',i>:.-> itr: ,4.1'^^ ■■"7'; f^^''■ ';■ "■'. r.ijv'i'-*'. ':^i ^.ilA'i! uH^ii^S^^A'^^'T^- ■-^^^^1 '"^^M JOAN OF AUC. POPULAR History of France BY ./ CHARLOTTE M. YONGE AUTHOR OF "the HEIR OF REDCLYFFE, "BOOK OF GOLDEN DEEDS," ETC. AUG 30 1894 :/A J^/^WASH i^^"^ dCS^-T. m BOSTON ESTES AND LAURIAT PUBLISHERS Copyright, 1879, 1894, By Estes and Lauriat. -IS? John Wilson and Son, Cambridge, U.S.A. PREFACE. THESE Stories on the History of France are meant for cliildren perhaps a year older tlian those on the History of England. They try to put such facts as need most to be remembered in a comprehensible form, and to attach some real characteristic to each reign; though, in later political history, it is diflacult to translate the leading ideas into any- thing that can enter an intellect of seven or eight years old. The gentleman who, some time ago, recommended teaching history backwards from our own time, could never have prac- tically tried how much harder it is to make la C/iarte or the Keform Bill interesting to the childish mind, than how King Kobert fed the beggars or William Rufus was killed by an arrow. Early history is generally personal, and thus can be far more easily recollected than that which concerns the mul- titude, who are indeed everything to the philanthropist, but are nothing to the child. Even the popular fairy tale has its princes and princesses, and the wonder tale of history can only be carried on in the infant imagination by the like dramat't personce. CHARLOTTE M. YONGE. CONTENTS. CHAP, 1. — 2.— 3.— 4. — 5. — 6. — 7.— 8.— 9.~ 10. — 11.— The Old Kelts. B.C. 150 . The Roman Conquest. B.C. 67. a.d. 79 The Conversion of Gaul. 100 --400 The Frank Kuigdom. 450—533 The Long-haired Kings. 533—681 . Carl of the Hammer. 681 Carl the Great. 768 . The Carlings. 814—887 . The Counts of Paris. 887—987. Hugh Capet. 987—997 . Robert the Pious. 997—1031 Henry I. 1031—1060 Philip I. 1060—1108 Louis VI. Le Gros. 1108—1137 . Louis YII. The Young. 1137—1180 Philip H., Augustus. 1180—1223 . •The Albigenses. 1190 Louis VIII., The Lion. 1223—1223 -St. Louis IX. 1226 .... • Philip III. , The Hardy. 1271—1284 Philip IV., The Fair. 1284—1314 . Louis X., Hutin. 1314—1316 Philip v., Le Long. 1316—1322 Charles IV., Le Bel. 1322 Philip VI. 1350 19. —John. 1350—1364 .... (V.) 12. 13. 14. 15.— 16.— 17.— 18.— 108 185 n. CONTENTS. CHAP. 20.- 21.- 22.- 23.- 24.- 25.- 26.- 27." 28.- 29.- 30." 31.- 32. 33.- 34.- 35.- 36.- 37. 38.- 39.- 40. 41. 42. 43. 44. 45. 46. 47. 48. -Charles Y. 1364—1380 — Charles YI. 1380—1396 . — Burgundians and Armagnacs. 1415 — 1422 -Charles YII. 1422—1461 . -Louis XL 1461—1483 -Charles YIII. 1483—1498. -Louis XII. 1498—1515 . — Francis 1. Youth. 1515 — 1526 . -Francis I. Middle Age. 1526—1547 -Henry 11. 1547—1559 -Francis 11. 1559—1560 . Charles IX. 1560—1572 , -Charles IX. 1572—1574 . — Henry III. 1574 . . . -Henry lY. 1589—1610 — Louis XIIL 1610—1643 . — Louis XIY. Youth. 1643—1061 — Louis XIY. Middle Age. 1 061— 1688 — Louis XIY. Old Age. 1688—1715 -Louis XY. 1715—1774 -Louis XYI. 1774—1793 . — The Great French Revolution. 1792—1796 — Napoleon I. 1790—1814 . — Louis XYIII. 1814—1824 . — Charles X. 1824—1830 . — Louis Philippe. 1830—1848 — The Republic. 1848—1852 — The Second Empire. 1852—1870 The Siege of Paris. 1870—1871 — The Communists. 1871. PAGE. 209 218 227 237 '246 257 268 276 289 , 300 I 210 . 322 . 230 . 340 , 352 . 364 . 374 . 383 . 392 . 402 . 411 . 420 . 429 . 437 . 443 . 452 . 458 . 465 . 474 LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. -»♦•- Frontispiece. Keltic Tribe . H The Gauls in Rome . 15 Mounted Gauls .... 19 Roman Army in Gaul . 22 Yercingetorix surrenders to Caesar 27 Conversion of Gaul 32 Druid Sacrifice 39 Huns at Chalons 45 Death of Hlodimir's Children 51 The Meerwings > . 54 Arabs had Dec imped . 65 Charlemagne at the Head of his Arm y 70 Baptism of Saxons by Charlemagne 71 Death of Roland 75 School of the Palace . . 79 Barks of Northmen . . * 81 " He Shed Tears at the Sight " . 87 Northmen before Paris . 91 Count Eudes entering Paris . . 95 Knights and Peasants . 101 Coronation of Hugh Capet . 109 The Accolades . . 115 Crusaders' March lis Robert and The Poor . • • . 12? (vii.) vm» List of Illustrations, "God willethit" The Leaders of the First Crusade Louis the Fat on an Expedition Crusaders' Keturn Capture of Acre . . The Battle of Muret . Death of Louis .... Colonna Striking the Pope Edward III. doing Homage " Bade them look out at the Sea " "This Way, Father" . Murder of the Marshals . . • The Attack on Marcel . Laying the Keys on Du Gueslin's Bier " Thou art Betrayed " The Night before the Battle of A gin court Murder of the Duke of Burgundy . Joan of Arc .... Joan of Arc examined in Prison Louis XL Interview of Louis XI. and Charles the Bold Charles YIII. Crossing the Alps Meeting of Charles and Amie of Brittany Charles VIIL .... Chevalier Bayard going to the Wars Bayard knighting Francis I. . Francis I. at Marignano Death of Bayard Capture of Francis I. . Breaking of the Statue of the Virgin Mary Duke of Orleans and Charles V. Guise at Metz .... List of Illustrations, IX. PAGE. Death of Henry II. ..... . 30T Francis II. and Mary Stuart . . 311 Death of Francis II. . . . 315 Massacre of St. Bartholomew . . 325 Henry III. and Favorites . 331 Murder of Guise . 335 Henry IV. at Ivry . 341 Henry lY. and Ministers . 345 Henry becomes a Catholic . 347 Concini and Mary de Medicis. . 353 Louis VIII. and Albert de Luynes . . 357 Richelieu and Father Joseph . . 361 King and Cardinal . 364 Death of Cardinal Mazarin . 369 Louis XIV. in Cabinet . 371 Theatrical Representation . 374 Death of Turenne . 377 Louis XIV. presenting King . . 383 D^ath of Louis XIV. . . 389 Maria Leczinska . 393 Battle of Fontenoy . 397 French Chateau . 402 Louis XVI. .. . 403 Marat . . . 413 Tuileries . 423 Battle of Waterloo . . 431 Guizot .... • . . 447 Versailles . . . • * . 469 YOUNG FOLKS' HISTOKY OF FRANCK CHAPTER I. THE OLD KELTS. B.C. 150. I BEGAN the '' History of England " with Julius Caesar's landing in Britain, and did not try to tell you who the people were whom he found there, for I thought it Avould puzzle you ; but you are a little older now, and can understand rathei more. 11 12 Young Folks' History of France. You must learn that in the old times, before people wrote down histories, Europe was over- spread by a great people, whom it is convenient to call altogether the Kelts — fierce, bold, warrior people, who kept together in large families or clans, all nearly related, and each clan with a chief. The clans joined together and formed tribes, and the cleverest chief of the clans would lead the rest. They spoke a language nearly alike — the language which has named a great many rivers and hills. I will tell 3"0U a few. Ben or Pen means a hill. So we see that the Ap-pen-nine mountains were named by the Kelts. Again, Avon is a river. You know we have several Avons. Ren Avon meant the running river, and Rhine and Rhone are both the same word, differently pronounced. Sen Avon was the slow river — the Seine and Saone ; and Garr Avon was the swift river — the Garonne. There were two great varieties of Kelts- — the Gael and the Kjanry (you should call this word Kewmri) . The Gael were the tallest, largest, wildest, and fiercest, but they were not so clever as the black- eyed little Kymry. The Kymry geem to have been the people who had the Druid priests, who lived in groves of oak, and cut down mistletoe with golden knives ; and most likely they set up The Old KelU. 13 the wonderful circles of huge stones which seem to have been meant to worship in ; at least, wherever those stones are the Kymry have been. But we know little about them, as all their knowledge was in verse, which the Druids and bards taught one another by word . of mouth, and which was never \vritten down. All we do know is from their neighbors the Greeks and Romans, who thought them very savage, and were very much afraid of them, when every now and then a tribe set otit on a robbing expedition into the lands to the south. When the Kelts did thus come, it was generally because they were driven from their own homes. There were a still fiercer, stronger set of people behind them, coming from the east to the west; and when the Kelts found that they could not hold their own against these people, they put their wives and children into wagons^ made of wood or wicker work, collected their oxen, sheep, and goats, called their great shaggy hounds, and set forth to find new homes. The men had long streaming hair and beards, and wore loose trousers of woollen, woven and dyed in checks by the women — tartan plaids, in fact. The chiefs always had gold collars round their necks, and they used round wicker shields, long spears, and heavy swords, and they 14 Young Folks' History of France. were very terrible enemies. When the country was free to the west, they went on thither, and generall}' settled down in a wood near a river, closing in their town with a wall of trunks of trees and banks of earth, and setting up their hovels within of stone or wood. But if other clans whom they could not beat were to the west of them, they would turn to the south into Greece or Italy, and do great damage there. One set of them, in very old times, even manao-ed to make a home in the middle of Asia Minor, and it was to their descendants that St. Paul wrote his Epistle to the Galatians. Another great troop, under a very mighty Bran, or chief, who, in Latin, is called Brennus, even broke into the great city of Rome itself. All the women and children of Rome had been sent away, and only a few brave men remained in the strong place called the Capitol, on the top of the steepest hill. There they stayed for seven months, while the Bran and his Gauls kept the city, drank up the wine in the long narrow jars, and drove in the pale-colored, long-horned oxen from the meadow land round. The Bran never did get into the Capitol, but the Romans were obliged to pay him a great sum of money before he would go away. However, this aimimiiuiuuniuiinjimmiy;' '4!iy,-=S '^? ^'^>M y 1 -^^^ THE GAU1,S IX HOME. The Old Kelts. 17 belongs to the history of Rome, and I only mean further to say, that the tribe who came with him stayed seventeen j^ears in the middle parts of Italy before they were entirely beaten. When the Kelts were beaten and saw there was no hope, they generally came within the enclosure they had made with their wagons, and slew their wives and chil- dren, set fire to everything, and then killed them- selves, that they might not be slaves. All the north part of Italy beyond the River Po was filled with Kelts, and there were many more of them beyond the Alps. So it came about that from the word Gael the Romans called the north of Italy Gallia Cis-Alpina — Gauls on this side the Alps; and the country westward Gallia Trans-Alpina, or Gaul beyond the Alps, and all the people there were known as Gauls, whether they were Gael or Kymry. Now, far uj) in Gaul, in the high ground that divides the rivers Loire, Saone, and Rhine, there were rocks full of metal, tin, copper, and some- times a little silver. The clever sailors and mer- chants called Phoenicians found • these out, and taught the Gauls to work the mines, and send the metals in boats down the Rhone to the Mediterra- nean sea. There is a beautiful bay where Gaul 18 Youny Folks' History of France, touches the Mediterranean, and not only the Phoe- nicians found it out, but the Greeks. They came to live there, and built the cities of Marseilles, Nice, Antibes, and several more. Lovely cities the Greeks always built, with marble temples to their gods, pillars standing on steps, and gardens with statues in them, and theatres for seeing plays acted in the open air. Inside these towns and close round them everything was beautiful; but the Gauls who lived near learnt some Greek ways, and were getting tamed. They coined money, wrote in Greek letters, and bought and sold with the Greeks; but their wilder brethren beyond did not a]3prove of this, and whenever they could catch a Greek on his journey would kill him, rob him, or make him prisoner. Sometimes, indeed, they threatened to rob the cities, and the Greeks bes-fred ' DO the Romans to protect them. So the Romans sent an officer and an army, who built two new towns, Aix and Narbonne, and made war on the Gauls, who tried to hinder him. Then a messenger was sent to the Roman camp. He was an immensely tall man, with a collar and bracelets of gold, and beside him came a bard singing the jDraises of his clan, the Arverni. There were many other attend- ants; but his chief guards were a pack of immense MOirNTKP ir hel}>. Sonu^ wanted hv^lp heeause they were quarrelling with o[\wv tribes, and cUhtM's because the Germans behind them had squeezed a great tribe v'( Kynuy out oi the Alps, and they \\anted to eome down and make a settlement in Chiul. rlulius (^lesiu* made short w ork o( beating these new-eomers, and he beat the Cierruans who were also trN'ino' to oret Into (^aul. Then he expected all the Gauls to submit to him — not oidy those \\ ho Tned round the Trovinee, and had always been friendly to Rome, l>nt all the free ones in the north. He was one of the most AviMuh^rfnl si>ldiers who e\er lived. He gained lirst, all the east siih>. He subdued the Belga\ who li\ed between the Al}>s and the sea, all the Armorieans along the north, and then the still wilder people on the coast towards the Atlantic ocean. But while he was away in the north, the Gaulish chiefs in the south agreed that they WiUild make one great attenq^t to set their eouutry free from the enemy. They resolved all io rise at once, and The Roman Conquest, 25 put themselves under the command of the brave young mountain chief of the Arverni, from whom Auvergne was named. The Romans called his name Vercingetorix ; and as it really was even longer and harder to speak than tliis word, we wilJ all him so. He was not a wild shaggy savage like Bituitus, but a graceful, spirited chief, v/ho had been trained to Roman manners, and knew their ways of fighting. AH in one night the Gauls rose. Men stood on the hill-tops, and shouted from clan to clan to rise up in arms. It was the depth of winter, and Caesar was away resting in Italy; but back he came on the first tidings, and led his men over six feet of sn(nN', taking ever}- Gallic town by the way. Vercingetorix saw that the wisest thing for tlic Gauls to do would be to 1)urn and hiy waste tlic land themselves, so that the Romans might find nothing to eat. " It was sad," he said, " to see burning houses, ])ut worse to liave wife and chil- dren led into ca^jtivity." One city, that no\\ called B o urges, was left ; the inhabitants beseeched him on their knees to spare it ; and it seemed to be safe, for there was a river on one side and a bog oil all the rest, witli only one narrow road across. But in twenty-five days Caesar made his way in, 26 Young Folks' History of France, and slew all he found there ; and then he folio wee' Vercingetorix to his own hills of Auvergne, and fought a battle, the only defeat the great Romar captain ever met with ; indeed, he was obliged tu retreat from the face of the brave Arverni. They followed him again, and fought anotiier battle, in which he was in great danger, and was forced even to leave his sword in the hands of the Gauls, who hung it up in a temple in thanksgiving to their gods. But the Gauls were not so steady as they were brave ; they fled, and all Vercingetorix could do was to lead them to a great camp under the hill of Alesia. He sent horsemen to rouse the rest of Gaul, and shut himself up in a great enclosure with his men. Csesar and the Romans came and made another enclosure outside, eleven miles round, so that no help, no food could come to them, and they had only provisions for thirty days. Their friends outside did try to break through to them, but in vain ; they were beaten off ; and then brave Vercingetorix offered to give himself up to the Romans, provided the lives of the rest of the Gauls were spared. Caesar gave his word that this should be done. Accordingly, at the appointed hour the gates of the Gallic camp opened. Out came Ver- cingetorix in his richest armor, mounted on his The Roman Conquest, 29 finest steed. He galloped about, wheeled round once, then drawing up suddenly before Caesar's seat, sprang to the ground, and laid his sword at the victor's feet. Caesar was not touched. He kept a cold, stern face ; ordered the gallant chief into captivity, and kept hirn for six years, while finishing other conquests, and then took him to Rome, to walk in chains behind the car in which the victorious general entered in triumph, with all the standards taken from the Gauls displayed ; and then, with the other captives, this noble war- rior was put to death in the dark vaults under the hill of the Capitol. With Vercingetorix ended the freedom of Gaul. The Romans took possession of all the country, and made the cities like their own. The old clans were broken up. The fighting men were enlisted in the Roman army, and sent to fight as far away as possible from home, and the chiefs thought it an honor to be enrolled as Roman citizens ; they wore the Roman tunic and toga, spoke and wrote Latin, and, except among the Kymry of the far north- Avest, the old Gaulish tongue was forgotten. Very grand temples and amphitheatres still remain in the Province of Roman building, especially at Nismes, Aries, and Autun : and a huge acqueduct. 30 Young Folks'* History of France, called the Pont du Gard, still stands across a valley near Nismes, with 600 feet of three tier of arcades, altogether 160 feet high. Roads made as only Romans made them crossed hither and thither throughout the country, and, except in the wilder and more distant parts, to live in Gaul was very like living in Rome. After Julius Csesar, the Romans had Emperors at the Iiead of their state, and some of these were very fond of Gaul. But when the first tweh^e who had some connection with Julius were all dead, a Gaul named Julius Sabinus rose up and called himself Emperor. The real Emperor, chosen at Rome, named Vespasian, soon came and over- threw his cause, and hunted him to his country house. Flames burst out of it, and it was declared that Sabinus had burnt himself there. But no ; he was safely hidden in a cave in the woods. No one knew of it but his wife Eponina and one trusty slave, and there they lived together for nine years, and had two little sons. Eponina twice left him to go to Rome to consult her friends whether the}' could obtain a pardon for her husband; but Ves- pasian was a stern man, and they saw no hope, so she went back disappointed ; and the second time she -was watched and followed, and Sabinus was The Roman Conquest, St found. He was taken and chained, and carried to Rome, and she and her two boys came with him. She knelt before the Emperor, and besought his pardon, saying that here were two more to plead for their father. Tears came into Vespasian's eyes, but he would not forgive, and the husband and wife were both sentenced to die. The last thing Eponina said before his judgment-seat was, that it was better to die together than to be alive as such an Emperor. Her two boys were taken care of, and one of them lived long after in Greece, as far away from his home as possible. CHAPTER HI. THE CONVERSION OF GAUL. . A.D. 100-400. GAUL could not be free in her own way, but the truth that maketh free was come to her. The Druids, though their worship was cruel, had better notions of the true God than the Romans with their multitude of idols, and when they heard more of the truth, many of them gladly embraced 32 Tlie Conversion of Giaul. 33 it. The Province was so near Rome that very soon after the Apostles had reached the great city, they sent on to Gaul. The people in Provence believe tliat Lazarus and his two sisters came thither, but this is not likely. However, the first Bishop of Aries was Trophimus, and we may quite believe him to have been the Ephesian who was with St. Paul in his third journey, and was at Jerusalem with him when he was made prisoner. Trophimus brought a service-book with him very like the one that St. John the Evangelist had drawn up for the Churches of Asia. It was to Vienne, one of these Roman cities, that Pontius Pilate had been banished for his cruelty. In this town and in the larger one at Lyons there were manj^ Christians, and their bishop was Pothinus, who had been instructed by St. John. It was many years before the Gallic Chris- tians suffered any danger for their faith, not till the year 177, when Pothinus was full ninety years old. Then, under the Emperor Marcus Aurelius, a governor was sent to the Province who was resolved to put an end to Christianity. The difficulty was that there were no crimes of which to accuse the Christians. So he caused several slaves to be 34 Young Folks' History of France. seized and put to torture, while they were asked questions. There were two young girls among them, Blandina and Biblis. Blandina was a weak, delicate maiden, but whatever pain they gave her, she still said, "I am a Christian, and no evil is done among us." Biblis, however, in her fright and agony, said " Yes " to all her tormentors asked, and accused the Christians of killing babies, eating human flesh, and all sorts of horrible things. Afterwards she was shocked at herself, declared there was not a word of truth in what she had said, and bore fresh and worse torture bravely. The Christians were seized. The old bishop was dragged through the streets, and so pelted and ill- treated that after a few days he died in prison. The others Avere for fifteen days brought out before all the people in the amphitheatre, while every torture that could be thought of was tried upon them. All were, brave, but Blandina was the bravest of all. She did not seem to feel when she was put to sit on a red hot iron chair, but encour- aged her young brother through all. At last she was put into a net and tossed by a bull, and then, being found to be still alive, her throat was pierced, everyone declaring that never had woman endured ^o much. The persecution did not last much The Conversion of G-aul. 36 longer after this, and the bones of the martyrs were collected and buried, and a church built over them, the same, though of course much altered, which is now the Cathedral of Lyons. Instead of the martyred Pothinus, the new bishop was Irenaeus, a holy man who left so many writings that he is counted as one of the Fathers of the Church. Almost all the townsmen of Lyons became Christians under his wise persuasion and good example, but the rough people in the country were much less easily reached. Indeed, the word pagan, which now means a heathen, was only the old Latin word for a peasant or villager. In the 3^ear 202, the Emperor Severus, who had himself been born at Lyons, put out an edict against the Chris- tians. The fierce Gauls in the adjoining country hearing of it, broke furiously into the city, and slaughtered every Christian they laid hands upon, St. Irenaeus among them. There is an old mosaic pavement in a church at Lyons where the inscrip- tion declares that nineteen thousand died in this massacre, but it can hardly be believed that the numbers were so large. The northerly parts of Gaul were not yet con- verted, and a bishop named Dionysius was sent to teach a tribe called the Parisii, whose chief city 36 Young Folks'^ History of France. was Lutetia, on the banks of the Seine. He was taken in the year 272, and was beheaded just out- side the walls on a hill which is still known as Mont Martie, the martyr's mount, and his name, cut short into St. Denys, became one of the most famous in all France. The three Keltic provinces, Gaul, Spain, and Britain, used to be put together under one governor, and the brave, kindly Constantius ruled over them, and hindered persecution as much as he could. His son Constantine was also much loved, and it was while marching to Italy with an army, in which were many Gauls, to obtain the empire, that Constantine saw the vision of a bright cross in the sky, surrounded by the words, "In this sign thou shalt conquer." He did conquer, and did confess himself a Christian two years later, and under him the Church of Gaul flourished. Gallic bishops were at the great council of Nicea, in Asia Minor, when the Nicene creed was drawn up, and many beautiful hymns for Christian worship were written in Gaul. After Constantine's death, his son Constantius fostered the false doctrine that the Nicene creed contradicted. He lived at Constantinople, and dressed and lived like an Eastern prince, and the The Conversion of G-aul. 37 Gauls were growing discontented ; more especially as the Franks — a terrible tribe of their Teuton enemies to the east — were trying to break into theii' lands. A young cousin of Constantius, named Julian, was sent to fight with them. He fixed his chief abode in a little island in the middle of the River Seine, at Lutetia, among his dear Parisii, as he called the tribe around, and thence he came out to drive back the Franks whenever they tried to attack the Gauls. He was a very brave, able man, but he had seen so much selfishness among the Christians in Rome and Constantinople, that he fancied their faults arose from their faith; and tried to be an old heathen again as soon as Con- stantius was dead, and he became emperor. He only reigned three years, and then, in the year 863, was killed in a war with the Persians. Very sad times followed his death. He was the last of his family, and several emperors rose and fell at Rome. The governor of Gaul, Maximus, called himself emperor, and, raising an arm}- in Britain, defeated the young man who had reigned at Rome in the year 881, and ruled the Keltic provinces for seven years. He was a brave soldier, and not wholly a bad man, for he much loved and valued the great Bishop Martin, of Tours. Martin had 38 Young Folks History of France, been brought up as a soldier, but he was so kind that once when he saw a shivering beggar he cut his cloak into two with his sword, and gave the poor man half. He was then not baptized, but at eighteen he became altogether a Christian, and was the pupil of the great Bishop Hilary of Poitiers. It was in these days that men were first beginniug to band together to live in toil, poverty, and devo- tion in monasteries or abbeys, and Martin was the first person in Gaul to form one, near Poitiers; but he was called from it to be Bishop of Tours, and near that city he began another abbey, which still bears his name, Marmoutiers, or Martin's Monastery. He and the monks used to go out from thence to teach the Pagans, who still remained in the far west, and whom Roman punishment had never cured of the old Druid ways. These people could not learn the Latin that all the rest of the country spoke, but lived on their granite moors as their forefathers had lived four hundred years before. However, Martin did what no one else had ever done ; he taught them to become staunch Christians, though they still remained a people apart, speaking their own tongue and following their own customs. This was the good St. Martin's work while his PRUIP SACJitFJ* *-• The Co7iver8ion of Craul. 41 friend, the false Emperor Maximus, was being overtlirown by the true Emperor Theodosius ; and much more struggling and fighting was going on among the Romans and Gauls, while in the mean- time the dreadful Franks were every now and then bursting into the country from across the Rhine to plunder and burn and kill and make slaves. St. Martin had finished the conversion of Gaul, just before he died in his monastery at Marmou- tiers, in the year 400. He died in time to escape the terrible times that were coming upon all the Gauls, or rather Romans. Fur all the southern and eastern Gauls called themselves Romans, spoke nothing but Latin, and had entirely forgotten all thoughts, waj's, and manners but those they had learnt from the Greeks and Romans. CHAPTER IV. THE FRANK KINGDOM, A.D. 450-533. THAT race of people which had been driving the Kelts westward for six or seven hundred years was making a way into Gaul at last ; indeed, they had been only held back by Roman skill. These were the race which, as a general name, is called Teutonic, but which divided into man}^ different nations. All were large-limbed, blue- eyed, and light-haired. They all spoke a language like rough German, and all had the same religion, believing in the great warlike gods, Odin, Thor, and Frey ; worshipping tliem at stone altars, and expecting to live with them in the hall of heroes after death. That is, all so called who were brave and who were chosen by the valkyr, or slaughter- choosing goddesses, to die nobly in battle. Cow- ards were sent to dwell with Hela, the pale, gloomy goddess of death. 42 The Frank Kingdom. 43 Of course the different tribes were not exacth' alike, but tliey all had these features in common. Thev had Mved for at least five hundred years in the centre of Europe, now and then attacking their neighbors, when, being harassed by another fierce race who came behind them, they made more great efforts. The chief tribes whose names must be remembered were the Goths, who conquered Rome and settled in Spain ; the Longbeards, or Lombards, who spread over the north of Italy ; the Burgundians (burg or town livers), who held all the country round the Alps ; the Swabians and Germans, who stayed in the middle of Europe ; the Saxons, who dwelt about the south of the Baltic, and finally conquered South Britain ; the Northmen, who found a home in Scandinavia ; and the Franks, who had been long settled on the rivers Sale, Meuse, and Rhine. Their name meant Freemen, and they were noted for using an axe called after them. There were two tribes — the Salian, from the River Sale, and the Ripuarian. They were great horsemen, and dreadful pillagers, and the Salians had a family of kings, which, like the kings of all the other tribco, was supposed to descend from Odin. The king was always of this family, called Meerwings, after 44 Young Folks'' History of France. Meerwig, the son of Wehrmund, one of the first chiefs. After the death of the great Theodosius, who had conquered the false Emperor Maximus, there was no power to keep these Franks back, and they were contmually dashing into Ganl, and carrying off slaves and plunder. Even worse was the great rush that, in the year 450, was made all across Europe by the Hnns, a terrible nation of another race, whose chief was called Etzel, or Attila, and who named himself the Scourge of God. In 451, he invaded Gaul with his army, horrible looking men, whose faces had been gashed by their savage parents in their infancy, that they might look more dreadful. It was worse to fall into their hands than into those of the Franks, and everywhere there was terror. At Lutetia there was a great desire to flee away, but they. were persuaded to remain by the holy woman, Genoveva. She was a young shepherdess of Nanterre, near Paris, who had devoted herself to the service of God, and whose holy life made the people listen to her as a kind of prophet. And she was right. The Huns did not come further that Orleans, where the good Bishop Lupus made the people shu^ their gates, and defend their town, until an army, composed of HrXS AT CHALOXS, as- The Frank Kingdom. 47 Franks, Goths, Burgunclians, Gauls, all under the Roman General Aetius, attacked the Huns at Chalons-sur-Marne, beat them, and drove them buck in 451. Chalons was the last victory won under the old Roman eagles. There was too much trouble in Italy for Rome to help any one. In came the Franks whenever they pleased, and Hil- perik, the . son of Meerwig, came to Lutetia, or Paris, as it was now called from the tribe round it, and there he rioted in Julian's old palace. He had a great respect for Genoveva, heathen though he was ; and when he came home from plundering, with crowds of prisoners driven before him, Geno- veva would go and stand before him, and entreat for their pardon, and he never could withstand her, but set them all free. She died at eighty-nine years old, and St. Genevieve, as she was afterwards called, was honored at Paris as much as St. Den3's. Hilperik's son was named Hlodwig, which means loud or renowned w ar, but as the name is harsii, histories generally name him Clovis. He wanted to marry a Burgundian maiden named Clothilda and as she was a Christian, he promised that she should be allowed to pray to her God in the churches which still stood throughout Gaul. When her first child was born, she persuaded Clovis to 48 Young Folks* History of France, let her have it baptized. It died very soon, and Clovis fancied it was because her God could not save it. However, she caused the next child to be baptized, and when it fell sick she prayed for it, and it recovered. He began to listen more to what she said of her God, and when, soon after, the Germans came wifh a great army across the Rhine, and he drew out his Franks to fight with them at Tolbiac, near Cologne, he was in great danger in the battle, and he cried aloud, " Christ, whom Clothilda calls the true God, I have called on my own gods, and they help me not ! Send help, and I will own Thy name." The Germans fled, and Clovis had the victory. He kept his word, and was baptized at Rheims by St. Remigius, with his two sisters, three thousand men, and many women and children ; and as he was the first great Teutonic prince who was a Catholic Christian, the King of France, ever since his time, has been called the Most Christian King and eldest son of the Church. Clovis was the first Frank chief who really made a home of Gaul, or who wore a purple robe and a crown like a Roman emperor. He made his chief home at Paris, where he built a church in the little island on the Seine, in honor of the Blessed Virgin, measuring the The Frank Kingdom, 49 length by how far he could throw an axe ; but, though he honored the Gaulish clergy, he was still a fierce and violent savage, who did many cruel things. He generally repented of them afterwards, and gave gifts to churches to show his sorrow, and holy men were about him when, in 511, he died at Paris. His sons had all been baptized, but tliey were worse men than he had been. The Frank kingdom was only the north part of the country above the Loire. In the south, where the Romans had had possession so much longer, and built so many more walled towns, the Franks never really lived. They used to rush down and plunder the country round about ; but then the townsmen shut themselves in^ closed their gates, and strengthened their walls, and the Franks had no machines to batter the walls, no patience for a blockade, and went home again with only the spoil of the country round ; while in the Province people called themselves Roman citizens still, and each place governed itself by the old Roman law. Plenty of Gauls were in the northern part too, speaking Latin still. They had to bear much rough treatment from the Franks, but all tlie time their knowledge and skill made them respected. 50 Young Folks'' History of France. The clergy, too, were almost all Gauls ; and now that the Franks were Christians, in name at least, they were afraid of them, and seldom damaged a church or broke into a monaster3^ Indeed, if there was any good in a Frank, he was apt to go into a monastery out of the horrid barbarous ways of his comrades, and perhaps this left those outside to be still worse, as they had hardly any better men among them. The four sons of Clovis divided the kingdom. That is, they were all kings, and each had towns of his own, but all a good deal mixed up together; and in the four chief towns — Paris, Orleans, Soissons, and Metz — they all had equal shares. Not that they really governed, only each had a strong box filled with gold and jewels, and they always were leaders when the Franks went out to plunder in the southern lands of Pro- vincia and Aquitaine. There was another part the Franks .never conquered, namely, that far north- western corner called Armorica. which Julius Csesar had conquered, and St. Martin had converted last of all. The granite moors did not tempt the Franks, and the Kjmri there were bold and free. More- over, so many of their kindred Kymri from Britain came over thither for fear of the Saxons, that the country came to be called from them Bretagne, or DEATH OF HLODIMIR'S CHILDi;ii>'. The Frank Kingdom, 53 Brittan}^ and the Kymric tongue is spoken there to this day. When Hlodmir, one of the sons of Clovis, died, his three little sons were sent to Paris to bo under the care of their grandmother, Clothilda. She was so fond of them that their uncles, Hloter and Hildebert, were afraid she would require that their father's inheritance should be given to them. So they asked her to send the boys to them on a visit, and as soon as they arrived, a messenger was sent to the Queen with a sword and a pair of scissors, desiring her to choose. This meant that she would choose whether the poor boys should be killed, or have their heads shaven and become monks. Clo- thilda answered that she had rather see them dead than monks. So Hloter killed the eldest, who was only ten, with his sword ; the second clung to Hildebert, and begged hard for life, but Hloter forced his brother to give him up, and killed him too ; the third, whose name was Hlodoald, was helped by some of the bystanders to hide himself, and when he grew older, he cut oif his long hair, went into a monastery, and was so good a man that he is now called St. Cloud. This horrible murder happened about the year 533, CHAPTER y. THE LONG-HAIRED KINGS. A.D. 533-681. THE Meer wings, or long-haired kings, were altogether the most wicked dynasty (or race of kings) who ever called themselves Christian. They do not seem to have put off any of their heathen customs, except the actual worship of Frey and Odin. They murdered, plundered, and 54 The Long-Haired Kings, 5o married numerous wives, just as if they had been heathens stilL Most likely the}' thouglit that as Christ was the God of Gaul, he must be honored there ; but they had no notion of obeying Him, and if a Gallic bishop rebuked them, they only plundered his church. By the Frank law, a mur- der might be redeemed by a payment, and it was full twice as costly to kill a Frank as to kill a Roman, that is to say, a Gaul ; for, except in the cities in the Province and Aquitaine, this term of Roman, once so proud, was only a little better than that of slave. Out of all the Meerwing names, one or two have to be remembered above the rest for their crimes. Hlother, the murderous son of Clovis, left four sons, among whom the kingdom was, as usual, divided. Two of these sons, Hilperik and 8ieg- bert, wished for queenly wives, though Hilperik, at least, had a houseful of wives before, and among them a slave gir] named Fredegond. The two brothers married the two daughters of the King of the Goths in Spain, Galswinth and Brj^nhild. Siegbert seems to have really loved Brynhild, but Hilperik cared for the beautiful and clever Frede- gond more than anyone else, and very soon poor Galswinth was found in her bed strangled. Frede- 56 Young Folks' History of France. gond reigned as queen, and Brynhild hated lier bitterly, and constantly stirred up lier husband to avenge her sister's death. Siegbert raised an army and defeated Hilperik, but Fredegond contrived to have him stabbed. She also contrived to have all her husband's other children- killed by different means, and at last, fearing he would find out crimes greater than even he could bear with, she contrived that he too should bo stabbed when returning from hunting, in the year 584. She had lost several infants, and now had only one child left, Illoter II., a few months old, but in his name she ruled what the Franks called the Ne-oster-ik, the not eastern, or western kingdom, namely, France, from the Saone westward ; while Bry:ixhild and her son Hil- debert ruled in the Austerik, or eastern kingdom, from the Saone to the Sale p^ d Rhine. There was a most bitter hatred between the two sisters-in-law. It seems as if Fredegond was of a wicked nature, and would have been a bad woman anywhere. One's mind shrinks frr le horrible stories of murder, treachery, and e\ y sort of vice that are told of her; but no oi. ,/ard punishment came upon her in this world, iiiid she died in 597 at Paris, leaving her son, Hh her II., on the throne. Brynhild often did ba things, but she erred The Long'Haired Kings. 51 more from the bad times in which she lived than from her own disposition. She tried, so far as she knew how, to do good; she made friends with the clergy, she helped the few learned men, she tried to stop cruelty, she tried to repair the old Roman roads and bridges, and many places are called after her — Queen Brynhild's tower, or stone, or the like — and she was very kind to the poor, and gave them large alms. But she grew worse as she grew older; she had furious quarrels wicL the Frank chiefs, and when the Bishops found fault with her she attacked them> and even caused the saintly Bishop of Yienne to be assassinated. In her time there came from Ire- land a number of very holy men, Keltic Christians, who had set forth fi\>m the monasteries to convert such Gauls and Franks as remained heathen, and to try to bring the rj-st to a better sense of what a Christian life was. St. ^'Columbanus came into the Austerick when Brynhild's two grandsons, Theude- bert and Theuderick, were reigning there. Theu- derick listened willi^' u'to the holy man, and was proceeding to put a^v" /his many wives and mend his ways; but the old uieen's pride was offended, and she could not forg ve him for not allowing her to come into his mona ery, because no woman was permitted there. Sh < stirred up Theuderick to 58 Young Folks' History of France. drive him awaj, whereupon he went to the Alps and converted the people there, who were still worshippers of Odin. Soon after there Avas a iierce quarrel between her two grandsons. Theuderick was taken prisoner by his brother, and forced to cut his hair and become a monk, but this did not save his life. He was put to death shortly after, and his brother soon after died ; so that Brynhild, after having ruled in the name of her son and grandsons, now governed for her great-grandson, Siegbert, thirty-nine years after her husband's death. But she was old and weak, and her foe, Fredegond's son, Hlother, attacked her, defeated her forces, and made her and her great-grandchil- dren prisoners. The boys were slain, and the poor old Gothic Queen, after being placed on a camel and led through the camp to be mocked by all the savage Franks, was tied to the tail of a wild horse, to be dragged to death by it ! This was in 614. Hlother thus became King of 'all the Franks, and so was his son Dagobert I., who was not much better as a man, but was not such a savage, and took interest in the beautifid goldsmith's work done by the good Bishop Eligius ; and, somehow, his name has been more remembered at Paris than he seems properly to deserve. In fact, the FranksS The Long-Haired Kings. 