MARIE D’ANJOU--“LA PETITE REINE DE BOURGES”
I.
“The little Queen of Bourges,”--so called partly in derision, partly
in pity,--but all the same one of the noblest and best Queens who
ever shared the sovereign throne of France: “noble,” not so much in
gradation of rank as in distinction of character; “best,” or “good,”
not in the sense of mock righteousness, but in the interpretation of
whole-heartedness.
Marie d’Anjou was the eldest daughter of King Louis II. and Queen
Yolande of Sicily-Anjou-Naples-Provence. Born at Angers, October
14, 1404, she and her younger brother, René, four years her junior,
grew up to love one another almost distractedly. So intense was this
fraternal affection that their solicitous and resourceful mother viewed
it with apprehension, fearing its consequences,--if left unchecked or
undiverted into a more natural channel,--the cloister. It was no part
of the excellent training the Queen provided for her offspring to hide
their futures under the garb of religion; she had lofty ambitions for
all her children, and those ambitions she lived to see realized.
[Illustration: MARIE D’ANJOU
From a Painting of the School of Jean Fouquet (1460). National Gallery,
London
_To face page 174_]
Marie d’Anjou’s betrothal and marriage to Charles de Ponthieu,
Dauphin of France, in 1422, was a supreme master-stroke of statecraft
which only such a remarkable mother and Queen as Yolande of
Sicily-Anjou could effect. She, with all her prescience, could not have
forecast the future of France proper and her many sovereign sister
States, which was, in its happy fruition, due to that far-seeing
nuptial contract. Marie’s son, Louis XI., made France one nation much
as she is to-day.
When Queen Yolande so anxiously took charge of the young Dauphin, and
had him educated with her own children, she was quite prepared for
any mental and physical development in her son-in-law which might be
expected to result from his unhappy parentage. No doubt she did what
was possible to correct faults of heredity and to develop such latent
excellencies as had not been wholly vitiated in the child’s infancy.
Still, we may be sure she had a heart full of trouble as she witnessed
the degeneration of her son-in-law from paths of probity and virtue.
In truth, the marriage of Princess Marie was, in a strict sense, a
sacrifice and an oblation. The mating of her dearly loved daughter, a
girl of unusual promise, with a youth of evil ancestry and unworthy
predispositions must have cost the devoted mother much.
Marie was remarkable for rare beauty of person--pale, with perfect
features; tall, with a graceful figure, and distinguished by her regal
carriage.
In personal appearance Charles was unattractive: his figure was
insignificant and ill-formed; his head was unduly large; he had large
feet and hands, whilst his legs were short and bowed, and this caused
an ungraceful gait; his face was sickly-looking and pock-marked, with
a prominent nose, a wide and sensual mouth, and a heavy jaw; his
eyes were small and somewhat crisscross; he had coarse dark hair and
heavy eyebrows. If his destiny had not been a throne, he might just
as well have found his career in a stable. With all these personal
disadvantages, Charles was naturally warm-hearted and affectionate; he
was possessed of a cool judgment, very affable and considerate, and,
when roused, a very lion in the way. The marks of his evil mother’s
influence never left him; the crushing of his natural inclinations and
opportunities in childhood warped and unbalanced his mental calibre.
It was said scoffingly of him by those who were bereft of feeling: “_Le
Dauphin est un fou, fils d’un insensé et d’une prostituée_.”[A] Jean
Juvenal des Ursins perhaps went too far in the opposite direction, for
in 1433 he wrote in his “Chronicle” concerning the King: “_Sa vie est
plaisante à Dieu; il n’y-a-en aucun vice_.”[B]
[A] “The Dauphin is a poor fool, the son of a madman and a
prostitute.”
[B] “His manner of life is pleasant to God; he has no vice.”
The first notice we find of the life of Marie d’Anjou, however, does
not refer to her union with Charles VII., but her betrothal, when only
five years old, to Jehan de Beaux, Prince of Taranto, her kinsman.
He was the son of the Prince of Taranto who accompanied King Louis
II., Marie’s father, on his romantic journey to Perpignan, in 1399,
to welcome Princess Yolanda d’Arragona. Descended in direct line from
Charles, first Duke of Anjou, younger brother of St. Louis IX., his
grandfather was Philippe, second son of Charles III. and Marguerite
of France. Through the last-named Princess a sad stain besmirched
the shield of the silver lilies. Jehanne and Blanche de Luxembourg,
daughters of Otto IV., Count of Burgundy, married respectively King
Philippe the “Tall” and King Charles the “Fair” of France. Charged
with witchcraft, they were imprisoned for life in the Château de
Dourdan, where they were tonsured, scourged, and tortured--although
they were the most beautiful and most highly cultured women of their
day--together with their sister-in-law Marguerite, but she returned to
her husband in 1314. Their terrible experiences were made traditional
in the family, and, naturally, did not conduce to success in courtship.
No doubt the idea which fixed itself in the minds of Louis II. and
Yolande with respect to this betrothal was the strengthening of the
claims of Anjou, of the younger line, upon the crown of Naples, by the
alliance of the two branches of the house. Why this arrangement was set
aside, or when, it is hard to say. Some chroniclers aver that the young
Prince was drowned at sea off Taranto; others, that he had different
views; and, more likely than all, others attribute the renunciation to
the action of Queen Yolande, who, directly she had obtained charge of
the person of the young Dauphin Charles, determined a more brilliant
match politically, if a less attractive one psychologically.
Possibly Queen Yolande hardly realized, at the date of that auspicious
marriage, how its consummation would affect herself. High-toned as
she was, and assertive of Anjou’s prestige, she could not know that
Queen Isabeau’s absolute declension from rectitude would, by force of
contrast alone, throw her own worthy aims into emphatic prominence.
That marriage was the opening of the portals of imperial interest
to the personal guidance of the strongest mind and will in France.
She became actually the power on the throne, not behind it. Her hand
directed the issues of life and death between the rival Powers--France
and England. Yolande became at once the ruler of France and the
dictator of her foreign policy. What has history to say about all this?
Nothing, or next to nothing. Historians,--the most narrow-minded and
most easily biassed of writers,--have not cared to trace and teach the
ethics of the personality of this ruler of men and States.
The genesis of the paramount influence of women in the public and
private life of France was undoubtedly in the reign of Charles VII.
He was successively in the hands of Isabeau, his unworthy mother;
of Yolande, his noble mother-in-law; of Marie, his much-enduring
wife; and of Agnes Sorel, his inspiring mistress. Happily for him,
he was withdrawn early from the immediate care of Queen Isabeau, but
her intrigues later on brought out the latent bad elements of his
character. What saving grace was his, was his through Yolande of
Sicily-Anjou. His wife and his chief mistress were given him for two
distinct purposes: Marie kept the wolf from the door and emboldened
her faint-hearted spouse, whilst Agnes cheered his troubled spirit and
impelled his motive-power. There is a quatrain of Francis I. which is
interesting from the fact that his versification leaves it doubtful
whether Marie or Agnes was actually his good genius: he names _both_ in
the first line:
“Gentille Marie (Agnès), plus d’honneur tu mérite,
La cause étant de France recouvrer;
Que ce que peut dedans un cloître ouvrer--
Close nonain ou bien dévot hermite.”
“Gentle Marie (Agnes), thou hast gained all honour,
Of France the new life thou wast inspirer;
But thou wast born to adorn the cloister,
Encloséd nun or dedicated sister.”
