V EN ERIE AND THE V A LOIS 245 



Bude, did a great deal for hunting. In bis Treatise on Venerie,' 

 Bude tells him in the dedication, ' Sire, vous avez tellement 

 dresse et poli I'exercice de la venerie, qu'elle sembie estre 

 parvenue a sa perfection.' At all events, he put all the gilding 

 on just as he did to the doors and ceilings of Fontainebleau. 

 Tornabuoni, the Tuscan ambassador, evidently ' un homme 

 grave,' writes to the Grand Duke Cosmo I. de' Medicis : 

 ' This Court is not as other Courts are ; here they only think 

 of hunting, pretty women, entertainments, and change of 

 scene. The Court only stays in a place as long as the 

 herons last. They hunt the stag twice, then one day's deer 

 catching (' aux toiles '), and then on again somewhere else.' ^ 

 Everyday life was one long hunting progress. This is how 

 he describes the invasion of the country by the scarlet- 

 clad locusts : 



' Quelquefois le roi, outre ses cent pages, ses deux cents 

 ecuyers, piqueurs ou chevaucheurs, mene avec lui quatre ou 

 cinq cents gentilshommes, quelquefois il est accompagne de 

 la reine ou des reines, suivies de leurs nombreuses dames et 

 lilies d'honneur. Alors tons les appartements d'en haut, 

 toutes les salles d'en bas, tous les etages, tout le chateau, 

 toute la cour, toute a chevals, toute en habits rouges, sembie 

 au milieu de la campagne trotter, galoper a la suite du roi, 

 aussi en habit rouge, courant le cerf ou le sanglier.' 



This ' to-morrow to fresh woods and pastures new ' way 

 of going on quite upset all the Venetians. 



How swift we go, how softly, ah I 

 Were life but as the gondola ! 



It certainly was not so at the Court of France to the 

 homesick envoys and secretaries. 



' Our embassy,' cries this indignant and saddle-sore am- 



' TraiU de Vincrie de Biidf, translated from the Latin, Paris, 18()-1. 



- Documents Inedits: Nfkjociationsdiploiiiatiqucs avec la Toscanc, t. iii. p. 17. 



