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Grandeur and gallantry never appeared with more lustre in France, than in the last years of Henry the Second's reign. This Prince was amorous and handsome, and though his passion for Diana of Poitiers Duchess of Valentinois, was of above twenty years standing, it was not the less violent, nor did he give less distinguishing proofs of it.
Madam de Valentinois being jealous of a lady whom he had formerly loved, and whose wit and beauty were capable of lessening her interest, joined herself to the Constable, who was no more desirous than herself that the King should marry a sister of the Duke of Guise; they possessed the deceased King with their sentiments; and though he mortally hated the Duchess of Valentinois, and loved the Queen, he joined his endeavours with theirs to prevent the divorce; but in order to take from the King all thoughts of marrying the Queen my mother, they struck up a marriage between her and the King of Scotland, who had had for his first wife the King's sister, and they did this because it was the easiest to be brought to a conclusion, though they failed in their engagements to the King of England, who was very desirous of marrying her; and that failure wanted but little of occasioning a rupture between the two Crowns: for Henry the Eighth was inconsolable, when he found himself disappointed in his expectations of marrying my mother; and whatever other Princess of France was proposed to him, he always said, nothing could make him amends for her he had been deprived of.
Madame de Valentinois came to me with tears in her eyes to repeat the cruel remark of the princess; the marechale de Mirepoix, who heard her, sought to console her by assurances, that it would in no degree affect her interest at court. "Never mind, my good friend," said she; "the pretty bird merely warbles the notes it learns from its keeper la Vauguyon, and will as quickly forget as learn them.
Louise married, at the age of seventeen, Louis de la Tremouille, Prince de Talmont and Vicomte de Thouars, known as the Knight Sans Peur et Sans Reproche. She maintained some correspondence with her aunt, Lucrezia Borgia, whom she had never seen, and ever signed herself "Louise de Valentinois."
Le Brusquet had sought the tennis courts, haunted the apartments of La Valentinois, and lounged about the lawns where the ladies and gallants of the Court played at grelot of an evening; but in vain. Finally, he mounted his mule, and ambled off to the great square house behind the Bourgogne, where Antony of Vendôme lodged with his train.
M. de Monaco, who had obtained for himself the title of foreign prince by the marriage of his son with the Duchesse de Valentinois, daughter of M. le Grand, and who enjoyed, as it were, the sovereignty of a rock beyond whose narrow limits anybody might spit, so to speak, whilst standing in the middle soon found, and his son still more so, that they had bought the title very dearly.
And so, the matter being considered and determined, Cesare quitted Rome on the 12th and left it for the Pope to give answer to the Pisan envoys in the Consistory of June 14 that neither his Holiness nor the Duke of Valentinois could assent to the proposals which Pisa made. From Rome Cesare travelled swiftly to Spoleto, where his army, some ten thousand strong, was encamped.
The crafty young Florentine he was thirty-three at the time was sent to temporize and to avoid committing himself or his Government. Valentinois listened to the specious compliments, and replied by similar protestations and by reminding Florence how he had curbed the hand of those very condottieri who had now rebelled against him as a consequence.
Carracciuolo learned the news through one of the fugitives, who declared that he had recognised among the ravishers the Duke of Valentinois' soldiers.
Some witty people have remarked that the duchess of Valentinois spoke truly, and that she was as faithful in one case as in the other. Above the entablature, the equestrian statue, of the senechal, in white marble is placed.
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