rs to reproduce the charms of the
respective candidates for the hand of the king, and from the portraits
selected Isabeau de Baviere, daughter of Etienne II. and a princess of
the great Italian family of Visconti.

The young Isabeau, whose portrait showed her to be the most beautiful of
the princesses to be chosen from, was brought into Brabant by her uncle,
under pretext of a pilgrimage to the shrine of Saint John of Amiens,
while the Duke of Burgundy at the same time found an excuse for
conducting Charles to Amiens, without giving him the slightest hint of
the purpose of the journey. Isabeau was presented to the king by the
Duchesses of Brabant and Bourgogne, and kneeled low before him, lifting
up her sweet girlish face to him in lieu of speaking in a tongue as yet
unknown to her. Then Charles took her by the hand, raised her and looked
at her pensively; "and in this look the sweet thought of love did enter
into his heart." After the ladies had withdrawn from the royal presence,
the Sire de la Riviere, an old minister of Charles V., asked the king:
"Sire, what think you of this young lady? shall she remain with us?" "By
my faith, yes," replied Charles, "we wish no other, for she pleases us."
There was no tarrying for elaborate ceremonies, fond as the king was of
them; Charles insisted on an immediate wedding. He and the young German
princess were married on July 17, 1385, four days after this first
interview. The bride was but fourteen, and the groom not quite
seventeen; it was one of those infamous child marriages of which the
history of Europe is too full.

Isabeau de Baviere was already of a slothful habit, to be roused only by
her love of amusement, to purchase which neither she nor her young
husband would spare anything. Luxury and wild extravagance in dress, in
entertainments, even in funerals, was characteristic of the age; the
whole kingdom gave itself up to extravagance and debauchery; existence
was one mad revel, with no thought of who should pay the piper; all must
dance and caper as if bitten by the tarantula. The very costumes are
wild: "Here (we see) men-women comically tricked out, and effeminately
trailing on the ground robes twelve ells long; there, others, whose
figures are distinctly defined by their short Bohemian jackets and tight
pantaloons, though with sleeves floating down to the ground; here,
men-beasts, embroidered all over with animals of every kind; there,
men-music, pricked all over with