Lord Newcastle visited me next day with a note which he said the Prince had sent him.

“My Lord,” Charles had written in his still-childish script and on ruled lines to keep the writing straight, “I would not take too much physic for it doth always make me worse and I think it will do the like for you. I ride every day and am ready to follow any other direction from you. Charles P.”

I could not help laughing and was so impressed by the wit of my son that I told Lord Newcastle that we would not impose the physic for a day or so and if the boy was well enough without it he deserved to escape.

How could I help being proud of such a boy? And I was sure that even my mother could not succeed in getting the better of him.

My mother was complaining now that Mary ate too much at breakfast and must expect to be sick if in addition to manchets of bread and beef and mutton she took chicken as well. Also she drank too much ale.

It was true that when her rather large meals were curtailed Mary did seem better.

My mother was not popular. People thought she was too extravagant and that too much money was being spent on her entourage and entertainment. It was true that she expected to live like a queen—but then she was a queen.

The weather had changed as soon as she arrived, and the southern half of the country was engulfed in storms and gales which caused a great deal of damage. The people, always superstitious, said it was a sign and meant that the Queen Mother was going to be a menace to the country. It was very upsetting and I was afraid my mother would hear these rumors. But if she did, she brushed them aside. I had forgotten her capacity to accept only what she wanted to happen.

Whenever the weather was bad during my mother’s stay in England, the Thames watermen would shout to each other that this was more of the weather the Queen Mother had brought to England, as though she used some malicious influence in the heavens to make us uncomfortable.

As a queen she looked upon luxury as her natural right and maintaining her household was a drain on the exchequer. She did not, however, see why the people of England should not pay for it. They did, and complained bitterly about her in the streets and now and then I overheard unflattering comments. It was said that she was a trouble-bringer and there was never tranquility when she was nearby. There was grumbling about the people of England being taxed to pay for her “shaggrags”—by which I presume they meant her household.

Charles grew worried and told me he had sent a message to King Louis urging him to invite his mother back to France. “It is the best way,” he said. “She pines for the old life in Paris. I know that she has entered into intrigues in the past, but I feel sure she would promise not to if you would only have her back.”

Charles explained to me that, apart from the expense of keeping her in England, her presence was an irritation to the people and that was something he wanted to avoid because he was growing more and more uneasy about the state of the country.

I hated to see him worried so I made no protest, but Louis wrote back to the effect that however much his mother promised not to meddle she would be unable to prevent herself doing so because she was a meddler by nature; and he would not give her permission to return to France. He was sorry for his brother-in-law but he must be as firm as Louis himself was and explain to Queen Marie that her presence was no longer wanted in England.

But how could Charles do that! She was after all my mother and in spite of those traits of hers which I had to admit were there, I loved her. Charles could never do anything to hurt me if he could help it, so she remained.

It was true that she meddled. One day she said to me: “I was not idle in Holland. All the time I concerned myself with your good and that of the children. I sounded them on the possibility of a match between the Prince of Orange and one of your girls.”

“The Prince of Orange!” I cried. “He is of no great importance.”

“I didn’t mean for Mary, of course. Perhaps Elizabeth.”

“She is three years old!”

“My dear daughter, we have to think of the alliances of our children when they are in their cradles. I will discuss the matter with the King.”

“No, my lady,” I said firmly. “I will discuss it with the King.”

“Oh,” she said, a little huffily, “you two seem to talk nothing but lovers’ talk. State matters have their place too, remember.”

“They will be the state matters of England,” I retorted coolly, and wondered if I was becoming as hard toward her as Louis was. We must show her that she could not interfere in English affairs any more than she could in French. Hadn’t she learned her lesson? Surely being turned out of her home must have made her realize something. But no doubt she blamed Louis and Anne…and the Cardinal of course, for turning away one who could have been—as she would see it—a great help to them.

At the first opportunity I told Charles what she had suggested.

“The Prince of Orange!” he said. “Oh, he is too petty a prince to mate with a Princess of England.”

“So thought I,” I replied. “But my mother talked of it when she was in Holland and she tells me that the Prince of Orange would be very happy with the match.”

“I have no doubt he would. No. Not even for one of our younger daughters would he be good enough.”

There was one other point which seemed to have escaped them all and of which I was very much aware: the Prince of Orange was a Protestant. When my children married I wanted to make sure that they married Catholics.

I was getting bigger but still able to walk a little in the gardens. I loved those of St. James’s with the deer park and the terraces. I enjoyed walking there with Charles and the children. Charles was always so tender and affectionate and everyone marveled at his care of me…especially when I was in the condition I was at this time.

Charles and I would sit on one of the seats and the children would run about making a great deal of noise with all the dogs yapping round them; and the ladies and gentlemen made such a charming sight walking on the paths round the palace.

Happy days they were, when Charles looked so handsome and was so different from the rather shy young man whom I had first met. I rarely heard him stammer now; he didn’t when he was at peace and happy; and he certainly was with his family. He liked to hear little domestic details. He answered young Charles’s questions gravely and gave his attention to James when he accused Mary of taking his share of the custard tart they had had for dinner. I was sure he would have been happier being just with us than coping with his ministers.

Why couldn’t everyone stop complaining? I asked myself. Why could they not enjoy life as we did walking in the gardens of St. James’s.

Winter came in fiercely. “Queen Mother weather,” said the boatmen.

It was at the end of a bitter January that my baby was born. It was a little girl and she was hastily baptized and christened Catherine, for she died a few hours after her birth.

THE HUMAN SACRIFICE

After the death of Catherine I think happiness was over for me, although perhaps I did enjoy snatches of pleasure when I was able to convince myself that all was well; and even when I was most apprehensive I could not have conceived the magnitude of the horror which was waiting to spring on me, crushing my joy forever and making me wait each day for the release which only death could bring.

Where did it start? It is difficult to say. Scotland—I sometimes think—that land of trouble which I hate, with all the squabbling over a prayer book. But who am I to talk? Who was more sternly religious than I? Had I not from the moment I had set foot in England worked to bring the country back to Rome from which it had been so ruthlessly torn by that monster Henry VIII, simply because he wished for a new wife? But the succeeding monarchs had had their chance and had done nothing. I see now that the Protestant Faith suited the English—not the Puritan branch, which was as intense as our Catholic—but the easygoing, not-too-demanding Church of England.

Was it religion? Perhaps to some extent. Then if it were, I was indeed to blame.

But no. That was not the real reason. I was not the only one.

I suppose Archbishop Laud with his rigid insistence on the ceremonies of the Church, the correct vestments of the clergy, all the ceremonies which were akin to the Church of Rome, had done much to bring about the Puritan strain, and consequently to result in what was tantamount to a new party composed of solemn men who thought it was a sin even to laugh; as for dancing and singing, to take pleasure in those meant to them to be on the road to hell. Laud was anxious not to be called a Catholic, but he resembled one in many ways, and he had become the most unpopular man in the country.

Charles respected him very much and Charles was always loyal in his friendships, but I think the man he preferred above all was Thomas Wentworth. Charles admired him enormously for he had often in the past proved himself to be an honest man. He had recently returned from Ireland, where he had done well by promoting the growing of flax, opening up trade with Spain and abolishing piracy in St. George’s Channel. His aim had been to make the Irish as prosperous as the English and dependent on England while they realized that it was in their interest to be loyal to the English.

Wentworth’s conduct of affairs had led Charles to believe that it was men like him whom he wanted at home and he sent for him. Soon after his arrival in England, Thomas Wentworth was created Earl of Strafford.