Going Dutch_ How England Plundered Holland's Glory Part 4

The painting was evidently a success, and marks the beginning of a long and fruitful relations.h.i.+p between Huygens and van Campen, culminating in van Campen's designing and building Huygens's house in Het Plein in 1637. Along the way, he painted the double portrait of Constantijn and Susanna. At the end of 1635, Huygens penned three epigrams 'On the profile portrait of myself and my wife, on a sheet of paper, by J. van Campen'. The third reads: Brother and sister may differ as much as peace and friends.h.i.+p can stand: Man and Wife no more than here, Not the thickness of the paper.19

Here, thinks Held, we have the preliminary drawings for the double portrait he has re-identified.

In the course of 1635 Huygens and van Campen met regularly to discuss the plans and construction of Huygens's fas.h.i.+onable new neocla.s.sical house in Het Plein, their shared interests in both architecture and painting bringing them increasingly close. While his neighbour Johan Maurits van Na.s.sau-Siegen was abroad serving as Dutch Governor in Brazil, Huygens oversaw the completion of his house adjacent to his own also under construction by van Campen and Pieter Post. Although Huygens's house was demolished in the nineteenth century, we may consider the Mauritshuis as a memorial to the Huygensvan Campen architectural partners.h.i.+p.

Huygens later described how actively Susanna too had been involved in planning the layout and functions of rooms for their new family home. It was natural, then, that when plague broke out in The Hague in 1635, and Susanna had taken two of their four sons to stay with her brother-in-law in Arnhem, and needed temporary accommodation for herself and the other two boys, Constantijn junior and Lodewijk, she should seek refuge with the van Campen family on their estate near Amersfoort. They in their turn were only too happy to extend their hospitality to the Huygenses. It was while they were there that van Campen made a delightful drawing of the six-year-old Constantijn in a straw hat, in red chalk one of the few surviving examples of his artistic prowess which can be securely a.s.signed to him. On the back Constantijn Huygens junior has written (in later life): 'My portrait aged six or seven, drawn by Mr. van Campen'.

The sheet of ma.n.u.script music Susanna and her husband hold together in van Campen's double portrait is the ba.s.so continuo (the running instrumental accompaniment) to an unidentified song. Of course, a couple holding a piece of music in a Dutch painting may readily be taken simply to symbolise the harmonious relations.h.i.+p between them.20 The painting's subject, one historian of music writes, 'is not that of domestic music making but the treatment of music as a mirror of matrimonial harmony'. The painting's subject, one historian of music writes, 'is not that of domestic music making but the treatment of music as a mirror of matrimonial harmony'.21 LEFT: Drawing showing the Huygenshuis and Mauritshuis adjacent to one another in the fas.h.i.+onable district of Het Plein in The Hague. Drawing showing the Huygenshuis and Mauritshuis adjacent to one another in the fas.h.i.+onable district of Het Plein in The Hague.

RIGHT: Drawing of the six-year-old Constantijn Huygens junior by van Campen. Drawing of the six-year-old Constantijn Huygens junior by van Campen.

We may still allow that the musical reference in the double portrait is to actual musical activities shared by the young couple. The best-known portrait of Constantijn, painted by Thomas de Keyser on the occasion of Constantijn and Susanna's 1627 wedding, which hangs in the National Gallery in London, includes a theorbo (or theorbo-lute) alongside other carefully chosen objects connoting his interests and occupations. When, in 1647, Huygens sent his song collection Pathodia Sacra et Profana Pathodia Sacra et Profana for publication, the Latin psalms and French and Italian airs it contained had accompaniments specifically for theorbo. The publisher persuaded Huygens to replace this with a figured ba.s.s, in an easier notation (of the kind shown in the double portrait), in order that the songs could also be accompanied by a keyboard player. So the two paintings together suggest that Constantijn and Susanna are united musically, as singer and accompanist. The painting, which rediscovers the engaged, intelligent face and direct, searching gaze of Susanna Huygens, also suggests that she shared her husband's love of music. for publication, the Latin psalms and French and Italian airs it contained had accompaniments specifically for theorbo. The publisher persuaded Huygens to replace this with a figured ba.s.s, in an easier notation (of the kind shown in the double portrait), in order that the songs could also be accompanied by a keyboard player. So the two paintings together suggest that Constantijn and Susanna are united musically, as singer and accompanist. The painting, which rediscovers the engaged, intelligent face and direct, searching gaze of Susanna Huygens, also suggests that she shared her husband's love of music.22 It is when we begin to recover the sisters, wives and daughters in family histories during the periods of bi-directional migration of the 1640s and 1650s between England and the Netherlands that the extent of the interweaving of AngloDutch social and cultural relations really becomes apparent. Because the lives of seventeenth-century women are so hard to retrieve, this has proved the most difficult part of this book by far to research. What follows is a selection of specimen examples of the kind of AngloDutch marriage, forged by political circ.u.mstances in the mid-seventeenth century, which ensured that many of those moving in elite circles at the time of the Glorious Revolution both Dutch and English felt thoroughly comfortable and at home with the mores of the partner nation. In this, as in so many other contexts, Sir Constantijn Huygens is the source for several characteristic and telling examples.

At least one of the flirtations in which Huygens indulged during the 1640s and '50s might have become a serious relations.h.i.+p one which he could plausibly have hoped would lead to a second marriage. This was his friends.h.i.+p with Anna Morgan, daughter of the Governor of Bergen op Zoom, Sir Charles Morgan. Sir Charles (a Welshman) had married the Dutch heiress Elizabeth Marnix, daughter of the Protestant hero of the Dutch revolt (strategic adviser to, and personal emissary of, William the Silent), Philips Marnix, Heer van St Aldegonde, and was a member of Elizabeth of Bohemia's innermost court circle.23 Anna Morgan was born and raised in a bilingual and bicultural household in the northern Netherlands. Her first husband was another Welshman, Sir Lewis Morgan (no relation), who died in 1635, and who, like her father, had served with English regiments in the United Provinces. However, since he was Member of Parliament for Cardiff in 162829, and was knighted at Whitehall in March 1629, we may a.s.sume that Anna made her home in Wales (in 1652, Huygens wrote to her thanking her for 'the excess of civilities with which it has pleased you to shower my son [Lodewijk], extending as far as your beautiful country of Wales').24 In 1644, Anna was once again in the United Provinces, to commission a magnificent white marble funerary monument for her father, who had died the previous year, at Bergen op Zoom. She was advised on this project, and the creation and construction of the monument by Francois Dieussart (completed in 164546), by Sir Constantijn Huygens. He and Anna were already friends,25 and in the course of their a.s.sociation over the funerary sculpture a romantic attachment developed between them. An elaborately conceited poem in Dutch by Huygens, 'Aen Mevrouw Morgan', written in 1645, on the occasion of Anna presenting him with the gift of a mosquito net to be used in the field during the annual summer military campaigning, openly affirms his pa.s.sionate love for her. and in the course of their a.s.sociation over the funerary sculpture a romantic attachment developed between them. An elaborately conceited poem in Dutch by Huygens, 'Aen Mevrouw Morgan', written in 1645, on the occasion of Anna presenting him with the gift of a mosquito net to be used in the field during the annual summer military campaigning, openly affirms his pa.s.sionate love for her.26 In 1646, in a gossipy letter written to Huygens around the time news broke of her impending second marriage to somebody else, Constantijn's brother-in-law (husband of his sister Constantia) referred to Anna Morgan as 'your would-be (or alleged) mistress'. In 1646, in a gossipy letter written to Huygens around the time news broke of her impending second marriage to somebody else, Constantijn's brother-in-law (husband of his sister Constantia) referred to Anna Morgan as 'your would-be (or alleged) mistress'.27 The monument Huygens and Dieussart designed and erected for Anna in the Grote Kerk at Bergen op Zoom is a uniquely imposing piece of Dutch neocla.s.sical monumental sculpture, which remains enduring testimony to the pa.s.sionate, creative relations.h.i.+p between Huygens and 'Mevrouw Morgan'. The monument Huygens and Dieussart designed and erected for Anna in the Grote Kerk at Bergen op Zoom is a uniquely imposing piece of Dutch neocla.s.sical monumental sculpture, which remains enduring testimony to the pa.s.sionate, creative relations.h.i.+p between Huygens and 'Mevrouw Morgan'.