Marie and René d’Anjou and Charles de Ponthieu were educated together,
and for four years or more were inseparable companions. The betrothal
of Charles and Marie was effected at the Palace of the Louvre, December
18, 1413, in the presence of the King and Queen of France and of the
King and Queen of Sicily-Anjou. Charles VI. was then still King of
France, and fully in possession of his senses. His troubles, political
and mental, ranged from 1417 to 1422, when he had become no more than
nominal Sovereign, driven from place to place, crushed, depressed,
and suffering. Until his malady became hopeless, he was noted for his
nobility of endurance, his chivalry of deportment, and his unselfish
devotion to his duty. His Don Quixotic sort of life, however, was a
mixture of smiles and frowns--joys and sorrows. Such a wife and mother
as Queen Isabeau proved herself to be was quite enough to shatter the
patience and the peace of the most stolid of men. There was not a more
unhappy family in all France than that of its principal Sovereign, nor
a more miserable home than that of its King.
Still, there were not wanting human touches which paint the
character of King Charles VI. in sympathetic colours. In the King’s
room at the Castle of Blois is a superb piece of tapestry, among many
others, embroidered with the “Story of the Seigneur and Châtelaine de
Courrages.” The “_Annales Français_” recount the following narrative:
“The Seigneur de Courrages was called upon by the Parliament of Paris
to fight in the ‘Lists’ with a certain Knight, Jehan Le Gris, for the
honour of his wife, the Dame de Courrages. During the absence of her
spouse in the Holy Land, the fair châtelaine gave her favours to an
urgent lover, the Seigneur Le Gris, and he made love to her, quite
naturally, in return. King Charles VI. was presiding at a tournament,
and he noted the presence of the lady in question, but was amazed at
her effrontery; for she was seated, superbly attired, in her state
chariot, in view of the whole assemblage, whereas the custom of the
time should have found her upon her knees in her closet, praying for
her good man. The King despatched a herald to the impudent hussy, with
a message that ‘it is inconceivable that anyone lying under so grievous
a reproach should assume herself to be innocent till such time as that
innocence shall have been made apparent.’ The brazen dame was ordered
at once to dismount from her carriage and retire to her _manoir_. She
was unwilling to bow to the royal command, and, hearing of this, the
King sent another messenger, who was instructed to conduct the fair
and frail delinquent beneath a scaffold, where she was ordered to cry
aloud to God for mercy, and to the King for clemency. In the issue
of arms, luckily for her, fortune favoured her husband, who unhorsed
his adversary, and, after pinning him to the ground with his sword,
compelled him to confess the villainies he had committed with his wife.
Then the unfortunate man was hurried off to the scaffold,--beneath
which Dame de Courrages was humbly kneeling,--and there and then hung
up by the neck by way of justification of his miserable sweetheart.”
What happened to the frail woman the chronicler has failed to tell;
probably the Seigneur de Courrages took his erring wife home and
administered a well-deserved flagellation in the privacy of his
bedchamber, and condemned her to a period of imprisonment in the family
dungeon upon a spare diet of bread and water! Such was the wholesome
discipline for marital infidelity in the days of chivalry!
The marriage of Charles, Count of Ponthieu, and Marie, Princess of
Sicily-Anjou, was solemnized at St. Martin at Tours, January 15, 1422.
It was a year of rejoicing in France, for on May Day her King by
descent, Charles VI., and her King by conquest, Henry V., entered Paris
riding side by side in a splendid triumph of peace. Charles’s reason
had returned to him with the return of happier days, and although the
spectre of Isabeau was beside him, he managed to retain his senses and
his vigour until October 21, when death mercifully heralded a new reign
and a new régime in Paris.
The Dauphin and Dauphine spent their short honeymoon at Loches and
Bourges, whence they were called to attend the Kings in Paris, and
there they remained till Charles VI. died. Thereafter troubles once
more devastated fair suffering France: the peace was broken, and a
broken band of fugitives fled the capital. The Court sought refuge at
Bourges.
“The King by misfortune in the warres grew so behindhand, both in fame
and estate, that amongst other afflictions hee was subject to reproach
and poverty, so that he dined in his small chamber attended only by his
household servants. Pothou and La Hire, coming to Châteaudun to ask for
succour, found him at table with no more than a rump of mutton and two
chickens. He had neither wine nor dessert, and only two attendants,
whilst his carriage had no relay of horses and only two grooms. He was
reproached for his love of fair Agnes (Sorel), but the Bishop of St.
Denis reported that hee loved her onely for her pleasing behaviour,
eloquent speech, and beauty; and that he never used any lascivious
action unto her, nor never touched her beneath the chin.”
The _Comptes de la Royne Marie_ record that the King and Queen were
reduced to eat their meals off common pewter dishes, that they had
little or no change of linen, and that the Queen sold all her jewels to
purchase food and other necessaries. The townsfolk of the neighbourhood
as well as the nobility contributed liberally to their Sovereigns’
wants. Jacques Cœur of Bourges in particular rendered them hospitality,
for he was accustomed to send in daily the royal supper at his own
expense. Cœur was a merchant, a jeweller, and a wine-grower, and waxed
rich in trade, but never wavered in his loyalty. He became Charles’s
treasurer, but after advancing him nearly 300,000 gold crowns, he was
for some unknown reason cast into prison and condemned to execution and
the confiscation of his goods. Queen Marie pleaded for their faithful
subject, and gained his reprieve, but Jacques Cœur never recovered his
liberty nor his property.
A gory stain was dashed upon the lily shield of France when the Duke
of Burgundy was basely slain by Tanneguy de Châtel in the King’s
presence. He had been one of Charles’s most devoted adherents, for he
it was who, in 1418, carried off the youthful Dauphin, wrapped in a
piece of arras, for safety to the Bastile, and whence he was allowed to
escape to Poitiers. It was a time of terrible disaster. Paris was in
open revolution, and all the possessions of the Crown were threatened
with destruction. The English were marching all over France unopposed,
for the French Court and Government were divided by the feuds of rival
leaders. On June 12 the starving populace of the capital burnt the
Hôtel de Ville, the Temple, and prison. Women were seized, outraged,
and killed, and 1,600 murdered bodies were scattered in the streets and
squares. The Count of Armagnac was the chief supporter of the Dauphin’s
party, but Queen Isabeau joined hands with Jean “sans Peur,” Duke of
Burgundy, against her husband,--alas! now quite imbecile,--and her only
son.
A peace was patched up, and it was arranged that the Dauphin and the
Duke should meet for mutual satisfaction at Montereau. The latter had
no suspicion of foul-play, and Charles had no inkling of what was
in de Châtel’s mind. The meeting was arranged upon the stone bridge
crossing the Seine, on September 10, 1419. There the Dauphin, in full
armour, awaited his rival’s approach. The Duke passed the two barriers
on the bridge assured by the words: “Come if you please, Monseigneur.
Fear not; the Dauphin is awaiting you.” At the young Prince’s feet the
proud Jean knelt and did homage, but Charles put out no hand to raise
him graciously nor paid him any compliment, but brusquely exclaimed:
“Monseigneur, you and the Queen have disgraced France and me. I command
you to leave that wicked woman alone and go back in peace to your
dominions.”
The Duke, astounded, rose, and was about to offer some uncomplimentary
reply, when he was struck down by Tanneguy de Châtel with his
battle-axe, as he hissed out: “Thou art a traitor! Go thy way, base
Burgundy!” Twenty swords leaped from their scabbards and finished the
dastardly deed, and Charles, shocked beyond expression, mounted his
horse and galloped off. Queen Isabeau was at Troyes, where she had been
exiled by her son’s advisers, and the tragic death of her confederate
roused the whole fury of her nature. She assembled the chief citizens,
and made them an impassioned harangue:--
“Consider the horrors, faults, and crimes, perpetrated in this kingdom
of France by Charles, soi-disant Dauphin of Vienne. It is here and
now agreed that our son Henry, King of England, and our dear nephew,
Philippe, Duke of Burgundy, shall not enter into relations with the
said Charles.”
The assassination of the Duke of Burgundy weighed heavily upon the
conscience of Charles; he never concealed his wish that his mother’s
colleague should come by his end, but he never put his desire into
exact words.
