Lives of the last four princesses of the royal house of Stuart

84 MARY, PRINCESS-ROYAL. [1655,
letter from her brother Charles, on the subject of her in-
tended visit to the court of France, not only remonstrating
with her, but absolutely forbidding her to go, that she wrote
to him on the subject, temperately but mildly, explaining
her wish to pay her duty to her mother. She says : — *
"Before I write to satisfy you with my going into
France, give me leave to tell you, that not without
trouble, I must complain of your usage of me, in this par-
ticular, which I had no reason to expect from so good a
brother ; for I do not find, by your letters, that since I came
from Cullen (Cologne) you have had any new occasion to
think my going to see the Queen prejudicial to your affair
with the Spaniards. Therefore if you had been pleased
to have used me with that freedom which I always desired,
and you often promised me, and had spoken to me of this,
when I had the happiness to be with you, I should have
made as little question to have satisfied you then, as now.
I beseech you, first to consider how reasonable a thing all
the world must think it, in me, to desire to see the Queen,,
my mother, who I have not seen since I was a child ; and
next, you know that there has been ill offices done me to
her majesty, which I hope by my going quite to remove,
so as to put it out of malicious people's power to make me,
again, so unhappy. Besides all this, her majesty has
written to me two letters, which I have received since
I came hither, kindly pressing my coming before the
spring, because the peace is concluded. She says, she does
not know how long she shall stay at Paris, and, truly, if I
should deny her majesty, it would be very barbarous in me.
But I beseech you to believe that my going shall be done
with all the circumspection imaginable ; though I must
confess, I do not see how it can prejudice your busi-
ness with Spain. I shall acquaint the Spanish ambassa-
* Lambeth MSS.