Huygens remained on cordial terms with Anna Morgan after her marriage, in August 1646, to Walter Strickland, the English Parliamentary amba.s.sador to the United Provinces between 1642 and 1651, and a prominent ally of Oliver Cromwell in the 1650s.28 Anna was naturalised by Parliamentary ordinance in 1651, and took a further oath of naturalisation at the Restoration, in 1660. Anna was naturalised by Parliamentary ordinance in 1651, and took a further oath of naturalisation at the Restoration, in 1660.29 The two old lovers continued to correspond, in a mixture of English, French and Dutch, down to the 1680s. Occasionally, as often happens, disagreements over gifts exchanged during the love affair came between them, though not apparently for long. In October 1654, Huygens returned from a three-month trip to Spa, south of Maastricht, to find a letter from Anna demanding the return of 'some copper medals which [she] once generously gave to [him]'. Affecting amazement at the request, Huygens wrote: I am totally astonished, Madame, that having given them to me with the sweet and kind demeanour with which you were always pleased to honour me, you are now demanding their return.30

The medals were, he confessed, now intermingled with those which formed part of his considerable collection. However, if Lady Strickland (as she now was) was determined to have her gift returned, he would 'give her the whole cabinet, which is entirely at your service, if you should be pleased to receive it from my hand'. The abrupt communication Huygens had received from Anna now firmly of the English Commonwealth party was perhaps not unexpected: he had been at Spa with the Princess Royal, for weeks of court amus.e.m.e.nt with the itinerant future Charles II (to whom Huygens refers consistently as 'the King of Great Britain'). Reporting the goings on at Spa to Amalia van Solms, Huygens told her with evident satisfaction that 'there is a lot of dancing, and this Prince performs better than anyone else at all, since he has a true ear, and understands and loves music with a pa.s.sion, just like his Royal father'.31 The Commonwealth government of Oliver Cromwell was not well pleased at the continued support for Charles on the parts of Amalia and the Princess Royal. The Commonwealth government of Oliver Cromwell was not well pleased at the continued support for Charles on the parts of Amalia and the Princess Royal.

The intimate liaison between the Dutch Huygens and the Anglo Dutch Anna Morgan bridged the divide between the United Provinces and the British Isles, binding the interests of the two families invisibly together families with significant influence in their respective political administrations. In 1652, an incident at sea precipitated Commonwealth England and the United Provinces into naval confrontation, and eventually into the first AngloDutch war. Required by the captain of an English s.h.i.+p to dip his flag as a sign of English supremacy at sea, the Dutch commander, Admiral Tromp, refused to comply. Relations were already tense between the two countries, and England immediately declared war.

The situation was extremely delicate. At the moment when hostilities were declared between the two countries, a diplomatic mission from the States General to Parliament was in London, and with it Huygens's third son Lodewijk. Huygens wrote to his old flame, Anna Morgan, begging her, from her influential position as wife to one of Cromwell's closest advisers, to take care of his son.

In the same letter, he did some shrewd informal diplomatic negotiating. The insult to English pride on the part of Admiral Tromp which had precipitated the crisis was, he a.s.sured Anna, nothing to do with the Dutch government: We have just learned with great displeasure about the misunderstanding between our fleets. Whatever the reasons given by either party in this disorder, we can say with absolute certainty that the State did not authorise anybody to commit any hostile action, and to judge otherwise would be to do us wrong. However, since the authority of the government cannot always control the will of the people, in case of emergency, I commit my son to your care.32

Although Huygens in the end remained single for the fifty years of his life after Susanna's death, in the middle decades of the century his name was frequently linked with those of his young female musician friends. Many years later his son Constantijn junior, on a visit to Antwerp, was mortified when his host hinted that his father's relations with the 'beautiful Duarte girls' might not have been entirely innocent.

In the spring of 1642, on the eve of the outbreak of civil war in England, the ten-year-old Princess Mary Stuart, eldest daughter of Charles I, arrived in the Netherlands with her mother, Queen Henrietta Maria, to join her teenaged husband, Frederik Hendrik's son Prince William of Orange, whom she had married in London the previous year. The two royal ladies established themselves at The Hague, surrounded by a large number of household servants and hangers-on. Princess Mary was attended by an entourage of eighty (the marriage agreement had stipulated only forty), while her mother, according to eyewitnesses, brought a total of three hundred followers.33 One of those who arrived at The Hague as lady-in-waiting to Princess Mary Stuart was Utricia Ogle, a spirited young woman born in Utrecht of an English father (Governor of Utrecht in 1610, and commander of the English garrison there for a number of years) and a Dutch mother, but raised in England.34 Originally a member of the household of Katherine Wotton, Lady Stanhope (an English widow who had recently met and married William of Orange's leading negotiator in the matter of the English match), Utricia was an accomplished instrumentalist, with a lovely singing voice. She quickly became Huygens's protegee and close personal friend, and a regular visitor to his country retreat. He composed songs especially for her, and set them to music himself, coaching her in their performance. His one surviving published compilation of songs, the Originally a member of the household of Katherine Wotton, Lady Stanhope (an English widow who had recently met and married William of Orange's leading negotiator in the matter of the English match), Utricia was an accomplished instrumentalist, with a lovely singing voice. She quickly became Huygens's protegee and close personal friend, and a regular visitor to his country retreat. He composed songs especially for her, and set them to music himself, coaching her in their performance. His one surviving published compilation of songs, the Pathodia Sacra et Profana Pathodia Sacra et Profana, is dedicated to her as its musical inspiration.