59 were getting gradually civilized by the Romanized Gauls — the conquerors by the conquered; and the daughters, when taken from their homes, some- times showed themselves excellent women. It was Bertha, the daughter of King Haribert, the mur- derer of his nephews, who persuaded her husband, Ethelbert of Kent, to receive St. Augustine ; and Ingund, the daughter of Br3aihild and Siegbert, was married to a Gothic Prince in Spain, whom she brought to die a martyr for the true faith. Twelve more Meerwings reigned after Dagobert. If they had become less savage they were less spirited, and they hardly attended at all to the affairs of their kingdoms, but only amused them- selves in their i-ude palaces at Soissons or Paris, thus obtaining the name of Rois Fai7ieants^ or sluggard kings. The affairs of the kingdom fell into the hands of the Major Domi, as he was called, or Mag or of the Palace. The Franks, as they tried to have courts and keep up state, followed Roman patterns so far as they knew them, and gave Roman names from the Emperor's Court to the men in attendance on them. So the steward, or Major JDomi, master of the household, rose to be the chief person in the kingdom next to the king himself. The next great- 60 Youny Folks' History of France. est people were called Comites, companions of the King, Counts; and the chief of these was the Master of the Horse, Gomes Stahuli, the Count of the Stable, or, as he came to be called in the end, the Constable. The leader of the army was called Dux, a Latin word meaning to lead ; and this word is our word Duke. But the Mayor of the Palace under these foolish do-nothing Meerwings soon came to be a much greater man than the King himself, and the Mayor of the Palace of the Oster- rik or Austrasia fought with the Palace Mayor of the Ne-oster-rik or Neustria, as if they \^~cr2 t"^^ sovereigns. The Austrian Franks sLx3tehed far away eastward, and were much more bold anCi spirited than the Neustrians, who had mixed a great deal with the Gauls. And, finally, Ebroin, the last Neustrian Mayor, was murdered in 681, the Neustrian army was defeated, and the Austra- sians became the most powerful. Their mayors were all one family, the first of whom was named Pepin of Landen. He was one of Queen Bryn- hild's great enemies, but he was a friend of Dago- bert I., and he and his family were brave defenders of the Franks from the other German nations, who, like them, loved war better than anything else. CPIAPTER VL CAEL OF THE HAMMER. A.D. 681. THE grandson of Pepin of Landen is commonly called Pepin L'Heristal. He was Mayor of the Palace through the reigns of four do-nothing Meerwings, and was a brave leader of the Franks^ fighting hard with their heathen neighbors on the other side of the Khine, the Saxons and Thurin- gians, along the banks of the Meuse and Elbe ; and not only fighting m ith them, but helj^ing the missionaries who came from England and from Ireland to endeavor to convert them. He died in 714, and after him came his brave son Car] of the Hammer, after whom all the family are known in history as Carlings. He was Duke of Austrasia and Mayor of the Palace, over (one cannot say under^ Hlother IV. and Theuderick IV., and fought the battles of the Franks against 61 62 Young FolW History of France. the Saxons and Frisians, besides making himself known and respected in the Province and Aqui- taine, where the soft Roman speech softeaed his name into Carolus and translated his nickname into Martellus, so that he has come down to our day as Charles Martel. Whether it was meant that he was a hammer himself, or that he carried a hammer, is not clear, but it is quite certain that he was the greatest man in Europe at that time, and he who did her the greatest benefit. It was a hundred }' ears since Mahommed had risen up in Arabia, teaching the wild Arabs a strict law, and declaring that God is but one, and that he was His prophet, by which he meant that he was a greater and a truer prophet than the Lord Jesus Christ. He had carried away many of the Eastern nations after him and had conquered others. He taught that it was right to fight for the spread of the religion he taught, and his Arabs did fight so mightily that they overcame the Holy Land and held the city of Jerusalem. Besides this, they had conquered Egj-pt and spread all along the north of Africa, on the coast of the Mediterranean Sea ; and thence they had crossed over into Spain, and subdued the Christian Goths, Carl of the Hammer, 63 all but the few who had got together in the Pyre- nean mountains and their continuation in the Asturias, along the coast of the Bay of Biscay. And now these Arabs — also called Saracens and Moors — were trying to pass the Pyrenees and make attacks upon Gaul, and it seemed as if all Europe was going to be given up to them and to become Mahommedan. Abdul Rhaman, the great Arab Governor of Spain, crossed the Pyrennees at the pass of Roncevalles, burst into Aquitaine, gained a great battle near Bordeaux, and pillaged the city, which was so rich a place that every soldier was loaded with topazes and emeralds, and gold was quite common ! Then they marched on towards Tours, where the Abbey of Marmoutiers was said to be the richest in all Gaul. But by this time Carl of the Hammer had got together his army ; not only Franks, but Burgundians, Gauls of the Province, Germans from bej'ond the Rhine — all who will- ingly owned the sovereignty of Austrasia, provided they could be saved from the Arabs. The battle of Tours, between Charles Martel and Abdul Rhaman, was fought in the autumn oi 732, and was one of the great battles that decide the fate of the world. For it was this which fixed 64 Young Folks^ History of France. whether Europe should be Christian or Mahomme- daii. It was a hotly-fought combat, but the tall powerful Franks and Germans stood like rocks against every charge of the Arab horsemen, till darkness came on. The Franks slept where they stood, and drew up the next morning to begin the battle again, but no enemy appeared. Some Franks were sent to reconnoitre, entered the enemy's camp, and penetrated into their tents. But no living man was to be found. The Arabs had decamped silently in the night, and had left nearly all their booty behind them, and the battle of Tours had saved Europe. However, the Hammer had still to strike many blows before they were driven back into Spain, and this tended to bring the south of Gaul much more under his power. Carl was looked upon as the great defender of Christendom, and, as at this time the king of the Lombards in Northern Italy seemed disposed to make himself master of Rome, the Pope sent two nuncios, as Pope's mes- sengers are called, to carry him presents, among them the keys of the tomb of St. Peter, and to beg for his protection. Still, great as he was in reality, he never called himself mor6 than Mayor of the Palace and Duke of Austrasia, and when he died in 741, his sons, Pepin and Carloman, divided the A1^VB> 1IA1> PH A^li'KP, Carl of the Hammer, 67 government, still as ^Mayors, for the Meerwing Hilderick III. In 746, however, Carloman, weary of the world, caused his head to be shaven hj Pope Zacharias, and retired into the great monas- tery of Monte Cassino, where, about a hundred years before, St. Benedict had begun a rule that became the pattern of most of the convents of the west. Pepin, commonly called le href or the Short, ruled alone, and in 751 he sent to ask Pope Zacha- rias whether it would not be wiser that tlie family who had all the power should bear the name of kings. The Pope replied that so it should be. Hilderick was put into a convent, and the great English Missionary-bishop, St. Boniface, whom Pepin and his father had aided in his work among the Germans, anointed Pepin as King of the Franks at Soissons, and two years later, the next Pope, Stephen II., came into Gaul again to ask aid against the Lombards, and at the Abbey of St. Deny's anointed Pepin again, together with his two young sons, Carl and Carloman. And so the Meerwings passed awa}^, and the Carlings began. Pepin was a great friend and supporter of St. Boniface, who -had been made Archbishop of May- intz. He did much b\' his advice to bring the Church of Gaul into good order, and he was much 68 Young Folks' History of France, grieved when the holy man was martyred whil^ preaching to the savage men of Friesland. Pepin was constantly fighting with the heathen Saxons and Germans to the east of him, and he so far subdued them that they promised to send three hundred horses as a present to the General Assem- bly of Franks. To the north he had the old Gauls in Brittany, who had to be well watched lest they should plunder their neighbors ; and to the south were the Arabs, continually trying to maraud in the Province and Aquitaine ; Avhile the Dukes of Aquitaine, though they were quite unable to keep back the Moors without the help of the Franks, could not endure their allies, and hated to acknowl- edge the upstart Pepin as their master. These Dukes, though Teuton themselves, had lived so long in the Roman civilization of the southern cities, that they despised the Franks as rude barba- rians ; and the Franks, on their side, thought them ver}^ slippery, untrustworthj^ people. Pepin was a great improvement in good sense, understanding, and civilization on the do-nothing Meerwings, but even he looked on writing as only the accomplishment of clerg}^, and did not cause his sons to learn to write. Yet Pope Stephen was for a whole winter his guest, and when the Franks Carl of the Rammer, 69 entered Italy and defeated Astolfo, King of the Lombards, Pepin was rewarded by being made "Senator of Rome.'' Afterwards the Lombards attacked the Pope again. Pepin again came to liis help, and after gaining several victories, forced King Astolfo to give up part of his lands near Rome. Of these Pepin made a gift to the Pope, and this was the beginning of the Pope's becoming a temporal sovereign, tliat is, holding lands like a king or prince, instead of only holding a spiritual power over men's consciences as chief Bishop of the Western Church. Pepin died at the Abbey of St. Denys in the year T68. Do not call him King of France, but King of the Franks, which does not mean the same thing. CHAPTER VII. CAUL THE GREAT. 768. CARL and Carloman, the two sons of Pepin, at first divided the Frank domains ; but Carlo- man soon died, and Carl reigned alone. He is one of the mightiest of the princes who ever bore the name of Great. Carl der Grosse, the Franks called him ; Carolos Magnus in Latin, and this has become 70 *w$ 5^|?#- ■ ^./^ ■^Tm. Oarl the Great, 73 in Frencli, Charlemagne ; and as this is the name by which everj^body knows him, it will be the most convenient way to call him so here, though no one ever knew him thus in his own time. He was a most warlike king. When the Saxons tailed to send Mm three hundred horses, he entered their country, ravaged it, and overthrew an image or pillar near the source of tlie Lippe, which they used as an idol, and called Irminsul. Thereupon the Saxons burnt the church at Fritzlar, which St. Boniface had built, and the war went on for years. Charlemagne was resolved to force the Saxons to be Christians, and Witikind, the great Saxon leader, was fiercely resolved against yielding, viewing the honor of Odin as the honor of his country. Thej^ fought on and on, till, in 785, Charlemagne win- tered in Saxony, and at last persuaded Witikind to come and meet him at Attigny. There the Saxon chief owned that Christ had conquered, and con- sented to be baptized. Charlemagne made him Duke of Saxony, and he lived in good faith to the new vows he had taken. The Frisians and Bavari- ans, and all who lived in Germany, were forced to submit to the great King of the Franks. There was a new king of the Lombards, Deside- rio, and a'new Pope, Adrian I. ; and, as usual, they f4 Young Folks' History of France, were at war, and Adrian entreated for the aid of Charlemagne. He came with a great army, drove Desiderio into Pavia, and besieged him tlicre. It was a long siege, and Charlemagne had a chapel set up in his camp to keep Christmas in ; but for Easter he went to Rome, and was met a mile of( by all the chief citizens and scholars carrying palm branches in their hands, and as he mounted the steps to St. Peter's Church, the Pope met him, saying, " Blessed is he that cometh in the name of the Lord." He prayed at all the chief churches in Rome, and then returned to Pavia, which wai= taken soon after. He carried off Desiderio as a prisoner, and took the title of King of the Franks and the Lombards. This was in 775, while the Saxon war was still going on. He had likewise a war with the Arabs in Spain, and in 778 he crossed the Pyrenees, and overran the country as far as the Ebro, where the Arabs offered him large gifts of gold and jewels if he would return without touching their splendid cities in the South. He consented, but as he was return- ing, the w^ild Basque people — a strange people who lived unconquered in the mountains — fell upon the rear guard of his army in the Pass of Roncevalles, and plundered the baggage, slaying I>EATH OF KOLANO- Carl the Great. 77 some of the bravest leaders, among them one Roland, Warden of the Marches of Brittany. Round this Roland wonderful stories have hung. It is said, and it may be true, that he blew a blast on his bugle-horn with his last strength, which first told Charlemagne, on far before, of this direful mischance : and further legends have made him the foremost and most perfect knight in the army, nay, raised him to gigantic strength, for there is a great cleft in the Pyrenean Hills called La Br^che de Roland, and said to have been made with one stroke of his sword. Pfalgraf, or Count of the Palace, was the title of some of the great Frank lords, and thus in these romances Roland and his friends- are called the Paladins. But to return to Charlemagne. He had threfi sons — Carl, Pepin, and Lodwig. When the two younger were four and three years old, he took them both with him to Rome, and there Pope Adrian anointed the elder to be King of Lom- bardy ; the younger. King of Aquitania. As soon as they had returned, Charlemagne had the little Lodwig taken to his kingdom. As far as the Loire he was carried in his cradle, but when he entered Aquitania he was dressed in a little suit of armor and placed on horseback, that he might be shown 78 Young Folks History of France. to his subjects in maiih^ fashion. Wise, strong men formed his council, whose whole work was keeping the Arabs back beyond the Ebro ; but he was taken back after a time to be educated in his father's palace at Aachen. Charlemagne had gath- ered there the most learned men he could find — Alcuin, an Englishman, being one — and had a kind of academy, called the School of the Palace, where his 3"oung nobles and clergy might acquire the learning of the old Roman times. Discussions on philosophy were held, everyone taking some old name, Charlemagne himself being called David. He strove hard to remedy the want of a good education ; and such was his ability, that he could calculate the courses of the planets in his head, though he never wrote easily, in spite of carrying about tablets in his bosom, and practising at odd times. Latin was, of course, familiar to him ; St. Augustine's " City of God" was his favorite book; and he composed several hymns, among them the Vcni Creator Spiritus — that invocation of the Holy Spirit which is sung at Ordinations. He ^Iso knew Greek, and he had begun to arrange a Frankish Grammar, and collect the old song's of his people. No one was so much honored and respected in SCHOOL OF THE PA LACK. Oarl The Great, 81 Europe, and after two more journeys to Rome on behalf of the Pope, Leo III., the greatest honor possible was conferred upon him. In the old Ro- man times, the Roman people had always been supposed to elect their Emperor. They uow elected him. On the Christmas Day of the year 800, as Carl the Frank knelt before the altar of St, Peter's, the Pope placed a crown on his head, and the Roman people cried aloud, " To Carolus Augustus, crowned by God, the great and j)eaceful Emperor of the Romans, life and victory ! " So the Empire of the West, which had died away for a time, or been merited in the Empire of the East at Constantinople, was brought to life again in the person .of Carl the Great ; ^^•hile his two sons were rulers of kingdoms, and all around him were numerous dukes and counts of different subject nations, all owning his empire. The old cities, likewise, in Provence — Aquitania, Lom- bardy, and Gaul — though they had councils that governed themselves, owned him as their Emperor. Moreover, he made the new territories which he had conquered along the German rivers great bishoprics, especially at Triers, Mentz, and Koln, thinking that bishops would more safely and loy- ally guard the frontier, and tame the heathen 82 Young Folks' History of France, borderers, than fierce warrior counts and dukes. Aachen was the capital of this Empire. There Carl had built a noble cathedral, and a palace for himself; and he collected from Italy the most learned clerks and the best singers of church music. His chosen name of David did not ill befit him, for he was a great founder and benefactor of the church, and gathered together synods of his bishops several times during his reign to consult for her good and defence. Indeed, his benefits to her, and his loyal service, were such that he has been placed in the calendar as a saint ; although he had several serious faults, the worst of which was that he did not rightly esteem the holiness and closeness of the tie of wedlock, and married and put away wives in a lax way that makes a great blot in his character. He was of a tall figure, with a long neck, and exceedmgiy active and dextrous in all exercises — : a powerful warrior, and very fond of hunting, but preferring swimming to anything else. Nobody could swim or dive like him ; and he used to take large parties to bathe with him, ^ that a hundred men were sometimes in the river at once. His dress was stately on occasion, but he did not ap- prove of mere finery ; and when he saw some Carl The G-reat, 83 young noble over-dressed, would rather enjoy tak- ing liim on a long muddy ride in the rain. He had intended his eldest son Carl to be Emperor, and Pepin and Lodwig to rule Lom- bardy and Aquitaine under him as kings ; but Pepin died in 810, and Carl in 811, and only Lod- wig was left. This last son he caused to be ac- cepted as Emperor by all his chief nobles in the church at Aachen, and then made him a discourse on the duties of a sovereign to his people ; after which he bade the young man take a crown that lay on the altar and put it on his own head. '^ Blessed be the Lord, who hath granted me to see my son sitting on my throne," he said. Charlemagne died the next year, in 814, in his seventy-first year, and was buried at Aachen, sit- ting upright, robed and crowned, in his chaii. U'ith his sword by his side. CHAPTER VIIL THE CAKLINGS, 814—887. THE Carlings after Charlemagne are nearly as difficult to understand or care about as the * Meerwings. The best way to understand the state of things is to remember that the Empire — the Holy Roman Empire of the West — consisted of a whole collection of separate states — German, The Carlings, 85 Frank, Lombard, B urgundian, Gallic, Latin, and that a Carling was always king in one or more of these, and the chief of the family Emperor ; but they were constantly quarrelling, and whenever any of them died, it was as if the whole were shaken up together and the parts picked out afresh. They were far from being as wicked or as ignorant as the Faindants; but it really was almost impossible for their utmost efforts to have succeeded in keeping the peace, even if they had been such giants in mind as Charlemagne had been. His only son, Lodwig — Ludovicus Pius, as the Latins called him; Louis le Debonnaire, as he stands in French books — was a good, gentle, pious man, but his life was one continual warfare with his sons. After he had given three kingdoms to his three sons, their mother died ; he married again, and had a younger son, Carl or Charles ; and his desire to give a share to this poor boy led to no less than three great revolts on the part of the elder brothers, till at last their poor father died worn out and broken-hearted, on a little islet in the Rhine, in the year 840. The eldest son, Lothar, was then Emperor, and had for his own, besides the kingdom of Italy and 86 Young Folks' History of F.rance. that country where Aachen (the capital) stood, the strip which is bounded by the Rhine and the Alps to the east, and the Meuse and the Rhone to the west. He was in the middle between his brothers — Lodwig, who had Germany ; and Charles, who had all the remainder of France. Of course, the}^ fought over this ; and when Lothar died, his two sons divided his dominions again — the elder (whose name was the same as his own) got the northern half, between the Meuse and Rhine ; and the younger had the old Provin- cia. They both died soon, and would not be worth speaking of, but that the name of the two Lothars remained to the northern kingdom. Loth arik or Lorraine, and because we shall sometimes hear of the old kingdom of Aries or Provence. Charles survived all his brothers, and came to be the head of the family, the second Emperor Charles, commonly called the Bald. He was King from his father's death in 840, but Emperor only for two years, from 875 to 877 ; and his life was a dreary time of tumult and warfare, though he was an active, able man, and did his best. He had a good deal more learning than Charlemagne had to begin with, and like him had a school in his pal- ace, where the most remarkable person was a Kelt "HE SHED TEARS AT THE SIGHT. The Cartings, 89 from one of the old Scottish or Irish monasteries, called John ; and also Scot, or Erigena (a native of Erin). He was a great arguer and philosopher, and got into trouble with the Pope about some of his definitions. Kins^ Alfred the Great of Eno-- land, who had his own palace school, invited Scot to it, and afterwards placed him in the abbey at Malmesbury ; but there the rude English schol- ars' hatred to Scot broke out, and when he tried to keep order they killed him with tlie iron pens with which they wrote on wax tablets. At least so goes the story. Charles the Bald had little peace to enjoy his palace school, for the same reason as Alfred was at war. The Northmen were even more dreadful enemies to France than to Encrland. The first fleet of their ships had been seen by Charlemagne, and he had shed tears at the sight ; for he per- ceived that all his efforts to subdue and convert Bavarians, Saxons, and Frisians had not saved his people from a terrible enemy of their own stock, far more earnest in the worship of Odin, and (as he foresaw) likely to come in greater numbers. All through the troubles of Louis le Debonnaire parties of Nortlnnen were landing, and plundering any city or abbey that was not strong enough to 90 Young Folks' History of France. keep them off ; and when Alfred had made Eng- land too mighty for them, they came all the more to France. Sometimes they were met in battle, sometimes a sum was offered to them to spare a city from their plunder ; and if tlie walls were strong, they would generally accept it. Paris was thus bought off in the time of Charles the Bald from the terrible sea-king, Hasting. Sometimes the bishop of the threatened place would fancy he had converted the sea-king and would add baptism to the treaty. But once when this was done, and there was a scarcity of white robes for the con- verts, they turned round in a rage, declaring that wherever they had been washed before they had been more handsomely treated. Another heathen had almost accepted the faith, when he paused and asked what had become of all his dead fathers." His teachers, instead of answering that God is merciful, and deals with men according to what they have, not according to what they have not, replied that they were in hell fire. " Then," said the pupil, " do you think I will desert them ? I cast in my lot with them wherever they are." It is not certain whether it was one of Witikind's Saxons or a Northman who made this answer. After Charles the Bald, three very short reigns. >^OBTHMEN BEFORE PAKIS. The Cartings, 93 only lasting seven years altogether, of his son and his two grandsons, and then the head of the Carl- ings was Charles III., commonly called de?' dicke (the Thick or the Fat) — in France known as Charles le Gros. He was the son of Lodwis: called the German, the son of Lodwig the Pious, and seems to have been less fit than most of his kindred for the difficulties of his post as Emperor of the West, or King of the Franks. The Northmen were worse than ever in his time, not so much from his weakness, as because Harald the Fairhaired had made himself sole- King of Norwa}^, driving out all opposition ; and those who would not brook his dominion now came south- ward, intending not only to plunder, but to win homes for themselves. One of these was the famous Rolf Gauge, or Walker, so called because he went into battle on foot. In the year 885 Rolf and another sea-king named Sigurd sailed up the Seine with seven hundred great ships, which stretched for six miles along the stream, and pre- pared to take Paris. First, however, Sigurd sent for Bishop Gozlin, and promised that if the city were only yielded to him he would allow no harm to be done, no man's goods to be touched. But the bishop said the city had been entrusted to 94 Young Folks' History of France. him and Count Eudes (the governer) by the Emperor, and that they could not yield it up ; and for full thirteen months the place was besieged, until at last the Emperor arrived with an arm\ collected from all the nations under him : but, after all, he did not fight — he only paid the Northmen to leave Paris, and go to winter in Burgundy, which was at enmity with him. In fact, every part of the domains of the empire was at enmit}^ with poor fat Charles ; and the next year (887) a diet or council met on the banks of the Rhine and deposed him. Arnulf, a son of the short-lived Carloman, was made Emperor, Count Eudes was crowned King of France, Guy (Duke of Spoleto) set up a kingdom in Italy, Boso of Aries called himself King of Provence, and Rodolf (another count) was crowned at St. Moritz King of Burgujid}' ; so that the whole Empire of Charle- magne seemed to have been broken up, and Rolf went on conquering more than ever, especially in Neustria. The seige of Paris, here mentioned, made an immense impression on French and Italian fancy, and was the subject of many poenis and rom^-nces in later times. Only they mixed up together in one the three Karls — the Hammer, the Great, and C'Ol'NT KirnKS KN'TKKrV*"} TAKIS. The Oarlings, 97 the Fat — and called him Carlo Magno, sur- rounded him with Paladins, of whom Roland or Orlando was foremost ; made the Saracens besiege Paris, and be beaten off, and pursued into Spain, where the battle of Roncevalles and the horn of Roland played their part — all having of course the manners of knights and ladies of the fifteenth century, with plenty of giants, enchanters, and wonders of all kinds of magical and fairy lore. CHAPTER IX. THE COUNTS OF PARIS. 887—987. POOR Carl the Fat died of misery and grief the 3^ear after he was deposed, but he was not the last Carling. Besides the Emperor Arnulf, there was a son of Ludwig the Stammerer (another Carl), who tried to win the old French domains back from Eudes. In fact, the westerly Franks, who held Paris and all the country up to the At- lantic Ocean, had become much mixed with the old Gauls, and had learned to speak Latin a little altered — in fact, the beginning of what we call French — and they held with Eudes ; while the Franks round Laon and Soissons were much more German, and chiefly clung to the Carling Carl, though he bore no better surname than the Simple. The further eastward Franks of Franconia, as we now call it, with all the other German tribes — 98 The Counts of Paris. 99 Swabians, Frisians, Saxons, Bavarians, &c., — were under Arnulf, and made up the kingdom of Germany. The Franks west of the Rhine never were joined to it again ; and after the death of Arnulf's only son, Ludwig the Child, no more Carlings reigned there, and soon the Saxons ob- tained the headship. The Counts of Paris were not Gauls, but Sax- ons who had settled in the Frank country and made common cause with the Gauls. They had the same sort of patience with which the first Carlings had waited till the Meer wings were quite worn out. Eudes let Charles the Simple govern the lauds between the Meuse and Seine, and when Eudes died, in 898, his brother Robert the Strong only called himself Duke of France, and left Charles the Simple to be King of the Franks. All this time Rolf and his Northmen had gone on conquering a home in Northern Gaul. The}' did not plunder and ravage like common vikings, but they spared the towns and made friends with the bishops ; and though they fought with the nations beyond, they treated all the country be- tween Brittany and the River E[)te as if it were their own. Charles the Simple came to an agree- ment with Rolf. He said that if Rolf would 100 Young Folhs* History of France, become a Christian, and accept him as his king, he would give him his daughter in marriage, and grant him the possession of all these lands, as Duke of the Northmen. Rolf consented, and in 911 he was baptized at Rouen, married Gisla (the king's daughter), and then went to swear to be faithful to the king. Now, this ceremony was called swearing fealty. It was repeated whenever there was a change either of the over or the ander-lord. The duke, count, or whatever he was, knelt down before the over-lord, and, holding his hands, swore to follow him in war, and to be true to him always. The over-lord, in his turn, swore to aid him and be true and good lord to him in return, and kissed his brow. In return, the under- lord — vassal, as he was called — was to kiss the foot of his superior. This was paying homage. Kings thus paid homage, and swore allegiance to the emperor ; dukes or counts, to kings ; lesser counts or barons, to dukes ; and for the lands they owned they were bound to serve their lord- in council and in war, and not to fight against him. Lands so held were called fiefs, and the whole was called the feudal system. Now, Rolf was to hold his lands in fief from the king, and he swore his oath, but he could not bear to stoop to kiss the The Counts of Paris, 103 foot of Charles. So lie was allowed to pay hom- age by deputy ; but the Northman he chose was as proud as himself, and, mstead of bending, lifted the king's foot to his lips, so that poor Charles the Simple was upset backwards, throne and all. Rolf was a sincere Christian ; he made great gifts to the church, divided the land among his Northmen, and kept up such good laws that Nor- mandy, as his domains came to be called, was the happiest part of the country. It was even said that a gold bracelet could be left hanging on a tree in the forest for a whole year without any one steal- ing it. Charles the Simple, in the meantime, was over- thrown in another way ; for Robert of Paris and Duke Raoul of Burgundy made war on him, and took him prisoner. His wife was a sister of the English king Athelstan, and she fled to him with her young son Ludwig, or Louis. They stayed there while first Robert was king for a year, and then Raoul, and poor Charles was dying in prison at Peroune; but when Raoul died, in 936, the young Louis was invited to come back from Eng- land and be king. The Count of Paris, Hugh the Great, and Rolf's son, William Longsword (Duke of Normandy), joined together in making him 104 Young Folks^ History of France, king ; but he was much afraid of them, and lived at Laon in constant hatred and suspicion. The French people, indeed, held him as a stranger, and called him Louis d' Outre Mer, or from beyond seas. At last William Longsword was murdered by the Count of Flanders, when his little son Richard was only seven years old. Louis thought this his opportunity. He went to Rouen, declared himself the little boy's right guardian, and carried him off to Laon, and there treated him so harshly that it was plain that there was an intention of getting rid of the child. So Osmond de Centeville, the little duke's squire, rolled him up in a bundle of straw, and carried him to the stable like fodder for his horse, then galloped off with him by night to Normand3\ A great war began, and Harald Blue- tooth, King of Denmark, came to the help of the Northmen. Louis was made prisoner, and only gained his freedom by giving up his two sons as hostages in his stead. Hugh, Count of Paris, aided young Richard of Normandy ; while the Saxon Emperor of Germany, Otho, aided Louis ; and there was a fie ^e struggle, ending in the vic- tory of the Count ox Paris and the Northmen. One of the young Frank princes died in the hands The Counts of Paris, 106 of the Normans ; the other, Lothar, was given back to his father when peace was made, giving the Counts of Paris another great step in power. In the year 954 Louis IV. died at Rbeims, and his "\\?idow entreated that the great Count Hugh would protect Lothar. He did so, and so did his son and successor, Hugh — commonly called Capet, from the hood he wore — who managed everything for the young king. When there was a war with Otho, the Emperor, the Franks said, " It is a pity so many brave men should die for two men's quarrel. Let them fight a single combat, and we will have for chief which- ever gains." This shocked the Germans, and one of them said, " We always heard that the Franks despised their king. Now we hear it proved." Peace was made, and the Emperor gave Lothar's younger brother Charles the province of Lotharik, or Lorraine, as it was coming to be called. Lothar died soon after, in 986 ; and though his son Louis V. was crowned, he only lived a year, and when he died in 987, the great counts and dukes met in consultation with the chief of the clergy, and agreed that,, as '''he counts of Paris were the real heads of the b^.ce, and nobody cared for the Carlings, it would be- better to do like the 106 Young Folks* History of France. Germans, and pass over the worn-out Carlings, who spoke old Frank,, while the Paris Counts spoke the altered Latin, which came to be called French. So Charles, Duke of Lorraine, was not listened to when he claimed his nephew's crown, but was forced to return to his own dukedom, where his descendants ruled for full eight hundred years, and then again obtained the empire, as you will hear. And in 987, Hugh Capet, Count of Paris, was crowned King of France, and from that time French history begins. At first it was Gaulish history, then it was Frank history, but at last it has become French history. The family which began with Robert the Strong exists still, after more than one thousand years, of which it reigned over France for nine hundred at least. It is usually called the House of Capet, from Hugh's nickname, though it would be more sensible to call it the House of Paris. So, remem- ber three great families — Meerwings or Mero- vingians, Frank chiefs ; Carlings or Garlovingians, the chief of whom was Emperor of the West; House of Paris, or Capetians, Kings of France. CHAPTER X. HUGH CAPET. 987—997. GET one of the older maps of France, where it is in provinces, and not departments, and I will try to show you what it was to be King of France when Hugh Capet was crowned at Rheims. Remember, there had once been a great Empire of the West ; indeed, there was an empire still, only the head of it was a Saxon instead of a Frank, and it had been divided into different nations or tribes, as it were, each ruled over by an officer or count or duke of the Emperor's. Now, the na- tions had fallen apart in groups, and their chiefs held together according to what suited them, or who was the strongest, and some with more, some with less, feeling that the Emperor had a right 'iver them all. But as to meddling in the manage- 107 108 Young Folks^ History of France, ment of a duke or count's province, no emperor nor king had any power to do that. The new king was Duke of France, and Count of Paris, and Guardian of the Abbey of St. Denj^s. So in the place called the Isle of France he was really master, and his brother Henri was Duke of Burgundy. On the Loire was the great county of Anjou, with a very spirited race of counts ; and to the eastward were Vermandois and Champagne, also counties. In all these places the nobles, like the king himself, were descended from the old Franks ; but the people in the towns and villages were Gauls, ajid they all talked the form of broken Latin which was then called the Langue d'oil, because oil or oui was the word for yes. This has now turned into French. In Normandy the people were Northmen, but were fast learning to talk nothing but French ; and in Brittany both duke and people were still old Kymry, and talked Kymric. They had never been much under the Romans or Franks. They hated the French and Normans, and never paid them any homage if they could help it ; but the Norman dukes always con- sidered that Brittany had been put under them, and this led to plenty of wars. The southern half of -the country had only been Sugh Capet. Ill overrun from time to time, never subdued or peo- pled even in the greatest Carling times. There the people were less Gaul than Roman, and talked a less altered Latin, which was called Langue d'oc^ because they said oc instead of oui ; and it was also called Romance or Provengal. Old Latin learning and manners, with their graces and ele- gances, were still kept up in these parts, and the few Frank chieftains who had come in had con- formed to them. These were the Dukes of Aquitaine or Guyenne, the Counts of Toulouse, and the Counts of Narbonne. But in the south- west of Aquitaine, near the Pyrenees and the sea, were an old race called Basques, who seem to be older still than the Gauls, and do not speak their language, but a strange and very difficult one of their own. The Basques, where more mixed with the other inhabitants in the plains, were called Gascons in France, Vascons in Spain, and were thought great boasters. These Romance-speaking counts were consid- ered by the King of France to belong to him ; but whether they considered themselves to belong to the King of France was quite a different thing. The County of Provence, Old Provincia, certainly did not, but held straight from the Holy Roman 112 Young Folks* Sistory of France, Empire. So did the other countries to the east- ward, where a German tongue was spoken, but which had much to do with the history of France — namely, Lorraine, where the old Carlings still ruled, and Flanders. So you see a king of France was not a very mighty person, and had little to call his own. But just as the empire was cut up into little divisions, so each dukedom or county was cut into lesser ones. If the duke or count did homage to emperor or king, he had under him barons (some- times counts) who did homage in their turn for the lands they held. And as the king could not make war without a council of hit; counts and dukes, no more could the duke or count without a parliament or council of his barons. When monej' was wanted, the clergy and the burghers from the lowns had to be called too, and to settle what they would give. The lands held in this way were called fiefs, and the great men who held straight from the king himself were crown vassals; those under them were their vassals. In time of war the king called his crown vassals, they called their barons, the barons called the vavasours or freemen under them, and got their men in from working on the farms, and out they went. Money was not JSugh Capet, US common then, so the lands were held on condition of serving the lord in war or by council, of giving a share of help on great occasions in his family or their own, and so many days' work on his own farm when it was wanted. This was called the feudal system, and some- times it worked well ; but if the baron was a hard man, the poor peasants often suffered sadl}-, for he would call them to work for liim when their own crops were spoiling, or take the best of all they had.. And the Franks had got into such a way of despising and ill-treating the poor Gauls, that they hardly looked on them as the same creatures as themselves. When two barons went to war — and this they were always doing — the first thing they did was to burn and destroy the cottages, corn, or cattle on each other's property, and often the peas- ants too. The barons themselves lived in strong castles, with walls so thick that, as there was no gunpowder, it was not possible to break into them. They filled them with youths whom they were training to arms — the younger ones called pages, the elder esquires or shield-bearers ; and as they practised their exercises in the castle court, the bearing of a gentleman was called courtesy. When a squire had attended his knight battle, 114 Young FoWs History of France, grown perfect in all his feats of arms, could move about easily in his heavy shirt of little chains of linked steel, and ride a tilt with his lance against another man armed like himself, and had learned enough to be a leader, he was made a knight or chevalier, as the French called it, by the accolade, that is a blow on the shoulders with the flat of the ' sword before an elder knight. A belt and gilded spurs marked the knight ; and he was re- quired to vow that he would fight for God and his Church, be faithful and true, and defend the poor and weak. Gradually chivalr}^, as this spirit of knighthood came to be called, did much to bring in a sense of honor and generosity ; but at this time, in the reign of Hugh Capet, there was very little good to be seen in the world. All over France there was turbulence, cruelty, and savage ways; except, perhaps, in Normandy, where Duke Richard the fearless and his son Duke Richard the Good kept order and peace, and were brave, up- right, religious men, making their subjects learn the better, rather than the worse ways of France. Just at this time, too, the Church and the clergy were going on badly. The Pope had — ever since, at least, the time of Carl the Great — been looked on as the head of the whole Western Church, and THE ACCOLADES. Hugh Oapet, 117 the people at Rome had the power of choosing the Pope. Two wicked women, named Marozia and Theodora, gained such power by their riches and flatteries, that they managed to have anyone chosen Pope whom they liked ; and of course they chose bad men, who would do as they pleased. This had gone on till the year 962, when the Emperor Otho came over the Alps, conquered Italy, and turned out the last of these shameful Popes. Then he and his successors chose the Pope ; but this was not the right way of doing things, and the whole Church felt it, for there was no proper restraint upon the Avickedness of the nobles. The bishops were too apt to care only for riches and power, and often fought like the lay nobles ; and in the monasteries, where prayer and good works and learning ought to have been kept up, there was sloth and greediness, if not worse ; and as to the people, they were hardly like Christians at all, but more like brute beasts in their ignorance and bad habits. Indeed, there hardly was a worse time in all the history of Europe than the reign of Hugh Capet, which lasted from 987 to 997, ^ ^H CHAPTER XL ROBERT THE PIOUS, 997—1031 HENRY 1, . IO3I-IO60! PHILIP L, . 