of the realm, Viscount James de
Rohan, and Archduke Maximilian of Austria, all three believed themselves
to have hopes of success, and prosecuted them assiduously. Sire
d'Albret, a widower and the father of eight children already, was
forty-five, with a pimply face, a hard eye, a hoarse voice, and a
quarrelsome and gloomy temper; and Anne, being pressed to answer his
suit, finally declared that she would turn nun rather than marry him.
James de Rohan, in spite of his powerful backers at the court of Rennes,
was likewise dismissed; his father, Viscount John II., was in the service
of the King of France. Archduke Maximilian remained the only claimant
with any pretensions. He was nine and twenty, of gigantic stature,
justly renowned for valor and ability in war, and of more literary
culture than any of the princes his contemporaries, a trait he had in
common with Princess Anne, whose education had been very carefully
attended to. She showed herself to be favorably disposed towards him;
and the Duke of Orleans, whose name, married though he was, was still
sometimes associated with that of the Breton princess, formally declared,
on the 26th of January, 1486, that, "when he came to the Duke of
Brittany's, it was solely to visit him and advise him on certain points
touching the defence of his duchy, and not to talk to him of marriage
with the princesses his daughters." But, whilst the negotiation was thus
inclining towards the Austrian prince, Anne de Beaujeu, ever far-sighted
and energetic, was vigorously pushing on the war against the Duke of
Brittany and his allies. She had found in Louis de la Tremoille an able
and a bold warrior, whom Guicciardini calls the greatest captain in the
world. In July, 1488, he came suddenly down upon Brittany, took one
after the other Chateaubriant, Ancenis, and Fougeres, and, on the 28th,
gained at St. Aubin-du-Cormier, near Rennes, over the army of the Duke of
Brittany and his English, German, and Gascon allies, a victory which
decided the campaign: six thousand of the Breton army were killed, and
Duke Louis of Orleans, the Prince of Orange, and several French lords,
his friends, were made prisoners. On receiving at Angers the news of
this victory, Charles VIII. gave orders that the two captive princes
should be brought to him; but Anne de Beaujeu, fearing some ebullition on
his part of a too prompt and too gratuitous generosity, caused delay in
their arrival; and the Duke of Orleans,