bring him to trial for it.

[Sidenote: Various difficulties and objections.]

In negotiating the peace, and in arranging the terms and conditions
of the marriage, a great many difficulties were found to be in the
way, but they were all at last overcome. One of these difficulties was
made by King Rene, the father of Margaret. He declared that he could
not consent to give his daughter in marriage to the King of England
unless the king would first restore to him and to his family the
province of Anjou, which had been the possession of his ancestors, but
which King Henry's armies had overrun and conquered. The Earl of
Suffolk was very unwilling to cede back this territory, for he knew
very well that nothing would be so unpopular in England, or so likely
to increase the hostility of the English people to the proposed
marriage, and consequently to give new life and vigor to the
Gloucester party in their opposition to it, as the giving up again of
territory which the English troops had won by so many hard-fought
battles and the sacrifice of so many lives. But Rene was inflexible,
and Suffolk finally yielded, and so Anjou was restored to its former
possessors.

[Sidenote: The king asks no dowry.]

Another objection which Rene made was that his fortune was not
sufficient to enable him to endow his daughter properly for so
splendid a marriage; not having the means, he said, of sending her in
a suitable manner into England.

But this the King of England said should make no difference. All that
he asked was the hand of the princess without any dowry. Her personal
charms and mental endowments were sufficient to outweigh all the
riches in the world; and if her royal father and mother would grant
her to King Henry as his bride, he would not ask to receive with her
"either penny or farthing."

[Sidenote: The king has a rival.]

[Sidenote: Margaret's wishes.]

King Henry was made all the more eager to close the negotiations for
the marriage as soon as possible, and to consent to almost any terms
which the King of France and Rene might exact, from the fact that
there was a young prince of the house of Burgundy--a very brave,
handsome, and accomplished man--who was also a suitor for Margaret's
hand, and was very devotedly attached to her. This young prince was in
France at this time, and ready, at any moment, to take advantage of
any difficulty which might arise in the negotiations with Henry to
press his claims, and, perhaps,