Clarendon swallowed the draught and sought the Queen, upon that
odious embassy with whose ends he was so entirely out of
sympathy. He used arguments whose hollowness was not more obvious
to the Queen than to himself.
That industrious and entertaining chronicler of trifles, Mr.
Pepys, tells us, scandalized, in his diary that on the following
day the talk of the Court was all upon a midnight scene between
the royal couple in the privacy of their own apartments, so
stormy that the sounds of it were plainly to be heard in the
neighbouring chambers.
You conceive the poor little woman, smarting under the insult of
Charles's proposal by the mouth of Clarendon, assailing her royal
husband, and fiercely upbraiding him with his lack not merely of
affection but even of the respect that was her absolute due. And
Charles, his purpose set, urged to it by the handsome termagant
whom he dared not refuse, stirred out of his indolent good-
nature, turning upon her, storming back, and finally threatening
her with the greater disgrace of seeing herself pack ed home to
Portugal, unless she would submit to the lesser disgrace he
thrust upon her here.
Whether by these or by other arguments he made his will prevail,
prevail it did.
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