Chapter XIX

Strained relations between France and England — Affairs of Scotland — Project of the Guises to marry their niece Mary Stuart to the Dauphin — Invasion of Scotland by the Protector Somerset and Battle of Pinkie — The Scotch nobility offer the hand of the little Queen to the Dauphin — French troops are despatched to the assistance of the Scots — Convention of Haddington — Mary Stuart is brought to France — Henri II's instructions to Humières, gouverneur of the Children of France, concerning her — His letter to the Queen-Dowager of Scotland — Progress of hostilities in Scotland — The War of Boulogne — Peace is concluded between England and France, and a marriage arranged between Edward VI and Madame Élisabeth, eldest daughter of Henri II

MEANWHILE, important questions of foreign policy had been again engaging the attention of Henri II and his Ministers.

By the terms of the treaty of 1546, Boulogne had been left in the possession of England for eight years, at the expiration of which it was to be restored to France on payment of 800,000 crowns; but the frontier line of the tract of country surrendered with it had been left undetermined at the peace, and the question was still being debated when François I died. Soon after the accession of Henri II, the English and French commissioners employed on the survey arrived at a settlement; but Henri II, who had not forgiven England the repulse he had suffered at Boulogne in 1544, and cherished the hope of one day avenging this mortification, declined to ratify the arrangement, and persisted in prolonging an uncertainty which might at any time become the occasion of a fresh quarrel. The Protector Somerset retaliated by running out a long embankment towards the sea. "It is but a jetty to amend the haven, and save both your ships and ours," said the English, when the French protested against it as a breach of a clause in the treaty which provided that, while Boulogne remained in English occupation, no fresh fortifications were to be erected. But it was obviously intended to carry cannon and command the approaches to the harbour, and the relations between the two governments became very strained indeed.

The ill-feeling was intensified by the affairs of Scotland. In 1543, the Scotch Assembly had promised the hand of their infant Queen to the young prince who had now become Edward VI; but French influence had prevented the fulfilment of this engagement, and Cardinal Beaton and the Catholic party drew the country into another war with England. The engagement had, however, never been legally cancelled, and no sooner had Edward VI ascended the English throne than, in accordance with the dying wishes of the late King, the Duke of Somerset demanded that it should be executed.

Meanwhile, Henri II had become King, and the brothers of the Queen-Dowager of Scotland, the Guises, had risen to power in France. The latter were quick to perceive how greatly a marriage between their niece and the Dauphin would add to their own influence and importance; and they urged the King to this step as the only means of preventing the marriage of Mary and Edward and the union of the two crowns. The project of the Guises accorded too closely with the traditional policy of France towards England and Scotland to meet with any opposition from the King, and even the Constable, much as he might fear the increase of his rivals' influence, felt obliged to express his approval.

Had Somerset been content to exercise patience and to confine himself to supporting the English party in Scotland, it is certain that a very few years would have seen the extinction of French influence in the northern kingdom, and with it all opposition to the marriage of the little Queen to Edward VI. But such methods of reaching the goal were but ill suited to his haughty and ambitious temper, and, finding the Scots still deaf to persuasion, he resolved to employ force, and on September 4, 1547 he crossed the border, at the head of an army of 18,000 men. Forgetting their differences for the moment, all parties in Scotland united to oppose the invader, for even those who, like the Earl of Huntly, "disliked not the match, hated the manner of the wooing"; but at Pinkie Cleugh, on September 10, the two armies met, and the Scots were utterly routed, with frightful slaughter. This defeat, instead of obliging the Scots to sue for peace, decided them to throw themselves without reserve into the arms of France; and the nobility, on the entreaty of the Queen-Dowager, offered the hand of Mary to the Dauphin, and consented that the little Queen should be brought up at the French Court until she had reached a marriageable age. Henri II immediately accepted the offer, and promised to make Scotland's quarrel his own; and in the spring of 1548 preparations were begun in the French ports for the transport of an army thither.

