The duke, seeing that the Genevese commune was seriously weakened, had formed new plans for definitively seizing the sovereignty, and of expelling both liberty and the tendencies towards the Reformation, with which, according to Charles III. and Charles V., this restless city was infected. Magnificence, fêtes, grandeur, flattery, seduction, and perfidy were all to be brought into play, and for that end Charles possessed new resources. He had just married Beatrice of Portugal, whose sister was about to be united to the Emperor Charles V. Beatrice, a woman of great beauty, proud, ambitious, and domineering, required everything to bend before her; Charles, a man of no will, found one in this princess; and the conspiracy of Savoy against Genevan independence entered into a new phase, which threatened to be marked by great reverses. After a few months of wedlock, the duke expressed a desire to present the beautiful duchess to his good friends of Geneva, and made preparations for displaying all the pomps and seductions of a court in order to win them over. And more than this: the duchess expected to be brought to bed in December: it was now August (1523); if she had a boy in Geneva, would not these worthy burgesses be happy, nay proud, to have for their prince a son of Savoy born within their walls? And would not the child’s uncle, the mighty emperor, have a word to say then in his favour in that ancient imperial city which still bore the eagle on its shield? Every means was set to work to carry out this court manœuvre.