of the Cittadel together with the Lordship of Pigingin both which he obtained by marrying the Daughter and Heir of the last Visedame of Amiens and Lord of Pigingin Anno 1619. A marriage which much advanced his fortunes which was compassed for him by the Constable Luynes his brother who also obtained for him of the King the title of Duke His highest attribute before being that of Mr. de Cadinet by which name he was known here in England at such time as he was sent extraordinary Ambassadour to King James This honour of Visedame is for ought that ever I could see used onely in France True it is that in some English Charters we meet with Vice-Dominus as in the Charter of King Edred to the Abbey of Crowland in Lincoln-shire dated in the year 948. there is subscribed Ego Bingulph Vice-dominus c. but with us and at those times this title was onely used to denotate a subordination to some superior Lord and not as an honorary attribute in which sense it is now used in France besides that with us it is frequently though falsly used for Vicecomes between which two Offices of Vicount and Vidame there are found no small resemblances For as they which did agere Vicem Comitis were called Vicecomites or Vicomits so were they also called Vidames or Vice-Domini qui Domini Episcopi vicem gerebant in temporalibus And as Vicountes from Offices of the Earles became honorary so did the Vidames disclaim the relation to the Bishop and became Seigneural or honorary also The Vidames then according to the first institution were the substitutes of the greater Bishops in matters of secular administration for which cause though they have altered their tenure they take all of them their denomination from the cheif Town of some Bishoprick neither is there any of them who holdeth not of some Bishoprick or other Concerning the number of them that are thus dignified I cannot determine Mr. Glover otherwise called Sommerset Herald in his discourse of Nobility published by Mr. Miles of Canterbury putteth it down for absolute that here are four onely Viz. of Amiens of Chartres of Chalons and of Gerbery in Bauvice but in this he hath deceived both himself and his Readers there being besides these divers others as of Rhemes Mans and the like but the particular and exact number of them together with the place denominating I leave to the French Heralds unto whose profession it belongeth CHAP. III. The Church of Nostre-Dame in Amiens The Principal Churches in most Cities called by her name More honour performed to her than to her Saviour The surpassing beauty of this Church on the outside The front of it King Henry the seventh's Chappel at Westminster The curiousness of this Church within By what means it became to be so The three sumptuous Massing-Closets in it The excellency of Perspective works Indulgencies by whom first founded The estate of the Bishoprick THere is yet one thing which addeth more lustre to the Citie of Amiens than either the Visdamate or the Cittadel which is the Church of Nostre Dame a name by which most of the principal Churches are known in France there have we the Nostre Dame in Roven a second in Paris a third in this City a fourth in Boulogne all Cathedrall so also a Nostre Dame in Abbeville and another in Estampes the principal Churches in those Towns also Had I seen more of their Towns I had met with more of her Temples for so of many â— have heard that if there be more than two Churches in a Town one shall be sure to be dedicated to her and that one of the fairest Of any Temples consecrated to the Name and memory of our Saviour Ne gry quidem there was not so much as a word stirring neither could I marvel at it considering the honours done to her and those to her Son betwixt which there is so great a disproportion that you would have imagined that Mary and not Jesus had been our Saviour for one Pater Noster the people are enjoyned ten Ave Maries and to recompence one pilgrimage to Christs Sepulchre at Hierusalem you shall hear of two hundred undertaken to our Lady of Loretto And whereas in their Kalendar they have dedicated onely four Festivals to our Saviour which are those of his birth circumcision resurrection and ascension all which the English Church also observeth for the Virgins sake they have more than doubled the number Thus do they solemnize the feast of her Purification and Annunciation at the times which we also do of her Visitation of Elizabeth in July of her Dedication and Assumption in August of her Nativity in September of her Presentation in November and of her Conception in the womb of her Mother in December To her have they appropriated set forms of prayers prescribed in the two books called one Officium and the other Rosarium beatae Mariae Virginis whereas her Son must be contented with those Orisons which are in the Common Mass Book her Shrines and Images are more glorious and magnificent then those of her Son and in her Chappel are more Vows paid than