WOMEN AND MEN OF THE FRENCH RENAISSANCE.* THKRE was room
for this very agreeable book ofMiss Sichers among the literature of the French Renaissance. In English, at least we know no book that gives a historical account of the early sixteenth century from this point of view, a wider one than Madame Darmesteter's in her Life of Margaret of Angoule:me. That wonderful Valois Princess is the chief figure in this book, it is true, but she stands out among a crowd of others, some almost equally picturesque.
We lay down the book with a quickened perception of Francis I.'s world, though hardly, perhaps, with a clearer realisation of himself. It is, as it always has been, difficult to understand why this politic, shallow, selfish, and not very generous Prince, with his small eyes, long nose, and splendid garments, should have kept the passionate affection of so superior a spirit as Margaret. Great curiosity in modern knowledge, a fine taste in the arts, a delicate fancy in the presents be gave to a few special favourites : it is difficult to find any higher merits in Francis. Perhaps we may forgive him a good deal for making a child happy with "some red dolls, a cradle, a toy tournament, a tiny ivory box, and a doll's kitchen in silver." Such entries as this in the King's accounts seem to show the most attractive side of his com- plicated character.
We think that Miss Sichel has succeeded very well—and the task is difficult—in making us feel the difference between the Italian and the French development of this new life in the minds of men. The difference is that which has always existed between Italy and France. The playfulness of France, when she does play, is lighter, and yet more self-controlled, than that of Italy. She has more mind, more logic, beneath her diversions. Italy is a wild animal, or an irresponsible child, while France is a reasonable being. The French mind, the mind of Margaret of Angouleme, advancing from the Dark Ages into the light of modern day, rejoices in width and freedom, examines, argues, is tolerant, loves discovery in every direction, adores beauty, and yet is too reasonable to give the fling to all its own passions and tendencies, like a Borgia or a Sforza of Italy. The elegance and fancy of Chenonceanx or Chaumont or Azay-le-Rideau, practical and wise as well as playful and beautiful, are the very expression of the French Renaissance. Not that the actual morality, to judge by the literature of the time, was much higher in French society than in Italian ; but life seems to have been less cruel, less animal. Refine- ment, as we understand it, was of course a thing almost unknown. And perhaps this is a slight defect in Miss filchers interesting book : that she leaves the moral or immoral side of things rather too much to the reader's imagination, and writes of Margaret of Angouleme as of a literary Princess of the present day. The fact is, it is very difficult to draw a true Renaissance picture for the public of Messrs. Mudie and Co. We may talk glibly about a state of society into which some of us are rather inclined to slip back; but few even of these quite clearly realise what that state of society was.
Among the many contemporary figures gathered round Margaret of Angouleme, Queen of Navarre, are her clever and unscrupulous mother, Louise of Savoy, her lover Bonnivets her friends among scholars, such as Bude, organiser of the College de France, and many a poet and poetess who regarded her as their chief inspiration. The romantic history of Louise Labe, the poetess of Lyons, shows a typical "advanced" woman of the sixteenth century. The story of the Constable de Bourbon is a brilliant and very tragic picture of the life of a great soldier and noble near the throne. His mild and rather pleasing portrait is hardly that of a man full of changes and treasons, nor of him who led that terrible mob of adventurers to the last and worst sack of Rome : but we must remember in his favour that he was killed in the first
• Women and Men of the French Renaissance. By Edith Sichel. With Numerous Illustrations. London : A. Constable and Co. [Di& net.]
assault. The destruction might not have been so great had he lived to command and restrain his army.
We have very clear and pleasant sketches of such Renais- sance figures as Jean and Francois Clouet, the painters ; Estienne, the printer ; Cousin, the glass-painter; and the throng of artists, sculptors, architects who made France beautiful in this century. Indeed, Miss Sichel mentions, with more or less detail, every interesting personage of the time, Ronsard and Marot and Rabelais included, with men like Etienne Dolet and Saint-Gelais and Olivier de Magny to throw the greater ones into relief. But always, as is right, the central figure is the Marguerite des Marguerites with her large-minded studies in romance and religion, her love of books, of beautiful bindings ; her letter-writing ; her pictures worked in tapestry ; her rich dresses ; the magnifi- cence of her houses ; the generosity which always helped her friends and the poor, no matter whether she was her- self in money straits or not ; her sweet smile and gracious manners ; her thoughts always original. When one reflects on all these characteristics of the first Margaret of Navarre, it is plain to see. that Henry IV. inherited most of his charm and his open-mindedness from his grandmother.
Very much less attractive is the picture of Jeanne, the only child of Margaret who lived to grow up. She, too, was of a most decided character, uncrushed by the horrid ill- treatment by which the King, her uncle, tried to induce her to marry the Duke of Olives; but she shows the hard side of the French Renaissance. Loving books and learning, led towards reform by independence of mind and a passion for - novelty, she had little of her mother's sympathy with all things human; and the mother and daughter did not add to each other's happiness.
There is one person, lightly touched upon by Miss Sichel as "a sumptuous young scholar with Protestant leanings, divided between Olympus and Geneva," whose life and mind would repay, we think, a much fuller study. This is "Renee de France," celebrated by Clement Marot, daughter of Louis XII., sister of Queen Claude, and wife of the Duke of Ferrara. The patroness of Reformers, she also, long before her time, gave the strongest encouragement to scholarship among women. Her political and religious disagreements with her husband, her love of France in Italy, her wide- mindedness and strength of character, with all the curious circumstances of her life, a plain and lame but entirely French and Renaissance Princess : all this makes her, in her way, as typical a figure of the time and nation as Margaret of .Angouleme het self. We wish that Miss Sichel would some day make " ce noble co3ur de Renee de France" the subject of a separate and detailed study.
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