Chapter 17

THE FRENCH COURT

Long die thy happy days before thy death;
And, after many lengthened hours of grief,
Die neither mother, wife nor England’s queen!

SHAKSPEARE.

The voyage of the duke of York was easy and auspicious. He repaired to Paris; and all the exiled Yorkists, to the number of one hundred gentlemen, instantly gathered round him, offering him their services, and forming his court, Charles assigned him magnificent apartments in the Tuileries, and appointed a guard of honour, under the command of the lord of Concressault, who, as was the case with every one who approached him, soon became warmly attached to the princely youth. Having just concluded a peace with Britany by marrying its young duchess, the king of France found himself in so prosperous a state at home, that he began to look abroad for wars, and resolved to invade Naples, to whose crown he had a claim. Meanwhile, the utmost splendour and gaiety reigned in Paris:—balls, tournaments, and hunting-parties, succeeded one to the other; now to celebrate a marriage—now to grace the entrance of some noble gentleman into the order of knighthood. Charles was an amiable prince—his queen a beautiful and spirited lady—the duke of Orleans an accomplished and adventurous cavalier. They all vied in acts of courtesy and kindness towards their royal visitor. There was an innocence in Richard’s vivacity, an ingenuousness in his reliance on their protection, that particularly captivated the chivalrous Orleans and the fair Queen Anne. How changed the scene from the wilds of Ireland and the semi-barbarous halls of the Desmond! The courtly and soft grace of the French, different from the dignity of the Spaniard, was irresistible to the inexperienced youth. It seemed to him that his standard was set up here for ever. No change could sully the fair favour of these illustrious friends. All young as he was, to be treated as rightful king of England by this potent government satisfied for the moment his ambition. He and his English friends welcome everywhere, all honoured—himself beloved—were the ascendant star in Paris. O’Maurice of Desmond! O’Barry, and good, honest—hearted O’Water!—though still he acknowledged your kindness, how did your uncivilized hospitalities fade before the golden splendour of King Charles’s court!

York might by the sober be blamed for yielding to the current, for setting his swelling canvas with the favouring wind—exulting. It was a boy’s blindness; the unsuspiciousness of inexperience; the fault lay in the falsehood; and that was not his.

On the sixth of October Henry the Seventh landed at Calais; on the nineteenth he sat down before Boulogne, with sixteen hundred men-at-arms, and twenty-five thousand infantry. Charles could not much fear the tardy operations of his foe; but the name of an English invasion, so associated with defeat and disaster, was portentous to the French: besides, Charles was eager to prepare for his Italian wars. Thus disposed, peace was easily brought about. One only obstacle presented itself. Henry insisted that the newly-arrived duke of York should be delivered up to him; Charles rejected the proposition with disdain: the negotiations were suspended, and the French king grew uneasy: it was no pleasant thing to have thirty or forty thousand of those English in the kingdom, who had disputed it inch by inch, at the expense of so much misery and slaughter, with his grandfather. Their king was averse to war; but the body of the army, the nobles, and leaders, ardently desired it: some intrigue, some accident, might light up a train to be quenched only by seas of blood; and all this for a prince, in whom, except that he was gallant and unfortunate, Charles took no concern.

Richard, basking in the noon-day of regal favour, of a sudden felt a cloud spread athwart his sunshine, and a chill take place of the glowing warmth. The complaints of his followers, principally of Lady Brampton, opened his eyes; for the king and princes, on the eve of betraying him, were in manner kinder than ever. First, Queen Anne asked this lady, if it were not the duke’s intention to repair to Flanders, to claim the support of the Lady Margaret. It seemed as if nothing was to be spoken of but Brussels, the Low Countries, Maximilian of Austria, and, above all, the virtues and sagacity of the illustrious widow of Charles the Rash. In youth we are slow to understand the covert language of duplicity. Frion was next put in requisition; he arrived in Paris after ten days’ absence, with an invitation to her so-named nephew from the duchess of Burgundy; and when, from the disinclination of the French to an act of glaring inhospitality, and of the English so to pain the confiding spirit of their prince, he was still kept darkling, suddenly one night his friend, the sire de Concressault, visited him. He brought many sugared words from his sovereigns; but the end was, that their ever dear friend, and most honoured guest, the duke of York, would render them special pleasure, if, for some short time, he would visit Brussels. The fiery spirit of youth blazed forth at a dismission, still more when Concressault added, that horses were already prepared, and everything arranged for his immediate departure. To qualify this insult, Concressault could best bring his own warm, affectionate feelings. He loved the English prince, and by the frankness of his explanations, soothed him, while he made the wound deeper, by showing whence it was directed, and that Henry Tudor’s was the master-hand.