there anything like a mutiny? More questions might be asked, but now, I confess to little purpose. My conclusion is, to desire you to make your subsistence, until it shall please God to determine of my condition, somewhere beyond sea; to which end I send you herewith a pass; and I pray God to make you sensible of your present condition, and give you means to redeem what you have lost; for I shall have no greater joy in a victory, than a just occasion, without blushing, to assure you of my being "Your loving uncle and most faithful friend, "C. R." The Prince immediately hastened to explain his conduct to Charles, and to endeavour to recover his good opinion. The King, however, though he exonerated him from all suspicion of disloyalty or treason, very properly refused to absolve him from the charge of indiscretion, and never again became a suitor for his services. His rash intrepidity seems to have been exceeded only by his readiness to take offence at some imaginary insult; the common failing of a weak mind. About the time that Charles fled from Oxford to the Scots' army, we find the Prince on the point of fighting a duel with the loyal, virtuous, and high-minded Earl of Southampton, the friend of Lord Clarendon, and afterwards. his own chosen companion in the days of their adversity. The latter having made use of some expressions at the council-table, which the hot-headed Prince interpreted as applying personally to himself, he instantly despatched * Thomas Wriothesley, fourth Earl of Southampton, K. G., Lord Treasurer of England, and father of the celebrated Rachael, Lady Russell. He died 16th May, 1667. Lord Gerard to the Earl, in order to insist upon his making an immediate apology. Southampton, however, so far from retracting, persisted in repeating the language which he had made use of at the council-board. Accordingly, Prince Rupert, laying aside his near relationship to the King, desired Lord Gerard to return to the Earl as the bearer of a formal challenge. They were to have fought the next morning, with pistols; but Lord Gerard's frequent visits having excited suspicion, and the words spoken at the council-table having been called to mind, the gates of Oxford were closed to prevent the egress of the intended combatants, and eventually a reconciliation was effected between them.† Prince Rupert having returned to England at the Restoration, he was shortly afterwards made a Privy Councillor, Vice-Admiral of England, Constable of Windsor Castle, and granted a pension of 40001. a year. From the period of the loss of his military reputation by his surrender of Bristol, he had adopted and distinguished himself in the naval profession; and accordingly, at the Restoration, Charles the Second willingly availed himself of the Prince's undoubted valour and valuable experience at sea. In the great sea-fight with the Dutch, in 1665, he was second in command under the Duke of York; and, in the doubtful naval engagements with the Dutch in 1673, was Admiral of the English fleet. Later in life he became a mechanist and a philosopher, and amidst his forges and furnaces found a sufficient equivalent for the tumultuous excitement of his former career. He is well-known as the inventor of mezzotinto, of which the accidental circumstance of his observing a soldier scraping a rusty fusil, is said to have supplied * Charles Gerard, fourth Baron Gerard. He died in 1667. him with the idea. He also invented glass drops, and a metal, known by his name, which was used for casting guns: his method of boring them was much esteemed. The angler of the seventeenth century was indebted to his contrivance for the best-tempered fish-hooks which were then made in England. Prince Rupert was famous for his play at tennis, and was also an excellent marksman with fire-arms. A particular instance of his skill is mentioned in Plot's History of Staffordshire, where he is said to have sent two balls successively, with a horse-pistol, through the weather-cock of St. Mary's steeple at Stafford, a distance of sixty yards. The feat was performed in the presence of Charles the First. An excessive admiration of female beauty had always been a failing of Prince Rupert. Accordingly, at a somewhat advanced age, we find him imitating the fashionable vices of the Court of Charles the Second, and even supporting Mrs. Hughes, a handsome actress belonging to the King's company, as his acknowledged mistress. As this person was on the stage as early as 1663, which was very shortly after female characters had ceased to be performed by men, she must have been one of the earliest actresses who figured in public. She was still on the stage as late as 1676. Evelyn remarks in his Diary (18th October, 1666),— "This night was acted my Lord Broghill's tragedy, called 'Mustapha,' before their Majesties at Court, at which I was present, very seldom going to the public theatres for many reasons now, as they were abused to an atheistical liberty; foul and indecent women now (and never till now) permitted to appear and act, who, inflaming several young noblemen and gallants, became their misses, and to some their wives; witness the Earl of Oxford, Sir R. Howard, Prince Rupert, the Earl of Dorset, and another greater person than any of them, who fell into their snares, to the reproach of their noble families, and ruin of both body and soul." The Prince, soon after the commencement of their intercourse, purchased for his mistress, of Sir Nicholas Crispe, the splendid mansion at Hammersmith, afterwards known as Brandenburgh House. His connection with this lady appears to have wrought a considerable change in his character and habits. "Prince Rupert," "found charms in the person of a says Count Hamilton, player called Hughes, who brought down and greatly subdued his natural fierceness. From this time, adieu alembics, crucibles, furnaces, and all the black furniture of the forges. A complete farewell to all mathematical instruments and chemical speculations. Sweet powders and essences were now the only ingredients that occupied any share of his attention. The impertinent gipsy chose to be attacked in form, and proudly refusing money, that, in the end, she might sell her favours at a dearer rate, she caused the poor Prince to act a part so unnatural, that he no longer appeared like the same person. The King was greatly pleased with that event, for which great rejoicings were made at Tunbridge; but nobody was bold enough to make it the subject of satire, though the same constraint was not observed respecting the follies of other personages." By this person the Prince had a daughter, Ruperta, born in 1671, who became the wife of LieutenantGeneral Emanuel Scroope Howe: she died at Somerset House, about 1740. Lord Lansdown celebrates her in his "Progress of Beauty," "Rupert, of royal blood, with modest grace, Blushes to hear the triumphs of her face." The Prince also left a son, Dudley Rupert, by Francisca Bard, daughter of Henry Bard, Viscount Bellomont. In his will he styles him Dudley Bard, and leaves him a considerable property in the Palatinate.* This youth was educated at Eton, where he is said to have been remarkable for his modesty and mild disposition. He seems, notwithstanding, to have inherited the intrepidity of his father, and to have gladly seized the earliest opportunity of presenting himself in arms. At the age of nineteen he entered as a volunteer in the Emperor's army, and served in a campaign against the Turks. He particularly distinguished himself by his valour at the siege of Buda, where he was killed in storming a breach, on the 13th of July, 1686. Prince Rupert died of a pleurisy and fever, at his house in Spring Gardens, on the 29th of November, 1684, in the sixty-third year of his age. He was buried privately, on the 6th of December following, on the south side of Henry the Seventh's Chapel. * Wood's Fasti, vol. i. p. 268. |