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 tance 
 
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 VOL. II. 
 
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 CHAPTER XIII 
 
 CHENONCEAUX. FROM THE REIGN OF 
 DIANE DE POITIERS TO THE PRESENT 
 DAY 
 
 PAGE 
 
 A Day with the Court of Henry II. at Chenonceaux — 
 Death of Henry II. at a Tournament — Catherine de 
 Medicis turns out Diana and builds a new Wing on 
 the Bridge across the Cher — Fetes at Chenonceaux 
 after the Massacre of Amboise — Visit of Marie 
 Stuart to Francis II. — Fetes in 1565 and 1577 — The 
 " Woman-King " — The Maids of Honour — Louise 
 de Lorraine — Her Gentleness and her Grief — The 
 Vendome Family — The " Roi des Halles " — Made- 
 moiselle d'Enghien — Madame Dupin and the Ency- 
 clopaedists — George Sand — M. Wilson — Madame 
 Pelouze — The Credit Foncier 9 
 
 CHAPTER XIV 
 
 TWO QUEENS OF FRANCE. MARIE STUART 
 AT THE FRENCH COURT, AND SOME 
 FACTS ABOUT CATHERINE DE MEDICIS 
 
 Leading Men and Women in the Sixteenth Century — 
 Childhood and Youth of Marie Stuart — Her Face — 
 Her Accomplishments — Her Regret at leaving France 
 — Poems in her Memory — Catherine de Medicis com- 
 pared with contemporary Queens — The " Apolo- 
 1 
 
(oontentd 
 
 getic " School of Historians — Her Youth and Mar- 
 riage — Relations with Diane de Poitiers — Her char- 
 acteristic Methods — The " Escadron Volant " — The 
 Guises — Details of her Life from the Venetian Am- 
 bassadors — Amboise Vassy and St. Bartholemew — 
 Walsingham and Coligny — Death of Catherine at 
 Blois 29 
 
 CHAPTER XV 
 
 AMBOISE: ITS EARLY HISTORY 
 
 Alaric and Clovis — The Chapel of St. Hubert — The 
 " Greniers de Cesar " — Stories of Amboise in an old 
 Latin History — King Arthur — The Counts of Anjou 
 — Louis XL — The Order of St. Michael — The old 
 Mystery Plays- — Education of Charles VIII. at Am- 
 boise — His Death — Arms and Armour at Amboise in 
 1499 {note) — Reign of Louis XII. — The Marechal de 
 Gie — Rivalry with Georges d'Amboise — Quarrel with 
 Anne de Bretagne — His Integrity and unjust Trial — 
 Youth of Frangois d'Angouleme (Francis I.) at Am- 
 boise — His Mother, Louise de Savoie, and his Sister, 
 Marguerite — His Playfellows — Their Games — News 
 of Marignano — The Grave of Leonardo da Vinci — 
 Francis I. and French Art 49 
 
 CHAPTER XVI 
 
 THE CONSPIRACY OF AMBOISE, AND THE 
 REIGN OF FRANCIS II. 
 
 The Beginnings of the Reformation — Parties in the 
 Court and in France — Catherine de Medicis — Mur- 
 der of Antoine Minard — Burning of Du Bourg — 
 Huguenot Cause championed by the Princes of the 
 Blood — Politics and Religion — La Renaudie and the 
 
(oontentd 
 
 PAGE 
 
 First Assembly at Nantes — Conde the " Chef Muet " 
 — Extraordinary Spread of the Movement — The 
 Court leaves Blois for Amboise — Preparations of the 
 Huguenots — Treachery of the Guises — Death of La 
 Renaudie — Wholesale Slaughters in the Forest — 
 Death of Chancellor Olivier — Horrible Scenes in the 
 Castle — The Balcony above the Scaffold — " Dieu 
 nous soit doux et favorable " — Power of the Guises 
 — Their Attacks on Conde — The Attempted Coup 
 d'Etat at Orleans — Death of Francis H. — Subse- 
 quent History of the Struggle — Fouquet at Ambois 
 — Abd-el-Kader — The " Stag's Head and Branches " 
 which John Evelyn saw — Later Restorations — 
 Church of St. Denis .79 
 
 CHAPTER XVII 
 
 LA REINE MARGOT. THE REIGN OF 
 CHARLES IX. 
 
 Madame de Sauves and the " Escadron Volant " — Visit 
 of the Court to Plessis — Beauty of Marguerite — Her 
 Passion for Henry, Duke of Guise — Her Marriage 
 with Henry of Navarre — Jeanne d'Albret poisoned by 
 the perfumed Gloves — Murder of Coligny — The 
 Night of St. Bartholomew — Bedroom of Marguerite 
 — The Harvest of Death — Bussy d' Amboise — Expedi- 
 tion to Flanders — Scenes at Huy and Dinan — Escape 
 of Anjou from the Louvre — La Guerre des Amou- 
 reux — The Chateau d'Usson — Estimate of Margue- 
 rite's Character 105 
 
 CHAPTER XVIII 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHATEAU OF BLOIS TILL 
 THE DEATH OF LOUIS XII. 
 
 The Restorations — Description of the Buildings — The 
 Wing of Francis I. — The open Staircase and Carv- 
 
Gontentd 
 
 PAGE 
 
 ings — Times of the old Counts of Blois and Cham- 
 pagne — Louis d'Orleans and Valentine Visconti — 
 The Library — Joan of Arc — Charles d'Orleans the 
 Poet — Birth and Education of his Son — Louis XIL 
 and Caesar Borgia at Blois — Career of Caesar Borgia 
 ^Robert de la Marche — Visit of Archduke Philip of 
 Austria — Anne de Bretagne at Blois — Her Death . 129 
 
 CHAPTER XIX 
 
 THE DRAMA OF THE SIXTEENTH CEN- 
 TURY AT BLOIS 
 
 Favourite Home of Claude, Wife of Francis I. — Made- 
 leine de France betrothed to James V. — Her Page, 
 Ronsard — The Rise of the Classical School of Poetry 
 — First French Tragedy — Claude Haton — The Cab- 
 inet of Catherine de Medicis — The Apartments in the 
 Wing of Francis I. — The Court of Marie Stuart and 
 Francis II. — Sudden Journey to Amboise — The Hu- 
 guenots — Jeanne d'Albret — Marguerite de Valois and 
 Henry of Navarre — Reign of Henry III. — He de- 
 clares himself Head of the Catholic League — The 
 First Estates at Blois — The Mignons — The Second 
 Estates at Blois in 1588— The Court in the Chateau 
 — ^The Murder of Henry, Duke of Guise . . .161 
 
 CHAPTER XX 
 
 LATER HISTORY OF BLOIS 
 
 Marie de Medicis, Widow of Henry IV., escapes from 
 Blois— Gaston d'Orleans and " La grande Mademoi- 
 selle "—Visit of John Evelyn— Louis XIV. at Blois 
 —Effects of History on Arthur Young — Chateau de- 
 faced by the Revolution — Barracks in 1871— Churches 
 and Houses in the Town IQI 
 
6, 
 
 ontentd 
 
 CHAPTER XXI 
 
 CHAMBORD, THE PARODY OF THE OLD FEU- 
 DAL CASTLES 
 
 PAGE 
 
 The Desolation of its Park — Extraordinary Transitional 
 Character of its Architecture — Enormous Extent of 
 the Building — The Double Staircase — The old For- 
 tress changed by Francis into a Hunting-Seat — His 
 Distich on the Window — Visit of Charles IX. — Louis 
 XHL and Mademoiselle de Hautefort — Marion de 
 Lorme — Gaston and his Daughter — Performance of 
 Moliere's Pourceaugnac and Bourgeois Gentil-. 
 homme — Stanislas Leczinski — Marshal Saxe — His 
 Life and Death — Damage done by the Revolution — 
 Paul Louis Courier's Pamphlets — The " Folic d'Hon- 
 neur " of Henry V 203 
 
 CHAPTER XXH 
 
 AZAY-LE-RIDEAU, THE PERFECT FRENCH 
 RENAISSANCE CHATEAU. 
 
 Architecture of the Building — Its Pictures — Its Stair- 
 case — The Chateau du Souvenir 225 
 
 CHAPTER XXHI 
 
 TOURS AND ITS SURROUNDINGS. THE CAS- 
 TLES OF THE FRONDE 
 
 The Chateaux of Cheverny and Beauregard — Their Pict- 
 ures — The Chateaux of Romorantin, Montrichard, 
 Montresor, Montbazon — Couzieres — Story of Marie 
 de Rohan and the Abbe de Ranee — Luynes — Cinq 
 Mars — Richelieu — Rochecorbon — Marmoutier — 
 Plessis-lez-Tours — House of Tristan I'Hermite — The 
 
& 
 
 ontentd 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Town of Tours — Silk Industry in 1546 — Receptions of 
 Charles IX. and Henry III. — Association of Print- 
 ers — Meeting of Henry of Navarre and Henry III, 
 at Plessis — Fighting with Leaguers at St. Sym- 
 phorien — Escape of the young Prince de Joinville — 
 Edict of Nantes — The Huguenots — Revocation of the 
 Edict — Visit of John Evelyn — Visit of Arthur 
 Young — The Revolution on the Loire — War of 1815 — 
 War of 1870 — Gambetta — The " Siege " — Conclu- 
 sion 235 
 
 APPENDIX 
 
 Itinerary — Lists of MSS., etc., at Tours — Lists of Pict- 
 ures in France and England — A further List of 
 Authorities — Extracts (on French Art and Architect- 
 ure) from Sir Frederick Leighton's Speech to the 
 Royal Academy Students in December 1891 . . 259 
 
 Index 295 
 
Jo>ut of QjliuMrationd 
 
 Photogravures by Elson & Co., Boston 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Diana of Poitiers Frontispiece 
 
 Marie Stuart 34 
 
 Catherine de Medicis . . . . . .46 
 
 From a portrait in the Uffizi Gallery, Florence, artist u7tknoiv7t. 
 
 The Doorway of Chapel at Amboise ... 54 
 
 The Chapel at Amboise 70 
 
 General View of Amboise, showing the Gallery 
 from which the court watched the exe- 
 CUTION OF THE Huguenots .... 94 
 
 Exterior of Spiral Staircase at Blois, in Wing 
 
 OF Francis 1 132 
 
 Central Pillar of Francis I. Staircase, Blois . 140 
 
 Chateau of Blois, Wing of Francis I. . . 154 
 
 Fireplace in Chateau of Blois .... 164 
 
 Hall of States-General, Blois .... 178 
 
 Henry, Due de Guise 190 
 
 7 
 
8 Joidt of cJlludtzationd 
 
 The ChSteau of Chambord . 
 
 The Lantern, Chateau of Chambord 
 
 The Chateau of Azay-le-Rideau . 
 
 Marie de Medicis .... 
 
 From a portrait in Uffizi Gallery, Florence. 
 
 Map of the Valley of the Loire 
 
 PAGE 
 208 
 
 222 
 228 
 244 
 
 at etid 
 
a 
 
 enonceauoco 
 
CHAPTER XIII 
 
 CHENONCEAUX (Continued) 
 
 In the gossip with which the pages of Brantome are 
 filled, the Court of Henry II. lives for us in all its 
 details. We can see the King showing his stables 
 to the Emperor's ambassador, and parading the 
 young nobles of his suite, " mon autre haras de ces 
 pages que j'estime autant que les autres," or taking 
 him to see the famous greyhounds whose ancestors 
 were brought to Saint Louis from Tartary, and 
 those noble white deerhounds which Charles IX. 
 would recommend as the only breed for a King to 
 take out hunting : we can imagine the day at Court 
 which the observant Venetian ambassador de- 
 scribes, such as it might often have been at Chenon- 
 ceaux. It is early in the day, but the King, who 
 rose with the sun, has been for some time closeted 
 with De Guise, Vendome, and the Constable talk- 
 ing over afifairs of State in his new-fashioned " nar- 
 row council." After business come devotions, for 
 the King attends regularly at mass, and after devo- 
 tions, dinner; and now Henry has done with 
 
 seriousness for the day — though counsellors and 
 
 11 
 
12 Old %. 
 
 ouzaine 
 
 secretaries are still at work in the great hall of the 
 castle — and with Saint Andre by his side he rides 
 forth a-hunting in the forest of Amboise. Vieille- 
 ville is with them too, talking of affairs at Metz/ or 
 asking for the latest fashions in furniture or food at 
 his friend's luxurious establishment at Saint Valery; 
 and as the sound of the hunters' horns grows fainter 
 in the distance, and the western sun glows on the 
 terraced garden, the walks begin to fill with the 
 ladies of the Court, in the costumes Cesare Vecellio 
 has made familiar — small velvet caps with strings 
 of pearls and feathers, wide slashed sleeves and flow- 
 ing robes with a long girdle drooping from the 
 waist. 
 
 M. Ramus may perhaps be there, disputing with 
 the King's doctor, Fernel, on a knotty point in 
 mathematics, and little thinking that his cruel end 
 shall come in the massacre of St. Bartholomew, and 
 his mangled corpse be dragged about the streets of 
 Paris by bloodthirsty Aristotelians : Jean Daurat 
 helps the argument with a Greek quotation, and 
 speaks of the promise of his pupil Ronsard with his 
 fellow-countryman Muret, who shall put much 
 sound learning into Montaigne's head. Amyot, 
 
 1 See Bertrand de Salignac for the account of the operations 
 of Claude de Lorraine, Due de Guise, at Metz, and for much 
 further information see Vieilleville's own Memoires. 
 
eii 
 
 enonceaux 13 
 
 too, has left the Dauphin at his studies to have a 
 word with Estienne about some new edition of the 
 classics, or to tell the others to prepare their pretty 
 speeches for Diana, who is just strolling across the 
 drawbridge. This is her first appearance in public, 
 but she has been up long before the rest and ridden 
 early through the dewy fields in the cold morning 
 air, then gone to bed again,^ and in a graceful dis- 
 habille transacted what might come of business, or 
 listened to the latest sonnet from the poets of the 
 Court; and now she appears at last, fresh and pro- 
 vokingly attractive, ready to stand comparison with 
 the fairest ladies about her, and to throw more 
 energy and life than all the rest into her quiet greet- 
 ing of the King as he comes back from hunting. 
 
 It is the Queen's turn now. She has felt some- 
 what neglected between the invincible Diana and 
 this new prodigy from Scotland, who has turned 
 the heads of all the courtiers in France; but the 
 King and all his gentlemen move gaily towards the 
 rooms of Catherine de Medicis, where, among the 
 fascinating smiles and dances of the famous " esca- 
 dron volant," the day is finished unconcernedly, and 
 
 1 She allowed herself the luxury of a warming-pan, for 
 which we have the authority of M. Nestor Roqueplan, in whose 
 collection that privileged instrument reposes in good com- 
 pany, side by side with the warming-pans of Marie Stuart and 
 Catherine de Medicis. 
 
u did "Go 
 
 uzatne 
 
 the long halberds of the archers of the guard begin 
 to glisten in the moonlight as they go their rounds, 
 clad in trunk hose and striped tunics broidered with 
 the royal cipher. And so Chenonceaux falls into a 
 graceful slumber. Let Diana sleep sound while she 
 can, for the awakening is to be rude enough : the 
 first shock came very unexpectedly. 
 
 In 1559, at the fetes in celebration of the mar- 
 riage of Alva and the Princess Elizabeth, the King 
 had organized a tournament with great magnifi- 
 cence, forgetful of the evil omen with which his 
 reign began, amid similar scenes of ill-considered 
 splendour. Always a good horseman, Henry in- 
 sisted on a bout with the young Comte de Lorges, 
 son of Montgomery of the Scottish Guard. The 
 trumpets ceased as they started, Vieilleville tells 
 us, " which gave us the first trembling presage of 
 the ill that was to happen; " they met and broke 
 their lances, when, as they parted, the King was 
 seen to sway forward in his saddle — the splinters of 
 De Lorges' lance had entered his eye beneath the 
 visor of his helmet. He was carried out fainting, 
 lingered unconscious for four days, and only recov- 
 ered to hand over the government formally to 
 Catherine de Medicis, and then die.^ 
 
 1 See the details in Vieilleville of the experiments made (upon 
 the heads of criminals) by the doctors to try and discover the 
 
6h 
 
 enonceaux 15 
 
 With the King's death came the favourite's dis- 
 grace. Diana was turned out of Chenonceaux by 
 the Regent Catherine, and given Chaumont in ex- 
 change; but it never consoled her for her double 
 grief, and she went to Anet for the rest of her life, 
 where Goujon's statue might remind her of the 
 royal love that she had lost. 
 
 The distinguishing marks of Catherine's strange 
 character soon became apparent in her life at Che- 
 nonceaux. She had a mania for building, and to 
 her is due the long gallery, raised upon the arches 
 of De I'Orme, which is perhaps the least happy of 
 the additions to the original chateau; she had, too, 
 with all the bloodthirsty temperament of her race 
 and her antecedents, the true Medici love for fetes 
 and extravagant revels in this western home, that 
 might have recalled to her the festivals of her child- 
 hood on the Arno.^ 
 
 It was not long before one of these great fetes 
 began. The Court at Amboise had requested a 
 change of atmosphere, for the consequences of a 
 long and persistent massacre of heretics are less 
 
 injury to the King's eye. Dumas describes the accident in 
 Les Deux Dianes. 
 
 1 Touraine is a country of strange and varied habitations ; if 
 the holes and caverns at Rochecorbon and Saumur suggested 
 Troglodytes, there is in Chenonceaux an equal resemblance to 
 the lake-dwellings of an earlier age. 
 
16 did "s. 
 
 ouzatne 
 
 pleasant to the well-conducted mind than the en- 
 couraging spectacle of executions still in progress, 
 so Catherine took advantage of her opportunity and 
 prepared a magnificent reception for the young 
 King and Queen in her new home. 
 
 The Court, as we may suppose, had ridden 
 straight southwards from St. Denis hors, and into 
 the main road by the river at La Croix : a little 
 farther on and they were at the turning to their 
 right, which is the beginning of the main drive of 
 the castle. 
 
 At the foot of every tree stood knots of women in 
 their holiday attire, wearing great broad-brimmed 
 rustic hats and waving many-coloured ribands, 
 while their husbands and brothers with flags flying 
 and drums beating made a brave show upon the 
 little hill at the entrance to the park : ^ at the end 
 of the long drive before the great court, the royal 
 
 1 See a very rare little book, Les Triomphes faicts a I'entree de 
 Francoys II. et de Marye Stuart au chasteau de Chenonceaiix le 
 Dymanche, Dernier Jour de Mars (o.s.), (which was published 
 at Tours in small 4to, reprinted by Techener in 1857), probably 
 written by one Antoine le Plessis-Richelieu, Captain of the 
 King's Guards at Amboise. Mezeray describing the conspiracy 
 of Amboise says: " On donna la commandement des Mousque- 
 taires a Cheval a Antoine du Plessis Richelieu, Gentilhomme 
 Poitevin, tout avoue a la maison de Guise." He was called 
 " le Moine " because he had given up Holy Orders for the 
 military profession. His eldest brother, Louis, was ancestor of 
 the famous Cardinal. 
 
&k 
 
 enonceaux 17 
 
 pair passed beneath a tall triumphal arch reared on 
 four pillars wreathed with ivy, and inscribed " to 
 the Divine Francis," with graceful reference to the 
 seditions lately crushed. Farther on, past a great 
 double fountain, stood two pyramids with Greek 
 inscriptions, the one referring in a brazen way to 
 the utility of a good conscience, the other praising 
 the wakeful habits of Homeric counsellors.^ 
 
 By now the King was crossing to the higher ter- 
 race by a bridge, beneath which countless fish were 
 playing, much to the amusement of the suite, and 
 on the terrace was a great tower, built with many 
 holes, with a bright light within that shone through 
 many-coloured glasses. As he entered the castle 
 an infinity of " fuzees, grenades, et petardes " went 
 ofif in streams of fire, and " the delighted company 
 heard at the same time the roar of thirty cannons 
 ranged upon the quay, which filled the air with 
 echoes for a long time." The evening was too 
 young yet for all the company to go indoors, and 
 they strolled through the gardens to see the column 
 raised by Primaticcio," " on which was placed a 
 
 1 " Nous avons ete contrains," says Guillaume Bourgeat, the 
 printer of this account at Tours, " d'imprimer les vers greques 
 en caracteres latins, d'autant que n'avions nuls caracteres grecs, 
 ce que nous aurons de brief, Dieu aidant." 
 
 2 We can imagine Primaticcio's pleasure at being given the 
 preference over Philibert de TOrme, his rival, after some years 
 of disfavour. 
 
 Vol. II.— 2 
 
18 did "(5. 
 
 ouzaine 
 
 great golden head of Medusa, with parted lips and 
 hair enlaced with snakes," by which was apparently 
 conveyed that " the prudence and wisdom of 
 Minerva accompanied the Queen that day." More 
 columns rose in every corner, crowned with mo- 
 rions and arms, and bearing graceful references in 
 weak distichs to the grief of the Queen-mother; and 
 all the while more and more fireworks went up and 
 fell hissing into the Cher, " so that the very water 
 seemed to burn." Amid the echoes of the last 
 triumphant burst of welcome on the terrace the 
 company moved back past more triumphal arches, 
 and naiads pouring " vin clairet " from their hospita- 
 ble urns, to the entrance gate, where a Pallas, ad- 
 vancing from the balcony above, rained down a 
 shower of flowers and leaves, inscribed with sonnets 
 to the King and Queen. The very trees for many 
 mornings after were vocal with rhyming tablets of 
 more or less ill-written greeting. 
 
 It is pleasant to think that Marie Stuart must have 
 spent some of the happiest months of her troubled 
 life at Chenonceaux, with the young King, about 
 this time. All Catherine's fetes had not so fair an 
 excuse. After a reception given to her son the 
 King, Charles IX., in 1565, in the same grounds, 
 she came here again to meet her favourite son, the 
 Due d'Anjou, who had gone to Chinon after the 
 
Gfienonceaux 19 
 
 marriage of Henry of Navarre and Marguerite, and 
 here she heard of Henry's victory of Montcontour, 
 and wished to change the castle's name to " Bonne 
 Nouvelle," without success. In 1577 there was 
 fresh triumph at the Huguenot defeat at Charite- 
 sur-Loire, which had already been celebrated by 
 extravagant orgies at Plessis-lez-Tours; but Cath- 
 erine determined to outshine them all, and the 
 pleasant fields of Chenonceaux lent themselves 
 more readily to festivals than the somewhat som- 
 bre castle of Louis XI, with all its grim associa- 
 tions. 
 
 The King appeared dressed as a woman,^ with 
 " Master Love " under his arm, no doubt barking at 
 Chicot, and with his " mignons " round him in such 
 enormous rufifs, that " their heads," says the chroni- 
 cler, " looked like the head of John the Baptist on 
 a charger." 
 
 The Queen was there with her daughter Mar- 
 guerite, and the gentle Louise de Lorraine, and all 
 
 1 " Si qu'au premier abord chacun estoit en peine 
 
 S'il voyoit un roy-femme, ou bien un homme-re3me. " 
 
 See Pierre de I'Estoile, Journal de Henri HI. 
 
 Anthropologists may have noticed a " survival " of these ex- 
 traordinary freaks of costume in the peculiar fondness of the 
 Bank Holiday revellers of to-day for an interchange of their 
 masculine headgear with the more alluring ornaments of their 
 female friends. 
 
20 did % 
 
 outaine 
 
 the flying squadron of her maids of honour, with 
 what little dress they had in flattering imitation of 
 the costume which their masculine admirers had 
 similarly exchanged for petticoats. Brantome 
 gives the list of all these lively ladies: Mesde- 
 moiselles de Rohan, de Saint Andre, Davila with 
 stories of the siege of Cyprus, two sisters Gabrielle 
 and Diane d'Estrees, Madame de Sauve, of whom 
 we shall hear more at Blois, and many others. 
 " Tout y estoit en bel ordre," says I'Estoile, so we 
 leave them, with as little scandal as we may, to have 
 their revel out. 
 
 Some ten years afterwards the central figure of 
 the fete was dead. Catherine had passed away at 
 Blois, and Henry had been murdered. One of the 
 most unnoticed of the whole throng at the festi- 
 vals of Catherine came back to Chenonceaux and 
 brought a great change with her. Louise de Lor- 
 raine, of the great house of the Guises, was of very 
 dififerent mould from the wicked little Duchesse de 
 Montpensier, or any of her proud relations — a weak, 
 pure soul, who spent her life in prayer for her worth- 
 less husband, and " stayed where she was," alone 
 with her grief and without the comfort of children 
 to help her bear its burden. The creditors of Cath- 
 erine de Medicis had carried off all that was porta- 
 ble of the work of Bernard Palissy or the sculptures 
 
6li 
 
 enonceaux 21 
 
 of the Italians/ and the first days of Louise were 
 busied in arranging her own " meubles, bijoux et 
 livres," of which the catalogue has been preserved 
 by Prince Galitzin. Among the books was a de- 
 scription by M. Balthasar de Beaujoyeulx (printed 
 in 1582) of the appearance of Louise at the mar- 
 riage fetes of the Due de Joyeuse. This quiet, pure 
 woman, in the midst of a licentious Court, had a 
 beauty of her own that shrank from the light of 
 criticism in an outspoken time, and passed easily 
 unnoticed among the rest. It is to the Venetian 
 ambassador, as usual, that we must look for a deli- 
 cate appreciation of her character and worth. " She 
 is full of a sweet simplicity," says Girolamo Lippo- 
 mano, " which nothing disturbs save the presence 
 of her lord the King, upon whom her eyes are 
 always fixed. Her face is pale and somewhat thin, 
 but she has brilliant eyes and light hair over a pure 
 brow and slight features." 
 
 At Chenonceaux she stayed for eleven years, 
 vainly demanding justice from Henry IV.; but the 
 King could not do much; he had but little income 
 either, to bestow on her; but it was not much she 
 spent upon herself. One day when she was Queen, 
 she had only a hundred crowns in the world, and 
 
 1 See Les Archives de Chenonceaux, published by M. I'Abbe 
 Chevalier, from the original MSS. 
 
22 did ^, 
 
 outaine 
 
 gave them all to a messenger who brought good 
 tidings; and now her small income served her to 
 continue her charity to the famiHes of the poor on 
 the estate. A monument of her care for poor pris- 
 oners still survives in her benefactions to several 
 Paris prisons. 
 
 During the war she writes to the King, who some- 
 times came to visit her himself, that the Sieur de 
 Rosny was trampling over all her ground with his 
 horses, to the great detriment of the good people 
 of the country, " que je vous prie vous souvenir, 
 Monsieur, qu'ils me sont vassaulz et tenus pour moi 
 comme enfants tres afifectionez." 
 
 So, between weeping and caring for her tenants, 
 her sad life wears to its end. Visitors come to her 
 occasionally — Marguerite de Valois, or the King 
 with Gabrielle d'Estrees, but none of them satisfies 
 her sense of injustice and her bitter grief. In 1601 
 she died in the Chateau de Moulins. 
 
 Chenonceaux now passed into the hands of the 
 Duchesse de Mercoeur and the Vendome family, 
 and here, while Richelieu was controlling the des- 
 tinies of France, and the Three Musketeers were 
 quarrelling with his Eminence's guards, Gaston 
 d'Orleans was entertained at supper while the gay 
 Due de Beaufort,^ in despair at all attempts to make 
 
 1 Known in Paris at the time as the " Roi des Halles." 
 
(?A 
 
 enonceaux 23 
 
 her father see a joke, turned to try conversation 
 with his daughter, " la grande Mademoiselle " ; 
 here, in 1650, came Mazarin to be reconciled with 
 the Due de Vendome; and shortly after, the foot- 
 steps of Anne of Austria, with her son, Louis XIV., 
 were heard in the gallery which had seen so many 
 beauties, but few so royal and so fair. A trace of 
 this visit was left at Versailles, where some statues 
 taken from Chenonceaux were sent to grace the 
 royal gardens. 
 
 The last Due de Vendome connected with the 
 chateau was famous for his ugliness, and when very 
 old, and still uglier if possible than before, he mar- 
 ried an extremely plain grand-daughter of the great 
 Conde. Mademoiselle d'Enghien, being unable 
 even in the country to get rid of some of her old 
 habits, was so unfortunate as to drink herself to 
 death. 
 
 The romance of Chenonceaux seemed in danger 
 of being utterly crushed, when a fresh reign began 
 with the new attractions of the literary Madame 
 Dupin, to whom the place was sold in 1733 by the 
 Due de Bourbon, not without great legal disputes, 
 in which the whole process of Diane de Poitiers' 
 elaborate arrangements for possession was brought 
 to light again with a new meaning. One La Ferme 
 had been appointed in the name of the nation as 
 
24 did %. 
 
 ouzatne 
 
 proprietor of Chenonceaux, which was thus consid- 
 ered to be a Crown domain, and there is no Httle 
 irony in the fact of all Diana's schemes, which 
 profited herself so little, having been the main in- 
 strument in proving the inalienable rights of this 
 later owner. 
 
 Even the debts of Catherine de Medicis came up 
 for discussion, and it was only when the last of the 
 descendants of her host of creditors had been proved 
 satisfied that M. Claude Dupin, the Fermier-Gen- 
 eral, a second Bohier in fact, came to Chenonceaux. 
 
 This new proprietor was a friend of Montesquieu 
 and gathered in his wife's salons the most famous 
 literary celebrities of the day. It was a different 
 kind of life from any that had yet been seen in Che- 
 nonceaux. Madame Dupin had a certain intelligent 
 little secretary, who actually had the temerity to fall 
 in love with her, and be gently enough reproved; 
 it is Jean Jacques Rousseau, who shall become the 
 great man of the company later on. Bernis is there, 
 and Buffon, and Voltaire, and unhappy-looking 
 Diderot, with all the Encyclopaedists in his train, ex- 
 horting poor Jean Jacques to " continue virtuous, 
 for the state of those who have ceased to be so makes 
 me shudder." 
 
 The great Revolution, which owed no little to 
 these last visitors to the chateau, spared its beauty 
 
eh 
 
 enonceaux 25 
 
 from the ruin with which it visited so many more 
 illustrious and more noted noble houses. The 
 grand-nephew of Madame Dupin, Rene, Comte de 
 Villeneuve, died here in 1863, after the castle had 
 had yet another literary visit, from George Sand; 
 and the last memories of Chenonceaux hark back 
 again to Scotland with its latest owners, M. Pelouze 
 and his wife Madame Wilson, a relative of that 
 Daniel Wilson from Glasgow who in 1789 was 
 Under-Secretary of State to the Minister of Finance 
 in France, and whose descendant has but lately 
 gained a somewhat unenviable notoriety in French 
 politics. The wire of his telephone to Paris still 
 hangs in the gallery of the chateau. 
 
 By Madame Pelouze much was done to restore 
 the ancient glories of Chenonceaux, which had been 
 somewhat dimmed by the neglect of the Vendomes, 
 but the traditional financial embarrassments which 
 seem to have hung about the place ever since the 
 bankruptcy of the Marques, its first owners, have 
 unfortunately reappeared; the enormous sums spent 
 in decoration, and the splendid fetes that recalled 
 the galas of the sixteenth century, resulted in the 
 arrival of the creditors again, though for less sums 
 than in the days of Catherine de Medicis. 
 
 The chateau is now in the hands of the Credit 
 Foncier, who charge their visitors a franc a head — 
 
26 Old Oowcaine 
 
 " sic transit gloria " — but much of the beauty and 
 all the interest of Chenonceaux still remain. As we 
 left it we saw a solitary swan that floated in the moat; 
 her white breast cut the mirrored image of the walls, 
 and reminded us strangely of the old times that had 
 passed from them. And indeed the traveller will 
 find much that is worthy of a longer visit here than 
 his guide will probably allow him in this home of 
 beautiful women and gigantic debts. He will not 
 be impressed as by the solid masonry and bulk of 
 Chambord or Langeais, but neither will he be left 
 with the sense of a somewhat too respectable and 
 comfortless blank of tradition and association; he 
 may not find here all the history that seems incrusted 
 on the very stones of Blois, but he will not see the 
 blood of Guises on the floors : the charm of the place 
 is a more domestic one; the very attempts at forti- 
 fication only add to its picturesqueness, and are 
 obviously only meant to do so. It seems built 
 especially for the enjoyment of the brilliant Court 
 favourites who so often were its inmates, and to re- 
 flect, in the exuberant fancy and brightness of its 
 architecture, the gaieties which were meant to be 
 habitual within its walls. 
 
 The rich decorations of the rooms of Francis I., 
 the windows of the boudoir from which Diane de 
 Poitiers watched for the coming of her royal lover, 
 
&h 
 
 enonceaux 27 
 
 the pictured faces all along the great gallery upon 
 whose ceiling the light from the waves of the Cher 
 dances in strange flickering fragments, all will im- 
 press him with a sense of beauty, and will leave him 
 with a pleasant memory. At Amboise he will see 
 the dark side of the picture, and watch the next act 
 of the drama at the Court of Francis II. and Marie 
 Stuart. 
 
Ovoo ,,^eend of cfzancey 
 
CHAPTER XIV 
 
 TWO QUEENS OF FRANCE 
 
 " La nef qui disjoint nos amours 
 N'a eu de moi que la moitie, 
 
 Une part te reste, elle est la tienne, 
 Je la fie a ton amitie, 
 
 Pour que de I'autre il te souvienne." 
 
 The scene in French history in which the children 
 
 of Catherine de Medicis played the leading parts, 
 
 and which ended in the capitulation of Paris to 
 
 Henry IV., begins with the reign of Francis II. 
 
 All the principal characters of the drama either 
 
 appear, or are in the near distance. Catherine de 
 
 Medicis, the Queen-mother, and the young Queen, 
 
 Marie Stuart, will be seen first and most clearly; of 
 
 Marguerite de Valois we shall hear more later on, 
 
 as of Jeanne d'Albret, Madame de Montpensier, and 
 
 the lovely Madame de Sauves, Marquise de Noir- 
 
 moutier. 
 
 The reign of Diane de Poitiers was the beginning 
 
 of an influence upon the highest issues of French 
 
 politics, of women with far less self-control, with 
 
 even less scrupulousness, than Henry's favourite — 
 
 31 
 
32 Old ^owcairie 
 
 an influence mainly Italian in its origin, as has been 
 noticed, and to which was due all the misery and 
 bloodshed which the unbridled passions of such 
 women could not but cause. 
 
 Of the men, there appear at this time the first 
 generation of the Guises, the Duke Francois and the 
 Cardinal de Lorraine, powerful with their niece 
 upon the throne of France, the forerunners of the 
 famous Henri de Guise and the second Cardinal; 
 Anne de Montmorency, the Constable, is here too, 
 with his nephews the Chatillons; Antoine of Na- 
 varre, father of " le bon Bearnais " ; the first Prince 
 of Conde; De I'Hopital, Harley, and De Thou; — 
 these make up the more important actors in the 
 drama that is to follow. And upon the scenes, or 
 waiting for their turn, are the maids of honour of 
 Catherine de Medicis, the " mignons " of the future 
 Henry HI.; Besme and Coconnas, the murderers of 
 St. Bartholomew; the grim perfumer of the Queen- 
 mother, Poltrot, Jacques Clement, and Ravaillac. 
 The literary men stand off from such forbidding 
 company: Ronsard, Montaigne, and Estienne Jo- 
 delle, with Beauvais, tutor to the young Prince of 
 Navarre, and many more, are hovering about the 
 Court. 
 
 Let us look closer at some of these as they throng 
 to the Louvre, where Catherine and the Guises are 
 
c'wo c^jieend of cFtance 33 
 
 staying up the young King for his first attempt at 
 royalty. With the Constable, who is talking to 
 Conde and the King of Navarre, are his nephews, 
 Admiral Coligny and the Colonel d'Andelot, watch- 
 ing the clear, keen face of the Cardinal de Guise, 
 with its quick, cat-like eye and the strange hard 
 turn at the corners of his lip, half hidden in the fair 
 hair of the beard; beside him is his brother, the 
 brave Captain Francois, gray of tint and thin in 
 face and body, with light grayish hair, " figure 
 d'aventurier, de parvenu qui voudra parvenir tou- 
 jours " ; in the midst is the little King with his pale 
 puffed face and flat nose,^ between the Scotch- 
 woman and the Florentine, whose strong, intelHgent 
 head, the true muzzle of the Medicis, becomes all 
 but bestial in the prominent mouth and underhang- 
 ing jowl of later life; but on the other side, in 
 contrast to the pale Italian, is the lovely Marie, for 
 whose love this half-grown King, distracted at the 
 gift of so much beauty, was to exhaust his feeble 
 strength and die; for never was there charmer of 
 more power than Marie Stuart. Fortunately we are 
 only concerned with her life in France, and with the 
 
 1 " II avait le nez fort camus," says Louis Regnier de la 
 Planche in a passage in which the various weaknesses of the 
 sickly Francis are detailed. Anne the Constable was known as 
 " le camus de Montmorency," from his flat nose. 
 Vol. II.— 3 
 
34 Old Oowcaine 
 
 later years so fruitful in controversy of her 
 chequered career in Scotland, we have nothing 
 to do. 
 
 King James of Scotland had married the daughter 
 of Claude de Lorraine, Due de Guise, and from the 
 troubles of a country constantly at variance with 
 England, their daughter Marie escaped when quite 
 young to the shelter of the French Court. There 
 we hear of her first in 1554, at a fete in the gardens 
 of St. Germain, where she appeared by the side of 
 the pretty Miss Fleming. Authentic portraits of 
 her a few years later show her with the auburn- 
 tinted hair and the fine transparent skin of the paint- 
 ing at Azay-le-Rideau, the complexion she shared 
 with her uncle the Cardinal, and the quick, light eye 
 of brownish tinge that could be hard and fixed at 
 will; but her youthful beauty, which was undenia- 
 ble at this time at any rate, was the least among her 
 charms. " Showing an astonishing acquaintance," 
 says Michelet, " with books, affairs, and men, well 
 versed in politics at ten, and mistress of the French 
 Court at fifteen, she ruled everything by her word, 
 by the charm of her presence, which troubled every 
 heart. In this wonder, whom the Guises brought to 
 France, every human gift was united save self-con- 
 trol and tact; fantastic and visionary, for all her 
 keenness in intrigue, for all her seeming cunning 
 
(yfbazie (Stuart 
 
Owo ..^eend of cFtance 35 
 
 and finesse, she ended by falling into every snare 
 her enemies spread for her." ^ 
 
 Yet during the few months of her power in 
 France, a power that has been too little recognised, 
 no one could escape her influence, the Queen- 
 mother no more than the rest. A little court of 
 poets gathered round her, Du Bellay and De Maison 
 Fleur ^ among them, whose verses were answered 
 with her own, and gave yet another charm to such 
 memories as those of Chenonceaux. She left 
 France with the sorrow of her young dead husband 
 in her heart, and the sweet verses of her favourite 
 Ronsard in her memory, verses in which for once 
 the poet forgot to be classical and gave utterance 
 to a natural beauty of pathos and expression, but 
 too rare in his writings. 
 
 1 It is interesting to note French opinion on her character 
 from another point of view. 
 
 " L'ennemie la plus intime," says Balzac, " et la plus habile 
 de Catherine de Medicis etait sa belle-fille la reine Marie, petite 
 blonde, malicieuse comme une soubrette, here comme une Stu- 
 art qui portait trois couronnes, instruite comme un vieux 
 savant, espiegle comme une pensionnaire de convent, amou- 
 reuse de son mari comme une courtisane Test de son amant, 
 devouee a ses oncles qu'elle admirait, et heureuse de voir le 
 roi Frangois partager, elle y aidant, la bonne opinion qu'elle 
 avait d'eux." — Etudes Philosophiques sur Catherine de Medicis, 
 p. 90. 
 
 2 Not so well known as his companions ; he was a Huguenot 
 writer of some celebrity in his time, author of Les Divins 
 C antiques, Anvers, 1580. 
 
36 ULd Oowcatne 
 
 " Adieu," she cries, upon the deck of the ship that 
 bore her from Calais. " Adieu done, ma chere 
 France, je ne vous verrai jamais plus." The words 
 of Beranger are too true — 
 
 " Adieu, charmant pays de France, 
 Que je dois tant cherir; 
 Berceau de mon heureuse enfance, 
 Adieu, te quitter c'est mourir." 
 
 She left a country where she was always regretted, 
 and which kept a romantic memory of her beauty, a 
 tender pity for her sorrows. The Guises could make 
 no motion at her death, for they were paralysed by 
 the murder of Le Balafre, but the French Court had 
 done its utmost to save the victim of its plots with 
 Scotland, and the whole country felt the compas- 
 sion for her misfortunes, which makes Brantome's 
 account rise above the ordinary level of a gossiping 
 Court chronicle. 
 
 " This Queen," says Giovanni Correro eight years 
 afterwards, " while she kept the love of her honour 
 and the fear of God before her eyes, reigned in a 
 most admirable manner, so that all the world won- 
 dered to see a young girl, so delicately nurtured and 
 so little used to government, able to resist the influ- 
 ences against her. The Pope especially favoured 
 her, sending her encouragement with words and 
 
uwo ^ueend of atance 37 
 
 money. But her joy was short-lived; at one blow 
 she lost her husband, her freedom, and her crown." 
 
 " Tout ce qui est de beau ne se garde longtemps," 
 
 sings Ronsard, 
 
 " Les roses at les lis ne regnent qu'un printemps, 
 Ainsi vostre beaute, seulement apparue 
 Quinze ou seize ans en France est soudain disparue." ^ 
 
 She left France and the intrigues of the decaying 
 dynasty of the Valois for a rude atmosphere where 
 stronger wills than hers were paramount, and where 
 she had no longer strength to fight against ne- 
 cessity.^ 
 
 Of very different mould is the woman standing 
 near her by the King's chair. It becomes necessary 
 to have a clear idea of the character which dominates 
 the next thirty years of French history, and who, in 
 1533, left the intrigues of Italy, to contaminate the 
 French Court. 
 
 1 Malherbe's improvement on these lines ran as follows : — 
 
 " Elle etait de ce monde oh les plus belles choses 
 Ont le pire destin ; 
 Et, rose, elle a vecu ce que vivent les roses 
 L'espace d'un matin." 
 
 2 " L'Angleterre impie," cries Dumas, " ce bourreau fatal de 
 tout ce que la France eut de divin, tua avec elle la grace, 
 comme elle avait deja tue Tinspiration en Jeanne d'Arc, 
 comme elle devait tuer en Napoleon le genie." 
 
38 Old Ooutalne 
 
 About Catherine de Medicis at least, there can be 
 no doubt as to the verdict, and even the brilliant 
 attempt of Balzac cannot change the judgment of 
 posterity on one of the most infamous women who 
 ever held the royal power. 
 
 The present school of historical criticism, if it de- 
 lights in destroying old ideals, has shown itself no 
 less skilful at whitewashing characters hitherto con- 
 demned without appeal; and in many cases a fairer 
 estimate of results has been arrived at; but difBcult 
 as it is to accept even a modified picture of the vil- 
 lainies of a Louis XI,, it becomes impossible to 
 acquiesce in the strained attempt after originality 
 and paradox, which becomes obvious in any apology 
 for Catherine; nor will the well-worn argument of 
 the dangers of her situation or the habits of her time 
 suffice to clear her character. Such arguments 
 might have been used in her favour, were her acts, 
 her policy, and her influence other than they are — 
 in the face of results they become absolutely untena- 
 ble. Nor is it merely a wholesale feeling of dis- 
 gust at the tendencies and methods of the age, that 
 leads us unequivocally to condemn one of its chief 
 personages. Of the three Queens of that time it 
 was given to but one to succeed, and in her success 
 to build up the greatness of the English nation. 
 The unhappy fate of Marie Stuart has procured a 
 
^wo ^ueend of azatice 39 
 
 pardon for her faults, the death of Catherine de 
 Medicis was welcomed as a release from an ever- 
 present evil, as the beginning of an attempt to bet- 
 ter things. The lives of Coligny, of Jeanne d'Al- 
 bret, of Henry of Navarre, of Michel de I'Hopital, 
 show that even in the sixteenth century it was possi- 
 ble to fulfil many duties, many obligations, without 
 the stain of lying or of murder/ 
 
 When first Catherine came to the Court to marry 
 the young Dauphin, with her caressing manners 
 and her Spanish etiquette, Diane de Poitiers was 
 
 1 Of contemporary authorities perhaps the most severe 
 criticism is the Discours merveilleux de la vie, actions et de- 
 portemens de la reine Catherine de Medicis, attributed to Beze, 
 probably the work of Estienne, and in any case a brilliant piece 
 of writing — first published in 1574. D'Aubigne is also on the 
 Huguenot side against the Queen. Brantome gives us the 
 extreme of all that could be said in her favour by a partisan 
 of her Court. In De Castelnau, Tavannes, De Bordenaye, and 
 the Memoires of Marguerite de Valois, there is also much to 
 be gathered. The Venetian ambassadors in France at this 
 time, when Venice was still powerful enough to be fearless in 
 judging other nations when she wished, have a feeling of hon- 
 esty and strength behind them, that gives great value to their 
 impartial judgments, while their artistic sensibility gives a 
 colour and a refinement to their descriptions, very rare in other 
 writings. Finally, a large collection of the actual letters of 
 the Queen-mother afford a source of information that admits 
 of no dispute. Passing over English writers, and omitting the 
 Life by Balzac as a brilliant literary paradox, the Catherine 
 de Medicis, Mere des Rois, etc., by M. Capefigue, 1856, may 
 be taken as an example of the apologetic school in France, 
 fortunately not a numerous one. 
 
40 did "Q. 
 
 owcatne 
 
 pointing out " the siiopkeeper's daughter " to the 
 courtiers, and the keen-eyed Venetian ambassador, 
 Marino Giustiniano had already noticed the discon- 
 tent of the whole nation at the marriage. " Men 
 find," he says, " that the Pope (her uncle) has de- 
 ceived the King," and the Dauphin himself was no 
 better pleased with the match; it was not merely as 
 a merchant's daughter,^ not merely as one to whom 
 deceit and lying were as habitual as breath, that he 
 
 1 For details of the early life of Catherine see the researches 
 of M. Alberi and M. de Remmont, collected from the archives 
 at Venice. 
 
 Her descent from the founder of the family is as follows : — 
 
 Giovanni de Medici (d. 1428) . 
 
 Cosmo (Pater Patriae, d. 1464) 
 Pietro (d. 1472) 
 
 Lorenzo il Magniiico (d. 1492) Julian 
 
 I Pope Clement VII. 
 
 Alfonsina, daughter = Pietro the Unfortunate 
 
 of Orsino, 
 Constable of France 
 
 Lorenzo, Due d'Urbino (d. 1519) = Magdalena, daughter of Jean 
 
 Ide la Tour, Comte of 
 Boulogne and Auvergne 
 
 Henry II. of France = Catherine de Medici (1519-1589). 
 
 It is curious to note that Catherine was distantly related to 
 both her rivals at the French Court — to Marie Stuart through 
 the Duke of Albany, son of James III. and Anne de la Tour, 
 the aunt of Catherine ; to Diane de Poitiers through her father, 
 Jean de Poitiers, whose mother, Jeanne de Boulogne, was an 
 aunt of Magdalena de la Tour. 
 
 In connection with Catherine's own children the Pope's re- 
 mark on leaving her at Marseilles is interesting. " A figlia 
 d' inganno non manca mai la figliuolanza." 
 
^wo ^leend of c/tance 41 
 
 disliked her, but " as some serpent born of tainted 
 parents in the charnel-houses of Italy." ^ 
 
 The strange sight of the foreign wife protected 
 and befriended by the French mistress, is explained 
 by Diana's fear that the throne in default of direct 
 heirs would fall to her enemies; and when at last 
 a child was born, it was the weak and ill-formed 
 Francis, who died before his time, and bequeathed 
 the civil wars to France; then came the madman 
 Charles IX., with the blood of St. Bartholomew's 
 Day upon his hands; then the effeminate Henry, 
 weak and spiteful as he was cowardly, who debased 
 the country to his own degraded level; and after 
 bearing such a brood, the pale, fat-faced Florentine 
 grew old and battened on the miseries of France. 
 Educated among the faction and intrigue of the 
 Italian Republics, when murder was the habitual 
 solution of a difficulty, with little knowledge of 
 French customs, no prejudices of birth or aristoc- 
 racy, as incredulous of good as she was supersti- 
 tious and given over to enchantments,^ she only saw 
 
 1 She had no children for ten years. This, say her apolo- 
 gists, was more Henry's fault than hers, but the fact remains, 
 and I cannot help seeing more truth in Michelet, than in the 
 untranslatable explanations of Brantome, Balzac, and the 
 others. 
 
 2 See the traces of her cabalistic figures at Chaumont, her 
 tower " Uraniae Sacrum " at Blois. " The eccentricities of 
 genius," says M. Capefigue. 
 
42 Old ^outaine 
 
 in France another Florence to be cowed by the old 
 mean methods, and in the factions of Guises and 
 Chatillons another quarrel to be settled like the 
 feuds of Medici and Pazzi. Where it was impossi- 
 ble to avail herself of the secrets of Ruggieri, she 
 unhesitatingly made every use which a cynical im- 
 morality could suggest of the " escadron volant " 
 that was always at her orders. The statesman 
 whose position saved him from assassination was 
 seldom man enough to resist the temptations of an 
 intrigue; he was entangled at the critical moment, 
 and his opportunity was lost. Antoine de Navarre 
 and Conde were only two examples among many 
 of the astuteness of the Queen-mother's policy. 
 Jeanne d'Albret's letters from Blois show the disgust 
 and alarm which were aroused in a good woman 
 by contact with this society at Court. ^ 
 
 Crushed and humiliated from her very infancy, 
 broken by the contempt of Henry II., at the mercy 
 of his mistress, and eclipsed by the young Queen of 
 
 1 M. Capefigue's explanation is worth hearing. By the sweet 
 influence of the " escadron volant " the soft airs and graces 
 of the Court were to tone down the rough and violent society 
 of the time. " Au milieu des plaisirs des fetes et du luxe, 
 elle esperait user ces ames ardentes, ces coeurs de fer et de 
 feu." After this it is only to be expected that we should find 
 that " the Mignons were encouraged to show what a Court 
 ought to be," that " Henry of Navarre was coarse compared 
 with them," and other extraordinary statements. 
 
