May, 1509] A SFORZA DUKE
The education of Charles and his sisters was the subject of their guardian's most anxious consideration. A lady of Navarre, Dame Anne de Beaumont, took charge of the little girls from their infancy, and watched over them with a tenderness which earned their lifelong gratitude. The old King of Aragon rewarded this lady with the Order of S. Iago, while Margaret begged that she might be allowed to spend her old age in one of the Archduke's houses at Ghent, seeing that she had served "Mesdames mes nièces" so long and so well, and had been but poorly paid for her trouble. Among their teachers was Louis Vives, the learned friend of Erasmus, who afterwards became tutor to their cousin, the Princess Mary of England, and took Sir Thomas More's daughters as his models. Vives taught his pupils Greek and Latin, and made them study the Gospels, and St. Paul's Epistles, as well as some parts of the Old Testament. French romances, then so much in vogue, were banished from their schoolroom, and the only tales which they were allowed to read were those of Joseph and his brethren, of the Roman matron Lucretia, and the well-known story of Griselda. Madame Leonore was fond of reading at a very early age, but Madame Isabeau was more occupied with her dolls, and is represented holding one in her arms in the triptych of Charles and his sisters at Vienna. All the children were very fond of music, in which they were daily instructed by the Archduchess's organist, and there is a charming portrait of Eleanor playing on the clavichord in Monsieur Cardon's collection at Brussels. When, in 1508, the Spanish Legate, Cardinal Carvajal, visited Malines, Charles and his sisters were confirmed by him in the palace chapel, and the Archduke addressed a letter of thanks to Pope Julius II. in his childish round hand.
ELEANOR OF AUSTRIA, QUEEN OF PORTUGAL AND FRANCE
By Bernard van Orley (Cardon Collection)
To face p. [6]
Margaret was careful to provide her young charges with suitable companions. A niece of Madame de Beaumont and a Spanish girl of noble birth were brought up with the Archduchesses, while the sons of the Marquis of Brandenburg and Duke of Saxe-Lauenburg were among Charles's playmates. Another youth whom the Emperor sent to be educated at Malines in 1509 was his godson, Maximilian Sforza, the eldest son of the unfortunate Duke Lodovico and Beatrice d'Este. While his younger brother, Francesco, afterwards the husband of Christina of Denmark, remained at Innsbruck with his cousin, the Empress Bianca, Maximilian grew up with Charles, and throughout his life never ceased to regard Margaret as a second mother. The young Duke of Milan's name often figures in the Archduchess's correspondence with her father. One day Maximilian tells her to borrow 3,000 livres from the Fuggers, and give them to the Duke, who has not enough to buy his own clothes, let alone those of his servants.[4] At another time we find Margaret appealing to her father to settle the disputes of precedence which have arisen between the Dukes of Milan and Saxe-Lauenburg, upon which Maximilian replied that they were too young to think of such matters, and that for the present they had better take the place of honour on alternate days.
It was a free and joyous life which these young Princes and Princesses led at the Court of Malines. If they were kept strictly to their lessons, they also had plenty of amusements. They played games, shot with bows and arrows, and looked on at stag-hunts from the balcony of the Swan, an old hostelry in the market-place. Charles had a little chariot, drawn by two ponies, in which he often drove his sisters through the town and out into the open country. Above all they enjoyed the visits which they paid to the Castle of Vueren, near Brussels, where Charles often went by his grandfather's orders to enjoy fresh air and take hunting expeditions. The old Emperor was delighted to hear of his grandson's taste for sport, and wrote from Augsburg that, if the Archduke had not been fond of hunting, people would have suspected him of being a bastard.[5]