LOUIS II DE BOURBON, PRINCE DE CONDÉ, French General, born; Known as “the Great Condé,” this greatest of French generals was an intimate of Moliere, Racine, Boileau, and La Bruyère. He also had the misfortune to be acquainted with “Madame”—whom we have already met—the gossipy wife of Philip, duc d’Orleans, who spread the word about Conde’s amours with his own sex.

Condé, a clever gent, went to great pains to establish a reputation as a great womanizer, but between the sharp tongue of Madame and the word of the well-known courtesan, Ninon de Lenclos, who was in a position to know, Condé fooled no one with his boasts.