It is Charles D'Estanges.

I am a cousin of the Duc de Guise, and am naturally of the court party; but I can esteem a brave enemy, and regret to see one engaged in an encounter in which he must needs be overmatched." "I am a fair swordsman, sir," Philip said; "though my arm may lack somewhat of the strength it will have, a few years later.

But had it been otherwise, I should have still taken the course I have.

I do not say your conjecture is a correct one, but at any rate I would prefer the most unequal fight to being seized and questioned.
One can but be killed once, and it were better that it should be by a thrust in the open air than a long imprisonment, ending perhaps with death at the stake." Monsieur D'Estanges said no more.

In spite of his relationship with the Guises he, like many other French Catholic nobles, disapproved of the persecutions of the Huguenots, and especially of the massacres perpetrated by the lower orders in the towns, men for whom he had the profoundest contempt.