"AMBOISE, June 7th.
"Loys, by the grace of God, King of France. Beloved brother and cousin, we have received the letters you have written making mention, as you have heard, that in the truce lately concluded between us and the Duke of Burgundy up to April 1st next coming, which will be the year 1473, the Duke of Burgundy has mentioned you as his ally, which you do not like because you never asked the Duke of Burgundy to do so, and you do not know whether he made this statement on the advice of the Venetian ambassador who is with him.
"Therefore, and because you do not mean to enter into alliance or understanding with the Duke of Burgundy but wish to remain our confederate and ally and have sworn to that effect before notaries, and sealed your oath with your seal ... that you are no ally of the Duke of Burgundy and that you renounce and repudiate his nomination as such ... also you may be certain that on our part we are determined to maintain all friendship between us and you ... and if we make any treaty in the future we will expressly include you in it and never will do ."23
"Monseigneur the grand master, I am advised how while the truce is still in being, the Duke of Burgundy has taken Nesle and slain all whom he found within. I must be avenged for this. I wished you to know so that if you can find means to do him a like injury in his country you will do it there and anywhere that you can without sparing anything. I have good hopes that God will aid in avenging us, considering the murders for which he is responsible within the church and elsewhere, and because by virtue of the terms of their surrender [they thought] they had saved their lives.
"Done at Angers, June 19th.
"P.S.—If the said place had been destroyed and rased as I ordered this never would have happened. Therefore, see to it that all such places be rased to the ground, for if this be not done the people will be ruined and there will be an increase of dishonour and damage to me."24
One fact stated by Louis in this letter was true. Charles of Burgundy broke the truce when it had but two weeks to run, and thus put himself in the wrong. The death of Guienne made him wild with anger. Apparently he had not believed in the imminence of the danger, although he had been constantly informed of the progress of the prince's illness. But to his mind, it was the hand of Louis, not the judgment of God, that ended the life of the prince.
"On the morrow, which was about May 15, 1472, so far as I remember [says Commines] came letters from Simon de Quingey, the duke's ambassador to the king, announcing the death of the Duke of Guienne and that the king had recovered the majority of his places. Messages from various localities followed headlong one on the other, and every one had a different story of the death.
"The duke being in despair at the death, at the instigation of other people as much concerned as himself, wrote letters full of bitter accusations against the king to several towns—an action that profited little for nothing was done about it.25... In this violent passion the duke proceeded towards Nesle in Vermandois, and commenced a kind of warfare such as he had never used before, burning and destroying wherever he passed."
It is interesting to note how smoothly Commines sails by the capital charges against the king. He neither accepts nor denies the king's crime, while frankly admitting that Guienne's decease was an opportune circumstance for Louis. He apologises for mentioning any evil report of either king or duke, but urges his duty as historian to tell the truth without palliation.
Nesle was a little place on a tributary of the Somme which refused the duke's summons to surrender, sent to it on June 10th. It seems possible that there was a misunderstanding between the citizens and the garrison which resulted in the slaughter of the Burgundian heralds. Whereupon, the exasperated soldiers rushed headlong upon the ill-defended burghers and wreaked a terrible vengeance on the town.
When the duke arrived on the spot, the carnage was over, but he was unreproving as he inspected the gruesome result. Into the great church itself he rode, and his horse's hoofs sank through the blood lying inches deep on the floor. The desecrated building was full of dead—men, women, and children—but the duke's only comment as he looked about was, "Here is a fine sight. Verily I have good butchers with me," and he crossed himself piously.
"Those who were taken alive were hanged, except some few suffered to escape by the compassionate common soldiers. Quite a number had their hands chopped off. I dislike to mention this cruelty but I was on the spot and needs must give some account of it." 26
The story of the duke's treatment of the innocent little town of Nesle is painted in colours quite as lurid as the king's murder of his brother. There is some ground for the denunciations of Charles, but the gravest accusation, that the duke promised clemency to the citizens on surrender and then basely broke his word, does not deserve credence. He was in a state of exasperation and the horrors were committed in passion, not in cold blood.27
BURGUNDIAN STANDARD CAPTURED AT BEAUVAIS
It is delightful to note the king's virtuous indignation at his cousin's proceedings, coupled with his regrets that he himself had not destroyed the town.
With the terrible report of the events at Nesle flying before his advance guard, Charles went on towards Normandy. Roye he gained easily, and then, passing by Compiègne where "Monseigneur the grand master" had intrenched himself, and Amiens with the good burghers whom Louis delighted to honour, he marched on until he reached Beauvais, an old town on the Thérain. Some of the garrison from the fallen Roye had taken refuge there, but the place was weak in its defences, not even having its usual garrison or cannon, as it happened.
