"What is the little black-eyed woman talking about?" asked Miss Cassandra, in a most pathetic tone. Fortunately, our cicerone gave us more time in this room than in the others, and as we stood by the windows which look out upon the court and gardens, a blaze of color in the September sunshine, Lydia and I tried to explain about the very remarkable marriage solemnized in this chateau between the heiress of Brittany and the young King of France. Odd as royal marriages usually are, this was especially melodramatic, as the royal lover seems to have set forth to meet the lady of his choice with a sword in one hand and a wedding ring in the other. The hand of the young Duchess of Brittany was naturally sought after by many princes, who looked with longing eyes upon her rich inheritance, in addition to which, as Brantome says, she was renowned for her beauty and grace, which latter was not impaired by the fact that one leg was shorter than the other. She was also learned, according to the learning of her day, and clever, which circumstances probably weighed lighter than vanity when put in the scale against the wealth of the Duchy of Brittany. Among the various pretendants to the hand of the Duchess was Louis, Duke of Orleans, who as next in succession to his cousin Charles was a suitor quite worthy of the hand of this high-born lady. Feats of valor had been performed by Louis in Brittany earlier in his career, which of course reached the ears of Anne, who like every woman of spirit admired a hero, when lo! misfortune of misfortunes, he was taken prisoner at the battle of St. Aubin, where he fought bravely at the head of his infantry. This capture must have been a sad blow to the hopes of the young Duke of Orleans, as Maximilian, Duke of Austria, promptly stepped in and claimed the hand of the Breton heiress; but even this wooing was not destined to prosper, as Charles VIII, who had just succeeded to the throne of France, suddenly announced that he was the proper person to wed the Duchess Anne and her possessions, and promptly breaking his engagement with Margaret of Austria, set forth upon his war-like wooing. She, poor girl, would probably have preferred any one of her suitors to the boy of nineteen or twenty, misshapen and ignorant, says a chronicler of the time, and so feeble in body that his father, despairing of his holding the throne, had arranged a marriage between the next heir, this same Duke of Orleans, and his daughter, Jeanne of France. The young Duchess, an heiress in her own right, and possessed of a decided will of her own, as appeared later, was singularly hampered in the choice of a consort, several eligible suitors being separated from her by the armies of Charles, who, closely besieging the town of Rennes, demanded her hand at the point of the sword. Thus wooed, Anne reluctantly consented to become Queen of France, and was secretly betrothed to Charles at Rennes.