Your loyal and most assured Servant,
H. no other A B seek R.
Letter Fourteenth To Anne Boleyn
_DARLING_, I heartily recommend me to you, ascertaining you that I am not a little perplexed with such things as your brother shall on my part declare unto you, to whom I pray you give full credence, for it were too long to write. In my last letters I writ to you that I trusted shortly to see you, which is better known at London than with any that is about me, whereof I not a little marvel; but lack of discreet handling must needs be the cause thereof. No more to you at this time, but that I trust shortly our meetings shall not depend upon other men's light handlings, but upon our own.
Written with the hand of him that longeth to be yours.
H. R.
Letter Fifteenth To Anne Boleyn
_MINE own SWEETHEART_, this shall be to advertise you of the great elengeness that I find here since your departing; for, I ensure you methinketh the time longer since your departing now last, than I was wont to do a whole fortnight. I think your kindness and my fervency of love causeth it; for, otherwise, I would not have thought it possible that for so little a while it should have grieved me. But now that I am coming towards you, methinketh my pains be half removed; and also I am right well comforted in so much that my book maketh substantially for my matter; in looking whereof I have spent above four hours this day, which causeth me now to write the shorter letter to you at this time, because of some pain in my head; wishing myself (especially an evening) in my sweetheart's arms, whose pretty dukkys I trust shortly to kiss.
Written by the hand of him that was, is, and shall be yours by his own will,
H. R.
Letter Sixteenth To Anne Boleyn
_DARLING_, Though I have scant leisure, yet, remembering my promise, I thought it convenient to certify you briefly in what case our affairs stand. As touching a lodging for you, we have got one by my lord cardinal's means, the like whereof could not have been found hereabouts for all causes, as this bearer shall more show you. As touching our other affairs, I assure you there can be no more done, nor more diligence used, nor all manner of dangers better both foreseen and provided for, so that I trust it shall be hereafter to both our comforts, the specialities whereof were both too long to be written, and hardly by messenger to be declared. Wherefore, till you repair hither, I keep something in store, trusting it shall not be long to; for I have caused my lord, your father, to make his provisions with speed; and thus for lack of time, darling, I make an end of my letter, written with the hand of him which I would were yours.
H. R.
Letter Seventeenth To Anne Boleyn
The reasonable request of your last letter, with the pleasure also that I take to know them true, causeth me to send you these news. The legate which we most desire arrived at Paris on Sunday or Monday last past, so that I trust by the next Monday to hear of his arrival at Calais: and then I trust within a while after to enjoy that which I have so long longed for, to God's pleasure and our both comforts.
No more to you at this present, mine own darling, for lack of time, but that I would you were in mine arms, or I in yours, for I think it long since I kissed you.
Written after the killing of a hart, at eleven of the clock, minding, with God's grace, to-morrow, mightily timely, to kill another, by the hand which, I trust, shortly shall be yours.
HENRY R.
Letter Eighteenth To Anne Boleyn
To inform you what joy it is to me to understand of your conformableness with reason, and of the suppressing of your inutile and vain thoughts with the bridle of reason. I assure you all the good in this world could not counterpoise for my satisfaction the knowledge and certainty thereof, wherefore, good sweetheart, continue the same, not only in this, but in all your doings hereafter; for thereby shall come, both to you and me, the greatest quietness that may be in this world.
The cause why the bearer stays so long, is the business I have had to dress up gear for you; and which I trust, ere long to cause you occupy: then I trust to occupy yours, which shall be recompense enough to me for all my pains and labour.
The unfeigned sickness of this well-willing legate doth somewhat retard his access to your person; but I trust verily, when God shall send him health, he will with diligence recompense his demur. For I know well where he hath said (touching the saying and bruit that he is thought imperial) that it shall be well known in this matter that he is not imperial; and thus, for lack of time, sweetheart, farewell.
Written with the hand which fain would be yours, and so is the heart.
