THE LOUVRE FROM THE HÔTEL DE NESLE.
During this year one Salmon, a gentleman of the household of the Queen of England, who had gone with her to that country on her marriage, arrived with letters from King Richard, who wished to send the King and Queen of France news of the welfare and happiness of their daughter. Charles and Isabeau, delighted to hear about her, received the messenger with great honour. Richard appears to have felt some uneasiness at the friendship between Henry, son of the Duke of Lancaster, and the Duc d’Orléans. For Henry of Lancaster was already his secret enemy and dangerous rival, and the Duc d’Orléans was extremely powerful and ambitious; the Venetians sent ambassadors to him, and European princes appealed to him as to an independent sovereign. Year after year the dissension grew deeper between him and his uncle of Burgundy, who persisted in retaining the regency, which Louis declared ought to be his, during the King’s frequent attacks of insanity.
The year 1399 was an unfortunate one in every way. Troubles and dangers were beginning to gather in England, threatening the safety of Richard and Isabelle, and causing the greatest anxiety to the King and Queen of France. In March and April there were great floods. The Seine overflowed the whole country and destroyed the seeds, so that the crops were ruined and the country made so unhealthy that the plague began again. For eight days a dreadful comet flamed in the sky, which every one said foreboded evil.[186]
Henry of Lancaster, Earl of Hereford and Derby, had become Duke of Lancaster through his father’s death, and having been exiled for treasonable practices by King Richard was spending some months at the French court. Richard seized the duchy of Lancaster and wrote to the King of France, complaining of the disloyalty of Henry and begging him not to consent to his marriage with Marie, daughter of the Duc de Berry, who, though only twenty-three, was a widow for the second time, and would have brought him great riches and powerful alliances.[187]
The Duc de Berry was quite willing to agree to the marriage, but Charles spoke to the Duke of Burgundy, who, when Henry, still called Earl of Derby, took occasion, the King, princes, and court being assembled, to speak of the matter, said in the name of the King: “Cousin, we cannot give our cousin to a traitor.” Henry replied indignantly that he was no traitor, and defied any one who should call him so; whereupon Charles, who really liked him, and besides was weak and confused with illness, softened the refusal by assuring him that the words of his uncle of Burgundy were inspired by England, and that no one in France doubted his honour. That as to the marriage, it could be spoken of another time, but first it was necessary that he should be invested with his duchy of Lancaster. After which wine and dessert (épices) were served and the subject dropped.[188] Henry of Lancaster, who was crafty enough, succeeded in deluding and making friends with the King and princes, even gaining over the Duke of Burgundy; and then returned to England.
The plague grew worse and worse; so fatal was the epidemic that it was forbidden at Paris to publish the lists of the dead. The court moved for a time into Normandy, there were litanies, sermons, and processions, but as the monk of St. Denis says, “many abbeys were nearly depopulated, though the abbey of St. Denis only lost one brother, who passed without doubt to the abode of the blessed.” The plague was about in the country for two years.
Disquieting reports were brought from England to the French coast by some merchants of Bruges.[189] It was rumoured that a revolution had taken place, that King Richard had been deposed, and that both he and the young queen were in captivity. The King and Queen of France were in the deepest anxiety about their daughter and nobody could tell what had happened (which is a strange reflection, in this, the five-hundredth year after these events). The court returned to the capital, and suddenly all Paris was thrown into excitement by the news that the Dame de Coucy, grande-maitresse to the Queen of England, had arrived unexpectedly at her family hôtel. Directly Charles heard of it he rushed to the hôtel de Coucy to see her. He found her in great alarm and dismay, having been banished from England, and all that she told him of the dethronement, imprisonment, and danger of his son-in-law and the captivity of his daughter so distressed and incensed him that although he had been rather unusually well for some little time, he fell into a frenzy of madness which for the present rendered him incapable of doing anything.[190]
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The astonishment and anger of all the French princes at these events knew no bounds. They cursed the insolent London burghers who had dared to rebel against their King, were furious with Henry of Lancaster, of whose resistance to Richard they had never contemplated such a result; and tried to stir up against him the inhabitants of the remaining English possessions in France, but without success; for although attached to Richard, who was born at Bordeaux, the inhabitants of Bordeaux, Bayonne, &c., were so much better governed, less taxed, and more prosperous than their French neighbours that they declined to exchange the English for the French rule.
The people of Paris, discontented and uneasy at the King’s illness and the various misfortunes that kept happening, bethought themselves that they never saw anything of the Dauphin, who was delicate and did not appear much in public. They therefore insisted on his being shown to them, and his uncles, in consequence, made him ride through Paris to St. Denis, attended by a cortège of nobles. There was a state banquet there, and the people, delighted with the Dauphin and the splendid pageant, thronged the whole way, singing hymns and litanies, and praying for the little lad who rode in state for the first and last time as the heir of France.[191]