In 1645 Utricia married Sir William Swann, an English professional soldier serving in the forces of the Prince of Orange. Swann was also a musician, and it is probable that he and Utricia met at one of Huygens's musical evenings (he and Huygens corresponded regularly particularly, anxiously, concerning Utricia's health). Utricia and Constantijn continued to perform together, privately and publicly. Indeed, her husband seems to have encouraged them to combine their musical talents whenever possible, probably to enhance his own prestige in court circles.35 'My wife presents her humbel service to you,' he writes in January 1647 from Breda, 'and greefs much for the loss of her voice, which a great could [cold] has taken from her ... But I hoope, eere long she will bee fitt againe to beare her part in musyck with your consort, which I long to heare.' 'My wife presents her humbel service to you,' he writes in January 1647 from Breda, 'and greefs much for the loss of her voice, which a great could [cold] has taken from her ... But I hoope, eere long she will bee fitt againe to beare her part in musyck with your consort, which I long to heare.'36 Some years later, Huygens sent the English composer and lutenist Nicholas Lanier a copy of the Pathodia Sacra et Profana Pathodia Sacra et Profana, flattering him with the a.s.surance that Lanier could correct any deficiencies in his compositions as he performed them on his 'most excelent royal tiorba'. Huygens had met Lanier in London, at the home of Sir Robert Killigrew, in 1622.37 Now Lanier, who was of Huguenot descent, was in Antwerp, jostling for some kind of place with all the other English exiles, and trying to eke out a musical living there (though he soon went north, to the more welcoming exile community at The Hague). Huygens again characterised the songs as particularly intended for Utricia: Now Lanier, who was of Huguenot descent, was in Antwerp, jostling for some kind of place with all the other English exiles, and trying to eke out a musical living there (though he soon went north, to the more welcoming exile community at The Hague). Huygens again characterised the songs as particularly intended for Utricia: Or else, if you will bee so good to us one day, as to come where you may heare mylady Swanne and me make a reasonable beau bruict about some lessons on this booke. The Psalmes she most lovethe and doth use to sing are named here in the margent, as allso some of the songs.38

In a long Latin poem published in 1651, in celebration of his country estate 'Hofwijk', Huygens devotes an entire section to Utricia Ogle's musical presence there, recalling the extraordinary emotional impact of her singing, and likening her open-air performance to the thrilling sound of the nightingale in the charmed surroundings of the Hofwijk garden.

Of women you the loveliest, Most worthy to be heard.

The memory's so strong That I hear your song, first heard within this greenness, Heard in my calm of leaves below the stormy trees, That I still think it true that these, my finest trees Were drawn into the wood, all through your voice's power.39

Huygens's poetic praise for Utricia beautifully captures the interwoven contexts of English and Dutch culture and taste, within which these enchanted moments in the Hofwijk gardens need to be understood. Utricia's singing voice 'eclipses the nightingale', her presence in the garden raises Huygens's spirits above his immediate surroundings, providing him with memories which endure beyond the moment: I'd linger in my wood a while; for here remains One thing to hear, when silenced still remembered.

Utricia and Constantijn sing in a variety of European languages (predominantly French and Italian), but they converse in English and share English experience of small consort and vocal musical performance. Both of their musical trainings and experiences are inflected with English taste and technique. All Huygens's surviving letters to Utricia are in fluent, colloquial English, and although she spent most of her life in the Netherlands, William Swann, whom she married in 1645 and who, to Huygens's politely feigned annoyance, took her away from The Hague and her regular partic.i.p.ation in his musical soirees was an Englishman in the service of the Prince of Orange. Huygens and Swann also corresponded in English, with occasional French and Dutch interspersed. In the garden at Hofwijk, French and English Princesses, as well as Dutch gentry and n.o.bility, joined their host in marvelling at Utricia's accomplishment, their delight easily fusing Dutch and English sensibilities.40 The tendrils of cultural exchange and mutual influence binding Huygens's virtuoso command of Dutch taste and style to equivalent circles in England extend into almost every corner of the cultural life of both nations. He seems unerringly to have bonded with others with equally ambitious international artistic interests and aspirations. During his regular early visits to England, one household in particular had shaped his musical appreciation. Huygens, we recall, had formed his impressions of England and its culture early, and with enthusiasm. During a visit to London in 1622, one of those whose hospitality he enjoyed was the English courtier Sir Robert Killigrew.

The Killigrews' was a household full of excitement and activity music, conversation and entertainment. There were no fewer than twelve Killigrew children, and according to Huygens everyone in the family partic.i.p.ated in their musical soirees. It was through the Killigrews that Constantijn met Nicholas Lanier, who helped organise the musical evenings. He also encountered the philosopher and natural scientist Sir Francis Bacon (the Lord Chancellor, and Lady Killigrew's uncle, whom Huygens disliked), the eccentric inventor and scientist Cornelius Drebbel, the poet John Donne, some of whose poetry Huygens later translated into Dutch, and possibly the poet and dramatist Ben Jonson.41 In a Latin poem ent.i.tled simply 'My Life', and written when Huygens was in his eighties, he recalls his time spent with the Killigrews as a formative episode in his life, when he forged lasting bonds of friends.h.i.+p with the whole family, 'men and women alike': he particularly admired, and became deeply attached to, Robert's wife, Mary Killigrew, with whom, as a sign of intimacy, he sometimes corresponded in Dutch. In a Latin poem ent.i.tled simply 'My Life', and written when Huygens was in his eighties, he recalls his time spent with the Killigrews as a formative episode in his life, when he forged lasting bonds of friends.h.i.+p with the whole family, 'men and women alike': he particularly admired, and became deeply attached to, Robert's wife, Mary Killigrew, with whom, as a sign of intimacy, he sometimes corresponded in Dutch.42 In fact, it seems to have been rather fas.h.i.+onable for ladies in England to learn Dutch, which certainly must have made the young Huygens's life in London that much more pleasurable (though his English was becoming extremely good). By the 1620s, Charles I's sister, Elizabeth of Bohemia, was permanently domiciled at The Hague, with regular openings in her household for English ladies of rank. In a letter to Sir Thomas Roe, Elizabeth writes that she is 'glade [his wife] beginns to learne so good dutch'.43 Huygens was devastated when it came to his ears at The Hague that Lady Killigrew was blaming him for the death in some kind of accident of her son Charles, for whom he had found a position in Holland as a page in the personal household of Prince William. Huygens's first efforts on Charles's behalf had been made while he was still residing in London in 1622. Positions as page to the Prince were much sought after, and it was 1630 before Huygens was able to notify the Killigrews that he had been successful. He had, naturally, a.s.sured his English friends that he would keep a careful eye on their son. Charles, though, fell in with bad company, and turned out to be something of a liability. Huygens wrote to both his old friends in French to William Killigrew, in English to his wife personal and pa.s.sionate letters a.s.suring them that he had done all he could to protect their son: Everyone here knows the pressure of business under which I, because of my vocation, am obliged to live. To you, who might be ignorant of it, I must insist upon the fact that ... I was too busy to be able constantly to supervise pages, even if they had been sons of my own father.

