Page:The Queens of England.djvu/65

ELEANOR OF AQUITAINE. 51 Duchess of Aquitaine. several princes immediatelly sought her alliance. Returning to her native country, her adventures were strange enough for any heroine of romance ; several plans were laid to carry her off, and even in one instance by Geoffrey, the brother of the very man for whose sake she was now free, and to whom she had promised marriage before her divorce was obtained. Six weeks after leaving Paris, Eleanor gave her hand to Henry Plantagenet, Count of Anjou. The nuptials were cele- brated with extraordinary magnificence at Bourdeaux in the year 1152, after which Henry took his bride into Normandy. This marriage greatly annoyed Louis, who even at one time thought of forbidding it, on the plea that the Count of Anjou could not marry without the consent of him, his feudal lord. He, however, in this spirit of animosity, entered into a league with King Stephen, and, in consequence, Henry was obliged not very long after bis marriage, yet, nevertheless, after the birth of their first child, to hasten into England in defense of his inheritance there. Whilst in England, the young Henry, who perhaps was only imitating his wife's example during her first marriage, renewed his acquaintance with, and even, by some, is supposed to have married that fair Rosamond Clifford, whose story, as related by the . old ballad writers, has left the character of Queen Eleanor some shades darker than history, the grave and more accurate sister of poetry, has proved it to be. Henry, it is said, first saw arid fell in love with the fair Rosamond in his early youth, when he was in England, and received knighthood from his uncle, the King of Scotland ; and it is probable that at that time some form of betrothal or marriage took place between them, for it is difficult to conceive how, on the occasion of his second visit to England, his marriage with Eleanor should not be known to Rosamond, if, as some suppose, the marriage took place at this time between himself and her. But that the vir- tuous daughter of the Cliffords believed herself, at this period and even till the queen's discovery of her at Woodstock, to be Henry's lawful wife, there can be no doubt; and Henry him- self appears to have regarded her as such, for many years after- ward, when the dissensions with the princes, his sons, had greatly embittered his life, he is -recorded to have exclaimed to one of the sons of Rosamond, "Thou art my legitimate son, and the rest are bastards." The son to whom were addressed