The Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois, Volume I.

M >> Marguerite de Valois, Queen of Navarre >> The Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois, Volume I.

MARGUERITE DE NAVARRE

MEMOIRS OF MARGUERITE DE VALOIS



MEMOIRS OF MARGUERITE DE VALOIS QUEEN OF NAVARRE

Written by Herself

Being Historic Memoirs of the Courts of France and Navarre




LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS


Marguerite de Valois--Etching by Mercier

Bussi d' Amboise--Painting in the Versailles Gallery

Duc de Guise--Painting in the Versailles Gallery

Catherine de' Medici--Original Etching by Mercier

Henri VI. and La Fosseuse--Painting by A. P. E. Morton

A Scene at Henri's Court--Original Photogravure





PUBLISHER'S NOTE.


The first volume of the Court Memoir Series will, it is confidently
anticipated, prove to be of great interest. These Letters first appeared
in French, in 1628, just thirteen years after the death of their witty
and beautiful authoress, who, whether as the wife for many years of the
great Henri of France, or on account of her own charms and
accomplishments, has always been the subject of romantic interest.

The letters contain many particulars of her life, together with many
anecdotes hitherto unknown or forgotten, told with a saucy vivacity which
is charming, and an air vividly recalling the sprightly, arch demeanour,
and black, sparkling eyes of the fair Queen of Navarre. She died in
1615, aged sixty-three.

These letters contain the secret history of the Court of France during
the seventeen eventful years 1565-82.

The events of the seventeen years referred to are of surpassing interest,
including, as they do, the Massacre of St. Bartholomew, the formation of
the League, the Peace of Sens, and an account of the religious struggles
which agitated that period. They, besides, afford an instructive insight
into royal life at the close of the sixteenth century, the modes of
travelling then in vogue, the manners and customs of the time, and a
picturesque account of the city of Liege and its sovereign bishop.

As has been already stated, these Memoirs first appeared in French in
1628. They were, thirty years later, printed in London in English, and
were again there translated and published in 1813.




TRANSLATOR'S PREFACE.


The Memoirs, of which a new translation is now presented to the public,
are the undoubted composition of the celebrated princess whose name they
bear, the contemporary of our Queen Elizabeth; of equal abilities with
her, but of far unequal fortunes. Both Elizabeth and Marguerite had been
bred in the school of adversity; both profited by it, but Elizabeth had
the fullest opportunity of displaying her acquirements in it. Queen
Elizabeth met with trials and difficulties in the early part of her life,
and closed a long and successful reign in the happy possession of the
good-will and love of her subjects. Queen Marguerite, during her whole
life, experienced little else besides mortification and disappointment;
she was suspected and hated by both Protestants and Catholics, with the
latter of whom, though, she invariably joined in communion, yet was she
not in the least inclined to persecute or injure the former. Elizabeth
amused herself with a number of suitors, but never submitted to the yoke
of matrimony. Marguerite, in compliance with the injunctions of the
Queen her mother, and King Charles her brother, married Henri, King of
Navarre, afterwards Henri IV. of France, for whom she had no inclination;
and this union being followed by a mutual indifference and dislike, she
readily consented to dissolve it; soon after which event she saw a
princess, more fruitful but less prudent, share the throne of her
ancestors, of whom she was the only representative. Elizabeth was
polluted with the blood of her cousin, the Queen of Scots, widow of
Marguerite's eldest brother. Marguerite saved many Huguenots from the
massacre of St. Bartholomew's Day, and, according to Brantome, the life
of the King, her husband, whose name was on the list of the proscribed.
To close this parallel, Elizabeth began early to govern a kingdom, which
she ruled through the course of her long life with severity, yet
gloriously, and with success. Marguerite, after the death of the Queen
her mother and her brothers, though sole heiress of the House of Valois,
was, by the Salic law, excluded from all pretensions to the Crown of
France; and though for the greater part of her life shut up in a castle,
surrounded by rocks and mountains, she has not escaped the shafts of
obloquy.

