Tudor Women: Queens and Commoners (12 page)

Mary, brought up to revere both her parents, had undoubtedly been made to feel acutely guilty and unhappy over her difference with her father, but now she bore an even heavier burden of guilt. She begged Chapuys to ask the Pope to give her a secret absolution for what she had done, but nothing could alter the fact that she had knowingly betrayed the two things which meant most in the world to her - her religious faith and her mother's memory. The consciousness of that betrayal, made by a frightened girl of twenty, was to haunt her for the rest of her life.

Meanwhile, the King's younger daughter was being disinherited in her turn. Parliament met that June and passed a second Act of Succession, ratifying the annulment of the Boleyn marriage and settling the crown, this time, on Jane Seymour's children. At not quite three years old, this sudden diminution of her social status did not greatly concern Elizabeth, but it prompted a worried letter from Lady Bryan, the Lady Mistress of the nursery, to Thomas Cromwell. 'Now as my Lady Elizabeth is put from that degree she was in,' wrote Margaret Bryan distractedly, 'and what degree she is at now I know not but by hearsay, I know not how to order her or myself, or her women or grooms.' The child was growing fast and her wardrobe urgently needed replenishing, but where was Lady Bryan to turn for instructions and supplies? There was trouble, too, within the household. Sir John Shelton, the steward or governor, wanted Elizabeth 'to dine and sup every day at the board of estate', probably to bolster his own importance, but the Lady Mistress considered this most unsuitable. 'It is not meet for a child of her age to keep such rule yet. If she do, I dare not take it upon me to keep her Grace in health; for there she shall see divers meats, and fruits, and wine, which it would be hard for me to restrain her Grace from.' Elizabeth was already in some danger of becoming spoiled, for 'my lady hath great pain with her great teeth, and they come very slowly forth, which causeth me to suffer her Grace to have her will more than I would'. However, Lady Bryan means to put this right as soon as she can. 'I trust to God, and her teeth were well graft, to have her Grace after another fashion than she is yet, so as I trust the King's Grace shall have great comfort in her Grace. For she is as toward a child and as gentle of conditions as ever I knew any in my life, Jesu preserve her Grace.'

Thomas Cromwell added the voluble Lady Bryan's problems to his innumerable other preoccupations, and once the confusion created by the recent upheavals in the royal circle had settled down, both Mary and Elizabeth were suitably provided for. The sisters continued for the most part to share an establishment, and although they now stood on equal terms socially, Mary, as the elder, had regained a natural precedence. Many of her old friends and servants were being allowed to rejoin her, and in August Chapuys was able to report that her position was improving every day. 'Never did she enjoy so much liberty as she does now,' he wrote, 'nor was she ever served with such solemnity and honour as she is at present.' Mary was at Court that autumn, where she came first after the Queen, presenting the napkin at the meal-time ceremony after the King and Queen had washed, and taking her place at table opposite them and only a little lower down the board. Jane Seymour had once served Queen Catherine as maid of honour, and now it was noticed that she went out of her way to show consideration to Catherine's daughter, often taking her by the hand so that they could pass through a doorway side by side.

Henry still seemed satisfied by his third marriage - at least there are no stories of his unfaithfulness to this wife - but the year ended with no sign of Jane's becoming pregnant. It wasn't until March 1537 that a hopeful announcement could at last be made. On Trinity Sunday, 'like one given of God', the child quickened in its mother's womb, and Te Deums were sung in many churches, while loyal subjects everywhere prayed for a prince. Henry fussed anxiously round his wife, sending here and there for fat quails, for which she apparently had a pregnant woman's craving, and generally behaving like a model husband. He had intended to go north that summer, but in view of the Queen's condition, he cancelled all his arrangements. Jane had everything she could reasonably want, but Henry was taking no chances: 'considering that, being but a woman, upon some sudden and displeasant rumours and bruits that might by foolish or light persons be blown abroad in our absence, being specially so far from her, she might take to her stomach such impressions as might engender no little danger or displeasure to the infant'. So, to avoid such perils, the King let it be known that he would travel no further than sixty miles from the palace until the Queen had been delivered.

