he later
Renaissance. The famous artist Da Vinci died at his court, in his arms,
legend says. Artists, literary men, flocked to his service. Paris became
the intellectual centre of Europe. France snatched from Italy the
supremacy of thought, of genius.

Alas for the fickleness of untried youth! Henry seemed to promise his
country freedom and he gave it tyranny. Francis promised his people
glory--that is, honor and splendor. In the end he brought them shame and
suffering. Charles V of Germany, youngest of this mighty trio, seemed by
his wisdom to promise his subjects at least protection; and his reign
produced anarchy.

Charles, unlike his rivals, was almost born into power. His father died
in the lad's babyhood; his mother went insane. His two grandfathers were
the two mightiest potentates of Europe, Ferdinand the Wise of Spain, and
Maximilian, head of the great Hapsburg house and Emperor of Germany.
Neither had any nearer heir than little Charles. His father's position
as ruler of the Netherlands was given him as a child, so that he was
really a Fleming by education, a silent, thoughtful, secretive youth,
far different from the jovial Henry or the brilliant Francis, but
ambitious as either and more conscientious perhaps, a dangerous rival in
the race for fame.

Ferdinand died in 1515, and Charles became King of Spain, with all that
the title included of power over the Mediterranean and Southern Italy,
and all the vast new world of America. Charles was then fifteen, just
the age of the century, nine years younger than Henry, five years
younger than Francis. Amid the tumult of the opening Reformation in
1519, the aged Maximilian also died, departed not unwillingly, one
fancies, from an age whose intricacies had grown too many for his simple
soul. The young King of Spain thus became lord of all the vast Hapsburg
possessions of Austria, Bohemia, the Netherlands and so on.

He sought to be elected Emperor of Germany also, but here the matter was
less easy. Already his rule extended over more of Europe than any
sovereign had held since Charlemagne, and Europe took alarm. Henry and
Francis both thrust in, each of them suggesting to the German electorial
princes that he had claims of his own, and would make an emperor far
more suitable than Charles. Henry polished up his German ancestry;
Francis recalled that Germans and Frenchmen were both Franks, had been
one mighty race under Charlemagne, and surely might become so once