1060-1108. TN a very curious way a better spirit was stirred A up in the world. In the Book of Revelation it is said that Satan is to be bound for a thousand years. Now, as the year 1000 of our Lord was close at hand, it was thought that this meant that the Day of Judgment was coming then, and there 118 Henry I. 119 was great fear and dread at the thought. At first, however, the effect only seemed to be that the wicked grew worse, for the}- feasted anrl drank and revelled, like, the men before the flood ; and when the year 1000 began, so many thought it not worth while to sow their corn, that there was a most dreadful famine and great distress every- where, so that there were even wretches who set traps in the woods to catch little children for their food. But all this time there were good men who taught repentance, and one blessed thing tlie}- brought about while people's hearts were soft with dread, was what was called the Truce of God, namely, an agreement that nobody should fight on Sundays, Saturdays, or Fridays, so that three days in the week were peaceable. The monasteries began to improve, the clergy to be more diligent, and the king himself, whose name was Kobert, was one of the best and most religious men in his kingdom. He used to come to the Abbey at St. Denys every morning to sing with the monks ; he used the Psalms every day in prayer and praise, and wrote and set to music several Latin hymns,' which he carried to Rome and laid ou the altar at St. Peter's ; and he loved nothing so well as wait- 120 Young Folks' History of France^ ing on beggars, and dressing the wounds of the sick. But he could not manage his kingdom well, and everyone took advantage of him. He had married his cousin, Bertha of Burgundy, who was heiress of ArJes in Provence. Now Provence belonged to the Empire, and the Emperor did not choose that the Kings of France should have it ; so he made the Pope, whom he had appointed, declare that Robert and Bertha were such near relations that they could not be husband and wife, and, with great grief, Robert submitted. Bertha went into a nunnery and he married Constance of Aquitaine. She brought all the gay fashions of Southern France with her, and her followers wore their clothes and cut their hair, sung songs and made jokes, in a way that offended the Northern French very much. She was vain and light- minded herself, could not endure the king and his beggars, and grew weary of his hymns and prayers. The sons were more like her than like their father, and Robert had a troubled life, finding little peace except in church, until he died in the year 1031. His eldest son, Henry I., reigned after him, and the second, Robert, became Duke of Burgundy, and began a family of dukes which lasted on four hundred years. The spirit of improvement that liOBJiiiT AND THE I'OOIJ. llenry I. 123 had begun to stir was going on. Everybody was becoming more religious. The monks in their con- vents began either to set themselves to rights, or else they founded fresh monasteries in new places, with stricter rules, so as to make a new beofinnino-. And a very great man, whose name was Hilde- brand, was stirring up the Church not to go on leaving the choice of the Pope to the Emperor, but to have him j)roperl\' appointed by the clergy of the Diocese of Rome, who were called Cardinals — that is, chiefs. Though there was much fierce- ]iess and wildness, and much wickedness and cru- elty, among the great nobles, they still cared more for religion ; they built churches, they tried to repent as they grew old, and some went on pil- grimage to pray for the forgiveness of their sins at the Hol}^ Sepulchre, where our Blessed Lord once lay. One of these pilgrims was Robert the Magnifi- cent, Duke of Normandy. He walked on foot very humbly in the country, but at Constanti- nople, he rode through the gates of the city with his mule shod with silver shoes, loosely fastened on, so that the people might pick them up. He died on his way, and his young son, William, had 124 Young Folks' Hutory qf France. to light very hard with enemies on all sides before he could keep his dukedom. Henry I. had been dead six j^ears, and his son Phillip I. had reigned six, from 1060, when this great Duke of Normandy became still greater, b}' winning for himself the kingdom of England. Philip did not much wish this. Pie was afraid of William, and did not at all wish to see him grow so much more powerful than himself. He spoke contemptuously of the new King of England whenever he could, and at last it was one of his foolish speeches that made William so angry as to begin* the war in which the great conqueror met with the accident that caused his death. Philip was by no means a good man. After he had lost his first wife, he fell in love with the beautiful Countess of Anjou, Bertrade de Mgnt- fort, and persuaded her to come and pretend to be his wife. His son Louis, who was so active and spirited that he was called Veveille^ which means the Wide-awake, showed his displeasure, and Philip and Bertrade so persecuted him, that he was obliged to come for refuge to England. How- ever, in spite of the king's wickedness, there was much more spirit of religion in the people. There were many excellent Bishops and Abbots, and ^%;W? _— ^ -jx??^ dU l\.^^ ^ %:■■>• li.i'/fffi, V| /.ML- . "-• ^,-^-5?.,^ '^^^M^^'l QOD vriLLKia IT. Philip I. 127 some good nobles ; Godfrey de Bouillon, Duke of Lorraine, the descendant of the old Callings, was one of the very best of the princes at that, or in- deed, any other time. It was in this reign that a pilgrim, named Peter the Hermit, came home with a piteous history of the cruelty of the Mahometans, who had possession of the Holy Land. He obtained leave from the Pope, Urban IL, to call all the Avarriors of Christ- endom to save the Holy Sepulchre, where our Blessed Lord had lain, from the hands of the un- believers. The first great preaching was at Cler- mont, in Auvergne ; and there the whole people were so much moved that the}" cried as if with one voice, " God willeth it," and came crowding round to have their left shoulders marked with a cross made of two strips of cloth. An army came to- gether from many of the lands of the west, and the princes agreed to lay aside all their quarrels while the Crusade lasted. The good Duke Godfrey led them, all through Germany and Hungary, and across the narrow straits of the Bosphorus, meet- ing with many troubles and perils as they went ; but at last they did get safe to Jerusalem, laid seige to it and conquered it. Then they chose Godfrey to be King of Jerusalem, but he would 128 Young Folks' History of France. never be crowned ; he said it was not fitting for him to wear a crown of gold where his Lord had worn a crown of thorns. Many nobles and knights stayed with him to help him to guard the holy places, while the others went home. Two convents of monks resolved that, besides being monks they would be soldiers of the Holy War. These were called the Knights of St. John of Jerusalem, or Hospitaller Knights, and the Knights of the Tem- ple. The Hospitallers had their name because they had a house at Jerusalem for receiving the poor pilgrims, and nursing them if they were sick or wounded. People from England, Spain, Germany and Italy were of the Crusade, and might belong to the two orders of knighthood, but there were always more French there than of any other nation. Louis the Wide-awake was fetched home by the French barons, and ruled for his father for the last six years of Philip's reign, though the old king, did not die till the year 1108. THE LKAPEK'; OF '||||- iiRimple-minded Louis the Young died very soon 1^t6r his returji from Canterbury, in the year 11^50, fSie years before the death of his great enemj^, H ly II. '» 'i I , I ^9C.. CHAPTER XIV. PHILLIP 11., AUGUSTUS. ' 1180-1223. PHILIP the Gift of God is most commonly known in history as Philip Augustus. Why, is not quite plain ; but as he became a very power- ful King of France, it is most likely that one of the old names of the Western Emperors, who were all Csesar Augustus, got applied to him. If his father had still been Louis the Young in his old age, Philip might in his youth have been called Philip the Old, for he was much older in skill and cunning at fifteen than his father had been all his life. The whole history of his reign is of his endeavor to get the better of the Plantage- net kings of England. He so much hated the thought of what he had seen under the elm-tree of Gisors, that he cut it down ; and though he hated 148 Philip IL^ Augustus, 149 King Henry and his sons all alike, he saw that the best waj to do them harm was by pretending to be the friend of whichever was not the king, and so helping on their quarrels. The eldest and third sons, Henry and Geoffrey, were by this time dead, and Richard, of the Lion-heart was the favor- ite of the Aquitaine troubadours. There came news from Palestine that the Chris- tians had been conquered by the great Saracen chief Saladin, and that Jerusalem had been taken by him. There was great lamentation, and a fresh crusade was determined on by all the princes of Europe, the Emperor, tlie King of France, the King of England, and his sons. The Emperor, Frederick of the Red Beard, set off first, but he was lost by the way while bathing in a river in Asia Minor ; and the two kings waited to arrange their affairs. Philip's way of doing this was to get Richard to his court, and to pretend to be so fond of him that they both slept in the same bed, drank out of the same cup, and ate out of the same dish ; but he was stirring up Richard — who needed it little — to demand his mother's freedom and the land of Aquitaine, and to rebel against his father, leading his brother John with him. This was the rebellion which broke the heart of Henry II. He 150 Young Folks' History of France, died, and Richard went on his crusade as king. It was the first crusade when the armies went by sea instead of land. Richard had his own fleet, but Philip was obliged to hire ships of the mer- chants of Genoa ; and when the two fleets reached Sicily, they did not venture to sail on till the win- ter was over, but waited till spring. Now that Eichard was king, Philip no longer pretended to love him ; and there were manj^ disputes among the Crusaders. At last they sailed on to help the Christians, who were besieging Acre. Philip ar- rived first, and quickened the works ; but still no great things were done till Richard arrived ; and then Philip was vexed that every one talked so much more of the English king's brave doings than of himself. The heat of the climate soon made both kings fall sick ; and when the city was taken, Philip's doctors declared that he must go home at once if he wished to recover. Most likely they were right ; but he was glad to go, for he hoped to do Richard a great deal of harm in his absence. The Pope forbade any one to attack a Crusader's lands while he was away; but Philip could stir up Richard's subjects and his brother against him. And when, as you remember, Richard was made captive in Austria, on his way home, Philip even CAPTUBK OK ACKK. Philip Z7!, Augustus, 153 sent money to the Emperor of Geriiiany to keep him prisoner. At last, when the German princes had forced the Emperor to set him free, Philip sent word to John, in this short note, " Take care of yourself, for the devil is let loose. " But when, two years later, Richard of the Lion- heart was killed at Limoges. Philip became John's most bitter enemy, and the friend of the only other Plantagenet left, namely, Geoffrey's son, Arthur, Duke of Brittany, who appealed to his suzerain, Philip, to make him Duke of Normandy and Count of Anjou, as son of the elder brother. Philip called on John to give up these lands ; but John offered to make a peace by marrying his niece, Blanche, the daughter of his sister and tiie King of Castille, to Philip's son, Louis the Lion. Philip was in trouble himself at the time, and consented to make peace. Philip's trouble was by his own fault. His first wife, Isabel of Hainault, was dead, and he had thought to make friends with the King of Den- mark by marrying his daughter Ingeborg. But the Danes were then very rough and untaught, and poor Ingeborg was a dull, clumsy, ignorant girl, not at all like a courtly lady. P Ip took such a dislike to her that he sent her into a convent, and 154 Young Folks' History of France, married the beautiful Agnes de Meranie, the daughter of the Duke of the Tyrol. But there was then ruling one of the mightiest Popes who ever lived, called Innocent III. He was deter- mined not to let any one, however great, go on in sin unwarned ; and he called on Philip to put Agnes away, and take back his only true wife. And when Philip would not. Innocent laid the kingdom under an interdict — that is, he forbade any service to go on in an}- church except in those of the monks and the nuns, and there only with the doors shut against all outside. The whole na- tion Avas, as it were, cut off from God for their prince's sin. Philip tried to stand up against this dreadful sentence, at first ; but he found the peo- ple could not bear it, so he sent Agnes away, and took Ingeborg back. He was then absolved, and his kingdom went on prospering. When, in 1203, Arthur of Brittany perished in prison, Philip sum- moned John, as a vassal of France, to answer for the murder. The great vassals met, the trumpets sounded, and John was called on to appear ; but as he did not come, he was sentenced to have for- feited his lands of Normandy and Anjou, and Philip entered them with his army and took the castle, while John could not get men or money to Philip 11.^ Augustus, 155 come and stop him ; and only the lands of old Eleanor of Aquitaine, who was still alive, remained to the English. This forfeit made a great step in the power of the French kings, since not only had the English kings lost Normandy and Anjou, but these two great domains belonged to the French king as entire- ly as his County of Paris. He had no duke or count between him and. the barons or cities. Philip's de- signs against the Plantagenets were favored by John's own crimes. The quarrel with the Pope that you have heard of, about the Archbishop of Canterbury, made Innocent III. invite Philip to go and conquer England, but the fear of this brought John to make peace with the Pope. However, John's nephew, Otho of Brunswick, was emperor, and he too had quarrelled with the Pope, who wanted to make 3^oung Frederick of Sicily emperor. Philip took Frederick's part, and Otho marched against him into Flanders. All the French nobles had gathered round their king, and at Bouvines there was one of the greatest battles and victories that French history tells of. Otho had to gallop away from the battle, and Philip said, '' We shall see nothing more of him than his 166 Young Folks History of France, back." This great battle was fought in the year 1214. Very shortly after, Philip's eldest son, Louis, called the Lion, was invited to England by the barons, because they could no longer bear the hor- rible cruelties and wickednesses of John ; and he would not keep Magna Charta, which he had signed. Louis went to England, and London was put in his hands ; but when King John died, the barons liked better to have his little innocent son, Henry III., as their king, than to be joined on to France. So, after Louis's troops had been beaten by land and by sea, he came home and gave up the attempt. But Philip Augustus certainly had the wish of his life fulfilled, for he had seen his foes of the House of Plantagenet humbled and brought to bitter trouble, and he had taken to himself the chief of their great possessions. He died in the year 1223, having lived in the reigns of four English kings, and done his utmost to injure them all. He was not a good man ; but as he was brave and clever, and a good friend to the towns, the French were very proud of him. CHAPTER XV. THE ALBIGENSES 1190. LOUIS YIIL, THE LION . . . 1223-1226. LOUIS, the Lion had a very short reign, but most of his doings had been in his father's time ; and I left them out that you might hear, all in one, as it were, the history of Philip Augustus and his crafty dealings with the House of Planta- genet. Now, we will go back and speak of Louis, before he came to the throne, and of the people he chiefly fought with. You remember that the South of France, which had first been settled by the Romans, and had never been peopled by the Franks, was much' more full of learning and thinking than the northern part. T\iQ Langue doc was much more used for poetry and elegant speech than the Langue d'ouL But somehow, among these people there 157 l58 Young Folks' History of France* arose up a heresy (that is, a false doctrine), which seems to have come to them from the East. It would not be well to tell you all about it, even if you or I could understand it ; but one great point in it was that these people said that the Power of Evil is as great and strong as the Power of Good, thus making Satan like another God, as some old Eastern pagans thought. The evil ways of Chris- tians strengthened the notions of these people, who were called Albigenses, from the town of Albi. Their southern cleverness saw what was amiss, and they made songs laughing at the clergy, and at the way they dealt with holy things, and often at the holy things themselves, till they led away a great many people after them, and even some of the great princes of the South, who began to feel as if the Albigenses were something specially be- longing to themselves, and to the old culture of the Roman Provincia. But the great Pope, Innocent III., could not allow all this country to fall away from the Church. While he was thinking what was to be done, two men offered themselves to him. One was a Span- iard, named Dominic, who wished to found an order of brethren to go forth, preach, teach and bring back heretics ; the other was an Italian, The Alhigenses. 159 named Francis, who cared above all for holiness, and longed to be like our Lord, and wanted to draw together men within the Ciiurch to be more spiritual and less worldly, and give the enemy no cause to take offence at their faults. Both these good men were allowed to institute brotherhoods, orders not quite like the monks in the old con- vents, but still poorer. Their brethren were called friars, and went about preaching and hearing con- fessions, and helping men and women to lead holier lives — those of St. Francis in Christian places, those of St. Dominic wherever there was heresy. Dominic was further allowed to judge and punish with severe penances and captivity such as would not be convinced, and the inquiry into opinions which he and his friars made was called the Inquisition. But the great dukes and counts in the South of France — in Provence, Toulouse, Foix, Albi, and many others — did not choose to have their people interfered with. They all spoke much the same language, and they were resolved, right or wrong, to hold together ; and it is really one of the most difficult questions in the world whether it is well or ill to put down false teachings. The more peo- ple think and read the more they doubt about per- 160 Young Folks' History of France, secution ; and so these Provencal princes, being cleverer than their rough neighbors, were the less disposed to punish their subjects ; but they were also less religious and less earnest, and Pope Inno- cent had no question but that they ought to be called to an account. So he proclaimed a crusade against them, as if they had been Saracens, and made the leader of it Simon, Count de Montfort, a stern, hard, though pious old knight, the father of the Simon de Montfort who fought with Henry III. Pedro II., King of Aragon, joined the Albigenses, and there was a terrible war all over the south. In the year 1213 a great battle was fought at Muret, in the County of Toulouse, in which the Albigenses were beaten, and the King of Aragon killed. Those were cruel times, and the Crusaders treated their captives very savagely. The Count of Toulouse, Raymond, stood against the Crusaders, and with his son, also named Ray- mond, fought hard ; but the Pope declared them unworthy to rule, and granted Simon de Montfort all the lands he had conquered in the South of France. In the northern parts he was looked on as a saint, and when he went to do homage to the king, people ran to touch his horse and his clothes as something holy. Indeed, he was a sincerely ^^«r^.- »*VJ-J-7^ IIIK l;A!Tl.i; I'K -MLliKT. Louis VIIZ, The Lion, 163 good man ; aiiiL though he did many things so cruel that I cannot tell you of them, it was all be- cause he thought it his duty. Louis the Lion aided him, and learnt the art of war during these battles ; but when tlie Crusaders tried to take the city of Toulouse, the people, knowing how horribly they would be treated, held out against them ; and at last, in 1217, the year of our King John's death, one night, when Simon was attacking the walls, a woman threw down a heavy stone, which struck him on the head and killed him. His eldest son, Amaury, was not such an able warrior, and the Albigenses began to get the better of the Crusaders, while Louis the Lion was away in England ; but in the year 1223, when Philip died, and he became King of France, he was called upon by the Pope to begin war again. He fought with all hi^ might ; but in spite of his title of the Lion, he was not as able a soldier as he was a brave man, and in the three years of his reign he did not much weaken the Albigenses, though he was at war witt them all through his short reign. While he was passing through Auvergne, a sickness broke out in his army, he fell ill himself, and died in the year 1226. His eldest son, Louis IX., was only eleven years 164 Young Folks'* History of France^ old ; but the queen, Blanche of Castille, his mother, was a very good and spirited woman, and man- aged the kingdom excellently. She sent troops, who gained such successes that at last Count I^ay- mond of Toulouse was forced to make peace, and to give his only child into Blanche's hands to be » brought up as a wife for her third son, Alfonso. The Count of Provence, who held from the Em- peror, had four daughters, and no son, and these ladies were married in due time to the King of France and his brother Charles, and to the King of England and his brother Richard, and thus all that great country of the Languedoc was brought under the power and influence of the north. The Dominican friars and the Inquisition were put in authority everywhere, that the false doctrine of the Albigenses might be rooted out ; and there was much of barbarous punishment, imprisonmeijt tor- ture, and even burning of heretics. It Avas a cruel age, and no doubt terrible things were done ; but that the punishments were savage does not make the faith of the Albigenses right. It was a time when much thought was going on throughout Europe. Pope Innocent III. had made the Church of Rome very powerful, and though no one who came after was as great as he was, his L^uis Vlll.y The Lion* 165 plans were followed out, and the King of France, who was alwa3^s called the Eldest Son ot the Church, was one of the first to be reckoned on for carrying them out. They were often plans for mere earthly power more than spiritual, but all good men thought it their duty to aid them, and it was a time when there were many good men. The work of St. Bernard and the example of St. Francis were doing much to make the lives of men and women more pure and holy, and there was more learning and less roughness than in the last age. Everything that was then made was strangely beautiful too — castles, churches and cities were in most graceful architecture ; armor and dress were exquisite in color and shape, and the illuminations in the manuscripts were as lovely as hand could make them. CHAPTER XVI. ST. LOUIS IX. 1226. THE little king, Louis IX, who came to the throne in 1226, when he was only eleven years old, was happy in having a good and wise mother. Queen Blanche of Castille, who both brought him up carefull}^, and ruled his kingdom for him well and wisely. She was sometimes a little too jealous and stern, and as he grew up she was jealous of his caring for anybody else. When he married Margaret of Provence, she did not like the young husband and wife to be very much together, for fear Louis should be drawn off from graver matters ; but on the whole she was an excellent mother and queen, and there have been very few kings in any country so good and just and holy as Louis was. He never 166 St. Louis IX. 167 seems in all his life, to have done anything that he knew to be wrong, and he cared more for God's honor than anything else. Sometimes such very pious kings forgot that they had any duty to their people and did not make good rulers ; but Louis knew that he could not do his duty properly to God if he did not do it to man, so he showed himself a wise, just prince and good warrior. He was so much stronger and cleverer than our poor foolish Henry III., that his barons thought he could take away all Guyenne, which had been left to King John ; but he said he would not do an injustice. Henry had married his queen's sister, and their children would be cousins, so he would not do what would lead to wars between them. But when Henry wanted him to give back Normandy and Anjou, he had the matter well looked into; and he decided that King John had justly forfeited them for murdering Arthur of Brittany, and so he ought to keep them. So he was always sensible as well as just. He was still a young man, when he had a very bad illness and nearly died. In the midst of it he made a vow that if he got well he would go to the Holy Land, and fight to set Christ's Sepulchre free from the Mahometans. As soon as he grew better 168 Young Folks* History of France, he renewed the vow, though it grieved all his peo- ple very much ; but he left them to be governed by his mother, and as soon as he could get his army together, he set out on his crusade with his wife and his brothers. As the Mahometans who held the Holy Land came from Egypt, it was thought that the best way of fighting them would be to attack them in their own country. So Louis sailed for Egypt, and be- seiged and took Damietta ; and there he left his queen, Margaret, while he marched on by the side of the Nile, hoping to meet the eneni}-. But it was a bad season, for the Nile was overflowing, and the whole country was one swamp, where the knights and horses could hardly move, and grievous sick- ness broke out. The king himself became very ill, but he and his men roused themselves when they found that a battle was near. It was fought at Mansoureh. The adversaries were not native Egyptians, but soldiers called Memlooks. They had been taken from their homes in early infancy, made Mahometans, and bred up to nothing but w^ar ; and very terrible warriors they were and quite as much feared by the Sultan and the Egyp- tians as by the enemy. However, the French feared nothing ; they were only too fool-hardy ; tSt. Louis IX. 169 and when the English Earl of Salisbury gave ad- vice to be prudent and keep a guard at the camp, the king's brother Robert called out that he was afraid, and the earl answered in a passion that he should go as far among the enemy as Robert him- self. So they all dashed in, and many others, and the Memlooks got between them and the camp, and cut them off and killed them. The king was so weak that he could hardly sit on his horse, but he tried to call his men together and save them ; but it was all in vain, the Memlooks were all round them, and he was so faint that his knights took him off his horse, and laid his head in a woman's lap, fearing each moment to see him die. He gave himself up as a prisoner, and lay day after day in a hut with two priests waiting on him. He re- spected them so much that he could not bear to let them do servants' work for him ; and he was so patient and brave, that the Memlooks themselves said he was the best man they had ever seen, and wanted to make him Sultan of Egypt. At last it was settled that he should be set free, if he would pay a heavy ransom, and give up the city of Damietta, which he had taken. This was done, and afterwards he embarked with his queen and the remains of his army, and went to the Holy 170 Young Folks' History of France, Land ; but there was a peace just then, and no fighting ; and after he had fulfilled his vow of pilgrimage, he returned to France, but not to find his mother there, for she had died in his absence. Fourteen most happy and good 3'ears followed his return. He was a most wise and valiant king in his own kingdom, and thoroughly just and up- right. There was a great oak-tree near his palace of Vincennes, under which he used to sit, hearing the causes of the poor as well as the rich, and doing justice to all. He had a clear good sense and judgment, that made him see the right thing to do. The Pope had a great quarrel with the Emperor Frederick II., and tried to make Louis take up arms against him, as his father had done against King John of England; but the good king saw that even the Pope's bidding would not make this right, and held back. He and Henry III. of England were very loving brothers-in-law ; and during the barons' wars in England, Eleanor, the young wife of Ed- ward, the heir of England, was left with his aunt, Queen Margaret of France. You recollect that Louis IX. and Henry III. and their two brothers, Charles, Count of Anjou, and Richard, Earl of Gornwall, had married the four daughters of tho^ St, Louis IX, 171 Count of Provence. The Earl of Cornwall was chosen to be King of the Romans — that is, next heir to the Western ^llmpire — and when her three sisters were queens, the fourth sister, Beatrice, kept the County of Provence. . She is said to have been unhappy because her sisters sat on thrones, when she only sat on a stool ; but before long^ the Pope offered the kingdom of the two Sicilies to her husband, Charles of Anjou. It rightly be- longed to the grandson of the Emperor Frederick, and Louis wished his brother to have nothing to do with it ; but Charles was a false and ambitious man, though he pretended to be as religious as Louis ; and with an army of Provencals he set out and gained the kingdom we now call Naples and Sicily. The young heir Conradin set off to try to regain his inheritance, but Charles defied him in battle, made him prisoner, and put him to death on the scaffold. Louis had always intended to make another cru- sade, and Charles promised to join him in it, as well as Edward of England. All the North of Africa was held by the Moors, who were Mahom- etans ; but Louis had had letters that made him think that there was a chance of converting the Dey of Tunis to the Christian faith, and his brother 172 Young Folks' History of France, Charles wished to show them the crusading armj in hopes of alarming them, and getting powel there. So Louis, with his armj', landed in the Bay of Tunis, and encamped in the plains of Old Carthage to wait for King Charles and Edward of England ; but the Moors were foes instead of friends. It was very hot and unwholesome, and deadly sickness broke out. The good king went about from one tent to another, comforting and helping the sick, but he was soon laid low himself. He lay repeating Psalms, and dictating a beautiful letter of advice to his daughter, as he grew worse and Avorse ; and at last, with the words, " O Jeru- salem, Jerusalem ! " on his tongue, he died in the year 1270, nor has there ever been such a king in France again, and few in any other country. Charles of Sicily and Edward of England came three days later ; and as soon as they could get together the poor, broken, sad and sick army, they sailed for Sicily, taking with them the poor young king, Philip, who was very ill himself, and could not go on with the crusade, so that Edward was obliged to go alone, as we all know. Louis and his youngest son, who had died a day or two before him, were buried together at St. Denys, and he has ever since borne the well-deserved title of saint. DEATH OF LOUIS. CHAPTER XVII. PHILIP ni., THE HARDY ; AND PHILIP lY., THE FAIR. 1271—1284—1814. ST. LOUIS left three sons. The second, Rob- ert, Count of Clermont, must be remembered, because three hundred years later his descendants, the House of Bourbon, came to the throne of France. The eldest son, Philip HI., was a man who left very little mark, though lie reigned thir- teen years. The most remarkable thing that hap- pened in his time was a great rising against his uncle, Charles of Anjou, in Sicily. The French and Provencal knights he had brought with him were proud, and rude in their behavior to the peo- ple of the country, and oppressed them heavily. At last, on Easter Monday of 1282, as the people of Palermo were on their way to hear vespers, all in holiday attire, a French soldier was rude to a 175 176 Young Folks' History of France, Sicilian girl, and a fight broke ont, which ended in the killing of all the Frenchmen in the island ex- cept one, who had been more kind and gentle than the rest. This was called the Sicilian Vespers. The Sicilians then sent to offer the crown to Pedro, King of Aragon; the nearest kinsman of their old line. The Pope was so angry with him for accept- ing it as to declare his own kingdom forfeited, and to send Philip of France to take it from him. But soon after the French army had advanced into Aragon, sickness broke out among them, the king himself caught it, and died in the jqq.t 1284 ; and Pedro of Aragon gained the island of Sicily and kept it, though Charles of Anjou and his sons reigned on in Naples on the mainland. Philip IV., called Le Bel^ or the Fair, was only seventeen years old when he came to the crown ; but he was as clever and cunning as his uncle, Charles of Anjou, or his great grandfather Philip Augustus, and his great object was to increase the power of the crown by any means he could. He had not to deal with an English king like John ; but Edward I. was so much more anxious to make one kingdom of Great Britain than to be powerful in France, that he took little concern for his French duchies. So when Philip IV. picked a quarrel and Fhilip in.. The Hardy, 177 seized Guyenne, Edward would not draw off his men from Scotland to fight for it, but made a peace which only left hmi Gascony, and sealed it by him- self marrying Philip^s sister Margaret, and be- trothed his son Edward to Philip's little daughter Isabel. It was very wrong — almost the worst action of the great king's life — for young Edward was already betrothed to the young daughter of the poor Count of Flanders, Guy Dampierre, whom Philip was cruelly oppressing. When England thus forsook their cause, Philip made the count prisoner, and so kept him all the rest of his life. Nothing but misery came of the marriage. But the most remarkable part of the history of Philip TV. is what concerns the Church and the Popes. For the last two hundred years the Popes had been growing more and more powerful, and ruling over kings and princes — sometimes rebuk- ing them manfully for their crimes, but too often only interfering with what disturbed the worldly power of the Church. Now Philip was a man of evil life, and was, besides, very hard and grasping in requiring money from the clergy. The Pope, Boniface VIII., was an old man, but full of fiery vehemence; and he sent a letter of reprimand, 17 3 Young Folhs^ History of France, bidding the king release the Count of Flanders, make peace, and exact no more from the clergy. Philip was very angry, and the two went on writing letters that made matters worse, until the Pope threatened to depose the king ; and Philip sent off to Anagni, where the Pope generally lived, a French knight, named Nogaret, and an Italian called Sciarra Colonna, who had quarrelled with the Pope and fled to France. They rode into Anagni, cry- ing, " Long live the King of France ! death to Boniface ! " at the head of a troop of worthless fellows who had gathered round them. The people of Anagni were so shocked that they never moved, and the men went on to the church, where they found the Pope, a grand old man of eighty-six; seated calmly by the altar in his robes, with his tiara on his head. They rushed up to him, insult- ing liim and striking him on the cheeks ; indeed, Colonna would have killed him on the spot but for Nogaret. They dragged him out of the church, and kept him prisoner three days ; but after that, the townspeople recovered from their fright, rose, rescued him, and conducted him safely to Pome ; but what he had gone through had been too much for him, and a few mornings later he was found .'