The year 1422 saw Marie d’Anjou seated, at least metaphorically,
upon the throne of France. Both Kings of France died soon after her
marriage,--Henry V. on August 31, and Charles VI. on October 21,--and
Charles VII. and Marie were proclaimed King and Queen of France at
Mehun-sur-Yèvre in Berry on November 10 following. They were crowned in
Poitiers Cathedral on Christmas Day, where the new King had established
his Parliament.
[Illustration: A BESIEGED CASTLE IN FRANCE
From a Miniature, MS. Fourteenth Century, “Valeur Maxime” British Museum
_To face page 184_]
The King and Queen made many progresses through their circumscribed
dominions. The first was in the summer of 1423, when they made a state
entry also into Angers, and heard Mass at the Cathedral of St. Maurice.
They presented to the Chapter two superb pieces of tapestry, depicting
the Old and New Testaments. The Queen’s brother, Louis III., was of
course in Italy, but the Duke of Bar-Lorraine and the Duchess Isabelle
were there supporting the Queen-mother Yolande in rendering gracious
hospitalities; the citizens provided a mystery-play, and the Court
a tournament. The royal couple were lodged in the castle, from the
gateway of which Queen Marie addressed the assemblage of people: “_Vos
citoyens et habitans de la ville d’Angiers soyeant toujours loyaux et
fidèles à vostre sovereyns, et aussi des beaulx amis vers la couronne
de France, laquelle je porte moi même_.”[A] Vociferous plaudits hailed
this declamation, and both Queen Yolande and Duke René made patriotic
addresses.
[A] “You noble citizens and good inhabitants of this worthy
city of Angers were ever famous for loyalty and fidelity to
your Sovereigns, and, moreover, the best of friends to the
Crown of France, which you see I wear.”
Five years later Charles and Marie entered Anjou and took up their
residence at Saumur, where the King received the homage of no less
a fellow-Sovereign than the Duke of Brittany, this being due to the
tactful policy of the Queen-mother. Charles also had a request to place
before the loyal Angevines: he wanted money and men to carry on the
ceaseless warfare against the English. In this he admirably succeeded,
and through Duke René he gained help from Lorraine and Bar besides.
Marie, though the consort of a fugitive penniless King, had a suite
worthy of herself and of her parentage and rank; the Queen-mother saw
to that. Her Controller was Hardoin de Mailly, and her Master of Horse
Jacques Odon de Maulevrier, a devoted friend of her brother, Duke René.
The Queen’s four _Dames d’Honneur_ were Catherine Bourgoing, Aimée de
Beauvais, Philippe de la Rochefoucault, and Jeanne Sorel. Her Maids
of Honour were Marie du Couldray, Jeanne de la Grosse, Catherine de
Beauvais, Jeannett la Garrelle, Hervée Catherine de Montplaie, and
Jehanne Biardelle, with three quite young girls whose Christian names
alone have been preserved--Felize, Geffeline, and Jacquette--perhaps
pet names.
Duke René, ever a liberal-minded and open-handed Prince, gave each of
his sister’s ladies a robe of richest _aigneaulx_ fur, with crimson
satin lining, and twenty skins of martens for bordering their kirtle
bodices. Each robe cost 16 florins (= £12), and was supplied by the
Queen-mother’s furrier at Angers, one Martin Chebiton.
The immodest fashions set by Queen Isabeau and the ladies of her
Court, and their outrageous modes of headgear, did not go unrebuked by
the better sort of clergy. A very famous preaching friar, one Thomas
Correcte, a Carmelite monk from Brittany, in particular inaugurated
a crusade against feminine extravagances through the North of France
and in Flanders during the second decade of the fifteenth century.
He further strenuously denounced the dignified clergy who kept
fashionable mistresses. He was welcomed heartily by the burghers of
the towns through which he passed, and conducted to a special pulpit
erected in the market-place, adorned with rich hangings and a gigantic
crucifix. Guards of honour and musicians were at his service, and, in
spite of opposition and natural predilections, the clergy fell into
line with the popular fancy, and rang their bells on his arrival. His
denunciations were quite in accord with the feelings of the people,
but they incited the rougher element to take the law into their own
hands. Squads of youths paraded the public thoroughfares in search
of errant dames, and no sooner had their gaze alighted upon a lady
of degree, coiffured _à l’outrance_, than a flight of stones, deftly
aimed, quickly made havoc of her headgear. The popular cry, “_Un
hennin! un hennin! à bas les hennins!_” produced a panic, so that the
women dared hardly sally forth from their own doors. It was said that
the friar personally organized these demonstrations, and even paid
the lads to disenchant the fair sex by forcibly pulling down their
hideous superstructures. At all events, women with dishevelled heads
and disordered attire ran hither and thither helpless and defenceless.
The worthy and enthusiastic evangelist had, however, an alternative
fashion with which modest women might cover their heads and breasts.
He prescribed the universal habit of wearing plain _chapelles_, the
ordinary caps of peasant women. The raid, however, ceased to terrify
the determined votaries of eccentricity in dress, and, as Monstrelet,
the historian, pithily puts it, “Snails, when anybody passes near
them, draw in their horns; but when the danger is past they put them
forth again.” The _hennin_, so called by Friar Correcte, became still
more gigantic and grotesque, although Queen Marie, backed by her good
mother, Queen Yolande, made loud protests and refused their favours to
transgressors.
With respect to indecency in dress, the preacher insisted upon running
a thick cord between the men and women of his audiences. The mixing of
the sexes in public he gravely denounced, and the bareness of women’s
breasts and the tightness of men’s hose excited his most eloquent
tirades. The reason of the cord he quaintly phrased: “I perceive that
sly doings will be going on!” The King of Sicily, Louis III., and Duke
René, were quite in accord with the friar’s philippics; but the “King
of Bourges” was another sort of man, and much of the coolness which
existed between himself and Queen Marie was due to her moderation in
dress and quietness of manner. Charles, it was said, chanced to hear
the friar one day at Ponthieu, where he was in residence, and ordered
him to keep silence and depart. The friar retired to his monastery
after a year of eloquence and exertions, but his animadversions upon
the lives of the higher clergy led to his being summoned to Rome, to
answer to certain charges of breach of monkish discipline and errors
of doctrine. The poor man seems to have felt his position keenly, so
keenly, indeed, that to escape judgment he jumped out of the window of
his cell and decamped. Being quickly captured, he was arraigned before
the Holy Office of the Inquisition, and condemned to be burnt as a
heretic. Perhaps he deserved punishment for his unguarded language, but
he paid dearly indeed as a reformer of gay women’s fashions and gross
parsons’ passions!
The years 1427 and 1428 saw France plunged in warfare. King Charles
shook himself, metaphorically, and registered a vow that he would drive
out every “desecrating English dog.” He bestirred himself, and led
forlorn hopes here and there, only to meet with disaster; and then he
gave way to despair, and declared that he would do no more for France
or for himself. Queen Marie, with true Anjou-Aragon grit, chided him
with his faint-heartedness, and one day she surprised him greatly by
appearing in a full suit of armour and armed, and declared that “If
you, Charles of France, will not lead your troops, I will!” Her example
was contagious, for within a week scores of loyal, devoted women
assumed mail and stood for the weal or woe of France. These heroic
doings were noised abroad, and possibly they had effect in a very
unexpected quarter, for in 1429 another heroine appeared in armour from
the eastern frontier of France, and made good woman’s claim to military
prowess. Thus quaintly wrote Monstrelet of her:
“In the course of this year (1429) a young girl called Jehanne, about
twenty years of age, and dressed like a man, came to Charles, King
of France, at Chinon. She was born in the village of Droimy, on the
borders of Burgundy and Lorraine, not far from Vaucouleurs. She had
been for some time an ostler and chambermaid at an inn, and had shown
much courage in riding horses to water and in other feats unusual for
young women to do. She called herself a ‘Maiden inspired by the Divine
Grace,’ and said that she was sent to restore Charles to his kingdom.”
