Voyages of Samuel de Champlain, vol 1 | Page 8

De Saint Luc, the governor, succeeded in removing only four or five. The entrance for vessels afterward remained difficult except at high tide. Subsequently Cardinal de Richelieu expended a hundred thousand francs to remove the rest, but did not succeed in removing one of them.--Vide Histoire de La Rochelle, par Arcere, Tom I. p. 121.
7. The Prince of Condé. "Leaving Monsieur de St. Mesmes with the Infantry and Artillery at the Siege of Brouage, and giving order that the Fleet should continue to block it up by sea, he departed upon the eight of October to relieve the Castle of Angiers with 800 Gentlemen and 1400 Harquebuziers on horseback."--Davila, p. 583. See also Memoirs of Sully, Phila., 1817, Vol. I., p 123; Histoire de Thou, à Londres, 1734, Tom. IX, p. 385.
8. "_St. Luc_ sallying out of Brouage, and following those that were scattered severall wayes, made a great slaughter of them in many places; whereupon the Commander, despairing to rally the Army any more, got away as well as they could possibly, to secure their own strong holds."-- _His. Civ. Warres of France_, by Henrico Caterino Davila, London, 1647, p 588.
9. An old writer gives us some idea of the vast quantities of salt exported from France by the amount sent to a single country.
"Important denique sexies mille vel circiter centenarios salis, quorum singuli constant centenis modiis, ducentenas ut minimum & vicenas quinas, vel & tricenas, pro salis ipsius candore puritateque, libras pondo pendentibus, sena igitur libras centenariorum millia, computatis in singulos aureis nummis tricenis, centum & octoginta reserunt aureorum millia."--Belguae Descrtptio, a Lud. Gvicciardino, Amstelodami, 1652, p. 244.
TRANSLATION.--They import in fine 6000 centenarii of salt, each one of which contains 100 bushels, weighing at least 225 or 230 pounds, according to the purity and whiteness of the salt; therefore six thousand centenarii, computing each at thirty golden nummi, amount to 180,000 aurei.
It may not be easy to determine the value of this importation in money, since the value of gold is constantly changing, but the quantity imported may be readily determined, which was according to the above statement, 67,500 tons.
A treaty of April 30, 1527, between Francis I. of France and Henry VIII. of England, provided as follows:--"And, besides, should furnish unto the said Henry, as long as hee lived, yearly, of the Salt of Brouage, the value of fifteene thousand Crownes."--_Life and Raigne of Henry VIII._, by Lord Herbert of Cherbury, London, 1649, p. 206.
Saintonge continued for a long time to be the source of large exports of salt. De Witt, writing about the year 1658, says they received in Holland of "salt, yearly, the lading of 500 or 600 ships, exported from Rochel, Maran, Brouage, the Island of Oleron, and Ree."--Republick of Holland, by John De Witt, London, 1702, p. 271. But it no longer holds the pre-eminence which it did three centuries ago. Saintonge long since yielded the palm to Brittany.
10. Vide Oeuvres de Champlain, Quebec ed, Tom. III. p. v.
11. In 1558, it was estimated that there were already 400,000 persons in France who were declared adherents of the Reformation.--_Ranke's Civil Wars in France_, Vol. I., p. 234.
"Although our assemblies were most frequently held in the depth of midnight, and our enemies very often heard us passing through the street, yet so it was, that God bridled them in such manner that we were preserved under His protection."--Bernard Palissy, 1580. Vide _Morlay's Life of Palissy_, Vol. II., p. 274.
When Henry IV. besieged Paris, its population was more than 200,000.-- _Malte-Brun_.
12. "Catherine de Médicis was of a large and, at the same time, firm and powerful figure, her countenance had an olive tint, and her prominent eyes and curled lip reminded the spectator of her great uncle, Leo X" --Civil Wars in France, by Leopold Ranke, London, 1852, p 28.
13. Philippe Emanuel de Lorraine, Duc de Mercoeur, born at Nomény, September 9, 1558, was the son of Nicolas, Count de Vaudemont, by his second wife, Jeanne de Savoy, and was half-brother of Queen Louise, the wife of Henry III. He was made governor of Brittany in 1582. He embraced the party of the League before the death of Henry III., entered into an alliance with Philip II., and gave the Spaniards possession of the port of Blavet in 1591. He made his submission to Henry IV. in 1598, on which occasion his only daughter Fran?oise, probably the richest heiress in the kingdom, was contracted in marriage to César, Duc de Vend?me, the illegitimate son of Henry IV. by Gabrielle d'Estrées, the Duchess de Beaufort. The Duc de Mercoeur died at Nuremburg, February 19, 1602.--_Vide Birch's Memoirs of Queen Elizabeth_, Vol. I., p. 82; _Davila's His. Civil Warres of France_, p. 1476.
14. Jean d'Aumont, born in 1522, a Marshal of France who served under six kings,