before the Crucifix But I cannot blame the Vulgar when the great Masters of their souls are thus also besotted The Officium before mentioned published by the Command of Pius the fifth saith thus of her Gaude Maria Virgo tu sola omnes haereses intermistâ— in universo mundo Catherinus in the Council of Trent calleth Fidelissimam Dei sociam and he was modest if compared with others In one of their Councils Christs name is quite forgotten and the name of our Lady put in the place of it for thus it beginneth Authoritate Dei Patris beatae Virginis omnium Sanctorum c. but most horrible is that of one of their Writers I am loath to say it was Bernard Beata Virgo monstra te esse Matrem jube filium which Harding in his confutation of the Apologie endeavouring to make good would needs have it to be onely an excess of mind or a spiritual sport and dalliance but from all such sports and dalliances good Lord deliver us Leaving our Lady let us go see her Church which questionless is one of the most glorious piles of building under the Heavens what Velleius saith of Augustus that he was homo qui omnibus omnium gentium viris inducturus erat caliginem or what Suetonius spake of Titus when he called him Delias humani generis both these attributes and more too may I most fitly fasten on this magnificent structure The whole body of it is of most curious and polished stones every where born up by buttresses of excellent composure that they seem to add more of beauty to it than of strength the Quire of it is as in great Churches commonly it is of a fairer fabrick than the body thick set with dainty pillars and most of them reaching unto the top of it in the fashion of an Arch.
in these later they onely consummate strength so say the Physitians generally Non enim in duobus sequentibus mensibus they speak it of the intermedii additur aliquid ad perfectionem partium sed ad perfectionem roboris The last time terminus ultimus in the common account of this Profession is the eleventh moneth which some of them hold neither unlikely nor rare Massurius recordeth of Papyrius a Roman Praetor to have recovered his inheritance in open Court though his Mother confest him to be born in the thirteenth month And Avicen a Moor of Corduba relateth as he is cited in Laurentius that he had seen a Child born after the fourteenth But these are but the impostures of Women and yet indeed the modern Doctors are more charitable and refer it to supernatural causes Vt extra ordinariam artis considerationem On the other side Hippocrates giveth it out definitively 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that in ten moneths at the furthest understand ten moneths compleat the Child is born And Vlpian the great Civilian of his times in the title of Digests de Testamentis is of opinion that a Child born after the tenth moneth compleat is not to be admitted to the inheritance of its pretended Father As for the Common Law of England as I remember I have read it in a book written of Wils and Testaments it taketh a middle course between the charity of nature and the severity of Law leaving it meerly to the conscience and circumstance of the Judge But all this must be conceived taking it in the most favourable construction after the conception of the Mother and by no meanes after the death of the Father and so can it no way if I were first President advantage the Prince of Conde His Father had been extreamly sick no small time before his death for the particular and supposed since his poison taken Anno 1552. to be little prone to Women in the general They therefore that would seem to know more than the vulgar reckon him as one of the by-blows of Henry the fourth but this under the Rose yet by way of conjecture we may argue thus First from the Kings care of his education assigning him for his Tutor Nicholas de Februe whom he also designed for his Son King Lewis Secondly from his care to work the Prince then young Mollis aptus agi to become a Catholike Thirdly the age of the old Henry of Conde and the privacy of this King with his Lady being then King of Navarre in the prime of his strength and in discontent with the Lady Margaret of Valoys his first Wife Adde to this that Kings love to fair Ladies in the general and we may see this probability to be no miracle For besides the Dutchess of Beaufort the Marchioness of Verneville and the Countess of Morret already mentioned he is beleived to have been the Father of Mr. Luines the great Favorite of King Lewis And certain it is that the very year before his death when he was even in the winter of his dayes he took such an amorous liking to the Prince of Conde s Wife a very beautiful Lady and Daughter to the Constable Duke of Montmorencie that the Prince to save his honour was compelled to flie together with his Princess into the Arch-Dukes Country whence he returned not till long after the death of King Henry If Marie de Medices in her Husbands life time paid his