Page:The Queens of England.djvu/101

ELEANOR OF PROVENCE. 83 so well aware of the instability of his good-will, that they sought to take the utmost advantage of it, careless how much injury they entailed on this weak and vacillating monarch by their covetous exactions. With such a husband, Eleanor must have been indeed a woman of more than ordinary good sense and high principle to have escaped being involved in his unpopularity, and, unfortunately, we have no evidence to prove that she possessed these qualities. Under the influence of her Uncle, Peter of Savoy, she aided him to attain a power over Henry never exercised but for his own selfish ends, and which defeated the efforts made by Prince Richard, the king's brother, to enlighten him on the danger he was incurring by lavishing the subsidies, raised with much difficulty from his subjects, on foreigners whom they detested. It was not until 1239 that Queen Eleanor gave Henry an heir to the English crown, who was named Edward, a name rendered popular in England from that being borne by Edward the Confessor. The birth of Edward cemented the affection of Henry for his queen, and increased her influence over him. He commanded the apartments she occupied to be adorned in a style of luxurious elegance hitherto unknown in England, and remarkable for good taste in a period when it was so little understood. Eleanor's passion for jewels was encouraged rather than checked by her husband. She wore these costly ornaments on her head, neck, waist, and robes ; and the money expended on them is said to have amounted to no less a sum than thirty thousand pounds, an expenditure which the country could ill afford at that period, and which added to the dissatis- faction of Henry's subjects, so often and heavily taxed to supply his wants. He had created Peter of Savoy, Earl of Richmond, which furnished another cause of discontent in England, still more enhanced when the influence exercised over the weak monarch by that noble became known. The near connection between the kings of France and Eng- land, they having married sisters, did not strengthen the good understanding which such a relationship is supposed to estab- lish. Louis, heir presumptive to the throne, having, when peace was accorded to him during the minority of Henry the Third, consented to the conditions required, namely, that he should, when he succeeded his father as King of France, yield up the provinces seized by Philip from King John, failed in the per-