R. H.
Finis
Notes
Love Letters of Henry viii to Anne Boleyn
By J. O. Halliwell Phillips
The letters of Henry VIII to Anne Boleyn, perhaps the most remarkable documents of the kind known to exist, were published at Oxford in 1720 by Hearne, in a volume entitled _Roberti de Avesbury Historia de mirabilibus gestis Edwardi III_, and inserted in the third volume of the Harleian Miscellany, 1745. These two editions differ considerably from each other, and still more so from the transcripts here given, which are taken from the edition printed at Paris by M. Meon, who held a situation in the Manuscript Department of the Bibliothèque de Roi. The fifth and thirteenth, however, which are not comprehended in the Vatican collection, are supplied from Hearne's work. Of the seventeen letters of which the series consists, eight are written in English and nine in French.
They appear to have been written after Anne Boleyn had been sent away from court, in consequence of reports injurious to her reputation, which had begun to be publicly circulated. Her removal indeed was so abrupt that she had resolved never to return. The king soon repented his harshness, and strove to persuade her to come back; but it was a long time, and not without great trouble, before he could induce her to comply. Her retirement did not take place before the month of May, 1528; this is proved by a letter from Fox, Bishop of Hereford, to Gardiner, Bishop of Winchester, dated the 4th of May, in that year, in which the writer, who had just returned from Rome, whither he had been sent to negotiate the king's divorce, gives an account of his landing at Sandwich on the 2nd, of his arrival on the same night at Greenwich, where the king then was, and of the order he received from him to go to the apartments of Anne Boleyn, which were in the Tiltyard, and inform her how anxious he had been to hasten the arrival of the legate, and how much he was rejoiced by it. This letter, formerly in the collection of Harley, Earl of Oxford, is now at Rome.
It must have been very soon afterwards that Anne Boleyn left the court. In fact, in the first letter (4 of this series) the king excuses himself for being under the necessity of parting from her. In the second (6) he complains of the dislike which she shows to return to court; but in neither of them does he allude to the pestilential disease which in that year committed such ravages in England. In the third (10), however, he does advert to it as a disorder which has prevailed for some time, and on which he makes some observations.
Between this letter, probably written in the month of July, and the sixth (17), in which the king speaks of the arrival of the legate in Paris, and which must have been written about the end of September, there are two letters (1 and 5) certainly written within a few days of each other. In the second of these two, _viz._, the fifth of this series, the king expresses his extreme satisfaction which he has received from the lady's answer to his request. In the effusion of his gratitude, he pays a visit to his mistress, and both address a letter (8) to Cardinal Wolsey, in which Henry manifests his astonishment at not having yet heard of the arrival of Campeggio, the legate, in Paris. The date of this letter may thus be fixed in the month of September.
The fourth (1), apparently written in August, is the most interesting of the whole collection, inasmuch as it fixes the period of the commencement of the king's affection for Anne Boleyn. He complains of "having been above a whole year struck with the dart of love," and that he is not yet certain whether he shall succeed in finding a place in the heart and affections of her whom he loves.
The last letter (18), which makes mention of the illness of the legate as the cause of the delay in the affair of the divorce, shows that this correspondence ended in May, 1529, at which time the court of legates was open for the final decision of that point.
Anne, daughter of Sir Thomas Boleyn, subsequently created Earl of Wiltshire, after passing many years at the court of Claude, queen of Francis I of France, returned to England about the end of the year 1525, at the age of eighteen. Here she was soon appointed maid of honour to Queen Katherine, and attracted the particular attentions of Henry VIII, who was then engaged in soliciting a divorce from the Pope. The marked preference shown by the king for Anne Boleyn raised so much jealousy and slander that it was thought advisable by her family to remove the new favourite from the court; and it was during this retirement at Hever, a seat of her father's in Kent, that these letters were addressed to her by her royal lover. It was no doubt to render them the more agreeable that he wrote some of them in French. They breathe a fondness and an ardour which could scarcely leave room to doubt the sincerity of his love.