debts for him which I cannot say she onely made good that of vindicate· And yet perhaps a consciousness of some injuries not onely moved her to back the Count of Soison's and his faction against the Prince and his but also to resolve upon him for the Husband of her Daughter From the Princes of the bloud descend we to the Princes of the Court and therein the first place we meet with Mr. Barradas the Kings present Favourite a young Gentleman of a fresh and lively hew little bearded and one whom the people as yet cannot accuse for any oppression or misgovernment Honours the King hath conferred none upon him but onely Pensions and Offices He is the Governour of the Kings Children of Honour Pages we call them in England a place of more trouble than wealth or credit He is also the Master of the Horse or le grand Escuire the esteem of which place recompenceth the emptiness of the other for by vertue of this Office he carryeth the Kings Sword sheathed before him at his entrance into Paris the Cloth of Estate carryed over the King by the Provosts and Eschevins is his Fee No man can be the Kings Spur maker his Smith or have any place in the Kings Stables but from him and the like This place to note so much by the way was taken out of the Constables Office Comes stabuli is the true name to whom it properly belonged in the time of Charles the seventh Besides this he hath a pension of 500000. Crowns yearly and had an Office given him which he sold for 100000. Crownes in ready money A good fortune for one who the other day was but the Kings Page And to say truth he is as yet but a little better being onely removed from his Servant to his play-fellow with the affairs of State he intermeddleth not if he should he might expect the Queene Mother should say to him what Apollo in Ovid did to Cupid Tibi quia cum fortibus armis Mi puer ista decent humeros gestamina nostros For indeed first during her Sons minority and after since her redentigration with him she hath made her self so absolute a Mistress of her mind that he hath entrusted to her the entire conduct of all his most weighty affairs for her Assistant in the managing of her greatest business she hath pieced her self to the strongest side of the State the Church having principally since the death of the Marshall D' Anere Joneane assumed to her Counsails the Cardinal of Richileiu a man of no great birth were Nobility the greatest Parentage but otherwise to be ranked among the Noblest Of a sound reach he is and of a close brain one exceedingly well mixt of a Lay Vnderstanding and a Church Habit one that is compleatly skilled in the art of men and a perfect Master of his own mind and affections Him the Queene useth as her Counseller to keep out frailty and the Kings name as her countenance to keep off envy She is of a Florentine wit and hath in her all the vertues of Katherine de Medices her Ancestor in the Regencie and some also of her vices only her designes tend not to the ruine of her Kingdome and her Children John de Seirres telleth us in his Inventaire of France how the Queene Katherine suffered her Son Henry the third a devout and simple Prince to spend his most dangerous times even uncontrolled upon his Beades whiles in the meantime she usurped the Government of the Realm Like it is that Queene Mary hath
disposition that they would not betray their credits Nunquam illis adeo ulla opportuna visa est victoriae occasio quam damno pensaâ—ent fidei as the Historian of Tiberius If then this City escaped a sack or a surprisal it cannot be imputed to the wisdom of the French but to the modesty and fair dealing of the English but this was not the onely Solaecisme in point of State committed by that great Politick of his time King Lewis there never being a man so famed for brain that more grosly over-reached himself than that Prince though perhaps more frequently The buildings of this Town are of divers materials some built of stone others of wood and some again of both the streets very sweet and clean and the air not giving place to any for a lively pureness Of their buildings the principal are their Churches whereof there are twelve onely in number Churches I mean parochial besides those belonging unto Religious Houses Next unto them the work of most especial note is a great large Hospital in method and disposing of the beds much like unto the Hostel Dieu in Paris but in number much inferior Et me tamen capuerant and yet the decency of them did much delight me The sweetness and neatness of the Town proceedeth partly as I say from the air and partly from the conveniencie of the River of Some on which it is seated for the River running in one entire bank at the further end of the Town is there divided into six Channels which almost at an equal distance run through the several parts of it These Channels thus divided receive into them all the ordure and filth wherewith the Town were otherwise likely to be pestered and affordeth