Part 8
Jaqueline was reduced to extremities. Philip had cornered her up in Zealand, and set to watch over her a lieutenant of his named Philip Borssele who had risen in his service by his business talents. Jaqueline the inheritor of some of the richest provinces in Europe, was so straitened that she had not money enough to defray her housekeeping. One day her mother had sent her a present of a span of horses, and she could not find a single florin in her purse to give as drink-money to the grooms who had brought them. One of her attendants suggested to her to apply to Borssele who always had money to lend. She spurned the thought of being beholden to that low-born myrmidon of her hated cousin. But finally her necessities prevailed. She sent to Borssele to borrow a small sum. He not only lent it to her but told her he had more at her disposal. Jaqueline was mollified: we are all mollified with a little money and the promise of more. She made up her mind he was not a myrmidon after all but an honest fellow. She admitted him to her presence. Borssele was handsome and graceful; and she did not frown upon him. He took a pliant hour, and though he had never read Othello, he told his tale of love as eloquently as the Moor. They were privately married.
When Philip-the-good heard of this fresh escapade of his double cousin, he flew into a towering passion--or at least, pretended to do so. He stamped and stormed. That Jaqueline of Bavaria, duchess of Brabant, daughter of Burgundy and of France, should stoop to the hand of Philip Borssele! So he seized the bridegroom and shut him up in the castle of Rupelmonde; and thus was Jaqueline deprived of her fourth husband.
But there is reason to believe that Philip-the-good was putting on airs, and that he was secretly glad of the advantage which Jaqueline’s imprudence had given him over her. She had never ceded her estates to him by any formal act: he held them as a brigand holds his prey; but now he brought her to surrender to him her whole patrimony as the ransom of her husband. Borssele was set free, and in order to raise him to a rank a little more commensurate with that of his wife, Philip created him count of Ostravant, and conferred upon him the collar of the Golden Fleece, an order of chivalry which Philip himself had established as a rival to the English order of the Garter; and he settled upon the newly married pair a part of the revenues of Ostravant, so that his double cousin and cousin-in-law might not starve.[12]
We know but little of the remaining years of Jaqueline’s life. We hope they were more tranquil than those we have recounted. She died in 1436, at the age of thirty-five, leaving no issue.
The domains which she had inherited formed technically a part of the Empire Holy and Roman; and at her death the emperor Sigismund claimed that they had escheated to him. The claim was in accordance with feudal law, but Philip was already in possession and was too powerful to be dislodged. Thus did the provinces of Jaqueline go to swell the dominion of the House of Burgundy--that house whose fate it was never to decline after the manner of empires, but to grow in power and splendor under each succeeding duke until the day when Charles-the-rash, son of Philip, should stretch forth his hand to a regal diadem; and then the storm came which swept away both duke and dominion.
* * * * *
The same year that Jaqueline of Bavaria married Philip Borssele, Jaqueline of Luxembourg married the duke of Bedford.
But to introduce our second Jaqueline with due ceremony we must go back ten years; and I promise not to be so long as that in fetching up the arrears of my story.
After the death of Henry V. his brother of Bedford was at first desirous to obey the injunction of the dying king, to keep on good terms with the duke of Burgundy. There had been love passages, ardent no doubt, but still diplomatic only between Bedford and Anne of Burgundy Philip’s sister, a comely maiden of eighteen. Bedford pressed his suit and was accepted, and Anne made him a good wife, at least in a political sense, for her kind offices were often required to keep peace between her arrogant husband and her obstinate brother.
Bedford was endowed with all the haughtiness of his brother Henry without his genius; and he affected to treat Philip as his inferior which he certainly was not. The House of Valois descended in direct male line from Hugh Capet, had nothing to yield to the House of Plantagenet whose highest male descent was from the counts of Anjou vassals of the line of Capet. Besides, duke Philip was an hereditary sovereign, while duke John of Bedford was only regent of a kingdom not yet achieved, and not destined to be achieved.
