Catherine of Braganza

“The greatest fault of Catherine of Braganza,” says Sir Walter Scott , “was her being educated a Catholic; her greatest misfortune bearing the King no children: and her greatest foible an excessive love of dancing.”

The quote above was used by John Jesse, in “Memoirs of the Court of England during the reign of the Stuarts...”.  It first appeared in “Dryden’s Works”, edited by Scott.  John Evelyn saw Catherine as she arrived in London for the first time.  From Evelyn’s diary:

25th May, 1662. I went this evening to London, in

order to our journey to Hampton Court, to see the new

Queen; who, having landed at Portsmouth, had been

married to the King a week before by the Bishop of

London.

Out of Exile

‘But our brave young king is now come home,
King Charles the Second in degree;

The Lord send peace into his time,
And God preserve his majestie! ‘ 

The text above is from “The Gallant Grahams”, which is included in Sir Walter Scott’s “Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border”.  On May 25^th, 1660, Samuel Pepys, in his diary, records arriving in England with Charles II and Charles’ brother James, Duke of York. The Stuart brothers were returning from their exile in the Netherlands.

‘By the morning we were come close to the land, and every body made ready to get on shore. The King and the two Dukes did eat their breakfast before they went, and there being set some ship’s diet before them, only to show them the manner of the ship’s diet, they eat of nothing else but pease and pork, and boiled beef. I had Mr. Darcy in my cabin and Dr. Clerke, who eat with me, told me how the King had given 50l. to Mr. Sheply for my Lord’s servants, and 500l. among the officers and common men of the ship. I spoke with the Duke of York about business, who called me Pepys by name, and upon my desire did promise me his future favour. Great expectation of the King’s making some Knights, but there was none. About noon (though the brigantine that Beale made was there ready to carry him) yet he would go in my Lord’s barge with the two Dukes. Our Captain steered, and my Lord went along bare with him. I went, and Mr. Mansell, and one of the King’s footmen, with a dog that the King loved,1 (which [dirted] the boat, which made us laugh, and me think that a King and all that belong to him are but just as others are), in a boat by ourselves, and so got on shore when the King did, who was received by General Monk with all imaginable love and respect at his entrance upon the land of Dover. Infinite the crowd of people and the horsemen, citizens, and noblemen of all sorts. The Mayor of the town came and gave him his white staff, the badge of his place, which the King did give him again. The Mayor also presented him from the town a very rich Bible, which he took and said it was the thing that he loved above all things in the world. A canopy was provided for him to stand under, which he did, and talked awhile with General Monk and others, and so into a stately coach there set for him, and so away through the town towards Canterbury, without making any stay at Dover. The shouting and joy expressed by all is past imagination. Seeing that my Lord did not stir out of his barge, I got into a boat, and so into his barge, whither Mr. John Crew stepped, and spoke a word or two to my Lord, and so returned, we back to the ship, and going did see a man almost drowned that fell out of his boat into the sea, but with much ado was got out. My Lord almost transported with joy that he had done all this without any the least blur or obstruction in the world, that could give an offence to any, and with the great honour he thought it would be to him. Being overtook by the brigantine, my Lord and we went out of our barge into it, and so went on board with Sir W. Batten, and the Vice and Rear-Admirals. At night my Lord supped and Mr. Thomas Crew with Captain Stoakes, I supped with the Captain, who told me what the King had given us. My Lord returned late, and at his coming did give me order to cause the marke to be gilded, and a Crown and C. R. to be made at the head of the coach table, where the King to-day with his own hand did mark his height, which accordingly I caused the painter to do, and is now done as is to be seen.’

Richard Cromwell Resigns as Lord Protector

On May 25, 1659, a beleaguered Richard Cromwell resigned as Lord Protector of England.  He left when the Rump Parliament agreed to fund his personal debt and provide him with a pension.  Walter Scott covers this period of history in his "Tales of a Grandfather, history of Scotland":

"...To return to public affairs in London, where, after the abdication of Richard, changes succeeded with as little permanence as the reflection of faces presented to a mirror, the attempt of the officers of the army to establish a purely military government was combated by the return to Parliament of those republican members whom Oliver Cromwell had expelled, and whom the common people, by a vulgar but expressive nickname, now called the Rump Parliament. This assembly, so called because it was the sitting part of that which commenced the civil war, was again subjected to military violence, and dissolved by General Lambert, who unquestionably designed in his own person to act the part of Oliver Cromwell, though without either the talents or high reputation of the original performer. But a general change had taken place in the sentiments of the nation..."