he was attacked by a disease then prevalent and which was probably
typhoid fever, and died in his castle of Hal, in April 1404, in his
seventy-third year. Philip-the-bold was the first and best of the
Valois dukes of Burgundy. If the French people were not happy under his
administration, it was that happiness could not be their lot. Their
country was desolated by the English wars, and war was uppermost in
their minds. Even in intervals of peace they would have no peace; and
military games not always bloodless were the amusement of all classes.
On one occasion a challenge was received from the English pale, that
seven French knights should meet seven English to fight à outrance,
which means mortal combat. The challenge was accepted. The most noted
of the French seven was Tanneguy du Châtel whom we shall meet again in
a scene of bloodshed more important. (See Two Jaquelines.) The English
knights had planned that at the onset, two of them at once should
attack Du Châtel, and he done for they thought to have an easy bargain
of the rest. This would of course leave for a moment one of the French
champions without an antagonist, and they arranged that this floating
warrior should be one they feared the least. This was an awkward
gentleman from Champagne, of no great renown, who had been let into the
French seven for his ponderous strength. When the signal was given,
this unwieldy knight for want of something better, threw himself upon
the stoutest of the English seven, and with a single blow laid him
dead at his feet. The English could not overcome this disadvantage and
were worsted. It is but just to say that the French chroniclers explain
differently the defeat of the English. The French seven, before the
fight, had heard mass and received the communion, while the English had
neglected that precaution.
The king’s mental disorder grew worse. The worthless queen abandoned
him on the plea that she was afraid of him, and he was often shamefully
neglected. While the whole court was drinking the choicest wines
of Burgundy and Bordeaux, the king was served with such abominable
piquette, that he was often doubled up with the colic. It is true he
was at times stubborn and violent. On one occasion he refused to wash
his face and put on clean linen. Three stout fellows sprang in upon him
and by main strength washed him and changed him.
The opinion that he was possessed was nearly universal, and means of
casting out the evil spirit were not omitted. Three famous exorcists, a
priest, a locksmith and a woman who had had much success in that branch
of therapeutics, came to cure him. They took him out into a grove, and
seated him in a magic chair. They planted around him twelve stakes to
each of which was attached a chain, every seventh link of silver. Then
they announced that twelve persons of repute must be fastened to the
stakes by the neck. Such was the devotion to the monarch that knights,
magistrates, burgesses all pressed to offer themselves. Twelve were
chosen and with their faces toward the king were chained not tight
enough to choke them but enough to give them a gruesome expression
which would now be called weird. The incantation was in full blast when
one of the twelve losing either faith or breath crossed himself. This
broke the spell, and the king lapsed into a worse frenzy than ever.
In March 1405, Margaret countess of Flanders, double duchess dowager of
Burgundy died, having survived her second Philip but eleven months. She
seems to have been every way reputable and worthy except that she was
imperious and domineering. Philip either from unswerving affection or
because he knew what would be his portion at home if he did not behave,
was always true to her, a virtue not much in vogue in those days. The
contention between him and his nephew of Orleans, was fully shared by
their wives; and the lofty airs of the Flemish dame were not put up
with submissively by the high-spirited Italian: indeed those two august
ladies at times so far forgot their augustness as to call each other
names.
John-the-fearless was now duke of Burgundy and count of Flanders.
In the French peerage, Burgundy was held to outrank Orleans, and
John claimed to be first peer of the realm. His claim did not pass
undisputed: Louis of Orleans was the king’s brother and in default of
the king’s sons, might become king himself; and bitter as had been the
feud between him and his uncle, that between him and his cousin, was so
much more so that it was fated to destroy them both.
John and Louis mustered their respective forces and marched to Paris.
The old duke of Berri uncle to both and to the king, brought about
a truce. Then as troops were ready for any mischief, Louis proposed
to lead their joint levies against the English provinces; and John
consented in hopes that some honest Cockney or Gascon might knock him
on the head.
A girl who was crazy and therefore considered inspired, told Louis
that the expedition would succeed provided he kissed the head of Saint
Denis before setting out. He was proceeding to the abbey of Saint
Denis for that purpose when the canons of Notre Dame informed him
that it was they who possessed the true head of the saint, and that
the other was a fraud. The monks of the abbey retorted the charge of
imposture; the canons answered back; and these two reverend bodies
opened upon each other such a fire of abuse and recrimination that the
king who happened to be rational, imposed silence on them both. In the
uncertainty, Louis must have kissed the wrong head, for the expedition
failed. It was now duke John’s turn; he made an attack upon Calais and
was repulsed. On his return the quarrel between him and Louis broke out
more fiercely than ever. Once more did their uncle of Berri interpose
and bring them to partake of the communion together; but it was too
late, the feud was mortal.