the people a plentiful measure of water wherewith to purge the lanes and by-corners of it as often as them listeth But this is not all the benefit of these Channels they bestow upon the City matter also of commodity which is the infinite number of Griest-Mils that are built upon them At the other end of the Town the Channels are again united into one stream both those places as well at the division as the union of the Channels being exceedingly fortified with chains and piles and also with bulwarks and out-works Neither is the Town well fortified and strengthened at those passages onely in the upper parts of it having enough of strength to enable them to a long resistance The Ditch round about it save where it meeteth with the Cittadel is exceeding deep and steepy the wals of a good height broad and composed of earth and stone equally the one making up the outside of them and the other the inside The Gates are very large and strong as well in the sinewie composition of themselves as in addition of the Draw-bridge Subburbs this City hath none because a Town of Warr nor any liberal circuit of territoty because a Frontier yet the people are indifferent wealthy and have amongst them good trading besides the benefit of the Garrison and the Cathedral The Garrison consisteth of two hundred and fity men five hundred in all they should be who are continually in pay to guard the Cittadel their pay eight Sols daily The Governour of them is the Duke of Chawne who is also the Lieutenant or Deputy Governour of the whole Province under the Constable Their Captain Mr Le Noyr said to be a man of good experience and worthy his place This Cittadel was built by Henry the fourth as soon as he had recovered the Town from the Spaniards Anno 1591. It is seated on the lower part of the City though somewhat on the advantage of an hill and seemeth in my opinion better scituate to command the Town than to defend it or rather to recover the Town being taken than to save it from taking They who have seen it and know the arts of Fortification report it to be impregnable Quod nec Jovis ira nec ignes Nec poterit ferrum nec edax abolere vetustas Nor am I able to contradict it for besides that it is a skill beyond my profession we were not permitted to come within it to take a survey of it at a distance As soon as we approached nigh unto it one of the Garrison offered us the musket a sufficient warning not to be too venterous So that all I could observe was this that they had within themselves good plenty of earth to make their gabions and repair their breaches With the same jealousie also are the rest of the Forts and Towns of importance guarded in this and other Countries no people that ever I heard of being so open in shewing their places of strength and safety unto strangers as the English For a dozen of Ale a Forreiner may pace over the Curtain of Portsmouth and measure every sconce and bulwark of it for a shilling more he shall see their provision of powder and other munition and when that is done if he will he shall walk the round too A French crown fathometh the wals of Dover Castle and for a pint of Wine one may see the nakedness of the block-houses at Gravesend A negligence which may one day cost us dearly though now we think it not For what else do we in it but commit that prodigal folly for which Plutarch condemneth Pericles Viz. _____ c. that is to break open all the pales and inclosures of our Land to the end that every man might come in freely and take away our fruits at his pleasure Jealousie though a vice in a man toward his Wife is yet one of the safest Vertues in a Governour towards his Fortress and therefore I could wish that an English man would borrow a little of this Italian humor Besides these Souldiers which are continually in garrison for the defence of the Cittadel there are also three hundred which keep watch every night for the defence of the City These watchmen receive no pay from the King but discharge that duty amongst themselves and in turns every house finding one for that service twelve nights in the year The Weapons which they use are Pikes onely and Musquets there being not one peice of Ordinance all about the Town or on the wals of it The Governour of this Town as it hath reference to the King is a Bailly who hath belonging unto him all the authority which belongeth to a Siege Presidial Under him he hath a Lieutenant Generall and particular seven Counsellors a publick Notary and other inferior Officers and Magistrates As it is a Corporation the Cheif Governour of it is a Mayor and next to him the Eschevins or Sheriffs as Protectors of the Inhabitants and their Liberties besides those of the Common-Council Another Circumstance there is which ennobleth this Town of Amiens which is that it is a Visedamate or that it giveth honour to one of the Nobility who is called the Visedame of Amiens This title at this time belongeth to the Duke of Chauny Governour