Disappointed in his first expectation of picking the town like a cherry, Charles sat down before it. The siege that followed won a reputation beyond the warrant of its real importance from the extraordinary tenacity and energy of the people in their own defence. Every missile that the ingenuity of man or woman could imagine was used to drive back the besiegers when the town was finally invested.
From June 27th to July 9th Charles waited, then an assault was ordered. Charles laughed at the idea of any serious resistance. "He asked some of his people whether they thought the citizens would wait for the assault. It was answered yes, considering their number even if they had nothing before them but a hedge."28 He took this as a joke and said, "To-morrow you will not find a person." He thought that there would be a simple repetition of his experience at Dinant and Liege, and that the garrison would simply succumb in terror. When the Burgundians rushed at the walls their reception showed not only that every point had a defender, but also that those same defenders were provided with huge stones, pots of boiling water, burning torches—all most unpleasant things when thrown in the faces of men trying to scale a wall. Three hours were sufficient to prove to the assailants the difficulty of the task. Twelve hundred were slain and maimed, and the strength of the place was proven.
Charles was not inclined to relinquish his scheme, but the weather came to the aid of the besieged. Heavy rains forced the troops to change camp. More men were lost in skirmishes and mimic assaults, losses that Charles could ill afford at the moment. Finally at the end of three fruitless weeks, the siege was raised and the Burgundians marched on to try to redeem their reputation in Normandy. Had Beauvais fallen, it would have been possible to relieve the Duke of Brittany, against whom Louis had marched with all his forces and whom he had enveloped as in a net. This reverse was the first serious rebuff that had happened to Charles, and it marked a turn in his fortunes.
Louis fully appreciated the enormous advantage to himself, and was not stinting in his reward to the plucky little town. Privileges and a reduction of taxes were bestowed on Beauvais. An annual procession was inaugurated in which women were to have precedence as a special recognition of their services with boiling water and other irregular weapons, while a special gift was bestowed on one particular girl, Jeanne Laisné, who had wrested a Burgundian standard from a soldier just as he was about to plant it on the wall. Not only was she endowed from the royal purse, but she and her husband and their descendants were declared tax free for ever.29
Charles to the Duke of Brittany
"My good brother, I recommend myself to you with good heart. I rather hoped to be able to march through Rouen, but the whole strength of the foe was on the frontier, where was the grand master, of whose loyalty I have not the least doubt, so that the project could not be effected. I do not know what will happen. Realising this, I have given subject for thought elsewhere and I have pitched my camp between Rouen and Neufchâtel, intending, however, to return speedily. If not I will exploit the war in another quarter more injurious to the enemy, and I will exert myself to keep them from your route. My Burgundians and Luxemburgers have done bravely in Champagne. I know, too, that you have done well on your part, for which I rejoice. I have burned the territory of Caux in a fashion so that it will not injure you, nor us, nor others, and I will not lay down arms without you, as I am certain you will not without me. I will pursue the work commenced by your advice at the pleasure of Our Lord, may He give you good and long life with a fruitful victory.
"Written at my camp near Boscise, September 4th.
"Your loyal brother,
"CHARLES."30
The duke's course was marked by waste and devastation from the walls of Rouen to those of Dieppe, but nothing was gained from this desolation. By September, keen anxiety about his territories led him to fear staying so far from his own boundaries, and he decided to return. Through Picardy he marched eastward burning and laying waste as before.
Hardly had he turned towards the Netherlands, when Louis marched into Brittany against his weakest foe. There was no fighting, but Francis found it wise to accept a truce. Odet d'Aydie, who had ridden in hot haste to Brittany, scattering from his saddle dire accusations of fratricide against Louis—this same Odet became silenced and took service with the king.31 When reconcilations were effected, most kind to the returning ally or servant did Louis always show himself.
On November 3d, a truce was struck between Louis and Charles, which, later, was renewed for a year. But never again did the two men come into actual conflict with each other, though they were on the eve of doing so in 1475.
The period of the great coalitions among the nobles was at an end. Charles of France was dead and so, too, were others who were strong enough to work the king ill. The Duke of Brittany showed no more energy. When again within his own territories, Charles of Burgundy became absorbed in other projects which he wished to perfect before he again measured steel with Louis.
"The Duke of Berry, he is dead,
Brittany doth nod his head,
Burgundy doth sulky sit,
While Louis works with every wit."32
Such was the tenor of a doggerel verse sung in France, a verse that probably never came to Charles's ears—though Louis might have listened to it cheerfully.