Hampton Court, the handsome riverside mansion built by Cardinal Wolsey in the days of his glory, had been chosen for the lying-in, and there, on 16 September, the Queen 'took her chamber' with all due ceremony; but she did not enjoy the 'good hour' so earnestly prayed for on these occasions. She went into labour during the afternoon of 9 October, and her ordeal lasted three days and two nights. At two o'clock in the morning of 12 October the child was born. It was a boy, normal and healthy. The whole country went hysterical with joy, while, at Hampton Court, preparations began at once for a christening which would be worthy of Henry Tudor's son. But in all the flurry of correspondence, the triumphant announcements carried by royal messenger to every corner of the kingdom and the letters of congratulation and thankfulness pouring into the palace, there was scarcely a mention of the woman who had at last given England a prince. This complete lack of sentimentality or even sympathy was typical of the general attitude towards childbirth. It was also the obverse side of all the splendour and ceremonial, the elaborate deference paid to the Queen. Jane, like any farmer's wife, had done her business, the business she'd been created for. She'd done it successfully and been lucky enough to survive, and really there was no more to be said.

The christening of Prince Edward took place on the fifteenth and the Queen, wrapped in velvet and fur, was carried from her bed to lie propped up with pillows on an elaborate state pallet, or sofa, to receive the guests. The ceremony lasted nearly six hours, but protocol did not release Jane until the procession had returned from the chapel and the precious baby, borne in the arms of the Marchioness of Exeter, had been presented for his parents' blessing. Three days later, the Queen collapsed in a high fever, and early on the morning of the nineteenth she received the last sacrament. She rallied briefly and seemed to be holding her own, but by 24 October she was dead.

The generally received explanation of this unfortunate occurrence was that, by the carelessness of her attendants, she had been allowed to catch cold at the christening, and Thomas Cromwell also blamed those about her for letting her eat such unsuitable food 'as her fantasy in sickness called for'. In fact, of course, as far as it is possible to be certain, she died of puerperal sepsis, or childbed fever, caused by bacterial infection of the placental site -.the large raw area on the interior of the uterus - or the lacerations of the birth canal, especially likely after a long and difficult labour.

Henry was with his wife to the end and seemed genuinely grief-stricken by her death. Jane was given a state funeral, with the Princess Mary, who had lost an influential friend, acting as chief mourner. She was buried in St. George's Chapel at Windsor and was the first and, as it turned out, the only one of Henry's wives to be buried as Queen. Perhaps this was fair. She was, after all, the only one who fulfilled her side of the bargain to his satisfaction.

Henry embarked on the second half of his matrimonial marathon at the end of 1539, after an intensive two-year search for a bride round the Courts of Europe. Threatened with the danger of encirclement by hostile Catholic powers, England urgently needed friends abroad, but unfortunately the King of England's reputation as a husband was not now such as to reassure the parents of marriageable daughters. He had, after all, had one wife publicly put to death; while it was freely rumoured in certain circles that he'd disposed of Catherine of Aragon by poison and callously allowed Jane Seymour to be lost 'for lack of keeping in her childbed'. In the circumstances, it was not surprising that at least one strong-minded princess should have spurned the doubtful privilege of becoming wife number four, though there is, unhappily, no authority for the story that Christina of Milan rejected Henry's flattering proposal on the grounds that she had only one head.

Negotiations with foreign royalty were further hampered by the King's determination to inspect their daughters personally, instead of following the normal diplomatic practice of trusting to portrait-painters and the reports of ambassadors. His insensitive attempt to stage what amounted to a 'Miss Queen of England' contest at Calais from among a shortlist of French candidates provoked a stinging rebuke from King François. It was not the custom of his country, remarked that monarch coldly, to send young ladies of good family to be passed in review like horses for sale. Was this, enquired his ambassador, how the knights of the Round Table had treated their womenfolk? And Henry was, for once, reduced to silence.

