Whilst he was labouring at his impossible task, and almost despairing of success, an underhand intrigue was carried on behind his back by those who thought that his diplomatic caution stood in the way of a settlement of the affair. James badly wanted ready money in form of a dowry for his son's bride, and a guarantee that the Palatinate should be restored by the Emperor to his son-in-law, Frederick. Olivares wanted to lead England on to the slope of Catholicism, and to ensure Spain's hegemony over Europe. Gondomar, who had returned to Spain, and Buckingham, whom he had bought, wanted to gain the honour and profit of having effected so important a match. So, at Gondomar's instance, Buckingham sent his half-Spanish secretary, Endymion Porter, a late page of Olivares, to Madrid with secret orders to promise religious concessions, which, had they been known in England, would have caused serious trouble, and to hint that the Prince himself might come to Spain to fetch his bride. Porter, who was no diplomatist, saw Olivares early in November 1622, and bluntly asked for assurance that in return for the concessions promised, Spain would at once consent to the marriage and force the Emperor to restore the Palatinate to the Elector, at which Olivares haughtily scoffed, and said that, as for the match, he did not know what Porter meant.[21] Bristol soon heard of this, and quite lost heart, but he did not know that Endymion took back to London a private message from Gondomar to Buckingham, telling him that the only way to make the match was for the Prince to come suddenly to Madrid incognito and force the hands of the slow-moving diplomatists, who would be unable to draw back when the honour of England was so far pledged.
Poetic and romantic Prince Charles was soon won over to so compromising and dangerous a course; but King James wept and slobbered like a frightened infant when "Baby" and "Steenie" wrung from him unwilling permission to undertake so hare-brained an adventure.[22] Only Cottington and Porter were to go with them to Spain, and the former at least, who knew Spain well, was dead against the voyage; but Buckingham's violence gained the day. Distancing all posts, and riding for a fortnight an average of sixty miles a day, through France and over the rough mule tracks in the north of Spain, the little party pushed onwards. Cottington and Porter were distanced and left behind a day's journey from Madrid; and when the man with the valise, who gave his name as Thomas Smith, entered Lord Bristol's study, and, throwing aside his cloak and hat, disclosed the handsome face of "Steenie," the Marquis of Buckingham, the King's favourite, the ambassador was in dismay, increased almost to terror when he learnt that the Prince of Wales, the only son of King James, masquerading under the name of John Smith, was holding the horses on the other side of the dark street.[23]
Charles and Buckingham
What was to be done? The presence of the heir of England could not be hidden for many hours from gossiping Madrid, for the couriers from Paris, where he had been recognised, were following close upon his heels. A voyage to Spain in those days was a far greater adventure than an expedition to Thibet would be now, and the temerity, nay the foolhardiness, of putting such a pledge as the Prince of Wales unconditionally in the hands of the Spaniards, who if they chose to detain him could exact what terms they liked as the price of his safe return, struck the harassed ambassador with alarm. "My Lord Bristol in a kind of astonishment brought him (i.e. Prince Charles) up to his chamber, where he presently called for pen and ink, and despatched a post that night to England to acquaint his Majesty how in less than sixteen days he was come safely to the Court of Spain."[24]
After grave discussion in Bristol's room, it was decided to send at once for Gondomar, to whom, as Buckingham well knew, the arrival of the Prince would cause no surprise. It was past nine o'clock at night when Gondomar entered the "house with the seven chimneys," full of glee at the success of his bold diplomacy; and not long afterwards he was at the door of Olivares' rooms' in the palace, anxious to give to the favourite the first news of the great event. The Count-Duke was seated at supper as Gondomar entered the apartment. The famous Spanish ambassador in England owed much of his success to the assumed bluff jocosity with which he was wont to cover his cunning; but when he bounced into the Count-Duke's supper chamber on this occasion, he was so exuberant in his joy that grave Olivares looked up in surprise, and said: "Ah, Count! what brings you here at such an hour as this? You look as jolly as if you had the King of England himself in Madrid." "If we have not the King," chuckled Gondomar, "we have the next best thing to him,—the Prince of Wales."[25]
Olivares was far from sharing Gondomar's delight. To him the news meant infinite anxiety, danger, and expenditure; for not only must the Prince be entertained lavishly, but somehow he must be got rid of without marrying the Infanta, and if possible without a national war with England for the slight put upon the Prince. The Count-Duke hurried to the King's apartments with the great news, and Philip was as much taken aback as his minister, for young as he was he fully understood the gravity of the situation. One thing, however, he was quite determined upon. Already the adulation of which he had been made the object, and the high hopes aroused by the new measures and men that had been introduced upon his accession, had convinced the lad he was the heaven-sent instrument destined to restore to Spain its proud supremacy over a united Christendom, and religious exaltation had claimed him henceforth for its own, however ungodly his daily life might be. When Olivares had laid before him the difficulties that arose from the unexpected descent of Charles Stuart upon them, Philip rose, and walking to where a figure of Christ crucified hung at the head of his bed, he kissed the feet of the figure, and burst out into the following impassioned oath: "O Lord! I swear to Thee by the human and divine alliance crucified that in Thee I adore, and upon whose feet I seal this pledge with my lips, that not only shall the coming of this Prince be powerless to make me concede one point in the matter of the Catholic religion, not in accordance with what Thy Vicar the Pontiff of Rome may resolve, but even if I were to lose all the realms I enjoy, by Thy grace I will not give way a single iota." Then turning to Olivares (who says that this was one of the only two oaths he ever knew the King to take), Philip told him they must nevertheless fulfil the duties of hospitality that the Prince had thrown upon them.[26]
For the greater part of that night the minister worked hard laying out all the plans for the entertainment of the Prince, and for avoiding without giving mortal offence the marriage he sought. At eight o'clock next morning a meeting of high councillors, with Gondomar and the King's confessor, met in the Count-Duke's room in the palace, the result of their deliberations, being highly characteristic: namely, "first, to offer public prayers to God in thanks for the event, and in supplication for His guidance"; and secondly, to instruct Gondomar to sound Buckingham and Cottington (who was expected to arrive that day) as to how far the King of England might be squeezed, "in order to bring this visit to be a great and very signal service to the Church."[27]
Olivares meets Buckingham
A dozen knotty points of etiquette had to be settled, and Gondomar was busy all day speeding backward and forward between the palace and the "house with the seven chimneys";[28] but at last it was arranged that the pride of Olivares should be saved from making the first visit, by the device of an apparently chance meeting with Buckingham. Already Madrid was agog with the news that some great personage, the King of England some said, had arrived in disguise; and when, late on Saturday afternoon, the great swaying gilded coach of Olivares, with its leather curtains, its six gaudily decked mules, and its crowd of liveried servants and pages around it, was seen threading the green alleys of the gardens below the palace on the banks of the Manzanares, all the idlers on "Liars Walk" knew that the Count-Duke was going to meet, "by chance," the Admiral of England, the favourite of his King. When the carriages met, Olivares alighted and greeted Buckingham half-way between their coaches, where, with carefully arranged politeness and high-flown compliments, as false as they were pompous, the great Guzman first measured his strength with brilliant, rash, unscrupulous George Villiers.