Infinitely disastrous were the events of that summer to Charles of Burgundy. Not only had he lost in allies, not only had he squandered life and money uselessly in his reckless expedition over the north of France, but his own retinue was diminished and weakened by the men whom Louis had succeeded in luring from his service. The loss that Charles suffered was not only for the time but for posterity. Among those convinced that there was more scope for men of talent in France than in Burgundy was that clever observer of humanity who had been at Charles's side for eight years. In August of 1472, Philip de Commines took French leave of his master and betook himself to Louis, who evidently was not surprised at his advent.
The historian's own words in regard to this change of base are laconic: "About this time I entered the king's service (and it was the year 1472), who had received the majority of the servitors of his brother the Duke of Guienne. And he was then at Pont de Cé."33 This passing from one lord to another happened on the night between the 7th and 8th of August, when the Burgundian army lay near Eu.
The suddenness of the departure was probably due to the duke's discovery of his servant's intentions not yet wholly ripe, and those intentions had undoubtedly been formed at Orleans, in 1471, when Commines made a secret journey to the king. On his way back to Burgundy, he deposited a large sum of money at Tours. Evidently he did not dare put this under his own name, or claim it when it was confiscated as the property of a notorious adherent of Louis's foe.34
When the fugitive reached the French court, however, he was amply recompensed for all his losses.35 For, naturally, at his flight, all his Burgundian estates were abandoned.36 It was at six o'clock on the morning of August 8th that the deed was signed whereby the duke transferred to the Seigneur de Quiévrain all the rights appertaining to Philip de Commines, "which rights together with all the property of whatever kind have escheated to us by virtue of confiscation because he has to-day, the date of this document, departed from our obedience and gone as a fugitive to the party opposed to us."37
There are various surmises as to the cause of this precipitate departure. Not improbable is the suggestion that Charles often overstepped the bounds of courtesy towards his followers. Once, so runs one story, he found the historian sleeping on his bed where he had flung himself while awaiting his master. Charles pulled off one of his boots "to give him more ease" and struck him in the face with it. In derision the courtiers called Commines tête bottée, and their mocking sank deep into his soul.
Contemporary writers make little of the chronicler's defection. These crossings from the peer's to the king's camp were accepted occurrences. But by Charles they were not accepted. There is a vindictive look about the hour when he disposes of his late confidant's possessions, only explicable by intense indignation not itemised in the deed approved by the court of Mons.38
More loyal was that other chronicler, Olivier de la Marche, though to him, also, came intimations that he would find a pleasant welcome at the French court. He, too, had opportunities galore to make links with Louis. The accounts teem with references to his secret missions here and there, and with mention of the rewards paid, all carefully itemised. So zealous was this messenger on his master's commissions, that his hackneys were ruined by his fast riding and had to be sold for petty sums. The keen eye of Louis XI. was not blind to the quality of La Marche's services, and he thought that they, too, might be diverted to his use.39
"Monsieur du Bouchage, Guillaume de Thouars has told me that Messire Olivier de la Marche is willing to enter my service and I am afraid that there may be some deception. However, there is nothing that I would like better than to have the said Sieur de Cimay, as you know. Therefore, pray find out how the matter stands, and if you see that it is in good earnest work for it with all diligence. Whatever you pledge I will hold to. Advise me of everything.
"Written at Cléry, October 16th [1472].
"To our beloved and faithful councillor and chancellor,
Sire du Bouchage."40
But La Marche was not tempted, and was rewarded for his fidelity by high office in a duchy which, shortly after these events, was "annexed" to his master's domain.
[Footnote 1: Journal de Jean de Roye, i., 258.]
[Footnote 2: Commynes-Dupont, iii., 202.]
[Footnote 3: Plancher, iv., cccvi., May 28th.]
[Footnote 4: Rymer, Fœdera, xi., 735. Pro Ducissa Burgundiæ super Lana claccanda.]
[Footnote 5: Lettres de Louis XI., iv., 256.]
[Footnote 6: One of Guienne's retinue who, later, passed to Louis's service.]
[Footnote 7: Louis's sister Yolande.]
[Footnote 8: The Duke of Brittany had married the third daughter of the Count de Foix.]
[Footnote 9: This was an allusion to a proposed marriage between Guienne and Jeanne, reputed daughter of Henry IV. of Castile. Vaesen cannot explain the use of Aragon. Various documents relating to this negotiation are given. (Comines-Lenglet, iii., 156.)]
[Footnote 10: Vaesen gives femmes, Duclos filles. The king was above all afraid that his brother might marry Mary of Burgundy.]
[Footnote 11: Lettres de Louis XI.., iv., 286.]
[Footnote 12: There was a pestilence raging at Amboise.]
[Footnote 13: At Orleans, in the last days of October and the first of November, there was a conference wherein the king apparently promised to restore St. Quentin and Amiens to Charles, if he would renounce his alliance with the dukes of Brittany and Guienne and would betroth his daughter to the dauphin.]
