Margaret had a difficult part to play in the history of England; married to a weak king, who preferred founding colleges to governing a kingdom, she had to take the reins of government into her own hands. With the interest of her only son at heart, she refused to stand by and see the kingdom snatched from her husband and son; wrath roused her to energy. So far she may have been right, but she was led on to hard-hearted cruelty; love for her son made her bloodthirsty; and when both her husband and son were slain, the woman, once beautiful and strong, was left to go back friendless to her native land, ruined, miserable. Margaret of Anjou was born in one of the grandest castles in Lorraine in 1429. Her father, Rene of Anjou, was taken prisoner fighting for his country, when Margaret, the youngest of his four little children, was but a baby. "Alas!" cried the mother, clasping her little golden-haired Margaret to her bosom, "Where is Rene, my lord? He is taken--he is slain!" The four children of the captive prince were very beautiful, and the bards loved to sing of them, and follow them in crowds, and scatter flowers in their path. When Margaret was but six, it was arranged that she should marry Henry VI., the young King of England, in order to make peace between the two countries. When her father, Rene, was released, Margaret went to live in Italy with her father and mother; she inherited her father's taste for learning and love of art. "There was no princess in Christendom more accomplished than my lady Margaret of Anjou," said a writer of these times. The news of her charms, beauty, talent and courage reached Henry's ears in England, and he sent for a portrait of the princess. The picture delighted him, and it ended in a truce being signed between the two countries, and Margaret starting for England to marry King Henry. The parting with her uncle, Charles VII. of France, was very affecting; sobs stifled his voice; the young queen could only reply by a torrent of tears, as they parted, never to meet again. It was harder still to part with her father, for "never was a princess more deeply loved in the bosom of her own family." Neither father nor daughter could speak, but each turned their different ways, with full hearts. The people pressed in crowds to look at Margaret when she was married, for "England had never seen a queen more worthy of a throne than Margaret of Anjou."