Heroines of the Crusades

by C. A. Bloss

CHAPTER IV.

“I’ll hang my harp on the willow-tree, And off to the wars again; My peaceful home has no charms for me, The battle-field no pain.”

Convinced by the crusade of the children that the spirit which had moved the former expeditions to the Holy Land was still active in Europe, Pope Innocent exclaiming, “While we sleep these children are awake,” determined once more to arm the Christian world against the Moslem. The commands of the Vatican calling upon men to exterminate the Infidel were hurled upon every part of Europe. In a circular letter to sovereigns and clergy the pope declared that the time had at last arrived when the most happy results might be expected from a confederation of the Christian powers.

Count la Marche was among the first to hear and obey the mandate of the spiritual head. With the Duke of Nevers he commanded the French croises that in 1215 sailed for Egypt, where he was actively engaged in the Holy warfare when Isabella visited Valence. The siege of Damietta was carried on with the usual atrocities. Tidings of the death of Saphadin weakened the forces of the garrison, and Camel, younger son of Elsiebede, lord of the fertile country of the Nile, was compelled to seek refuge in Arabia. The first success of the crusaders was followed by disaster and discord; and when after a siege of seventeen months Damietta was taken, they found in pestilence and famine more terrible foes than in the sixty thousand Moslems that had perished beneath their swords.

Queen Isabella was seated in her former apartment in the castle of Valence describing to her daughter the person of the young King of England and his noble brother the Prince Richard, and painting to the imagination of the child the charms of the infant Princess Isabella, when the horn of the warder rang out shrill and clear on the evening air. The window of the turret commanded the view of the drawbridge. From that window where, eighteen years before, Isabella had watched with delight for the return of her gay knightly lover, she now beheld with palpitating heart the advance of a jaded, weary troop, at whose head rode one whose proud crest drooped as though the inspiration of hope had ceased to animate the warrior-frame, and the heart bereft of the blissful fervor of love no longer anticipated the sweet guerdon of his lady’s smile. A tide of recollections swept over her spirit; dizzy and faint she sank upon a seat in the embrasure of the window, and veiled her agitation in the curtaining drapery. She heard his tread upon the stair, no longer the elastic step that she had been wont to welcome with the sportive gaiety of a heart free from care; the door was thrown open, her daughter with bounding footstep so like her own in former days, flew to meet him as he entered. She saw the childish fingers unlace the helmet, unbind the gorget, unbelt the sword, and lay aside the armor. The form of the warrior was slightly bent, there were furrows upon the sunburnt cheek, deep lines upon the noble brow, and threads of silver among his dark locks. A heavy sigh was the first salutation of his little bride. He drew the fair girl to him and pressed his lip upon her cheek, but the anxious observer saw that the look and the smile were the expression rather of paternal regard than of lover like fondness; they were not such as had lighted up his countenance and kindled in his eyes when with gleesome alacrity she had rendered him the same gentle service. Her agitation subsided, and when the little Joanna took the hand of the Count la Marche, and led him forward to present him to her mother, she received his embarrassed greeting with the stately courtesy of a queen and the dignity of a woman. The marvellous beauty that won for Isabella the appellation of the “Helen of the middle ages” soon eclipsed the infant graces of the princess, and reinstated her in the heart once all her own. We accordingly find in the records of the year 1220, that “Isabella, Queen Dowager of England, having before crossed the seas, took to her husband her former spouse, the Count of Marche, in France, without leave of the king, her son, or his council.”

Notwithstanding this romantic change in their relations, Joanna continued to reside at the castle of Valence, under the care of the gallant count, who remained her steady friend and protector. She was of infinite service to her parents and her country. The English were greatly incensed at the marriage of Isabella, and the council of the regency withheld her jointure as the widow of John, and neither the representations nor threats of her valiant husband could induce them to repair the wrong. A war soon after occurred between England and Scotland, and Alexander II., the chivalric descendant of Maude, declared that he could not trust the strength of a political treaty without the bond of a union with the royal family of England. King Henry therefore despatched a messenger with an affectionate letter to his mother, demanding the restoration of his sister. Count la Marche refused to resign the guardianship of his lovely step-daughter until the dower of his wife should be restored. The young king had then recourse to Pope Honorius III., traducing his mother and her husband in no measured terms, and praying him to lay upon them the ban of excommunication. By a process almost as tedious as the present “law’s delays,” the pope investigated the affair, till Alexander becoming impatient, Henry was glad to accommodate the matter by paying up the arrears of his mother’s dower. The little princess was then sent to England, and married to Alexander II., at York, 1221. She was a child of angelic beauty and sweetness, and though only eleven years of age, had thus twice stopped a cruel war. The English styled her Joan Makepeace.

