Royal James

“ It would be hard to find, in any class of society except those reputed infamous, more low, gross, [Pg 29] and vulgar modes of life than have been exhibited generally in the royal palaces of Europe for the last five hundred years. King James the First has, among English sovereigns, rather a high character for sobriety and gravity of deportment, and purity of morals; but the glimpses we get of the real, every-day routine of his domestic life, are such as to show that the pomp and parade of royalty is mere glittering tinsel, after all. ”

“ He answered, with his uncle, a royal summons to London in 1606 for the discussion of Church policy. The uncompromising attitude of the kinsmen, though it was made the excuse for sending the elder to the Tower, brought no further punishment to James than easy detention within ten miles of Newcastle-on-Tyne. During his residence there it was made clear to him by the king’s agents that he would receive high reward if he supported the royal plans. In 1613 negotiations were begun for his return to Scotland, but his health was broken, and he died at Berwick in January 1614. ”

“ No charm of rural life was wanting; and the towers of the most superb city of the Continent were visible in the distance. The royal apartments were richly adorned with tapestry and marquetry, vases of silver and mirrors in gilded frames. A pension of more than forty thousand pounds sterling was annually paid to James from the French Treasury. He had a guard of honour composed of some of the finest soldiers in Europe. ”

“ James I, an eccentric mixture of the kingly and unkingly—of the well-balanced and the "just not mad"—was, first and last, a consistent Uranian. His court became aware of it, even to its use by state-intriguers. James never could resist a handsome young man. Once in love with him, James was almost incredibly indifferent to moral un-worth behind mere beauty of body, exactly as dionistic princes have been mischievously bewitched by mistresses. The histories of James's chief favourites are good illustrations of the dangers of becoming a royal pet. ”

“ While ev'ry loyal heart exclaims, God save the king! [36]
From war, dissension, anarchy, Kind heav'n protect this kingdom free! United may it ever be! God save the king!
From exile see the monarch bring The olive round our harp to string! With transport let each patriot sing, God save the king!
Then welcome be the royal James, None shall resist his legal claims; While ev'ry honest heart exclaims, God save the king!
[Pg 276]
During this pause the public curiosity had sufficient time for its indulgence by a full view of the royal person. King James looked extremely well ”

“ As soon as Barillon received the remittance, he flew to Whitehall, and communicated the welcome news. James was not ashamed to shed, or pretend to shed, tears of delight and gratitude. "Nobody but your King," he said, "does such kind, such noble things. I never can be grateful enough. Assure him that my attachment will last to the end of my days." Rochester, Sunderland, and Godolphin came, one after another, to embrace the ambassador, and to whisper to him that he had given new life to their royal master. ”

“ In his zeal to assert his personal will as the source of all power, whether judicial or other, James had struck one of its most powerful instruments from the hands of the Crown. He had broken the spell of the royal courts. If the good sense of Englishmen had revolted against their decisions in favour of the prerogative, the English reverence for law had made men submit to them. But now that all show of judicial independence was taken away, and the judges debased into mere mouthpieces of the king's will, the weight of their judgements came to an end. ”

“ The greed of man on every page;
No matter whether young or old,
His strife in life is search for gold!
[236]
King James left Edinburgh on the 5th of April with a royal escort for London, and by easy stage from town to town and castle to castle, made a triumphal march to London, where he arrived on the 7th of May, 1603, putting up at the Whitehall Palace. The lords of the realm and millions of faithful subjects gave James their loyal adhesion and support, lauding him to the skies as monarch of the realm and defender of the Faith. Hope had no thorns in her crown. ”

“ The journey of the young prince was, meantime, retarded by the reluctance of the King. James justly considered that continental nations might impugn his natural affection, as well as his judgment, in permitting the heir-apparent to quit the kingdom, and to leave his royal father childless, for Elizabeth of Bohemia had taken refuge in the Dutch states, and had not then looked to England as her exile. He considered the danger, writes a contemporary historian, “himself being now aged, if he should die, what then might befall his children.” ”

“ However, if we may believe the Royal word (which is a matter of choice) , James ‘loved the young Master like a brother.’
The Master approached the King, and entered into conversation with him. James’s account of what he had to say must be given later. For the present we may be content with the depositions on oath, which were made later, at a trial in November, by the attendants of the King and other witnesses. Among these was the Duke of Lennox, who swore to the following effect. ”

“ The fortunes of the family culminated in the reign of James II. Whatever its origin had been, in that reign the race had attained an eminence more dazzling, perhaps, than that of any subject before or since. Earls of Douglas and Wigton, Lords of Bothwell, Galloway, and Annandale, Dukes of Touraine, Lords of Longueville, and Marshals of France, they had inter-married more than once with the Scottish Royal House itself. Members of the family also held the Earldoms of Angus, Ormond, and Moray. What wonder that they lifted haughty heads, and began to look askance at the Royal power? ”

“ King James was not without an object amid all the laughter and the pranks of his holiday. The King's cheerful ridicule of the clumsy fellows who could not draw the bow was intended, with a prick of scorn under the laughter, to rouse up his rustic lieges to emulation, not to be behind the southern pock-puddings whose deadly arrows were, in every encounter between Scots and English, the chief danger to the fighting men of the north. ”

“ With all the rancour of fanatic rage, and all the ferocity of atrocious civil war, the troops of King William pursued the royal fugitive. And history is wholly silent as to whether any royal mandate was issued to spare the life of King James, the father of Mary, who was the wife of William! ”

“ In 1672 he was appointed captain of the Royal James, carrying the flag of the Earl of Sandwich [see Mountagu, Edward, first Earl of Sandwich] . In the battle of Solebay, on 28 May, the Royal James was closely engaged and grappled with by two of the enemy's ships. ”

