Sir Arthur Henry Hardinge's essay on Kristina, year 1880, part 2

Source:

Queen Christina of Sweden: Lothian Prize Essay for 1880, pages 5 to 16, by Sir Arthur Henry Hardinge, 1880; original at the University of Michigan

https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=mdp.39015012302041&seq=11

The essay:

CHAPTER I.

CHRISTINA'S MINORITY.

CHRISTINA was six years old when the death of her father at Lützen made her heir to the Swedish throne. Her age and sex might, perhaps, have been considered obstacles to her succession, but for the fear felt of the designs of the King of Poland, whose partisans in Sweden began to spread reports of his intended abjuration of Romanism; in which case, they said, it would be the clear duty of the nation to restore his family to the throne. All such schemes, however, were put an end to by the meeting of the Diet in 1633. That assembly, after reciting the decisions of the years 1604 and 1627, regulating the succession to the crown, solemnly proclaimed Christina "queen-elect, and hereditary princess of the Swedes, Goths, and Vandals", on condition of her confirming, on her majority, all the rights, liberties, and privileges guaranteed to the nation by former kings. It may, perhaps, be as well not to omit a well-known incident, which is said to have taken place on the occasion of this proclamation. The question of the succession was being debated in the Diet, when a peasant deputy, so the story goes, stepped forward from his place, "Who is this Christina", he asked, "of whom you speak? we do not know her; we have never seen her; let her be brought to us, that we may know what she is like." The child was brought down, and placed in the midst of the Diet, and after the man had looked attentively at her for a short time, he turned round to his comrades, and exclaimed, "Yes, she is in truth the daughter of Gustavus; she has the same eyes, the same features, the same expression of face; let her reign over us, we will have her to be our queen."

The question how the government should be administered during the minority had next to be decided. Oxenstyerna, at that time in Germany, produced a paper prescribing a "Form of Government", which he declared had been drawn up by the late king, but which was generally looked upon, at least to a great extent, as the work of the Chancellor himself. This document began by reciting the laws fixing the succession, and obliging the king and people to profess the Lutheran faith; it next provided that the king should rule according to the laws, and by the advice of a Senate, or Royal Council, of not less than twenty-five members, to be nominated by himself from amongst the nobility; of this Council, the five great officers of state, the Steward or Lord Chief Justice (Riks-Drotset), the High Constable or Marshal, the High Admiral, the Chancellor, and the Treasurer, who were, at the same time, heads of the five great boards or ministries of Justice, War, Admiralty, Chancery or Foreign Affairs, and Exchequer or Treasury, were to be ex officio members. The functions of the Senate were to be, in the main, administrative; but it was to possess, under certain circumstances, judicial powers. The ordinary justice of the kingdom was to be administered by four high courts, Jonköping for Gothland, Abo for Finland, Dorpat for Livonia and the remaining Trans-Baltic lands, and Stockholm for Sweden proper; the court at Stockholm being the Board of Justice, mentioned above, of which the Drotset, or Lord Steward, the first of the five great officers, was president, and which was the supreme court of the whole kingdom. The members of these five great courts, assisted by the burgomasters of the six chief cities of the kingdom, Stockholm, Upsala, Gothenburg, Norrköping, Abo, and Wiborg, were to form, conjointly with the Senate, a special judicial body, for the purpose of trying offenders whose rank, or the character of whose crimes, placed them beyond the reach of the common tribunals. Besides the four high courts, the country was divided for judicial purposes into fourteen circuits (lagsagor), and for administrative purposes into twenty-four governments (län), exclusive of the city of Stockholm, which retained its own local jurisdiction, and was governed by its own town-reeve. All the public officials, legal, military, naval, diplomatic, and exchequer, were to give an account of their administration, either in person or by deputy, every year, at the feast of Epiphany, to whichever of the five great boards had authority over them, and these boards [through their respective heads, the five great officers of state] were to present the accounts thus given, before the feast of Candlemas, for the sanction of the king.

