COURT AND SOCIETY FROM ELIZABETH TO ANNE.* "THE Papers at

Kimbolton" is an alluring title to the student of English history, suggestive of many new and possibly startling lights on the dark passages of our national story. From the reign of Henry VIII. to the days of the Revolution of '89 the Montague played a conspicuous part in nearly all public events, and though Kimbolton did not come into the possession of the family till the beginning of the Stuart period, we might reasonably have hoped for illustrative matter relating to the previous century from the family archives, as well as a rich store of additional information on the times of the Civil War and Commonwealth. Mr. Carlyle, by giving us in his collection of " Cromwell Letters" a copy of a very curious epistle drawn from Kimbolton, seemed to confirm our natural impression as to the historical value of the documents preserved there. But either we were lamentably mistaken in such a supposition, or the pre- sent selection has been a most unaccountably ill-judged one. The greater part of the second volume is made up of letters from or to the first Duke of Manchester during his embassy in Germany, of very little historical interest, and the editor has been compelled to " make up " the first volume by sweepings from other sources, with the thinnest thread of connection between their subject and that put forward on the title-page. The work professes to give us an account from the " Kimbolton Papers" of English society from Elizabeth to Anne, and this is fulfilled by starting with half a volume (202 pages) of matter relating to the times of Henry VII. and Henry VIII., and based on papers not at Kimbolton, but at Simancas, or in the private portfolio of the Empress of the French. The heroine of these pages is Catherine of Arragon, and the artificial ;plea put forward for intruding them into this work is that Queen Catherine died at Kimbolton before it came into the possession of the Montague. Such book-making deserves a strong word of reproof, and we are surprised that the Duke of Manchester could lend his name to it. The Simancas correspondence has been already made known to students by the Government commission which brought it to light, and the only merit which the present publication of some of it can lay claim to (putting out of view its irrelevancy in such a work) is that of bringing it before the notice of the general public in a popular and attractive form. We quite admit the qualifications of the gentlemen to whom the Duke has expressed his obligations, for doing this in a certain wag effectively; but at the same time we should be very sorry to see such effective- ness applied to many of the repositories of our national history. The sensation style of smart writing, though it may be adapted to a certain class of publications, becomes extremely offensive to all good taste when applied to the graver events of history. The off-hand, familiar, and affectedly jocular style by which some writers endeavour to popularize history is as unworthy of men of real ability as it is nauseous in itself.

The one new contribution to history in these 200 pages is the letter of Henry VII., belonging (how it does not appear) to the Empress Eugenie, in which he consents with reluctance, on .account of Prince Arthur's youth and state of health, to the consummation of his marriage with Catherine, which had been demanded by Ferdinand. The letter is curious enough to be well worth publishing, but the deductions here drawn from it are a little precipitate. It only proves that the serious apprehensions as to Prince Arthur's health which were felt by everybody in England were shared by the King, and that he was desirous of avoiding anything which might increase the danger. As it happened, Prince Arthur died very shortly after the time when the consummation was alleged to have taken place, but beyond a cer- tain increased presumption in favour of its accomplishment as the immediate cause of death we are left much where we were as to evidence on the matter. On the other hand, there is a letter of Isa- Ceurt and Society /rose Elizabeth to Amu. Edited from the Papers at Kimbolton the Duke of Manchester. 2 vols. London: Hardt and Blacken. 1664. bella's given in these volumes from the Simancas archives, written almost immediately after the death, in which she asserts positively, on the authority of the Spanish lady in waiting on Catherine, that the latter remained only nominally a wife. This may be a

Spanish lie-and we lay no stress on it as evidence of any im- portance—but it may surely be allowed to balance the mere inferential deduction from Henry's letter. As to the subsequent account and statements of the several parties concerned in the negotiations for a marriage with the new Prince of Wales, it is evident that they were all guided by other considerations, and recognized or denied the consummation of the marriage just as best suited their purpose at the time. We have remaining the assertions of the Prince's attendants on one side, professing to be derived from himself, and on the other the positive decla- ration of Catherine herself. Little stress can be laid on

the former—even if given bond fide—for they are vague and

capable of another interpretation. Nor is there anything in the character of Catherine to render it impossible that she might lie deliberately when so much depended on her statement—and who shall unravel the casuistry of a Roman Catholic woman's conscience in those days ? We believe the matter remains as un- settled as ever.

