The Life of Marie de Medicis, Queen of France, Consort of Henri IV, and Regent of the Kingdom under Louis XIII — Volume 1 · Chapter 141602 (4)
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FOOTNOTES:
[158] César de Vendôme was the son of Henri IV and la belle Gabrielle. He became Governor of Brittany, and superintendent-in-chief of the national navigation. Henry also bestowed on him as an appanage the duchy of Vendôme. He married the daughter of Philip Emmanuel of Lorraine, Duc de Mercoeur, by whom he had three children: Isabelle, who became the wife of Charles Amédée, Duc de Nemours; Louis, who died single; and François, Duc de Beaufort.
[159] Jean de Berthault (or Bertaut) was born at Caen in 1552. He was first-almoner of Catherine de Medicis, Abbot of Aulnai, and subsequently Bishop of Séez. He was a pupil of Ronsard, and a friend of Desportes. He wrote a great number of sacred and profane poems, psalms, and sonnets. He also produced a "Funeral Oration on Henri IV," and a "Translation of St. Ambroise." He died in 1611.
[160] Amours du Grand Alcandre, p. 41.
[161] Amours du Grand Alcandre, p. 42.
[162] Claude de Lorraine, Prince de Joinville, was the fourth son of Henri, Duc de Guise, surnamed the Balafré, brother of Charles, Duc de Mayenne, and of Louis, Cardinal de Guise. He married Marie de Rohan, Duchesse de Chevreuse, the daughter of Hercule de Rohan, Duc de Montbazon, and peer of France, and was subsequently known as Duc de Chevreuse. He died in 1657.
[163] Amours du Grand Alcandre, pp. 272, 273.
[164] Dreux du Radier, vol. vi. p. 85. Saint-Edmé, p. 218.
[165] Amours du Grand Alcandre, p. 274.
[166] Amours du Grand Alcandre, p. 276.
[167] Mademoiselle de Sourdis was the daughter of François d'Escoubleau, Seigneur de Jouy, de Launay, Marquis de Sourdis, etc., and of Isabelle Babou, Dame d'Alluie, daughter of Jean Babou, Seigneur de la Bourdaisière, and aunt of Gabrielle d'Estrées. He was deprived of the government of Chartres by the League; but was restored by Henri III at the entreaty of Gabrielle.
[168] Caterina Selvaggio was one of the Queen's favourite Italian waiting-women.
[169] Sully, Mém. vol. iv. pp. 93, 94.
[170] Rambure, MS. Mém. vol. i. p. 332.
[171] Capefigue, Hist, de la Réforme, de la Ligue, et du Règne de Henri IV, vol. viii. pp. 147, 148.
[172] Histoire de la Mère et du Fils, a continuation of the Memoirs of Richelieu, incorrectly attributed to Mézeray, vol. i. p. 7.
[173] Sully, Note to Memoirs, vol. iv. pp. 95, 96.
[174] Richelieu, La Mère et le Fils, vol. i. p. 7.
[175] Claude, Seigneur de la Trémouille, second Duc de Thouars, peer of France, Prince de Talmond, was born in the year 1566, and first bore arms under François de Bourbon, Duc de Montpensier. He embraced the reformed religion, and attached himself to the fortunes of Henri de Navarre, subsequently King of France, whom he followed to the sieges of Rouen and Poitiers, and the battle of Fontaine-Française; after which the King conferred upon him the rank of peer of France. He was the brother-in-law of the Duc de Bouillon. He died in the castle of Thouars, to which he had retired, suspected of treason, after refusing to return to Court to justify himself, on the 25th of October 1604, in his thirty-eighth year.
