Isabella of France

“ Innocents Day, 138, 139 Isabella of Bavaria, Queen of France, 51, 97, 145, 214, 225, 236 Isabella of Bourbon, Countess of Charolais, Consort of Charles the Bold, 41, 43 Isabella of Castile, queen of Spain, 35 Isabella of France, queen of England, 225 Isabella of Portugal, Duchess of Burgundy, 264 James, William—, 66, 167, 176 James I, King of England, 44 Jannequin, 247 Jason, 76, 236 Jean sans Peur, duke of Burgundy, 4, 9, 12, 18, 34, 40, 41, 76, 83, 103, 104, 122, 142, 208, 209, 211, 214, 233 Jerusalem, 83, 84 ”

“ The Spanish sovereigns were convinced that they must look to their artillery as the only effectual means for the reduction of these strong- holds. In this, they as well as the Moors were extremely deficient, although Spain appears to have furnished earlier examples of its use than any other country in Europe. Isabella, who seems to have had the particular control of this department, caused the most skilful engineers and artisans to be invited into the kingdom from France, Germany, and Italy. ”

“ Among the subjects discussed during the visit was the question of "the Spanish marriages."
The unfortunate Queen of Spain, Isabella II., was just sixteen years old; her sister, the Infanta Luisa, was a year younger. Isabella was the daughter of a vicious race, and with such a mother as she had in Queen Christina, she had grown up to early womanhood utterly ignorant and untrained. One of her ministers said of her that "no one could be astonished that she had vices, but the wonder was that she had by nature so many good qualities." ”

“ The first impediment which they were called upon to surmount was their total inability to defray the expenses of a powerful army, and to secure the necessary funds for maintaining a secret correspondence with their French adherents. The munificence of Isabella supplied all their personal wants, but even her truly regal profusion could not be expected to extend beyond this point; and it was ultimately agreed that both parties should forward at all risks their jewels by a trusty messenger to Amsterdam for sale. ”

“ The wasted fuel that escapes as smoke would cook not one but many dinners.
It is a truism to say that France, pressed by circumstances, has accomplished much in the realm of cookery. France has achieved the highest results in luxurious cookery; and to the thrift of her peasantry we must look for the beginnings of the French economy in cookery that has become almost proverbial. Luxury with economy is the highest praise in cookery. ”

“ In consequence of the defeat and disgrace of Monmouth, the hunt, for a time, sank into oblivion, only, however, to rise again in fresh glory when King William brought peace to the troubled land; and Roper, who had found a temporary refuge in France, was unanimously recalled, and given back his old command. William, who spared no pains to suit his humour to that of every man, finding it politic to become a fox-hunter, honoured Charlton by his presence, bringing with him his guest the Grand Duke of Tuscany ”

“ At any rate, London has a much larger supply of animal food in the shape of fish.
Fish in England and France.—Here, again, art is the handmaiden of nature. The sea supplies us so plentifully that we neglect or disdain fresh-water fish, upon which our neighbours expend much skill and pains in cookery. Very few English people have eaten a carp, though our lakes and ponds contain many; yet in every French cookery-book are to be found recipes showing that carp is intended to be served at dinners of some pretension. ”

“ The nobility and chivalry of the land all thronged there to gather renown. Queen Isabel, who attended with her whole court, breathed courage into every heart. There was scarce a cavalier, who was not enamoured of some one or other of her ladies, the witness of his achievements, and who, as she presented him his weapons, or some token of her favor, admonished him to bear himself like a true knight, and show the strength of his passion by his valiant deeds. ”

“ Isabella revolutionised the institutions of her country, religious, political, military, financial; she consolidated her dominions, humiliated her nobles, cajoled her commons, defied the pope, reformed the clergy; she burned some ten thousand of her subjects, she deported a million more, and of the remnant she made a great nation; she brooked no man’s opposition, in a reign of thirty years, and she died in the arms of the king, her husband! It is open to any man to call her a saint and a heroine. It is open to any man to call her a bigot and a tyrant. ”

