladder and set it up against the church, and climbed upon it, and thrust Ivar through with a spear so that he fell dead to the ground.
Now these things displeased the people of Norway, and one by one his liegemen departed from Skuli and took service with Hacon, till at length so few followers had the earl that he was forced to fly. The Birchlegs sought him everywhere, and one day news was brought to them that he was lying hidden in a monastery, and some of his men also. So the Birchlegs came up to the monastery to attack it, but the archbishop went forth to meet them and begged that Skuli might be let pass in peace to see the king. Some listened to the archbishop, but others, whose hearts were harder, crept away and set fire to the monastery, and the fire spread. Then Skuli saw that the time for fighting was past, and, lifting up his shield, he stood in the doorway crying, 'Strike me not in the face, for not so is it done to princes'; therefore they thrust him through in the body, and he died.
But all this happened fifteen years after the marriage of Hacon, and it is no longer the concern of this tale, which treats only of his youth. At sixty years old he died, having worn the crown of Norway forty-seven years. In spite of his enemies at home, he did many things for his people, and ruled them well. The poor were mercifully dealt with, and his soldiers were forbidden to steal from either friends or foes. Churches and hospitals and great halls he built in plenty, rivers he widened and numbers of ships he had, swift sailing and water-tight, for he was overlord of lands far away over the sea. Iceland and Greenland paid their dues to him. The Isle of Man, which owned a king, did him homage, and so did the south isles of Scotland – the 'Sudar' Isles as they were called, Jura, and Islay, and Bute, and the rest – and their bishop was known as the Bishop of Sodor and Man, as he is to this day. Besides this, the friendship of Hacon was sought by many foreign princes: by the Emperor Frederick the Second, 'the Wonder of the World'; by the Grand Prince of Russia; by the Pope Innocent IV., who sent a legate to crown him king. Hacon also sent his daughter to Spain with a great dowry, to marry whichever of the king's four sons pleased her best. Still, in spite of his fame, his voyages were few, and it seems strange that he should have been seized with mortal illness at the bishop's house in Kirk wall. At first they read him Latin books, but his head grew tired, and he bade them take the scrolls away and tell him instead the tales of the Norse kings his forefathers. And so he died, and when the ice was melted and the sea set free, his body was carried to Bergen and buried in Christ Church, where he had been married and where he had been crowned.
This is the tale of Hacon the King.
MI REINA! MI REINA!
When Marie Louise d'Orléans, daughter of Madame, and niece of Louis XIV., was born, on March 27, 1662, both her grandmothers as well as her mother were terribly disappointed that she was not a boy. 'Throw her into the river,' exclaimed Madame, in fun, of course; but the queen-mother of England, the widow of Charles I., whose sorrows had crushed all jokes out of her, answered gravely that after all, perhaps, things were not quite so bad as they seemed, for by-and-by she might marry her cousin the dauphin who was only a few months older.
Quite unconscious of her cold welcome, the baby grew and thrived, and was so pretty and had such charming little ways, that they soon forgave her for being only a girl, especially as when she was two years old she had a little brother. The Duc de Valois, as he was called, was a beautiful child, strong and healthy, whereas the dauphin was always ill, and Louis XIV. had no other sons to inherit his crown. So great rejoicings were held at the Duc de Valois' birth in the château of Fontainebleau; bonfires were lighted and banquets were given, and, more than that, an allowance of money was settled on him by the king. His other uncle, Charles II., was his godfather, and the baby was given his name, with that of his father Philippe. The children lived mostly at St. Cloud, where there were splendid gardens to run about in and merry little streams to play with. When their mother drove to Paris or St. Germain to attend great balls or fêtes at Court, Madame de St. Chaumont took care of them, and saw that they did not fall into any mischief. For some time they never had an ache or a pain, but when the Duc de Valois was about two years old he was very ill, from the difficulty of cutting his teeth. Madame de St. Chaumont stayed with him and nursed him night and day till his mother could reach him; however, he soon improved, and Madame was able to go back to St. Germain, knowing that his governess would take as much care of him as she could herself. After he grew better, the great coach and six horses were got ready, and he was driven to the Palais Royal in Paris, and placed in the charge of the fashionable doctor of the day, Maître Gui Patin. But unhappily, in spite of all their precautions, the boy managed to catch cold; convulsions followed, and Monsieur insisted on preparations being made for the christening, instead of only having, as was usual, a hasty ceremony, while the public rite was commonly put off till the royal child had passed its twelfth birthday. It was on December 7, 1667, that little Philippe Charles was baptized, and the following day he had a fresh attack, and died of exhaustion, to the despair of his mother, who adored him. All the honours customary to be paid to one so near the throne were bestowed on the dead child. For three days he lay in state, and the princes of the blood, headed by the king himself, passed before him and sprinkled water on his bier. Then the people were let in, and many a woman's eyes grew wet at the sight of that beautiful baby. Three days later he was put to rest in the royal burying-place at St. Denis, near Paris.
