. The poets once praised Aurora for her fine hands and
tapering fingers; but I think our Queen would surpass her in
that; and she carefully guarded and maintained this beauty to
her dying day.

King Henry III, her son, inherited much of this beauty of the
hand.

Moreover she always dressed herself well and superbly, often
with some new and pretty conceit. In short, she had many charms
in herself to make her well loved. I remember that at Lyons one
day she went to see a painter named Corneille who had painted
and exhibited in a spacious room portraits of all the great
seigneurs, princes, cavaliers, queens, princesses, ladies and
maids of honour of the Court, and she being in this room with us
we all saw there her portrait painted true to life, showing her
in all her beauty and perfection, apparelled as a Frenchwoman with
a cap, showing her great pearls, and a gown whose wide sleeves of
silver tissue were trimmed with lynx--the whole picture, which
also showed the portraits of her three daughters, was so perfect
that speech alone seemed lacking.

The Queen took great pleasure in seeing the portrait, and the
assembled company did likewise, and praised and admired her beauty
above all.

She herself was so ravished at the sight of the portrait that
she could not take her gaze from it, until M. de Nemours came to
her and said, "Madame, I think you are so well portrayed there
that there remains nothing more to be said, and it seems to me,
too, that your daughters do you great honour, for they do not
excel you, nor surpass you."

To this the Queen replied, "My cousin, I think you can remember
the period, the age, and the dress represented in this portrait,
so that you can judge better than anyone present, you who have
seen me dressed as I am represented in this portrait, and can
say whether I was esteemed as much as they say, and whether I
ever looked as I am portrayed there."

There was not one in the whole company who did not lavish praise
and estimate her beauty highly, and who did not say that the mother
was worthy of the daughters and the daughters of the mother. And
this beauty remained her portion through life, while married and
while widowed, until her death; not that she had the freshness
of her more blooming and younger years, but still she remained
well preserved, always agreeable, always desirable.

Besides she was very good company, always of a good humour; loving
any becoming exercise, such as dancing,