[176] Jean Louis de Nogaret de la Valette, Duc d'Epernon, was the younger son of an old Gascon family, who sought his fortunes at the French Court under the name of Caumont. After the death of Charles IX, he offered his services to Henri de Navarre, subsequently Henri IV; but was ultimately admitted to the intimacy of Henri III, who caused him to be instructed in politics and literature, and made him one of his mignons. He was next created Duc d'Epernon, first peer and admiral of France, colonel-general of infantry, and held several governments. On the death of Henri III, this ennobled adventurer once more became a partisan of his successor, and commanded the royal forces during the war in Savoy; but throughout the whole of this reign he lived in constant misunderstanding with the Court and the King, and was even suspected of the act of regicide which deprived France of her idolised monarch. It was the Duc d'Epernon who, immediately after that event, convoked the Parliament, caused the recognition of Marie de Medicis as Regent, and formed a privy council over which he presided. Banished by the Concini during their period of power, he reappeared at Court after their fall, but Richelieu would not permit him to hold any government office, and, moreover, deprived him of all his governments save that of Guienne. He died in 1642.
[177] Daniel, vol. vii. p. 408.
[178] Pedro Henriques Azevedo, Condé de Fuentes.
[179] Montfaucon, vol. v. pp. 405-407.
[180] Edmé de Malain, Baron de Luz, Lieutenant-Governor of Burgundy, was the son of Joachim de Malain and Marguerite d'Epinac. He was deeply involved in the conspiracy of the Maréchal de Biron, and would infallibly have perished with him had he not been induced by the President Jeannin to reveal all that he knew of the plot to Henri IV, on condition of a free pardon. He survived his treachery for ten years, and in 1613 was killed in a duel by the Chevalier de Guise. His son, Claude de Malain, having sworn to avenge his death, in his turn challenged M. de Guise, at whose hands he met with the same fate as his father.
[181] Jacques de Lanode, Sieur de la Fin, was a petty Burgundian nobleman, whose spirit of intrigue was perpetually involving those to whom he attached himself in cabals and factions. He had been actively engaged at one time in the affairs of the Duc d'Alençon, and at another, he was no less busily engaged in instigating Henri III to aggressive measures against the Duc de Guise. Since that period he had negotiated with the ministers of Spain and Savoy, and by these means he had contracted a great intimacy with the Duc de Biron, to whom he affected to be distantly related, and over whom he acquired such extraordinary ascendancy by his subtle and unceasing flattery that the weak Maréchal became a mere puppet in his hands, and, misled by his vanity, suffered himself to be persuaded that his merit had been overlooked and his services comparatively unrewarded, and that he was consequently fully justified in aspiring even to regal honours, and in using every exertion to attain them.
[182] Matthieu, Histoire des Derniers Troubles arrivez en France, book ii. p. 411.
[183] Pierre Fougeuse, Sieur Descures.
[184] Pierre Jeannin was the architect of his own fortunes. He was born at Autun in 1540, where his father followed the trade of a tanner, and was universally respected alike for his probity and his sound judgment. The future president, after receiving the rudiments of his education in his native town, was removed to Bourges, where he became a pupil of the celebrated Cujas. In 1569 he was entered as an advocate at the Parliament of Burgundy, where he greatly distinguished himself during the space of two years, at the expiration of which time he was appointed provincial advocate and member of the Burgundian States; and in this capacity he justified, by his extraordinary talents, the choice of his fellow-citizens. On one occasion a wealthy individual, enchanted by his eloquence, waited upon him at his house, and expressed a desire to have him for a son-in-law, inquiring, however, at the same time, the amount of his property. Jeannin, by no means disconcerted at the abruptness of his visitor, pointed with a smile first to his head and then to his books: "You see it before you," he said with honest pride; "I have not, nor do I require, a greater fortune." Tradition is silent as regards the termination of the interview. In the following year (1572) Jeannin was present at the council which was held during the frightful massacre of St. Bartholomew, where he secured the friendship of the Comte de Charny, at that period Grand Equerry of France, Lieutenant-General of Burgundy, and provisional governor of the province during the absence of the Duc d'Aumale, then Governor of Paris; and in the same year he was deputed from the tiers-état of Burgundy to the States-General, convoked at Blois by Henri III. It was on that occasion that he began to comprehend the designs of the Guises, and made the celebrated speech in favour of religious toleration which does so much honour to his memory. By Henri III he was successively appointed governor of the chancelry of Burgundy, councillor of the provincial Parliament, and subsequently president.--Petitot.