««-^SNA SraiKINO TUE POPE. Philip IV., The Fair. 181 lying quite dead, tlie head of liis stick at his lips, gnawed and covered witli foam, and his white hair stained with blood, as if in a fit of terror he had dashed his head against the wall. This piteous death was in the year 1303. Another Pope was chosen ; but as soon as Philip found that the new one was determined to control him, he caused him to be poisoned, and then deter- mined to get the future one into his hands. There were a good many French cardinals who would, he knew, vote for any one he chose ; and meeting in secret the Archbishop of Bordeaux, the king told him he should have their votes on six condi- tions. Five of these related to the making up of the old quarrel with Boniface ; the sixth Philip would not tell then, but the archbishop swore it should be fulfilled ; and the king then brought about his election as Pope, when he took the name of Clement V. To everyone's surprise, he chose to be crowned at Lyons instead of Rome, and then took up his abode at Avignon, in Provence, which, though it belonged to the empire, was so much in France as to be entirely in the king's power. As long as the Popes remained at Avignon, they were nothing but tools to the kings of France ; and this really 182 Young Folks' History of France, seems to have been the greatest misfortune that happened to France. The power of the Popes was stretched much too far, and their interference in temporal matters was often wrong, bilt it was the only authority that ever kept kings and princes in order; and when the Popes lived on French ground, and were afraid to reprove the lords of the country, there was nothing to hinder the evil ways of either kings and nobles, and they went on from bad to worse, unrestrained by the Church, the wit- ness of truth. Philip the Fair was a very greedy man, always seeking after money, and oppressing his people heavily to obtain it. Now, you remember that two orders of soldier monks had been set up to defend the Holy Sepulchre. Soon after St. Louis' last crusade. Acre, the last spot that belonged to the Christians, had been taken from them. The Knights Hospitallers had settled in the island of Rhodes, hoping some day to return ; but the Knights Templars had gone to the houses in Europe, where they used to train up young men to arms. They were rich in lands, and, having nothing to do, were proud and insolent. And Philip cast his eyes on their great wealth, and told the Pope that his sixth condition was that all the Templars should Philip IV., The Fair. 183 oe destroyed. Most of them were living in France, but the others were invited to hold a great chapter there ; and when almost all were come, horrible accusations were made — that they were really heathen, that no one came into their order without being made to renounce his baptism and trample on the Cross, that they murdered little children, and other frightful stories ; and then five hundred and two were imprisoned by the Inquisition, and seventy-two tortured to make them confess. Most of them were brave and denied it all ; but there were a few who could not bear the pain, and said whatever was put into their mouths. Then, after being kept in prison two years, the rest were sentenced, brought out in parties of fifty and burnt to death, while the Pope declared the order dissolved, and gave the king all his possessions. This was in 1311. The Grand Master, James de Molay, was kept in prison three years longer, but then was brought out at Paris, and burnt before the king's palace garden. He was a fine old white- bearded man ; and as he stood there in the fire, he called on Clement, Pope of Kome, and Philip, King of France, to appear before the judgment seat of God — the first within forty da3S, the sec- 184 Young Folks' History of France. Olid within a year — to answer for their nsage of him and his knights. Before the fortieth day, Clement Y. actually died ; and before the year was out, Philip the Fair sank away from consumption, and died in his forty- sixth year, in the year 1314, leaving the most hate- ful name in French history. CHAPTER XVIII. LOUIS X., HUTIN, 1314—1316. PHILIP v., LE LONG, 1310—1322 CHARLES lY., LE BEL, 1322. PHILIP YI 1350. PHILIP the Fair left three sons — Louis, Philip, and Charles — and one daughter, Isabel, who was married to Edward of England. Louis X. was called by the nickname of Hutin, which is said to mean the Peevish or Ill-tempered. He was married to the young Queen of Navarre, in her own right ; but he only reigned two years, and his only son lived but five days. The French barons declared it was against the old law of the Salic Franks that their kingdom should fall to a woman, so Louis's little daughter Joan was only to be Queen of Navarre, while his brother, Philip V. (Le Long, or the Tall), became king. He must have been as cruel as his father, for there rose up in his time a 185 186 Young FoWs History of France, foolish story that the fountains of water bad been poisoned by the lepers and the Jews, whereupon he gave orders that they should suffer for it. They were killed on the spot, or else burnt at the stake throughout France, while the king and his nobles seized the treasures of the Jews ; but in the midst the king died, at only thirty years old, in the year 1322, leaving only four girls ; so that his brother, Charles IV., reigned after him. It was during the six years that Charles was on the throne that his sister Isabel came from England with complaints of lier husband, Edward II., and succeeded in collect- ing the knights, who helped her to dethrone him, after which he v/as brought to a miserable end in prison. Every one believed that the sins of the wicked father had been visited on these three sons — dying young, and without heirs ; and the French were glad when Charles the Fair died, in 1328, that their kingdom should go to Philip YI., Count of Valois, the son of the younger brother of Philip IV., Charles of Valois. But Edward III. of England called himself the right heir, declaring himself nearer in blood to his uncle, Charles IV., than Philip of Valois, their first cousin, could be. This was true ; but, then, if all Philip VI. 189 the daughters of the last three kings were shut out from reigning, it was not reasonable that he should pretend to a right through their aunt. At first, though he put his claim forward, he seems to have been willing to let it sleep, for he appeared before the French king in the Cathedral at Amiens, and did homage for the duchy of Aquitaine ; but there was a certain Robert of Artois, who had been deprived of what he thought his lawful inheritance, and who was suspected of wanting to bring about Philip's death by sorcery. He was said to have made a waxen image of the king and stuck it full of pins and set it before the fire, expecting that as the wax melted, so Philip would perish away and die. Philip believed the story, and Robert was obliged to fly to England, where, out of hatred and revenge, he stirred up the king to put forward his claim, and to begin the war with France which is sometimes called the Hundred Years' War. The great cities in Flanders, where cloth was woven, were friendly to the English, because in that peace- able country the sheep that bore the wool could feed quietly, and their supplies of material came from thence. Besides, Philip had tried to make them accept a count whom they hated, so they drove him away, and invited Edward to Ghent. 190 Young FolW History of France, The French fleet tried to meet and stop him, bat their ships were defeated and sunk, with great loss of men, off Sluys, in the year 1340. Not long after, there was a great dispute about the dukedom of Brittany, which was claimed by the daughter of the elder brother, and by the younger brother of the late duke. The niece had married Charles de Blois ; the uncle was the Count de Montfort. The King of France took the part of the niece, the King of England that of Montfort. Before long, Montfort was made prisoner and sent to Paris ; but his wife, the brave Joan, defended. his cause as well as any knight of them all. She shut herself up in Hennebonne, and held out the town while De Blois besieged her ; and when the townsmen began to lose heart, and say they must surrender, she bade them look out to the sea ; and there was the English fleet coming to their aid. Sir Walter Manny commanded the troops it brought, and the first thing he did was to lead a party to sally out and burn the French machines for battering the town. When they came back, Countess Joan came to meet them, and kissed all the knights, like a right valiant lady that she was, says the old chronicler Froissart, who has left us a charming history of these times. The war in Brit- 'bAPE THEM T.OOK Ol'T AT THK SEA Philip VL 193 tany lasted twenty-four years altogether. Montfort made his escape from prison, but he died very soon after he reached home ; and his widow sent her little son to be bred up in Edward's court in Eng- land, while she took care of his cause at home. The English were ver}' much hated and disliked in Brittany, and seem to have been ver}^ fierce and rough with the people, whose language they did not understand ; and some of the knights who were the greatest foes of all to the English grew up in Brittany, more especially Bertrand du Guesclin and Oliver de Clisson, but they were as yet boys. Edward made his greatest attack on France in the year 1346. Philip had gathered all the very best of his kingdom to meet him. The knights of France were nearly as strong as the knights of England, but there was one great difference be- tween the two armies, and that arose from the harshness of the counts and barons. Every one below them was a poor, miserable serf (unless he lived in a town), and had never handled arms. Now, in England there were farmers and stout peasants, who used to practice shooting with the bow once a week. So there were always sturdy English archers to fight, and the French had nothing of the same kind to meet them, and tried 194 Young FolJcs^ History of France, hiring men from Genoa. The battle was fought at Cregy, near Ponthieu ; and when it was to begin by each troop of archers shooting a flight of arrows at one another, it turned out that a shower of rain which had just fallen had slackened the bow-strings of the Genoese archers; but the Englishmen had their bows safe in leathern cases, and their strings were in full order, so the arrows galled the French knights, and a charge was ordered to cut them down. But full iii the way stood the poor Genoese, fumbling to tighten their strings ; and the knights were so angry at being hindered, that they began cutting them down right and left, thus spending their strength against their own army, so that it was no wonder that they were beaten and put to flight. King Philip himself had to ride as fast as he could from the battle-field ; and coming to a castle just as night set in, he blew his horn at the gates, and when the warder called out to know who was there, he answered, " Open, open ! it is the fortune of France ! " The English went on to besiege and take the city of Calais ; and in Brittany Charles de Blois was defeated and made prisoner ; and there was the further misfortune of a horrible plagu^, called the black death, raging all through France. Fiv^ PhUip FT. 19.^ hundred people a-day died in the great hospital callecl the Hotel Dieu, at Paris, and it was bad also in England ; so that both kings were glad to have a truce, and rest for a few years, though Edward still called himself King of France, and the dispute was far from settled. Philip paid his men by causing the nation to pay a tax upon salt, while Edward's chief tax was on wool ; so while Philip called his rival the wool merchant, Edward said that the * Valois did indeed reign by the Salic law (s«Z being the Latin for salt.) The Counts of the Yiennois, in 4;he South of France, used to be called Counts Dauphin, because there was a dolphin in their coat of arms. The Dauphin Humbert, having neither children nor brothers, bequeathed his county to the king's eldest grandson, Charles, on condition that it should always be kept separate from the Crown lands. Ever since that time the eldest son of the King of France has always been called the Dauphin. A year later Philip died, in the year 1350, after a reign that had been little more than one long war. CHAPTER XIX. JOHN. 1350—1364. IF Philip VI. had a reign which was all one war, it was much the same with his son John, who thought himself a brave and honorable knight, though he often did evil and cruel actions. The little kingdom of Navarre, in the Pyrenees, had passed from the daughter of Louis Hutin to her son, Charles, called the Bad. In right of his father, the Count D'Evreux, he was a French noble, and he wanted to hold the highest office a noble could hold — namely, that of Constable of France. The Constable commanded all the armies, and was the most mighty person in the realm next to the king ; and when John gave the appointment to the Lord Charles de la Cerda, Charles the Bad, in his rage and disappointment, contrived to poison the 196 THIS WAY, FATHER. John, 199 new constable ; and he was also said to have tried to poison the Dauphin Charles; and though the dose failed to kill, it ruined the young man's health, and in the end shortened his life. It was owing to the Dauphin that Charles the Bad was seized at last. He invited him to dinner, and appeared to be very friendl}' ; but in the midst of the feast the king appeared witli a band of soldiers, seized the King of Navarre, and carried him to prison. It was very treacherous ; but the Dauphin Charles, young as lie was, was much more cunning than his father. Charles the Bad was clever, and had many friends who were angered by his imprisonment, and went over to the cause of the King of -England. Edward, the Prince of Wales, who was at Bordeaux, the capital of Gascony, took the opportunity of ad- vancing into the French dominions, and John as- sembled an army to meet and drive him back. The battle was fought at Poitiers ; John was there, with his sons and his brother, and all his best knights, and the battle was long and hotly fought. The French did much better than at CrcQy ; but the English were too strong for them, though the king was as brave as a lion, and struck vehement!}' with his battle-axe, his youngest son, Philip, ktep- 200 Young Folks' History of France. mg close to him, and warning him where to strike. "This way, father!" or, " That way, father!" " To the right ! " " To the left ! " But at last the father and son found themselves almost alone, with all their men scattered and dispersed, and nothing but enemies around. The king had lost his helmet, and was slightly wounded, and greatly worn out ; so he called to the first squire he saw — one Denis de Morbeque — and finding that he was a gentleman, surrendered to him. He was brought to the Prince of Wales, who treated him with the utmost kindness and courtesy, and did his best to lighten the pain and humiliation of captivity. The Dauphin had fled early in the day, and was thought to have been the cause of the loss of the battle. Everything fell into a deplorable state. The Prince of Wales ruled the old English Gascon territory at Bordeaux ; and though there was a truce between the two kings, troops of soldiers — Free Companions, as they called themselves — roamed about, plundering and robbing all over France, while the king was a prisoner in England. The Dauphin was hated and despised, and had no power at all ; and in Paris, a burgher named Stephen Marcel was chosen provost, and led all the populace to terrify the Government into doing what he MURDER OF THE MARSHAL.': John. 208 pleased. The mark of his followers was a hood, half red and half blue; and thinking that the Dauphin's friends gave him bad advice, Marcel sud- denly rushed into his presence, at the head of a whole troop of Parisians, wearing these colors, and demanded, " Will you put an end to the troubles, and provide for the defence of the kingdom ? " '' That is not ni}^ part," said Charles, " but that of those who receive the money of the taxes." Mar- cel made a sign, and his followers murdered the two noblemen who stood beside the Dauphin. The prince, in terror, fell on his knees and begged for his life ; and Marcel thrust one of the red and blue hoods upon his head, and then told him, pointing to the two corpses, " I require you, in the iiame of the people, to consent to their death, for it is done by the will of the people." The Dauphin consented ; but he soon made his escape, and took up arms against Marcel. Charles of Navarre had been released from his prison, and was fighting in the South of France ; and Cliarles de Blois had been ransomed, and was fighting in Brittany; and to add to all these, the peasants, who had been always ill-used and trampled down by the nobles, began to rise against them. " Bon homme Jacques'' had been the nickname given them by the 204 Young Follies' History of France. nobles, and hence this rebellion was called the Jacquerie, and a terrible one it was ; for the peas- ants were almost savages, and whenever they could surprise a castle, they murdered every one in it. They set up a king from among them, and soon one hundred thousand had arisen in Picardy and Champagne ; but they were armed only with scythes and axes, and the nobles soon put them down and then were just as brutal themselves in their revenge. The " King of the Jacques " was crowned with a red-hot tripod, and hung ; and the poor wretches were hunted down like wild beasts, and slaughtered everywhere, and nothing was done to lessen the misery that made them rebel. The Dauphin beseiged Paris, and Marcel, find- ing he could not hold out, invited the King of Navarre to help him ; but another magistrate, who hated Charles the Bad, contrived to attack Marcel as he was changing the guard, killed him and six of his friends and brought him back to Paris. This was only the first of the many fierce and tumult- uous outbreaks that have stained the fair city of Paris with blood. King John was so anxious to return that he prom- ised to give up to Edward all that Henry 11. and Cceur de Lion had held ; but the Dauphin and the mf" THK ATTACK OX MARCEL, John. 207 States-General did not choose to confirm Lis pro- posal, thinking it better to leave him in prison, than to weaken the kingdom so much. So Edward mvaded France again, and marched almost up to Paris, intending to fight another battle ; but the Dauphin had made up his mind never to fight a a battle with the English again ; and between the war and the Jacquerie, the whole country was bare of inhabitants, cattle, or crops. The English army was almost starved, and a frightful tempest did it much damage ; so that Edward consented to make peace and set John free, on condition that his two sons should be given up as hostages for the pay- ment of a great ransom, and a large part of Aqui- taine ceded to England. King John returned ; but he found the kingdom m such a dreadful state of misery and povert}^ that he did not collect mone}^ for the ransom, nor would tiis sons remain as pledges for it. They were al- lowed to live at Calais, and make short journeys into France ; but they would not submit to this, ^nd at last stayed away altogether. John was much .grieved and ashamed, and said the only thing he could do was to return and give himself up as a prisoner, since he could not fulfil the conditions of 208 Young Folks' History of France, his release. When he was entreated to remam at home, he said, " Where should honor find a refuge if not in the breasts of kings ? " and accordingly he went back to London, where he was welcomed as a friend by King Edward, and there he died in the year 1364. He left four sons — the Dauphin Charles ; Louis, the Duke of Anjou ; John, Duke of Berry ; and Philip, who had married the heiress of Burgundy, and was made duke of that province^ CHAPTER XX. CHARLES V. 1364—1380. CHARLES v., in spite of his troubles as Dau- phin, was a much abler man than his father John ; and he had seen the best way to treat the English enemy — namely, not to fight them, but to starve them out. The French knights could beat anyone except the English ; and just now there professed to be peace with Edward III., but with Charles the Bad of Navarre there was still war, until a battle was fought at Cocherel, between the French, under the brave Breton knight, Bertrand du Guesclin, and the Navarrese, under the great friend of the Black Prince, the brave Gascon knight, the Captal de ^ Buch. Du Guesclin gained a great victory, and made the Captal prisoner, and from that time no 209 210 Young Folks' History of France. French knight was equal to him in fame. Thus Charles the Bad had to make peace. The young De Montfort, wl o had been brought up in England, was by this time old enough to try to fight for Brittany ; and though the kings were at peace, the Prince of Wales lent him a troop of English, commanded by the best captain in all Europe, Sir John Chandos ; and at the battle of Auray, Charles de Blois, who had so long striven to win the duchy, was killed, and Du Guesclin was made prisoner. After this, the king accepted Mont- fort as Duke of Brittany, and this war was like- wise over. But after so many years of fighting, there were a great many men who knew and cared for nothing else. They could not be quiet. All they wanted was a horse and armor, and some one to hire them to fight, let them gain plunder, and take prisoners to but to ransom. They called themselves Free Companions, or Free Tiances, and used to get some skilful warrior to be their leader. When the wars were over and nobody wanted to hire them, they would take possession of some castle, and live by plundering the travellers in the country round, so that they were the most dreadful plague imaginable. King Charles asked Du Guesclin how to get rid Claries V. 211 of tliera, and Bertrand thought of apian. Castille, in Spain, had just then one of the wickedest kings .r.n who ever lived, Petor the Cruel, who murdered his wife (a cousin of Charles), and killed most of his mlf-brothers, besides many other persons. One of these brothers, Henry of Trastamere, managed to escape, and came to France to beg for help ; and Du Guesclin told the king that it would be an ex- cellent way to get rid of the Free Companions to draw them off into Spain. Charles consented, and Du Guesclin invited their leaders to meet him; and when they found he would lead them, they all consented, making sure of plenty of fighting and plundering. As they rode past Avignon, they frightened the Pope into giving them a large con- tribution ; and as soon as they entered Castille, Peter the Cruel fled away, and Henry was crowned king. He kept Du Guesclin in his service, but sent all the others back to France. However, Peter came to Bordeaux, and showed himself to the Black Prince as an ill-used, dis- tressed king ; and Edward took up his cause, and undertook to set him on the throne again. All the Free Companions, who were coming back fron\ Spain, no sooner heard that the Prince was going 212 Young Folks' History of France. there, than they took service with him to restore the very king they had just dethroned. A great battle was fought at Navareta, in which the Prince was victorious. Du Guesclin was made prisoner, and Henry of Trastamere fled for his Hfe. Pedro was placed on the throne once more ; but he kept none of his promises to the English, and they soon perceived what a horribly cruel and wicked wretch he was. Sickness broke out among them, and they went back to Bordeaux, leaving him to his fate. Every one in France was most anxious to have Du Guesclin free again, and leven the maidens of Brit- tany are said to have spun day and night to earn money for his ransom. As soon as the sum was raised and he was at liberty, he returned to Spain with Henry, and they chased Pedro into the castle of Montiel, whence he came out in the night and attempted to murder his brother, but in the struggle was himself killed, to the great relief of all con- cerned with him. The Black Prince was, in the meantime, ill at Bordeaux, and in trouble how to pay the Free Companions, since Pedro had not given him the promised sum. He was obliged to tax his Saxon subjects, and this made them angry. They ap- Charles V. 213 pealed to Charles V., who was their suzerain, and he summoned the prince to appear tit Paris and answer their complaint. Edward said he should only come with his hel- met on his head and sixty thousand men behind him, and so the war began again ; but the Prince was out of health, and could not fight as he used to do, and the French king forbade his captains even to give battle, even Du Guesclin, whom he made Constable of France, and who grumbled at being forbidden. The war was carried on by sieges of castles, which, one by one, fell into French hands for want of means on the part of the English prince, to re- lieve them. Stung and embittered, at last he roused himself ; and though he could no longer mount his horse, he went in a litter to besiege the city of Limoges, and when it was taken, he sought his revenge in a ter- rible massacre of all the inhabitants. This, his saddest expedition, was his last. He went back to England and never recovered. Governors were sent to Bordeaux ; but they could do little against the continually advancing French, and at last nothing 'A France was left to Edward but the province of Gascony and the city of Calais, A 214 Young Folks' History of France, truce was made ; and before the end of it both the great Edwards were dead, and Richard II. on the throne, under the regency of his uncles, who tried to carry on the war, but still with no better fortune. It was Avhile besieging a little castle, named Chateau Randon, that tlic brave Du Guesclin fell sick of a fever and died. The English captain had promised to surrender if help did not come to him within a certain time ; and when he heard that the great constable was dead, he would not yield to any one else, but caused himself to be led to the tent of the dead man, on whose breast he laid down the ke^^s of the castle. The king made Du Gues- clin's friend, Oliver de Clisson, Constable in his stead. He was a Breton too, a brave knight, and a skilful leader ; but his brother had been made prisoner b}' the English, and hung, and he had made the savage vow that he would never spare the life of an Englishman, so that he was called the Butcher ; and it was a dreadful thing to fall into his hands. The king himself did not live much longer. He had never entirely shaken off the effects of the poison his bad namesake had given him, and knew he should die young. He carefully instructed his queen, Joan de Bourbon, how to protect his two Charles V. 217 young sons, Charles and Louis ; but to his great grief she died first, and he was obliged to leave the boys to the care of their uncles, when he died, on the 16th of September, 1380, after a reign of so much success that he is commonly known as Charles the Wise. CHAPTER XXI. CHAKLES VI. 1380—1396. IT was an evil hour for poor young Charles YI., when, at twelve years old, he was left an orphan king. His uncles — the Dukes of Anjou, Berri, and Burgundy (his father's brothers), quarrelled about the government, and he Avas allowed to grow up little heeded or restrained, and with all his pas- sions unchecked. The Church was in a most unsettled state. The Popes, while living at Avignon, were at the beck of the French kings, and this could not be borne by the otlier lands of the Western Church. Be- sides, they and their cardinals had not enough to do in this little town, and idleness led to all kinds of wickedness, while their proper abode at Rome was left to wild tumults and confusion. So at last, in 213 Charles VI. 219 tlie year 1376, Pope Gregor}^ XI. had decided on going back to Rome, though Charles V. and all the cardinals of French birth did all they could to pre- vent him. He died two years after he came there ; and then all the cardinals who wanted to stay in Italy chose one Pope, and all the cardinals who wished to live at Avignon chose another, and went back with him. So there were two Popes, the real Pope and the anti-Pope, and this made a grievous division, which is knov/n as the. Great Schism. The French and all their friends held by the Pope at Avignon, the English and all theirs by the Pope at Rome ; and things grew worse than ever, for both Popes were very poor and wanted as much money as they could ; and they were also afraid to offend either kings or bishops, for fear they should leave their party, and so sin and wickedness went on unchecked. One of the proudest nobles was Louis, Count of Flanders. He had many rich cities in his county, where almost all the best cloth, linen, and lace of the time was made, and where the burghers were rich and resolute. There was always much dislike and distrust between the counts and the cities ; and Louis was so severe, that at last the men of Ghent rose against him and shut their gates, choos- 220 Young Folks' History of France. ing as their leader Philip von Artevelde, the son of the brewer, Jacob von Artevelde, who had been a friend of Edward III. Artevelde led them out to fight with the count, gained a great victory, and hunted him into the city of Bruges. There he was as much hated as he was in Ghent ; all the people in the streets rose up against him, and no- body would give him shelter, till at last he found himself in the house of a poor widow who had sometimes received alms at his gate. He begged her to hide him, and she bade him creep under the bed, where her three little children were lying asleep. He had only just time to do so, when his enemies burst open the door, declaring he had gone in there ; but the widow bade them look in, and when they saw only the bed full of children, they thought he could not be there, and went away. In the morning he managed to get out of the city and escaped to Paris where he begged the king and his uncles to come to his help. He had but one daughter, who was to marry the son of the Duke of Burgundy ; so it was their interest to bring the Flemish towns to obedience, and the young king was very eager to make his first campaign. All the revolted burghers came out to battle with the knights and gentlemen, but they could not make Charles VI. 221 head against such a well-tried old leader as the Constable de Clisson, though they fought desper- ately ; and at the battle of Rosbecque twenty-six thousand men were killed, and Philip von Arte* velde was trampled to death in the flight. The young king loved and admired the Constable de Clisson more than any one else ; but the old man was much hated by many others for his harsh- ness and cruelty ; and one night in the streets of Paris, he was set upon by some murderers, who wounded him badly, and he was only saved by fall- ing against a house door, which gave way with his weight, so that he fell into a dark passage, where his enemies left him for dead, and fled away into Brittany. The king demanded that they should be sent back to be put to death, but the Duke of Brit- tany, who hated Clisson, would not give them up. Charles made sure that the duke had set them on, and in a great rage declared he would lay all Brit- tany waste. He collected his troops and set out, but a strange thing happened as he was riding- through the forest of Mans, on a burning hot sum- mer day. A man, probabl}" mad, rushed out from the bushes, caught his bridle, and cried, " Ride no further, king ; thou art betrayed I " The man was drawn away ; but presently after, as they rode on, 222 Young Folks'^ History of France, a page who had charge of the kmg's lance fell asleep on horseback, and let the point ring against the helmet of the man in front. This must have made the king fancy the treason had begun, and becoming frantic that moment, he drew his sword and rushed upon his followers, crying, " Down with the traitors ! " He killed four, but the others saved themselves by pretending to fall before the stroke ; and at last, as his strength became spent, a tall, strong knight sprang on his horse behind him and overpowered him. He was carried back to Mans, where he had a brain fever ; but he recovered and was for some time in perfect health, governing, not perhaps well, but with kind intentions. He married Isabel of Bavaria ; and had she taken better care of him, his life would have been far happier ; but she was a dull, and selfish woman, who cared more for good eating and amusement than for her hus- band and children, whom she neglected greatly. At a great festival, the king and five of his nobles dressed themselves up as wild men of the woods, in close garments, covered with pitch, with long loose flakes of tow, hanging to them to represent hair, and green boughs round their heads and waists. Chained together, they danced in among the ladies, who were to guess who they were. The king's ^>^''# '^THOU ART BETRAYED I" Charles VL 225 brother (the Duke of Orleans) held a torch so near one of them, the better to see who it was, that he set fire to the tow, and the flames spread to the whole party. Four were burnt to death, one saved himself by breaking the chain and leaping into a tub of water, aud the king himself was preserved by the Duchess of Berri, who threw her mantle over him ; but the shock had been so great that his insanity came on again, and he was never sensible for long together through the rest of his life. But he still was supposed to rule France, and so the power was in the hands of whoever had possession of him, and this at first was his uncle Philip, Duke of Burgundy. Still, as there was peace with England, the knights thought of crusades. Indeed, the Turks, under their great leader Bajazet, were beginning to make their way into Europe ; and the eldest son of the Duke of Burgundy, John the Fearless, set out Avith a party of French knights to succor the Hun- garians against them. They came just as peace had been sworn to on either side ; but it seemed such a pity that their aid should be wasted, that the Hungarians broke their word, and attacked the Turks. But their breach of faith met a due reward , for the whole army was defeated and butchei-ed, 226 Young Folks' History of France, and John himself, with twenty-seven nobles, alone lived to be ransomed. Afterwards, Marshal Boucicault led another i-roop to help the Emperor of Constantinople, Falseologos, and brought him home to France to visit the king, and ask further aid from the princes of Europe. CHAPTER XXII. BURGUNDIANS AND ARMAGNACS. 1415—1422. NOTHING could be more sad than the state of France under the mad king. As long as his uncle (the Duke of Burgundy) lived, he was not so ill cared for, and the country was under some sort of government ; but when Duke Philip died, and the dukedom passed to his son, John the Fearless, there was a perpetual quarrel between this rough and violent duke and the king's brother Louis, Duke of Orleans. The Duchess of Orleans — a gentle Italian lady (Valentina of Milan) — was the only person who could calm the poor king in his fits of frenzy, and the friends of Burgundy de- clared she bewitched him and made him worse. In the meantime, Queen Isabel would do nothing but amuse herself with the Duke of Orleans, and the king and her little children were left without attend- 227 228 Young Folks* History of France, ants, and often without proper clothes or food. The people of Paris hated Orleans, and loved the Duke of Burgundy, and this last was resolved to get the king into his power. So one night, as ^ the Duke of Orleans was going home from supper with the queen, he was set upon hy murderers and killed in the streets of Paris ; and what was even more horrible, the Duke of Burgundy caused a priest to preach a sermon defending the wicked act. The Duchess of Orleans came with her sons and knelt at the king's feet, imploring for the mur- derer to be punished ; but he could do nothing for her, and she went home and died broken hearted. Plowever, her son, the young Duke of Orleans, mar- ried the daughter of the Count of Armagnac, who took up his cause so vehemently, that all the friends of the House of Orleans were called Armagnacs, and were known by wearing a white scarf over the left shoulder, while the Burgundians wore blue hoods. The king's eldest son, the Dauphin Louis, was sixteen years old, and tried to get into power ; but he was a foolish, idle youth, whom no one heeded. When he heard that the new king, Henry Y., meant to invade France, Louis sent him a present of a basket of tennis balls, saying they were his TFTE yrrinr befork the battle agixoourt. Burgundians and Armagnacs. 231 most fitting weapons, considering his way of life as the madcap prince. Henry answered that he hoped to return balls from the mouths of cannon against Paris ; and it was not long before he actually crossed the channel, and laid siege to Harfleur, in Normandy. He soon took it, for no aid was sent to it ; and he proclaimed himself king of France, like Edward in. before him, and proceeded to endeavor to con- quer the country. The Dauphin collected an army, and marched to intercept him, as he was on the way from Harfleur to Calais to obtain fresh supplies. The French army greatly outnumbered the English, and thought it would be easy to cut them off, see- ing them hungry, sick, and worn with a long march. But the carelessness, the dissensions, and the insubordination of the French army would have caused it to be beaten by a far less skilful general than Henry Y. ; and though each noble and knight was personally valiant, this did little good when they were not united. There was an immense slaughter at this far-famed battle of Agincourt, and many noted prisoners were taken by the English, especiall}^ the Duke of Orleans ; and Henry would not allow these nobles to be ransomed, but kept them in captivity in England, until he should have finished winning the kingdom. 232 Young Folks\ History of France, The Dauphin Louis escaped from the battle, but died soon after ; his next brother (the Dauphin John) did not survive him long ; and the third brother (the Dauphin Charles) was entirely under the power of the Armagnac party, as well as his father and mother. But the Count of Armagnac was so insolent that qneen Isabel could bear it no longer, and fled to the Duke of Burgundy's protection ; and soon after the people of Paris rose against the Armagnacs, and murdered every one whom they found belonging to it. The count himself was horribly gashed, and his body was dragged up and down the streets. The poor king was in a fit of madness in his palace ; the Dauphin was carried away by his friend, Sir Tanneguy du Chastel : and for a whole month there were nothing but savage murders throughout Paris, of all who were supposed to be Armagnacs, until the queen and the Duke of Burgundy ar- rived, and restored something like order. No one, of course, had leisure to do anything to relieve Rouen, which Henry V. was besieging, and took in spite of the citizens holding out bravely. The queen and duke determined to make peace with him, and met him at a meadow near Pontoise, where beautiful embroidered tents were pitched ; MtrRT>KR OF THE DUKE OF BURGUNDY. Burgundians and Armaynacs. 235 and they held a conference, in which Henry asked in marriage Catherine, the youngest daughter of Charles and Isabel, with the whole of the provinces that had once belonged to the English kings as her dowry — Normandy, Aquitaine, and all. If this were refused, he would conquer the whole kingdom for himself. No promises were absolutely made. The Duk(^ of Burgundy could not make up his mind to give up so large a portion of his native realm, and be- gan to consider of going over to the Dauphin and helping him to defend himself. A meeting was arranged for the duke and Dauphin on the bridge of Montereau ; but Tanneguy du Chaste 1 and the prince's other friends had no intention of letting the bo}' get into the power of the great duke, and during the conference they treacherously stabbed John the Fearless to. the heart. His murder of the Duke of Orleans was thus visited upon him, but the crime Avas dreadful in those who committed it. The consequence was that his son Philip, called the Good, went entbely over to the English ; and be- fore long Henry V. was married to Catherine, and was to be Regent of France as long as poor Charles lived, and after that, king, the Dauphin being dis- inherited as a murderer. 286 Young Folks^ History of France^ All the North of France had been conquered by the English, and the Dauphin and his friends had retired to the South. Thence they sent to the Scots to ask for help, and many brave Scotsmen came, glad of a chance of fighting with the English. Henry had gone home to England to take his bride, and had left his brother, the Duke of Clarence, in command, when, as the English were marching into Aiijou, the . Scots fell on them at Beauje and defeated them, killing the Duke of Clarence. Henry came back in haste, and again carried all before him. He took the town of Meaux, where a horrible robber lived, cruelly preying on the inhab- itants of Paris ; but the siege lasted the whole winter. Henry caught cold there, and never was well again, though he kept his Whitsuntide at Paris with great state. Soon after, he set out for another campaign, but he became so ill on the journey that he had to be carried back to Vincennes, and there died. No one of all his own children had ever been so good to poor King Charles as Henry had been, and the loss at last broke his heart. He wept and wailed constantly for his good son Henry, pined away, and died only three months later, in October, 1422, after thirty years of madness. :^%3^ ^- CHAPTER XXIII. CHARLES Vn. 1422—1461. THOUGH all history counts the reign of Charles VII. as beginning from the death of his un- happy father, yet it was really the infant Henry, son of his sister Catherine and of Henry V. of England, who was proclaimed King of France over the grave in which Charles VI. was buried, and - 237 238 Young Folks^ History of France. who was acknowledged throughout France, as far as Loire, while his uncle, the Duke of Bedford, acted as Regent. Charles YIT. was proclaimed king by the Armag- nacs, but most people called him the Dauphin, and many termed him the King of Bourges, for he lived in that little town, never seeming to trouble himself about the state of his kingdom, but only thinking how to amuse himself from day to day, and some- times even talking of fleeing to Scotland, and leaving everything to the English. Bedford, in the meantime, determined to push on the work of conquest, and sent the Earl of Salis- bury to lay siege to Orleans ; but the place was bravely defended, and Salisbury was killed by a shot in the throat while looking on at the works. Soon after, as some stores were being sent to the English, a party of French nobles resolved to stop them, and fell upon the wagons. The English came out to defend them, and there was a general battle, which is known as the Battle of Herrings, because the provisions chiefly consisted of salt fish, intended to be eaten in Lent. The siege lasted on, but a wonderful aid came to the French. In the summer of 1425 a young girl, named Joan d'Arc, as she was in her father's little Charles VTT. 239 garden, thought she was called by the Angel St. Michael, and the Virgin Saints, Catherine and Mar- garet, to deliver her country and lead the king to be crowned at Rheims. At first no one would be- lieve her, but she was so earnest that at last the king heard of her, and sent for her. He received her by torchlight, and standing in the midst of many nobles, more richly dressed than he was ; but she knew him at once among them all, and led him a little apart, when she told him things that he de- clared no one else could have known but himself, and which made him sure she must have some un- earthly knowledge. She said her Voices directed her to go and fetch a marvellous sword from the shrine of St. Catherine, at Fierbois, and with this in her hand she led the troops to drive the English from Orleans ; but she never herself fought or struck a blow ; she only led the French, who had such trust in her, that wherever she led the}^ will- ingly followed. The English soldiers, on the other hand, believed her to be a witch, and fled in horror and dismay, leaving their leaders, who stood firm, to be slain. Thus it was that she succeeded in en- tering Orleans and delivering it from the siege. Thenceforth she was called the Maid of Orleans, and victory seemed to follow her. She fought in 240 Young FolW History of France. the name of Heaven, and did all she could to make her followers holy and good, rebuking them for all bad language or excess ; and at last she had the great joy of opening the way to Rheims, the city where all the French kings had been crowned ever since the beginning of the Meerwings. She saw Charles YII. crowned and anointed, and then she begged to go home to her cottage ; but the king and his council would not permit this, because she was such an encouragement to their men, and a terror to the English. But her hope and confidence were gone, and the French captains did not like her, though their men did ; and at Compiegne the governor shut the gates, and left her outside to be made prisoner by the Burgundians. She was kept in prison a long time — first in Burgundy, and then at Rouen — and tried before French and Burgun- dian bishops, who decided that her Voices had been delusions of Satan, and her victories his work ; therefore, that she ought to be burnt as a witch. To the eternal disgrace of Charles YII., he never stirred a finger to save her, and she was burnt to death in the market-place at Rouen. No one ever deserved less to win back a kingdom than Charles. He amused himself with one un- worthy favorite after another ; but there was ^ JOA>' OF AKC EXAMINKD IN PHISON. (Tharles VIT. 24b brave spirit among his knights and nobles, and the ablest of them was Arthur, Count de Richemont, brother to the Duke of Brittany, and Constable of France. As they grew stronger, the English grew Aveaker and less prudent. The Duke of Burgundy was offended, and made his peace with the King of France ; and the Duke of Bedford soon after died at Rouen, worn out with care and trouble. Step by step, and bit by bit, did the French king regain his dominion. When his cause began to look hopeful, he shook off his sluggishness, and came in person to receive the submission of Paris, and to reconquer Normandy. But the war was not finally ended till the year 1453, when Bordeaux itself was taken by the French; and thus finished the hundred years' war that Edward III. had begun. Charles YII. was not at all a foolish person when once he chose to exert himself. When the war was over, and the bands of men-at-arms had nothino- to do, he managed better than his grandfather, Charles V. ; for he laid them under strict rules, and gave them pay, so that they made him stronger, instead of being a torment to the whole country. But the nobles were very angry, and rose in an insurrection, which the Dauphin Louis joined, chiefly because he thought it would give his father trouble ; but when 244 Young Folks' History of France, he found the king too strong for the rebels, he made his peace, and left them to their fate. Charles was a prosperous man, and established peace. In the church, too, there was peace ; for at the council held by the Lake of Constance, in the year 1415, the rival Popes of Rome and Avignon had both been made to resign, and a new one had been elected, who was reigning at Rome ; but a great deal of evil had grown up during the Great Schism, which had not been remedied, =and things were growing worse and worse ; for if religion was not rightly taught, sin was sure to get unrestrained. One of the worst parts of Charles's nature was that he was so cold and ungrateful. The merchant, Jacques Coeur, had counselled him and lent him money, and done more than any one else to bear him through his troubles ; and yet he let false and ridiculous accusations be brought forward, on which this great man was stripped of all his property, and sent away to die in exile. Yet Charles's name in history is the Well-served ! But his son, Louis the Dauphin, hated him, and in a cunning, bitter way did all he could to vex and anger him. After many quarrels, Louis fled from court, and asked the protection of Duke Philip of Burgundy, who had become the most magnificent and stately of Charles VIZ 245 European princes, and hoped to make himself or his son king of the Low Countries. The old king lived in continual fear of this son of his, and at last fancied that Louis meant to poison him, and refused to take any food or drink, until he lost the power of swallowing ; and thus this cold-hearted, ungrateful king died a miserable death, in the year 1461. His coldness had nade everyone the more admire the splendid and gen- erous Duke of Burgundy, whose riches and liber- ality were the talk of all, and whose court was the most stately in existence. Through his mother he had inherited Flanders, with all the rich m-anufac- turing towns ; and Holland, with her merchant cities : and his court was full of beautv and luxury. CHAPTER XXIV. LOUIS XI. L 1461—1483. OUIS XI. was one of the cleverest of men, -^ but also one of the most crafty and cruel, and who has left the most hateful name in history. The one thing he cared for was to be powerful, and no sense of truth or pity would stop him in bringing this about. But it Avas not for state or splendor that he cared. He wore the meanest and most shabby clothes, and an old hat, surmounted by little leaden images of the saints, which he would take down and invoke to help him. For though his re- ligion could have been good for nothing, since it did not keep him from ever committing any crime, he was wonderfully superstitious. He must really have been taught, like all of his Church, that the saints did not bestow benefits, and could only be 246 ^M'-.