Some typographical errors have been corrected;a list follows the text. List of Illustrations (etext transcriber's note) |
A GALLANT OF LORRAINE
VOL. I.
“C’étoit un homme de grande qualité, beau, bien fait, quoique d’unetaille un peu épaisse. Il avoit bien de l’esprit et d’un caractèrefort galant. Il avoit du courage, de l’ambition et l’âme du grandroi.”
Bussy-Rabutin to Madame de Scudéry,
August 16, 1671.
FRANÇOIS, SEIGNEUR DE BASSOMPIERRE, MARQUIS D’HAROUEL, MARÉCHAL DEFRANCE.
From an engraving by Lasne.
[Frontispiece
A GALLANT
OF LORRAINE
MARQUIS D’HAROUEL, MARÉCHAL
DE FRANCE (1579-1646) :: ::
BY
H. NOEL WILLIAMS
AUTHOR OF “FIVE FAIR SISTERS,” “A PRINCESS OF INTRIGUE,”
“THE BROOD OF FALSE LORRAINE,” ETC.
IN TWO VOLUMES
With 16 Illustrations
VOL. I
LONDON : HURST & BLACKETT, LTD.
:: PATERNOSTER HOUSE, E.C. ::
PREFATORY NOTE
Although the Mémoires of the Maréchal de Bassompierre are acknowledgedto be one of the chief authorities for the history of France during theearly part of the seventeenth century, they have never been translatedinto English, nor, if we except the charming but all too brief sketch ofthe marshal by Comte Boudet de Puymaigre in his Poètes et Romanciers dela Lorraine (Paris, 1848), has any biography of their author yet beenattempted. That such should be the case is certainly very surprising,since seldom can a man have led so eventful a life, or played so manydifferent parts with distinction, as did François de Bassompierre.Soldier, courtier, diplomatist, gallant and wit, he was to the Courts ofHenri IV and Louis XIII very much what the c