Plymouth

Plymouth is remembered as the port where Catalina’s arrival in England became a public encounter, and where the people’s response gave her a source of support she later weighed in the struggle to remain at court.

Arrival and Public Reception

Catalina recalls that people had scrambled to see her when she arrived at the little port of Plymouth. The memory is not merely one of a welcome: she believes the people of England had loved her from that first meeting. The passage offers no further description of the port, but establishes it as the setting of her earliest public reception in the country.

Political Significance

As Catalina walks beside a cold river among boatmen hunched in winter coats, a man recognizes her and calls, "God bless you, Princess!" She raises her hand in reply. The greeting makes visible the popular affection she has been considering: Catalina believes it may count in her favor with a newly enthroned prince who is eager to be loved. Plymouth matters in this calculation as the remembered beginning of that bond between the princess and the English people.