Lady Dudley

“ Each soul has its own method. Lady Dudley is the strong woman who can traverse distances and act with the vigor of a man; she would rescue her lover and kill jailers and guards; while other women can only love with their whole souls ”

“ In Dudley’s upper sphere, everything was exposed: Scandal walked naked and unashamed-figurante of the polite world. But still this lady was of the mint and coin, a true lady. Handsome now, she must have been beautiful. And a comprehensible pride (for so would Dudley have borne it) keeps the forsaken man silent up to death:... grandly silent; but the loss of such a woman is enough to kill a man! Not in time, though! Legitimacy evidently, by the mother’s confession, cannot protect where it is wanted. Dudley was optically affected by a round spot of the world swinging its shadow over Nesta. ”

“ We dare not. He is the son of the gospel's champion. He is Lord Guilford Dudley.”
Elizabeth had the clue at last. Swiftly she understood Robert Dudley's bullying diplomacy, and that mysterious device which she was to approve. Northumberland had found in the pedant Lady Jane a perfect puppet, as like a soul as the world could furnish to the cold pedant of a boy who was called King. Edward had never found wit or will to thwart his ambitious Minister; there would be neither will nor wit in the bloodless Lady Jane. If she were Queen, Northumberland would be King still in all but name and crown. ”

“ Dudley, duke of Northumberland, then became paramount in the privy council, and easily obtained the sanction of the young king to those schemes for altering the succession which led immediately after his death to the usurpation of Lady Jane Grey. Dudley had, in fact, overawed all the rest of the privy council, and when the event occurred he took such energetic measures to give effect to the scheme that Lady Jane was actually recognized as queen for some days, and Mary had even to fly from Hunsdon into Norfolk. ”

“ Dudley since her marriage. Long before her advent, the Dudleys had dropped off the visiting lists of their more aristocratic acquaintances, and no one felt much inclined to take steps towards reviving the old intimacy when Arthur Dudley brought home to the Hollow a wife of whom no one knew anything, who might, in fact, be “anybody”—as Mrs. Poole Seymour, the great lady of North Kemms, vaguely expressed herself.
When society does not take notice of a woman on the occasion of her marriage, it is difficult for any member composing it subsequently to repair that omission ”

“ Of all the long array of the lovers of this famous queen, foreign or English, none ever acquired such a place in her regard and favour as the Lord Robert Dudley, one of the sons of the Duke of Northumberland, who had been attainted, with his father and family, for his participation in the attempt to place Lady Jane Grey on the throne, to the exclusion of Queen Mary and of this very Elizabeth. The queen restored him in blood, made him Master of the Horse, installed him Knight of the Garter, and, soon after this period, Earl of Leicester. ”

“ Northumberland was gone. The weight of his dominant influence was removed, and many of his colleagues must have breathed more freely. In the Tower Lady Jane, with those of the Council left in London, continued to watch and wait the course of events. It must have been recognised that the future was dark and uncertain; and whilst the lords and nobles looked about for a way of escape should affairs go ill with the new government, the boy and girl arbitrarily linked together may have been drawn closer by the growing sense of a common danger. Guilford Dudley did not share his father’s unpopularity. ”

“ He also determined that, during the time necessary to ripen his scheme, he would marry his son, Guilford Dudley, to Lady Jane Grey, in which event he would be the father to a Queen of England, and if she did as he wished, to a Prince Consort as well, which would exactly suit his ambition. So in different ways the tangled threads of cruel circumstance were fast winding around an innocent young victim, who was ignorant of them all as yet. ”

“ Here is an elaborate carving, by Dudley, Earl of Warwick, brother to the Lord Dudley who married Lady Jane Grey. It is a shield, bearing the Lion, Bear, and Ragged Staff, and surrounded by a wreath of oak leaves, roses, and acorns, all cut in the stone, and underneath an inscription, in Old English letters, stating that his four brothers were imprisoned here. In another room is the word Jane cut, which is said to refer to Lady Jane Grey, and to have been cut by her husband. ”

