who insisted that these achievements
inferred rather the successful soldier than the great captain;[405] and
that, whatever merit he could boast in the field, it was no proof of his
capacity for so important a civil station as that of governor of the
Netherlands. Yet it could not be doubted that his nomination would be
most acceptable to the people. This did not recommend him to Philip.

Another candidate was Christine, duchess of Lorraine, the king's cousin.
The large estates of her house lay in the neighborhood of the
Netherlands. She had shown her talent for political affairs by the part
she had taken in effecting the arrangements of Cateau-Cambresis. The
prince of Orange, lately become a widower, was desirous, it was said, of
marrying her daughter. Neither did this prove a recommendation with
Philip, who was by no means anxious to raise the house of Orange higher
in the scale, still less to intrust it with the destinies of the
Netherlands. In a word, the monarch had no mind to confide the regency
of the country to any one of its powerful nobles.[406]

The individual on whom the king at length decided to bestow this mark of
his confidence was his half-sister, Margaret, duchess of Parma. She was
the natural daughter of Charles the Fifth, born about four years before
his marriage with Isabella of Portugal. Margaret's mother, Margaret
Vander Gheenst, belonged to a noble Flemish house. Her parents both died
during her infancy. The little orphan was received into the family of
Count Hoogstraten, who, with his wife, reared her with the same
tenderness as they did their own offspring. At the age of seventeen she
was unfortunate enough to attract the eye of Charles the Fifth, who,
then in his twenty-third year, was captivated by the charms of the
Flemish maiden. Margaret's virtue was not proof against the seductions
of her royal suitor; and the victim of love--or of vanity--became the
mother of a child, who received her own name of Margaret.

[Sidenote: MARGARET OF PARMA REGENT.]

The emperor's aunt, then regent of the Netherlands, took charge of the
infant; and on the death of that princess, she was taken into the family
of the emperor's sister, Mary, queen of Hungary, who succeeded in the
regency. Margaret's birth did not long remain a secret; and she received
an education suited to the high station she was to occupy in life. When
only twelve years of age, the emperor gave her in marriage to Alexander
de'Medici, grand d