[Footnote 14: Ythier Marchant negotiated the proposed marriage between Guienne and Mary of Burgundy. He had received "signed and sealed blanks" from the two princes in order to enable him to hasten matters. (Lettres de Louis XI., iv., 289.)]
[Footnote 15: III., ch. viii.]
[Footnote 16: "Cette paix jura le Due de Bourgogne et y estois présent."]
[Footnote 17: The king's envoys who had spent the winter in the Burgundian court. See letter to them in December.]
[Footnote 18: See Kervyn, Bulletin de l'Academie royale de Belgique, p. 256. Also Kirk, ii., 160; Commynes-Mandrot, i., 234.]
[Footnote 19: Louis to the Vicomte de la Belliére, Lettres, etc., iv., 319.]
[Footnote 20: Louis to Dammartin, Ibid., 325. Mars was written first and then replaced by Mai.]
[Footnote 21: Odet d'Aydie, younger brother of the Seigneur de Lescun.]
[Footnote 22: Lettres, XI., iv., 328. Louis to Dammartin, 1472.]
[Footnote 23: Lettres, iv., 331. Louis to the Duke of Milan.]
[Footnote 24: Lettres, etc., v., 4. Louis to Dammartin. See also Duclos, v., 331. There are slight discrepancies between the two texts, but the differences do not affect the narrative.]
[Footnote 25: Odet d'Aydie, whom Louis had hoped to have converted to his cause, was the man to spread the charge against Louis broadcast over the land. The truth of the death is not proven. Frequent mentions of Guienne's condition occur through the letters of the winter '71-72. The story was that the poison, administered subtly by the king's orders, caused the illness of both the prince and his mistress, Mme. de Thouan. She died after two months of suffering, December 14th, while he resisted the poison longer, though his health was completely shattered and his months of longer life were unutterably wretched and painful, a constant torture until death mercifully released him in May. Accusations of poisoning are often repeated in history. In this case, there was certainly a wide-spread belief in Louis's guilt. In his manifestos, (Lenglet, ii., 198) Charles declares that the king's tools in compassing his brother's death were a friar, Jourdain Favre, and Henri de la Roche, esquire of his kitchen.
The story told by Brantôme (Œuvres Complètes de Pierre de Bourdeille, Seigneur de Brantôme, ii., 329. "Grands Capitaines Francois." There is nothing too severe for Brantôme to say about Louis XI.) is very detailed. A fool passed to Louis's service from that of the dead prince. While this man was attending his new master in the church of Notre Dame de Cléry, he heard him make this prayer to the Virgin: "Ah! my good Lady, my little mistress, my great friend in whom I have always put my trust, I pray thee be a suppliant to God in my behalf, be my advocate with Him so that He may pardon me for the death of my brother whom I had poisoned by this wicked Abbé of St. John. I confess it to thee as to my good patron and mistress. But what was to be done? He was a torment to my realm. Get me pardoned and I know well what I will give thee."
Brantôme tells further that the fool, using the privilege of free speech accorded to his class, talked about Guienne's death at dinner in public and after that day was never seen again. On the other hand, the young duke's will was all to his brother's favour. Louis was made executor and legatee, "and if we have ever offended our beloved brother," dictated the dying man, "we implore him to pardon us as we with débonnaire affection pardon him." Mandrot, editor of Commynes (1901), i., 230, considers the whole story a malicious fabrication of Odet d'Aydie, and other authorities refer the cause to disease. The very date of the death varies from May 12th to May 24th.]
[Footnote 26: Commines, iii., ch. ix.]
[Footnote 27: There is a curious document in existence (see Bulletins de L'Hist. de France, 1833-34) dated fifty years after the event. It is the deposition of several old people who had been just old enough to remember that awful experience of their youth. Fifty years of repetition gave time for the growth of the story.]
[Footnote 28: Commines, iii., ch. x.]
[Footnote 29: Legend makes it that Jeanne Laisné, called Fouquet, chopped off the hands of the standard-bearer with a hatchet. Hence her name was changed to La Hachette, and she is represented with a hatchet.]
[Footnote 30: Barante, vii., 333.]
[Footnote 31: See Lavisse, ivii., 368.]
"Berri est mort,
Bretagne dort,
Bourgogne hongne,
Le Roy besogne."
Le Roux de Lincy, Chants historiques et populaires du temps de Louis XI.]
[Footnote 33: Commines also mentions here "the confessor of the Duke of Guienne and a knight to whom is imputed the death of the Duke of Guienne." (iii., ch. xi.)]
[Footnote 34: Kirk (ii., 156) thinks that this confiscation was only Louis's way of prodding him up to act.]