Owo c^^eend of cFtance 43 
 
 Scotland, Catherine seemed to see in the early years 
 of Charles IX.'s reign, her first glimpse of the power 
 she thirsted for, which had almost escaped her in the 
 short life of Francis II. 
 
 But the strength of the Guises soon taught her, at 
 Vassy and at Fontainebleau, that her time was not 
 yet. " She felt their heavy hand upon her neck and 
 bowed her head; her heart fell back again to the 
 meanness that was natural to it " : she played the 
 good Queen-mother at the Guises' bidding. 
 
 " She never leaves the King," writes Giovanni 
 Michiel, who gives some striking details of the life 
 of the French Court. " She keeps the seal which 
 the King uses, which they call cachet. . . . 
 The Queen-mother is very fond of the good things 
 of life; her habits are irregular and she eats much, 
 but afterwards seeks remedy in strong exercise; she 
 walks, rides,^ and is never still; strangest of all, she 
 has even been seen out hunting. But in spite of all 
 this, her face is always pale and almost of a greenish 
 tinge, and she is very fat." Even the Italian am- 
 bassadors cannot find much to praise in their com- 
 patriot, though they do their best. "As to the 
 Queen," says another, Michele Suriano, "it is 
 
 1 " Elle estoit fort bien a cheval et bardie, et s'y tenoit de 
 fort bonne grace, ayant este la premiere qui avoit mis la jambe 
 sur I'arQon, d'autant que la grace y estoit bien plus belle et 
 apparoissante que sur la planchette." — Brantome. 
 
44 ULd Ooiitaine 
 
 enough to say she is a true Florentine if ever there 
 was one, but it is impossible to deny that she is a 
 woman of great tact and intellectual vigour." 
 Brantome and Davila agree in this last opinion, 
 which is perhaps the best that can be said of Cather- 
 ine, for even the feelings of maternity which she 
 shared in common with the brutes were perverted 
 by her superstition and her cruelty, and warped into 
 a preference for the least worthy of her sons, the 
 miserable Henry, Due d'Anjou. Her son Charles 
 had only frightened her whenever he attempted to 
 show a will of his own; for Francis she felt too much 
 contempt for love; in Henry alone she could see her 
 own nature reflected, womanish and Italian, witty, 
 heartless and corrupted. 
 
 It is only necessary to peruse the letters she was 
 perpetually scribbling ^ at the time to be convinced 
 of her true character. Throughout them all is the 
 same undercurrent of commercial vulgarity, of plot- 
 ting and intrigue, of requests for help for Gondi and 
 Bizago, and the rest of her Italian proteges. 
 
 " She does everything a man could do, and yet 
 she is scarcely loved," says Correro again naively in 
 the reign of Charles IX. " The Huguenots say 
 that she deceived them by her fair words and her 
 
 1 " Je la vis une fois, pour une apres disnee, escrire de sa 
 main vingt pures lettres et longues." — Brantome, 
 
Owo c:^eend of a'cance 45 
 
 false air of kindliness, while all the time she was 
 plotting their destruction with the Catholic King; 
 the Catholics, on the other hand, say that if the 
 Queen had not encouraged the Huguenots they 
 would not have gone so far." 
 
 " Extremes disgusted her," explains M. Cape- 
 figue : " she tried to unite both parties to the 
 King." As a matter of fact she played fast and 
 loose with one after the other, and the only consis- 
 tent motive in the hand-to-mouth policy of her 
 whole life was her insatiate ambition for her own 
 and for her children's greatness.^ 
 
 It scarcely needed the terrible picture in Dumas' 
 Reine Margot, of Catherine ranging like a wolf 
 among the dead, for us to imagine how she ruined 
 the diseased and excitable nature of her son Charles, 
 and drove him slowly mad by hideous plots and 
 countless thwartings of his feeble attempts at right- 
 eous government. So well recognised had her 
 character become that the danger of her friendship 
 was a proverb at the Court.^ No one could feel safe 
 with a woman who took such obvious delight in 
 
 1 See Martin, Hist. ix. 271. 
 
 2 " Quand elle appelait quelqu'un * mon amy ' c'estoit qu'elle 
 I'estimoit sot ou qu'elle estoit en colere," etc. . . . " Je la 
 vis une fois . . . tout du long du chemin lire dans un 
 parchemin tout un proces verbal que Ton avoit fait de Derdois, 
 basque, secretaire favory du Connestable," etc. — Brantonie. 
 
46 6 Id "lO. 
 
 owcatne 
 
 condemnations and in trials, whose relaxation from 
 a satiety of festivals was the sight of organised 
 butcheries, which restored her the energies for 
 renewed debauchery and dissipation. From the 
 revels at Blois she moves to the massacres at Am- 
 boise, and completes the round of pleasure with the 
 fetes at Chenonceaux : even if her complicity in the 
 murders of St. Bartholomew were not completely 
 proved, it would be hard to acquit any one who had 
 such interest in the death of the Huguenot leaders 
 as had Catherine, but it was entirely owing to her 
 evil suggestions that the mind of the unhappy King 
 was worked up to the pitch of frenzy required to let 
 loose the wild fanaticism of Paris, that might even 
 still have been restrained. After the massacre she 
 triumphantly showed the papers of the murdered 
 Admiral Coligny to Walsingham, Elizabeth's am- 
 bassador. " Le voila votre ami," she cried, " voyez 
 s'il aimait I'Angleterre." — " Madame," replies the 
 Englishman, " at least he loved France." ^ And as 
 a true lover of his country, as one of the few real 
 heroes of that time, Coligny was especially obnox- 
 
 1 Among many contemporary witnesses see La Noue's testi- 
 mony to the worth of Coligny in Discours Politiques et Mili- 
 taires, xxvi. " Troisiemes Troubles," Bale, 1587, p. 702. 
 " Or, si quelqu'un en ces lamentables guerres a grandement 
 travaille et du corps et de I'esprit, on peut dire que c'a este 
 M. I'Amiral . . . somme, c'etait un personnage digne de 
 restituer un Estat affoibly et corrompue." 
 
(Datliexlne dc Wljedlctd 
 
 cfrom. a poxtxah in the %ffyl gaLiexy, 
 
 cHoxence. Sj^xUM unknown 
 
O'WO <:^ieend of cFtance 47 
 
 ious to Catherine; and France, which still trembled, 
 began at last to see the truth. " She is accused," 
 says Giovanni Michiel in 1575, " of every evil that 
 has desolated the kingdom; up till this time she was 
 but little liked, now she is detested." For thir- 
 teen years longer her pale face was at the King's 
 shoulder whispering the venom of her counsels to 
 his cowardly heart. In the reign of Henry III. at 
 Blois we shall meet her again, and there the end 
 comes worthily, after her son, who had begun his 
 career with the death of the chief of the Protestants, 
 had ended it with the murder of the head of the 
 Catholic League. Her tricks and schemes are over, 
 she is found out at last, and dies beneath the rooms 
 where Guise was stabbed to death; her body, which 
 found but scant and hasty burial, was left almost 
 forgotten, and hurried to its tomb from the Church 
 of St. Sauveur. 
 
Chmbol 
 
 otdey 
 
CHAPTER XV 
 
 AMBOISE 
 
 " Carolus Octavus primus me erexit in urbem; 
 
 Hunc fontem, Hos muros, Haec mihi templa dedit 
 Ambosa." 
 
 Bishop of Arezzo to Piero di Medici, 1493. 
 
 The Castle of Amboise stands high above the town, 
 Hke another Acropolis above a smaller Athens; it 
 rises upon the only height visible for some distance, 
 and is in a commanding position for holding the 
 level fields of Touraine*around it, and securing the 
 passage of the Loire between Tours and Chaumont, 
 which is the next link in the chain that ends at Blois. 
 
 The river at this point is divided in two by an 
 island, as is so often the case where the first bridge- 
 builders sought to join the wide banks of the Loire, 
 and on this little spot between the waters Clovis is 
 said to have met Alaric before he overthrew the 
 power of the Visigoths in Aquitaine. 
 
 Amboise gains even more from the river than the 
 other chateaux of the Loire. The magnificent 
 round tower that springs from the end of Charles 
 VIIL's facade completely commands the ap- 
 
 51 
 
52 Old ^ouzaine 
 
 proaches of the bridge, and the extraordinary effect 
 of lofty masonry, produced by building on the sum- 
 mit of an elevation and carrying the stone courses 
 upwards from the lower ground, is here seen at its 
 best. 
 
 Through the white houses of the little town that 
 cluster round the lofty castle, " like crumbs that 
 have fallen from a well-laden table," ^ we passed 
 towards the archway which gives entrance to the 
 castle from behind, though the " drawbridge, which 
 had an invention to let one fall, if not premonished," 
 no longer existed. The moats across which Evelyn 
 passed in 1644, and which are clearly drawn in 
 prints of the sixteenth century,^ no longer exist. A 
 winding ascent led us into the gardens, which have 
 a special charm of beauty, removed and isolated 
 from the common life below, lifted high in the air on 
 the great rock of the fortress, and surrounded by its 
 towers and terraces. Here we were left to wander 
 for a time when we first arrived, and discovered 
 alone the lovely little chapel of St. Hubert, with an 
 
 1 Mr. Henry James, op. cit. The few chapters on Touraine 
 by this writer are full of picturesque and appreciative touches 
 of the impression which the mere exterior of all these chateaux 
 leaves upon an artistic visitor; see especially his description 
 of Blois {A Little Tour in France). 
 
 2 In the picture of La Renaudie's death, for instance, which 
 will be referred to in subsequent pages. 
 
U^mboide 53 
 
 extraordinary carving above the doorway, repre- 
 senting St. Hubert's encounter with the miraculous 
 Stag. The building looks very tiny in one corner 
 of this vast courtyard, but the charming effect of its 
 light buttresses, rising from below and cHnging to 
 the great outer walls of rock and brickwork until 
 they end in finely chiselled pinnacles that blossom 
 from the angles of its roof, is completed by a rich- 
 ness and care in the workmanship of the interior 
 very rarely surpassed by any monument of its time; 
 the inner surface of its walls is a marvel of beautiful 
 stone carving fine as lace, and shows up the more as 
 it is almost the only work of the kind to be seen at 
 Amboise. The chapel was built ^ by Charles VIII. 
 after his return from Italy, and was no doubt carved 
 by the Italian artists who came with him. There is 
 a strangely grotesque figure of an ape above the 
 altar, which is mentioned by M. Champfleury 
 (Histoire de la Caricature au moyen age) as peculiarly 
 distinctive of that period of Italian taste. The 
 whole has been restored and strengthened with the 
 
 1 Any one who knows Oxford will remember the carving 
 which is above the entrance gate of Merton ; let him imagine 
 this inserted above the door of Exeter College Chapel, and the 
 whole raised upon steep walls many feet into the air, and he 
 will have a faint idea of the chapel at Amboise, which is on 
 much the same lines (very much reduced, but in perfect pro- 
 portion) as the Sainte Chapelle at Paris, with the same light 
 spire. 
 
64 did ^, 
 
 owcaine 
 
 greatest care and success since 1872 by the architect 
 of M. le Comte de Paris, in whose possession the 
 castle then was, and it is by his care, too, that the 
 beauty of the great towers, built by Charles VIII. 
 about the same time, remains in its original condi- 
 tion, stripped of the hideous modern erections 
 which formerly defaced them. Amboise has not 
 always met with such careful treatment; in 1806 a 
 certain vandal senator, one Roger Ducos, irrepara- 
 bly destroyed a great part of the old buildings to 
 avoid the trouble and expense of keeping them in 
 proper repair; nor did the war of 1870 spare the 
 place entirely, for when the bridge was blown up, 
 the excessive quantity of powder employed loosened 
 the foundations of several parts of the chateau, and 
 almost produced incalculable disaster. 
 
 Little more than the actual rooms and walls built 
 by Charles VIII. , with various modern restorations 
 that were only necessitated from decay and never 
 look incongruous, now remains at Amboise. We 
 shall see more of them as we look closer into the 
 story of the castle, ana though of the interior there 
 is absolutely nothing worth inspection left, the out- 
 side walls and terraces have a grandeur all their own 
 that compensates for any shortcomings within. 
 
 But Amboise has a history before the days of 
 Charles VIIL There was without doubt a Roman 
 
(?lie tJJootwaif of (pkapel at Ci^mhoi 
 
 016 e 
 
Ubmbotde 55 
 
 camp here, but the traditions of the ubiquitous 
 Caesar must be received with caution/ The so- 
 called " Greniers de Cesar," strange, unexplained 
 constructions caverned in the soft rock, are proved 
 to be the work of a later age by that same indefatiga- 
 ble Abbe Chevalier to whom we have been already 
 indebted for so much archaeological research. A 
 possible explanation of them is contained in an old 
 Latin history of the castle, which goes down to the 
 death of Stephen of England. According to this,^ 
 the Romans had held Amboise from the days of 
 Caesar till the reign of Diocletian; the Baugaredi or 
 Bagaudae then put them to flight, but let the rest of 
 the inhabitants remain, who, " being afraid to live 
 above ground, tunnelled beneath it, and made a 
 
 1 The Chronicle written by the monk Jean de Marmoutier in 
 the twelfth century says that Caesar on his way back from the 
 siege of Bourges was so struck with the strategical position 
 of Amboise that he built a tower upon the rock, and raised 
 upon the whole a great statue of the god Mars, which fell in 
 a miraculous storm raised by St. Martin to abolish the em- 
 blems of paganism. Touraine is full of the strangest tradi- 
 tions of Julius Csesar. The most amusing instance of such 
 stories I have found is the passport gravely asserted to be 
 authentic which runs as follows : " Laissez passer le nomme 
 Cesar. (Signe) Vercingetorix." 
 
 - " Liber de Compositione Castri Ambacias et ipsius Domi- 
 norum Gestis," which is No. 9 in a collection bound together 
 called Veterum aliquot Scriptorum qui in Gallics Bibliothecis 
 maxine Benedictorum latuerant Spicilegium, torn, x., pub- 
 lished in Paris 1671. 
 
56 Old Ooutaine 
 
 great colony of subterranean dwellings in the holes 
 they had dug out," a custom apparently common in 
 Touraine from the earliest times, and of which we 
 have already noticed several instances. The Ro- 
 mans at any rate left unmistakable traces of their 
 presence; many of their architectural remains still 
 exist, and their fort is spoken of by Sulpicius Sev- 
 erus; but they can have built no bridge of stone, 
 for in St. Gregory's time there were only boats 
 available for the crossing of the river,^ 
 
 One more detail occurs in the Latin chronicler 
 which is too attractive to English readers to be 
 omitted, in spite of the suspicions somewhat brutally 
 expressed in a marginal note by some more modern 
 critic. At the time when the Romans had lost all 
 hold upon the province, one Maximus, the captain 
 of the castle, gave his daughter in marriage to the 
 King of Britain, after which it came into possession 
 of King Arthur, who gave it back to the Franks 
 " before he sailed away to conquer Mordred, and 
 was slain in the Isle of Avalon." 
 
 But by the time of Clovis, Amboise begins to 
 stand clearly out from the mist of tradition and un- 
 certainty, and in the ninth century the great tower, 
 which had already become a fortress, was in the 
 
 1 M. Mabille, op. cit. (cap. i.), Bihl. de I'&cole des Chartes, 
 Touraine. 
 
Chmboide 57 
 
 power of the Counts of Anjou, and in 1016 we hear 
 of the Angevin captain, Pontlevoy, bringing back 
 much plunder from the conquest of Odo of Blois and 
 storing it in the great keep of Amboise. 
 
 Not till the fifteenth century did the castle be- 
 come royal property, when it was confiscated by 
 Charles VII. as a punishment for treacherous deal- 
 ings with the invading English very similar to the 
 treason discovered at Chenonceaux just before. 
 But beyond threatening the fortifications of the 
 place this King did Httle for his new possession. 
 
 In a few years the castle is overshadowed by the 
 cruel spectre of Louis XI., whose memory has 
 already spoilt several charming views for us. It was 
 to Amboise that the father of this unfiHal prince was 
 carried from Chinon on his way north, when wearied 
 out by the annoyance caused by the Dauphin's plots. 
 The castle had become a royal residence, and soon 
 after the whole town turns out to meet the new King 
 with a " moralite que maistre Estienne avait faite 
 pour jouer ladite joyeuse venue," for Amboise was 
 already famous for those dramatic performances al- 
 ways so dear to the French, and particularly to these 
 citizens, in the old days at any rate. There is no 
 trace of such frivolities now in the sleepy little town. 
 
 Then, " wine was given to all comers to drink at 
 the expense of the town," with a wild hospitality 
 
58 uLd Oomaine 
 
 which told upon the civic treasury somewhat too 
 heavily; but they made merry while they could: 
 Louis XL was but newly crowned, the whips had 
 not yet changed to scorpions. In less than four 
 years the actors had thrown away their motley, and, 
 clad in what steel they had, were formed into a civic 
 guard for the protection of the town. The Duke of 
 Burgundy had already begun to show how true he 
 was to be to the troublesome traditions of his house, 
 and the word " Peronne " had furnished the latest 
 jest for Paris, always ready to laugh at a faux pas 
 even of its King. 
 
 It was at Amboise that Louis XL instituted the 
 Order of St. Michael, that was to rival the dignity 
 of the famous Order of the Golden Fleece, and at 
 this time the arms of France were first surrounded 
 with the chain of cockle-shells that held the figure 
 of the Saint conquering Satan.^ A representation of 
 a meeting of this Order in August 1469 at Amboise 
 occurs in the " Statutes of the Order," dated from 
 Plessis-lez-Tours, which is decorated with minia- 
 tures, and preserved at Paris. 
 
 But in spite of troubles with Burgundy and taxa- 
 tions from the King's council, all brightness was not 
 quite gone from the little town, for more Mystery 
 
 1 Travellers who have visited Mont St. Michel will agree 
 that the shells from Cancale and that part of the coast quite 
 deserve their proud position in the royal escutcheon. 
 
Ubmbolde 59 
 
 Plays were occasioned by the birth of the future 
 Charles VIII., and not many years after Louis made 
 his last visit to Amboise to give his son his blessing, 
 whatever that might be worth, before retiring to try 
 to keep out death by lock and key, by moats and 
 man-traps, in his dismal fortress at Plessis-lez- 
 Tours. 
 
 During his reign Amboise, both town and castle, 
 suffered from the depression that was general 
 throughout France; even their Mystery Plays seem 
 to have somewhat flagged. Some three hundred 
 years of jesting at the Pope and the morality of ab- 
 beys had begun to weary; these representations, 
 which had begun by being always of a religious 
 character, had made a new departure in the Mistere 
 du Siege df Orleans, already quoted; yet even here 
 there is a whole company of heavenly actors. Be- 
 fore this the author could merely change the words 
 of Scripture in the mouths of secondary personages 
 whose comic interludes produced the only effect 
 that gave success, and were the supreme effort of 
 contemporary dramatic art; plot there was none, 
 only a multiplicity of variety and scene. Rabelais 
 tells us of Villon's efforts in this direction, and 
 draws several lively pictures of the Comedies and 
 Diableries which followed, for which last the town 
 of Doue was particularly famous. 
 
60 Old ^ 
 
 owcaine 
 
 The " Mystery Plays," properly so called, were of 
 very early origin, and were possibly an attempt to 
 present to all classes a vivid enactment of sacred 
 scenes which had not yet become public property 
 by the agency of the printing press. The story of 
 Daniel, or the parable of the Ten Virgins, became 
 much more of a reality to the common people when 
 actually thrown into life and action before their eyes, 
 than when spelt out with difificulty from a rare manu- 
 script, or misunderstood from the readings of some 
 ecclesiastic in a foreign tongue. The custom thus 
 originated lasted long after the presses of Faust and 
 Gutenberg had popularised literature, sacred and 
 profane, even after the movement of the Reforma- 
 tion had given a French Bible to the nation, and a 
 Marot had produced his metrical version of the 
 Psalms. But it was not from these that the drama 
 of Moliere drew its inspiration, nor from what is 
 known as the " profane mystery," a kind of horrible 
 parody upon Biblical subjects, but from the " mo- 
 ralities," the farces, and " soties," which had their 
 origin in the innate dramatic instinct of the French 
 people. The farce of Patelin,^ for instance, was a 
 very fair reproduction of the manners of the time, 
 
 1 The farce of Patelin was very celebrated in the sixteenth 
 century. It was composed between 1467 and 1470. For a 
 criticism and analysis of it see Estienne Pasquier, Recherches, 
 viii. 59, p. 780 (ed. 1621). 
 
Chmbolde 61 
 
 and as such it has been already quoted, and indeed 
 so great a hold did these representations gain upon 
 the public mind that we find such a piece as the 
 Farce du Paste et de la Tarte retaining its popularity 
 until the days of Louis XIV., when Moliere's com- 
 pany took the place of the Comediens de I'Hotel 
 de Bourgogne. These last " Comediens " were a 
 survival of the old " Confrerie de la Passion," a so- 
 ciety of actors who had almost superseded the old 
 " Basoche " and the " Enfants sans Souci," by an 
 audacious mixture of the old and established Script- 
 ural subjects with grotesque or obscene incidents 
 which appealed to the grossness of the time, while 
 it reflected the chaotic nature of the religious sym- 
 pathies and beliefs of men in the thick darkness of 
 the Middle Ages. There is in them the same ghastly 
 mockery of holiness which disgusts us chiefly in the 
 character of Louis XL, as it will sicken us later on 
 in Henry IIL The hideous cloak of superstition 
 and idolatry which Louis called religion, still more 
 perhaps the heartless cruelty of the man in private 
 as well as in public relations with his fellow-man, all 
 this remained far too clear for us to be long doubtful 
 about the sincerity of the joy of Amboise when the 
 old cry was heard again, " Le Roi est mort, vive le 
 roi." 
 
 For some time the Dauphin had been living at 
 
62 did %. 
 
 outatne 
 
 Amboise in idleness and seclusion; but the accounts 
 of his father's neglect are not to be too hastily be- 
 lieved. Louis has quite enough to answer for with- 
 out this being laid to his charge unnecessarily, and 
 the testimony of Commines on the point is to be 
 received with caution. The scene at the castle in 
 September 1482, when Louis, just returned from a 
 pilgrimage to Saint Claude, and feeling that his end 
 was near, solemnly invested his son with the royal 
 authority, would seem to show that his neglect of 
 Charles has been somewhat exaggerated; but there 
 is other evidence, too: the letters of the King to 
 Bourre, who had charge of the Prince, are not those 
 of a careless and indifferent father, nor would a man 
 whose ideas of classical education were limited by 
 the sentence " Qui nescit dissimulare nescit reg- 
 nare " so highly reward Etienne de Vesc, the other 
 tutor. Such a maxim was at any rate not the one 
 by which the new King guided his policy; nor was 
 his reading, even before he came to the throne, lim- 
 ited to the romances of chivalry by which his 
 mother's notions of literature were bounded. The 
 Grandes Chrotiiques de France and the Rosier des 
 Guerres of Pierre Choinet were in his hands soon 
 after 1482, and this ignorant prince, who was sup- 
 posed to have been suppressed for fear of opposi- 
 tion to his father's power, astonishes Europe by an 
 
Uhmkotde 63 
 
 invasion of Italy as soon as the disturbances of his 
 own nobles within the kingdom had been quelled. 
 
 It is well known, too, that his was a mind which 
 developed slowly and would bear but little pressure. 
 Claude de Seyssel and Commines give the wrong 
 reason for the education prescribed for Charles by 
 his father. From Nicole Gilles we find what is far 
 nearer the truth, that the life of the heir to the throne 
 was rightly considered to be of more importance 
 than the acuteness of his intellect, and that his 
 strength of body was encouraged in preference to 
 the risk of enfeebling a naturally weak constitution 
 by the enforcement of displeasing studies. " Sa 
 mauvaise nourriture," as Commines calls it, " n'en- 
 dommagea en rien son genereux naturel brave 
 courage qui etait ne avec lui," and when he was 
 strong enough to learn he had the will to study. 
 The number of classical books which he brought 
 back from Italy would alone prove that his tastes in 
 this direction had not been neglected; and though 
 inevitably much was wanting in his general educa- 
 tion, yet the sound advice and firm policy of the 
 Regent, Anne de Beaujeu, did much to steer him 
 safely through the first troubled years of the reign 
 that he began when still a child. 
 
 The young King's return from his campaign in 
 Italy, unpleasant enough in its inevitable ill-success, 
 
64 did %. 
 
 ouzatne 
 
 was still further saddened by the death of his son at 
 three years of age, " bel enfant," says Commines, 
 " et audacieux en parole; et ne craignant point les 
 choses que les autres enfants ont accoutume de 
 craindre." This boy was buried with his brother 
 in the Church of St. Martin at Tours, and their tomb 
 is still one of the most beautiful ornaments of the 
 cathedral to which it was removed after the destruc- 
 tion of the older church. 
 
 The two great towers of Amboise with the in- 
 clined planes of brickwork, which wind upwards in 
 the midst instead of staircases, were the result of 
 the work which Charles set on foot as a distraction 
 to his grief. These strange ascents had been par- 
 tially restored by the Comte de Paris, the present 
 owner of Amboise, before his exile stopped the work 
 of repairing the chateau, and it is still possible to 
 imagine the " charrettes, mullets, et litieres," of 
 which Du Bellay speaks, mounting from the low 
 ground to the chambers above, or the Emperor 
 Charles V., in later years, riding up with his royal 
 host, Francis L, always fond of display, amid such a 
 blaze of flambeaux " that a man might see as clearly 
 as at mid-day." 
 
 These great towers and the exquisite little chapel 
 were the work of the " excellent sculptors and 
 artists from Naples " who, as Commines tells us, 
 
Ubmbotde 65 
 
 were brought back with the spoils of the Italian 
 wars; for the young King " never thought of 
 death " but only of collecting round him " all the 
 beautiful things which he had seen and which had 
 given him pleasure, from France or Italy or Flan- 
 ders; " ^ but death came upon him suddenly. At 
 the end of a garden walk, fringed with a mossy 
 grove of limes that rises from the river bank, is the 
 little doorway through which Charles VIII. was 
 passing when he hit his head, never a very strong 
 one, against the low stone arch, and died a few hours 
 afterwards. The castle had been fortified before 
 his time; he left it beautiful as well, and the traces 
 of his work are those which are most striking at the 
 present day.^ 
 
 1 In October and November 1493 he shows off the new build- 
 ings with much pride to the Italian ambassadors. See Des- 
 jardins, Negot. Diplom. de la F. avec la Toscane, i. 340. 
 
 2 Baron de Cosson has been kind enough to send me a list 
 of the arms and armour in the Chateau of Amboise at 1499. 
 It will be noticed that the ownership of King Arthur is trace- 
 able in the entry referring to Lancelot's sword. " Une dague 
 en manchee de licorne la poignee de cristalin nommee la dague 
 Saint-Charlemagne. Une espee en manchee de fer, garnie en 
 fa^on de clef nommee I'espee de Lancelot du Lac, et dit-on 
 qu'elle est fee. Une espee d'armes garnie de fouet blanc et 
 au pommeau une Nostre Dame d'un coste et un souleil de 
 I'autre, nommee I'espee du Roy Charles VII., appellee la bien- 
 aimee. Une espee d'armes, la poignee couverte de fouet blanc 
 et au pommeau a une Nostre Dame d'un coste et un S. Michel 
 de I'autre, nommee I'espee du Roy de France qui fist armes 
 
 Vol. II.— 5 
 
66 6Ld %. 
 
 outaine 
 
 The new reign began with the disgraceful process 
 of divorce against the first wife of the King, Jeanne 
 de France; in the Church of St. Denys it was con- 
 firmed publicly, and the papal sanction read. The 
 indignation which must have been felt pretty gen- 
 erally throughout France was particularly out- 
 spoken in Amboise, where the prelates and the- 
 ologians of the Court were pointed out in the streets 
 as the " Herods and Pilates " of their time. 
 
 It may have been as much a feeling of shame as 
 a movement prompted by more delicate associa- 
 tions, which prevented Louis from entering the 
 town with Anne de Bretagne when she made her 
 second entry as Queen of France. Amboise was, 
 
 centre un gean a Paris et le conquist." Various other swords 
 are mentioned, such as the Papal one given with the arms of 
 Pope Calixtus ; the war-sword of Charles VIII. ; a sword given 
 by the King of Scotland to Louis XL when he married Madame 
 la Dauphine ; the sword of Louis XL, " nommee la belle espee 
 du Roy Louis qu'il avoit a la conqueste qu'il fist premier sur 
 les Suysses, nommee Estrefuse " ; a sword " nommee I'espee 
 de Philippe le Bel " ; another " nommee I'espee du Roy Je- 
 han " ; with others belonging to Louis XL and Charles VIII. 
 The sword called " La Victoire " seems to have been made 
 for Charles VI. in 1383 (see V. Gay, Glossaire Archeologique, 
 Paris, 1887, p. 686). Amongst the armour was, " Une 
 brigandine de Tallebot couverte de veloux noir tout usee, et 
 sa salade noire couverte d'un houx de broderie fait sur veloux, 
 tout usee " ; also, " Harnoys de la pucelle, garny de gardebras, 
 d'une paire de mitons, et d'un abillement de teste oti il y a ung 
 gorgeray de maille, le bort dore, le dedans garny de satin 
 cramoisy, double de mesme." There was besides " une hache 
 a une main qui fut au Roy Saint Loys " (see V. Gay, p. 65). 
 
Ubmboide 67 
 
 as usual, ready with its Mystery Play to welcome 
 the new Queen — this time a history of Julius Caesar 
 — but the demonstration of loyal and dramatic fer- 
 vour was suppressed. 
 
 At this time the Marechal de Gie, whom we 
 have met before, begins to take a prominent posi- 
 tion. He had accompanied the King on the first 
 expedition to Italy, and after his return had been 
 moved, by a sudden accident to Louis, to think 
 of the marriage of his daughter Claude. Unfortu- 
 nately Anne de Bretagne, never a great friend to 
 the Marechal, had thought about it too, and hostili- 
 ties began between them, on the Queen's side " une 
 guerre de coups d'epingle," on the Marechal's 
 nothing save a profound and apparent contempt.^ 
 De Gie was now given the care of Louise de Savoie, 
 Comtesse d'Angouleme, and her children, with a 
 small force of men-at-arms in the Castle of Am- 
 boise, and by his command in Angers, and his con- 
 nections in Saumur and Tours, he was practically 
 master of the Loire — a fact which was pecuHarly 
 galling to the Queen, for by way of trying, like a 
 true Breton, to guarantee her eventual indepen- 
 dence, she was in the habit of sending jewels and 
 other valuables down the river to safe-keeping at 
 
 1 See Procedures Politiques du regne de Louis XII., M. de 
 Maulde, Ecole des Chartes. 
 
68 Old 'E. 
 
 outatne 
 
 Nantes; but this, though it was to appear again 
 later on, was not the chief grievance of which the 
 Queen complained, for De Gie had a far higher 
 task : he was holding the future Francis I. against 
 all other possible heirs whom Anne de Bretagne 
 might produce by marrying her daughter to a for- 
 eign prince, and his position was made all the more 
 difficult by the narrow and suspicious nature of 
 Louise de Savoie. 
 
 But between De Gie and D'Amboise was now 
 divided the chief power in the kingdom, and he 
 soon began definite negotiations for the marriage 
 of Francis with the Princess Claude. Anne de 
 Bretagne, as we have seen, was actually desirous of 
 giving her daughter to the boy who was to become 
 Charles V., and the value of De Gie's authority in 
 French politics may be estimated by this fact alone 
 of spirited opposition to so grave an error. 
 
 Nor were his energies exhausted upon this one 
 struggle. He found time to send opportune help 
 to the French army that was struggling in Italy, 
 and, though fifty-two years of age, to marry Mar- 
 guerite d'Armagnac and obtain the title of Due de 
 Nemours. It was owing to his exertions, too, that 
 a National Infantry, some twenty thousand strong, 
 was raised, and when the Cardinal returned in all 
 the disappointment of his lost opportunities at 
 
Obmbolde 69 
 
 Rome, De Gie's position of confident authority in 
 France added one more sting to the annoyance of 
 his own failures in Italy. 
 
 But the Marechal's well-merited good fortune 
 did not last. His son's wife and his own died with- 
 in a short interval, and in January 1504 the~ King 
 fell suddenly very ill, and was sent to Blois to 
 recover in the healing influence of his natal air, as 
 Francis was sent later on to Cognac, in accordance 
 with a medical superstition for long prevalent in 
 France. 
 
 It now became more than ever important to urge 
 on the marriage of Francis and the princess, and 
 in the opposition that ensued Cardinal d'Amboise 
 joined the Queen against De Gie and resolved upon 
 his fall, making various accusations as to his un- 
 warrantable interference with the Queen's move- 
 ments; indeed, just at this time the Marechal had 
 seized two boats laden with her furniture and jewels 
 between Saumur and Nantes, which were on their 
 way westwards to provide a comfortable provision 
 for the widowhood which then seemed near at hand. 
 Anne was furious, and her anger was increased by 
 the betrothal of Francis. She at once instituted 
 proceedings against De Gie, but his character and 
 probity were too well known for her to succeed. 
 But the Queen would not rest without her ven- 
 
70 Old Ooutaifie 
 
 geance, got up another trial, and condemned him 
 at the Court of Toulouse, while D'Amboise looked 
 on, and " let justice take its course." 
 
 De Gie, banished from the Court and heavily 
 fined, went into an honourable retirement at his 
 Chateau of Verger, which recalled in many details 
 the home at Blois of the King he had served so 
 well. The process which the Queen instituted 
 against him proved his justification for all time, and 
 purified his memory for ever from the calumnies of 
 the Court. He was too honest and too straightfor- 
 ward for those with whom he had to come in con- 
 tact, and, like Semblanqay afterwards, he had to pay 
 the penalty for his integrity. He reorganised the 
 army, established a sound defence on the frontiers, 
 and invariably opposed the foreign expeditions 
 which wasted to so little purpose the resources of 
 the kingdom; it is in this that his greatness con- 
 sists, for perhaps he was alone of his time in realis- 
 ing that the strength of France lay in her natural 
 boundaries, and alone in devoting his energies to 
 the unity and solidification of his country. 
 
 In 1507, at the engagement of the Princess 
 Claude to Francis, then the probable heir to the 
 throne, the enthusiastic citizens of Amboise would 
 not be denied their usual tribute of congratulation, 
 and the Mystere de la Passion was presented with 
 
(Dne (Dkapel at iSS^inbolae 
 

(%mholde 71 
 
 so much magnificence that the town accounts were 
 in hopeless confusion for a long while afterwards. 
 
 Francis I., whose long nose and slumbrous eye 
 look down from the walls of so many chateaux of 
 Touraine, has been at Amboise for some time. The 
 reader has already been introduced to him in later 
 Hfe, and to his sister, the learned Marguerite, who in 
 1 501, at the age of nine, was watching her brother, 
 two years younger than herself, playing with little 
 Fleurange, who had just made his youthful debut at 
 Blois, and had been sent on by the King to keep the 
 young duke company. They played a rough kind 
 of tennis in the level spaces of the garden, using a 
 racquet weighted with lead to give more force to 
 their blows, or shot with bows and arrows at a white 
 mark fixed to a door, or, as the prince's strength 
 grew with his age, a new game is introduced from 
 Italy, played with enormous hollow balls that were 
 struck with a queer instrument of metal covered 
 with felt and tied on the arm from wrist to elbow 
 with leathern straps; and now, finding that four 
 make a better game than two, Francis takes young 
 Anne de Montmorency to try conclusions with 
 Brion Chabot, who is partner to Robert de la 
 Marche. 
 
 Two of the players were to turn their mimic 
 rivalry into grim earnest later on, and all were to 
 
72 ULd Ooutaine 
 
 be famous; perhaps they felt that even now, for 
 when the game is over, the little snub nose of " Le 
 Camus " may be seen in close proximity to the 
 lengthy face of Francis, asking the duke to make 
 him Constable some day, when he shall have come 
 into his kingdom; while Chabot, not to be left be- 
 hind, begs to be Admiral of France in that glorious 
 future when they shall help together to regenerate 
 the world. Both had their wish, and Montmo- 
 rency, the Constable, lived sternly through the next 
 four reigns, to die fighting in 1567 at the battle of 
 St. Denis. 
 
 With these boys there are others, too, who shall 
 be famous in their deaths. Gaston de Foix, who 
 died so young at Ravenna; Bonnivet, who was to 
 fall in love with the fair sister of his playmate and 
 die upon the field of Pavia, where Fleurange, too, 
 was taken prisoner, and used his hours of solitude 
 to write his Memoires. And watching her son with 
 eyes as eager as her daughter's, and even more am- 
 bitious, is Louise de Savoie, whose short journal, 
 full of this idolised son, gives us many details of his 
 life at Amboise. 
 
 In January 1501 she writes: "About two in the 
 afternoon my king, my lord, my Cccsar, and my son, 
 was run away with across the fields near Amboise 
 by a pony which the Marechal de Gie had given 
 
Obmholde 73 
 
 him; the danger was so great that those present 
 considered it past remedy. Nevertheless God, the 
 protector of widow women and the defence of or- 
 phans, foreseeing the future, would not abandon 
 me, knowing that had ill fortune robbed me sud- 
 denly of my love I should have been too unhappy." 
 
 This journal, which is the barest chronicle of 
 facts and dates, the narrow record of a mean char- 
 acter, never rises into pretentious diction but when 
 speaking of this boy on whom her whole soul rested. 
 The strong young prince was soon to leave the 
 castle, where his impetuous nature had often fright- 
 ened others besides his anxious mother. One day 
 he let a wild boar loose within the court, which 
 rushed madly at the flying servants, and finally 
 made for the great staircase, where Francis was 
 waiting and killed it with his dagger. 
 
 Soon after, Louise writes : " Mon fils partit 
 d'Amboise pour etre homme de cour et me laissa 
 toute seule " — there is all a mother's pathos in these 
 short words; but the diary still contains references 
 to his visits to the castle; once when on his way to 
 Guienne against the Spaniards in 15 12, and three 
 years later when he rides over from Chaumont with 
 a thorn in his leg, " from which," writes his mother, 
 " he had much pain, and I too." 
 
 Then after some terrible sidehghts upon the jeal- 
 
74 did % 
 
 outatfie 
 
 ousy between the Savoyard and the Breton woman, 
 comes " the triumphant entry " of the death of 
 Louis XII. without male issue, and the coronation 
 of her beloved Francis. Between the births of his 
 daughters, Louise and Charlotte, at Amboise, the 
 tidings of Marignano came to Louise. " The fight 
 began," she writes, " at five in the afternoon and 
 lasted all the night; that very day (13th September 
 15 1 5) I left Amboise to go on foot to Notre Dame 
 de Fontaines, to recommend to her him whom I 
 love more than myself, my glorious son and my 
 victorious Caesar, who has subdued the Helvetians." 
 On the same day there was seen in Flanders a great 
 comet shaped Hke a lance; the beginning of the 
 reign of Francis was crowned with military glory; 
 we have already seen how it ended. 
 
 Within the shadow of the lime trees on the ter- 
 raced garden of Amboise is a small bust of Leonardo 
 da Vinci, for it was near here that he died. His 
 remains are laid in the beautiful chapel at the cor- 
 ner of the castle court, and the romantic story of 
 his last moments at Fontainebleau becomes the sad 
 reality of a tombstone covering ashes mostly un- 
 known and certainly indistinguishable; " amongst 
 which," as the epitaph painfully records, " are sup- 
 posed to be the remains of Leonardo da Vinci." 
 He had been brought to Paris a weak old man of 
 
Cbmbotde 75 
 
 sixty-five, by Francis, in pursuance of a certain fixed 
 artistic policy, to which it may be noticed this for- 
 gotten and uncertain grave does but little credit. 
 
 To Francis I., rightly or wrongly, is given the 
 glory of having naturalised in France the arts of 
 Italy; to him is due the architecture built for ease 
 and charm which turned the fortress into a beautiful 
 habitation, which changed Chambord from a feudal 
 stronghold to a country seat, and which left its 
 traces at Amboise, as it did at Chaumont and at 
 Blois. He found in France the highest and most 
 beautiful expression of the work of " the great un- 
 named race of master-masons;" he found the 
 traditions of a national school of painting, the work 
 of Fouquet and the Clouets, but for these he cared 
 not;^ for him the only schools were those of Rome 
 and Florence, and though by encouraging their 
 
 ^ For an account of Fouquet, see chapter on the Dukes of 
 Orleans. Jehan Clouet, called Janet, was Court painter to 
 Francis I. after 1518, and died in 1540. His painting is nota- 
 ble for its simplicity and delicacy. His best known works 
 are the equestrian portrait of Francis (on parchment), in the 
 Uffizi, and the half-length on panel at Versailles. There is 
 also a portrait of the Princess Marguerite in the Royal In- 
 stitution by him, though it is usually attributed to Holbein, 
 with whom the school of the Clouets was contemporary. 
 There are other fine examples of their work at Hampton 
 Court, notably the Dauphin Francis. The most famous of 
 the family, Francois Clouet, was born at Tours, and the castles 
 on the Loire contain several examples of his work. 
 
76 did %, 
 
 outatne 
 
 imitation he weakened the vital sincerity of French 
 art, yet from his first exercise of royal power the 
 consistency always somewhat lacking in his politics 
 was shown clearly and firmly in his taste for art. 
 
 Only the pupils of the other great masters were 
 to be had from Italy ; so Giovanni Battista Rosso 
 (known in France as Maitre le Roux), who had 
 studied under Michael Angelo, came to Paris for a 
 sufficient inducement. The Raphaelesque figures 
 of Francesco Primaticcio soon presented a contrast 
 to Le Roux's more vigorous handling, and the 
 quarrel between the two artists, which only ended 
 in Rosso's suicide, was still more embittered by the 
 arrival of the masterly and impudent Benvenuto 
 Cellini, whose extraordinary autobiography gives 
 many piquant details of his stay in France. 
 
 But while the King was employing his Italians 
 upon Fontainebleau, Jean Bullant was already at 
 work, who built Ecouen for the Constable,^ and 
 
 1 Jean Bullant was the last of the old master-masons and 
 the first of the great architects of France. Of the palace he 
 began in Paris for Catherine de Medicis nothing is left but a 
 large Doric column, now attached to the modern Halle aux 
 Bles. The Queen used to climb up its staircase to consult the 
 stars. With Bullant at Ecouen was Goujon, who began life 
 as a simple mason under Maitre Quesnel, and began a long 
 friendship with Pierre Lescot by working with him at the 
 Rood Screen of St. Germain I'Auxerrois. His best works 
 are the Diane Chasseresse, and the statues of the Hotel Car- 
 navalet. 
 
uhmbolde 77 
 
 Goujon, who was to carve the Diane Chasseresse 
 for Anet. The truly original art of these men, some 
 of whom had need of help, some of whom, like 
 Lescot, the Sieur de Clagny, were strong enough to 
 stand alone, went on its own way untouched by the 
 foreign influences which Francis brought from 
 Italy, or only using the best of the ideas which the 
 foreign workmen brought them. 
 
 The whole question of the position of Francis in 
 the movement of the Renaissance is far beyond the 
 scope of these chapters, but three things at least 
 seemed clear to us as we stood by the tomb of 
 Leonardo at Amboise — that there was a strong 
 national school of sculpture, of painting, and of 
 architecture in France that deserved more encour- 
 agement from the French King than it obtained; 
 that " the first pure dream " of art from Italy by 
 which the spirits of this older school were touched, 
 was worth far more both to the nation and to the 
 interests of art than the decadence of the Italy which 
 Francis brought to Paris; and finally, that if the 
 King so far neglected the greatest of all those whom 
 he invited to his Court, the most accomplished and 
 most varied intellect the world has ever seen, he can 
 have had but little true appreciation of the foreign 
 talent for whose sake he neglected the vigorous 
 schools of art and industry at home. 
 
Chmbolde — oke (oondpizac^j 
 
CHAPTER XVI 
 
 AMBOISE— THE CONSPIRACY 
 
 ** Ne presche plus en France une Evangile armee, 
 Un Christ empistole, tout noirci de fumee, 
 Protant un morion en teste, et dans sa main 
 Un large coutelas rouge de sang humain." 
 
 Diane de Poitiers does not seem to have cared 
 much for Amboise, so the reign of Henry H. does 
 not come into its story, but with the boy who fol- 
 lowed Henry to the throne begins the most terrible 
 scene in the history of the castle. 
 
 In November 1559, Marie Stuart was riding into 
 Amboise with her young husband, Francis II., 
 barely fifteen years of age, beneath the bright crisp 
 sunshine of a winter in Touraine, through gaily- 
 decorated streets filled with a crowd of men and 
 women cheering the new King and his northern 
 bride. Five months afterwards Marie Stuart rode 
 through the same streets again, with none to watch 
 her but armed men, the doors and windows of the 
 houses closed, and only here and there a gibbet or a 
 corpse by way of decoration. For the little town 
 
 had suddenly become the centre of a widespread 
 Vol. II— 6 81 
 
82 Old (bouzaine 
 
 movement — a movement which had begun many- 
 years ago, and gradually gathered force almost un- 
 seen and unappreciated by the Court, until at last 
 it broke suddenly and terribly into view with the 
 conspiracy of Amboise. 
 
 The strangely new doctrines of Calvin had begun 
 to penetrate Touraine soon after Francis I. had 
 brought the Italian Renaissance into France, and 
 the queer cave dwellings in the rocks of St. Georges 
 and Rochecorbon already concealed hermits with 
 tendencies too revolutionary and unorthodox to be 
 sheltered in ordinary resting-places. But the full 
 consequences of the spread of the new doctrines did 
 not become apparent until later, and it was not until 
 the accession of a mere child to the throne that the 
 feeling to which those doctrines had given rise 
 joined itself to a more definite political grievance, 
 and became the expression of an actual party in 
 the kingdom. 
 
 At the death of Henry II. the influence of the 
 Guises became paramount at Court, and it was the 
 policy of Catherine to join their party and to secure 
 the additional support of the Constable Montmo- 
 rency, whose nephews. Admiral Coligny and his 
 brother D'Andelot, were in the opposition with the 
 Bourbon princes, Antoine, King of Navarre, the 
 Prince of Conde, and the Cardinal de Bourbon. It 
 
Cbmboide — oke Goadpttac^ 83 
 
 was therefore necessary, if the Guises were to have 
 a free hand, that the ground should be first cleared, 
 and Catherine was persuaded to send the Bourbon 
 princes and their following away from Court. At 
 the same time began fresh rehgious persecutions, 
 with a vigour encouraged by the promises which the 
 Cardinal de Guise had made to his foreign allies, to 
 root out once and for all the troublesome heresy 
 from France. Already the persecutions had devel- 
 oped into a reign of terror which began with half- 
 drunken slaughters in the Rue Marais and lasted all 
 the winter, and the iniquitous trial of Du Bourg at 
 length frightened the Huguenots into writing for 
 help to the Bourbons; the opposition in politics was 
 thus brought into relations with the opposition in 
 religion, and gained in strength from its new ally. 
 Catherine had characteristically promised help to 
 the Huguenots, without the faintest intention of 
 giving any assistance, and had even gone so far as 
 to tell Coligny that she would see and listen to a 
 clergyman of the reformed religion whom he would 
 send her. As a matter of fact she was completely 
 in the power of the Guises, and it was against this 
 power, which was already felt and resented in wider 
 circles than those immediately about the Court, 
 that the first blow was to be aimed, for the greatest 
 indignation had been aroused throughout the king- 
 
84 did % 
 
 ouzattie 
 
 dom by their flat refusal to summon the States- 
 General. 
 
 Meanwhile the King suddenly grew weaker than 
 ever, and was ordered by his physician to spend the 
 winter and spring at Blois, where terrible rumours 
 began to be circulated as to the methods to be em- 
 ployed for his recovery/ During his illness oc- 
 curred the mysterious murder of the President, 
 Antoine Minard, in Paris. He was a partisan of 
 the Guises, and they at once made swift reprisals. 
 Du Bourg was condemned and burnt at St. Jean en 
 Greve.^ The Huguenots could wait no longer, and 
 they found themselves irreparably joined to the 
 great party of the " Discontented," which now con- 
 tained three main elements, — the first imbued with 
 an honest zeal for their religion, and with a 
 thoroughly sincere devotion to their country and 
 their King; the second, mainly composed of the 
 more ambitious spirits eager for some change from 
 the present miserable state of afifairs; the third, 
 eager for vengeance on the Guises, both for public 
 and for private reasons. 
 
 ^ He was supposed, absolutely without foundation, to be 
 desirous of bathing in the blood of infants to remove the 
 blotches on his skin. See the Memoires of Louis Regnier de 
 la Planche, from whom in the main the following account of 
 the conspiracy is taken, in combination with the testimony of 
 Vieilleville and of De Castelnau. 
 
 - See Bib. Nat. Estampes, Hist, de Fr. reg. Q. b. 19. 
 
Ubmkoide — (jfie Gondpitaci/ 85 
 
 Moved by these various feelings the Huguenot 
 party went for counsel to their natural leaders, the 
 Princes of the Blood, " qui sont nes en tel cas legi- 
 times magistrats," and their cause was at once taken 
 up by Louis de Bourbon, Prince of Conde. The 
 gist of their demands was, to oust the usurpers, to 
 get hold of the persons of Frangois, Due de Guise, 
 and of his brother Charles, the Cardinal, and then 
 to try them for their many sins before the States- 
 General, which would be immediately summoned. 
 
