Page:ThePrincessofCleves.djvu/17

Part I. she yet reigned so absolutely in his heart, that his person and state seemed entirely at her disposal.

The king had such an affection for the constable, that he was no sooner possessed of the government, but he recalled him from the banishment he had been sent into by Francis the First: thus was the court divided between messieurs de Guise, and the constable, who was supported by the princes of the blood, and both parties made it their care to gain the duchess of Valentinois. The duke d'Aumale, the duke of Guise's brother, had married one of her daughters, and the constable aspired to the fame alliance; he was not contented with having married his eldest son with madam Diana, the king's daughter by a Piemontese lady, who turned nun as soon as she was brought to bed. This marriage had met with a great many obstacles from the promises which monsieur Montmorency had made to madam de Piennes, one of the maids of honour to the queen; and though the king had surmounted them with extreme patience and goodness, the constable did not think himself sufficiently established, unless he secured madam de Valentinois in his interest, and separated her from messieurs de Guise, whose greatness began to give her uneasiness. The duchess had obstructed as much as she could the marriage of the dauphin with the queen of Scotland; the beauty and forward wit of that young queen, and the credit which her marriage gave to messieurs de Guise, were insupportable to her; she in particular hated the cardinal of Loraine, who had spoken to her with severity, and even with contempt; she was sensible he took the party of the queen, so that the constable found her very well disposed to unite her interests with his and to enter into alliance with him, by marrying her granddaughter madam de la Marke with monsieur d'Anville, his second son, who succeeded him in his employment under the reign of Charles the Ninth. the constable did not expect to find the same disinclination to marriage in his second son which he had found in his eldest, but he