[Footnote 35: Dupont (Commynes, iii., xxxvi). The fugitive did not enter immediately into his new possessions. The king's gift of the principality of Talmont, dated October, 1472, was not registered in Parlement until December 13, 1473, and in the court of records May 2, 1474. Prince of Talmont did Commines become at last, and as such he married Helen de Chambes, January 27, 1473.]
[Footnote 36: It is strange that La Marche does not mention this defection.]
[Footnote 37: See document quoted by Gachard, Études et Notices, etc. ii., 344. The original is in the Croy family archives preserved in the château of Beaumont.]
[Footnote 38: See also Comines-Lenglet, i., xcj., for discussion of this event. He asserts that the court of Burgundy was too corrupt for honest men to endure it.]
[Footnote 39: See Stein. Étude, etc., sur Olivier de la Marche. (Mém. Couronnés) xlix.]
[Footnote 40: Letter of Louis XI. in Bibl. Nat.: Ibid., p. 179.]
The affairs of the little duchy of Guelders were among the matters urgently demanding the attention of the Duke of Burgundy at the close of his campaign in France. The circumstances of the long-standing quarrel between Duke Arnold and his unscrupulous son Adolf were a scandal throughout Europe. In 1463, a seeming reconciliation of the parties had not only been effected but celebrated in the town of Grave by a pleasant family festival, from whose gaieties the elder duke, fatigued, retired at an early hour. Scarcely was he in bed, when he was aroused rudely, and carried off half clad to a dungeon in the castle of Buren, by the order of his son, who superintended the abduction in person and then became duke regnant. For over six years the old man languished in prison, actually taunted, from time to time, it is said, by Duke Adolf himself.
Indignant remonstrances against this conduct were heard from various quarters, and were all alike unheeded by the young duke until Charles of Burgundy interfered and ordered him to bring his father to his presence, and to submit the dispute to his arbitration. Charles was too near and too powerful a neighbour to be disregarded, and his peremptory invitation was accepted. Pending the decision, the two dukes were forced to be guests in his court, under a strict surveillance which amounted to an arrest.
The first suggestion made by Charles was for a compromise between father and son. "Let Duke Arnold retain the nominal sovereignty in Guelders, actual possession of one town, and a fair income, while to Adolf be ceded the full power of administration." The latter was emphatic in his refusal to consider the proposition. "Rather would I prefer to see my father thrown into a well and to follow him thither than to agree to such terms. He has been sovereign duke for forty-four years; it is my turn now to reign." Arnold thought it would be a simple feat to fight out the dispute. "I saw them both several times in the duke's apartment and in the council chamber when they pleaded, each his own cause. I saw the old man offer a gage of battle to his son."1 The senior belonged to the disappearing age of chivalry. A trial of arms seemed to him an easy and knightly fashion of ending his differences with his importunate heir.
No settlement was effected before the French expedition, but Charles was not disposed to let the matter slip from his control, and when he proceeded to Amiens, the two dukes, still under restraint, were obliged to follow in his train. At a leisure moment Charles intended to force them to accept his arbitration as final. Before that moment arrived, the more agile of the two plaintiffs, Adolf, succeeded in eluding surveillance and escaping from the camp at Wailly. He made his way successfully to Namur disguised as a Franciscan monk. Then, at the ferry, he gave a florin when a penny would have sufficed. The liberality, inconsistent with his assumed rôle, aroused suspicion and led to the detection of his rank and identity. He was stayed in his flight and imprisoned in the castle of Namur to await a decision on his case by his self-constituted judge. This was not pronounced until the summer of 1473.
By that time, Charles was resolved on another course of action than that of adjusting a family dispute in the capacity of puissant, impartial, and friendly neighbour. Adolf's behaviour towards his father had been extraordinarily brutal and outrageous. Public comment had been excited to a wide degree. It was not an affair to be dealt with lightly by Duke Charles. The young Duchess of Guelders was Catharine of Bourbon, sister to the late Duchess of Burgundy, and Adolf himself was chevalier of the Golden Fleece. In consideration of these links of family and knightly brotherhood, Charles desired that the case should be tried with all formality.
ARNOLD, DUKE OF GUELDERS
On May 3, 1473, an assembly of the Order was held at Valenciennes,2 and the knights were asked to pass upon the conduct of their delinquent fellow, who was permitted to present his own brief through an attorney, but was detained in his own person at Namur. The innocence or guilt of his prisoner was no longer the chief point of interest as far as the Duke of Burgundy was concerned. The latter had made an excellent bargain on his own behalf with the moribund Duke of Guelders, who had signed (December, 1472) a document wherein he sold to Charles all his administrative rights in Guelders and Zutphen for ninety-two thousand florins,3 in consideration of Arnold's enjoying a life interest in half of the revenue of his ancient duchy. That clause soon lost its significance. The old man's life ceased in March, 1473, and, by virtue of the contract, Charles proposed to enter into full possession of his estates, setting aside not only Adolf, whom he was ready to pronounce an outlawed criminal, quite beyond the pale of society, but that Adolf's innocent eight-year-old heir, Charles, whose hereditary claims had also been ignored by his grandfather.