“ But James loved pomp, and appointed a household for his eldest son, when still an infant. Besides the Earl of Mar, his Governor, the illustrious babe had a Gentleman of the Bedchamber, in the person of Sir David Murray, who attended him into England, and 308remained with him till his death. When between five and six, Henry was removed to the custody of Adam Newton, a learned Scot, on whom James, on his accession to the English throne, bestowed the Deanery of Durham (although a layman) , and a Baronetcy. This was probably a reward for translating a work of the royal pedant’s into Latin. ”

“ James's Palace, because that building, less commodious for honest purposes than Whitehall, had some rooms and passages well suited for the purpose of the Jesuits. There, amidst a circle of zealots who thought nothing a crime that tended to promote the interests of their Church, and of courtiers who thought nothing a crime that tended to enrich and aggrandise themselves, a new born child had been introduced into the royal bed, and then handed round in triumph, as heir of the three kingdoms. ”

“ Barton and Falconer were now compelled to leave the ladies, and with many other gentlemen sprang on horseback, to accompany the admiral, who had now joined the royal cavalcade.
The king received the fine old man with unfeigned expressions of affection and joy; for grief soon discovers true sympathy, and misfortune readily discerns the difference between flattery and devotion: thus James III. always felt stronger and more confident when such men as Sir Andrew Wood, or Lindesay and Montrose were by his side; but such nobles as Angus and Lord Drummond were his horror and aversion. ”

“ In the beginning of James's reign this new power was but beginning to swell in the silent bosom of the country, showing here and there in a trial for heresy and in the startling fires of execution which cut off the first martyrs for the reformed faith. But there is no evidence to show that James, a young man full of affairs much more absorbing than religious controversy, with more confidence, politically at least, in the Church than in any other power of his realm, had ever been awakened to the importance of the struggle. ”

“ James's supineness, over-refinement, and love of peaceful occupations were made the more remarkable from the contrast with two manly and chivalrous brothers, the Dukes of Mar and Albany, of fine person and energetic tastes, {135}interested in all the operations of war, fond of fine horses and gallant doings, and coming up to all the popular expectations of what was becoming in a prince. Nothing is more difficult to make out at any time than the real motives and meaning of family discords: and this is still more the case in an age not yet enlightened by the clear light of history. ”

“ James would seem to have yielded to the inspiration of his new prime minister for a period of years, until his mind had fully developed, and he became conscious, as his father had been, of the dangers which arose to the common weal from the lawless sway of the great nobles, their continual feuds among themselves, and the reckless independence of each great man's following, whose only care was to please their lord, with little regard either for the King and Parliament or the laws they made. ”

“ The preachers would have contented the Lords by merely reading James’s letter aloud to their congregations. But this they declined to do; they wished, in the pulpit, to evade the Royal letter, and merely to talk, conditionally, of the possible truth of the report, or ‘bruit.’ This appears to have been a verbal narrative brought by Graham of Balgonie, which seemed to vary from the long letter probably penned by Moysie. At this moment the Rev. David Lindsay, who had been at Falkland, and had heard James’s story from his own mouth, arrived. ”

“ It must indeed be allowed, notwithstanding his poetry and his evident love of everything that was lovely and of good report, that the reign of the first James was a stern one. Every witness agrees as to his accomplishment, and that he was the flower of knighthood, of splendour and courtesy, the most chivalrous, the most daring, the most graceful and gracious of all his Court: and his genius as a poet is even more generally acknowledged. The King's "Quhair" as a poem is quite capable of standing on its own merits, and needs no additional prestige as the performance of a king. ”

“ One by one all the associations connected with the religion of his fathers, were rent away, till kneeling became an abomination, and the prayers of his church a loathing. The arm of royal authority then held a firm grasp on the consciences of men, and England was no place for him who spoke against the religion of his king. So their children were called together, and the gay young beauty who had sparkled awhile in the court of king James, slept in a rude shelter on a foreign soil. ”

“ The dwarf confirmed his choice, and in the next second James was standing outside the hill, with his rusty musket, his dented horn, and the little gray horse. He jumped into the saddle and rode straight to the king's court, where a sentry inquired about his errand. "I wish to become one of the royal hunters," said James. "Then you had better apply to the king's adjutant. If he has any use for you, he may engage your service," returned the sentry. ”

“ In 1678 he commanded the Royal James as flag-captain to Sir Thomas Allin [q. v.] ; in 1679 he was captain of the Northumberland, in 1680 of the Woolwich. On 20 Nov. 1680 he was knighted. In October 1683 he was appointed captain of the East India Company's ship Royal James, with a double commission from the king and the company to command the fleet in the East Indies for reinstating the king of Bantam and re-establishing the trade there. ”

“ It contained nine volumes of memoirs, written in the hand of James himself. These volumes reached France in safety, and, after the lapse of more than a century, perished there in the havoc of a revolution far more terrible than that from which they had escaped. But some fragments still remain, and, though grievously mutilated, and imbedded in great masses of childish fiction, well deserve to be attentively studied.
The rich plate of the Chapel Royal had been deposited at Wild House, near Lincoln's Inn Fields, the residence of the Spanish ambassador Ronquillo. ”

“ James’s, drawing-rooms were held several times a week, public days as they were called, and the King and Queen gave frequent audiences besides. Court balls often took place, and at the evening drawing-rooms cards and high play were still in vogue. Every movement of the King and Queen in public was made the occasion of ceremonial; they attended divine service at the Chapel Royal in state; they walked in St. James’s Park followed by a numerous suite, the way kept clear by guards; they seldom drove out unless preceded by an escort ”