Very little has been recorded of what Queen Marie felt and said
concerning that strange visitor. Nobody in all that recklessly gay
Court at Chinon viewed the coming of the maid of Domremy more eagerly
or more hopefully than did she. She had failed to rouse the King to
strike a new blow for his throne, it is true, but she anxiously prayed
that this heaven-sent village girl might be the means of doing so.
The Queen gave La Pucelle a most sympathetic welcome. The mysteries
of devotion and the dictates of religion had in her a very reverent
disciple. Apartments were prepared for Jeanne’s reception quite near
her own boudoir and private oratory, and its priest was placed at her
disposal.
If Jeanne was dumbfounded at the spectacle of a King wholly apathetic
to the duties of his high station, and of a Court abandoned, in the
midst of dire disaster, to all the frivolities of the idle and the
dissolute, she had at least one solace. The beautiful and serious face
of the young Queen was to her a comfort and a stay. Looking from one
bedizened beauty to another in that fatuous assembly, her eyes fastened
themselves upon the one figure that was dissimilar to the rest,--the
figure of a good woman, the daughter of the good Queen Yolande. She
looked to her like what she conceived of her own saintly Margaret, of
the Bois de Chènus. Marie received her unsophisticated visitor with
emotion. She entered fully into her story, and conversed daily with
her in private about herself, her home, her mission, and her “voices,”
and thus she gained the girl’s confidence and her love. If Jeanne had
conceived profound veneration for Queen Yolande,--she even called her
“my St. Catherine,”--her sentiments towards Queen Marie were those of
the most tender affection. Marie, so near her own age, so modest, so
simple, and so true, became Jeanne’s confidant and loving patroness.
To Marie the mere sight of the girl and her frank, girlish ways was
quite sufficient, had she sought for proof positive, to dispel from her
mind any suspicions which may have been forced upon her about Jeanne’s
relations with her dear brother, René de Bar. Of course, she knew him
far too well to credit any tales of faithlessness or dishonour on his
part. He and she had been, till he was carried off to Bar-le-Duc by
the good Cardinal Louis de Bar, the very dearest and most intimate of
playmates in and out of school. Their intercourse had never ceased;
such never fails between kindred souls, though parted by hemispheres.
René was a just man still, and a true knight. Jeanne likened him to her
own St. Michael.
All through Jeanne’s ordeals,--first the open scoffs of the courtiers
and servitors at Chinon, then the covert jeers of the divines and
busybodies at Poitiers, and lastly the base insinuations of libertines
and adventurers,--the Queen stood by La Pucelle. Queen Yolande’s panel
of matrons found Marie’s tribute of the utmost value; she staked her
royal prerogative upon the girl’s absolute chastity, and the prying,
posturing Court bowed to her decision.
If Queen Yolande clothed the maid in shining armour within the great
Hall of Audience of Angers Castle, on the eve of the advance upon
Orléans, Queen Marie knelt with her in prayer in the solemn choir of
Angers Cathedral from Vespers to Compline. How much of her strength
of will and the promptness of her action Jeanne d’Arc gained from the
whole-hearted favour of these two good Queens the world may never know,
but this much we all can apprehend: that unselfish human sympathy is a
more mobile force than the uncertainties of Providence.
We can never know why Queen Marie was denied the satisfaction of
witnessing and sharing in the coronation of Charles at Reims. She was
living quietly at Bourges when the King set off for the metropolitical
cathedral under the conduct of La Pucelle and of her brother René. She
was prepared for the expedition, and her robes of state were ready for
the ceremony, when suddenly Charles commanded her to remain where she
was, saying that the march was full of dangers and quite impossible
for the Queen and her ladies. La Pucelle begged the King to recall
his prohibitions, saying that Queen Marie was quite as worthy as was
he to receive a crown. The poor Queen put by her finery,--perhaps not
altogether sorrowfully,--and went to reflect awhile at Gien upon the
untowardness of human affairs in general and the inconsequences of
Charles in particular. Her parting with Jeanne was affecting; Queen and
peasant embraced each other affectionately--and never more they met.
II.
After the disastrous battle of Bulgneville, Duchess Isabelle of
Lorraine set off to Vienne in Dauphiné, a province which ever remained
faithful to the royal house of France, where the Court of Charles
VII. was established, to claim his aid for her captive husband
languishing at Bracon. In her train went her fairest Maid of Honour,
Agnes Sorel, just twenty years of age; she was Mistress of the Robes
to the Duchess. She made an immediate impression upon the jejune King,
who urged Isabelle to allow her to be transferred to the suite of
his consort--perhaps by way of _quid pro quo_. Queen Marie added her
entreaties to the monarch’s suit. She had failed completely to rouse
her husband; perhaps she thought Agnes would be more successful. The
Duchess would not hear of the arrangement, and the beauteous Maid of
Honour was anything but eager to be the creature of so unattractive a
master.
Happier days, however, dawned both for King René and for King Charles,
and jousts, pageants, and mystery-plays, were in full fling everywhere.
At Angers, in particular, everything was gay and merry for the welcome
of King René to his ancestral home,--after his duress at Tour de
Bar,--and of Queen Isabelle. Agnes Sorel was still attached to her
royal mistress, and, although unmarried, she numbered her lovers by the
score.
Agnes Sorel, or Soreau, was born at Fromenteau, on the verge of the
forest of Fontainebleau, on May 17, 1409. Her father was the Sieur
Jehan Soreau, and her mother Catherine de Maignelais, who were quiet
country people and occupied in agricultural pursuits. She had a younger
sister, Jehanne, to whom she was devoted, and mothered her when Dame
Catherine died. Her uncle, Raoul de Maignelais, followed the profession
of arms, and made himself a name as a dauntless warrior in the service
of King Charles VI. He had an only daughter, Antoinette, born 1420,
who, her mother dying when she was very young, was confided to the
care of her aunt, Catherine Soreau, and was brought up by her with
her own little daughters. Nothing is positively known about Agnes’s
girlhood, but in 1423 the two cousins entered the service of Isabelle,
the Duchess of Bar-Lorraine. Bar-le-Duc, ever since the advent of the
famous Countess Iolande, had been remarkable for the number of lovely
damsels and comely youths from all parts of France attached to the
“Court of Love,” under the patronage and maintenance of the Dukes and
Duchesses. The young Duchess appears to have taken a particular fancy
to fair Agnes, due no doubt to the girl’s physical beauty and mental
brilliance. Few maidens at that merry Court excelled her in good looks,
grace of figure, and distinction of deportment. Bourdigne, the Court
chronicler, says “she was the most lovely girl in France.” She sang
divinely,--a natural gift,--and danced bewitchingly, and gave promise
of a splendid career. She was welcomed at Chinon with delight both by
the King and Queen.
Perhaps one reason why Agnes’s presence was so grateful to the
taciturn and indolent monarch was that she dressed so superbly, and
yet so tastefully. The Queen and her ladies were subject to strict
Court sartorial conventions, but the Demoiselle de Fromenteau knew
no such restrictions. One day “_la Belle des Belles_,” as everybody
called her, appeared as “Cleopatra,” another as “Diana,” and a third
as “Venus,” and so on. Her costumes were of the richest and the
thinnest. Her abundant beautiful brown hair, too, she dressed not only
for the _hennin à la mode_,--bunched over the ears or gathered into
a chignon,--but _à la calotte galonnée_: frizzed out, or _en simple
résille_--in a net, or _à tours_, thrown round and round her head in
massive coils. Agnes was short of stature, but she made up for this
by wearing Venetian _zilve_, or high pattens, beautifully embroidered
with silk and pearls. Her _decollétage_ was never vulgar or immodest,
like that of the King’s mother, but her well-formed bust was covered
lightly by white lace or thinnest gauze. A string of pearls usually
embraced her well-shaped throat. One article of clothing was peculiarly
her own invention. Whilst the ladies of the Court, and even Queen Marie
herself, wore serge chemises, hers were of fine Flemish linen. Very
many of her tasteful fancies were taken up by the ladies about her, and
Queen Marie herself followed suit by discarding the daily use of the
_hennin_ and the stiff and heavy fur borders of her kirtle. She, too,
had hair as fair as that of Agnes, and she was privately quite as proud
of it as was her _Dame d’Honneur_, for so “_la Belle des Belles_” had
become.