It is probable that Somerset, whom want of supplies had compelled to withdraw across the border, might have purchased the non-interference of France by the cession of Boulogne, which Henri II ardently desired to recover. But his pride shrank from such a sacrifice, and, in the hope of breaking down the resistance of the Scots before help could reach them from France, he determined on another invasion. In April, accordingly, an English army under Lord Grey and Sir Thomas Palmer invaded Scotland, took and garrisoned Haddington and laid waste the country round Edinburgh, after which it retired to Berwick.

In June, the French expedition sailed from Brest. It consisted of sixty transports and twenty-two galleys, with 6,000 men on board. The command of the troops was entrusted to André de Montalembert, Sieur d'Essé, who had distinguished himself in the defence of Landrecies in 1544 — a defence which had gained him the post of gentleman of the Chamber, although, according to Brantôme, he was "more fitted to give a camisado to the enemy than the shirt to the King." With him were Catherine de' Medici's cousin, Piero Strozzi, and Andelot, nephew of the Constable. Villegaignon, who was afterwards so unfortunately associated with Coligny's colonial enterprise, commanded the fleet.

The French landed at Leith on June 16, and having been joined by the Regent with 8,000 Scots, laid siege to Haddington, in which Grey and Palmer had left a garrison of 2,500 men. On July 7, amid the ruins of an abbey which the English had destroyed, was held "a Parliament of all the Estates," known as the Convention of Haddington, when it was agreed that the crowns of France and Scotland were to be formally and for ever united, though Scotland was to retain her ancient laws and liberties, and that the little Queen should be brought up at the French Court with the children of Henri II until her marriage.

This decision, as Froude and other historians have shown, was not arrived at with the unanimity which the formal records of the convention might lead us to suppose, for there were some who believed that a union with France constituted as grave a menace to Scottish independence as a union with England. Moreover, Somerset had made a belated attempt to repair his error, by promising to abstain from interference in the affairs of Scotland until Edward VI was of age, if the Scots, on their part, would enter into no engagements with the French, at the same time suggesting that the question of their Queen's marriage should be deferred for ten years, when she should be free to make her own choice; and, though his proposals were scouted by the great majority, a few were inclined to regard them as reasonable.

These symptoms of dissent showed that, when the exasperation caused by recent events had abated, it was far from improbable that the Estates might repent of their present decision, as they had repented of that of 1543 in favour of Edward, and determined Marie de Guise to remove her daughter forthwith beyond the reach of the English. Instructions were therefore sent to Villegaignon, who lay with his galleys in the harbour of Leith, to proceed to Dumbarton, whither the young Queen had been sent for security after the disaster of Pinkie, take her and her suite on board, and proceed straight to France. That resourceful sailor at once weighed anchor, and, by steering a southward course, deluded the English ships which were waiting at the mouth of the Forth into the belief that he was making for the coast of France. But, when night fell, he put about, and, rounding the Orkneys, reached the Clyde.

Accompanied by Artus de Brézé, Henri II's Ambassador to the Scottish Court, whose letters to the Queen-Mother contain some interesting details of the voyage,⁰¹ and a numerous suite — which included her half-brother, Lord James Stuart (the future Regent Murray), Janet Stuart, Lady Fleming, a natural daughter of James IV, of whom more anon, the four Maries of the Houses of Fleming, Beaton, Seton, and Livingston, and Lords Erskine and Livingston — the little Queen embarked in Villegaignon's galley, and the admiral at once put to sea again. Soon after leaving the Clyde, an English squadron was sighted; but, favoured by the wind, the French galleys easily outstripped the enemy's ships, and on August 20 Mary disembarked at the little port of Roscoff,⁰² on the coast of Finisterre, now a favourite resort of the English tourist in Brittany. From Roscoff, the little Queen was conducted by easy stages to Nantes, and thence by barge up the Loire to Orléans, where the land journey was resumed. At Tours, she was met by her grandmother, the Duchesse de Guise (Antoinette de Bourbon), who describes her, in a letter to her daughter, the Queen-Dowager of Scotland, as "very pretty indeed, and as intelligent a child as one could wish to see," and expresses the opinion that "when she developed she would be a handsome girl."⁰³ The duchess accompanied her the rest of the way to Saint-Germain, which was reached about the middle of October.

