This luxurious, magnificent, expensive mode of living was carried on for so long a time, increasing to such an alarming extent, that his brother René presented a memoir or petition to the King, called in history _Mémoires des Héritiers_, wherein these expenditures and extravagances were set forth at as great length and with as much detail and redundant phrase as though it were a bill in equity. This memoir ended with the prayer that the King should pass a decree against Gilles, interdicting him from making sale, transfer, or alienation, or mortgaging or pledging any of his property. This process is not unknown to French law. Without having the law of primogeniture as in England, the heirs yet had certain rights which, consequent upon the death of Gilles, would accrue to them under the law of France, and thus it was that the King was prayed to take the necessary steps for the protection of the rights of the heirs. In this proceeding his brother, René de la Suze, seems to have been the principal and moving spirit, although he was afterwards aided and abetted by his cousin, Guy de Laval. From the _Mémoires des Héritiers_ we get a knowledge of the property of Gilles de Retz. The list of his lands, possessions, and income, with his family ancestry, through which he received them, was as follows: From the house of Rais, left by Joan la Sage, first the title of Baron and then the rank of Dean of Barons in the duchy of Brittany, with its châteaux and dependencies in great number, of which the principal only are named--Machecoul, Saint-Étienne-de-Mer-Morte, Pornic, Prinçay (or Princé), Vue, Ile de Bouin, etc. From the house of Montmorency-Laval, the original ancestry of his father,--independent of his adoption by Joan la Sage,--the seigniories of Blaison, of Chemillé, of Fontaine-Milon, and of Grattecuisse in Anjou; of Ambrières, Saint-Aubin-de-Fosse-Louvain, province of Maine; and others in Brittany. From the house of Craon, through his grandfather and his mother, the Hôtel de la Suze at Nantes; the seigniories and châteaux of Briollay, Champtocé, and Ingrandes, province of Anjou; of Sénéché, Loroux-Botereau, Bénate, Bourgneuf-en-Rais, Voulte, and others. From his wife, on their marriage, Tiffauges, Pouzauges, Chabanais, Confolens, Châteaumorant, Savenay, Lombert, Grez-sur-Maine, with “_plusiers autres terres fort belles, et leurs dépendencies_.” The value of this immense property has been estimated at four and a half millions of francs, though this may be exaggerated. His personal property was valued at one time at a hundred thousand golden crowns, and his income was variously estimated from thirty to sixty thousand pounds per annum. It was alleged that he had made sales and transfers of property in an improvident manner and to an unjustifiable extent, dissipating to that extent his patrimony, to the damage of his estate and the detriment of his heirs. These were given somewhat in detail in the _Mémoires_, etc., viz.: