f her bigoted brother Philip. Upon reaching Madrid
she developed the spirit which dishonored her, in expressing great joy
that she was once more in a country where no heretic was tolerated. Soon
after she entered a nunnery where she remained seven years until her
death.

It is interesting briefly to trace out the history of the children of
this royal family. It certainly will not tend to make one any more
discontented to move in a humbler sphere. Maximilian left three
daughters and five sons.

Anne, the eldest daughter, was engaged to her cousin, Don Carlos, only
son of her uncle Philip, King of Spain. As he was consequently heir to
the Spanish throne, this was a brilliant match. History thus records the
person and character of Don Carlos. He was sickly and one of his legs
was shorter than the other. His temper was not only violent, but
furious, breaking over all restraints, and the malignant passions were
those alone which governed him. He always slept with two naked swords
under his pillow, two loaded pistols, and several loaded guns, with a
chest of fire-arms at the side of his bed. He formed a conspiracy to
murder his father. He was arrested and imprisoned. Choking with rage, he
called for a fire, and threw himself into the flames, hoping to
suffocate himself. Being rescued, he attempted to starve himself.
Failing in this, he tried to choke himself by swallowing a diamond. He
threw off his clothes, and went naked and barefoot on the stone floor,
hoping to engender some fatal disease. For eleven days he took no food
but ice. At length the wretched man died, and thus Anne lost her lover.
But Philip, the father of Don Carlos, and own uncle of Anne, concluded
to take her for himself. She lived a few years as Queen of Spain, and
died four years after the death of her father, Maximilian.

Elizabeth, the second daughter, was beautiful. At sixteen years of age
she married Charles IX., King of France, who was then twenty years old.
Charles IX. ascended the throne when but ten years of age, under the
regency of his infamous mother, Catherine de Medici, perhaps the most
demoniac female earth has known. Under her tutelage, her boy, equally
impotent in body and in mind, became as pitiable a creature as ever
disgraced a throne. The only energy he ever showed was in shooting the
Protestants from a window of the Louvre in the horrible Massacre of St.
Bartholomew, which he planned at the instigation of his fiend-like
mother. A fe