Had not Huygens written to the Killigrews with such regularity that 'you must have been as exhausted with reading everything I entertained you with, covering so many sheets of paper, on the subject of your poor son, as I was in writing it'? He had done everything he could on their son's behalf. He could have treated his own children no better. Surely their friends.h.i.+p is strong enough to withstand 'the black and malicious calumny' which has given such a 'vile impression' of him to Lady Killigrew?44 There was also some question as to whether there was money owing between Charles Killigrew and Huygens. Nor was this the only occasion in the long HuygensKilligrew family friends.h.i.+p when debts and misunderstandings troubled the otherwise cordial relations.h.i.+p. At some point much later on, Huygens lent the Killigrews' daughter Elizabeth Boyle (Lady Shannon) a large sum which she apparently failed to pay back. In 1671 Hugyens wrote to her brother Thomas in some indignation at 'this foole business', protesting at the fact that no other member of the family seemed inclined to settle the debt: I would faine know, if I am to go and tell it in Holland, that the whole family of the n.o.ble Killigrews could find it in their heart to deny in the behalf of a sister what one stranger did not deny unto that sister in consideration of the whole familie.45

His affection for Lady Killigrew in particular, however, survived the occasional frictions caused by the more f.e.c.kless of her children. He sent her gifts of engravings, and after his wife's death he extended the hospitality of his house to her. There was room enough, in the wing which had been intended for Susanna, for Lady Killigrew to stay whenever she was pa.s.sing through The Hague.

Despite their occasional difficulties, generally Huygens was quick to come to the support of his old friends. When their daughter Anne, lady-in-waiting to Queen Henrietta Maria, drowned in a freak accident on the Thames in August 1641 (the boat in which she was travelling attempted to shoot the turbulent waters under a bridge, and overturned, resulting in the death of all those on board), Huygens, who was away from home on military manoeuvres with the Stadholder, wrote three short poems bewailing the loss of the 'most beautiful Anne'.

Sir Robert was briefly appointed English Resident Amba.s.sador to the United Provinces, though he apparently never took up the post. But in the second half of the 1640s and the 1650s, as the English Civil Wars and their aftermath unravelled the comfortable lives of many with Royalist sympathies, the fortunes of several of the Killigrew children became entwined with those of their Dutch neighbours. A letter Nicholas Lanier sent to Constantijn Huygens in 1646 captures the flavour of those unstable times. Lanier writes from Antwerp, where he and his family have just found a precarious refuge. They have been beset by calamities along the way: 'The common calamitie of our c.u.n.trey and of every one of us in particular espetially servants of the King by odd and ill accidents are even become prodigious': My poore wife with her two maydes between Gand [Ghent] and Bruges by a partie of Hollands soldiers were pillaged of all they had; she lost two trunkes with her cloaths and all she had. Among others ther was one caried prisoner to Sluce; he was once Sir Antony van d.y.k.e's man; he is releast and sent me word that he solicited the Rynegrave for my wives two trunks, telling him that she was a frend and retayner to Mylady of Arundell.46

The purpose of Lanier's writing to Huygens is to secure from him a pa.s.sport in the Stadholder's name, to travel from Antwerp, which he considers a 'prison, or denne of theeves for myselfe was robd returning from France hither', to the United Provinces. 'If this favour may be obtayn'd, I most humbly desier, it may be directed for me to Mr. Dewarte [Duarte].' He also hoped Huygens might be able to intervene in the matter of the missing trunks (these were eventually returned).47 In August 1646, Sir Robert Killigrew's daughter Elizabeth also travelled to the Netherlands, arriving at The Hague with her husband Francis Boyle, a son of the Earl of Cork, and his younger brother, the future scientist and Fellow of the Royal Society, Robert Boyle. Elizabeth and Francis had been married at Whitehall Palace, where Elizabeth was one of Queen Henrietta Maria's ladies-in-waiting, in 1638. Francis had been only fifteen, his brother, in attendance at the formalities representing his family in Ireland, just ten.48The two boys had been packed off on a Grand Tour of the Continent with their tutor immediately after the wedding, deferring the consummation of the marriage for propriety's sake. On that tour, the party were joined by Elizabeth's brother Thomas Killigrew, who had recently lost his own wife tragically.

Now, as civil war raged in England, the young Boyle couple had been granted a pa.s.sport to leave England to become members of the household of Princess Mary of Orange.49 For them as for so many others, the English-speaking court across the water was a haven from the social and political upheavals at home. For them as for so many others, the English-speaking court across the water was a haven from the social and political upheavals at home.

Just a year and a half later, however, in February 1648, Robert Boyle left England for The Hague, at relatively short notice, 'to accompany his brother Francis in conducting his wife from the Hague'.50 There was a Boyle family emergency. Following a rather public affair with the exiled Charles II possibly the first of his many 'flings' during his European exile Elizabeth Killigrew was pregnant. Robert Boyle went to help his brother to salvage his self-esteem as Elizabeth's husband, and to hush up, as far as possible, a Boyle family scandal. There was a Boyle family emergency. Following a rather public affair with the exiled Charles II possibly the first of his many 'flings' during his European exile Elizabeth Killigrew was pregnant. Robert Boyle went to help his brother to salvage his self-esteem as Elizabeth's husband, and to hush up, as far as possible, a Boyle family scandal.

We can pinpoint the birth of Elizabeth's baby to late summer 1648, because there was a family wedding at The Hague that autumn, which Francis and his wife ought to have attended, but from which they were noticeably absent. In October 1648, Frederik van Na.s.sau-Zuijlenstein, the illegitimate son of the recently deceased Stadholder, Frederik Hendrik, and a person of considerable importance at the court, married Elizabeth Killigrew's cousin, Mary Killigrew, another English lady-in-waiting to Princess Mary Stuart.

The marriage between Mary Killigrew and Frederik van Na.s.sau-Zuijlenstein was to prove particularly important for future relations between England and the Dutch Republic, since it was to this couple (conveniently bicultural and bilingual in English and Dutch, and loyal supporters of the Stuarts) that in 1659 Mary of Orange entrusted the raising and education of her nine-year-old son William (later William III), who grew up, as a result, in a household of women who were native English-speakers. His faultless, if formal, English was to be a considerable a.s.set when he arrived at Whitehall in 1688 to claim the English throne.