[Illustration: KING RENÉ AND HIS COURT
From a Miniature by King René in his “Breviary.” Musée de l’Arsenal.
Paris
_To face page 194_]
A pretty story is told of “_la Belle des Belles_” with respect to the
melancholy moods of King Charles. One day Charles was more than usually
depressed, and, try how she would, Queen Marie could not cheer him; so
she sent for Agnes, who at once ran to her mistress, and, then entering
the King’s presence, knelt at his feet and fondled his knees. “Sire,”
she said, “when I was a very little girl a soothsayer told my mother
that I should be the plaything of a King who would be the most valiant
in Europe. I thought that your Majesty was such an one, but I find
that I am mistaken. Perhaps I ought to have sought the Court of Henry
rather than that of Charles!” The King frowned, but the bantering words
had struck home, and he raised himself and Agnes, and, kissing her
affectionately, replied: “No, my sweet, you have no need to seek Henry.
I am your valiant King!”
Agnes held Charles under a spell. She was his “Queen of Hearts”; he
denied her nothing, her will was his. Her influence was complete, and
if the poor neglected Queen had thrown upon her frail shoulders the
heavy weight of sovereignty, it was fond Agnes’s fair hair that wore
the light crown of gaiety. Her tact and unselfishness were remarkable;
every domestic squabble and every State imbroglio were quietly and
swiftly settled when she joined the fray. Charles could not do enough
for his sweetheart. Besides costly presents of jewellery and clothes,
he bestowed upon her the county of Penthièvre, the lordships of
Roquecesière, Issoudon, and Vernon, with the Castle of Breauté and its
great woods of pine-trees.
Agnes had by Charles four daughters; the youngest died in infancy,
but the rest grew up, like their mother, famed for good looks
and attractive manners, and were legitimatized and married well.
Catherine de France, the eldest, wedded, in 1464, Jacques de Brézé,
Comte de Maulevrier, and became the accomplished châtelaine of his
splendid castle near Saumur. Alas for the joys of married life! the
Count, himself unfaithful and intolerant, grew suspicious of his
wife’s conduct,--she had attracted the attention of King René, among
others,--accused her of adultery, and stabbed her as she was sallying
forth one dark November day, 1477, bent upon an errand of charity.
Their son, Louis de Brézé became the husband of the celebrated Diane de
Poitiers, in 1515, before her liaison with King Henry II. Marguerite
de France married, in 1458, Seigneur Olivier de Coëtivi, and died in
1473; and Jeanne de France became the wife of Antoine de Benil, Comte
de Sancerre, and received from the King, her father, a _dot_ of 40,000
_écus d’or_.
These three daughters were born and educated as Princesses of the
Royal House, in conformity with the existent code of morals. Queen
Marie not only made no demur at their status, but, acting upon the
advice of good Queen Yolande, her mother, treated them in every respect
as she did her own offspring. When Agnes’s second daughter was married,
the Queen stood by her and gave her rich wedding presents. Certainly
she was not subjected to the indignity of sharing hearth and home with
her husband’s mistress. Dame Agnes Sorel resided at her own Castle de
Breauté-sur-Marne, and there she bore him her family. The castle was a
bijou residence,--a great favourite of Charles,--and Agnes made it a
habitation of beauty, adorned not alone by her own gracious presence,
but by the attendance of a brilliant Court, quite outrivalling that of
the modest Queen, and filled her rooms and galleries with the countless
beautiful and costly gifts of her former devoted mistress, Duchess
Isabelle.
Agnes’s ascendancy over Charles VII. was purely erotic. She exercised
no influence whatever upon the affairs of state, or, indeed, upon
anything but what ministered to his personal pleasure and amusement.
However, she was useful, and indeed invaluable, on more than one
occasion of danger and suspicion. Unreservedly devoted to her paramour,
she was sensitive of any dereliction of duty and of any appearance of
intrigue. To her was solely due the detection of the conspiracy of
1449, which, fomented by the Dauphin, threatened the life of the King.
Marie inspired the fervent love of her son, Louis the Dauphin, as
she did, in truth, the devotion of all her children. When a stripling
of fourteen, he championed his mother against his father’s mistress;
and when Agnes made a disparaging remark affecting the Queen, the lad
immediately boxed her ears, and warned her never to repeat the offence
in his hearing! From that day Louis hated “_la Belle des Belles_,”
and never tired of checking her assumptions. He even dared to protest
personally before his father against the King’s neglect of the Queen
and his partiality for her Lady of Honour. Charles on one occasion
took his son’s strictures seriously to heart, sent for Marie, bewailed
his infidelity, and craved her pardon. But the wanton monarch’s day of
righteousness was short, for he very soon forgot his son’s vehemence,
and went on fondling his favourite.
“_La Belle des Belles_” died in childbed on February 18, 1450. Her
end was quite unexpected, for she had gone on a visit of pleasure to
her cousin, Antoinette de Maignelais, the Baroness of Villerequier, at
the Castle of Mesnil la Belle, near the far-famed Abbey of Jumièges
in Normandy. Her husband, André de Villerequier, was Chamberlain to
Charles VII., who presented her at her bridal, as a wedding gift, the
three islands, Oléron, Marennes, and Auvert, at the mouth of the River
Charente. Floral games and spectacles were engaging the attention of
the merry party assembled at the castle, and Agnes Sorel was the gayest
of the gay, but unfortunately, tripping upon the sash of her gown, she
fell heavily to the ground. She was carried tenderly to her chamber,
and at once her life was despaired of. She had barely time to make her
confession, and then, calling to mind the example of St. Mary Magdalen,
she called aloud to Heaven for pardon of her sins and for the prayers
of those standing by. She heard Mass and received the Last Sacraments,
and painfully passed away in her cousin’s arms. The distracted Baroness
laid the dead head of the lovely Agnes gently upon the pillow, closed
the eyes which had spell-bound King Charles and many more besides, and,
weeping bitterly, exclaimed: “The good God has taken away my Agnes
because He feared she would never lose her beauty.”
King Charles was not with his sweetheart in her death, but he grieved
and rocked himself in woe. “Because she was what she was,” he sobbed,
“for that I mourn.” He hastened to Jumièges, and with every mark of
sincere affection he assisted in placing his Agnes in her coffin. Her
heart he had enclosed in a costly gold vase, which he carried about
with him wherever he went, and when he died it was deposited by his
command beneath a black marble slab in front of the high-altar of
Jumièges, with the simple epitaph: “Agnes Seurelle--Dame de Breauté.”
Fair Agnes’s body, still comely in death, was ultimately translated
by Charles to Loches, and interred in the basement of the King’s
Apartments. Her tomb, surmounted by a statue, was erected by her royal
lover. Upon a block marble bed reclines a white marble effigy of “_la
Belle des Belles_,” evidently sculptured after life. The fascinating
features with her sweet smile are beautifully chiselled, and the
graceful figure lightly covered by a long chemise admirably exhibits
her exquisitely-proportioned form.
Agnes, in a will she made a year before her death, directed that her
body should rest at Jumièges, and she bequeathed 1,000 _écus d’or_ (=
£500) to the monastery for Masses for the rest of her soul. She had
for years been a munificent benefactress to the clergy of the abbey.
