Madame La Duchesse

He found an ancient dame in dim brocade.---TENNYSON


Madame la Duchesse de Quinet had been a great heiress and a
personal friend and favourite of Queen Jeanne d'Albret.  She had
been left a widow after five years' marriage, and for forty
subsequent years had reigned despotically in her own name and that
of mon fils.  Busied with the support of the Huguenot cause,
sometimes by arms, but more usually by politics, and constantly
occupied by the hereditary government of one of the lesser counties
of France, the Duke was all the better son for relinquishing to her
the home administration, as well as the education of his two
motherless boys; and their confidence and affection were perfect,
though he was almost as seldom at home as she was abroad. 

At times, indeed, she had visited Queen Jeanne at Nerac; but since the
good Queen's death, she only left the great chateau of Quinet to
make a royal progress of inspection through the family towns,
castles, and estates, sometimes to winter in her beautiful
hereditary hotel at Montauban, and as at present to attend any
great assembly of the Reformed.

Very seldom was her will not law.  Strong sense and judgment,
backed by the learning that Queen Marguerite of Navarre had
introduced among the companions of her daughter, had rendered her
superior to most of those with whom she came in contact: and the
Huguenot ministers, who were much more dependent on their laity
than the Catholic priesthood, for the most part treated her as not
only a devout and honourable woman, an elect lady, but as a sort of
State authority.