d
other festivities, to which she had been accustomed in the gay capital
of France. Her domestic establishment was on a scale of magnificence
suited to her station; and the old courtier, Brantome, dwells with
delight on the splendid profusion of her wardrobe, and the costly jewels
with which it was adorned. When she went abroad, she dispensed with her
veil, after the fashion of her own country, though so much at variance
with the habits of the Spanish ladies. Yet it made her a greater
favorite with the people, who crowded around her wherever she appeared,
eager to catch a glimpse of her beautiful features. She brought into the
country a troop of French ladies and waiting-women, some of whom
remained, and married in Castile. Such as returned home, she provided
with liberal dowries. To persons of her own nation she was ever
accessible,--receiving the humblest as well as the highest, says her
biographer, with her wonted benignity. With them she conversed in her
native tongue. But, in the course of three months, her ready wit had so
far mastered the Castilian, that she could make herself understood in
that language, and in a short time spoke it with elegance, though with a
slight foreign accent, not unpleasing. Born and bred among a people so
different from that with whom her lot was now cast, Isabella seemed to
unite in her own person the good qualities of each. The easy vivacity of
the French character was so happily tempered by the gravity of the
Spanish, as to give an inexpressible charm to her manners.[1552] Thus
richly endowed with the best gifts of nature and of fortune, it is no
wonder that Elizabeth of France should have been the delight of the
courtly circle over which she presided, and of which she was the
greatest ornament.

Her gentle nature must have been much disturbed, by witnessing the wild,
capricious temper of Carlos, and the daily increasing estrangement of
his father. Yet she did not despair of reclaiming him. At least, we may
infer so from the eagerness with which she seconded her mother in
pressing the union of her sister, Catherine de Medicis' younger
daughter, with the prince. "My sister is of so excellent a disposition,"
the queen said to Ruy Gomez, "that no princess in Christendom would be
more apt to moderate and accommodate herself to my step-son's humors, or
be better suited to the father, as well as the son, in their relations
with each other."[1553] But although the minister readily adopted t