 The difficulty lay in the first move; but a man 
 was forthcoming at the crisis, " a certain gentleman 
 from Perigord, Godefroy de Barry, Seigneur de la 
 Renaudie," who at. once proffered his services, and 
 bent so keenly to his task that in a few weeks a 
 great assembly of nobles was being secretly held at 
 Nantes to discuss the plan of action. All treason- 
 able attempts against the King himself were from 
 the first distinctly repudiated. The first resolution 
 of the assembly ran as follows : " Protestation faite 
 par le chef et tons ceux du conseil, de n'attenter 
 aucune chose contre la majeste du roi, princes du 
 sang, ni Etat legitime du royaume." 
 
 " Le chef " was of course Conde, and his name of 
 " chef muet " had a distinct meaning in the plan of 
 the conspiracy : to his party he was a " leader," to 
 the Court he was " dumb " ; and it was with the 
 
86 Old Ooutaine 
 
 distinct approval of his party that he went into 
 Amboise later on, to give them assistance from 
 within, when it should be needed, without arousing 
 the suspicion of the Guises. Neither he nor his 
 friends imagined the terrible position in which he 
 was to be placed. 
 
 The council at Nantes further resolved that on 
 the loth of March (1560) the Guises should be 
 seized at Blois. De Castelnau Avas given command 
 of the Gascons, and captains were similarly ap- 
 pointed for the levies that were to come from every 
 province.^ 
 
 The whole project was very properly condemned 
 by the far-seeing ministers of Geneva as being im- 
 possible without treasonable practices. The King, 
 if he was to be taken out of the power of the Guises, 
 must presumably be handed over to Conde; but the 
 remonstrance came too late. The movement went 
 on and grew in strength, people came together with 
 the idea of presenting their grievances to the King, 
 in all confidence marching without much mystery 
 and by every road to the Loire, many without know- 
 ing of the plot of La Renaudie or ever having heard 
 his name: this is most clearly seen from the fact 
 that his death did not stop the others gathering from 
 
 1 For a list of the Captains and Provinces in the plan of the 
 Conspiracy, see Mezeray, iii. 18 (fol. 1685). 
 
(%mboide — ^he (Sotidpitaci/ 87 
 
 all round, intent on getting audience from the King 
 in spite of the hated Guises, and the swift executions 
 did not stay the tide that kept pouring in from the 
 woods only to be mercilessly killed. 
 
 While making his preparations in Paris La Re- 
 naudie lodged with one Des Avenelles, who was 
 supposed to be a Huguenot, but who disclosed as 
 much as he could discover of the whole affair to 
 the secretaries of Duke Francis and the Cardinal. 
 The Guises were thunderstruck at the extent of 
 the conspiracy; they had always suspected the 
 Chatillons, but they could not understand this 
 widespread movement. Their ally, the King of 
 Spain, was far better informed. Coligny, D'An- 
 delot, and Conde had all been in communication 
 with Elizabeth, and Anabaptists, Calvinists, and 
 Huguenots in England, in Switzerland, and in Ger- 
 many, were all vaguely conscious that some at- 
 tempt was to be made. 
 
 In fear for the King's safety — for they realised as 
 well as their opponents the importance of the royal 
 person — they hurriedly moved the Court from 
 Blois to what was considered the far safer fortress 
 of Amboise, where, as a matter of fact, the castle 
 was almost without troops or stores, where the town 
 was full of Protestants, and Tours hard by was hos- 
 tile or indiflferent. With three hundred resolute 
 
88 did 'S. 
 
 outatne 
 
 men La Renaudie might have succeeded yet, but he 
 was fettered by advices from Nantes, fatally hin- 
 dered by the number of his accomplices, and ended 
 by waiting too long for the decisive stroke. 
 
 The Guises had at any rate the merit of swiftly 
 realising the emergency of the situation. They 
 sent out messengers in every direction calling for 
 help; they did their utmost to arouse popular 
 hatred against the Huguenots by numberless ac- 
 cusations fabricated with the utmost disregard for 
 truth; finally, they tried to get hold of the chiefs of 
 the conspiracy. 
 
 The Admiral and his brother came immediately 
 they were summoned, and the Guises got nothing 
 but very plain speaking from Coligny. " They 
 were disgusted," said he, " that the affairs of the 
 State should be wholly managed by persons whom 
 men considered to be foreigners; what was needed 
 was a good edict in clear, significant, and unam- 
 biguous terms that both parties should be bound 
 to keep." 
 
 Conde came in too; not seduced this time by the 
 attractions of the " escadron volant," though Cath- 
 erine doubtless put him down among her many vic- 
 tims, but of his own free will, to brave out the 
 Guises and call an assembly of the States-General 
 when the plot was over. 
 
ubftitolde — ohe Gotidpltac^ 89 
 
 The day for the attempt had been fixed afresh for 
 the 1 6th of March. Young Ferrieres was to go first 
 to the castle with some hundred men, who were to 
 be concealed hard by, La Renaudie and De Castel- 
 nau would follow with the rest from Noizay, which 
 was the new headquarters now the Court had 
 moved; a signal would be given from the roof of the 
 castle that all was going well within, and then " le 
 chef muet " was to speak. 
 
 But most unfortunately a certain Captain Lig- 
 nieres had broken his oath and betrayed all to 
 Catherine de Medicis. The Guises then roused the 
 country on the plea of an attack against the King's 
 safety, and affairs began to come to a crisis. Soon 
 afterwards the Comte de Lancerre, with a few of the 
 garrison from Amboise, met De Castelnau in the 
 woods and attempted to arrest him, but astonished 
 at the numbers who suddenly appeared to his assist- 
 ance, they retired precipitately and rushed back to 
 Amboise shouting, " Treason, help, in the King's 
 name ! " No one looked out except a baker, who 
 shut his door again immediately, and De Castelnau 
 might have easily secured the town by a sudden 
 attack. The Court was alarmed by the discourag- 
 ing news of thirty captains and five hundred cavalry 
 waiting with a good company of men-at-arms at 
 Noizay, and Vieilleville was asked to represent to 
 
90 Old Ooiitalne 
 
 them the baseness of their conduct, and offer a free 
 pass to the presence of the King. 
 
 Nothing would do, however, but the word of a 
 prince of the blood, so the Due de Nemours ap- 
 peared, and " having sworn on the faith of a prince, 
 on his honour, and on the damnation of his soul, 
 and having further signed with his own hand his 
 name, Jacques de Savoie," he led De Castelnau and 
 the Huguenot deputies into the castle, " all consid- 
 ering it a great honour and advantage to have thus 
 free access to the King." 
 
 The inevitable result followed. They were seized, 
 thrown into prison, and " tormented with hellish 
 cruelty." Chancellor Oliver was forced to explain 
 the nature of a royal promise, and the executions 
 began, much to the disgust of the Due de Nemours 
 whose word had so cynically been disregarded. 
 VieillevUle, well pleased to be out of so discredita- 
 ble an affair, was sent to Orleans. 
 
 Meanwhile La Renaudie, hearing of the danger 
 from a distance, sent help; his men were all seized 
 by the Guises' cavalry. By bands of tens, fifteens, 
 and twenties they were tied to the horses' tails and 
 dragged in to death; the better-dressed were killed 
 at once, stripped, and left dead in the ditches. The 
 Guises felt that they were not safe yet, and they 
 resolved to play desperately " for double or quits." 
 
(%mboide — olie (oondpitacy 91 
 
 But on the i8th they began to feel more assured, 
 for La Renaudie himself, whose bravery deserved a 
 better fate, was shot by a servant of the Baron de 
 Pardeillan, whom he had killed at the same moment 
 in a chance encounter in the woods. His body was 
 carried to the town and hung upon the bridge with 
 a placard stuck upon the neck. 
 
 But the Guises still chafed at the sight of their 
 enemies within the castle. They strove to make 
 out that the conspiracy was not against themselves 
 at all, but that their name was used merely as a pre- 
 text to abolish monarchy, to reduce France to a 
 repubhc of Cantons, to kill off the nobility and es- 
 tablish Communism. To try and prove this they 
 made fruitless efforts to collect evidence of treason 
 from Navarre, or from La Bigne, the servant of La 
 Renaudie; but they could elicit no more than the 
 truth, " that no treason against the King was 
 meant." Their efforts succeeded better with the 
 lower classes : all the scoundrels of the neighbor- 
 hood rallied to the powerful Guises. Some two 
 thousand idlers, muleteers, grooms, carters, lackeys, 
 ruffians of all kinds, flocked to the rich plunder of 
 arms and clothing like kites upon the carrion : 
 many peaceable merchants were robbed of their 
 clothing and all that they possessed, and murdered 
 as heretics if they offered to resist. 
 
92 6U "So 
 
 uzatne 
 
 The slaughter of the wretched Huguenots went 
 on bravely throughout all the forest paths, and 
 " many others," says De Castelnau, " were taken 
 and hanged to serve as a precedent in so strange a 
 case; a certain number, too, were strung up to the 
 battlements of the castle to astonish the rest." For 
 a month this went on, till every cut-throat in the 
 Guises' pay had made his fortune, for the country 
 swarmed with men who waited to be killed, or citi- 
 zens like those of Toulouse, who refused to move 
 before they had spoken with the King, and were 
 only cured of their importunity by being hanged 
 from the castle windows. 
 
 The young King tried to mitigate the severity of 
 the Guises, exclaiming in horror " at the punish- 
 ment of so many of my poor subjects," but it was no 
 use. Stronger heads than his had given way in the 
 crisis. The miserable Chancellor Olivier, forced 
 against his will to connive at all this blood-shedding, 
 shrieked aloud as he saw the dripping hands of one 
 of the Protestant noblemen kneeling at the block 
 in fervent prayer. He was carried to his bed mor- 
 tally sick, where the Cardinal de Guise visited him 
 to check this strange weakness of an officer of the 
 Court. " Ha ! mauldit Cardinal," cried Olivier, 
 " tu te dampnes et nous fais aussi tons damnez." — 
 " My son," said the prelate, " resist the Evil One." 
 
ubmboide — ulie (jondplx-acy 93 
 
 — " So he has come at last ! " cried the other with a 
 hideous laugh, as he turned his back upon De Guise 
 and died. 
 
 The scene at the castle at this time was a terrible 
 one. The passages and courts were thronged with 
 men and women crying for justice or for mercy; 
 whole families were to be seen in despair at the ap- 
 proaching death of a father or a husband; but no 
 energy, no bribery, no intercession availed to stay 
 the vengeance of the Guises; if their cruelty was 
 unparalleled, their precautions were infinite as well. 
 The most brilliant example of their stage manage- 
 ment was yet to come. 
 
 Beneath the walls of the castle, in full view of 
 that iron balcony whose bars rusted blood-red still 
 guard the windows looking down upon the Loire, 
 the scaffolds had been raised with great magnifi- 
 cence : all round the square in which they stood 
 were lines of planked seats rising in tiers from the 
 ground, and filled with an expectant crowd; the 
 night before, thousands of people had slept in the 
 fields around the town to avoid being late for the 
 sight of the morrow, the very roofs were black 
 with sightseers, and a merry barter was carried on, 
 by the fortunate owners of houses looking out upon 
 the square, for spaces at the windows which gave 
 a good view of the block and the scaffold draped 
 in black. 
 
94 Old (Douxalne 
 
 After mass in the castle and the various churches 
 of the town, the lines of the Scottish guard, who had 
 been holding the ground since daybreak, were 
 broken by the first of the Huguenot nobles reserved 
 for execution before the royal presence. All those 
 who could walked bravely forward, speaking little 
 save to refuse the help of the Catholic monks who 
 pressed the hated faith upon them to the last; many, 
 with faces white and drawn and reddening bandages 
 about their feet, were helped by their friends 
 towards the place of execution; these were they 
 who had been tortured beforehand in the dungeons 
 of Amboise. 
 
 The whispers of the crowd were suddenly hushed, 
 for from the mouths of all the prisoners rose the 
 words of the Psalm, which Clement Marot had not 
 long ago translated, " God be merciful unto us and 
 bless us; and show us the light of His counte- 
 nance," ^ and as the crowd heard the last notes die 
 away and followed the singers' eyes with theirs, 
 they saw a quick movement of all the prisoners' 
 heads; the Prince of Conde had appeared upon the 
 
 1 " Dieii nous soit doux et favorable 
 Nous benissant par sa bonte, 
 Et de son visage adorable 
 Nous fasse luire la clarte. 
 
 " Dieu, tu nous as mis a I'epreuve 
 Et tu nous as examines, 
 
yenetal '"View of o^mboide 
 
 (Allowing tkc yaUezy ftotn <vfiic/i t/ie Gouxt 
 watched the cyxecution of the (jGuguenotd 
 
Cbmbolde — oke bondpttaci/ 95 
 
 gallery above between the young Queen, Marie 
 Stuart, and the Duke of Orleans, and all the gentle- 
 men, his followers who were about to die, had 
 saluted the prince, their " chef muet." He was 
 brave enough to give them the last satisfaction of a 
 dangerous farewell. 
 
 The Court had just left the dining-hall, and had 
 been all led out, men, women and children, by the 
 Duke of Guise to see this last and finest execution 
 of the rebels. The ladies shuddered at first, but 
 Catherine de Medicis was there to show them the 
 conduct proper to a loyal friend of the little trem- 
 bling King, who would have turned his head away 
 but did not dare. Behind the two Queens stood the 
 Papal Nuncio, below was the Lieutenant-General, 
 with the marshals and their suite on horseback. The 
 whole Court was there, as ready, apparently, for the 
 executions of Amboise as they had been for the 
 fetes just finished in the hall at Blois. But not all, 
 we may at least believe, were there of their own will : 
 if it be too true that the young Marie Stuart stood 
 and watched this horrible execution, she was at 
 
 Comme I'argent que Ton epreuve 
 Par le feu tu nous as affines. 
 
 " Tu nous as fait entrer et joindre 
 Aux pieges de nos ennemis, 
 Tu nous as fait les reins astreindre 
 Des filets oix tu nous as mis." 
 
96 did "S. 
 
 owcaine 
 
 least no more willing to look on than was the Prince 
 of Conde; both were forced by the iron will of the 
 Guises and the policy of the Queen-mother. 
 
 The whispers of the crowd were checked again, 
 by a sign from the Due de Guise, and in the silence 
 that followed the first name was called out,^ and 
 the first head fell — and still the Psalm that had be- 
 gun again was chanted by the knot of prisoners, and 
 grew fainter as their number lessened and the axe 
 kept falling fast. The young King grew pale at the 
 sight of so much blood, the very headsman wearied 
 of his task, for the axe's edge was dull and blunted. 
 Conde could keep still no longer, " Ah, what an 
 easy task," he cried, " for foreigners to seize on 
 France after the death of so many honourable 
 men ! " The Guises never forgot the words, and 
 hated the Prince until his death. 
 
 The very crowd beneath them was murmuring at 
 the sight of such unflinching courage, and as the 
 last victim mounted to the block with the lines of 
 the old Psalm upon his lips, there was a universal 
 movement which even the agitated King could not 
 misunderstand — but it was too late; the Cardinal 
 had made the fatal sign and the last head fell with 
 the rest.^ 
 
 1 Jean Louis Alberic, Baron de Raunay. 
 
 2 Michel Jean Louis, Baron de Castelnau Chalosse. The 
 
Ubmholde — o/ie bondptzacif 97 
 
 The Guises were fairly maddened with blood; 
 gallows and scaffold were not enough for them; 
 heads were stuck upon the railings of the castle, the 
 markets were befouled with the dead bodies, the 
 Loire rolled thick with human corpses, the chateau 
 and the woods were crammed with dead: a man 
 was brought in while De Guise was breakfasting, 
 hung by the neck to the window-bars, and sent with 
 a stab to join the others. 
 
 The whole place reeked like a shambles, so that 
 the Queen-mother, persuaded by the softer spirits 
 of her Court, left Amboise at last, and riding 
 through the woods still filled with ghastly traces 
 of the massacre, carried off the young King and 
 Queen to forget the heretics in fresh riots and de- 
 bauchery at Chenonceaux/ 
 
 Only one among the Guises had shown any com- 
 
 brother of this man had already laid down his life for the 
 royal family at Amboise. One night when Francis I. and all 
 his Court were in bed, the Duke of Orleans roused his com- 
 panions and made a wanton assault on the band of lacqueys 
 who were on guard at the bridge; the duke would have been 
 killed in the scuffle had not M. de Castelnau rushed in, re- 
 ceived the blow, and died. 
 
 1 " A huit ans et demi le pere mena son fils (Agrippa 
 d'Aubigne) a Paris, et en passant par Amboise un jour de 
 foire, il veit les testes de ses compagnons d' Amboise encore 
 recognoissables sur un bout de potence, et fut tellement esmu, 
 qu'entre sept ou huit milles personnes, il s'ecria — lis ont 
 descapite la France les bourreaux." — CEuvres Completes de 
 d'Aubigne, ed. Reaume et de Causade, p. 67. 
 Vol. II.— 7 
 
98 did ^ou 
 
 "caine 
 
 passion for the martyrs, Anne d'Este, the daughter 
 of Renee de France and the Duke of Ferrara, and 
 mother of Madame de Montpensier and Henri 
 le Balafre. She was at first instinctively hostile to 
 the Florentine who had been so unexpectedly 
 raised to the throne of France, but she ended in 
 being weakened by her influence, and by the 
 strength of the family into which she had married. 
 But the Duke Francis could not completely change 
 the gentle nature of his wife which she inherited 
 from the princess her mother. " This is a piteous 
 tragedy," she cried to Catherine de Medicis, who 
 noticed her faltering at the sight of the executions; 
 " some great misfortune will surely fall upon our 
 house in vengeance for it." Her husband rated her 
 soundly for her weakness. The horrible scenes of 
 the massacre of Vassy were yet to come, and pass 
 before her very eyes without a possibility of hin- 
 drance, Catherine de Medicis and the Guises were 
 to have yet another wholesale slaughter, for Am- 
 boise and Vassy were not enough, and the night of 
 St. Bartholomew was needed to satisfy them; but 
 the assassin Poltrot justified her fears, and after her 
 husband had been murdered, her son Henry paid 
 the penalty for the sins of his house in the chamber 
 of the King at Blois. 
 
 And at this time the position of this extraordi- 
 
Uhmtolde — She Gondpttactf 99 
 
 nary family might well have pardoned them their 
 pride. The Duke Francis had gained an easy mili- 
 tary reputation at Metz and Calais, his father before 
 him had served his country in the field and made 
 every use of the position which his successes gave 
 him, his mother was Antoinette de Bourbon, the 
 great-aunt of Henry IV., his niece, Marie Stuart, 
 was on the throne of France. The Cardinal, his 
 brother, absorbed the rest of the- power which 
 Francis left untouched; he was called " the Pope 
 across the Alps," and treated his " colleague " at 
 Rome on a basis of equality. He was as eloquent 
 in speech as he was learned in theology, and finally 
 had absolutely under his control three great relig- 
 ious orders who throughout France and Italy 
 worked his will without question.^ 
 
 Little wonder that when once so terribly em- 
 barked upon a definite policy the Guises felt them- 
 selves strong enough to pursue it to the bitter end. 
 The rank and file had been taught a sharp lesson; 
 it remained to deal with the leaders. In their rage 
 against the Prince of Conde, who never gave any 
 justification for their attacks, they had even sug- 
 gested to the little King that he should stab the 
 
 1 The reputation of this family is shown by the famous story 
 of the beggar who, as one of them passed by and gave him 
 gold, cried, " Ah ! that must be Jesus Christ or the Cardinal 
 de Lorraine ! " 
 
 l.ofC. 
 
100 Old ^, 
 
 outatne 
 
 Prince with his dagger while pretending to be jest- 
 ing with him, and they put down his scruples to the 
 cowardice of a half-grown child. At last they got 
 him to summon Conde formally into the royal 
 presence, while their officials searched his baggage 
 for incriminating evidence — too much ashamed of 
 their mean task to look closely, and finding abso- 
 lutely nothing. The intrepid hunchbacked Prince 
 appeared at once, and demanding a full court to 
 hear what he had to say, boldly gave his accusers 
 the lie, saving the honour of the Royal Family, and 
 declared himself ready to uphold his word by single 
 combat. This straightforward method checked the 
 Guises for a time; the Duke was even compelled to 
 pose as his champion, and must have looked almost 
 as ridiculous as did his accomplice, Catherine, in the 
 disguise of a sympathiser with the reformed religion. 
 
 Conde was allowed to go unharmed for the time, 
 and Coligny was sent to Normandy. The Consta- 
 ble had managed to skilfully veil any real expres- 
 sion of opinion in Paris, by an ambiguous speech 
 that committed him with neither party. 
 
 The first terror of surprise into which the Guises 
 had been thrown when the plot was revealed to 
 them had shown them one thing clearly, that it was 
 impossible to put off holding the States-General. 
 They determined to make this distasteful necessity 
 
Chmboidc — ^lie bondpttact/ 101 
 
 fit in with the rest of their schemes, and having 
 secured the King and the Court at Orleans, and 
 filled the town with armed men, they proceeded to 
 entice Navarre and Conde by every means their 
 unscrupulousness suggested, to attend the meeting 
 of the Parliament. The princes of the blood came, 
 in spite of every warning; and trusting themselves 
 unhesitatingly to the protection of the King, were 
 immediately arrested, and would have certainly been 
 executed but for the sudden death of Francis II. 
 
 This unlooked-for contretemps ruined for the time 
 being the Guises' combinations, and they were 
 obliged to have recourse to a fresh line of policy. 
 The famous League was formed, and the founda- 
 tions laid for that long civil war which was meant 
 to end in the supremacy of the house of Lorraine. 
 By skilfully posing as the party of the nation, of the 
 Bourgeoisie, and the Catholic religion, and by de- 
 scribing their opponents as aristocrats who fa- 
 voured the doctrines of the heretics, they for a 
 time maintained the upper hand; for, though they 
 themselves were backed by foreign help, the opposi- 
 tion could, no more than the Guises, describe itself 
 as the national party. Nor was that opposition fort- 
 unate in its leaders. Coligny alone was worthy of 
 the cause for which he died; Navarre was fickle, 
 useless, and untrustworthy; Conde, with all his 
 
102 uLd ^owcatne 
 
 courage, was but little better. It was not until 
 Jeanne d'Albret brought her son into the camp after 
 the battle of Jarnac that a real leader appeared, and 
 the party of the Politiques became the party of the 
 nation. It was not until the Leaguers were seen 
 to be the really hostile and foreign element in the 
 struggle that in Henry of Navarre was recognised 
 the true head of the party of France and of the 
 throne, and the distracted kingdom at last had rest 
 under a rule that was strong enough to crush all 
 opposition. 
 
 The history of Amboise stops with this last 
 tragedy, whose progress and results we have just 
 sketched. One more conspiracy it was yet to see — 
 the results of the murder of Le Balafre at Blois — 
 but its details are of no more importance than the 
 scoundrels who engaged in it. 
 
 Almost the last personage of interest whom Am- 
 boise was to receive within its walls, was Fouquet 
 the Surintendant, who was carried here by D'Artag- 
 nan after the marvellous chase and capture which 
 all readers of Dumas remember. 
 
 Long years after, the room from which the execu- 
 tions had been witnessed served as a prison for Abd- 
 el-Kader, many of whose suite lie buried in the gar- 
 dens. Small wonder that in such a dwelling even 
 the lovely views across the valley of the Loire could 
 
Uhmhoide — S/ie (oondpltac^ 103 
 
 not console them for the warmer breezes of their 
 native land. 
 
 The Franco-German war is responsible for the 
 loss of the great " Bois de Cerf," which for so many- 
 centuries had been the wonder of the Castle. In 
 1577 Girolamo Lippomano saw three men lift them 
 with difficulty from their place; and in 1644 John 
 Evelyn writes : " In the ancient chapell (at Am- 
 bois) is a stag's head or branches, hung up by 
 chayns, consisting of twenty brow antlers, the 
 beame bigger than a man's middle, and of an in- 
 credible length. Indeed it is monstrous, and I can- 
 not conceive how it should be artificial; they show 
 also the ribs and vertebrae of the same beast; but 
 these might be made of whalebone." 
 
 It remained for a German soldier to discover that 
 they were a gigantic fraud in wood. Before the 
 " rude conquerors " could get their booty to the 
 next station, the famous horns had crumbled into 
 a mass of worm-eaten dust. 
 
 And now this mediaeval hoax has vanished, there 
 is scarcely anything to be seen in the interior of 
 Amboise. The energies of modern proprietors have 
 been chiefly directed to removing the monstrosities 
 of former occupants in the last two centuries; but 
 the work of restoration has stopped incomplete, and 
 we could only notice with satisfaction the efforts 
 
104 did "B 
 
 outaine 
 
 begun to clear away the woodwork which had been 
 built up to separate the old spacious apartments into 
 more numerous and meaner rooms. But the out- 
 side of the castle brings an ample recompense. 
 From no place we had yet seen were the views so 
 numerous and so magnificent; for even the high 
 keep of Loches lost all that Amboise gained in the 
 wide sweep of the Loire that flowed past its battle- 
 ments to the Bridge of Tours, whose cathedral the 
 more keen-sighted of us could discover to the west. 
 Before leaving the town we strolled through the 
 shady wall along the quay to St. Denis, a cross 
 church with a massive central tower, in Roman- 
 esque and transitional style, with very fine detail in 
 the carving of the pillars; and as we crossed the 
 bridge again, the Queen of Navarre's story came 
 into our memory of the poor muleteer who, coming 
 home from Blois, found his wife murdered at her 
 door, across the river. It seemed impossible to 
 leave Amboise without some terrible impression of 
 sudden death; for we were passing the very spot 
 where La Renaudie's body had been lifted in the 
 wind — a warning to all conspirators who fail. 
 
-oa cJlDeine STBazgot^ 
 
CHAPTER XVII 
 
 LA REINE MARGOT 
 
 " Voir la cour sans voir Marguerite de Valois, c'est ne voir 
 ni la France ni la cour." 
 
 " Behold his bed . . . threescore valiant men are about 
 it, they all hold swords, being expert in war: every man hath 
 his sword girt upon his thigh because of fear in the night." 
 
 From Amboise the story of Touraine moves on to 
 Blois, from Francis II. trembling above the scaffold 
 of the Huguenots to Henry III. spurning with 
 his foot the face of murdered Guise. Many and 
 strange had been the changes of fortune before Le 
 Balafre's ambition met so terrible an end. The 
 Conde whom we saw at Amboise had fallen at Jar- 
 nac nine years afterwards; the unstable Antoine of 
 Navarre was dead; Jeanne d'Albret, the noblest 
 woman of her time, had brought her young son 
 Henry, Prince of Beam, to be the head of the 
 Huguenot party, though he was as yet too young 
 for much more settled policy than affection for his 
 mother and young Conde, and obedience to the 
 brave Coligny. 
 
 But into the heartbreaking struggle of the civil 
 107 
 
108 did % 
 
 outatne 
 
 wars we cannot enter. It is but possible for us to 
 look swiftly at the troublous reign of Charles IX. 
 through the medium of the writings of another 
 Marguerite, another and the last child of Catherine 
 de Medicis, " not less divine but more human in her 
 moods " than the gentle mystic sister of King 
 Francis. 
 
 From her we shall learn the life of that Court 
 which still wandered so often to the pleasant castles 
 of Touraine, from the reeking atmosphere of Paris 
 and the Louvre. It is joined with her name that 
 there first comes into prominence the young King 
 of Navarre, who shall at last bring order into the 
 chaos of conflicting parties; it is in company with 
 her that we shall hear, from very close at hand, the 
 clamour of that tocsin of St. Bartholomew, whose 
 echoes troubled every town in France; and we shall 
 be listening to the most celebrated woman of her 
 time, to a princess gifted with the beauty of an 
 Aphrodite, the refinement of a Valois, and a loyalty 
 that was all her own. 
 
 The life of Marguerite began in the Court of 
 Catherine of Medicis, in the company of the " esca- 
 dron volant " and such ladies as Madame de Ne- 
 vers and Charlotte de Beaune Semblan(;ay, grand- 
 daughter of the unhappy Semblangay, executed in 
 the reign of Francis I., a slight, fair-haired woman, 
 
Jo a dlDeine Slba'c^ot 109 
 
 by turns sparkling with vivacity and languishing 
 with a gentle weakness, wife of Simon de Fizes, 
 Baron de Sauves, and afterwards of Frangois de la 
 Tremouille, Marquis de Noirmoutier. 
 
 In 1569 came news from Henry, Due d'Anjou, 
 that threw the whole Court into a bustle of prep- 
 aration. A battle was imminent, and he must see 
 his mother and the King before he fought. The 
 journey from Paris to Tours was done in three and 
 a half days, and the ladies seem to have derived 
 much amusement from the distress caused to poor 
 Cardinal de Bourbon,^ whose constitution was little 
 fitted for such unwonted exertions. 
 
 It was in the park of Plessis-lez-Tours, at this 
 time, that the childhood of Marguerite first con- 
 sciously ended, and her brother secured her help 
 and friendship by treating her as a woman grown 
 up and responsible, who should help his interests 
 with the King and with their mother. " Such lan- 
 guage," she writes, " was quite new to me. My 
 life hitherto had been quite thoughtless; my only 
 cares the dance and hunting. I had even neglected 
 my dress and personal appearance." ^ Her life was 
 
 1 Charles de Bourbon, Archbishop of Rouen, son of the 
 Duke of Vendome, called King Charles X. by the League. 
 He would be about forty-six at this time, and died twenty-one 
 years later. 
 
 2 Memoires de la Reine Marguerite, Bibl. Elzevir., P. Jannet, 
 i8=;8. 
 
110 uLd Ooutatne 
 
 henceforth to be among the society described by 
 Brantome, " whose vices it would be repulsive to 
 suggest, whose virtues were homicide and adul- 
 tery," ^ where " no man was honoured who could 
 not show blood on his hands, no woman admired 
 who would not boast as loudly of the favours she 
 had granted, as her gallants of the favours they had 
 received." 
 
 In such a court, where ignorance was impossible, 
 innocence was almost as rare; and this latest addi- 
 tion to the beauties of the " escadron volant " soon 
 received the approval of her companions in some 
 very creditable scandals which were in circulation 
 about her various intrigues almost immediately 
 after her appearance in public. The Aurora or the 
 Cytherea of the lesser poets of the Court, the 
 Pasithee of Ronsard's verses, she had rapidly taken 
 her place as the acknowledged queen of the many 
 revels of that disastrous time; and indeed at the age 
 of eighteen she seems to have easily surpassed even 
 the loveliest sirens in that band whom Catherine de 
 Medicis had gathered round her, of the fairest faces 
 in the land, for the bewilderment of the gallant cap- 
 tains and politicians of France. 
 
 Her thick black hair shaded a face of brilliant 
 whiteness, and from beneath long dark lashes her 
 
 1 Swinburne, Miscellanies ("Mary Queen of Scots"), p. z?^- 
 
jSa Soelne cJlba^^ot 111 
 
 eyes shone suddenly as the delicate red Hps moved 
 in speech, and with words of no common kind too, 
 but witty with the unrestrained freedom of her time, 
 and with a learning whose facility and skill were a 
 perpetual amazement to her companions. 
 
 Small wonder that her name soon was whispered 
 in connection with that of the leader of the Catholic 
 party, Henri de Guise, the head of the faction with 
 whom she was thrown most in contact. At twenty- 
 two years of age the young Duke of Guise had well- 
 nigh reached the level of his father Francis's fame; 
 the height and elegance of his figure, the natural 
 majesty of his looks and bearing, seemed to confirm 
 the popular opinion which already idolised the son 
 of the great captain, and which was to support him 
 afterwards in his ambitious and ill-fated struggle for 
 the throne of France. 
 
 Unfortunately for Marguerite, her own Memoires 
 are not the only sources open to us for information 
 as to her character and her methods; but it seems 
 fairly clear that this, probably her first, love was at 
 any rate sincere. She can as little hide her admira- 
 tion for De Guise at this time, as she can conceal 
 her passionate feelings for the brave Bussy 
 d'Amboise later on; and she deserves at least such 
 compassion from her judges as shall be always given 
 to a nature keenly susceptible, little liking restraint, 
 
112 0U ^, 
 
 outatne 
 
 and sacrificed mercilessly upon the altar of political 
 necessity. 
 
 Her vexation at the insinuations of Du Guast ^ at 
 this time brought on a fever, in which she was 
 tended by her favourite brother the King; for the 
 royal physicians had themselves been stricken with 
 the disorder. To rid herself of similar persecution 
 in the future, she besought her sister Claude, now 
 Duchess of Lorraine, to arrange the marriage of 
 Henri de Guise with Catherine de Cleves, Princesse 
 de Porcian, which was celebrated in 1571. The 
 House of Lorraine was already but too closely con- 
 nected with the royal family; any further alliance 
 was impossible. 
 
 But other reasons, still more important, had 
 already settled the destinies of Marguerite. Peace 
 had been made with the Huguenots after Jarnac 
 and Montcontour; and an attempt at securing the 
 head of the rebel party by a close alliance with the 
 throne was only what might have been expected 
 from the characteristic political methods of Cather- 
 ine. It was even rumoured that unless prompt 
 measures were taken, the young Bearnais would 
 soon be betrothed to the English Elizabeth," for 
 
 ^ He was assassinated in 1575. No writer of the sixteenth 
 century would have deprived Marguerite's reputation of the 
 honour of his death, so it is put down to her. 
 
 2 See M. H. de la Ferriere, Le XVIme Siecle et les Valois. 
 
Jha c/oelne (yJoaz^ot 113 
 
 whom Catherine had already arranged, in her own 
 mind, a match with the Due d'Anjou. The King 
 was as determined as the rest, and spoke with some 
 levity of the tardiness with which the Pope gave his 
 approval. Margot should be married at any cost, 
 and his own royal hand should give her away. 
 
 The opposite party in politics were equally de- 
 lighted, and Jeanne d'Albret, after her first and very 
 natural disgust at the habits of the Court, managed 
 the negotiations with a skill and intrepidity which 
 deserved a better fate; for after returning to Paris 
 from her visit to the Court in Touraine, she sick- 
 ened suddenly and died — of a pleurisy, so it was 
 given out; but rumours were persistently spread 
 that her death was owing to the scent of some gloves 
 skilfully prepared by Rene, the Queen's Florentine 
 perfumer; and these reports gained credence from 
 the fact that Ambroise Pare, in his examination of 
 the body, was forbidden to look at the brain, the 
 sole organ that Rene's poisons would have touched. 
 Be this as it may, Jeanne d'Albret was too good a 
 woman for her existence to be long tolerated; her 
 honesty, like Semblangay's long before, was too 
 transparent, her truth too courageous, for life 
 among the Court of Catherine de Medicis, and when 
 her duty to her son brought her into contact with 
 that Court, she was only allowed to live long enough 
 Vol. II.— 8 
 
114 GLd Oowcaine 
 
 to complete the negotiations, and not too long for 
 the interests of the Queen-mother. She is one of 
 the few women of her time whose death it is pos- 
 sible, for every reason, to regret/ 
 
 In August 1572 the marriage of Henry of 
 Navarre to Marguerite de Valois was celebrated 
 with great splendour at the Louvre; and surely 
 there was never a festival at which political necessity 
 so triumphed over human feelings, not only in the 
 principal pair concerned, but in nearly all the spec- 
 tators. For the young King of Navarre had to 
 stifle his genuine grief for his mother's sudden 
 death, his wife had to conceal her own passions be- 
 neath the mask of a proper conjugal affection, no 
 less had Conde to forgive D'Anjou his father's mur- 
 der, and the young Due de Guise to forget Poltrot 
 de Mere. Opinions were strangely divided, for 
 even the Catholics themselves realised that some- 
 thing more was in progress than they could fathom, 
 and the Huguenots still felt uneasy, they knew not 
 
 1 It will be remembered that Jeanne was the daughter of 
 our first Marguerite d'Angouleme, Queen of Navarre, the 
 author of the Heptameron. It was for Isabeau, her fascinating 
 aunt, that Clement Marot, a favourite with her mother, wrote 
 some of his most charming lines. 
 
 " Elle a tres bien cette gorge d'albastre, 
 
 Ce doux parler, ce cler teint, ces beaux yeux, 
 
 Mais en effet ce petit ris folastre 
 
 C'est, k mon gr^, ce qui lui sied le mieux." 
 
Joa c/aeine (y/Oat^ot 115 
 
 why. So little could the Princess conquer her re- 
 pugnance at the last moment to the marriage forced 
 upon her, that the King was obliged with his own 
 hand to bend her head down in token of assent 
 during the ceremony. Neither husband nor wife 
 treated that ceremony as anything save the mockery 
 it really was; and they went their own way, bound 
 yet divided, to the end. 
 
 The sole link that ever bound them was the same 
 political necessity which had first brought about 
 their marriage; and to this political necessity 
 (though to this only) Marguerite remained for ever 
 loyal. Her husband was no very brilliant example 
 of conjugal fidelity; and the accepted lover of 
 Madame de Sauves could not severely criticise the 
 mistress of De Guise. 
 
 Thus their strange married life began. The first 
 interruption to the fetes and dances was the " acci- 
 dent " to Coligny, when he was wounded in the 
 shoulder by Maurevel's pistol-shot from a window 
 in the Louvre. It was connected by public opinion 
 with the old ill-founded quarrel between Guise and 
 Coligny about the murder of Duke Francis; ^ and 
 for a while all seemed quiet again. 
 
 iThe original still exists (Bib. Nat. MS. F. 209, fo. 37) of 
 the act by which the children of Duke Francis accept the 
 King's decree as to the innocence of Coligny of their father's 
 murder by Poltrot. 
 
116 OLd Oouzaine 
 
 What followed is a matter of history too well 
 known, too wide in scope, for these chapters to 
 relate. We can but look upon one small part of the 
 great tragedy of St. Bartholomew, the part that 
 came beneath the actual notice of Marguerite, so 
 lately married, and from that infer the horrors of 
 the rest. 
 
 The resolution to massacre the Huguenots was 
 taken on the 23d of August 1572. Catherine's sole 
 object seems to have been to allow both parties to 
 cut each other's throats and leave the throne the 
 stronger for their fall. Marguerite tells us what 
 really turned the brain of the poor passionate King : 
 " The Huguenots were coming to accuse Guise " 
 of attempting Coligny's murder. De Retz had to 
 explain who were the real culprits, with hints per- 
 haps of another Sicilian Vespers, and other such 
 inventions as the Italians with Catherine de Medicis 
 would employ to fire Charles's unsteady imagina- 
 tion. He suddenly and wildly gave his consent, 
 and at four the next morning Besme, the brutal 
 follower of the Guises, had thrown Coligny's corpse 
 from the upper window to the feet of his master, who 
 stood waiting in the court. 
 
 Of all this Marguerite was told nothing. Her 
 first suspicion of the truth came as she went to bed 
 on the night of the council. Her sister Claude 
 
JL>a cJoeine <yT6at.^ot 117 
 
 clung to her with tears, beseeching her not to go; 
 but Catherine sternly bade her twice to be off to 
 her own room. Arrived there, and praying to be 
 saved from the unknown dangers which she felt 
 around her, she found the husband she had married 
 but a week ago waiting upon his bed, who ordered 
 her to lie down. " This I did," she writes, " and 
 then found that his bed was surrounded by some 
 thirty or forty Huguenots whom I did not know; 
 for it was but a few days since my marriage. All 
 night they talked of nothing but the mishap which 
 had befallen the Admiral, resolving as soon as day 
 should break to demand justice on Guise from the 
 King, in default of which they would do justice 
 themselves. 
 
 " As for me, the tears of my sister continued to 
 trouble my heart, and I could not sleep for the fear 
 which she had given me, though of what I knew not. 
 So the night passed, and I never closed my eyes. 
 At daybreak the King, my husband, said that he was 
 minded to go and play tennis with King Charles, 
 and then and there to ask his justice. He left my 
 room, and all the gentlemen with him. I saw that 
 it was day, and thinking that the peril of which my 
 sister spoke was past, being heavy with sleep, I told 
 my nurse to shut the door that I might sleep at my 
 ease." Meanwhile the tocsin which gave the sig- 
 
118 Old ^owcalne 
 
 nal for the massacre had rung from St. Germain 
 
 I'Auxerrois, Coligny was past all human justice, 
 
 and the Louvre itself soon became little better than 
 
 a shambles. 
 
 " An hour afterwards," goes on the Princess, 
 
 " when I had fallen into a deep sleep, there came 
 
 suddenly a man beating with his hands and feet 
 
 against my door, crying, ' Navarre, Navarre ! ' My 
 
 nurse, thinking it was the King, my husband, ran 
 
 swiftly and opened the door. It was a gentleman 
 
 called M. de Leran,^ who had a sword-thrust in the 
 
 shoulder, and a wound from a pike in the arm; he 
 
 was pursued by four archers, and they all rushed 
 
 after him into my room. He threw himself upon 
 
 my bed for safety. Feeling his hold upon me I 
 
 threw myself into the space between the bed and 
 
 the wall; he followed, keeping fast hold of my body. 
 
 I knew nothing of the man, and could not discover 
 
 whether he was there to harm me, or whether the 
 
 archers were in pursuit of him or of myself; so both 
 
 of us cried out, the one as frightened as the other. 
 
 At last, by God's will, M. de Nanqay, Captain of the 
 
 Guard, came in, and finding me in such a plight 
 
 could not, for all his pity, stay his laughter; with 
 
 1 Readers of Dumas know better; it was La Mole flying from 
 Coconnas and the rest, and taking refuge with the woman who 
 was afterwards to give him her love, as she gave him pity 
 now. Compare the scene in La Reiiie Margot. 
 
JLya cJi>eine cJIba'c^ot 119 
 
 sharp reprimands to the archers for their indiscre- 
 tion he ordered them forth, and granted me the life 
 of the poor man who still was clasping me — him I 
 made to lie down, and gave him remedies in my 
 own cabinet until such time as he was quite cured. 
 While I changed my clothes, for I was all covered 
 with blood, M. de Nangay told me what was going 
 on, and assured me that my husband was in the 
 King's chamber and would suffer no harm. Mak- 
 ing me put on a dressing-gown, he led me to the 
 room of my sister, the Duchesse de Lorraine, where 
 I came more dead than alive; for as I crossed the 
 ante-chamber, whose doors were wide open, a gen- 
 tlen*an named Bourse, flying from the archers who 
 pursued him, was run through within a few paces 
 from me. I fell half-unconscious into the arms of 
 M. de Nanqay on the other side, thinking for the 
 moment that the same blow had wounded both of 
 us." . . . 
 
 In her sister's bedroom she begged for the lives 
 of two gentlemen in her husband's suite, which 
 were with difficulty granted her; others were less 
 successful, for the King's brain had given way at 
 the sight of blood, and he was little better than a 
 madman. The scenes outside the Louvre were 
 worse still. Tavannes was slaying like a butcher; 
 Montpensier like a fanatic; De la Rochefoucauld, 
 
120 Old ^. 
 
 outatne 
 
 who thought the whole thing one more of the wild 
 King's jests, had his throat cut in the middle of a 
 scream of laughter; few like young Caumont de la 
 Force were so fortunate as to escape, sheltered be- 
 neath the dead bodies of his brother and his father. 
 
 The harvest of death went on, throughout Paris, 
 throughout France, until the whole nation seemed 
 smitten as by a pestilence. Coligny, the one pure- 
 minded politician-soldier, was murdered; Goujon, 
 the artist, was killed even at his work; Ramus, the 
 philosopher, was dead; L'Hopital had died of grief; 
 afid the morality, the religion of the nation was dead 
 with them. A week after the massacre a great 
 flock of crows and ravens settled upon the Louvre, 
 and for days afterwards the King seemed to hear 
 the shrieks of dying men around the palace. 
 
 Some annoyance was felt that, amid all this blood- 
 shedding, both Navarre and Conde had come forth 
 scot-free, and the plots began again; but Margue- 
 rite would not desert her husband, or consent to a 
 divorce. La Mole and Coconnas, puppets in the 
 hands of stronger wills, paid for their loyalty with 
 their lives, and the sadness of Marguerite grew 
 deeper still at the loss of her favourite brother, the 
 King, " tout I'appuy et support de ma vie, un frere 
 duquel je n'avois receu que bien." The next reign 
 belongs to other chapters, but there are one or two 
 
Jo a cJoeine cwoaz^ot 121 
 
 more pages of the Memoires of Marguerite, one or 
 two more incidents in her Hfe, which cannot be 
 passed over. 
 
 It is in 1574 that " the brave Bussy d'Amboise " 
 is first mentioned. " He was born," she says, " to 
 be the terror of his enemies, the glory of his master, 
 and the hope of his friends; " and there is little 
 doubt that he helped to console Marguerite for her 
 husband's absence; it was only five years afterwards 
 that his love for the Countess of Montsoreau was 
 so terribly punished by her husband. But political 
 reasons again proved superior to sentiment in the 
 life of this somewhat hardly-used princess. 
 
 Life at the Court became unbearable when war 
 had been openly declared against her husband out- 
 side, so she left Paris to help the affairs of her 
 brother D'Alenqon in Flanders. 
 
 " I travelled," she tells us, " in a litter made with 
 pillars covered with pink Spanish velvet, broidered 
 with gold, and adorned with devices worked in silk; 
 the litter was fitted with glass too, and covered with 
 devices," — some forty of them, all speaking of the 
 sun and of its effects. 
 
 They went to Liege by way of the Meuse in 
 charming boats, but the pleasure of the whole party 
 was suddenly stopped by unforeseen disasters — first 
 by the rising of the river, which obliged them all to 
 
122 6li "S. 
 
 owcatne 
 
 fly for safety up the mountain-side, and then by the' 
 sudden illness of a maid-of-honour, Mademoiselle 
 de Tournon. For the romantic story of this young 
 lady's love and death, the tender-hearted reader is 
 referred to Marguerite's own words; they would 
 lose too much in the rendering to permit of their 
 transcription here/ 
 
 The account of her journey continues to be full 
 of interest. Huy, some six miles from Liege, 
 proves a most inhospitable resting-place, for they 
 drew chains across the streets, and pointed cannon 
 at the Princess's lodging all the night. At Dinan, 
 farther on, the burgomasters had just been elected, 
 " tout y estoit ce jour la en debauche, tout le monde 
 yvre; " and Marguerite's cortege was kept outside 
 the gates while the drunken citizens threw away 
 their cups and seized what arms were near to oppose 
 her entry. At last she rose in her litter, took ofif her 
 mask, and beckoned to the most important of them 
 
 1 Notice particularly the scene where her ungrateful lover 
 meets her corpse being borne out for burial; he is told that it 
 is Mademoiselle de Tournon — " a ce mot, il se pasme et tombe. 
 II le fault emporter en un logis comme mort, voulant plus 
 justement, en cette extremite, luy rendre union en la mort, que 
 trop tard en la vie il luy avoit accordee. Son ame, que je 
 crois, allant dans le tombeau requerir pardon a celle que son 
 desdaigneux oubly y avoit mise, le laissa quelque temps sans 
 aucune apparence de vie ; d'oii estant revenu, I'anima de nou- 
 veau pour luy faire esprouver la mort, qui d'une seule fois 
 n'eust assez puni son ingratitude." 
 
Jo a cJloelne cy/uaz^ot 123 
 
 that she wished to speak with him. After some 
 trouble it was arranged that part of her escort 
 should be allowed with her inside the town. 
 
 Unluckily, a servant of the bishop's was recog- 
 nised among them — and the Bishop of Liege was 
 an especial foe — so in a moment all was tumult and 
 disorder again. A drunken deputation came up to 
 Madame la Princesse, apparently with the object of 
 protesting against the bishop, but scarcely able to 
 utter anything intelligible at all. The oldest of 
 them, stuttering and smiling, asked her whether 
 she was a friend of the Comte de Lalain, and her 
 answer that she was not only friend but relation too, 
 restored everything to a complacent state of baccha- 
 nalian friendship. During the night the poor 
 Princess's enemies were active. Du Bois, the 
 King's agent, had arrived, and was hard at work 
 plotting to get Marguerite into the power of the 
 Spaniards, and the town into the hands of Don 
 Juan. 
 
 But her good friends the burgomasters, having 
 slept off their wine, had not forgotten their prom- 
 ises of friendship, and helped her willingly to escape. 
 So when Du Bois arrived to lead her to Namur, with 
 feigned complaisance she left the town in his com- 
 pany, with several hundreds of the citizens escorting 
 her as well; and by dint of carefully watching and 
 
m 0Ld ^. 
 
 outaitie 
 
 talking to him, she managed to progress in exactly 
 the opposite direction, to embark herself and her 
 litters on the river, and finally to put the stream 
 between her followers and the Spaniards, much to 
 Du Bois's disgust, who only realised too late the 
 cool audacity of the whole proceeding, and was left 
 storming with anger on the wrong bank amid an 
 amused crowd of citizens from Dinan. With many 
 more adventures she at last travelled by way of 
 Cambresis and Chastelet to her own La Fere, where 
 her brother was waiting for her. 
 
