The _Commentaires_ of BLAISE DE MONLUC (1502-77) are said to have been named by Henri IV. "the soldier's Bible"; the Bible is one which does not always inculcate mercy or peace. Monluc, a Gascon of honourable birth and a soldier of fortune, had the instinct of battle in his blood; from a soldier he rose through every rank to be the King's lieutenant of Guyenne and a Marshal of France; during fifty years he fought, as a daring captain rather than as a great general, amorous of danger, and at length, terribly disfigured by wounds, he sat down, not to rest, but to wield his pen as if it were a sword of steel. His _Commentaires_ were meant to be a manual for hardy combatants, and what model could he set before the young aspirant so animating as himself? In his earlier wars against the foreign foes of his country, Monluc was indeed a model of military prowess; the civil wars added cruelty to his courage; after a fashion he was religious, and a short shrift and a cord were good enough for heretics and adversaries of his King. An unlettered soldier, Monluc, by virtue of his energy of character and directness of speech, became a most impressive and spirited narrator. His Memoirs close with a sigh for stern and inviolable solitude. Among the Pyrenean rocks he had formerly observed a lonely monastery, in view at once of Spain and France; there it was his wish to end his days. From the opposite party in the great religious and political strife came the temperate Memoirs of Lanoue, the simple and beautiful record of her husband's life by Madame de Mornay, and that of his own career, written in an old age of gloom and passion, by D'Aubigne. The ideas of Henri IV.--himself a royal author in his _Lettres missives_--are embodied in the _OEconomies Royales_ of the statesman Sully, whose secretaries were employed for the occasion in laboriously reciting his words and deeds as they had learnt them from their chief. The superficial aspects of the life of society, the manners and morals--or lack of morals--of the time, are lightly and brightly exhibited by PIERRE DE BOURDEILLE, lord of BRANTOME, Catholic abbe, soldier and courtier, observer of the great world, gossip of amorous secrets. His _Vies des Hommes Illustres et des Grands Capitaines_, his _Vies des Dames Illustres et des Dames Galantes_, and his _Memoires_ contained matter too dangerous, perhaps, for publication during his lifetime, but the author cherished the thought of his posthumous renown. Brantome, wholly indifferent to good and evil, had a vivid interest in life; virtue and vice concerned him alike and equally, if only they had vivacity, movement, colour; and although, as with Monluc, it was a physical calamity that made him turn to authorship, he wrote with a naive art, an easy grace, and abundant spirit. To correct and complete Brantome's narrative as it related to herself, Marguerite, Queen of Navarre, first wife of Henri IV., prepared her