The Translator has added some notes, which give an account of such places
as are mentioned in the Memoirs, taken from the itineraries of the time,
but principally from the "Geographie Universelle" of Vosgien; in which
regard is had to the new division of France into departments, as well as
to the ancient one of principalities, archbishoprics, bishoprics,
generalities, chatellenies, balliages, duchies, seigniories, etc.

In the composition of her Memoirs, Marguerite has evidently adopted the
epistolary form, though the work came out of the French editor's hand
divided into three (as they are styled) books; these three books, or
letters, the Translator has taken the liberty of subdividing into
twenty-one, and, at the head of each of them, he has placed a short table
of the contents. This is the only liberty he has taken with the original
Memoirs, the translation itself being as near as the present improved
state of our language could be brought to approach the unpolished
strength and masculine vigour of the French of the age of Henri IV.

This translation is styled a new one, because, after the Translator had
made some progress in it, he found these Memoirs had already been made
English, and printed, in London, in the year 1656, thirty years after the
first edition of the French original. This translation has the following
title: "The grand Cabinet Counsels unlocked; or, the most faithful
Transaction of Court Affairs, and Growth and Continuance of the Civil
Wars in France, during the Reigns of Charles the last, Henry III., and
Henry IV., commonly called the Great. Most excellently written, in the
French Tongue, by Margaret de Valois, Sister to the two first Kings, and
Wife of the last. Faithfully translated by Robert Codrington, Master of
Arts;" and again as "Memorials of Court Affairs," etc., London, 1658.

The Memoirs of Queen Marguerite contained the secret history of the Court
of France during the space of seventeen years, from 1565 to 1582, and
they end seven years before Henri III., her brother, fell by the hands of
Clement, the monk; consequently, they take in no part of the reign of
Henri IV. (as Mr. Codrington has asserted in his title-page), though
they relate many particulars of the early part of his life.

Marguerite's Memoirs include likewise the history nearly of the first
half of her own life, or until she had reached the twenty-ninth year of
her age; and as she died in 1616, at the age of sixty-three years, there
remain thirty-four years of her life, of which little is known. In 1598,
when she was forty-five years old, her marriage with Henri was dissolved
by mutual consent,--she declaring that she had no other wish than to give
him content, and preserve the peace of the kingdom; making it her
request, according to Brantome, that the King would favour her with his
protection, which, as her letter expresses, she hoped to enjoy during the
rest of her life. Sully says she stipulated only for an establishment
and the payment of her debts, which were granted. After Henri, in 1610,
had fallen a victim to the furious fanaticism of the monk Ravaillac, she
lived to see the kingdom brought into the greatest confusion by the bad
government of the Queen Regent, Marie de Medici, who suffered herself to
be directed by an Italian woman she had brought over with her, named
Leonora Galligai. This woman marrying a Florentine, called Concini,
afterwards made a marshal of France, they jointly ruled the kingdom, and
became so unpopular that the marshal was assassinated, and the wife, who
had been qualified with the title of Marquise d'Ancre, burnt for a witch.
This happened about the time of Marguerite's decease.

It has just before been mentioned how little has been handed down to
these times respecting Queen Marguerite's history. The latter part of
her life, there is reason to believe, was wholly passed at a considerable
distance from Court, in her retirement (so it is called, though it
appears to have been rather her prison) at the castle of Usson. This
castle, rendered famous by her long residence in it, has been demolished
since the year 1634. It was built on a mountain, near a little town of
the same name, in that part of France called Auvergne, which now
constitutes part of the present Departments of the Upper Loire and
Puy-de-Dome, from a river and mountain so named. These Memoirs appear to
have been composed in this retreat. Marguerite amused herself likewise,
in this solitude, in composing verses, and there are specimens still
remaining of her poetry. These compositions she often set to music, and
sang them herself, accompanying her voice with the lute, on which she
played to perfection. Great part of her time was spent in the perusal of
the Bible and books of piety, together with the works of the best authors
she could procure. Brantome assures us that Marguerite spoke the Latin
tongue with purity and elegance; and it appears, from her Memoirs, that
she had read Plutarch with attention.