Before the knights of the Order as a final court, were rehearsed all the circumstances of the old family quarrel and of the late commercial transaction. Their verdict was the one desired by their chief. It was proven to their entire satisfaction that Arnold's sale of the duchy of Guelders and Zutphen was a legitimate proceeding, and that the deed executed by him was a perfect and valid instrument, whereby Charles of Burgundy was duly empowered to enjoy all the revenues of, and to exert authority in, his new duchy at his pleasure. As to Duke Adolf, he was condemned by this tribunal of his peers to life imprisonment as punishment for his unfilial and unjustifiable cruelty towards Arnold, late Duke of Guelders.
Adolf's protests were stifled by his prison bars, but the people of Guelders were by no means disposed to accept unquestioned this deed of transfer, made when the two parties to the conveyance were in very unequal conditions of freedom. In order to convince them of the justice of his pretensions, Charles levied a force almost as efficient as his army of the preceding summer, and fell upon Guelders. A truce, a triple compact with France and England, had recently been renewed, so that for the moment his hands were free from complications, an event commented upon by Sir John Paston, as follows:
"April 16, 1473, CANTERBURY.
"As for tydings ther was a truce taken at Brusslys about the xxvi day off March last, betwyn the Duke of Burgoyn and the Frense Kings inbassators and Master William Atclyff ffor the king heer, whiche is a pese be londe and be water tyll the ffyrst daye off Apryll nowe next comyng betweyn Fraunce and Ingeland, and also the Dukys londes. God holde it ffor ever."
The writer had recently been in Charles's court. Writing from Calais in February, he says:
"As ffor tydyngs heer ther bee but few saff that the Duke of Burgoyen and my Lady hys wyffe fareth well. I was with them on Thorysdaye last past at Gaunt."4
The Duke of Burgundy was not the only pretender to the vacated sovereignty of Guelders. The Duke of Juliers was also inclined to urge his cause, were Adolf's family to be set aside. At the sight of Burgundian puissance, however, he was ready to be convinced, and accepted 24,000 florins for his acquiescence in the righteousness of the accession. Several of the cities manifested opposition to Charles, but yielded one after another. In Nimwegen—long hostile to Duke Arnold—there was a determined effort to support little Charles of Guelders who, with his sister, was in that city. The child made a pretty show on his little pony, and there were many declarations of devotion to his cause as he was put forward to excite sympathy. For three weeks, the town held out in his name. The resistance to the Burgundian troops was sturdy. When the gates gave way before their attacks the burghers defended the broken walls. Six hundred English archers were repulsed from an assault with such sudden energy that they left their banners sticking in the very breaches they thought they had won, fine prizes for the triumphant citizens. But the game was unequal, and the combatants, convinced that discretion was the better part of valour, at last accepted the Duke of Cleves as a mediator with their would-be sovereign.
On July 19th, a long civic procession headed by the burgomasters, wearing neither hats nor shoes, marched to the Duke of Burgundy with a prayer for pardon on their lips. The leaders of the opposition to his accession were delivered over to the mercy of the victor. The garrison were accorded their lives and a tax was imposed on the city to indemnify the duke for his needless trouble, and Guelders was added de facto to the list of Burgundian ducal titles. In the various state papers presently issued by the new ruler, the mention of the circumstance of his accession to the sovereignty was simple and straightforward, as in a certain document appointing Olivier de la Marche to be treasurer. The patent bears the date of August 18th and was one of the earliest issued by Charles in this new capacity.
"As by the death of the late Messire Arnold, in his life Duke of Guelderland, these counties and duchy have lapsed to me, and by the same token the offices of the land have escheated to our disposition, and among others the office of master of the moneys of those countships ... using the rights, etc., escheated to me, and in consideration of the good and agreeable services already rendered and continually rendered by our knight, etc., Olivier de la Marche, having full confidence in his sense, loyalty, probity, and good diligence—for these causes and others we entrust the office of master and overseer of moneys of the land of Guelders to him, with all the rights, duties, and privileges thereto pertaining. In testimony of this we have set our seal to these papers. Done in our city of Nimwegen, August 18, 1473. Thus signed by M. le duc."
