his
bride was thirty. Richard was so far bound to her that he could not
marry any other lady, and his father obstinately persisted in
preventing his completing the marriage with her.

[Illustration: PORTRAIT OF KING HENRY II.]

In the mean time Prince Geoffrey, another of the king's sons, came to
a miserable end. He was killed in a tournament. He was riding
furiously in the tournament in the midst of a great number of other
horsemen, when he was unfortunately thrown from his steed, and trodden
to death on the ground by the hoofs of the other horses that galloped
over him. The only two sons that were now left were Richard and John.
Of these, Richard was now the oldest, and he was, of course, his
father's heir. King Henry, however, formed a plan for dividing his
dominions between his two sons, instead of allowing Richard to inherit
the whole. John was his youngest son, and, as such, the king loved him
tenderly. So he conceived the idea of leaving to Richard all his
possessions in France, which constituted the most important part of
his dominions, and of bestowing the kingdom of England upon John; and,
in order to make sure of the carrying of this arrangement into effect,
he proposed crowning John king of England forthwith.

Richard, however, determined to resist this plan. The former king of
France, Louis the Seventh, was now dead, and his son, Philip the
Second, the brother of Alice, reigned in his stead. Richard
immediately set off for Paris, and laid his case before the young
French king. "I am engaged," said he, "to your sister Alice, and my
father will not give her to me. Help me to maintain my rights and
hers."

Philip, like his father, was always ready to do any thing in his power
to foment dissensions in the family of Henry. So he readily took
Richard's part in this new quarrel, and he, somehow or other,
contrived means to induce John to come and join in the rebellion. King
Henry was overwhelmed with grief when he learned that John, his
youngest, and now his dearest child, and the last that remained, had
abandoned him. His grief was mingled with resentment and rage. He
invoked the bitterest curses on his children's heads, and he caused a
device to be painted for John and sent to him, representing a young
eaglet picking out the parent eagle's eyes. This was to typify to him
his own undutiful and unnatural behavior.

Thus the domestic life which Richard led while he was a young man was
imbittered by the cont