Louis was intimate with the queen and passed much of his time in her
company. One night when he was supping with her, the message came that
the king wished to see him. He mounted his mule and escorted by a few
servants carrying torches, took his way toward the king’s lodgings.
Suddenly he was attacked by armed men. Thinking there was some mistake
he cried out I am the duke of Orleans! You are the man we want, was the
response, and they struck him down and left him dead.
Even at that time when acts of violence were so common, the murder
of the king’s brother in the streets of the capital, gave a shock to
the court; and vigorous search was made for the assassins. Suspicion
fell at first on the lord of Canny whose wife Louis had misled; but it
was soon shown that Canny was many leagues away that night. Evidence
at last pressed so close around John of Burgundy that he confessed
the deed. He laid the blame to the devil who he said had put him up
to it. At the same time he proclaimed the duke of Orleans a public
enemy deservedly slain. He employed a Franciscan named John Petit
renowned for his eloquence, to justify the act. The monk in an oration
which has come down to us, and in which dates, events, personages,
customs, creeds, epochs are jumbled together in matchless confusion,
demonstrated that the taking off of Louis de Valois was the most
righteous taking off since the day when Samuel hewed Agag to pieces
before the Lord in Gilgal.
Felon as he was, John was still popular with the Parisiens. He had
a good deal of rough talent and many of the arts of the politician.
Moreover he paid his debts, a rare virtue for a prince of the blood
of those days. His father had died owing his butcher and his grocer
and his tailor, and John had not hesitated to sell the furniture of
his town palace the hotel Artois, to pay these tradesmen. They had not
forgotten how his rival had served them on that solemn occasion when
all the glory was ascribed to Our Lady; and they were not to blame if
they preferred the man who paid to the man who did not.
Duke John married Margaret of Bavaria, and her brother William, Count
of Hainault, married John’s sister Margaret. It was decreed that no
Margaret should marry without bringing increased power to the house
of Burgundy; and it was the nuptials of these two Margarets that
made possible some years later, the violence and fraud which wrested
Holland, Zealand, Hainault and other provinces from John’s niece
Jaqueline, sole issue of the last named marriage. (See Two Jaquelines).
John’s wife Margaret had another brother, John of Bavaria, bishop of
Liége, called John-the-pitiless, a riotous prelate and a cruel, whose
riotings and whose cruelties were to be one more element of strength
to the dukes of Burgundy. The town of Liége on the river Meuse, was a
fief of the Empire, but was under ecclesiastical government. The chief
magistrate was a bishop. The reigning diocesan at this time, was that
disreputable brother-in-law of John-the-fearless. The inhabitants of
Liége weary of his unclerical behavior, had driven him out of their
territory. He besought his brother of Burgundy to reinstate him; and
John, with an eye to acquiring that sort of predominance over both
diocese and diocesan, which is now-a-days called a protectorate, levied
his troops. The Liégeois prepared to receive him. The two armies met at
Hasbain. The duke’s force was small but well disciplined. The Liégeois
aided by five hundred English archers were the stronger, and so proud a
front did they present, that the duke’s lieutenants warned him of the
risk of a general engagement. What, cried he, have I come as far as
this to quail before a rabble of tinkers and tailors! and he gave the
signal for combat.
There is no doubt that John-the-fearless was in his element on the
field of battle. He did not, as did his grandfather John-the-good,
mount his charger and precipitate himself into the wrong place at the
wrong moment; but astride an active little jennet, he flew from rank
to rank, directing everything and inspiring everybody. The Liégeois
charged in column upon his centre. His pikemen stood firm. He detached
a body of cavalry which spurred into the flank of the advancing column,
and it gave way.
Just before the battle John had confessed and received absolution and
eucharist, so that his conscience was clear for a new score. He ordered
that no quarter be given, and the conflict became a massacre. But few
of the men of Liége escaped. Their leader a citizen named Pervez was
found dead on the field, still holding by the hand, his son dead by his
side.