The next few years passed peacefully away. Marie Louise was a clever little girl, and not only was fond of books, like her mother, but had sharp eyes, and noticed everything that went on round her. On wet days she danced in the rooms of St. Cloud or the Palais Royal, as Madame had danced twenty years ago at the Louvre; and when she was seven there was a small sister, Anne Marie, for her to play with and to nurse. 'She can move her fingers and toes, and squeaks without being squeezed. She is more amusing than any doll,' said Marie Louise.
But the quiet of the child's life was soon to be disturbed, and Mademoiselle was to learn her first sorrow. One morning, at the end of 1669, a messenger in the royal livery arrived from the king, bearing a letter for Madame, who burst into sobs while reading it. Dismissing the messenger with a wave of her hand – for she was unable to speak – she sank back on the sofa, and for some minutes wept bitterly. Then, gathering up her strength, she passed into the adjoining room, where Madame de St. Chaumont was sitting over her embroidery.
'Read this, my friend,' said Madame, and walked to the window. The letter, which Madame de St. Chaumont read silently to the end, was from the king. It was very short, and merely informed Madame that his Majesty had reason to think that her children's governess had been concerned in an intrigue whereby the bishop of Valence had incurred his displeasure, and he begged, therefore, that she might be at once dismissed from her post. Grieved though she was at parting from a woman who for nearly eight years had shared both her cares and her troubles, Madame had no choice but to obey, and Madame de St. Chaumont knew it. So they parted, and during the winter and spring that followed Madame missed her friend daily more and more. Then, with the bright June weather, came Madame's sudden seizure and death, and Monsieur, poor foolish, womanish man, was left with two little girls to look after.
How could he do it? Well, he began very characteristically by dressing up Mademoiselle, now eight years old, in a violet velvet mantle which trailed on the ground, and announcing that she would receive visits of condolence. Of course members of the Court and the great officials flocked in crowds, and when they had paid their respects to Mademoiselle, they were, much to their surprise, shown into the nursery where little Anne Marie, Mademoiselle de Valois, at this time hardly past her first birthday, was awaiting them. The baby was too young to be hurt by her father's follies, and as long as she had good nurses to look after her could safely be left to their care; but with Marie Louise it was different, and, luckily for her, the kind queen, Marie Thérèse, had pity on her, and took her to Court to be brought up with the dauphin. Together they danced and played, and no doubt quarrelled, but in all their games, the lively, sharp-witted little girl took the lead of the slow and rather dull boy. In a year's time Monsieur married again, and his choice fell on his dead wife's cousin, Charlotte Elizabeth, daughter of the Elector Palatine, only ten years older than Marie Louise herself. The new Madame, ugly, awkward, ill-dressed, plain-spoken, but kind-hearted and full of sense, was a great contrast to her predecessor, Henriette, but she was very good to the two little girls, and never made any difference between them and her own children. We may be sure that Marie Louise, who was gentle and sweet-tempered, as well as pretty and clever, was quick to notice all her good qualities and to be grateful for her stepmother's care and affection, though at first it was a trial to leave the court and her friend the dauphin and go and live in the Palais Royal. But then, how amusing Madame was, and what stories she could tell of 'when I was a little girl,' which was not so long ago, either!