After many professions of delight on both sides, the Count-Duke entered the English coach with Buckingham, Bristol, and Cottington, and for an hour they drove in close confabulation. On their return they entered the palace gateway, and Olivares secretly led Buckingham into the King's presence, where again the compliments were repeated. There is no doubt that the Spaniards, from the King downward, were flattered with the embarrassing visit, which was a patent proof, it was proudly claimed, of the reality of Spain's regained power and superiority under the new régime, when the heir of England came wooing her at so great a risk. So Philip was all smiles to Buckingham; and when the latter returned to the "house with the seven chimneys," Olivares insisted upon accompanying him to greet the Prince personally in the King's name, the Spanish narratives say that the Count-Duke performed his part with all the dignity and splendour characteristic of him; but Howel, who was in Madrid at the time, and knew Porter well, writes that the Count-Duke "knelt, and kissed his (i.e. the Prince's) hands and hugged his thighs, and delivered how immeasurably glad his Catholic Majesty was at his coming, and other high compliments, which Mr. Porter did interpret."[29]
During the interview Charles expressed his ardent desire to see his lady love, the Infanta—"to discover the wooer," as Buckingham called it; and it was agreed that on the next day, Sunday, 9th March, the coaches of the royal family should parade the Prado, where the Infanta should be distinguished by a blue ribbon tied round her arm; and the Prince in Bristol's coach might meet the royal party as if by chance, and incognito. Little enough of incognito there was about the affair, when, at four o'clock in the afternoon the ambassador's coach with the Prince, Buckingham, Aston, Gondomar, and Bristol in it, stood in the narrow street of the Puerta de Guadalajara in the Calle Mayor to await the coming of the King's party. Every foot of the streets was crowded with sightseers, and the pride and joy of the show-loving Madrileños knew no bounds. By and by the long line of coaches accompanying the King rumbled by, and at last young Philip with his pretty dark-eyed girl wife, his two young brothers, Carlos and Fernando, almost exact replicas of himself, with their lank sandy hair, their long white faces, thick red lips, under-hung jaws and great pale eyes. In the door-seat of the carriage sat the Infanta Maria. She was much like her brothers: "a very comely lady, rather of Flemish complexion than Spanish, fair haired, and carrying a most pure mixture of red and white in her face. She is full and big lipped, which is held a beauty rather than a blemish."[30] As the King's carriage passed that of the Prince, Philip, who was not supposed to see Charles, bowed low, as did his brothers, to Lord Bristol; but it was noticed that the Infanta first flushed and then turned deadly pale as her lover's eyes fell upon her.
The poor girl, indeed, was getting seriously alarmed. She was, of course, devout and ignorant. To her heretics were an abomination, and the prospect of living amongst such was worse than death. Her monkish confessor painted in lurid colours the horror of the fate that threatened her; worse than hell it was, he said, to lie by a heretic's side, and bear heretic children. Only that morning she had sent her confidential lady, Margaret Tavara, to Olivares, passionately protesting against the marriage being seriously negotiated. She would, she said, take refuge in the Convent of the Discalced Carmelites, and assume the nun's veil the moment she heard that the capitulations were signed. Charles on his part appears to have been really smitten with the pink and white charms of the little lady, and played the eager wooer well. The Prince and Buckingham writing to their "Dear Dad and Gossip" (the King) calls this first meeting "a private obligation hidden from nobody; for there was the Pope's Nuncio, the Emperor's ambassador, the French, and all the streets filled with guards and other people. Before the King's coach went the best of the nobility, after followed by the ladies of the Court. We sat in an invisible coach, because nobody was suffered to take notice of it, though seen by all the world."[31] The cavalcades then wended their ways by different roads to the Prado, where, parading up and down, the Prince had several opportunities of looking upon his blushing sweetheart. Soon Olivares came and entered the Prince's coach; and again fulsome compliments passed as they drove back to the English embassy.[32]
Buckingham, indeed, was fairly dazzled and deceived, for both he and Charles believed now that the match was as good as completed. Alas! they did not know Olivares or Spanish methods so well as Bristol did.
"Steenie's" letter to James I.
"If we can judge by outward shows," wrote Charles and Steenie to the King, "or general speeches, we have reason to condemn your ambassadors for rather writing too sparingly than too much. To conclude, we find the Conde de Olivares so overvaluing our journey, he is so full of real courtesy, that we can do no less than beseech your Majesty to write the kindest letter of thanks and acknowledgment you can unto him. He said, no later to us than this morning, that if the Pope would not give a dispensation for a wife they would give the Infanta to thy Baby as his wench,[33] and hath this day written to Cardinal Ludovico, the Pope's nephew, that the King of England hath put such an obligation upon this King in sending his son hither, that he entreats him to make haste of the dispensation, for he can deny nothing that is in his kingdom.... The Pope's Nuncio works as maliciously and as actively as he can against us, but receives such rude answers that we hope he will soon weary on't. We make this collection that the Pope will be very loth to grant a dispensation, which, if he will not do, then we would gladly have your directions how far we may engage you in the acknowledgment of the Pope's special power, for we almost find, if you will be contented to acknowledge the Pope as chief head under Christ, that the match will be made without him."[34]
It is difficult to know what to condemn most in this astounding letter,—whether the simplicity that made Buckingham so easy a dupe of Olivares' soft speeches, or the proposal at the end, which, as the reply shows, was too much even for King James, that the latter should abandon the main condition upon which he held the Protestant crown of England. It is clear that the intention of Olivares was to cast upon the Pope the whole of the blame for the failure of the match, and this, at least from the Spanish point of view, was a statesmanlike policy, although the full falsity of it is evident to us now that we have before us the communications that passed between Madrid and Rome on the subject.[35]
Charles in Madrid
Leaving Charles at the embassy after the drive, Olivares and Buckingham, with Porter as their interpreter, re-entered a coach and drove off in the gathering darkness to the gardens behind the palace, to arrange the details of the coming private interview to be held that night between Philip and the English Prince. Whilst the coach, with Olivares and Buckingham, was in the green alleys of the garden, a man, unaccompanied, with his cloak masking his face, and sword and buckler by his side, was seen walking towards them. "This is the King," said Olivares, to Steenie's intense astonishment. "Is it possible," exclaimed Buckingham, "that you have a King who can walk like that? What a marvel!" and, leaping from the carriage, he knelt and kissed the young King's hand. Entering the coach again, the party, accompanied now by the King, were driven through the quiet streets of the unlit capital, for it was ten o'clock at night, to the Prado, where the Prince, with Gondomar, Bristol, Aston, and Cottington, in another coach, awaited their coming. Descending and embracing warmly, the King and Prince then re-entered the carriage with Bristol alone, and for more than half an hour discoursed amiable banalities in the darkness under the overhanging trees of the promenade.