The Liégeois were crushed, and their mitred but unregenerate suzerain
was again set to reign over them. What with those who had perished in
the massacre and those he threw directly after into the Meuse, it would
seem that he had not many subjects left to govern.
In the articles of submission which the surviving few were compelled
to sign, it was agreed that if they were again disobedient, they were
to be laid under that awful discipline an interdict, provided there
existed any authority competent to fulminate interdicts. The Schism
comes up again to explain this curious proviso. The Council of Pisa was
sitting to restore unity to the Church. They had declared the throne
of Saint Peter to be one and indivisible; and they had declared it
vacant in spite of the incumbent at Rome and the incumbent at Avignon.
They had elected a new pope to that vacancy. The other two refused to
abdicate, so there were three popes; and as each was himself under
double interdict by the anathemas launched at him by his own rivals,
it was doubtful whether a rescript from such maimed authority would be
canonical. So paralysed was the Church that even her curses would no
longer hold. The degree to which they recovered their validity when the
Schism was healed, is a point of history that illustrates the saying
that truth is stranger than fiction.
The news of the victory of Hasbain was not good news to the queen and
the court who favored the Orleans faction, and were alarmed at the
growing power of the duke of Burgundy. A council was held, and the king
spirited away to Tours. An accidental delay of the duke, gave them
time for this. He had stopped at Lille to settle a quarrel between his
brother, Anthony and his brother-in-law William of Hainault, touching
50,000 florins left by the late duchess of Brabant. They were on the
point of deciding by mortal combat which should have the money, when
the duke came. I regret I cannot inform you which of them got the
50,000 florins.
The escape of the king from under his hand, was a serious loss to the
duke who was aiming at supreme control; and on reaching Paris he bent
all his diplomacy to recover possession of the monarch. He won over the
grand master of the king’s household, a parvenu named Montague; and by
his means Charles was brought back to the capital.
Montague by minding his own business, had grown wealthy; and as he was
now of no further use to his new friends, they put him to torture, and
made him confess a list of crimes he had never committed. They then
cut off his head, gibbetted his carcass, and divided his estates among
them, duke John getting the castle of Marcoussis for his share.
When the distracted king came slowly and mistily to a sense of the way
his faithful steward had been done to death, and his wealth seized by
his murderers, he was wroth. He wandered about the palace of Saint Paul
muttering vengeance; but the queen who in the meantime had sold herself
to the Burgundians, represented to him how unseemly it was for a
parvenu like Montague to own castles; and Charles after a vain struggle
to master the point, let it drop.
We propose incidentally to resume the history of the dukes of Burgundy
in our essay on the Jaquelines.
EPILOGUE.
Madame de Sévigné said that Providence favors the best battalions. It
was she who was the author of that remark, and not Frederick-the-great
nor Napoleon nor others to whom it is attributed. It has not always
proved true. Henry V., ablest of the Plantagenets, at the head of the
best armies then existing, tried to wrest the sceptre of France from
the palsied hand of Charles VI., and perished in the attempt. From
the loins of that crazy monarch and his worse than crazy queen, came
forth that House of Tudor which, by the ordeal of battle, displaced the
Plantagenet on the throne of England.
Much bad logic and worse history has been put forth in good English,
touching the claim of Edward III. to the throne of France. It is often
said that Edward denied the validity of the salic law. He did nothing
of the kind. His theory was that the salic law, while it excluded
females, did not exclude their progeny, and he claimed the crown of
France by right of his mother Isabella daughter of Philip-the-fair. But
even this theory gave the right to somebody else, as Hume has shown,
and as we propose to make visible to the naked eye.
Philip IV.=Joanna, queen regnant of Navarre
|
+------+---+--------------------------+
| | | |
Louis X. Philip V. Charles IV. Isabella.
| | | |
Joanna. Daughters. Daughter. Edward III.
|
Charles-the-bad, }
King of Navarre }
Edward’s theory would have given the crown of France to
Charles-the-bad, grandson of Louis X. It went to Philip of Valois,
Philip VI. by right of unbroken male descent from Hugh Capet, as it
did long afterwards to the House of Bourbon.
Louis IX. Eighth in male line from Hugh Capet.
|
Philip III.
|
+--+--------------+
| |
Philip IV. Charles of Valois.
|
Philip VI.
|
John II.
