t very rare.
Coligny, however, braved everything; he challenged Guise, and on the
appointed day the two noble adversaries, accompanied by their seconds,
D'Estrades and Bridieu, met upon the Place Royale.

Of this memorable duel, thanks to contemporary memoirs as well as
various kinds of MSS., the minutest details have been preserved.

On the 12th of December, 1643, D'Estrades went in the morning to call
out the Duke de Guise on the part of Coligny. The rendezvous was fixed
for the same day, at three o'clock in the afternoon, at the Place
Royale. The two adversaries did not appear abroad during the whole
morning, and at three o'clock they were on the ground. A sentence is
ascribed to Guise which invests the scene with an unwonted grandeur, and
arrays for the last time in bitterest animosity and deadly antagonism
the two most illustrious representatives of the League wars in the
persons of their descendants. On unsheathing his sword Guise said to
Coligny: "We are about to decide the old feud of our two houses, and to
see what a difference there is between the blood of Guise and that of
Coligny."

Coligny's only reply was to deal his adversary a long lunge; but, weak
as he was, his rearward foot failed him, and he sank upon his knee.
Guise advanced upon him and set his foot upon his sword, in such manner
as though he would have said, "I do not desire to kill you, but to treat
you as you deserve, for having presumed to address yourself to a prince
of such birth as mine, without his having given you just cause,"--and he
struck him with the flat of his sword-blade. Coligny, furious, collected
his strength, threw himself backwards, disengaged his sword, and
recommenced the strife. In this second bout, Guise was slightly wounded
in the shoulder, and Coligny in the hand. At length, Guise, in making
another thrust at his adversary, grasped his sword-blade, by which his
hand was slightly cut, but, wresting it from Coligny's grasp, dealt him
a desperate thrust in the arm which put him _hors de combat_. Meanwhile
D'Estrades and Bridieu had grievously wounded each other.

Such was the issue of that memorable duel--the last, it appears, of the
famous encounters on the Place Royale. We thus see that, though cowed,
the French noblesse had not been tamed by Richelieu's solemn edict. This
last duel did very little honour to Coligny, and almost everybody took
part with the Duke de Guise. The Queen manifested very lively
displeasure at