A prompt at dVerse this week was a quote from the late Gloria Steinem: "When you're lucky enough to have lived a long life, as I have done, your role is to remind us how far we have come."
I thought of one of those ancestors people traditionally used to spend a lot of time and money to find out they can claim, and then even more to try to avoid having to claim. Talk about awful women...women who had the excuse of being denied legitimate opportunities to reach positions of power, but probably would have used illegitimate ones if they'd had legitimate ones, because they were awful. At one point, when her awfulness had been discovered, Douglass Howard pled insanity and spent a short time in a hospital; she was not insane, at least not in the legal sense, and soon got out again. What she had was the kind of tunnel vision that shut out considerations of ethics, or proprieties, or the possibility of getting caught, when she had devised a plan for getting what she wanted.
Despite having a mannish name, apparently a mannish look, and a mannish thought process that got her into trouble, Douglass Howard was the mother of five children.
When she was only seventeen
She went to court to serve the Queen,
As, in that unenlightened day,
Was quite the most accepted way
For sons and daughters of the wealthy
To find mates who at least looked healthy.
Within a year fair Douglass wed
John, Baron Sheffield; shared his bed,
And, just five summers later on,
They had the necessary son.
But Douglass still hung round the court,
Apparently to be a sort
Of chaperone to her shameless sister,
And stole the young man who had kissed her.
His wife had died. So soon? The answer
May have involved a case of cancer,
But likely she was pushed--she fell
Down just an ordinary stairwell
And broke not hip, not even knee,
But neck. The husband was ambitious.
A richer prospect he could see.
Some said the wife's death looked suspicious,
Like many others, some did say--
But he'd always been far away
When "what really happened" did.
Douglass, bored with her spouse and kid,
Wrote to the man her sister chased
That it would suit her noble taste
If Baron Sheffield were to meet
The sort of accident, complete,
Though fatal, that had swept away
Those others, out of Leicester's way.
(Cut-off point for tired eyes--although the Bad Baroness is only warming up.)
This awful letter then was seen
And brought to court before the Queen.
"I must have been out of my mind!"
Douglass screamed. "Memory cannot find
Any basis for such a letter!
Send me to Bedlam till I'm better!"
And there, indeed, she found a room.
But not even postpartum gloom
Suggested she'd ever gone mad,
And so I doubt she ever had.
She had no conscience. Was she crazy?
No more than she was ever lazy...
Though languid luxury might have served
Her better than the schemes she nerved
Herself up to. Sheffield, meanwhile,
Drank water dirty folk defile,
Caught dysentery, passed away
While staying many and many a mile
Out of the Earl of Leicester's way.
Fair Douglass, widowed, hardly'd play
At mourning, but threw all her charms
(Such as they were) at Leicester's arms.
"I cannot marry you," he wrote,
"It would strike a discordant note
In my romance with England's Queen!"
No shame on either face was seen.
Douglass sighed, "Just a chance there may be
That you and I could have a baby."
So, Leicester: "All think it befits
The king to have his share of fitz,
But 'illegitimate' sons of others
Are persecuted, and their mothers.
I'll do the honorable thing,
A secret midnight marriage bring
To friends' house. Don't tell anyone!
Then you and I can have our fun,
But if the Queen will have me, I
The marriage publicly deny;
As king, I'll do right by my fitz,
And you, too, custom then acquits."
Likely they were a well matched pair,
Except their times were more unfair
To women. Douglass faced more shame
Though both were equally to blame.
The secret wedding, all benighted,
Produced a son. Both were delighted.
At christening, the little cuddly
Child was recorded "Robert Dudley,"
The same name Leicester had at birth.
Like every child of wealth and worth,
The boy called Robin was cared for
Mostly by servants, but given more
Advantages than other boys.
The Earl, whom Oxford now employs,
Made sure that Oxford took young Robin,
His heart with navigation throbbing.
Quite uninclined to leave her throne
For childbirth's hazards, so well known,
Elizabeth knew what her friends
Were up to, though, for her own ends,
She seems to have tactfully ignored
Behavior otherwise deplored.
In any case, a rich knight offered;
Douglass ditched Leicester for Stafford.
He was Ambassador to France,
Where she was free to party, dance,
Spend Stafford's money as she'd like,
And Leicester's--though their little tyke
Lived in his father's house, adored
And pampered like a little lord,
And always absolutely free,
When she'd let him, to go and see
Douglass wherever she was staying,
Though she preferred to spend time playing
With Catherine de Medici.
Some ask: how horrible was she?
She was consort, not ruling Queen.
The Medici-Valois machine
Did its worst work before the hours
When Catherine had gained real powers,
But she had hardly taught her son
To do better than his father'd done.
In any case, Douglass's role
Was to encourage and console
The "Italian Serpent's" last few days;
Some say, in wicked witches' ways.
Back in England, Elizabeth,
Who feared childbirth as certain death,
Left Leicester to her plump cousin,
Set England's gossip mills to buzzing.
Now Robin's hurried off to college,
Quite young, though quick at gaining knowledge,
To hide him from the Countess Leicester.
From France now Douglass writes: "At Esher,
A house in Surrey, wintertide,
There Leicester made me his bride,
Though it was never my idea.
I only said yes out of fear..."
Elizabeth and court all shout,
"Throw this liar and her letter out!"
At Oxford Robin had been styled
As Robert Leicester, the Earl's child;
Now, thanks to Douglass, ruled a bastard,
The art of navigation mastered.
He travelled, wrote, was married twice,
And found Italy's climate nice,
Compared with England's. He lived long
And well. The Stafford babes died young.
So did the Queen's first cousin's child,
Named Robert Leicester, from birth styled
The Earl of Denbigh, prone to fits
And never thought quite in right wits.
Catherine died old. Stafford confessed
Douglass always loved Leicester best.
The French sent Douglass back to Britain
To die. In Douglass' will was written:
Robin, "mine honourable son."
If he was, he's the only one
In this lot. Stafford also lied;
In England's court he testified
That Robin terrorized his mother
Into writing a statement other
Than all the facts they all knew well.
How Queen Bess managed not to yell,
"Ye pack of liars! Out the door
And never see my face, no more!"
Is unrecorded. She was strong.
And if this tale's run on too long,
So did the lives of all these rats
That England had for aristocrats.
(Cut-off point for those who duon't think poems should end in "morals")
Always prepared to fight and quarrel,
They seem to've hardly had one moral
Among them all. But if you want
A moral, have one: Women aren't
Improved by injustice and oppression,
Except they need not claim "depression"
As a pretext for awfulness;
We might as well have our redress--
Responsibilities and rights,
To use, as men do, by such lights
As conscience may give. If not all
Have consciences, then let them fall.
Some do have conscience; let those stand
As fittest to rule o'er the land.
As witch, as conspirator, liar,
Douglass prepared for judgment's fire.
If she'd lived when young women heard
They might stand out above the herd
By accomplishments instead of schemes,
She might have chased ambitious dreams
As diplomat, as president,
In her own right and government,
Rather than using all those men
And children with them. She might then
Have done her job, and done it well;
Bigotry fitted her for Hell.
(I don't claim to know whether Douglass Howard really was a Christian, or repented of her sins, or may go to Heaven. But it would be a great surprise to all who knew her.)