At the moment of the little Queen's arrival at Saint-Germain the Court was at Moulins, but Henri II had not failed to send very precise instructions concerning his future daughter-in-law to Humières, the gouverneur of the Children of France. Apartments were to be made ready for her in the Château above his own and those of Catherine de' Medici; but, as these arrangements could not be completed in time, she was to be lodged for the present in the neighbouring Château of Carrières, whither the royal children, "who could derive nothing but benefit from a change of air," were to precede her. Advantage was to be taken of the children's absence from Saint-Germain to "cleanse" the Château, the base-court, and the village. Orders were to be given that no person was to be permitted to come to the said Saint-Germain, and especially to the Château whether mason, labourer, or other, from any place suspected of having in it an infectious disease," and Humières was to see that the same was done at Poissy and the surrounding villages, "so that when I shall come there, I may be in no danger." The persons of the Queen's entourage were to be lodged in the vicinity, but Henri II had determined to send them back to Scotland, and had already despatched an officer of his Household to discharge them.

The King also decided Mary's precedence at the Court. "In answer to your question as to the rank which I wish my daughter the Queen of Scotland to occupy," he writes, "I inform you that it is my intention that she should take precedence of my daughters. For the marriage between her and my son is decided and settled; and, apart from that, she is a crowned Queen. And as such it is my wish that she should be honoured and served."⁰⁴

Diane de Poitiers, on behalf of the King, also wrote to Humières. "I have communicated to the King the contents of your letter, and your advice about everything," she writes to him, on October 3, from Tarrare. "The said Lord wishes that Madame Ysabal⁰⁵ and the Queen of Scotland should be lodged together; wherefore you will select the best chamber for them both and their suite; for it is the said Lord's wish that they get to know one another."⁰⁶

Soon after the marriage of Antoine de Bourbon and Jeanne d'Albret, Henri II left Moulins and set out for Saint-Germain, accompanied only by a few of his Household, in order "to see Messeigneurs his children and to enjoy their company alone." He arrived on November 9, and was quite charmed with the little Queen, whom he pronounced "the most perfect child that he had ever seen."

The Balcarres MSS. in the Advocates' Library at Edinburgh contain a number of letters written by Henri II to Marie de Guise, Queen-Dowager of Scotland, which were published by the Maitland Club in 1834. The most of the letters refer to purely political matters; but there is one which is of more general interest, since it describes an incident which took place at the marriage-fêtes of François de Guise and Anne d'Este, the first Court function at which the little Queen assisted.

"I should certainly wish you to know, Madame, my good sister," writes the King, "that I had invited to the nuptials of my cousin the Duc Daumalle [d'Aumale], your brother, all the Ambassadors of the princes, who are with me [i.e., at my Court], not omitting him of England, in whose presence I made my son the Dauphin dance with my daughter the Queen of Scotland. And, as he was conversing with the Emperor's Ambassador, my cousin the Cardinal de Guise approached him, to whom I remarked that it was a pretty sight to see them. And my said cousin responded that it was a fine marriage, to which the said Ambassador merely replied that it gave him great pleasure to watch them. Yet I will wager my life that he did not find much therein, and as little in the caresses which he saw me bestow upon them. Such, Madame my good sister, are the tidings of our little household. I wished to tell you them, so that you may experience, yonder, something of the pleasure which I enjoy constantly, and which increases from day to day, when I see my daughter and yours improving continually, which is the greatest satisfaction that I can have."

