Queen Anne of England

“ On the 8th of March 1702 Anne became, by King William’s death, queen of Great Britain, being crowned on the 23rd of April. Her reign was destined to be one of the most brilliant in the annals of England. Splendid military triumphs crushed the hereditary national foe. The Act of Union with Scotland constituted one of the strongest foundations of the future empire. Art and literature found a fresh renascence. ”

“ Now we must take a look at Queen Anne to see what sort of a ruler she made, for thus far we have touched lightly on this important matter, or given the Duchess of Marlborough the precedence. As far as personal affection goes, this queen was the most popular one who had occupied the English throne; the lower classes always [454] called her "our good Queen Anne," and do so to this very day. ”

“ Those with Peace in a car, Britannia standing with olive-branch and spear, or seated under an arch, are patterns; the second has the legend BELLO ET PACE in indented letters, a mode revived in the reign of George III. It is said that many years ago a lady in the north of England lost one of the farthings of Queen Anne, which she much prized as the bequest of a deceased friend, and that having offered in the public journals a large reward for its recovery, it was ever afterwards supposed that any farthing of this monarch was of great value. ”

“ The death of Mary brought Princess Anne more into public notice as heir presumptive to the throne, though it was many years before she became Queen of England. Heretofore, as we have seen, she lived like a private person at Berkeley House, and had not even been permitted to appear at court, because of the ill-feeling that existed between her and her sister Mary. Lord and Lady Marlborough, whose devotion to Princess Anne had seriously offended the queen, still continued her warm friends, and the princess wrote letters to her father filled with professions of loyalty and affection as before. ”

“ THE AUTHOR OF “ROBINSON CRUSOE” THE age of Queen Anne was one which abounded in paradoxes, and loved them. It was an age when England was full of patriotic policy, yet every statesman was a traitor; when tradition was dear, yet revolution practicable; when speech was gross and manners unrefined, yet the laws of literary composition rigid, and correctness the test of poetry. It was full of high ecclesiasticism and strict Puritanism, sometimes united in one person. ”

“ Queen Anne was not a beauty, but at the age of sixteen, when she became King Richard's wife, she was a blooming, healthy girl, with a clear, fresh complexion and bright eyes. She had a high, narrow forehead, long upper lip and fat cheeks, but the remarkable head-dress she wore neutralized these defects somewhat. ”

“ The sovereigns of England, unlike those of France, have seldom taken to themselves the task of acting as patrons of the fine arts. Therefore when we write of the "Queen Anne period" we do not refer to the influence of the undistinguished lady who for twelve years occupied the throne of England. The term is merely convenient for the purpose of classification, embracing, as it does, the period from William and Mary to George I. during which the furniture had a strong family likeness and shows a development very much on the same line. ”

“ No sooner was Queen Anne convinced that her son's guardian was well out of the way, than she set off for Stirling Castle, accompanied by a strong body of nobles, never doubting that she could easily intimidate the Countess of Marr into the surrender of her son Henry. But the old lady proved herself equal to the emergency, and flatly refused to give up the boy unless ordered to do so by the king himself. Some fighting ensued, and the queen flew into such a tremendous passion that she became seriously ill, and had to be put to bed in the royal apartments of the castle. ”

“ The number of learned men of Queer. Anne's reign exceeded that of Elizabeth, and represented every branch of art, science, and literature. It included no Shakespeare, it is true; but there were Newton, Wren, Locke, Hogarth, Congreve, Colley, Cibber, Pope, Swift, Gay, Addison, Steele, and a host of others. We must not omit to mention Defoe, because every child will connect his name with that delightful romance, "Robinson Crusoe." It was on account of the existence of such a bevy of luminaries that Queen Anne's reign was entitled the Augustan age of England. ”

“ We have been necessarily led to observe the weak and defective side of Anne Boleyn's character, in tracing her progress. Her ambition, her levity, her little regard for the feelings and patience of her Royal mistress, her regardlessness of her good fame by living so openly with the king before their marriage, and her great culpability in marrying him whilst the real queen was not only still living, but undivorced, exhibit her but as a worldly woman of a conduct most censurable. ”

