CHAPTER II

ANNE, DUCHESS OF YORK (née HYDE) (2) 1637-1671

The married life of the Duchess of York was not all roses. Her consort was a pleasant enough fellow, though not so genial nor so dignified as his brother, the King, and he was certainly as selfish as any of the Stuarts. Anthony Hamilton in his Memoirs of Grammont presents a good and fairly reliable penportrait of the Heir-Presumptive. "He was very brave in his youth," he says, "and so much magnified by Monsieur Turenne, that till his marriage lessened him, he really clouded the King, and passed for the superior genius. He was naturally candid and sincere, and a firm friend, till affairs and his religion wore out all his first principles and inclinations. He had a great desire to understand affairs: and in order to do that he kept a constant journal of all that passed, of which he showed me a great deal.

"The Duke of Buckingham gave me once a short but severe character of the two brothers. It was the more severe, because it was true: the King (he said), could see things if he would: and the Duke would see things if he could. He had no true judgment, and was soon determined by those whom he trusted: but he was obstinate against all other advices. He was bred with high notions of kingly authority, and laid it down for a maxim, that all who opposed the King were rebels in their hearts. He was perpetually in one amour or another, without being very nice in his choice: upon which the King once said, he believed his brother had his mistress given him by his priests for penance. He was naturally eager and revengeful: and was against the taking off any, that set up in opposition to the measures of the Court. He was for rougher methods. He continued many years dissembling his religion, and seemed zealous for the Church of England, but it was chiefly on design to hinder all propositions, that tended to unite us among ourselves. He was a frugal prince, and brought his court into method and magnificence, for he had £100,000 a-year allowed him. He was made High Admiral, and he came to understand all the concerns of the sea very particularly."

It was not to be expected that a lady not of royal blood who, married the Heir-Presumptive to the throne would at once become popular with the ladies of the Court or with society generally. In fact, jealousy was, not unnaturally, rampant. Nor did her relations by marriage accept her with equanimity. The Duke of Gloucester said that his sister-in-law smelt of her father's green-bag, and that in a parvenue the pride habitually imputed to her was naturally resented. However, after a time, she contrived to live down her unpopularity. Anthony Hamilton wrote of her: "The Duchess of York's want of birth was made up by endowments, and her carriage afterwards became her acquired dignity. She had a majestic air, a pretty good shape, not much beauty, a good deal of wit, and so just a discernment of merit, that, whoever of either sex were possessed of it, were sure to be distinguished by her: an air of grandeur in all her actions made her to be considered as if born to support the rank which placed her so near the throne."

Of her, Pepys wrote in 1667, "The Duchess is not only the proudest woman in the world, but the most expenceful." Anyhow, whether the fault lay with her or her husband, the fact remains that the cost of their household was £20,000 a year in excess of their revenue, and that about the time that Pepys reflected on the matter Commissioners were appointed to control the Duke's revenue. The Duchess of York was, in fact, a woman of sense, and contrived, by the exercise of her tact, to keep her husband within reasonable bounds-a task that was none too easy. "The Duke of York," says Pepys, "in all things but his amours, was led by the nose of his wife." His Royal Highness's amorous propensities she could not, indeed, check. He flitted after every fresh face, and even made love to one at least of his brother's mistresses-to the undisguised annoyance of that monarch, who, for his part, it must in justice be said, never hesitated to poach upon the preserves of others: His Majesty took up the regal attitude that what is sauce for the King, is not necessarily sauce for his younger brother.

It was about this time that the Duchess's father offered his resignation, and expressed his desire to go abroad.

"May it please your Majesty.

"I am so broken under the daily insupportable instances of your Majesty's terrible displeasure, that I know not what to do, hardly what to wish. The crimes which are objected against me, how passionately soever pursued, and with circumstances very unusual, do not in the least degree fright me. God knows I am innocent in every particular as I ought to be; and I hope your Majesty knows enough of me to believe that I had never a violent appetite for money, that could corrupt me. But, alas! your Majesty's declared anger and indignation deprives me of comfort and support even of my own innocence, and exposes me to the rage and fury of those who have some excuse for being my enemies; whom I have sometimes displeased, when (and only then) your Majesty believed them not to be your friends. I hope they may be changed; I am sure I am not, but have the same duty, passion, and affection for you, that I had when you thought it most unquestionable, and which was and is as great as ever man had for any mortal creature. I should die in peace (and truly I do heartily wish that God Almighty would free you from further trouble, by taking me to himself), if I could know or guess at the ground of your displeasure, which I am sure must proceed from your believing, that I have said or done somewhat I have neither said [nor] done. If it be for any thing my Lord Berkeley hath reported, which I know he hath said to many, though being charged with it by me he did as positively disclaim it; I am as innocent in that whole affair, and gave no more advice or counselor countenance in it, than that, which your Majesty seemed once to believe, when I took notice to you of the report, and when you considered how totally I was a stranger to the persons mentioned, to either of whom I never spake word, or received message from either in my life. And this I protest to your Majesty is true, as I have hope in heaven: and that I have never wilfully offended your Majesty in my life, and do upon my knees beg your pardon for any over-bold or saucy expressions I have ever used to you; which, being a natural disease in old servants who have received too much countenance, I am sure hath always proceeded from the zeal and warmth of the most sincere affection and duty.

"I hope your Majesty believes, that the sharp chastisement I have received from the best-natured and most bountiful master in the world, and whose kindness alone made my condition these many years supportable, hath enough mortified me as to this world, and that I have not the presumption or the madness to imagine or desire ever to be admitted to any employment or trust again. But I do most humbly beseech your Majesty, by the memory of your father, who recommended me to you with some testimony, and by your own gracious reflection upon some one service I may have performed in my life, that hath been acceptable to you; that you will by your royal power and interposition put a stop to this severe prosecution against me, and that my concernment may give no longer interruption to the great affairs of the kingdom; but that I may spend the small remainder of my life, which cannot hold long, in some parts beyond the seas, never to return, where I will pray for your Majesty, and never suffer the least diminution in the duty and obedience of,

"May it please your Majesty,

"Your Majesty's

"Most humble and most

"Obedient subject and servant,

"CLARENDON.

"From my house

this 16th of November."

Gallantry was the fashion of the day, anyhow at Court and in fashionable circles generally. "In fine," Pepys wrote on New Year's Day, 1663, being in moralising mood, probably after thinking of his own peccadilloes as it is right and proper at the beginning of a year, "I find there is nothing almost but bawdry at Court from top to bottom, as, if it were fit, I could instance, but it is not necessary only they say my Lord Chesterfield, Groom of the Stole to the Queen, is either gone or put away from the Court upon the score of his lady's having smitten the Duke of York, so as that he is watched by the Duchess of York, and his lady is retired into the country upon it. How much of this is true, God knows, but it is common talk."

There was, however, no breach between the royal pair at this time. On January 4 Pepys saw them at the theatre, when Tom Killi-grew's play Clarasilla was being performed: "Neither the King nor Queen were there, but only the Duke and Duchess, who did show some impertinent and, methought, unnatural dalliance there, before the whole world, such a kissing and leaning upon one another." In May of the same year, the diarist makes an entry, "The Duke of York, whose lady, I am told, is very troublesome to him by her jealousy."

The Duchess had cause enough for jealousy. "Pierce tells me also," to quote Pepys, November 2, 1662, "how the Duke of York is smitten in love with my Lady Chesterfield (a virtuous lady, daughter to my Lord of Ormonde), and so much, that the Duchess of York hath complained to the King and her father about it, and my Lady...