Two Jaquelines
They were both Dutchwomen. They were contemporaries and lived in the
fifteenth century. They both contributed, though unwittingly and by
their love scrapes, to break the alliance between England and Burgundy,
and thus to the salvation of the French monarchy. They were both of
high lineage and married kings’ sons: one of them married two kings’
sons; and they both married commoners. One of them died without issue;
the other by a misalliance with a simple knight, became the mother of a
line of kings as long as that which Macbeth saw when the race of Banquo
defiled before him. Indeed Macbeth on that dread occasion looked till
he beheld those who “two fold balls and triple sceptres bore,” and
those were of the generation of Jaqueline.
John-the-fearless, second of the four Valois dukes of Burgundy
married Margaret of Bavaria. Her brother William of Bavaria was
count of Hainault, lord of Holland, of Zealand, of Friesland and of
nearly all the territory which now goes to make up the kingdom of
the Netherlands. Now John having married William’s sister Margaret,
William to be even with him, turned round and married John’s sister
Margaret, Margaret of Valois, Margaret of Burgundy. These two princes
having each married the other’s sister Margaret, were thus double
brothers-in-law; and this close relationship did not breed any
dissention between them: it was otherwise with their children who were,
you perceive, double cousins. John and his Margaret were blest with one
son and seven daughters. William and his Margaret had but one child,
a daughter whom they christened Jaqueline. This lady is called by so
many different names in history, that if you were not on your guard you
might imagine there were half a dozen of them: Jaqueline of Bavaria,
Jaqueline of Holland, Jaqueline of Hainault, Jaqueline of Brabant.
Then the Dutch called her Jacoba; so some English writers affect to
call her Jacoba, and ring the changes on it. But in spite of these
manifold appellations she was but a sole and only child; and as the
salic law did not rule in the low countries, she was a great heiress.
Her situation was a repetition of that of her grandmother Margaret of
Flanders except that the provinces they inherited respectively were
different. (See Second House of Burgundy.)
The great expectations of Jaqueline entitled her to a distinguished
husband, and when only five years old she was wedded to John of
Touraine second son of Charles VI. The marriage was celebrated with
much splendor at Compiegne, at the same time with that of prince John’s
cousin the count of Angoulême who espoused Isabella, John’s sister,
widow of Richard II. of England who had been murdered at Pomfret. It is
said that the joy of these double nuptials was saddened by the tears of
Isabella who wept aloud at having to give up the title of queen.
Not long after the marriage, John’s elder brother the dauphin died,
and John himself became dauphin. Behold then our little Jaqueline in a
fair way to become queen of France! But it was not to be: prince John
died suddenly one day, and his death like all sudden death of exalted
personages in those days, was attributed to poison. But the probability
is that all the poison he took was what the doctors gave him in good
faith, to cure him of a cold he had caught playing at tennis; and I
may hold the case up to you as a warning either against tennis or the
doctors as you prefer.
Jaqueline was eleven years old when her husband died. The same year,
1417, she lost also her father the count William. Thus from a great
heiress she became a great potentate. She was of course too young to
administer her own affairs; and they fell chiefly into the hand of her
powerful uncle John-the-fearless. She was not only a great potentate
but a stylish young widow, the best match in the market; and great was
the scramble for her hand. Not a single princely fortune hunter in
Europe but was dying of love for her.
After some years of widowhood, a family council was held, and it was
determined that she should marry her cousin John duke of Brabant, son
of Antony of Burgundy and Elizabeth of Luxembourg. Antony who was
brother of John-the-fearless, had fallen at Agincourt. Jaqueline and
the duke of Brabant being first cousins, a dispensation was of course
necessary to their marriage; and they applied for one to the Roman
pontiff Martin V. In the family council referred to, an active part
had been taken by an uncle of Jaqueline on her father’s side, namely
John-the-pitiless, bishop of Liége, whom we have already introduced
to you in our paper on the House of Burgundy. He had approved of
the betrothal, and had joined in the application to the pope; but
he was secretly resolved to leave no stone unturned to seize his
dead brother’s estates, the inheritance of Jaqueline; and indeed it
is alleged that he was even manoeuvring to espouse her himself. He
despatched furtively a messenger to the pope praying him to withhold
the dispensation, or to revoke it if already granted, pleading that he
had just discovered a flaw in his brother’s marriage with Margaret of
Burgundy, that would render Jaqueline illegitimate. The dispensation
was already on its way to Flanders; so the pontiff instantly put forth
an annulment, and the one document arrived at the heels of the other.
