"This command, as may be supposed, was punctually obeyed by the messengers, who were furnisht with ample powers for authenticating their mission. The ring was received by the Royal Confessor, and in after times was preserved with due care at his shrine in the Abbey of Westminster."]
_The Bourbons._--What was the origin of the Bourbon family? How did Henry IV. come to be the next heir to the throne on the extinction of the line of Valois?
[Henri IV., King of Navarre, succeeded to the throne on the extinction of the house of Valois, as the head of the house of Bourbon, which descends from Robert of France, Count de Clermont, the fifth son of St. Louis, and Seigneur de Bourbon. On the death of Louis I. in 1341, leaving two sons, this house was divided into the Bourbon, or elder branch (which became extinct on the death of the Constable of Bourbon, in 1527), and the younger branch, or that of the Counts de la Marche, afterwards Counts and Dukes of Vendome. Henri was the son of Antoine de Bourbon, Duc de Vendome.]
The Query confirms Professor De Morgan's excellent article in _The Companion to the Almanack for 1853_, "On the Difficulty of correct Description of Books." The manuscript note cited by H. J., though curiously inaccurate, guided me to the book for which he inquires. I copy the title-page: "_Die Betrübte Pegnesis, den Leben, Kunst, und Tugend-Wandel des Seelig-Edeln Floridans, H. Sigm. von Birken, Com. Pal. Cæs. durch 24 Sinnbilder in Kupfern, zur schuldigen nach-Ehre fürstellend, und mit Gesprach und Reim-Gedichten erklärend, durch ihre Blumen-Hirten._ Nürnberg, 1684, 12mo." I presume the annotator, not understanding German, and seeing "Floridans" the most conspicuous word on the title-page, cited him as the author; but it is the pastoral academic name of the late Herr Sigmond von Birken, in whose honour the work is composed. The emblem, with the motto "Bis fracta relinquor," at p. 249. (not 240.), is a tree from which two boughs are broken. It illustrates the death of Floridan's second wife, and his determination not to take a third. The chess-board, plate xiv. p. 202., has the motto, "Per tot discrimina rerum," and commemorates Floridan's safe return to Nuremberg after the multitudinous perils ("die Schaaren der Gefahren") of a journey through Lower Saxony. They must have been great, if typified by the state of the board, on which only a black king and a white bishop are left--a chess problem!