In summer 1648 Elizabeth Boyle returned to England in disgrace, before the Killigrew wedding guests were a.s.sembled, and was whisked out of sight to avoid awkward questions being asked about her thickening waistline. She and her husband spent the remainder of their lives mostly out of the public gaze, on their estates in Ireland. Her daughter, Charlotte Jemima Henrietta Fitzcharles one of a number of illegitimate children Charles later acknowledged was brought up as a Boyle.51 Shortly after the Restoration, Charles II elevated Francis Boyle to the Irish t.i.tle of First Viscount of Shannon a reward for his loyalty in not bringing his wife's unseemly behaviour to public attention twelve years earlier. Shortly after the Restoration, Charles II elevated Francis Boyle to the Irish t.i.tle of First Viscount of Shannon a reward for his loyalty in not bringing his wife's unseemly behaviour to public attention twelve years earlier.

Six years after the hushed-up scandal of Elizabeth's royal affair, her brother Thomas Killigrew, soldier and dramatist, also joined the English exiles in the northern Netherlands. His experiences on both sides of the Narrow Sea formed his later interests, and offer a compelling example of the easy commerce through the middle of the seventeenth century between English and Dutch social and cultural circles.52 A courtier and dramatist, Thomas Killigrew became a page of honour to Charles I in 1632, and began composing plays for performance by Henrietta Maria's court circle in 1635. He married Cecilia Crofts, a maid of honour to the Queen, but she died, tragically, three years later (van Dyck's 1638 double portrait of Thomas and Cecilia's brother is a mourning picture). Thomas joined his brother-in-law Francis Boyle, his brother Robert and their tutor on their 'grand tour' of European cities.53 As the situation in England deteriorated for those with Royalist sympathies in the late 1640s, Thomas Killigrew again left for the Continent. In 1652 he was briefly in The Hague, in the entourage of Charles I's third son, Henry, Duke of Gloucester. He returned there in 1654, when he met and married Charlotte van Hesse-Piers.h.i.+l, the eldest and well-provided-for daughter of Johan van Hesse, gentleman of the Prince of Orange. The couple were married on 28 January 1655 she had the good sense to draw up a prenuptial agreement, to protect the greater part of her inheritance from her new English husband and shortly afterwards moved to Maastricht. Thomas Killigrew spent the rest of the Commonwealth years in the United Provinces, enjoying the lifestyle of the prosperous, cultivated families who moved in the circles of the princely courts at The Hague. He owed his appointment in 1655 as a captain in the service of the States General to Elizabeth, Queen of Bohemia's intercession with Charles II, her nephew, and to the latter's mediation with Willem Frederik of Na.s.sau-Dietz, Stadholder of Friesland. He appears to have performed sensitive missions (including a spot of spying, perhaps for both sides) as groom of the bedchamber for the peripatetic, exiled Charles II.

In his diary for 24 May 1660, Pepys records meeting Thomas Killigrew, 'a gentleman of great esteem with the King', on board the Charles Charles, the boat on which Charles II returned in triumph to England. Thomas's pregnant wife and the three children, however, prolonged their stay in Maastricht Charlotte did not settle in England till after the birth in July of their son Robert. By the end of the year she and her three sons were naturalised, and in June 1662 Charlotte was made first lady of the privy chamber.

Thomas was less successful than his Dutch wife in securing royal employment, and for a while he retained his Maastricht connections (including obtaining formal citizens.h.i.+p there). In July 1660, however, the English King issued Killigrew and Sir William Davenant with a royal warrant 'to erect two playhouses [in London], [and] to control the charges to be demanded, and the payments to actors ... absolutely suppressing all other playhouses'. The two men thus obtained a virtual theatrical monopoly in London, authorised to form two companies of players, produce all and any dramatic entertainments, and license all plays submitted to them. This royal appointment marked the beginning of a successful career as a theatre manager for Thomas Killigrew, who enlisted the services of, among others, the poet John Dryden for his King's Company. Killigrew died at Whitehall on 19 March 1683. Charlotte Killigrew outlived her husband, living on in London for more than thirty years.54 In 1655, Mary Killigrew herself (widowed, and now remarried to Sir Thomas Stafford) left London for the United Provinces. With no sign that the situation in England would improve for those with Royalist sympathies, she opted for a life of exile 'amongst some of [her] obedient children' there. It was Constantijn Huygens who offered to help find her a suitable house in which to live. He was 'infinitly rejoyced to see your ladys.h.i.+p is in so good a health, that she hath the courage to thinke of a jorney beyond sea': In good faith, Madam, as the world goeth in your island, I doe imagine, you could as happily and quietly end your dayes in these parts amongst some of your obedient children as there, where publique and private troubles have agitated you till now. As for howses fit for such a family, I make account your ladys.h.i.+p may be served here at her ease for 60, 70 or 80 pounds a yeare, more or lesse, as she shall thinke fit herselfe. If it please your ladys.h.i.+p to let me know, of what and how many and how large roomes you would desire to bee accommodated, I will make your ladys.h.i.+p acquainted of what is to bee had here at the Haghe, which, you may beleeve, Madam, to bee one of the sweetest and handsomest dwellings of the world.55

On the other hand, he continued, she might understandably prefer to 'live in one family with your sonne [Thomas Killigrew] and daughter in law', who were installed in some comfort in Maastricht. The drawback to this plan was that she would find herself entirely cut off from the kinds of society and entertainment she was accustomed to in London: If so bee, another course is to be taken, for they seeme to have a mind to live at Maestricht, which is more than a hundred mile from hence, in an excellent aire indeed, but as far from the Queen of Bohemia as the Haghe from thence, and no such conversation there, nor such pictures, nor such performes, nor such musicke as we are able to afford you here.56

7.

Consorts of Viols, Theorbos and AngloDutch Voices

Although The Hague was the destination of choice and the centre of gravity in the lives of English Royalist exiles between the later 1640s and the Restoration of 1660, another important emigre English community established itself in Antwerp. After 1656, when Prince Charles was excluded entirely from the United Provinces (under an agreement between the English Commonwealth regime and the Dutch States General) and moved to Bruges, Antwerp's convenient access to the English court in exile drew itinerant Royalists to it. But even before that, its location gave its residents comparatively easy access to both the northern and southern Netherlands, making it an attractive place for those keeping an eye on the changing fortunes of exiled English political players (they were also exempt from taxes there). Throughout the 1650s, Antwerp acted as a gateway for those following the fortunes of the itinerant Stuarts. Mary Stuart, Princess Royal, and her entourage stopped regularly in the city on their way to take the medicinal waters and meet up with her brother Charles at fas.h.i.+onable Spa, a day's ride south of Maastricht.

Besides, it was a pleasant town to live in. John Evelyn, travelling through it in 1641, wrote in his diary: '[Antwerp is] one of the sweetest places in Europe. Nor did I ever observe a more quiet, clean, elegantly built, and civil place than this magnificent and famous city.' William Cavendish, Duke of Newcastle, found Antwerp's inhabitants 'the civilest and best-behaved people that ever I saw'.

