The future life of Jeanne, married to a man like the Duc de Vendôme, was
certain to be unhappy, and the state of France, with its perpetual
religious wars, could only increase that unhappiness. As far as possible
she stayed in her own kingdom, and kept her son, afterwards Henri IV.,
living a free, hardy life among the mountains. But there were times when
policy forced her to visit the Court of Catherine, whom she hated and
mistrusted, and, what was infinitely worse, to leave her son there. His
tutors were men of the Reformed religion, but Henri had too much of his
father in him for any faith to take root, and when he had to decide
between Calvinism and a crown, it was easy to tell what his choice would
be. But Jeanne was spared the knowledge of that, and of much else that
would have grieved her sorely, for she died in Paris, whither she had
gone to attend the marriage of Henri and the Princess Margot, a few days
before the Massacre of St. Bartholomew.
_HACON THE KING_
WHEN little Hacon, son of the dead king Hacon, and grandson of Sverrir,
was born at Smaalen, in Norway, in the summer of 1204, the country was
divided into two great parties. In the south were gathered the
Croziermen, or churchmen, supported by the King of Denmark, while
further north lay the followers of old Sverrir, who had been nicknamed
'Birchlegs' from the gaiters of birch-bark which they always wore. In
those days men needed a king to keep order, and after the death of
Hacon, son of Sverrir, the great council, called the Thing, met to
consult about the matter. The first king they chose died in a few
months, and then Ingi, his kinsman, was put in his place. But when the
child of Hacon and Inga proved to be a boy the Birchlegs declared that
he and none other should rule over them. Now the Croziermen were spread
all over the south and east of Norway, and, as Smaalen was right in the
middle of them, a few Birchlegs went secretly to Inga, the child's
mother, and told her that for a time the baby must be hidden away so
that no man should know where he was; for they feared King Ingi.
So Thrond the priest took the boy and gave him the name of his father,
and his wife cared for him as her own, and no one knew he was a king's
son, save only herself and her two boys. And Inga his mother abode close
by.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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