'I longed to be a boy, and was always playing boys' games; but as I grew bigger I was not allowed so much liberty, and had to make up my mind to be a girl, and do stupid things at home, and dress up, which I hated. I was also obliged to drink tea or chocolate, which I thought very nasty. My only pleasure was hunting, and I was never so happy – I never am so happy now – as when I got up at dawn and rode away to hunt with my dogs yapping round me. How all your French ladies are so lazy I can't imagine; I can't bear to stay in bed when I am awake.' No doubt Madame made a very strange figure in the splendid Court of Louis XIV.; and she on her part looked down with scorn from the superiority of a stout riding habit and a man's wig on the beautiful, ladies with their elegant dresses and plumed hats! But the king himself was not more particular about forms and ceremonies than she was, and though her manners and free remarks often made him shudder, yet he had a real respect for her good sense, and was grateful to her for making the best of his silly brother.
MARIE LOUISE MAKES HER PETITION TO THE KING
So the years slipped by, and one day Marie Louise was seventeen, graceful and charming like her mother, with 'feet that danced of themselves,' as Madame de Sévigné said to her daughter. The dauphin was seventeen too, and in those days young men, especially princes, married early. Would the prophecy uttered over her cradle by her grandmother, Henrietta Maria, come true, and the beautiful, quick-witted girl be queen of France? The Parisians would have liked nothing better, and even the princes of the blood would have been content; she had been like a daughter to the queen, and was sure of a welcome from her; but the king – why did the king stand aloof and say nothing? Marie Louise guessed what was being whispered, and waited and wondered too, till she grew pale and thin, and Madame watched her and said angrily to Monsieur: 'Did I not warn you not to let her go to Court so much, if you did not want to make her miserable? Now she will never be happy anywhere else.'
At length the king's silence was explained. Marie Louise would never be queen of France – a German princess must be the wife of the dauphin; but she should be queen of Spain, and her husband was to be Charles II., the brother of Marie Thérèse. True, the King of Spain was ill-educated and ugly, and so stupid that some doubted if he had all his wits. He was very delicate too, and at four years old could scarcely walk or talk, and never stood without leaning on somebody. But he was lord over vast possessions, though, perhaps, he had not much real power out of Spain, and there the country was in such poverty that there was but little money passing from hand to hand. His mother, Marie Anne of Austria, had held the reins of government, but at length, aided by his half-brother, Don John, Charles suddenly banished her to Toledo, and announced that he meant to be king in fact as well as in name. His first step was to break off negotiations with the emperor, whose daughter the queen-mother had chosen for his wife. This was done under the influence of Don John, and it was he who first suggested that King Charles might look for a bride in France. The king was slow to take in new ideas, and as backward in parting with them. Don John let him alone, and did not hurry him, but he threw in his way a portrait of the princess, and contrived that he should overhear the conversation of some Spanish gentlemen who had lately returned from Paris, and were loud in praises of the lovely and fascinating Mademoiselle. Charles looked at the miniature oftener and oftener; soon he refused to part with it at all, and by-and-by began even to talk to it. Then he told Don John he would never marry any woman but this.
Soon an envoy was sent to the King of France to ask the hand of his niece, which, after the usual official delays, lasting fully nine months, was joyfully granted to him. Tales of Charles II., who was, after all, Marie Thérèse's brother, had not failed to cross the Pyrenees, and Mademoiselle's heart sank as she thought of what awaited her. Once she summoned up all her courage and threw herself at the king's feet, imploring him to let her stay in France, even though she were to remain unmarried.
'I am making you queen of Spain,' he answered; 'what more could I have done for my daughter?'
'Ah, Sire! you could have done more for your niece,' she said, turning away, for she saw it was hopeless.