Thenceforward Buckingham and Olivares by agreement changed offices, the former constituting himself chief equerry in waiting to Philip, whilst Olivares attended Prince Charles. In pursuance of this idea, the suite of apartments in the palace occupied by Olivares as master of the horse were hastily prepared with great magnificence for the occupation of the English Prince; and whilst their redecoration and furnishing were being accomplished, Charles was invited to transfer his lodging to the rooms in the monastery of St. Geronimo in the Prado, to which the Kings of Spain usually retired in times of mourning, and previous to state entries to the capital, an invitation which he did not accept.
In the week that followed the first meeting of Charles and his host, until Sunday the 16th March,[36] which was the day fixed for his public entry into the city, Madrid was astir with excitement. The pragmatic decrees recently promulgated forbidding starched and fluted ruffs, embroidered dresses, and the use of gold in tissues, and generally suppressing extravagance of living, were all suspended by proclamation during the visit of the Prince; the streets were ordered to be swept and garnished, and the houses on the line of route richly adorned; and Madrid, by the morning of the day fixed for the public entry, had covered its squalor and dirt by an overcoating of finery. All the gaols, too, were emptied of prisoners, by way of welcoming the English guest.[37]
In the week of waiting Charles sought permission to visit Philip privately in return for the interview in the Prado on Sunday night, and he and Buckingham gave the following account of the meeting to their "Dear Dad and Gossip."
"The next day your Baby desired to kiss the King's hand privately in the palace, which was granted, and thus performed. First, the King would not suffer him to come to his chamber, but met him at the stair-foot, then entered into the coach and walked in his park. The greatest matter that passed between them was compliments, ... and then by force he would needs convey him (i.e. Charles) half way home, in which doing they were both almost overthrown in brick pits. Two days after we met his Majesty again in his park with his two brothers; they spent their time in seeing his men kill partridges flying and conies running with a gun."[38]
In the meanwhile the people with pride and delight had quite satisfied themselves that the coming of the Prince meant the intended conversion of himself to Catholicism and the return of England to the fold of the Church,[39] and Olivares pressed this point so persistently and publicly upon Charles, that Buckingham himself began to take fright. He noticed that whenever the Count-Duke found himself near Charles, which indeed was continually, he turned the conversation towards the Catholic religion. Charles was young, the son of a Catholic mother, and was certainly for the time smitten by the Catholic Infanta: his father had professed himself Catholic again and again; and at this moment was writing thus to his "Sweet boys": "I send you, my Baby, two of your fittest chaplains for this purpose, Mawe and Wren, together with all stuff and ornaments fit for the service of God. I have fully instructed them, so as all their behaviour and service shall, I hope, prove decent and agreeable to the service of the primitive Church; and yet as near the Roman form as can lawfully be done; for it hath ever been my way to go with the Church of Rome usque ad aras." But whatever may have been the tendencies of Charles himself, Buckingham in his saner moments, and certainly Bristol, must have seen the pitfall laid for the Prince, and thus early, in the midst of all the complimentary billing and cooing before the state entry, the young adventurers began to realise the difficulty of the task, which looked so easy from a distance.
On the day following the state entry, Charles and Buckingham wrote to the King—
"For our chief business, we find them by outward shows as desirous of it as ourselves, yet they are hankering upon a conversion; for they say that there can be no firm friendship without union in religion, but they put no question in bestowing their sister, and we put the other quite out of the question, because neither our conscience nor the time serves for it."[40]
Delay, as they said, was the worst denial; for King James was in a hurry,—in a hurry to get his heir married, in a hurry for the Infanta's dowry, and in a hurry to get the Palatinate back for his son-in-law; and as yet the priests were still squabbling over the dispensation in Rome, and Olivares, equally with his master, was determined to delay until either England became practically Catholic, or the English themselves broke off the negotiations by refusing the terms upon which Rome, prompted by the Spanish agents, alone would consent to the match. This, indeed, as Olivares saw, was the only slender chance of preventing war with England, and to avoid throwing James into the arms of France.
[1] Novoa, who was present at the scene described, Documentos Ineditos, lxi.
[2] Especially Gil Blas, Guzman de Alfarache, Marcos de Obregon, Estevanillo Gonzales, and El Diablo Cojuelo.
[3] This was constantly denied by his many enemies, but original documents, to which I shall refer later, will prove that in this as in so many other things they did him an injustice, whatever his real aim might have been.
[4] Cambridge Modern History, vol. iv. "Spain," by Martin Hume.
[5] Fragmentos Historicos MSS., by Vera y Figueroa, also Novoa, and Yañez,; and Relazioni degli Ambassciatori Veneti, British Museum MSS., Add. 8701.
[6] Discursos y Apuntamientos, by Lison y Biedma, a member of this Parliament. (Secretly printed book of the period in my possession, which gives a sad picture of affairs.)
[7] There are two letters in Cabala—the first from Philip to Olivares, and the second the minister's reply to the King—which show that there was never any intention on their part of carrying the English match through. The long letter from Olivares to the King is an adaptation of a Spanish original which is well known, and to which I shall refer later, proposing the marriage of Charles with the Emperor's daughter; but the King's letter which produced Olivares' reply is not, to my knowledge, printed elsewhere.
