MARGARET MARIA LOUISA. 



683 



ferings, and her crimes have been delineated with 

 historic truth and poetic beauty by the genius of 

 Shakspeare. 



MARGARET OF AUSTRIA, daughter of the 

 emperor Maximilian I., born in 1480, was sent to 

 France, after the death of her mother, Mary of Bur- 

 gundy, to be educated at the court of Louis XL, to 

 whose son (Charles VIII.) she was affianced. Charles, 

 however, having married Anna, heiress of Brittany, 

 she was sent back to her father's court, and was 

 married in 1497 to John, Infant of Spain. On the 

 voyage to Spain, a terrible storm threatened the 

 destruction of the ship. In the midst of the danger, 

 while the rest of the company were at their prayers, 

 she is said to have composed her epitaph in the fol- 

 lowing words : 



Cy-git Margot, la gente demoiselle, 

 J^mucfois mariee et morte pucelle. 



She arrived in safety, but, October 4, 1497, the In- 

 fant died. In 1501, she was married to Philibert It., 

 duke of Savoy, who died in 1504. Her father then 

 named her governess of the Netherlands, where her 

 administration was distinguished by prudence and 

 vigour. She died in 1530. Jean le Maire collected 

 her addresses before the court and the estates, in the 

 Couronne Margaritique (1549), which contains also 

 many poems, and her Discours de sa vie et de ses 

 infortunes. Fontenelle has made her a speaker in 

 one of his witty Dialogues of the Dead. 



MARGARET OF VALOIS, queen of Navarre, 

 sister to Francis I., was born at Angonleme in 1492. 

 She was brought up at the court of Louis XII., and 

 married the duke of Alengon in 1509, became a 

 widow in 1525 ; and in 1527, was espoused to Henry 

 d'Albret, king of Navarre. She joined with her 

 husband in every effort to make their small kingdom 

 flourish, by encouraging agriculture and the useful 

 arts, and by improving knowledge and civilization. 

 She was fond of reading, and had been led by curiosity 

 to make herself acquainted with the principles of 

 the reformers, to which she became partially a con- 

 vert, and not only afforded protection to reformed 

 divines, but used her influence with her brother 

 Francis to the same purpose. She also read the 

 bible in the French translation, and formed mysteries 

 for representation, from the New Testament, which 

 she caused to be performed at court. She wrote a 

 work entitled Le Miroir de VAmeyecheresse, printed 

 in 1533, which incurred the censure of the Sorboitne. 

 She underwent some ill treatment from her husband 

 on this account, and might have suffered more, but 

 for the interposition of her brother, Francis I., who 

 was much attached to her, and in complaisance to 

 whom she, externally at least, became more strict in 

 her attention to the ceremonial of the ancient religion. 

 It will appear extraordinary in the present day, that 

 a princess so contemplative and pious as Margaret 

 of Valois, should be author of a book of tales as free 

 in their tendency as those of Boccaccio. Such is 

 Heptameron, ou sept Journees de la Reyne de Nav- 

 arre, which was written during the gayety of youth, 

 but not printed until after her death. She died in 

 1549, leaving one child, Joan d'Albret, afterwards 

 mother of Henry IV. In 1547, a collection of her 

 poems and other pieces was printed, under the title 

 of Marguerites de la Marguerite des Princesses. 



MARGARET, called Madame de Parma, duchess 

 of Parma, the natural daughter of Charles V. and 

 Margaret of Gest, was born 1522, and married first 

 to Alexander of Medici, and afterwards to Octavio 

 Farnese, duke of Parma and Piacenza. Philip II., 

 of Spain, appointed her to the government of the, 

 Netherlands, in 1559, where she acted, under the 

 advice of Granvella (q. v.), with considerable pru- 

 dence, and, perhaps, might have restored quiet, had 



not the king sent the duke of Alva to aid in sup- 

 pressing the disaffection. Alva brought such powers, 

 that nothing but the title of sovereign was left to 

 Margaret, who returned, indignantly, to Italy, to her 

 husband, and died at Ortona in 158b. Her sou was 

 the famous Alexander Farnese, duke of Parma. 



MARGARET OF FRANCE, queen of Navarre, 

 wife of Henry IV., daughter of Henry II., was born 

 in 1552, and was one of the greatest beauties of her 

 age. Her talents and accomplishments correspond- 

 ed to the charms of her person. She was married to 

 Henry, then prince of Beam, in 1572 ; but the 

 duke of Guise was known to be the object of her 

 affections, and notwithstanding her amiable qualities 

 and brilliant beauty, she never possessed the heart 

 of her husband. (See Henry IV.} The gallantries 

 of Henry, which he never pretended to conceal from 

 his wife, could not excuse nor authorize, but doubt- 

 less contributed to increase, her own irregularities. 

 On the escape of Henry from Paris, she demanded 

 permission of Henry III. to follow him, but was not, 

 for a long time, allowed to depart. After living 

 several years with the king of Navarre, she returned 

 to Paris, on account of some disgust at the restraints 

 placed on the exercise of the Catholic religion, and 

 while there was guilty of the greatest licentiousness. 

 Rejected at once from the court of Navarre and that 

 of Paris, she maintained herself in the Agenois, in 

 open defiance of her husband and brother. On the 

 accession of the former to the throne of France, he 

 proposed to dissolve their marriage, to which she 

 consented, on condition of receiving a suitable pen- 

 sion, and having her debts paid. In 1605, Margaret 

 returned to Paris, where she lived in great splendour, 

 retaining her beauty, wit, and habits of dissipation, 

 and died in 1615, at the age of sixty-three. The 

 house of Margaret was frequented by the wits of the 

 day, and she knew how to unite excessive indulgence 

 in pleasure with attention to study. Some very 

 agreeable poems by her are extant, and her Memoir es 

 (1661 and 1713) are extremely curious. 



MARGATE ; a watering place in the isle of 

 Thanet, Kent, 71 miles E. of London, with which 

 it has frequent communication by steam vessels. 

 It has several pleasant promenades, among which 

 the pier is the favourite. It is much resorted to for 

 sea-bathing. Population, in 1831, 10,339. 



MARGRAVE (from the German, Markgraf, 

 count of the mark; in Latin, Marchio; see 

 Marches); originally a commander intruded with 

 the protection of a mark, or a country on the fron- 

 tier. As early as the times of Charlemagne, marks 

 and margraves appear ; for instance, the mark of 

 Austria. The margraves stood immediately under 

 the German kings and emperors, and not under 

 the dukes, in whose country the margraviate was 

 situated ; yet there were also some margraves 

 dependent on dukes. In the twelfth century, mar- 

 graviates became hereditary, and, at last, the mar- 

 graves acquired the rank of princes of the empire, 

 and stood between counts and dukes in the German 

 empire. The word mark signified, anciently, a land- 

 mark, and was then taken for countries on the fron - 

 tier ; as the mark Brandenburg. 



MARIA LOUISA, queen of Spain, daughter of 

 Philip duke of Parma, born in 1751, was married to 

 Charles IV., against his wishes, but in obedience to 

 the express commands of his father, in 1765. Maria 

 was prudent, not without address, and much superior 

 to her husband in understanding. She soon over- 

 came the violent temper of Charles, which at first 

 broke out into acts of personal outrage, and so far 

 prevailed over the formality of the Spanish court as 

 to have unrestricted access to the king. Every 

 thing was submitted to her approval. For her 