When Charles had joined his sweetheart in the Paradise of Love, the
ungrateful monks were desirous of removing Agnes’s heart and its
memorial tablet, on the score that she had led an immoral life; but
Louis XI., in spite of his fierce hatred of his father’s mistress,
reproved the religious, and warned them that, if they determined to
cast out her remains, they must also divest themselves of the gifts and
legacies of their patroness. “If you,” the new King said, “disturb her
ashes, I shall expect you to hand over to me the gold _écus_.” Needless
perhaps to say, the worldly-wise Canons kept the money and the heart.
The death of Agnes Sorel had a terrible effect upon the subsequent life
of Charles the King. She and Queen Marie between them had managed to
keep him free from amorous imbroglios, but now, with only his wife’s
protestations to guard him, he gave way to immoderate indulgences, and
he, to quote the French,--“_enlardit sa vie de tenir males femmes en
son hostel!_”
III.
“Everything must be sacrificed for the glory of France!” was no empty,
echoing cry in a desert; it was the pleading and persistent cry of a
devoted wife and a patriotic Queen. Into the ears of the King of France
and into the ears of everybody who was even in the smallest degree
likely to be able to do anything at all for her beloved country, the
admirable Queen Marie poured her complaint. She stood for the expulsion
of the English invaders of her native soil, and for the composure of
the feuds and jealousies of the French Sovereigns and nobles. “God
and reason,” she went on to exclaim, “are on my side; rouse you like
men and fight!” Surely he is a coward or a simpleton in whose heart a
woman’s voice and a woman’s taunts fail to enkindle enthusiasm. All
France flocked to do homage to the “little Queen of Bourges,” to kiss
her hand, and to lay their swords at the feet of the King. From Loches
to Chinon and Tours, right down the river valley of the Rhone, and
throughout Dauphiné, that voice went echoing. The new campaign was
hers, hers the credit, hers the glory, for great deeds were done that
shamed men’s apathy.
Alas! her enthusiasm found faint response in Charles. A skit of the
time denounced him thus: “_Nouvelle du Roy nullement; ne que se il fust
à Romme oue Jherusalemme!_”--“The King is of no use whatever; he might
as well be at Rome or at Jerusalem!” Still, the Queen did not fail for
loyal soldiers nor for consummate captains; first and foremost was her
beloved brother René, now King of Sicily-Anjou.
But now enemies more terrible than the hated English, more insidious
than the squabbling Princes, stalked the broad plains of suffering
France--the three fell sisters, famine, flood, and fever. The price of
foodstuffs rose portentously; wheat, butter, oil, and cheese, were a
hundred times dearer than their usual cost. Men grovelled like pigs for
offal, and women and children laid themselves down to die just where
they were. Queen Marie’s tender heart grieved sorely for her people’s
misery. She sold what jewellery she had left, and pawned her available
property to minister to the prevailing want. And then a new terror
seized the land--the rivers were in flood, and what stocks and crops
the famine had left were washed away, and beggary stared the nation
in the face. The Queen instituted pilgrimages of women to celebrated
shrines, and she herself put on the deepest mourning and spent her
time in prayer. All seemed to be of no avail to stay the afflicting
hand of Heaven, for no sooner were the waters abated than the scourge
of fever was let loose on the devoted land of France, and corpses were
flung out of echoing doorways and left for chance burial, or to be the
prey of scavaging dogs. Had the Day of Judgment dawned? men asked each
other, whilst they promptly covered their mouths against the infection.
Delirium would have seized all the remnants of the population had not
the intrepid Queen ridden up and down, risking her own precious life
and appealing to one and all to be courageous, bear all, and hope for
better days.
Marie had happy days and proud to cancel days of gloom and penury.
Toulouse was _en fête_; it was the month of May, 1435, best loved
of all the children of Mary; and she made a stately entry into that
ancient, loyal city with the King by her side. Oddly enough, she was
mounted on pillion behind her young son, the Dauphin Louis, then a
lad of twelve. Her vesture was superb--a blue brocaded satin robe,
bordered heavily with royal ermine. She was _décolletée_, her bosom
covered with jewels and chains of gold. Upon her head, rising out of
a regal diadem of flashing gems, she wore a _chaperon_, a hood of
fine white cambric shaped like a crescent, raised at the points, and
lightly covered with a thin white gauze veil. Her hair was bunched
over her ears, and carried in a golden jewelled net. Her feet were
shod in white, gold-embroidered kid, and she wore, after her mother’s
fashion, jewelled white kid gloves. Four Chamberlains, also mounted,
held a state canopy of cloth of gold and white plumes over their royal
mistress and her white charger.
A bright day dawned for Queen Marie. It was the Festival of the
Forerunner, June 24, 1436, and the ancient and loyal city of Tours
was decked for the royal nuptials of the Dauphin. The King and Queen
of France with the good Queen Yolande and their suite awaited at the
Château du Plessis-lès-Tours the arrival of the young bridal couple.
Louis had gone to meet his bride at Saumur; he was but a boy of
thirteen, small, ill-looking, and not too clever. Princess Margaret,
daughter of James I. of Scotland, with a following of Scottish nobles
and Maids of Honour, a tall, sprightly girl of twelve, vastly enjoyed
her voyage, and clapped her hands delightedly at the flowers and fruits
of Anjou. She embraced her little husband-to-be, and took him by the
hand as they stepped on board the state barge in waiting at the river
quay.
Among the bevy of fair maidens who welcomed the royal bride was
Jehanne de Laval, who was attached to the suite of the Dauphiness.
The grand hall of the castle and state-rooms were hung with tapestry
and lengths of cloth of gold. There the Sovereigns were seated on a
canopied daïs, wearing their crowns and robes of state. The little
Princess entered the Presence somewhat nervously, still holding the
hand of the young Dauphin, and chaperoned by her Scottish Mistress
of the Robes. Making a graceful obeisance, Margaret advanced with
childlike confidence, and Queen Marie, rising, went to greet her young
daughter-in-law; she embraced her tenderly, and introduced her to the
King and to Queen Yolande. The courtiers pressed forward to kiss the
Princess’s hand, and many costly gifts were laid at her feet. Wearied
at length with the ceremonies, Queen Marie conducted her interesting
visitor to her own apartments, where dinner was served.
The bells of all the churches in Tours set up merry janglings at dawn
next day, and the cathedral was crowded by a goodly company of wedding
guests. The King and the two Queens were seated on their thrones.
Charles wore a black velvet doublet and hose, his _berretta_ was of
red, and he bore round his neck a decoration sent from the King of
Scotland. The Queen was arrayed in crimson velvet and ermine. She wore
an abbreviated _hennin_ with a fine lace fall; her hair was embroidered
with gold. The young Prince was in blue and silver, his bride in
bridal white. Everybody bore wedding favours--Scottish heather and
French lilies entwined with white satin ribbons. The Archbishop of
Reims performed the ceremony, accompanied by a number of Bishops and
dignified clergy.
Margaret at once became a great favourite with the King and Queen.
Her Northern vigour and sweet manners were good credentials; but,
unhappily, the young bridegroom from the first took a dislike to his
consort. She was never happy when he was present, and her furtive eyes
searched in vain for tokens of affection and _camaraderie_. “There was
no one,” wrote Philippe de Commines a few years later, “in all the
world whom she dreaded more than the Dauphin.” Her life was indeed a
sad one; neglected by her husband, misunderstood and disesteemed at
Court, the poor young Dauphiness passed her time mostly with Queen
Marie and in futile regrets for her dear, dear home in Scotland.
[Illustration: QUEENS AND JUDGES INSPECT KNIGHTS BEFORE THE “LISTS,”
SAUMUR TOURNAMENT, 1446
Painted by King René. From “Le Livre des Tournois”
_To face page 204_]
Her death came about most unexpectedly, for she was discovered
poisoned,--rumour had it by her spouse,--in her boudoir at
Sarry-le-Château, on August 16, 1444, an ill-used wife of no more than
twenty years of age. Princess Margaret’s fate was as sad as sad could
be--too young to die. Her last words,--the most pathetic ever uttered
by an unhappy woman,--were addressed to her faithful chaperon: “A curse
on life! don’t speak to me about it!” No child, perhaps happily, was
born of that ill-starred marriage.