"The King my father declared at his death that his intention never was to marry my sister the Infanta Doña Maria with the Prince of Wales, which your uncle Don Baltasar well understood; for he so treated this match with an intention to delay it, notwithstanding it is so far advanced that, considering with all the averseness unto it of the Infanta, it is high time to seek some means to divert the treaty which I would have you discover, and I will make it good whatsoever it may be; but in all other things procure the satisfaction of the King of Great Britain, who hath deserved very much, and it shall content me, so that it be not the match." This must have been written before Charles' arrival in Madrid.
[8] Nearly all foreigners who visited Madrid during the reign of Philip IV. remarked the extraordinary liberty which existed in the demeanour of the women, even ladies of high birth and position, no doubt a reaction from the conventual strictness with which they had been kept during the two previous reigns. There is no need to multiply authorities; but the following passage, from the report of the Venetian ambassador in Spain at the time of Olivares' fall, will give an idea of the prevailing laxity—even in the royal entourage. "In the royal palace the gentlemen are permitted to carry on with the ladies of the Queen the relations they call 'gallanting,' in which lavishness, ostentation, and expenditure are carried to such an extraordinary excess as to be beyond belief, although here it is considered the most ordinary thing in the world, for rivalry and competition do away with all moderation. Those who go the greatest lengths are held in the highest esteem, not only by the courtiers in general, but also by the royal personages, who make quite a recreation of hearing the accounts of the presents given and attentions paid to them, that the ladies narrate daily to their Majesties." British Museum MS., Add. 8701.
[9] Address; by J. E. Hartzenbusch, Transactions of the Royal Spanish Academy, 1861.
[10] It is fair to say that this story depends upon the very untrustworthy evidence of Mme. D'Aulnoy.
[11] The tradition that this was the case existed from the first, and has never been lost; although most of the stories of the relations of Villa Mediana with the Queen are quite unsupported by serious contemporary evidence. Lord Holland, in his Lope de Vega, says that only a few days after Philip's accession, the Prime Minister Zuñiga, Olivares' uncle, warned Villa Mediana that his life was in danger. The tradition that Philip was involved in the murder from motives of jealousy is too firm and long-standing to be ignored, though whether his jealousy concerned his wife is very doubtful.
[12] Transcripts (contemporary) of these letters, etc., to which reference will be made later, are in British Museum, Egerton MSS. 338.
[13] Historia del Arte Dramatica en España, from the German of A. F. Schack.
[14] Especially in the MS. of the Royal Academy of History, Madrid by Soto y Aguilar, one of the courtiers and writers of the time, and in the MS. at the National Library at Madrid (M. 299) called Noticias de Madrid. These are contemporary news letters from 1621 to 1627.
[15] From the Soto y Aguilar MS. already mentioned.
[16] This was a narrow street forming part of the line of the Calle Mayor, in which it is now incorporated. It is quite close to the other three courses.
[17] A tremendous and costly monastic house (of which the church still stands in the Calle Mayor) upon which Philip III. and his wife had squandered incredible sums.
[18] This is very Spanish. The whole of the company had been ordered to be ready mounted at one o'clock, and yet the royal guard which was to keep the space and maintain order did not appear until an hour later, the maskers of course coming later still.
[19] In a document quoted on page 51, it will have been noticed that Philip refers to the match as being one that it was necessary to avoid, even at the cost of a war with England. In a notable document in Spanish in the British Museum (MSS. Add. 14,043), reproduced by the Camden Society under the editorship of Dr. Gardiner (El Hecho de los Tratados de Matrimonio, etc.), there is a long memorandum written by Olivares for Philip's information in 1622, proposing as a way out of the difficulty the marriage of the Infanta to the son of the Emperor, the marriage of the Prince of Wales with the Emperor's elder daughter, and the betrothal of the Palatine's eldest son Maurice to the second daughter on condition that the Prince was sent to Vienna to be brought up as a Catholic, the Palatinate being restored to him after his marriage. This solution, however, it is quite evident, would have been unacceptable to James for many reasons. In any case it is quite clear that when Charles appeared in Madrid, Olivares had no intention of allowing the Infanta to marry him, unless indeed England became Catholic.
[20] The Earl of Bristol's defence. Camden Society Miscellany, vol. vi.
[21] A very interesting and, as I believe, unpublished contemporary manuscript account of the proceedings of Charles and Buckingham in Madrid, and of the events that followed their return to London, so far as regards the Spanish match, has been brought to my notice whilst this chapter is being written. The manuscript, evidently an original, appears to have been the work of someone who accompanied the Prince in his journey. Many expressions in it are the same as those which I have quoted from other sources, especially from certain letters of Endymion Porter in the Record Office, and from those of Buckingham to the King, most of which were written by Porter. I am therefore led to the conclusion that this interesting new document, which is the property of Dr. Rosedale of the Royal Society of Literature, is the work of Endymion Porter. I am informed that it will shortly be published by the Society.
[22] Clarendon, Great Rebellion.
[23] Howel's Familiar Letters. Howel was in Madrid at the time.
[24] Howel's Familiar Letters.
[25] Fragmentos Historicos de la Vida de Caspar de Guzman, etc. MS. by Count de la Roca in my possession.
[26] Fragmentos Historicos, etc. MS. by Count de la Roca, the great friend and confidant of Olivares.
[27] Hecho de los Tratados, etc., British Museum MS., Add. 14,043, and Camden Society.
[28] Gondomar had been raised to the Council of State during the early morning sitting, and on his first visit that day (Saturday) to the English embassy he came rushing to the Prince in his usual boisterously jocose fashion, saying that he had a strange piece of news to convey. "An Englishman had been sworn a Privy Councillor of Spain," meaning, as Howel (who tells the story) says, himself, who, he professed, was an Englishman at heart. This was the kind of joke by which he had managed to dominate King James.
[29] Familiar Letters. The sequence of events, meetings, etc., as given in Life and Times of James I., is untrustworthy.
[30] Howel.
[31] Hardwicke, State Papers. Charles and Buckingham to the King.
[32] We are told that on this occasion Olivares, notwithstanding the Prince's remonstrance, insisted upon taking the humble seat at the carriage doorstep; and that throughout the whole visit he treated Charles with the same honours as he did the King, kneeling when he spoke to him, kissing his hand, etc. Charles, on the other hand, appears to have been equally polite to Olivares; but Buckingham soon got tired of an attitude so unusual to him, and behaved himself with extraordinary rudeness and ill-breeding, as will be told later. Hecho de los Tratados, etc.
