But of all the gay ladies Brantome loves to dwell upon, his favorites are the two Marguerites:  Marguerite of Angouleme, Queen of Navarre, the sister of Francis I., and Marguerite, daughter of Catherine de’ Medici and wife of Henry IV.  Of the latter, called familiarly “La Reine Margot,” he is always writing.  “To speak of the beauty of this rare princess,” he says, “I think that all that are, or will be, or have ever been near her are ugly.”

Brantome has been a puzzle to many critics, who cannot explain his “contradictions.”  He had none.  He extolled wicked and immoral characters because he recognized only two merits,—­aristocratic birth and hatred of the Huguenots.  He is well described by M. de Barante, who says:—­“Brantome expresses the entire character of his country and of his profession.  Careless of the difference between good and evil; a courtier who has no idea that anything can be blameworthy in the great, but who sees and narrates their vices and their crimes all the more frankly in that he is not very sure whether what he tells be good or bad; as indifferent to the honor of women as he is to the morality of men; relating scandalous things with no consciousness that they are such, and almost leading his reader into accepting them as the simplest things in the world, so little importance does he attach to them; terming Louis XI., who poisoned his brother, the good King Louis, calling women whose adventures could hardly have been written by any pen save his own, honnetes dames.”

Brantome must therefore not be regarded as a chronicler who revels in scandals, although his pages reek with them; but as the true mirror of the Valois court and the Valois period.

* * * * *

THE DANCING OF ROYALTY

From ‘Lives of Notable Women’

Ah! how the times have changed since I saw them together in the ball-room, expressing the very spirit of the dance!  The King always opened the grand ball by leading out his sister, and each equaled the other in majesty and grace.  I have often seen them dancing the Pavane d’Espagne, which must be performed with the utmost majesty and grace.  The eyes of the entire court were riveted upon them, ravished by this lovely scene; for the measures were so well danced, the steps so intelligently placed, the sudden pauses timed so accurately and making so elegant an effect, that one did not know what to admire most,—­the beautiful manner of moving, or the majesty of the halts, now expressing excessive gayety, now a beautiful and haughty disdain.  Who could dance with such elegance and grace as the royal brother and sister?  None, I believe; and I have watched the King dancing with the Queen of Spain and the Queen of Scotland, each of whom was an excellent dancer.

I have seen them dance the ‘Pazzemezzo d’Italie,’ walking gravely through the measures, and directing their steps with so graceful and solemn a manner that no other prince nor lady could approach them in dignity.  This Queen took great pleasure in performing these grave dances; for she preferred to exhibit dignified grace rather than to express the gayety of the Branle, the Volta, and the Courante.  Although she acquired them quickly, she did not think them worthy of her majesty.