Hostilities continued in Scotland, while there was some skirmishing in the Boulonnais, and Villegaignon's galleys and English privateers roamed about the Channel and inflicted considerable damage on the shipping of both nations. Singularly enough, there had been no declaration of war by either side, which explains why the English Ambassador still remained at the French Court. In Scotland, little impression was made upon the stubborn garrison of Haddington, and a night-assault attempted by the French at the beginning of October ended in the assailants being repulsed with heavy loss; but by the spring of 1549 all the other fortresses in the hands of the English had fallen.

In the summer, encouraged by the rebellion in England, Henri II determined to invade the Boulonnais in person. At the end of July, a considerable army began assembling between Ardres and Montreuil under the orders of the Constable, and on August 17 the King joined it.

Besides Boulogne itself, the English had several detached works in the vicinity. Froude distinguishes five: one at Bullenberg (Mont-Lambert), on a hill at the back of the town; another at Ambleteuse, where there was a tidal harbour; a third, called Newhaven, at the mouth of the Boulogne river; a fourth, Blackness (Blaconet), a little inland; and the fifth, and most important, on the high ground between Bou-logne and Ambleteuse, called the Almain camp. But, according to Decrue, Froude is in error in supposing that Ambleteuse and Newhaven were separate forts, as they were one and the same.

However that may be, the Almain camp, or Fort Slack, as French historians call it, was the key of the position, and it was against it that Henri II and the Constable first directed their efforts. On the 23rd, the trenches were opened, and at dawn on the morrow five-and-twenty pieces of cannon opened fire on the fort, which was garrisoned by some 500 men. The English, perceiving the hopelessness of resistance, sent two officers to the Constable, to ask that the garrison might be allowed to march out with their arms and baggage. Montmorency replied that they must appeal to the clemency of the King, and, to gain time, conducted them, Protestants though they were, to hear Mass. At that same moment, the French surprised the fort and cut the unsuspecting garrison to pieces — an act of treachery and barbarity which the Constable's biographer wisely does not attempt to palliate.⁰⁷

The fort of Ambleteuse, where the English had established their depot, and Blaconet speedily surrendered, and the communications of Boulogne with the Calais coast were thus completely cut off. Then the King and the Constable turned southwards to threaten Boulogne itself. On their approach, Sir Henry Palmer, who commanded on Mont-Lambert, deeming his position untenable, evacuated the fort, after first setting it on fire; but the French succeeded in extinguishing the flames, and established themselves in the place. It was supposed that Henri II, who had been heard to say that he would recover Boulogne or lose his realm for it, would at once proceed to invest the town in form, or perhaps endeavour to carry it by an immediate assault, and thus avenge his repulse of five years before. But the King recognised that the strength of the garrison and the formidable batteries which had been erected by Henry VIII would render an assault an extremely hazardous undertaking, and might enable the English to prolong their defence into the winter. A terrific storm which burst over the camp and left not a single tent or pavilion standing, followed by two days and nights of incessant rain, decided him to abandon the siege and content himself with a blockade. Having, therefore, garrisoned the captured posts and stationed a number of galleys in the port of Ambleteuse to intercept any supplies coming from England, he disbanded his army and set out with the Constable for Saint-Germain, confident that, by the spring, Boulogne, hemmed in as it now was on all sides, would be reduced to such straits that it must fall an easy prey.

Soon after Henri II's departure, the English Government recalled their Ambassadors, and "for their late manifold injuries and also for that, contrary to faith, honour, and godliness, the French King had taken away the young Scottish Queen, the King's Majesty's espouse, . . . did intimate and declare him and all his subjects to be enemies of the King's Majesty of England." But, notwithstanding this belated declaration of war, no attempt was made to succour Boulogne until the following January, when some 5,000 men under Lord Huntingdon were despatched thither. These reinforcements, however, were only intended to secure honourable terms of surrender, for Somerset had now fallen, and his successor, the Earl of Warwick, recognised that it was impossible to secure any improvement in the state of affairs in England while the constant drain on the resources of the nation caused by the war with France continued. In point of fact, Lord Clinton, the English commander in Boulogne, had already had two conferences with Gaspard de Coligny, who had been entrusted with the command of the blockading force; and on February 20 a truce of fifteen days was concluded, and the English and French plenipotentiaries met between Boulogne and Outreau. The negotiations were facilitated by the intrigues of a Florentine merchant named Antonio Guidotti, a secret agent of the French Court, whom the Constable had sent to London, and who had suggested that the long quarrel between England and France might be fittingly terminated by an alliance between Edward VI and Madame Elisabeth. On March 24, 1550, peace was signed, and England agreed to restore Boulogne within six weeks, in return for a sum of 400,000 crowns, half to be paid upon the spot and half in the following August. Scotland was included in the peace.