The quest ended at last in the north Rhineland duchy of Cleves on the Dutch-German border with the twenty-three-year-old sister of the reigning duke - a rather curious choice in view of ambassador Nicholas Wootton's reports. Anne of Cleves had, it seemed, been strictly brought-up and spent most of her time at her needlework. She could read and write, but knew no French or Latin or indeed any language except her native German, though Wootton thought she was intelligent enough to learn English quite quickly if she put her mind to it. More seriously, she could not sing or play any instrument, for, the ambassador explained, 'they take it here in Germany for a rebuke and an occasion of lightness that great ladies should be learned or have any knowledge of music'. And he added that he 'could never hear that she is inclined to the good cheer of this country'. None of this makes Anne sound a particularly suitable bride for Henry VIII, nor, contrary to legend, does the miniature painted by Hans Holbein portray any great beauty. However, in view of the increasingly serious international situation, Henry could not afford to be too choosy. An alliance in the emerging 'third world' of non-aligned north European states would be undeniably valuable - especially at a time when France and Spain were, temporarily at least, presenting a united front. So the marriage contract was signed, and Anne of Cleves landed at the port of Deal on 27 December 1539.

The story of the King's acute and freely expressed disappointment on first seeing his betrothed is perhaps sufficiently well known, but whether poor Anne was really so very unattractive may be open to some doubt. Certainly the face which looks out of Holbein's miniature is by no means without charm, and compared with, say, the portrait of Queen Jane Seymour, her successor would seem to have little to be ashamed of. According to the French ambassador, she looked older than her years -he put her down as being about thirty, was tall of stature, pitted with the smallpox and had little beauty. No one, which seems rather odd, had apparently thought fit to mention the matter of the smallpox scars to Henry, although it was a common enough defect at the time. Marillac went on to describe her countenance as 'determined and resolute', and although he admitted there was some show of vivacity in her expression, he considered it 'insufficient to counterbalance her want of beauty'.

Anne was a sturdy, big-boned, strong-featured young woman - a common enough Germanic type - but emphatically not a type admired by the sophisticates of London and Paris, and the stiff, clumsy German fashions she arrived in appeared grotesque to English eyes. All the same, Anne was not devoid of taste and was soon ordering plain black dresses of satin and damask to show off her jewellery, which seems to have been her only major extravagance. She was clearly anxious to please and adapted readily to English ways, more than fulfilling Nicholas Wootton's estimate of her ability to learn the language. She learned to play cards, too, and in spite of not being able to sing or play an instrument, her account books show that she was fond of music and also took an interest in gardens and gardening. Her first few weeks in England must have been particularly trying, since she can scarcely have failed to realize that she was being despised, but she carried off a difficult and humiliating situation with great natural dignity and composure. Given half a chance, there is no reason to suppose that this large, homely, serene and sensible girl would not have made the King a perfectly satisfactory wife.

But Henry made no attempt to overcome his initial aversion. Lacking the courage to do the honourable thing and send Anne straight home again, he went through with the wedding, complaining piteously that 'if it were not to satisfy the world and my realm, I would not do that I must do this day for none earthly thing'. But not even to satisfy the world and his realm could he bring himself to consummate the marriage, finding nothing in his bride 'to excite and provoke any lust in him'. He did, however, share her bed for a few nights, and the English matrons of the Queen's bedchamber questioned her hopefully about her condition. But when Anne told them that, when the King came to bed, 'he kisses me and taketh me by the hand and biddeth me "Goodnight, sweetheart"; and in the morning kisses me and biddeth me "Farewell, darling",' Lady Rochford burst out: 'Madam, there must be more than this, or it will be long ere we have a Duke of York.' 'Nay,' said Anne innocently, 'is not this enough? I am contented with this, for I know no more.'

No one, of course, supposed for a moment that the King would put up with the unsatisfactory state of his marital affairs for long, and the only question in most people's minds was how soon it would be before he took steps to extricate himself. The presence of a queen, after a two-year gap, had brought the girls to Court again and, although Anne's household was somewhat smaller than most of her predecessors' had been, there was the usual vigorous scrambling for places. Mistress Anne Basset, already established as a maid of honour, was urged by her ambitious mama to recommend her sister Katherine for a post among the Queen's maids and sent ajar of her mother's special quince preserve to offer the King as a sweetener. His Highness was graciously pleased to accept the gift and 'liked it wondrous well', but he was evidently not in any very approachable mood. Anne Basset summoned up the courage to speak for her sister, but she hesitated to address the matter or to mention certain other favours requested by her parents (there was no point in having a daughter at Court and not making use of her to further the family's interests), 'for fear how his Grace would take it'.