Passing from this extraneous matter, we enter on the reign of Elizabeth, and here we meet with, not what we might expect—an illustration of English society directly from the doings of the Montagu family, but a few interesting but disconnected letters which have come into the Kimbolton archives. Such are portions of the correspondence of Walsingh am during his residence at the French Court respecting the match with Anjou and at the crisis of St. Bartholomew's Day, and two letters of the second Earl of Essex to his sister, Lady Rich. The former letters are very much identical in character with all the correspondence on the subject of Elizabeth's suitors—the same insincerity on all sides except ou the main point of gaining a political advantage over each other or third parties. The Bartholomew despatches are phlegmatic to an extent which will surprise a modern reader, who believes that the English statesmen as well as the English people were overwhelmed with horror and indignation at that event. They reflect, however, only the first impressions of the Ambassador, before the real character of the event was known, and while its political bearings were still uncertain, as well as the extent to which it would be identified with a religions crusade. It must be remembered that no one who was in the position of Waking- ham could look upon Catherine de Medicis as a Catholic fanatic, and, taking for granted that her motives were political, it became a question how far the interests of England would be affected by them, and how far the national sympathy with co-religionists might be moderated or neutralized by other considerations. The letters of Essex are curious and characteristic. The editor is not without justification in his theory that they reflect very much the character of Hamlet, but perhaps he has gone too far in sup- posing that Shakespeare had Essex in particular in his mind when he worked out that marvellous conception of character. There were not a few Hamlets, we suspect, in those days, for it was a time when dreams and melancholy meditation at times so overlaid and paralyzed action, and yet at other times (as with Philip Sidney) added such a strange interest to it, that we are left with a mixed impression of incomplete and purposeless aspirations very similar to that pourtrayed in the Royal Dane. The actual age was hollow and unreal ; the world of fancy was, on the contrary, noble, and lofty, and intensely realized, so as to take its place as a substitute for real life, and the result was a race of noble thinkers and feeble or evil doers. The ideal was as much above as the actual was below the fair average of practice. But the letters speak best on this point for themselves :—

" Tim E RL OF ESSEX TO LADY RICH.

" Mum Suirsa,—Because I will not be in your debt for sending you a footman, I have directed the bearer to you, to bring me word how you do. I am melancholy, merry, sometimes happy, and often discontented. The Court is of as many humours as the rainbow hath colours. The time wherein we live is more inconstant than women's thoughts, more miserable than old age itself, and breedeth both people and occasions like itself, that is, violent, desperate, and fantastical. Myself, for won- dering at other men's strange adventures, have not leisure to follow the ways of mine own heart, but by still resolving not to be proud of any good that can come, because it is but the favour of chance • nor do (I) throw down my mind a whit for any ill that shall happen, because I see that all fortunes are good or evil, as they are esteemed. The preacher is ready to begin, and therefore I shall end this discourse, though upon another text.—Your brother that dearly loves you,—R. Lam"

"THE EARL OF EMIT TO LADY RICH.

"DEAR SISTER,—I would have made more haste with you but that yesternight I was surprised with a fever, and this morning I have got an humour fallen down into one aide of my head, so I dare not look out

of my chamber. This lady bath entreated me to write a fantas- tical. . • . . but I am so ill with my pains and some other more secret carps, as I will rather chose to dispraise those affections with which none but woman, apes, and lovers are delighted. To hope for that which I have not is a vain expectation, to delight in that which I have is a deceiving pleasure, to wish the return of that which is gone from me is womanish inconstancy. Those things which fly me I will not lose labour to follow. Those that meet me I esteem as they are worth, and leave when they are nought worth. I will neither brag of my good hap nor complain of my ill; for secrecy makes joys more sweet, and I am then most unhappy when another knows that I am unhappy. I do not envy, because I will do no man that honour to think he hath that which I want; nor yet am I not contented because I know some things that I have not. Love I confess to be a blind god. . . . Ambition, fit for hearts that already confess themselves to be base. Envy is the humour of him that *will be glad of the reversion of another man's fortune ; and revenge the remedy of such fools as in injuries know not how to keep themselves aforehand. Jealous I am not, for I will be glad to lose that which. I am not sure to keep. If to be of this mind be to be fantastical, then join me with the three that I first reckoned; but if they be young and handsome, with the first. —And so I take my leave, being not able to write more for pain.—Your brother that loves you dearly, "R. Essex."

After this prologue is disposed of, we reach at length the Montagu family history, which we need not pursue here, as we have so recently had occasion to notice it at some length. The present volumes add scarcely anything to our previous know- ledge, while they repeat all the old blunders of the family annalists, as, for instance, the supposititious pedigree from the Montacutes, the alleged Speakership of Sir Edward Montagu

in Henry time, &c., &c. Thera are a few details of family life, such as the negotiations for the marriage of the Parliamen- tary General's eldest son with the daughter of a country gentle-

man, which are amusing as illustrations of English life in those days. It is pleasant to find such excellent specimens of a step- mother and a mother-in-law as in Essex Cheeke, the third wife of the Parliamentary Earl, and her mother, Lady Cheeke. The delicate and generous manner in which the latter intercedes for the conclusion of the marriage of her daughter's stepson, which had nearly been broken off from pecuniary considerations, in which the interests of her daughter bad been preferred is quite a model letter of its kind, fit to be inserted in the next edition of the "Complete Letter-Writer." Robert Sidney, Earl of Leicester, appears in somewhat ambiguous colours as a timid trimmer between parties—a character which we believe to be fully confirmed by other evidence. Lord Manchester's alleged "sweet meekness " of character is oddly illustrated by his persevering obstinacy in the negotiation of this marriage match of his son's. There is a little additional fact added to the story of Oliver Cromwell's quarrel with the first Mayor of Huntingdon, the facts of which, as far as they appear in the State papers, have been communicated to the public by Mr. John Bruce. It seems that when the first Earl of Manchester made inquiry on the

