Claude de Bourdeille Montrésor, Cologne, 1663 (Google Books)

Lister read the Count de Montresor’s recently and posthumously published memoirs in December 1664.

Claude de Bourdeille, comte de Montrésor (c. 1606–1663) was a French aristocrat, favorite of Gason, Duc de Orleans (the brother of King Louis XIII).   The Comte was involved in several political intrigues, including the Fronde and Cabale des Importants.   He also schemed to assassinate Cardinal Richelieu at the camp of Amiens in 1636, a plan which failed due to the cowardice of the Duc de Orleans.

A period of imprisonment and exile finally led to the Comte relinquishing any role in public life. In 1654, Claude de Bourdeille Montrésor shared a house with the writer Paul Scarron in the rue Neuve-Saint-Louis in the Marais in Paris ¹

The Comte’s memoirs are candid and interesting, his literary talents encouraged by Scarron, and perhaps inherited from the eminent writer Brantôme, his great uncle.