 But they were soon obliged to return to Paris to 
 the old intrigues; they arrived in time for St. Luc's 
 marriage with Jeanne de Brissac, at which D'Anjou 
 was so insulted by the " mignons " of the King. 
 The Prince's situation at the Court had become in- 
 tolerable again, and Marguerite began to plot for 
 his escape. With some difficulty she managed to 
 let him down from a window in the Louvre with a 
 rope ladder; it became necessary to conceal all 
 traces of the flight, so her maids put the ladder on 
 the fire; it made so great a blaze that the chimney 
 itself caught, and in a few moments the royal archers 
 were clamouring at the door to be let in, and extin- 
 guish the blaze. They were with difficulty prevailed 
 on " to leave the princess asleep," and let her maids 
 put out the fire, and so the danger passed. At last 
 
Jo a cJljeine alba'C^ot 125 
 
 Marguerite herself left the Court for Gascony " et 
 ce petit Geneve de Pau," where she found her hus- 
 band ill, and nursed him tenderly. Several months 
 at Nerac followed " ou nostre cour estoit si belle et 
 si plaisante, que n'envions point celle de France." 
 If reports were right, Chancellor Pibrac helped the 
 Princess to pass the time here; and Chicot has left 
 upon record how the young Turenne (then Due de 
 Bouillon) was also gracefully allowed to fall in love 
 with her catholic-minded majesty; Henry himself 
 beguiled the time with La Fosseuse, and the war 
 that followed could have borne no more appropriate 
 name than that of " La Guerre des Amoureux." 
 
 It ended in the treaty of Fleix. And after the 
 failure of her favourite brother's expedition in Flan- 
 ders, and his death (from the fatal bouquet of Diane 
 de Montsoreau), Marguerite returned to Nerac 
 from her short visit to the Court in 1583, and left 
 her husband again after his excommunication by 
 the Pope two years later. A short and stormy visit 
 to Agen followed, and then she disappears within 
 the Chateau d'Usson, one of the old prisons of Louis 
 XL in Auvergne. Here the civil wars of 1588 
 passed her by unharmed, though two years later the 
 royal troops of her husband chased the Leaguers 
 from the field before her very eyes; and so for many 
 more years the actual Queen of France lived in 
 
126 Old ^i 
 
 oiL'caine 
 
 seclusion, refusing constantly to grant her husband 
 a divorce while Gabrielle d'Estrees is living, but 
 after her death (in 1599) consenting to the Italian 
 marriage. 
 
 Though she came again to Paris, she still lived 
 in close retirement until her death some sixteen 
 years later — a retirement which, by her friends, is 
 called a literary and cultured retreat; by her ene- 
 mies a debauch of wickedness sheltered by the 
 seclusion of her various palaces; and of a like mixed 
 nature is the estimate of her character that has been 
 handed down to us. 
 
 As her beauty is of that mould which was 
 apparently more in favour three centuries ago than 
 now, so her morals can with even greater difficulty 
 be made to conform with any modern standard of 
 decorum; but as a type of the Court lady of her 
 time she is unapproachable. With an accurate 
 knowledge of the powers her beauty gave her, and 
 a careful economy of its resources, she tried to live 
 out, according to her knowledge, that life of senti- 
 ment, of passion, of sheer human nature, which had 
 well-nigh been crushed out of her at the beginning 
 by the relentless policy of the Queen-mother. 
 Amidst the depravity and corruption of the most 
 shameless Court in Europe, her intellect and her 
 refinement were as rare as they were worthy of 
 
Joa oloelne STBat^ot 127 
 
 respect; and if we had only her own Memoires to 
 guide us, our estimate of her character and her 
 worth would be a very different one — ^with so much 
 grace are they written, with so much insight and 
 skill are the events of a distracted time described. 
 Such women as Jeanne d'Albret are rare in the six- 
 teenth century; a Marguerite de Valois is needed 
 to complete the picture — a woman who, to the 
 virtues of the Valois added but a small part of their 
 vices, who of all the children of Catherine de Medi- 
 cis is the one posterity could least have spared. 
 
CHAPTER XVIII 
 
 BLOIS 
 
 " J'avance parmi les decombres 
 De tout un monde enseveli, 
 Dans le mystere des penombres 
 A travers des limbes d'oubli." 
 
 Gautier. 
 
 Balzac was afraid that later generations would 
 
 know nothing of the Chateau of Blois save from 
 
 his pages; so far advanced, in his day, was the ruin 
 
 and decay of the whole fabric. But that ruin has 
 
 been suddenly and thoroughly arrested; the hand of 
 
 the conscientious restorer has intervened, and that 
 
 with a lavishness of display, an ingenuity of detail, 
 
 very rarely equalled. The " buried world," upon 
 
 which three centuries of kindly time had laid their 
 
 touch, has been refashioned in a somewhat garish 
 
 blaze of gold and carving; there are but few 
 
 " mysterious shadows " in these brightly-coloured 
 
 rooms; there is but little left to fancy, to the dreams 
 
 of the imagination, in a reconstruction so painfully 
 
 complete. 
 
 Yet it is difficult to find fault with that spirit of 
 131 
 
132 6U "B. 
 
 owcatne 
 
 almost reverential care which has given us back the 
 great Castle of Pierrefonds, vi^ith all its intricacies of 
 defence, which has restored the walls of wondrous 
 Carcassonne, which has preserved the marvels upon 
 Mont St. Michel; and of the two extremes, Blois 
 is perhaps nearer to what is possible for us of per- 
 fection than is Chinon, deserted, ruined past recall. 
 To few houses is it given as to Langeais, or Azay- 
 le-Rideau, to escape decay and yet preserve the 
 mellowed beauty of their past — a beauty like the 
 golden haze upon a famous picture, or the strange 
 bloom upon an antique marble, which is something 
 different from any hues or colourings wrought by 
 the hand of man. 
 
 But at Blois no change, no renovation can check 
 the rush of memories that press upon the traveller 
 directly he has crossed the threshold beneath the 
 statue of the good King Louis, for the threefold 
 fashion of the architecture around him speaks elo- 
 quently of the three great ages through which the 
 life of the castle has passed. The early years when 
 the Orleans princes were educated here, and 
 Valentine Visconti mourned her murdered hus- 
 band; the terrible days of the sixteenth century, 
 when Guise was murdered above the exquisite 
 carvings of the central staircase; finally, the decay- 
 ing glories of Gaston and his daughter, fitly framed 
 
Sxteztot of (^fpital (^taUcadc at cSloid 
 in sPtti^ of ffzancid I. 
 
lo'td 133 
 
 in the ruled lines and spaces of the frigid building 
 opposite the entrance. 
 
 The first view of Blois from the town shows the 
 outside of the wing of Francis I., ending at the 
 right hand corner in the great tower which was half 
 destroyed when Mansard joined his later buildings 
 on to the older fabric; the whole stands on a rising 
 slope; and beneath the fine buttresses, upon which 
 the wing of Gaston rests, the road plunges deeply 
 into a dark ravine which winds downward to the 
 Church of St. Sauveur, and was once the bed of a 
 stream that joined the waters of the Loire. 
 
 The entrance to the chateau is to the left of 
 Francis's wing, along a winding terrace that leads 
 to a quiet moss-grown square, the old basse-cour 
 into which Raoul rode with letters to the prince, 
 and where the son of Charles the Poet heard the 
 soldiers shouting that the Duke of Orleans was the 
 King of France. There is his statue as Louis XIL 
 above the entrance-gate,* with the badge of the 
 porcupine beneath it, which he took from the 
 " camail " that his father wore at Agincourt; and 
 in the inner court, to which the gateway leads, the 
 line of lightly chiselled columns that support the 
 painted roof immediately beyond is also the work 
 
 ^ Not the original, which was destroyed at the Revolution. 
 " The father of his people " was not good enough. 
 
134 Old "B. 
 
 owcatfie 
 
 of this King, who did much for the improvement of 
 the old feudal fortress which the Dukes of Orleans 
 inherited from the Counts of Blois. The oldest 
 work of all is on the left side of the great court, by 
 the chapel which saw the consecration of Joan of 
 Arc's banner, and the betrothal of Margot to Henry 
 of Navarre; the only other remnant of the earlier 
 fabric is the apartment in which the States-General 
 were assembled in the reign of Henry HI. Con- 
 trary to the general rule (says M. Viollet le Due) 
 that all great halls in palaces or chateaux should be 
 composed of two floors, this one is built wholly on 
 the ground-floor, and has no rooms beneath it; it is 
 separated into two parts by a line of columns, and 
 roofed by a double row of vaulted arches; it is not 
 by any means an imposing room — nor, indeed, 
 could the chateau itself, in the thirteenth century, 
 have been at all a striking edifice — and it is scarcely 
 helped by the extraordinary scheme of colour and 
 pattern which the modern architect has spread 
 regardlessly over its walls. 
 
 This council hall was reached by the King 
 through a private staircase leading from the wing 
 of Francis I., the wing to the right hand of the en- 
 trance, whose exterior we, like La Fontaine, had 
 seen from the great square in the town outside. It 
 is this wing that contains the gem of the whole 
 
lold 135 
 
 castle — the ''escalier a jour " that springs, many- 
 sided, from the sculptured wall and lights up all 
 the court with the exquisite beauty of its lines and 
 carvings. Of the whole architecture of this wing, 
 by an unknown artist, as so often happens in Tou- 
 raine, there is an excellent description by Mrs. 
 Mark Pattison.^ " The main features," says this 
 writer, " are such as are common to other chateaux 
 in the valley of the Loire; but there are important 
 though minor differences which specially individ- 
 ualise it. The architectural scheme is very simple. 
 Three rows of pilasters are superimposed one above 
 the other. At about two-thirds down the front the 
 open spiral staircase juts out and towers upwards. 
 It seems at first to stand free, breaking up the even 
 succession of small columns and their perpendicular 
 descent with the bold projection of its octagonal 
 lines. But above, it is embraced and caught into 
 the whole mass by the broad crowning cornice 
 which gathers within its strengthening bands every 
 various curve. The sculptured dormers fret along 
 its edge, searching the air with their pointed 
 tongues, and twice the carved cases of the chimney 
 stacks break aloft through the roof like towers, but 
 the cornice keeps firm hold upon their base." It 
 is the grave simplicity of the wall from which the 
 1 Renaissance of Art in France, vol. i. p. 51. 
 
136 did '^, 
 
 omatne 
 
 staircase springs, the fine and choice instinct of 
 proportion which it displays, says the same writer, 
 that mark this building as a production of the new 
 movement, as an advance on Chenonceaux and 
 Langeais. 
 
 The staircase itself is a triumph of ingenuity — 
 
 *' Carved with figures strange and sweet, 
 All made out of the carver's brain," 
 
 a perfect whole, for which a master mind drew the 
 first plans, and every detail was carefully and lov- 
 ingly worked out. 
 
 The figures poised above the entrance, though 
 they have been for three hundred years out of doors, 
 still preserve the clear, firm touch of their unknown 
 sculptor's chisel, and there is little doubt that these 
 statues are either some of the first work of Jean 
 Goujon in his youth, or are the productions of that 
 school by which he was first and most directly in- 
 fluenced. Everything of unknown origin at this 
 period is generally put down to this artist, but in 
 this case there are certain indications of style which 
 seem to lend somewhat more of certainty to a con- 
 jecture usually a trifle reckless. The date of Gou- 
 jon's best work is considerably later than the time 
 at which the wing of Francis I. was built; yet so 
 elaborate a piece of architecture as this staircase 
 
told 137 
 
 may very well have remained without the statues 
 that completed it until long after all the surround- 
 ings had been finished. There are several stones 
 in it that to this day are quite untouched, a few are 
 only roughly chiselled out; the end of the sixteenth 
 century was too hurried in its methods to allow the 
 perfect completion of a structure for which, as there 
 seems reason to believe, the initial ideas may have 
 been sketched quite early in the reign of Francis I. 
 
 Goujon was born in 1520,^ and it is quite possible 
 that while still a simple mason under old Maitre 
 Quesnel, and before the work with Pierre Lescot 
 at St. Germain I'Auxerrois had made him famous, 
 the young artist chiselled these figures, or at least 
 the one on the right hand of the entrance, which 
 particularly recalls various mannerisms in the works 
 that are recognised as his. 
 
 The folding clothes are held in by a belt below 
 the actual waist, and the drapery is caught up on 
 
 1 For the date of Goujon's birth see Archives de VArt Fran- 
 gais, by A. de Montaiglon, iii. 350. Blois was building in 1515 
 (L. E. de Laborde, La Renaissance des Arts a la Cour de 
 France, p. 190); in 1540 Goujon was at Rouen. The next 
 year he worked in St. Maclou and in the Cathedral; in 1542 
 with Lescot; two years afterwards at Ecouen. The " Eons 
 Nymphium " and the " Caryatides " were carved in 1550, and 
 five years later he had begun the work on the Louvre at which 
 he was employed while the massacre of St. Bartholomew was 
 going on. 
 
138 did '^, 
 
 outaine 
 
 the swell of the hip in a way peculiarly his own, and 
 reproduced on the famous Fontaine des Innocents, 
 and in a bas-relief in the Salle des cent Suisses; the 
 very attitude in which the wavy sheaf of water-flags 
 is held is also characteristic of his methods; but 
 more convincing still is the elaborate treatment of 
 the head-dress, with its pendent ornament, and the 
 chiselled bracelet upon the arm, both of which are 
 found especially prominent in the " Diane Chasser- 
 esse," another example of the long lithe limbs, and 
 the small breasts high on the body, which Goujon 
 was especially fond of reproducing. 
 
 The carving of the canopy of this statue at Blois 
 is alone worthy of long study; though every detail 
 varies, yet each contributes gracefully to the per- 
 fection of the whole; here especially is it possible 
 to realise what a labour of love was the work of the 
 old masons, what time unlimited their workmen 
 had, to chisel cunningly at the firm white stone be- 
 neath the mellow sunshine of Touraine, until each 
 part was filled with something of the individuality 
 of the man whose life was spent in slow and perfect 
 labour with his hands, until the scheme which gave 
 each workman his allotted task was finished in its 
 harmony of carving, its strength and delicacy of 
 construction and of form. It is often by the shape 
 
laid 139 
 
 and moulding of his mere grotesques that a great 
 artist's power is seen; and this is the case here. 
 Between the statues we have just examined and 
 the main wall is a salamander, marvellous in its 
 originality, its living force of movement, clinging 
 to the stone with a reality that is little short of 
 creative; the line of its spinal column curves firmly 
 from neck to tail as in a living thing, the grip of 
 hind and fore feet set with claws is amazing in 
 its grasp and actuality of movement and organic 
 strength, the very warts upon its scaly back add 
 one more touch of Hfe to this extraordinary 
 carving. 
 
 But the wonders of this perfect structure do not 
 cease with the sculpture upon its outward walls. 
 The stairs wind upwards, folding round their cen- 
 tral shaft as the petals of a tulip fold one within 
 the other, and by a slight curve at the attachment 
 of each step, a strange look of life and growth is 
 produced that is marvellously helped by the ascend- 
 ing spiral of the column which supports the whole; 
 its waving lines rush upwards like a flame blown 
 from beneath, or like the flying spiral of a jet of 
 water falHng fast yet strongly from a. height; there 
 is in it a beauty that is elemental, a touch of the 
 same nature that curves the tall shaft of the iris 
 
140 Otd Fontaine 
 
 upwards from the pool in which it grows. But the 
 delicate strength of this central column reproduces 
 with an even greater accuracy the lines that in 
 natural objects are most beautiful because most 
 adapted to the purpose they fulfil; the spiral upon 
 its shaft is the exact curve which is contained within 
 a sea-shell for the beauty of the work is of that 
 necessary order which comes of perfect skill, and 
 finds its ultimate justification in the essential har- 
 mony of natural structures. In this particular case 
 it seems more than probable that an actual shell 
 was used consciously as a model; for the absolutely 
 unique double curve of the steps, with their relation 
 to the ascending curves from which they grow, is 
 precisely the same as the spiral and its attachments 
 in the shell. There is a more striking correspond- 
 ence still: the lines upon the outside of the top 
 part of the shell will be found to have the same 
 arrangement as the balustrades on the exterior of 
 the staircase, and reversed, in exactly the same zvay 
 as the spiral. It is tempting to complete the 
 hypothesis by imagining such a shell as this to have 
 been in the possession of the architect to whom the 
 first plans of the work were due : he must have been 
 a man who collected natural objects to study the 
 secrets of their beauty; a man of unequalled con- 
 structive power, for the groin-work and vaulting 
 
(Sentzal S^illat of cftancid I. 
 
lold 141 
 
 of the stairs are not the least astounding part of the 
 whole building; a man, too, of extraordinary imagi- 
 nation, and with a sense of harmonious proportion 
 rarely equalled in the world. Scarcely any one of 
 that time save Leonardo da Vinci possessed a 
 genius at once so universal and so thorough, and 
 Leonardo was at Amboise, a Httle farther down the 
 river, just when the first plans of this staircase would 
 be required. Is it possible that Francis found one 
 last sketch, one remnant of the dying artist's 
 genius, and employed to decorate his newest 
 chateau the last " tour de force " of the great master 
 for whom he had no care to build a tomb? 
 
 It is possible to realise, even more keenly than 
 elsewhere, the full spirit and movement of the true 
 Renaissance, when such a gem of art and architect- 
 ure as the wing of Francis I. is placed next to the 
 cold and meaningless productions of Francois Man- 
 sard at the height of his reputation, at the most 
 chilling point of his respectability. In this wing, 
 opposite the entrance, so different from all the rest 
 of the chateau, lived Gaston d'Orleans, dullest of 
 royal dullards, himself so chillingly respectable that 
 he had formed a plan of delivering up the whole 
 of the palace to the mercies of reforming Mansard, 
 and would have done so, had not Providence re- 
 moved him in time and preserved for the wonder 
 
142 did ^1 
 
 ouzatrie 
 
 of later ages the fantasies of a creation too unfet- 
 tered for his slow wit to understand. 
 
 The early history of the castle is connected with 
 those Counts of Blois whom we have already heard 
 of in tracing the fortunes of their mortal enemies, 
 the Angevin Counts. Upon the remains of the old 
 Roman camp which held the tongue of land be- 
 tween the Loire and the now lost Arou, the robber 
 captains of the sixth and seventh centuries built 
 their first rude stronghold, which was later on to 
 become part of the wide possessions held by the 
 Counts of Vermandois, Champagne, and Blois. 
 These three houses were among the first of the great 
 feudal families of France in the eleventh and twelfth 
 centuries; their relationships extended to lands as 
 far apart as England and Palestine, while nearer 
 home Flanders, Burgundy, Aquitaine, and Navarre 
 were all more or less closely connected with the 
 same powerful stock. It was from Thibault le 
 Tricheur, whose fame still fills the low country all 
 round Chambord, that the Chateau of Blois received 
 its first donjon built with money raised by certain 
 fraudulent practices, and increased by more open 
 deeds of violence and robbery. Even if authenti- 
 cated records of these times were forthcoming they 
 would be of little interest, for the quarrels of the 
 barons had not much influence on the real history 
 
loid 143 
 
 of France; but before the thirteenth century the 
 possessions of Champagne and Vermandois had 
 fallen by marriage to King Philip IV., and by 1233 
 Chartres and Blois had been bought by the Crown 
 from another Count Thibault. Blois had become 
 Crown property, and was soon to be the recognised 
 possession of the family of Orleans. 
 
 The historian Froissart, who was chaplain here 
 during the regency of the dukes in the first years of 
 Charles VI. 's reign, relates an interview that took 
 place between the Dukes of Burgundy and Berry 
 concerning the old quarrels between Brittany and 
 France; but the castle began to take its actual 
 place in the history of France when Louis d'Orleans 
 brought Valentine Visconti here from Milan.^ The 
 princess had made a triumphant entry into Paris, 
 and had immediately secured the good graces of the 
 King; but her happiness was very short-lived, and 
 this visit to Blois, one of the many homes of her 
 clever and unfeeling husband, seemed almost a 
 flight from the horror of the poor King's madness, 
 which she had tried in vain to soothe, and from the 
 dark suspicions of the changeable populace of Paris. 
 
 About this time Eustache Deschamps, the poet, 
 was " maitre d'hotel " to the duke, and at his mar- 
 riage in 1393 received from his patron a present of 
 ^ See Chapter VI. " Three Dukes of Orleans." 
 
144 uld Ooiizalne 
 
 five hundred gold pieces. It was by Eustache's 
 care that the Hbrary, which had been begun by a 
 small donation from the royal collection, was in- 
 creased by the Three Pilgrimages of Human Life, of 
 Christ, and of the Soul, bought from one Jehan 
 Bizet, and written in cursive characters. There was 
 a Legende Doree too, bound in the black velvet which 
 the duke especially affected, and a History of the 
 Old and New Testament by Pierre Comestor, which 
 had been translated in the last century, and cost the 
 duke as much as eighty gold crowns. A book to 
 the taste of Madame Valentine was perhaps La 
 Consolacion de Boece, which her husband bought in 
 Paris — she needed comfort as much as most women 
 of her time; while the scholarly proclivities of 
 the duke himself are traceable in the Problesmes 
 d'Aristote, translated by Evrard de Conty, which he 
 bought from a Paris student, whose tastes were 
 probably more in the direction of the outspoken 
 rhymes with which Francois Villon was soon to 
 delight the idle scholars of the capital. 
 
 But Valentine was not allowed to rest for long 
 in the quiet valley of the Loire. She had to rejoin 
 the duke, whose excess and immorality soon 
 brought their inevitable punishment, and in 1407 
 she was once more at Blois in even greater grief 
 than at her former visit, for this handsome, cruel 
 
loid 145 
 
 husband, whom she had loved passionately in spite 
 of all his faults, had been basely murdered in the 
 streets of Paris. Her attempts at vengeance failed. 
 The poor King's mind, which in its weakness 
 showed more plainly all those feelings which its 
 strength had hidden, was warped for ever against 
 his brother of Orleans; the murder was pardoned, 
 praised even, and the gentle heart of Valentine was 
 broken in a year. 
 
 Her son Charles in his first years showed but 
 little of the poetic temperament which always 
 passed almost unnoticed by his companions. In 
 company with Dunois, the famous Bastard, the 
 most capable of all the children of Duke Louis, he 
 was soon at work organising the forces which were 
 to fall at Agincourt. In 141 5 the battle had been 
 won and lost, Charles had been taken prisoner, and 
 the Chateau of Blois was deserted. Twelve years 
 afterwards even the library which had lightened the 
 hours of those who were left behind in mourning 
 for their lord was removed to Saumur for greater 
 safety; for tidings had reached the duke in his cap- 
 tivity of the movements of the English in the valley 
 of the Loire. 
 
 The castle itself was soon filled with tokens of 
 
 coming change. In 1429 Joan of Arc was in the 
 
 Church of St. Sauveur, where the Archbishop of 
 Vol. 11—10. 
 
146 did ^1 
 
 outatne 
 
 Rheims blessed the standard she was to bear to 
 victory; and the tide of English invasion turned at 
 last. But the delivery of Charles d'Orleans was not 
 yet. Dunois was in charge of the castle when the 
 conspiracy of the Praguerie broke out that was 
 organised by the Dauphin Louis against his father 
 Charles VIL; and only in 1440, after twenty-five 
 long years, did the duke return home again. Of 
 his life at Blois we know already; to him and to his 
 son are chiefly owing those Italian influences which 
 were most worth copying by French artists, and 
 which lend their peculiar charm to the work of this 
 period at Blois. But the most important event 
 during his life at the castle, both to his family and 
 to France, was the birth of the young Louis 
 d'Orleans, who was to be King Louis XIL He 
 was held at the font by Louis XL The father was 
 congratulated by his poets, and by the whole 
 country; and having little else to do in life, he left 
 it gracefully soon afterwards. 
 
 The next few years of the story of the Chateau of 
 Blois are the years of the childhood of the young 
 duke who was to be Louis XIL 
 
 With the help of a miniature in a fifteenth-cen- 
 tury MS. of the " Roman de Renaud de Montau- 
 ban," we can imagine the boy seated by his mother 
 at the table beneath a high red canopy upon the 
 
loid 147 
 
 dais of the great hall, with two maids of honour in 
 their lofty head-dresses on either side. There is a 
 hound pacing across the tiled floor and watching 
 the pages, who move to and fro between the side- 
 board and the dais; and from a gallery draped in 
 red, above their heads, the musicians blow quaint 
 instruments and play the tunes that poet Charles 
 delighted in; while all the time at lower tables the 
 talk flows merrily and unrestrained among the vas- 
 sals and retainers of the Court. 
 
 Saint Gelais tells us how the boy was taught to 
 read before he was seven years old, and soon showed 
 a great love for history, which he probably first read 
 in the four great black velvet volumes of the Miroir 
 Historial in his father's library, a kind of unwieldy 
 encyclopaedia of the Middle Ages.^ 
 
 By the age of seventeen he could leap, wrestle, 
 shoot, and play tennis with the best, and particu- 
 larly aroused the historian's admiration for his ex- 
 cellent horsemanship. Nor was the example of his 
 mother's life thrown away upon him. With the 
 help of her women the good duchess made five 
 hundred shirts yearly to be given away, and quietly 
 provided in many other ways for the poorest in- 
 
 1 The fine library which had been begun by Louis d'Orleans, 
 and which was much improved by Louis XIL, was moved by 
 Francis L to Fontainebleau in 1544. 
 
148 uld Oouzalne 
 
 habitants of every town in which she might be 
 living. She taught her son to be forgiving at any 
 rate, for when he came to the throne after Charles 
 VIII. 's death, he behaved civilly enough to the men 
 who in earlier years had been obliged to oppose 
 him, not only in the Brittany wars but in the hap- 
 hazard skirmishes in Italy. 
 
 " La Tremouille," says Jean Bouchet, " made 
 great mourn at the death of his master King 
 Charles, for with that body he lost all hope of reward 
 for his labours." At Saint Aubin, too, he had 
 soundly beaten Louis, and had little expectation of 
 the generous reception that awaited him at Blois. 
 " Le Roi de France oublie les injures du due 
 d'Orleans," said the King, and La Tremouille was 
 confirmed in all his states and dignities. 
 
 The strength of Louis' character had received a 
 rude shock before this from the unfeeling policy of 
 Louis XL, and he was only enabled to recover at 
 his own accession to the throne. The marriage to 
 Jeanne de France, never one of inclination, must 
 have been very hard for the young prince to bear 
 in the first strength of his manhood. 
 
 Our pity for the unhappy victim of her father's 
 cruel calculations has perhaps hardened our judg- 
 ment upon the young Duke of Orleans, It is upon 
 Louis XL that the blame of the inevitable misery 
 
laid 14:9 
 
 that followed should rightly be laid. Saint Gelais 
 emphasises the impossibility of refusal when once 
 the royal will had been declared, and Jeanne must 
 have long been ready with the gentle words of 
 renunciation and loyalty which La Tremouille 
 brought from her to Louis as soon as Charles VIIL 
 was dead. 
 
 Her husband was now King of France, and the 
 necessity for a son to carry on his line was stronger 
 than the ties of individual affection, if indeed we 
 may suppose that Jeanne had ever loved the hus- 
 band upon whom she had been thrust. She retired 
 to the Duchy of Berry with a suitable retinue 
 allowed her by the King, and died, with a great 
 reputation for her sanctity of life, in 1504 at 
 Bourges. 
 
 The proceedings for divorce had necessitated the 
 presence in France of one whom we have already 
 met at Chinon, Csesar Borgia, Due de Valentinois, 
 the bearer of the bull from Alexander VI. 
 
 This extraordinary man was a worthy actor of 
 the strange part he had to play, dramatic and inevi- 
 table as the succession of events in ancient tragedy. 
 He had come to Chinon bearing besides the bull a 
 Cardinal's hat for Georges d'Amboise, the first real 
 Cardinal prime minister of France, and in a far more 
 real sense than Balue or Brigonnet, the true fore- 
 
150 uLd (Douzaine 
 
 runner of Richelieu and Mazarin. And now Cae- 
 sar's presence at Blois was due to the inevitable 
 return which had to be made for the favour of the 
 Pope's consent. A bride had to be provided for 
 this new prince of France, whose dignities were in- 
 creased by the gift of the Collar of St. Michael. 
 Frederic of Naples absolutely refused his daughter 
 Carlotta, and the King, after publicly marrying 
 Anne de Bretagne at Nantes in January 1499, pro- 
 posed Germaine de Foix or Charlotte d'Albret, 
 sister of the King of Navarre, as a wife for the 
 Italian. The latter was selected, and we may hope 
 that, here at any rate, she was happy in a husband 
 who was handsome even for a Borgia; for his face 
 and figure, we are told, were very near perfection, 
 and he possessed a subtle fascination, even for men, 
 that attracted women as a magnet draws the 
 iron.^ He wrote to Alexander VI. soon after, de- 
 
 1 Of the few portraits left of Csesar Borgia, Yriarte con- 
 siders that the woodcut in Paulus Jovius is the most authentic. 
 There is a supposed portrait by Raphael that is not hastily 
 to be accepted. 
 
 In the Bibliotheque Nationale at Paris there are three 
 types of his face — a woodcut in the style of Albert Diirer, a 
 drawing by Le Coeur which shows a long nose, flowing hair 
 and moustache, and a " bold bad eye," and a cut by B. 
 Bernaerts of Cgssar in youth, with the motto — 
 
 " Cui tranquilla quies odio cui proelia cord 
 Et rixa et caedes seditioque fuit. 
 
ioid 151 
 
 scribing his impressions of their " mariage de con- 
 venance." 
 
 No sooner was the wedding over than Louis was 
 deep in schemes for Italian invasion, which were 
 certainly as disastrous for France as Lorenzo de 
 Medicis foretold they would be to Italy. By Sep- 
 tember in the same year Caesar himself had gone 
 to Italy, and his wife was left in France never to see 
 this strange husband again/ With his career in 
 Italy we have nothing to do. Like a baleful stroke 
 of lightning he flashed across the clouds of Italian 
 intrigue, and disappeared before men understood 
 his meaning. 
 
 After his father's death he went to Spain. His 
 political life was ended, and the epilogue came fitly 
 in an imprisonment, a wildly venturous escape, and 
 a death in a skirmish when fighting for the King of 
 Navarre, against desperate odds, with the rebellious 
 Comte de Lerins. His memory has been blackened 
 
 ^ Charlotte retired to Valence. Later on she tried to reach 
 her husband in Italy, but he stopped her at Naples : she had 
 become unnecessary, and he had no time or inclination for 
 family affection. She then went to live at Issoudon, a town 
 which had been given to Caesar, and there educated her daugh- 
 ter Louise, who in 1516 (two years after her mother's death) 
 married Louis de la Tremouille. By the treaty of Blois in 
 October 1505 Germaine de Foix was given to Ferdinand in 
 marriage; he was to hand over Naples to her descendants, 
 and cement France and Spain against the interest of the 
 Borgias. 
 
152 Old %. 
 
 outatne 
 
 with the universal condemnation of posterity; but 
 only to great natures is it given to sin so greatly as 
 did Caesar Borgia. Born at a time which had cast 
 off the old morality and was not yet ready for the 
 new, he grew up amid the most licentious Court in 
 a licentious age; yet, of all who then lived, he alone 
 saw the true issues to which events inevitably 
 tended. 
 
 Far differently from his father, the lying, sensual 
 diplomat, he saw, as a true statesman, above all as 
 a thorough soldier, the one end that was worth 
 striving for. While Ludovico Sforza, while the 
 councils of Florence and of Venice were miserably 
 wasting time in weakening their neighbours, he 
 alone saw that the unity of Italy was worth the 
 battle, and was possible, and because he failed he has 
 been pitilessly judged. " Gran conoscitore della 
 occasione," says MachiavelH of this prince, who cap- 
 tivated the intellect of the astute ambassador; and 
 this is his chiefest praise. The friend of Pintoric- 
 chio, of Michael Angelo, of Leonardo da Vinci, his 
 engineer, staunch always in his love for Lucrezia — 
 " belle et bonne, douce, courtoise a toutes gens," as 
 Bayard says of her — Caesar Borgia must be judged, 
 not on his private life, but on his aspirations to his 
 country. He failed, he was crushed by adverse 
 fortune, he died before his youth had grown to the 
 
told 153 
 
 strength that should give fulfilment to its promises; 
 his motto remained, " Aut Caesar aut nihil." He 
 died too young to be a Caesar, he was much more 
 than nothing while he lived/ 
 
 In 1 501 a very different scene was passing within 
 the walls of Blois. 
 
 Robert de la Marche, who was afterwards the 
 Marechal de Fleuranges, tells us of his introduction 
 to the Court. Being about nine years of age, and 
 " se sentant solide sur son petit cheval, il delibere 
 en lui-meme," after the precocious fashion of young 
 adventurers of the time, and at length, with his 
 tutor and some other friends, he rides to Blois to 
 offer the strength of his small arms to King Louis. 
 " Welcome, my son," said the King; " you are too 
 young yet to serve me, and so you shall go live 
 with M. d'Angouleme at Amboise, with whom you 
 will be very happy." — " I will go wherever you may 
 please to order," replied the child. To Amboise he 
 went accordingly, to play with the young Prince 
 
 1 The Valentinois title was revived with Diane de Poitiers, 
 and later researches have brought to light that it is still pre- 
 served by the Prince of Monaco, as the Almanack de Gotha 
 tells us. In the Standard for 24th April 1891 occurs the fol- 
 lowing paragraph : " The last descendant of the once powerful 
 family of Borgias died last week in distressed circumstances. 
 He was the grandson of Don Alberto Calisto di Borgia, and 
 during the last twenty years had gained his living as a pho- 
 tographer." 
 
154 Old Ooutaine 
 
 Francis, and make friends with the future King of 
 France/ 
 
 Tn the same year there was a magnificent recep- 
 tion of the Archduke Philip of Austria at the 
 chateau. The whole of the State ceremonial has 
 been carefully preserved for us by a conscientious 
 Court chronicler. On the 6th of December the 
 visitors left Orleans and reached Saint Die, close 
 to Blois, where they found several falconers with 
 their birds sent forward by the King to amuse his 
 guest upon his way. The Archbishop of Sens, 
 Monsieur de Rohan, and many others had also come 
 from the Court to meet him, and all the way along 
 the road the cortege was met by companies of gen- 
 tlemen who welcomed the archduke to Blois. It 
 was late when they all reached their journey's end, 
 and torches were flashing from the river as they 
 rode into the town, the ladies all on palfreys har- 
 nessed in black and crimson velvet. The whole 
 courtyard of the castle was filled with the King's 
 archers, and the Swiss bodyguards kept back the 
 
 1 As we have seen, Louis XII. died without male issue. 
 Anne de Bretagne had to be content with " ma fille Claude et 
 ma fille Renee." " Anne Reine de France," writes Louise de 
 Savoie, who was watching events eagerly from Amboise, " le 
 jour de Sainte apres 21 Jan. eut un fils, mais il ne pouvait 
 retarder I'exaltation de mon Cesar, car il avoit faute de vie." 
 
 Louis XII. 's third marriage proved no more fruitful, and 
 Francis, Due d'Angouleme, became Francis I. 
 
bliateau of cBlol/i, %Vinq of cftancld I. 
 
loid 155 
 
 crowd that pressed forward to see the procession 
 pass into the doorway of the new-built castle, that 
 had just been decorated with the porcupine of Louis 
 XIL 
 
 The archduke slowly made his way to the great 
 hall, which was all hung with cloth of gold, and 
 tapestry that pictured the fall of Troy. Upon a 
 broad velvet carpet was the King's chair, with Mon- 
 seigneur d'Angouleme behind it, and the greetings 
 were soon over with great courtesy on either side. 
 The archduchess was some little way behind; the 
 press had been so great that she was somewhat 
 separated from her husband, but at last she ap- 
 peared, and having obtained the sanction of the 
 Bishop of Cordova she kissed King Louis and the 
 young duke, and was then, with great consideration, 
 sent away to the ladies. " Madame," said the 
 kindly King, " je sais bien que vous ne demandez 
 qu'a etre entre vous femmes, allez-vous en voir ma 
 femme, et laissez-nous entre nous hommes." The 
 crowd was still so thick in all the rooms and pas- 
 sages that movement became a thing of time and 
 patience, even for the great; and when they met 
 the baby princess Claude, carried by Madame de 
 Tournon's daughter, that httle lady signified her 
 disapproval of the whole ceremony with such lusty 
 yells that etiquette had to be disregarded, and all 
 
156 Old "S. 
 
 ouzatne 
 
 the four-and-twenty small girls who followed the 
 princess set themselves loyally to soothe her dis- 
 content. 
 
 At length the company were distributed in their 
 various rooms, the still-protesting princess to her 
 apartment hung with tapestries of farmyard scenes 
 and " tout petits personnages," the archduke to his 
 chamber, adorned with stories of the Trojan War, 
 and Anne de Bretagne to the room that was deco- 
 rated with a kind of " natural history pattern " of 
 strange birds and beasts. 
 
 Later on refreshments were borne to the arch- 
 duchess in solemn procession, led by the " maitre 
 d'hotel," with little page-boys after him, clad in yel- 
 low silk with velvet slashes, bearing each a waxen 
 candle in a golden candlestick. Madame de Bour- 
 bon followed, carrying a great gold box filled with 
 all kinds of confectionery and sweetmeats, then 
 Madame d'Angouleme with a gold box filled with 
 napkins, and Madame de Nevers with yet another 
 filled with knives and forks. And so the Court 
 goes pompously to bed, to wake up and find the 
 morning so unkind that the weather barely per- 
 mitted them to go outside the castle, though the 
 King and the archduke did their best to get sport 
 with their falcons. 
 
 Some few more days of solemn ceremony and 
 
lold 157 
 
 courtly converse and the guests left Blois in as great 
 state as they came. It is amusing to note with what 
 contempt the chronicler dismisses any attempt at 
 business or State affairs which may have been trans- 
 acted; for him it is enough that all the ceremonials 
 were got through decently and in order; and for us, 
 too, the politics may remain in the background: 
 what little of the history of the times was possible 
 for us has already been described. 
 
 It was at this time that the castle began to assume 
 something of its present shape. The whole of the 
 wing in which the entrance door is placed was built 
 and ready for the archduke and his suite. And it is 
 here that we can see Anne de Bretagne at her best, 
 among the ladies of her Court. " Like another 
 Vesta," says Hilarion Costa, " or another Diana, 
 she held all her nymphs in strict discipline, and yet 
 remained full of sweetness and courtesy." 
 
 In the library at St. Petersburg there is a picture 
 of the Queen weeping for her husband absent at the 
 wars in Italy. She is dressed in a black head-dress 
 and a square-cut bodice, holding a kerchief to her 
 eyes and writing. A great bed takes up much of 
 the room, a bird mopes in a cage, and on the floor 
 in one corner is a group of girls watching her 
 silently. In the Bibliotheque Nationale at Paris is 
 the sequel to the scene. The Queen is now seated 
 
158 uid Oowcaine 
 
 upon a kind of canopied throne, while her women 
 cluster round admiring the royal letter that is being 
 folded. Still another picture shows us the Queen, 
 her corded girdle at her side, and a fine smile of 
 conscious rectitude upon her face, handing the 
 epistle to her courier, while the attendant ladies with 
 difficulty restrain their emotions. 
 
 This letter may have been one of those composi- 
 tions in verse in which Fausto Andrelini assisted, or 
 Jean d'Auton, the King's historian; for Anne was 
 strong in literary tastes, and did much to help her 
 husband form that famous library, based on the 
 older collections of his grandfather, which was after- 
 wards to go to Paris.^ One part of the chateau the 
 Queen particularly afifected. " Voila mes Bre- 
 tons," she would say, " qui sont sur ma perche et 
 qui m'attendent," and the terrace where she loved 
 to meet her countrymen is still known as the 
 " Perche aux Bretons." These soldiers were the 
 bodyguard of a hundred gentlemen whom she had 
 picked out to attend her, in the same way as she 
 had begun the " Court of ladies," the innocent fore- 
 runner of the " escadron volant," over which Bran- 
 tome waxes so enthusiastic. 
 
 1 Many of the most precious MSS. in the Bibliotheque Na- 
 tionale come from this library. 
 
 See Bibl. Nat. MS. No. 5091, in which Jean des Maretz is 
 depicted giving the Queen a book. 
 
loid 159 
 
 ' On the 9th of January 15 14, at the age of thirty- 
 seven years, Anne died at the Chateau of Blois, to 
 the great grief of her husband. Brantome has de- 
 scribed the magnificence of her funeral. 
 
 Not long afterwards Louis XII. followed her to 
 the tomb, and with his death ends the first part of 
 the chateau's history. He left an ineffaceable mark 
 upon the place, and the porcupines carved here and 
 there upon the walls remind us still of the son of 
 Charles d'Orleans. It was here that he transacted 
 nearly all the important business of the State, the 
 famous Ordonnances of Blois, and the three great 
 treaties of 1504. It was here that he was brought 
 to recover, in his natal air, whenever illness pressed 
 upon him in the more confined atmosphere of the 
 capital. 
 
 The love he had for Blois he bequeathed to his 
 daughter Claude, the wife of Francis, to whom is no 
 doubt due the initiation of those magnificent works 
 which were to give a third side to the chateau, and 
 to provide the background for the drama that is to 
 come, the drama of the sixteenth century that was 
 now well on its way. 
 
c/Sloid 
 
CHAPTER XIX 
 
 BLOIS (Continued) 
 
 " Sit subitum quodcunque paras, sit caeca futuri 
 Mens hominum fati, liceat sperare timenti." 
 
 LUCAN. 
 
 Queen Claude, the daughter of Anne de Bretagne 
 and wife of Francis I., is the hnk in the history of 
 Blois between the old times and the new. It was 
 her fondness for her father's home that persuaded 
 the King to build the famous wing of Francis I. 
 that was to give shelter after his reign to Marie 
 Stuart, and later on to Henry III.; and at her death 
 it was left unfinished. Francis left it for Gaston 
 d'Orleans to complete in the next century, and 
 went off to build the gigantic Chambord in the 
 plains of the Sologne — Chambord which might 
 have been added to the home of Claude, and made of 
 Blois so fair a palace that Versailles would never 
 have existed. 
 
 For the next few reigns not much of interest 
 happened at the castle. In 1536 Madame Madeleine 
 de France was betrothed here to James V. of Scot- 
 land, and they were married shortly afterwards in 
 Paris. A young page went with them, who had 
 
 163 
 
164 Old ^outaine 
 
 been given to the Scottish King by the Duke of 
 Orleans, after the fashion of the time : it was Ron- 
 sard, who stayed in the north two years and six 
 months, and came back at the age of sixteen to go 
 with De Baif to Germany, before he settled down 
 in France as the favourite Court poet of the King. 
 
 Of the imitation of classical authors, for which 
 Michelet so severely criticises Ronsard, there is a 
 striking example at Blois in 1549, when a 
 " tragedy " was performed, which was the latest de- 
 velopment of that dramatic instinct which we have 
 already had occasion to notice. 
 
 In the museum now attached to the buildings of 
 the chateau there is an old plank covered with rude 
 paintings and rough verses such as were sung by 
 the first players of Mysteries and Sottises whom we 
 found at Amboise. There had been a somewhat 
 sudden development in these primitive dramatic 
 writings; the laxity of public morals, and the de- 
 cline in public religion which was emphasised by the 
 growing struggles between Huguenots and Catho- 
 lics, had produced their inevitable result in the na- 
 tional literature; the mystery had been neglected 
 for the farce, and a strange compromise had been 
 effected between the two, which by 1541 reached 
 such a pitch of scandal and disorder that they were 
 definitely suppressed by the Government. The 
 
ioid 165 
 
 ' death of the old religious theatre was the signal for 
 the rise of the literary theatre under the auspices of 
 Ronsard and the Pleiad, and the efforts of these 
 pioneers in the dramatic art have been somewhat 
 too harshly condemned from a lack of due apprecia- 
 tion of their strange position. The old methods 
 had been cast aside, and for the time no new ones 
 were forthcoming. It was inevitable that the re- 
 vival of classical learning, which was then at its 
 height, should have pointed out the new way that 
 was to be trodden by the dramatic author; so such 
 pieces as Cleopdtre, Medee, and Antigone appear, 
 mere copies, often bad ones, of the old originals, but 
 the best then possible. Not to every age is it given 
 to produce a Moliere, who should make a national 
 comedy from the old Confreres de la Passion at the 
 Hotel de Bourgogne; and this first classical revival 
 which began with Jodelle and the rest was strong 
 enough to last through Corneille and Racine, until 
 Dumas and Hugo startled the literary world with 
 the first French romantic drama, the drama which 
 first drew its scenes from the history of Touraine, 
 from the " Court of Henry HI." at Blois, and the 
 " Huguenots " at Chenonceaux. 
 
 Appropriately enough, it was owing to Catherine 
 de Medicis that one of these early French adapted 
 tragedies was played at Blois. Brantome par- 
 
166 Old Ooutatne 
 
 ticularly praises it, saying that " M. de Saint Gelais 
 composed it, or rather took and stole it from an- 
 other, with better ornamentation." ^ 
 
 There were not many fetes at Blois during the 
 reign of Henry 11. , and for the greater part of it 
 Catherine must bide her time and watch her rival's 
 triumph at Chenonceaux; but already the martial 
 cure at Meriot, who was better at holding pistols 
 and an arquebuse than at intoning prayers, had 
 discovered the inconveniences of a Church mili- 
 tant upon earth. Claude Haton's Memoires, full 
 of details as to weather, crops, and prices, unre- 
 liable as records of character or of policy, are yet 
 full of compassion for the sufferings of the poor by 
 war and by disease. They express plainly and 
 simply the common opinions of the time, and show 
 very fairly the direction in which afifairs were tend- 
 ing. In 1558 he was at Paris and saw the mar- 
 riages of Claude de France and Marie Stuart. 
 
 Soon afterwards — 
 
 " Pleurez done la France desolee," 
 cry the Memoires, 
 
 " Maudissez le coup de lance, 
 Maudissez Lorge qui la branle." 
 
 1 " Sophonisbe, tragedie tres excellente, tant pour I'agre- 
 ment que pour le poly lengage, representee et prononcee de- 
 vant le roy, en sa ville de Blois," Paris, 1559, in 8vo. 
 
lotd 167 
 
 Henry II. was dead, and the young King and 
 Queen moved their Court to Blois. 
 
 In the new wing of the castle Catherine de 
 Medicis with her two young children, the Due 
 d'Anjou and Marguerite de Valois, lodged in the 
 rooms that were decorated with the device of 
 Claude, the wife of Francis I., two C's intertwined 
 with lilies and the wings of a swan. The panelling 
 of her library, rescued from the decay into which 
 it had fallen, still shows traces of the colouring 
 which threw into bold relief the exquisite carving 
 of its walls; there are two hundred and thirty panels 
 here, all different, and each a brilliant example of 
 workmanship and design. This cabinet alone 
 would be sufificient indication of the luxury of 
 decoration lavished by four Valois Courts upon the 
 chateau; its solidity is conspicuous in the great 
 wall of division which cuts through the whole wing 
 like a spinal column, and divides each story into a 
 double range of rooms, each large enough, as 
 Balzac said, to hold a company of infantry with 
 ease. Above the rooms of Catherine de Medicis, 
 and with an exactly similar arrangement, were the 
 apartments of Francis II. and Marie Stuart, and it 
 is during their visit here in 1560 that the drama 
 of the Religious Wars, and of the attempts of the 
 Lorraines at power, first began to be unfolded. 
 
168 Uld Ooutaine 
 
 The Guises were at this time in the chateau, the 
 Duke Francis and the Cardinal; and though they 
 had, like many others of the Court, their own hotel 
 in the town, they preferred to watch events from 
 close at hand, and were lodged in the rooms of 
 Louis XII. above the twisted columns of the en- 
 trance; and they had many things to watch, for 
 the Loire, then as always, was covered with boats 
 sailing from the west and bearing emissaries from 
 the Huguenot headquarters, or Guisard spies who 
 brought news to the Cardinal; Catherine herself, 
 " niece of a pope, mother of four Valois, a Queen 
 of France, widow of an ardent enemy of the 
 Huguenots, an Italian Catholic, above all a Medi- 
 cis," had showed signs of favouring the heretics; 
 and the Guises were on the alert for traces of con- 
 spiracy, eager to crush once and for all the party 
 that opposed them both in religion and in politics. 
 But for the present Catherine seemed inclined to 
 follow her favourite motto, " Odiate e aspettate," 
 and life at the Court went on unwitting of coming 
 change, and happy in the pleasure of the two royal 
 lovers in their rooms above. We can imagine the 
 day on which was first sounded the signal of alarm. 
 The courtyard is filled with officers and men-at- 
 arms, and the sun just rising above the carved and 
 traceried windows of the roof shines on pourpoints 
 
loid 169 
 
 and slashed trunk-hose, and glitters on the hilts of 
 swords; within, all is in the bustle that indicates 
 the expected presence of the King, who is soon to 
 give his morning greeting to the Court. Mar- 
 shalled under the watchful eyes of the Comtesse de 
 Fiesque and the Duchesse de Guise, are the two 
 bands of maids-of-honour, on one side those of 
 Catherine, on the other (nearer to the royal apart- 
 ments) those of Marie Stuart; talking to them is 
 the young Prince Charles, brother of the King, 
 dressed in cloth of gold embroidered with black 
 flowers, and a short black cloak; behind him is 
 his tutor Amyot, and farther on the Chancellor 
 Olivier, while Brantome has already begun a con- 
 versation with Mademoiselle de Piennes, one of the 
 maids-of-honour, criticising the poetry of De Ba'if 
 and Du Bellay, who had the day before arranged 
 a fete for the amusement of the Court. 
 
 Some of the ladies passed the time in reading. 
 She who was afterwards to be " la belle Fosseuse "• 
 of Henry of Navarre was beginning her education 
 early with the Amadis de Gaule, by the Seigneur 
 des Essarts; Madame de Guise fingered Boccaccio's 
 Celebrated Ladies. Tales of gallantry were at the 
 time far more in favour at the Court than books 
 upon religious subjects, or even the many political 
 pamphlets with which the League and its oppo- 
 
170 uid (bowcatfie 
 
 nents afterwards flooded the capital and the prov- 
 inces. 
 
