On the 30th April there came flying to London from Hampton Court the news that the nation’s prayers had been heard, and that at midnight of the 29th a male child had been born to the Queen, happily and well. Proclamation was made, joy bells rang, all business was suspended, and processions from every church perambulated the parishes with psalms of thanksgiving for so signal a mercy. Public tables were spread that all might freely eat and drink their fill, whilst bonfires blazed in broad daylight, and the people forgot for a moment the grim spectre of persecution that might be perpetuated if the news was true. But it was not true, and the sad disillusionment came whilst yet the rejoicings were in full swing. It was, said the Catholics, an invention of the enemy in order to cause trouble; but though this was possible, for Noailles had never ceased to sneer at the assurance of the Queen’s condition, the open and ostentatious preparations for the event that had been made at Court were of themselves sufficient reason for the rumour of the birth. The occurrence naturally distressed Mary, who kept her room thereafter for a time, and at once a flood of scurrilous literature was surreptitiously circulated in London, calumniating the Queen, her husband, and all their friends.[94] All through May the country stood on tiptoe of expectation for the birth of the prince whose coming meant so much apparently for the future of Christendom. Mary, still deceiving herself, was comforted by the sight of new-born babies brought to her whose mothers were, it was said, as old and as thin as she. Philip’s solicitude, too, knew no bounds. Every demonstration of affection was lavished upon his wife, and nothing was allowed to stand in the way of his anticipated joy. Although in deep mourning for his grandmother, Jane the Crazy, he ordered that the moment his expected son was born all signs of mourning were to be abandoned. His father was summoning him incessantly, and he was yearning furiously to get away, but he could not leave his wife whilst this event was still pending. At last, at the end of May, he gave permission for most of his Spanish suite and his guards to cross the Channel in advance of him. It was indeed time; for only a week before a regular pitched battle between five hundred armed Englishmen and a body of Spaniards took place at Hampton Court, many being killed and wounded on both sides;[95] and the fires of Smithfield were blazing freely now, to the almost open anger of the people, who unjustly cast all the blame upon the Spanish influence at Court.