[33] Lord Bristol, in his defence (Camden Miscellany, vi.) gives an account of a conversation in the coach when the Prince, Bristol, Gondomar, Olivares, Buckingham, and Aston were waiting for the royal party to pass on the Sunday referred to in the text. This shows how entirely Olivares had convinced them all of his sincerity. Gondomar in boastful mood had asked Olivares if he was not justified now in all he had written from England about the real desire of King James for the marriage; and whether Bristol and himself had not proved themselves honest men. "Yes," replied Olivares, "you may both say your Nunc Dimitis now, and trouble no more about it, except to claim the reward of success." No blame, he said, could attach to them in any case.
[34] Hardwicke, State Papers.
[35] Hecho de los Tratados, etc. B.M. MSS. Add. 14,043.
[36] The dates given throughout are old style, according to the English calendar of the time. The Spanish dates are ten days later.
[37] MSS. Soto y Aguilar.
[38] Hardwicke, State Papers.
[39] Most of the poets and poetasters of the Court were convinced of this, and the romantic love-making of the Prince, who for the sweet eyes of the Infanta was to make England Catholic, inspired many verses. Howel sends to a friend in England one stanza of such a poem written at this time, he says by Lope de Vega—
Carlos Estuardo, soy,
Que siendo amor mi guia.
Al cielo de España voy.
Par ver mi estrella Maria.
Charles Stuart, here am I,
Guided by love afar
Into the Spanish sky,
To see Maria my star.
Gongora's fine sonnet, translated by Churton, is worth quoting entire—
Fair from his cradle springs the star of day,
Rock'd on bright waves fair sinks his parting light:
Such be thy course, in sunlike beauty bright,
Daughter of kings and born to be as they.
The world's majestic wonder. Lo! thy ray
Hath called a royal bird, in venturous flight,
From realms where keen Arcturus fires by night
The polar skies: from regions far away
He wheels on swiftest wing: within thy sphere
Secure his bold eye drinks the soft clear fires.
Now Heaven and Love be kind; and both ordain
What time his suit shall win thy beauty's ear.
The Northern Eagle won with chaste desires,
By Truth's pure light may live to God again.
[40] Hardwicke, State Papers.
STATE ENTRY OF CHARLES INTO MADRID—GREAT FESTIVITIES—HIS LOVE-MAKING—ATTEMPTS TO CONVERT THE PRINCE—THE REAL INTENTION OF OLIVARES—HIS CLEVER PROCRASTINATION—CHARLES AND BUCKINGHAM LOSE PATIENCE—HOWEL'S STORY OF CHARLES AND THE INFANTA—THE FEELING AGAINST BUCKINGHAM—ANXIETY OF KING JAMES—HIS CORRESPONDENCE WITH "BABY AND STEENIE"—CHARLES DECIDES TO DEPART—FURTHER DELAY—THE DIPLOMACY OF OLIVARES—BUCKINGHAM AND ARCHY ARMSTRONG—DEPARTURE OF CHARLES—HIS RETURN HOME, AND THE ENGLISH DISILLUSION
All being ready for the public entry of Charles on Sunday, 16th, the Prince, though he declined the invitation to sleep the previous night at the monastery of St. Geronimo, as was customary with Spanish sovereigns who entered the capital in state, went thither early in the morning, and was entertained at a sumptuous banquet by the Count Gondomar, as near as he could manage it in English fashion. Then, as was also the usage with Spanish sovereigns, all the members of the numerous Councils and juntas rode in full state, accompanied by their officers and escorts, to pay their respects to the Prince. Charles received this glittering crowd, numbering some hundreds, standing by a velvet-covered table beneath a canopy of silver tissue in the royal apartment of the monastery, the empty throne being behind him, and the walls of the chambers covered with rich hangings and pictures, amongst which were portraits of King James and his councillors. As each pompously named official knelt and begged permission to kiss the Prince's hand, Charles gracefully threw his arms upon their shoulders instead, and raised them from the ground.[1] The impression generally produced by the Prince now and during his stay was excellent, and it was noticed throughout that he never took advantage, as Buckingham and the crowd of noisy English courtiers who soon arrived in Spain did, of the Spanish politeness which places everything at the disposal of a guest. The behaviour of these courtiers, indeed, and especially Buckingham's insolence, very soon produced disgust amongst the grave, courteous Spaniards.
The state entry
At midday, when the councils had retired and taken their places on the line of route, a flourish of drums and pipes heralded the coming of the Spanish Guard in orange and scarlet to the monastery, followed by the German Guard, in crimson satin and gold with white sleeves and plumed caps; then came the municipality of Madrid, with a great following of town officers dressed in orange satin with silver spangles. Nobles and princes followed in pairs, led by Prince Edward of Portugal and the Count of Villamor, each pair of high gentlemen resplendent in satin, velvet and gold, jingling and flashing on their showy Andalusian horses. Following these and a hundred other ostentatious groups, the mention of which would fill pages, King Philip left his palace as the great clock in the courtyard—one of the marvels of Madrid—struck the hour of one, and reached a side door of the monastery in his coach by a circuitous route. Until three o'clock Charles and Philip chatted in friendly converse, and then the signal was given for the cortege to start, the King and Prince mounting their horses at the same moment.
