244 STAG-HUNTING RECOLLECTIONS 



CHAPTER XIV 



VEXERIE AND THE VALOIS 



Pour le plaisir des lois je suis donne, 



De jour en jour les veneurs me pourcliassent ; 



Par les forests je suis abandonne 



A tous les cliiens qui sans cesse me chassent. 



(Bouchet's Comi^laintc du Cerf, 16th century.) 



The sixteenth century in France is the Velasquez period of 

 stag-hunting. It formed the grand style. Woodcraft hugger- 

 muggered along with poverty and privilege in the provinces, 

 but Venerie, at once an art and a science, came to Court. 

 Like some daughter of the gods visiting the sons of men, she 

 disputed precedence with everybody and everything. Even 

 the king's mistresses had to reckon with her. Diane de 

 Poitiers, conscious of the attractions of an enchanting rival, 

 spent large sums of money in building hunting stables and 

 mews, and laid out her demesne at Anet to suit hunting. 

 Meeting gallantry and intrigue on equal terms, hunting 

 became the instrument of political ambition. It conducted 

 and controlled the great affairs of state.' It challenged 

 diplomacy and plenipotentiaries. The main current of 

 politics, or what we should call politics in these days, 

 streamed along the alleys of Fontainebleau and Compiegne 

 and flooded the level plains of the Loiret and Seine-et-Marne. 

 Francois I., according to that eminent and polite Hellenist 



' Documents InMits : Nt'gociations avec la Toscanc, t. iii, p. 421. 