 But the Huguenot cause was not without its 
 representatives even here. Groslot, the servant of 
 Jeanne d'Albret, was watching the proceedings; 
 Coligny and Chatillon are there too, talking with 
 Moret of the visit of Theodore de Beze to Nerac, 
 when all whisperings ceased suddenly, as Dayelle, 
 the favourite waiting-woman of the Queen, an- 
 nounced that their Majesties were entering the 
 room. The face of Catherine, grave and sombre, 
 almost livid in the daytime though the ivory skin 
 lit up well at night, threw into lively contrast the 
 fresh pink and white of the youthful and piquant 
 Marie Stuart, whose careless gaiety had completely 
 captivated the fragile little King, almost crushed 
 by the severity of his mother. 
 
 But on this morning at the Court at Blois all 
 three seemed equally depressed, for strange news 
 had reached them. The Guises, who arranged 
 everything, had suddenly given out that the King's 
 life was in danger, and he must go for safety to 
 Amboise. By degrees the news spread through 
 the ranks of attendant courtiers, to the guards who 
 waited in the embrasures of the staircase, to the 
 men-at-arms below. The assembly in the rooms 
 above broke up hastily, and the chateau was 
 
loid 171 
 
 soon in all the hurry and discomfort of a swift 
 departure. 
 
 What passed thereafter at Amboise we know 
 already. It was the beginning of the terrible 
 thirty years of bloodshed that were to be signalised 
 in still more horrible a fashion at the massacre of 
 St. Bartholomew, and were to stain the very walls 
 of Blois with the traces of their cruelty and their 
 assassinations. Catherine de Medicis was in her 
 element, the country was full of wars and rumors 
 of wars, an(^ one by one the actors in the drama fall, 
 and their places are taken by others. 
 
 Soon after the battle of Dreux, news reached her 
 of the assassination of the Duke of Guise by Poltrot, 
 and she wrote at once to the Cardinal of " le mal- 
 heureux inconvenient advenu a son frere." Henry, 
 the son of the murdered man, was established in all 
 his father's rights and dignities. 
 
 The death of the Prince of Conde, too, brought 
 another Henry on the scene. The young prince of 
 Beam, who had been placed by his mother, Jeanne 
 d'Albret, under the care of Caumont la Force dur- 
 ing the campaign which ended at Jarnac, was now 
 raised to be the head of the Huguenot party, and 
 under the guidance of his mother and Coligny soon 
 made his influence evident to the anxious plotters 
 round the Court of Charles IX, 
 
172 Uid Oowcalne 
 
 The position had indeed become one of consid- 
 erable difficulty, and it was by means of the King's 
 sister, Marguerite de Valois, already famous for her 
 beauty and her wit, that a " rapprochement " was 
 hoped for between the hostile parties. 
 
 At Blois the first negotiations were begun by 
 Beauvais, tutor to the young Prince of Navarre, 
 who was sent by Jeanne d'Albret to the Court while 
 she herself went throughout her estates establish- 
 ing the reformed religion, strengthening the Uni- 
 versity of Beam, and chasing the Catholic priests 
 out of the country. Beauvais came back overjoyed 
 with the reception, but, says Bordenaye, " ceux 
 qui n'avaient I'entendement opile par les crudites et 
 viscosites de I'ambition et de I'avarice avaient ces 
 trop grandes caresses pour suspectes." Towards 
 the end of 1571 Jeanne d'Albret left her son under 
 the care of Beauvais, and travelled by way of Biron 
 (which she reached on 21st January in the new 
 year) towards Poitiers, where the Pope's legate met 
 her coach and passed it without a sign, for the 
 Queen of Navarre was in no good odour at the 
 Vatican, and Paul V. had very vehemently ex- 
 claimed against the marriage of a son of this de- 
 termined heretic with a Valois princess. But 
 Charles IX. had expressed his own opinion in 
 language even more vigorous than the Pope's, and 
 
loid 173 
 
 every preparation was made to receive Jeanne 
 d'Albret at the Court. The first interview took 
 place at Chenonceaux, but from Tours (which she 
 had only reached by the loth of February) the 
 Queen writes to her son of the difficulties of her 
 position. " Je vous assure que je suis en grande 
 peine, car Ton me brave extremement et j'ai toutes 
 les patiences du monde." She sends him news of 
 the Princess Marguerite, and of her own niece then 
 betrothed to the young Prince of Conde, with 
 various warnings as to the customs of the Court; 
 but it is from Blois that her indignation really 
 breaks out, at what she sees around her. Writing 
 from the chateau on the 8th of March 1572,^ she 
 complains bitterly of the cynical deceit and care- 
 lessness with which her advances are received. " I 
 am so shamefully used," she cries, " that you may 
 well say my patience passes that of Griselda. . . . 
 Madame (Marguerite) is beautiful, witty, and 
 graceful, but brought up in the most terribly cor- 
 rupted company; there is not one here but is 
 
 1 The beginning of this now famous letter explains the long 
 time that was taken over the journey. " Mon fils," she writes, 
 " je suis en mal d'enfant, et en telle extremite que, si je n'eusse 
 pourvu, j'eusse ete extremement tourmentee." It increases 
 our admiration for her strength of resolution and courage 
 that these difficult negotiations should have been carried on 
 during great bodily distress, and in much mental trouble wil- 
 fully caused her by Catherine. 
 
174 Old (Dowcalne 
 
 tainted with it. Your cousin, the Marquise, is so 
 changed that there is not a vestige of religion left 
 in her save that she never attends mass. For nothing 
 in the world would I have you living here; there is 
 my reason for your marrying and taking yourself 
 and your wife out of this corruption, for it is far 
 worse than ever I believed. It is no longer the men 
 who ask the women, but the women ask the men. 
 If you were here yourself you would only escape 
 by some remarkable mercy of God. I send you a 
 favour to wear beneath your ear since you are now 
 for sale, and some studs for your cap." 
 
 Marguerite herself would send no messages to her 
 betrothed, but otherwise was respectful enough to 
 the mother, who admits to Beauvais that the prin- 
 cess " has a fine figure, but laces herself very tightly, 
 and uses so much artificial help for her complexion 
 that I am grieved to think how she will spoil it; 
 but at this Court women paint as much as in Spain. 
 You would scarcely believe how pretty my own 
 daughter is in these surroundings. Every one at- 
 tacks her religion, but she holds her own and gives 
 in not a whit. Every one loves her." 
 
 Coming fresh from her edicts against gaming 
 and sumptuous apparel in the south, Jeanne 
 d'Albret was hardly of a mind to appreciate the 
 over-dressed princess, whom Brantome describes 
 
told 175 
 
 with so much enthusiasm at this time, taking part 
 in the procession during the " Paques Fleuries " at 
 Blois, and resplendent in a robe of cloth of gold 
 which had been given by the Sultan to M. Grand- 
 champ, and by him presented to Madame Margue- 
 rite. " Nor is this all," continues the same chroni- 
 cler, " for she walked in her place in the procession 
 with her face uncovered, so as not to deprive men 
 during so great a festival of its gracious light, and 
 seemed more beautiful still as she held in her hand 
 her sceptre (as all our Queens are wont to do) with 
 a queenly dignity, with a grace half royal and half 
 tender." 
 
 The fetes kept up during the whole visit were of 
 unusual magnificence, and were doubtless meant to 
 show how much more brilliantly the Catholics 
 could live than their Protestant opponents. The 
 King was no unready pupil of his crafty mother, 
 and Coligny himself had been enticed from La 
 Rochelle to see the splendour of the Court.^ 
 
 1 There is an interest for Englishmen in the family of Co- 
 ligny, apart from the admiration which his character and life 
 must always arouse among a nation which (whatever its other 
 faults) were certainly averse to the doubtful methods of policy 
 in favour among Coligny' s enemies. His ancestor was Gas- 
 pard de Coligny, Marshal of France under Charles VIII., 
 Louis XII., and Francis I., and through his uncle, Montmo- 
 rency, he was connected with the house of Nassau. William 
 of Nassau (the Silent) was father of the great General 
 
176 Old Oowcalne 
 
 At last the marriage contract was drawn up, and 
 in June the Queen of Navarre was in Paris. On 
 the loth of that month she was dead, being only 
 forty-four years old. It may well have been the 
 poisoned gloves that killed her, as tradition tells, 
 for Maitre Rene, Catherine's instrument in such 
 delicate situations, was equal to gracefully remov- 
 ing any one who was at all obnoxious to the Queen- 
 mother. 
 
 Jeanne d'Albret was too much given to taking 
 things " au grand serieux " for this careless and 
 unscrupulous age, her religion was too much of a 
 reality for the polished mockery of Courts, and as 
 like Coligny she would not bend, like him she must 
 be broken. The massacre of St. Bartholomew, in 
 which the admiral was murdered, took place very 
 shortly after these events. 
 
 Upon the terrace beyond the main building of the 
 castle is the tower with the letters " Uraniae Sac- 
 rum " inscribed upon its entrance, in which Cather- 
 ine consulted the stars with her astronomer, and 
 with the superstition so common to minds of her 
 peculiar nature, inquired the influence of the plan- 
 ets upon her various schemes. Here she plotted the 
 accession of her son, the Duke of Anjou, to the 
 
 Maurice, grandfather of Turenne, and great-grandfather of 
 William III. of England. 
 
loid 177 
 
 -Crown of Poland, and negotiated, though happily 
 with no success, for his marriage with the English 
 Queen, Elizabeth; ^ here she dreamed of the carni- 
 val of death that was to run riot in the streets of 
 Paris, of the murder of Coligny, of Navarre, of 
 Conde, of all who ever crossed her path — horrors 
 which her son's mind was not strong enough to 
 bear. 
 
 In 1574 began the fourth reign in which this 
 woman's sinister influence was to play a part, the 
 reign which brings to its crisis the history of the 
 Chateau of Blois. 
 
 Her son Henry had hurried from Cracow on the 
 death of Charles IX., had gone through the dis- 
 gusting mockery of penitence in the streets of 
 Avignon, and was beginning his cruel and dissi- 
 pated career, in which enough of frivolous and ex- 
 aggerated religion was mingled to rob his care- 
 lessness of its one excuse.^ 
 
 1 Elizabeth seems to have been considered a fair mark at 
 this time for all royal matrons with marriageable sons. 
 
 There was a scheme afoot at one time to marry her to Henry 
 of Navarre, and join England, France, and Navarre in one 
 great Empire that should recall the dominions of the Ange- 
 vins. Smith and Throckmorton, the English ambassadors, 
 were in Touraine in 1571, and were spoken to on this strange 
 business. 
 
 2 " Cette vie lache et meprisable," says Vitet with as much 
 truth as force, " dont une moitie etait consacree aux plus 
 
 Vol. II.— 13 
 
178 uLd (joiLzaine 
 
 There is a small staircase leading from the main 
 buildings of the castle into the great hall in which, 
 in 1576, Henry III. convoked the first States-Gen- 
 eral of Blois. Henry, the famous Due de Guise, 
 was at the height of his power; with the conscious- 
 ness that Spain was at its back, he was prepared 
 with the League to combat to the full the powers 
 of the King, The famous Catholic League had 
 been thought of so far back as 1562 by the Cardinal 
 de Lorraine at the Council of Trent; it got its first 
 strength from the Press, and from secret associa- 
 tions in the capital; indeed, although 1572 had 
 given a bloody proof of its existence, the League, 
 until 1576, remained almost a secret society, with 
 meetings such as that into which the reckless 
 Chicot penetrated and gave Brother Gorenflot so 
 great a reputation for his oratory. 
 
 But at this time they felt strong enough to throw 
 off the mask, and the King was fairly terrified at 
 the revelation of the extent of their plans. It must 
 have been a sore surprise for the Guises when the 
 King, in a moment of sudden resolution, declared 
 that he himself would head the famous League; 
 and we may be sure that all the Court who 
 
 honteuses debauches et I'autre aux plus ridicules devotions." 
 The best that can be said for his melancholy culture and re- 
 finement is said in Dumas' Quarantc Cinq, and the rest. 
 
BSalL of Stato-fJenezaL, cBlotd 
 
told 179 
 
 dared were laughing at the great man's discomfi- 
 ture/ 
 
 The King's resolve is described by his sister 
 Marguerite, who was present at the meeting of the 
 states of Blois; and (says her usual ardent admirer 
 Brantome) the assembly were even more occupied 
 in studying her royal charms than in listening to 
 the excellent discourses of the King. As a matter 
 of fact the King spoke very well and with much 
 dignity when occasion required it, as it did certainly 
 now, for Guise was only put on his mettle by the 
 temporary check, and was soon moving every influ- 
 ence in his power towards his one fixed aim — the 
 King's abasement and his own advance. 
 
 D'Aubigne describes how these first estates at 
 Blois dragged wearily on, with demands for redress 
 of grievances ^ alternating with royal complaints of 
 lack of money, and here and there a murder, to 
 diversify proceedings, in the castle grounds. At 
 last the sessions were over, and while, for the sixth 
 time, the Religious Wars began in the South Prov- 
 inces, within the courtyard of the chateau the 
 " mignons " of the King, the D'Epernons and Joy- 
 euses of Dumas' famous drama, were swaggering 
 
 1 " J'ai detrone mon cousin de Guise (said Henry to Mor- 
 villier), me voila roi des ligueurs a sa place." 
 
 2 Which had one good result, the "Edit de Blois," a sound 
 measure of reform much needed. 
 
180 did "S. 
 
 owcaine 
 
 in their short cloaks and long rapiers, and some- 
 times having serious fights in the midst of the dis- 
 sipation of the Court. 
 
 Thus, Caylus, Maugiron, Livarot, and St. Megrin 
 were beaten by D'Entragues, Schomberg, and 
 Ribeirac, in the famous duel that is immortalised 
 in " La Dame de Montsoreau." The King's grief 
 for his favourites was overwhelming, and he built 
 to their memory a magnificent sepulchre, which 
 was knocked down by the people of the capital 
 soon afterwards. Thus, the Sieur de Saint Sulpice 
 met his death at the hands of the Vicomte de Tours 
 behind the archways in the moonlight, while the 
 courtiers were dancing in the brilliant rooms above, 
 and the King, effeminate enough already, dressed 
 as a woman, was simpering at the jests of the first 
 Italian comedians who had replaced the stormy 
 councillors in the great hall of the castle. 
 
 Of the private life of the Court at this time, of 
 the exploits of the " mignons," of Bussy d'Amboise, 
 and the rest, of the King's maudlin affections, his 
 Httle dogs, his mummeries, his effeminacy, his nau- 
 seating mockeries of holiness, the chronicles of the 
 time are full; and they are not pleasant reading. 
 Small wonder that so many of Montaigne's essays, 
 first printed about 1581, breathe discouragement 
 and weariness of soul at all this purposeless and 
 
loid 181 
 
 endless vice and debauchery — this ghastly careless- 
 ness of life and of its ending, which is the distin- 
 guishing mark of the times of the last Valois. 
 
 But even the indolence of the King was at last 
 roused by the startling events that were in progress. 
 On the first day of March 1587 L'Estoile chroni- 
 cles the news of Marie Stuart's execution; tidings 
 followed fast of the gathering of the Armada that 
 was to be hurled against the English heretics, and 
 the result of the struggle was watched eagerly both 
 by the Guises and the King; the King, in Chartres, 
 was in fact in deadly fear in spite of his new body- 
 guard of D'Epernon's Quarante-Cinq, for, con- 
 trary to all orders, De Guise had entered Paris, the 
 city had risen in his favour, the very streets been 
 barricaded at the least sign of opposition, and he 
 was actually on his way to demand his appointment 
 as Constable at the coming session of the States 
 at Blois, which the King was unwillingly obliged 
 to summon in October 1588. 
 
 Of the three divisions of the Parliament, only 
 in the noblesse could Henry count on a majority, 
 the Guises held the clergy, and the enormous ma- 
 jority of 150 out of 191 in the Tiers Etat. 
 
 The sitting did not promise to be very gratifying 
 to the royal pride, and the King's mind showed 
 traces of irresolution that did not go unmarked by 
 
182 did ^0 
 
 utatne 
 
 his mother and those who watched him carefully. 
 He had dismissed Cheverny, Villeroi and his old 
 ministers, and taken on Montholon, to every one's 
 surprise, with Ruze, Revol, and others whom he 
 hoped to influence as he liked. A solemn proces- 
 sion was then started round the town, of all the 
 elected members and the councillors of the Court; 
 at last the first sitting was definitely fixed for the 
 middle of October. The appearance of the great 
 Salle des Etats has been often described; its walls 
 were covered with tapestry, and its pillars twisted 
 with gold lilies upon violet velvet; between the 
 third and fourth was placed a dais with a throne, 
 by which sat the Queen and the Queen-mother. 
 Strong barriers all round kept the spectators at a 
 distance, and on a chair within them sat De Guise, 
 in his white satin doublet, watching keenly all the 
 men of his own party ranged in lines before him. 
 At last he rose, and mounting the private staircase 
 to the castle rooms, came back with the King. 
 
 The speech from the Throne was unexpectedly 
 firm and created a great sensation, but its effect 
 was somewhat spoilt by Montholon's tedious dis- 
 cussion, which wandered from Solomon and the 
 Druids to general exhortations to the assembly, and 
 by the time the Archbishop of Bourges had men- 
 tioned Nestor and Ulysses, and even dragged in the 
 
lold 183 
 
 examples of Nebuchadnezzar and Artaxerxes, the 
 patience of the house was well-nigh exhausted. 
 The King's friends had done him Httle good, and 
 the Duke of Guise's popularity became more pro- 
 nounced than ever; he was proud to excess before, 
 he now became violent and disrespectful. It was 
 clear to the anxious King that his conduct was 
 Httle short of treasonable; and the jests which the 
 great duke pitilessly flung to all his followers, 
 about the King being more fitted for a cloister than 
 a Court, at last drove Henry's naturally timid and 
 irresolute character to take a desperate revenge. 
 
 Personal enmities have always had much to do 
 with the crises of French history, and they were 
 not lacking now to add one more touch to the 
 gloomy picture whose background was shadowed 
 with the struggles of fanaticism and persecution, 
 only relieved by the lurid lights from burning vil- 
 lages throughout the desolated realm of France.^ 
 The Cardinal de Guise talked of making a crown 
 for Henry with a dagger's point, and the wicked 
 
 1 There were horrible cruelties practised on both sides. See 
 the Theatrum crudelitatum nostri temporis, Anvers, 1587, 4to, 
 where the Huguenots are represented torturing men and wom- 
 en with cruelties unspeakable. 
 
 The Oldenhurgisches Chronicon, folio, 1599, shows the re- 
 prisals of the other side — confused scenes of pillage and 
 murder, with Catholic soldiers sacking the villages of the 
 Huguenots. 
 
184 Old Oowcaine 
 
 little Duchesse de Montpensier, with her pack of 
 cards in her gibeciere, carried on the other side of 
 her girdle the golden scissors with which she had 
 sworn to cut the tonsure for the King when he was 
 made a monk. 
 
 Anne d'Este was in the Guises' lodgings, the 
 grand-daughter of Louis XII. and mother of Duke 
 Henry, who married the Due de Nemours after 
 her first husband's death; his wife, too, Catherine 
 de Cleves, only left Blois on the 17th of December 
 that her child might be born at Paris. His son 
 Charles, Prince de Joinville, stayed with him all the 
 time, and spent his days in matches at tennis and 
 flirting with the maids-of-honour. All over the 
 castle grounds the pages of the rival factions were 
 perpetually quarrelling, and constant duels, in de- 
 fiance of Court etiquette, took place in the gardens 
 and the town. At every turn the King saw Gui- 
 sard faces, watching him and hating him, and every 
 day brought fresh humihations; like Louis XL, he 
 veiled his projects in a still deeper cloak of exag- 
 gerated and loathsome cant and superstition; he 
 even took mass with De Guise on the 4th of De- 
 cember, and on the i8th entered with unusual 
 gaiety into the festivities at the marriage of Chris- 
 tina of Lorraine. The Duke affected to believe 
 the hypocritical expressions of the King, or passed 
 
ioid 185 
 
 him altogether as beneath contempt, but that 
 very night the murder was first actually spoken 
 of. 
 
 Henry's accomplices knew the strength of the 
 man with whom they had to deal; arrangements 
 were made to isolate him from his numerous suite, 
 and a murderer was found courageous enough to 
 strike the blow. 
 
 So much ambition and so much contempt could 
 only have one end, but the pride of Le Balafre 
 would only listen to the bolder spirits among his 
 friends; confident in himself and despising his 
 royal enemy, he rejected all the warnings which 
 were showered upon him; a note in his dinner 
 napkin was thrown away unread, and all the vague 
 prophecies with which the air was full were for- 
 gotten, or passed over as the idle tales of quacks 
 and prophecy-mongers. 
 
 At a supper in the Guises' rooms the position 
 was talked over; the Cardinal and the Archbishop 
 of Lyons were there, De Neuilly, Chapelle Marteau, 
 and without doubt the Duchesse de Montpensier 
 in her white damask, with the pink and green 
 embroidery, and her long skirt hiding the slight 
 defect in one leg. The Duke's mother, too, was full 
 of anxiety at the constant warnings that reached 
 her. 
 
186 utd (jowcalne 
 
 " Paris conjure un grand meurtre commettre, 
 Blois lui fera sortir son plein effet." 
 
 " La cour sera en un bien facheux trouble, 
 Le grand de Blois son bon ami tuera," 
 
 were two of the numberless doggerels that every 
 one was quoting at the time. The Duke was 
 again and again besought to beware of Christmas, 
 " for before the year dies you will be dead," had 
 said the prophet. 
 
 But as if his destruction had already been fated 
 by a higher power, his usual prudence seemed for 
 the time to have been cast aside, and even the 
 prayers of his mistress, the lovely Charlotte de 
 Sauves, Marquise de Noirmoutier, could not pre- 
 vail on him either to strike the first blow or to leave 
 the Court that was so full of danger for him, and 
 the town that was notoriously hostile to the League. 
 
 Before the breaking of the storm the King kept 
 outwardly very calm, and occupied his leisure in 
 obtrusively pious celebrations of the masses before 
 Christmas. On the evening of the 22d the last 
 arrangements were made. 
 
 At four o'clock the next morning the King, who 
 had not slept all night, was roused by Du Halde. 
 Several of the Quarante-Cinq were hidden in the 
 staircase leading to the King's "cabinet neuf ; " 
 
loid 187 
 
 others were disposed in convenient hiding-places 
 along the passages that led from the Council cham- 
 ber to the royal apartments; others were put in 
 readiness to secure the persons of the Cardinal and 
 the Archbishop of Lyons as soon as the blow had 
 fallen. 
 
 The King walked nervously from room to room 
 in the darkness of the December morning, seeing 
 that all was ready, and listening to the chanting 
 of the monks in the alcove hard at hand, who were 
 praying for the success of this cowardly assassina- 
 tion. The members of the Council had been ex- 
 horted, the last words of encouragement and warn- 
 ing given to the Quarante-Cinq, swords and dag- 
 gers even had been served out to those who had 
 none, the ministers were beginning to assemble in 
 the great hall beyond, and still the Duke came not. 
 
 De Guise, all unconscious of the imminent peril 
 he was in, had spent the night with the fascinating 
 Madame de Sauves, and only left her at about 
 three in the morning for his own rooms. 
 
 It was after eight o'clock when his valets aroused 
 him, saying that the King was on the point of 
 leaving the chateau, and the Council waited. He 
 walked across the courtyard of the castle to the 
 royal apartments, beneath a dark and threatening 
 sky, " Ce ciel sombre et triste," that was to over- 
 
188 Uid Oowcal 
 
 ine 
 
 shadow the last moments of his Hfe. Upon the 
 terrace La Salle and D'Aubercourt begged him to 
 go back, and he crumpled in his fingers the ninth 
 note of warning since the night. 
 
 At the foot of the beautiful staircase/ beneath 
 the statues and the twining leaves, is a man-at- 
 arms, the Sieur de Larchant, who entreats the 
 nobleman in power for some favour for the Scottish 
 Guard from the King himself, and as the Duke as- 
 cends, the steps behind him are closed up with a 
 double file of soldiers, and all the castle gates are 
 bolted. A last message sent him in a handker- 
 chief failed of its purpose, and in another moment 
 he is in the Council chamber, pale and cold with 
 the night air, warming himself at the great fire, 
 eating some plums, and jesting with the courtiers 
 waiting with him. 
 
 The pale face of Revol, the Secretary of State, 
 just then showed through the open door, and the 
 message came that His Majesty awaited the Duke 
 in the Cabinet vieux. De Guise put some of his 
 plums in a small box in his pocket, threw the rest 
 upon the table for the councillors, and with an 
 " Adieu, messieurs," to them all, left the Council 
 
 1 Mezeray (iii. 734, fol. 1685) says that Chicot was on the 
 steps, rubbing an old " alumelle " against the window, and 
 murmuring, " He j'ay Guise." 
 
loid 189 
 
 chamber; the Sieur de Nambu shut the door be- 
 hind him. 
 
 The miserable King was not in the room to 
 which De Guise had been summoned, and which 
 lay through a narrow passage to the left, but 
 waiting in the Cabinet de travail at the other end 
 of his apartments, trembling behind a door until 
 his cut-throats should have completed their task. 
 
 Turning to the left as he came out, the Duke 
 has reached the end of the room that is crowded 
 with his murderers, though he knows it not, for he 
 has bowed to all of them, and gone his way 
 towards the Cabinet vieux; there is a pressure on 
 his foot, perhaps a warning, but it comes too late, 
 and the assassins are close round him. 
 
 With a strange feeling of oppression and un- 
 certainty he was half turning back, with one hand 
 on his beard, when he felt the first dagger stroke 
 upon his neck. It was Montfery who grasped his 
 arm, crying, " Traitor, thou shalt die ! " At the 
 same time his legs were seized by Des Effranats, 
 Saint Malines stabbed him in the chest, and Loig- 
 nac thrust him with his rapier through the loins; 
 but powerful still in his last agony, and with a loud 
 cry for help,^ he dragged his murderers, strug- 
 
 1 " Le premier coup qu'il receut luy faisant regorger le sang 
 dans le gosier, il ne put jetter qu'un grand soupir qui fut 
 entendu avec horreur de ceux qui etaient au conseil " (Meze- 
 
190 Old ^outatne 
 
 gling, from one end of the room to the other, 
 staggering with arms outstretched, dull eyes with- 
 in their staring sockets, and mouth half-opened, 
 as one already dead. 
 
 At last he fell beside the curtains of the bed. 
 Then came out the King, and with all the meanness 
 of his pitiful nature spurned with his heel the face 
 of the dying man — a terrible reprisal this, for the 
 cruelty of De Guise himself to the gray hairs of 
 Coligny; and the last sigh of the great duke, who 
 rendered up his strong spirit slowly and with 
 almost unconquerable efifort, was received by the 
 courtier who was kneeling down to rifle the pock- 
 ets of the corpse; it was covered with a gray cloak, 
 and a cross of straw was thrown upon it. 
 
 In the confusion that ensued among the crowd 
 in the ante-chamber De Guise's relatives were 
 seized, and the tragedy was completed when his 
 body and that of the murdered Cardinal his brother 
 had been burnt within the castle, and their ashes 
 scattered on the waters of the Loire. 
 
 Catherine de Medicis died a few days afterwards, 
 
 and within a year the King was murdered. The 
 
 sixteenth century ended red with the blood of its 
 
 chief actors, and the stage was cleared again for a 
 
 new reign. 
 
 ray, iii. 734, fol. 1685). For further details see authorities 
 mentioned in the Appendix. 
 
emif, Jjnc cie (jtuAi 
 
CHAPTER XX 
 
 BLOIS (Concluded) 
 
 " Fy de la Ligue et de son nom, 
 Fy de la Lorraine estrangere, 
 Vive le Roi, Vive Bourbon, 
 Vive la France, nostre mere." 
 
 " For the transgressions of a land many are the princes 
 thereof." 
 
 With the murder of the Balafre the War of the 
 Three Henrys closed, for now that one was dead, 
 the other two fell into each other's arms and com- 
 bined to crush the party of the League, which 
 still writhed and tried to sting, although its head 
 was gone. 
 
 A meeting between the King and Henry of 
 Navarre took place at Tours, and their combined 
 army then moved towards Paris; but Henry HI, 
 was destined never to enter his capital again, and 
 was stabbed by Jacques Clement at St, Cloud. 
 With the new reign that begins, the real history 
 of Touraine is over; the Court is seldom in its 
 
 palaces again; but there are still a few more events 
 Vol. II.— 13 193 
 
194 did '^O 
 
 utaine 
 
 which are of interest before the story of the Chateau 
 of Blois is done. 
 
 After Gabrielle d'Estrees had died and Mar- 
 guerite de Valois been divorced, Henry IV. 
 brought Marie de Medicis from Italy as his wife. 
 Her magnificent reception and subsequent career 
 are portrayed in the glowing colours of Rubens's 
 great series of complimentary historical pictures; 
 but the connection of Marie with the Castle of 
 Blois was only of the most humiliating description. 
 
 The Vert Galant had been stabbed by Ravaillac 
 in the very midst of his pursuit of the lovely 
 Princess of Conde, in the course of which he had 
 threatened to set all Europe by the ears for the 
 sake of one woman, as Buckingham was to do after 
 him; and during the reign of the next King, the 
 sombre Medicean Louis XIII., the position of the 
 Queen-mother had become one of very considera- 
 ble difficulty. Her embarrassments, political and 
 otherwise, at last landed her in the Chateau of Blois, 
 and there the King's favourite, De Luynes, showed 
 every intention of keeping her shut up and out of 
 harm's way. The tortuous designs of Richelieu, 
 who had accompanied her, were not yet clear; and 
 he was ordered to leave her household and retire 
 to Avignon. The position of Marie de Medicis 
 became more and more intolerable, for De Roissy, 
 
lotd 195 
 
 the governor of the castle, seemed to take pleasure 
 in making her captivity as odious as possible. De 
 Luynes set his mind at rest, and proceeded with his 
 own affairs at Paris, confident that the Queen- 
 mother would trouble him no more. But the nu- 
 merous political executions, which were at this time 
 constantly taking place, so roused the indignation 
 of the people, that the nobles resolved to take ad- 
 vantage of the crisis and liberate the Queen- 
 mother. 
 
 The Dukes of Rohan and Montbazon resolved to 
 effect a reconciliation between the King and Marie 
 de Medicis at all costs. Her friends the Concinis 
 were working for the royal captive, and they had 
 sent the Abbe Ruccelai to manage her escape from 
 Blois. That this was no easy matter is shown by 
 the fact that it took two years to make the neces- 
 sary preparations. On 22d January 1619 D'Eper- 
 non left Metz with a hundred well-armed men, his 
 guards and personal attendants, his jewels, and 
 eight thousand pistoles. His letters to the Queen 
 were carried by treachery to De Luynes, who 
 fortunately disregarded them, and after much un- 
 easiness Marie heard at last that D'Epernon was 
 at Loches, where a refuge had been arranged for 
 her. 
 
 On the 2 1st of February 1619 a certain Cadillac 
 
196 did '=B. 
 
 ouzatne 
 
 was walking at midnight across the bridge, when 
 he met some of the Queen's friends who had been 
 sent out to say that all was ready. They all went 
 to the foot of the wall in which her window opened, 
 where much agitated talking could be heard. 
 After great hesitation the Comte de Brienne ap- 
 peared down a rope-ladder, and Marie de Medicis 
 after him, in an attitude more calculated for safety 
 than for that dignity with which she had been por- 
 trayed by Rubens. One ladder was enough for 
 the poor Queen, who had had great difficulty in 
 getting through the window, and was accompanied 
 by only a single waiting-woman; the rest of the 
 descent from the platform to the ditch of the cas- 
 tle was made upon a cloak spread out upon the 
 slope. Friends were waiting at the bottom, and 
 walked her quickly ofif, one upon each side; but 
 no carriage was to be seen. After a moment of 
 intense anxiety it was found hiding in a side street; 
 then the royal jewels had been forgotten. More 
 suspense till they were recovered, dropped in the 
 haste of escaping, beneath the castle walls. At 
 last the carriage started, and Marie de Medicis was 
 free to begin plotting again with her clumsy Gaston 
 against the astute and omnipotent Richelieu. 
 
 Gaston had neither the skill to foil him nor the 
 courage to assassinate him, and no Aramis or Por- 
 
told 197 
 
 thos was at hand to help, for Monsieur d'Orleans 
 had an evil notoriety for abandoning his friends to 
 their fate without lifting- a finger to save them; so 
 he failed as he was bound to do, and found him- 
 self sent into exile, after the Fronde had given the 
 jfinal death-blow to his schemes, to the Chateau 
 of Blois. 
 
 Here, in 1635, he was living with his solemn 
 Court; and Mademoiselle de Montpensier his 
 daughter, " La grande Mademoiselle," as she was 
 called, gives a pitilessly accurate account of the 
 wearisome etiquette of the Duke of Orleans' house- 
 hold. " Monsieur dissertoit, distinguoit, Hesitoit 
 comme a I'ordinaire." ^ After both the King and 
 Queen had followed Richelieu to the tomb, the un- 
 lucky Gaston heard once more the shouts of " Vive 
 le Roi ! " which had grown so distasteful to his en- 
 vious ears, and the quiet of his Court was inter- 
 rupted by the visit of the young King Louis. 
 
 At the end of April 1644 John Evelyn had come 
 down the Loire by boat from Orleans to Blois, and 
 his diary is worth quoting to describe for us the 
 state of the chateau at this time. They arrived in 
 the evening, and noticed the " stately stone bridge 
 on which is a pyramid with an inscription. At the 
 
 1 Compare De Retz: " Monsieur n'agissait jamais que quand 
 il etait presse, et Fremont I'appelait ' I'interlocutaire income.' " 
 
198 Old ^outaine 
 
 entrance of the castle," he continues, " is a stone 
 statue of Lewis XII. on horseback as large as Hfe, 
 under a Gothic state/ Under this is a very wide 
 payre of gates nailed full of wolves and wild boars' 
 heads. Behind the castle the present Duke Gas- 
 tion (sic) had begun a faire building through 
 which we walked into a large garden, esteemed for 
 its furniture one of the fairest, especially for simples 
 and exotic plants, in which he takes extraordinary 
 delight. On the right hand is a long gallery, full 
 of ancient statues and inscriptions, both of marble 
 and brasse; the length, 300 paces, divides the 
 garden into higher and lower grounds, having a 
 very noble fountain. . . . From hence we pro- 
 ceeded with a friend of mine through the adjoining 
 forest to see if we could meete any wolves, which 
 are here in such numbers that they often come and 
 take children out of the very streetes; yet will not 
 the duke, who is sov'raigne here, permite them to 
 be destroyed. . . . Bloys is a town where the 
 language is exactly spoken; the inhabitants very 
 courteous; the ayre so good, that it is the ordinary 
 nursery of the King's children." 
 
 1 This is the statue that was destroyed in the Revolution. 
 The old inscription ran — 
 
 " Hie ubi natus erat dextro Ludovicus Olympo 
 Sumpsit honorata regia sceptra manu ; 
 Felix quae tanti fulsit lux nuncia Regis 
 Gallica non alio principe digna fuit." 
 
Loid 199 
 
 Evelyn came too soon to see the streets of the 
 town decorated for the entry of the young King 
 Louis XIV., the great State carriages, huge 
 machines of wood and leather with enormous nails, 
 Genoa velvet curtains and wide wheels; to watch 
 the musketeers in their brilliant uniform, the light 
 blue cosaque with a great star on breast and back, 
 the long-plumed hat, and high soft boots to the 
 knee. The gay procession goes laughing on to the 
 castle, and from the windows in the court above us, 
 which had just been filled with the terrible shadows 
 of the murdered Guises, it was a relief to hear the 
 whispers of that roguish Montalais as she pointed 
 out the young Vicomte de Bragelonne to Louise 
 de la Valliere. Mazarin was adding up accounts 
 in his bedroom on the other side, and the exiled 
 EngHsh King was asking D'Artagnan the way to 
 Louis XIV.'s apartments. 
 
 But the visit did not last long. Mademoiselle 
 tells us the Court were bored to death, as well they 
 might be; and the King was soon away to meet his 
 Spanish bride, without a thought that the young 
 maid-of-honour he had seen at Blois was one day 
 to hold so tender a place in his impressionable royal 
 heart. 
 
 This was the last of the splendour of Blois. Gas- 
 ton returned to his solemnity and his gardening, 
 
200 did '^, 
 
 owcaine 
 
 and after his death in 1660 the whole place was 
 dismantled. 
 
 Arthur Young, passing it in 1787, could still be 
 shown the details of the Guises' murder, and his 
 eminently practical reflections thereupon are worth 
 transcribing. " The character of the period," says 
 he, " and of the men that figured in it, were alike 
 disgusting. Bigotry and ambition equally dark, 
 insidious, and bloody, allow no feelings of regret. 
 The parties could hardly be better employed than 
 in cutting each other's throats." So far our honest 
 agriculturist, who happily finds much soil suited 
 to his taste farther on in the Sologne plains, and 
 leaves Blois to be still further defaced by the Rev- 
 olution which followed hard upon this peaceful 
 visit. 
 
 In the terrible devastations of 1793 Blois suffered 
 like the rest for its royal recollections, and was as 
 usual converted into barracks; in 1871 it served 
 as an ambulance for the wounded in the Franco- 
 Prussian war; and finally it is restored to-day with 
 an abundance of care and thought worthy of the 
 structure which holds so many memories. The 
 rooms are even too vividly restored, as we have 
 noticed, with brilliant colourings on ceiling and on 
 floor, and gorgeous tapestries on all the walls; but 
 they only need kindly time to soften them again, 
 
c/Slold 
 
 201 
 
 and they are peopled for ever with the shadows of 
 their history. 
 
 But much as there is for the traveller to see in 
 the great Chateau of Blois, he must by no means 
 leave the town with only the royal palace explored. 
 He will find numerous churches all well worth his 
 visiting; he will see, most beautiful of all, the 
 Hotel d'Alluye, where Florimond Robertet, the 
 famous secretary, lived, and from the gardens that 
 slope downwards to the river he will see the other 
 bank of the stream, the country of the Sologne, and 
 the bridge that points him on to Chambord, where 
 Porthos, kindly giant, might have found a home, 
 when Bracieux close by became too small for him. 
 
 The history with which these pages have had too 
 hastily to deal is now brought to its farthest point. 
 From chateau to chateau we have followed it till 
 the chain that began with the Plantagenets at 
 Chinon is broken with the murder of the Balafre 
 at Blois. The seventeenth century is the century 
 of the intrigues of Paris, the age of Versailles and 
 Fontainebleau, and Touraine is all but neglected 
 by the Court. Yet it is impossible to leave Tou- 
 raine without visiting the gigantic Chambord, 
 without glancing, though but for a moment, at a 
 few more of the noble houses scattered through the 
 province, without finishing the brief sketch of the 
 
202 did %. 
 
 outatne 
 
 central town of Tours which was begun earlier in 
 this book. 
 
 These last things, then, we have left to do, and 
 then bid the traveller wander at his will^ 
 
 1 Nearly all the notes from which the foregoing chapters 
 were written were taken during the summer and autumn of 
 1890. A few changes noticed on a short visit in 1891 will be 
 found in the Appendix. At the present moment (December 
 1891) I hear that Chenonceaux has at last actually found a 
 purchaser; but there is a loss to record as well; the Abbey 
 of Cormery has been all but completely ruined by the storms. 
 
(okambozd 
 
CHAPTER XXI 
 
 CHAMBORD 
 
 " Ledict bastiment estoit cent fois plus magnifique que n'est 
 Bonivet ne Chambourg ne Chantilly : car en icellui estoient 
 neuf mille trois cents trente et deux chambres, chascune garnie 
 de arriere chambre, cabinet, garderobe, chapelle, et issue en 
 une grande salle." — La vie tres horrHique du grand Gargantua, 
 cap. liii. 
 
 The road that leads from Blois to Chambord 
 crosses the Loire by a fine stone bridge, which the 
 inscription sets forth to be the first public work of 
 Louis Philippe. 
 
 For some distance the rails of a small tramway- 
 followed the road by which our carriage was slowly 
 rolling towards the level plains of the Sologne, but 
 we gradually left such uncompromising signs of 
 activity, and came into a flat country of endless 
 vineyards, with here and there a small plaster tower 
 showing its slated roof above the low green clusters 
 of the vines. ^ We passed through several villages, 
 
 1 These towers may very possibly be modern erections con- 
 nected with the cultivation of these enormous and apparently 
 uninhabited regions, but they are very like the old watch- 
 
 205 
 
206 Old ^^ 
 
 outattie 
 
 whose inhabitants that day seemed to have but one 
 care upon their minds, Hke the famous Scilly 
 Islanders, to gain a precarious livelihood by taking 
 in each other's washing. On every bush and briar 
 fluttered the household linen and the family apparel, 
 of various textures and in different states of dis- 
 repair; and with that strict observance of utility 
 which is the chief characteristic of the French 
 peasant, the inevitable blouses of faded blue were 
 being blown into shapeless bundles even along the 
 railings of the churchyard tombs. 
 
 At last we came to an old moss-grown wall, and 
 through a broken gateway entered what is called 
 the Park of Chambord. There is very little of it 
 to be seen now, the trees have been ruthlessly cut 
 down and mutilated, and of the wild boars which 
 Francis I. was so fond of hunting there is left only 
 the ghostly quarry that Thibault of Champagne 
 chases through the air, while the sound of his 
 ghostly horn echoes down the autumn night as the 
 phantom pack sweeps by to Montfrault.^ 
 
 towers which M. Prosper Merimee reproduces from a fifteenth- 
 century MS., showing the beacons that flamed from its roof, 
 while watchdogs beneath are couched behind an encircling 
 hedge of wattles. 
 
 1 Called in the country the " Chasse du comte Thibault " (le 
 Tricheur), or the " Chasse Machabee." Touraine has also 
 its " danse macabre," the " chasse du roi Hugon." In Poitou 
 there is the " chasse Galerie," with many other examples for 
 
Gliamhozd 207 
 
 The woods that inspired such graceful reflections 
 in Pelisson's letter to Mademoiselle de Scudery 
 (1668) have little left of the romantic now; indeed 
 when Arthur Young drove through them a century 
 ago the only reflections they suggest to him are 
 " that if the King of France ever formed the idea 
 of establishing one compleat and perfect farm under 
 the turnip culture of England, here is the place for 
 it." And Paul Louis Courier would have thor- 
 oughly agreed with him. 
 
 At the end of a sufficiently long avenue, the very 
 ghost of an avenue, which only showed more deso- 
 lation upon either hand as it advanced, could be 
 seen at last what seemed a village in the air. Grad- 
 ually the village showed its foundations on the solid 
 earth, and we were soon beneath the shadow of the 
 enormous towers of Chambord, towers of immense 
 girth yet with a somewhat squat expression, which 
 we found out afterwards was the result of the dis- 
 proportionate elaboration of the upper parts of the 
 building. There are thirteen great staircases in 
 this wilderness of hewn stone, not to mention the 
 numberless smaller ones, and four hundred and 
 more rooms of various sizes; the resulting impres- 
 sion, though we were spared from seeing more 
 
 the comparative mythologist of the widespread story of the 
 Spectre Huntsman. 
 
208 6Ld "S. 
 
 outatne 
 
 than about a quarter, was that of a vast and com- 
 fortless barrack, and as all its sixteenth-century art 
 treasures had perished ,with the rest of the furniture 
 and fittings in the vast bonfire of the Revolution, 
 the great empty rooms had even less chance than 
 was perhaps fair of showing how far their size was 
 equalled by their comfort. 
 
 It is impossible for the uninstructed mind to 
 grasp the plan or method of this mass of architect- 
 ure; yet it is unsatisfactory to give it up, with Mr. 
 Henry James, " as an irresponsible, insoluble laby- 
 rinth." M. Viollet le Due, with a sympathetic de- 
 nial of any extreme and over-technical admiration, 
 gives just that intelligible account of the chateau 
 which is a compromise between the unmeaning 
 adulation of its contemporary critics and the igno- 
 rance of the casual traveller. 
 
 " Chambord," says he, " must be taken for what 
 it is; for an attempt in which the architect has 
 sought to reconcile the methods of two opposite 
 principles, to unite in one building the fortified 
 castle of the Middle Ages and the pleasure-palace " 
 of the sixteenth century. Granted that the attempt 
 was an absurd one, it must be remembered that the 
 Renaissance was but just beginning in France; 
 Gothic art seemed out of date, yet none other had 
 established itself to take its place. In literature, in 
 
(?lic (3/iateau of Ohaml^otd 
 
(okambo'cci 209 
 
 morals, as in architecture, this particular phase in 
 the civilisation of the time has already become 
 evident even in the course of these small wanderings 
 in a single province, and if only this transition 
 period is realised in all its meaning, with all the 
 " monstrous and inform " characteristics that were 
 inevitably a part of it, the mystery of this strange 
 sixteenth century in France is half explained, of 
 this " glorious devil, large in heart and brain. That 
 did love beauty only," and would have it some- 
 where, somehow, at whatever cost. 
 
 Francis I. had passed his early years at Cognac, 
 at Amboise, or Romorantin, and when he first saw 
 Chambord it was only the old feudal manor-house 
 built by the Counts of Blois. He transformed it, 
 not by the help of Primaticcio, with whose name 
 it is tempting to associate any building of this 
 King's, for the methods of contemporary Italian 
 architecture were totally different; but, as M. de 
 la Saussaye proves, by the skill of that fertile school 
 of art and architecture round Tours and Blois, and 
 more particularly of one Maitre Pierre Trinqueau, 
 or Le Nepveu, whose name is connected with more 
 successful buildings at Amboise and Blois. The 
 plan is that of the true French chateau; in the 
 centre is the habitation of the seigneur and his 
 
 family, flanked by four angle towers; on three 
 Vol. II.— 14 
 
210 did ^1 
 
 OLizatne 
 
 sides is a court closed by buildings, also with towers 
 at each angle, and like most feudal dwellings the 
 central donjon has one of its sides on the exterior 
 of the whole. 
 
 Though all ideas of a practical defence are sacri- 
 ficed to produce a dwelling-house, yet this house is 
 furnished with secret stairways, with isolated tur- 
 rets, with numberless facilities for what the gallant 
 M. Viollet le Due calls " les intrigues secretes de 
 cette cour jeune et toute occupee de galanteries," 
 which kept up the constant semblance of a mimic 
 war. Michelet, romantic as ever, explains the 
 strangeness of the plan of Chambord by the state 
 of mind in which the grandson of Valentine Vis- 
 conti returned from his prison at Madrid; but the 
 chateau of Longchamps with the exquisite work 
 of Girolamo della Robbia, which was begun only 
 a year after (1527), seems sufficient contradiction, 
 if that were necessary, to this last theory. 
 
 It may well be imagined that Chambord is the 
 parody of the old feudal castles, just as the Abbey 
 of Thelema parodies the abbeys of the twelfth and 
 thirteenth centuries. Both heaped a fatal ridicule 
 upon the bygone age, but what Rabelais could only 
 dream Francis could realise, yet not with the unfet- 
 tered perfection that was granted to the vision of 
 Gargantua; for surely never was the spirit of the 
 
(jkambo'cd 211 
 
 time seized and smitten into incongruous shapes of 
 stone at so unfortunate a moment, just when the 
 early Renaissance was striving to take upon itself 
 the burden which was too heavy for the failing 
 Gothic spirit, just when success was coming but 
 had not yet come. 
 
 But Mrs. Mark Pattison has pointed out one 
 great danger of criticising the castle as it is now. 
 " Burdened," says this writer,^ " by the weighty 
 labours of Louis XIV., weakened by eight improv- 
 ing years at the hands of Stanislas Leczinski, 
 mutilated by Marshal Saxe, the Chambord which 
 we now go out from Blois to visit is not the Cham- 
 bord of Francis I. The broad foundations and 
 heaving arches which rose proudly out of the waters 
 of the moat no longer impress the eye. The 
 truncated mass squats ignobly upon the turf, the 
 waters of the moat are gone, gone are the deep 
 embankments crowned with pierced balustrades, 
 gone is the no longer needed bridge with its 
 guardian lions." 
 
 It is only from within the court, where the great 
 towers fling their shadows over the space, where 
 pinnacles and gables soar into the air, and strange 
 gargoyles and projections shoot from the darkness 
 into light, that it is possible to realise the admira- 
 1 Renaissance of Art in France, vol. i. 55. 
 
212 Old Oowcatne 
 
 tion which Chambord roused when it was first 
 created. Brantome waxes enthusiastic over its 
 wonders, and describes how the King had drawn 
 up plans (mercifully never c*arried out) to divert 
 the waters of the Loire to his new palace, not con- 
 tent with the slender stream of Cosson, from which 
 the place derived its name/ Others compare it to 
 a palace out of the Arabian Nights raised at the 
 Prince's bidding by a genie, or like Lippomano, 
 the Venetian ambassador, to " the abode of Mor- 
 gana or Alcinous " ; but this topheavy barrack is 
 anything rather than a " monument feerique " ; it 
 might with as much humour be called a " souvenir 
 de premieres amours," as the learned M. de la 
 Saussaye has it. Both these descriptions fit Che- 
 nonceaux admirably; when used of Chambord 
 they are out of place. 
 
 The praises of contemporary critics may have 
 been more genuine when they drew attention to the 
 marvellous staircase in the middle of the chateau, 
 which is the first thing to which the guide directs 
 his visitors. This is indeed a gigantic freak of 
 
 1 Chambord is apparently the correct spelling, not Cham- 
 bourg ; from which it would seem that the name is derived 
 from the Celtic " cam " (French courbe), from the turn which 
 the Cosson takes at this point, and " rhyd," a ford or passage. 
 
 Cf. " Cambridge " = the passage over the twisting river. — 
 M. de la Saussaye, Chambord, p. 44. 
 
Gharnbotd 213 
 
 fancy, and worthy of the buildings which contain 
 it, where Gargantua and Pantagruel might have 
 wandered amid congenial surroundings. 
 
