After Elizabeth: The Death of Elizabeth and the Coming of King James. Leanda Lisle de

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СКАЧАТЬ a strong advocate of James’s claim. The Scots King had a French grandmother, their countries were traditional allies and Henri had hoped to gain goodwill from the Pope by encouraging James to grant toleration of religion to Catholics, as he had offered it to Protestants in France. Henri’s attitude, however, underwent a revolution in the summer of 1602.

      After discovering that Cecil was working for James, Henri had realised that if James became king, it might mean a settlement between Spain and England, a cause that had always been close to Cecil’s heart. Although France and Spain were at peace, it was an uneasy one and Henri spent half his revenue on defence. Not only did he fear better Anglo-Spanish relations, but under James the English and Scots crowns would be united and France would lose the benefits of the Auld Alliance, which he called France’s ‘bridle on England’. In October 1602 Spanish spies reported home that Henri IV of France was ‘no less worried about the King of Scotland than we are’. Robert Persons approached the leader of the curia’s French faction, Cardinal D’Ossat, and urged him to encourage the opening of discussions between Spain, France and the Papacy. The Pope meanwhile had issued a secret brief to his nuncio in Flanders ordering all English Catholics to oppose any Protestant successor to Elizabeth, ‘whensoever that wretched woman should depart this life’.

      Alarmed by the prospect of Jesuit plots in England, James wrote a furious letter to Cecil in January, attacking his pursuit of peace with Spain. If any treaty were achieved, he complained:

      it would no more be thought odious for any Englishman to dispute upon [i.e. argue for] a Spanish title; … the king of Spain would … have free access in England, to corrupt the minds of all corruptible men for the advancement of his ambitions … and lastly, Jesuits, seminary priests, and that rabble, with which England is already too much infected, would then resort there in such swarms as the caterpillars or flies did in Egypt, no man any more abhorring them.⁷⁷

      He demanded to know why Cecil had not carried out a royal proclamation issued in November ordering the expulsion of all priests from England.

      I know it may be justly thought that I have the like beam in my own eye, but alas it is a far more barbarous and stiff-necked people that I rule over. Saint George surely rides upon a towardly riding horse, where I am daily struggling to control a wild unruly colt … I protest in God’s presence the daily increase that I hear of popery in England, and the proud vaunting that the papists make daily there of their power, their increase and their combined faction, that none shall enter to be king there, but by their permission.⁷⁸

      Cecil tried to put James’s mind at rest. He insisted he was indeed ferocious in his pursuit of Jesuits – ‘that generation of vipers’ – and if he was reluctant to see the secular Catholic priests ‘die by dozens’ it was because by and large they shared moderate Catholic opinion. Many were loyal to James’s candidature and they were useful tools against the Jesuits. Why, some secular priests had published pamphlets accusing the Jesuits of treason and were even prepared to betray them to their deaths.⁷⁹ Unconvinced, James replied with what amounted to an order:

      I long to see the execution of the last edict against [the priests], not that thereby I wish to have their heads divided from their bodies but that I would be glad to have both their heads and their bodies separated from this whole land, and safely transported beyond the seas, where they may freely glut themselves on their imagined Gods.

      James explained that he was not interested in ‘the distinction in their ranks, I mean betwixt the Jesuits and the secular priests’. Both were subject to the Pope, he pointed out, arguing that if the secular priests appeared harmless it actually made them more dangerous.⁸⁰

      On 20 January 1603 the Spanish Council finally submitted their recommendations on the succession issue to Philip III. They suggested that an English candidate should be chosen because it would satisfy the ‘universal desire of all men to have a King of their own nation … whilst the King of France will have reason to be satisfied, and to refrain from helping the King of Scotland, as it cannot suit him for Scotland and England to be reunited’. The Marquis de Poza added that if the English could not agree on a Catholic candidate ‘it would be better to have any heretic there rather than the King of Scotland’. The Count de Olivares agreed:

      the worst solution of the question for us may be regarded as the succession of the King of Scotland. He is not only personally to be distrusted, but the union of two kingdoms, and above all the increment of England … with the naval forces she possesses, would be a standing danger to your Majesty in a vital point, namely the navigation to both Indies. To this must be added the hatred which has always existed between the crowns of Spain and Scotland and the old friendship of the latter with France.

      The Council noted that there was a faction within the curia that believed James might be converted. It recommended that English Catholics might be informed that the truth was otherwise. They pointed out that James was notoriously dishonest and Henri IV’s ambassador was complaining that it was being made difficult for him to hear mass in Edinburgh. Furthermore: ‘There is a strong belief that he consented to the killing of his mother, and at least he manifested no sorrow or resentment at it.’⁸¹ They advised that their new candidate should support religious toleration for Protestants and observed that Catholics and Protestants shared ‘a common ground of agreement … their hatred of the Scottish domination’, and concluded that ‘the greatest aid to success will be … the liberal promises made to Catholics and heretics, almost without distinction, particularly to other claimants and their principal supporters, who should be given estates, incomes, offices, grants, privileges, and exemptions, almost, indeed, sharing the crown amongst them’ – as James was already doing.

      The Council then emphasised to Philip that the means of approaching France had to be decided immediately, ‘in case the Queen dies before we are fully prepared. If this should happen we should not only be confronted with the evils already set forth, but the Catholics, who have placed their trust in your Majesty, will be handed over to the hangman and religion will receive its death blow’.⁸² Orders were made ‘that the building and fitting out of high ships should be continued with high speed, and also that the [military] efforts already recommended to be made in Flanders should proceed …’

      News of a build-up of Spanish forces had already reached England. On 17 January, an English courtier wrote to a friend that a former prisoner in Spain had described military preparations and that the Queen’s ships had captured several vessels heading to Spain laden ‘with arms and munitions’.⁸³

      There was also shocking news about Arbella Stuart emerging at court. That Christmas she had at last attempted to escape from her grandmother’s house, Hardwick Hall in Derbyshire. It was said that she had planned a marriage with Edward Seymour, the senior grandson of the Earl of Hertford and Catherine Grey. Hertford had betrayed her plan and Cecil had tried to assure James that, as far as he knew, Arbella was no Catholic, just a lonely spinster. Courtiers in England now anxiously prepared for whatever violence lay ahead. Northumberland added fifty-three war horses to his stables. The Earl of Hertford reinforced the gateways to his house and erected defensive structures. Bess of Hardwick’s elder son, Henry Cavendish, began stocking Chatsworth with new pikes and other arms.⁸⁴ Cecil, meanwhile, busily began shoring up his personal financial position. Even the prospect of a peaceful Stuart inheritance did not make his future secure. James might sack or demote him after he had served his purpose and if that occurred he would be brought down by the weight of his debts. The building of his new grandiose palace on the Strand had almost bankrupt him. Harington СКАЧАТЬ