Page:English Historical Review Volume 37.djvu/591

 1922 REVIEWS OF BOOKS 583 their own divisions and from the lack of popular support which the people were too indifferent to give. The succeeding chapters deal in considerable detail with the Breton question, and not only does the author lead his reader ably through the tangles of intrigue and diplomacy which ended in the marriage of the Duchess Anne with the young king, but he also contrives to make the actors in the drama very real persons. This is especially the case with the young duchess herself, whose Breton patriotism and determined character played no small part in the history of her time and lend addi- tional interest to the story of the struggle for her hand. The young duke of Orleans is also well portrayed, and there is no dull page in the history of this complicated period, which might so easily have been over- weighted by detail. The central feature of the book, however, the point round which all else revolves, is Anne of Beaujeu herself. Mr. Bridge has taken Anne for his heroine ; and the main object of his work is to throw all possible light on her character and her rule. Three views may be taken of the Regent Anne. Was she, as M. Petit-du-Taillis suggests, a fairly unimportant personage, taking credit for what her husband really achieved ? Was she, as we gather from the pages of M. Pelicier, a second Louis XI, ab- solutely unscrupulous ; working for the unity of France whilst in power, and for her own selfish interests later as duchess of Bourbon ? Or was she a woman of consummate skill, crafty perhaps but never treacherous, devoted to the interests of her country to the last, and only endangering the complete authority of the Crown by her claims for Bourbon indepen- dence, because she felt that autocracy had gone too far. This last view is the one Mr. Bridge reaches from his close study of her actions throughout the period. Has he proved his point ? The view that Pierre de Beaujeu was the inspirer of the policy of the regency is, I think, amply disproved. M. Pelicier and Mr. Bridge agree in discarding such a theory. Anne had authority over the young king with no council of regency, and the council in which her husband sat was an uninfluential body and gave little trouble. Her authority over her young brother is well attested ; he trembled and lost his appetite at her approach. Letters to her and negotiations with her show that con- temporaries had no doubt as to who was the power under the throne. It was Anne who manipulated the states-general and advised Charles whom he should summon; it was Anne who secured the defeat and imprisonment of the troublesome Orleans ; it was Anne who steered the French state through a period when one false move might have ended in destruction to any vessel less skilfully managed ; it was Anne who effected the union of Brittany and the great centralization of power in the hands of the Crown through the crushing out of provincial feudalism. So far Mr. Bridge and M. Pelicier agree, and it is hard to differ from them. To clear Anne, however, from the charge of perfidy and the reception of bribes and from the charge of having finally abandoned the main object of her life in the interests of her family is a less easy task. I doubt if even Mr. Bridge's able defence can be considered wholly successful. Her complete loss of power, also, after Charles's marriage, when she failed to