On one occasion, in the presence of both English and Burgundian nobles, Bedford so far forgot himself as to threaten that if his brother Philip did not behave, he would send him to England to drink more beer than he liked. This was a gross affront. Philip had been brought up on the delicious wines of his native Burgundy; and he detested beer. But the good duchess Anne interposed and persuaded her husband not to make her brother drink beer, and peace was maintained.
After nine years of married life Anne died. This event might not have dissolved the alliance between the two powers, had not Bedford conducted himself with a wanton disregard to Philip’s sensibilities. Among the vassals of the House of Burgundy the most illustrious was a branch of that of Luxembourg; and the gentlemen of that house were among the most ardent partisans of the English cause. It was John of Luxembourg into whose hands the maid of Orleans had fallen after her capture at Compiegne. John took her to his castle of Beaurevoir where she was received with kindness by the ladies of his house, especially by his young niece Jaqueline of Saint Pol, or of Luxembourg.
The high rank and eminent services of this family had brought them into social relations with the regent Bedford; and Anne of Burgundy was no sooner in her grave than he offered his hand to Jaqueline. And so promptly did they dispatch the business that it might be said of that as of another occasion well known to you, that the funeral baked meats did coldly furnish forth the marriage tables.
Jaqueline of Luxembourg was Philip’s vassal, and by feudal law, had no right to marry without his consent, but he was not even consulted. This disrespect to the memory of his dead sister, and contempt of his own authority exhausted his patience. He had long had his head broken at home over his English alliance. His eldest sister had married Arthur of Brittany, count of Richmont, Constable of France. His next sister was the wife of the count of Clermont afterwards duke of Bourbon. Both these gentlemen were partisans of king Charles. Philip who as we have said, was good-tempered, had kept on friendly terms with his sisters, though their husbands would now and then burst into his territories and lay them waste; and he now empowered those fighting brothers-in-law to open negotiations in his name with the king.
Cardinal Beaufort--we have anticipated in referring to his death-bed--Cardinal Beaufort made a strenuous effort to turn aside the peril. He induced Philip and Bedford to agree to a personal interview, and they went to Saint Omer for that purpose. But a question of precedence arose: neither of them would pay the other the first visit. In vain did the cardinal represent to Bedford that it was he who had given the cause of offence, and it was he who had everything to lose by the rupture. The self-willed Plantagenet would concede nothing. The cardinal then tried Philip, calling him his dear nephew.[13] But the Burgundian’s blood was up and he was as intractable as the Englishman. So the two princes left St. Omer without seeing each other.
The envoys of the king of France and of the duke of Burgundy met in the church of Saint Vaast in the town of Arras. Cardinal Beaufort took part in the conference on behalf of England; and the cardinal of Santa Croce on the part of the Roman pontiff. In an eloquent speech Beaufort pleaded in the name of that Church of which he was a prince, that Philip could renounce his alliance with England only at the cost of his salvation. He had taken an oath, and if he broke that oath his soul was lost. On the contrary the cardinal of Santa Croce maintained that Philip’s first and greatest sublunary duty was to his liege lord king Charles, and if he were recreant to that duty he would be damned. And to prove that it was he and not the English cardinal who spoke by the authority of the Church, he wrought a miracle on the spot. They brought to him a consecrated wafer--the BREAD that the hand of the priest had transformed into the very substance of the Omnipotent. He cursed it, and it turned black; he blessed it and it turned white again.