“ I thought I was bein' humorous; for Dudley's about as much of a lady's man as he is a heavy shot putter. I never knew of his lookin' twice at a girl before; but to-night he seems to be makin' up for lost time. All durin' the rest of the meal he does the steady, admirin' gaze at Veronica. He don't try to hide it, either, but fixes them gray eyes of his her way and neglects to eat five perfectly good courses. When we adjourns to the livin' room for coffee he keeps it up too. ”

“ I know I just talk like the purest commonality—I’m not fit to be a lady.”
“You can’t help yourself; you are a lady.”
“I’m better than I was, thanks be to Miss Usher; she [Pg 240] made me read aloud to her every day. Now, do tell me, when are you going to be married to my cousin?”
“Most probably never—though it would be a splendid match for me.”
“Then why not give in to it?”
“I expect there would be two words to the bargain. Dudley is in no hurry; he knows his value, and that he could marry almost any girl in England. Perhaps he may take it into his head to marry you! ”

“ Guildford, as the queen was pleased to call her, was the wife of Sir William Guildford, controller of the royal household, who eventually stood godfather to that unfortunate Guildford Dudley who became the husband of Lady Jane Grey. If we may believe King Louis, he had certainly some justification for wishing Lady Guildford out of his sight, since she exasperated him to such an extent that he told Worcester that “rather than have such a woman about my wife, I would liever be without a wife.... ”

“ Dudley—the thought and care she [Katherine] taketh for the want of Her Highness’s favour pines her away; before God I speak it, if it come not the sooner she will not long live thus; she eateth not above six morsels in the meal. If I say unto her, ‘Good Madam, eat somewhat [201] to comfort yourself,’ she falls a-weeping and goeth up to her chamber; if I ask her what the cause is she useth herself in that sort, she answers me: ‘Alas! Uncle, what a life this is to me, thus to live in the Queen’s displeasure ”

“ I thought animals weren't allowed in the dormitories."
"That's just where the chump's meanness comes in!" burst out Donald. "We couldn't throw the things out alive, of course, and we couldn't kill 'em. Lady Jane" (the matron) "came in on us while we had 'em on the table,—caught us with the goods on us, she thought,—and jawed us like a stepmother for defying the school rules. When we said some one put 'em in the desk drawer, she thought we were lying and threatened to have us fired for breaking the rules and not showing her proper respect. I call it a low-down trick!" ”

“ Elizabeth had made up her mind that, should the Lady Robert Dudley conveniently depart this life at an early date, she would marry the widower. All these and many other open and covert attacks on the queen’s character were damaging her good name with the people, to such an extent, indeed, that it was actually proposed to dethrone her and to replace her by some more suitable successor. The English Catholics naturally favoured the Queen of Scots, but Katherine Grey was preferred by Spain. ”

“ Until he was free, she would remain free. Presently a fresh rumour was started concerning Dudley’s neglected wife, Amy Robsart, now residing, separated from her husband, at Cumnor Hall, near Oxford, a fair old mansion, [156] still in existence, which in those days was rented from the heirs of George Owen, physician to Henry VIII, by a certain Mr. Anthony Forster. In November 1559, Quadra wrote to the king that there is “a rumour in London to the effect that Robert Dudley thinks of poisoning his wife.” So at least he has been told by “a person who is in the habit of giving him veracious news.” ”

“ Quadra evidently thought that the people might yet favour Lady Katherine over Elizabeth, who in the first year of his embassy he believed to be more unpopular than she really was. He seemed disgusted at the queen’s levity and indecision: “It is ruining her popularity,” he says; “she is in danger of losing her Crown.” One day she tells him she will never marry any one, and the next she asks him if he thinks there would be much opposition if she married one of her servants [meaning Dudley] , as the duchesses of Somerset and Suffolk had done. ”