 It has two openings, and by imagining two huge 
 corkscrews one within the other, whose curves 
 ascend together yet never touch except at their 
 extreme edges, the perplexed visitor strives to un- 
 derstand how it comes about that his companion, 
 who is mounting upward like himself, can never 
 meet him though never be completely lost. 
 
 From the country visible from the open top of 
 this staircase, one of the chief ornaments of the 
 roof, it is perhaps possible to assign a reason for the 
 position of the old castle, which is confirmed by a 
 manuscript in the library of Blois. The place 
 seems originally to have formed part of a system 
 which guarded the approaches of the Loire, and 
 made it possible for Joan of Arc to move up the 
 river to Orleans. This old fortress of the Counts 
 of Blois and Champagne passed with the rest of the 
 estates to the family of the Dukes of Orleans, and 
 through them to the Crown, at the accession of 
 Louis XII.; this it was that his successor Francis 
 changed into an unwieldy hunting-seat in 1526. 
 For twelve years eighteen hundred workmen la- 
 boured incessantly at the task, and it was handed 
 on to the next reign unfinished. 
 
214 Old Ooutaine 
 
 Here came Francis towards the end of his life, 
 
 when he sought vainly to forget the fever that was 
 
 in him by wild hunting excursions throughout his 
 
 great estates in Touraine, and with him his sister, 
 
 the Queen of Navarre, his " rare pale Margaret," 
 
 whose eyes, " ever trembling through the dew of 
 
 dainty woful sympathies," were anxiously watching 
 
 her idolised brother in his sickness. It was in one 
 
 of their conversations that Francis, perhaps grown 
 
 wiser with experience, echoed Virgil with his lines 
 
 upon the fickleness of woman. Tradition says that 
 
 the pane of glass which so ungallantly preserved 
 
 the words — 
 
 " Toute femme varie 
 Mai habil qui s'y fie," 
 
 was broken by a later King whose philosophy was 
 not yet proof to the fascinations of Louise de la 
 Valliere.^ 
 
 1 There has been much controversy about this famous in- 
 scription. Even the phrasing of it differs in every authority, 
 especially for the second line. There are three proofs from 
 which I have argued its existence, (i) The statement in the 
 Lettres Inedites de la Reine Marguerite, Partie i^e; (2) the 
 testimony of Brantome, an eye-witness, " et I'ayant leu en 
 grande lettre, y avoit ce mot : Tout femme varie " {Brantome , 
 ed. Lalanne, t. ix. p. 715) ; (3) in 1682 Bernier (Histoire de 
 Blois, p. 8) says " Ton y voit cette rime," etc. Whether it 
 was Louis XIV. or not who destroyed it, it exists no longer; 
 and even the signature which M. de la Saussaye considers to 
 be that of Francis is totally unlike his handwriting in the 
 MSS. of the Bibliotheque Nationale. 
 
Qkambord 215 
 
 Charles IX. came here after Francis I. had gone 
 to hunt shadowy boars in the Elysian fields, but 
 there was not much happening at the castle for the 
 next few reigns. Henry IV. found himself far too 
 busy to leave Paris, and too happy at Fontainebleau 
 with Gabrielle d'Estrees, who probably found Che- 
 nonceaux far more to her taste when she went ex- 
 cursions into the country. 
 
 Later on Louis XIII. was wandering in his mel- 
 ancholy way through the corridors of Chambord, 
 with his arm in that of his favourite for the time 
 being. " Mettons nous a cette fenetre. Monsieur," 
 he was saying, " et ennuyons nous " — apparently 
 this was the one occupation of a monarch who was 
 more thoroughly bored with himself and others 
 than any crowned head in Europe. " Vexed with 
 a morbid devil in his blood, That veiled the world 
 with jaundice," his very love affairs were so mo- 
 rosely platonic that the Court almost lost interest 
 in their incidents. It was at Chambord that this 
 timid lover, wishing to take a note from the fair 
 Mademoiselle de Hautefort, who had hidden it in 
 her bosom, advanced to capture the missive with a 
 pair of tongs.^ His father could have taught him 
 
 1 The science of correct dates will very soon make any ro- 
 mance in history impossible. It is argued that because the 
 lady was born in 1616, and Chambord was given to Prince 
 Gaston in 1626, this incident did not occur. Tallemant des 
 
216 6Ld '^o 
 
 lizaine 
 
 better manners, more gallantry or less of clum- 
 siness. 
 
 In the fourth act of Victor Hugo's drama we can 
 see the curtain lifted for a moment upon the Court 
 at Chambord. There is the King, who finds it 
 hard enough to live, without the added trouble of 
 a kingdom, striving to shake off the power of 
 Richelieu, whose scarlet robes so terribly suggest 
 the powers of his of^ce. " La pourpre est faite 
 avec des gouttes de leur sang." There is the Due 
 de Bellegarde, laughing with the Marquis de Nan- 
 gis, while a Mousquetaire stands sentinel before 
 the royal door; De Retz is Jiere too, and L'Angely 
 the jester, and the Vicomte de Rohan, who makes 
 a strange discovery behind the arras, for Marion de 
 Lorme is there, pleading in terrible earnest for her 
 lover's life. 
 
 Reaux, whom Dumas considers a sufficient authority, relates 
 it; and why should it not have been at Chambord, where 
 tradition insists that the event took place, and where the 
 courtiers who laughed over the Bourgeois Gentilhomme were 
 still told the story that had lasted to their days in all its 
 piquancy? The place where Mademoiselle de Hautefort hid 
 the innocent epistle had achieved a certain amount of reputa- 
 tion in French literature ; Boisrobert writes of a pearl that 
 was equally fortunate — 
 
 " Ne te plains pas du piege ou je te vols tombee, 
 Riche perle qui fais le plaisir de nos yeux : 
 La gorge qui t'a derobee 
 Fait des larcins plus precieux ! " 
 
G/iambotd 217 
 
 It was not often that so interesting a " scene " 
 took place at Chambord. When in 1626 the castle 
 became the property of Monsieur Gaston, brother 
 of the King, the small Mademoiselle de Montpen- 
 sier found much innocent amusement in laughing 
 up and down the winding steps of that perplexing 
 staircase, while her solemn father mounted with her 
 to the open lantern at the top. Gaston, with his 
 red beard and sleepy eyes, was probably as mys- 
 tified as his more lively daughter; but Gaston sel- 
 dom laughed, and would never admit his perspi- 
 cuity to be at fault. It would have been fortunate 
 for him, perhaps, if the problem of that staircase 
 had been the only one his dull brains had tried to 
 fathom, or if he had kept to his botanical researches 
 with his physician, Albert Brunyer. His attempts 
 at politics only revealed, by the dastardly aban- 
 donment of Chalais, of Cinq Mars, and De Thou, 
 that to his general faults of ignorance and incapac- 
 ity must be added the severer blame of an un- 
 pardonable ingratitude.^ 
 
 But with nothing save a staircase to recommend 
 it by way of frivolous amusement, it is easily intelli- 
 
 1 " Monsieur," says that acute observer, De Retz, " etait un 
 des hommes du monde le plus faible, et tout ensemble le plus 
 defiant et le plus couvert . . . il faisait en toutes choses 
 comme font la plupart des hommes quand ils se baignent : ils 
 ferment les yeux en se jetant dans I'eau." 
 
218 Old ^i 
 
 outaine 
 
 igible that Chambord was no favourite with the 
 Dianes and Gabrielles of the period; and Madame 
 de Maintenon, at a time when Louis XIV. gave 
 the place one of its few glimpses of royal gaiety, 
 seems to have spent her time there chiefly in quar- 
 relling with Madame de Montespan. It was in one 
 of the great rooms on which the staircase opens 
 that Louis XIV. sat, solemn and bored, amid a 
 sympathetically jaded Court to hear the first per- 
 formance of Pourceaugnac. Moliere was ill, and 
 Lulli, who had on the instant filled the vacant place, 
 was in despair at the array of long-drawn faces 
 listening wearily before the stage. Something 
 must be done to rouse the King. Our courageous 
 Lulli suddenly bounds across the footlights, and 
 from the debris of a discomfited orchestra joyfully 
 detects the peal of royal laughter that greets this 
 unexpected piece of acting. The play ended in a 
 general applause. Le Bourgeois Gentilhomme was 
 more successful, and at once, as it deserved to be. 
 It is amusing to detect the satisfaction of M, I'Am- 
 bassadeur from the Levant, who takes to himself 
 all the credit of the Turkish metamorphosis and 
 superintends the correct Eastern costume and 
 mise-en-scene for M. Moliere. 
 
 In 1725 the luckless Stanislas Leczinski found a 
 home here, to mourn over his lost Poland, and left 
 
(okambotd 219 
 
 an appropriate memory of kindliness and charity 
 among the scattered peasantry of the neighbour- 
 hood. 
 
 The next tenant was of a very different character. 
 The astonished villagers could now hear words of 
 command echoing from the terrace, and see squad- 
 rons of horse wheeling to and fro under the orders 
 of the conqueror of Fontenoy. 
 
 Maurice de Saxe, the newcomer, owed his birth 
 to a strange and still unexplained event. In 1695 
 Sophia Dorothea, wife of the Electoral Prince of 
 Hanover, was sent suddenly to prison in the for- 
 tress of Ahlden, and her lover, Count Philip von 
 Konigsmarck, simultaneously disappeared. His 
 sister, Aurora von Konigsmarck, went to seek help 
 from Augustus the Strong, Elector of Saxony, and 
 the negotiations resulted in the birth of Marshal 
 Saxe. After a rough education, he went to France 
 and waited for a chance of fighting, consoling him- 
 self in the interval with Adrienne Lecouvreur. He 
 was six feet high, with good features, blue eyes, and 
 black arched brows, and needed only the address 
 which every Konigsmarck possessed to prove him- 
 self capable of procuring " consolation " whenever 
 he might need to seek it. 
 
 At last, in 1740, came the league against Maria 
 Theresa ; and five years afterwards, though he had 
 
220 Old ^> 
 
 ouzame 
 
 just been tapped for dropsy and was carried in a 
 litter on the field, chewing a bullet to ease his rag- 
 ing thirst, he had defeated Cumberland at Fontenoy 
 and opened the way to the Scheldt. He was re- 
 warded with the estate of Chambord, which he 
 forthwith decorated with his captured cannon and 
 filled with his bodyguard of Uhlans, and then pro- 
 ceeded to forget as fast as possible the politics 
 which had given him his chance of victory. " I 
 know nothing about your infernal reasons of state," 
 he cried to the Comte de Maurepas, and at once 
 began to thoroughly enjoy himself after his own 
 manner.^ 
 
 Fetes and reviews, such as had not been seen 
 since the building of the chateau, were now the 
 order of the day; and the Marshal would soon 
 have killed himself off in the ordinary course of 
 events, had not an old enemy appeared to save him 
 the trouble. A letter was suddenly brought one 
 morning from a carriage that had just driven 
 through the park. Marshal Saxe at once went out, 
 attended only by an aide-de-camp, and disappeared 
 in one of the alleys branching out into the forest 
 from the main drive. In a short time he was car- 
 
 1 By an actress, Mademoiselle Veneres, he had a daughter 
 Aurora who married a M. Dupin de Francueil, and became 
 the mother of George Sand, whom we have heard of already 
 at Chenonceaux. 
 
Ghambo'tcl 221 
 
 ried home badly wounded. There had been a duel 
 with the Prince of Conti, who had been his enemy 
 ever since the Flanders campaign of 1747, and the 
 Marshal had been worsted. 
 
 The doctors could do nothing for him, and like 
 Rabelais he went with a laugh to seek the " grand 
 peut-etre." " Life," said the dying general, " is 
 but a dream. Mine has been short, but it has been 
 a good one." 
 
 It is strange that almost the only bit of the old 
 furniture left by the Revolution was the great mar- 
 ble table on which the body of Marshal Saxe had 
 been embalmed. This same outburst of revolu- 
 tionary iconoclasts came very near puHing down 
 Chambord altogether, which at any rate deserved 
 to remain when once it had been built; and after 
 refusing to sell it to a society of Quakers, who 
 hoped to make use of it no doubt in some pacific 
 schemes of manufacture, they pulled down all the 
 fleurs-de-lys within reach and otherwise mutilated 
 the place, according to the Republican standard. 
 And when Madame la Duchesse de Berry visited it 
 in 1828, she must have been astonished to find the 
 disorder which a few regiments with a proper spirit 
 can effect in the strongest Royalist abode. 
 
 Chambord was at this time the property of Henri 
 de Bourbon, who, though he was an exile, took his 
 
222 Old uoutaine 
 
 title from this estate in France, which had been 
 presented to him by national subscription. The 
 subscription itself is chiefly memorable for the 
 brilliant pamphlet which it evoked from Paul Louis 
 Courier, the " Simple Discours du Vigneron de la 
 Chavonniere." ^ 
 
 In 1870 Chambord was garrisoned in earnest by 
 the French, who were as usual taken by surprise 
 by a German attack and compelled to make a stra- 
 tegic movement to the rear. In the next year the 
 Comte de Chambord wrote the famous letter about 
 the white flag of the Bourbons, on one of the few 
 visits he ever made to the estate. " This amazing 
 epistle," says Mr. Henry James, " which is virtu- 
 ally an invitation to the French people to repudiate 
 as their national ensign that immortal tricolour, the 
 flag of the Revolution and the Empire, under which 
 they have won the glory which of all glories has 
 hitherto been dearest to them." The logic of the 
 Comte de Chambord was inevitable and fine, if un- 
 fortunate. It ruined the Legitimist cause; but the 
 last of the Bourbons could not, for any reason, have 
 turned his back on the white flag. 
 
 1 The pamphlet begins : " Si nous avions de I'argent a n'en 
 savoir que faire, toutes nos dettes payees, nos chemins repares 
 . . . je crois, mes amis, qu'il faudrait contribuer a refaire 
 le pont de Saint Avertin . . . mais d'acheter Chambord 
 pour le due de Bordeaux je ne suis pas d'avis." 
 
'^Iie £antezn, (jhdteati of (jliambozd 
 
Gkambotd 223 
 
 The Prince's rooms, decorated with the most 
 impossible of tapestries presented by the ladies of 
 France, are exhibited by the guide, and his vast 
 collection of extremely military toys of great per- 
 fection of workmanship and detail. There is also 
 here an excellent statue of the Madame Elizabeth 
 who so courageously attempted to save the Queen, 
 and at the last died with her. It is one more me- 
 mento among many, of the terrible efifects of the 
 Revolution. 
 
 Our last, and perhaps most satisfactory, visit was 
 to the forest of masonry upon the roof. Chimneys 
 had expanded into monuments and lanterns into 
 mausoleums, yet none of the grace with which the 
 chimneys are treated at Azay or Chenonceaux is 
 visible; nothing strikes the onlooker but a massive- 
 ness without much object, in which any beauty of 
 detail ^ is only thrown away. 
 
 Only as we began to drive homewards, in the 
 slanting rays of sunset, did the Towers of Cham- 
 bord begin to look more attractive. The stunted 
 aspect of the masonry became less perceptible, and 
 with the last tint of rose-red light upon its lofty 
 fleur-de-lys, Chambord, as we left it, seemed finer 
 than it had been before. Chateaubriand's poetical 
 
 1 Chiefly consisting in squares and diamonds of slate let 
 into the surface of the stone. 
 
224 OLd Ooiizalne 
 
 description seemed more justified : the brilliant 
 butterfly of the Renaissance striving to burst 
 through its still visible chrysalis of Gothic tradi- 
 tions, the laced and ruffled head of the cavalier ap- 
 pearing above the strong joints of his armour, the 
 beauty that was sought for and so nearly won, 
 showed clearer than the failure which had at first 
 oppressed us. 
 
 The drive back returns to Blois by a different 
 road and we came in sight of the cathedral with a 
 magnificent sunset sky behind it. The darkening 
 river shone with a reflected golden light, while the 
 black towers above it stood out against a bank of 
 amber clouds that faded into violet and gray. 
 
(Jozay-le- QjiDtdeau 
 
CHAPTER XXII 
 
 AZAY-LE-RIDEAU 
 
 " Ce chasteau est ung des beaulx des gentils des mignons 
 des mieulx elaborez chasteaulx de la mignonne Touraine, et 
 se baigne tousiours en I'lndre comme une galloise princiere." 
 
 The Chateau of Azay-le-Rideau was built in 1520 
 by Gilles Berthelot, a relation of the Brigonnet, 
 Beaune, and Bohier families, to whom Touraine 
 owes so many of its graceful homes. It is re- 
 markable not so much for its history ^ as for its 
 extreme beauty as a type of the pure early French 
 Renaissance architecture, untouched by the Italian 
 influence of Primaticcio. The old fortress-dwell- 
 ing is entirely discarded, nor is any attempt made, 
 as at Chambord, to unite the feudal fortress to the 
 hunting-seat. While Le Nepveu was actually at- 
 
 1 The name is apparently derived from one Hugues Ridel, 
 one of the knights-banneret of Touraine instituted by Philip 
 Augustus, originally destined to command the road from Tours 
 to Chinon. The old chateau was taken by the Burgundians 
 in the reign of Charles VI., and retaken by the Dauphin in 
 1418, to be altogether rebuilt in the next century. Its new 
 owner, Berthelot the financier, was involved in the usual dis- 
 tresses which seemed the inevitable portion of the Beaunes 
 and Bohiers, and died of grief at Cambrai in 1529. 
 
 227 
 
228 did '^0 
 
 utatne 
 
 tempting a " tour de force " that from its very 
 nature could but be doomed to failure, the walls of 
 Azay-le-Rideau were rising at the bidding of a per- 
 fect and consistent plan. The luxuriant fancy of 
 the architect has given itself free play in making as 
 beautiful a dwelling-place as could be well imag- 
 ined, and using only those details of the old for- 
 tress architecture which gave solidity to the whole 
 while they added to the picturesqueness of its 
 various parts. The old master masons had well- 
 nigh disappeared, and in their place had arisen the 
 brilliant school of Jean Bullant, of Pierre Lescot, 
 of Jean Goujon, who, while Maitre le Roux and Le 
 Primatice were working at Fontainebleau, formed 
 in France the strong national artistic Renaissance 
 that remained almost untouched by innovations 
 from the schools of Rome and Florence. 
 
 Azay-le-Rideau is built in the form of an L upon 
 its side, with the entrance in the courtyard formed 
 by the meeting of the long arm of the letter with 
 its base. At each corner is placed with exquisite 
 effect a turreted and crested tower, and by an ex- 
 tremely happy turn of the angle of the building 
 which is nearest to the entrance bridge across the 
 river, an effect of distance and beauty of line is 
 secured unequalled among the series of architect- 
 ural triumphs. 
 
Qke (jkateau of o^zai^-U-cJiDtdeau 
 
Cbzaij-Le-cJiDideaii 229 
 
 Nor is the setting of this rare building unworthy 
 of the gem it holds. Under the bridge, guarded by 
 two sculptured lions, flow the waters of the Indre, 
 that turn again in graceful curves beneath the win- 
 dows of the chateau, and are fringed with banks 
 of pleasant green shaded by limes and cedars. The 
 winding walks lead round towards the other side, 
 past a carved gallery of stone with curved steps lead- 
 ing downwards from the windows to the water, past 
 the corner tower, to the long facade. Here, as in the 
 entrance court, the walls are covered with carved 
 panels, the bands that mark the different stories are 
 accentuated with graceful ornament, the very 
 chimney-tops are decorated with raised broidery, 
 and beneath the deep-cut line of the embrasures, 
 marking the low fall of the roof, the windows set in 
 sculptured frames have their full value and effect. 
 Round the next corner, in the quiet pool, swim the 
 great carp preserved for the table of the Marquis,^ 
 lazily floating beneath the balcony that looks out 
 upon the water. 
 
 Among the trees lies hidden a small chapel, res- 
 onant with the rapid waters that fall in silver foam 
 upon each side and rush beneath its stone floor; 
 
 1 The present owner is M. le Marquis de Biencourt, by whom 
 an added grace of tasteful habitation is given to the rooms 
 of Azay. 
 
230 Old ^outaine 
 
 and from this point a particularly charming view of 
 the angle that holds the central court within may 
 be obtained. It is in this central court that the 
 carving on the walls is brought to its greatest per- 
 fection. Worthy in some parts of Jean Goujon's 
 chisel, it gives a singularly rich effect of fretted 
 lace-work among the lights and shadows of the 
 graceful corner towers, and, every pretence of for- 
 tification having been cast aside, rises to its high- 
 est excellence in the work above the entrance. 
 Mrs. Mark Pattison gives the following description 
 of it : '* The first frieze shows bas-reliefs of the 
 salamander of Francis L, and of the ermine of 
 Claude of Brittany, his wife, who lay dying at Blois 
 in July 1524, when this chateau was in course of 
 building. On the plinth which supports the two 
 windows of the pediment the same devices appear; 
 then a little arcade connects the ground floor with 
 the upper stories, the pilasters and other members 
 of which are covered with arabesques which may 
 challenge comparison for beauty of design with 
 the most exquisite passages produced at a later 
 period." 
 
 Azay-le-Rideau should be seen last of the cha- 
 teaux of Touraine, for as it is perhaps the most beau- 
 tiful and perfect of them all, so its beauty gains by 
 its association with all that is best and most attrac- 
 
(%zai/-le-cJaicleau 231 
 
 tive; for in the shrine of Azay is gathered the whole 
 gallery of faces of those who have made the his- 
 tory of Blois, of Amboise, of Chenonceaux, of 
 France; and the chateau, that is happy in its own 
 lack of history and intrigue, gathers up within its 
 sculptured walls the memories of all that was worth 
 keeping of the old life that throbbed and struggled 
 in the larger chateaux, and left them ruined or de- 
 faced. If the traveller who has seen the hot sun- 
 shine of the summer beat upon the walls of Loches 
 and Chinon, or light up the halls of Blois, is so 
 fortunate as to come to Azay in the cool, clear air 
 of autumn, when the delicate colouring of its oaf ven 
 balconies is framed in the gold and crimson of the 
 changing leaves, he will find, as we found, just 
 such an ending to his own travels, just such a com- 
 pletion to his memories, as his imagination could 
 desire. 
 
 No catalogue has yet been made of the most 
 interesting pictures in the chateau; but among 
 them all should be picked out the exquisitely clear 
 and careful presentment by F. Clouet of the face 
 of Catherine de Medicis. This work is in the 
 Chambre des Rois, where Francis I. and Louis 
 XIV. slept on their various visits.^ 
 
 Among many portraits of Francis I., perhaps 
 ^ See list of pictures in the Appendix. 
 
232 Old Oowcaine 
 
 that in the first guest-room is the best. There is 
 the long nose, the insufferable smile upon his lips 
 that curl upward satyr-like towards the narrow 
 eyes, the crisp close-cut brownish beard, the pink 
 silken sleeves and doublet. Above him, in stern 
 contrast, hangs the face of Calvin. 
 
 But in the salon are the greatest treasures of the 
 whole collection. Here is the charming Marie 
 Stuart in youth, painted with exquisite care and 
 refinement, with her young husband in the same 
 frame beside her; here is the great picture of 
 Henry II. on horseback, with the interlacing 
 letters on his harness that cover the walls of Che-- 
 nonceaux; here are the haggard eyes of Charles 
 IX., full of the nameless terrors of the wild night 
 of St. Bartholomew, and weighed down in mor- 
 tal melancholy by the fatal counsels of his moth- 
 er. Marguerite of Navarre is here as well, and 
 the relentless face of Anne de Montmorency, the 
 stern Constable, Coligny, white-haired and ven- 
 erable, and the weak revolting countenance of 
 Henry III. 
 
 Upon the other wall is the bright child's face of 
 Charles IX. before the plots of Catherine de Medicis 
 had wrecked him soul and body. Near him is the 
 Pucelle d' Orleans and Philip of Burgundy; while 
 Anne of Austria, still striving to be beautiful, 
 
Cbzaif-U-c/ljldeau 233 
 
 is showing off the " fairest hand and arm in 
 France." 
 
 All the ages of French History look down upon 
 us from the panels as we pass. In another guest- 
 room is the beautiful laughing face of Henrietta 
 of England, whose young husband with his effemi- 
 nate eyes and satin bows had watched us in the 
 room before. Farther on is Mademoiselle de 
 Montpensier in the merry days of her girlhood, too 
 cruelly placed near the great red hat that shades 
 her disappointed face in later life. Near to this is 
 the small bourgeoise head of the Pompadour, next 
 her contemporary Mademoiselle de I'Enclos, ever- 
 lastingly invincible, and opposite to these the 
 stately figure of Madame de Maintenon. 
 
 But the list grows long — of grave and gay, of 
 good and bad, all thrown together as they never 
 were in life, and all for the first time meeting under 
 one roof, never (let us hope) to be separated again. 
 
 " Old faces glimmered thro' the doors, 
 Old footsteps trod the upper floors." 
 
 There seemed a strange reality about this great 
 company of the illustrious dead. It must have 
 been here that Gautier dreamed of the old manor- 
 house where, as the evening falls, the portraits step 
 down from their frames. 
 
234 Old ^ou 
 
 taine 
 
 " D'un reflet rouge illuminee 
 La bande se chauffe les doigts, 
 Et fait cercle a la cheminee 
 Ou tout a coup flambe le bois. 
 L'image au sepulcre ravie 
 Perd son aspect roide et glace, 
 La chaude pourpre de la vie 
 Remonte aux veines du passe." 
 
 It seemed no easy thing to step from so vivid 
 a resurrection of the past into the present that was 
 beneath, as we descended towards the entrance 
 hall by the fine staircase, the chief glory of the 
 chateau, that is panelled with the portraits of the 
 kings of France; and where the towers of the old 
 church ^ showed among the trees beyond the park, 
 we wandered slowly back across the murmuring 
 Indre, and left Azay-le-Rideau veiled in the soft 
 beauty of a golden mist. 
 
 " Chateau du Souvenir, adieu ! " 
 
 * " There are some Angevine traces about the architecture 
 of this church," says Mr. Petit {op. cit.), " but the oldest 
 part, now the north aisle, the tower, and its eastern apse, 
 seem, as in other instances, to have constituted formerly the 
 whole church." 
 
 Even in the eleventh century, when under the direction of 
 the Abbey of Cormery, this church is spoken of as old, and 
 still shows traces of ninth and tenth century work. There 
 are some particularly curious archaic statuettes and carvings 
 along the front. 
 
Qke (Down of Oouzd and ltd 
 &azzoundin^d 
 
CHAPTER XXIII 
 
 THE TOWN OF TOURS AND ITS SURROUNDINGS 
 
 " Monuments de la vieille France, 
 Passe plus frais que I'avenir, 
 Ou trouverai-je une esperance 
 Egale a votre souvenir ? " 
 
 With Chambord and Azay-le-Rideau the list is 
 ended of those typical castles in the valley of the 
 Loire which must of necessity be visited. The 
 history in which they bore a part ended in the story 
 of the last Valois king at Blois. The school of 
 architecture of which they furnish so many brill- 
 iant examples has reached its highest point of 
 delicacy and perfection in the achievement of Azay. 
 It only remains to indicate quite briefly a few of 
 those castles which have been left almost unmen- 
 tioned. Though of less interest, whether historical 
 or architectural, than those already described, yet 
 they cannot be omitted from the shortest sketch of 
 what can be seen and learned in the extraordinary 
 district between Blois and Saumur which, for want 
 of a more accurate name, I have called " Old 
 Touraine." 
 
 Blois, like Tours, is a centre from which it is 
 237 
 
238 Old %. 
 
 owcaine 
 
 possible to do much. Chambord and Chaumont 
 we already know; but there are two other chateaux, 
 Cheverny and Beauregard, within a drive of Blois, 
 which have yet to be explored. After keeping 
 for a long time in the shadow of the forest, the 
 road from Blois reaches the quiet little village of 
 Cheverny, and a short distance farther on passes 
 the old church of Cour-Cheverny with its fine 
 roofed porch; opposite to this is the gateway of 
 the chateau, which is very large and white and 
 modern-looking, built with pavilions on each side 
 in the style of Versailles, and with the foundations 
 with which Mansard had already familiarised us in 
 the newest part of Blois. 
 
 The best pictures are in the grand salon, where 
 is the face of the founder Philippe Hurault, Comte 
 de Cheverny, Chancellor of France in the reign of 
 Henry IV. Opposite to him is his wife Anne de 
 Thou, a relation of the friend of the unhappy Cinq 
 Mars, who perished on the same scafifold. Their 
 daughter is above the mantelpiece, a Scotch-look- 
 ing woman with black hair strung with pearls. 
 
 But the finest work of art in the whole chateau 
 is the portrait of Cosmo de Medicis when quite 
 young, which hangs on the right hand of the door; 
 it has unfortunately been retouched all round the 
 face in 1827, but is not seriously damaged; the 
 
Glievetny 239 
 
 treatment of the armour and lace, the masterly 
 touches in the growth of the hair round the temples, 
 and the magnificent breadth of the style would al- 
 most suggest that, did dates allow of it, this pict- 
 ure was the work of Titian. 
 
 In the next room is an excellent pencil sketch by 
 Robert le Fevre of Charles X., with his falling un- 
 der lip and high-bridged nose. The rest of the 
 ground floor is chiefly decorated with the advent- 
 ures of Don Quixote, painted on the panels of the 
 gallery and dining-room. 
 
 A carved stone staircase leads to the Salle des 
 Gardes above, which rejoices in an extremely well- 
 preserved floor and ceiling, while the long row of 
 tall windows looking out upon the park lights up 
 to the full a room whose fine proportions are un- 
 concealed by any attempt at furniture. The walls 
 only, besides their appropriate decoration of tro- 
 phies and suits of armour, are lined at the bottom 
 with panel paintings of various flowers, each with a 
 Latin motto. But the most extraordinary room in 
 the chateau is the small " chambre des rois " be- 
 yond, wherein is the first parquetry made after tiles 
 " went out." The walls are completely covered 
 with tapestry and painting, and within this appro- 
 priate setting is the " legendary-looking bed " in 
 which the good chancellor died in 1599. 
 
240 did "S. 
 
 outaine 
 
 On the left hand of the road that leads back to 
 Blois, in the midst of the Forest of Russy, stands 
 another chateau filled with pictures, with the appro- 
 priate name of Beauregard. There is the same 
 strangely new appearance here as we had noticed 
 at Cheverny, for probably little remains of the old 
 chateau to which Jean du Thier (as Ronsard tells 
 us) brought home in 1545 the Pindar and Simon- 
 ides he had saved from Constantinople. The col- 
 lection of pictures was begun by the minister Paul 
 Ardier early in the seventeenth century, and com- 
 poses a complete series of fifteen reigns down to 
 Louis XIV., placed in the long gallery floored 
 with tiles that represent a whole army of the reign 
 of Louis XIV.; this must have been much as we 
 see it now when Mademoiselle de Montpensier 
 came to visit De Vineuil here and talked over the 
 intrigues of the Fronde and the doings of the great 
 Conde. 
 
 Besides these pictures — there are some three 
 hundred and fifty of them — there is not much to see 
 save a charming sketch by Watteau in the drawing- 
 room, of the Duchesse de Dino, the chatelaine at 
 the beginning of the present century. 
 
 Before travelling westward again, there is Ramo- 
 rantin to be seen, where Louise de Savoie first 
 brought up her young son Francis, and where later 
 
o/oamo'cantin — c/Ibontzic/iazcl 241 
 
 on she saw the comet in the sky that presaged his 
 success at Marignano. Upon the banks of the 
 Cher is Montrichard, one of the many strongholds 
 of Foulques Nerra, and now terribly damaged by 
 the vandalism of 1793; on almost every eminence 
 that rises from the vine-clad plains the traveller 
 
 " Decouvre du vieux manoir 
 Les tourelles en poivriere 
 Et les hauts toits en eteignoir," 
 
 and nearly all are filled with memories of the 
 Fronde; for here the chief actors in those troublous 
 times came to repose a little from the feverish in- 
 trigues of Paris, to talk a little quiet scandal, like 
 De Retz, or to lie " perdue " till the storm blew 
 over, like Madame de Chevreuse and many more 
 of the " beautes de qualite," who mixed up politics 
 with gallantry and claimed the lead in both. 
 
 From his chateau east of Loches, between the 
 Indre and the Cher, the Due de Montresor would 
 ride across to Tours to talk to Madame de Chev- 
 reuse of the impossibility of rousing Gaston d'Or- 
 leans to anything approaching consistent policy or 
 courageous support to his allies; or stop at Mont- 
 bazon, a little farther northward down the Indre, 
 to hear the latest news of Marie de Rohan's quarrel 
 with the Duchesse de Longueville. Of Mont- 
 VoL. II.— 16 
 
242 did "bo 
 
 azattie 
 
 bazon little is left now save " the ruins of a castle, 
 built when men knew how to build, upon a rock 
 with turrets lichen-gilded like a rock," and even 
 in those times it seems to have fallen into disrepair, 
 for the family lived chiefly at the Chateau of Cou- 
 zieres, where the tale still lingers of the terrible 
 end that befell the Duchesse de Montbazon, whose 
 beauty De Retz praises so highly and whose vices 
 even he cannot condone. In a famous sentence he 
 has summed her up : " Je n'ai jamais vu personne 
 qui eiit conserve dans le vice si peu de respect pour 
 la vertu." 
 
 The last of her lovers was one Armand de Ranee, 
 an ecclesiastic of easy morals, like the Coadjutor 
 himself, who " preached like an angel all the fore- 
 noon, and hunted like a devil all the evening." The 
 beauty of Marie de Rohan, perhaps too the strange 
 attraction of her wild and unrestrained abandon- 
 ment in the pursuit of pleasure, on horseback or 
 afoot, had completely fascinated the Abbe de 
 Ranee; with one last effort to shake ofif the spell he 
 accepted the chance of employment in negotiations 
 with the Vatican. But he could not stay in Italy; 
 in the groves of the Campagna, in the corridors of 
 the Vatican, the memory of Marie was with him 
 still, and he could not rest away from her. After a 
 hurried journey back he rode to the Chateau of 
 
(?, 
 
 oiiziezed 243 
 
 Couzieres late on an evening, too wrapped up in 
 his own thoughts to see a strange air of sudden 
 desolation in the place, or notice that the servants 
 were in black; he was on familiar ground, and was 
 soon through the side-door and mounting the 
 secret staircase to her room. 
 
 There were two candles burning in it as he en- 
 tered, with a faint light that showed him the 
 duchess lying on her bed ; he rushed across the 
 room and kissed her passionately upon the lips; 
 the white face fell from him heavily, and her head 
 rolled down between his feet. 
 
 How the unhappy lover fled from the room, with 
 what thoughts of a husband's vengeance, of the 
 terrible greeting that had been placed for him, we 
 know not; but it was Armand de Ranee who was 
 the first Abbe Commandataire de la Trappe, and 
 sought perhaps, in the silence of the Trappiste 
 monasteries, forgetfulness.^ 
 
 It was to Couzieres that Marie de Medicis came 
 from Montbazon, after she had escaped from the 
 
 1 Such is the legend : the truth (as far as it will ever be 
 known) is almost as strange. While De Ranee was away a 
 sudden attack of smallpox had killed the Duchess, who was 
 one of the finest riders and tallest women of her time ; the 
 colifin that was hurriedly provided for her burial had proved 
 too short, and the corpse could only be put in without its 
 head, which was cut ofif and laid upon a silver tray ; and this 
 was what the Abbe saw. 
 
244 did % 
 
 outaine 
 
 Chateau of Blois and had been persuaded to leave 
 Angouleme; De Retz and Luynes had met her at 
 Poitiers, and at Couzieres the Dukes of Guise and 
 Montbazon joined them, to witness her reconcilia- 
 tion with Louis XIII. , after which the whole Court 
 left, with an exaggerated gaiety, to see the fetes 
 at Tours. 
 
 The chateau from which the Marechal de Luynes, 
 the King's favourite, took his title is close to Tours, 
 a little westward down the Loire; it stands upon 
 a hill looking down upon the fields that slope 
 toward the river, and is approached by a fine bridge 
 very like that at Chinon. The place was called 
 Maille ^ before Louis XIII. had given his favourite 
 the title, and there are still standing relics of a far 
 older time, in the great Roman aqueduct which 
 bore the waters of the stream behind the Church of 
 St. Vernant to the fort which defended the old road 
 to Le Mans.^ 
 
 The name of yet another favourite in the same 
 reign is recalled by the strange Pile de Cinq Mars, 
 a little farther down the valley. An explanation 
 has already been suggested for this strange erec- 
 tion; it may well have flashed signals for the Lan- 
 
 ^ Malliacense Castrum (Mabille). 
 
 2 These ruins were ruins already in the time of Gregory of 
 Tours, who says of the convent there, " ab antiquis vallatum 
 aedificiis jam erutis." 
 
uroni a poztzatt in loffiti Cfallety, (J'Lozence 
 
Gincj c/lBatd — cJiDickeiieu 245 
 
 terne de Rochecorbon to pass on to Amboise, but 
 no reasonable account of its building and design 
 has been as yet forthcoming. Upon the hill a little 
 higher up are the ruins of a chateau, three round 
 towers, the smallest with a pointed roof, and lower 
 down a smaller tower, detached, that may have 
 been the outworks of the entrance gate. It is ap- 
 propriate that the memorials of so sad a fate, of so 
 unexplained a character, should be ruins as strange 
 and as decayed as these; De Vigny has told the 
 whole sad story of the sudden rise to power, the 
 hopeless love, the whole career of Cinq Mars, from 
 his leaving home at Chaumont till his execution 
 with De Thou. It is but one more trace of the 
 sinister influence of Richelieu, who built one of the 
 towns in Touraine, with whose memory all these 
 Castles of the Fronde are filled. It was down the 
 Loire that the Cardinal was borne in his last 
 illness, in the vast litter which was carried into the 
 towns at night, where gates built only for an ordi- 
 nary prince were far too narrow, through breaches 
 battered in the walls, as though by a besieging 
 army. Many breathed more freely in the town of 
 Richelieu,^ and in all Touraine, when that strong 
 spirit passed away. " II avait assez de religion 
 pour ce monde," says the broad-minded De Retz, 
 1 A few miles south of Chinon. 
 
246 Old ^outaine 
 
 " il aneantissait par son pouvoir et par son faste 
 royal la majeste personnelle du roi," and it was for 
 this mastery over the King, for this subjection in 
 which he held all France, that Richelieu was chiefly 
 hated in Touraine, one of the last strongholds of 
 the feudal nobility who had opposed him to the 
 last. 
 
 We have drawn very close now to our journey's 
 end, to the town of Tours itself. Upon the other 
 side, eastwards, is the tall shaft poised upon a 
 precipice which is known as the Lanterne de 
 Rochecorbon; it is all that is left of the " chastel 
 deschiquete et taillade comme ung pourpoinct 
 hespaignol," which Messire Bruyn built when he 
 returned from the crusades to marry his young 
 wife. 
 
 The next estates to his were those of the great 
 Abbey of Marmoutier,^ within which the seven 
 sleepers slept for five-and-twenty years, and appar- 
 ently remained in unchanged slumber after death. 
 The little cells within the solid rock wherein St. 
 Martin and St. Gatien lived and prayed, are still 
 to be seen; but the modern buildings (of the 
 Sacred Heart) contrast somewhat too sharply with 
 the bygone religious memories which the place un- 
 consciously awakens, and which are preserved in 
 the old door and shortened spire, alone, that face 
 1 This word is said to be " mains monasterium" 
 
J^leddid-lez-uowcd 247 
 
 the entrance. But the impressions of the modern 
 Marmoutier are at least far preferable to the ter- 
 rible disappointment that awaits, the visitor to 
 Plessis-lez-Tours; he must boldly discard the vision 
 that the scenes of Quentin Durward conjured up, he 
 must approach with more than one sense blunted 
 to the possibilities of offence, for the abode of the 
 once " dreadful Louis " is reduced to an evil-smell- 
 ing shed filled with the carts of the night scav- 
 engers. 
 
 There can still be traced (chiefly in the imagina- 
 tion of the attendant ghoul) the outline and the 
 walls and ditches of the park, the httle nook beneath 
 a stairway where Balue was hidden in his cage, and 
 certain problematical and earthly hollows which are 
 supposed to lead by subterranean passages to the 
 town of Tours; at their other end was the house 
 of Tristan I'Hermite; the house that is called his, 
 at any rate exists, and though nearly certainly 
 built in the next century, it is worth a visit for its 
 own sake; for the outside, which is decorated with 
 a twisted cord (at once put down as the somewhat 
 too obvious badge of Tristan's office), has a quiet 
 harmony of colour in the lines of brick and stone; 
 and the little court within, from which rises a tall 
 tower with a winding stair, is a pretty example of 
 the domestic architecture of the time. 
 
248 0U "6. 
 
 owcaine 
 
 The presence of the Court at Plessis, which was 
 not always so offensive after all, was often the oc- 
 casion of festivities in the Town. Mystery Plays, 
 processions, and receptions often occupied the 
 good citizens, who, as we have seen, were quite 
 capable of taking their part in anything artistic. 
 Their trade, too, flourished; in the birthplace of 
 Jean Fouquet, of Michel Colombe, of Francois 
 Clouet, the arts were not likely to fall into neglect, 
 and in 1546 the Venetian Marino de' Cavalli 
 notices one branch of industry in which those arts 
 were used, " the manufactories of silken work and 
 tapestry at Tours," he says, " are of the best in 
 France; " the silk from Spain and Italy was sent 
 there, and Venetian workmen were encouraged to 
 come over to teach the Tourangeaux all that they 
 knew of weaving broidery and tissues. In the year 
 before this, just as the right-hand tower of the Ca- 
 thedral was being brought to its completion, a 
 Royal Charter had been granted for two fairs at 
 Tours in March and in September, at which " silks 
 and cloth of gold and silver, as good and fine as 
 those of any foreign manufacture," were always on 
 sale. These great fairs stopped in 1616, but were 
 revived again in 1782, and still take place each 
 winter and summer along the Quai beside the 
 Loire. 
 
^ouzd 249 
 
 One of the great features of the public reception 
 given to Charles IX/ was an arch with an inscrip- 
 tion referring to 
 
 " La Soye, honneur de cette ville, 
 Donnant la vie aux peuples avec leurs mains." 
 
 Immediately after the Colonel of Infantry, in the 
 procession that came out to greet the King, was the 
 Company of Silk-makers clad in black velvet hats 
 with green cord, in leather of the King's colour, 
 pourpoints of " taffetas cramoisy " and black col- 
 lars. Mercers, armourers, and jewellers followed, 
 and a brave array of butchers " who were magnifi- 
 cently dressed and very brawny men," wearing blue 
 hats and scarlet doublets. Last came the " Sieurs 
 de la Bazoche," the town company of actors, " who 
 had right cunningly secured permission from the 
 Silk Mercers, par une invention rare et magni- 
 fique," to wear " taffetas cramoisy," and black vel- 
 vet hats as well. 
 
 The next royal reception was to Henry III. 
 and his mother, in which devices were scattered 
 throughout the town with complimentary refer- 
 
 1 See La description de V entree du tres Chretien Roy Charles 
 IX. du noin, en sa ville de Tours, par Jehan Cloppel, a Tours 
 par Ollivier Tafforeau Imprimeur demeurant pres les Corde- 
 liers, 1565, a rare little book in the Bibliotheque Nationale. 
 
250 ULd Ooutaine 
 
 ences to the peace-loving virtues and general amia- 
 bility of Catherine de Medicis. Tours was at this 
 time in great happiness and prosperity, and Gi- 
 rolamo Lippomano, the Venetian, sends home a 
 glowing account of the pastures and beeves, the 
 wine, the fruit, the corn, that grew in such abun- 
 dance, the silks and merchandise that vied with 
 goods from Naples and from Lucca. 
 
 But the town was not to be wholly untouched by 
 the political and religious quarrels of the sixteenth 
 century. In 1588, certain printers found them- 
 selves forced to quit Paris after the disturbances at 
 the end of Henry III.'s reign, and fled to Tours, 
 where they formed a society for the publication of 
 certain works in demand.^ Their deed and agree- 
 ment is still in existence. 
 
 1 See " Une Association d'imprimeurs et de libraires de 
 Paris refugies a Tours au xvi. siecle. Janet Mettayer. Marc 
 Orry. Claude de Montr'oeil. Jehan Richer. Matthieu Guille- 
 mot. Sebastien du Molin. Georges de Robet. Abel Langel- 
 lier." Tours, imp. Rouille Ladeveze, 1878, 8vo. Their publi- 
 cations are rather rare, and I have only seen two, which are 
 Recueil de la Harangue faicte a V ouverture du Parlement, par 
 M. C. Servain, 1589, and La Pucelle d' Orleans Restituee, par 
 Jean Beroalde de Verulle, 1599. 
 
 The first Guide-book I can discover for the town and dis- 
 trict was published in 1592 by Isaac Frangois Sieur de la 
 Girardie at Tours. 
 
 L. Vitet in La Ligue gives a list of the many political pam- 
 phlets published at this time, in a small duodecimo edition, with 
 narrow margins, and thick type such as the Machiavel, printed 
 
^oatd 251 
 
 The beginning of 1589 was an agitated time in 
 many ways for the town that was so near the place 
 where Guise had been murdered; a more interest- 
 ing meeting than any seen that century came off 
 in the gardens of Plessis when Henry of Navarre 
 came from the Protestant assembly at La Rochelle, 
 the only one of all his suite who had a cloak to 
 wear or a feather in his hat, the famous " panache 
 blanche " that led the way at Ivry. 
 
 The last of the Valois embracing the first of the 
 Bourbons must have been a strange sight for those 
 of the courtiers who had watched the long strug- 
 gle between the three Henrys; but now Guise was 
 dead, and Catherine de Medicis, his bitterest enemy, 
 was gone, there was nothing to hinder the King of 
 Navarre from coming forward to take his true 
 position. The murder of the King by Jacques 
 Clement still further cleared his pathway to the 
 throne of France, and with his reign the next cen- 
 tury seemed at last likely to have rest from civil 
 wars. 
 
 Tours itself had not escaped the last efforts of 
 the League — there had been hard fighting on the 
 bridge and in the faubourg of St. Symphorien, from 
 which Mayenne's men were only with difficulty 
 
 at Tours, which Henry III. was reading Just before the murder 
 of the Due de Guise. 
 
252 Old ^1 
 
 ouzatne 
 
 dislodged, after several churches had suffered ter- 
 ribly from the rude treatment of the defenders of 
 the Catholic Faith, 
 
 One more reminder of De Guise's murder re- 
 mained in a tower of the Fortress by the river — 
 his young son, the Prince de Joinville, had been 
 imprisoned there, and in 1593 escaped with singu- 
 lar daring and success. On his way to mass, he 
 suddenly laid a wager with his guards that he could 
 run upstairs again quicker than they could; he 
 reached his room first, bolted the door, and with a 
 long cord which had been brought him by his 
 laundress, slipped out of window with a bar be- 
 tween his legs, and dropped from fifteen feet. 
 With shots whistling round his ears, he rushed 
 round the walls to the Faubourg de la Riche, where 
 he found a baker's horse and leaped upon its back; 
 the saddle turned round and threw him, and a 
 soldier came up suddenly — it was no enemy, but 
 by a happy chance, a Leaguer who gave him a 
 fresh mount; in a few moments he was past the 
 town and had soon put the Cher between himself 
 and his pursuers. 
 
 The town still prospered; and its manufactures 
 had received further encouragement by the Edict 
 of Nantes about 1598. The King had even or- 
 dered mulberry trees to be planted round Paris, 
 
Ooutd 253 
 
 Tours, and Orleans, and the first book published on 
 the art of silk-making appeared, by one Jean Bap- 
 tiste Letellier, But the next century saw a terrible 
 change. 
 
 The question of religion now becomes inextrica- 
 bly mixed up with the commercial issues which are 
 at stake, for at the head of the silk-weaving indus- 
 try were the numerous families of Huguenots who 
 for some time had been flourishing within the town; 
 nor had their presence there been without suffer- 
 ing; so far back as 1544, persecutions had begun in 
 the town ^ of those heretics whose doctrines were 
 first heard of twenty years before. Some of the 
 leading Huguenots were even taken to Paris to be 
 burnt, to serve as a more striking warning to the 
 rest. At last in 1562 came the inevitable result of 
 the massacre at Amboise. In the library at Tours 
 is a horribly faithful representation of the slaying 
 of the Huguenots throughout the town, and even 
 in boats and barges on the river. There was of 
 course vengeance upon the other side, when 
 Conde's army ten years later opened the town 
 again to the victorious Protestants, and towards 
 the end of the century the presence of Henry of 
 Navarre did much to strengthen the Huguenot 
 
 1 See the excellent little work on Protestantism in Touraine 
 by M. Dupin St. Andre, now Minister at Tours. 
 
254 etd '^0 
 
 iLzaine 
 
 cause. At last it seemed possible, in spite of sud- 
 den outbursts of fanaticism, that the two religions 
 should live side by side. The Huguenots, more- 
 over, had justified their presence by their skill in 
 arts and industries, particularly in the silk manu- 
 facture, which was always the staple of commerce 
 of the place. 
 
 Suddenly, upon the i6th May, 1685, the Revoca- 
 tion of the Edict of Nantes fell like a thunderclap 
 upon the town. The Huguenots dispersed to 
 Switzerland, to Holland, to the southern shores of 
 England, even to America, carrying the secrets of 
 their commerce with them, and, what was worse, 
 followed by their workmen. Out of a total of 
 eighty thousand inhabitants, fifty thousand went; 
 the silk industry was destroyed or carried across 
 the Channel, to enrich the English at the expense 
 of whole populations of the working French. 
 