spot into the cause of the difference, Dr. Beard, Cromwell's old Schoolmaster and pastor, gave in an affidavit on the opposite side, affirming that Cromwell had at first warmly approved of the proposed change to government by a mayor and aldermen. This may, of course, have been the case, and yet Cromwell may have afterwards consistently opposed the change, when he found it was being worked (as it was) to the destruction of the popular liberties in the town, and the establishment of a Royal influence which did not previously exist. It is possible that Dr. Beard was a little prejudiced in this matter, as we learn from the

dedication to one of his books that the Mayor of Huntingdon had been his scholar, " brought up in his own house." All, however, ended in a friendly manner as far as personal differences were concerned, Cromwell, it appears, offering to shake hands with his opponent, and the breach being, for the time at least, healed to the satisfaction of all parties, and especially of the arbiter, the Earl of Manchester.

There are a few letters of Walter Montagu—the brother of Edward, Earl of Manchester—who became a Roman Catholic abbot at Pontoise, in France ; but little is added to what was already known of his adventurous life. More amusing are some of Sir John Vanbrugh's gossiping letters to the first Duke of

Manchester. Shoplifting, for example, would seem to have been a ladylike accomplishment even in those days (1699).

"My Lady Arglass having been for some time under strong suspicion for pocketing some small goods, by the bye, in shops, was t'other day catch't stealing 4 or 5 fans at Mrs. Toomes [Thomas's], who made her refund just as she was getting into her coach. The mob presently gathered about, and made noise enough. My Lady Drummond was with her, and Lady Betty Cromwell, who is sick upon't, and keeps house. This thing is seriously true."

It is difficult to wade through the mass of common-place cor- respondence (even though graced by distinguished names) and editorial padding by which the second volume is swollen to its

actual bulk, but one or two gleanings of more or less interest may suffice to indicate the general character of the contents. Matthew Prior, in December, 1700, thus speaks of the balance of parties on which King William's theory of government mainly depended :—" Whig and Tory are railing on both sides so vio- lent, that the Government may easily be overturned by the madness of either faction. We take it to be our play to do nothing against common sense or common law, and to be for those that will support the Crown rather than oblige their party ; and, in order to this, men are preferred who are looked upon to be honest and moderate. In this number (whether with reason or not time must decide) we comprehend our Lord Keeper and our new Secretary. Lord Rochester and Lord Godolphin are in the Cabinet Council ; the latter is at head of the Treasury ; the former (we take for granted) is to go Lord- Lieutenant of Ireland, though it be yet a secret." We have quoted rather more of this passage than we need have done, in order to rectify the editor's punctuation, which makes utter non- sense of the sentences. The postscript is worth all the rest :- "Though I am no longer in a Secretary's office, venison would not poison a commissioner, and does are now in season, which may be useful to inform Mr. Woolaston of when your lordship writes to him." There are a good many incidental notices of the wretched Court of St. Germain's and the intrigues of the Jacobites, Lord Manchester being Ambassador at Paris at the time of James II.'s death. He gives a regular account of the progress of his illness, and at the end of one of his letters is this brief addi- tion :—" P.S.—King James is dead." Then came the specu- lations as to the conduct of the Court of France, and the indignation of the Ambassador at their recognizing the old Pretender as King of England." Lord Manchester comments sarcastically on the nominations to peerages contained in King James's will. "By this will Lord Middleton is declared Duke of Monmouth, but it is said he will not take it. Lord Perth, by an old patent, is a duke, and Caryl' a baron. There are several others not yet declared, so that the House of Lords will be well filled at their return. We shall bear soon of some Garters dis- posed of. It is a comical scheme, and I hope it will end so, though it will be difficult to make them understand it in that manner." There are some letters from the Duke of Marlborough, one giving Manchester (then at Venice) the news of the victory at Oudenarde in the following simple and unpretending terms. The letter begins with other matters :—" Your lordship will have heard with concern the enemy's taking the city of Gand by treachery of some of the inhabitants ; but the good news that will soon have followed of our defeating, on Wednesday last, part of their army near Oudenarde, and obliging them to retire behind the canal between Gand and Bruges, will have made some amends. We took between 6,000 and 7,000 prisoners, besides about 700 officers, of which several are of note, and a great number of standards and colours." In the present day an American outpost success would be reported in language in- finitely more pompous.

There is a good deal of gossip about music and musicians in this Lord Manchester's correspondence, he being a great ad- mirer and patron of that art and profession. Indeed, he seems to have been very much what Lord Westmoreland has been in our own days at foreign Courts—a distinguished amateur patron of the Opera. But we have said enough to indicate the sort of information—slight and meagre enough compared with the promise held forth by the title—afforded by the present work.