to face successfully so many adversaries and to humble the power of France.  The last important act of Margaret, like her first, was connected with the town of Cambray.  In this town, as the representative and plenipotentiary of her nephew the emperor, she met, July, 1529, Louise of Savoy, who had been granted similar powers by her son Francis I, to negotiate a treaty of peace.  The two princesses proved worthy of the trust that had been placed in them, and a general treaty of peace, often spoken of as “the Ladies’ Peace,” was speedily drawn up and ratified.  The conditions were highly advantageous to the interests of Spain and the Netherlands.  On November 30 of the following year Margaret died, as the result of a slight accident to her foot which the medical science of the day did not know how to treat properly, in the 50th year of her age and the 24th of her regency.

Charles, who had a few months previously reached the zenith of his power by being crowned with the iron crown of Lombardy and with the imperial crown at the hands of Pope Clement VII at Bologna (February 22 and 24, 1530), appointed as governess in Margaret’s place his sister Mary, the widowed queen of Louis, King of Hungary, who had been slain by the Turks at the battle of Mohacs, August 29, 1526.

Mary, who had passed her early life in the Netherlands under the care of her aunt Margaret, proved herself in every way her worthy successor.  She possessed, like Margaret, a strong character, statesmanlike qualities and singular capacity in the administration of affairs.  She filled the difficult post of regent for the whole period of twenty-four years between the death of Margaret and the abdication of Charles V in 1555.  It was fortunate indeed for that great sovereign that these two eminent women of his house should, each in turn for one half of his long reign, have so admirably conducted the government of this important portion of his dominions, as to leave him free for the carrying out of his far-reaching political projects and constant military campaigns in other lands.  Two years after Mary entered upon her regency Charles appointed three advisory and administrative bodies—­the Council of State, the Council of Finance and the Privy Council—­to assist her in the government.  The Council of State dealt with questions of external and internal policy and with the appointment of officials; the Council of Finance with the care of the revenue and private domains of the sovereign; to the Privy Council were entrusted the publication of edicts and “placards,” and the care of justice and police.