Page:Cassell's Illustrated History of England vol 2.djvu/384

370 for England, and landed at Southampton on the 20th, after a week's voyage. Mary had discussed ere his arrival the position and title which Philip was to bear in England. She appeared disposed to give him all the power and dignity that she could, but in much of this she was very properly opposed by her Council, and especially by Gardiner, her chancellor, who, though he was a positive bigot and a fierce persecutor on account of religion, had many of the qualities of a sterling patriot. On the other hand, Renard was on the watch to claim for his master all the concessions possible. The first point mooted was whether the name of the king or the queen should stand first. Gardiner contended that as Mary was queen-regnant of her own kingdom, and Philip mere king-consort, the queen's name must take precedence. This Renard stoutly opposed, and as the queen was too ready to concede, it was decided that Philip's name should stand first. Mary next proposed that Philip should receive the honour of a coronation, but on this head Gardiner would not yield, and therefore the coronation was set aside. The queen next proposed, with as little success, that Philip should be crowned with the diadem of the queens-consort of England, and she was obliged to content herself with the arrangement that he should be invested with the collar and mantle of the Garter the moment he set foot on English ground.

These matters being settled, she retired with her Court to the palace of Guildford, to be near Southampton, where the prince was expected to land. When the fleet was expected in July she sent Lord Russell, privy-seal, to await his arrival, with the injunction to obey his commands in all things. This was the one weakness which ruined Mary's happiness, involved her in the horrors of persecution, and blackened her character to all futurity—the fond idea that she must in all things be subject to her husband.

Her courtiers were far from participating in this feeling. The Lord-Admiral Howard had been dispatched by Mary to meet and escort the prince to England. Howard was furnished with a fine fleet, and the emperor's ambassador, Renard, offered him a pension in token of the prince's sense of this service, but Howard declined accepting it, only referring him to the queen. Mary gave her consent for the grant: it in no degree subdued the blunt John Bullism of the admiral. The same ambassador was very soon excessively indignant at the admiral, on the joining of the fleets, irreverently calling the Spanish and Flemish vessels mussel-shells. Howard conceived a great contempt for the Spanish admiral, and quarrelled with him. The sailors were just as rough and uncomplimentary as their commander. They pushed and elbowed the Spanish sailors whenever they met, and the Spanish admiral forbade his men going on shore, during the month they lay off Corunna waiting for Philip, to prevent downright bloodshed. When they came into the narrow seas the English admiral insisted on the Spanish commander lowering topsails out of respect for the British fleet, and when he refused, Howard fired a gun over the admiral's ship, notwithstanding the prince being aboard, to compel him.

When the news arrived of Philip having landed at Southampton, the queen, who happened then to be at Windsor, set off the next day with a gay retinue to meet him at Winchester, where the marriage was fixed to take place. She arrived there on the 23rd of July, that is, three days after her bridegroom. He came attended by many Spanish officers of high rank, and amongst them the Duke of Alva, whose name afterwards became so infamous for his atrocities committed in the Netherlands on the Protestants. Philip, on ascending the stairs from the beach at Southampton, was received by a great concourse of nobles and ladies deputed for that purpose by the queen. He was immediately invested with the insignia of the order of the Garter, and, mounted on a beautiful genet, which the queen had sent him by the Master of the Horse, he rode to the church of the Holy Rood, and returned thanks for his safe voyage.

Philip was dressed simply in black velvet, having a barret-cap of the same, with small chains of gold. He was described as a man of singular beauty, but the judgment of others is not in accordance with these representations: "his complexion being cane-coloured, his hair sandy and scanty, his eyes small, blue, and weak, with a glowing expression of face, which is peculiarly odious in a person of very light complexion. A mighty volume of brain, although it sloped too much towards the top of the head, denoted that this unpleasant-looking prince was a man of considerable abilities."

The weather was terribly rainy and tempestuous although July. "It was a cruel rain," says Baoardo, an Italian who was present, through which Gardiner, Bishop of Winchester, came to welcome Don Philip, accompanied by fifty gentlemen with rich gold chains about their necks, dressed in black velvet, passamented with gold, and a hundred other gentlemen dressed in black cloth bound with gold. The Duchess of Alva landed in the evening, and was carried on shore in a chair of black velvet, borne by four of her gentlemen. Don Philip dispatched the next morning his grand chamberlain, Don Ruy Gomez de Silva, with a magnificent offering of jewels of the value of 50,000 ducats, as a present to his Royal bride. That day being Sunday, after mass he dined in public, and was waited upon by his newly-appointed English officers of the household, to the great chagrin of his Spanish attendants, most of whom were, according to the marriage treaty, obliged to return with the Spanish fleet. Don Philip courted popularity. He told his new attendants in Latin that he was come to live among them like an Englishman; and in proof thereof, drank some ale for the first time, which he gravely commended as "the wine of the country." The next day he and his retinue set forward for Winchester in still pouring rain; which they, however, only suffered in common with the Earl of Pembroke and a splendid cavalcade of 150 gentlemen and nobles in black velvet and gold chains, and a body-guard of 100 archers mounted, and wearing the prince's livery of yellow cloth, striped with red velvet, and with cordons of white and crimson silk. Besides these there were 4,000 spectators variously mounted, who closed the procession.

A ludicrous incident soon occurred. A gentleman came riding fast from the queen, praying him to proceed no further in such weather. Philip, seeing him present a small ring, and but imperfectly understanding his language, immediately imagined that the queen had sent to warn him of some menaced danger from his discontented subjects, for he was well aware how ill-disposed they were