^ ■-..?%.■* ■ Mfrj'S.^ ■^■^ ')W-. v<- ^ f^} =K^ IvOUIS XI. / Louis XL 249 asked to intercede for them ; but he not only prayed to them direct, but to their images ; and it actually seems that he thought that if he told one image of the Blessed Virgin of some crime, or made it some promise, it was a different thing from telling another. His court fool once overheard him at his devo- tions, and thought them so absurd and foolish that he could not help telling of them. The truth was that Louis had no love for God or man, he had only fear ; and so tried to bribe the saints to keep from him the punishments he knew he deserved, by fine promises of gifts at their shrines. And his fear of man made him shut himself up in a grim castle at Plessis-les-Tours, with walls and moats all round, and a guard of archers from Scotland, posted in iron cages on the battlements, to shoot at any dan- gerous person. He did not like the company of his nobles and knights, but preferred that of his barber, Oliver le Daim, and his chief executioner, Tristan I'Hermite ; and whoever offended him, if not put to death, was imprisoned in the castle of Loches, often in an iron cage, so small that it was impossible to stand upright or lie at full length. He had one brother, the Duke of Berri, whom he feared and hated, persecuting him till the Duke of Burgundy took the young man's part ; but Louis 250 Young Folks' History of France. managed to break up their alliance, and get his brother back into his own hands, and then to poison him. The old duke, Philip the Good, died just after Louis came to the throne, and his son, Charles the Bold, was a brave, high-spirited prince, with much that was noble and earnest about him, though very ambitious, and even more bent than his father on making his dukedom into a kingdom, reaching from the German Ocean to the Alps. To upset this power was Louis's great object. First, he began to stir up the turbulent towns of Flanders to break out against Charles ; and then, while this was at work, he came to visit him at his town of Peronne, hoping to talk him over, and cajole him with polite words. But what the king had not expected came to pass. The mischief he had been brewing at Liege broke out suddenly ; and the people rose in tumult, killed the duke's officers, and shut their gates. No wonder Charles went into a great rage ; and since Louis had put himself into a trap, thought it only fair to close the door on him. He kept him there till the French army had been summoned, and helped to reduce and punish Lidge ; besides which Louis made all manner of oaths, which, of course, he never meant to keep. Louis XL 253 King and duke hated one another more than ever ; and Charles, who had married the sister of Edward TV. of England, promised to aid the English if they would come to conquer France. Then Edward should have all the western parts, and he all the eastern. Edward actually came, with one of the finest armies that had ever sailed from England ; hut the Duke of Burgundy had been drawn into war with the German emperor and could not join him ; and Louis sent cunning messages and bribes to Edward and his friends, to persuade him to go away without fighting. The two kings met on the bridge of Pecquiguy, across the Somme, with a great wooden barrier put up between, for fear they would murder one another ; and they kissed each other through the bars, while the two armies looked on — the English ashamed, and the French well pleased, but laughing at them for going back in this dishonorabie way. Charles the Bold would have gone on with the war, but Louis s^tirred up fresh enemies for liim in Switzerland. The French king sent secret messen- gers into the Swiss towns and cantons to set them against the duke. The town of Basle rose, and murdered Charles's governor, and then joined the young Duke of Lorraine, his bitter enemy, and 254 Young Folks' History of France. made war on him. Charles was beaten in two battles, at Morat and Granson ; and at last, when he was besieging Nancy (the capital of Lorraine), the wicked Count Campobasso, the commander of his hired Italian troops, on Epiphany night, be- trayed him to the Swiss, opened the gates of the camp, and went over to the enemy. There was a great, slaughter of the Burgundians ; and after it was over, the body of the brave Duke Charles was found, stripped naked and gashed, lying half in and half out of a frozen pool of water. He only left one daughter, named Mary. His dukedom of Burgundy could not go to a woman, so that returned to France ; but Mary had all Flanders and Holland. Her father had betrothed her to Maximilian of Austria (the son of the German Emperor) ; and when Louis was stirring up the towns to rebel against her, she sent her be- trothed a ring as a token to beg him to come to her help. He did so at once, and they were married, and were most happy and prosperous for five years, till Mary was killed by a fall from her horse, and her baby son Philip had her inheritance. So Louis obtained the French part of the duchy of Burgundy. His mother, (Mary of Anjou) had been the sister of the Duke of Aujou, who had been Louis XL 255 adopted as the son of Queen Jane of Naples, the descendant of Charles of Anjou, St. Louis's brother. Rene, Duke of Anjou, his brother (the father of our Queen Margaret), had never been able to get the kingdom of Naples, though he was always called King Rene, but he did get the county of Provence, which belonged to it ; and there he led a cheerful, peaceable life, among painters, poets and musicians, and was one of the few good men of his time. His wife had been Duchess of Lorraine in her own rignt, and the young Duke of Lorraine who fought with Charles the Bold, was the son of his eldest daughter, for all his sons died young. Louis could not take away Lorraine from the young duke ; but he did persuade old King Rene at his death to leave the French kings all his claims to the kingdom of Naples — a very unhappy legacy, as j^ou will see. Louis had three children — Anne, who married the Duke of Bourbon's brother, the Lord of Beaujeu, and whom he loved ; and Jane, a poor, deformed, sickly girl, whom he cruelly teased because she was ugly, so that she used to hide behind her sister to escape his eye. She wanted to go into a convent, but he forced her to marry her cousin Louis, Duke of Orleans, who made no secret that he hated the very sight of her, though she was as good and meek 256 Young FoWs History of France* as possible. Charles the Dauphin was sickly, too, and the king himself had lost his health. He was in great dread of death — sent for a hermit from Italy (Francis de Paula) to pray for him, and vowed to give silver and gold images and candle- sticks and shrines to half the saints if they would save him ; but death came to him at last, in 1483, just as the wicked Richard III. had gained the crow» of England. CHAPTER XXV. CHARLES YIII. 1483—1498. YOUNG Charles VIII. was but nine years old when he came to the crown. He was a weakly boy, with thin legs and large head, but very full of spirit. His father had never cared about his learn- ing, saying that to know how to dissimulate was all that signified to a king ; and his sister Anne, the 257 258 Young Folks' History of France. Lady of Beaujeu, who had charge of him and his kingdom, thought like her father, and took no pains to teach him. He read nothing but poems and romances about knights and ladies, dragons and en- chanters ; but he really did gain the best lessons they could teach him, for instead of learning dis- sim Illation, he hated it. He never deceived any- one, never broke his word, was always courteous ; and so far from showing mean spite, like his father, he never wilfully grieved or vexed any one of any sort through his whole life. At first the Lady of Beaujeu was taken up with quarrels with their cousin and brother-in-law, the Duke of Orleans, who thought he had a better righ\. to be Regent than a woman ; and when he could not rule, went off to Brittany and made mischief there. The Duke of Brittany had no son, and everybody wanted to marry his little daughter Anne. Orleans himself had hopes of getting him- self divorced from his poor, good Jane, and marr}^- ing this young girl ; and at last a battle was fought between the Bretons and French, in which Orleans was knocked down, and made prisoner. He was sent off to one castle after another ; but his good wife Jane always followed him to do her best to comfort him, and never left him except to try and Qharles VIIL 259 gain his pardon ; but the Lady of Beanjen knew better than to let him out as long as Anne of Brit- tany was not married. Indeed, the Lady thought the best thing would be if young Charles could marry Anne, and join the great dukedom to his dominions. But on the one hand, Charles was betrothed to Maximilian's daughter Margaret, and Anne to Max- imilian himself ; and on the other, there was nothing the Bretons hated so much as the notion of being joined on to the French. They wanted the poor girl of fourteen ro marry a grim old baron, Alan de Albret, who had eight children already, because they thought he would fight for the duchy. In the midst of the dispute, the Duke of Brittany died, and poor young Anne had to strive for herself — on the one side against the French, who wanted to get her duch}^ into their hands ; and on the other, against her own Bretons, who wanted to force her into taking old Alan d' Albret. She waited in vain for Maximilian, hoping he would come to her, as he had once come to Mary of Burgundy ; and he was setting off, when his son's Flemish subjects, jealous of his raising troops, rose in tumult ; so that he had to hide in an apothecary's shop, till he was carried to prison in the castle at Bruges. 260 Young Folks' History of France, Anne of Beaujeu, in the meantime, raised an army and entered Brittany, taking one town after another. Still Anne of Brittany held out in her city of Rennes. But late one evening a young gentleman, with a small suite, came to the gates and desired to see the duchess. It was the king ; and so sweet in manner, so gentle and knightly was he, that Duchess Anne forgot her objections, and consented to marry him. And so the duchy of Brittany was joined to the crown of France. The worst of it was, that Charles VIII. had been be- trothed oO Maximilian's daughter Margaret ; but his sister cared little for scruples, and he was stili under her charge. As soon as Charles and Anne were married, the Duke of Orleans was released. Charles had always lived on romances, and wanted to be a king of romance himself. So he recollected the right to the kingdom of Naples which old King Ren^ had left to his father, and he gathered to- gether one of the most splendid armies that ever was seen in France to go and conquer it for him- self. Nobody in Italy was ready to oppose him, for the cities were all quarrelling among themselves ; and the Pope who was reigning then, Alexander VI., was one of the wickedest men who ever lived. All good men hoped that this young king would Charles VIII. 263 set things to rights — call a council of the Church, and have the court of Rome purified ; but Charles was a mere youth who cared as yet chiefly for mak- ing a grand knightly display ; and yet he could not even keep his army in order, so that they did dreadful mischief to the people in Italy, and made themselves very much hated. He was crowned King of Naples, and then left a division of his army to guard the kingdom, wliile he rode back again the whole length of Italy, and on the way claimed the duchy of Milan for his brother-in-law, the Duke of Orleans, whose grandmother, Valen- tina Visconti, had been a daughter of the Duke of Milan. The Italian States, however, had all leagued against him, and a great army gathered together to attack him at Fornova. Then he shewed all the high spirit and bravery there was in him. He really seemed to grow bigger with j 03' and courage ; lie fought like a lion, and gained a grand victory, so that he could go home to Queen Anne feeling like a true knight. But more goes to make a king than knighthood, and he did not keep up what he had conquered, nor send men or provisions to his army in Naples ; so they were all driven out by the great Spanish 264 Young Folks' JSistori/ of France. captain, Gonzalo de Cordova, and only a rem-nant of them came home to France, in a miserable con- dition. » Charles began to think more deeply as he grew older. He lost both his infant sons, and his grief changed him a good deal. He read better books than the romances of chivalry ; and as he had learnt truth, honor, and kindness before, so now he learnt piet}^, justice and firmness. He resolved to live like St. Louis, and began, like him, sitting under the oak-tree to hear the causes of the rich and poor, and doing justice to all. Above all, he knew how vain and foolish he had been in Italy, and what a great opportunity he had . thrown away of trying to get the terrible evils that were going on among the Pope and his cardinals cured, by helping the good men left in Italy, to- gether with Maximilian and Henry YII., to call a council of the Church, and set matters to rights. He was just beginning to make arrangements for another expedition to make up for his former mis- takes, when, one day, as he was going through a dark passage leading to the tennis court at Blois, he struck his forehead against the top of a doorway, was knocked backward, taken up senseless, and after lying in that state for a couple of hours, died. CHABLT^^ VTB. Charles VIH. 267 in the twenty-ninth year of his life and the fif- teenth of his reign, in 1498. He was so much loved that one of his servants died of grief, and his noble temper had trained up in France such a race of knightly men as perhaps has never been seen at any other time. CHAPTER XXVI. LOUIS XII. 149S— 1515. CHARLES VIII. had lost both his children, so the throne went to Louis, Duke of Orleans, grandson to the second son of Charles V. He was a kindly man when selfishness did not come in his way, and he was much admired for saying, when asked to punish some of his old enemiQs, that the King of France forgot all injuries to the Duke of Orleans. The first thing he did, however, was to bribe the wicked old Pope, Alexander VI., to sep- arate him from his good, faithful wife, Jane, who went into a convent and spent the rest of her life in praying for him ; while he married Anne of Brittany, in order to keep her duchy united with the crown. She was a very noble and high-spirited queen, and kept her court in such excellent order, 268 Louis Xn, 269 that the time of good Queen Anne has always been looked back upon as the very best time of the French court. Louis was a vain man, and could not rest till he had done as much as Charles VIII. So he allied himself with the Pope, set off into Italy with an- other brilliant army, and seized Milan. He did not himself go to Naples, but he sent thither an army, who seized a large portion of the kingdom ; but then the Spanish King Ferdinand persuaded Louis to make peace, and divide the kingdom of Naples in half. But while the two kings and their ministers were settling where the division should be, the soldiers in the kingdom itself were con- stantly quarrelling, and the war went on there just as if the kings were not making a treaty. At first the French had the advantage, for their knights were courage itself, especially one whose name was Bayard, and who was commonly called " the fear- 1^ less and blameless knight." The Spaniards, with Gonzalo de Cordova, their captain, were shut up in the city of Barletta, and stood a long and weary siege ; but he was wonderfully patient, and held out till fresh troops came out to him from Spain, and then beat the French completely at the battle 270 Young Folks' History of France. of Cerignola, and then drove them out, city by city, castle by castle, as he had done once before. The Italians themselves hated both French and Spaniards alike, and only wanted to get Italy free of them ; but instead of all joining openly together against them, their little states and princes took different sides, according to what they thought most likely to be profitable, though in a battle they did not care much who they killed, so long as he was a foreigner. A clever Florentine, named Machiavelli, wrote a book called " The Prince," in w^hich he made out that craft and trickery was the right way for small states to prosper and overthrow their enemies ; and this spirit of falsehood was taken for good policy, and is known by his name. The manner of fighting was curious. Able cap- tains used to get together bands of men-at-arms, who had been trained to skill in warfare, but who did not care on what side the}^ fought, provided they were paid well, allowed to plunder the towns they took, and to make prisoners, whom they put to ransom. Some of these bands were on horse- back, some on foot, and the most feared of all among the foot soldiers were the Swiss, who were very terrible with their long pikes, and would hire themselves out to any one who paid them well , but CHEVALIER KAYAKD GOLNa TO IHK \\ AKS. Louis XII. 273 if they did not get money enough, were apt to mutiny and go over to the other side. The wicked Pope, Alexander VI., was poisoned by drinking by mistake the wine he had meant to poison another person with ; and the new Pope, Julius II., made a league with Louis and Maxi- milian against the Venetians. It was called the League of Cambrai, but no sooner had the brave French army gained and given to Julius the towns he had been promised, than he turned again to his Italian hatred of the foreigner, and deserted their cause. He made another league, which he called the Holy League, with the Emperor Maximilian, the Spanish Ferdinand, and Henry VIII. , for driving the French out of Italy. This was the sort of bad faith that Machiavelli had taught men to think good policy. The French army in Italy was attacked by the Spaniards and Italians, and though the brave young general, Gaston de Foix, Duke of Nemours, gained a grand battle at Ravenna, he was killed at the close of the day ; and the French having everybody against them, were driven back out of the duchy of Milan, and over the Alps, and entirely out of Italy. Louis XII. could not send help to them, for Ferdinand was attacking him in the south of France, 274 Young Folks' History of France, and Henry yill. in the north. The sister of the Duke of Nemours was the second wife of Ferdi- nand, and he said she ought to be Queen of Navarre ; and as the real queen was wife to a French count, Ferdinand seized the little kingdom, and left only the possessions that belonged to the French side ot the family ; so that henceforth the King of Navarre was only a French noble. Henry VIII brought a line army with him, with which he besieged and took the city of Tournay, and fought a battle at Enguingate, in which the French were taken by surprise ; a panic seized them, they left their brave knights. Bayard among them, to be made prisoners, and galloped of so fast that there were only forty men killed, and the English called it the Battle of the Spurs. Terouenne was also taken, and Louis thought it time to make peace. His wife, Anne of Brittany, was just dead. She had had only two daughters. Claude and Renee ; and as Claude was heiress oi Brittany, it was thought well to marry her to Francis, Duke of Angouleme, who was first cousin to her father, and who would be King of France. Francis was a fine, handsome, graceful young man. but he had a very bad mother, Louise of Savoy. Queen Anne knew Claude would not be happy, and Louis XIL '275 tried hard to prevent the match, but she could not SiUcceed, and she died soon after it was concluded. Louis then offered himself to marry Henry's young- est sister, Mary, and the most beautiful princess in Europe, and she was obliged to consent. Louis was not an old man, but he had been long obliged to take great care of his health, and the feastings and pageants witli which he received his young bride quite wore him out, so that he died at the end of six weeks, on the Xew Year's Day of 1515. He is sometimes called the father of his people, though he does not seem to have done much for their good, only taxed them heavily for his wars in Italy ; but his manners were pleasant, and that went for a great deal with the French. The Italian wars, though very bad in themselves, improved the French in taste by causing them to see the splendid libraries and buildings, and the wonderful collection of statues, gems, and vases of the old Greek times, which the Italian princes were making, and those most beautiful pictures that were being produced by the greatest artists who have lived. This brought in a love of all these forms of beauty, and from that time forward the French gentlemen were much more cultivated than they had been in the old knightly days, though, unfortunately, they were much less religious, for the sight of those wicked Popes had done them all much harm. CHAPTER XXYII. FRANCIS I. — YOUTH. 1515—1526. FRANCIS I., the new King of France, was twenty years old, and very brilliant, hand- some, gracious, brave, and clever, with his head full of chivalrous notions, but no real sense of religion to keep him up to the truth and honor tha: are the most real part of chivalry. 276 FKAKCIS T. AT MARIGNANO. Francis I. — Youth, 279 To conquer Italy was, as usaal, liis first notion, and lie set out across the Alps ; but the Swiss had turned against him, and blocked up his way at Marignano. There was a terrible battle, beginning late in the day, and when night came on everything was in confusion. The king lay down on a cannon, and asked for some water ; but the only water that could be found was red with blood, and he turned from it, sickened. All night the great cow-horns which were the signal of the Swiss troops, were heard blowing, to gather them together ; but the French rallied sooner, and Avon a complete victory, which was very much thought of as no one had ever beaten the Swiss before. When it was over, Francis knelt down before Bayard, and desired to be dubbed a knight by him, as the bravest and truest of knights. When this was done. Bayard kissed his sword and declared that it should never be put to any meaner use. After this, Francis went on to take possession of Milan ; and he had an interview with the Pope at Bologna. It was a new Pope, called Leo X., a man very fond of art and learning and everything beau- tiful, though he cared little for duty or religion. He made an agreement with Francis, which is called the Concordat of Bologna. By this the king gave 280 Young Folks' Itistory of Prance. the Pope cei'tain payments every year for ever, and gave up the calling sj-nods of his clergj^ regularly ; and the Pope, in return, gave the king the right for himself and his successors of appointing all the bishops, deans, abbots, and abbesses in France for ever. Nothing ever did so much harm in France, for the courtiers used to get bad men, little children, ;ai)d all sorts of unfit persons appointed for the sake of their lands and wealth; and the clerg}*, being liindered from taking counsel together, grew more idle and dull. The people were taught nothing good, and every sin that they were prone to grew worse and worse. Francis himself was a spoilt child, caring only for pleasure, and what he called glory. He wanted to be Emperor of Germany, and tried to get Henry VIII. to help him ; and they had a great meeting at Ardres (near Calais), when such splendors in tents, ornaments, and apparel were displayed, that the conference was known as the Field of the Cloth of Gold. The two kings were both joyous young men, and they wrestled and played together like two boys ; but nothing came of this display, for Henry really preferred the young King Charles of Spain, who was grandson to the Emperor Maxi- DEATH OF BAYABD. Francis I. — Youth. n 283 milian and Mary of Burgundy, and thus inherited the Low Countries. When Maximilian died, Francis offered himself for the empire, and told the electors the}^ were to think of him and Charles not as enemies, but as rivals for the same lady. This, however, was only a fine speech, for Francis was much discontented when Charles was chosen emperor, and began a war again at once : but all he got by this was, that the Italians rose and drove his army out of Milan. Another misfortune befel him. His mother, Louise of Savoy, who had always spoilt him, and whom he gave way to more than any one else, was so foolish as to fall in love with Charles, Duke of Bourbon and Constable of France ; and when the Constable laughed at lier, she resolved to ruin him, and made the king most unjustly decide against him in a suit about his lands. The Constable was so angry that he went to Spain, and offered to serve Charles against his king and country. He was so good a captain that Charles was glad ; but every one felt that he was a disgraced man, and the old Spanish noble in whose castle the emperor lodged him would not so much as shake hands with him. However, he was with the army that Charles sent into Ital}' to meet tliat with wliicli Francis tried to 284 Young Folks' History of France, regain Milan. In a little battle near Ivrea, the good knight, Bayard, was sliot through the back. The French were retreating before the enem}^, and were forced to leave him lying under a tree ; but the Spaniards treated him with the deepest respect, and when the Constable de Bourbon came to him, it was with much grief and sorrow. " Sir," said the dying Bayard, " j^ou need not pity me for dying in my- duty, like a brave man ; but I pity you for serving against your king, your country and your oath." And Bayard set up his cross-handled sword before him, and died as a true and good knight. But Bourbon did not take warning. He actually led a Spanish army to invade his own country, and ravaged Provence ; but all the French rallied under Francis, and he was driven back. Then Francis himself crossed the Alps, hoping to recover what he had lost in Italy, and for a time he had the advan- tage ; but Charles's best general, the Marquis of Pescara, marched against him while he was be-, sieging Pavia. There was a terrible battle, fought on the 24th of February, 1525. Francis was too hasty in supposing the victory was his, charged with all his horse, got entangled in the firm Spanish squadrons, and was surrounded, wounded, and CAPTURE OF FKA>CIS I. Francis L — Youth. 287 obliged to yield himself as a prisoner. Most of his best knights were killed round him, and in a fort- night after the battle there was not a Frenchman in Lombardy who was not a prisoner. The Marquis of Pescara treated Francis respect- full}^ and he was sent as a prisoner to Madrid, where he was closely guarded ; and Charles, who had given out as his object to break the pride of France, would only release him upon very hard terms — namely, that he should yield up all his pre- tentions to any part of Italy, renounce the sov- ereignty of the Low Countries, make Henry d'Al- bret give up his claim to Navarre, and marry Charles's sister Eleanor, giving his two sons as hos- tages till this was carried out. Francis was in despair, and grew so ill that his sister Margaret came from Paris to nurse him, when he declared that he would rather abdicate his throne than thus cripple his kingdom. If he had held to that reso- lution, he would have been honored forever ; but he had no real truth in him, and after about ten months' captivity, he brought himself to engage to do all that was demanded of him ; but at the same time, he made a protest, before a few of his French friends, that ho only signed a treaty with Charles because he was a prisoner and in his 288 Young Folks'* History of France, power, and that he would not think himself bound to keep it when he was free. If any Spaniard had heard him, this would have been fair ; but as no one knew of it but the French, it was a shameful deceit. However, he signed and swore to whatever Charles chose, and then was escorted back to the borders, where, on the river Bidassoa, he met his two young sons, who were to be exchanged for him ; and after embracing them and giving them up to the Spaniards, he landed, mounted his horse, made it bound into the air, and, waving his sword above his head, cried out, " I am yet a king ! " He had better have been an honest man ; but though his first thought was how to break the treaty, he was at first so glad to get home that he spent his time in pleasures. He had one or two good and noble tastes. He was so fond of those great artists who were then living, that some of their very grandest pictures were painted for him, such as Raffaelle's beautiful picture of the Archangel St Michael; and Leonardo de Vinci, one of the greatest of painters, found a home with him, and died at last in his arms. CHAPTER XXVIII. FKANCIS I. — MIDDLE AGE. 1526—1517. THE other nations of Europe thought that the emperor was too hard npon Francis, and they were the more inclined to join against him when the Imperial army, without any orders to that effect, marched to Rome, under the Constable de Bourbon, and actually took the city. Bourbon himself was shot dead in the assault, and there was no one to stop the troops in the horrible savage cruelties and profanations they committed. The Pope gave him- self up as prisoner, and Charles could make what terms he pleased. Francis found he could not stand up against him, so the mother of the French king (Louise of Savoy) and the aunt of the Em- peror (Margaret of Austria) met at Cambrai, and made what is called the Ladies' Peace, which gave 289 290 Young Folks History of France, France somewliat better terms than the treaty of Madrid had done. Things were very bad in France just then, and good earnest men longed to set them right. John Calvin, a man of much learning, who had been in- tended for a priest, had, during his course of study, come to think that much of the teaching of the Church of Rome was mistaken, and he put forth books which were eagerly read by great numbers, especially by the king's sister Margaret, who had married the dispossessed King of Navarre ; and by his sister-in-law, Renee, the Duchess of Ferrara. Tlie king himself liked very well to laugh atthe greedy and vicious ways of the clergy he had got about him, and he was too clever a man not to see that they let the people be taught a great deal that was foolish and could not be true ; but Calvin and his friends condemned strongly all his own easy, pleasure-loving ways of life. A real good priest of the Church would have done the same ; but Francis did not bring good ones about him, and the Cal- vinist teaching made him angry. Besides, Calvin condemned things that were right as well as things that were wrong, affud his followers shocked many devout and reverent spirits by treating all things that they had always thought sacred, as idols. Some BUF.A5CrvO ()?• TIIK STATUE OF THE VTKniX MAKV. Francis L — Middle Age. 293 one broke a statue of the Virgin Mary in the streets of Paris, and this led to a cry on the part of the people that such things should not be allowed to go on. The persons who were pointed out as Calvin- ists were seized ; and when they showed how little they agreed with the doctrines of the Roman Cath- olic Church, they were delivered over by the clergy to the State, and burnt alive, according to the cruel laws for dealing with heretics. But their brethren were only the firmer in their doctrine, and hated the Romish Church the more for thus trying to put down the truths that contra- dicted some of her teachings. The Calvinists were called in France Huguenots, though no oue quite knows why. The most likely explanation is, that it is from two Swiss words, meaning " oath-com- rades," because they were all sworn brothers. Cal- vin himself, when he could not safely stay in France, accepted an invitation from the Reformers of Geneva to come and guide them, and thence he sent out rules which guided the French Huguenots. Margaret, the Queen of Navarre, thought with the Huguenots, that much was wrong in her Church, but she would rather have set the Church right ; and her brother, the king, never allowed measures to be taken for driving her to break with 294 Young Folks' History of France, the Church. Her only child, Jane, was, however, brought up an ardent Huguenot. She was a de- termined, high-spirited little girl ; and when in her twelfth year, her uncle. King Francis, wanted to marry her to the dull, heavy Duke of Cleves, and send her off to Flanders, she cried and entreated till the good-natured king could hardly bear it. When the poor little bride was dressed, against her will, she either could not stand under the weight of her jewels or she would not try, and her uncle bade the stout Constable de Montmorency take her in his arms and carry her to the church ; and so the wedding was gone through ; but before the feasts were over, or she could be carried to Cleves, Fran- cis heard news of the duke's having made friends with, the emperor, and was very glad to be able to say that, as the bride had never consented, the marriage was null and void. Jane afterwards mar- ried Antony, Duke of Bourbon, who was always called King of Navarre in her right, though the Spaniards had all the real kingdom of Navarre, and she only had the little French counties of Beam and Foix, but here she fostered the Huguenots with all her might. Charles V. and Francis kept up a war for most of their lives, but without any more great battles Francis L — Middle Age, 295 Francis would do any thing however disgraceful, to damage Charles ; and though he \\'as persecuting the Calvinists at home, he helped and made friends with the Protestants in Germany, because they were the Emperor's great trouble ; and again, be- cause Charles was at war with the Turks and the Moors, Francis allied himself with them. How- ever, as he deserved, his treachery profited him little, for the emperor gained a fast hold on Italy, and, moreover, invaded Provence ; but the Count de Montmorency laid waste every town, village, and farm in his way, so that his army found nothing to eat, and he was forced to retreat, though, in truth, the poor Provencals suffered just as much from their own side as they could have done from the enemy. However, Montmorency was made Constable of France as a reward. After this, peace was made for a time, and Charles, who wanted to go in haste from Spain to Flanders, asked leave to pass through France ; and Francis admired himself immensely for receiving him most courteously, sending the Dauphin to meet him, and entertaining him magnificently. But at one of the banquets, we are told that Francis pointed to the Duchess of Chatelherault, saying, " Here's a lady who says I am a great fool to let 29o Young Folks' History of France, jou go free." The emperor took the hint, and dropped a costly ring into the gold basin that the duchess held to him to wash his hands in. An- other day. as the king and the emperor were set* ting out on a pleasure excursion, the Duke of Orleans, Francis's second son, a wild young fellow, always in mischief, sprang up behind the emperor, and clasping both arms round his waist, cried out, " Your Imperial Majesty is my prisoner ! " It is said that Charles was for the moment much disconcerted. However, he departed in safety, but no sooner did Francis hear of his being in trouble in his own domains, than all promises were again broken, and the war began again. This time Henry VIII. was very angry with his bad faith, and joined the emperor to punish it. Charles invaded Champagne, and Henry landed at Calais, and besieged and took Boulogne. However, the emperor first made peace, and then Henry, who promised, in eight years' time, to give back Boulogne for a ransom of two million crowns. Just after this peace was made Henry died, and Francis only lived two months after him, dying in January, 1547, when only fifty- three years old. Poor queen Claude had long been dead, and he had married the emperor's sister Eleanor, to whom he did not behave better than to BCKE OF ORLEANS AND CHARLES V. Francis I. — Middle Age, 299 Claude. She had had no children, and most of Claude's were weak and delicate, so that only two survived their father— Henry, who had been the second son, but had become Dauphin | and Mar^ garet, the youngest daughter. CHAPTER XXIX. HENEY II. 1547—1559. HENRY II., the son of Francis I., had better qualities than his vain and faithless father, and if he had lived in better times, and had good men about him, he might have been an excellent person. He was not one of those men who can change the whole face of a country for good, but was borne along with the stream : his grandmother and father had made the whole court wicked and corrupt, while, now that the Church of France had lost its freedom, the clergy were so much in bondage that nobody dared to speak plain truths to the king, and he went on in sin unrebuked. The Calvinists (or Huguenots), who read the Bible and tried to keep the Commandments, looked at the wicked court with horror, and declared that 300 Henry IL 301 the way the clergy let it go on was a sign that their Church could not be true ; and, on the other hand, the young nobles mixed up Calvinism and strictness of life in their fancies, and laughed at both ; and so the two parties made one another worse. The king was a kind-hearted man, and very con- stant in his affections. His greatest friend was the Constable de Montmorenc}-, to whom he held fast all his life ; and his other strongest feeling was for a beautiful lady called Diana of Poitiers. She was> a widow, and he wore her colors (black and silver) and twisted her initial (D.) up with his own (H.) in his device, without ever being made to see how wrong it was to forsake his wife Catherine who had been chosen for him when his father wanted to make friends in Italy. She was the daughter of the great Florentine family of Medici, and was very wary and cunning, living so quietly that no one guessed how much ability she had. She had a large family, and the eldest son, Francis, was be- trothed to the infant Mary, Queen of Scots, who was sent from her own kingdom to be brought up with her young husband in the court of France. Henry went on with the war with the emperor, and would not let the French .bishops go to Trent, 302 Young Folks' History of France, where Charles was trying to get together a council of the Church, to set to right the evils that had led to the separations. Henry had one verj^ able gen- eral, .Francis de Lorraine, Duke of Guise (a son of that Bene, Duke of Lorraine, of whom you may remember hearing as grandson to old King Ren^). He sent this general to seize the city of Metz, which he declared he had a right to ; and there Guise shut himself up and stood a siege by the emperor himself, until hunger and famine made such havoc in the besieging army that they were forced to retreat. The emperor was growing old, and suffered much from the gout, and he longed for rest and time to prepare himself for death. So he decided on re- signing his crowns, and going and spending the remainder of his life in a Spanish monastery. He gave the empire to his brother Ferdinand, and the kingdoms of Spain and the two Sicilies, with Lom- bardy and the Low Countries, to his son, Philip IL, who was married to the English queen, Mary Tudor. This made the English join in the war against Henry IL, and a small brave body was sent to the Spanish army, which, witli Philip himself, was besieging St. Quentin, a town on the borders of Picardy. One of the bravest' men in France (a Huguenot 'lSTEUa, Eenry TV. 349 leave to have places of worship where there was a sufficient congregation, provided it was not where they would annoy the Catholics. And they were not hindered from taking offices at court or in the army, nor from keeping schools in certain places ; and to secure all this to them, they were allowed to hold three towns as pledges — La Rochelle, Mon- tauban, and Montpellier. In this last, there was a college for educating their pastors, and at each of the three in turn there were meetings of their clergy to consult on the affairs of the Church. This law was called the Edict of Nantes, because Henry had it registered by the Parliament of the old duchy of Brittany, since each old province still kept its own laws and parliament. He obtained this Edict of Nantes with great difficult}^ for almost all the Catholics thought it a very wicked thing to allow, any person to remain outside the Church ; but every one T^as worn out with the long and bloody civil war, and was glad to rest ; so the Edict was passed, and France began to recover. Henry had no children, and wished to be rid of his wife Margaret, that he might marry another, in- stead of having to leave his crown to his young cousin, the Prince of Conde. So, as there had never been real consent on the Pope's part to the 360 Young Folks' History of France, marriage of the cousins, and as the bride had been forced into it against her will by her mother and brother, the Pope was persuaded to pronounce the wedding null and void, and that the two were free to marry again. Still, it was not easy to find a princess, for all the Spaniards and Austrians and their allies were his greatest enemies, and he could not now marry a Protestant ; so he ended by choos- ing one of the Medici family, Mary, who proved to be a dull, selfish woman, not so clever as Catherine, and not much of a companion to him. However, she gave him two sons and three daugh- ters, and there was never a fonder father. Once, when the Austrian ambassador came to see him, he was found on all-fours, with his little son riding on bis back. " Are jo\x a father, sir ? " he said to the new-comer. " Yes, sire." " Then we will finish our game," returned the king. There were many of the remnants of the Leaguers who hated the king for having once been a Hugue- not, and for the Edict of Nantes ; and though the love of the whole country was more and more with him, he still was not willing to gather a great crowd together in Paris, lest harm might follow. So, as he had been crowned long before he was married, the coronation of Mary de Medicis was put oft, Henry IV. 351 year after year, till it should seem safer ; but she was vexed at the delay, and prevailed at last. Henry was not with her, and only looked on from a private box at the pageant, and while so doing, he gravely said to the friend who was with him, that he had been thinking how all this crowd would feel if the last trumpet were at once to sound. His own call was nearer than he thought. The next day, just as he had seated himself in his car- riage, a man named Francis Ravaillac sprang on the wheel, held a paper to him to read, and the next moment stabbed him to the heart with a knife, so that he died in an instant, one of the greatest losses his country had ever known. It was on the 14th of May, 1610. He was greatly beloved by his people, and his memory is affectionately cherished to this day ; and he was really a great man, though he would have been far greater if he had been really good. DH4PTER XXXIT- LOUIS xin, 1610—1648. - ^IIE eldest son of Henry IV., Louis XIII., was but nine years old when his father was killed ; and his mother, Marj^ de Medicis, became regent. She was a weak, foolish woman, and let herself be entire!