was also Christina, Duchess of Lorraine, and aunt of the king,
who, as mediatrix of the peace of Chateau-Cambray, had rendered
important service to the crown. William aimed at the hand of her
daughter, and he hoped to promote his suit by actively interposing his
good offices for the mother; but he did not reflect that through this
very intercession he ruined her cause. The Duchess Christina was
rejected, not so much for the reason alleged, namely, the dependence of
her territories on France made her an object of suspicion to the Spanish
court, as because she was acceptable to the people of the Netherlands
and the Prince of Orange.

MARGARET OF PARMA REGENT OF THE NETHERLANDS.

While the general expectation was on the stretch as to whom the fature
destines of the provinces would be committed, there appeared on the
frontiers of the country the Duchess Margaret of Parma, having been
summoned by the king from Italy to assume the government.

Margaret was a natural daughter of Charles V. and of a noble Flemish
lady named Vangeest, and born in 1522.

Out of regard for the honor of her mother's house she was at first
educated in obscurity; but her mother, who possessed more vanity than
honor, was not very anxious to preserve the secret of her origin, and a
princely education betrayed the daughter of the Emperor. While yet a
child she was entrusted to the Regent Margaret, her great-aunt, to be
brought up at Brussels under her eye. This guardian she lost in her
eighth year, and the care of her education devolved on Queen Mary of
Hungary, the successor of Margaret in the regency. Her father had
already affianced her, while yet in her fourth year, to a Prince of
Ferrara; but this alliance being subsequently dissolved, she was
betrothed to Alexander de Medicis, the new Duke of Florence, which
marriage was, after the victorious return of the Emperor from Africa,
actually consummated in Naples. In the first year of this unfortunate
union, a violent death removed from her a husband who could not love
her, and for the third time her hand was disposed of to serve the policy
of her father. Octavius Farnese, a prince of thirteen years of age and
nephew of Paul III., obtained, with her person, the Duchies of Parma and
Piacenza as her portion. Thus, by a strange destiny, Margaret at the
age of maturity was contracted to a boy, as in the years of infancy she
had been sold to a man. Her disposition, which was anything but
f