Although the formal consent of Louis XIV. was not given till July 1679, King Charles had nominated the persons who were to form the household of the young queen ever since January. He had Don John continually with him, asking his advice about this and that, though he never even took the trouble to tell his mother of his marriage, and left her to learn it from common rumour. At length all was ready; the king was informed of the day that the princess would reach the frontier, and Don John was about to start for the Pyrenees, when he was seized by a severe attack of fever, and in ten days was dead. According to etiquette he lay in state for the people to visit, in the splendid dress which had been made for him to wear when he met the new queen.
It was on a little island in the middle of the river Bidassoa that Marie Louise said good-bye to France. She had thought she could not feel more pain when she had bidden farewell to the friends of her childhood – to the king and queen, to her father and stepmother, to her young sister, now ten years old, whose daughter would one day be queen of Spain too; worse than all, to the dauphin himself. Yet as long as she remained on French soil she was not wholly parted from them, and now and then a wild hope rushed through her heart that something, she did not know what, would happen, and that she might see one or other of them again. But as she entered the pavilion on the island where her Spanish attendants awaited her she knew that the links that bound her to the old life were broken, and she must make the best of that which lay before. It was a very strange Spain over which she was to reign, and she may often have dreamed that she was living in a fairy tale, and that some day her ugly king would throw off his enchanted mask and become the handsomest and most charming of princes. Spain itself really began in the old French town of Bayonne, where ladies paid visits with fat little sucking pigs under their arms, instead of being followed by long-eared spaniels, as in France. The pigs had ribbons round their necks to match their mistresses' dresses, and at balls were placed, after their entrance, in a room by themselves, while their owners danced with a grace no other nation could equal the branle, the canaris, or the sarabande. At certain times the gentlemen threw their canes into the air, and caught them cleverly as they came down, and they leapt high, and cut capers, all to the sound of a fife and a tambourine – a wooden instrument like a ship's trumpet, which was struck by a stick. As to the clothes in which the young queen was dressed by her Camarera Mayor, or chief lady of the bedchamber, on her arrival at Vittoria, Marie Louise did not know whether to laugh or to cry when she caught sight of herself in a mirror. Her hair was parted on one side, and hung down in five plaits, each tied with a bow of ribbon and a string of jewels. In winter, twelve petticoats were always worn, and though the upper one was of lace or fine embroidered muslin, one at any rate of the other eleven was of thick velvet or satin, worked in gold, while, to support the weight, which was tremendous, a huge stiff hoop was fastened on underneath them all. The dress itself was made very long, so as to conceal the feet, shod in flat, black morocco slippers. The bodice, high in front and low behind, which gave a very odd effect, was made of rich cloth of gold, and glittered with diamonds. 'But I can never move in these clothes,' said the queen, turning to the Duchess of Terranova, who knew no French and waited till the Princess d'Harcourt interpreted for her.
'In summer her Majesty the Queen of Spain will wear only seven petticoats,' replied the duchess, dropping a low curtesy; and Marie Louise gave a little laugh.
Odd as her own dress seemed, that of the old Camarera Mayor and the mistress of the maids of honour was odder still. They were both widows, and wore loose, shapeless black garments, with every scrap of hair hidden away. When they went out of doors large hats concealed their faces, and in this guise they rode on mules after their mistress, who was mounted on a beautiful Andalusian mare; As she travelled to Burgos, near which the king was to meet her, Marie Louise noticed with surprise that all the carriages were drawn by six mules, but they were so big and strong that they could gallop as fast as any horse. The reins were usually of silk or rope, and each pair was harnessed at a great distance from the next, the coachman riding on one of the first two. When she inquired why he did not sit on the box, as in France, and have postillions in front, she was told that since a coachman had overheard some state secrets discussed between Olivares and his master, Philip IV., no one had ever been allowed to come within earshot of his Majesty.