}' guided by a lady in her train, named Leo- nora Galigai, who had married a man named Con- cini. iMary made her son give him the title of Marshal d'Ancre, and it was they who really ruled FrancOo When Leonora was asked how she man- aged the queen, she answered, " By the power of a strong mind over a weak one.'' But all the old French nobles greatly hated d'Ancre for his pride and insolence, and many declared that Leonora had bewitched the queen. Their rule lasted seven years , but when the 352 ■noxriNl AND MAKY DE MKUICID. Louis Xin. 355 young king was sixteen years old, a young noble- man named Luynes stirred him up to free himself from them, telling him that, now he was growing up, they would secretly kill him, that his mother might continue regent in the name of his little brother. So Louis desired his guards to arrest d'Ancre next time he came to the palace, and to kill him if he resisted. He did resist, and was cut down and slain, and his wife tried for be witching the queen, and put to death. Mary had to leave the court and go into the country; whence after some years of wrangling with her son, she went to England, after her youngest daughter, Henrietta Maria, had married King Charles I. and she afterwards died in great poverty. Louis XHL was a strange person — slow, dull, and cold-hearted, though not ill-disposed. His health was bad, and he hated trouble and think- ing more than anything else. What he chiefly cared for was to have some friend about him, who would hunt, talk, and amuse him, while all trouble was saved him. One very clever man was in his court, Armand de Richelieu, Bishop of Lu^on, who was the ablest man in court. Albert de Luynes was the king's first minister after d'Ancre's fall ; but when he died of a fever, Richelieu obtained the 356 Young Folks' History of France, management of everything. He let the king have young men as his companions and favorites ; but if ever one of these showed any spirit, and tried to stir up the king to act for himself and over- throw the tyranny he lived under, Richelieu al- waj's found it out and put the bold man to death. The king did nothing to save liis friends, and wlien they were once out of his sight seemed to forget all about them ; for in truth he disliked trouble more than anything else, and would have been very sorry to think for himself instead of letting Richelieu think and act for him. The cardinal, for so the Pope created him, was really one of the most wonderful statesmen who ever lived, and made France a much greater and more mighty power than ever before, and the king much more powerful too. He was a hard, stern man, and did not care for justice, or for any one's suffering, provided he could do that one thing — make the crown of France more powerful. The nobles, who had grown strong and haughty during the long wars, were very sternly, and even cruelly, put down by him. He thought nothing of getting them accused of treason, shutting them up in prison or having them put to death; and he thus man- aged to get rid of all the great men who had been LftVli: HIE VIII. A>;D ALBfc-KT DE LUYXKS. Louis XIII. 359 almost princes, such as the Count de Montmor- enc}', grandson to the old Constable. lie also made war upon the Huguenots, in spite of the Edict of Nantes, and tried to take La Rochelle from them. There was a long and terrible siege. Charles I. of England sent them help ; and his favorite, the Duke of Buckingham, was to have had the command of the fleet tliat was coming to ihem, but he was killed at Portsmouth, as you have heard. When at last the people were starved out, after fourteen months, the cardinal made the king himself come down to receive their submission. La Rochelle was a terrible loss to them, and they were far more at the king's mercy than when they had such a strong town. But at least the Roman Catholic Church was in a much better state than it had been when they had broken away from it. Much still needed to be set right ; but some of the worst evils had been put a stop to, and there were many very good men among the clergy, especially Francis de Sales, Bishop of Geneva, and Vinceni de Paul, a good priest, who gathered together the poor desolate children who had no lionies, and were starving in the streets of Paris, and set good ladies to take care of them. He also first established the order of Sisters of Mercy, who are like nuns, only 360 Young Folks' History af France. not shut up in convents, but going about to nurse tlie sick, take care of orphans, and teach poor chil- dren. The great ladies at court used to put on plain dresses and go to nurse the sick in hospitals,' even the queen herself. She was a Spanish prin- cess, called Anne of Austria — a good, kind and gracious lady — but no one cared for her much at court ; and for many years she had no children, but at last when all hope had been given up, she had first one and then another boy, and there was immense rejoicing. Wars were going on with the Spaniards, all through the reign, in Italy and the Low Countries, us well as a terrible fight between the Roman Catholics and Protestants in Germany, which is called the Thirty Years' War. Cardinal de Riche- lieu managed matters so well that France always gained the advantage ; and some excellent generals were growing up in the army, especially the Vis- count de Turrenne, brother to the Duke of Bouillon and the Duke d'Enghien, eldest son of the Prince of Cond^, who gained some wonderful victories in the Low Countries, while still a mere youth. But Richelieu's own iron rule was coming to an end. He had been in very bad health for years, but he never seemed to care about it, and was as KlCUKLllCU AND FATl.KK JObEPH. Louis XIIL 363 ever if a friend of the king tried to take away his power. The Baron de Cinq Mars was put to death for conspiring against him when he was almost at the gates of the grave. He declared, when he was receiving his last communion, that he had always meant to work for the honor of God and the good of the State ; and he died, in his fifty-eighth year, on the 4th of December, 1642, after advising the king to trust an Italian priest named Mazarin, as he had trusted to him. Louis seemed to care very little for the loss of Richelieu. He only said, " There's a great states- man dead ; " and when there was a great storm on the day of the funeral, he said, " The Cardinal has a bad day for his journey." But he was in a very weakly state himself, and only lived five months after Richelieu, dying at forty-two }■ ears old, on the 14th of May, 1643. Never was a son more unlike his father than he had been to Henry IV., seeming to be his exact opposite in every one of his better or worse qualities ; and tho agh his reign was a grand one to France, it was no thanks to him, but to the great statesman who ruled both him and t\o country. a 'J iH ID I (J I HAPTER XXXV. LOUIS XrV. YOUTH. 1643—1661. " T AM Louis XIV.," cried the little five years' i old Daupliin, as lie stood by his dying father's bedside. "Not yet/' the old king Avas still strong enough to say, though he did not live many more hours. Poor child ! he did not know what he re- joiced in. His was the longest reign that ever king 364 Louis XI r. — Youth, 365 iiad (no less than seventy-seven years), and he was sick and wearj^ of it long before it ended. At first his mother, Queen Anne, was Regent, and she trusted entirely to Mazarin. He was not a great man, like Richelieu, but he was clever and cunning, and the saying was, '' The fox comes after the lion ;" for as he was a foreigner, and of low Dirth, the French found it much harder to submit to him, than to Richelieu, who was of one of the noblest families ill France. Only four days after the accession of the little king, the Duke of d'Enghien won the great battle of Rocro}^ in the Low Countries, which quite destroyed the fine old Spanit^h foot soldiers ; and after two more victories, peace was made between France and Spain. But this did not make things easier for Mazarin, for all the nobles who had been away with the army came home, with nothing to do, and especially the Duke d'Enghien, who soon, on his father's death, became Prince of Conde, and who was proud and fiery, and hated the upstart Mazarin. All this hatred broke out in a great quarrel be- tween the queen and the parliament of Paris. You must remember that the parliament of Paris was a very different thing from the English parliament, It did not represent the whole kingdom, for each 366 Young Folks' History of France* of the great old provinces had a separate parlia- ment of its own ; and it was only made up of the lawyers of Paris, and the great nobles who be- longed to the old duchy of France, with the bishops and princes of the blood-royal. It used to judge peers of France for State ofences, and in matters of property ; but it could not make laws or grant taxes. All it could do was to register the laws and the taxes when the king had made them ; and the king's acts were not valid till this had been done. Now, when Mazarin, in the king's name laid an un- just tax on all the food that was brought into Paris, the parliament refused to register the act, and there was a great struggle, which is known by the strange name of the Fronde. Fronde is the French name of a sling ; and in the earlier part of the quarrel the speakers used to stand up and throw sharp words at one another, then draw back, just like little boys slinging stones at one another. But they soon came to much worse weapons. You could not un- derstand or remember all the strange things that then took place ; it is enough for the present to re- member that the Fronde was the effort of parlia- ment to stand up against the royal power, and that there were two sieges of Paris in the course of it. The Prince of Conde at first would not turn against iOUl8 XIV. — Youth. 367 the king, and helped to make a short peace ; but then he insisted on the queen sending Mazarin away, and when he was gone, the queen found Cond^ such a stern, insolent master, that she con- trived to get Mazarin back, and he threw Condd into prison. Conde's wife joined with the other Frondeurs to try to gain his freedom again, and he was set free, but only to make another war, in which, however, he was overcome, and forced to go into banishment, when, to his shame be it spoken, he joined the Spaniards, and helped them to make war against his own countr3^ It was no small punishment for him that Mar« shal Turenne was commanding the French, and Cond^ was under a very lazy, indolent Spanish gen- eral, so that he was sure that there must be a de- feat. He said to the Duke o£ York, who was serving with him, " Now you will see how a battle ought not to be fought." For this was the time when all King Charles's family were living scattered about in banishment. Queen Henrietta was at Paris with her youngest daughter ; but when Oliver Cromwell made a treaty with the French, he had required that Charles II. and his brother, the Duke of York, should not be allowed to live in France. 868 Young Folks' History of France. Cardinal Mazarin followed up all the plans of Richelieu, and France went on prospering and gain- ing victories, until the Spaniards at last, in the year 1659, made what is called the Peace of the Pyr- enees, giving up several towns in the Low Coun= tries. The young King Louis was to forgive the Prince of Conde, and to marry Maria Teresa, the daughter of the King of Spain. Only two years later died Cardinal Mazarin, leaving an immense fortune. He had, like Richelieu, cared for the greatness of the kingdom of France and for the power of the crown more than for the charac- ter of the king who held all this power, and so he had let the young king grow up very ignorant, for fear of being interfered with. Anne of Austria, who was a good woman, tried hard to make her boys religious, and they always respected religion ; but their flatter- ers did not teach them how it should tame their pride or make them care for the good of the people, and Louis XIV. grew up thinking that the nation was made for his glory, and not himself for the good of his people. Yet he was a wonderfully able man. Mazarin said, " There is stuff in him to make four kings, and an honest man into the bargain. When the cardinal died, and the ministers asked to whom they should come, he answered, " To myself;" and DEATH OF CARDINAL, MAZAKIN. Louis XIV. — Youth, 37S for all the half-century after that his reign lasted, he was always ready for them. He tried afterwards to study and make up for the neglect of his youth, but he never was the same he might have been with good training. One thing he had from his mother, namely, the grandest and most stately courtesy and the most kingly manners that perhaps were ever seen. He never received a courtse}^ from a woman without a bow, and his gracious dignity seems fairly to have dazzled the eyes of the very best and wisest men, so that they looked up to him like a sort of divinity, and could not even see his faults. His court was exceedingly splendid, and very stiff. Every one had his place there, and never came out of it : and who must stand or who might sit, who might be on stools and who must kneel, in the royal presence, was thought a matter of the greatest importance. Richelieu and Maza- rin had robbed the nobles of all useful work ; so all they cared for was war and waiting at court, and getting moiiey from their poor peasants to sup- port expense. CHAPTER XXXVI. LOUIS XIV. — MIDDLE AGE. 1661—1688. T OUIS XIV. loved to be called the Great, but ^*— ' he did not tinderstand that real greatness is making a kingdom happier instead of making it larger, and he only cared for his own glory. H( had the two best generals then in Europe, th( Viscount de Turenne and the Prince of Condd, and 374 , Louis XIV. — Middle Age. 375 his nobles were very brave and spirited ; so he was always going to war, without thinking whether it was justly or not, and fancying the honor was his, whereas his victories were all owing to his generals ; and when he went out to war, he only went to the siege of some city, where he rode about in a splen- did gold-laced coat, with a huge white feather in his cocked hat, quite out of reach of danger. And yet his people were all so proud of him that the very sight of him made his soldiers fight all the better, and poets wrote verses comparing him to Jupiter and Mars, and every other warlike hero they could think of. He had married Maria Teresa, daughter to the King of Spain ; and when her father died, he pre- tended that he ought to inherit all the Low Coun- tries instead of her little brother Charles. This was very unjust, and would have made France much too powerful ; so the Dutch and English joined together to prevent it, and there were some terrible fights. But it was when Charles II. was king, and his youngest sister, Henrietta, had mar- ried Louis's brother, the Duke of Orleans. So Louis sent the duchess to persuade King Charles and his minister, by promises of money and favor, to desert the Dutch ; and to the great shame of the 376 Young Folks^ History of France. English, she succeeded. The brave Dutch were left alone against all the power of France. William, Prince of Orange, commanded their armies; and though he was beaten again and again, the little State never gave in ; though to keep out the French, it was needful to open the flood-gates that pK)tect Holland from the sea, and let in so much water that the enemy could not pass. Then the Emperor of Germany took up the cause of the Dutch, but Louis sent Turenne against his troops, and conquered Alsace. Turenne went on into Germany, and there his army was grievously cruel. Crops were burnt down, houses and villages burnt and plundered, and the inhabitants brought to misery beyond imagination. Turenne could hardly help what he was commanded to do, but this war was the darkest spot in his life. He was a kind and merciful man in general, and very just and upright ; and his soldiers loved him so much, that once, when he had fallen asleep during a short halt on a bare, bleak hill-side, and it began to snow, they made a tent for him with their own cloaks. In this war he was killed, while standing under a tree near the village of Salzbach, by a cannon-shot, which nearly cut his body in two, and mortally wounded a nobleman close by. " Do not weep for DEATH OF TURENNE. Louis XIV. — Middle Age. 379 me, but for that great man," were the words of this gentleman to his son. Turenne was buried among the kings at St. Den3^s, and Conde took command of the army, gaining man}^ hard-fought battles ; until at last peace was made, leaving Louis in possession of Alsace and of the city of Stras- burg, both of which properl}^ belonged to the empire. But glory, or what he fancied glory, was all Louis cared about ; and besides his great generals, he had about him many of the ablest men who had ever lived in France, both ministers of State and writers. He had likewise most excellent bishops and clergy, such as Bossuet, bishop of Meaux, who was a won- derfully good preacher, as well as a great scholar. Louis made Bossuet tutor to his only son ; but the Dauphin was a very dull and silly youth, who cared for nothing but playing at cards and shooting, and very little could be taught him. He married a German princess, who was duller still, and they had three sons, the Dukes of Burgundy, Anjou, and Berri. To them the king, gave as tutor, Fdn^- ion. Archbishop of Cambrai, one of the best and holiest men then living. The Duke of Burgundy, was a fiery, selfish, passionate boy ; but unier Fdn- ^lon he learnt to rule himself, and his whole thought 380 Young Folks' History of France. was how to be a good religious prince, heedful of his people rather than himself. Fi^n^lon would not have thought it right to blame the king himself, but he could not teach the young prince his duties without showing something yqyj different from Louis XIV. as a model. He wrote a story for him of a young Greek prince named Telemachus, who went on his travels in search of his father, and saw all forms of government in his way. A servant who was employed to write out the story, stole a copy, and sent it to Holland and had it printed there ; and when the old king saw it, he was keen- sighted enough to perceive that it was meant to teach his grandson how to be a better king than himself, and he hated Fdndlon accordingly. How- ever, it was not for this open reason that the good archbishop was kept away from court, but because he had taken the part of a religious lad}^ named Madam Guyon, who had written a book about the Love of God, where there were sentences that Bossuet thought likely to do harm. F(^n^lon wrote a book himself on the subject ; and though the Pope could see no fault in it, Louis forced him to condemn it, and F^n^lon submitted most meekly, and went on quietly with his work in his own dio- cese at Cambrai, often writing to his dear pupil, Louis XIV. — Middle Age. 381 though he was only once allowed to see him again. Louis lost his wife, Maria Teresa of Spain, and then married a lady called Madam de Maintenon ; but he never owned her as his queen, and not more than three or four people at court knew that she was his wife. He looked up to her and respected her opinion very much ; and she used to sit by with her work when he was consulting with his minis- ters, and he would ask at the end, " What does your solidity think ? She was very religious, and tried to make him so ; but he was so proud that he never could bear to think that our Blessed Lord had been a poor man and humble. And the one thing she could make him do was a sad one, and that was to persecute. All the poor nuns of Port Royal were turned out, and shut up in other con- vents, because they held fast to the teachings of their old guide, M. de St. Cyran. And, what was worse, she led him to repeal the Edict of Nantes, which protected the Huguenots, and begin to per- secute them. Dragoons were quartered in their houses, who ate up their food, spoilt their goods, and tortured them to make them become Catholic ; they were allowed no schools ; their children were taken away to be bred up in convents ; numbers were thrown into prison ; and if they were caught 382 Young Folks'' History of Pruned. escaping, they were sent to work as convicts, or put to death. However, many did escape to Eng- land and Prussia, and the English gave them a kind welcome. Many who came from the south were silk weavers, and settled at Spitalfields, where they worked and flourished for several generations. Some, who were noblemen, came to court, and were officers in the army ; and the loss to France became gain to England. CHAPTER XXXYIL liOXJIS XIY. — OLD AGE. 1688—1715, IN 1688, Louis lost the English alliance. Charle?- II. and James II. having spent their youth in France, and being Roman Catholics — the one at heart, and the other openly — had always looked lip to him and been led by him ; but when the Revolution took place and James was driven away 383 384 Young Folks'' History of France, * to take refuge once more in France, Louis's greatest enemy, William of Orange, became King of Eng- land. Louis gave James and his queen a home at his palace of St. Germain's, and did all he could for them, sending an expedition with James to Ireland ; but all in yain — the English only hated James the more for bringing the French upon them, and his troops were beaten at the river Boyne and his ships at Cape La Hogue, so that he was obliged to cease from the attempt. But another great war soon begai% Charles IL, King of Spain, died in 1700, leaving no children. His sister and his two aunts had married Emperors of Germany and Kings of France ; but as the Spaniards did not choose to have their kingdom joined on to another, it was always the custom for the princesses to renounce all right to the crown for themselves and their children. However, the whole Spanish line had come to an end, and there really was nobody else who had any right at all. Now, Louis XIV. had married the sister, so his son was the nearest heir ; but, on the other hand, the Emperor of Germany was descended from the brother of the great Charles V., who had been Em- peror and King of Spain both at once. The emperor wanted to make his second son, the Archduke Louis XIV,— Old Age, 385 Charles, King of Spain ; and Louis put forward Ms second grandson, Pliilip, Duke of Anjou. The Spaniards would have preferred Charles, but Louis was ready first. He made the Dauphin and Duke of Burgundy give up their right to Philip, saluted him as King of Spain, and sent him off with an army to Madrid, saying, "There are no more Pyrenees;" by which he meant that France and Spain were now to be like only one country. Now this was just what the rest of the world did not wish. France was a great deal too powerful al- ready, and nobody could be glad to see Spain and the Low Countries ruled over by a young man who was sure to do exactly what his grandfather bade him ; and so England and all the other States of Europe joined to assist the Archduke Charles in winning Spain. Thus began what was called the War of the Spanish Succession. The Archduke Charles went to Spain, and the English helped him there j and a French army invaded Germany, but there they met the English and Austrian armies, under the Duke of Marlborough and Prince Eugene of Savo}^ and were terribly defeated at Blenheim. The Prince Eugene's father had always lived in France, and his mother was a niece of Cardinal 386 Young Folks' History of France, Mazarin ; but he and some other young men had grown tired of the dull court life, and had run away to fight in the Austrian army against the Turks. Louis had been very angry, and had had their letters seized ; and there he found himself laughed at, and called a stage king in peace, and a chess king in war. He was very angry, and never forgave Prince Eugene, who took service under the Emperor of Germany, and was the second-best general then in Europe. For all the great generals of Louis's youth were dead ; and though Marshals Villars and Bouf&ers were able men, they were not equal to Marlborough, and were beaten again and again in the Low Countries. The only victory the French did gain was in Spain, at Almanza, where, strangely enough, the English were commanded by a French Huguenot, and the French by Marl- borough's nephew, the Duke of Berwick, who had left home with James 11. But troubles came thick upon Louis XIV. He lost his only son, known in history as the Grand Dauphin, to distinguish him from the other two princes who successively bore that title in the reign of Louis XIV. ; and all his great men who had made his reign so splendid were dying round him, and nobody rising up equa] to them. His subjects, Louis XIV.— Old Age. 387 too, were worn out ; all their strongest young men had been carried off to be soldiers, and there were not enough left to till the ground properly. Be- sides, the money that the king wanted for his wars and buildings was far more than they could pay, and it was the tradesmen, farmers, and lawyers who had to pay it all ; for in France no priest and no noble ever paid taxes. Moreover, all the family of a noble was considered as noble for ever, instead of, as it is in England, only the head of the house himself; and so all the younger sons and their children for ever paid no taxes, and were allowed to be of no profession, but only to be clergy or soldiers. They were always the ofiQcers, so that a soldier, however clever and brave, never could rise unless he was of good birth. People were getting very discontented, and especially when, instead of getting glory, they were always beaten, at Ramillies and Oudenarde and Malplaquet ; and Louis's build- ings and gardens at Versailles and Trianon heavily oppressed them. Old as Louis was, there was untamable pride and resolution in him, and his steadiness was admired even by his enemies, when he continued dauntlessly to resist even when there seemed little to hinder Marlborough aud Eugene from marching upon 388 Young Folks* History of France. Paris. However, this humiliation was spared the f)roud old king by the change in Queen Anne's councils, which deprived Marlborough of power, and led to a peace at last with France. The Arch- duke Charles became emperor after the death of his father and brother ; and thus Philip of Anjou was allowed to remain King of Spain. Everything, however, was sad and mournful.at the French court. The king kept up all his old state, but his strength and spirit were gone ; and Madam de Maintenon used to say no one could guess what a dreadful thing it was to have to amuse an unamusable king. The brightest person at court was the young Dauphiness, Adelaide of Savoy, wife to the Duke of Burgundy, who was now Dauphin. She used to play merrily with the king, and coax him into cheerfulness as no one else could ; but she was giddy and gay, and sometimes grieved her husband. He was a grave, thoughtful man, very pious and religious, always trying to fol- low the counsels of his dear friend and master, F^n^lon, and thinking anxiously of the load that the kingdom would be in the state in which his grandfather would leave it. But he never had to bear that load. A dreadful form of malignant measles came into the court, and m- i^^^^l IN^^^fetoi^^S-'ll m m i DKATH OF LOULS XIV. Louis XIV, — Old Age. 891 the Dauphiness caught it and died, then the eldest of her two little sons, and lastly, the good Dauphin himself. All were ill so very few days that people talked about poison ; and no one was left of the whole family except the old king and one little great-grandson, the Dauphin's second son, a baby not able to walk alone, and the king's nephew, Philip, Duke of Orleans, the son of his brother, who was known to be a very bad and selfish man. It was a sad prospect for France, when, a year later, Louis XIV. died, after a reign of seventy years, when he had been the greatest monarch in Europe, and might have been one of the grandest of men, if he had only known what true greatne.ss is. CHAPTER XXXVIII. LOUIS XV. 1715— 17V4. THE poor little boy who had become King of France was so young that he could scarcely walk alone, and so forlorn that he had no kinsman near enough to take his hand when he was shown to the people, but had to be held in purple ribbon leading-strings. It was a sad reign altogether. The regent was the Duke of Orleans, a thoroughly dissipated man, not unlike the English Charles II., but worse in conduct, though quite as good-natured ; and the whole court became nothing but a sink of iniquity under him. He died just as the young king was growing up ; but the boy was slow, dull, and painfully shy — not at all fit to take the command of every thing, like Louis XIV. He had had a good tutor, Cardinal 392 ^iIO/^jaT MAKIA LECZINSKA. Louis XV. 395 Fleury, who was ruler for a little while, but soon died ; and then there was nothing to hinder the king from being drawn into all sorts of evil by the wicked men who had grown up in the time of the regent, Duke of Orleans. The queen was a Polish princess, named Maria Leczinska. She was a gentle, kindly person, though not at all clever, and at first the king was very fond of her ; but these wretches thought it dull to have a respectable court, and wanted to manage the king their own wa}^, so they taught him to be a gluttoii and a drunkard, and to think it witty to talk the low, coarse language of the vulgar crowd in Paris. The queen was shocked, and when she showed her offence, Louis was angry, and never cared for her again, but only showed himself with her in public, and spent all his spare time in the most disgraceful amusements. Yet the people, who did not know all as yet, had such a love and loyalty for the very name of king, that they were ready to break their hearts when he had a bad fever, and almost went mad with joy when lie recovered. They then called him Louis the Well-beloved, a name that sounded very sad in after times. There was a great war going on all this time be- 396 Young Folk's History of France, tween Maria Theresa, the Queen of Hungary and Archduchess of Austria, and Frederick II., King of Prussia. The English held with the Austrians, and the French with the Prussians; and at the battle of Dettingen George II. had defeated the Marshal de Noailles. Again, at Fontenoy the Eng- lish were defeated ; and though Louis XV. was with the arm}', the victory was owing to his general, Marshal Saxe. The wars, however, pressed heavily on the French, and the poor were even more wretched than in the former reign. The Duke of Orleans, a good man, son to the wicked regent, one da}^ brought a horrible bit of black bread to the council to show the king what his subjects lived upon ; but nothing would make Louis care for any- body but himself. However, there was peace made for a little while, but what was called* the Seven Years' War soon broke out again ; but this time the English were with the Pruijsians and the French with the Aus- trians, and there was a great battle at Minden, which the French lost, and soon after there was a more lasting peace in Europe. But nothing could do the unfortunate kingdom of France any good while it had such a king as Louis XV., who had no feeling for any one but BATTLr: CF rr^xxrxoY. Louis XV. 399 himself, and had such low tastes that he liked nothing but the basest, coarsest pleasures, and hated all that interfered with them. He had only one son, the Dauphin, who had grown up, in the midst of that wicked court, pure, upright, and pious, and lived a peaceful, quiet life with his good wife, a Polish princess ; but there was nobody the king disliked so much, because their goodness was a continual reproof, and he could not help think- ing that the people would rather have had the Dauphin for their king than himself. So the Dauphin was never allowed to take any part in business, and all he could do was to try to bring up his children well, and to help his four sisters, whom the king had scarcely educated at all, and who lived a very dull life in the palace, so that the happiest was Madame Louise, who became a nun. The good Dauphin died of a decline, when only thirty-six years old, leaving j&ve children, the eldest eleven years old ; and his wife followed him fifteen months after, begging her sisters-in-law to watch over her children. The king only grew worse than ever, and used to amuse himself by going in disguise to low dances among the Paris mob. Yet all the time he went every morning to church ; and among all the clergy in the country, 400 Young Folks' History of France, only one good Bishop once dared to tell him what a sinner he was. There were still a great many good clergy, but it was only the bad ones who would not speak out about the wickedness at court who met with any favor. Half the people in the country were getting mad with misery ; and when they saw that the priests did nothing to rebuke all the crimes they suffered from, it seemed to them that even the Christian religion itself must be a mistake. There were a great many clever men at . that time, of whom the most noted were Voltaire and Rousseau, who wrote books that everyone was readings which made attacks on all Christianity, and pretended that the old heathen philosophers were much better and wiser than Christians ; and it was a strange thing that though Huguenots were still persecuted, and their religious books burnt, nobody meddled with these infidels, who had no religion at all. Everyone saw that a great storm was coming, and that there must be a terrible downfall of the royal power that Richelieu, Mazarin, and Louis XIY. had built up, and wliich Louis XV. used so shamefully ; but when he was told that there was danger, he only said the kingdom would last his time. His grandson, the young Dauphin, had I Louis XV. 401 grown lip, and was married to the beautiful, bright young daughter of Maria Theresa — Marie Antoi- nette. The evening she arrived at Paris, there were grand illuminations and fireworks, and in the midst some terror seized the people that there Avas a fire, and they all rushed crowding together in the gates of the Champs Elysees, so that a number of them were trampled to death ; and this, though the poor young bride had nothing to do with it, made people feel that it had been a bad beginning. Louis XV. died at the age of sixty-four, in the year 1774, after a disgraceful reign of sixty years, in which he had constantly fallen deeper and deeper into the mire of sin and disgrace. CHAPTER XXXIX. LOUIS XVI. 1774 — 1793. THE young king, Louis XVI., and his queen, Marie Antoinette,^ threw themselves on their knees when they heard that their grandfather was dead, crying out, *' O God ! help us ; we are too young to reign." It was as if thej^ knew what dreadful times were y402 JLiOUlt iVl. Louis XVI. 405 coming, brought on bj the selfishness and wicked- ness of those who had gone before them. Nobody could be more good or anxious to set things right than Louis XVI. ; but the evils that had been working up for hundreds of years could not be set to rights by one word, and it was hard to know how to begin. And though the king wished well to all, he was not a clever man, and could not see how to act. Besides, he was very shy and awk- ward ; he hated speaking to strangers, and was so confused that people went away offended ; and, besides, they were so much used to bad kings, that they could not believe that he was a good and innocent man. The queen gave offence in other ways. She was a young, merry girl, who had been brought up in a court where the habits were much more simple and less stately than those in France ; and she was always laughing at the formal court ways, and try- ing to get free from them. When the ladies came to pay their respects, some of her own attendants grew tired of standing round her, and sat down on the floor, hidden by the hobps of the others. She saw and nodded and smiled ; and the old ladies who were being presented thought she was making game of their dresses, and were very 406 Young Folks' History of France. angry. Her chief lady of the bedchamber, the Duchess of Noailles, tried to keep her in order ; but she laughed, and gave the old lady the name of Madame I'Etiquette. When once she was riding a donkey, and it fell with her, she sat on the ground laughing till the duchess came up, and then said, " Pray, madame, when the queen and her donkey both tumble down together, which ought to be the first to get up ? " The great palace that Louis XIY. had adorned at Versailles was so grand that nobody could live in it in comfort. Even he had made a smaller one at Trianon, and this was too stately for the queen's tastes ; so she had another smaller house, with a farm and dairy, where she and her ladies used to amuse themselves, in white muslin dresses and straw hats ; but the people would not believe but that something very wrong went on there ; and hated her greatly because she was an Austrian, and her country had been at war with theirs. It was just then that the Americans began their war with George III., and a young French noble- man, the Marquis de la Fayette, ran away from home to fight in the army. Afterwards, Louis XVI. sent troops to help them ; and the sight of the freedom the United States had gained made Louis XVL 407 Lafayette and his friends feel far more bitterly the state of things at home, where the poor were ground down to wretchedness by all the old rights of their lords ; and till the laws were changed, neither king, nobles, nor clergy, however much they might wish it, could help them. No one felt this more than the king himself. At last, in 1789, he called together his States-General — that is, all his peers, and deputies from the towns and prov- inces, to see what could be done. It was not like the English parliament, where the peers form one chamber and the commons another : but they were all mixed up together, and there were a great many more deputies than peers, so that they had it all their own way. Besides, they sat in the middle of Paris, and the people of the city could not bear to wait. Perhaps it was no wonder, for they were very poor and miserable, and were fierce with hunger. Whenever they saw anyone whom they fancied was against the changes, they used to fly at him, crjang out, " To the lamp ! " and hang him lip to the lamps, which were fastened by iron rods over the streets. They rushed to the great old prison, the Bastile, where the former kings had kept their State pris- oners, and tore it down; but they found hardly 408 Young Folks' History cf France, anyone there, for Louis XVI. had released all his grandfather's prisoners. Most of the men were enrolled in what was called the National Guard, and all wore cockades, and scarfs of red, blue, and white. Lafayette was made general of this guard. The States-General called itself the National Assembly, and went on changing the laws. It was at first settled that no law could be passed without the king's consent ; but the notion that he could stop any plan added to the people's hatred, and they were always fancying he would bring his soldiers to stop the reforms. At last, when there was a scarcity of food in Paris, the mob all rushed out to Versailles, that most splendid of palaces, upon which Louis XIV. had spent so much, and whose iron gates looked down the long avenue of trees leading from Paris, a memorial how little pity for their people the two last kings had had. It was the less wonder that tlie mob of Paris believed that Louis XVI. and Marie Antoi- nette had the same hard hearts, and were willingly letting them starve. They came and filled the courts of the palace, shouting and yelling for the queen to show herself. She came out on the bal- cony, with her daughter of twelve years old and her son of six. " No children ! " they cried ; and Louis XVI. 409 she sent them back, and stood, fully believing that they would shoot her, and hoping that her death might content themo But no hand was raised, and night came on. In the night they were seized with another fit of fury, and broke into the queen's room, from which she had but just escaped, while a brave lady and two of her guards were barring the outer door. The next day the whole family were taken back into Paris, while the fishwomen shouted before them, " Here come the baker, his wife, and the lit- tle baker's boy ! " The National Assembly went on to take away all the rights of the nobles, and the property of the Church, and to decree that the clergy must swear to obey them instead of the Church, while those who refused were turned out of their par- ishes. The National Guard watched the Tuileries, and made the life of the royal family so miserable that they tried to escape in disguise ; but fearing that they would come back with armies to put down the Revolution, the National Guard seized and stopped them, and they were more closely watched than ever. On the 20th of June, 1792, the mob rushed into the palace, threatened all the family , and spent three hours in rioting and insulting ilO Young Folks' History af France. them ; and on the 10th of August another attack was made. The queen longed to let the Swiss guards and the loyal gentlemen fight for her husband ; but Louis could not bear to have a drop of blood shed in his defence, and hoped to save life by going to the National Assembly with his wife, children, and sister ; but no sooner were they gone, than every one of the gallant men who would have defended him was savagely massacred, and their heads were carried about the streets of Paris on pikes. It was fear that made the Parisians so ferocious, for the German princes and the French nobles had collected an army to deliver the king, and, as the mob thought, to destroy them ; and in the bitter hatred that had now risen against all kings, the Assembly voted that Louis XVI. was no longer King of France, but that the nation was free. So his reign ended on the 10th of August, 1792. CHAPTER XL. THE GREAT FRENCH REVOLUTION. 