arents, brought
up in the Court of the Kings my father and brothers, allied in
blood and friendship to the most virtuous and accomplished women
of our times, of which society I have had the good fortune to
be the bond of union.

I shall begin these Memoirs in the reign of Charles IX., and
set out with the first remarkable event of my life which fell
within my remembrance. Herein I follow the example of geographical
writers, who having described the places within their knowledge,
tell you that all beyond them are sandy deserts, countries without
inhabitants, or seas never navigated. Thus I might say that all
prior to the commencement of these Memoirs was the barrenness of
my infancy, when we can only be said to vegetate like plants,
or live, like brutes, according to instinct, and not as human
creatures, guided by reason. To those who had the direction of
my earliest years I leave the task of relating the transactions
of my infancy, if they find them as worthy of being recorded as
the infantine exploits of Themistocles and Alexander,--the one
exposing himself to be trampled on by the horses of a charioteer,
who would not stop them when requested to do so, and the other
refusing to run a race unless kings were to enter the contest
against him. Amongst such memorable things might be related the
answer I made the King my father, a short time before the fatal
accident which deprived France of peace, and our family of its
chief glory. I was then about four or five years of age, when
the King, placing me on his knee, entered familiarly into chat
with me. There were, in the same room, playing and diverting
themselves, the Prince de Joinville, since the great and unfortunate
Duc de Guise, and the Marquis de Beaupreau, son of the Prince
de la Roche-sur-Yon, who died in his fourteenth year, and by
whose death his country lost a youth of most promising talents.
Amongst other discourse, the King asked which of the two Princes
that were before me I liked best. I replied, "The Marquis." The
King said, "Why so? He is not the handsomest." The Prince de
Joinville was fair, with light-coloured hair, and the Marquis
de Beaupreau brown, with dark hair. I answered, "Because he is
the best behaved; whilst the Prince is always making mischief,
and will be master over everybody."

This was a presage of what we have seen happen since, when the
whole Court was infected with heresy, about the time of the
Conference of Poissy. It was with grea