[66] This Gascon gentleman is a person of some interest, from his name being mentioned by Caxton. He was resident at the English court, as a servant of Anthony lord Scales (the queen's brother) as early as the year 1466, when in a letter, dated at London, on the 16th of June, he challenged sir Jehan de Chassa, a knight in the retinue of the duke of Burgundy, to do battle with him in honour of a noble lady of high estimation, immediately after the performance of the intended combat in London between the lord Scales and the bastard of Burgundy. His letter of challenge, in which he terms the king of England his sovereign lord, is printed in the Excerpta Historica, 1831, p. 216; and that of sir Jehan de Chassa accepting it at p. 219, addressed, A treshonnouré escueire Louys de Brutallis. His own signature is Loys de Brutalljs. The encounter is thus noticed in the Annals of William of Wyrcestre: "Et iijo die congressi sunt pedestres in campo, in præsencia regis, Lodowicus Bretailles cum Burgundiæ; deditque Rex honorem ambobus, attamen Bretailles habuit se melius in campo:" and thus by Olivier de la Marche: "On the morrow Messire Jehan de Cassa and a Gascon squire named Louis de Brettailles, servant of Mons. d'Escalles, did arms on foot: and they accomplished these arms without hurting one another much. And on the morrow they did arms on horseback; wherein Messire Jean de Chassa had great honour, and was held for a good runner at the lance." Lowys de Bretaylles, as his name is printed by Caxton, was still attendant upon the same nobleman, then earl Rivers, in 1473, when he went to the pilgrimage of St. James in Galicia; and upon that occasion, soon after sailing from Southampton, he lent to the earl the Book of Les Dictes Moraux des Philosophes, written in French by Johan de Tronville, which the earl translated, and caused it to be printed by Caxton, as The Dicts and Sayings of the Philosophers, in 1477.
[67] Fabyan's Chronicle.
[68] The former importance and power of the constable are thus described by Commines: "Some persons may perhaps hereafter ask, Whether the king alone was not able to have ruined him? I answer, No; for his territories lay just between those of the king and the duke of Burgundy: he had St. Quintin always, and another strong town in Vermandois: he had Ham and Bohain, and other considerable places not far from St. Quintin, which he might always garrison with what troops (and of what country) he pleased. He had four hundred of the king's men at arms, well paid; was commissary himself, and made his own musters,—by which means he feathered his nest very well, for he never had his complement. He had likewise a salary of forty-five thousand francs, and exacted a crown upon every pipe of wine that passed into Hainault or Flanders through any of his dominions; and, besides all this, he had great lordships and possessions of his own, a great interest in France, and a greater in Burgundy, on account of his kinsmen."
[69] None had actually been made with Burgundy by the treaty of the 29th of August. Commines certainly wrote under a misapprehension in that respect, as well as upon the number of years of the truce with England.
[70] Besides the lady Margaret there were two sons: Maximilian, afterwards the emperor Maximilian, and Philip. There was a contract of marriage in 1479 between the latter and the lady Anne of England, one of the daughters of Edward the Fourth. (Rymer, xii. 110.)
[71] Margaret herself was eventually rejected by Charles VIII. who was nearly nine years her senior. When he had the opportunity of marrying the heiress of Bretagne, and thereby annexing that duchy to France, Margaret was sent back to her father in 1493, and afterwards married in 1497 to John infante of Castile, and in 1501 to Philibert duke of Savoy. She subsequently nearly yielded to the suit of Charles Brandon lord Lisle, (afterwards the husband of Mary queen dowager of France,) who was made duke of Suffolk by his royal master in order to be more worthy of her acceptance; but at last she died childless in 1530, after a widowhood of six and twenty years, and a long and prosperous reign as regent of the Netherlands.
[72] Paston Letters, vol. i. p. 172.
[73] "Whiche book was translated and thystoryes openly declared by the ordinaunce and desyre of the noble auncyent knyght Syr Johan Fastolf, of the countee of Norfolk banerette, lyvyng' the age of four score yere, excercisyng' the warrys in the Royame of Fraunce and other countrees for the diffence and universal welfare of bothe royames of Englond' and' Fraunce, by fourty yeres enduryng', the fayte of armes haunting, and in admynystryng Justice and polytique governaunce under thre kynges, that is to wete, Henry the fourth, Henry the fyfthe, Henry the syxthe, And was governour of the duchye of Angeou and the countee of Mayne, Capytayn of many townys, castellys, and fortressys in the said Royame of Fraunce, havyng' the charge and saufgarde of them dyverse yeres, ocupyeng' and rewlynge thre honderd' speres and' the bowes acustomed thenne, And yeldyng' good' acompt of the foresaid townes, castellys, and fortresses to the seyd' kynges and to theyr lyeutenauntes, Prynces of noble recomendacion, as Johan regent of Fraunce Duc of Bedforde, Thomas duc of Excestre, Thomas duc of Clarence, and other lyeutenauntes." This may be considered as a grateful tribute from William of Worcestre, when himself advanced in years (he died in or about 1484), to the memory of his ancient master, sir John Fastolfe, who had died in 1460. The biography of William of Worcestre was written by the Rev. James Dallaway in the Retrospective Review, vol. xvi. p. 451; and reprinted in 4to. 1823, in his volume entitled "William Wyrcestre redivivus: Notices of Ancient Church Architecture, particularly in Bristol," &c.; but the latest and most agreeable sketch of Worcestre's life is that given by Mr. G. Poulett Scrope in his History of Castle Combe, 1852, 4to.
[74] He has recorded that in 1473 he presented a copy of his translation to bishop Waynflete,—"but received no reward!" His version was not made from the original, but from the French of Laurentius de Primo Facto, or du Premier-Faict: an industrious French translator, who flourished from 1380 to 1420.
[75] Bale, in his list of the works of Worcestre, whom he notices under his alias of Botoner, mentions Acta Domini Joannis Fastolf, lib. I, (commencing) "Anno Christi 1421, et anno regni—"