1792—1796. THE Government, after the king was deposed^ was placed in the hands of the National Assembly — or Convention, as it now called it- self — of deputies chosen by the people. There is nothing but what is sad and terrible to be told of France for the next four or five years, and the whole account of what happened woMd be too hard for you to understand, and some part is too dreadful to dwell upon. The short account of it is that, for years and years before, the kings, the nobles, and some of the clergy too, had cared for little but their own pride and pleasure, and had done nothing to help on their people — teach, train, or lead them. So now these people were wild with despair; and when the hold on them was a little loosened, the^' 411 412 Young Folks* History of France, threw it off, and turned in furious rage upon their masters. Hatred grew, and all those who had once been respected were looked on as a brood of wolves, who must be done away with, even the young and innocent. The king, queen, his chil- dren, and sister (Madame Elisabeth), were shut up in a castle called the Temple, because it had once belonged to the Knights Templars, and there they were very roughly and unkindly treated. A National Guard continually Watched them, and these men were often shockingly rude and insult- ing to them, though they were as patient as possi- ble. Great numbers of the nobles and clergy were shut up in the other prisons ; and when news came that an army of Germans and emigrant nobles was marching to rescue the king, a set of ruffians were sent to murder them all, cutting them down like sheep for the slaughter, men and women all alike. The family in the Temple were spared for the time, but the emigrant army was beaten at Jemappes; and the brave nobles and peasants who had risen in the district of La Vendue, in hopes of saving them, could not make head against the regular French arm}^, all of which had joined in the Revolution, being angered because no one not of noble birth could be an officer. All his friends The Great Fre7ieh Revolution, 415 did for the king only served ta make his enemies hate him trebly ; and three men had obtained the leadership who seem to have had a regular thirst for blood, and to have thought that the only way to make a fresh beginning was to kill everyone Avho had inherited any of the rights that had been so oppressive. Their names were Marat, Danton, and Robespierre ; and the}^ had a power over the minds of the Convention and the mob which no one dared resist, so that this time was called the Reign of Terror. A doctor named Guillotin had invented a machine for cutting off heads quickly and painlessly, which was called hj his name ; and this horrible instrument was set up in Paris to do this work of cutting off the old race. The king — whom they called Louis Capet, after Hugh, the first king of his line — was tried before the Assembly, and sentenced to die. He forgave his murderers, and charged the Irish clergyman, named Edgworth, who was allowed to attend him in his last moments, to take care that, if his family were ever restored, there should be no attempt to revenge his death. The last words of the priest to him were, "Son of St. Louis, ascend to the skies." The queen and her children remained in the 416 Young Folks' History of France, Temple, cheered by the piety and kindness of Madame Elisabeth, until the poor little prince — a gentle, but spirited boy of eight — was taken from them, and shut up in the lower rooms, under the charge of a brutal wretch (a shoemaker) named Simon, who was told that the boy was not to be killed or guillotined, but to be " got rid of " — namely, tormented to death by bad air, bad living, blows, and rude usage. Not long after, Marie Antoinette was taken to a dismal chamber in the Conciergerie prison, and there watched day and night by National Guards, until she too was brought to trial, and sentenced to die, eight months after her husband. Gentle Madame Elisabeth was likewise put to death, and only the two children remained, shut up in separate rooms ; but the girl was better off than her brother, in that she was alone, with her little dog, and had no one who made a point of torturing her. Meanwhile the guillotine was every day in use. Cart-loads were carried from the prisons — nobles, priests, ladies, young girls, lawyers, ser- vants, shopkeepers — everybody whom the savage men who were called the Committee of public Safety chose to condemn. There were guillotines in almost every town ; but at Nantes the victims The G-reat French Revolution. 417 were drowned, and at Lyons they were placed in a square and shot down with grape shot. Moreover, all churches were taken from the faithful. A wicked woman was called the Goddess of Reason, and carried in a car to the great cathe- dral of Notre Dame, where she was enthroned. Sundays were abolished, and every tenth day was kept instead, and Christianity was called folly and superstition ; in short, the whole nation was given up to the most horrible frenzy against God and man. In the midst, Marat was stabbed to the heart by a girl named Charlotte Corday, who hoped thus to end these horrors ; but the other two continued their work of blood, till Robespierre grew jealous of Danton, and had him guillotined ; but at last the more humane of the National Convention plucked up courage to rise against him, and he and his inferior associates v/ere carried to prison. He tried to commit suicide with a pistol, but only shattered his jaw, and in this condition he was guillotined, when the Reign of Terror had lasted about two years. There was much rejoicing at his fall ; the prisons were opened, and people began to breathe freely once more. The National Convention governed 418 Young Folks' History of France, more mildly and reasonably ; but they had a great deal on their hands, for France had gone to war with all the countries round ; and the soldiers were so delighted at the freedom they had obtained, that it seemed as if no one could beat them, so that the invaders were everywhere driven back. And thus was brought to light the wonderful powers of a young Corsican officer. Napoleon Bonaparte, who had been educated at a military school in France as an engineer. When there was an attempt of the mob to rise and bring back the horrible days of the Reign of Terror, Colonel Bonaparte came with his grape shot, and showed that there was a government again that must be obeyed, so that some quiet and good order was restored. Some pity had at last been felt for the poor chil- dren in the Temple. It came too late to save the life of the boy, Louis XVII., as he is reckoned, who had for the whole ninth year of his life lain alone in a filthy room, afraid to call anyone lest he should be ill-used, and without spirit enough to wash him- self, so that he was one mass of sores and dirt ; and he only lingered till the 8th of June, 1795, when he died, thinking he heard lovely music, with his mother's voice among the rest. In the The Great French Revolution, 419 end of the same year his sister was released, and went to Russia to join her uncle, who had fled at the beginning of the Revolution, and was now owned by the loyal among the French as Louis XVIII. In the meantime, the French army had beaten the Germans on the frontier, and had decided on attacking their power in the north of Italy. Bona- parte made a most wonderful passage of the Alps, where there were scarcely any roads but bridle- paths, and he gained amazing victories. His plan was to get all the strength of his army up into one point, as it were, and with that to fall upon the centre of the enemy ; and as the old German gen- erals did not understand this way of fighting, and were not ready, he beat them everywhere, and won all Lombardy, which he persuaded to set up for a republic, under the protection of the Freuch. All this time, the French were under so many different varieties of government, that 3"0U would not understand them at all ; but that which lasted longest was called the Directory. People were be- ginning to feel safe at last ; the emigrants were coming home again, and matters were settling down a little more. CHAPTER XLI. NAPOLEON I. 1796—1814. WHEN Bonaparte liad come back from Italy, he persuaded the Directory to send him with an army to Egypt to try to gain the East, and drive the English out of India. He landed in Egypt, and near Grand Cairo gained the battle of the Pyramids, and tried to recommend himself to the people of Egypt by showing great admiration for Mahomet and the Koran. But his ships, which he had left on the coast, were attacked by the English fleet, under Sir Horatio Nelson, and every one of them taken or sunk except two, which car- ried the tidings home. This was the battle of the Nile. The Sultan of Turkey, to whom Egypt belonged, fitted ont an army against the French, and Bona- 420 Napoleon I. 421 parte marched to meet it half-way in the Holy Land. There he took Jaffa, cruelly massacred the Turkish garrison, and beat the Sultan's army at Tabor ; but Acre was so bravely and well defended, under the management of a brave English sailor. Sir Sidney Smith, that he was obliged to turn back without taking it. He led his troops back, suffering sadly from hunger and sickness, to Egypt, and there de- feated another Turkish army in the battle of Aboa- kir. However, he there heard news from home which showed him that he was needed. The French had, indeed, gone on to stir up a revolution both in Rome and Naples. The Pope was a pris- oner in France, and the King of Naples had fled to Sicily ; but the Russians had come to the help of the other nations, and the French had nearly been driven out of Lombardy. Besides, the Directory was not able to keep the unruly people in order ; and Napoleon felt himself so much wanted, that, finding there were two ships in the port, he em- barked in one of them and came home, leaving his Egyptian arrny to shift for themselves. However, he was received at home like a con- queror ; and the people of France were so proud of him, that he soon persuaded them to change the P^rectory for a government of three consuls, of 422 Young Folks* History of France. whom he was the first. He lived in the Tuileries, and began to keep something very like the old court' and his Avife, Josephine, A^as a beautiful, graceful, kind lady, Avhom every one loved, and who helped A^ery much in gaining people over to his cause. Indeed, he gave the French rest at home and victories abroad, and that was all they desired. He Avon back all that had been lost in Italy ; and the battle of Marengo, on the 14th of June, 1800, Avhen the Austrians Avere totally routed, was a splendid victory. Austria made peace again, and nobody Avas at war with France but England, which conquered everywhere by sea, as France did by land. The last remnant of the French army in Egypt was beaten at Alexandria, and obliged to let the English ships transport them to France ; and after this there was a short peace called the Peace of Amiens, but it did not last long ; and as soon as Bonaparte had decided on Avar, he pounced without notice on every English traveller in his dominions, and kept them prisoners till the end of the war. He had made up his mind to be Emperor of the French, and before declaring this, he wanted to alarm the old royalists ; so he sent a party to seize the Duke d'Enghien (heir of the Princes of Cond<^), who was living at Baden, and conduct him to Vin- THh 1 L ILl.Khlts. Napoleon L 425 cennes, where, at midnight, he was tried by a sham court-martial, and at six in the morning brought down to the court-yard, and shot beside his own graye. After this, every one was afraid to utter a whis- per against Bonaparte becoming emperor, and on the second of December, 1804, he was crowned in Notre Dame, with great splendor. The Pope was present, but Bonaparte placed the crown on his own head — a golden wreath of laurel leaves ; and he gave his soldiers eagle standards, in memory of the old Roman empire. He drew up an excellent code of laws, which have been used ever since in France, and are known by his name ; and his wonderful talent did much to bring the shattered nation into order. Still, England would not acknowledge his unlawful power, and his hatred to her was very great. He had an army ready to invade England, but the English fleet never allowed him to cross the Channel ; and his fleet was entirely destroyed by ^ Lord Nelson, at the great battle of Trafalgar, on the 21st of October, 1805. But Napoleon was winning another splendid vic- tory at Ulm, over the Austrians; and not long after, he beat the Prussians as entirely at Jena, and had all Germany at his feet. Pie was exceedingly 426 Young Folks" History of France, harsh and savage to the good and gentle Queen Louisa, when she came with her husband to try to make better terms for her country, thus sowing seeds of bitter resentment which were to bear fruit long after. The Russians advanced to the aid of Germany, but the battles of Eylau and Friedland made them also anxious for peace. There never, indeed, was a much abler man than Napoleon ; but he had no honor, honesty or generosity, and had very little heart amid all his seeming greatness. He made his family kings of conquered countries. His brother Louis was King of Holland ; Jerome, of "Westphalia, and the eldest brother, Joseph, King of Naples ; but in 1808 he contrived to cheat the King of Spain of his crown, and keep him and his son prisoners in France, while Joseph was sent to reign in Spain, and General Murat, the husband of his sister Caroline, was made king of Naples. The Portuguese royal family were obliged to flee away to Brazil ; but the Spaniards and Portuguese would not submit to the French yoke, and called the En- glish to help them. So 3'ear after year the Duke of Wellington was beating Napoleon's generals, and wearing away his strength ; but he still went on uith his German wars, and in 1809, after two ter- rible battles at Aspern and Wagram, entered Napoleon I, 427 Vienna itself. Again there wa§ a peace ; and Napo- leon, who was grieved to have no child to leave his empire to, had the wickedness and cruelty to de- cide on setting aside his good, loving Josephine, and making the Emperor Francis of Austria give him his young daughter, Marie Louise. In ISIO^ the deed was done ; and it was said that from that time all his good-fortune left him, though he had one little son born to him, whom he called King of Rome. He set out with what he named the Grand Army, to conquer Russia ; and after winning the battle of Borodino, he entered Moscow ; but no sooner was he there than the whole town was on fire, and it burnt on, so that it was not possible to stay there. Winter was just coming on, the Russian army was watching everywhere, and he could only retreat ; and the unhappy Grand Army, struggling in the snow, with nothing to eat, and beset by the enemy everywhere, suffered the most frightful misery. Napoleon left it in the midst, and hurried home ; but no sooner had this blow been given him, than all the Germans — the Prussians especially, to wliom he had been so harsh — rose up and banded together against him. France was worn out with the long wars ; and though Napoleon still showed wonderful 428 Young FolW History of France, skill, especially at the battle of Leipzic, lie was driven back, inch by inch, as it were, across Germany, and into France, by the Emperors of Austria and Russia and King of Prussia ; for though each battle of his was a victory, force of numbers was too much for him. He went to the palace of Fon- tainebleau, and tried to give up his crown to his little son, but the Allies would not accept this ; and at last, in the spring of 1814, he was forced to yield entirely, and put himself into the hands of the English, Prussian, Russian, and Austrian sover- eigns. They decided on sending him to a little isle called Elba, in the Mediterranean Sea, where he was still to be treated as a prince. His deserted wife Josephine loved him so much that she' died of grief for his fall ; but Marie Louise returned to hei father, and did nothing to help him. CHAPTER XLII. LOUIS XYJII. 1814-1824. THE Allies had entered Paris — Russians, Anstrians, and Prussians — and the Duke of Wellington, after winning the battle of Toulouse, came up from the south to meet them there. It was left to the French to decide what gov- ernment they would have ; and those who loved the old royalty took the lead, and inrited back the brothers of their king, Louis XYIII and Charles, Count of Artois, whose eldest son, the Duke of Angouleme, was married to Marie Therese, the only survivor of the prisoners of the Temple. Louis XYIII. was a clever, cunning old man by this time, and meant to do what he could to con- tent the French and keep the peace; but the Count of Artois was stiff and haughty, and tha poor Duchess of Angouleme so grave and s^ that 429 430 Young Folks' History of France, she could not exert herself to please and amuse the people. There was much discontent at the changes that had to be made, and at the giving up of all that IS^apoleon had robbed other countries of and p'iven to France. He had carried off all the best pictures and statues wherever he went, and set them up in the Louvre ; and these were all sent home to their right owners. The lands that he had taken were to be restored ; and ministers from all the Allies met at the Congress of Vienna to settle how this should be done. Full in the midst came the news, like a thunder- bolt, that Napoleon had escaped from Elba, and landed in France on the 27th of February, 1815. No soldier who had served under him would fight against him. The army threw away the white flag, and shouted his name in ecstasy. Louis XVIII. was obliged to flee to Belgium ; and in a very short time Napoleon seemed as powerful as ever. But the Allies were collecting their forces against him ; and England and Prussia, as being the nearest, first had their armies ready near Brussels. Napoleon hoped to beat them before Austria and Russia could come to their help, and marched thither with all speed in the beginning of June. Four days of battles with the Prussians RATTLE OF WATERLOO. Louis XVm. 433 left matters undecided ; but on the 18th of June, 1815, the Duke of Wellington, assisted by the Prussians, gave the French an overwhelming defeat at Waterloo, and marched direct on Paris ; while Napoleon, after vainly seeking shelter, went at last to Rochefort, and there finding it impossible to escape to America, gave himself up to the cap- tain of an English ship, the Bellerophon. He was taken to Plymouth harbor, and remained on board until his fate was decided by the Allied Sover- eigns, who determined to send him where he should not again escape to disturb all Europe ; and he was therefore placed in the little lonely island of St. Helena, in the midst of the Atlantic Ocean, under the custody of an English governor, who was to see him every da3'. He fretted and chafed in his confinement ; and the governer (Sir Hudson Lowe) was continually anxious, and therefore seemed harsh and insulting to him in the fallen pride that did not know how to be really great. After six miserable years, Napoleon died, in 1821, of cancer in the stomach, and was buried under the willow trees of Longwood, in St. Helena. Of course his brothers and sisters had all been put down from the thrones he had given them. Murat tried to recover Naples, but was taken and 434 Young Folks' History of France, . shot ; but the others subDiitted quietly, haying never much enjoyed their honors. Marie Louise had a little Italian duchy given to her, and her son was called the Duke of Keichstadt, and brought up at the court of his grandfather, the Emperor of Austria. He died in early youth, and the person who cared the most for the great- ness of the Bonaparte name was Louis Napoleon, son to Louis, once King of Holland, and of Hortense Beauharnais, the daughter of Josephine by her first marriage. Meantime, the English army had remained for three 3^ears in France, to assist Louis XYIII. in case of any fresh outbreak ; and Marshal Nej', the foremost of the generals who had gone over to Napoleon, was tried by court-martial and shot. ^? Imost everybody else was forgiven ; and Prince Talle^^rand, one of the cleverest and most cunning men who ever lived, who had risen under Napo- leon, worked on still with Louis XYIII. It was the saying in France that in their exile the Bourbons had learnt nothing and forgotten nothing. This was not quite true of Louis XVIII. , who was clever in an indolent way, and resolved to please the people enough to remain where he was till his death, and really gave them a very Louis XVIIL 435 good charter ; only he declared he gave it to them by his free grace as their king, and they wanted him to acknowledge that the}^ had forced it from royalty by the Revolution. But his brother Charles, Count of Artois, was much more strongly and openly devoted to the old waj-s that came before the Revolution, and, as Louis had no children, his accession was dreaded. His eldest son, the Duke of Angouleme, had no children ; and his second son, the Duke of Berri, who was married to a Nea- politan princess, was the most amiable and hopeful person in the family ; but on the 12th of Februar}^, 1820, he was stabbed by a wretch called Louvet, as he was leaving the opera, and died in a few hours. His infant son, Henry, Duke of Bordeaux, was the only hope of the elder branch of the Bourbons. France was worn out arid weary of war, so that little happened in this reign, except that the Duke of Angouleme made an expedition tg assist the King of Spain in putting down an insurrection. The French nobility had returned to all their titles ; but many of them had lost all their property in the Revolution, and hung about the court, much needing ofBces and employments ; while all the generation who had grown up among the triumphs of Napoleon, looked ^th contempt and dislike at 486 Young Folks^ History of France. the endeavor to revive old habits and ways of thinking. Louis XVIII. was in failing health, but he kept up much of the old state of the French court, and was most careful never to keep any one waiting, for he used to say, " Punctuality is the politeness of kings." Even when very ill, he would never give up any of the court ceremonies ; and when urged to spare himself, said, " A king of France ought to die standing ; but for some years he was unable to walk, being dreadfully tormented by the gout, and he was obliged to let his brother manage his affairs. But he, was shrewd enough to dread the Count of Artois' desire to return to the old times of the overgrown royal power ; and when he found himself dying, lie put his hand on the head of his little four years' old great-nephew, Henry, and said to his brother, " Let Charles X. take care of the crown for this child." He died in Septem- ber, 1824. CHAPTER XLIII. CHAHLES X, 1824—1830. WHEN Charles X. had been the young Count of Artois, before the Revolution, he had been gaj, lively, and thoughtless — a playfellow of Marie Antoinette in those bright, giddy days when she had caused so much, ill-will. After all his exile and wanderings, and in his old age, he had become very religious ; but not in a wise way, for he was guided entirely by the Pope and a few clergy, who wanted to bring things back to what they were be- fore the Revolution. It was just the same with the State. His ministers were trying to get back the old power of the crown, and this made every one discontented and jealous, tbougb France had a share in two victories in his time. The first was made on behalf of the Greeks, 437 438 Young Folks'^ History of France. who had long been trying to break away from the rule of the Turks ; and at last the Prussian, English, and French fleets joined' and defeated the Turka and Egyptians at the battle of Nayarino ; after which, Greece was able to become a kingdom under Christian rule. The other was to clear the Mediterranean Sea of the Moorish robbers who had infested it for centu- ries past. Ships came from the African ports, es- pecially Algiers, and fell upon any merchant vessel they couhl seize, taking the goods and carrying the crew and passengers off into slavery". Even the coasts of France, Spain, and Italy were not safe ; and people were continually carried off, and set to work for the Moors, until they were ransomed by their friends in Europe. But in 1830 the English and French fleets united to attack this nest of pirates, and gained a grand victory, which put an end to all further sea robberies in the Mediterranean. But no one was pleased by the victory, for the doings of the king and his ministers enraged the public, and the newspapers found great fault with them, and accused them of all sorts of impossible tilings. On this, on the 26th of July, 1830, the king put an edict putting an end to the liberty of the press — that is, forbidding anything to appear Charles X, 43& in any newspaper withoufc being approved by the government. Some other edicts were also madej which offended the people so much that there was a frightful disturbance at Paris. Every one begged the king to change his mind, and withdraw the edicts ; but he thought it was yielding that had ruined his brother Louis XVI., and nothing would persuade him to give way, till too late, when for what are called the " three days of July" there had been fighting throughout Paris, and his troops had been broken and driven out by the National Guard. Then he did consent ; but the people would not be satisfied without dethroning him, and he was obliged to leave France again, taking with him his son and daughter-in-law (the last Dauphin and Dauphiness), and his grandson, the little Henry. They lived first in Scotland, and afterwards in Italy and in Germany ; and while all the old loyal French still viewed Charles, and after his death, his grandson, Henry V., as they have always called him, as the only true kings of France. The Marquis de la Fayette, who had been one of the first movers in the old Revolution, had lived to assist in this, the Revolution of 1830, a far less bloody and mischievous one. Some of the French 440 Young Folks' History of France. wanted to have another republic, but most of them wished to try a limited monarchy, like that of England, with a king at the head, but without power to do anything without the consent of the subjects. They resolved to put at the head of their new constitution the Duke of Orleans. He was of the Bourbon royal blood, for he was descended from Louis XIV.'s brother, the Duke of Orleans, and from the wicked regent of the childhood of Louis XV. After these two, there had been two quiet dukes, not noted for much, but the fifth had been vehement in the cause of the Revolution. He had given up his title of Duke of Orleans, and called himself Citizen Philip Egalite, or Equality, and he had even voted for the death of Louis XYL , but when, in the Reign of Terror, everyone who had any high birth was put to death, he was guillo- tined. His eldest son, Louis Philippe, had been brought up by a very clever governess. Madam de Genlis, who wrote the " Tales of the Castle," and many other books for children; and she made a great point of his learning many useful habits which princes had thought quite beneath them. He served in the French army till his father, mother, and younger brothers were thrown into Charles X. 441 Drison, and lie was obliged to earn his bread as a teacher in a school. Afterwards he came to Eng- land, where his brothers joined him ; but they both fell into declines and died, one in England, and the other at Malta, where Louis Philippe had taken, him for his health. Next he travelled in America, and there, when he had a bad fall from his wagon in a little lonely settlement, took out his own lancet, and bled himself so dextrously, that the people begged him to remain and be their doctor. At the Restoration, he came back to France, with his wife, Marie Amelie, the daughter of the King of Naples, and his sister Adelaide, both very good and clever women. They brought up their large family at the Palais Royal, and were very kind and sensible people, though all along there were many who thought he was scheming to get the people's favor away from King Charles X. Whether this were true or not is not certain. At any rate, when Charles fled, the leaders of the nation all agreed to offer the crown to the Duke of Orleans, but it was not to be as an old heredi- tary monarch. He was not to be King of France, but King of the French; he was not to be Louis XIX., but Louis Philippe I. ; and his eldest son 442 Young Folks'* History of France. was not to be Dauphin, but Duke of Orleans ; and his power was to be bounded by peers and depu- ties, much, as the power of the English king is bounded by the peers and commons. This was the Revolution of the " three days of July," 1830. CHAPTER XL LOUIS PHILIPPE. 1830-1848. LOUIS PHILIPPE of Orleans began prosper-- ously. He was called the Citizen King, and used the tricolored flag of the old Revolution instead of the white one of the Bourbons, and the cock of Gaul instead of the old blue shield with gold fleurs-de-lys, to show that he reigned not as a son of the old royal family, but by the choice of the people. Tliere was a chamber of peers and a chamber of deputies ; and the constitution was a limited monarchy. Much was done to please the people, and much to make them prosperous. Railways and steam- boats came in, and manufactures began to flourish, more especially the Aveaving of silk at Lyons ; and though the French have never made articles as strong and useful as the English do, they have 443 444 Young Folks' History of France. much better taste, and all that is gay and elegant is better finished there ; so that Paris grew more and more to be the chief mart for dress and orna- ment in the world. Almost all the colonies the French had once made had been lost in wars since the time of Louis XI Y. ; and Louis Philippe thought it would be well to form new ones, and to get the navy into good order again. So a settlement was ma,de in Algeria ; but it caused a long and fierce war with the Arab chiefs, which lasted nearly throughout the reign ; for no sooner had a grant of land been made, and brought into good order, than the Arabs would fall u[)on the farm in the night, and burn^ destroy, and plunder. Guards of soldiers had to be kept in the forts all round the border ; and there was much terrible fighting, for the Arabs were as brave as the French themselves, and had a most gallant chief, named Abd-el-Kader. At last, however, after years of fighting, he was forced to surrender himself a prisoner, and was taken to France ; but this was not till quite at the end of the reign of Louis Philippe, though I have told you about it all at once. ^ The French also tried to make settlements in the Pacific islands, especially New Caledonia and Louis Philippe, 445 the island of Taliiti. They were not at all wel- come in this last, for the native queen, Pomar^, had been taught to be a Christian bj.the English, and did not wish for French protection or Roman Catholic teaching. However, the French were the strongest, and have taken the management there, though the island still professes to be under its own government. Louis Philippe did his utmost to keep the Paris- ians in good humor, knowing that he could only reign by their favor ; and as the miseries of the old wars were forgotten, and the French only thought of the victories of the times of Napoleon, praising him as the greatest of heroes, the king gratified them by requesting the English to allow him to bring home the corpse of the Emperor from St. Helena, and bury it in the Church of the Invalides, a great asylum for old soldiers at Paris. It was fetched in a man-of-war by the king's sailor son, the Prince de Joinville, and brought to Paris in a triumphal car, which was followed through the streets by Louis Philippe and his sons, A chapel was built, and ornamented with splendid marbles, for the burials of the Bonaparte family. Napoleon's little son was dead, but his brother 446 Young Folks' History of France. Louis had left a son, who was living in exile in England or Germany. Do what he would, Louis Philippe could not prevent a great deal of discontent among the Bonapartists on the one hand, and the Repub- licans on the other. The richer the shopkeepers and merchants grew, and the more show they made, the bitterer was the hatred of the workmen, who said that everybody ought to be equal not only in rank but in property ; and these men used red alone, instead of the tricolor, for their badge. A horrible conspiracy was made by some wretches, of w^hom the chief was named Fieschi, for destro3'-- ing the king, as he rode out, by what was called the Infernal Machine, which was like a whole bat- tery of guns fired off in a moment. The king was not hurt, but fourteen people were killed, of whom one was an old marshal of Napoleon's. The men were traced and seized, and Fieschi was put to death. The queen, Marie Amelie of Naples, was one of the best women who ever lived, and did all she could to promote goodness and piety. So did the king's prime minister M. Guizot, who was one of a staunch old Huguenot family ; but the Republi- can dislike to having religion taught in schools Louis Philippe, 449 hindered the grovvth of good; and there were a great number of unbelievers, though there were good and holy men struggling with the evil. There were always many parties. There were the Legitimists, who ^dewed first Charles X., and then his grandson, Henry V., the Count of Chambord, as the only true kino^, and would take no office under Louis Philippe : and there were the Bona- partists and the Red Republicans, as well as the Moderate ones, who held by the king. The king had five sons, of whom the eldest, the Duke of Orleans, was much loved and looked up to. He married the Princess Helen of Mecklen- burg Schwerin, and they had had two little sons, before he was unhappily killed by leaping out of his open carriage while the horses were running away. It is a curious thing that the power of a French sovereign always seems to melt away as soon as he shows any designs upon Spain. The king, Ferdinand YIL, whom Kapoleon kept so long in prison, had left two little daughters ; and as they grew up, Louis Philippe interfered about their marriages in a way that caused much displeasure. He could only gain the younger one for his son, the Duke of Montpensier ; but he was thought to 450 Young Folks' History of France, be grasping at the crown for him, and this made everj^one jealous. A little later, a nobleman, the Duke de Praslin, horrified all Europe by murder- ing his wife. He was, of course, condemned to death, but he put an end to his own life in prison, and the E,ed Republicans fancied that he must have been allowed the means, in order that there might not be a public execution of a nobleman ; and this added to the discontent and hatred of poor against rich that had been growing every year. At last, in February, 1848, after the council and the chambers of deputies had decided against some measures much desired by the people, there was a rising of the mob throughout Paris. The troops were drawn up, and the National Guard ; but when the moment came for action, the National Guard would not fire, but made common cause with the people. The army would still have fought, but Louis Philippe would not have blood shed for him. He sent a message that he abdi- cated in favor of his little grandson, the Count of Paris, with his mother, the Duchess of Orleans, as regent. Then he left the Tuileries privately, and under the name of William Smith, safely reached England. Louis Philippe, * 451 The Duchess of Orleans bravely came forward to the people with her two boys, but there was no shout in her favor, only angry looks, and her friends saw it was all in vain, and hurried her away as fast as they could. All the family made their way by different means, one by one, to Eng- land, where the queen and her people received them as kindly as warm hearts always welcome the unfortunate. Claremont Palace was lent to them as a dwelling-place, and there Louis Philippe and his good queen spent the remainder of their lives. He died in the year 1849, and Amdlie a few years later. CHAPTER XLV» THE REPUBLIC. 