Traditionally it has been taken as a given that the economy of Antwerp declined sharply after the treaty of Munster (between the Dutch and the Spanish) in 1648, with international trade s.h.i.+fting to Amsterdam in the United Provinces because of the blockading of s.h.i.+pping in the Scheldt estuary. In fact, the city's wealth did not vanish overnight (and indeed, movement of s.h.i.+pping and goods was significantly less severely constrained than is often implied). 'Antwerp was still affluent, still home to a number of families who had held on to considerable fortunes generated in better days. They led a princely lifestyle which they were more than happy to demonstrate in the form of large houses, fine art collections and country estates.'1 Indeed, Antwerp enjoyed a minor economic boom in the years after 1648. 'In these years Antwerp's merchants were jubilant at the prospect of new economic opportunities. The riddertol, a tax levied on s.h.i.+pping on the Scheldt and a reliable fiscal parameter for gauging the volume of trade, particularly trade with the United Provinces, indeed points to a significant increase in harbour activity compared to the first half of the seventeenth century.'2 In particular, a market in luxury goods (small in bulk, and easy to transport) continued to thrive, with art dealers and dealers in precious stones and jewels enjoying a particularly buoyant period between 1648 and the 1680s. There remained in Antwerp a core community of extremely wealthy individuals their wealth primarily established on trade who continued to spend extravagantly.

The population of Antwerp in the mid-seventeenth century was around seventy thousand. The city was diverse, and impressively multicultural. Although it found itself on the threshold of the Catholic Netherlands, it was unusually tolerant of the religious observance of its Protestant population. The English Anglican divine, George Morley, canon of Christ Church, and later Bishop of Worcester, records that he 'read the Divine Service of our Church twice a day' at Antwerp in the 1650s (during which period he was also Elizabeth of Bohemia's private chaplain). He 'celebrated the Sacrament of the Eucharist once a month', 'did there bury the dead' and 'baptize children according to the form prescribed in our liturgy'; and 'besides this did once a week, at least, catechize the whole family wherein I lived, in the principles of Christian doctrine as they are taught in our Church Catechism'.3 Antwerp was also quietly tolerant of the Sephardic Jewish merchants who lived and conducted their successful businesses there.4 Visitors commented on the freedom with which Jews observed their festivals (for example, they were able openly to set up huts in their gardens for the feast of Succoth). Prominent merchants like the diamond dealer Gaspar Duarte (who also dealt in paintings) were officially registered as Catholic, but they and their families seem to have continued discreetly to practise their Judaism reasonably freely, under the tolerant eye of their Christian neighbours. Visitors commented on the freedom with which Jews observed their festivals (for example, they were able openly to set up huts in their gardens for the feast of Succoth). Prominent merchants like the diamond dealer Gaspar Duarte (who also dealt in paintings) were officially registered as Catholic, but they and their families seem to have continued discreetly to practise their Judaism reasonably freely, under the tolerant eye of their Christian neighbours.5 Gaspar Duarte was born in Antwerp, the son of Diego Duarte and Leonor Rodrigues, who had come to the city as refugees, escaping religious persecution in Lisbon, around 1591. He built a flouris.h.i.+ng business in gems and artworks, which was subsequently continued by his family. Around 1632 Gaspar established a business outlet in London, where he and his sons Diego and Jacob were granted 'denizen' status as nationalised Englishmen in 1634. From 1632 to 1639 Gaspar Duarte was jeweller (and gem procurer and supplier) to Charles I a position which effectively made him agent for Charles's purchases and disposals of gemstones. He relocated the business to Antwerp after the outbreak of the Civil War, but remained in touch with many of his old clients from London.6 The imposing Duarte house on the broad boulevard which is still Antwerp's main shopping street today, the Meir, a family home that John Evelyn described as more like a palace, was the focus for the extravagant entertainment of visitors from all over Europe between 1650 and 1680 (when Gaspar died in 1653, Diego took over both the family business and the social networking). Gaspar's three daughters were virtuoso musicians, and close friends with Utricia Swann, who often performed with them. Those fortunate enough to spend an evening in the Duarte musical salon were dazzled by the ostentation of the family's wealth, and enchanted by the quality of the lifestyle and the entertainment.

In 1641, John Evelyn recorded in his diary a concert held at the Duartes' home: 'In the evening I was invited to Signor Duerts [Duarte], a Portuguese by nation, an exceeding rich merchant, whose palace I found to be furnish'd like a prince's; and here his three daughters, entertain'd us with rare musick, both vocal and instrumental, which was finish'd with a handsome collation.'

More palatial than any other house in Antwerp, the home of the Duartes was where both Mary Stuart, Princess Royal, and her brother Prince Charles stayed when they were visiting, as befitting their royal status, although they might be lavishly entertained by the English community elsewhere in town.

Gaspar Duarte and his family's musical virtuosity made of their house and its circle a genuine 'salon' where connoisseurs a.s.sembled for concerts. Occasions on which Duarte's musically gifted daughters performed with voice and instruments brought together cultivated and influential individuals like Sir Constantijn Huygens, Frederik Hendrik and his wife Amalia van Solms, and subsequently their son Prince William and his wife Princess Mary Stuart. Huygens senior became a good personal friend of Gaspar Duarte, and his sons became equally close to the diamond merchant's children (one of Diego Duarte's daughters was named Constantia, after Sir Constantijn).

The intimate friends.h.i.+p and the musical soirees were part of an elaborate system of interdependencies among the individuals and families involved, which also extended to include a much more robustly commercial relations.h.i.+p between Huygens (representing the house of Orange) and Duarte as a powerful and extremely influential Antwerp merchant and international businessman.

Huygens regularly did business with the Duartes on behalf of his Stadholder employer. A single, delightful example of a transaction organised and carried out by them on Frederik Hendrik's behalf begins to reveal the hidden tendrils of influence in matters of cultural exchange in the 1640s, originating in Antwerp, and extending across the water between England and the United Provinces and, indeed, back again.

In March 1641, Gaspar Duarte wrote from Antwerp to Sir Constantijn Huygens in The Hague. The letter (in French) contains an appropriate amount of musical small talk (the two men are exchanging the scores of Italian songs for one or more voices), but a substantive item of Stadholder business occupies most of its s.p.a.ce.

Duarte writes to let Huygens know that, as requested by representatives of Frederik Hendrik, his son Jacob in London has located a particularly striking (and expensive) piece of jewellery an elaborate brooch in the latest fas.h.i.+onable style, comprising four individual diamonds in a complicated setting, and designed to be worn on the stomacher of a woman's dress.