The drums, pipes, clarionets, and trumpets led off followed by judges, officials, courtiers, and nobles, heralds, guards, pages, lacqueys, and grooms by the hundred, upon whose grand dresses Soto y Aguilar dwells with tedious minuteness. Then came the King and the Prince, under a canopy of white damask and gold, mounted upon silver poles borne by six officers of the corporation, the Prince riding on the right hand of his host. They must have looked a gallant pair, for they were mere youths, and both fine horsemen. Olivares and Buckingham side by side followed them, and then came a great troop of Spanish grandees with the English ambassadors and officers. Through the streets, decked lavishly, and crowded with cheering people, flattered at the coming conversion of England by means of Spain the cavalcade rode by the Puerta del Sol and Calle Mayor to the ancient Alcazar upon the cliff, which looks across the arid plain to the snow-capped Guadarramas. On the line of route national dances and the eternal comedies were played until the Prince approached, when special dances were performed in his honour, at which, we are told, he was much delighted. Upon entering the palace the King himself conveyed the Prince to his apartments, and surpassed himself in courtly welcome to his guest; and that same night the Queen sent to the Prince a great present of white linen for table use and personal wear, with a rich dressing gown and toilet paraphernalia in a scented casket with gold keys.[2] It was all as Howel wrote, "a very glorious sight to behold, for the custom of the Spaniard is, tho' he go plain in his ordinary habit, yet upon some great festival or cause of triumph there's none goes beyond him in gaudiness."[3]
The next day the municipality of Madrid celebrated a royal bull-fight on a scale of magnificence rarely approached. The great Plaza Mayor of Madrid, 340 feet square, was surrounded by stagings, and every one of the hundreds of balconies of the high houses overlooking the plaza was hung with crimson silk and gold, and filled with noblemen and ladies whose names were as splendid as the clothes, of which Solo y Aguilar[4] spares us no detail. The royal balcony was erected on the first floor of the municipal bakery (still standing), and must have been a mass of crimson and cloth of gold, with its hangings, its canopies, its curtains, and its balustrades. Every council and board, and under Olivares they were infinite, had its special tribune. Nobles, officials, officers, and foreign representatives, all of whose fine garb the literary quarter-master details for us until his description produces but a vague impression of sumptuous stuffs without end, smothered in bullion, arrived in procession to occupy their places as spectators or actors in the glittering show. The English visitors were accommodated in a special stand occupying the opening of the Street of Bitterness (Calle de Amargura), which gave rise to much satirical comment. When all was ready, and around the vast plaza a packed mass of bedizened humanity had assembled, the royal coaches entered and drove around the arena to the central entrance of the Queen's balcony before the bakehouse. Here Isabel alighted, dressed, we are told, like the Infanta, who accompanied her, in brown silk embroidered with gold, and covered with gems, the plumes of their jaunty toques being white and brown, sprinkled with diamonds. With them came the two Infantes, Carlos, in black velvet and gold, with diamond chains and buttons, and the boy Cardinal Infante Fernando, in the purple of his ecclesiastical rank. Behind them came scores of ladies, and then officers of the Guards, and finally a "great company of Spanish and English gentlemen, courtiers, grandees, and attendants."
The Prince of Wales was very beautifully dressed in black with white plumes, and was mounted on a bright bay horse, whilst the King, also in sober brown, for it was Lent, rode a silver grey charger, "both horses showing by their majestic port that they were conscious of the preciousness of their burdens." After them rode the Admiral of England (i.e. Buckingham) and the Count of Olivares, with the English ambassador, councillors of state, gentlemen-in-waiting, and archers of the guard.... The Queen and Infanta sat in the right-hand balcony, and separated only by a rail from them in the next balcony were Don Carlos, the King, the Prince of Wales, and the Cardinal Infante Don Fernando; the Marquis of Buckingham, the Count of Olivares, and the other English and Spanish gentlemen being in the balcony on the left. The trumpets sounded, and when a hundred lacqueys, in brown jerkins and floating silver ribbons, had cleared the arena, the Duke of Cea pranced in on a grey horse, preceded by fifty lacqueys in doublets of cloth of silver and fawn-coloured breeches, wearing silver thread caps, and followed by a group of famous bull-fighters. The Duke bowed low before the royal balcony, whereupon Prince Charles uncovered. Then came the Duke of Maqueda, with his gallant party, who performed the same courtly ceremony as the Duke of Cea, "looking like a Cæsar," as Soto y Aguilar says. And so noble after noble, each with his glittering train of mounted gentlemen and host of servants, passed before the King and his English guest, until, in the written description of the scene, gorgeous fabrics, fine colours, and precious metals seem to lose their separate significance, so lavish is the repetition of them.
Then came the many bulls, each despatched by a grandee's spear (rejon); many hairbreadth escapes being recorded, but no noble killed. When the feast was ended the rain was falling heavily, and we are told by the courtly chronicler "that amidst the falling torrents there fell a torrent of pages with torches who inundated with light the realms of darkness." It would be tedious to give particulars of the many such shows provided for Prince Charles, but at one subsequent bullfight, more splendid still, described by Soto, no less than twenty bulls were done to death by noble bull-fighters on horseback, and prodigality itself ran riot to show the English Prince how rich Spain was.
For three days more the rejoicings of the State entry of Charles went on day and night: comedies, music, cane tourneys, and illumination and fireworks continuing without cessation. Even Buckingham was dazzled, extravagant as he was, and he says in his letter to the King—
They "made their entry with as great a triumph as could be, where he (Philip) forced your Baby (Charles) to ride on his right hand.... This entry was made just as when the Kings of Castile came first to the crown, all prisoners set at liberty, and no office nor matter of grace falls but is put into your Baby's hands to dispose of.... We had almost forgotten to tell you that the first thing they did at their arrival in the palace was to visit the Queen, where grew a quarrel between your Baby and lady for want of a salutation; but your dog's (i.e. Buckingham's) opinion is that it is an artificial forced quarrel to beget hereafter greater kindness."
Charles in love
But in this letter, written the day after the state entry, when the municipality were offering as a present to Buckingham the costly canopy that had served in the ceremony,[5] the flustered visitors forgot to tell the King how his "Baby" liked the Infanta, whom he had now seen at close quarters for the first time, and a hurried little note was scribbled and enclosed with the letter just quoted, saying—
"Baby Charles himself is so touched at the heart that he confesses that all he ever saw is nothing to her[6] (i.e. the Infanta), and swears that if he want her there shall be blows. I (Buckingham) shall lose no time in hastening their conjunction, in which I shall please him, her, you, and myself most of all, in thereby getting liberty to make the speedier haste to lay myself at your feet; for never none longed more to be in the arms of his mistress. So, craving your blessing, I end, your humble slave and dog, Steenie."[7]
But withal the negotiations got no nearer. The dispensation still tarried in Rome, and Olivares staved off all definite discussion, on the lying pretext that he did not know upon what the Pope would insist. To keep things going and beguile the English, the Count-Duke persuaded Charles to listen to a disputation in the monastery of St. Geronimo as to the truth of the Catholic religion, and set all the most persuasive clerics of the Court upon the task of converting the English Prince. An English priest named Wallsfort (?) was specially charged to tackle Buckingham, in conjunction with Friar Francisco de Jesus, the King's preacher; but, as may be supposed, with little success, though they asserted that Buckingham, though a heretic for political reasons, was really a Catholic at heart. But when the great attempt was made to bring to bear all the priestly artillery in Madrid upon the Prince's Protestantism, and Charles showed some signs of acquiescence in the Catholic arguments,[8] Buckingham put his foot down firmly, and rudely told Olivares he should not allow the Prince to continue the discussion, to which Olivares retorted by warning him that any attempt to introduce the Protestant chaplains from England into the Prince's apartment in the palace would be resisted by force,[9] for all their pretence that the rites they used were similar to those of Rome. Charles, indeed, flattered himself with the idea that he had half converted the Infanta's confessor, Rahosa,[10] though certainly no signs appear of it in the subsequent actions of the priest. In every diocese in Spain, too, orders were given that religious processions, rogations, and penitential exercises should be celebrated in all churches and convents, in supplication to God for the fortunate issue of the negotiations for the marriage, which, of course, meant the conversion of the Prince and his country, whilst ecclesiastics were bombarding the King and Olivares with solemn addresses, denouncing the idea of the marriage of the Infanta to any Prince not a devout Catholic.