On November 20, at a small village called Quintanapalla, near Burgos, she was met by the king. Her journey had not been a pleasant one, for the Duchess of Terranova appeared to think that her position as Camarera Mayor enabled her to treat the queen as she chose, and she behaved not only with great severity, but with positive rudeness. Besides this, a dispute arose between the Duke of Osuna and the Marquis of Astorga as to who should ride nearest the queen, and, to put an end to it, Marie Louise was obliged to quit her horse and enter a carriage, surrounded, as the custom was, by curtains of shiny green cloth, which were kept drawn. Right glad was she to think that she would soon be free of this tyranny, and be with someone who wanted her – and Charles did want her to the end of her life.
It was at ten o'clock in the morning that the news was brought to her that the king had arrived. Dressed in her Spanish costume, in which she still felt awkward, she hurried to greet him, but before she reached the antechamber he was in the room. The queen tried to kneel in order to kiss his hand; but he saluted her in the Spanish manner by taking hold of her arms, looking admiringly at her, and murmuring 'My Queen! my Queen! mi reina! mi reina!' She answered in French, assuring him of her love and obedience; and he replied in Spanish, for neither knew a word of the other's language, which seems the more strange when we remember how long the marriage negotiations had lasted, and that the Queen of France, with whom Marie Louise had passed so much of her life, was herself a Spaniard. Under these circumstances, conversation is apt to come to a standstill; but, luckily, the French ambassador, the Marquis de Villars, was present as well as a number of Spanish grandees, and he was able to interpret – or perhaps to invent – everything that was suitable to the occasion. It was decided that the marriage should take place at once in the queen's antechamber, and as the archbishop of Burgos was ill, the benediction should be given by the Patriarch of the Indies, who was also grand almoner. As the king and queen knelt side by side a white ribbon was knotted round them, and a piece of white gauze fringed with silver was laid on the head of the queen and on the shoulders of the king.
After seeing a bull fight and some races at Burgos, the king and queen entered their carriage, and, with the shiny green cloth curtains drawn back, they began their drive to Madrid. It must have felt terribly long to both of them, as neither could speak to the other; but then Charles was accustomed to be silent, and Marie Louise was not. How thankful she must have been when the evening came, and she could exchange a few words with her nurse or her French maids! But she could not chatter as she would have liked to do, or the Camarera Mayor would drop the low curtesy which Marie Louise was fast growing to hate, and say, 'Her Majesty the Queen of Spain is not aware that it is past nine o'clock, and time she was in bed.' Marie Louise was not clever at languages, and had as yet picked up no Spanish; but she knew quite well that whenever her lady-in-waiting began 'Her majesty the Queen of Spain,' she must stop whatever she was doing at the moment and make ready to do something else. Her maids of honour happily soon became fond of their new mistress, and did all they could to make her like her adopted country, and some of them who knew a little French would try and explain any custom that puzzled her. The rest looked their sympathy when the old duchess had done something specially rude or disagreeable, as when, for instance, she would put her finger into her mouth and attempt to dab down the queen's curly hair into the smooth locks admired by the Spaniards!
It was from the maids of honour that Marie Louise learned to know many things about Spanish life, for she was naturally curious about what went on around her, and had little to distract her thoughts. From them she heard that no great noblemen would ever think of dismissing his servants, but, on the contrary, when any members of his family died he added all their retainers to his own. As to actual wages, the servants were paid very little; why, even the gentlemen who formed part of the household only received fifteen crowns a month, and out of that they were expected to feed themselves, and to dress in black velvet in winter and in silk in summer. But, as her Majesty would soon notice, they lived mostly on vegetables and fruit, which were cheap, and they took their meals at the public eating-houses at the corners of the streets. Her Majesty was surprised to see all the carriages drawn by mules? But in Madrid horses were coming into fashion, which were much better. The late king had been frequently painted on his horse by one Velasquez, and it had a beautiful tail, which nearly swept the ground, and a long mane decorated with ribbons. Then, if the dreaded Camarera Mayor did not happen to be present, they would begin to talk about the fashions.