The domestic bliss of Count Hugh and Isabella was less exquisite than might have been anticipated from the constancy of his love, and the romantic revival of her attachment: nor did the birth and education of eight beautiful children concentrate their affections or afford sufficient scope for their ambitious aspirations. Differences constantly arose between the King of France and her son Henry, and it was often the duty of her husband to fight in behalf of Louis, his liege lord, against her former subjects of Aquitaine. It was her sole study, therefore, to render French Poitou independent of the King of France. She “was a queen,” she said, “and she disdained to be the wife of a man who had to kneel before another.” Causes of mortification on this point were constantly occurring. Count la Marche sought to obviate the difficulty by allying his family with the blood royal. He offered his eldest daughter in marriage to the brother of the French king, but the prince refused her, and gave his hand to Jane of Toulouse. On this occasion the king made his brother Count of Poictiers, and thus it became necessary for Count Hugh and his haughty wife to fill the rôle of honor, and do homage to the young couple as their suzerains. From this time forward the unfortunate count found that the only way to secure domestic peace was to make perpetual war upon the dominions of his sovereign. As a good soldier and a loyal knight who hangs his hopes upon a woman’s smile, he perseveringly followed the dangerous path till he was utterly dispossessed of castle and patrimony, feudatory and vassal. There remained then no resource but to cast themselves upon the charity of the good king. The repentant count first despatched his eldest son to the camp of Louis, and encouraged by the gracious reception of the youth, soon followed with the remainder of his family. The monarch compassionated their miserable situation, and granted to his rebellious subject three castles on the simple condition of his doing homage for them to Alphonso, Count of Poictiers. After this humiliating concession, Count Hugh was disposed to dwell in quietness: but the restless spirit of Isabella was untamed by disaster. The life of King Louis was twice attempted, and the assassins being seized and put to the torture, confessed that they had been bribed to the inhuman deed by the dowager Queen of England. Alarmed for the consequences, she fled for safety to the abbey of Fontevraud, where, says a contemporary chronicler, “She was hid in a secret chamber, and lived at her ease, though the Poictevins and French considering her as the cause of the disastrous war with their king, called her by no other name than Jezebel, instead of her rightful appellation of Isabel.” Notwithstanding the disgrace and defeat that Count Hugh had suffered, no sooner was the fair fame of his wife attacked than he once more girded on his sword and appealed to arms to prove the falsehood of the accusation upon the body of Prince Alphonso. Little inclined to the fray, Alphonso declared contemptuously, that the Count la Marche was so “treason-spotted” it would be disgrace to fight with him. Young Hugh, the son of Isabella, then threw down the gage in defence of his mother’s reputation, but the cowardly prince again declined, alleging that the infamy of the family rendered the young knight unworthy so distinguished an honor.

The last interview between Hugh de Lusignan, Count la Marche, and Isabella of Angoulême, ex-Queen of England, took place in the general reception room in the convent of Fontevraud. The dishonored noble sought his wife to acquaint her with the ruin of all their worldly prospects and the stain upon their knightly escutcheon. The last tones that he heard from those lips that once breathed tenderness and love were words of indignant upbraiding and heart-broken despair. All his attempts at consolation were repulsed with cruel scorn. She tore herself violently from his last fond embrace, sought again the secret chamber and assumed the veil, and for three years sister Felice, most inaptly so named, was distinguished among the nuns by her lengthened penances and multiplied prayers.

The land of his nativity no longer possessed any attractions for the bereaved and disappointed count. All the associations of his youth became sources of painful reflection, and anxious to escape from the scenes where every familiar object was but a monument of a buried hope, he determined to share the crusade which St. Louis was preparing against the Infidel. He fell, covered with wounds and glory in one of the eastern battles, fighting beside his old antagonist Alphonso Count of Poictiers.