[185] Daniel, vol. vii. pp. 414, 415. Péréfixe, vol. ii. p. 367. Matthieu, Hist. des Derniers Troubles, book ii. p. 411.
[186] Charles de Bourbon-Conti, Comte de Soissons, espoused the cause of the King of Navarre, whom he accompanied to the battle of Coutras in 1587. Henry promised to him the hand of his sister, Catherine de Navarre, to whom he presented him immediately afterwards, when a reciprocal affection was the result. M. de Soissons, however, abandoned the reform party, and did not return to it until after the death of Henri III. He served actively and zealously during the League; but having discovered that the King did not intend to fulfil his promise of marrying him to the Princess, he quitted him during the siege of Rouen in 1592, on the pretext of illness, and hastened to Béarn, hoping to induce Catherine to become his wife before the King could interfere to prevent their union, and by engaging himself to support his brother, the Cardinal de Bourbon, to make himself master of the possessions of the house of Navarre beyond the Loire. On reaching Béarn, however, he found Henry already there, and was obliged to withdraw without having accomplished either object. A short time subsequently he renewed his friendship with that monarch, and officiated as Duke of Normandy at his coronation at Chartres in 1594.
[187] Péréfixe, vol. ii. p. 369.
[188] Louis de l'Hôpital de Vitry, knight of all the Royal Orders, and Captain of the King's bodyguard, was descended from the illustrious and ancient family of the Marquis de Sainte-Même and de Montpellier, Comtes d'Entremons.
[189] Charles de Choiseul, Marquis de Praslin, the representative of one of the most illustrious families of France, was a descendant of the ancient Comtes de Langres. He distinguished himself at the siege of La Fère in 1580, at that of Paris in 1589, and at the battle of Aumale in 1592. Henri IV made him a captain of his bodyguard, and Louis XIII, in 1619, bestowed upon him the bâton of marshal of France. He died in 1626, in his sixty-third year.
[190] Mézeray asserts, and with greater probability, that Henry's parting words were: "Since you will not speak out, adieu, Baron" (Hist, de France, vol. x. p. 201); while Péréfixe gives a third version, asserting that the King took leave of him by saying: "Well then, the truth must be learnt elsewhere; adieu, Baron de Biron" (Hist, de Henri le Grand, vol. ii. p. 371).
[191] Sully, Mém. vol. iv. pp. 108, 109.
[192] Daniel, vol. vii. pp. 415-417. Matthieu, Hist, des Derniers Troubles, book ii. pp. 413-415. Mézeray, vol. x. pp. 196-202. Péréfixe, vol. ii. pp. 369-372.
[193] Mézeray, vol. x. p. 203.
[194] Matthieu, Hist. des Troubles, book ii. pp. 415, 416.
[195] François de la Grange d'Anquien, Seigneur de Montigny, Sery, etc., afterwards known as the Maréchal de Montigny, served with the Catholics at Coutras, where he was taken prisoner. In 1601 Henri IV made him Governor of Paris; in 1609, lieutenant of the King in the Three Bishoprics; and subsequently, in 1616, Marie de Medicis procured for him the bâton of Marshal of France. He commanded the royal army against the malcontents in Nivernais, and died in the same year (1617). He had but one son, who left no male issue; but his brother had, among other children, Henri, Marquis d'Anquien, whose daughter, Marie Casimire, married Sobieski, King of Poland, and died in France, in 1716, two years after her return to her native country.
[196] Mézeray, vol. x. p. 204.
[197] L'Etoile computes them at one hundred and twenty-seven.--Journ. de Henri IV, vol. iii. p. 21.
[198] Mézeray, vol. x. p. 205.
[199] Matthieu, Hist. des Troubles, book ii. pp. 426, 427.
[200] Monttaucon, vol. v. p. 410.
[201] Péréfixe, vol. ii. p. 377. Mézeray, vol. x. p. 209.
