Lives of Some Famous Women of All Ages; Including the Empress Josephine, Lady Jane Grey, Beatrice Cenci, Joan of Arc, Ann Boleyn, Charlotte, Corday, Semiramis, Zenobia, Boadicea, Isabella of Castile, Berengaria, Etc (Paperback)

This historic book may have numerous typos, missing text or index. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. 1912. Not illustrated. Excerpt: ... MARIA THERESA, EMPSESS OF GERMANY, AND QUEEN OF HUNGARY. Maria Theresa, of Austria--born on the 13th of May 1717 --was the daughter of Charles the Sixth, Emperor of Germany, and Elizabeth Christina, of Brunswick, a lovely and amiable woman, who possessed and deserved her husband's entire confidence and affection. Maria Theresa had beauty, spirit, and understanding. To her sister, Marianna, she was tenderly attached. The two arch-duchesses were brought up under the superintendence of their mother, and received an education in no respect different from that of other young ladies of rank of the same age and country. In those accomplishments to which her time was chiefly devoted, Maria Theresa made rapid progress. She inherited from her father a taste for music, which was highly cultivated, and remained to the end of her life one of her principal pleasures. She danced and moved with exquisite grace. Metastasio, who taught her Italian, and also presided over her musical studies, speaks of his pupil with delight and admiration, and in his letters he often alludes to her talent, her docility, and the sweetness of her manners. Of her progress in graver acquirements we do not hear. Much of her time was given to the strict observance of the forms of the Roman Catholic faith; and though she could not derive from the bigoted old women and ecclesiastics around her any very enlarged and enlightened ideas of religion, her piety was at least sincere. She omitted no opportunities of obtaining information relative to the history and geography of her country; and she appears to have been early possessed with a most magnificent idea of the power and grandeur of her family, and of the lofty rank to which she was destined. This early impression of her own vast importance was only cou...