“ James's wife, Anne of Denmark, was crowned with him. The weather had been intensely hot, but it now set in very rainy. To spoil the pleasure of the people, the plague was raging in the City, and the inhabitants were by proclamation forbidden to enter Westminster. No queen-consort had been crowned since Anne Boleyn, nor had any king and queen been crowned together since Henry VIII. and Catherine of Aragon, and therefore the restriction was the more mortifying. Queen Anne went to the coronation "with her seemly hair down hanging on her princely shoulders, and on her head a coronet of gold. ”

“ She’s new! She’s gallant, like a tall ship setting sail, And boasts she fears no man. Say “woman” though—
Anne. What woman does this woman fear?
Henslowe. The Queen. I’ve seen it in her eye.
Anne. I should not fear.
Henslowe. You never saw the Queen of England smile And crook her finger, once—and the fate falls.
Anne. I’ve seen her picture. She’s eaten of a worm As I am eaten. I’d not fear the Queen. Her snake would know its fellow in my heart And pass me. But this woman—what’s her name? ”

“ Besides, the state of public affairs was now totally changed since Lord Lovat had left England, and it was incumbent upon the Government to avail themselves of any tool which they might require for certain ends and undertakings.
Queen Anne was now dead,—the last of the Stuart dynasty in this kingdom. Whatever were her failings and her weaknesses as a woman, she has left behind her the character of having loved her people; and she was endeared to them by her purely English birth, her homely virtue of economy, and her domestic unpretending qualities. Her reign had been one of mercy ”

“ The unfounded rumour that William contemplated settling the succession after his death on James’s son, provided he were educated a Protestant in England, may possibly have alarmed her. [8] Meanwhile, since the birth of the duke of Gloucester, the princess had experienced six more miscarriages, and had given birth to two children who only survived a few hours, and the last maternal hope flickered out on the death of the young prince on the 29th of July 1700. Henceforth Anne signs herself in her letters to Lady Marlborough as “your poor unfortunate” as well as “faithful Morley.” ”

“ The solemn entry therefore of Anne into the city of London was greeted by the applause of the multitude; and it was probably the genuine voice of public feeling, which, in saluting her queen of England, wished her, how much in vain! a long and prosperous life.
The pageants displayed in the streets of London on this joyful occasion, are described with much minuteness by our chroniclers, and afford ample indications that the barbarism of taste which permitted an incongruous mixture of classical mythology with scriptural allusions, was at its height in the learned reign of our eighth Henry. ”

“ Anne was born in 1664, two years before the great fire of London, on which the astrologers (there were some left, and Louis XIV. was born with the assistance of an astrologer, and swaddled in a horoscope) predicted that, being the elder sister of fire, she would be queen. And so she was, thanks to astrology and the revolution of 1688. She had the humiliation of having only Gilbert, Archbishop of Canterbury, for godfather. To be godchild of the Pope was no longer possible in England. A mere primate is but a poor sort of godfather. Anne had to put up with one, however. ”

“ Three short years have yet to pass, and again, on a summer morning, Queen Anne Boleyn will leave the Tower of London—not radiant then with beauty on a gay errand of coronation, but a poor wandering ghost, on a sad tragic errand, from which she will never more return, passing away out of an earth where she may stay no longer, into a presence where, nevertheless, we know that all is well—for all of us—and therefore for her. ”

“ Long live Queen Anne! May the queen live forever!"
At the banquet in the evening Prince George of Denmark sat at her majesty's left hand, and care was taken that tables should be provided for members of the house of commons, who had complained of being neglected at the coronation banquet of William and Mary. On the whole, the ceremony was eminently satisfactory from beginning to end, even to the thieves who stole all the plate used at her majesty's table in Westminster Hall, as well as the finest of the table linen. ”