 It is not too much to say that the town never 
 recovered from the shock; it is only in the last ten 
 years that the old prosperity seems coming back 
 again. ^ Already much of what John Evelyn saw, 
 
 1 The years after the Revocation of the Edict were unpros- 
 perous for many reasons besides the loss of the silk industry: 
 it was the time when the inequality and injustice of taxation 
 so convincingly pointed out by De Tocqueville was at its 
 height. Even in 1761 the Societe d' Agriculture at Tours writes 
 to complain bitterly of the unfair pressure of certain feudal 
 rights on the country populations. 
 
boiled 255 
 
 when he came here for nineteen weeks, " took a 
 master of the language and studied very dili- 
 gently," is gone for ever. " Both the church and 
 monastery of Martin are large," he writes, speak- 
 ing of buildings which now exist only in name,^ 
 " having four square towers, fair organs, and a 
 stately altar, where they show the bones and ashes 
 of St. Martin, with other reliques. The Mall with- 
 out comparison is the noblest in Europe for length 
 and shade, having seven rows of the tallest and 
 goodliest elms I had ever beheld, the innermost of 
 which do so embrace each other and at such a 
 height that nothing can be more solemn or majes- 
 tical. . . . No city in France exceeds it in 
 beauty or delight." This was written before the 
 Revocation had devastated the town, Evelyn saw, 
 too, the tomb of Ronsard, who died at St. Cosmo 
 in 1585, in the chapel of Plessis-lez-Tours, and was 
 so fortunate as to meet the Queen of England, who 
 was entertained at the archbishop's palace on her 
 way to Paris. 
 
 Great efforts had been made to restore the sink- 
 ing fortunes of the town, and when Arthur Young 
 came here in 1787, he could speak of the "new 
 street (the Rue Royale) of large houses, built of 
 
 1 Save for the two towers, with a waste of street between, 
 melancholy landmarks of the great church that once existed. 
 
256 . did 'S. 
 
 owcatne 
 
 hewn white stone with regular fronts," which had 
 just been laid out, though even now several of the 
 owners refuse to incur the expense of filling up the 
 design. " They ought, however, to be unroosted 
 if they will not comply," cries the Englishman. He 
 saw too several fine pictures in the chapel at Plessis, 
 and heard with regret that the corporation had 
 ofifered the old trees in the Park for sale. " One 
 would not wonder," he reflects frankly enough, " at 
 an English corporation sacrificing the ladies' walk 
 for plenty of turtle, venison, and madeira; but that 
 a French one should have so little gallantry is in- 
 excusable." 
 
 But worse things than this were soon to happen. 
 In 1792 the town was celebrating a fete to Lib- 
 erty, and all the chateaux in the valley suffered in 
 the general turmoil. The citizens were busy listen- 
 ing to the " Hymn to Great Men," to a " Discourse 
 to the Nations," to a " Hymn to Reason," or sing- 
 ing tumultuously after this fashion — 
 
 " Les ennemis du nom frangais 
 Sur Tours ont forme des projets, 
 Mais on les attend la, 
 A Tours on les fera 
 Voir de vrais sansculottes; 
 Vive le son 
 Du canon ! " 
 
^ouzd 267 
 
 In 1815 the enemy were at the gates in earnest: 
 the Prussians and the Allies were encamped in St. 
 Symphorien. 
 
 But after the fever of the Revolution had some- 
 what calmed, after the terrible fighting in La 
 Vendee had ceased, Tours began slowly and stead- 
 ily to recover, in a quiet prosperous time of harvest 
 and repose. These were the days when English 
 most did congregate at Tours. The handbook of 
 1841 reports two English churches, where not one 
 now exists, and speaks of the trout fishing to be had, 
 and of the seventy English families who throve and 
 multiplied in their new colony among the vine- 
 yards. 
 
 The war of 1870 seems to have frightened them 
 away. In the autumn of that year Leon Gambetta, 
 escaping in his balloon from Paris, carried on the 
 Government in the Palais de Justice of Tours be- 
 fore the Assembly at Bordeaux was constituted. 
 It was in that winter that the Germans occupied the 
 heights above the town, which was absolutely in- 
 capable of making any defence. But the traces of 
 the so-called " siege " have vanished, and the town 
 has resumed its quiet advance towards material 
 prosperity. 
 
 The statue of Balzac looks down the Rue Royale 
 
 he loved so well, towards the Quai where Rabelais 
 Vol. n.— 17 
 
268 did '^. 
 
 ouzaine 
 
 and Descartes look upon the town; behind them 
 stretches the valley of the Loire. It is a fascinating 
 valley, full of history, full of romance. The Plan- 
 tagenets have lived and died here, the Black Prince 
 has fought up and down the river, Sir Walter 
 Raleigh served his first campaign here with the 
 Protestants, even King Arthur has been heard of at 
 Amboise. Here are scenes that Turner has painted, 
 where Landor and Wordsworth have watched the 
 setting sun; here in the heart of France, in the 
 most French of all her provinces, there seems a 
 special interest for the Englishman, a special beauty 
 in this royal river flowing past Fontevrault to the 
 sea, in this broad smiling landscape clad with 
 vines, 
 
 " Where from the frequent bridge, 
 Like emblems of infinity, 
 The trenched waters run from sky to sky." 
 
Chj^endl 
 
 toco 
 
Chppendix 
 
 I. — Itinerary 
 
 The traveller may find it convenient to have a few 
 other places in Tours and its neighbourhood pointed 
 out for his especial notice. Information concern- 
 ing them is easily procurable (especially from the 
 books already recommended), and they are col- 
 lected here merely to avoid his missing them. Be- 
 tween the two best hotels, the Hotel de I'Univers 
 and the Hotel du Faisan, there is very little choice; 
 the first is on the Boulevards not far from the 
 main line station, the second in the Rue Royale: 
 both are good. The Rue Royale (or Nationale, 
 according to your politics) runs straight through 
 the town from the Palais de Justice on the Boule- 
 vards to the great stone bridge over the Loire. At 
 No. 39, Balzac was born. On the Quai to the 
 right, in what is now a barrack, is the Tour de 
 Guise. In visiting the Cathedral, the traveller 
 should especially notice the old glass in the choir, 
 the tomb of Charles VIII. 's children, and the ex- 
 traordinary staircase poised upon the keystone of 
 
 S61 
 
262 6U "B. 
 
 outatne 
 
 an arch, by which he will be conducted to the sum- 
 mit of one of the towers. Two great towers are 
 all that is left of St. Martin's Cathedral and Abbey. 
 Near the Tour de Charlemagne the Cloister of St. 
 Martin must particularly be seen, as one of the 
 finest examples of Renaissance carving in the town. 
 The date of this cloister is given as 1508 in p. 141 
 of M. Grandmaison's Documents Inedits pour Servir 
 a I'Histoire des Arts en Touraine. The Church of 
 St. Julien, too, near the Rue Royale, should be 
 visited : it had been begun by the historian Gregory 
 of Tours in 576, was destroyed in 856 by the Nor- 
 mans, and of the later church little but the western 
 tower of eleventh-century work remains; the pres- 
 ent structure is chiefly of the fourteenth century, 
 and has not long been restored to its present state 
 from the terrible decay and disrepair into which it 
 had fallen. In 18 17, Mr. W. D. Fellowes, who 
 has published notes of his travels on the way to 
 the Monastery of La Trappe, arrived at Tours and 
 notices its foot pavement in the Rue Royale, " a 
 thing seldom to be met with in this country," 
 though at that time Tours was almost an English 
 colony. The traveller was put up in the " Hotel 
 St. Julien." In the side aisles of the church were 
 stalls for horses and cattle, the centre was a " re- 
 mise " for carriages. 
 
Chppendix 263 
 
 The Bank in the Rue de Commerce, where circu- 
 lar notes are exchanged, is the famous Hotel Gouin, 
 a beautiful example of early French Renaissance. 
 The Hotel de Beaune, in the Rue St. Francois, is 
 another example of the same type, and the chim- 
 neypiece in the Hotel de la Boule d'Or must also 
 be seen. The house of Tristan I'Hermite has been 
 already mentioned. In the Place du Grand Mar- 
 che is a fine fountain put up in 15 lo by Jacques 
 de Beaune Semblangay, whose house is in the cor- 
 ner of the same square. M. Grandmaison pub- 
 lishes the details of the fountain's construction from 
 the archives of Tours. Its four blocks of marble 
 came from Genoa. Michel Colombe directed the 
 sculptors, Bastein and Martin les Francois. It was 
 originally surmounted by a crown and flowers, 
 above which was a bronzed and gilt crucifixion, 
 but all these ornaments have now disappeared. 
 There is an excellent theatre in the Rue de la 
 Scellerie, nearly opposite the best bookseller. 
 Baths in the Loire are to be found on the island 
 which helps to support the suspension bridge; and 
 there is a good library. 
 
 At St. Symphorien across the river is a quaint 
 Romanesque cross church, " swamped by a flam- 
 boyant nave," with a good western door. At St. 
 Radegonde, farther to the east along the bank, 
 
264 Old ^. 
 
 owcaine 
 
 the church is built against the rock, in which a 
 chapel is excavated that communicates with the 
 tower. The Abbey of Marmoutier is in the same 
 direction. Crossing the river again, on the far 
 side of the town to the south and west the traveller 
 will find Plessis-lez-Tours and the Abbey of St. 
 Como. Still farther out into the country is the 
 Romanesque church of Villandry, which, says Mr, 
 Petit, " combines in itself the chief characteristics 
 one or other of which is found in most churches 
 of this district." The chateau there, too, with the 
 beautiful flower-beds surrounding it, is well worth 
 a visit. The finest conservatories in Touraine, 
 almost in France, are to be seen at M. Mame's 
 chateau of Les Touches, near Savonnieres, not far 
 from Ballan; there are also some strange grottos, 
 " caves gouttieres," in the neighbourhood. Mr. 
 Fellowes in 1817 seems to have made a strangely 
 fragmentary visit. Out of all the chateaux he chose 
 only Chanteloup, Menard, the favourite home of 
 Madame de Pompadour, and Valangay, the seat of 
 M. de Talleyrand, from which the English Govern- 
 ment failed in its attempt to rescue Ferdinand VII. 
 of Spain by means of a certain mysterious foreign 
 baron. 
 
 One more excursion may be advised, to the 
 Chateau d'Usse, now in the possession of the Comte 
 
Chppendlx 265 
 
 de Blacas, the heir of Madame la Comtesse de la 
 Rochejaquelein, an exceedingly picturesque old 
 pile in well-kept grounds near the junction of the 
 Indre with the Loire. There are some interesting 
 rooms and some good pictures, especially in the 
 Gallerie de Vauban. The greatest treasure there is 
 what is known as the " Buste d'Usse," a Florentine 
 work of the late fifteenth century; it formerly was 
 in the collection of the famous Fouquet, and M. 
 Leon Palustre considers that it represents Hercule, 
 Due de Ferrara (1471-1505). In any case, it is one 
 of the finest pieces of portrait sculpture to be seen 
 in Touraine, not excepting the bust of Francis near 
 Loches, and it should on no account be missed. 
 Many places might yet be mentioned, but the typi- 
 cal chateau and churches have been pointed out, 
 and in the map, which shows only a few details for 
 the sake of being quite clear, their relative position 
 and accessibility can be quickly seen. Further in- 
 formation can be easily procured, and as to railways 
 the useful Guide Bijou d'Indre et Loire may be 
 safely and profitably used. The inns are almost 
 uniformly good and clean. 
 
266 Old Ooutatne 
 
 11. — Manuscripts and Books 
 
 The town is particularly fortunate in the abun- 
 dance of Manuscripts and Documents which it 
 possesses. In the Archives Departmentales d'ln- 
 dre et Loire, kept in the Prefecture, are great quan- 
 tities of title-deeds and records preserved from the 
 old religious houses, among which is the grant of 
 Louis le Debonnaire in 837 to found the Abbey of 
 Cormery, with a seal attached, a deed of Hugh 
 Capet, and other treasures; in the Hotel de Ville 
 are the Archives Communales, which are among 
 the most important in France. Mgr. Chevalier 
 gives a list of their contents. Detailed accounts of 
 parish expenses since 1358 are preserved, municipal 
 documents since 1408, and numbers of letters and 
 other manuscripts from 1140 onwards. The politi- 
 cal archives stretch fairly continuously from the 
 English occupation in 1347 to 18 15 and Waterloo. 
 Many most valuable facts with reference to the old 
 Mystery Plays and theatrical representations are 
 also to be found here (copied by M. Andre Salmon), 
 and the diligence of M. Grandmaison has brought 
 to light all that is known of the Clouets, and es^ 
 pecially of Jean Clouet H., whose illuminated Livy 
 is preserved in the town library, which also contains 
 the Hours of Charles V. and of Anne of Brittany, a 
 
Ubppendix 267 
 
 thirteenth-century Terence, and many other rari- 
 ties. But the librarian shall describe them himself. 
 " La Bibliotheque de Tours, installee rue Nationale 
 90, dans les batiments de I'ancienne fabrique royale 
 de soieries (lampas et damas de Tours), contient 
 aujourd'hui cent mille volumes environ. lis pro- 
 viennent, en grande partie, des librairies ou biblio- 
 theques des abbayes et convents qui existaient 
 autrefois a Tours. Notons particulierement les 
 riches et precieux fonds des Benedictins de I'abbaye 
 de Marmoutier, des chanoines de la collegiale de 
 Saint Martin, et de I'eglise metropolitaine de Saint 
 Gatien. Dans la serie de Manuscrits, au nombre 
 de pres de 1800, on remarque plusieurs Sacramen- 
 taires, sortis de I'Ecole d'enluminure et de calli- 
 graphic a Tours, fondee par le celebre Alcuin au 
 VIII""^ siecle. L'un d'eux, ecrit en lettres d'or sur 
 magnifique velin et remontant au VIII"^ siecle, est 
 I'evangeliaire sur lequel les rois de France pretaient 
 serment lorsqu'ils etaient regus abbes honoraires de 
 Saint Martin." This MS. was collated in 1884 
 with that in the British Museum; it is one of the 
 finest specimens of its kind in the world, and in 
 almost perfect preservation. A MS. of Ovid has 
 also been published by the Clarendon Press in 1888, 
 and a Hebrew Bible of the fifteenth century was 
 annotated in 1884. 
 
268 Old ^owcai 
 
 ine 
 
 " Dans les documents liturgiques d'un grand 
 interet," continues M. Duboz, " on remarque un 
 Missel a I'usage de I'eglise anglicane (sic)] ce 
 manuscrit, qui a appartenu primitivement a la 
 famille de Hungerford, devint la propriete des 
 seigneurs de Bueil. Notons encore un ravissant 
 manuscrit persan contenant les poesies de Hafiz, 
 intitulees ' Le Divan.' Enfin d'importants docu- 
 ments sur I'histoire de la Touraine, copies dans 
 divers depots publics de I'Angleterre, sont aujourd'- 
 hui conserves dans cette bibliotheque, qui n'est pas 
 moins riche en editions du commencement de 
 I'imprimerie; elle possede plus de 400 Incunables, 
 parmi lesquels se trouvent un superbe exemplaire 
 de la Bible de Mayence (1462), un exemplaire 
 unique des * Coutumes de Touraine,' et un magni- 
 fique Missel sur velin a I'usage de Tours (1485)." 
 The library is open every week-day (except fete- 
 days) from 1st April to 30th September from 12 
 till 6; from ist October till 30th March from 10 
 A.M. till 4, and from 7 p.m. till 9.30. 
 
 III. — Pictures 
 
 The valley of the Loire is peculiarly rich in 
 
 pictures by Jean and Francois Clouet and their 
 
 school. At Chenonceaux, among many other 
 
 valuable portraits, is a fine Catherine de Medicis 
 
Uhppendlx 269 
 
 and a clean-shaven monkish-looking head of 
 Henry III. At Azay-le-Rideau is the richest col- 
 lection of all — another Henry HI., dressed very 
 much like a woman, an excellent half-length of 
 Charles IX,, and many other examples of the 
 Cloiiets, of De Brissac, and Corneille de Lyon; 
 best of all is the equestrian portrait. Mrs. Mark 
 Pattison has described it as follows. "The King 
 is represented about half life-size on horseback. 
 He wears a rich Court costume of black reUeved 
 by white, and the trappings of his horse show 
 the same colours. . . . The sombre figure 
 of the mounted King, swarthy, dififiicult of speech, 
 gazing outwards with concentrated intention, 
 habited in black, and set in a framework of gray 
 half tones, haunts the recollection with the viv- 
 idness of actual vision; for the subject, which 
 seems to offer in itself weird suggestions of a 
 phantom magic, is realised with tangible definite- 
 ness of conception, and rendered with unflinching 
 fidelity to the solid aspect of real life." Other 
 fine pictures in the collection of the Marquis de 
 Biencourt at Azay-le-Rideau are the portrait of 
 Ambroise Pare, surgeon of Henry HI., in the 
 library, and of Monsieur, brother of Louis XIV., 
 in the same room. At my last visit to Azay-le- 
 Rideau, almost a year after Chapter XXIL was 
 
270 Old ^. 
 
 outatne 
 
 written, there were a few changes in the arrange- 
 ment of the pictures, which will be noticed in com- 
 paring my description of them with what a visitor 
 may be shown at present. Clouet's " Catherine de 
 Medicis " (for instance) is now removed to the 
 upper rooms. A few more pictures in this same 
 treasure-house of art should also be noticed. Next 
 to the Clouet of Charles IX. is another by the same 
 artist and with the same green background, of Odet 
 de Coligny. Other examples of F. Clouet are the 
 " Claude, wife of Francis I." and the " Henry VIII. 
 of England " ; pictures of this school are " La 
 Reine Margot " and " Marguerite de Navarre." 
 There are also some exceptionally fine bronze me- 
 dallions in the lower passage, representing Cather- 
 ine de Medicis, Henry II., Charles IX., and Henry 
 III. In the private room of M. le Marquis de Bien- 
 court are Marie de Medicis, perhaps by Rubens, the 
 Marechal de Luxembourg, and Turenne by Cham- 
 pagne, whose finest example here is the Marie de 
 Medicis on the lower floor. The portraits of Marie 
 Leczinska (in red) and her husband are also good, 
 and there are several copies of Cardinal Fleury with 
 the same placid smile, and soft white cloak excel- 
 lently rendered; with many more which well de- 
 serve a closer inspection than will be possible for 
 most travellers. 
 
Ubppendlx 271 
 
 The pictures at the Chateau of Cheverny must 
 also be seen. The immense gallery of historical 
 portraits at Beauregard are remarkable more for 
 their interest and variety than for any especial 
 artistic merit : they leave the impression of having 
 all been done by the same hand. The series begins 
 upon the wall in which the entrance door opens, 
 and at the spectator's right hand of that wall, begin- 
 ing at Philippe de Valois, born in 1328, and going 
 from right to left entirely round the room. They 
 are roughly divided into reigns by divisions in the 
 panels. In the second division are Philippe de 
 Commines, Caesar Borgia, and a good portrait of 
 Anne de Bretagne looking fat and comfortable, but 
 determined; in the third division are the Cardinal 
 d'Amboise (very different from the more spirited 
 likeness at Chaumont) and Amerigo Vespucci; in 
 the fourth, Florimond Robertet is the best. There 
 is also a portrait of Sir Thomas More. In the fifth 
 are " Francois Pisarre " and Diane de Poitiers; in 
 the sixth, Jehan Destre, " Grand Maistre d'Artil- 
 lerie " with a beard like a pufif of smoke; in the 
 seventh, Marie Stuart in a high collar; in the eighth, 
 Henri de Guise and Francis Drake; in the ninth, 
 Elizabeth, Queen of England, in old age, and what 
 is perhaps the best piece of work in the room, a 
 large Henry IV. on horseback, with his good- 
 
272 did %, 
 
 outatne 
 
 natured face and gray beard beneath a most strange 
 helmet, surrounded by D'Arnaud, Biron, and Sully. 
 The tenth and last division has a portrait of the 
 famous " Due de Bukinkan," a very feeble produc- 
 tion after the handsome face of Villiers at Hampton 
 Court. In the museums at Blois and at Tours 
 there are also a very few good pictures which must 
 be picked out from a mass of inferior painting. 
 
 Of the historical portraits in the Ecole Franqaise 
 at the Louvre Galleries in Paris only two can be 
 ascribed with certainty to Francois Clouet. Among 
 all the examples of the Ecole Clouet, the two finest 
 are those numbered 107 and 108 in the catalogue 
 edited by M. Frederic Villot. The first is that of 
 Charles IX., a small full-length figure, three- 
 quarter face, with black coat buttoned to the ruff 
 and embroidered with gold; the right hand, carry- 
 ing his gloves, rests on the back of a red velvet 
 sofa; two green curtains form the background: a 
 copy of this, life-size, exists in the Imperial Gallery 
 at Vienna. The second is the portrait of his wife, 
 Elizabeth of Austria; her head is turned to the left, 
 three-quarter face, the hair lifted up from the fore- 
 head; she wears a rich gold necklace, and a dress 
 of cloth of gold embroidered with precious stones.- 
 These two portraits may be taken as types of Fran- 
 <;ois Clouet's style, in distinguishing copies from 
 
Cbppendix 273 
 
 the few productions that are left of this master's 
 actual handiwork. No. 109, a head of Francis I., 
 of extreme delicacy and accuracy of presentment, 
 is also probably by a Clouet, but whether by Jean or 
 by his son Francois cannot be determined; it looks 
 as if the basis of the painting were a thin gold 
 or silver background on which the surface tints 
 were afterwards applied. In the same room is 
 another portrait of Francis I., two of Henry II., one 
 full length, the other of smaller size, perhaps a copy, 
 wearing the medallion of the Order of St. Michael 
 and the same black dress striped with gold. No. 
 113 is Francois de Lorraine, Due de Guise; No. 
 124 is Catherine de Medicis. Note also No. 732, 
 Gaspard de Coligny; 729, Charles IX.; and 653, 
 " le tres victorieux Roy de France, Charles VII.," 
 a repulsive face beneath a hideous hat. No. 656 
 (a ball at the Court of Henry III.) will give a good 
 idea of the costume of the latter half of the six- 
 teenth century. These last are all by unknown 
 artists. 
 
 It may help to complete this note if I mention 
 very briefly a few places in England where pictures 
 by the Clouets and their school exist, or where the 
 portraits of persons connected with Touraine may 
 be seen. First and foremost is the great collection 
 
 at Hampton Court, which contains Eleanor of 
 Vol. II.— 18 
 
274 did %. 
 
 outattie 
 
 Spain, wife of Francis L, by Jean Clouet (No. 561 
 in the Catalogue published by Mr. Ernest Law), 
 and a Francis I. attributed to Holbein, which Mrs. 
 Mark Pattison considers to be by a French hand 
 (No, 598 in the same Catalogue). This portrait 
 gives an extraordinary sense of nakedness; the 
 complexion is of an almost porcine pink, and the 
 expression brutal. There is also a portrait of a 
 boy, attributed to Janet, described as the Dauphin 
 FranQois, son of Henry 11, The writer already 
 quoted considers this to be Henry IH. in youth, 
 and says, " Perhaps the whole of Frangois Clouet's 
 work does not afford a better example than the 
 Hampton Court portrait, of that art of giving life 
 which was attributed to him in chief by his con- 
 temporaries." In the same collection note No. 342 
 (in the Catalogue above quoted), the meeting at 
 the Field of the Cloth of Gold; No. 407, Louis 
 XHL, by Belcamp; No. 411, Marie de Medicis, by 
 Pourbus; No. 418, Henry IV., by the same artist; 
 No. 566, by Janet, of Francis I. and a lady, 
 variously described as Diane de Poitiers, and as his 
 wife Eleanor (No. 561), already mentioned; No. 
 582, La Belle Gabrielle; No. 592, a French noble- 
 man, holding a copy of Petrarch, by Holbein, with 
 long straight nose and narrow eyes, a close brown 
 beard, black cape, and a low black round cap; No. 
 
Cbppendix 275 
 
 617, Marie de Lorraine, mother of the Queen of 
 Scots, just misses being clever, and perhaps suffers 
 by contrast with the magnificently beautiful por- 
 trait in No. 622. 
 
 At Hatfield the finest picture is the " Mary 
 Queen of Scots," by P. Oudry, 1578; there is 
 another of the same princess, in a Brabant costume, 
 that is pretty but not authentic. Other paintings 
 are Francois de Chatillon; Seigneur d'Andelot, a 
 copy after Pourbus; Louise de Lorraine, Queen of 
 Henry HL; Henry IH., King of France, by F. 
 Pourbus; Catherine de Medicis, a copy after 
 Clouet; Henry, Duke of Guise, a copy, with a 
 large and realistic scar on the left cheek; and Henry 
 IH., another copy, after F. Pourbus. The best 
 examples of art at Hatfield are portraits which have 
 no connection with the present subject. 
 
 The pictures with which we are concerned at 
 Stafford House are all much finer. There are a 
 good Henry HL, Jeanne d'Albret, Catherine de 
 Medicis, and Frangois, Due d'Alen(;on, all by Fran- 
 cois Clouet; and a Francis I., with his sister Mar- 
 guerite, by Jean Clouet. At Castle Howard are 
 other examples of the same school. 
 
 The portrait of Marie Stuart, reproduced in 
 Chapter XIV., is from a painting. There is a chalk 
 drawing of Marie Stuart, at the period of her mar- 
 
276 did '^, 
 
 outatne 
 
 riage to Francois Dauphin of France in 1558, 
 which was taken from life by " Jannet " or Francois 
 Clouet, who became " peintre du roy " after the 
 death of his father the second Jean Clouet in 1541. 
 A larger photograph by Braun of this drawing is 
 now in the National Portrait Gallery, and according 
 to the Catalogue revised by Mr. Lionel Cust in 1896, 
 it was the sketch for a finished miniature painted by 
 the same artist, which is now in the royal collection 
 at Windsor Castle, and was in the possession of 
 King Charles I. at Whitehall in 1639. The origi- 
 nal drawing is in the Bibliotheque Nationale at 
 Paris, and was formerly in the Bibliotheque Sainte 
 Genevieve. This Francois Clouet was probably at 
 Tours before 1523, when his father Jean (from 
 whom he inherited the name of " Jannet ") left 
 Touraine for Paris. For the work of the Clouets, 
 see Mrs. Mark Pattison, op. cit. 
 
 There is a view of Chambord in an old col- 
 lection of prints bound together in the Library 
 of Wadham College. It is catalogued in the 
 British Museum (the only other place where I 
 know of its existence) as " Veiles des belles mai- 
 sons de France (les places, portes, fontaines, egli- 
 ses, et maisons de Paris; veiies des plus beaux 
 endroits de Versailles; diverses veiies de Chantilly) 
 designees et gravees par Perelle." (Paris, 1685, 
 
Chppendix 277 
 
 obi. 4to.) Brit. Mus. 564, f. i. France, pt. i, f. 
 136, b. 
 
 In conclusion there are drawings by Etienne 
 Delaulne in the Bodleian Library at Oxford, men- 
 tioned by Mrs. Mark Pattison. Among them oc- 
 curs a profile of Marie Stuart, the reverse of a piece 
 struck at the accession of her husband, Francis II. 
 There are also coins for the reigns of Henry II., 
 Francis II., Charles IX., and Henry III. The book 
 is labelled as by Le Petit Bernard, and formed part 
 of the Douce collection. 
 
 IV. — Authorities 
 
 It may be useful for purposes of reference to in- 
 sert a few more authorities which have not been 
 previously mentioned. 
 
 Among guide-books — La Loire, by Touchard 
 Lafosse (1856), a large work in five volumes; 
 Touraine (including a bibliography), by Bellanger; 
 Feudal Castles in France, by Mrs. Byrne; Historic 
 Chateaux, by A. B. Cochrane, M.P.; a Handbook 
 of Tours, publishea in 1841; La Cathedrale de 
 Tours, by Mgr. Chevalier; Le Chateau de Chambord 
 and Le Chateau de Blois, by M. de la Saussaye; 
 Langeais, by Maurice Brincourt, with drawings by 
 Roy; Laches, by the Abbe E. Hat; Le Chateau 
 
278 6Ld 'S. 
 
 ouzatne 
 
 d'Amboise, edited by M. Guilland Verger, Tours; 
 Lettre a M. de Caumont sur une Excursion en 
 Touraine, by M. de Cougny, and several other 
 works by Mgr. Chevalier; Fontevrault, by M. Mali- 
 faud. 
 
 In periodical literature there has lately appeared 
 an article on " Castle Life in the Middle Ages," in 
 Scribner's for January 1889, by the two Blashfields, 
 who contributed " The Paris of the Three Muske- 
 teers " to the same magazine for August 1890. 
 In the English Illustrated for February 1891, 
 " Thoughts in Prison," by Mrs. Watts Jones, con- 
 tains a careful copy of nearly all the best inscrip- 
 tions in Loches. In Harper's for June 1891 is a 
 short article by Louis Frechette on Blois, Cham- 
 bord, and Amboise. 
 
 Of contemporary authorities, it has already been 
 pointed out that the numerous works published 
 under the auspices of the Ecole des Chartes are of 
 the highest value. For the Italian history, and 
 much else of interest in the reigns of Louis XL and 
 Charles VIIL, the history of Philippe de Commines 
 has been used. Throughout, the works of Villon, 
 Rabelais, Clement Marot, Ronsard, Regnier, Du- 
 mas, Balzac, De Vigny, and the pamphlets of P. L. 
 Courier, illustrate in their own way the manner of 
 the time. There is far more historically accurate 
 
Cbppendix 279 
 
 matter in many of the novels of Dumas than he is 
 often credited with; his fidelity, in particular, to 
 the old Memoires is astonishing, though he has not 
 always so freely acknowledged the sources of his 
 narratives as in the reference to the Memoires of 
 the actual D'Artagnan prefixed to his Three Muske- 
 teers. The picture of the sixteenth century given 
 in the older trilogy — La Dame de Montsoreau, La 
 Reine Margot, and Les Quarante Cinq — is a very 
 accurate one. Les Deux Dianes touches on events 
 in the reign of Henry 11. , and contains a vivid and 
 fairly true relation of the " Tumult of Amboise," 
 which is again described in Balzac's Catherine de 
 Medicis. De Vigny publishes with great care 
 many of the manuscripts and evidences for the 
 story of the conspiracy of Cinq Mars and De Thou, 
 in his romance of Cinq Mars. 
 
 For the best idea of Mary Queen of Scots, the 
 " Marie Stuart " of French history, see the article 
 on her life and character in the Encyclopcedia Bri- 
 tannica, which is perhaps the finest piece of short 
 biographical work ever written, and has been re- 
 published, with an important additional note, in 
 Swinburne's Miscellanies, p. 323. 
 
 For further details as to the Abbe de Ranee, 
 whose " tragical history " was shortly sketched in 
 Chapter XXIIL, see the Memoires of the Count de 
 
280 Old ^ 
 
 outaine 
 
 Comminges. As to the Trappistes, see Reglements 
 de VAhhaye de la Trappe, par Dom Armand de 
 Ranee, and the narrative of Dom Claude Lancelot, 
 1667. Mr. W. D. Fellowes, in A Visit to the Mon- 
 astery of La Trappe in 181 7, etc., says that the in- 
 scription on De Ranee's portrait there runs as 
 follows : — " Mort en 1700 a pres de yy ans et de 40 
 ans {sic) de la plus austere penitence." This would 
 give his age approximately at the time of the epi- 
 sode mentioned in the text. The Monastery of La 
 Trappe is one of the most ancient abbeys of the 
 order of Benedictines, established in 1140 by 
 Rotrou, Comte de la Perche, as a thankoffering; 
 by 1660 its monks not only lived in luxury, but 
 were so famous for their scandalous excesses of 
 every kind, that they were called the Banditti of La 
 Trappe. It was to these men that De Ranee came 
 and reformed the abbey (which he had the reputa- 
 tion of actually founding), by introducing the 
 terribly austere rules for which the order is famous. 
 De Ranee himself gives an interesting account of 
 the first of the many visits of the unfortunate James 
 IL to the Monastery in 1690. In Champfleury, 
 Histoire de la Caricature, there is much interesting 
 matter with reference not only to published sketches 
 but to architecture, and even dramatic perform- 
 ances, during the period I have chiefly dealt with. 
 
Ubpperidlx 281 
 
 In connection with these latter, he quotes a long 
 passage from De Thou's Memoires describing the 
 entry of Francis II. into Tours after leaving Am- 
 boise; both places, as we have seen, were famous 
 for their Mystery Plays and allegorical representa- 
 tions, and on this occasion an imaginative baker 
 equipped his son in a manner more likely to amuse 
 the spectators than to gratify the Court : " tous 
 disoient que cette representation etoit une vive 
 image de I'etat du royaume, gouverne par un roi 
 encore enfant, qui avoit pour ministres des etran- 
 gers qui I'avoient rendu aveugle." See also La 
 Satire en France au Moyen Age, by C. Lenient; and 
 for another account of the beginning of the fifteenth 
 century, which should have been mentioned earlier, 
 see the edition by M. de Viriville of the Chronique 
 de la Pucelle, by Guillaume Cousinot; an earlier 
 writer of the same name wrote the Geste des nobles 
 Francoys, etc., MS. 10,297 in Bibl. Nat. The 
 Journal du Siege d'Orleans in 1428 might also be 
 added. 
 
 Passing to later authorities in the sixteenth cen- 
 tury, the year 1588 almost claims a bibliography to 
 itself. The most complete account of the murder 
 of Guise, and the surrounding circumstances, is 
 given by Frangois Miron Medecin du Roy Henry 
 III. Other authorities are the Memoires de VEstoile, 
 
282 uLd Ooiitaine 
 
 Sully's Economies Royales, and the Chronologie 
 Novennaire of Palma Cayet. Further details will 
 be found in " Agreable Recit de ce qui s'est passe 
 aux dernieres barricades de Paris," 1588; '' Nou- 
 velles de la Coiir, escrites de Blois, Lundy dernier, 
 dix septieme jour d'Octobre," 1588 (which contains 
 the election lists) ; " Harangue prononcee par Mon- 
 sieur de Bourges aux trois estats assemblez au chas- 
 teau de Blois le jour saincte Catherine 25 Nov. a 
 quatre heures du soir," 1588; " Discours de ce qui 
 est arrive a Blois jusques a la mort du due et du 
 Cardinal de Guise," 1588 (by a Protestant); Le 
 Martyre des deux Freres, 1589 (by a Catholic). In 
 La Ligue, by L. Vitet, vol. i. p. 320, are details of 
 the exact costume of men and women at the time. 
 More information may be found in the Bibliographic 
 of Monod. 
 
 V. — Note to the Third Edition 
 
 One of my critics was kind enough to point out 
 (in the Spectator some years ago) that the architect 
 of the staircase at Blois (described on p. 139 of this 
 volume) might have had a naturally reversed shell 
 directly to his hand and eye. Such conch, chank, 
 or sankha shells are not unknown; they are called 
 dakshina varta, " right-twisted," and used to be 
 
Ubppendix 283 
 
 worth their weight in gold, as holiest cosmic sym- 
 bols, to the Hindus. They now cost some four or 
 five pounds in India. To this I will only add that 
 on some future occasion I hope to be able to treat 
 the whole subject of this spiral staircase, and of 
 others like it, in a manner more complete than is 
 possible in a book of which architectural questions 
 form necessarily but a small part. 
 
% 
 
 ote 
 
 As the " dernier mot " (in English) upon French 
 art, I insert part of the speech of Sir Frederick 
 Leighton to the students of the Royal Academy 
 {The Times, nth December 1891): — 
 
 The French Renaissance 
 
 " And now we turn to a wholly new phase in 
 French art, the expression of a new order of ideas 
 and of materially altered social conditions. During 
 the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries the prestige 
 of the fighting nobility had suffered much through 
 the introduction of artillery and the reverses of the 
 English wars; the middle classes, on the other hand, 
 had, under the favour of the kings, steadily risen in 
 importance. Before the end of the fifteenth cen- 
 tury the printing press had begun to scatter knowl- 
 edge far and wide. The discovery of a new 
 continent across the Atlantic was stirring the 
 imagination of the Old World. But it was a 
 discovery within that Old World which was to ex- 
 ercise the deepest influence on the intellectual con- 
 
 285 
 
286 Old ^. 
 
 outatne 
 
 dition of France, the discovery of Italy, through 
 the expeditions of Charles VIII. and Louis XII., 
 for a discovery it may be called, though it must not 
 be assumed that Italian influence was entirely 
 absent in France until that period. Already in the 
 middle of the fifteenth century, Rene of Anjou, 
 himself a painter and the friend of the leading 
 humanists of his time, had made his Court at 
 Tarascon a centre of culture and of art, and em- 
 ployed the labour of Italian artists. Within the 
 first half of the century, too, a great painter, Jehan 
 Fouquet, had brought back from Italy a marked 
 leaning to the new classic spirit. Nevertheless it 
 was not until the return of the romantic stripling, 
 Charles VIII., with the flower of the French no- 
 bility from his futile and fantastic campaign that the 
 desire for all things Italian took wide and lasting 
 hold of the French — at least, among the nobility — 
 and this enthusiasm, further whetted during the 
 chequered campaigns of his successor, Louis XII., 
 grew at a rapid pace. It was not, however, till the 
 second decade of the sixteenth century that, 
 through the example of that brilliant dilettante, 
 Francis I., the Italian contagion showed important 
 results. Within the thirty-five years of his reign 
 a host of palatial buildings were raised in a new 
 style, which, if it had not, as had the style it pushed 
 
%ote 
 
 287 
 
 aside, the virtue of indigenous growth, was cer- 
 tainly marked by extreme charm and beauty. It 
 was not, I say, of spontaneous growth, but neither 
 was it a wholly alien product, for the people from 
 whom it was adopted had in past times left on the 
 more vivacious Gallic stock distinct traces of its 
 blood, and the French have not ceased to this day 
 to claim kinship with the Imperial race. Mean- 
 while, borrowed though the new style was, the 
 French at once moulded it to their own genius, and 
 produced a result distinctly personal to themselves; 
 and the modifications they introduced in the Italian 
 style were just such as you would expect from the 
 different temper of the race. The restrained and 
 sweet gravity which delights us in the purest ex- 
 amples of trans-Alpine Renaissance is, it must be 
 admitted, too often wanting in the French work 
 of the same class; and if, as I believe, the rank of 
 the work of art is according to the dignity of the 
 emotion it stirs in the beholder, then the creations 
 of the great Italians rise to a higher level than those 
 of the artists of the French Renaissance. For 
 vitality and variety, on the other hand, for exuber- 
 ance of fancy, for resourceful ingenuity of construc- 
 tion, and for a delicate sense of rhythm and 
 proportion, the superiority of the work of the 
 French is, in my opinion, conspicuous. Above all 
 
288 Old '15^ 
 
 ouzatne 
 
 things, it is their own, and for this reason it seems 
 to me that the jealous investigation which has been 
 noticeable in recent times in France as to how far 
 Italian arts have been unduly credited with the 
 building of certain of the masterpieces of the Re- 
 naissance in that country is, however valuable in the 
 interests of truth, of no great moment to the dig- 
 nity of French art. Close study of documents has 
 led, as is well shown, for instance, in Palustre's 
 beautiful instalment of a History of French Renais- 
 sance, to the dismissal of claims hitherto advanced 
 in various cases in favour of Italian artists; it is 
 bringing into greater prominence the names of 
 native maistres magons whose claims had been un- 
 derrated, men who had inherited traditions which 
 made them greatly superior, as builders at all 
 events, to the artists who came amongst them from 
 beyond the Alps. But, apart from such inquiries, 
 it is patent that all but every work of the French 
 Early Renaissance, however it may have originated, 
 bears the unmistakable stamp of the fusing energy 
 of French genius. That the style was not born 
 in France is a fact no one can challenge; that it 
 was recast in that country into a distinctly French 
 thing no narrowness could dispute. 
 
9Bote 
 
 289 
 
 French Domestic Architecture 
 
 The keynote of the Renaissance movement being 
 the assertion of the beauty of life and the dignity 
 of man, its influence was naturally most felt in con- 
 nection with secular life. The great era of church 
 building was past, and, indeed, for a population 
 reduced by long and wasting wars the existing 
 places of worship were not insufificient. The main 
 determining motive of artistic activity under Fran- 
 cis I. was the ambition of the King and his nobles 
 to multiply places of delight for their residence, 
 especially in the country, and to replace by sights 
 of beauty, such as they had learned to love and 
 covet in Italy, the moated gloom of their ancestral 
 chateaux, built and well suited for purposes of pro- 
 tection and defence, but little in harmony with the 
 tastes of the pleasure-loving Court and the light- 
 hearted young King who led it. Prodigious and 
 breathless was the activity with which chateaux 
 were raised, first in the Royal province watered by 
 the Loire, and then in and about Paris. It would 
 be fruitless to enumerate at length even the chief 
 of the stately buildings which from that time to the 
 death of Henry III. occupied the energies of French 
 architects; nor can I do more here than name a few 
 of the foremost of these considerable men, such as in 
 Vol. II.— 19 
 
290 uLd Fontaine 
 
 the first line Jean Bullant and Philibert de I'Orme; 
 and in the second, CoHn Biart, Pierre Chambiges, 
 Pierre Nepveu, alias Trinqueau, Gadier, Le Prestre, 
 and Hector Sohier. It will be more profitable to 
 note a few points in connection with the evolution 
 of the style itself. Although, as I have said, the 
 great outburst of activity in the new direction coin- 
 cides with the reign of Francis, Italian influence 
 had already begun to assert itself in architecture as 
 in other things in the preceding century, through 
 Charles VIII. , at Amboise, for instance, and more 
 effectually under his successor, who built the east 
 wing of the Chateau de Blois. 
 
 In the case of secular buildings the transition 
 from the later Gothic was facilitated by the fact that 
 square-headed openings prevailed already in that 
 style, of which, too, the incontinence in ornament 
 was acceptable to the exuberant spirit of the new 
 art. The character of that ornament, however, was 
 entirely changed; fantastic, foreign arabesque took 
 the place of the floral decoration which had been 
 one of the glories of the French school. Mean- 
 while the love for aspiring forms lived on, and the 
 tendency to complexity died hard. The wealth of 
 sky-line produced by spires and pinnacles was per- 
 petuated in high-pitched roofs, turrets, and tall, 
 
%ote 
 
 291 
 
 buttressed dormer windows. The sky-line of Cham- 
 bord could have been conceived only by an archi- 
 tect having Gothic tradition in his blood. In other 
 matters, too, we find the Gothic habit surviving. 
 The external winding staircase, for instance, was 
 long preserved, and you may see on a dainty 
 fagade of the time of Francis I. the survival of the 
 grouped shaft in a fanciful colonnette engaged on 
 the face of a pilaster. 
 
 The days of civil strife and butchery in which so 
 many noble lives were quenched in blood, the dark 
 days of the Huguenot persecution, were not auspi- 
 cious for the growth of art, and with the close of 
 the century we find life and spontaneity at a low 
 ebb — little production, a tendency now to heavy 
 monotony and now to barocque redundancy, and a 
 lack of sense and fitness which admitted of mask- 
 ing with a ponderous classic fagade churches built 
 on the scheme of, if not with the forms of, ogival 
 architecture. Officialism, too, in artistic matters 
 was at hand, and soon that implacable organiser 
 Colbert was to regulate the arts, also by Royal 
 decree, and to found an academy which admitted 
 only one saving creed. The frigid pomp, the artifi- 
 cial graces of the structures inspired by the " Roi 
 Soleil " — majestic in the many-storied wig which 
 
292 Old ^omaine 
 
 encircled his retreating brow — how far are they 
 from the radiant daintiness, the joyous freedom of 
 the palaces and pleasances which sprang up in the 
 days and at the beck of that truly sunny Sovereign 
 Francis I. ! 
 
 Other Artistic Developments 
 
 To that period let us for one brief moment revert 
 to notice, however summarily, the parallel develop- 
 ment of painting and sculpture. In the latter art 
 we have already recorded the names of Jean Goujon 
 and Germain Pilon. These great artists were not 
 without forerunners, of whom, no doubt, Michel 
 Columbe was the most gifted, though his works 
 lack both suppleness and definiteness of artistic 
 purpose. I should name, also, Nicholas Bachelier 
 and Giusti, the latter a family of Italians settled in 
 Tours, but true to their nationality in the character 
 of their work. 
 
 Turning now briefly to painting we find in the 
 sixteenth century but little to rejoice us. Yet a 
 few considerable names redeem it from bareness. 
 When Francis I. began to build he did no.t find 
 amongst his countrymen painters to whom he could 
 entrust the decoration of his numerous palaces. 
 
%ote 
 
 293 
 
 The elder Clouet was, it is true, already promi- 
 nently known, but both he and his more famous suc- 
 cessor in the nickname of " Janet " were specially 
 and exclusively painters of portraits. There were, 
 of course, at the time a number of painters in the 
 country; but whilst it may be admitted that Fran- 
 cis, in his keen admiration for everything Italian, 
 may in some measure have overlooked native talent, 
 it is difficult to believe that any very marked per- 
 sonality could have failed to assert itself in spite of 
 the crushing incubus of the Italian influence — a 
 baneful influence, be it said in passing, for it was 
 not the influence of Raphael or of Leonardo, of 
 Andrea del Sarto or of Titian, with all of whom the 
 King was in more or less direct contact, but the 
 influence of Cellini, mischievous for all his genius — ■ 
 and especially, through their long sojourn in the 
 country, that of Primaticcio, II Rosso, and Nicolo 
 deir Abate, which weighed on the art of France. 
 Nor does the sixteenth century in France boast in 
 painting, apart from the Clouets, any name of much 
 calibre, except perhaps that of Perreal, and cer- 
 tainly that of Jean Cousin, a man whose dignity of 
 artistic temper preserved him in great measure from 
 the excesses of the school of Parmigiano." 
 
V 
 
 •> 
 
 >. 
 
 LE RID 
 i- I N 
 
MAP OF THE 
 
 VALLEY OF THE LOIRE 
 
 FOR 
 
 "OLD TOURAINE" 
 
 From the French Government Ordnance survc , ) 
 
 Kilomclro 
 I ? I J 3f ?<■ 789'.°'.".".''.". :^ 
 
 \ 
 
 
 
 K 
 
 __^ 
 
Q)nde3C^ 
 
QjncLeocD 
 
 [Note. — The Appendix has been omitted in the references of this 
 Index, and all but the more important of the notes. 
 A number, e.g. 34, refers to p. 34 of vol. i. ; when vol. ii. is meant 
 it is referred to thus : ii. 34. ] 
 
 Abd-el-Kader, 26 ; ii. 102 
 
 Abd-el-Rahman, ^^ 
 
 Adela, 50 
 
 Adria, 130 
 
 Aegidius, 63 
 
 Agen, ii. 125 
 
 Agincourt, 73, 74, 135, 136, 252 ; 
 
 ii. 133, 145 
 Ahlden, ii. 219 
 Alaric, 37; ii. 51 
 Albret, Charlotte d', ii. 150, 151 
 
 note 
 Jeanne d', 262 ; ii. 31, 39, 
 
 42, 102, 107, 113, 171-176 
 
 John d', 231 
 
 Alcuin, 36, 38 and note 
 Alenjon, 134, 138 
 
 D', ii. 121 
 
 Due d', 76, 254, 257 
 
 Alexander VI., Pope, 92, 231 ; 
 
 ii. 149, 150 
 AUuye, Hotel d', ii. 201 
 Alnwick, 89 
 Alva, ii. 14 
 Amboise, 23, 24, 26, 34, and 
 
 note, 45, 53, 62, 67, 87, 119, 
 
 135, 144, 147, 166, 205, 212, 
 
 222, 269, 289, 304; ii. 12, 27, 
 
 46, 51-77. 107, 209, 245, 253, 
 
 258 
 Amboise, Bussy d', 104 and note; 
 
 ii. Ill, 121, 180 
 
 Charles d', 89, 204 
 
 Conspiracy of, 16; ii. 81-104 
 
 Georges d', 93, 94, 182, 
 
 220-241, 257, 302 ; ii. 69, 70, 
 
 149 
 
 Louis d', 89 
 
 • Pierre d', 220 
 
 America, 205 
 
 Amiens, 204 
 
 Ampthill, 136 
 
 Amyot, 213, 273; ii. 12, 169 
 
 Anabaptists, ii. 87 
 
 Ancona, 175 
 
 Andelot, Colonel d', ii. ^^, 82, 87 
 
 Andre, Saint, 297; ii. 12 
 
 Mademoiselle de, ii. 20 
 
 Andrelini, Fausto, ii. 158 
 Anet, 238, 295, 296; ii. 15, 77 
 Angelo, Michael, 206 ; ii. 76, 
 
 152 
 
 297 
 
298 
 
 Snd^ 
 
 ex 
 
 Angely, L', ii. 216 
 Angers, 35 note, 37, 48, iii; ii. 67 
 Bishop of, see Balue, Car- 
 dinal 
 Angouleme, ii. 244 
 
 Comte d', 70 
 
 Francis of, 235 ; ii. 154 and 
 
 note 
 
 Isabella of, 70 
 
 Madame d', ii. 156 
 
 Marguerite d', 247; ii. 114 
 
 Anjou, Counts of, 23, 37, 39, 42- 
 
 54, 106 
 Ducd' (Henri), ii. 113-116, 
 
 176 
 
 ■ Hammer of, 46 
 
 Marguerite d', 88 
 
 Marie d', 85, 88, 156, 164 
 
 Rene d', 117, 143, 236 
 
 Annonain, Pont de 1', 54 
 
 Antoine, Tour de St., 152 
 
 Antonine, 34 
 
 Aquitaine, t,t„ 47; ii. 51, 142 
 
 Aramis, ii. 196 
 
 Arbrissel, D', 30, 31, 106-108, 
 
 114 
 Arc, Jeanne d', 29, 64, 79-85, 
 
 98,134, 138, 164, 170; ii. 134, 
 
 14s, 213, 232 
 Ardier, Paul, ii. 240 
 Aremburg, 48 
 Argenton, 91 
 Aristotelians, ii. 12 
 Armada, ii. 181 
 Armagnac, 74, 134, 165 ; ii. 68 
 
 Marguerite d', ii. 68 
 
 Armorican Republic, 63 
 Arms and armour in Chateau of 
 Amboise, ii. 65 note, 66 note 
 
 Arou, ii. 142 
 
 Arques, 71 
 
 Arras, Maitre Jean d', 128 
 
 Artagnan, D', ii. 102, 199 
 
 Artesano, Antonio, 142 
 
 Arthur of Bretagne, 66, 70, 71, 
 
 76 
 Arthur, King, ii. 56, 258 
 Asti, 126, 130, 140, 141, 143, 
 
 211, 223 
 Athens, 35 
 
 Aubercourt, D', ii. 188 
 Aubigne, D', ii. 179 
 Agrippa, d', 25, 28 ; ii. 97 
 
 note 
 Aubin, St., ii. 148 
 Austria, Anne of, ii. 23, 232 
 
 Archduke Philip of, ii. 1 54 
 
 Eleanor of, 289 
 
 Autin, Due d', Julie Sophie, 
 
 daughter of, 114 
 Auton, Jean d', 180, 183 note, 
 
 229 ; ii. 158 
 Autun, 33 
 
 Bishop of, 185-187 
 
 Avalon, Isle of, ii. 56 
 Avenelles, Des, ii. 87 
 Avice of Gloucester, 70, 1 10 
 Avignon, 73, 169; ii. 177, 194 
 Aymar, Count of Angouleme, 
 
 no 
 Azay-le-Rideau, 24, 58, 67, 151, 
 
 198, 285, 291 ; ii. 34, 132, 222, 
 
 227-237 
 
 Bacbuc, 62 
 Bacon, 303 
 Baif, De, ii. 164 
 Bajazet, 174 
 
Sndi 
 
 ex 
 
 299 
 
 Balafre, Le, ii. 36, 98, 102 
 Ballan, 58, 67, 73 
 Balsac, Katherine de, 207 note 
 Balue, Cardinal, 89, 174-176, 
 
 226 ; ii. 149, 247 
 Balzac, 31, 58, 61, 118; ii. 38, 
 
 131 
 Barbarossa, 269 
 
 Barry, Godefroy de, see Renaudie 
 Basselin, 169 
 
 Bassompierre, Marechal de, 222 
 Bartholomew, Archbishop of 
 
 Tours, 69 
 St., ii. 12, 32, 41, 46, 98, 
 
 108, 116 
 Baugaredi, or Bagaudse, ii. 55 
 Bayard, l8l, 182, 231, 252 ; ii. 
 
