The history and poetry of finger-ringsEdwards, Charles
History
The history and poetry of finger-rings
Edwards, Charles
Rings
“Madam, my good sister, the wish that I have to omit nothing that
could testify to you how much I desire not to be distant from your
good favor, or to give you occasion to suspect me from my actions
to be less attached to you than, my good sister, I am, does not
permit me to defer longer the sending to you the bearer, Master of my
Requests, to inform you further of my good will to embrace all means
which are reasonable, not to give you occasion to be to me other than
you have been hitherto; and relying on the sufficiency of the bearer,
I will kiss your hands, praying God that he will keep you, Madam my
good sister, in health and a happy and long life. From St. John’s
Town, this 15th of June.
“Your very affectionate and faithful
“Good Sister and Cousin,
“MARIE R.”
“To the Queen of England,
“Madam my good Sister
“and Cousin.”
The history of the ring bearing the arms of England, Scotland and
Ireland, (and which is said to have been produced in evidence at the
trial of the unfortunate Mary as a proof of her pretensions to the
crown of England,) is curious. It descended from Mary to her grandson
Charles the First, who gave it on the scaffold to Archbishop Juxon
for his son Charles the Second, who, in his troubles, pawned it in
Holland for three hundred pounds, where it was bought by Governor
Yale; and sold at his sale for three hundred and twenty dollars,
supposed to the Pretender. Afterwards it came into the possession
of the Earl of Ilay, Duke of Argyll. It was ultimately purchased by
George the Fourth of England, when he was Prince Regent.[276] This is
sometimes called the Juxon ring.
It appears by Andrews’s continuation of Henry’s History of Great
Britain,[277] that Mary had three wedding rings on her marriage with
Darnley: “She had on her back the great mourning gown of black, with
the great mourning hood,” (fit robes for such a wedding!) “The rings,
which were three, the middle a rich diamond, were put on her finger.
They kneel together and many prayers are said over them,” etc.,
etc. Rings of Mary of Modena have been mistaken for those of Mary of
Scotland.
There is a ring at Bolsover Castle containing a portrait of Mary.[278]
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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