Page:Cassell's Illustrated History of England vol 2.djvu/127

A.D. 1506.] and seas were nothing when hearts were open—a thing true enough, in more than one sense, which, no doubt, Philip thought to himself. Philip found himself received with much magnificence at the castle of Windsor; but he was not suffered to remain long without feeling that he was in the hands of a man who would have his full advantage out of him. The insatiable old miser went to work and propounded his demands, and there was nothing for it but for Philip to comply, if he ever meant to see Spain. First, Henry informed him that he was intending to marry, and that Philip's sister, the Dowager-Duchess of Savoy, was the woman of his choice. He demanded with her the sum of 300,000 crowns, of which 100,000 should be paid in August—it was already the 10th of March—and the remainder in six years by equal instalments. Besides this, Margaret, the duchess, was in the annual receipt of two dowries; one as the widow of John, Prince of Spain, and the other as widow of Philibert, Duke of Savoy, for she had been twice married already. This income Henry stipulated should be settled upon himself—poor man! as if he were so destitute of income already—and the princess was to receive instead an income as queen of England. That meant that Henry would have an income certain, and give her one most uncertain, for at this very time Catherine, the widow of his son Arthur, and betrothed bride of his son Henry, was kept by him in a condition of the most shameful destitution.

Philip consented—for what could he do?—and that point settled, Henry informed Philip that he had also a son, whom he, Henry, proposed to marry to his youngest daughter, Mary. This must have been a still more bitter draught for the poor Spanish monarch than the former. Henry had already made this very proposal, and it had been at once rejected. This son of Philip, the future celebrated Emperor Charles V., was now a child of six years of age, and the little Princess Mary was just three! Philip, however much he might inwardly rebel, and however differently he had planned the destiny of his son, was in the miser's vice, and the thing was done.

Henry next proceeded to dictate a new treaty of commerce betwixt England and Flanders, reversing the advantages which Flanders had before enjoyed, and placing them on the side of England. This change the Flemish denounced bitterly when it became known. They had called their old treaty with England the intercursus magnus—the great treaty—but this they dubbed the intercursus malus—the bad treaty. These matters being settled, Henry consented to lend Philip £138,000 on good and profitable securities, to assist him in his enterprise of obtaining his wife's throne in Spain; and then demanded that he should put into his hands the unfortunate Earl of Suffolk, who was now in the Netherlands. At this demand Philip recoiled in disgust. It was a direct attack upon his honour, and if Henry had had one spark of feeling himself he would have called to mind his own ideas when Richard III. demanded his surrender from the Duke of Brittany. But Philip must either yield or remain an actual captive himself at Windsor; he therefore consented, on the strict condition that the life of the earl should be spared. This being conceded, Philip wrote to assure the earl that he might safely venture to return to England. Suffolk returned, to enable Philip, his benefactor, to escape from the clutches of Henry, and on the earl's surrender, Philip was permitted to take his leave. Henry thirsted for the blood of Suffolk, but, fearful of offending Philip, he refrained from putting the earl to death; he kept him shut up in the Tower, and left at his death a strict order that his successor should have him executed.

The visit which Juana made to Windsor, during these extraordinary proceedings, was studiedly short. She arrived on the 10th of February, and left again on the 12th, thus remaining little more than a day, after the long journey from Weymouth in the winter, though her husband was at Windsor with her. But there were reasons sufficiently strong why Juana should not have too much opportunity for speech with her sister Catherine, the Princess of Wales. Catherine, as we have said, was kept by Henry in a condition of poverty and insult which would have created a great sensation in Spain if it became known, and which was likely to stir uneasily the heart of a sister. The miserable king, angry at not receiving the remainder of her dower—for since her mother's death the state of Castillo had refused to pay it, and Ferdinand was, therefore, unable to remit it—revenged himself by taunting her with the non-payment of the money. When she assured him that her father was certain to discharge it at one time or another, he replied churlishly, "that was yet to see," and that "he did not know that." Nor did he confine himself to taunts: he refused to pay her allotted income as Dowager-Princess of Wales. The endowing her by Prince Arthur with one-third of his property at the church door was a cruel farce: she had nothing. The residences assigned to her were such as lay low—as Durham House, in the Strand, or Arragon House, at Twickenham—and the great change from the warm, dry air of Spain fixed on her an obstinate intermittent fever, of which she was suffering for more than a year. In this condition she was not blessed with a penny. She complains in her letters to her father that she was in debt in London for herself and household—not for extravagance, but simply for food. She implores her father with tears to prevail on the King of England to discharge her debts. "My lord," she says, "I am in the greatest trouble and anguish in the world, on the one part seeing all my people that they are ready to ask alms; on the other, the debts that I have in London. About my own person I have nothing for chemises, wherefore, by your highness's life, I have now sold some bracelets to get a dress of black velvet; for since I departed from Spain, I have had nothing but two new dresses, for till now those I brought have lasted me, although now I have got nothing but dresses of brocade."

The death of her husband, Prince Arthur, and of her mother, had compelled her to get these two only new dresses, as mourning. But there was also a dispute going on betwixt Henry and Ferdinand, the brunt of which fell on the princess. Ferdinand contended that Catherine's jewels, amounting in value to 33,000 crowns, were meant as a part of the 200,000 crowns of dowry, but this Henry would not admit, but insisted on the payment in full.

Such was the situation of this unfortunate princess with this most miserable of royal misers. She was longing to get away to her own country again. She was strongly opposed to the second marriage with