CHAPTER XVI

GUELDERS

1473

The affairs of the little duchy of Guelders were among the matters urgently demanding the attention of the Duke of Burgundy at the close of his campaign in France. The circumstances of the long-standing quarrel between Duke Arnold and his unscrupulous son Adolf were a scandal throughout Europe. In 1463, a seeming reconciliation of the parties had not only been effected but celebrated in the town of Grave by a pleasant family festival, from whose gaieties the elder duke, fatigued, retired at an early hour. Scarcely was he in bed, when he was aroused rudely, and carried off half clad to a dungeon in the castle of Buren, by the order of his son, who superintended the abduction in person and then became duke regnant. For over six years the old man languished in prison, actually taunted, from time to time, it is said, by Duke Adolf himself.

Indignant remonstrances against this conduct were heard from various quarters, and were all alike unheeded by the young duke until Charles of Burgundy interfered and ordered him to bring his father to his presence, and to submit the dispute to his arbitration. Charles was too near and too powerful a neighbour to be disregarded, and his peremptory invitation was accepted. Pending the decision, the two dukes were forced to be guests in his court, under a strict surveillance which amounted to an arrest.

The first suggestion made by Charles was for a compromise between father and son. "Let Duke Arnold retain the nominal sovereignty in Guelders, actual possession of one town, and a fair income, while to Adolf be ceded the full power of administration." The latter was emphatic in his refusal to consider the proposition. "Rather would I prefer to see my father thrown into a well and to follow him thither than to agree to such terms. He has been sovereign duke for forty-four years; it is my turn now to reign." Arnold thought it would be a simple feat to fight out the dispute. "I saw them both several times in the duke's apartment and in the council chamber when they pleaded, each his own cause. I saw the old man offer a gage of battle to his son."[1] The senior belonged to the disappearing age of chivalry. A trial of arms seemed to him an easy and knightly fashion of ending his differences with his importunate heir.

No settlement was effected before the French expedition, but Charles was not disposed to let the matter slip from his control, and when he proceeded to Amiens, the two dukes, still under restraint, were obliged to follow in his train. At a leisure moment Charles intended to force them to accept his arbitration as final. Before that moment arrived, the more agile of the two plaintiffs, Adolf, succeeded in eluding surveillance and escaping from the camp at Wailly. He made his way successfully to Namur disguised as a Franciscan monk. Then, at the ferry, he gave a florin when a penny would have sufficed. The liberality, inconsistent with his assumed rôle, aroused suspicion and led to the detection of his rank and identity. He was stayed in his flight and imprisoned in the castle of Namur to await a decision on his case by his self-constituted judge. This was not pronounced until the summer of 1473.

By that time, Charles was resolved on another course of action than that of adjusting a family dispute in the capacity of puissant, impartial, and friendly neighbour. Adolf's behaviour towards his father had been extraordinarily brutal and outrageous. Public comment had been excited to a wide degree. It was not an affair to be dealt with lightly by Duke Charles. The young Duchess of Guelders was Catharine of Bourbon, sister to the late Duchess of Burgundy, and Adolf himself was chevalier of the Golden Fleece. In consideration of these links of family and knightly brotherhood, Charles desired that the case should be tried with all formality.

[Illustration: ARNOLD, DUKE OF GUELDERS (FROM THE ENGRAVING BY PINSSIO, AFTER THE DRAWING BY J. ROBERT)]

On May 3, 1473, an assembly of the Order was held at Valenciennes,[2] and the knights were asked to pass upon the conduct of their delinquent fellow, who was permitted to present his own brief through an attorney, but was detained in his own person at Namur. The innocence or guilt of his prisoner was no longer the chief point of interest as far as the Duke of Burgundy was concerned. The latter had made an excellent bargain on his own behalf with the moribund Duke of Guelders, who had signed (December, 1472) a document wherein he sold to Charles all his administrative rights in Guelders and Zutphen for ninety-two thousand florins,[3] in consideration of Arnold's enjoying a life interest in half of the revenue of his ancient duchy. That clause soon lost its significance. The old man's life ceased in March, 1473, and, by virtue of the contract, Charles proposed to enter into full possession of his estates, setting aside not only Adolf, whom he was ready to pronounce an outlawed criminal, quite beyond the pale of society, but that Adolf's innocent eight-year-old heir, Charles, whose hereditary claims had also been ignored by his grandfather.

Before the knights of the Order as a final court, were rehearsed all the circumstances of the old family quarrel and of the late commercial transaction. Their verdict was the one desired by their chief. It was proven to their entire satisfaction that Arnold's sale of the duchy of Guelders and Zutphen was a legitimate proceeding, and that the deed executed by him was a perfect and valid instrument, whereby Charles of Burgundy was duly empowered to enjoy all the revenues of, and to exert authority in, his new duchy at his pleasure. As to Duke Adolf, he was condemned by this tribunal of his peers to life imprisonment as punishment for his unfilial and unjustifiable cruelty towards Arnold, late Duke of Guelders.

Adolf's protests were stifled by his prison bars, but the people of Guelders were by no means disposed to accept unquestioned this deed of transfer, made when the two parties to the conveyance were in very unequal conditions of freedom. In order to convince them of the justice of his pretensions, Charles levied a force almost as efficient as his army of the preceding summer, and fell upon Guelders. A truce, a triple compact with France and England, had recently been renewed, so that for the moment his hands were free from complications, an event commented upon by Sir John Paston, as follows:

"April 16, 1473, CANTERBURY.

