Of course, no sooner did the handsome young heiress appear at Court than
suitors for her hand appeared also. The king favoured the claims of
François, duke of Guise, afterwards the captor of Calais; but Jeanne
declared that her husband must be of royal blood, and asked Henri how
she could suffer the Duchesse d'Aumale, who now thought it an honour to
bear her train, to walk beside her as her sister-in-law? Perhaps, being
a man, the case might not have seemed as impossible to Henri as it did
to Jeanne; but one thing was quite clear to him, and that was that he
could never obtain the consent of the lady, so he wisely let the matter
drop. The other suitor was Antoine de Bourbon, eldest son of the Duc de
Vendôme, and nephew, by her first husband, of Marguérite. Antoine was
now about thirty, a tall, handsome man, and a leader of fashion; but,
had she known it, Jeanne would have been much happier as the wife of
Francois de Guise. For the Duc de Vendôme, though brave and fascinating,
was absolutely untrustworthy. His word was lightly given, and lightly
broken; his friends were always changing, and only his love of pleasure
and love of ease remained the same. As to the king and queen of Navarre,
_their_ opinions were, as usual, divided. Henri d'Albret did not like
his proposed son-in-law—he was too thoughtless, and too extravagant;
while Marguérite, on the contrary, was prepared to overlook everything,
seeing he was the first prince of the blood, and, like his brother
Condé, an advocate of the Reformed religion. She did not pause to ask
herself how far his life gave evidence of any religion at all! However,
also as usual, the wishes of the King of Navarre were once more
thwarted, and Jeanne, her mother, and Henri II. proved too much for him.
The marriage took place at the town of Moulins, at the end of October
1548, when the bride was nearly twenty-one, the King and Queen of France
being present at the ceremony. The King of Navarre did all he could to
prevent his daughter's dowry from being wasted by declaring that it
should only be paid in instalments, while the queen stipulated in the
contract that Jeanne should have absolute control over the bringing up
of her children till they were eighteen years of age.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Elsewhere in the archive
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account