throat, and La Berthe, another of the seconds,
was wounded also. Botteville and de Beuvrou
went quietly to lunch at a barber's shop
close by, while La Berthe had his wounds
dressed, and poor de Bussy confessed to a
friar and died. De Botteville fled again;
but, recognised by a sister of De Bussy, was
brought back to Paris, tried for murder and
beheaded; sorely troubled about his
moustaches—the finest in France. A few years
later the Due de Nemours and the Duc de
Beaufort —brothers-in-law—with four seconds
a-piece, met to decide a quarrel, with pistols
and swords. De Nemours was shot dead;
and of De Beaufort's seconds, D'Henricourt
was shot by the Marquis de Villars, and De
Ris by the Due d'Uzerches. This was in
sixteen hundred and fifty-two, after the
accession of Louis the Fourteenth.

Le Comte de Coliguy, one day leaving the
apartment of his lady love, Madame de
Longueville, Conde's sister, dropped a woman's
letter, which, amongst more pleasant and
tender things, contained various malicious
words against Madame de Montbazon, mother-
in-law to Madame de Chevreuse; between
whom and De Longueville there was open
war. The letter was found, and ascribed to
Madame de Longueville. She, wishing to deny the
charge, insisted that Coligny, her lover, should
challenge De Guise, the lover of Madame de
Montbazon; which accordingly was done.
The two men. met in the Place Royale, and
Coliguy was mortally wounded; the seconds,
D'Estrade and De Bridieu, fought at the same
time all in open day and Bridieu was
severely hurt. It is singular that just seventy
years before, the grandfather of this Coligny,
the noble Admiral and Huguenot, had been
murdered in the Bartholomew massacres by
order of the grandfather of the De Guise, who
now killed the descendant.

One day, le Comte de Eochefort drank
himself mad, with le Comte d'Harcourt and a
large party. It was proposed that they should
all go on the Pout Neuf and rob; an amusement
introduced by the Due d'Orléans.
Rochefort and the Chevalier de Rieux, not
wishing to join in that questionable sport,
climbed up on the neck of the large bronze
horse of Henry the Fourth, thence to look
down on their companions robbing the passers
by of their purses and cloaks. Suddenly a party
of archers appeared in sight, and the titled
highwaymen took to their heels; but, De
Rieux, in trying to get down, hung too
heavily on to the bronze bridle of the statue,
broke it, and fell to the ground. He was
captured, and both he and Rochefort were
sent to the Chatelet. De Rieux threw all the
blame on Rochefort, who, when they were
liberated, challenged him; but, the Chevalier
would not fight, though the count struck him
with the flat of his sword to stir him up.
However, Rochefort was determined to fight
some one; so, failing De Rieux he turned to
Harcourt; but Harcourt declined on account
of his rank. In revenge Rochefort and one
of his creatures cut down all the finest trees
on his estate, destroyed his preserves, and
committed all sorts of depredations, until a
relative of the count, one Breaute, a professed
desperado, called out, disarmed and wounded
Rochefort. The Cardinal Mazarin, whose
friend and tool Rochefort was, sent him a
purse of five hundred crowns and his own
surgeon; so little did even the Church in
those days uphold order or repudiate crime.
When recovered from his wound, Rochefort,
joined this time by Des Planches, set out to
further harry M. le Comte d'Harcourt; but,
quarrelling by the way, they fell to fisticuffs
with each other, and Des Planches amused
himself by peppering Rochefort as he poached
on Harcourt's preserves; excusing himself by
saying that he thought it was the count and
his gamekeepers.

In sixteen hundred and sixty-three La
Frète and De Chalais were leaving a
ballroom together. They had long been on bad
terms, and La Frète pushed against Chalais
rudely. A meeting was agreed on, of three
against three; which, coming to the king's
ears, he sent Saint Aignau with a message
to La Frète, telling him that if he went out
he should have his throat cut. Saint Aignau,
who was a relation to La Frète, delivered
his message, but as a corollary stayed behind
to fight against the Marquis d'Autin, who
was hunted up for the occasion, so as to
make a grander party of four against four.
Louis was excessively angry at this gross act
of disobedience, and the noble duellists had
all to fly the country. Duelling brought no
sense of sin or shame with it, under any
circumstances. It was a legal offence, being
against the royal ordonnances; but it carried
no moral obloquy along with its legal penalties.
When the Marquis de Douza was on
the eve of execution for the murder of his
brother-in-law, his only reply to his confessor
who exhorted him to repent of his crime,
was, "Sandis! do you call one of the cleverest
thrusts in Gascony a crime?"

It was only after many generations that the
anti-duelling society, founded by the priest of
Saint Sulpice, M. Olier, and enrolling as
its first member the brave and virtuous
Marquis de Fénélon, made any way with the
public. As yet, duels were honourable, necessary,
and a title to distinction in the minds
of all. Sometimes, however, they had a
ludicrous side. Madaillan sent a challenge to the
Marquis de Rivard, who had lost a leg at
the siege of Puy Cerda. The marquis
accepted; but sent with his answer a case
of surgical instruments, insisting that
Madaillan should first lose his leg, so as to place
them on an equal footing together. The joke
hindered the duel. La Fontaine, too; was
forced by a friend into fighting a duel with a
certain young officer, whose attentions to
Madame were more expressive than becoming.
The good, peaceful, old philosopher