petitions and clamours arise throughout the realm.

Item, the count d'Armagnac, who is your subject, pays no regard to the peace; and, so far from observing it, is constantly making war on your more faithful subjects.

Item, for the better observance of this peace, we recommend that your majesty should cause letters to be drawn up, in which all the articles of the treaty shall be incorporated, and sent to the different officers, or to whomsoever else you may please, with orders to make known all transgressors of them, that they may be punished accordingly.

• With regard to the second point on which you, our sovereign lord, demand our advice, having fully considered all that concerns your own honour and welfare, with every thing that may tend to the prosperity of the kingdom,. we feel ourselves obliged to make known to you what we perceive to be defects in your government. We must begin by the bad administration of the public finances, to which you, as king, ought to have caused more faithful attention to be paid. We recommend, in the first place, that the revenues of the royal demesne be divided

into four parts: one to be distributed in alms, another to defray the expenses of your majesty, those of the queen, the duke of Acquitaine, and your household; another to pay the salaries of your officers and servants; another to be applied to the repairs of bridges, roads, mills, castles, causeways, or other public works, and the overplus to be paid into the king's treasury, as was formerly done.

• Item, it clearly appears, that the finances are not at this present time so regulated, which is the fault of your treasurers, who have the administration of them. The religious of both sexes, as well belonging to convents as to hospitals, are frequently forced to expend their own money on the repairs of their churches, without deriving any assistance from the royal treasury, to their great detriment, to the loss of their personal comforts, the ruin of the churches, and the failure of divine service, to the prejudice of the souls of your predecessors, and to the oppression of your own conscience.

In regard to alms, it is well known that scarcely any thing is paid; and as to the expenses of yourself, the queen, and the duke of Acquitaine, which are regulated by sir

Pierre de Fontenay, and paid by Raymond Ragnier and Jean Pie, clerks of the exchequer, they are found to amount to four hundred and fifty thousand francs, as well received from the royal demesnes as from other sources; whereas in former times only ninety-two thousand francs were received for this purpose, and your predecessors kept up a royal state, and the tradesmen were regularly paid, notwithstanding the smallness of the sum: but at present this is far from being the case, for the tradesmen are not only unpaid, but your household and those of the queen and the duke of Acquitaine are frequently broken up.

Even so lately as Thursday last, this disgrace happened to the household of the queen, whence it appears, that these sums are not employed for your expenses, but wasted at the will of your ministers, and among their favourites, as we shall more fully explain at a proper time and place.

• In former days, the sum raised for the expenses of the queen's household was but thirty-six thousand francs; but at present, one hundred and forty thousand are raised on this account, from taxes independant of the revenues of her demesnes. This difference

proceeds from the fault of the administrators of this department, the principal of whom is Raymond Ragnier, the treasurer; and he has so managed this money destined for the use of the queen that he has purchased large estates, and built fine houses, as may be seen both in town and country. The management of this part of the finances should be examined into; for beside the regular receipt, other sums are demanded by way of extraordinaries.

• Item, there are also great abuses in the offices of the master of your wardrobe, and of the treasury; for those who have the direction receive very large sums of money, and dispose of them otherwise than in the payment of your debts or to your advantage: the salaries of your officers and servants are consequently in arrear, and those who have supplied your table with provision and wine cannot get their money. Of course, these sums must be applied to their own use, as is very apparent from the great state they live in, from the number of their horses and other luxuries, as in the instance of Raymond Ragnier, who, in purchasing and building, has expended, as it is said, upward of thirty thousand francs,

council about to be holden, was taken dangerously ill at his hôtel of Neele; but by the care and affection of his daughter the duchess of Bourbon, who, on hearing of his illness, had come to see him, and by her nursing, he was soon restored to health. He was also very frequently visited by his nephew the duke of Burgundy.

While the duchess of Bourbon was at Paris, she obtained from the king, and from the dukes of Acquitaine and Burgundy, that the body of Binet d'Espineuse, formerly the knight of her lord the duke of Bourbon, should be taken down from the gibbet of Montfaucon, and his head from the market-house, where it had been placed some time since by the king's officers of justice. She had it escorted by many of his friends to the town of Espineuse, in the county of Clermont, where it was honourably interred.

The duke of Burgundy at this time had the sole government of the kingdom, for nothing was done but by his advice or that of his friends.

Notwithstanding it had been promised at the peace of Auxerre, by the king and the princes of the blood, that every one, of whatever