Page:The Queens of England.djvu/178

ISABELLA OF VALOIS, SFCOND WIFE OF RICHARD THE SECOND. Isabella of Valois, second wife of Richard the Second, was born at Paris in 1387, and was the eldest daughter of Charles the Sixth of France, and of Isabeau de Baviere, a woman as celebrated for her vices and extravagances as she was for her extraordinary beauty. This match excited the utmost astonishment in England, and no little displeasure ; astonishment, on account of the age of the bride, who, as some historians state, was, at the time of her betrothal, but nine years old, while others declare her to- have been only seven ; and displeasure, on account of the violent animosity the English had long entertained against the French, an animosity the indulgence of which had brought nothing but the most disastrous consequences during the last fifteen years of Edward the Third's reign, as well as during the earlier part of Richard's. They desired, also, that as the king's first wife, Anne of Bohemia — "good Queen Anne," as she is emphatically called — had brought him no offspring, he should marry a woman capable of giving an heir to the throne, instead of a child who could not be expected to do so for many years. Before determining on this marriage, Richard had, it appears, oc- cupied himself a good deal about the selection of a wife : "He would willingly have allied himself to the Duke of Bourgogne, or the Count of Hainault, but they had no daughters married or unaffianced. The Duke of Gloucester had one of a proper age, and would fain have had his nephew marry her; but Richard would not hear of it, pretending she was too near in blood, being his cousin-german ; though perhaps the true reason was, that the relation of father to the queen being added to that of uncle to the king, the duke's arrogance would have been swelled to an insupportable degree, and his power raised to an irresistible height, which was already but too formidable." None of these alliances succeeding, therefore, a triple motive 150