But when they came to unroll them they found that there was wanting
to the revocation a bit of red tape and a leaden seal. In the great
haste some functionary through whose hands it had passed, had neglected
to attach those ornaments; and for the want of an ounce of lead, the
annulment was of no weight, while the dispensation duly ballasted with
that metal, was of force. The wedding party did not give the bishop
time to have the error corrected, and the nuptials took place.
The bishop immediately levied ban and arrière ban and invaded the
provinces of his niece. It was a favorable moment for him. Holland
was convulsed with civil strife between two factions called the
Fishhooks and the Codfish. The latter sided with the bishop, and the
former with Jaqueline who flew in an undaunted manner to the rescue of
her patrimony. The duke of Burgundy sent to the seat of war his son
afterwards Philip-the-good; and that prince compelled both parties
to lay down their arms. The duke then thought to pacify the bishop by
investing him with the revenues of certain of his niece’s estates.
John-the-pitiless was bishop by brevet only. He had taken no orders
higher than those of deacon, and therefore was not irrevocably a
churchman. His plan to marry Jaqueline having failed, he fixed his
eye on another bride. In order to carry out this fresh design upon
the peace and tranquillity of the sex, he appealed to the pope for a
decree of secularisation unfrocking him. The pope was compliant and
the ex-bishop led to the altar, Elizabeth of Luxembourg relict of
Anthony of Burgundy, mother of the duke of Brabant and mother-in-law of
Jaqueline.
Jaqueline had been so busy fighting her demi-reverend uncle who had
just assumed a nearer and dearer relationship to her, that she had
given herself no time to see what sort of a husband she had married.
She now took a good look at him and found that he was a puny, misshapen
invalid, while her looking-glass and her friends told her that she
had grown up into a handsome, wholesome, vigorous woman. They went to
housekeeping however, and quarrelled like man and wife. One day while
she was absent, her husband of Brabant took it upon him to dismiss
all her Dutch hand-maidens, and send them back, bag and baggage,
to Holland. The reason he gave for it was that they talked Dutch, a
dialect he did not understand and did not commend. Jaqueline was not
disposed to put up with this affront. She left him and went back to
her mother who was residing at Valenciennes. She soon found life too
dull there for a spirit as restless as hers, and planned an expedition
to England. A retinue suitable to a princess of her rank was furnished
her, and she crossed the channel.
England was at that time ruled by Henry V. the second king of the house
of Lancaster. His queen was Catharine of France daughter of Charles
VI., and sister of Jaqueline’s first husband prince John. Catharine
was therefore her sister-in-law and her cousin. Henry was also related
to her but more remotely through their common descent from Charles of
Valois. Henry and Catharine received Jaqueline with great distinction,
and invited her to stand godmother to their infant son afterwards the
good and pious but unfortunate Henry VI.
In the family party assembled at the baptism, was the king’s youngest
brother Humphrey duke of Gloucester, called by historians and by
Shakspeare, the good duke of Gloucester. He looked wistfully across the
font at his blooming Dutch cousin; and she, I am sorry to say, looked
wistfully back at him. They fell in love and so desperately that they
resolved that nothing should prevent their union, not even the crooked
little duke of Brabant who was already the husband of Jaqueline. They
applied to pope Martin to annul that marriage; and the pontiff usually
so compliant, was obstinate in his refusal. We shall see by and by what
was the cause of his obstinacy. But he was not the only pope. These
were still the days of the Great Schism: a pope at Rome, and a pope
at Avignon. To such a degree however, had the Eternal City regained
its prestige, that at the epoch of our story, the greater number of
the powers of Europe, had renounced the obedience of Avignon and gone
over to that of Rome. Among the first that had done so, were the
houses of Plantagenet and Bavaria, the houses to which our two lovers
belonged. But to them the true pope was the pope who would let them
marry. They had failed before Martin V., so they appealed from him to
Benedict XIII. who sat in a kind of survival of grandeur on the throne
of Avignon. Benedict, flattered that an English prince and a Flemish
princess should abjure his rival and come over to him, granted a bull
in due form annulling Jaqueline’s marriage with the duke of Brabant,
and anathematising Martin V. Gloucester and Jaqueline were immediately
united.
Leaving them to enjoy the honey-moon, we will go back and take a rapid
survey of the events which gave political importance to their marriage.