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Updated: May 15, 2025
Now, it was early in the year 1283, the evening was balmy for the season, the first spring flowers were budding forth, and the moon, as a silver crescent, was seen among the stars. The young scholar and soldier of unknown birth walked in the gardens of the Count of Dreux, and the lovely Jolande leaned upon his arm.
It is seldom that kings are such tardy wooers; but between the union of the good Alexander and the beautiful Jolande many obstacles were thrown. When, however, their nuptials were finally agreed to, it was resolved that they should be celebrated on a scale of magnificence such as the world had not seen.
By his second wife, Jolande de Dieux, Duke Arthur had one son, John, Count of Montford. Thus it happened, that when Duke John died, his half-brother, the Count of Montford, and Joan, daughter of his second brother Guy, were all that survived of the family. These were the rival claimants for the vacant dukedom. In England we have but one law of succession, which rules through the whole land.
More than two years passed away, and the negotiations between the Courts of Scotland and of France, respecting the marriage of King Alexander and Fair Jolande, were continued; but, during that period, even the name of Patrick Douglas, the Scottish soldier, began to be forgotten his learning became a dead letter, and his feats of arms continued no longer the theme of tongues.
But, before another sun rose, Patrick Douglas, the honoured military adventurer of King Philip, was not to be found in the palace of the Count de Dreux. Many were the conjectures concerning his sudden departure; and, amongst those conjectures, as regarding the cause, many were right. But Jolande stole to her chamber, and in secret wept for the brave stranger.
She was startled by his manner, and had only said "Sir! what means?" though in a tone neither of reproach nor of pride, when what she would have said was cut short by the sudden approach of a page, who, bowing before her, stated that four commissioners having arrived from the King of Scotland, the presence of the Princess Jolande was required at the palace.
No "single silverings" yet marked the raven ringlets which waved down his temples; and, though his years were forty and three, his appearance did not betoken him to be above thirty. His people, therefore, wished, and his courtiers urged, that he should marry again; and fame pointed out the lovely Jolande, the daughter of the Count of Dreux, as his bride.
A hundred nobles were there, each exhibiting all the pageantry of the age; and there, too, were a hundred ladies, vying with each other in beauty, and in the splendour of their array. But chief of all was Jolande, the daughter of their host, the Count of Dreux, and the fame of whose charms had spread throughout Christendom. Troubadours sang of her beauty, and princes bent the knee before her.
Altogether it would seem that right is upon Joan's side; but, on the other hand, the Count of Montford is the son of Jolande, a great heiress in Brittany. He is an active and energetic noble. The Bretons love not too close a connection with France, and assuredly prefer to be ruled by a duke whom they regard as one of themselves rather than by Charles of Blois, nephew of the French king.
When Patrick Douglas, the learned and honoured, but fortuneless soldier, found that his new competitor for the hand of the gentle Jolande was none other than his sovereign, he was dumb with despair, and the last, the miserable hope which it imparts, and which maketh wretched, began to leave him.
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