National Animosity
James, of course, was moving too quickly for both nations, attempting to conjure away centuries of mutual hostility virtually overnight. He scarcely improved his position as large numbers of impoverished Scottish aristocrats and other place seekers made their way to London, ready to compete for the very highest positions at the heart of government. Several years later Sir Anthony Weldon was to write that 'Scotland was too guid for those that inhabit it, and too bad for others to be at the charge of conquering it. The ayre might be wholesome, but for the stinking people that inhabit it...Thair beastis be generallie small (women excepted) of which sort there are no greater in the world.' But the most immediately wounding observation came in the comedy Eastward Ho, a collaboration between Ben Jonson, George Chapman and John Marston. In enthusing over the good life to be had in the colony of Virginia it is observed;
| “ | And then you shal live freely there, without Sergeants, or Courtiers, or Lawyers, or Intelligencers – onely a few industrious Scots perhaps, who indeed are disperst over the face of the whole earth. But as for them, there are no greater friends of Englishmen and England, when they are out an't, in the world, then they are. And for my part, I would a hundred thousand of them were there, for wee are all one Countrymen now, yee know; and wee shoulde finde ten times more comfort of them there, then wee do here. | ” |
But the Scots were too happy to pay out these libels, with interest. The age-old French slander that the English had tails like monkeys was once again in circulation, joining many more original anti-English satires, so much so that in 1609 the king had an act passed, promising the direst penalties against the writers of "pasquillis, libellis, rymis, cockalanis, comedies and sicklyk occasiones whereby they slander and maligne and revile the estait and countrey of England..."
Against this cultural and political background the gentlemen of the parliamentary commission had little real prospect of making any progress along the road to a close and intimate union. As early as October 1605, well before the commissioners reported, the Venetian ambassador noted 'the question of the Union will, I am assured, be dropped; for His Majesty is now well aware that nothing can be effected, both sides displaying such obstinacy that an accommodation is impossible; and so his Majesty is resolved to abandon the question for the present, in hope that time may consume the ill-humours.' It did, but over a far longer period than James can ever have imagined.
Read more about this topic: Union Of The Crowns
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