Page:Dictionary of National Biography. Sup. Vol III (1901).djvu/153

Margaret prose. A third printed play, a tragedy, called 'The Bastard,' which was published anonymously also in 1652, has been assigned traditionally to Manuche, and that theory of authorship is accepted by Charles Lamb, who gives a quotation from it in his 'Specimens of English Dramatic Poets.' Langbaine traces its plots to episodes in 'The English Lovers' and in Cespedes's 'Gerardo, the unfortunate Spaniard' (Engl. transl. by Leonard Digges, 1622). In the prologue the author describes his work as translated from the Spanish. A small part of 'The Bastard' is in prose, the rest is in blank verse, which is of a far more regular kind than is to be met with in Manuche's undoubted work.

Bishop Percy found, about 1770, nine manuscript plays other than those already named in the Marquis of Northampton's library at Castle Ash by, the greater number of which he attributed on reasonable grounds to Manuche's pen. Eight, which are written on folio sheets, are all in the same handwriting. Of these, two in blank verse, entitled respectively 'The Banished Shepherdess' and 'The Feast: a comedy,' have dedications to the Marquis of Northampton, which are signed 'Cos:Manuche.' The third and fourth, 'The Mandrake' (a comedy in prose) and 'Agamemnon: a tragedy,' are unfinished. The fifth, a blank-verse tragedy, is named by Percy 'Leontius, King of Ciprus;' the sixth, 'The Captives,' seems to be an adaptation in prose from Plautus; the seventh, 'Mariamne,' a blank-verse tragedy, is 'very much torn;' and the eighth, a tragedy in blank verse without a title, opens with a scene between three characters named Macrinus, Papinianus, and Ardentius. A manuscript of a prose untitled comedy in quarto, in which the first character is called Hermengildus, is also at Castle Ashby, and was tentatively ascribed by Bishop Percy to Manuche.

[Authorities cited; Langbaine's English Dramatic Poets (with Bishop Percy's manuscript notes in British Museum Library, C 45, d. 15); Phillips's Theatrum Poetarum; Fleay's Chron. of the English Drama; Lowndes's Bibliographer's Manual.]  MARGARET, the (1283–1290), queen of Scotland, born in 1283, was daughter of Eric II of Norway. Her mother, who died at or soon after her birth, was Margaret, daughter of Alexander III of Scotland [q. v.], by his queen Margaret, daughter of Henry III [q. v.] Alexander, the only surviving son of Alexander III, having clied before the end of 1283, the nobles of Scotland met at Scone on 5 Feb. 1284 and bound themselves to acknowledge Margaret as heir of the kingdom, reserving the rights of any children who might thereafter be born to the king, and of any posthumous child who might be born to his son Alexander. On 19 March 1286 Alexander III was killed, and on 11 April the estates appointed six regents to govern for the infant queen. Edward I obtained a bill of dispensation from Honorius IV in May 1287, that his sons and daughters might marry within the prohibited degrees, and in May 1289 sent ambassadors to Nicolas IV to obtain the pope's consent to the marriage of his sonEdward and Margaret. Eric, who was largely indebted to the English king, sent three ambassadors to England in September, as from himself and Margaret, to request Edward to secure the rights of the queen. At Edward's instance four commissioners were sent by the regents of Scotland to meet them and three commissioners appointed by himself at Salisbury, where on 6 Nov. it was agreed that before 1 Nov. next following Eric should send Margaret either to England or Scotland free from any matrimonial engagement; Edward promised that if Scotland was in a settled state he would send her thither unengaged, on receiving a promise from the Scots that they would not give her in marriage except as he should ordain and with her father's consent. The bill of dispensation for the marriage of the young Edward and Margaret was obtained a few days later.

Tidings of the proposed marriage having reached Scotland, the estates of that kingdom at a meeting at Brigham in March 1290 wrote to Edward warmly approving his design, and to Eric urging him to send his daughter to England speedily. By the articles of Margaret's marriage treaty, arranged on 11 July, Edward promised that the kingdom of Scotland should remain separate and independent, saving his rights in the marches and elsewhere. He requisitioned a ship at Yarmouth to fetch Margaret, and caused it to be fitted out and victualled by Matthew de Columbers, his butler. The ship was manned by forty seamen, and as Eric seems to have been expected to accompany his daughter great provision was made for the voyage, thirty-one hogsheads and one pipe of wine, ten barrels of beer, fifteen salted oxen, four hundred dried fish and two hundred stock fish, five hundred walnuts, and two loaves of sugar being put on board. The ship arrived at Bergen, and took Margaret on board without her father. On 7 Oct. William Fraser (d. 1297) [q. v.], bishop of St. Andrews, wrote to Edward saying that be and the English proctors appointed for the marriage had heard that Margaret had been 