On the back of this document was written:
"To-day, November 3, 1473, Messire Olivier de la Marche ... took the oath of office of master and overseer of the land and duchy of Guelders."5
The charge of the ducal children, Charles and Philippa, was entrusted to the duke who, in his turn, deputed Margaret of York to supervise their education. In a comparatively brief time agitation in behalf of the disinherited heir ceased, and imperial ratification alone was required to stamp the territory as a legal fraction of the Burgundian domains. Under the circumstances the minor heirs were the emperor's wards, and it was his express duty to look to their interests, but Frederic III. showed no disposition to assert himself as their champion. On the contrary, the embassy that arrived from his court on August 14th was charged with felicitations to his dear friend, Charles of Burgundy, for his acquisition, and with assurances that the requisite investiture into his dignities should be given by his imperial hand at the duke's pleasure.6
Communication between Frederic and Charles had been intermittently frequent during the past three years, and one subject of their letters was probably a reason why Charles had been willing to abandon a losing game in France to give another bias to his thoughts. He was lured on by the bait of certain prospects, varying in their definite form indeed, but full of promise that he might be enabled, eventually, to confer with Louis XI. from a better vantage ground than his position as first peer of France. The story of these hopes now becomes the story of Charles of Burgundy.
When Sigismund of Austria completed his mortgage, in 1469, at St. Omer, and returned home, as already stated, he was fired with zeal to divert some of the dazzling Burgundian wealth into the empty imperial coffers. An alliance between Mary of Burgundy and the young Archduke Maximilian seemed to him the most advantageous matrimonial bargain possible for the emperor's heir. He urged it upon his cousin with all the eloquence he possessed, and was lavish in his offers to be mediator between him and his new friend Charles.
Frederic was impressed by Sigismund's enthusiastic exposition of the advantages of the match, and little time elapsed before his ambassador brought formal proposals to Charles for the alliance. The duke received the advances complacently and returned propositions significant of his personal ambitions. As early as May, 1470, his instructions to certain envoys sent to the intermediary, Sigismund, are plain. In unequivocal terms, his daughter's hand is made contingent on his own election as King of the Romans, that shadowy royalty which veiled the approach to the imperial throne.
"Item—And in regard to the said marriage, the ambassadors shall inform Monseigneur of Austria that, since his departure from Hesdin, certain people have talked to Monseigneur about this marriage and mentioned that, in return, the emperor would be willing to grant to Monseigneur the crown and the government of the Kingdom of the Romans, with the stipulation that Monseigneur, arrived at the empire by the good pleasure of the emperor or by his death, would, in his turn, procure the said crown of the Romans for his son-in-law. The result will be that the empire will be continued in the person of the emperor's son and his descendants.
"Item—They shall tell him about a meeting between the imperial and ducal ambassadors, at which meeting there was some talk of making a kingdom out of certain lands of Monseigneur and joining these to an imperial vicariate of all the lands and principalities lying along the Rhine."
In the following paragraphs of this instruction,7 Charles directs his envoys to make it clear to Monseigneur of Austria (Sigismund) that the duke's interest in the plan does not spring from avarice or ambition. He is purely actuated by a yearning to employ his time and his strength for God's service and for the defence of the Faith, while still in his prime.
Should the emperor refuse to approve the duke's nomination as King of the Romans, the ambassadors are instructed to say that they are not empowered to proceed with the marriage negotiations without first referring to their chief. They must ask leave to return with their report. If Sigismund should take it on himself to sound the emperor again about his sentiments, the envoys might await the result of his investigations. He was to be assured that while Charles was resolved to hold back until he was fully satisfied on this point, if it were once ceded, he would interpose no further delay in the celebration of the nuptials. He must know, however, just what power and revenue the emperor would attach to the proposed title. He was not willing to accept it without emoluments. His present financial burdens were already heavy, etc. The concluding items of the instructions had reference to the marriage settlements.
A kingdom of his own was not the duke's dream at this stage of Burgundo-Austrian negotiations. The title that Charles desired primarily was King of the Romans, one empty of substantial sovereign power, but rich with promise of the all-embracing imperial dignity. Significant is the intimation that after this preliminary title was conferred, its wearer would be glad to have Frederic step aside voluntarily. A resignation would be as efficient as death in making room for his appointed successor.
Frederic III. had, indeed, intimated occasionally that a life of meditation would suit his tastes better than the imperial throne, but he seems in no wise to have been tempted by the offer made by Charles to relieve him of his onerous duties, and then to pass on the office to his son. At any rate, the emperor rejected the opportunity to enjoy an irresponsible ease. His answer to the duke was that he did not exercise sufficient influence over his electors to ensure their accepting his nominee as successor to the imperium.
There was, however, one honour that lay wholly within his gift. If Charles desired higher rank, the emperor would be quite willing to erect his territories into a realm and to create him monarch of his own agglomerated possessions, welded into a new unity. This proposition wounded Charles keenly. He assured Sigismund8 (January 15, 1471) that his nomination as King of the Romans would never have occurred to him spontaneously. He had been assured that it was a darling project of the emperor, and he had simply been willing to please him, etc. As to a kingdom of his own, he refused the proposition with actual disdain.