The king was to command the army, and nominate to all the offices of state, on the understanding that such nomination should be made exclusively from the nobility. Before raising any tax, or altering any law, he was to obtain the consent of the Diet, or Four Estates; or if the case required prompt and secret action, of a body composed of twenty-eight nobles, two from each of the fourteen lagsagor, of the archbishop and bishops, and of six deputies, one from each of the six cities of Stockholm, Upsala, Gothenburg, Norrköping, Abo, and Wiborg. In case of the king's death without the succession being regulated, the government was to be in the hands of the Senate until the election of a successor; and the same rule was to hold ground if the lawfully-appointed successor was a minor, but all appointments or changes made during such a successor's minority were to be liable to be either sanctioned or cancelled, on his or her attaining the age of eighteen, at which the majority of a king was considered to have been reached.

Such were the main features of the "Form of Government" of 1634. In the immense power given to the Senate, as well as in the aristocratical composition of that body, it bears a striking resemblance to the famous constitution of 1720, which the Swedish nobles forced upon Queen Ulrica Eleonora, under circumstances not altogether unlike those attending the accession of Christina. It is chiefly interesting, however, as clearly marking, for the first time, the transition of the Swedish nobility from a turbulent military baronage to an official, senatorial class. Its centralising bureaucratic character is as different from the disintegrating feudalism which Richelieu was crushing in France, as from the wild licence which passed for government amongst the nobles of Poland. Indeed, the Swedish statesmen of that age seem to have looked rather to Venice for their model, than to the mediæval form of limited monarchy; imitating in this their English contemporaries, for whom Oxenstyerna, who made no secret of his republican opinions, professed on all occasions extreme admiration and sympathy. Of the five great offices of state, three were already filled: Axel Oxenstyerna himself was Chancellor; Gabriel Oxenstyerna, Gustavsson Drotset; and Baron Gyldenheim [sic], High Admiral. The vacant places of the Treasury and War-office were given to Gabriel Oxenstyerna (Axelson), and Count Jacob de la Gardie; the Palsgrave John Casimir of Zweibrücken, being refused the Treasury, which had been promised him by the late king, his brother-in-law, owing to the jealousy felt for him by the aristocracy. At the same time, Oxenstyerna (Axel) was appointed by the Diet "Supreme Administrator of the affairs of the Roman Empire", and to him was entrusted the carrying out of the work of Gustavus, and the successful termination of the Thirty Years' war.

His task was by no means an easy one. After Lützen, for a short while all was anarchy. The Protestant League seemed on the eve of dissolution. Freed from all fear about the northern bishoprics, the Lutheran princes of Lower Saxony were no longer eager to continue, in the interests of a foreign power, a destructive and useless war. Brandenburg was equally sluggish. The Elector had from the first joined Sweden with great reluctance, and not all the hopes held out by Oxenstyerna of a marriage between Christina and the Electoral prince, and a mighty Hohenzollern empire on both sides of the Baltic, could draw from him more than a faint and hesitating promise of possible support. Worst of all was the Elector of Saxony. John George had only under the most bitter provocation fallen away from the Austrian traditions of his house, and now that affairs had so completely changed, he began once more "to turn towards the Emperor." He was furious at the erection of the bishoprics of Bamberg and Wurzburg into a "duchy of Franconia", for his kinsman, Bernard of Weimar; a concession which Oxenstyerna had been unable to refuse, but which the Elector looked on as a lawless attack upon vested rights, and still worse, as a revival of the power of the old Ernestine line. Not only did he aim at himself leading the princely league, but he was personally jealous of Oxenstyerna, and spoke with angry bitterness of the foreign adventurer, who presumed to partition German lands amongst his followers, and to number German sovereigns amongst his lieutenants. In the face of this defection, swift action on the part of Sweden was necessary. Happily, the Protestant princes of Southern and Western Germany, surrounded on all sides by Catholic states, and themselves for the most part Calvinists, felt very differently from the apathetic Lutherans of the North. Deputies from the Rhenish circles, and from Suabia and Franconia, assembled in March, 1633, at Heilbronn, and concluded a new treaty with Oxenstyerna, which gave him the supreme management of the affairs of the German Protestants. He was, however, to act on the advice of a council of six appointed by the Union, a suggestion of the French ambassador, Feuquières. France had for some time watched with growing jealousy the victories of Gustavus Adolphus; and now that he was dead, it began to feel that the time was come to save its credit with the Protestant princes, and to acquire at the same time a real claim on the spoils of the empire by a "policy of active intervention." Accordingly, in 1634, Richelieu engaged to furnish Sweden with 12,000 men, and asked in return that Alsace, now occupied by Swedish troops, should be handed over to France. To this last proposal Oxenstyerna consented with great reluctance, nor could all the promises of Feuquières, who offered to make him Archbishop of Mayence, and even to bring about a marriage between his son and Christina, induce him ever to enter very heartily into the alliance with France. He seems always to have treated Feuquières with coldness, and to have felt that France's desire was to destroy the effect of Sweden's victories, and to supplant that power in the affections of the German princes. To gain these latter was still his aim, and after long and wearisome negotiations, it was at last partially successful, for before the end of 1634 he had persuaded the Northern Circles assembled at Halberstadt, and even the Elector of Brandenburg, to join the alliance of Heilbronn. Into the events which followed, — the treason and death of Wallenstein, the invasion of Germany by the French, the victories of Turenne and Torstenson, — it is hardly needful to enter. They belong chiefly to military history, and need only be quite lightly touched upon as forming part of the events of the reign, though not of the life, of Christina.