Marguerite has been said to have given in to the gallantries to which the
Court of France was, during her time, but too much addicted; but, though
the Translator is obliged to notice it, he is far from being inclined to
give any credit to a romance entitled, "Le Divorce Satyrique; ou, les
Amours de la Reyne Marguerite de Valois," which is written in the person
of her husband, and bears on the title-page these initials: D. R. H. Q.
M.; that is to say, "du Roi Henri Quatre, Mari." This work professes to
give a relation of Marguerite's conduct during her residence at the
castle of Usson; but it contains so many gross absurdities and
indecencies that it is undeserving of attention, and appears to have been
written by some bitter enemy, who has assumed the character of her
husband to traduce her memory.

["Le Divorce Satyrique" is said to have been written by Louise Marguerite
de Lorraine, Princesse de Conti, who is likewise the reputed author of
"The Amours of Henri IV.," disguised under the name of Alcander. She was
the daughter of the Due de Guise, assassinated at Blois in 1588, and was
born the year her father died. She married Francois, Prince de Conti,
and was considered one of the most ingenious and accomplished persons
belonging to the French Court in the age of Louis XIII. She was left a
widow in 1614, and died in 1631.]

M. Pierre de Bourdeille, Seigneur de Brantome, better known by the name
of Brantome, wrote the Memoirs of his own times. He was brought up in
the Court of France, and lived in it during the reigns of Marguerite's
father and brothers, dying at the advanced age of eighty or eighty-four
years, but in what year is not certainly known.

[The author of the "Tablettes de France," and "Anecdotes des Rois de
France," thinks that Marguerite alludes to Brantome's "Anecdotes" in the
beginning of her first letter, where she says: "I should commend your
work much more were I myself not so much praised in it." (According to
the original: "Je louerois davantage votre oeuvre, si elle ne me louoit
tant.") If so, these letters were addressed to Brantome, and not to the
Baron de la Chataigneraie, as mentioned in the Preface to the French
edition. In Letter I. mention is made of Madame de Dampierre, whom
Marguerite styles the aunt of the person the letter is addressed to. She
was dame d'honneur, or lady of the bedchamber, to the Queen of Henri
III., and Brantome, speaking of her, calls her his aunt. Indeed, it is
not a matter of any consequence to whom these Memoirs were addressed; it
is, however, remarkable that Louis XIV. used the same words to Boileau,
after hearing him read his celebrated epistle upon the famous Passage of
the Rhine; and yet Louis was no reader, and is not supposed to have
adopted them from these Memoirs. The thought is, in reality, fine, but
might easily suggest itself to any other. "Cela est beau," said the
monarch, "et je vous louerois davantage, si vous m'aviez moins loue."
(The poetry is excellent, and I should praise you more had you praised me
less.)]

He has given anecdotes of the life of Marguerite, written during her
before-mentioned retreat, when she was, as he says ("fille unique
maintenant restee, de la noble maison de France"), the only survivor of
her illustrious house. Brantome praises her excellent beauty in a long
string of laboured hyperboles. Ronsard, the Court poet, has done the
same in a poem of considerable length, wherein he has exhausted all his
wit and fancy. From what they have said, we may collect that Marguerite
was graceful in her person and figure, and remarkably happy in her
choice of dress and ornaments to set herself off to the most advantage;
that her height was above the middle size, her shape easy, with that due
proportion of plumpness which gives an appearance of majesty and
comeliness. Her eyes were full, black, and sparkling; she had bright,
chestnut-coloured hair, and a complexion fresh and blooming. Her skin
was delicately white, and her neck admirably well formed; and this so
generally admired beauty, the fashion of dress, in her time, admitted of
being fully displayed.