No one wept more bitterly at this mischance than tender-hearted Queen
Marie. She loved her son to distraction, and he loved her as greatly
in return; and she had learned to love Margaret too, but nothing that
she could say moved Louis to love, honour, and comfort, his young wife.
Calm, crafty, and selfish, like his father, and vindictive, Louis’s
character may be succinctly stated as he himself wrote it: “The King
knows not how to rule who knows not how to dissemble.… If my cap should
know my thoughts, I would burn it!”
Queen Marie’s other son, Charles, Duc de Berry, the last of all her
surviving children, born December 28, 1446, was a Prince of no strength
of character. Easily led by others, he became involved in endless
imbroglios, and aided and abetted his elder brother the Dauphin, in
his unfilial conduct towards their father. Created Duke of Guienne and
Duke of Normandy in 1469,--after the expulsion of the English,--he
was a source of constant anxiety and trouble to his mother. The Queen
of Sicily-Anjou, Isabelle de Lorraine, his godmother, with King
René, took the young Prince in hand, but he did not well repay their
solicitude. Immoral, dissipated, and in debt, Charles de Berry spent
his time in debauches and intrigues; he was own grandson of Isabeau the
Infamous. Among his many mistresses, Derouillée de Montereau, widow
of Louis d’Amboise, exercised the greatest influence. She, too, was
the cause of his death, for at lunch one day she placed a peach in his
wineglass, and she challenged Charles to bite the fruit with her. Her
half she swallowed, and she fell dead in a few minutes, whilst her
royal paramour lingered in acute suffering for three whole days, and at
last succumbed to the poison on May 28, 1472. Whether she caused the
fruit to be poisoned we know not; most likely she knew all about it,
and only followed in the steps of those whose immorality turns love to
hate and sanctity to madness. This was a characteristic of society in
the Renaissance, the cloven hoof of the old Adam showing beneath the
sumptuous garments of the new man.
As might very well have been expected at a Court of self-seekers
and sycophants, the integrity and unselfishness of the Queen were
goads to slander and aids to hypocrisy. She was assailed on account
of her absolute faithfulness to the marriage bond and for her want of
personal ambition. Roués could not understand her; mondaines would
not tolerate her; the King’s favourites and mistresses,--not Agnes
Sorel, be it said,--strove all they could to poison his mind against
his consort. The names of many prominent Princes and courtiers were
linked scandalously with the Queen’s. Arthur de Richemont, son of
Duke Jehan VI. of Brittany, the Constable of France; Pierre de Giac
de la Trémouille, Captain of the King’s Guards; Étienne Louvet,
President of the Privy Council; and the Count of Dunois, better known
as the “Bastard of Orléans,” were all said to have shared the Queen’s
confidences and her favours. The latter was thrown, indeed, very much
with Her Majesty, and ranked among the Princes of the Royal House. Son
of the assassinated Duke of Orléans by an unknown mother, the Duchess
brought him up along with her own children, and she hoped he would live
to avenge his father’s death. The “Bastard” was the playmate of the
children of King Louis II. of Sicily-Anjou and Queen Yolande, and he
and the Princess Marie were much drawn to one another.
The two young people were one day in the gardens of the Hôtel de
St. Pol along with the Comte de Ponthieu,--Charles VII.,--and the
Princes and Princesses of Sicily-Anjou, when the Count, wearied of his
forced attentions to the Princess Marie, sauntered away by himself.
Xaintrailles followed him and remonstrated with him for his coolness
to his fiancée. Charles replied that they were not fully betrothed,
and that he did not admire and did not love Marie. Xaintrailles told
Dunois what the Count had said, and Dunois, with a scornful laugh,
exclaimed: “One must be dull and blind indeed not to be smitten by her
eyes--the most beautiful eyes in the whole world, and quite incapable
of seeing the faults of others.” Dunois was very much in love with the
Princess, and did not conceal his passion, so much so that when he
kissed her hand, as he often did, he also lifted the hem of her skirt
and implanted a kiss there, as a lover’s token of humility.
Dunois contrived _têtes-à-tête_ as often as he could with his
sweetheart, as he called Marie d’Anjou. One day, it is said, Charles
passed down a sheltered path in the gardens, and his companion pointed
out to him a couple love-making in a secluded arbour. They chided him
with the feebleness of his suit, and told him it would serve him right
if Marie married Dunois. He said he did not care a bit if she did or
if she did not. They were all mere children--the Count sixteen, Marie
fifteen, and Dunois of a like age. The intimacy between the Princess
and her lover became embarrassing to the whole Court, but time went on,
and developments were awaited by the curious and intriguing. A summer’s
day came when some ladies of the Court went wandering about searching
for shady shelters. Right away from the palace, near a springing
fountain, they came upon a crossing in the path, and there in the sandy
dust they read, written by a stick or something:
“Destin qui va m’unir d’une éternelle chaîne
A l’object de ma haîne--
Cruel destin, arrache de mon cœur
Une trop vive ardeur.”
“Fate which would rivet me with a perpetual chain
To the object of my deep disdain--
O, cruel fate! which would snatch from my poor worn heart
A passion full of ardour on my part.”
Puzzling over the meaning of this strange verse, the ladies beheld
the Princess hastening to where they stood. With heightened colour
she asked them: “What are you doing here? Why are you not with the
Queen of Sicily?” Then effacing the writing with her foot, she added:
“I cannot think why I did not efface those words; I have committed an
indiscretion. But take note I did not name the unhappy person who wrote
them.” The romance went on unchecked. Dunois, still under age, very
adroitly contrived to remove the suspicions his conduct had aroused in
the mind of Queen Yolande, and Marie took dutifully and silently the
maternal reproofs. Then came the death of Charles VI., and Princess
Marie was proclaimed Queen of France. With more than a sigh,--almost a
broken heart,--she set herself to play her part as a virtuous woman and
as a loyal spouse. Dunois did not renounce his devotion to the Queen,
and she never forgot the love she had borne him--a Prince the very
antithesis of her husband, remarkable for personal beauty and mental
accomplishment, just the sort of man all women love. Daily she poured
out her soul before the altar of her private chapel for strength to be
true and faithful, and victory was hers; but it cost her dear.
“Car en vertueuse souffrance,
Au temps du commun desarroy,
Elle a monstre plus de vaillance
Que sage prince ou fier roy.”
“In point of virtuous suffering,
At times of deep alarms,
She exhibited more daring
Than wise prince or king in arms.”
This fascinating story of the loves of Count Dunois d’Orléans and
Princess Marie d’Anjou was worked up by fanatics into a culpable
liaison of the Queen. It grew in vile misrepresentation, and swelled
in garbled facts until it became abhorrent in the ears of all
decent-minded people. Some of Charles’s legitimate children were said
to have been fathered by the Count. The Queen very wisely refrained
from making replies to the evil stories, the only sensible way of
dealing with them. “Exempt,” as wrote Varillas, “not only from the
faults of the Court, but still more from suspicion that she had any
part therein, she had all the same to suffer from the poison of
calumny.” On the other hand, Marie suffered in patience the disdain and
unfaithfulness of the King, and returned his evil with her good. Her
entire life was a scene of sacrifice and an arena of benevolence.
Marie, in her quiet, unobtrusive way, did very much for the correction
of morals in Court and country. Due to her representation, Charles at
Toul abolished the obscene _Fête des Fous_, which was observed through
his dominions. It was a scandalous exhibition, an indecent orgy,
shared in alike by laity and clergy. The latter chose a local Pope or
Bishop, to whom for the time the actual Bishop of the diocese rendered
up the attributes of his office. The mock prelate was enthroned in
the cathedral, and then a wild scene of profanity was witnessed. Men
and women dressed as buffoons, many exposing their nakedness without
shame, joined in licentious dances and blasphemous songs, and gorged
themselves with roast pork and other coarse viands and intoxicating
beverages served upon the altars. In the holy censers were burnt common
corks and bits of leather; the holy-water stoups were used for nameless
indecencies; and promiscuous prostitution made each sacred edifice a
brothel and a Gehenna.