Oxenstyerna's absence in Germany left the management of affairs in Sweden entirely in the hands of the other four Regents. One of their first cares was the education of the young queen. In 1635, the matter had been brought before the Estates. They drew up a paper containing their recommendations as to the method to be adopted for her bringing up. "She ought", this paper says, "to learn the mutual duties of sovereign and of subject; to know something of the manners and laws of foreign countries, whilst giving special attention to those of her own kingdom; but, before anything else, she should be carefully taught the Word of God, and all those articles of faith and rules of morality which are based upon it." It goes on to advise a close study of history, "particularly that of the Bible, which is the foundation of all other history", and the keeping away from her of all useless or dangerous books, "that she may not be imbued with the errors of the Pope or of Calvinism", or learn ideas "incompatible with the laws and liberties of Sweden." This last clause was especially insisted upon, and every care was taken to impress Christina's youthful mind as strongly as possible with the limited and constitutional character, so to speak, of her royalty. "Novit dilectio vestra", she is made to write to the Elector of Brandenburg, "Regnum Sueciæ ab antiquo electivum fuisse; datum id vero meritis proavi nostri, ut suæ familiæ hæreditarium transcriberetur, non absolute, sed certis pactis inter regem et ordines, quibus servatis, subditi obsequio tenentur, solvuntur violatis et neglectis." The theory of original contract, and of the popular origin of monarchy, could not have been more clearly and shortly stated.

The tutor chosen for the queen was a court chaplain, Dr. Johannes Matthiæ by name. So early as 1630, Gustavus Adolphus had expressed a wish that he should, when the time came, undertake his daughter's education. He was a man of great learning, and of great liberality. The dream of his life was a re-union between the Lutheran and Reformed communions; but the readiness which he expressed to yield some minor points of difference in order to realize his favourite scheme, made the more rigid Churchmen accuse him of lax opinions; and he was obliged, in 1664, to resign his bishopric of Strengnäs. It is, perhaps, to the wide and unsectarian character of his teaching, and his contempt for what he looked upon as non-essentials, that is to be traced Christina's extreme indifference to the doctrinal disputes between the various Christian Churches, as compared with the great questions which divided them all alike, from "Jews, free-thinkers, and Atheists." His influence over her was considerable, and even after her change of religion, she continued to feel the strongest esteem and friendship for him. Meanwhile, her progress under his teaching was swift. By nature a clever and highly-imaginative girl, she took great interest in the study of the Classics, especially in ancient history; and before she reached the age of eighteen, she read Thucydides, Polybius, and Tacitus without difficulty, and discussed with pleasure the subject-matter of other great writers of antiquity. She also learned to speak several modern languages, and was well-informed about the history and internal affairs of the principal European states. Whitelocke was surprised, when he visited her court in 1653, to find how conversant she was with recent events in England; and those who saw her at the court of France were almost equally struck with the knowledge she shewed of the domestic concerns of their country.