“ Elisabeth of Hainault, on her marriage with Philippe Auguste, seems to have been the first to suffer the transmutation into Isabelle, the French being the nation of all others who delighted to bring everything into conformity with their own pronunciation. The royal name thus introduced became popular among the crown vassals, 34and Isabelle of Angoulême, betrothed to Hugues de Lusignan, but married to King John, brought Isabel to England, whence her daughter, the wife of Friedrich II., conveyed Isabella to Germany and Sicily. ”

“ This feature of bigotry, which has thrown a shade over Isabella's otherwise beautiful character, might lead to a disparagement of her intellectual power compared with that of the English queen. To estimate this aright, we must contemplate the results of their respective reigns. Elizabeth found all the materials of prosperity at hand, and availed herself of them most ably to build up a solid fabric of national grandeur. Isabella created these materials. ”

“ Yet sweeter were the tender notes of Isabella's song!
So soft into the ear they steal, so soft into the soul,
The deep'ning pain of love they soothe, and sorrow's pang control.
I look'd upon the pure brook that murmur'd through the glade,
And mingled in the melody that Isabella made;
Yet purer was the residence of Isabella's heart!
Above the reach of pride and guile, above the reach of art. ”

“ Clouds and darkness have, indeed, settled thick around the throne of the youthful Isabella; but not a deeper darkness than that which covered the land in the first years of her illustrious namesake; and we may humbly trust, that the same Providence, which guided her reign to so prosperous a termination, may carry the nation safe through its present perils, and secure to it the greatest of earthly blessings, civil and religious liberty. ”

“ It was Isabella, the Queen of the Red Chessmen, who had been obliged to yield. She was young and proud, and it was she, indeed, who held the rule; for her father, the old Red King, had grown too imbecile to direct affairs; he merely bore the name of sovereignty. And Isabella was loved by knights, pawns, and all; the bishops were willing to die in her cause, the castles would have crumbled to earth for her. Opposed to her, stood the detested White Queen. All the Whites, of course, were despised by her; but the haughty, self-sufficient queen angered her most. ”

“ Isabella created these materials. She saw the faculties of her people locked up in a death-like lethargy, and she breathed into them the breath of life for those great and heroic enterprises which terminated in such glorious consequences to the monarchy. It is when viewed from the depressed position of her early days that the achievements of her reign seem scarcely less than miraculous. The masculine genius of the English queen stands out relieved beyond its natural dimensions by its separation from the softer qualities of her sex ”

“ In the course of his many adventures we come across Queen Isabella herself, the woman to whom every man was loyal save her own husband; and countless Spanish worthies, seamen, soldiers, governors and priests, all real men, the makers of Empire four hundred years ago. The book abounds in quaint sayings both of Spaniard and native, while the love-making of the simple young hero and his child-wife weaves a pretty thread of romance through the stirring tale of adventure. ”

“ The discovery of a world was estimated, like that of a rich mine, by the value of its returns in gold and silver. Much of Isabella's legislation, it is true, is of that comprehensive character, which shows that she looked to higher and far nobler objects. But with much that is good, there was mingled, as in most of her institutions, one germ of evil, of little moment at the time, indeed, but which, under the vicious culture of her successors, shot up to a height that overshadowed and blighted all the rest. ”

“ Isabella had, in this instance, departed from a law she had laid down for her own government, under the influence of her womanly feelings, which often caused her to forget that she was a queen, when no very grave duties existed to keep alive the recollection; for it would have been difficult to decide in which light this pure-minded and excellent female most merited the esteem of mankind—in her high character as a just and conscientious sovereign, or when she acted more directly under the gentler impulses of her sex. ”

“ Charming, charming Isabella—how ravishing, how enchanting wast thou at that moment when thou didst offer sweet consolation to thy father! The roses dyed thy cheeks beneath the delicate tinge of transparent bistre which proclaimed thee a daughter of the sunny south;—thy moist red lips apart, disclosed thy teeth white as the orient pearl;—thy young bosom heaved beneath the gauze which veiled it;—purity sat upon thy lofty brow, like a diadem which innocence confers upon its elect! Very beautiful wast thou, Isabella—charming exotic flower from the sweet Italian clime! ”