Such was Queen Marguerite as she is portrayed, with the greatest
luxuriance of colouring, by these authors. To her personal charms were
added readiness of wit, ease and gracefulness of speech, and great
affability and courtesy of manners. This description of Queen Marguerite
cannot be dismissed without observing, if only for the sake of keeping
the fashion of the present times with her sex in countenance, that,
though she had hair, as has been already described, becoming her, and
sufficiently ornamental in itself, yet she occasionally called in the aid
of wigs. Brantome's words are: "l'artifice de perruques bien gentiment
faconnees."

[Ladies in the days of Ovid wore periwigs. That poet says to Corinna:

"Nunc tibi captivos mittet Germania crines;
Culta triumphatae munere gentis eris."

(Wigs shall from captive Germany be sent;
'Tis with such spoils your head you ornament.)

These, we may conclude, were flaxen, that being the prevailing coloured
hair of the Germans at this day. The Translator has met with a further
account of Marguerite's head-dress, which describes her as wearing a
velvet bonnet ornamented with pearls and diamonds, and surmounted with a
plume of feathers.]

I shall conclude this Preface with a letter from Marguerite to Brantome;
the first, he says, he received from her during her adversity ('son
adversite' are his words),--being, as he expresses it, so ambitious
('presomptueux') as to have sent to inquire concerning her health, as she
was the daughter and sister of the Kings, his masters. ("D'avoir envoye
scavoir de ses nouvelles, mais quoy elle estoit fille et soeur de mes
roys.")

The letter here follows: "From the attention and regard you have shown me
(which to me appears less strange than it is agreeable), I find you still
preserve that attachment you have ever had to my family, in a
recollection of these poor remains which have escaped its wreck. Such as
I am, you will find me always ready to do you service, since I am so
happy as to discover that my fortune has not been able to blot out my
name from the memory of my oldest friends, of which number you are one. I
have heard that, like me, you have chosen a life of retirement, which I
esteem those happy who can enjoy, as God, out of His great mercy, has
enabled me to do for these last five years; having placed me, during
these times of trouble, in an ark of safety, out of the reach, God be
thanked, of storms. If, in my present situation, I am able to serve my
friends, and you more especially, I shall be found entirely disposed to
it, and with the greatest good-will."

There is such an air of dignified majesty in the foregoing letter, and,
at the same time, such a spirit of genuine piety and resignation, that it
cannot but give an exalted idea of Marguerite's character, who appears
superior to ill-fortune and great even in her distress. If, as I doubt
not, the reader thinks the same, I shall not need to make an apology for
concluding this Preface with it.

The following Latin verses, or call them, if you please, epigram, are of
the composition of Barclay, or Barclaius, author of "Argenis," etc.

ON MARGUERITE DE VALOIS,
QUEEN OF NAVARRE.


Dear native land! and you, proud castles! say
(Where grandsire,[1] father,[2] and three brothers[3] lay,
Who each, in turn, the crown imperial wore),
Me will you own, your daughter whom you bore?
Me, once your greatest boast and chiefest pride,
By Bourbon and Lorraine,[4] when sought a bride;
Now widowed wife,[5] a queen without a throne,
Midst rocks and mountains [6] wander I alone.
Nor yet hath Fortune vented all her spite,
But sets one up,[7] who now enjoys my right,
Points to the boy,[8] who henceforth claims the throne
And crown, a son of mine should call his own.
But ah, alas! for me 'tis now too late [9]
To strive 'gainst Fortune and contend with Fate;
Of those I slighted, can I beg relief [10]
No; let me die the victim of my grief.
And can I then be justly said to live?
Dead in estate, do I then yet survive?
Last of the name, I carry to the grave
All the remains the House of Valois have.



