The story of Charles I. is one of the most dreadful in English history. It seems impossible to believe that so many of the English people could stand calmly round and watch their King executed like a common criminal without raising a finger to save him. We have met Charles once before in this book, if you remember, when he walked across Spring Gardens on his way to be murdered. He was born in Scotland, and he had an elder brother, Prince Henry, so that it was thought at first that Charles would not be King. But Prince Henry died when Charles was only twelve, and so Charles became Prince of Wales and heir to the throne. By this time the Kings of England lived, when in London, not in Westminster Palace, but in another palace called Whitehall. When Henry VIII. was King, the old palace of Westminster, of which you have heard so much in the story of Edward V., had fallen into ruins, so Henry looked about for another. James I. was the father of Charles, and he gave many splendid entertainments at this palace, in which, no doubt, Prince Charles took part. There were dinners and dances, and other things not so harmless; for instance, it was supposed to be great sport to see two poor cocks fight until they tore each other almost to pieces, and people used to bet on one cock or the other. There were also fights between bears and greyhounds; and a wretched bull was tied to a stake and a number of savage dogs let loose on him, and the more the bull threw his head this way and that, and stuck his great horns into the dogs, and the more the dogs seized him at the back, where he could not defend himself, and tore his flesh with their teeth, the more the people laughed and applauded. Even ladies watched these sports. Prince Charles was never a strong boy, and always rather quiet and thoughtful, and he cannot have liked such cruelty; but then it was the fashion—everyone did it, so he thought it must be all right. King James was very fond of hunting, and while he lived the Court was always gay. But the palace was getting more and more old and inconvenient, and at last James thought he would build a new one. So he sent for his architect, a wonderful man called Inigo Jones, and ordered him Well, when James died his son Charles became King. Charles was then twenty-five years old, and was still delicate and thin, and not very tall. His hair was long, parted in the middle, and falling on each side of his face to his collar. His little neat beard was cut to a point, and his eyes were very sad. He liked better to live quietly than to be a king. Almost directly after his father's death he married Henrietta Maria was dark, with black eyes and dark-brown hair, and was very quick and bright, and Charles loved her always to the end of his life. After a time Henrietta was given Somerset House, a magnificent house in the Strand, for herself, and all her French attendants lived there with her. Perhaps Charles felt that the old palace at Whitehall was hardly fit for this bright little French woman, and perhaps it annoyed him to hear all the French people chattering about his own Court. Somerset House had been built by an uncle of Edward VI., the Duke of Somerset, who was such a greedy man that he had pulled This Somerset House was pulled down when George III. was King, and another great house called by the same name was built instead. This one is still standing, and in it there are offices belonging to the Government. In one part are all the wills that people have left when they died, and if anyone wants to see a particular will he can go there and see it if he pays a shilling. One day when Queen Henrietta Maria lived in old Somerset House, Charles came and told her he was going to send all her French attendants back to France except her lady's-maid and one other, for the French people were saying things against the King and making mischief. Henrietta was much grieved, but she had to obey the King, so she sent them back to France. Long years after the death of her husband, when her son was King, after many terrible wars, Henrietta once again For one thing, he wanted money, and the Parliament would not give it to him. Then he asked rich people to lend him some, and many refused. Of course, he had a good deal of money; but he had very great expenses, and he wanted more. So he quarrelled with the Parliament, and that was the beginning of a long, sad contest. However, it did not get very serious all at once; but the quarrels between the King and the Parliament gradually grew worse and worse for many years. Charles and Henrietta had been married about five years when a little son came to them, and they called him Charles after his father. He was not long without a playfellow; for a year after there was a daughter called Mary, and then another son called James. There is still in existence a letter which his mother, the Queen, wrote to Prince Charles when he was a very little boy and was naughty, and would not take his medicine. Here it is:
I do not know where Henrietta was when she wrote that letter; perhaps she was staying away at one of the palaces in the country. In London King Charles still lived in Whitehall Palace, though he had another, of which you have heard, called St. James's Palace, in St. James's Park, quite near. In either of these he was not far from the Houses of Parliament, and it was to the members of Parliament he applied for money. When they would not give him any more he dissolved Parliament, and sent all the members away; but when he found he could not get money any other way, he called them together again. After these wretched quarrels it must have been a pleasure to him to go back to the royal nursery, and forget about being a king for a time in playing with his children. When little Charles was five Mary was a good girl, affectionate and warm-hearted; but she was not clever like Elizabeth. I think Charles must have been a nice boy; but his brother James was such a horrid man when he came to be King years afterwards that he cannot ever have been nice at all, even as a boy. When Mary was ten a great event happened: she was married to a boy prince, the Prince of Orange, who lived in Holland. She still lived with her father and mother; but she knew when she grew up she would be Princess of Orange—would have to go to live in Holland with her husband. Her son, who married his cousin Mary, daughter of James II., became King of England, as William III., many years after. It was not very long after this that the quarrels between King and Parliament grew so bad that Charles was afraid, and had to fly for his life. Little Charles, Prince of Wales, was twelve, and Elizabeth, the younger girl, was seven, and there was a younger boy, Henry, Duke of Gloucester, only four years old. Henry was far the nicest of Henrietta, the Queen, fled to France and afterwards to Holland, where she sold her jewels to raise money to pay soldiers to fight for the King her husband. The two eldest boys were sent over to France too. Princess Mary went to her husband's family in Holland, and little Elizabeth and Henry were taken prisoners by the Parliament. The story of the battles between Charles and the