in his turn nominated his daughter, Margaret, to be regent in his place and guardian of his grandson during Charles’ minority, and she with the assent of the States-General took the oath on her installation as Mambour or Governor-General of the Netherlands, March, 1507.  Margaret was but 27 years of age, and for twenty-four years she continued to administer the affairs of the Netherlands with singular discretion, firmness and Statesmanlike ability.  The superintendence and training of the young archduke could have been placed in no better hands.  Charles, who with his three sisters lived with his aunt at Mechlin, was thus both by birth and education a Netherlander.

One of the first acts of Margaret was a refusal to ratify the Malus Intercursus and the revival of the Magnus Intercursus of 1496.  This important commercial treaty from that time forward continued in force for more than a century.  The great difficulty that Margaret encountered in her government was the lack of adequate financial resources.  The extensive privileges accorded to the various provinces and their mutual jealousies and diverse interests made the task of levying taxes arduous and often fruitless.  Margaret found that the granting of supplies, even for so necessary a purpose as the raising of troops to resist the raids of Charles of Gelderland, aided by the French king, into Utrecht and Holland, was refused.  She fortunately possessed in a high degree those qualities of persuasive address and sound judgment, which gave to her a foremost place among the diplomatists and rulers of her time.  Such was the confidence that her brilliant abilities inspired that she was deputed both by the Emperor Maximilian and by Ferdinand of Aragon to be their plenipotentiary at the Peace Congress that assembled at Cambray in November, 1508.  Chiefly through her exertions the negotiations had a speedy and successful issue, and the famous treaty known as the League of Cambray was signed on December 10.  By this treaty many of the disputes concerning the rights and prerogatives of the French crown in the Burgundian Netherlands were amicably settled; and it was arranged that Charles of Egmont should be provisionally recognised as Duke of Gelderland on condition that he should give up the towns in Holland that he had captured and withdraw his troops within his own borders.

The extant correspondence between Maximilian and Margaret, which is of the most confidential character, on matters of high policy, is a proof of the high opinion the emperor entertained of his daughter’s intelligence and capacity.  In nothing was his confidence more justified than in the assiduous care and interest that the regent took in the education of the Archduke Charles and his three sisters, who had been placed in her charge.  In 1515 Charles, on entering his sixteenth year, was declared by Maximilian to be of age; Margaret accordingly handed over to him the reins of government and withdrew for the time into private