Royal Edinburgh: Her Saints, Kings, Prophets and PoetsOliphant, Mrs. (Margaret)
History
Royal Edinburgh: Her Saints, Kings, Prophets and Poets
Oliphant, Mrs. (Margaret)
Edinburgh (Scotland) -- History
Scotland; and he made sic good diligence and provision therein that to
this hour he is lovit; and your Grace may as well have as gude a tyme as
he had." But the cunning old potentate at Westminster was not moved even
by this argument. Instead of following the instructions of the virulent
spy whose hatred of his native king and country reaches the height of
passion, he sent a wise emissary, moderate like himself, the Bishop of
Durham, to inquire into the reasons of the attack.
And Edinburgh must have had another great sensational spectacle in the
arrival not only of the English commissioners, but of such a great
foreign personage as the Spanish envoy, one of the greatest grandees of
the most splendid of continental kingdoms, who had come to England to
negotiate the marriage of Catherine of Arragon with the Prince of Wales,
and who continued his journey to Scotland with letters of amity from his
sovereigns for James, and with the object of assisting in the
peacemaking between the two Kings. Henry required James to give up the
pretender into his hands--a thing which of course it was not consistent
with honour to do--but it was evident that the King of Scots had already
in his own mind given up the adventurer's cause. And after the
negotiations had been concluded and peace made between England and
Scotland, Perkin and his beautiful young wife and his train of followers
set sail from Scotland in a little flotilla of three ships, intending it
is said to go to Ireland, where he had been well received before coming
to the Court of James. The imagination follows with irrestrainable pity
the forlorn voyage of this youthful band of adventurers: the young
husband trained to all the manners and ways of thinking of a prince,
however little reality there might be in his claims; the young wife,
mild and fair, the White Rose as she was called, with the best blood of
Scotland in her veins; the few noble followers, knights, and a lady or
two who shared their fortunes, setting out vaguely to sea, not knowing
were to go, with the world before them where to choose. When they got to
Ireland Prince Perkin heard of an insurrection in Cornwall, and hastened
to put himself at the head of it, placing his wife for security in the
quaint fortress, among the waters, of St. Michael's Mount. But the
insurrection came to nothing, and "the unfortunate prince or adventurer"
was taken prisoner. He was pardoned it is said, but making a wild
attempt at insurrection again, was this time tried and executed. His
White Rose, most forlorn of ladies, was taken by King Henry from her
refuge at the end of the world, placed in charge of the Queen, and never
left the English Court again. There is no record that she and her
husband were ever allowed to meet. So ends one of the saddest and most
romantic of historical episodes.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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