1. Francois I.
2. Henri II.
3. Francois II., Charles IX., and Henri III.
4. Henri, King of Navarre, and Henri, Duc de Guise.
5. Alluding to her divorce from Henri IV..
6. The castle of Usson
7. Marie de' Medici, whom Henri married after his divorce from
Marguerite.
8. Louis XIII., the son of Henri and his queen, Marie de' Medici.
9. Alluding to the differences betwixt Marguerite and Henri, her
husband.
10. This is said with allusion to the supposition that she was rather
inclined to favour the suit of the Due de Guise and reject Henri for a
husband.




CONTENTS


LETTER I.

Introduction.--Anecdotes of Marguerite's Infancy.--Endeavours Used to
Convert Her to the New Religion.--She Is Confirmed in Catholicism.--The
Court on a Progress.--A Grand Festivity Suddenly Interrupted.--The
Confusion in Consequence.


LETTER II.

Message from the Duc d'Anjou, Afterwards Henri III., to King Charles His
Brother and the Queen-mother.--Her Fondness for Her Children.--Their
Interview.--Anjou's Eloquent Harangue.--The Queen-mother's Character.
Discourse of the Duc d'Anjou with Marguerite.--She Discovers Her Own
Importance.--Engages to Serve Her Brother Anjou.--Is in High Favour with
the Queenmother.


LETTER III.

Le Guast.--His Character.--Anjou Affects to Be Jealous of the
Guises.--Dissuades the Queen-mother from Reposing Confidence in
Marguerite.--She Loses the Favour of the Queen-mother and Falls
Sick.--Anjou's Hypocrisy.--He Introduces De Guise into Marguerite's Sick
Chamber.--Marguerite Demanded in Marriage by the King of Portugal.--Made
Uneasy on That Account.--Contrives to Relieve Herself.--The Match with
Portugal Broken off.


LETTER IV.

Death of the Queen of Navarre--Marguerite's Marriage with Her Son, the
King of Navarre, Afterwards Henri IV. of France.--The Preparations for
That Solemnisation Described.--The Circumstances Which Led to the
Massacre of the Huguenots on St. Bartholomew's Day.


LETTER V.

The Massacre of St. Bartholomew's Day.


LETTER VI.

Henri, Duc d'Anjou, Elected King of Poland, Leaves France.--Huguenot
Plots to Withdraw the Duc d'Alencon and the King of Navarre from
Court.--Discovered and Defeated by Marguerite's Vigilance.--She Draws Up
an Eloquent Defence, Which Her Husband Delivers before a Committee from
the Court of Parliament.--Alencon and Her Husband, under a Close Arrest,
Regain Their Liberty by the Death of Charles IX.


LETTER VII.

Accession of Henri III.--A Journey to Lyons.--Marguerite's Faith in
Supernatural Intelligence.


LETTER VIII.

What Happened at Lyons.


LETTER IX.

Fresh Intrigues.--Marriage of Henri III.--Bussi Arrives at Court and
Narrowly Escapes Assassination.


LETTER X.

Bussi Is Sent from Court.--Marguerite's Husband Attacked with a Fit of
Epilepsy.--Her Great Care of Him.--Torigni Dismissed from Marguerite's
Service.--The King of Navarre and the Duc d'Alencon Secretly Leave the
Court.


LETTER XI.

Queen Marguerite under Arrest.--Attempt on Torigni's Life.--Her Fortunate
Deliverance.


LETTER XII.

The Peace of Sens betwixt Henri III. and the Huguenots.


LETTER XIII.

The League.--War Declared against the Huguenots.--Queen Marguerite Sets
out for Spa.


LETTER XIV.

Description of Queen Marguerite's Equipage.--Her Journey to Liege
Described.--She Enters with Success upon Her Mission.--Striking Instance
of Maternal Duty and Affection in a Great Lady.--Disasters near the Close
of the Journey.


LETTER XV.

The City of Liege Described.--Affecting Story of Mademoiselle de
Tournon.--Fatal Effects of Suppressed Anguish of Mind.


LETTER XVI.