Early in the year 1457 Ambassadors from Duke Ladislaus of Austria
came to France to ask from Charles VII. the hand of his youngest
daughter, Madeleine, a girl of fourteen, and dowered with beauty if
not with wealth. Passing through Lorraine and Bar, King René greeted
them, entertained them handsomely, and accompanied them to Tours.
The King and Queen of France were at the castle with their three
daughters,--Jeanne; Yolande, the wife of Amadeo IX., Duke of Savoy;
and Madeleine,--and a numerous and distinguished suite. In the Grand
Salle twelve long tables were placed, each seating seven guests. At
the first were the two Kings and the Queens with the three Princesses
and the Duke of Savoy. The Masters of Ceremonies were the Counts
Gaston de Foix, Dunois, and de la Marche, with the Grand Seneschal of
France. It was a typical entertainment--lavish, long, and laborious.
The first course consisted of white hypocras and “_rosties_”--_hors
d’œuvres_(?)--served in crystal vessels. The second course offered
_grands pâtes de chapons à haute grasse_, with boars’ tongues, and
accompanied by seven kinds of soup--all served on plates of silver. The
third course presented all kinds of game-birds with venison and boars’
heads served on silver dishes. The fourth course was _des petites
oyseaux_ on toast and spit, with prunes and salads, set forth on dishes
of silver gilt. The fifth course consisted of tarts, orange trifles,
candied lemons, and many sorts of sweetmeats, beautifully arranged on
plates and stands of coloured jewelled glass. The sixth and last course
was hypocras again, but red, served with _oublies_--perhaps macaroons
and wafers.
The wines which accompanied this regal menu, unhappily, are not
mentioned by the chronicler, but the name of Tours in connection with
delicacies of the palate has always been a _cachet_ of excellence; its
cuisine and its cellars are still unsurpassed in France. The banquet
was accompanied by minstrelsy and masque. King René himself arranged
the musical programme; indeed, he brought with him some of his famous
troubadours. After dinner the august company disposed themselves, some
to the merry dance, some to the quiet _têtes-à-tête_, and some to
cards--then so fashionable and so much beloved by the King and Queen
of France. A very famous pack was used, the Queens of the suit being
Isabeau for “Hearts,” Marie for “Clubs,” Agnes Sorel for “Diamonds,”
and Jeanne d’Arc for “Spades,” Kinged respectively by Charles VI.,
Louis III., Charles VII., and René; and the Knaves, Xaintrailles, La
Hire, Dunois, and Barbazan--a quaint conceit!
Upon the death of Louis III., his sister, Queen Marie, came in for
a considerable fortune--renounced, be it said, by that most loving
of all brothers, René, in her behalf. It was said that the new Duke
assigned the whole of his revenues from Anjou to the use of his
sister. He settled certain estates upon her which she very quickly and
cleverly turned to good account. In person the Queen visited her new
properties, dressed plainly in black and without ceremony, inquired
into the condition of the labourers and the promise of the harvest, and
then, calling to her assistance the well-known financier of Bourges,
Jacques Cœur, opened out business relations with England. The vineyards
of Anjou--at least, those bordering the Loire--were among the most
fruitful in France. These the Ministers of the Queen exploited, and
opened out a very profitable export trade from the port of La Rochelle.
The sweet white vinous brandies of Annis became established favourites
of English palates. Anjou cheese, too, was excellent; it still is made
from milk of Anjou cows and goats. _Crême de Blois_ was famous long
before Roquefort, Cantal, or Brie, came into request, and with fresh
butter was exported largely to Southampton, much to the profit of Queen
Marie’s exchequer.
These homely touches introduce the student of “_La Vie Privée des
Français_” to a charming hobby of the good Queen Marie--her love of
animals and birds. In the _Comptes de Roy René_ is a letter to the
Agents of the Audit; it is dated July 16, 1458, and is as follows:
“By Command of the Queen.
“WELL-BELOVED AND RIGHT TRUSTY,
“We have noted that our brother the King of Sicily (René) has
in his house at Rivetes, of which you, Guillaume Bernart,
have the superintendence, some cocks and hens of good strain,
and that they are very fine, as we have seen. If you are well
disposed, then, the messenger can bring us a cock and a hen,
with a broody hen and her chicks. You will see that they are
in good condition. Do not be at all fearful of displeasing our
royal brother, for we shall make him both pleased and happy.
“Dearly beloved, may Our Lord protect you. Written at our
Castle of Chinon, XVI. day of July, 1458.
“MARIE.”
King René had a farm at Rivetes, and from an inventory dated November
12, 1458, we learn that he had--“69 _chés d’animaille_ (heads of
stock), 1 _jument_ (mare), 1 _poulain_ (colt), 42 _chés de pourceaux_
(pigs), and much poultry.” Rivetes, with its forest of chestnuts, was
situated between the rivers Loire and Anthion, at no great distance
from Angers. René had also wild beasts and birds--a vast menagerie
at Rivetes and Reculée. His keeper of lions and leopards in 1476 was
Benoist Bagonet, and of his eagles and peacocks, Vissuel Gosmes. He had
also at Reculée a Court fool, Triboullet. They were all very pleasant
fellows, and helped to amuse the King and Queen and their guests.
King Charles VII. died at his favourite castle of Mehun-sur-Yèvre, July
22, 1461. He had suffered for a considerable time from an incurable
ulcer in his mouth, which denied him the pleasure and necessity of
eating. In his last illness Marie was at Chinon; he cried piteously for
her to come to him: “_Marie, ma Marie!_” She hastened to Mehun, and
was in time to hold his hand and moisten his heated brow, and quietly
he died in her arms--the arms of the truest of wives and noblest of
queens. Charles was buried in the royal vaults at St. Denis, and
Louis XI., his son, reigned in his stead. Devoted to his mother, her
widowhood was lightened by his affectionate regard. His father’s death
made no difference in her royal state; the King placed his mother
before his wife--Charlotte of Savoy.
Queen Marie bore her consort twelve children; six died in infancy.
Her two sons were Louis and Charles; her daughters, who survived,
Catherine, Jeanne, Yolande, and Madeleine. She survived Charles but two
short years. Enguerrand de Monstrelet speaks thus of her death, which
occurred near Poitiers, November 23, 1463: “There passed away from this
world Marie of Anjou and France.… She bore all through her life the
character of a good and devout woman, ever generous and patient.” Her
death was not unexpected, for through trouble, sorrow, and fasting, her
frame had become emaciated and her pulse beat slow; she died actually
from prostration. Her end was very peaceful in the silent cloisters of
the Abbey of Chastilliers in Poitou. She had but just returned from
a pilgrimage to the Gallician shrine of Santiago da Compostella. Her
body was embalmed and translated in solemn guise to St. Denis, and laid
beside that of her husband. Her devotion to him had not ceased at his
death, for she had endowed twelve altars in the chief cities of France
proper for the offering of Masses for the repose of his soul. Every
month she made the practice of visiting the royal tomb at St. Denis to
hear Mass and pray for him. At Bourges, of sad and chastened memory,
the widowed Queen founded in honour of her consort three considerable
benevolent institutions--a hospital for the sick poor, a refuge for
poor pilgrims, and an orphanage for illegitimate children.
Queen Marie’s transparent faithfulness and absolute unselfishness is
outlined in a famous saying of hers with respect to her relations with
King Charles: “He is my lord and master; he has entire power over all
my actions, and I have none over his.” Her whole-hearted devotion and
her heroic courage have raised Marie d’Anjou far above the ordinary
level of her sex, and have elevated her to the very highest throne
among the Queens of France.