0). The court-poet, William
Cretin, who was in great renown during the reigns of Louis XII. and
Francis I., having asked two ladies to discuss the same subject in verse,
does not hesitate, on the contrary, to place falconry above venery.

[Illustration: Fig. 158.--German Falconer, designed and engraved, in the
Sixteenth Century, by J. Amman.]

It may fairly be asserted that venery and falconry have taken a position
of some importance in history; and in support of this theory it will
suffice to mention a few facts borrowed from the annals of the chase.

The King of Navarre, Charles the Bad, had sworn to be faithful to the
alliance made between himself and King Edward III. of England; but the
English troops having been beaten by Du Guesclin, Charles saw that it was
to his advantage to turn to the side of the King of France. In order not
to appear to break his oath, he managed to be taken prisoner by the French
whilst out hunting, and thus he sacrificed his honour to his personal
interests. It was also due to a hunting party that Henry III., another
King of Navarre, who was afterwards Henry IV., escaped from Paris, on the
3rd February, 1576, and fled to Senlis, where his friends of the Reformed
religion came to join him.

[Illustration: Fig. 159.--Heron-hawking.--Fac-simile of a Miniature in the
Manuscript of the "Livre du Roy Modus" (Fourteenth Century).]

Hunting formed a principal entertainment when public festivals were
celebrated, and it was frequently accompanied with great magnificence. At
the entry of Isabel of Bavaria into Paris, a sort of stag hunt was
performed, when "the streets," according to a popular story of the time,
"were full to profusion of hares, rabbits, and goslings." Again, at the
solemn entry of Louis XI. into Paris, a representation of a doe hunt took
place near the fountain St. Innocent; "after which the queen received a
present of a magnificent stag, made of confectionery, and having the royal
arms hung round its neck." At the memorable festival given at Lille, in
1453, by the Duke of Burgundy, a very curious performance took place. "At
one end of the table," says the historian Mathieu de Coucy, "a heron was
started, which was hunted as if by falconers and sportsmen; and presently
from the other end of the table a falcon was slipped, which hovered over
the heron. In a few minutes another falcon was started from the other side
of the table, which attacked the heron so fiercely that he brought