[Sidente: Attempts at conversion]
It is fair to say that Olivares, whilst professing platonically an ardent desire for the match, never attempted to disguise that it would only be conceded on terms quite impossible for England. The self-deception was indeed entirely on the part of Buckingham and the Englishmen of Catholic leanings whose hopes prompted the belief. From the first no pretence was made on the Spanish side of trusting to the word, or even the oath, of King James; the Spaniards knew him too well. Deeds must precede words, repeated Olivares again and again. The Catholics of England must have full toleration, and Parliament must repeal the Penal Acts of Elizabeth against them before the Infanta left Spain. James was ready to promise much, and did promise much at various times, though not so much as Buckingham; but it was clear that he could not coerce the English Parliament into a course of action that would have made his crown not worth a week's purchase; and, charm as he and Buckingham might, the Spaniards never budged an inch on the main point, amiable and flattering as they were to Charles, in the hope, probably, that some solid concession to the English Catholics might be wrung from his father, in any case, as a preliminary to the more than problematical marriage.
It is impossible in this book to follow the daily changing phases of the negotiations through the many months that the Prince stayed in Madrid, but some accounts, contained in the correspondence and other contemporary manuscripts, of the manner in which he and his followers passed their time at Court, will convey the best idea of the dexterity with which Olivares beguiled and befooled the Prince and his advisers into the position which threw upon them the onus of a rupture, whilst the Spaniards appeared to be only too anxious for the marriage and for the friendship of England.
Charles usually spent his afternoons with Philip or Olivares, witnessing fencing bouts or other sports from a window in the palace, or walking in the garden, or in hunting the boar or hawking; and though he did not accompany the King and Court in their frequent visits to the Discalced Carmelite convent, or to the other religious houses where celebrations were held he often saw the processions from closed jalousies, or through the drawn leather curtains of a coach. The mornings were passed in studying Spanish or writing, and in the evening he frequently visited the royal family, where, on a few occasions, the Infanta was present. One such visit, on Easter Day 1623, is thus described in Bristol's diary[11]—
"In the morning the Prince sent to desire leave to repay the visit and the buenas pascuas he had received the day before, and was accordingly appointed about four o'clock in the afternoon to be brought up by a private way to the King, with whom, when he had been a short space and performed that compliment, he intimated a desire to do the like to the Queen, and was presently conducted by the King, who accompanied him publicly, attended by all the grandees and great ministers of the Court, from his own side of the square, which is on the opposite side of the palace (to the Queen's), and there found the Queen and the Infanta together, attended by all the ladies of the Court. This being the first time that his Highness had personally visited the Infanta, there were four chairs set: in the middlemost sat the Queen and the Infanta, on the right hand of the Queen sat the Prince, and on the left of them all sat the King. When the Prince had given the Queen the buenas pascuas (i.e. compliments of the season), and passed some other compliments of gratitude for the favours he had received from her since his coming to this Court, in which it pleased his Highness to call me (i.e. Bristol) to do him service as interpreter, he rose out of his chair and went towards the Infanta, who likewise rose to entertain (i.e. to receive) him; and, after fitting courtesies on both sides performed, the Prince told her that the great friendship which was between his Catholic Majesty and the King his father, had brought him to this Court to make a personal acknowledgment thereof, and to assure, for his part, the desire he had to continue and increase the same, and that he was glad on this occasion to kiss her Highness's hands and offer her his services. To which the Infanta answered, that she did highly esteem what the Prince had said unto her. His Highness then told her that he had been troubled to understand that of late she had not been in perfect health, and asked her how she had passed the Lent, and how she did now, whereunto the Infanta answered: "Que quedava buena á servicio de su Alteza (that she was now well, and at his Highness's service). The Prince then retired himself to his chair and sat down again by the Queen, with whom he passed some short compliments, and so they all rose, and with much courtesy took their leaves.
Charles's lovemaking
"And I do assure you (i.e. Mr. Secretary Conway, to whom the diary was sent) that in all things the Prince's comportment was so natural and suitable to his quality and greatness, that he hath given instant cause to the Spaniards to admire him, as I find they generally do. From hence he was conducted by the King in the same equipage that he had come thither unto the King's side, where, when the King had entertained his Highness awhile with beholding from a window certain masters and gentlemen exercising fencing before them, the King had him to another window which looketh upon a large place before the court-gate, and, telling the Prince that he would only go and see the Queen, took his brother, Don Carlos, with him, and left the Infante Cardinal with the Prince, expecting his return.