Parliament can be read in history, and does not belong particularly to London. The end was very sad. The King was taken prisoner by the Parliamentarians, who were now led by a man called Oliver Cromwell. Queen Henrietta had gone back to France, leaving a little baby named after herself in England. When this baby was two years old the Countess of Dorset, who had charge of her, wanted to take her over to her mother in France, and she was afraid that the little Princess would be recognised and seized by Cromwell's men, so she dressed her in a coarse stuff frock instead of the pretty laces and ribbons she had been accustomed to wear. But when they started on the journey the little child carefully explained, in her lisping, baby way, to To return to Charles and his two younger children, Elizabeth and Henry, who were now left in London. The King was taken to Westminster, and then for many days there was what the Parliamentarians called a 'trial.' They accused their King of breaking laws, of trying to hinder the liberty of the people, and of many other things. Through it all Charles was patient and gentle, and even at the end, when they condemned him to death, he showed no fear or horror. Some day you can go to Westminster and walk into that great hall where this mock trial took place, and imagine the scene. It is all bare now, a great empty place with a stone floor and stone walls and no seats, and it is not used for anything; but when the King was there it was filled with eager, bustling crowds all gone mad for a time, and willing to kill their King. Then Charles was told to These two children had been taken from one place to another by their enemies, and not treated at all like a prince and princess. Elizabeth was now fourteen and Henry ten. They had been called plain Master and Miss instead of Prince and Princess, and had lived very plainly in the houses of persons who were supposed to take care of them. When they saw their father and heard what he had to tell them, they were very unhappy. Charles said to his little boy: 'Sweetheart, now they will cut off thy father's head. Mark, child, what I say—they will cut off my head, and perhaps make thee King; but mark what I say, you must not be a king so long as your brothers Charles and James do live, for they will cut off your brothers' heads (if they can catch them), and cut off thy head, too, at the last; and therefore I charge you, do not be made a king by them.' At which the child, sighing, said: 'I will be torn in pieces first.' Charles thought that the Parliamentarians might make Henry King because he was a little boy, and they could force him to do as they liked; but they did not do that. Then Charles went on to say that the two children must always be Protestants, and never become Roman Catholics. Their mother Henrietta was a Roman Catholic, and he was afraid she might try to make them change their religion. And he was quite right; for afterwards, when Henry went across to France, the Queen did everything in her power to make him change. She was very cruel to him, took away his dinner, and would not let him play or ride, and at last was going to send him to a Roman Catholic school. But Henry's brother Charles, who was still wandering about on the Continent, and had not then regained the throne, wrote to her saying that his brother must come to him, and he would take care of him. So brave little Henry was rescued. He lived to be nineteen, and to see his brother an English King, and then he died of small-pox. King Charles, after telling both the children they must never be Roman Catholics, turned to Elizabeth, and told her what books she must read so as to understand about the Protestant religion, and very difficult books they were for a little girl of fourteen; and he told her many other things, and that she must give his love to the other children. Then he said: 'Sweetheart, you will forget this?' It must have been awful for those poor children to tear themselves away, knowing that their father, the King of all England and Scotland and Ireland, was to be killed. However, at last it was over, and Elizabeth and her brother were taken down to be kept in Carisbrooke Castle in the Isle of Wight. Here the little girl pined away, and died when she was only fifteen. She was found kneeling before her open Bible with her head lying on the text 'Come unto Me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden,' and she had passed into her rest. When King Charles had said good-bye to them, he tried to fix his thoughts on the other world, and to forget all his wicked enemies. He slept that night at St. James's Palace, where our present Prince and Princess of Wales lived with their children until a short time ago. In the morning Charles walked across the Park and Spring Gardens, where, as he passed, he pointed out a tree that had been planted by his own elder brother Henry, who had died young. Then he went across to the Banqueting Hall. Hundreds and hundreds of people were waiting in Whitehall. They cannot all have been wicked, King Charles walked right through the Banqueting Hall under a beautiful ceiling which he himself had paid a great painter to paint. You can walk there yourself now under the same ceiling, for the place is a museum, and anyone can go to see it. Then he went through one of the windows upstairs—no one is quite sure which, but it is supposed to be the second one from one end—and when he stepped out on to the scaffold there was the dreadful executioner, with his black mask on and his sharp axe. It was the custom for the executioner to wear a mask, and I think he must have been glad of it that day. The scaffold was all draped in black, and on it was a block, at which the King must kneel, and on which he must rest his head. He said gently the block was very low, and he had expected it to be higher; but they told him it must be so, and he said no more. Then he took off a beautiful star he wore, the Then King Charles said to the executioner that he would put his head on the block, and when he stretched out his hands he might strike. In a few minutes he finished praying, and stretched out his hands. Down fell the sharp axe, and a deep groan rose up from all the multitude as King Charles was beheaded. Now every day hundreds of people walk up and down on the pavement before the Banqueting Hall, but hardly one thinks of that awful day when a King's blood was shed on this very place. The old palace of Whitehall has quite gone. Over the place where it was are houses and gardens; some of the houses are large and some are quite old. Only the Banqueting Hall remains, that At the top of Whitehall at Charing Cross there is a statue of King Charles on a horse, as if he were riding down toward the place where he died. On the very spot where it stands, before it was put up, the worst of the men who murdered Charles were themselves executed only a short distance from the place of the King's execution. For after Cromwell's death England realized her wickedness, and Charles's son came back to reign. But never, never can be forgotten the dreadful deed that happened in Whitehall more than two hundred and fifty years ago. |