- Lady Southwell on the Final Days of Queen Elizabeth I.
- Queen Elizabeth I’s Heart and the French Ambassador.
- William Camden to Sir Robert Cotton. March 15, 1603 [1602 O.S.].
- Scaramelli, Venetian Secretary in England, to the Doge and Senate; March 20, 1603
- Sir Robert Carey’s Account of the Death of Queen Elizabeth
- Scaramelli, Venetian Secretary in England, to the Doge and Senate; March 27, 1603.
In this selection from the March 20 letter we get a look
behind the curtain, reading the hints and statements that were available to the
Venetian ambassadorial secretary, three days before the event, and how he interpreted them. It
was impossible not to notice the masques and plays so common at Court during
the Shrovetide had not materialized and excuses had to be made. The word went
out: the Queen’s heart was broken over the loss of her dear, dear friend, Catherine
Howard, Countess of Nottingham. When the Queen mourns, all the Court mourns.
As for Scaramelli’s request for an audience, “Her
Majesty caused answer to be made”… Of course she never replied in person to
such requests. That one of her attendants acted as go-between was only normal. But a personal touch seems to
imply that the Queen herself may actually have sent the reply: “she desired
to discuss pleasant topics only with me”. The Queen herself, then, may not yet
have surrendered to her fate. She may even have thought she could hold
audience. That she could outwit death yet again through a pure act of will.
Some of the hints are mere hints to us even now. Was
the report of the lavish funeral for Howard a cover for preparations that
already were underway for the Queen’s funeral? Perhaps Cecil and co. feared that
stray comments might be overheard that consequently needed a cover story?
What is also interesting is that Scaramelli seems genuinely to be unaware of the momentous events that were transpiring around him. He seems to have lacked the wariness that should be the first talent of ambassadorial personnel at their foreign stations.
I sought an audience of the Queen in order to conclude the business
entrusted to me so that I might return to the feet of your Serenity. Her
Majesty caused answer to be made that she desired to discuss pleasant topics
only with me, and so, if I were seeking audience on the subject of my mission,
she begged me to wait till the Commissioners appointed by her had reported;
that this report would soon be presented on the advice of the Privy Council and
by her own orders, and if the answer were to my satisfaction there would be no
need for further discussion, if not, then I might address any further remarks I
might have to make to her in person, for she would listen willingly, in the
desire to give every gratification to your Serenity. The cause of the delay in
the meeting of the Commissioners is the death last week of the Lord High
Admiral’s wife. Apart from her husband’s exalted rank she herself was a lady of
high consideration and one of the Queen’s principal ladies of the bed-chamber.
This rank is reckoned so lofty here that they say her funeral is to cost forty
thousand crowns. I might also add that the Carnival, which according to the
English calendar continued down to the day before yesterday, has delayed the
meeting, only here in Court it has not been observed with the usual
accompaniment of dances and comedies, for the Queen for many days has never
left her chamber. And although they say that the reason for this is her sorrow
for the death of the Countess[1],
nevertheless the truer cause is that the business of Lady Arabella has reached
such a pitch that the son of the Earl of Hertford, to whom they affirm she is betrothed,
has suddenly disappeared and is nowhere to be found, and Arabella for this
reason has been removed from the custody of the Countess of Shrewsbury, and
taken to the same castle where Queen Mary of England kept her sister, the
present Queen, a prisoner, opposing her
right to the succession on the ground of her illegitimacy, and her Calvinism;
disabilities subsequently removed by Act of Parliament, ere which Queen Mary,
to please Philip II, declared her sister capable of succeeding to the throne.
It is well known that this unexpected event has greatly
disturbed the Queen, for she has suddenly withdrawn into herself, she who was
wont to live so gaily—specially in these last years of her life, when, as far
as health was concerned, her days seemed numerous indeed but not burdensome—and
to force herself to throw off all care but that of enjoying life; how she
allows grief to overcome her strength, and so anxious is she that rumours of
this beginning of troubles should not spread beyond the kingdom, that she forbade
either persons or letters to leave any of the ports, although, perceiving that
this provision came late and was too violent to secure silence, she
subsequently abandoned it. All minds are anxious and the partizans of the King
of Scotland, the most powerful party, in order to destroy public sympathy for
Arabella, are spreading reports prejudicial to her character as an honest woman
both in the past and in the present.
London, 20 March 1603.
Source: Calendar of State Papers and Manuscripts, Relating to English Affairs,… Venice (1592-1603). IX.554-5.
[1] Catherine
Howard, Countess of Nottingham had died on February 25.
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