Marche,
of Beaujolais, and a large number of domains and castles in different
parts of France. Throughout all these possessions he levied taxes and
troops, convoked the local estates, appointed the officers of justice,
and regulated almost the whole social organism. He was born on the 10th
of February, 1490, four years before Francis I.; he was the head of the
younger branch of the Bourbons-Montpensier; and he had married, in 1515,
his cousin, Suzanne of Bourbon, only daughter of Peter II., head of the
elder branch, and Anne of France, the able and for a long while puissant
daughter of Louis XI. Louis XII. had taken great interest in this
marriage, and it had been stipulated in the contract "that the pair
should make a mutual and general settlement of all their possessions in
favor of the survivor." Thus the young duke, Charles, had united all the
possessions of the house of Bourbon; and he held at Moulins a brilliant
princely court, of which he was himself the most brilliant ornament.
Having been trained from his boyhood in all chivalrous qualities, he was
an accomplished knight before becoming a tried warrior; and he no sooner
appeared upon the field of battle than he won renown not only as a
valiant prince, but as an eminent soldier. In 1509, at the battle of
Agnadello, under the eye of Louis XII. himself, he showed that he was a
worthy pupil of La Tremoille, of La Palice, and of Bayard; and in 1512,
at that of Ravenna, his reputation was already so well established in the
army that, when Gaston de Foix was killed, they clamored for Duke Charles
of Bourbon, then twenty-two years old, as his successor. Louis XII.
gave him full credit for his bravery and his warlike abilities; but the
young prince's unexpansive character, haughty independence, and momentary
flashes of audacity, caused the veteran king some disquietude. "I wish,"
said he, "he had a more open, more gay, less taciturn spirit; stagnant
water affrights me." In 1516, the year after Louis XII.'s death, Andrew
Trevisani, Venetian ambassador at Milan, wrote to the Venetian council,
"This Duke of Bourbon handles a sword most gallantly and successfully; he
fears God, he is devout, humane, and very generous; he has a revenue of
one hundred and twenty thousand crowns, twenty thousand from his
mother-in-law, Anne of France, and two thousand a month as constable of
France; and, according to what is said by M. de Longueville, governor of
Paris, he might dispose