Chapter C: A. SAINTE-BEUVE, Causeries du Lundi (1852) (4)

It was she who received so honourably our young King Charles VIII. when he went to his kingdom of Naples, through all her lands and principally her city of Turin, where she gave him a pompous entry, and met him in person, very sumptuously accoutred. She showed she felt herself a great lady; for she appeared that day in magnificent state, dressed in a grand gown of crinkled cloth of gold, edged with large diamonds, rubies, sapphires, emeralds, and other precious stones. Round her throat she wore a necklace of very large oriental pearls, the value of which none could estimate, with bracelets of the same. She was mounted on a beautiful white ambling mare, harnessed most superbly and led by six lacqueys dressed in figured cloth of gold. A great band of damoiselles followed her, very richly, daintily, and neatly dressed in the Piedmont fashion, which was fine to see; and after them came a very long troop of noblemen and knights of the country. Then there entered and marched King Charles, beneath a rich canopy, and went to the castle, where he lodged, and where Madame de Savoie presented to him her son, who was very young. After which she made the king a fine harangue, offering her lands and means, both hers and her son’s; which the king received with very good heart, and thanked her much, feeling greatly obliged to her. Throughout the town were everywhere seen the arms of France and those of Savoie interlaced in a great lover’s-knot, which bound together the two escutcheons and the two orders, with these words: _Sanguinis arctus amor_; as may be read in the “Chronicles of Savoie.”

I have heard several of our fathers and mothers, who got it from their parents, and also Mademoiselle the Sénéchale de Poitou, my grandmother, then a damoiselle at Court, affirm that nothing was talked of but the beauty, wisdom, and wit of this princess, when the courtiers and gallants returned from their journey; and, above all, by the king, who seemed, from appearance, to be wounded in his heart.

At any rate, even without her beauty, he had good reason to love her; for she aided him with all the means in her power, and gave up her jewels and pearls and precious stones to send them to him that he might use them and pledge them as he pleased; which was indeed a very great obligation, for ladies bear a great affection to their precious stones and rings and jewels, and would sooner give and pledge some precious piece of their person than their wealth of jewels--I speak of some, not all. Certainly this obligation was great; for without this courtesy, and that also of the Marquise de Montferrat, a very virtuous lady and very handsome, he would have met in the long run a short shame, and must have returned from the semi-journey he had undertaken without money; having done worse than that bishop of France who went to the Council of Trent without money and without Latin. What an embarkation without biscuit! However, there is a difference between the two; for what one did was out of noble generosity and fine ambition, which closed his eyes to all inconveniency, thinking nothing impossible to his brave heart; while as for the other, he lacked wit and ability, sinning in that through ignorance and stupidity--if it was not that he trusted to beg them when he got there.

In this discourse that I have made of that fine entry, there is to be noted the superbness of the accoutrements of this princess, which seem to be more those of a married woman than a widow. Upon which the ladies said that for so great a king she could dispense with mourning; and also that great people, men and women, gave the law to themselves; and besides, that in those times the widows, so it was said, were not so restricted nor so reformed in their clothes as they have been since for the last forty years; like a certain lady whom I know, who, being in the good graces and delights of a king [probably Diane de Poitiers] dressed herself much _à la_ modest (though always in silk), the better to cover and hide her game; and in that respect, the widows of the Court, wishing to imitate her, did the same. But this lady did not reform herself so much, nor to such austerity, that she ceased to dress prettily and pompously, though always in black and white; indeed there seemed more of worldliness than of widow’s reformation about it; for especially did she always show her beautiful bosom. I have heard the queen, mother of King Henri, say the same thing at the coronation and wedding of King Henri III., namely: that the widows in times past did not have such great regard to their clothes and to modesty of actions as they have to-day; the which she said she saw in the times of King François, who wanted his Court to be free in every way; and even the widows danced, and the partners took them as readily as if they were girls or married women. She said on this point that she commanded and begged M. de Vaudemont to honour the fête by taking out Madame la Princesse de Condé, the dowager, to dance; which he did to obey her; and he took the princess to the grand ball; those who were at the coronation, like myself, saw it, and remember it well. These were the liberties that widows had in the olden time. To-day such things are forbidden them like sacrilege; and as for colours, they dare not wear them, or dress in anything but black and white; though their skirts and petticoats and also their stockings they may wear of a tan-gray, violet, or blue. Some that I see emancipate themselves in flesh-coloured red and chamois colour, as in times past, when, as I have heard said, all colours could be worn in petticoats and stockings, but not in gowns.

So this duchess, about whom we have been speaking, could very well wear this gown of cloth of gold, that being her ducal garment and her robe of grandeur, the which was becoming and permissible in her to show her sovereignty and dignity of duchess. Our widows of to-day dare not wear precious stones, except on their fingers, on some mirrors, on some “Hours,” and on their belts; but never on their heads or bodies, unless a few pearls on their neck and arms. But I swear to you I have seen widows as dainty as could be in their black and white gowns, who attracted quite as many and as much as the bedizened brides and maidens of France. There is enough said now of this foreign widow.

9. _Catherine de Clèves, wife of Henri I. de Lorraine, Duc de Guise._

Madame de Guise, Catherine de Clèves, one of the three daughters of Nevers (three princesses who cannot be lauded enough either for their beauty or their virtues, and of whom I hope to make a chapter), has celebrated and celebrates daily the eternal absence of her husband [Le Balafré, killed at Blois 1588]. But oh! what a husband he was! The none-such of the world! That is what she called him in several letters which she wrote to certain ladies of her intimacy whom she held in esteem, after her misfortune; manifesting in sad and grievous words the regrets of her wounded soul.

10. _Madame de Bourdeille._

Madame de Bourdeille, issuing from the illustrious and ancient house of Montbéron, and from the Comtes de Périgord and the Vicomtes d’Aunay, became a widow at the age of thirty-seven or thirty-eight, very beautiful (in Guyenne, where she lived, it was believed that none surpassed her in her day for beauty, grace, and noble appearance); and being thus in fine estate and widowed, she was sought in marriage and pursued by three very great and rich seigneurs, to whom she answered:--

“I shall not say as many ladies do, who declare they will never marry, and give their word in such a way that they must be believed, after which nothing comes of it; but I do say that, if God and flesh do not give me any other wishes than I have at present, it is a very certain thing that I have bade farewell to marriage forever.”

And then, as some one said to her, “But, madame, would you burn of love in the flower of your age?” she answered: “I know not what you mean. For up to this hour I have never been even warmed, but widowed and cold as ice. Still, I do not say that, being in company with a second husband and approaching his fire, I might not burn, as you think. But because cold is easier to bear than heat, I am resolved to remain in my present quality and to abstain from a second marriage.”

And just as she said then, so she has remained to the present day, a widow these twelve years, without the least losing her beauty, but always nourishing it and taking care of it, so that it has not a single spot. Which is a great respect to the ashes of her husband, and a proof that she loved him well; also an injunction on her children to honour her always. The late M. Strozzi was one of those who courted her and asked her in marriage; but great as he was and allied to the queen-mother, she refused him and excused herself kindly. But what a humour was this! to be beautiful, virtuous, a very rich heiress, and yet to end her days on a solitary feather-bed and blanket, desolate and cold as ice, and thus to pass so many widowed nights! Oh! how many there be unlike this lady--but some are like her, too.