these epigrams, which are entitled: IN PICTAVIAM, ANAM AULIGAM.

"A painted trap catches no game," says the poet, after telling Diane
that she painted her face and bought her teeth and hair. "You may buy
all that superficially makes a woman, but you can't buy that your
lover wants; for he wants life, and you are dead."

This collection, printed by Simon de Colines, is dedicated to a
bishop!--to Francois Bohier, the brother of the man who, to save his
credit at court and redeem his offence, offered to Diane, on the
accession of Henri II., the chateau de Chenonceaux, built by his
father, Thomas Bohier, a councillor of state under four kings: Louis
XI., Charles VIII., Louis XII., and Francois I. What were the
pamphlets published against Madame de Pompadour and against
Marie-Antoinette compared to these verses, which might have been
written by Martial? Voute must have made a bad end. The estate and
chateau cost Diane nothing more than the forgiveness enjoined by the
gospel. After all, the penalties inflicted on the press, though not
decreed by juries, were somewhat more severe than those of to-day.

The queens of France, on becoming widows, were required to remain in
the king's chamber forty days without other light than that of wax
tapers; they did not leave the room until after the burial of the
king. This inviolable custom was a great annoyance to Catherine, who
feared cabals; and, by chance, she found a means to evade it, thus:
Cardinal de Lorraine, leaving, very early in the morning, the house of
the /belle Romaine/, a celebrated courtesan of the period, who lived
in the rue Culture-Sainte-Catherine, was set upon and maltreated by a
party of libertines. "On which his holiness, being much astonished"
(says Henri Estienne), "gave out that the heretics were preparing