These three daughters were born and educated as Princesses of the Royal House, in conformity with the existent code of morals. Queen Marie not only made no demur at their status, but, acting upon the advice of good Queen Yolande, her mother, treated them in every respect as she did her own offspring. When Agnes’s second daughter was married, the Queen stood by her and gave her rich wedding presents. Certainly she was not subjected to the indignity of sharing hearth and home with her husband’s mistress. Dame Agnes Sorel resided at her own Castle de Breauté-sur-Marne, and there she bore him her family. The castle was a bijou residence,--a great favourite of Charles,--and Agnes made it a habitation of beauty, adorned not alone by her own gracious presence, but by the attendance of a brilliant Court, quite outrivalling that of the modest Queen, and filled her rooms and galleries with the countless beautiful and costly gifts of her former devoted mistress, Duchess Isabelle.
Agnes’s ascendancy over Charles VII. was purely erotic. She exercised no influence whatever upon the affairs of state, or, indeed, upon anything but what ministered to his personal pleasure and amusement. However, she was useful, and indeed invaluable, on more than one occasion of danger and suspicion. Unreservedly devoted to her paramour, she was sensitive of any dereliction of duty and of any appearance of intrigue. To her was solely due the detection of the conspiracy of 1449, which, fomented by the Dauphin, threatened the life of the King.
Marie inspired the fervent love of her son, Louis the Dauphin, as she did, in truth, the devotion of all her children. When a stripling of fourteen, he championed his mother against his father’s mistress; and when Agnes made a disparaging remark affecting the Queen, the lad immediately boxed her ears, and warned her never to repeat the offence in his hearing! From that day Louis hated “_la Belle des Belles_,” and never tired of checking her assumptions. He even dared to protest personally before his father against the King’s neglect of the Queen and his partiality for her Lady of Honour. Charles on one occasion took his son’s strictures seriously to heart, sent for Marie, bewailed his infidelity, and craved her pardon. But the wanton monarch’s day of righteousness was short, for he very soon forgot his son’s vehemence, and went on fondling his favourite.