This was beyond gainsaying. Beaufort withdrew; and the treaty of Arras was signed, in which Philip dictated nearly his own terms. Among other concessions Charles agreed to build an expiatory chapel at Montereau where John-the-fearless had been murdered, and to maintain there daily low mass for the repose of his soul. Not a word about John’s victim the equally murdered Louis of Orleans the king’s uncle. His soul was left to shift for itself without diplomatic succor. Time once more vindicated its reputation for putting things to rights. Before the century was out the generation of Charles VII. was extinct; and that of the neglected Louis mounted the throne and sat there till the end.[14]
The defection of the duke of Burgundy resulted as Henry V. had foreseen: it rendered hopeless the Plantagenet cause in France. But indeed the tide had already turned, and the remnant of the kingdom left to Charles VII. had suddenly shown itself a match for its enemies. The superstitious spirit of the age attributed this change to the direct interposition of Providence in the advent and career of Jeanne Darc the famous Maid of Orleans; and the English have seemed willing to leave this coloring upon it in order to throw a mist over some of the most unfortunate passages of their military history. The true explanation like most true explanations, is simple enough. There had sprung up around the falling throne of Charles an array of military talent not equalled elsewhere. Charles VII. was not a great king, but so fortunate was he in making use of the greatness of others that he gained the name of Charles-the-well-served. Foremost among those to whom he owed that title, was his cousin the count Dunois called in the early part of his career and in Shakspeare, the Bastard of Orleans.
So little can be gathered in English histories concerning this great man, that I will say a word more about him. Louis of Orleans, the husband of Valentina, was not true to her. An intrigue with the wife of the lord of Canny, resulted in the birth of a boy. Why the mother did not take charge of her offspring I do not know; but it is certain that Valentina herself adopted this by-blow of her husband, and brought him up with her own little brood. It is even said that he was her favorite among them, from his singular wit and spirit. After having tried many years in vain to bring the lordly assassin of her husband to justice, Valentina lay on her death-bed. She called her children to her side; she called to him who was not her child, but whom she loved as well; and she told him that he above them all was chosen to be the avenger of his father. But Heaven had marked out for him a higher rôle than to avenge an unworthy sire. It was he who was ever at the side of the Maid of Orleans eking out her inspiration with his own, and at times setting aside the mandates she received from above, in favor of the suggestions of his own genius; and then with true magnanimity ascribing to her all the glory of the success.
After the capture of the Maid, the renown of Dunois, no longer obscured by the cloud of superstition in which he himself had been willing to envelop it, shone forth with its proper splendor.
Bedford, after having hacked the spurs off the heels of one of his bravest captains, because he had lost the battle of Patay, took the field himself against Dunois; and at Lagni was forced to abandon to him his cannon and his baggage. Subsequently Dunois was made lieutenant general of France.
The hundred years war ended by the dismemberment not of the French empire but of the English. The vast continental domains of the Plantagenets, the inheritance of Eleanor of Aquitaine, containing nearly one-third of France, which they had held three centuries--as long indeed as they had held the throne of England--were all conquered and annexed to the French crown. Nothing remained but the town of Calais which however was not a part of Eleanor’s patrimony.
This was the severest blow England ever received: it reduced her to a second class power, and left to her kings hardly more territory than they had inherited from their Saxon predecessors. In treating of this great war, English historians with some exceptions, strive to make nothing conspicuous but English victories; and the thoughtful reader is puzzled at the result, if indeed the result is disclosed to him. Well, let him admire the patriotism of the English writers and look elsewhere.
But the Jaquelines! We have tried to explain how they were a cause, albeit a minor one, of this outcome, by the dissention which the love affairs of both fomented between the Plantagenets and the Burgundian Valois. A major cause was the soldiership of Dunois and his companions in arms.[15]
Three years after his marriage with Jaqueline of Luxembourg, the duke of Bedford, worn out like his brother Henry, with care and toil, died at Rouen, leaving his widow childless. Her further history demands that we go back two years.
