The King and Queen were again in residence at the Castle of Tarascon in 1443, and there, on February 2, they received an imposing mission from the Duke of Burgundy, headed by Guillaume Harancourt, Bishop of Verdun, the Seigneurs Pierre de Beauprémont and Adolphe de Charny, with Antoine de Gaudel, the Duke’s principal secretary. They came to Tarascon to negotiate a marriage between the Duke’s nephew, Charles de Borugges, son of Philippe, Count of Nevers, and the Princess Margaret. This bridegroom expectant had been very much in the matrimonial market before accepting the choice of his uncle. His first fiancée was Jeanne, daughter of Robert, Count de la Marche; she gave place to Anne, Duchess of Austria; and she in turn was passed over before the greater charms of the Angevine Princess. The contract of betrothal with Pierre de Luxembourg was cancelled, and Charles de Nevers was the choice of René and Isabelle.
The date for signing the marriage contract was fixed, February 4, and to all the articles the King and Queen readily assented. The dowry was 50,000 livres, but how that large sum was to be raised neither René nor Isabelle had the slightest idea; they had exhausted their exchequer in the fruitless fight for Naples. The Duke of Burgundy, acting as next of kin to the bridegroom-elect, promised to settle a jointure of 40,000 livres on Margaret. René had put forward a plea that the Duke should forego 80,000 écus d’or, which was due on loans, and Philippe agreed, receiving as further security and indemnity to the towns of Neufchâteau, Preny, and Longwy,—already in pawn to him,—the Castles of Clermont, Varennes, and Renne, all in Argonne. A secret clause was, however, at the eleventh hour foisted upon the Angevine Sovereigns—a proceeding quite in accordance with the proverbial cunning of the Court of Burgundy. It stipulated that the children of Charles and Margaret should be heirs-presumptive of Sicily-Anjou-Provence, Lorraine, and Bar, to the exclusion of the issue of Ferri and Yolande de Vaudémont.
The judicial mind of King René would not let his consent to this article be recorded until he had consulted both the Count de Vaudémont and King Charles of France. The former indignantly interviewed the Duke of Burgundy, and stated his determination to oppose the proposed marriage. Charles resented the stipulation upon the ground of its injustice, and warned his brother-in-law not to agree to any such proposals. The marriage contract was not signed, and, whilst acrimonious negotiations were carried on both at Dijon and Vienne, another and a very much more illustrious suitor of the hand of Princess Margaret appeared upon the scene, no less a person than Henry VI., King of England and France.
When the matter was first mooted, it was thought nothing of by the King and Queen of Sicily, because Henry had been all but betrothed to Isabelle, the daughter of the Count of Armagnac, to whom he owed so very much in earlier days. Indeed, the gossip went so far as to link the English King’s name in turn with all three daughters of the Count—the loveliest girls in France: “Three Graces of Armagnac” they were called. Henry had sent his favourite painter, Hans of Antwerp, to paint the three comely sisters, and his handiwork was so acceptable to the royal young bachelor that he sat and gazed at them for long, changing the order of their arrangement to see which face of the beauteous three made the most passionate appeal. The Armagnac marriage was backed by all the influence of the Duke of Gloucester, the younger of the King’s uncles, and lately Lord Protector of England.
What drew Margaret of Anjou into the orbit of Henry of England was that she had gone on a visit to her aunt, Queen Marie of France, and had at the French Court created quite a sensation. She was nearly fourteen years of age, and gave fascinating indications of those charms of mind and person which made her “the most lovely, the best-educated, and the most fearless Princess in Christendom.”
Cardinal Beaufort was also a visitor at King Charles’s castle at Chinon, and was immensely moved by Margaret’s appearance and accomplishments. He also detected her latent strength of character, and certain traits therein which marked her unerringly as the counterfoil of his royal pupil and master’s mental and moral weaknesses. The Cardinal returned to England full of the charms of the young Princess, and descanted upon them so enthusiastically to the King that Henry was in a perfect fever to behold the beauteous Princess for himself. His amorous appetite was further stimulated by conversations he quite accidentally had with one Jules Champchevier, a prisoner of war on parole from Anjou, lodging with Sir John Falstaff, in attendance upon the King. Champchevier was sent off to Saumur to obtain, if possible, a portrait of the bewitching young Princess. The King wished her to be painted quite simply and naturally “in a plain kirtle, her face unpainted, and her hair in coils.” He required information about “her height, her form, the colour of her skin, her hair, her eyes, and what size of hand she hath.”
Champchevier was taken prisoner on landing in France, and threatened with death for breaking his parole whilst executing the royal commission; but news reaching Charles VII. of the unfortunate fellow’s predicament, he laughed heartily at the situation when he learned the reason of his mission, and forthwith ordered his release. The idea of a matrimonial contract between his royal rival and his royal niece opened His Majesty’s eyes to possibilities created thereby of a satisfactory peace between the two countries. Once more,—and how many times before and since!—a royal maiden’s heart contained the key to great political issues.
The portrait was painted exactly to order—perhaps, and quite correctly, with a little artistic embellishment. The beauty of Nature is always enhanced by the decorative features of art. Henry was charmed with the sweet face he gazed and gazed upon, quite putting into the shade the other reigning beauties of his heart. He was himself as comely as might be, just four-and-twenty, highly educated, his mind unusually refined. In thought and deed he was pure and devout, and very shy of strange women. Upon the latter head he was emphatic, for when at Court or elsewhere he beheld women with open bosoms à l’Isabeau de Bavière he was shocked, and turned away his face, muttering: “Oh fie! oh fie! ye be much to blame!” His earnest wish was marriage, not concubinage. The King’s choice very soon became noised abroad, and the Court became agitated and divided. The Duke of Gloucester, the King’s next of kin and heir-presumptive to the throne, championed the Armagnac match, whilst Cardinal Beaufort and the Earl of Suffolk decided for Margaret of Anjou.
There was, however, an obstacle in the way, quite consistently with the proverbial rugged course of all true love; the Count of Nevers refused to release his fiancée. He was prepared, he averred, to cancel the contentious clause in the marriage contract, made at Tarascon, and not to insist upon anything derogatory to the dignity of King René and his elder daughter, the Countess Ferri de Vaudémont. The prospect to René of such an auspicious union, however, which would place his daughter upon one of the greatest of European thrones, was too dazzling to be ignored, and the outcome of the imbroglio was the assembling in January, 1444, of a mixed Commission, representing England, France, Anjou, and Burgundy, at Tours, whereat two protocols were framed: a treaty for a two years’ peace, and a marriage agreement between the King of England and the Princess of Anjou. This was signed on May 28 of the same year. The marriage contract thus drawn out was very favourable to the House of Sicily-Anjou: Henry asked for no dowry, but required only the rights transmitted to King René by Queen Yolande with respect to the kingdom of Minorca. Henry further agreed to the retrocession of Le Mans and other points in Anjou held by the English.
To the Earl of Suffolk, the leading English plenipotentiary, was mainly due the successful issue of the conference. Henry created him Marquis and Grand Seneschal of the Royal Household. The King furthermore despatched to him an autograph letter to the following effect: “As you have lately, by the Divine favour and grace, in our name, and for us, engaged verbally the excellent, magnificent, and very bright Margaret, the second daughter of the King of Sicily, and sworn that we shall contract marriage with her, we consent thereto, and will that she be conveyed to us over the seas at our expense.” Arrangements were forthwith made for the immediate marriage of the Princess. Suffolk,—one of the handsomest and most cultivated men of the day, though now verging on fifty years of age,—headed a majestic embassy to Nancy, where the Sicily-Anjou Court was in residence. He bore with him a dispensation from his royal master to act as his proxy at the nuptial ceremony, and to receive in his name the hand of his fascinating bride. It was indeed a notable function, and held in the ancient cathedral of Tours, whereat all that was royal, noble, brave, and beautiful, forgathered. The witnesses for Margaret were the King and Queen of France, the King and Queen of Sicily-Anjou, and the Duke and Duchess of Calabria, with the Dauphin Louis. The Princess’s supporters were the Duke of Alençon, the most gallant and most accomplished Prince in France, and the Marquis of Suffolk, the premier noble of England. Upon the latter’s consort, the clever Marchioness, devolved the duties of Mistress of the Robes.