Her training, however, was not purely intellectual; her father had wished it to be that of a man, and accordingly she was encouraged to take pleasure in field-sports. Her aptitude for them was indeed only surpassed by her incapacity for all womanly work. Chanut speaks with astonishment of her powers of bodily endurance. She would sit, for instance, ten hours in the saddle without being tired; and Whitelocke, after hearing her describe a journey she had just made into the country in the depth of winter, told her, to her evident pleasure, that she would be equal to commanding an army. In truth, she always loved martial sights and sounds, and often regretted that she had so little of them. She delighted in firing off pistols and listening to the roar of cannon; and in France she told Mdlle. de Montpensier that she would give anything to be present at a battle. These masculine tastes were encouraged rather than repressed by those who brought her up; and it is only fair to remember the character of her training in these respects, before passing too harsh a judgment on her strange behaviour, in courts in which stricter notions of female decorum prevailed. It is just, too, to add that, though she wanted many of the gentler virtues of her sex, she was free from some of the faults and weaknesses which are considered, though often wrongly, as especially belonging to it. Although not strikingly beautiful, she might fairly have been called a pretty woman; yet she was utterly devoid of all personal vanity. She made no attempt to hide the fact that one of her shoulders was slightly higher than the other, or to make up for the smallness of her stature by an ample train, or by the tight, high-heeled shoes which at that time were the fashion. Her dress, which was more like that of a man than of a woman, was, in fact, careless even to untidiness; her hands were coarse and brown, from exposure to the air; and her cuffs were often soiled with stains and spots of ink.

The home-training of Christina was entrusted, not to the queen-mother, Maria Eleonora, a sentimental and rather weak-minded woman, much under the influence of the clergy, but to her aunt, the Palsgravine Catherine of Zweibrücken. This princess, a sister of Gustavus Adolphus, had been married to the Prince Palatine, Johan Casimir; and it was hoped that her son, Prince Charles Gustavus (afterwards Charles X.) might some day become Christina's husband. The Palatine family were, however, looked on with great jealousy by the Swedish aristocracy, who feared their interference in the government; and when, after the death of one of the regents, the Drotset Gabriel Oxenstyerna, John Casimir proposed to give the vacant place to his son, Prince Charles, he was dissuaded from the scheme by a letter from the queen herself, which shews, for a girl of fifteen, considerable knowledge of the world, and which, from the character of its contents, can have been composed by Christina alone. In it she tells her uncle that, if the prince were to take the regency, all means (even those which cannot be expressed or hinted at in words) might be employed to get rid of him.

