[Master Mercurius 03] - Dishonour and Obey

by Graham Brack

  ‘I can see the difficulty,’ I ventured uncertainly.

  ‘Whereas the King of England is a different matter!’ William began brightly. ‘He’s my uncle, for a start, and we’ve known each other a long time.’

  This was true. Charles II had been exiled in the Netherlands and lived in Breda for a while, and when he was younger William had been a guest at the restored King’s court. The small problem here was that Charles had tried to introduce him to wine, women and the theatre, whereas William was much more interested in war, study and prayer. It was reported that the English King had referred to his nephew as the most boring youth in Christendom, though I don’t suppose that would have stopped him marrying his daughter to William if there was any advantage in it for him.

  ‘The snag is that Charles doesn’t have any daughters,’ continued William. ‘Not by the Queen, at any rate. But his brother, my uncle James, has two very fine girls, Mary and Anne. Do you know anything about horses, Mercurius?’

  ‘Only that one end has teeth and the other doesn’t.’

  ‘Well, if you breed horses you try to ensure that good characteristics are passed down and bad ones aren’t. I never met my grandfather Charles I, but he was a little fellow, and when he married Henrietta Maria it was remarked that he had managed to find the only princess in Europe who was even shorter than he was. And yet my uncles are both above two yards tall, and the Princess Mary is a strapping girl. People tell me she is well above middle height. How do you account for that, then? I mean, if they were horses you’d suppose that a stray stallion got into the field.’

  ‘It reminds us, Stadhouder, that our science is not as secure as we would like to think it is,’ I suggested.

  ‘What? Oh, you mean that we don’t know what we think we know. Well, that’s true, I suppose. Anyway, James has converted to Catholicism and he would like his daughters to marry French royalty, but Charles is determined that they have to remain Protestant. I’m telling you all this so you understand the background to your task, you see.’

  Since no particular task had been outlined, I couldn’t really say I knew what it was all about, but I nodded politely, because that seemed to be expected of me.

  ‘The thing is, I’ve had a message conveyed by the Ambassador. Not our Ambassador, the English Ambassador here, Sir William Temple. Charles’ chief minister, the Earl of Danby, wants us to know that he is working towards an Anglo-Dutch wedding and he thinks that the time is right to make an approach. He can’t instruct their Ambassador here to start the matter without upsetting Uncle Charles, who likes to think that he is the embodiment of the government, but if we were to raise it with him, he would be bound to give the union some thought. And since, despite the advice of one or two of his ministers who want a French wedding, Charles is wary of France, we would be likely to succeed.’

  ‘I see,’ I said, because up to this point, I did.

  ‘Danby thinks that Charles approves of me and wants to ensure that his kingdom doesn’t revert to Catholicism, which would cause another civil war so soon after the last one, so marrying the second in line to the throne to me would be a guarantee of that. And if Charles told his brother that was what was going to happen, James would be bound to agree because he always does what his big brother says. In any case, the family line has always been that the King is appointed by God, meaning the King’s word is law, so if James defied the King now he could hardly expect obedience when he takes the throne, as he surely will, since the present Queen of England is past child bearing. I think Danby is right about that. But I know my uncle James. He may say yes, but if the opportunity arises to jam the cogs he’ll take it. And that’s where you can render me a great service.’

  ‘Stadhouder? Please explain.’

  ‘Haven’t I done so? I’m sending the Heer Van Langenburg to London as an Ambassador Extraordinary. He’ll do all the normal diplomatic stuff. But I want you to go with him. Ostensibly you’ll be there to ensure that the Princess Mary is a sound Protestant, but what I really want you to do is to look out for anyone who may be plotting against the marriage so it can be nipped in the bud.’

  ‘You want me to bribe them, Stadhouder?’

  ‘Goodness me, no! That’s what we have an Ambassador for. No, just tell him what you discover and he’ll deal with it. But a normal diplomat couldn’t just wander wherever he wanted and speak to anyone who crossed his path whereas you, as an ordained minister there for religious reasons, can do whatever you want without embarrassing either government.’

  I liked this less and less, and I thought I had a convincing argument why I was not the man for this “little job”.

  ‘Forgive me, Stadhouder, but I assume the Princess Mary doesn’t speak Dutch, so how will I question her?’

  ‘I’ve thought of that, Mercurius. Bouwman here speaks English, don’t you, Bouwman?’

  ‘Yes, Excellency,’ came the reply, slightly guarded, I thought, as if he had no idea what was about to be suggested.

  ‘Good. Teach Mercurius to speak English. You’ve got a month before you leave.’

  CHAPTER THREE

  There are people who will tell you that if you just speak Dutch slowly and loudly, the intelligent Englishman will understand you. That may be true, but we cannot rely on always having an intelligent Englishman to hand, and I recalled that when I questioned some English people in Utrecht on my last little job for the Stadhouder I understood not a word they said in their barbaric language. Nevertheless, I thought, if I can master Latin and Greek, I can surely pick up some English. Actually, although I did not know it then, Mary was a bit of a bluestocking and we could have conversed in Latin quite successfully. However, I could hardly rely on plotters speaking Latin when I was overhearing them, so I completely understood the need to get on top of this language.

