[247] Andre Hurault, Seigneur de Maisse, had been ambassador to Venice under both Henri III and Henri IV, and in his official capacity had frequent disputes with the nuncios of Sixtus V and Clement VIII, in consequence of which those prelates exerted all their influence to injure his interests at the Court of Rome.  Andre Morosin mentions M. de Maisse as an able and far-seeing man, sagaci admodum ingenio.  In 1595 Henri IV again sent him to Venice to offer his thanks to the Senate for the extraordinary embassy which they had forwarded to him during the previous year; and as M. de Maisse travelled on this occasion with Cardinal Duperron, who was instructed to pass by that city on his way to Rome, great alarm was created in the mind of the Pope that the French ambassador was about to visit the Papal Court in his company, an event which he deprecated from the distrust which he felt of the designs of an individual who had already frustrated the measures of his accredited agents.  His Holiness was, however, quitte pour la peur, the instructions of M. de Maisse having restricted him to his Venetian mission.

[248] Louis Potier de Gevres, Secretary of State.  It is from him that the branch of his family still bearing the name of Gevres is descended, while that of Novion owes its origin to his elder brother, Nicolas Potier de Blancmenil.

[249] Mezeray, vol. x. p. 261.

[250] Le Laboureur sur Castelnau.

[251] Jacqueline de Bueil, subsequently Comtesse de Moret, was the daughter of Claude de Bueil, Seigneur de Courcillon and La Machere, and of Catherine de Monteclu, who both died in 1596.  The family of Bueil traced their descent from Jean, the first of the name, Sieur de Bueil in Touraine, who was equerry of honour to Charles-le-Bel in 1321.

[252] Dreux du Radier, vol. vi. p. 97.

[253] Wraxall, vol. v. pp. 356, 357.

[254] Abraham-Nicolas Amelot de la Houssaye, was born at Orleans in the year 1634, and passed nearly all his life in composing works of history and in translating the historians by whom he had been preceded.  His principal productions are A History of the Government of Venice; Historical, Political, Critical, and Literary Memoirs; and translations of the History of the Council of Trent, by Fra Paolo; of the Prince by Machiavelli; and of the Annals of Tacitus.  He died in 1706.

[255] Mezeray, vol. x. pp. 261, 262.

[256] Sully, Mem. vol. iv. p. 125.

[257] Pierre Fougeuse, Sieur d’Escures.

[258] Daniel, vol. vii. pp. 453, 454.

[259] Treasurer of the war department, and lieutenant-general at Riom.

[260] Philibert de Nerestan, knight of Malta, and captain of the bodyguard of Henri IV, was as celebrated for his admirable qualities of mind and heart as for the antiquity of his birth.  He was grand master of the Orders of St. Lazarus and Notre-Dame du Mont Carmel, the latter of which was instituted by the sovereign at his intercession.