The slight put upon her by the Diet and Senate, in the withdrawal of her daughter from her care, increased the growing dislike of the queen-mother to Sweden to such a pitch, that she resolved to leave the country for ever. Accordingly, on pretence of spending a short time in religious exercises, she retired to her private domain of Gripsholm, an old castle situated amidst pine-woods on the Mälar Lake, and which had been the scene of the murder of the deposed Eric XIV. Stealing away from this castle one night with a few attendants, she crossed an arm of the Mälar in a little boat, and posted, with horses prepared to meet her on the other side, to the seaport-town of Nyköping. Here she found two of the King of Denmark's men-of-war, under the command of the Danish admiral Otteson, awaiting her by preconcerted arrangement. Embarking on one of these, which was fitted up on purpose to receive her, she was conveyed to the Danish island of Oeland, whence she proceeded first to Copenhagen, and then to Brandenburg, her native country. It was pretended by some, and notably by Count d'Avaux, French Ambassador at Stockholm, that the real cause of this flight was a love-affair between Maria Eleonora and the King of Denmark; and that, in order to meet her, Christian IV. had himself secretly repaired to Oeland. It need hardly be said that there is no reason for suspecting the old king (he was nearly eighty [sic]) of having lent himself to so culpable a farce; yet that he aided her flight, in order to create troubles in Sweden, is beyond doubt; and his conduct gave rise to bitter feelings between the two states. For some time past, indeed, they had been far from friendly. Denmark had watched with natural jealousy the victories of Gustavus Adolphus in Germany. Not only was it annoyed at seeing its old rival succeed where itself had failed, but it feared the establishment of Sweden on the southern coast of the Baltic. It therefore determined, under pretext of mediating, to interfere between that country and its enemies; and this interference, added to the affair of the queen-mother, produced the final rupture with Sweden. On the 25th of May, 1643, Oxenstyerna wrote to Torstenson, the Swedish commander in North Germany, that "the Emperor is seeking allies in Poland and Denmark, which latter country, under the semblance of a mediator, has intermeddled in the peace.... The King of Denmark is arming by land and sea, and is drawing his army together, under pretext of quieting Hamburg, but in reality for purposes of intimidation, and to appear as an armed negotiator..... We know that this Danish armament is intended to disturb our arms in Germany, and to attack us, if not in this, at any rate in the following year." He goes on to complain of the tolls levied by the Danes on Swedish ships in the Sound, and concludes by ordering Torstenson to forestall the Danish attack, by himself invading Holstein and Jutland. War began in the autumn of 1643. Torstenson marched rapidly into Jutland, took Kolding, the frontier fortress of that province, overran the whole country up to the Scaw, and prepared to cross the Little Belt into Fyen. Meanwhile, the Swedish fleet, supported by some ships manned by Dutch volunteers, completely defeated the Danes off the south coast of Laaland. Christian IV. behaved like a hero, and though over eighty [sic], led his men in person against the enemy; but he could get no help from the oligarchy which really ruled the country, and in the following year he was compelled to treat for peace. Negotiations were opened at Bromsebro, on the frontiers of the two kingdoms, under the mediation of France and Holland. The latter, however, as a Protestant and commercial power, was not disposed to do anything to help a state which had joined the enemies of the Reformation from selfish jealousy of Sweden, and which insisted on exacting the vexatious Sound-dues; its envoys were, on the contrary, instructed to use all their influence on the Swedish side, and to threaten Denmark with war, should it refuse the proposed terms of peace.

Further resistance was therefore hopeless; and on the 13th of August, 1645, the Peace of Bromsebro gave Sweden full freedom from tolls in the Sound and Belts, besides the provinces of Jemteland and Herjedalen, and the islands of Oesel and Gothland, with Halland to be occupied for a period of thirty years. The town of Bremen, taken by Konigsmark from Prince Frederick of Denmark, was also secured to the Swedes. This treaty was the first of the many humiliating peaces which Sweden was to extort from Denmark, up to the time of Charles XII. Its gains by it were considerable. The acquisition of Halland protected Gothenburg from a Danish attack from the south; Oesel and Gothland supplied good harbours and convenient naval stations between Sweden and its Trans-Baltic provinces; whilst the possession of the great rugged regions of Jemteland, &c., gave the kingdom a good natural frontier in the shape of the Norwegian mountains, though, as afterwards appeared in Armfelt's invasion of Norway, without much facilitating the conquest of that country. With the exception of the provinces of Blekinge and Skaanen, Sweden had now reached what we are used to look on as its natural limits, and nothing but a small defenceless corner in the south remained to the Danes of the country over which, but a century before, they had held undivided sway. The Chancellor, Oxenstyerna, as the chief author of this peace, was rewarded with the title of Count of Sodermære [sic]; and the honour was heightened by the high terms of praise with which it was conferred on him by the queen.

Above: Kristina.

Above: Sir Arthur Henry Hardinge.

Notes: Åbo is the Swedish name for the Finnish city of Turku, in the Southwest Finland/Finland Proper region.

Dorpat is the old German and Swedish name for the Estonian city of Tartu.

Viborg (now spelled Vyborg) is now a town in the Vyborgsky District of Russia's Leningrad Oblast. It is located on the Karelian Isthmus, 81 miles northwest of St. Petersburg.

Ösel is the old German and Swedish name for the Estonian island of Saaremaa.