Jagello

In order to give a color of impartiality to their proceedings, a diet was convoked at Cracow, immediately on the return of the embassy, to deliberate on the relative claims of Jagello, William of Austria, and the Dukes of Mazovia and Oppelen, all of whom aspired to the hand of Hedwige and the crown of Poland.

To obtain the consent of Duke William to their separation was of course out of the question; and before the puzzled council could arrive at any decision, Jagello entered Cracow, more in the style of a conqueror than a suitor, and repaired at once to the castle, where he found the queen surrounded by a court surpassing in beauty and magnificence all that his imagination had pictured.

Fame was not slow in wafting to his ears rumors of the beauty and accomplishments of Hedwige, which being more than corroborated by ambassadors employed to ascertain the truth, the impetuous Jagello determined to secure the prize, even at the cost of national independence.

The majority, however, were of a different opinion, and at the close of the diet it was decided that an ambassador should be despatched to Jagello, inviting him to Cracow for the purpose of continuing the negotiations in his own person.

William, thus repulsed, fixed his quarters at the Franciscan monastery; and Hedwige, fired by the insult, rode forth accompanied by a chosen body of knights and her female attendants, determined by the completion of her marriage to place an insuperable bar between her and Jagello.