It emerges that the piece is to be a sensational gift for Frederik Hendrik's teenaged son William to present to his bride-to-be, the nine-year-old Mary Stuart, on the occasion of their marriage in London in May, the details of which have just been negotiated and settled in London by Dutch amba.s.sadors. Duarte in Antwerp tells Huygens in The Hague that he has identified the perfect piece for this purpose in London: One of my friends, Sir Arnout Lundi, has asked me for an important jewel ['joiau'] worth 80,000 florins, on behalf of His Highness, the Prince of Orange. I had delivered to the said Sir Lundi a mock-up [plomb] and pattern of a rich jewel, a fortnight ago, to show to His Highness, by way of a gentleman, a friend of the aforementioned Lundi, called Mr. Joachim Fiqfort. So far I have received no response. So your cousin advised me that it would be a good thing if I let yourself know about this, so that you could alert His Highness not to buy any other piece of equivalent value until he has seen this one. It is in London in the control of my son, who, if I instruct him to do so, will himself convey it to you. Their honours the Holland amba.s.sadors saw it in London, and also told His Highness about it, because they were so delighted to see so magnificent a piece. For the four diamonds in combination have the impact of a single diamond of value 1 million florins.7

On 7 April, Gaspar Duarte's son Jacob arrived in Antwerp with the jewel, and the following day Huygens examined it.8 A fortnight later, with Huygens discreetly facilitating the process, the deal had made progress. Huygens has agreed to take the jewel to The Hague, but the Stadholder's suggested best offer for it is still too low to be acceptable: A fortnight later, with Huygens discreetly facilitating the process, the deal had made progress. Huygens has agreed to take the jewel to The Hague, but the Stadholder's suggested best offer for it is still too low to be acceptable: I remain greatly indebted to you [Duarte wrote to Huygens] for the great affection you have shown towards my son Jacob Duarte, by tomorrow showing His Highness that beautiful jewel which I mentioned to you previously. And although I understand that Mr. Alonse de Lope has already managed to sell His Highness four other pieces [of expensive jewellery], nevertheless I hope that your particular favour will have the power to be successful in this matter, since this is such an extraordinarily rare piece. It would be most gracious of you to represent [to His Highness] how thus far I see small appearance [of successful completion], not having been made an offer which is reasonable, [but] one much lower than what it cost me.Which disappoints me, not thereby being able to serve His Highness. I was a.s.sured that His Majesty [the King] of England would have been more delighted with this piece than with all the other jewels, since he had already made an offer for it himself to my younger son, by way of Milord Chamberlain, if his brother had arrived in time. For His Majesty had even offered 6,500 pounds sterling, and would never imagine that His Highness could have acquired it for less.9

Duarte's suggestion that the English King had almost obtained the piece himself, and that he had offered a sum in excess of the one being proposed by the Dutch Stadholder, was a shrewd piece of commercial pressuring. It apparently clinched the deal. On 9 May, Duarte acknowledged receipt of payment by Huygens on the Stadholder's behalf.10 These exchanges of letters present us with the intriguing picture of a luxury object whose value both financial and in terms of current taste and fas.h.i.+on is being established by reference to the object's desirability in two locations, inside two fas.h.i.+onable societies. The Dutch Stadholder needs a gift which will greatly impress the English King. His agent has identified a suitable candidate which is actually in London, conveniently in the possession of a Dutch diamond dealer who also operates out of England. The piece has already been seen and admired by the English King, who has allegedly tried to acquire it.

The Duartes are suppliers of gems and made-up pieces of jewellery to Charles I in London and Frederik Hendrik in The Hague. They also, again conveniently, have close family friends in place to help facilitate the deal Joachim of Wicquefort, otherwise known as Joachim Factor, was a friend of Gaspar Duarte's daughter Francesca, and part of the 'firm'.11 Huygens, who moves freely between England and the United Provinces, is fluent in English, and frequents the English and Dutch courts, provides his expert imprimatur to the deal. Huygens, who moves freely between England and the United Provinces, is fluent in English, and frequents the English and Dutch courts, provides his expert imprimatur to the deal.

On 19 April 1641, Prince William, with an entourage of 250 people, arrived at Gravesend for his 'royal' wedding. Some days later he was received in Whitehall Palace, where he presented members of the royal party with diamonds, pearls and other jewellery, worth close on 23,000.12 These included the spectacular jewel for his bride which Huygens had helped negotiate the purchase of in London, and which she wore on the front of her silver wedding dress. These included the spectacular jewel for his bride which Huygens had helped negotiate the purchase of in London, and which she wore on the front of her silver wedding dress.13 Less than a year later, when Princess Mary and her mother joined her husband in The Hague, the jewel went with them. Thus in the s.p.a.ce of a year, this distinctive, exquisitely crafted, expensive piece of jewellery crossed the Narrow Sea three times. Less than a year later, when Princess Mary and her mother joined her husband in The Hague, the jewel went with them. Thus in the s.p.a.ce of a year, this distinctive, exquisitely crafted, expensive piece of jewellery crossed the Narrow Sea three times.

Cash settlement of this highly satisfactory piece of brokered purchasing was ingeniously executed using a second DuarteHuygens business deal, this time carried out on Huygens's own behalf, which occupies a further part of the exchange of letters we have been looking at between the two men. Huygens, who had family in Antwerp, had a house just outside the town which he wanted to sell to finance the ambitious country house and garden he was in the process of creating at Hofwijk, outside The Hague.14 This business was already under way, with Gaspar Duarte acting as Huygens's agent for the house sale in Antwerp, when the 'jewel affair' arose. This business was already under way, with Gaspar Duarte acting as Huygens's agent for the house sale in Antwerp, when the 'jewel affair' arose.

In the letter proposing the London jewel for Frederik Hendrik, Duarte asked permission to take 'the person who desires to purchase' around Huygens's house. This person, Duarte informed Huygens, 'has already two days ago bought a large house here in town for 45,000 florins, which still needs building work', and had made it clear to him that he wanted two such houses, one in town and 'yours in the country'. On 21 April he told Huygens that negotiations for the house sale were going well. When Huygens settled payment for the Stadholder's jewel purchase in early May, the sum sent was the total, less the agreed sale price on Huygens's property.

By the 1650s the Duartes had also acquired a considerable reputation as connoisseurs and collectors of fine art and exactly as in the case of the gemstones and jewels, the dividing line between their activities as private collectors and dealers is blurred. Again, Sir Constantijn Huygens, this time together with his son Constantijn junior, is our witness. Between 1640 and the 1670s, both men regularly visited the Duarte picture gallery in their house in the Meir whenever they were pa.s.sing through Antwerp. In the 1670s, Constantijn junior records in his diary how he would take time off from accompanying William III of Orange on his summer military campaigns against the French, in his capacity as secretary to the Prince, to look at the Duarte paintings and prints, to request Diego Duarte to appraise potential items for purchase he had himself located in the area, and to buy from him himself. The pictures would then be s.h.i.+pped by the Duarte 'shop' to The Hague.

A 1683 inventory of the stock of paintings in the Duartes' home reveals a valuable collection, a.s.sembled by a discerning connoisseur of contemporary art, within which several outstanding items are identified as having been acquired from named aristocratic art collectors particularly English emigres. This ought not to surprise us. The Duartes bought pictures for much-needed cash from families who had carried the more portable of their valuable possessions out of England in the late 1640s, as well as paintings from the collections of those (like the Duke of Buckingham and the Earl of Arundel) whose collections had been broken up and sold as their political fortunes waned. The result is that the Duarte collection contains a striking number of portraits of English sitters by artists fas.h.i.+onable across the Channel thereby in turn creating a demand in the Netherlands for such pictures.

