THE LIFE OF THE DUCHESS OF FERIA.* THIS little volume
contains a most interesting Life of Jane Dormer, Duchess of Feria, who was born in the reign of Henry VIII., and died in the reign of James I. The biography is written from manuscripts at Grove Park, which Lord Dormer has kindly allowed to be copied.
Lady Jane's ancestors were living in Normandy when Edward the Confessor sought refuge in that country from the tyranny of Harold Harefoot, son of Canute, who had usurped the Kingdom. When Prince Edward was recalled from Nor- mandy, he brought one Thomas D'Ormer in his retinue, whom he advanced to great dignity. An old tradition tells us that Thomas D'Ormer assisted the King "with much monies" during his wars with the Danes, and that after a victorious ending to one of their battles, D'Ormer in- vited the King to a banquet. As soon as it was ended, a dish with tallies (evidences of the money he had lent the King) was brought in, and D'Ormer, turning to his Majesty, said, in the picturesque language of that day, "that for the honour done to his house, he had no better dish to show his thankfulness withal than these wooden chips," and so he cast the tallies into the great fire. The King at once understood, by the number of the tallies, the greatness of the gift, and exclaimed, with an almost Eastern fancy, "Well may'st thou be called D'Ormer, thou hest a sea of gold, doing what thou haat done." In memory of that gift, the arms of D'Ormer were altered ; for whereas before they were a lion rampant, sable, on a gold field, there was added azure, the gold billets, and the lion placed in chief.
Little Lady Jane Dormer, coming down from a long line of good and noble ancestors, was born at Eythorpe on the Feast of the Epiphany, 1538. She inherited all the traits of her forefathers. She was very generous, obedient, and "withal prompt with contentment to all holy things ;" so that she was beloved by the servants and gentlewomen in her grandmother's house. Here in this grandmother's home must the child Jane have often been told the sad story of her great-uncle, Sebastian Newdigate, who was once a gay, handsome courtier, and one of the Privy Chamber to Henry VIII. But, owing chiefly to his sister's, Lady Dormer's, influence, he left the Court and entered religion in the Charter House. Henry Via's next step, after he had quarrelled with the Apostolic See about his divorce, was to bring the Carthusian Heads to trial, and Father Sebastian, with two other fathers, were stretched along * The Life of Jane Dormer, Duchess of Feria. Transcribed from the Ancient Manuscript M the possession of Lord Dormer, by Henry Clifford. London : Burns and Oates, hurdles, and drawn with horses to Tyburn, and hanged for a very little or no space of time, for they were cut down being yet alive, and disembowelled, their bowels cast into the fire, their heads cut off, and their bodies quartered and set up in. the highways on the gates of London.
When Lady Jane was old enough to leave her home, she served Queen Mary, and remained with her until her death. Indeed, she was such a favourite with the Queen, that "at table she eat the meat that the hand of Jane Dormer carved for her," and she entrusted to her care everything she valued. Very simple and very homely are the accounts of this Court life of three hundred years ago ; the Queen very seldom went in progress, we are told, except to the Cardinal's house at Croydon. She avoids all means to trouble and grieve her subjects in times of hay and corn harvest, when they would have use of their carts and horses. When the Court was at Croydon, her Majesty's chief pleasure (like our Queen's of to-day) was in visiting her poor neighbours, sitting in their cottages, asking them of their manner of living, and how the officers of State dealt with them. Once, when in a collier's house, the Queen was sitting by while he did eat his supper, and the man, not knowing who his visitor was, answered that "they had pressed his cart from London, and had not paid him," The Queen asked if he was sure he had called for the money. He said : "Yea, to them that set him awork ; but they gave him neither his money nor good answer." Queen Mary went back instantly to the Court, and called her Comptroller (probably Sir Robert Rochester), and gave him such a reproof, that her ladies who heard her grieved much.
In all her visits she was accompanied by Jane Dormer ; and if fresh complaints were made, she commended them hence- forth to her remembrance. These special favours of the Queen, and her own rare beauty and sweetness, made Jane very eagerly sought for in marriage; but the Duke of Norfolk the Earl of Nottingham, and many others, were all dismissed. Jane would have nothing to say to them, and the Queen had no will that she should leave her. When the Prince of Spain, how- ever, came over to England to marry the Queen, he brought in his train the Duke of Feria, a great Lord and Grandee of Spain, who found the Lady Jane Dormer's birth and descent as noble as his own, and moved by her exceeding grace and beauty, he at last won her heart ; but their marriage was not to take place until the King returned from Flanders, where he had gone about a war. In the meantime, the Queen died, and Lady Jane retired from the English Court to her grandmother, who lived in the Palace of the Savoy, and her marriage with the Duke took place on December 24th that same year in the Savoy Chapel. The Duke, as Ambassador and Vicegerent of his King, held his authority with great valour, for perceiving that Queen Elizabeth intended to alter some of the religious ceremonies in connection with her coronation, he would by no means, either publicly or privately, assist at it. Soon after her accession, King Philip sent for the Duke ; he started in April, 1559 the Duchess followed him three months later; and a right royal journey was provided for her. Six daughters of nobles attended her, besides a great guard of gentlemen and priests. At Calais she was received by the Governor, and "very honourably entreated," and when she arrived in Spain artil- lery was discharged, feasts were made, soldiers marched by in their military order, and sumptuous gifts were presented to this beautiful English bride. Soon after her triumphant arrival a little son was born, and baptised with great honour; and the next year we read of the Duchess being received by Queen Mary of Scotland, who, beholding her beauty, was so charmed with the sweetness of her countenance and the good grace of her person, that she commanded her to lodge in her own palace, and dressed her with her own hands ; "and bore her an entire and intimate love, as she continued to keep it to her death." A correspondence began. then between the Scotch Queen and the Duchess which lasted until the Queen's sad death, and in all these old letters we read the same affectionate ending,—" Your perfect friend, old acquaintance, and dear cousin, MARIA. REGINA."
In the autumn of 1560, when the Duke and Duchess arrived at Toledo, the "city was dispeopled " to see her enter it. The King of Spain and her husband stood side by side in a window to watch, while she, riding on a horse decorated with crimson velvet and gold trappings, rode first, her six ladies following after her, then twenty pages in costly livery; at the end rode most of the gallantry of the Court. But her own sweet, dignified person outshone all this brilliant crowd. After twelve years of a life of great happiness, the Duke of Feria died, leaving his widow, young, beautiful, far from her own country, and in a manner wholly solitary, with the care of their only son, and in charge of an immense estate. Then do we read how our Lady Jane gave herself to a recollected kind of life, how she put away all ostentation of greatness, how her home was ordered by holiness and by prudence everywhere. Great debts had lain upon the estate, they were all paid off ; her son was trained with a noble and a virtuous education, sick people were visited, sorrowing ones were comforted, and so a long life of charity, of good-will, and of blameless deeds was fulfilled. Then the end came. People from a great distance, courtiers, clergy, and statesmen flocked together to her room to entreat a last word of blessing. To them all she gave a word of love and of blessing, asking it for them and for herself from Heaven, which for her was not far off ; and on the night of January 23rd, 1612, "sweetly and without any trouble she rendered her blessed soul to God, to live with Him eternally," This little volume has no literary pretension ; hut its simple record of a noble life spent through the troublous years of Henry VIII., Queen Mary, and Queen Elizabeth bring the charm of the pant into our present, and we realise how faith- fully the Dormers, through their long line of ancestry until to-day, have served their motto,—" Gib che Dio vuole, o voglio."
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