missed, as Richard had ordered. Great indignation was expressed in France (Religieux de Saint-Denys, ii. 702–5; Juvenal des Ursins, p. 417). Froissart is wrong in making the Londoners expel the French ladies in the interests of Henry of Lancaster (xvi. 189). Henceforward Isabella was left with English-speaking attendants, except one lady and her confessor. On Henry's invasion in July the regent York entrusted her to the care of Wiltshire and Richard's other chief favourites (Fœdera, viii. 83). But she soon fell into Henry's hands, and was placed at Sonning, near Reading. A letter she wrote to her father never reached him (Religieux de Saint-Denys, ii. 720). Richard asked in vain to see her (Creton, p. 117).
The French court would not recognise Henry IV as king, and demanded the restitution of Isabella and the two hundred thousand francs of her portion paid since her marriage. Henry was unable to pay so large a sum, and commissioned ambassadors to treat for a marriage between the Prince of Wales and a daughter or cousin of Charles VI (Fœdera, viii. 108). Isabella was evidently intended (Froissart, xvi. 237; Chronique de la Traïson, p. 106), and it would not have been hard to arrange the union, as her marriage with Richard had never been consummated. But the French would not listen to the proposal, even after Richard's death. They demanded the fulfilment of the treaty of 1396, and Henry, though putting things off as long as he could, did not venture to openly repudiate it. But he set up, as a counterclaim to the demand for Isabella's portion, a request for the unpaid arrears of King John's ransom.
Isabella was still at Sonning when the rebellion of January 1400 broke out. The insurgents, headed by Kent, captured Sonning, and comforted her with hopes of greater success, tearing away Henry IV's badges from her servants (Walsingham, ii. 243–4), but they do not seem to have attempted to take her away with them. After this she was guarded more carefully, and removed to Havering-atte-Bower in Essex. The death of Richard was for a time carefully concealed from her. In November 1400 she was visited by the French ambassadors, who pledged themselves to make no mention of Richard (Froissart, xvi. 220). They had been secretly instructed to urge her not to involve herself in any matrimonial or other engagement (Douët-D'Arcq, Pièces Inédites, i. 171–173). It was feared that Henry would keep her until after her twelfth birthday, when she could contract a legal marriage.
The threat of an invasion of Guienne facilitated Isabella's restoration. On 27 May 1401 a treaty was signed at Leulinghen that she should be sent back with her jewels and belongings in July, on her pledging herself to abstain from all intrigues in England. The question of her portion was to be considered later on. Great preparations were now made for her restoration with a pomp not unworthy of her reception. On 27 June the Earl of Worcester conducted her to Westminster. She was taken before Henry, but in his presence she hardly spoke, remaining sullen and morose, and clad in deep black (Adam of Usk, p. 61). Next day she was taken through the silent crowds of Londoners on her way to the coast. She was kept nearly a month at Dover, and crossed the Straits on 28 July. On 31 July she was handed over by Worcester to the Count of Saint-Pôl at Leulinghen, and Isabella took leave of her English ladies amid much weeping and lamenting. She signed at Boulogne the required bond, and was taken to Paris, being received with great rejoicings in every town. On her arrival at Paris she was made to issue a declaration that she had never acknowledged Henry as her husband's successor. Her mother now took charge of her. Henceforth she lived in less state, but was still attended by ladies of high rank (Religieux de Saint-Denys, iii. 4). Common fame said that she was never happy after her return from England (Chron. Anonyme in Monstrelet, vi. 192).
Partisans of Richard II in England still looked to Isabella or her friends for help. In 1403 it was believed she was about to land in Essex, and in 1404 the French invaders of the Isle of Wight demanded tribute in her name and that of the false Richard, hidden away in Scotland. But Isabella's friends never recognised the impostor in any way, though repeated applications had failed to extract any of her marriage portion from Henry IV, and Louis of Orleans, Henry's special foe, was predominant in her father's counsels. In June 1404 she was contracted in marriage to her cousin Charles, count of Angoulême, afterwards famous as a poet, and the eldest son of Louis of Orleans (Douët-D'Arcq, Pièces Inédites, i. 260), who gave her as dower six thousand livres a year, and all the profits of the châtellenie of Crecy-en-Brie (Report on Fœdera, App. D, p. 146). In 1406 another proposal to marry her to Henry, prince of Wales, was rejected (Monstrelet, i. 126), and she was married to Angoulême at Compiègne on 29 June 1406 (Religieux de Saint-Denys, iii. 394; Monstrelet, i. 129; Anselme, i. 208). Isabella wept bitterly during the ceremony which united her to a boy two years her junior