Queen Marguerite, on Her Return from Liege, Is in Danger of Being Made a
Prisoner.--She Arrives, after Some Narrow Escapes, at La Fere.


LETTER XVII.

Good Effects of Queen Marguerite's Negotiations in Flanders.--She Obtains
Leave to Go to the King of Navarre Her Husband, but Her Journey Is
Delayed.--Court Intrigues and Plots.--The Duc d'Alencon Again Put under
Arrest.


LETTER XVIII.

The Brothers Reconciled.--Alencon Restored to His Liberty.


LETTER XIX.

The Duc d'Alencon Makes His Escape from Court.--Queen Marguerite's
Fidelity Put to a Severe Trial.


LETTER XX.

Queen Marguerite Permitted to Go to the King Her Husband.--Is Accompanied
by the Queenmother.--Marguerite Insulted by Her Husband's Secretary.--She
Harbours Jealousy.--Her Attention to the King Her Husband during an
Indisposition.--Their Reconciliation.--The War Breaks Out
Afresh.--Affront Received from Marechal de Biron.


LETTER XXI.

Situation of Affairs in Flanders.--Peace Brought About by Duc d'Alencon's
Negotiation.--Marechal de Biron Apologises for Firing on Nerac.--Henri
Desperately in Love with Fosseuse.--Queen Marguerite Discovers Fosseuse
to Be Pregnant, Which She Denies.--Fosseuse in Labour. Marguerite's
Generous Behaviour to Her.--Marguerite's Return to Paris.


HISTORY OF THE HOUSE OF VALOIS. [Author unknown]




MARGUERITE DE VALOIS.




BOOK 1.


LETTER I.

Introduction.--Anecdotes of Marguerite's Infancy.--Endeavours Used to
Convert Her to the New Religion.--She Is Confirmed in Catholicism.--The
Court on a Progress.--A Grand Festivity Suddenly Interrupted.--The
Confusion in Consequence.


I should commend your work much more were I myself less praised in it;
but I am unwilling to do so, lest my praises should seem rather the
effect of self-love than to be founded on reason and justice. I am
fearful that, like Themistocles, I should appear to admire their
eloquence the most who are most forward to praise me. It is the usual
frailty of our sex to be fond of flattery. I blame this in other women,
and should wish not to be chargeable with it myself. Yet I confess that
I take a pride in being painted by the hand of so able a master, however
flattering the likeness may be. If I ever were possessed of the graces
you have assigned to me, trouble and vexation render them no longer
visible, and have even effaced them from my own recollection. So that I
view myself in your Memoirs, and say, with old Madame de Rendan, who, not
having consulted her glass since her husband's death, on seeing her own
face in the mirror of another lady, exclaimed, "Who is this?" Whatever
my friends tell me when they see me now, I am inclined to think proceeds
from the partiality of their affection. I am sure that you yourself,
when you consider more impartially what you have said, will be induced to
believe, according to these lines of Du Bellay:

"C'est chercher Rome en Rome, Et rien de Rome en Rome ne trouver."

('Tis to seek Rome, in Rome to go, And Rome herself at Rome not know.)

But as we read with pleasure the history of the Siege of Troy, the
magnificence of Athens, and other splendid cities, which once flourished,
but are now so entirely destroyed that scarcely the spot whereon they
stood can be traced, so you please yourself with describing these
excellences of beauty which are no more, and which will be discoverable
only in your writings.

If you had taken upon you to contrast Nature and Fortune, you could not
have chosen a happier theme upon which to descant, for both have made a
trial of their strength on the subject of your Memoirs. What Nature did,
you had the evidence of your own eyes to vouch for, but what was done by
Fortune, you know only from hearsay; and hearsay, I need not tell you, is
liable to be influenced by ignorance or malice, and, therefore, is not to
be depended on. You will for that reason, I make no doubt, be pleased to
receive these Memoirs from the hand which is most interested in the truth
of them.