Richter, Louise M.: Chantilly in history and art (London: Murray, 1913)

ELEONORE DE ROYE

i7

Valois. Louis de Bourbon, first Prince de Conde,1
married Eleonore de Roye, granddaughter of
Louise de Montmorency, a sister of the famous
Constable Anne and mother of the Huguenot chief,
Gaspard de Coligny. It was no doubt owing to the
influence of his wife Eleonore—so named after the
second wife of Francis I—that the Prince de Cond£
embraced the Protestant cause, and was thencefor-
ward regarded by the Huguenots as one of their
leaders. Eleonore was on terms of great intimacy
with her sister-in-law, Jeanne d’Albret, Queen of
Navarre, who had herself become a Protestant;
and one may fairly assert that if Antoine de
Bourbon, King of Navarre, and his brother Louis
de Conde, had in any way equalled their noble
wives in pious sentiment and religious fervour, the
Protestant Faith in France would never have been
nipped in the bud, but would have become as firmly
established there as it did in England and Germany.
As it was, the Guises of Lorraine who embraced
the Catholic cause gained considerable ground
after the death of Henri II, through their cousin
Mary Stuart, Queen of France; and with the
ostensible object of furthering this cause, they also
tried to supplant the Bourbon Princes, Antoine
de Navarre and Louis de Bourbon Cond£, who
were by right nearer the throne. The latter
during the reign of Francis II was thrown
into prison for high treason, under a false accu-
1 The grandfather of Henri II de Bourbon, husband of the fair
Charlotte de Montmorency.
2