“ Queen Mary talks all,
Prince George drinks all,
And Princess Anne eats all.” [18]
She took no interest in the art, the drama or the literature of her day. But she possessed the homely virtues; she was deeply religious, attached to the Church of England and concerned for the efficiency of the ministry. One of the first acts of her reign was a proclamation against vice, and Lord Chesterfield regretted the strict morality of her court. Instances abound of her kindness and consideration for others. ”

“ An admirably lucid narrative is Somerville's History of Great Britain during the Reign of Queen Anne, 1798, which includes an essay on the ‘Danger of the Protestant Succession during her last years.’ Charles Hamilton's Transactions during the Reign of Queen Anne from the Union to her death, 1790, is violently partisan and valueless. More recent historians of the period are Lord Stanhope, here cited from the separate History of England, comprising the reign of Queen Anne until the peace of Utrecht, 1870 ”

“ George and Caroline were equally indisposed to accept the prince for a son-in-law, and the parental disinclination was expressed in words to the effect that neither King nor Queen would force the feelings of their daughter, whom they left free to accept or reject the misshapen suitor who aspired to the plump hand and proud person of the Princess Anne.
The lady thought of her increasing years; that lovers were not to be found on every bush, especially sovereign lovers ”

“ King William's reign, contrary to the expectation of all the statesmen of Europe, was decidedly more prosperous and more tranquil after Queen Mary's death than it had been during her life.
In course of time Princess Anne's health improved, and she became a great huntress. This exercise was begun for the cure of gout and dropsy, but was continued on account of the pleasure the princess derived from it. She was too fat to hunt on horseback, but went in a sort of sedan chair, hung between two very high wheels, and drawn by one horse. ”

“ Meanwhile, Princess Anne was deprived of the society of her favorites, but she frequently wrote to Lady Marlborough, and referred to the king as "Caliban," or "that Dutch [394] monster"; she sometimes mentioned her little son, the Duke of Gloucester, and said that she patiently awaited the bright day when he should arrive at man's estate, so that England might flourish again.
In order to rid the metropolis of burglars, and the neighboring roads of highwaymen, Queen Mary issued a proclamation offering forty pounds a head for such offenders. ”

“ England watched with the greatest anxiety the latest days of Queen Anne's life; not out of any deep concern for the Queen herself, but simply because of the knowledge that with her death must come a crisis and might come a revolution. Who was to snatch the crown as it fell from Queen Anne's dying head? Over at Herrenhausen, in {3} Hanover, was one claimant to the throne ”

“ The personal history of Elizabeth may truly be said to begin with her birth; for she had scarcely entered her second year when her marriage—that never-accomplished project, which for half a century afterwards inspired so many vain hopes and was the subject of so many fruitless negotiations, was already proposed as an article of a treaty between France and England.
Henry had caused an act of succession to be passed, by which his divorce was confirmed, the authority of the pope disclaimed, and the crown settled on his issue by Anne Boleyn. ”

“ In 1706, Queen Anne created her son, George Augustus, Baron of Tewkesbury, Viscount Northallerton, Earl of Milford Haven, Marquis and Duke of Cambridge. With these honours it was also decreed that he should enjoy full precedence over the entire peerage.
There was a strong party in England whose most earnest desire it was that the Electress Sophia, in whose person the succession to the crown of Great Britain was settled, should repair to London—not permanently to reside there, but in order that during a brief visit she might receive the homage of the Protestant party. ”

“ The influence of the Duchess of Marlborough at the court of Queen Anne was now well understood by the continental powers of Europe. When England, in 1703, received a foreign potentate as her guest, the Duchess, was, of all her subjects, the object peculiarly selected for distinction. Charles, the second son of the Emperor of Austria, having recently been proclaimed, at Vienna, King of Spain, in opposition to the Duke of Anjou, completed his visits to sundry courts in Germany, whither he had repaired to seek a wife, by paying his respects to Anne of England. ”