◆Ronsard the poet was born 1524, being the son of Louis de Ronsard, sieur de la Poissonnière, an officer in the household of King Francis I., and died 1586. He enjoyed an immense reputation in his lifetime, and was the favourite poet of Mary Queen of Scots. Her lover, the unfortunate Chastelard, read his _Hymne de la mort_ on the scaffold, and refused any other book or confessor to prepare him for death. Originator and leading member of the famous _Pleïade_ of Poets. [32] P. 46: ◆He was a Florentine, Luigi di Ghiaceti, who had grown rich by negotiating the taxes with the king. He married the beautiful Mlle. d’Atri, and to please her he had bought for 400,000 francs the estate of Chateauvilain. Mme. de Chateauvilain was a model of virtue, if Brantôme is to be believed; but we wonder, fully agreeing with the author of the notes to the _Journal de Henri III._, where this lady could have acquired her virtue—was it at the court or at her husband’s estate? Besides this gallery of pictures which is mentioned here, Louis Adjecet (the French form for Luigi Ghiaceti) had mistresses with whom he indulged in the low appetites of rich upstarts. He was killed in 1593 by an officer; and his wife withdrew to Langres, where she lived with her children. [33] P. 47: ◆Ariosto, _Orlando furioso_, canto XLII., stanza 98. Ecco un donzello a chi l’ufficio tocca Por su la mensa un bel nappo d’or fino.... ◆Very likely Bernardin Turissan. Brantôme is perhaps referring to the _Ragionamento della Nanna_, printed in Paris in 1534, without the name of the publisher. The _peggio_ must have been one of those infamous Italian books which the noblemen of the court wrangled over. The _Nanna_ was well known at the French court (see _Le Divorce satyrique_, t. I. of the _Journal de Henri III._, 1720 edition, p. 190). ◆Bernardino Turisan, who used as his sign the well-known mark of the Manutii, his kinsmen. ◆Pietro Aretino was born at Arezzo in Tuscany in 1492. The natural son of a plain gentleman he became the companion and protégé of Princes, and their unscrupulous and adroit flatterer. Friend of Michael Angelo and Titian. His works are full of learning and wit,—and obscenity. [34] P. 48: ◆This book, entitled _La Somme des péchés et les remèdes d’iceux_ (Compendium of all Sins, and the Remedies of the same), printed at Lyons, by Charles Pesnot c. 1584, 4to, and several times since, was compiled by Jean Benedict, a Cordelier monk of Brittany. He has filled it with filth and foulness as full as did the Jesuit Sanchez his treatise _De Matrimonio_ (on Marriage). It is a singular fact that a work so indecent should have been none the less dedicated to the Holy Virgin. As we see from the text, Brantôme and his fellows quite well understood how to turn such works to their advantage and find fresh stories of lubricity in their pages. [35] P. 49: