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.
Margaret's correspondents included most of the sovereigns of Europe and their various ambassadors. Besides the personages already mentioned, we come across the names of Raulin, Carondelet, Alberto Pio, the Cardinal of Gurk, Caulier, and Laurent de Gorrevod, to whose conferences and intrigues we are introduced, and sometimes to the snares they laid for their best friends. Amongst them we find André de Burgo, Maximilian's 'faithful councillor' and ambassador in France, whose despatches to Malines are masterpieces of finesse and diplomacy. The pages in which he describes the events of which Julius II. is the hero are full of interest. In a witty and delightful manner he records the ambitions, cabals, and various factions which hastened the end of this warrior pontiff who was 'always dying but never buried.' He frequently announces that the Holy Father is the victim of a violent fever, and that the doctors hardly hope to save him—it is whispered that he will be 'in paradise before a year and a half is out.' The Cardinals prepare to 'choose a good and holy Pope,' but before they can do so, the dying Pope recovers, or at least he is 'so much better that he thinks himself cured and has lost his fever.'
Then there is André de Burgo's successor, Chancellor Perrenot, the father of Cardinal de Granvelle. Also the Granvelles' enemy, Mercurin de Gattinare, a skilled diplomatist and picturesque writer. More than once we read of his reminding Margaret of the respect she owes him, and he tells her, not without pride, that she does not deserve to have a servant like himself, and when she gave him some unmerited rebuke, he replied: 'These words should be addressed to a stranger and an unknown man, not to me, whom you have known and tried.'
In Margaret's time Malines was a flourishing commercial city, whose manufactures were exported to all parts of Europe. Commerce, industries, and navigation had made great progress under her wise rule. Her palace was the centre of life in the old city and the meeting-place of many illustrious families and learned men who came from all parts of the Netherlands to visit her Court. Jean Second, Erasmus, Cornelius Agrippa, Jean Lemaire, Mabuse, Coxcie, and Van Orley were amongst her frequent guests.
One of her chief ladies was the Countess of Hochstrate, who had charge of her maids of honour and the women of her household. Her husband, Count Hochstrate, was the princess's chevalier d'honneur, and commanded her bodyguard of twenty-seven noblemen, whose duty it was to attend her wherever she went. He also was in charge of the stewards, cooks, pastrycooks, bakers, cupbearers, carvers and the other servants, besides the keeper of Prince Charles's lions and rare birds, so that his post was no sinecure.
Margaret took great pride in keeping up an establishment worthy of her rank. She lived in great luxury, and her table was always furnished with the choicest wines, and every kind of fish, fowl, and game in its season. In spite of her habitual melancholy, she took part in the usual amusements of her time. We read of her attending many feasts, dances, and jousts; and it was seldom she did not have music during her meals, either fife, tambourin, or violin players, or sometimes the choristers of Notre-Dame de Sablon, or Monsieur de Ravestein's singers, who played and sang songs before her. Another day we read of her watching the performance of 'two large and powerful bears' brought by some strolling Hungarian players; or sitting in the vast hall, silent and dreamy, listening to old airs of German minstrelsy.
Maximilian occasionally visited his daughter, and then Malines was en fête. Sometimes he invited his young granddaughters to spend a few days with him at Brussels, 'to see the park and enjoy themselves.'[42]
But Margaret's favourite occupation was superintending the education of her nephew Charles. She had a wonderful aptitude for teaching, and was not satisfied that he should excel in manly sports, which was usually all that was required of princes, but she insisted on his studying history, languages, and science. She also found time for more domestic employments. From the letters we find that she spun flax, and amongst the objects mentioned in her inventory are a spindle, distaff, and winding reels. She was accustomed to work with her needle, and once she surprised her father by sending him 'good linen shirts,' which she had made herself, and Maximilian, delighted with this present, hastened to thank her: 'I have received by this bearer some beautiful shirts and "huves" which you have helped to make with your own hand, with which I am delighted.... Our skin will be comforted with meeting the fineness and softness of such beautiful linen, such as the angels in Paradise use for their clothing.' Margaret also sent her father receipts for various dishes which pleased her, and we find her recommending him to eat some preserves during the heat of summer which she has tried herself and found excellent. 'I have a good apothecary,' she says, 'called Countess de Horne, who takes care to supply me every year with the best preserves in the world, which she makes with her own hands, and as I find them good, it seems to me that you will also, even in this great heat.'
Margaret took much interest in her maids of honour, and when necessary did not spare them either advice or punishment. She warned them especially to avoid gossiping or foolish conversation. During the long winter evenings she played chess, or when summer came with long fine days, she rode with them through the forests of Scheplaken, Groenendael, and Boisfort, followed by her greyhounds. If one of her maids married, Margaret took care to prepare the trousseau. Sometimes she put aside a certain sum for this purpose from her privy purse, and often begged a post from Maximilian for the girl's future husband. Thus she dowered and provided for many maidens whose names are mentioned in the Archives of Lille.
As a rule, Margaret and her father treated each other with the greatest confidence. Maximilian took a fatherly interest in whatever concerned his daughter's happiness. He would like to have seen her married to Henry VII., for then, as he said, she would not have been 'a person lost and forgotten.' Sometimes he made her small presents, 'a carbuncle which his father the Emperor Frederick had valued,' or a haunch of venison off which she could 'feast at some dinner or supper.' On another occasion he sent her the plan of a triumphal arch before 'having it erected, so that it might remain for ever as a monument to their perpetual glory.'