“ A princess who could deliberately repudiate the obligations of national honor can scarcely be regarded in the light of a public benefactor. The patroness of the Inquisition has but a slender claim to the admiration of posterity. The popularity of Isabella is based upon the fact that she was the representative of contemporaneous popular sentiment. In the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries no proceeding was so meritorious as the torture of heretics. ”

“ With regard to Isabella, moreover, it must be borne constantly in mind, as has been repeatedly remarked in the course of this History, that she had been used to surrender her own judgment, in matters of conscience, to those spiritual guardians, who were supposed in that age to be its rightful depositaries, and the only casuists who could safely determine the doubtful line of duty. Isabella's pious disposition, and her trembling solicitude to discharge her duty, at whatever cost of personal inclination, greatly enforced the precepts of education. ”

“ But Isabella, the ambitious young mother, who had married the decrepit monarch that she might enjoy wealth and station, had no intention that her babe should be less of a king than his father was. She was the daughter of Sigismond, King of Poland, and relying upon the support of her regal father she claimed the crown of Hungary for her boy, in defiance of the solemn compact. In that age of chivalry a young and beautiful woman could easily find defenders whatever might be her claims. ”

“ Quarrels and reconciliations among the princes, feasts and festivals among the peerage, and the most relentless treatment of the citizens, were the distinguishing marks of the opening of this century. Isabella of Bavaria, the shameless wife of the hapless Charles, added a great feature of infamy to the state of manners at the time, by the openness of her profligacy, and her neglect of all the duties of wife and queen. ”

“ Then gushed in clamorous torrents the bitter waters of envy, hatred, and detraction; but Isabella heeded not their clamors, but awaited with hope and exultation the arrival of her protégé.
At length a triumphant train approached the city. Loud shouts swelled up to heaven from the excited multitudes; the city poured out her torrents of living creatures to meet the mighty man who had wrested a world from the untraversed ocean floods.
The monarchs, in their most glorious apparel, sat upon their throne in the magnificently furnished reception hall of their palace home. ”

“ To be just, if Isabella is accredited with her virtues, she must be charged with her crimes. And if the queen may throw from her shoulders upon those of her advisers the responsibility of iniquity permitted under her rule, why not King Ferdinand, who likewise had men about him urging him to this policy and to that? True, we excuse much in woman as the weaker, and very justly so, which we condemn in the man of powerful cunning. But Isabella was not exactly clay in the hands of those about her ”

“ Isabella, instead of being the daughter of an obscure count, was the only child of one who, if he were not to become himself the sovereign of the most powerful petty state in Europe, would at all events occupy a station next only to the sovereign whenever circumstances should allow him to return to his native land. ”

“ The queen was more than a match for all who opposed her, court intrigues, instigated by Luna, were to no avail, and in the end he had to give up, beaten by a woman, and one whom he had hoped to make his agent, or ally, in the further subjection of the king. A year after the marriage of John and Isabella, the Princess Isabella was born, and with her advent there came new hope for Spain. ”

“ The most beautiful embellishment of the composition is the character of Isabella, who, on the point of taking the veil, is yet prevailed upon by sisterly affection to tread again the perplexing ways of the world, while, amid the general corruption, the heavenly purity of her mind is not even stained with one unholy thought: in the humble robes of the novice she is a very angel of light. ”

“ To Isabella, a beautiful girl of sixteen, the fallen crown was offered and urged; but in spite of the fact that the old standard had already been unfurled in her honor, and unmoved by the eloquence of the primate and the arguments of the first nobles of the land, Isabella, with a wisdom beyond her years, resolutely refused to take the throne. Her reasons baffled her advisers: "So long as King Henry lives none other has the right to wear the crown." ”