All these territories made a goodly realm for a mere duke. But
they were individual entities centred around one head with little
interconnection.

Philip thought that the one thing needed to bring his possessions into
a national life, as coherent as that of France, was a unity of legal
existence among the dissimilar parts, and the effort to attain this
unity was the one thought dominating the career of his successor,
whose pompous introduction to life naturally inspired him with a high
idea of his own rank, and led him to dream of greater dignities for
himself and his successor than a bundle of titles,--a splendid, vain,
fatal dream as it proved.

As a final cement to the new friendship between Burgundy and France,
it was also agreed at Arras that the heir of the former should wed a
daughter of Charles VII. When the Count of Charolais was five years
old, the Seigneur of Crèvecoeur,[22] "a wise and prudent gentleman"
was despatched to the French court on divers missions, among which
was the business of negotiating the projected alliance. A very joyous
reception was accorded the envoy by the king and the queen, and his
proposal was accepted in behalf of the second daughter, Catherine,
easily substituted for an older sister, deceased between the first and
second stages of negotiation.

A year later, a formal betrothal took place at St Omer, whither
the young bride was conducted, most honourably accompanied by the
archbishops of Rheims and of Narbonne, by the counts of Vendôme,
Tonnerre, and Dunois, the young son of the Duke of Bourbon, named the
Lord of Beaujeu, and various other distinguished nobles, besides a