Page:The Queens of England.djvu/469

 ANNE OF DENMARK. 423 sinore, of the lover she was to meet from over sea, they could hardly have prepared her for the waddling, babbling, bluster- ing, unprincely figure, that thus suddenly proclaimed itself the' Scottish king and tried to fling its arms around her neck- in a paroxysm of admiration. The account of James's per- son which was given a few years later, on authority which has never been disputed, will explain the somewhat natural re- pulsion awakened by such attempted caresses. The son of an unhappy mother and a miserable marriage, struck even before his birth by the paralyzing terror of Rizzio's murder, James was born a coward, and never lived to be able to endure even the sight of a drawn sword. He was of the middle stature, and with a tendency to corpulence, which the fashion of his ' dress very much exaggerated. His clothes were so made as to form a woolen rampart round his person. His breeches were in great plaits and full stuffed, and his doublets quilted for stiletto-proof. He had little or no beard ; and his large eve so rolled after any stranger that came into his presence, that "maney for shame have left the roome, as being out of countenance." His tongue was greatly too big for his mouth, and hence he not only slobbered his words in talk- ing but his person in drinking. It was, says honest Balfour, "as if eatting his drinke, wich cam out into the cupe in each syde of his mouthe." . His skin was as soft as taffeta sarse- net ; and it felt thus, we are told, because he never washed his hands, but only rubbed his fingers slightly in the wet end of a napkin. Finally, he never could walk straight. His steps formed circles; and such from his birth was the weak- ness of his legs that he was "ever leaning on other men's shoulders." From the first salute of such a companion for life, from the rude embrace of such an indecent clown, the young princess might reasonably shrink a little. She was herself less handsome than she desired to be thought; but she had the spirit and attractiveness of youth ; with some bold- ness of feature she had great liveliness and beauty of expres- sion, and she preserved these charms to middle age. The marriage was celebrated at Upslo on the 23rd of Novem- ber; a third celebration took place at Cronenburg in the fol- lowing January, amid festivities that did justice to the jocund fame of Denmark; and James found the Danish drink so much to his taste, and so approved the depth of the carous- ing, that from month to month he delayed his departure. They