A GIRL OF FATE.

Timaru Herald, Volume XIIC, Issue 13846, 6 March 1909, Page 3

A GIRL OF FATE.

The story of Mary Stuart; is often told as it it began, when she/ bade adieu to the pleasant land of France and arrived in Leitli ltoads - under a heaven that never showed a more dolorous fat-e.' It is true that the real tragedy of Mary Stuart opened then. She returned to Scotland " predestined to doom," and her residence at the court of France was a prelude inevitably charged with the atmosphere of her ruin. But if we may not go to her girlhood's years for the explanation of her fall, 91- to speculate upon how it might have been averted, we do naturally look to them for light upon the. sleeping passions that, as Mr Lang says, added dishonour to it. AN ADMIRABLE WORK. Yet it Is doubtful if we find it. The temptation must be avoided of discovering in ' the so-called " French influences " an illumination upon her later life, which is not there. The problem of ,Mary's character, at any rate, is brought no nearer a solution by airy references to the evil communications of the court of Henry 11., or by scandalous hints about ttie wicked Guises. What is wanted is, in the first place, the prpductiori of tlie recorded facts' about her association with the Court and the Guises, with an impartial esr timate of the worth of the authorities to whom we owe them; and thereafter

a. scrupulous care to distinguish between what they actually tell and what may even reasonably be deduced from them. This .is supplied in Miss Stoddart 1 s admirable work. In these days ,of jerry-built books it is a pleasure to come upon one so solidly founded and carefully finished as hers. It is not one of those, vamped volumes which owe their existence to the inherent popularity of la, subject or expectations of gain from a catchy title. A remark in the preface, that the story of Queen Mary's girlhood in France disengaged itself in the t author's mind from the larger subject of the history of the Guises, is borne out in the scholarly treatment of the historical background against which the fateful figure of the girl is set, and indicates the spirit in which the work has been conceived and written. THE ROYAL-NURSERY.

It fell to the lot of Mary Stuart, like all her family, to be associated with, even when she had no share' in calling forth, a large and vividly-dra-matic play of human character. ■ To this, as much as to inherent' qualities, is due the romance which attaches to the race. Thus, even in the nursery, Mary is interesting through her surroundings. She was the object of a concern as incongruous as it was affectionate. We have Diane de Poitiers writing to the Sieur Jean. d'Humieres, the governor of the Royal children, to see that the women keep on good terms, and conveying other wishes of the' King, who has heard of the new charge as a wonder, and is soon himself to fall under her spell. Catherine, too, is solicitoiis . about "our little Scottish Qweenie," who. has not yet attained the- age or the daring to flout her shopkeeper origin. The governor was also in receipt of very particular instructions about the babies from the grim Anne de Montmorency —as, for example, that he should see "that the Dauphin uses his pockethandkerchief." As she .grew older Mary came more directly under the supervision of the Guises, particularly of the Cardinal of Lorraine, who . supped with her as her first guest on becoming mistress of her own establishment at the age of twelve. When the Guises "were driven to the door," after the death of Francis, she found herself no longer " weill lyked." But that was because she was a pawn of the losers; and from the first her personality won all hearts. Nor did she ever lose them through conduct of her own. Even Catherine, who had for her daugliter-in-law, a gret mislyking " admitted that she could turn all French heads. "One of the most perfect creatures that were ever seen," said Jean de Beaugue, summing up the contemporary testimonies which assure us, as her portraits curiously do not, of her beauty and charm. AFFECTIONATE HOME LIFE. In her soberly sympathetic pages Miss Stoddart fills up this broad outline of the Scottish Queen's formative years. What is the impression left upon us P To say that they were the happiest in Mary Stuart's life is not to say very much j but in the mam they were h;ippv. TJntil the death of Henry 11. she lived continually m the warm glow of affection and admiration. There is abundant evidence that the children brought up by the Guises breathed an atmosphere of love rather than of fear, and enjoyed a. frank, gav intercourse with their elders. It the author has a prejudice—and she is singularly free from them it is not against the Guises. Her estimate of the brliliant and powerful Cardinal is a little lower than Bishop Creighton's, but considerably above that of the

I Huguenot and anti-Guise historians, 'me corruption of the Court was notorious, but the question, as Professor Lemnnier says, is how far it penetrated, and Miss Stoddart is able to show that some of the purest influences 01 the Queen's character might derive from her residence at it. it is worth while quoting what she says apropos the letters of its great ladies, to Alary ' of Lorraine in Scotland: Have not we of the twentieth century much to learn from the wonderful ful and voluminous correspondence of that period, in which extreme delicacy of feeling is joined with perfect goodwill P We may search through twenty volumes without finding a single unkind letter. The peculiar situation of each friend is perfectly understood, and the writer knows, as if by instinct, how to choose the word which will cheer and strengthen. FRENCH INFLUENCES. These do not, of course, exhaust the "French influences," and the author does not hide others, less direct perhaps, which were for evil. If the Guises were linked in the bonds of af'feetion, so they were in those of intrigue. In their home .circles' it was possible, Miss Stoddart says, that the Christian virtues should thrive, but whether they did is another matter, and among the broken records of Mary's childhood she notes th« essential fact that it was spent in a world where religion was often fatally divorced from morality. The atmosphere of affection and admiration she was brought up in was one of scandal also, and she could not escape the knowledge of cruelty, though there in no evidence that she practised it. Miss Stoddart disposes of the story about her leading forth the Court to see the "fair cluster of grapes" which the grey stories of Amboise had produced. It is not certain that she was present. Speculations are easy, however, about the effects of. such influences upon a shallow and passionate nature that could only be safe in the sun —an estimate of Mary Stuart's nature which is itself no more than a speculation. Miss Stoddart, setting out to solve 110 mystery, is content to present the facts so far as research and travel and i\ knowledge of authorities can reveal -them, and this she does with both learning and charm.