the treaty of Troyes had come to naught, her death occurring on
September 24, 1435. She died with outward show of piety, and was buried
as meanly, says a contemporary, as if she had been a humble
_bourgeoise_, but four persons being present at the graveside.

The very portraits of Isabeau de Baviere, and of other women of her
court, suggest sensuality. They are fat, and of the earth, earthy,
suggesting lives led in indolence and the pursuit of pleasures not of
the highest. As Michelet says, "Obesity is a characteristic of the
figures of this sensual epoch. See the statues at Saint Denys; those of
the fourteenth century are clearly portraits. See, in particular, the
statue of the Duke de Berri in the subterranean chapel of Bourges, with
the ignoble fat dog lying at his feet." As was the epoch, so was the
queen; she was not actively bad, except where interference with her
pleasures was threatened; she was merely a vain and utterly incapable
woman of low tastes and cold heart who was called upon to be Queen of
France in the most disastrous period of the history of that land. We
need not think her a second Fredegonde, as some historians have tried to
represent her; for her follies and her vices were such as to cause
abhorrence by their puerility or their bestiality rather than to stir
the deeper feelings of fear and hate excited by the greater among the
bad women of history.

CHAPTER XI

CHRISTINE DE PISAN

"SEULETE suy et seulete veuil estre,
Seulete m'a mon doulz ami laissiee,
Seulete suy sans compagnon ne maistre,
Seulete suy dolente et courrouciee,
Seulete suy en langueur mesaisiee,
Seulete suy plus que nulle esgaree,
Seulete suy sans amis demouree."

(Alone am I in the world, and alone would I remain,
Alone has my dear love left me,
Alone am I, a poor lone woman, without companion or master,
Alone am I, stricken with sorrow and anguish of mind,
Alone am I, and ill at ease,
Alone am I, more lonely than one who has lost her way,
Alone have I been left without friends.)

This complaint of one who has lost her lover, or been betrayed and
forsaken by him, might well have been the lament of France, betrayed by
Isabeau de Baviere and left naked to her enemies. But the author of the
lament, though one ready enough to find matter for her pen in the
con