  Bouwman was very patient. We started each morning as soon as we met and continued late into the evening. I was given plays by Shakespeare to read aloud so I could get used to the sounds, and each Sunday I was sent to the British Church to hear the service and the sermon. As to the service, I understood little, and the sermon itself was near impenetrable. Dr Bowie, the minister there, was very kind to me, and made me a copy of his sermon so that I might study it at leisure, but since he spoke extempore his notes were sketchy, and it came to me that I could not expect people in England to write down everything they said.

  My mind was somewhat eased when I was introduced to the Heer Van Langenburg.

  ‘You’re the minister who is coming with us,’ he said cheerfully. ‘I’m glad of that. Religion is not my forte, you understand.’

  Van Langenburg was one of those irritating people who speaks four languages, plays every musical instrument known to man, and can improvise Greek quatrains at a moment’s notice. In his youth he was a noted tennis player, at least until he ran at full speed into the court’s wall, which accounted for his broken nose.

  I had worried that my actual mission would not have been explained to him, but he soon put my concerns aside. He had been fully briefed. Thus reassured, I felt able to confess that I was finding English quite difficult.

  ‘Don’t worry,’ he said. ‘The English are an odd people, but one of their endearing habits is that they are always happy to talk, so you won’t have to say much. Just ask them their opinion on the weather and all will be well.’

  ‘The weather?’

  ‘Yes, the English are fascinated about weather. They can talk about it for hours. And they are so certain that everyone in the world speaks English that even if you obviously don’t, they will behave as if you do and just talk a little louder to you.’

  ‘Have you any other advice for me?’

  ‘Yes. Take your warmest clothes. And lots of them.’

  A carriage duly arrived at the University to take me to Scheveningen, where our ship would be waiting. It was not as luxurious as other carriages I had been lent by the Stadhouder, but it had plenty of space for my trunk, in which I had stowed almost every item of clothing
I owned.

  The sandy shelf at Scheveningen meant that the ship had to stand off to sea and we were rowed out to it. I was in the last but one boat. It seemed that this embassy consisted of fifteen people, though I had no idea what most of them were there for, and I was no wiser after we had all been introduced.

  Van Langenburg was there, and a man I took to be his personal attendant, and Bouwman had been attached to the party, presumably in case my hard-won English failed me. There was an elderly man called Preuveneers who had been included because he had known the King when he was in exile and it was hoped that Charles would be especially happy to see him again. As for the rest, I would have to learn their roles as we went along.

  Bouwman, Preuveneers and our baggage filled the boat. I am not a terrible sailor, but I confess that I did not enjoy the short trip out to the ship. For some reason, the idea weighed upon me that the boat would overturn and all my possessions would descend to the depths. A little thought would have told me that the very reason why we were having to use a boat was that the sea was too shallow for a ship and the chances were that if anything fell overboard one of the swimmers amongst us could have easily retrieved it.

  “Swimmers”, incidentally, does not really include me. My late brother Laurentius was very happy diving into ponds or canals as a boy, and subsequently went to sea, where he died. Admittedly the proximate cause was an English bullet at the Battle of Lowestoft, but if he had kept clear of the oceans that would not have happened.

  The ship’s master told us to expect a two-day voyage, though he cheerfully added that if the winds were contrary it might well take double that time, or more. Wishing to reassure myself, I asked whether he had sailed to London before.

  ‘Aye, Master,’ he said, ‘some years ago. But this will be an easier trip, because this time they won’t shoot at us.’

  ‘Shoot at us?’

  ‘It was during the late war, and a merry time it was for us as we wrecked their ships. I do not propose to do that this time.’

  I assured him that I was pleased to hear this and privately hoped that they did not recognise him as we docked.

  We had been sent in one of William’s grandest ships so that we could make some display as we arrived, but I pitied the poor mariners sent aloft to tie orange streamers to the mast, not least because it was raining. While this was unfortunate for the sailors, it gave the Lord Mayor of London something to talk about when we disembarked.

  About a decade before, London had suffered an enormous fire, and rebuilding was still in hand, but my first impressions were very favourable. With much of the medieval city having gone, there was less wood and more stone than many Dutch cities could boast at that time. The carts bringing bricks from the works outside the city rolled back and forth without rest.

  In the rebuilding the opportunity had been taken to widen some of the streets and reduce the overcrowding at the centre by expanding, mainly to the north. Unlike the Amsterdammers, who enlarge their city by draining the surrounding sea, the Londoners build outwards until their feverish construction absorbs the nearby villages. I was told that hamlets which were once out of town were now mere suburbs of the city. Since much of this expansion was taking place on farming land, I wondered how it would be possible to feed so great a population, who must undoubtedly someday succumb to famine and die in large numbers.

  I was assured by one of the Englishmen that the city contained no less than half a million souls, and by another that there were very near two hundred thousand; at which a man called Pepys standing nearby sniffed, and said that like most enumerations, the number discovered depended upon the purpose, it being his experience that when the people were counted for taxation there were far fewer of them than when some benefit was on offer.

