Lives of Fair and Gallant Ladies. Vol 1

by Pierre de Bourdeille Brantôme

14.

Next it behoveth me to mention an ill opinion which many have held and do still hold concerning the Court of our French Kings. Men say the ladies thereof, both maids and wives, do oft times trip, indeed do so customarily. But in this are they very much deceived, for truly there be amongst these very chaste, honourable and virtuous women, nay! even more than elsewhere. Virtue doth reside there just as much, or more than in other places,—a fact we should duly prize, for that it can readily be put to proof.

Je n’alléguerai que ce seul exemple de Mme. la grande-duchesse de Florence d’aujourd’hui, de la maison de Lorraine,[94*] laquelle étant arrivée á Florence le soir que le grand-duc l’épousa, et qu’il voulut aller coucher avec elle pour la dépuceler, il la fit avant pisser dans un bel urinoir de cristal, le plus beau et le plus clair qu’il put, et en ayant vu l’urine, il la consulta avec son médecin, qui était un très grand et très savant et expert personnage, pour savoir de lui, par cette inspection, si elle était pucelle oui ou non. Le médecin l’ayant bien fixement et doctement inspectée, il trouva qu’elle était telle comme quand sortit du ventre de sa mère, et qu’il y allât hardiment, et qu’il n’y trouverait point le chemin nullement ouvert, frayé ni battu; ce qu’il fit, et en trouva la vérité telle et puis.

Then next morning, in amaze, he did exclaim thus: “Lo and behold, a miracle,—that the girl should thus have come forth a virgin from yonder Court of France!” Truly a curious investigation, and a strange opinion! I know not if the tale be true, but it hath been confidently affirmed to me as being so.

A fine repute for our Court. But indeed ’tis no long while since men generally held that all the ladies of the Court and of Paris city were not so virtuous of their body as they of the open countryside, and such as never left their homes. There have been men known so scrupulous they would never wed with girls or women which had travelled far afield, and seen the world, be it ever so little. Thus in our native Guyenne, in the days of my youth, I have heard not a few gallant gentlemen say this and seen them swear to the same, that they would never wed girl or woman which should ever have gone forth of the Port de Pille, to journey away toward France. Poor silly creatures surely herein, albeit wise and gallant men enough in other matters, to suppose that cuckoldry did never abide in their own houses, at their hearths and in their closets and bedchambers, just as readily,—or mayhap more so, seeing the easy opportunities,—as in the Royal Palaces and the great Royal towns! For could not lovers well enough come thither to suborn, win over, court and undo their wives for them, when they were themselves away at Court, at the wars, or the chase, attending their law business or on their journeyings abroad? This they would never understand, but were so simple as to think men would never dare to say one word of love to their ladies, but speak only of their households, gardens, hunting and hawking parties. And so by such blindness and rash confidence they did get themselves cuckolded even more freely than elsewhere; for there is no spot where a fair and clever woman, and an honourable and gallant man, cannot find room and convenience for love-making. Poor fools and idiots that they were! could they not realize how that Venus hath no fixed and special place of abode, as of old in Cyprus, at Paphos and Amathos, and see that she doth dwell everywhere, yea! even in the very herdsmen’s cots and the lowly lap of shepherdesses the most simple seeming?

Since some while now have they begun to abandon these silly prejudices. For, having observed that in all parts was risk of this same unhappy cuckoldry, they have of late taken wives wherever they have pleased or been able. Nay! they have gone yet further; for they have sent them or taken them with them to Court, to let their beauty be manifest and have full appreciation, and so strike envy to the heart of all and sundry,—as if for the very end of getting themselves a set of horns!

Others again do nowadays send their wives, or take the same along with them, to plead and influence by their solicitations their suits at law; whereof some really and truly have no law business at all, but do make pretense they have. Or else, if they really have some case toward, they will wilfully prolong the same, the better to prolong their amours. Nay! sometimes husbands will actually leave their wives on duty at the Courts, in the galleries and great Hall thereof, and so away to their own homes, deeming these will better do their business for them, and they will win their cause better so. And in truth I do know of several which have so won them, more by the dexterity and delights of their wives’ fore parts than by any claim of justice on their side. And so many a time will the wives be gotten with child at this game, and then to avoid scandal,—drugs having failed of their efficacy to preserve them therefrom,—will speedily hie away home to their husbands, feigning they are going thither to look up titles or documents of the which they stand in need, or to institute some enquiry, or else that ’tis to await Martinmas and the re-opening of the Courts, and that being unable in vacation time to make any progress in their suit, they are fain to have a bout of the male and see their households again and husbands. And so they do in sooth, but they were well in child, ere ever they began!

I appeal to many a learned judge and presiding magistrate as to the fine tit-bits these same have enjoyed from time to time of country gentlemen’s wives.

’Tis no long while since a very fair, great and honourable lady, which myself have known, going in this wise to forward her case at the Paris Courts, one seeing it did say, “Why! what doth she think to do? She will surely lose, for she hath no great claim of right and justice.” But, tell me, doth not her right and justice lie in the beauty of her fore part, even as Cæsar did bear his on the pommel and point of his sword?[95*]