On April 25 the Constable's eldest son, François de Montmorency, lieutenant-general of Picardy, took possession of Boulogne, in the name of Henri II. The commandant of the garrison, with all his officers, came to meet the royal representative, and handed him the keys of the town; and, as the French entered by one gate, the English withdrew by the opposite one. On May 15, Ascension Day, the King made his entry into the town, and, in accordance with a vow which he had made two years before, declared the Holy Virgin sovereign of the Boulonnais, and made the cathedral a gift of an image of the Virgin 3 feet 4 inches in height, of massive silver.⁰⁸

Notwithstanding the Treaty of Boulogne, the relations between England and France remained for some months in a far from satisfactory state, as several questions, such as the restoration of the merchant vessels captured by either side during the war and the frontier line of the Calais Pale, had been reserved for future settlement, and proved far from easy to adjust. At one time, indeed, there seemed a danger of a fresh rupture, for the Guises, who hated England, did not fail to make the most of these disagreements, and urged Henri II to follow up his success at Boulogne by the conquest of Guines and Calais. The Constable, however, partly out of hostility to the Guises and partly from a genuine desire for peace, used all his influence to bring about a better understanding; and the King, satisfied for the moment with having, as he considered, vindicated his personal honour by the recovery of Boulogne, gave him his support. Thanks to this prudent conduct, Montmorency succeeded in concluding with England not only a satisfactory peace, but a grand matrimonial alliance. In the spring of 1551, the two sovereigns exchanged embassies, and while Saint-André was despatched to England to carry to Edward VI the collar of Saint-Michel, the Marquis of Northampton, accompanied by the future Chancellor, Gardiner, Bishop of Ely, and an imposing suite, arrived in France to invest Henri II with the Order of the Garter, and to demand for Edward VI the hand of Madame Élisabeth.

To this demand Henri II, who was profuse in his assurances of friendship, declaring that although he had been at war with England "he never enterprised anything with worse will, nor more against his stomach,"⁰⁹ was graciously pleased to accede, and, after a good deal of haggling over the amount of the little princess's dowry,¹⁰ the treaty was signed at Angers, on July 19.

Notes

(1) These letters are among the Balcarres MSS. in the Advocates' Library, Edinburgh. They have been published by Miss J. T. Stoddart in the Appendix to her interesting work "The Girlhood of Mary Queen of Scots."

(2) Henri Martin, Froude, and several other historians state that Mary landed at Brest, but it is now proved beyond dispute that Roscoff was the place where she disembarked.

(3) Marquis de Pimordan, la Mère des Guises.

(4) Guiffrey, Lettres de Dianne de Poytiers; Ruble, la Première Jeunesse de Marie Stuart.

(5) Madame Élisabeth, who was called by abbreviation Madame Isabel.

(6) Guiffrey, Lettres de Dianne de Poytiers.

(7) Ribier; F. Decrue, Anne, duc de Montmorency.

(8) La Barre du Parcq, Histoire de Henri II^e

(9) Despatch of Northampton to the Council, July 20, 1551.

(10) "Northampton suggested that they should give with the princess, as a moderate dowry, 1,500,000 crowns. He lowered his terms on being refused, amidst shouts of laughter, to 1,400,000 crowns; then to a million, then to 800,000, and at last to 200,000; which only 'after great reasonings and showings of precedents' the French commissioners consented to allow." — Froude.