 152 
 Beaufort, Due de, ii. 22 
 Beaujeu, Anne de, 29, 91, 144, 
 
 145, 176, 204, 223; ii. 63 
 Beaujoyeulx, M. Balthasar de, ii. 
 
 21 
 Beaulieu, 46, 47, 163 and note 
 Beaumont, 130 
 Beauregard, 24; ii. 240 
 Beauvais, ii. 172, 174 
 Becket, Thomas, 52, 53, 68, 220 ; 
 
 ii. 32 
 Bede, 38 
 Bedford, 75, 76 
 Beham, Hans-Sebald, 274 
 Bellay, Du, 212, 213, 255 note, 
 
 258 note, 260 note, 263, 266 
 
 note, 269, 271 ; ii. 35, 64 
 Bellegarde, Due de, ii. 216 
 Bellini, 208 
 Benedict, St., 53 
 Beranger, 86; ii. 36 
 
 Berengaria, 70, 164 
 
 Bernis, ii. 24 
 
 Berri, Duchesse de, 221 ; ii. 37, 
 
 75 
 Berthelot, Gilles, 291 ; ii. 227 
 Besme, ii. 32, 116 
 Besnard, M., 97 
 Beuve, Sainte, 113 
 Beze, Theodore de, ii. 170 
 Biagrasso, 261 
 Biencourt, M. le Marquis de, ii. 
 
 229 and note 
 Bievre, 30 
 Bigne, La, ii. 91 
 Binasco, 181 
 Biragues, 224 note 
 Birco, Thomas, 271 
 Biron, ii. 172 
 Bizago, ii. 44 
 Bizet, Jehan, ii. 144 
 Black Prince, 199; ii. 258 
 Blanche, La Reine, 70 
 Blois, 24, 31, 32, 50, 65, 69, 81, 
 
 95, 113, 130, 135, 138, 142, 
 
 163, 198, 219, 304; ii. 26, 47, 
 
 51, 69, 84, 86, 98, 107, 131- 
 
 202, 213, 237 
 Boccaccio, ii. 169 
 Bohier, Antoine, 290, 29 1 
 
 Thomas, 281-288 
 
 Boileau, 114 
 
 " Bois de Cerf," ii. 103 
 
 Du, ii. 123 
 
 Boisrobert, ii. 216 note 
 
 Bonne, wife of Charles d'Orleans, 
 
 134, 178 
 Bonnivet, 254, 260 ; ii. 72 
 Bordeaux, 33 
 Bordenaye, De, 172 
 
300 
 
 Sndi 
 
 ex 
 
 Borgia, Cagsar, 92-95, 181, 224- 
 
 231 ; ii. 149, 150 
 
 Lucrezia, 92 
 
 Bouchet, Jean, ii. 148 
 
 BoulainvilHers, 143 
 
 Bourbon, Antoine de, King of 
 
 Navarre, 262 ; ii. 82 
 
 Antoinette de, ii. 99 
 
 Cardinal de, 97 ; ii. 82- 
 
 100 
 Constable of, 186, 257-259, 
 
 303; ii. 232 
 Henri de, Comte de Cham- 
 
 bord, 221 
 
 Louise de, 113 
 
 Pierre de, 142, 257 
 
 Renee de, 112, 113 
 
 Suzanne de, 257-259 
 
 Bourg, Du, ii. 84 
 
 Bourges, 35 note, 225, 273 ; ii. 
 
 55 ^^oi^> 149 
 
 Archbishop of, ii. 182 
 
 Le Roi de, 75, 164 
 
 Bourree, Jean, 199-286 
 
 Bracieux, ii. 201 
 
 Bragelonne, Vicomte de, ii. 199 
 
 Brain, 104 note 
 
 Brantome, 94, 200, 257, 271 ; ii. 
 
 II, 20, 36, 44, no, 165, 174, 
 
 175, 212 
 Bretagne, Anne de, 145, 159, 161, 
 
 183, 195-215,225; ii. 66, 157, 
 
 158, 159 
 
 Marie de, 112 
 
 Breze, Diane de, see Diane de 
 
 Poitiers 
 
 Louis de, 289, 293 
 
 Peter de, 88 
 
 Sieur de, 187 
 
 Brigonnet, Cardinal, 210, 224, 
 
 286-288, 302 ; ii. 149 
 
 Catherine, 281, 288 
 
 Jean, 199 
 
 Brienne, Comte de, ii. 196 
 
 Brissac, Jeanne de, ii. 124 
 
 Broglie, Due de, 238 
 
 Brosse, Pierre de la, 198 
 
 Brunhilda, 29 
 
 Brunyer, Albert, ii. 217 
 
 Bruyn, Messire, ii. 246 
 
 Buckingham, ii. 194 
 
 Buflfon, ii. 24 
 
 Bullant, Jean, ii. 76 and note, 
 
 228 
 Burgundians, 74 
 Burgundy, 37, 52, 124, 135, 175 ; 
 
 ii. 58, 142 
 Charles, Duke of, 90, 175 
 
 note ; ii. 42 
 
 Philip of, ii. 232 
 
 Bury, 125 
 
 Cabochiens, 74 
 Cadillac, ii. 196 
 Caesar, ii. 55 and note 
 Csesarodunum, 34, 35, 39 
 Cain, 57 
 
 Calahorra, Bishop of, 93 
 Calais, 87, 88, 303 ; ii. 99 
 Calvin, 213, 250, 263, 269; ii. 
 
 82, 232 
 Calvinists, ii. 81-104 
 Camail, Le, Order of, 140 
 Cambrai, League of, 232 
 Cambresis, ii. 124 
 Candes, 24, 34, loi note, 215 
 Canterbury, 53, 68 
 Capefigue, M., ii. 42 note, 45 
 
Snd> 
 
 ex 
 
 301 
 
 Capello, 248 
 Capet, 37, 44 
 Cappadocia, 115 no(e 
 Capponi, 208 
 Capua, 210 
 Carcassonne, ii. 132 
 Carlotta of Naples, ii. 150 
 Carlyle, 85 
 
 Carte, Chateau de la, 58 
 Castelnau, 79 
 
 De, ii. 84-89 
 
 Cavalli, Marino dei, 294; ii. 248 
 
 Caxton, 84 
 
 Caylus, ii. 189 
 
 Caynon, 57 
 
 Cazache, Jean Bernardin, 181 
 
 Ce, Fonts de, 54 
 
 Cellini, Benvenuto, 265, 274; ii. 
 
 76 
 Cerberus, 62 
 Cerissoles, 270 
 Certosa, 125, 179 
 Chabannes, Sieur de, 87, 165, 
 
 260 
 Chabot, Brion, ii. "Jl, 72 
 Chalais, ii. 217 
 Chalosse, Baron de Castdnau, 
 
 ii. 96 
 Chalus, 67 and note 
 Chambord, 23, 24, 31, 198, 221, 
 
 246, 270, 283 ; ii. 26, 75, 201, 
 
 205-224, 237, 238 
 
 Comte de, ii. 221 
 
 Chambourg, 152; ii. 21 ^ note 
 Champagne, ii. 213 
 Champfleury, M., ii. 53 
 Chantelles, 187 
 Charlemagne, 38 
 Tour de, 36 
 
 Charles, father of Louis XII., loi, 
 
 102 and note, 103 and note 
 
 : the Simple, 38, 39 
 
 V. (Emperor), 248-250, 262 
 
 VI., 126, 129 
 
 VII., 28, 75-88, 104, 118 
 
 VIII., 71, 91, 123, 125, 144, 
 
 145, 176, 179, 200-212, 223; 
 
 ii. 52-54, 65 
 IX., 113; ii. 18, 41, 108, 
 
 172, 215, 232, 249 
 
 X., ii. 239 
 
 Chartier, Alain, 137 
 Chartres, 35, 53 note ; ii. 181 
 Chastelet, ii. 124 
 Chataigneraie, 299, 300 
 Chateaubriand, 167 
 Chateaubriand, Franjoise de, 264 
 Chatillon, 151 
 Chatillons, ii. 87, 170 
 Chaucer, 125 
 Chaumont, 24, 32, 53, 67, 163, 
 
 198, 219-241, 286; ii. 15, 51, 
 
 238, 245 
 Chenonceaux, 24, 26, 32, 65, 96, 
 
 198, 238, 279-305; ii. 11-27, 
 
 46, 57. 97. 136, 165, 173, 202 
 
 note, 232 
 Cher, 24, 46, 58, 117, 151, 305; 
 
 ii. 241, 252 
 Chevalier, Abbe, ii. 55 
 Cheverny, 24; ii. 182, 238, 240 
 Chevreuse, Madame de, ii. 241 
 Chicot, ii. 188 note 
 Chinon, 24, 34 note, 40, 47, 48, 
 
 51. 53. 54. 55-98. 108, 109, 
 
 123, 154, 173, 198, 204; ii. 18, 
 
 57, 132, 149 
 Choinet, Pierre, ii. 63 
 
302 
 
 Snd. 
 
 ex 
 
 Chouzy, 219 
 
 Christ Church, Oxford, 155 note, 
 178 note 
 
 Cicero, 208 
 
 Cimetiere des Rois, no 
 
 Cinq Mars, 24, 32, 119, 195, 214, 
 222; ii. 217, 238, 245 
 
 Pile de, 119; ii. 244 
 
 Civitas Turonum, 34 
 
 Clagny, Sieur de, ii. 77 
 
 Clarendon, Constitutions of, 52 
 
 Claude, Queen, daughter of Anne 
 de Bretagne, and wife of Fran- 
 cis I., 232, 237-246, 261; ii. 
 67, 70, 112, 116-120, le^^note, 
 159-162 
 
 Saint, ii. 62 
 
 Clement, Jacques, 96 ; ii. 32, 193, 
 
 251 
 Clement VII., 268 
 Cleves, Catherine de, ii. 112, 184 
 
 Marie de, 139 
 
 Cloth of Gold, Field of, 254, 268 
 
 Clothaire, 154 
 
 Cloud, St., ii. 193 
 
 Clouet, Fran5ois, ii. 75, 231, 248 
 
 Clovis, 37; ii. 51, 56 
 
 Coconnas, ii. 32, 118 note, I20 
 
 Coeur, Jacques, 87, 158 
 
 Le, ii. 150 note 
 
 Cognac, ii. 69, 209 
 
 Colbert, 215 
 
 Coligny, Admiral, 303 ; ii. 33, 39, 
 
 46, 82-102, 107, 115-118, 170, 
 
 175 and note, 190, 232 
 
 Gaspard de, ii. 175 note 
 
 Cologne, 37 
 
 Colombieres, 67 
 
 Columbe, Michel, 124; ii. 248 
 
 Comestor, Pierre, ii. 144 
 
 Commanderie, 73 
 
 Commines, Philippe de, 89-91, 
 
 123, 147, 168, 174, 176, 182, 
 
 204, 206, 209, 210, 223; ii. 63 
 Compostella, 37 
 Concinis, ii. 195 
 Conde, Prince of, 97 ; ii. 33, 82- 
 
 102, 240 
 
 Princess of, 97, 222 ; ii. 194 
 
 Coni, 180 
 
 Constance, 70 
 
 Constant, Benjamin, 238 
 
 Constantinople, 87, 270; ii. 240 
 
 Contarini, 201 
 
 Conti, Prince of, ii. 221 
 
 Princess of, 113 
 
 Conty, Evrard de, ii. 144 
 Cordova, Bishop of, ii. 155 
 
 Gonsalvo di, 231 
 
 Cormery, 151, 202 note 
 
 Abbey of, ii. 234 note 
 
 Cormier, St. Aubin de, 145 
 
 Corneille, ii. 165 
 
 Correro, Giovanni, ii. 36, 44 
 
 Cortes, 272 
 
 Cosmo, St., ii. 255 
 
 Cosson, Baron de, ii. 65 note, 212 
 
 Costa, Hilarion, ii. 157 
 
 Coudray, Fort du, 65, 79 
 
 Couillatris, 59 
 
 Courcelles, Pierre de, 104 
 
 Courier, Paul Louis, 32 ; ii. 207, 
 
 222 
 Coutanciere, 104 note 
 Couzi^res, ii. 242-244 
 Cracow, ii. 177 
 Crecy, 73 
 Credit Foncier, ii. 25, 26 
 
cJnd, 
 
 ex 
 
 303 
 
 Croix, La, ii. i6 
 Croye, Ladies of, 31 
 Crusades, 69, 284 
 Cumberland, ii. 220 
 Cyprus, 126 
 
 Dacier, Madame, 119 
 Dante, 169, 176 
 Dauphine, 165 
 Daurat, Jean, ii. 12 
 Davila, ii. 44 
 Dayelle, ii. 170 
 Delorme, Marion, 31 
 Denis, St., 39, 75; ii. 16, 72 
 
 Church of, ii. 104 
 
 Denys, St., ii. 52 
 
 Descartes, 303 ; ii. 258 
 
 Deschamps, Eustache, ii. 143 
 
 Diderot, ii. 24 
 
 Die, Saint, ii. 154 
 
 Dijon, 123 
 
 Dinan, ii. 122, 124 
 
 Dino, Duchesse de, ii. 240 
 
 Diocletian, ii. 55 
 
 "Discontented," ii. 84 
 
 Dolmen at Saumur, 117 
 
 Domremy, 76 
 
 Dorothea, Sophia, of Hanover, 
 
 ii. 219 
 Done, ii. 59 
 Dreux, 130; ii. 171 
 Due, Viollet le, no, 153, 283; 
 
 ii. 134, 208, 210 
 Ducos, Roger, ii. 54 
 Dumas, 30, 104 note ; ii. 15 note, 
 
 2,1 note, 45, 102, 118 note, 165, 
 
 178 note, 216 note 
 Dunois, 31, 133, 138, 142, 144; 
 
 ii. 145 
 
 Dupin, M. Claude, ii. 24 
 
 Madame, ii. 23-25 
 
 Durward, Quentin, 31, 166; ii. 
 247 
 
 EcoUEN (Edict of), 304 ; ii. 76 
 Effranats, Des, ii. 189 
 Elboeuf, Due d', 190 
 Eleanor, wife of Henry II. of 
 
 England, 51-71, 109 
 sister of Charles V., 263, 
 
 264 
 Elias, Count of Maine, 48 
 Elizabeth, Madame, ii. 223 
 Queen of England, 302 ; ii. 
 
 46, 87, 112, 177 and note 
 Enclos, Mademoiselle de 1', ii. 
 
 233 
 
 Encyclopaedists, ii. 24 
 Enghien, Mademoiselle d', ii. 23 
 England, 49, 50, 69, in, 124 
 
 note, 126, 144, 302; ii. 34, 87, 
 
 142, 207 
 
 Henrietta of, ii. 233 
 
 Entragues, 230; ii. 180 
 Epernon, D', ii. 179 
 "Escadron volant," 29; ii. 13, 
 
 42 and note, 88, 108 
 Escar, D', 188 
 Essarts, Seigneur des, i. 169 
 Este, Anne d', ii. 98, 184 
 
 Beatrice d', 179, 180 
 
 Estienne, 263 ; ii. 13, 57 
 Estoile, D', Pierre, ii. 19, 20, 180 
 Estrees, Diane d', ii. 20 
 Gabrielle d', 30 ; ii. 20, 22, 
 
 126, 194, 215 
 Etable, Lefebvre d', 273 
 Etampes, Duchesse d', 289 
 
304 
 
 cJndi 
 
 ex 
 
 Eu, Count d', 138 
 
 Eudes II., 40, 196 
 
 Eustace, 51 
 
 Eustache, St., 154 
 
 Evelyn, 219 note ; ii. 52, 103, 
 
 197. 199, 254, 255 
 Evrault, 112 
 Exeter College Chapel, ii. 53 
 
 note 
 
 Fabre, M. Joseph, 83 
 
 Falaise, 71 
 
 Faronelle, 118 
 
 Fayette, Madame de la, 114 
 
 Felix, 31, 58 
 
 Fere, La, ii. 124 
 
 Ferme, La, ii. 23 
 
 Fernel, ii. 12 
 
 Ferrara, 145 
 
 Duke of, 179 
 
 Ferrieres, ii. 89 
 
 Fevre, Robert le, ii. 239 
 
 Fiesque, Comtesse de, ii. 168 
 
 Filarete, Antonio, 124 note 
 
 Fizes, Simon de, ii. 109 
 
 Fleix, ii. 125 
 
 Fleming, Miss, 302 ; ii. 34 
 
 Fleur, De Maison, ii. 35 and 
 
 note 
 Fleuranges, 236, 252 note; ii. 71, 
 
 72, 153 
 Florence, 147, 209, 210; ii. 75 
 Florio, Francesco, 124 note 
 Foix, Gaston de, 234, 235, 260; 
 
 ii. 72 
 
 Germaine de, ii. 1 50 
 
 Fontaine, La, ii. 134 
 Fontainebleau, 25 ; ii. 74, 76, 
 
 228 
 
 Fontenoy, ii. 219, 220 
 Fontevrault, 23, 24, 49, 69, 71 
 
 102-119, 258 
 Force, Caumont de la, ii. 120 
 Forges, Les, 89 
 Fornova, 210 
 Fosseuse, La, ii. 125, 169 
 Fouquet, Surintendant, 215, 286; 
 
 ii. 102 
 Jean, 124; ii. 75 and note, 
 
 248 
 Francis I., 112, 124, 148, 160, 
 
 186-191, 245-275; ii. 26, 206, 
 
 208, 211, 232 
 
 XL ii. 31-47, 81-104, 167 
 
 Franks, 37 
 
 Fredegonde, 29 
 
 Frederick, Prince Palatine, 264 
 
 Freundsberg, 264 
 
 Froissart, 128 note ; ii. 143 
 
 Fronde, 25 ; ii. 240, 241 
 
 Fulk the Good, 39, 44 
 
 Nerra (Black Falcon), 45, 
 
 47. 49. 52, 54. 66, 67, 116, 
 
 155. 173. 196. 220; ii. 240 
 
 Rechin, 48, 173 
 
 the Red, 43 
 
 Fuller, Thomas, 84 
 
 Gaillard Chateau, 69, 71 
 Galitzin, Prince, ii. 21 
 Gambetta, Leon, ii. 257 
 Gandia, Duke of, 92 
 Gargantua, 113 
 Garigliano, 231 
 
 Gatien, St., 34, 35, 39; ii. 246 
 Gelais, Saint, 180, 183 ; ii. 147, 
 
 166 
 Gelduin, 220 
 
Sndi 
 
 ex 
 
 305 
 
 Genep, i66 
 Genoa, 142 
 Geoffrey, 48, 50, 51, 66 
 
 Greygown, 44, 154 
 
 George, St., 63 
 
 Germain, St., I'Auxerrois, ii. 118 
 
 en Laye, 299, 302 ; ii. 34 
 
 Gerson, 170 
 
 Gie, Marechal de, 145, 203, 205, 
 
 210, 211, 234; ii. 67-70 
 Gilles, Nicole, ii. 63 
 Giustiniano, Marino, ii. 40 
 Gondi, ii. 44 
 Gondy, Baptiste, 300 
 Gonzague, Marie de, 222 
 Good Hope, Cape of, 271 
 Goujon, Jean, 238; ii. 15, 77, 
 
 120, 137 and note, 138, 228 
 Grammont, Seigneur de, 229 
 Granada, 205 
 Grandchamp, M., ii. 175 
 Grandet, Eugenie, 119 
 Gregory (of Tours), 37 ; ii. 56 
 Greniers de Cesar, ii. 55 
 Greve, St. Jean en, ii. 84 
 Groslot, ii. 170 
 Guast, Du, ii. 112 and note 
 Guesclin, Du, 73, 203, 282, 283 
 Guicciardini, 91 
 Guienne, 87 ; ii. 73 
 Guiscard, Robert, 238 
 Guise, 96 
 Cardinal de, ii. 32, ^■^f 83- 
 
 102 
 
 Duchesse de, 113 
 
 Fran9ois de, ii. 32, 33 
 
 Henri de, 214; ii. 32, 112, 
 
 178, 179 note, 181-190 
 ' Tour de, 39 
 
 Vol. II.— 20 
 
 Gutenberg, ii. 16 
 Guthrie, 85 
 
 Halde, Du, ii. 186 
 Hardouin, Bishop of Tours, 154 
 Harley, ii. 32 
 Haton, Claude, ii. 166 
 Hautefort, Mademoiselle de, ii. 
 
 215 and note 
 Henry I., King of France, 48 
 II., 238, 251, 275, 289, 292, 
 
 296, 297 and note, 300-305 ; 
 
 ii. 11-27, 82, 232 
 III., 65, 96; ii. 107, 176- 
 
 193, 232, 249, 250 
 IV., 25, 96, 222 ; ii. 21, 39, 
 
 107, 114, 193, 194, 215, 251 
 Henry I. of England, 48, 50 
 II. of England, 39, 40, 45, 
 
 46, 48, 50, 66-69, 108, 109, 
 
 III, 220 
 
 III. of England, 1 10 
 
 v., Emperor, 49 
 
 V. of England, 75, 138 
 
 VI. of England, 75 
 
 VIII., 237, 254 
 
 Heptameron, 262, 270; ii. 114 
 
 note 
 Hericault, M., 136 note, 137 
 Hermite, Tristan 1', 1 74 ; ii. 247 
 Herve, 36 
 
 Hildebert, Archbishop, 49 
 Hohenstaufen, 236 
 Holbein, 274 
 Holinshed, 84 note 
 Holland, ii. 234 
 Holy Land, 106 
 Hopital, De 1', ii. 32, 39, 120 
 Horloge, Tour de 1', 36, 64 
 
306 
 
 Sfid^ 
 
 ex 
 
 Hubert, St., Chapel of, ii. 52 
 Hugo, Victor, 30, 32 ; ii. 165, 
 
 216 
 Hugon, Tour du roi, 39 
 Huguenots, 97; ii. 81-104, 253- 
 
 256 
 Hundred Years' War, 27, 73 
 Huy, ii. 122 
 
 Indre, 24, 46, 58, 66, loi, 
 
 151 
 Ingelger, 39, 43 
 Isabel, of Angouleme, 70, 1 10 
 
 of Bavaria, 29 
 
 Isabella, daughter of John the 
 
 Good, 125 
 Isabella, Princess, 134 
 Ivry, ii. 251 
 
 Jacquerie, 169 
 
 James, Henry, 103 note ; ii. 52 
 note, 208, 222 
 
 King of Scotland, ii. 33 
 
 V. of Scotland, ii. 163 
 
 Jarnac, 299 
 
 Jean Sans Peur, 132, 139 
 
 Jeanne of France, 92, 144, 224, 
 
 225 
 Jehan, Jacques, 128 
 Jerusalem, 37, 47, 49, 67, 236 
 Jodelle, Estienne, ii. 32, 165 
 John the Good, King of France, 
 
 125 
 Lackland (King of Eng- 
 land), 66, 68, no, 164 
 Joinville, Prince de, ii. 252 
 Jovius, Paulus, 94 note, 1 77 note, 
 
 185 note; ii. 150 
 Joyeuse, Due de, ii. 21, 179 
 
 Julian, Emperor, 36 
 Julien, St., 47 
 
 Kant, 27 
 
 Kirkcudbright, 88 
 Knights Templars, 72, 73 
 Knights of St. John, 73 
 Konigsmarck, Aurora von, ii. 
 
 219 
 Count Philip von, ii. 219 
 
 Lafosse, M. Touchard, 98 
 
 Lalain, Comte de, ii. 123 
 
 Lamarck, 296 
 
 Lameire, 199 
 
 Lancaster, 88 
 
 Lancerre, Comte de, ii. 89 
 
 Landor, 85 ; ii. 258 
 
 Langeais, 24, 34, 46, 47, 62, 
 
 98, 119, 151, 193-215, 286, ii. 
 
 26, 132 
 
 Duchesse de, 31 
 
 Larchant, Sieur de, ii. 188 
 Lautrec, 235, 252, 254, 255, 266, 
 
 286 
 Laval, Guy de, 164 
 League, Catholic, 96 ; ii. 47, 1 78 
 Lecouvreur, Adrienne, ii. 219 
 Leczinski, Stanislas, ii. 211, 218 
 Legrand, Jacques, 130 
 Leran, M. de, ii. 118 
 Lerins, Comte de, ii. 151 
 Lescot, Pierre, ii. 137 and note, 
 
 228 
 Letellier, Jean Baptiste, ii. 253 
 Lidorius, 35 
 Liege, ii. 121-123 
 
 Bishop of, ii. 123 
 
 Lignieres, Captain, ii. 89 
 
cJnd^ 
 
 ex 
 
 307 
 
 Ligny, Seigneur de, 182, 183 
 Lippomano, Girolamo, ii. 21, 
 
 103, 212, 250 
 Lizet, 259 
 Loches, 24, 26, 32, 43, 45, 46, 
 
 69, 86, 91, 95, 119, 151-191, 
 
 223, 259 ; ii. 104, 195, 241 
 Loignac, ii. 189 
 Loir et Cher, 23 
 Loire, Charite sur, ii. 19 
 Lombardy, 126 
 London, Tower of, 136, 138 
 Longchamps, ii. 210 
 Longueville, Duchesse de, 200, 
 
 241 
 Lorges, Comte de, ii. 14 
 Lorme, Marion de, ii. 216 
 Lorraine, Louise de, ii. 19-22 
 Loudun, 46 
 Louis, son of Charlemagne, 38 
 
 Dauphin, 109; ii. 127 
 
 VL, 48 
 
 XL, 25, 29, 51, 88-91, 104, 
 
 123, 143, 144, 174, 205, 223; 
 
 ii. 57, 61, 146 
 XIL, 91-95. 112, 123, 143, 
 
 164-170, 181-184, 223-241; 
 
 ii. 74, 146, 213 
 
 XIII., ii. 194, 215, 244 
 
 XIV., 25, 65; ii. 23, 199, 
 
 211, 218, 240 
 
 XVI., 118 
 
 St., 71, 164, 198, 258 noie ; 
 
 ii. II 
 Louise, wife of Henry III., 
 
 96 
 Louvre, 72, iii 
 Loyal Servitor, 231, 234, 236, 
 
 261 
 
 Luc, St., ii. 124 
 
 Lucca, 107 
 
 Lucien, 31 
 
 Lufon, Bishop of, 229 
 
 Luitgard, 38 
 
 Lulli, ii. 218 
 
 Lusignan, Geoffrey of, 71 
 
 Guy of, 66 
 
 Hugues de, no 
 
 Luther, 270 
 Luynes, 24, 32, 195 
 
 Due de, ii. 194, 195, 244 
 
 Lyons, 37, 183, 187 
 
 Mabel, Duchess, 179 
 Mabille, M., 196 
 Macabre, Danse, 75 
 Mache, Saint, 202 
 Machiavelli, 91, 206, 231 
 Madeleine, La, 154 
 Madrid, 260, 262 
 Maille, ii. 244 
 Maine, 37, 46, 47, 48, 50 
 Maine et Loire, 23 
 
 Prefect of, in 
 
 Maintenon, Madame de, 30, 114, 
 
 218, 233 
 Malifaud, M., 108 
 Malines, Saint, ii. 189 
 Malo, St., Bishop of, 211 
 Mans, Le, 35 note, 37, 47, 48, 
 
 67, 128 and note ; ii. 244 
 Mansard, ii. 133, 141, 238 
 Marche, Hugh de la, 71 
 
 Olivier de la, 165 note 
 
 Robert de la, ii. 71 
 
 Margaret of Flanders, 234 
 
 France, 52 
 
 Scotland, 165 
 
308 
 
 Sndi 
 
 ex 
 
 Margot, La Reine, see Valois, 
 
 Marguerite de 
 Maria Galeazzo, 178 
 
 Theresa, ii. 220 
 
 Marignano, 236, 252, 258 ; ii. 
 
 74. 240 
 Marigny, 291 
 Marmoutier, 36 ; ii. 246, 247 
 
 Jean de, 43 ; ii. 55 note 
 
 Marot, Clement, 104, 250 ; ii. 94 
 Marques, Jean, 282 
 
 Pierre, 282 
 
 Marseilles, 93 
 
 Marteau, Chapelle, ii. 185 
 
 Martel, Charles, ^t,> S^, 58 
 
 Geoffrey, 47, 48, 104, 116 
 
 Martin, St., and Abbey of, ^^, 
 
 36, 38, 39, 69, 80, 102, 196 ; 
 
 ii. 246, 254 
 Matilda of Anjou, 47, 49, 51 
 Maugiron, ii. 180 
 Maurepas, Comte de, ii. 220 
 Maurevel, ii. 115 
 Maurice, St., 35 
 Maximilian, Emperor, 145, 179, 
 
 202, 234 
 Mayence, 37 
 Mayenne, 44 
 
 Due de, 96; ii. 251 
 
 Mazarin, ii. 23, 199 
 
 Medicis, Catherine de, 29, 238, 
 
 289, 296; ii. 13, 24, 31-47. 
 
 81-125, 163-190, 231, 232, 
 
 250 
 
 Cosmo de, 268 ; ii. 238 
 
 ' Jean de, 264 
 
 ■■ Marie de, ii. 194-197, 243, 
 
 244 
 . Piero de, 208 
 
 Megrin, St., ii. 180 
 
 Mehun sur Yevre, 88 
 
 Mercoeur, Duchesse de, ii. 22 
 
 Meschinot, 137 
 
 Metz, 47; ii. 12 note, 99, 195 
 
 Meudon, Cure de, 61 
 
 Mexme, St., 63 
 
 Mezeray, ii. 188 note, 189, 190 
 
 note 
 Mezieres, Philippe de, 125 
 Michael, St., 83 
 
 Collar of, ii. 150 
 
 Order of, ii. 58 
 
 Michel, Mont St., 83, 152; ii. 
 
 58, 132 
 Michelet, 26, 257 ; ii. 34 
 Michiel, Giovanni, ii. 43, 47 
 Milan, 145, 146, 178-182, 235, 
 
 254. 255 
 Milieu, Chateau du, 64, 85 
 Minard, Antoine, ii. 84 
 Minimes, Monastere des, 261 
 Mire, 58 
 
 Mirebeau, 46, 51, 71 
 Molay, Jacques, 72 
 Mole, La, ii. 120 
 Moliere, ii. 61, 165, 218 
 Monaco, Prince of, ii. 153 note 
 Montaigne, 91 note, 213 ; ii. 12, 
 
 32 
 Montalais, ii. 199 
 Montauban, Admiral de, 204 
 
 Bishop of, 222 
 
 Montbazon, 24, 46, 47, 151 
 Duchesse de, 152, 163, 175; 
 
 ii. 242, 243 
 
 Duke of, ii. 195, 243 
 
 Montespan, Madame de, ii. 218 
 Montesquieu, ii. 24 
 
c7fic/( 
 
 ex 
 
 309 
 
 Montezuma, 249 
 
 Montfery, ii. 189 
 
 Montfrault, ii. 206 
 
 Montholon, ii. 182 
 
 Montlieu, 258 
 
 Montluc, 270, 273 
 
 Montmorency, 250, 269 
 
 Anne de, 289 ; ii. 32, 71, 
 
 232 
 Montpensier, ii. 119 
 Mademoiselle de, 113, 197, 
 
 199, 217, 233, 240 
 Montresor, 46 
 
 Due de, ii. 241 
 
 Montrichard, 46, 163 ; ii. 241 
 Montsoreau, Mademoiselle de, 
 
 51, 104, 105 ; ii. 121 
 
 I.a Dame de, ii. 180 
 
 Moro, II, see Sforza, Ludovico 
 Mortara, 182 
 
 Mortemart, Seigneur de, 138 
 Moulin, Tour du, 65 
 Moulins, 165, 187 
 
 Chateau de, ii. 22 
 
 Muret, 98; ii. 12 
 
 Namur, ii. 123 
 Nan^ay, M. de, ii. 118, 119 
 Nangis, Marquis de, ii. 216 
 Nantes, 37 ; ii. 68, 86 
 
 Edict of, ii. 252, 253 
 
 Naples, 95, 145, 146, 210 
 Narbonese, ^^ 
 Narbonne, 103 fzote, 125 
 Navarre, Antoine of, ii. 32 
 Henry of, see Henry IV. of 
 
 France 
 ■ Queen of, 261-263, 272- 
 
 274 
 
 Nemours, 167 
 
 Due de, see Gie, de 
 
 Nepveu, Pierre le, 283 ; ii. 209, 
 
 227 
 Nerac, 263, 273; ii. 125, 170 
 Neuilly, De, ii. 185 
 Nevers, Madame de, ii. 108 
 Nini, 238 
 Noirmoutier, Fran9ois, Marquis 
 
 de, ii. 109 
 Noizay, ii. 89 
 Nominalists, 168 
 Nonnains, Pont aux, 54 noie, 
 
 108 
 Novara, 146, 147, 182, 183, 210, 
 
 223, 229, 235 
 Nuncio, Papal, ii. 95 
 
 Odo, 33, 44 
 
 Count of Blois, 45, 46; ii. 57 
 
 Odos, Castle of, 275 
 
 Olivier, Chancellor, ii. 90-93 
 
 Onzain, 219 
 
 Or, Chateau de I'lle d', 117, 118 
 
 Orleans, 31, 35 note, 74; ii. 76, 
 
 81, 197 
 
 Three Dukes of, 123-148 
 
 Orleans, Charles d', 133-148 
 Gaston d', brother of Louis 
 
 XIV., ii. 22, 133, 196, 197, 
 
 200, 217, 241 
 Louis d', father of Charles 
 
 d', 126 
 
 Madeleine d', 112 
 
 Maid of, see d'Arc, Jeanne 
 
 Pucelle d', see d'Arc, Jeanne 
 
 Orme, Philibert de 1', 221, 292 ; 
 
 ii. 15 
 Ostia, 93 
 
310 
 
 Snd^ 
 
 ex 
 
 Pactius. Thomas, 43 
 Palice, La, 233 
 Palissy, Bernard, ii. 20 
 Pantagruel, 57, 62 
 Pardeillan, Baron de, ii. 91 
 Pare, Ambroise, ii. 113 
 Paris, 37, 39, 74, 75, no, 123, 
 
 289; ii. 12, 77 
 Pasithee, ii. no 
 Patelin, ii. 60 and note 
 Pattison, Mrs. Mark, 124, 197, 
 
 283; ii. 135, 211, 230 
 Paul v., ii. 172 
 Pavia, 126, 179, 186, 187, 249; 
 
 ii. 72 
 Pelisson, ii. 207 
 Pelouze, M., ii. 25 
 Pepin, 38 
 Peronne, 90, 175 
 Perreal, Jean, 237 note 
 Petit, Maitre Jean, 133 
 
 Mr., Ill, 154, 283 
 
 Petrarca, Francesco, 125, 169 
 Philip I., 48 
 
 III., 198 
 
 of France (Auguste), 67- 
 
 69, 71, 104 
 Philippe, Louis, in 
 Pibrac, Chancellor, ii. 125 
 Piennes, Mademoiselle de, ii. 169 
 Piefort, Pierre, 304 note 
 Pierrefonds, Castle of, ii. 132 
 Pindar, ii. 240 
 Pintoricchio, ii. 152 
 Pisa, 209, 230 
 Pisseleu, Anne de, 264 
 Pizarro, 272 
 Place, Pierre de la, 304 note 
 
 Plantagenets, 40, 46, 49, 71, 98, 
 
 loi. III ; ii. 258 
 Plato, 114 
 Plessis-lez-Tours, 26, 31, 89, 
 
 175, 199, 289; ii. 19, 58, 59, 
 
 109, 247, 255 
 Poitiers, t,'^, 37 note, 73, 107, 
 
 123, 238 ; ii. 172, 244 
 Diane de, 29, 187-189, 
 
 270, 279-305; ii. 11-27 
 
 Jean de, 187 
 
 Poitou, 54, 102, 165 
 Poltrot, ii. 32, 98, 171 
 Pompadour, De, Bishop of Peri- 
 
 gueux, 186 note 
 Pontbrillant, 190 
 Pontlevoy, ii. 57 
 Pontremulo, 178 note 
 Porchier, Estienne, 143 note 
 Porthos, ii. 201 
 Poucher, Jean, 291 
 Poyet, 259 
 
 Pragmatic Sanction, 166 
 Praguerie, 165, 220 
 Prat, Du, 186, 224, 247, 253, 
 
 256, 267, 286 
 Prie, Emard de, 187 
 Primaticcio, 284 ; ii. 17 and 
 
 note, 76, 209, 227, 228 
 Prince, Black, ii. 258 
 Protestants, 268-270, 304 note, 
 
 305 
 Provence, 33 
 Puits-Herbaut, Gabriel de, 113 
 
 note 
 Puy, 187 
 
 Bishop of, 185 
 
 Pyrenees, 33 
 
(ynd> 
 
 ex 
 
 311 
 
 QuENTiN, St., 303 
 Quesnel, Maitre, ii. 137, 279 
 Quicherat, 81 note, 85 
 Quixote, Don, adventures of, ii. 
 239 
 
 Rabelais, 30-32, 59, 60, 206, 
 212-214, 263, 273 ; ii. 59, 257, 
 258 
 
 Racine, 114 
 
 Raleigh, Sir Walter, ii. 258 
 
 Ramorantin, ii. 240, 241 
 
 Ramus, M., ii. 12, 120 
 
 Ranee, Armand de, ii. 242, 245 
 and note 
 
 Raoul, ii. 133 
 
 Raunay, Baron de, ii. 96 and note 
 
 Ravaillac, ii. 32, 194 
 
 Ravenna, 234, 258 ; ii. 72 
 
 Ray, M. le, 238 
 
 Reformation, 206, 303 
 
 Regent, English, ill 
 
 Regnier, 169 
 
 Reignac, 152 
 
 Rembrandt, 303 
 
 Remy, Jeanne de St., 303 
 
 Renaissance, 87, 136, 148, 206, 
 284 ; ii. 227-230 
 
 Renard, Matthieu, 96 
 
 Renaudie, Godefroy de Barry de 
 la, ii. 85-104 
 
 Rene, 88 
 
 Rene, Queen's Florentine per- 
 fumer, ii. 113, 176 
 
 Retz, De, 190; ii. 216, 241, 
 242, 244, 24s 
 
 Revol, ii. 182, 188 
 
 Rheims, 81 
 
 • Archbishop of, ii. 146 
 
 Ribeirac, ii. 180 
 
 Richard Coeur de Lion, 66, 67, 
 
 69, 70 and note, 109, 164, 247 
 Richelieu, 25, 97, 104, 114, 190, 
 
 253; ii. 22, 194, 196, 216, 
 
 245 
 
 town of, ii. 245 
 
 Richemont, Count of, 76, 87 
 Ridel, Hugues, ii. 227 note 
 Ris, Michael, 229 
 Robbia, Girolamo della, ii. 210 
 Robert of Gloucester, 51 
 Robertet, Florimond, 125, 143, 
 
 291 ; ii. 201 
 Rocca, 178 
 Rochechouart, 190 
 
 Marie M. G. de, 114 
 
 Rochecorbon, 62, 67, 115, 119, 
 
 199, 290 ; ii. 245, 246 
 Rochefort, 97 
 
 Rochefoucauld, De la, ii. 119 
 Rochelle, La, 138; ii. 251 
 Rochester, 162 
 Roger the Devil, 46 
 Rohan, Cardinal de, 93, 303 
 
 Duke of, ii. 195 
 
 Marie de, ii. 241 
 
 Mademoiselle de, ii. 20 
 
 Vicomte de, ii. 216 
 
 Roissy, De, ii. 194, 195 
 
 Romagna, 92 
 
 Rome, 35, 37, 123, 210; ii, 75 
 
 Romorantin, ii. 209 
 
 Ronsard, 61, g2 ; ii. 12, 32, 35, 
 
 37, no, 164, 240, 255 
 Rosny, Sieur de, ii. 22 
 Rosso, Giovanni Battista, ii. 76 
 Rouen, 81, 109 
 Rousseau, J. J-, 32 ; ii. 24 
 
312 
 
 Sndi 
 
 ex 
 
 Roux, Le, ii. 228 
 
 Rovere, Cardinal de la, 175, 232 
 
 (Pope) 
 Rubens, ii. 194, 196 
 Ruccelai, Abbe, ii. 195 
 Ruggieri, ii. 42 
 Russy, Forest of, ii. 240 
 Ruze, ii. 182 
 
 Sainte Chapelle, ii. 53 note 
 
 Salle, La, ii. 188 
 
 Sand, Georges, 31 ; ii. 220 note 
 
 Sarthe, 44 
 
 Saumur, 23, 46, 47, 54, 67, 104 
 
 note, 113, 115, 116 
 Saussaye, M. de la, ii. 209, 212 
 Sauves, Madame de, ii. 20, 31, 
 
 186, 187 
 Sauveur, St., Church of, ii. 47, 
 
 133 
 Savoie, Charlotte de, 205 
 Louise de, 29, 58, 112, 186, 
 
 247, 251, 253, 255-260, 267, 
 
 287 ; ii. 72-74, 240 
 Savonarola, 206, 208, 212 
 Savoy, Bastard of, 260 
 Saxe, Marshal, ii. 211, 219 
 Saxony, Elector of, Augustus the 
 
 Strong, ii. 219 
 Scarron, 30 
 Scheldt, ii. 220 
 Schomberg, ii. 180 
 Scipio, 183 
 
 Scott, Sir Walter, 166, 167 
 Scudery, Mademoiselle de, ii. 207 
 Semblan9ay, Charlotte de Beaune, 
 
 ii. 108 
 Jacques de Beaune, 58, 255- 
 
 257, 286, 291 ; ii. 70, 108 
 
 Severus, Sulpicius, ii. 56 
 Seyssel, Claude de, ii. 63 
 Sforza, Francesco, 141, 142 
 
 Ludovico, 146, 176, 179, 
 
 180-184, 206, 209, 229 ; ii, 
 
 152 
 Shakespeare, 83, 84, 303 
 Sicily, Queen of, 76, no, 118 
 Siegfried, Monsieur, 199, 214 
 Sienna, Siege of, 302 note 
 Simonetta, Cecco, 178 
 Simonides, ii. 240 
 Smalkald, League of, 268 
 Socrates, 83 
 Soliman, 269 
 Sologne, ii. 201 
 Solomon, Song of, 104 
 Sophia, Dorothea, ii. 219 
 Sorbonne, 304 
 Sorel, Agnes, 26, 29, 86, 87, 
 
 155-159, 164, 273, 293 
 Southey, 83, 85 
 Spencer, Herbert, 27 
 Spinosa, 303 
 Stael, Madame de, 238 
 Statues of the Plantagenet Kings, 
 
 109-112 
 Stephen of Blois, Count of Bou- 
 logne, 45, 50 
 Stuart, Esme, 207 note 
 Marie, 26, 30, 113, 302; 
 
 ii. 18, 31-47, 81, 95, 96, 167, 
 
 180, 232 
 Suffolk, Duke of, 118, 140 
 Sulpice, Sieur de Saint, ii. 180 
 Suriano, Michele, ii. 43 
 Swiss, 165 
 Symphorien, St., 36; ii. 25lf 
 
 257 
 
Sndi 
 
 ex 
 
 313 
 
 Talbot, 87 
 
 Taro, 211 
 
 Tavannes, ii. 119 
 
 Thelema, 33 ; ii. 210 
 
 Thibault le Tricheur, ii. 142, 206 
 
 Thier, Jean du, ii. 240 
 
 Thou, De, 32; ii. 217, 245 
 
 Anne de, ii. 238 
 
 Thouet, 117 
 
 Throckmorton, ii. 177 note 
 Tinchebray, 48 
 Titian, ii. 239 
 Torinus, 34 note 
 Torquemada, 205 
 Toulouse, 33 ; ii. 92 
 
 Count Raymond of, no 
 
 Tournon, Mademoiselle de, ii. 
 
 122 
 Tours, ii. 237-258 
 
 Vicomte de, ii. 180 
 
 Tractus, Armoricanus, 37 
 Trappe, De la, ii. 243 
 Traus, Baron de, 93 
 Tremouille, La, 76, 143, 144, 
 
 182, 183, 203, 231, 235, 260; 
 
 ii. 148 
 Trihan, William de, 68 
 Trinqueau, Maitre Pierre, ii. 209 
 Trivulzio, 180-182, 210, 229 
 Troyes, Jean de, 175 note 
 Tr uncus, 116 
 Turenne, ii, 125 
 Turin, 211 
 Turner, ii. 258 
 
 Urban II., Pope, 106 
 
 Ursins, Juvenal des, 127 tiote, 
 
 130 note, 135 
 Usson, Chateau d', ii. 125 
 
 Valentinois, Duchy of, 92, 95 
 
 Duke of, 94 
 
 Valery, Saint, ii. 12 
 Vallier, Saint, 293 
 
 Seigneur de, 187-190, 293 
 
 Valliere, Louise de la, 30 ; ii. 
 
 199, 214 
 Valois, 130, 232 
 Marguerite de (La Reine 
 
 Margot) 50; ii. 22, 31, 45, 
 
 107-127, 172-179, 214 
 Vassy, ii. 98 
 Vaugien, M. de, 222 
 Vauguyon, La, 187 
 Vecellio, Cesare, ii. 12 
 Vendome, 53; ii. 11, 22 
 
 Due de, ii. 23 
 
 Venice, 146, 210, 291 
 Vercingetorix, ii. 55 note 
 Verger, Chateau of, ii. 70 
 Verieres, Mademoiselle, ii. 220 
 
 note 
 Vermandois, ii. 142, 143 
 Vernant, St., ii. 244 
 Versailles, 25 ; ii. 23, 201 
 Versigny, Nicole de, 303 
 Vertus, 130 
 
 Vesc, Etienne de, 203, 210; ii. 62 
 Vespers, Sicilian, ii. 116 
 Vieilleville, 299, 301; ii. 12, 14, 89 
 Vienna, 24, 46, 47, 54, 57, 58, 
 
 62, loi, 104, 108, 151 
 Vigelli, 287 
 Vignemont, 163 
 Vigny, De, 32, 116, 222, 245 
 Villeneuve, Rene, Comte de, ii. 25 
 Villeroi, ii 182 
 Villon, Francois, 60, 79, 142, 
 
 169; ii. 59, 144 
 
314 
 
 Snd> 
 
 ex 
 
 Vincennes, 97, 199 
 
 Vinci, Leonardo da, 208 ; ii. 74> 
 
 75. 77, 141. 152 
 Vineuil, De, ii. 240 
 Visconti, Filippo Maria, 141 
 
 Gian Galeazzo, 125-148 
 
 Valentine, 126-148; ii. 132, 
 
 143-145, 210 
 Viscontis, 204, 207 note 
 Visigoths, 37 ; ii. 51 
 Vitet, ii. 177 note, 250 note 
 Voltaire, 83, 167, 206; ii. 24 
 
 Watteau, ii. 240 
 Westminster Abbey, 51 
 William the Aetheling, 49 
 
 the Conqueror, 27, 47 
 
 the Marshal, 68 
 
 Wilson, Daniel, ii. 25 
 
 Madame, ii. 25 
 
 Windsor, 66 
 Wingfield, 136 
 Wolsey, 227 
 
 Worcester, William of, 84 
 Wordsworth, ii. 258 
 
 Walsingham, ii. 46 
 Wars of Religion, 95, 113 
 
 York, 36, 88 
 
 Young, Arthur, ii. 200, 207, 255