“ On Whit-Sunday (probably May 21) 1553, the day on which Lady Jane became the bride of Lord Guildford Dudley, Katherine was married, or rather, contracted—she was only thirteen years old at the time—to Henry, Lord Herbert, eldest son of the Earl of Pembroke, who was just a little over nineteen. After the ceremony (it was no more than a ceremony) , the very youthful “bride” lived, according to custom, under her father-in-law’s roof at Baynard’s Castle, the ancient palace on the Thames, within the walls of which Pembroke proclaimed his allegiance to Mary on the last day of Queen Jane’s reign. ”

“ Be this as it may, in May 1564 Hertford received a communication from Lord Robert Dudley (who does not seem to have made use, at this time, of his title of Earl of Leicester) and Cecil, asking him to send some one with a sum of money to pay my Lord of Pirgo’s charge for the maintenance of his wife and infant. The amount was stated to be £114, which had to be paid at once, “because the said Lady Graye (as she complaineth) cannot longer endure from payment.” ”

“ If it were true that a group of women all like to talk at the same time when they meet (which is a slander invented by men, who may be just as loquacious, but not so limber-tongued and quick-witted) , and raise their voices to a shriek in order to dominate each other, it could be demonstrated that they would be more readily heard if they all spoke in low tones. But the object is not conversation; it is the social exhilaration that comes from the wild exercise of the voice in working off a nervous energy; it is so seldom that in her own house a lady gets a chance to scream. ”

“ Ah! who comes here, pacing so proudly, while bright eyes turn admiringly—what exceeding loveliness is led by the arm. The blood rushes to the pale face, the little heart throbs aloud, she presses closer to the pane, for it is him—it is Dudley. She of the bright complexion, large, soft eyes and mass of ringlets, is seated near that fated window, and he bends over her. She hears him speak—no, his low voice cannot come through the heavy pane, but she knows too well—ah! ”

“ About 1563 the question of Queen Mary Stuart's marriage was before the English council, and Elizabeth, with every appearance of generous self-denial, suggested that Dudley should become the Scottish queen's husband. She would have preferred, she said, a union between Queen Mary and Dudley's brother Ambrose, but was willing on grounds of policy to surrender her favourite. In June 1564 Dudley made friends with De Silva, the new Spanish ambassador, and once more declared himself to be devoted to Spain. ”

“ Of lord Robert Dudley it is only necessary here to observe, that his favor with the queen became daily more apparent, and began to give fears and jealousies to her best friends and wisest counsellors.
The hearts of the common people, as this wise princess well knew, were easily and cheaply to be won by gratifying their eyes with the frequent view of her royal person, and she neglected no opportunity of offering herself, all smiles and affability, to their ready acclamations. ”

“ What a hell some women—good women—might have made of Dudley's life—that genial life that flowed as smoothly as a song. In the flights and pauses of his temperament what discord might have shocked the decent measure of their marriage? ”

“ Lord Robert Dudley was the son of Northumberland, had a fair portion of his father's ambition and something of his father's ability for intrigue, but lacked his father's smooth control of temper. By the time that Elizabeth's groom of the chambers was allowed to bid him to her presence, he was fuming to and fro, as angry a man as a cool mind could desire to do business with. ”

“ I cannot describe—for it would make too dismal reading—the way in which Queen Jane's relations and her husband's relations harassed her continually—Lord Guildford Dudley, perhaps, by his absence and treatment of her, the most of all, as he was the best beloved. For it is ever those whom we love most who have it in their power to inflict upon us the bitterest pain. ”

“ As a matter of fact, the Major's wife had planted it many years before, when their love-dream was at its height. Now she was gone, but it remained, and it helped to keep fresh and vigorous the memories which made Thomas Dudley's daily life a benediction to all who came within its radius.
As the perfume from the tiny white and yellow flowers crept subtly to his nostrils—fine, delicate nostrils they were, like those of a well-bred horse—a hungry, beseeching look stole over the old gentleman's face. ”