[103] The word in the text is Casteldunum (Châteaudun), but this must be a misprint or mistake, as Châteaudun is on the other side of the Loire, and a long way from Poitiers. From a journal kept by an Avocat of Saint-Maixent in Poitou, we are able to fix Alençon at La Guerche, which is close to Châtelherault, on October 1. Châtelherault is therefore probably the place intended. See Le Riche, p. 238.
[104] The Duke of Guise seems hardly to have deserved the credit he acquired at the battle of Château Thierry. With 10,000 infantry and 1,000 heavy cavalry, he attacked Thoré, whose troops did not number more than 2,500; even of these some had been tampered with and went over to the Duke. Neither was the way in which he received the wound which gave him the soubriquet of ‘le Balafré’ much to his credit as a soldier. The struggle had been decided, and he was engaged in hunting down one of the fugitives in a thicket of brambles, when the man turned and shot him in the face. See Thuanus, iii. 105-6.
‘Le mardi 11e octobre, le seingneur de Fervacques arriva á Paris, et apporta nouvelles au Roy de deux mille, que Reistres, que François, conduits par M. de Thoré, desfaits par le duc de Guise, près Fismes, en passant la rivière de Marne au-dessus de Dormans. Dont le Roy fait chanter le Te Deum solennel. Ceste desfaite estoit avenue le jour de devant 10e octobre, entre Dameri et Dormans, dont le bruit fust plus grand que l’effait; car il n’y mourust point cinquante hommes de part et d’autre, et après que deux ou trois cornettes de Reistres, prattiquées par argent, eurent fait semblant de se rendre à la merci du duc de Guise, le seingneur de Thoré passa sain et sauf à Nogent-sur-Seine avec mil ou douze cens chevaux, et s’alla rendre à M. le Duc (d’Alençon) à Vatan. Le duc de Guise, en ceste rencontre, par un simple soldat à pied qu’il attaqua, fut grièvement blessé d’une harquebuzade, qui lui emporta une grande partie de la joue et de l’aureille gauche.’—De l’Estoile, i. 91.
[105] Giovanni Michel, the Venetian Ambassador, paid his respects to Busbecq’s Queen, and has left an interesting notice of her appearance in her white widow’s dress. ‘I was most cordially received by the Queen, the wife of the late King, and daughter of the Emperor. She knew me at once, and appeared delighted to see me. She looked very well in her widow’s dress.’—Ambassadeurs Vénitiens, ii. 220.
[106] John von Manderschiet Blankenheim, Bishop of Strasburg, 1572-92. The town of Saverne was an appanage of the Bishopric, and here in later times the Bishops of Strasburg had a magnificent château.
[107] ‘Limer, or Lime-hound, the same as Bloud-hound, a great dog to hunt the wild boar.’—World of Words.
[108] Gaspard de Schomberg, Comte de Nanteuil, was descended from a German family of Meissen, but educated at Angers, in France. In 1562 he fought in defence of the last-named town on the Protestant side. He afterwards entered the royal service and fought for the king at Moncontour. He was next employed on a mission to the German Princes to induce them to form a league against Spain. He accompanied Henry III. to Poland, as his Seneschal. He was one of those who persuaded Henry IV. to go to Mass, and took a prominent part in the negotiations for peace between him and his rebellious subjects. He was on several occasions employed as the agent of the French Government for raising German troops. When Busbecq saw him he had just come to Paris with Bassompierre and Count Mansfeldt to conclude a bargain with the King for a levy of 8,000 mercenaries.
The Kinskys were an ancient Bohemian family. Perhaps, in the course of his negotiations for hiring German troops, Schomberg had some dealings with Maximilian’s protégé.
[109] This was no exaggeration, as the following extract from the Diary of a contemporary will show: ‘Le lundi 5e décembre, la Roine veufve, madame Ysabel d’Austriche, partist de Paris, pour s’en retourner à Vienne, chés son père et sa mère: et lui bailla le Roy messieurs de Luxembourg, comte de Rais, et l’évesque de Paris, pour l’accompagner: qui la rendirent entre les mains des députés par l’Empereur son père, pour la recevoir à Nanci en Lorraine. Elle fut fort aimée et honorée par les François tant qu’elle demeura en France, nommément par le peuple de Paris, lequel, plorant et gémissant à son départ, disoit qu’elle emportoit avec elle le bonheur de la France.’—De l’Estoile, i. 95.
Miss Freer (Henry III., vol. ii. p. 40), says ‘the Queen quitted Paris during the first week of August, 1575.’ She was led into this error by the description given by Godefroy (Le Cérémonial François, i. 927) of Elizabeth’s entrance into Orleans on August 21, and has confounded her journey to Amboise (see p. [96]), with her return to Germany.