DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.67417#0057
HENRY VIII. AND HIS WIVES
33
both the princesses. The King and Queen returned
there for Christmas, when a Chapter of the Knights
of the Garter was held, and one of the members
of the Order present was the accomplished Henry
Howard, Earl of Surrey, who on this occasion fell in
love with the fair lady of his sonnets.1
“ Bright is her hue, and Geraldine she hight.
Hampton me taught to wish her first for mine,
And Windsor, alas, doth chase me from her sight.”
But this “ princely poet,” as Drayton calls him,
was destined, like all the most brilliant personages
of the Court, to fall a victim to Henry VIII.’s
fickle temper, and three years later he died on the
scaffold, only ten days before the King breathed
his last.
Another guest who visited Hampton Court the
following Christmas, was Ferrante Gonzaga, the son
of that Marquis of Mantua who had sent the famous
Barbary horses as a present to King Henry thirty
years before. The Mantuan prince, who was now
Viceroy of Sicily and Captain-General of the Em-
peror’s armies, came to England, by Charles V.’s
command, to arrange plans for the invasion of
France, and after being splendidly entertained by
his royal host, was presented with several pieces of
precious and curiously-wrought gold plate.2 Before
long, however, Henry made peace with France, and
in August 1546, the last summer which this monarch
spent at Hampton Court, the French ambassador,
Lord High Admiral Claude d’Annebaut, was, in
1 Tottel’s Miscellany, ed. by E. Arber, p. 10.
2 Holinshed’s “Chronicle,” iv. 834.
C
33
both the princesses. The King and Queen returned
there for Christmas, when a Chapter of the Knights
of the Garter was held, and one of the members
of the Order present was the accomplished Henry
Howard, Earl of Surrey, who on this occasion fell in
love with the fair lady of his sonnets.1
“ Bright is her hue, and Geraldine she hight.
Hampton me taught to wish her first for mine,
And Windsor, alas, doth chase me from her sight.”
But this “ princely poet,” as Drayton calls him,
was destined, like all the most brilliant personages
of the Court, to fall a victim to Henry VIII.’s
fickle temper, and three years later he died on the
scaffold, only ten days before the King breathed
his last.
Another guest who visited Hampton Court the
following Christmas, was Ferrante Gonzaga, the son
of that Marquis of Mantua who had sent the famous
Barbary horses as a present to King Henry thirty
years before. The Mantuan prince, who was now
Viceroy of Sicily and Captain-General of the Em-
peror’s armies, came to England, by Charles V.’s
command, to arrange plans for the invasion of
France, and after being splendidly entertained by
his royal host, was presented with several pieces of
precious and curiously-wrought gold plate.2 Before
long, however, Henry made peace with France, and
in August 1546, the last summer which this monarch
spent at Hampton Court, the French ambassador,
Lord High Admiral Claude d’Annebaut, was, in
1 Tottel’s Miscellany, ed. by E. Arber, p. 10.
2 Holinshed’s “Chronicle,” iv. 834.
C