Charles was for hurrying the coronation, Frederic for pushing the marriage.  A magnificent throne was erected in the cathedral at Treves, and preparations were making on the grandest scale for the coronation solemnities, when Frederic, who did not like to tell the duke plumply to his face that he was fearful of being cheated, extricated himself from his embarrassment by feigning important business which called him suddenly to Cologne.  A scene of petty and disgraceful intrigues ensued between the exasperated duke and emperor, and there were the marching and the countermarching of hostile bands and the usual miseries of war, until the death of Duke Charles at the battle of Nancy on the 5th of January, 1477.

The King of France now made a desperate endeavor to obtain the hand of Mary for his son.  One of the novel acts of this imperial courtship, was to send an army into Burgundy, which wrested a large portion of Mary’s dominions from her, which the king, Louis XI., refused to surrender unless Mary would marry his son.  Many of her nobles urged the claims of France.  But love in the heart of Mary was stronger than political expediency, and more persuasive than the entreaties of her nobles.  To relieve herself from importunity, she was hurriedly married, three months after the death of her father, by proxy to Maximilian.

In August the young prince, but eighteen years of age, with a splendid retinue, made his public entry into Ghent.  His commanding person and the elegance of his manners, attracted universal admiration.  His subjects rallied with enthusiasm around him, and, guided by his prowess, in a continued warfare of five years, drove the invading French from their territories.  But death, the goal to which every one tends, was suddenly and unexpectedly reached by Mary.  She died the 7th of August, 1479, leaving two infant children, Philip and Margaret.

The Emperor Frederic also succeeded, by diplomatic cunning, in convening the diet of electors and choosing Maximilian as his successor to the imperial throne.  Frederic and Maximilian now united in the endeavor to recover Austria from the King of Hungary.  The German princes, however, notwithstanding the summons of the emperor, refused to take any part in the private quarrels of Austria, and thus the battle would have to be fought between the troops of Maximilian and of Matthias.  Maximilian prudently decided that it would be better to purchase the redemption of the territory with money than with blood.  The affair was in negotiation when Matthias was taken sick and died the 15th of July, 1490.  He left no heir, and the Hungarian nobles chose Ladislaus, King of Bohemia, to succeed him.  Maximilian had been confident of obtaining the crown of Hungary.  Exasperated by the disappointment, he relinquished all idea of purchasing his patrimonial estates, but making a sudden rush with his troops upon the Hungarians, he drove them out of Austria, and pursued them far over the frontiers of Hungary.  Ladislaus, the new King of Hungary, now listened to terms of peace.  A singular treaty was made.  The Bohemian king was to retain the crown of Hungary, officiating as reigning monarch, while Maximilian was to have the title of King of Hungary.  Ladislaus relinquished all claim to the Austrian territories, and paid a large sum of money as indemnity for the war.