  This Mr Pepys was the Master of Trinity House, it seems, and therefore responsible for all the lighthouses around England and Wales, not to mention the “improvement of mariners”. To judge by the English sailors I had met, there remained a considerable amount of work to do in that regard.

  The Lord Mayor had commenced a speech of welcome. Since we were not Englishmen, he spoke slowly and loudly, but in English, while Bouwman translated quietly for our benefit.

  His name was Sir Thomas Davies, and he was a stationer, which was useful to know because I had not brought much paper with me. It was a little vexing to be uprooted from Leiden just at that moment, because I was about two-thirds of the way through writing a book evaluating the orthodoxy or otherwise of the writings of John Scottus Eriugena, and being separated from the original sources (and my paper) was extremely inconvenient. I realise, of course, that there are lecturers at universities who take the view that reading a man’s work before commenting on it is an unnecessary step that merely slows the whole process down, but I felt I owed it to Eriugena to at least skim his writings before declaring that he was lucky to escape burning at the stake.

  Thus distracted, I was cogitating over Eriugena’s treatise De divina praedestinatione when I realised that Sir Thomas had stopped speaking. His delivery was so ponderous that it was a few moments before the audience realised that he intended to say no more, but the Heer Van Langenburg sprang to his feet and led us in lengthy and completely undeserved applause for the speech of welcome.

  I was just looking for the exit when Van Langenburg himself began to address those present, calling Bouwman forward to translate his Dutch into English. He gave a pretty speech, neatly glossing over the repeated wars between our two countries and reminding those present of the ready welcome that King Charles had received when he went into exile in our country.

  I could not resist glancing upwards to assure myself that if the heavens opened and a celestial thunderbolt issued forth in response to this perversion of the truth, I might have a moment or two to save myself. Charles was accepted largely because he was suspicious of the French, which has always been a strong point in a man’s favour in the Low Countries, and when the time came for him to return to England he left a number of large debts, some impoverished hosts and, I dare say, a few bastards behind him. But the Heer skipped over all that, and merely said that he was optimistic that our negotiations would be fruitful as, in time, would be the match between William and Mary.

  It seemed to me that we had been upwards of an hour listening to speeches, but when we left the quayside I could see that barely half that time had passed. I was just wondering what had next been arranged to delight us when my sleeve was plucked from behind and I turned to find myself looking at a clergyman; and, to judge by his dress, a very exalted one.

  ‘You will forgive my introducing myself in this way,’ he began. ‘My name is Compton — Henry Compton — and I am delighted to see that the Prince of Orange has included a godly minister within his embassy.’

  I started to look around when it dawned on me that he meant me. ‘You are too kind, sir,’ I replied.

  ‘Would you prefer that we conversed in Latin?’ he asked solicitously, which led me to suppose that Bouwman had been overly kind in praising my English.

  ‘That might be a good idea,’ I replied, and we adopted the old tongue.

  ‘If your time permits,’ Compton said, ‘I should be greatly favoured if you would dine with me. I should be very pleased to hear something of the state of the church in your land. I understand that your Prince is very tolerant of Catholics. I will not hide my view that this may be a grave mistake, sir, but I fear that my own country may be taking faltering steps along the same treacherous path.’

  The alert reader will recall that I confessed earlier to being a Catholic priest, so you may imagine that this turn of the discourse between us left me in some discomfort, but I judged it best not to cross this man, whoever he was. If he had been invited to greet us, he was plainly a man of standing.

  It was true that William had pursued a policy of religious toleration. This may have been because he was wise, but I suspect that it had more to do with his unwillingness to lose the support of anyone. Thus Catholics in my
land could worship in their own churches provided they were discreet, resorted there only for the Mass and accepted that many positions were closed to them as a result of their religion. During my life I held a number of posts that would have been stripped from me had my allegiance slipped out, not least of them my position at the University, which was very much a Reformed institution.

  Compton was, I thought, only a few years older than I was, a well-built man with long light brown hair and a prominent nose. Not, of course, quite as prominent as the Stadhouder’s; though I would never have mentioned that in front of him, since William was very touchy on the subject of large noses.

  I was happy to accept Compton’s invitation and promised to let him know when I had a free evening, and bowed politely as he excused himself to rejoin his party.

  Van Langenburg appeared at my side. ‘That’s interesting,’ he said. ‘And what did the Bishop of London want?’

  CHAPTER FOUR

  I am not a man for ceremony, which may seem odd in a Catholic priest, but I mean the kind of evening to which we were now subjected.

  We were conducted to our lodgings within a palace called Whitehall. We were told the King was somewhere within, but it took very little time to realise that any unplanned encounter would be very unlikely. To begin with, I never saw a grand building so badly designed. I have no doubt that at one time Whitehall was fairly proportioned and graceful, but repeated building of new walls, new windows, extensions and staircases had left it looking like it had been devised by rabbits. I left my room in search of the privy and took twenty-five minutes to find my way back, which I could not have done without the help of a passing footman.