Then various suitors for the hand of Mary of Burgundy appeared on the scene successively. To Nicholas of Calabria, Duke of Lorraine, grandson of old King René of Anjou, she was formally betrothed.9
"My cousin, since it is the pleasure of my very redoubtable seigneur and father, I promise you that, you being alive, I will take none other than you and I promise to take you when God permits it." So wrote Mary with her own hand on June 13, 1472, at Mons. On December 3d, she declared all such pledges revoked as though they never had been made, and Nicholas, too, formally renounced his pretensions to her hand.
There were several moments when Charles of France had appeared to be very near acceptance as Mary's husband, and several other princes seemed eligible suitors. Doubtless her father found his daughter very valuable as a means of attracting friendship. Doubtless, too, as Commines says, he was not anxious to introduce any son-in-law into his family. His fortieth year was only completed in 1473, and he was by no means ready to range himself as an ancestor.
At successive times the negotiations between Charles and Frederic were ruptured only to be renewed on some slightly different basis. Threaded together they made a story fraught with interest for Louis XI., and one that, very probably, he had an opportunity to hear. Up to August, 1472, it is a safe inference that Philip de Commines was fully cognisant of the propositions and counter-propositions, the understandings and misunderstandings, the private letters of, as well as the interviews with, the accredited Austrian envoys that appeared at one Burgundian camp after another. Probably there was nothing more valuable in the store of learning carried by the astute historian from his first patron to his second than all this fund of confidential miscellany.
It seems a fair surmise that Louis XI. enjoyed immensely the delightful private view into his rival's dreams, the disappointments and rehabilitation of his shattered visions. The relation would have made him not only fully aware of the reasons why Charles was diverted from his hot pursuit of the Somme towns, but thoroughly informed as to the great obstacles lying in the path which the duke hoped to travel. Naturally, the king was quite willing to rest assured that ruin was inevitable. If his rival were disposed to wreck himself rashly on German shoals, the king was equally disposed to be an acquiescent onlooker and to spare his own powder.
On his part, Charles was wholly unconscious of the extent of his loss of prestige within the French realm in 1472. There had been other periods when the king had appeared triumphant over his aspiring nobles only to be again checked by their alliance. In the radical change undergone by the feudatories after Guienne's death and Brittany's reconciliation, there was, however, no opening left for the Duke of Burgundy's re-entry as a French political leader. It was this definitive cessation of his importance that Charles failed to recognise. Confident that his star was rising in the east he did not note the significance of its setting in the west. Thereupon the situation was,—Charles, believing that his plans were his own secret, versus Louis, fully advised of those plans and alert to all incidents of the past, present, and future in a fashion impossible to the duke in his absorbed contemplation of his own prospects, blocking the scope of his view.
With the emperor's congratulations at the duke's accession to Guelders, and his offers to invest him with the title, were coupled intimations that it was an opportune moment to resume consideration of an alliance between the Archduke Maximilian and Mary of Burgundy. The duke accepted the new overtures, and Rudolf de Soulz and Peter von Hagenbach proceeded to the Burgundian and Austrian courts respectively, as confidential envoys to discuss the marriage.10
Charles was far more gracious to De Soulz than he had been to the last imperial messenger, the Abbé de Casanova, who had restricted his proposals to Mary's fortunes and ignored her father's. The duke had no intention of permitting any conference to proceed on that line. He was explicit as to his requisitions. De Soulz was surprised by a gift of ten thousand florins, explained by the phrase, "because Monseigneur recognised the love and affection borne him by the said count." That was a simple retainer. Other benefits, offices, and estates were conferred, to take effect on the day when Monseigneur was named King of the Romans.
The instructions to Hagenbach were definite, covering the ground of those previously mentioned, issued in 1470. He was, however, especially enjoined to assure Frederic that the duke did not require his abdication. He would be content to step into the shoes naturally vacated by his death.
The final suggestion resulting from these parleyings was that an interview between the two principals would be far more satisfactory than any further interchange of messages. It was not only a propitious time for a conference, but it was necessary. The ceremony of investiture of the duke into his latest acquired fief made it evidently imperative that he should visit the emperor. And to preparations for that event, Charles turned his attention, now absolutely confident that the outcome must be to his satisfaction. He had as little comprehension of the character of the man with whom he was to deal as he had of Louis XI. The choice of a place caused some difficulty, each prince preferring a locality near his own frontier. Metz was selected and abandoned on account of an epidemic. Finally Trèves was appointed for the important occasion, and Frederic sent official invitations to the princes of the empire to follow him thither in October.