Near the town of Beauvais there was a dilapidated castle called Gerberoy. In the neighborhood were hovering La Hire and Saintrailles two of the hardest fighters in the service of king Charles. Bedford feared that these gentlemen might seize Gerberoy and make it tenable, so he despatched one of his captains the earl of Arundel to intercept them. Arundel was approaching Gerberoy without having discovered any signs of the enemy; and there was apparently nothing to apprehend from a ruinous old stronghold which could not contain half as many men as he had at his back. Nevertheless like a prudent general he sent forward Sir Ralph Standish with a hundred men to reconnoitre. Sir Ralph arrived under the walls, and observing a soldier on the parapet, summoned him to surrender. The soldier answered with a gibe, and the next moment Sir Ralph and his hundred men were flying for their lives. La Hire and Saintrailles had thrown themselves into the place in the night with a corps of picked men. Not content with putting to flight Sir Ralph, they instantly fell upon the main body of the English which according to Hume, was five times their number. Arundel was slain and his detachment routed.
Among the prisoners taken, was an English knight named Richard Woodville, and it is on this occasion, I believe, that he makes his début on the page of history. He had fought with blind and misdirected valor in the battle, and so had other knights whose names have not come down to us. His name would not have spanned such a distance had it not been his fate to become the father of the long line of kings referred to in the beginning of this essay; nor is that the only royal line that traces descent from him.
He soon recovered his liberty and entered the personal service of the duke of Bedford as a sort of staff officer, and had frequent occasions to admire the charming duchess. After Bedford’s death Sir Richard ventured to lift his eyes to the widowed Jaqueline. Like Borssele he was handsome; and Jaqueline of Luxembourg took a leaf out of the book of Jaqueline of Bavaria, and became the bride of Sir Richard Woodville.
Their daughter was that Elizabeth Woodville, lady Grey who came and knelt before Edward IV. and prayed that he would lift from her and her children the attainder that had fallen upon them because her husband had perished at Saint Albans, fighting for the House of Lancaster. Edward granted her prayer, fell in love with her and married her. Their daughter was Elizabeth Plantagenet who became the queen of Henry VII.
One more love story is needed to complete the mosaic. Catharine of France widow of Henry V., became enamoured of what one English historian calls “an obscure Welch gentleman named Owen Tudor.” This was the gravest misalliance of all. Catharine of Valois, daughter of a king, sister of a king, widow of a king, mother of a king, stooped to be the wife of an obscure country gentleman. Their son Edmund Tudor, married Margaret Beaufort of the Beaufort family already mentioned. The son of Edmund Tudor and Margaret Beaufort was Henry earl of Richmond who seized the crown as the prize of his victory at Bosworth, and then strengthened his claim to it by marrying Elizabeth Plantagenet, Elizabeth of York, daughter of Edward IV. and grand daughter of Jaqueline.
Thus did the blood of Beaufort come to the throne; and thus were Jaqueline of Luxembourg and her true knight the progenitors of the line which Macbeth said would stretch out to the crack of doom.
VALOIS, BURGUNDY, HAPSBURG, BOURBON.
(The italics mark the line of descent.)
_Charles-le-temeraire_, Charles-the-rash, miscalled by the English, Charles-the-bold, was the last Valois duke of Burgundy. He left an only child _Mary of Burgundy_ who married _Maximilian of Hapsburg_, afterward emperor. Their son was the _Archduke Philip_ who is counted as Philip the first of Spain though he never reigned. Philip married _Joanna_ daughter of _Ferdinand_ and _Isabella_, and sister of Catharine of Aragon wife of Henry VIII. The son of Philip and Joanna was the great emperor _Charles-the-fifth_ who was Charles the first of Spain. The crown of Spain then fell from father to son, to _Philip II._, _Philip III._, _Philip IV._ and Charles II. where the male line of the elder branch of Hapsburg ended. The crown then fell to _Philip V._ (Bourbon), grandson of _Louis XIV._ and _Maria Teresa_ eldest daughter of Philip IV.
The younger, the Austrian branch of the House of Hapsburg, is descended from the emperor Ferdinand brother of Charles-the-fifth.
Hoche
Many years ago I knew a Frenchman whose father a captain of infantry, had been killed in La Vendée fighting under Hoche. He had many things to tell me about Hoche which interested me in his career, and led me to treasure up in my memory whatever I came across afterwards concerning him.