[202] Réné de Marée-Montbarot, Governor of Rennes in 1602. Wrongly suspected of complicity with Biron, he made no effort to evade the consequences of the accusation, but suffered himself to be arrested in the seat of his government, whence he was conveyed to the Bastille; and although he succeeded in establishing his innocence, he found himself, on his liberation, deprived of his office.
[203] Guy Eder de Beaumanoir de Lavardin, Baron de Fontenelles, was a Breton noble, who, according to De Thou, had been a celebrated Leaguer and brigand. From the year 1597 he had held, in the name of the Duc de Mercoeur, the fort of Douarnenez in Brittany, and the island of Tristain in which it is situated. Since that period he had continually been guilty of acts of piracy upon the English, and had even extended his system of theft and murder indiscriminately both on sea and land. He might, had he been willing so to do, have profited by the benefit of the edict accorded to the Duc de Mercoeur in 1598, but he affected to hold it as a point of honour to obtain a distinct one for himself, and he even appears to have continued in the enjoyment of his government despite this obstinacy; but having been convicted, during a period of profound peace, of maintaining an intelligence with the Spaniards, he was made prisoner by a stratagem, by Nicolas Rapin, provost of the connétablie (or constable's jurisdiction), as an accomplice of the Duc de Biron, as he was on the point of delivering up both the fort and the island to his dangerous allies.
[204] L'Etoile, vol. x. pp. 36, 37.
[205] Charles de Lorraine, Duc de Mayenne, was the second son of François de Lorraine, Duc de Guise, and was born in 1554. He distinguished himself at the sieges of Poitiers and La Rochelle, and at the battle of Montcontour, and fought successfully against the Calvinists in Guienne and Saintonge. His brothers having been killed at the States of Blois in 1588, he declared himself chief of the League, and assumed the title of lieutenant-general of the kingdom and crown of France; and by virtue of this self-created authority, caused the Cardinal de Bourbon to be declared King, under the name of Charles X. Having inherited the hatred of his brothers for Henri III, and his successor Henri IV, he marched eighty thousand men against the latter Prince, but was defeated, both at Arques and Ivry. He annihilated the faction of the Sixteen; and was ultimately compelled to effect a reconciliation with the King in 1599, when Henri IV, with his usual clemency, not only pardoned his past opposition, but bestowed upon him the government of the Isle of France. The Duc de Mayenne died in 1611, leaving by his wife, Henriette de Savoie, daughter of the Comte de Tende, one son, Henri, who died without issue in 1621.
[206] Charles de Lorraine, Duc de Guise, born in 1571, was the son of Henri, Duc de Guise, who was assassinated at the States of Blois in 1588. At the period of his father's death he was conveyed to the castle of Tours, where he was retained a prisoner until August 1591, when he effected his escape, a circumstance which materially changed the fortunes of the League. The general impression in the capital had been that he would become the husband of the Infanta Isabel, the daughter of Philip II of Spain, who would cause him to be proclaimed King, an arrangement which the Duque de Feria, the Spanish ambassador, proposed to the League in 1593. The Legate, the Sixteen, and the doctors of the Sorbonne, alike favoured this election, and the negotiations proceeded so far that the Spaniards and Neapolitans in Paris rendered him regal honours. The young Prince, who had at this period only attained his twenty-second year, expressed great indignation at being made the puppet of so absurd a comedy, feeling convinced that neither the Duc de Mayenne nor the Duc de Nemours, both of whom coveted the crown, would finally favour his accession; and there can be little doubt that the state of extreme poverty to which he was reduced at the time caused him to consider the project as still more extravagant than he might otherwise have done, it being stated (Mém. pour l'Hist. de France) that his servants were, on one occasion, compelled to pawn one of his cloaks and his saddle-cloth in order to furnish him with a dinner.
[207] Sully, Mém. vol. iv. pp. 128, 129. Daniel, vol. vii. p. 423. Mézeray, vol. x. p. 219.
[208] Elisabeth de France, who married in 1615 Philip IV of Spain.
[209] Bassompierre, Mém. p. 26.