Page:Catherine of Bragança, infanta of Portugal, & queen-consort of England.djvu/78

50 is a ridiculous account of how the envoy carried out his mission, hiding in a pew in church, and ducking up and down, to see them at their devotions. He brought back a most disconcerting report. One of the princesses was extremely fat, and had no figure. The other was so ugly that he dared not go forward with any negotiation.^

Vatteville was so desperate on hearing of Lord Bristol's ill-success, that he was driven to the point of offering to give a dowry to a Protestant bride, if Charles would only not choose Catherine. His only stipulation was that Spain must approve of the bride. D'Ablancourt's Memoirs describe the amusement of all Protestants throughout the world at this sop to Cerberus.

English merchants, probably suborned by the enemies of the marriage, brought back accounts from Portugal that corroborated Lord Bristol's and Vatteville's hideous descriptions. Charles had in turn the daughters of the King of Denmark, and the Elector of Saxony suggested to him by Vatteville. He still wavered. Then several people who had lately re- turned from Portugal again altered his opinion of Catherine. He made cautious inquiries, and in every case they gave him a description of the Infanta so diametrically opposed to Vatteville's and Bristol's that Charles began to show more politeness to poor de Mello, who had by this time taken to his bed with chagrin and real sickness caused by his disappoint- ment. His notice of de Mello provoked Vatteville to more remonstrance. Charles, good-tempered to a fault, was yet apt to turn on those who too much presumed on it. He showed Vatteville that he re- sented his interference, and when Vatteville pressed his impertinence to the last point, and remarked that he had orders from the King his master to let His Majesty know that if he should proceed towards the marriage with the daughter of his rebel the Duke of


 * Clarendon*