1848-1852. AFTER Louis Philippe and his family had lied from France, there was a time of con- fusion. An assembly of deputies met from all parts of France to arrange a fresh government ; and a very clever poet and author, named Lamar- tine, at first tried to bring about something like order, but he was not strong enough, and there was a great deal of tumult and disorder. In truth, the Red Republicans, who did not want to see anyone richer than themselves, were very much disappointed that, though noblemen and gentlemen had no more rights than other people, yet still rich men kept their money and estates; and though all sorts of occupations were devised at Paris, for which they were highly paid, in hopes of keeping them quiet and contented, they only 452 The Republic. 453 became more fierce and violent. They had devised a way of fortifying the streets, by seizing on all the carts, carriages, and cabs they could lay hands on, and fastening them together with ropes, so as to form a line across the street. Then they pulled up the paving-stones, and built them up, banking them up with earth, and thus making what they caUed a barricade. And when the top and back of this was thronged with men and boys armed with muskets, it was almost impossible to dislodge them. In the end of June, 1848, there were three dreadful days of barricades. It was really a fight of the Red Republicans against the Tricolored. Liberty, Fraternity, and Equality were the watch- words of them both; but the ReJ Republicans meant much more than the Tricolored by these words, for they thought liberty was no order at all, and equality was that no person should be better off than the rest. The good Archbishop of Paris, Monseigneur Affre, going out on one of these miserable days to try to make peace, was shot through the back from behind a barricade, and died in a few hours. However, General Cavaignac, one of the brave men who had been trained to war by the fighting 454 Young Folks' History of France. in Algeria, so managed the soldiers and the National Guard that they put down the Red Republicans, and restored order, though not with- out shedding much blood, and sending many into exile. Indeed, the two years 1847 and 1848 were un- quiet all over Europe. Much that had been settled at the Congress of Vienna, in 1814, after Napoleon had been overthrown, had been done more as if estates were being carved out than as if what was good for the people was considered ; and there had been distress and discontent ever since, especially in Italy, where all the north was under the Emperor of Austria, and his German officers were very rough and disagreeable in the towns where they were quartered. The Italians rose, and tried to shake them off by the help of the King of Sardinia ; and at the same time there was a great rising against the Pope, Pius IX., at Rome. The Popes had held Rome for more than a thousand years, and there ruled the Western Church ; but they had never been very good princes to their Roman subjects, and things had fallen into a sad state of confusion, which, when first he was chosen, Pius IX. had tried to improve ; but his people went on too fast for him, The Republic, 455 and at last rose up and so alarmed him that he fled in the disguise of a servant behind an Austrian carriage. Now, the Roman Catholics think the Pope can- not rule over the Church freely unless he has Home quite of his own, and lives there as a prince, instead of only as a Bishop in a country belonging to some one else. And though there were so many in France who had not much faith in anything, yet there were a good many honest, religious people, who were very anxious to have him back, and said tliat it mattered more that he should govern the Church than that the Romans should be well off. So a French army was sent to restore him ; and the Italians were grievously disappointed, for, the Austrians were putting them down in the north, and they thought Republicans bound to help them. But Rome was taken, and the Pope had his throne again ; and a strong guard of French soldiers were placed in Rome, for without such help he could no longer have reigned. The French at home were in more parties than ever. The Red Republicans still wanted to over- throw everything ; the Moderate ones cared chiefly to keep peace and order ; the Bonapartists longed to have another empire like Napoleon's ; the 456 Young Folks' History of France. Orleanists wished to bring back the Count of Paris, grandson of Louis Philippe ; and the Legit- imists still held fast by Henry V., the son of the murdered Duke of Berri, and the natural king by birth. Never was there such a house divided against itself ; but, in truth, the real fear was of the Ked Republicans. All the rest were ready to be quiet, and submit to anything so long as these could be kept down. After much deliberating in the Assembly, it was settled to have a republic, with a president as the Americans have. Then Louis Napoleon Bona- parte, the son of Napoleon's brother Louis, offered himself as president, and was elected, all the quiet people and all the Bonapartists joining in the choice. Most of the army were Bonapartists, for the sake of the old victories of Napoleon ; and when Algeria was quieted, and they came home, Louis Napoleon had a great power in his hands. Soon he persuaded the people to change his title from president to that of first consul, as his uncle had once been called ; and then everyone began to see what would follow, but most were glad to have a strong hand over them, to give a little peace and rest after all the changes. And the next time there was any chance of a The Republic, 457 disturbance at Paris, Louis Napoleon was before- hand with the mob. He surrounded them with soldiers, had cannon planted so as to command every street, and fired upon the mob before it had time to do any harm, then captured the ringlead- ers, and either had them executed or sent into banishment. Some violence and crueltythere cer- tainly was, but the Parisians were taught whom they must obey, and quiet people were grateful. This master stroke is always called the coup d'etat or stroke of policy, for it settled affairs for the time ; and after it Louis Napoleon did as he chose, for no one durst resist him. CHAPTER XLVI. THE SECOND EMPIRE. 1852—1870. IN the beginning of the year 1852, the whole of the French nation was called upon to decide by vote whether they would form an empire again, or continue to be a republic. Every man rich or poor, who was not a convict, had a vote ; and the larger number decided for the empire, and for Louis Napoleon Bonaparte as the emperor. He considered himself as the successor of his uncle, and therefore called himself Napoleon III., counting the little child in whose favor the great Bonaparte had ab- dicated at Fontainebleau as the second Napoleon. He married a Spanish lady of high rank, but not royal, whose mother was Scottish. Her name was Eugenie de Montijo, and she was one of the most lovely women of her time. She was pious and kind-hearted, and always ready to do anything 458 The Second Empire, 459 good ; but it was thought that the court would be more popular, and trade prosper more, if an exam- ple w*as set of great splendor and magnificence. So the ladies were encouraged to dress in a style of extravagance and brilliancy, with perpetual changes of fashion ; and this, as the Parisian dresses are always the models of those of other countries, has led to much folly iu all grades of society every- where. One son was born of this marriage, who was called the Prince Imperial. The emperor ruled w4th a strong hand, but he got everything into order again, and he made Paris more beautiful than ever, throwing down old nar- row streets, and building grand new ones, which, for the most part, had asphalt pavement, so that there might be no paving-stones to take up and make into barricades. He took away a good many of the places to which old historical remem- brances were attached ; and it has never seemed plain whether he did so for the sake of sweeping away the old remembrances, or only because they stood in the way of his plans. The name the emperor wished to be called by was the Napoleon of Peace, as his uncle had been the Napoleon of War ; but it was not always pos- sible to keep the peace. In the year 1852, just 460 Young Folks' History af France. after he had been crowned, the Russian emperor began to threaten to conquer Turkey, and there- upon the French joined with the English to protect the Sultan. The French and English armies, both together, landed in Turkey, and then made an ex- pedition to the Crimea, where the Russians had built a very strong fortified city named Sebastopol, whence to attack the Turks. Marshal Bugeaud was the French general, and, with Lord Raglan, commanded in the great battle fought on the banks of the Alma, and then. laid siege to Sebastopol, where again the Russians sallied out, in the night of the 4th of November, 1854, and attacked the camp at Inkerman. All the winter and spring the siege lasted, the two armies having much bitter cold to fear as they watched in the trenches ; but in the summer it was possible to assault the city, and while the English attacked the Redan, the French attacked the Malakoff Tower, and after much hard fighting this was taken. Then peace was made, on condition that all the fortifications of Sebastopol should be destroyed, and no fleet or army kept there for the future. Having thus been allies in war, England and France became much greater friends, and Queen Victoria and the emperor made visits to one The S('cond Empire. 461 m anotlier ; and the trade of the two nations was so mixed up together as to make it much less easy to go to war, for the emperor had a love and affection for England, which had been a home to him in his days of exile. The Italians were more uneasy and miserable than ever under the rule of the Austrians, and begged Victor Emmanuel, King of Sardinia, to help them, and become an Italian king over them. Louis Napoleon gave them his help, and went in person to Lombardy, where the French and Ital- ians defeated the Austrians at Magenta and Sol- ferino ; after which there was again a peace, and Victor Emmanuel was owned as King of Italy, on condition that, in return for the help he had received, he should give to France the little prov- ince of Nice, which had always been part of the dukedom of Savoy, the old inheritance of his fore- fathers long before they were kings, but which seemed as if it ought to be a part of France. The Romans hoped that they, too, should have shaken off the Papal government ; but the guard of French soldiers was still maintained at Rome. Another undertaking of the emperor was to bring Mexico into order. This country had been settled by Spaniards, and belonged to Spain until 462 Young Folks^ History of France, it revolted ; and for many years there had been constant revolutions, and very little law, so that it was full of outlaws and robbers. Some of the better disposed thought that they might do better if they set up a monarchy, and the French prom- ised to help them. The Archduke Maximilian, brother of the Emperor of Austria, was chosen, and went out, with his young wife Charlotte, daughter of the King of Belgium, and guarded by a French army. But the Mexicans were much more fierce and treacherous than had been ex- pected ; and the French troops found that staying there only made them more bitter, and it was costly to keep them there. So they were brought home ; and no sooner had they left Mexico, than the Mexicans rose up, made their emperor pris- oner, and shot him, while his poor wife lost her senses from grief. They were a good and noble pair — true-hearted, and anxious to do right ; and theirs is one of the saddest stories of our time. The Emperor of the French had ruled prosper- ously for a long time ; but the burning hatred of the Red Republicans was not quenched. His best advisers, too, were growing old and dying, and his own health and spirit were failing ; but he was trying to teach the people to rule themselves in The Second Empire, 463 some degree, instead of expecting liim to keep order with his power from above. He was anxious to be sure of his son reigning after him, and he put it to the vote all over France whether the empu'e should be hereditary. The vote was in his favor, and he seemed quite secure. But at this time the Prussians had been gaining great successes both against Denmark and Austria, and the French were very jealous of them, and expected a fight for some of the prov- inces that lie along the Rhine. Just then, too, the Spaniards had risen, and driven away Queen Isabella, who had not ruled well ; and they elected a cousin of the King of Prussia to be their king. He never accepted the Spanish crown, but the bare notion made the French furious, and there was a great cry from the whole nation that the pride of the Prussians must be put down. The emperor saw his popularity was failing him, and that his only chance was to please the people by going to war. Nobody knew that the army had been badly managed, and that it was quite changed from what it was when it fought in Algiers and the Crimea. Indeed, the French never think that anything but victory can happen to them, so the army went off in high spirits to meet the Prus- 464 Young Folks History of France. sians on the Rhine — singing, shouting, drinldng ; cind the emperor took his young son with him, unci tried to seem as hopeful as they did ; but all who saw him near saw that he was both ill and sad. This was in the summer of the year 1870, CHAPTER XLVIL THE SIEGE OF PABIS. 1870—1871. EVERYONE knew that whatever might be said to be the quarrel between France and Prussia, the truth was that the two figrhtino: nations were jealous of one another, and wanted to meas- ure their strength together. The Prussians had never forgotten the elder Napoleon's cruelty to their queen, and the harshness with which the whole nation had been treated ; and all the Ger- mans distrusted Napoleon III., and thought he had plans for spreading the French empire into the German provinces beyond the Rhine. All the Germans, therefore, felt as if the}'- were defending their fatherland, and came to the army in a very different temper from the boastful one of the French. It was in the provinces of the Rhine that the 46& ^ 466 Young Folks' History of France, battle was to be fought out. In the first fight, at Werth, the French were successful, and a great deal was made of the victory. The Prince Impe- rial was made to fire the first cannon, and all the newspapers profanely called it his baptism of fire. Indeed, one of the worst signs was that nobody was telling truth. The emperor had been deceived as to the strength and order of his army ; and the whole French nation were entirely deceived as to the state of things with the army, and thought they were beating the Prussians, and should soon be at Berlin. Instead of this, all round the city of Sedan there was a most frightful battle, which lasted day after day, and in which the French were entirely beaten, and so surrounded and cut off from retreat by the German forces, that the emperor was obliged to surrender himself a pris- oner to the King of Prussia. He had before sent his son to England, as soon as he saw how things were going. The Empress Eugenie had been left as regent at Paris ; but as soon as the dreadful news came, all the Parisians rose up, and declared that the emperor was deposed and that they would have a republic again. All that her best friends could do for her was to help her to pass ^ut of the Tuileries in a plain black The Siege of Paris, 467 dress, get into a fl}', and be driven to the station, whence she safely reached England. Marshal Macmahon and a large portion of the army who were in Sedan were made prisoners, and sent off to Germany. Still there was a general belief that help must come — that an army would come home from Algeria, or be put together from the garrisons — or that the whole nation would rise up and drive out the enemy. So the cities of Strasburg, Phalsburg, and Nancy shut their gates, and bravely stood a siege from the Germans ; and when the Parisians found that the main bodv of the enemy was advancing, they likewise prepared for a seige, under their commandant, General Trochu, a good man, but not enterprising. They were in a strange delirium of ungrateful joy at being rid of the empire ; they went about knock- ing down the carved eagles and effacing the great crowned N's, and declaring that now they should prosper, as if the enemy were not actually on their own ground. Almost every available man was enrolled in the National Guard or the Garde Mobile; but the Prussians put a stop to any warfare of the peas- antry, for at a little village called Bazeille, where some shots were fired on them, they burnt and 468 Yourtg FolTcs" History of France, destroj^ed every building, and killed all who fell into their hands. They gave out that though regular soldiers would be treated as prisoners of war, and those who did not fight would not be hurt, there was to be no mercy for places where Germans were fired upon. The Prussians meant to be just, but their jus- tice was of a hard kind ; and though they hardly ever did violence to anyone's person, they had less scruple about plundering than they ought to have had. Indeed, they had bitterly hated the French ever since the elder Napoleon had so tyrannously misused Prussia, and broken the heart of Queen Louisa, the mother of the King William who was now leading his forces to Paris ; and much that they called retribution, lookers-on called revenge. The king placed his headquarters in the grand old palace of Versailles, and thence besieged Paris, cutting off all supplies and all communication from outside. No one could come in or out, save through the German camp, except in a balloon ; and one of the Republican leaders, M. Gambetta, actually came out in a balloon, to try to raise the spirit of the rest of France to come to the relief of the capital. Letters came and went, too, by car- rier pigeons ; and tiny letters on thin paper, and The Seige of Paris, 471 newspapers in print so small that they could only be read with a magnifying glass, were prepared for this pigeon post. Meantime, the people ate up all their stores ; and after finishing the mutton and beef, all the horses were seized, and the cats and dogs were killed : the flour was diluted with saw- dust ; and the starvation became all the more wretched as the winter came on ; and there was as sad a want of fuel as of food. Meanwhile, the German shells were constantly flying in, destroy- ing houses, and killing all whom their splinters struck. It was as bad at Strasburg, while these Paris- ians were consoling themselves by ofl'ering gar- lands to the statue of that city in the Place de la Concorde ; but Strasburg, Metz, and Phalsburg all were taken, and all the hopes of helj) from without faded away. The supposed army in the south never appeared at all, and one in the west, which at first had some success, was soon defeated. The Prussian army occupied more and more ground ; and though the Parisian troops tried to sally out and attack the German camp, this turned out to be all in vain. For the Parisians, both in the National Guard and Garde Mobile, had no notion of obeying orders or observing discipline, and 472 Young Folks' History of France. without these nobody can fight ; while even as to bravery, they showed themselves sadly unlike their loud boasts of themselves. Nobody did show any steady courage but the few real soldiers, the gentle- men, and the Bretons ; and their bravery ended in their being killed when no one supported them. It was all the worse, because there was bitter dis- trust between the Red Republicans and the Mod- erate party, and each expected to be betrayed by the other. The only pleasant thing to think of in the whole war was the care taken by a society, gathered from all nations — chiefly Swiss, German, and English — for sending nurses to the wounded and help to the ruined. They were known by the Red Cross, and wherever this was seen they were respected. One difficulty was — Who or what was the government which might make peace with the Prussians ? but after half-a-year of siege, M. Thiers and General Trochu, and others of the Moderate party, made terms. Paris was, in fact, surren- dered ; but the King of Prussia jDromised not to grieve the French by marching in at the head of his army, but to be content with quietly entering himself. The two provinces of Lorraine and Alsace, which used to be German, were to be The Siege of Paris, 473 given up to him ; Prussian troops were to be left for a year in garrison in France ; and a fine was to be paid. At the same time, quantities of food and firing were sent in for the famished Parisians, the prisoners were released, and among them the emperor, who went to England. CHAPTER XLVIII. THE COMMUNISTS. 1871. 'T^HE terms of the treaty were no sooner knoAvn -L than all the ill-will and distrust of the Red Republicans openlj^ broke out. They declared that they were betrayed; that their generals and the National Guards would not fight, and had sold them to the enemy ; and that they would not give up their arms, or be bound by the treaty. They drew together on a height with their cannon, and closed the gates, and barricaded the streets again. The Government withdrew to Versailles, to wait for the arrival of all the troops who had been in captivity ; and these Red Republicans did what they chose. One horrible deed was, shooting, and that with many repeated wounds, two generals who had tried to maintain discipline in the first siege, and had thus offended them. 474 The Communists. 475 A sort of government was set up, calling itself the Commune — an old word for a town council governing itself — and thus the Red Republicans were known as the Communists. Thej were either newspaper writers, or else workmen and mechan- ics ; and there was one noble among them, quite as desperate as the rest. All the former pride in the first Bonaparte had turned into a ferocious hatred to the very name ; so that even the great column in the Place Vendome, raised in honor of his vic- tories, was thrown down ; and the Communists were as furious against law, order, property, and religion as ever their grandfathers in the Reign of Terror had been. They turned the clergy out of the churches, and the Sisters of Charity out of the hospitals, and uttered the maddest and most hor- rible blasphemies against all that was good or great. The women were equally violent, or even more so, with the men — they sang songs of liberty, and carried weapons, uttering fearful threats. Some of the leaders had been captured, and kept at Ver- sailles ; whereupon they seized on the archbishop, Monseigneur Darboy, and five more clergy — good and holy men, who had spent their whole lives in the endeavor to teach and help them, and who, all through the siege had toiled to lessen the suf- 476 Young Folks History of France, ferings of the poor. They were thrown into prison ; and when the Commune found that theii own members were not released, and that Marshal Macmahon and the army were closely besieging Paris, all these good priests were brought to the prison of La Roquette, and there shot, and hastily buried. The good archbishop died with his hand uplifted, as if in the act of blessing his mur- derers. This was on the 24th of May, 1871. All France was against the madmen who had possession of their much-loved Paris ; but the Communists held out desperately, and forced many quiet citizens to fight, by making their carrying arms the only condition of obtaining food, which of course, they could not earn by honest labor as of old. At last, however, the soldiers from Ver- sailles began to force their way in, and then, in their final madness, the Red Republicans set fire to the city. The Hotel de Ville was soon blazing, and so was the Tuileries. It was said that inflam- mable materials had been placed in them for this purpose, and that women went about throwing petroleum in at the windows of houses to set them on fire. The Versailles government, their troops, and indeed all who looked on, were in a frenzy of rage The Communists. 477 and grief at seeing their beautiful city, the pride and darling of every Frenchman's heart, thus destroyed before their eyes. And as the soldiers slowly fought their way in, with cannon pointed down the streets, and mowing all before them, they made a most fearful slaughter of men and women alike — and, it may be feared, the innocent with the guilty. Indeed, the very cry of " une petroleuse " was enough to cause a woman to be hunted down, and shot without further trial. There was a last stand made by the Communists in the great cemetery of Pere la Chaise, where most of them died the death of wolves ; and large herds of the captured were marched off towards Versailles — many to be shot at once, others im- prisoned, and after trial sent off to prison, and exiled to Cayenne or New Caledonia. Thus the Red Republic was extinguished in fire and blood, and order was restored. The city was found to be less injured by the fires than had been feared when they were seen raging ; and for the time M. Thiers ruled as a sort of president, and set matters as right as was possible in the torn and bleeding country. Meantime, the emperor. Napo- leon III., died in his exile in England ; and the nation began to consider what should be the gov- 478 Young Folks* History of France, ernment for the future. The old parties still existed — the Legitimists, still \oy?i\ to Henr}", Count of Chambord ; the Orleanists, wishing for a son or grandson of Louis Philippe ; the Bonapart- ists, loving the memory of Napoleon III., and hop- ing to restore his son ; the Moderate Republicans, chiefly seeking rest and order, and now revenge upon Germany and the remnant of the Com- munists. Henry, Count of Chambord, having no children, so that the Count of Paris, eldest grandson of Louis Philippe, was his right heir, there was a plan that the Legitimist and Orleans parties should join, and a proposal was made to restore the Count of Chambord as such a king as Louis Philippe was, and that the Count of Paris should reign after him. But the Count of Chambord's answer was that he would come to his forefathers' throne if he were invited, but only to reign as they did, by the right given to his family by God, not as the chosen of the people. He would be the Most Christian king ^ — the King of France, not of the French — with the white flag of the Bourbons, not the tricolor — and the Eldest Son of the Church obedient to the Pope. Nobody except the old Legitimists was in a The Communists. 479 mood to accept this answer, and so, when the choice of a government was put to the vote of the nation, it was decided to have a republic, with a president, instead of a monarch}^ ; and Marshal Macmahon was soon after elected as presidents Questions for Examination. Chapter I. — 1. Who were the Kelts ? 2. Into what were they divided ? 3. What does Pen mean in Keltic ? 4. What rivers did the Kelts name? 5. What do Rhine and Rhone mean ? 6. What does Seine mean ? 1. What does Garonne mean? 8. What were the two divisions of Kelts? 9. How did the Kelts travel? 10. How did they dress? 11. Who were the Galatians ? 12. Who sacked Rome ? 13. Wliat was Gallia Cis-Alpiiia ? 14. What was Gallia Trans-Alpina? 15. What metals are found in Gaul ? 16. Who found them out ? 17. Who followed the Phoenicians ? 18. What cities did the Greeks build ? 19. Whom did the Greeks call to help them ? 20. What were the first two Roman towns ? 21. Who was the messenger to the Romans ? 22. Which was the bravest clan in Gaul? Chapter IP — 1. What did the Romans call their settle- ment ? 2. What was a colony ? 3. How was a colony begun ? 4. How long were the Romans in gaining Gaul? 5. Who broke into Gaul ? 6. Who defeated the Cimbri and Teutons ? 7. Who conquered Gaul ? and in what year ?. 8. What tribe rose against him ? 9. Who was the great chief of the Arverni ? 10. Where did Vercingetorix fortify himself ? 11. How was 481 482 Questions for Examination. he shut in ? 12. How did Vercingetorix surrender ? 13. What was his end ? 14. Wliat cities did the Romans huild in Gaul ? 15. Wlio governed Rome ? 16. Who made a rising against Rome ? 17. What was tlie name of his brave wife ? Chapter III. — 1. Who was the first Bisliop of Aries ? 2. Who first persecuted the Gallic Christians ? 3. Wlio was their brave girl-martyr ? 4, Where were the Christians massacred ? 5. What were the three Keltic Provinces ? 6. How was Con- stantine converted ? 7. Who were the enemies of the Gauls ? 8. Who defended Gaul from them ? 9. Who set up an empire there ? 10. Who finished the conversion of Gaul ? 11. How long had the Romans held Gaul ? Chapter IY. — 1. What kind of people were the Teutons ? 2. Who were tlieir gods ? 3. What were their chief tribes ? 4. Which tribes came to Gaul ? 5. What were the two tribes of Franks? 6. What was their kingly family called ? 7. la what year was Attila's invasion? 8. Where was Attila de- feated? 9. Why was Gaul deserted by the Romans? 10. What good did Genoveva do at Paris ? 11. Who was Clovis ? 12. What was Clovis' promise ? 13. Where was he baptized ? 14. What was his chief home in Gaul ? 15. What church did he build ? 16. What was the King of France always called ? 17. When did Clovis die ? 18. What part of Gaul belonged to the Franks ? 19. What part was still Roman ? 20. What part was still Keltic ? 21. Hoav many sons had Clovis ? 22. What cruel thing did two of them do ? 23. Which child was saved ? Chapter Y. — 1. Who were the Meerwings ? 2. Who were the two wicked queens ? ^. What were the two kingdoms of Questions for JExamination, 48o the Franks ? 4. When did Fredegond die ? 5. What good did Brynhild do '? 6. But whom did she reject ? 7. What was her end? 8. In what year? 9. What work was done in Dago- bert's time? 10. How many more Meerwings reigned after him ? 11. What are they called ? 12. Who governed for them ? 13. Which kingdom came to be greatest ? 14. Who was Mayor of the Palace in iSTeustria ? Chaptee YI. — 1. Who was the next Mayor of the Palace ? 2. What was Pepin's son called? 3. What was Charles Mar- tel's great battle? 4. In what year? 5. With whom did he fight ? 6. Who was the false prophet of the Arabs ? T. What countries had they conquered ? 8. When did he die ? 9. Who was the first of these Mayors to become a king ? 10. In what year ? 11. What was their dynasty called ? 12. Who came to ask Pepin's help? 13. Against whom? 14. What reward did Pope Stephen give Pephi ? 15. What did Pepin give Pope Stephen ? 16, When did Pepin the Short die ? Chapter YII. — 1. When did Carl the Great begin to reign ? 2. Who reigned with him at first ? 3, What were his great conquests ? 4. Who was the Saxon chief ? 5. ^Yliy did Charlemagne fight with the Lombards ? 6. Who was king of the Lombards ? 7. Who held Spain ? 8. What disaster did Carl meet with ? 9. How many sons had Charlemagne ? 10. What were they kings of ? 11. Where did Carl generally live ? 12. What did he do to promote learning ? 13. What hymn did he write ? 14. What dignity was given him ? 15. In what year did his Empire begin ? 16. What was his capital ? 17. What great Bishoprics did he set up ? 18. When did he die ? 484 Questions for Examination, Chaptek YIII. — 1. Of what was the Empiie made up? 2. Who was always head of it ? 3. Who was Emperor after Charlemagne ? 4. Why were there wars in Louis's time ? 5. When did Louis L die ? 6. Which son was Emperor ? 7. Which reigned in France? 8. What province is called after Lothar ? 9. What was the story of John Scot ? 10. What were the troubles of Charles the Bald ? IL Whence did the Northmen come ? 12. When did Charles the Bald die ? 13. Who was Charles the Fat? 14. Who beseiged Paris? 15. When was Charles the Fat deposed? 16. How was the Empire broken up ? Chapter IX. — 1. Who warred for power? 2. Who held with Charles the Simple? 3. Who held with Arnulf? 4. When did Carlings cease to reign in Germany ? 5. Who were the Counts of Paris ? G. Who gained Normandy ? 7. When was Rolf baptized ? 8. What was homage ? 9. What was the story of Rolf's homage? 10. What became of Charles the Simple? 11. When? 12. Who reigned after him? 13. Where Mas his son bred up? 14. Who brought back Louis lY.? 15. Whom did Louis IV. make prisoner? 10. How was Richard saved ? 17. Who took his part ? 18. When did Louis lY. die ? 19. How long did Lothar reign ? 20. Who was the last of the Carlings ? 21. What family reigned next ? 22. When did Hugh Capet begin to reign ? Chapter X, — 1. What power had the King of France ? 2. What were the two languages of North and South called ? 3. What was talked in Brittany? 4. Who were the great nobles in the South ? 5. To whom did Provence belong ? G. What was the feudal system ? 7. How did the barons treat their Questions for Examination, 485 vassals ? 8. How were people knighted ? 9. How were the Popes going on ? 10. Who reformed the papacy ? 11. When did Hugh Capet die ? Chapter XI. — 1. What was expected in the year 1000 ? 2. What was the consequence ? 3. Wliat good came out of this ? 4. What was the Truce of God ? 5. What kind of man was King Kobert ? 6. What were his troubles ? 7. When did Robert die ? 8. Who reformed the elections of the Popes ? 9. Who choose the Pope ? 10. What was a pilgrimage ? 11. When did Henry I. die ? 12. What was a Crusade ? 1.3. Who preached the first Crusade ? 14. Where was it preached ? 15. Who led the Crusaders ? 16. What were the religious orders of knighthood ? 17. When did Philip I. die ? Chapter XII. — 1. How did the cities take care of them- selves ? 2. What were the free cities called ? 3. Whose part did Louis YI. take against Henry I.? 4. What were the battles then fought ? 5. Who was Suger ? 6. Who was Abailard ? 7. Who was St. Bernard ? 8. Of what was he abbot ? 9. What is he called ? 10. Whom did the son of Louis marry ? 11. When did Louis YI. die ? Chapter XIII. — 1. Who preached tha second Crusade ? 2. Where was it preached ? 3 Who went upon it ? 4. What misfortune happened on the way? 5. How did the queen behave ? 6. How was the king separated from her ? 7. Whom did she marry ? 8. What parts of France were in the hands of Henry II. of England ? 9. What was the meeting- place of the kings? 10. Whom did Louis shelter? 11. Why did Becket flee from England ? 12. Whom did Louis help 486 Questions for Examination. against Henry II.? 13. "Who were the troubadours? 14 What is the Salic law ? 15. What son was born to Louis ? 16. What danger did Philip fall into ? 17. How did Louis show his joy ? 18. In wliat year did Louis die ? Chapter XIY.— 1. Why did Philip II. cut down the elm of Gisors? 2. Wliat kind of person was Philip II.? 3. What is he called? 4. Why was the third Crusade begun ? 5. Who went upon it ? 6. What was the end of Henry II ? 7. How did Philip travel to the Holy Land ? 8. What city was taken ? 9. Why did Philip return ? 10. What did he do in Richard's absence ? 11. What kept Richard away so long ? 12. Who reigned after Richard? 13. Whose part did Philip take against John ? 14. How was peace made ? 15. What sin had Philip committed ? 16. How did the Pope punish him ? 17. What is an interdict ? 18. Whom was Philip forced to take back ? 19. How did Philip gain Normandy ? 20. What was John's quarrel with the Pope ? 21. Who was the Pope who laid both France and England under interdicts ? 22. Whom did Innocent III. hivite to conquer England? 23. What Emperor did Philip defeat? 24. At what battle? 25. Why was Louis the Lion invited to England ? 26. What city was put into his hands ? 27. Why did he not stay there .? 28. What was the great success of Philip Augustus ? 29. When did he die? 30. Which English kings were his contempo-. raries .-* Chapter XY.— 1. When did Louis YIII. come to the throne? 2. With whom was his chief war? 3. Where did the Albigenses live? 4. What was their false doctrine? 5. Who were the two men who came to Innocent HI ? 6. What was the work of the Franciscans ? 7. What was the work of Questions for Examination, 487 the Dominicans ? 8. Who supported tlie Albigenses ? 9. Whom did Innocent send against them? 10. Wliat was the great battle with them? 11. Who was killed there? 12. How did tlie Crusaders treat tlieir prisoners ? 13. Where was Simon de Montfort killed ? 14. Wlien did Louis the Lion die? 15. Vflio governed for his son ? 16. How was peace made ? 17. "WHiom did tlie four Provencal ladies marry? 18. What was the Inquisition for ? Chapter XYI. — 1. When Iiad Louis IX. come to the throne? 2. What was his character? 3. "Why would lie not take Guy- enne ? 4. Why would he not give up Normandy? 5. What made him go on a Crusade ? 6. Where did he attack the Mo- hammedans ? 7. What city did he take ? 8. Where was he made prisoners? 9. What caused his disasters? 10. Who were the Memlooks ? 11. How did Louis recover his liberty? 12. Where did he sit to do justice? 13. What county belonged to Louis's brother Charles ? 14. Wliat kingdom did tlie Pope give him? 15. How many Crusades did Louis undertake? 16. Where did he go on the second journey ? 17. What was the cause of his death ? 18. When did he die ? Chapter XTII. — 1. When did Philip HI. begin to reign ? 2. What were the Sicilian Vespers? 3. Who was made King of Sicily? 4. Who was sent to attack him in Aragon? 5. iWhen did Philip HI. die? 6. What sort of person was Philip lY.? 7. What province did he take from Edward I.? 8. How was peace made? 9. With whom was Philip's great quarrel? 10. What caused it? 11. Where was the Pope attacked? 12. What was the end of Boniface YIII.? 13. Wliat promise did the king obtain from Clement Y.? 14. 488 Questions for Exammation, Where did Clement Y. come to live ? 15. What was the harm of the move to Avignon ? 16. What Order was destroyed by Philip lY.? 17. Who was the Grand Master? 18. When did Philip the Fair die ? Chapter XYIII. — 1. How many sons did Philip the Fair leave ? 2. When did Louis X. begin to reign } 3. When did Philip Y. begin to reign ? 4. When did Charles lY. begin to reign ? 5. When did he die > 6. Who reigned after him ? 7. What relation was Philip YI. to him .? 8. Why did none of the daughters reign ? 9. But who laid claim to France ? 10. What was Edward III.'s claim? 11. How was he stirred up? 12. Where did he go first ? 13. Where did he defeat the French ships? 14. Who were fighting for Brittany? 15. Who gained it ? 16. Who were the great Breton knights ? 17. What made the English armies better than the French ? 18. Where did Edward defeat Philip ? 19. What misfortune led to a peace ? 20. Wliat was the king's eldest grandson called? 21. Why was he called Dauphin ? 22. Who left him Yienne ? 23. When' did Philip YI. die ? Chapter XIX. — 1. What had hurt the health of the Dau- phin ? 2. Who was Charles the bad ? 3. How was he of- fended ? 4. Who invaded France ? 5. Where was John made prisoner ? 6. Where did the Black Prince rule ? 7. What ruflBans roamed in France ? 8. What were the troubles in Paris ? 9. What was the rising of the peasants called ? 10. What resolution had the Dauphin taken ? 11. How then did he cause the English to retreat ? 12. What were the condi- tions of peace ? 13. How did John fulfil them ? 14. When did John die ? 15. Who were his sons ? Questions for Examination, 489 Chapter XX. — 1. How did Charles Y. manage his war ? 2. Who was liis Constable ? 3. What was the office of the Con- stable of France ? 4. When was Charles the Bad defeated ? 5. What question was settled at the battle of Auray ? 6. Who were the Free Companions ? 7. How did the king try to get rid of them ? 8. Who took up the cause of Peter the Cruel ? 9. Where did the Black Prince defeat Du Gaesclin ? 10. Where was Peter the Cruel killed? 11. Why did the Gascons appeal to Charles ? 12. How did lie carry on the war ? 13. What town was sacked by the Black Prince ? 14. What was left to England in France ? 15. Where did Du Guesclin die? 16. Who was the next Constable ? 17. When did Charles Y. die ? Chapter XXI. — 1. How old was Charles YI. when he came to the throne ? 2. Who quarrelled about him ? 3. What great quarrel was there in the Church ? 4. Where did these two Popes live ? 5. Where did the King of France hold by ? 6. How did the Count of Flanders get into trouble ? 7. What were the cities of Flanders famous for? 8. How was the Count hidden ? 9. Where were the Flemings defeated ? 10. Who tried to murder Clisson ? 11. What befel the king on his way ? 12. What brought on a second attack of his in- sanity ? 13. What Crusade was undertaken by the French ? Chapter XXII. — 1. What was the state of Charles YI. ? 2. What was the state of France ? 3. Who were the chief princes ? 4. With which did Paris take part ? 5. What crime was committed ? G. What were the partizans of Orleans called? 7. How were the Armagnacs and Burgundians distinguished ? 8. How many princes were Dauphins in turn ? 9. What battle was lost by Dauphin Louis ? 10. Who had the chief power in 4i'0 Questions for Examination* tiie French councils '? 11. What agreement was made with Henry Y.? 12. What murder was conim.itted in the name of Dauphin Charles ? 13. Wha.t was the effect of the murder of Jouu the Fearless ? 14. How much of France was held hy Henr/ Y.? 15. Who came to help the Dauphin? IG. What battle was won by the Scots allies ? 17. What sieges were uude) taken by Henry Y.? 18. When did Charles YI. die? "Uh^aPTer XXIII.— 1. Who was crowned King of France on iJhar] fs YI/s death ? 2. What , was Charles YII. called at (j.fst •-* -Se Who stirred up France to his aid ? 4. What was tii.e S rst exploit of Joan of Arc ? 5. What was her great ooject ? 6. How was she misused ? 7. Where was she put to Cieath ? 8. Who was the great Constable of France ? 9. What \i the Great Schism ? 11. How had the hundred years' \var uegun ? 12. How had the Great Schism begun ? 13. Y,'hcy was the mightiest prince in France ? 14. What was the ena it Charles YII.? J 5. When did he die ? 1.IAPTEB XXIY.— 1. What were the faults of Louis XT,? 2. ^^ bat was his religion ? 3. Who were his favorites ? 4. What became of his brother ? 5. Who was his great enemy ? D. TVhen did Louis fail into his own trap ? 7. How did he get ".mt of it ? 8. Who invaded France ? 9. Where had Louis and Ed3 5^