"As for tydings ther was a truce taken at Brusslys about the xxvi day off March last, betwyn the Duke of Burgoyn and the Frense Kings inbassators and Master William Atclyff ffor the king heer, whiche is a pese be londe and be water tyll the ffyrst daye off Apryll nowe next comyng betweyn Fraunce and Ingeland, and also the Dukys londes. God holde it ffor ever."

The writer had recently been in Charles's court. Writing from Calais in February, he says:

"As ffor tydyngs heer ther bee but few saff that the Duke of Burgoyen and my Lady hys wyffe fareth well. I was with them on Thorysdaye last past at Gaunt."[4]

The Duke of Burgundy was not the only pretender to the vacated sovereignty of Guelders. The Duke of Juliers was also inclined to urge his cause, were Adolf's family to be set aside. At the sight of Burgundian puissance, however, he was ready to be convinced, and accepted 24,000 florins for his acquiescence in the righteousness of the accession. Several of the cities manifested opposition to Charles, but yielded one after another. In Nimwegen--long hostile to Duke Arnold--there was a determined effort to support little Charles of Guelders who, with his sister, was in that city. The child made a pretty show on his little pony, and there were many declarations of devotion to his cause as he was put forward to excite sympathy. For three weeks, the town held out in his name. The resistance to the Burgundian troops was sturdy. When the gates gave way before their attacks the burghers defended the broken walls. Six hundred English archers were repulsed from an assault with such sudden energy that they left their banners sticking in the very breaches they thought they had won, fine prizes for the triumphant citizens. But the game was unequal, and the combatants, convinced that discretion was the better part of valour, at last accepted the Duke of Cleves as a mediator with their would-be sovereign.

On July 19th, a long civic procession headed by the burgomasters, wearing neither hats nor shoes, marched to the Duke of Burgundy with a prayer for pardon on their lips. The leaders of the opposition to his accession were delivered over to the mercy of the victor. The garrison were accorded their lives and a tax was imposed on the city to indemnify the duke for his needless trouble, and Guelders was added _de facto_ to the list of Burgundian ducal titles. In the various state papers presently issued by the new ruler, the mention of the circumstance of his accession to the sovereignty was simple and straightforward, as in a certain document appointing Olivier de la Marche to be treasurer. The patent bears the date of August 18th and was one of the earliest issued by Charles in this new capacity.

"As by the death of the late Messire Arnold, in his life Duke of Guelderland, these counties and duchy have lapsed to me, and by the same token the offices of the land have escheated to our disposition, and among others the office of master of the moneys of those countships ... using the rights, etc., escheated to me, and in consideration of the good and agreeable services already rendered and continually rendered by our knight, etc., Olivier de la Marche, having full confidence in his sense, loyalty, probity, and good diligence--for these causes and others we entrust the office of master and overseer of moneys of the land of Guelders to him, with all the rights, duties, and privileges thereto pertaining. In testimony of this we have set our seal to these papers. Done in our city of Nimwegen, August 18, 1473. Thus signed by M. le duc."

On the back of this document was written:

"To-day, November 3, 1473, Messire Olivier de la Marche ... took the oath of office of master and overseer of the land and duchy of Guelders."[5]

The charge of the ducal children, Charles and Philippa, was entrusted to the duke who, in his turn, deputed Margaret of York to supervise their education. In a comparatively brief time agitation in behalf of the disinherited heir ceased, and imperial ratification alone was required to stamp the territory as a legal fraction of the Burgundian domains. Under the circumstances the minor heirs were the emperor's wards, and it was his express duty to look to their interests, but Frederic III. showed no disposition to assert himself as their champion. On the contrary, the embassy that arrived from his court on August 14th was charged with felicitations to his dear friend, Charles of Burgundy, for his acquisition, and with assurances that the requisite investiture into his dignities should be given by his imperial hand at the duke's pleasure.[6]

Communication between Frederic and Charles had been intermittently frequent during the past three years, and one subject of their letters was probably a reason why Charles had been willing to abandon a losing game in France to give another bias to his thoughts. He was lured on by the bait of certain prospects, varying in their definite form indeed, but full of promise that he might be enabled, eventually, to confer with Louis XI. from a better vantage ground than his position as first peer of France. The story of these hopes now becomes the story of Charles of Burgundy.

When Sigismund of Austria completed his mortgage, in 1469, at St. Omer, and returned home, as already stated, he was fired with zeal to divert some of the dazzling Burgundian wealth into the empty imperial coffers. An alliance between Mary of Burgundy and the young Archduke Maximilian seemed to him the most advantageous matrimonial bargain possible for the emperor's heir. He urged it upon his cousin with all the eloquence he possessed, and was lavish in his offers to be mediator between him and his new friend Charles.

Frederic was impressed by Sigismund's enthusiastic exposition of the advantages of the match, and little time elapsed before his ambassador brought formal proposals to Charles for the alliance. The duke received the advances complacently and returned propositions significant of his personal ambitions. As early as May, 1470, his instructions to certain envoys sent to the intermediary, Sigismund, are plain. In unequivocal terms, his daughter's hand is made contingent on his own election as King of the Romans, that shadowy royalty which veiled the approach to the imperial throne.

"_Item_--And in regard to the said marriage, the ambassadors shall inform Monseigneur of Austria that, since his departure from Hesdin, certain people have talked to Monseigneur about this marriage and mentioned that, in return, the emperor would be willing to grant to Monseigneur the crown and the government of the Kingdom of the Romans, with the stipulation that Monseigneur, _arrived at the empire by the good pleasure