In June of the same year King Ferdinand wrote to his ambassador in Flanders 'to tell Madame Margaret that before and after he concluded the truce with France in his own name as well as in the name of the emperor, the King of England, and Prince Charles, he wrote to his ambassador, Don Pedro de Urea, and ordered him to explain all his reasons to the emperor.... Having concluded the truce from pure necessity, he is forced to observe it this year.' King Ferdinand tells his ambassador to beg Madame Margaret to use her influence with the emperor, and to show him that the policy he has hitherto adopted can have only one result, viz. 'that of making the King of France master of the world; whilst if the emperor follows his (Ferdinand's) advice, nothing will be lost.' He writes that 'Madame Margaret is willing to deliver Don Juan Manuel up to him as prisoner. She is to be told that Don Juan has not only behaved badly to King Ferdinand, but also speaks so ill of her that for this alone he deserves punishment.'[41] [41] _Calendar of Spanish State Papers_, vol. ii. And when, a little later, Margaret has asked Maximilian's permission to arrest Don Juan Manuel, because he had spoken against King Ferdinand, Maximilian answers that 'if Don Juan has committed a crime which is punishable according to law, he may be arrested; if not, it will be sufficient to banish him from the Court.' But although Margaret as Governess of the Netherlands took part in the greatest events of her century, yet her private life in her home at Malines was of the simplest and most domestic kind. We get a very good idea of the way she spent her days from her interesting correspondence and from her father's letters which have, fortunately, been preserved. These letters are in French, but Maximilian's spelling is chiefly euphonical, and the meaning often obscure. In spite of the quaint style, these letters form an interesting history of Europe at the dawn of the Renaissance. Beginning with the drama which opens at the League of Cambray, in which England, France, Germany, the Netherlands, Italy, and Spain all play their parts, and ending with the disaster of Pavia, the humbling of France, and the triumph of the House of Austria, there is not a negotiation, war, or treaty, whose secret cause and real origin is not disclosed. Although the correspondence comprises a comparatively short period, and does not go much beyond the first quarter of the sixteenth century, still the age was one of thrilling interest and brilliant personality. Amongst the illustrious personages who pass in review before us are Louis XII., Anne of Brittany, Francis I., Louise of Savoy, Margaret of Angoulême, the Cardinal of Amboise, and the Chevalier Bayard, Ferdinand of Aragon, Gonzalva of Cordova, and Ximenes, Henry VII., Henry VIII., and Cardinal Wolsey, Charles V., and Luther.