"But before much time had passed there appeared about three score of the principal nobility of the kingdom in the gallery (i.e. course) before the window, who were very richly apparelled with embroideries, and being on horseback came two and two together their several careers. They all had their faces uncovered save only the King, Don Carlos, the Count of Olivares, and the Marquis of Carpio, who wore vizards."[12]
The extremely slow courtship here described seems to have struck Charles as unsatisfactory, and a few weeks afterwards, probably encouraged by the general laxity and freedom he saw about him in the intercourse of the sexes, the Prince seriously violated the royal etiquette by an attempt to make love to the Infanta in less formal fashion. Howel tells the story in a letter to Tom Porter:
"Not long since the Prince, understanding that the Infanta was used to go some mornings to the Casa de Campo, a summer-house the King hath on t'other side of the river, to gather May-dew, he rose betimes and went thither, taking your brother (i.e. Endymion Porter) with him. They were let into the house, and so into the garden; but the Infanta was in the orchard, there being a high partition-wall between, and the door, doubly bolted, the Prince got on the top of the wall and sprung down a great height, and so made towards her. But she, spying him first of all the rest, gave a shriek and ran back. The old marquis that was then her guardian came towards the Prince and fell on his knees, conjuring his Highness to retire, in regard that he hazarded his head if he admitted any to her company. So the door was opened, and he came out under that wall over which he had got in. I have seen him watch a long hour together in a close coach in the open street to see her as she went abroad. I cannot say that the Prince did ever talk with her privately, yet publicly often, my Lord of Bristol being interpreter; but the King sat hard by, to overhear all. Our cousin Archy (i.e. Archy Armstrong, King James's jester, who had joined Charles in Madrid with a large number of English courtiers) hath more privileges than any, for he often goes with his fool's coat where the Infanta is with her meninas (maids) and ladies of honour, and keeps a'blowing and blustering among them, and slurts out what he lists."[13]
Festivities kept Charles well occupied; and; now that his father's courtiers had joined him with full baggage, he could play the Prince more effectively than on his first arrival. King James, indeed, seems to have imagined that by gifts and ostentation he could carry the point he had at heart,[14] though in one of his letters to his "sweet boys" he says that "for the honour of England he had curtailed the train of courtiers that went by sea of a number of rascals." Those who went, however, behaved very badly, and did little to raise Spanish opinion of English nobles generally. Buckingham was accused of having introduced bad company even into the palace, and to have behaved outrageously to the women who acted on the stage during a comedy. "For outward usage" (writes Howel in July), "there is all industry used to give the Prince and his servants all possible contentment, and some of the King's own servants wait upon them at table in the palace, where I am sorry to hear some of them jeer at the Spanish fare, and use other slighting speeches and demeanour."[15] Worst of all, many of these fine gallants went out of their way to offend Spanish religious susceptibilities; and Howel mentions one such case which nearly led to grave trouble. One of the Prince's pages, Mr. Washington, had died of fever, and before his death an English priest named Ballard visited him, in the hope of converting him. Sir Edmund Verney met the priest on the stairs, and attacked him, first with words and then with blows.
"The business was like to gather very ill blood and to come to a great height, had not Count Gondomar quashed it; which I believe he could not have done unless the times had been favourable, for such is the reverence they bear to the Church here, and so holy a conceit have they of all ecclesiastics, that the greatest Don in Spain will tremble to offer the meanest of them any outrage or affront. Count Gondomar hath also helped to free some English that were in the Inquisition in Toledo and Seville, and I could allege many instances how ready and cheerful he is to assist any Englishman whatsoever, notwithstanding the base affronts he hath often received from the London boys.[16] I heard a merry saying of his to the Queen, who, discoursing with him of the greatness of London, and whether it was as populous as Madrid: "Yes, madam," he said, "and more populous when I came away, though I believe there's scarce a man left now, but all women and children, for all the men both in court and city were ready booted and spurred to go away."
English courtiers in Madrid
Madrid was not quite so full of English courtiers as that, though their presence was conspicuous and assertive enough at Court. At the weekly representation of the comedies in the palace, only the royal party were provided with chairs; the ladies, in the usual Spanish Court fashion, being seated on cushions on the floor, and the gentlemen standing behind the royal family. This did not suit either Buckingham or the most ostentatious nobleman of his time, the upstart Hay, Earl of Carlisle, and they both fumed and fretted at what they considered a slight upon them. Buckingham, of course, was obliged to stay, but Hay and many others of the insolent crew left Madrid in dudgeon before the great heats came on. Hay, indeed, found it extremely difficult to obtain audience of the Infanta, whom the English already called Princess of Wales; and when, after much importunity, he was admitted, "he was brought into a room where the Infanta was placed on a throne aloft, gloriously set forth with her ladies about her: my lord, with his compliments, motions, and approaches, could not draw from her so much as the least nod, she remaining all the while as immovable as the image of the Virgin Mary.... At his coming away the Infanta gave him leave to kneel to her above an hour, whereupon our great ladies begin to consult how they shall demean herself when she comes."[17]
Marriage negotiations
During the whole of the spring, matters in Madrid remained thus, the arrival of the dispensation being constantly delayed, whilst England was being every day more deeply pledged to an impossible policy by the folly of Buckingham and Charles and the eagerness of King James. James had made the fatal mistake—after saying, through Bristol, that the Pope's dispensation meant nothing whatever to him—of sending agents, Father Gage particularly, to Rome to negotiate for the dispensation to be modified and expedited, and he showed himself more squeezable on the religious point at every turn of the negotiation. "As for myself," he wrote to his son and Buckingham late in March, "I would with all my heart give my consent that the Bishop of Rome should have the first seat. I, being a western King, would go with the Patriarch of the West. And as for his temporal seigniory of Rome I do not quarrel with that either. Let him, in God's name, be primus episcopus inter omnes episcopos, et princeps episcoporum, so it be no otherwise but as St. Peter was princeps episcoporum." So confident were they all that no serious hitch would stand in the way of the wedding at last, that the fleet which was intended to carry back the Infanta and her husband to England was ready to sail for Spain in April, and the silly doting King was busy settling the smallest details of the voyage for the comfort of his "sweet boys."
At length, late in April, news came to Madrid that the dispensation was on its way to Spain, but "clogged" with new guarantees and conditions in favour of English Catholics, which Buckingham still thought he could avoid granting, and asked that the English fleet should be sent to Corunna at once to convey them back triumphant with the Infanta. They soon found that matters were not so easily settled, for, as we know now, Olivares was determined that no marriage should take place, and a device for delay was easily found in the assembly of a commission of divines at St. Geronimo to discuss how far the conditions of the dispensation might be modified. Buckingham conceived the extraordinary plan of asking James to give a blank commission to his son, and Charles accordingly wrote to his father to send him the following pledge signed by his own hand: "We do hereby promise by the word of a King that whatsoever you, our son, shall promise in our name we shall punctually perform." "Sir, I confess," wrote the Prince, "that this is an ample trust; and if it were not mere necessity I should not be so bold"; and Buckingham accompanied the Prince's letter by a note that he knew would touch the King. "This letter of your son's is written out of an extraordinary desire to be soon with you again. He thinks if you sign thus much, though they would be glad (which he doth not yet discover) to make any further delay, this will disappoint them. The discretion of your Baby you need not doubt."[18] Needless to say, the weak King sent the power as requested, in order, as he wrote, "that ye may speedily and happily return and light in the arms of your dear Dad."