pay the remainder of the debt, and signed Henry's favourite stipulation, that if a traitor or rebel to either prince should seek refuge in the dominions of the other, he should be delivered up within twenty days at the requisition of the offended party. ' with Scot land. 2. The truces between England and Scotland, though Treaties frequently renewed and enforced with menaces and punishments, were but ill observed by the fierce and turbulent inhabitants of the borders. Soon after the last pacification, the garrison of Norham grew jealous of the repeated visits which they received from their Scottish neighbours. One day a serious affray was the consequence and the strangers, after losing some of their fellows, fled for protection to the nearest post of their countrymen. The intelligence was received with indignation by James, who instantly dispatched a herald to Henry, to announce that the truce was at an end and a war must have ensued had not the English monarch been as phlegmatic as the Scottish was irascible. Fox bishop of Durham, to whom the castle belonged, first wrote to James, and afterwards visited him at the abbey of Melrose and so successful were the address and eloquence of that prelate, that the king was not only appeased, but offered, what he had formerly refused, to marry Margaret the eldest daughter of Henry 2. By the English prince the offer was most joyfully accepted and when some of his council expressed a fear that then, in failure of the male line, England might hereafter become an appendage to the Scottish crown, « No, » he replied, « Scotland will become an appendage to the English. For the smaller Rym. xii. 638-642. 681-695. : Marriage of 1502. Jan. 24. « must follow the larger kingdom. » The event has verified the prediction and the marriage has been productive of more substantial benefits than Henry could probably foresee. It has not only united the two crowns on one head; it has also contributed to unite the two kingdoms into one empire. It would be tedious to narrate the repeated and prothe king's tracted negociations respecting this marriage. The daughter. parties were related within the prohibited degrees, and the princess was not of sufficient age to make a contract valid in law. Both these impediments were removed by a papal dispensation. Henry consented to give with his daughter the paltry sum of thirty thousand nobles, to be paid in three yearly instalments; and James settled on her lands to the annual value of two thousand pounds, in lieu of which she was to receive during his life five hundred marks yearly 2. The parties were now solemnly affianced to each other in the queen's chamber, the earl of Bothwell acting as proxy for James : tournaments were performed for two days in honour of the ceremony; and to exhilarate the populace twelve hogsheads of claret were tapped in the streets, and twelve bonfires kindled at night 3. At the same time Jan. 29. 2 Bacon, 119. Rym. xii. 787-793. As the noble was 6s. 8d. the whole portion amounted to no more than 10,000l. 3 The form was as follows: « I Patricke earl of Bothwel, procura«tor, etc. contract matrimony with thee Margaret, and take thee «< into and for the wieffe and spous of my soveraigne lord James « king of Scotland, and all uthir for thee, as procurator forsaid, forsake, induring his and thine lives naturall, and thereto as procu<< rator forsaid, I plight, and give thee his faythe and truthe. » Henry gave to the ambassadors at their departure presents to the value of several thousand pounds. Lel. Coll. iv. 258–264. was concluded, after one hundred and seventy years of war, or of truces little better than war, a treaty of perpetual peace between the two kingdoms, accompanied with the usual clause respecting the surrender of traitors, and a promise that neither prince should grant letters of protection to the subjects of the other without having previously obtained his permission. James, however, was careful that his new engagements should not interfere with the ancient alliance between Scotland and France. When he swore to observe the treaty, he had given to Henry the usual title of king of France; but he instantly arose, protested that he had done it inadvertently, and repeated the oath with the omission of that word; and when he was requested by his father-in-law not to renew the French league, he acquiesced for the time, but reserved to himself the power of renewing it, whenever he should be so advised. ' 1503. July 8. At the time of the contract the princess was but twelve years of age; and James had consented that she should remain twenty months longer under the roof of her royal parents. At length she departed from her grandmother's palace at Colliweston, with a long train of ladies and gentlemen, who accompanied her a mile, kissed her, and returned to the court. The earl of Kent, with the lords Strange, Hastings, and Willoughby, escorted her as far as York. She rode on a palfrey attended by three footmen: and was followed by a magnificent litter drawn by two horses, in which she made her entry into the different towns. In her suite were a company of players and another of minstrels. From July 17. York she proceeded under the care of the earls of Surrey and Northumberland to Lambertonkirk, where she was received by the Scottish nobility. James repeatedly visited her on her progress: and on her arrival in the neighbourhood of Edinburgh, mounted her palfrey, and rode with her behind him into his capital. The marriage ceremony was performed by the archbishop of Glasgow, and the Englishe lords and ladyes,» says Hall, « returned into their countrey, gevyinge more prayse to the manhoode, than to the good maner, and « nurture of Scotland. » 3. Henry had always cultivated with particular solicitude the alliance of Ferdinand king of Castile and Arragon and the more strongly to cement their friendship had proposed a marriage between his eldest son, Arthur prince of Wales, and Catharine the fourth daughter of the Castilian monarch. The arrangements were soon concluded: Ferdinand promised to give the princess a portion of two hundred thousand crowns; and Henry engaged that his son should endow her with one third of his income at present, and one third of the income of the crown, if he should live to wear it. The marriage was postponed on account of the youth of Arthur: but when he had reached his twelfth year, a dispensation was obtained to enable him to make the contract and the marriage ceremony was performed in the chapel of his manor of Bewdley, where Catharine was represented by her proxy the Spanish ambassador 3. At length the prince completed his fourteenth year, and the princess landed at Plymouth, after 2 'Lel. Coll. iv. 265-300. Hall, 56. Rym. xii. 658-666. The Spanish crown was worth 4s. 2d. English. Ibid. 3 Rym. xii. 754. Nov. 6. a wearisome and boisterous voyage. The king met her at Dogmersfield': she renewed to Arthur the contract which had been made by her proxy: the marriage ceremony was performed in St. Paul's: and at the door of the cathedral, and in the presence of the multitude, Arthur endowed her with one third of his property 2. The king spared no expense to testify his joy by disguis- Nov. 14. ings, tournaments, and banquets and several of the nobility, to flatter the monarch, indulged in a magnificence which proved ruinous to their families 3. The abilities of Arthur, the sweetness of his temper, and his proficiency in learning4, had gained him the affection of all who knew him and his bride by her beauty, I : 3 'An unexpected difficulty occurred on the road to Dogmersfield. The prothonotary of Spain met the king, and told him that the Spanish noblemen who had charge of the princess, had been charged by their sovereign that « they should in no manner of wise permit their lady to have any meeting, ne to use any manner of communication, nither to receive any companye, untill the inception of the very daye of the solemnisation of the marriadge. » But Henry declared that he would be master in his own kingdom; he entered her chamber, introduced his son to her, and caused them to renew the former contract. Lel. Coll. v. 352-355. « 2 Rym. xii. 780. 3 Those who are desirous of knowing what where the fashionable amusements of our ancestors, may read the account of the festivities on this occasion, added by Hearn to Leland's Collectanea, v. 356-373. 4 Besides the most eminent grammarians he had studied « in poetrie Homer, Virgil, Lucan, Ovid, Silius, Plautus, and Te<«<rence : In oratorie Tullies offices, epistles, paradoxes, and Quin«tilian : in historie, Thucydides, Livie, Cæsar's Commentaries, Suetonius, Tacitus, Plinius, Valerius Maximus, Salust, and Eusebius. Wherein we have been particular, to signifie what authors « were then thought fit to be elementary and rudimentall unto princes. » Speed (p. 988), who quotes the manuscript of André, the preceptor of Arthur. a |