There was a certain confidential air about the communications of my French friend, which leads me to say to the reader that I trust to his honor not to divulge what I say to him touching the warrior in question.
The French themselves hold that next to Napoleon Bonaparte, the most brilliant soldier thrown to the surface by the revolution, was Lazarus Hoche. This seems too to be the opinion of a writer in the Encyclopedia Brittanica who says that the death of Hoche deprived the French people of the only man capable of making head against the ambition of the Corsican. And it still adds force to that view to bear in mind how short a time was allotted him to win immortality: he never lived to be thirty. Indeed I remember but one general in history who died so young with so high a reputation; and that was that wondrous boy Gaston de Foix nephew of Louis XII., who fell at the age of twenty-three at Ravenna after having there as elsewhere totally overthrown the famous Spanish infantry.
Perhaps some honest reader still callow from the study of John Richard Green, may remind me that that unique historian not only makes the Spanish infantry triumphant at Ravenna, but cites it as their typical exploit. Well, we must be thankful that Mr. Green does not cite the Caudine Forks as the typical exploit of the Roman legions.
Lazarus Hoche was born near Versailles in June 1768. He was the son, not of a common workman as some of the encyclopedias do vainly talk, but of a common soldier, or rather of an uncommon soldier; for his father on account of his uncommonness, was taken from the line and made keeper of the royal kennels at Versailles; and the first useful occupation of the boy, if useful it were, was to help his father in the care of the king’s hounds.
Nature had endowed him with a handsome and vigorous body and a precocious intellect. He had a maternal uncle who was curé of Saint Germain-en-laye and a man of some learning. This good priest interested himself in the education of his clever nephew, and taught him the elements of latin and mathematics; and thus he received instruction beyond what was common in his station in life. And you academical gentlemen will insist I suppose, that his subsequent advancement was all owing to this latin and mathematics.
But his instincts were military and he resolved to be a soldier, and with a boyish longing at the same time, to see the world, he enlisted when he was sixteen in what he supposed to be a regiment bound for the Indies; but his friends had played a trick on him, and he found himself enrolled in a home regiment. He made the best of it however, and soon attracted the attention of his superiors by his prompt and intelligent observance of duty.
But there were some exceptions to his good behavior. On one occasion a soldier of his regiment had been killed in a pot-house brawl. Hoche joined with some of his comrades in razing to the ground the house of the assassin. For his share in this riot he was condemned to three months imprisonment. Another act of violence which cost the life of a fellow being, brought him no punishment whatever, as it was within the tolerance of the service. A corporal was noted for his skill in handling the sabre. He had already slain two opponents in his duels. He insulted Hoche who instantly challenged him. Hoche received a cut across the forehead, which nearly split his skull, and left a long deep scar there the rest of his days; but he put an end to the duelling of his antagonist by running him through the body.
Of his personal comeliness it is related that once, on parade, a noble lady pointed him out to her companion and exclaimed: What a splendid looking general that would make! She little knew she was playing the part of a prophetess.
And it was not long before his fine bearing stood him in still better stead. Near by was a regiment of grenadiers of the king’s guard. These superb fellows had noticed the soldier-like qualities of Hoche, and they petitioned that he might be enrolled among them. The petition was granted.
These men when in barracks, were allowed to earn money by any honest industry that did not interfere with their duty, and Hoche addicted himself to embroidery. If you think this an effeminate occupation for a soldier, I would remind those of you who have been to sea in a sailing ship, that you must have observed that sailors who are certainly as rough as soldiers, are often skillful in needle work useful and ornamental.
With the money Hoche earned in this manner, he bought books, especially books of history; and as he dwelt upon the renown of Hannibal and of Caesar, of Turenne and Condé, of Marlborough and of Frederic, it was his dream to write his own name some day on that immortal list, I say dream, for it could be nothing more then, under the old régime when the command of armies was the prerogative of the nobility alone.