Excerpt from The Queen's Quair: Or the Six Years' Tragedy

Beautiful she may not have been, though Monsieur de Brantome would never allow it; but fine, fine she was all over - sharply, exquisitely cut and modelled: her sweet smooth chin, her amorous lips, bright red where all else was pale as a tinged rose; her sensitive nose; her broad, high brows; her neck which two hands could hold, her small shoulders and bosom of a child. And then her hands, her waist no bigger than a stalk, her little feet! She had sometimes an intent, considering, wise look - the look of the Queen of Desire, who knew not where to set the bounds of her need, but revealed to no one what that was. And belying that look askance of hers sly, or wise, or sleepy, as you choosev - her voice was'bold and very clear, her manners were those of a lively, graceful bo her gestures quick, her spirit impatient and entirely thout fear. Her changes of mood were dangerous: she could wheedle the soul out of a saint, and then fling it back to him as worthless because it had been so easily got. She wrote a beautiful bold hand, loved learning, and petting, and a choice phrase. She used perfumes, and dipped her body every day in a bath of wine. At this hour she was nineteen years old, and not two months a widow.

All this the cardinal knew by heart, and had no need to observe while she stood strumming at the window-sill. His opinion - ii he had chosen to give it - would have been: these qualities and perfections, ab, -and these imperfections, are all very proper to a prince who'has a principality; for my niece, I count greatly upon a wise marriage - wise for our family, wise for herself. He Would have been the last to den that the Guises had been hampered by King cis' secase. All was to do again but all could be done. This fretful, fair girl was still Queen of Scotland, allow-i Dowager of France, but Queen of Scotland, worth a knight's venture. Advance pawns, therefore! He was a chess-player, passionate for the game.

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