On the 16th of June, 1406, there was a total eclipse of the sun between six and seven in the morning. It lasted half an hour, “and,” says the chronicler, “nothing whatever could one see, any more than if it had been night and there had been no moon.” People crowded into the churches, and every one thought the world was coming to an end. “However, the thing passed off, and the astronomers assembled and said that the thing was very strange and the sign of a great evil to come.”[217]
Two more royal marriages took place. Isabelle, Queen of England, was married to Charles, eldest son of the Duc d’Orléans, and her little brother Jean, to Jacqueline, daughter of the Comte de Hainault and niece of the Duke of Burgundy. Isabelle hated this marriage and cried all the time, it was said at court, because she thereby lost the title of Queen of England. Miss Strickland, in her life of that Queen, observes that if she had been so anxious to keep the crown of England, she could easily have done so by marrying King Henry V., and that her grief was caused by her love for King Richard. But at any rate, it is not difficult to understand that a girl of seventeen might well object to be married to a boy of fifteen,[218] and her cousin, besides the fact of his being a subject while she had been a queen. Miss Strickland goes on to state that after a short time she became reconciled to this marriage, Charles of Orléans being accomplished and precocious beyond his years, and devoted to her, but it was cut short by her early death.
After the weddings the Comtesse de Hainault wished to take the Duc de Touraine back with her. The Queen objected, and a dispute arose, but as it had been agreed in the contract that he should be under her care, she got her way, took leave of the Queen (the King was then ill), and returned to Hainault. The Count came to meet them with a brilliant suite and received the young prince with great ceremony, and in every place through which they passed was music and rejoicing. The children had the household of sovereign princes, and the Count tried to educate his son-in-law in the ways of the country, that he might live in harmony with his future subjects. The King, when he recovered, made no objection, but consented to the Count’s request that his son should be brought up in Hainault.[219]