At least one of the entries from this inventory, however, gives us a second insight into dealing and exchange strategies in Antwerp. It reveals an intriguing cross-over between the gem business and the art-dealing business. It also, incidentally, reminds us that the sums of money changing hands for gems in this period are generally in the region of ten times those being expended on artworks.

The first, and by far the most valuable, item in the Duarte 1683 inventory is a painting by Raphael of a Madonna and child with Joseph and St Anne (probably actually St Elizabeth, mother of John the Baptist). The inventory notes that the painting was acquired from 'Don Emanuel Prince of Portugal' (the husband of one of Prince William the Silent's daughters by his second marriage), in exchange for a diamond ring, the agreed value of which was 2,200 guilders.15 The diamond alone, Duarte notes, cost two thousand guilders, and the elaborate setting included other stones, among them an engraved sapphire (together valued by him at two hundred guilders). The diamond alone, Duarte notes, cost two thousand guilders, and the elaborate setting included other stones, among them an engraved sapphire (together valued by him at two hundred guilders).

In other words, the Duarte 'shop' offered facilities for providing the agreed purchase price for an item for which a sale was being negotiated in this case, an elaborate jewel in the form of other expensive goods for which the Duartes were competent to provide a valuation. They thus performed a particular service for those with disposable income who liked to follow fas.h.i.+on. Last year's piece of jewellery could be traded for a number of fas.h.i.+onable works of art (the Raphael was unusual in being a match for Don Emmanuel's ring).

One area of court culture over which Constantijn Huygens exerted particularly strong influence because it was close to his own heart was music both instrumental and for voices. An enthusiastic composer and performer himself (although, unfortunately, very few of his many known compositions survive), Huygens remained actively involved in music in the Low Countries throughout his entire life, absorbing influences from England, France and Italy and reshaping them into a quintessentially Dutch style and sentiment. He was also responsible for identifying, and helping the careers of, individual talented performers, just as he did those of talented painters. After William II's death in 1650, he clearly used his position as an influential and well-connected music connoisseur and pract.i.tioner in the same way as he did that in fine art, to sustain the cultural reputation of the house of Orange during its period of exclusion from public office.

In 1648, Sir Constantijn got wind of the fact that a young French singer, Anne de la Barre, daughter of the French court organist, who had already gained a considerable reputation in Paris, had been invited to travel to the court of Queen Christina of Sweden to perform (accompanied on various instruments by at least one of her younger siblings). In July, Huygens wrote to Anne, to persuade her to break her journey at the Stadholder's court in Holland: I beg you to accept this invitation to relax for a couple of weeks at my home, which is not perhaps the least convenient or least well-appointed at The Hague. There you would find lutes, theorbos, viols, spinets, clavichords and organs to divert you almost as many as you could be provided with in the whole of Sweden.16

To encourage her to take up his invitation, Huygens enclosed a copy of his own recently published book of psalm settings and airs for soprano voice, Pathodia Sacra et Profana Pathodia Sacra et Profana. Anne and her father, court organist to the French King, replied immediately (in separate letters). Anne had already performed several of Huygens's new songs, to general acclaim. 'I believe that you understand perfectly all the languages you compose in,' she adds, 'judging from the beautifully expressive use of words, which I have tried hard to express in my performances.'17 More pragmatically, Anne's father asked Huygens to put in a word with the Prince and Princess of Orange, in the hope that they too might invite Anne to sing for them: We pa.s.sionately desire to visit The Hague, in order to converse with someone of your merit and discernment ... I make this request because, as my children have tried to acquire the Science of music, all that remains is for them to find some prince whom they may please, who will reward their endeavours. The Queen of England [Henrietta Maria] and the Prince of Wales [the future Charles II], who have heard us, bestowed on us as much honour as one could wish for. The said Queen [in exile] hoped to be back in power in England, so that she could bring us there.18

Anne's planned trip to Sweden in 1648 did not take place, and in the meantime, disaster struck Huygens in the form of the death of his Orange employer he wrote in his diary: 'miserere populi hujus et mei, o Magnus Deus' ('have mercy upon this people and upon myself, o Great G.o.d'). So by the time Anne did embark on her European tour in 1653, Huygens had yet stronger motivation for persuading her to spend some time in The Hague, frequenting the courts of Amalia and the Princess Royal, and performing for the city's elite. Huygens and Anne's father had kept in close touch during the intervening five years, and had formed a professional relations.h.i.+p. Just as painters were happy to secure the continuing favour of their clients and patrons by supplying them with works by other artists, la Barre acted as agent for Huygens, commissioning and procuring sought-after state-of-the-art musical instruments for him in Paris. These were s.h.i.+pped from France via Gasper Duarte in Antwerp, to add to the collection of fine instruments Huygens had boasted of to la Barre's daughter.

The la Barres did indeed eventually break their journey to Sweden at The Hague. As he had promised, Constantijn Huygens entertained Anne and her accompanying family members in his own home, 'so that I am able to see her often, as far as my official responsibilities allow'. And true to his word, he recommended Anne enthusiastically whenever he had the opportunity, penning several eulogistic poems to her musical prowess, and preparing the way for her rapturous welcome at the court of Queen Christina, where the la Barres stayed for a year. 'Amarinthe [Anne],' he wrote, 'is admired and cherished here as she deserves': The Queen of Bohemia [Elizabeth] and her royal niece [Princess Mary Stuart] cannot get enough of her, and for the first time Madame la Princesse Mere [Amalia van Solms, widow of Stadholder Frederik Hendrik] attended a gathering which included the Queen [the exiled Henrietta Maria of England]. There that ill.u.s.trious young singer had a solemn audience, at which she was a marvellous success.19

This meant, of course, that by the time the la Barres continued on their way, their stories of sophisticated musical soirees in The Hague, where the Princess Royal, her mother-in-law and her aunt all partic.i.p.ated as 'a solemn audience', gratifyingly spread the word that all was continuing to prosper with the houses of Stuart and Orange in the United Provinces.

Music featured prominently in the masques and ballets which were a regular feature of the soirees and entertainments of the courts at The Hague, particularly as encouraged and patronised by Elizabeth of Bohemia. Spectacular combinations of theatre, elaborate scenery, song (solo and choral), dance and orchestral accompaniment, they were occasions for compet.i.tion between royal patrons.

In 1624, the young Sir Constantijn Huygens himself wrote a verse introduction to a 'ballet' performed before Elizabeth, in which 'Amor' and a series of suitors played poetic court to the exiled Queen.20 Such entertainments were popular at the English and French courts also, and by the 1650s the E