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 288 VENDEE delicate greenish brown above, shading into silvery below, with the lower fins bluish white ; iris silvery, tinged with yellow. The mouth is very small, and without teeth except a few minute ones on the tongue ; scales large ; first dorsal higher than long; lower jaw the longer. The arches of the gills are furnished on the inner side with numerous long processes barbed on each side and projecting into the cavity of the mouth ; those of the two sides meet and form a complete strainer, arresting the small crustaceans on which they feed until enough have been collected to be swallowed, the water at the same time flowing freely over the gills. It is highly esteemed for food, having some- what the flavor of the smelt ; it is caught only in nets ; it is in best condition about Aug. 1, when it is fat and well flavored ; the food consists chiefly of minute crustaceans. VENDEE, La, a W. department of France, formed from the old province of Poitou, bor- dering on Loire-Inferieure, Maine-et-Loire, Deux-Sevres, Charente-Infe>ieure, and the bay of Biscay ; area, 2,588 sq. m. ; pop. in 1872, 401,446. The surface is level or undulating, and marshy along the coast. The marshy dis- trict is known as le Marai* ; the woody tract in the centre of the department as le Bocage ; and the rest of the country as la Plaine, a fer- tile district watered chiefly by the river Vendee. The navigable streams are the Autise, Vendee, Lay, Vic, Sevre-Niortaise, and Sevre-Nantaise. The coasts are low, and there are but two har- bors, Sables-d'Olonne and St. Gilles. The chief productions are grain, wine, hemp, flax, wool, cattle, coal, and metals. The manufac- tures are unimportant. It is divided into the arrondissements of Napol6on-Vendee, Sables- d'Olonne, and Fontenay-le-Comte. Capital, Napol6on- Vendee. La Vende'e is famous for a royalist insurrection after the proclamation of the first republic, which spread over Lower Poitou, Anjou, Lower Maine, and Brittany. The movement was semi-religious, and ori- ginated with the peasantry in 1793, under the lead of Jacques Cathelinea.u. (See CATIIELI- NEATT.) The count Henri du Verger la Roche- jaquelein became especially distinguished as leader of the insurgents; but they were sig- nally defeated in December, 1793, and hun- dreds of them massacred. In the following spring the war broke out again under La Rochejaquelein, Stofflet, and Charette. (See LA ROCHEJAQUELEIN, and CHARETTE.) The first was killed at Nouaill6, March 4, 1794, after a desperate struggle. The Chouans, with whom the Vendeans were afterward united, appeared at the same time N. of the Loire, in the de- partments of Morbihan and C6tes-du-Nord. (See CHOUANS.) The convention made a peace with the Vendeans early in 1795, guarantee- ing to them a general amnesty, freedom of re- ligious worship, exemption from military ser- vice, and indemnification for their losses. But the landing of a body of French emigres at Quiberon in June encouraged them to take up VENDOME arms again. Gen. Hoche was sent against them, and succeeded, after Stofflet and Cha- rette and other chief leaders had been shot (February and March, 1796), in enforcing sub- mission. The cruel punishments of 1793-'4 were not repeated. Far less important insur- rectionary movements took place in 1799 and 1800, and during the hundred days (1815), when the marquis Louis du Verger la Roche- jaquelein, brother of Henri, the commander of the last Vendean army, was killed, June 4. See Cr6tineau-Joly, Hutoire de la Vendee militaire (4 vols., Paris, 5th ed., 1865). VENDOME (anc. Vindocinum), a town of France, in the department of Loir-et-Cher, on the Loir, 18 m. N. "W. of. Blois; pop. in 1872, 9,938. It was formerly capital of the district of Vend6mois, which comprised parts of the present departments of Loir-et-Cher and Sarthe. It contains the ruined chateau of the dukes of Vend6me, a lyceum, a public library, and manufactories of leather, gloves, and cot- ton goods. Several combats took place in the vicinity previous to and after the German oc- cupation of the city (Dec. 16, 1870). VENDOME. I. Cesar, duke de, a French prince, the eldest son of Henry IV. by his mis- tress Gabrielle d'Estr^es, born in the castle of Coucy, Picardy, in June, 1594, died in Paris, Oct. 22, 1665. Ho was legitimated in his in- fancy, and in 1598 made duke of Vend6me and betrothed to the daughter of the duke de Mer- cceur, who resigned to tim the government of Brittany. In 1610 he was allowed to take rank next to the princes of the blood. During the reign of his half brother" Louis XIII., he participated in the conspiracy of Chalais against Richelieu(1626), was incarcerated forfour years at Vincennes and Amboise, and banished for several years afterward. In 1641 he was charged with an attempt to poison Richelieu, and escaped to England. After the death of Richelieu ho returned home, and was treated with great favor by the queen regent Anne of Austria; but he lost her good will by his active part in the Fronde. In 1650, having made his peace with the government, he was appointed governor of Burgundy. In 1653 he took Bor- deaux from the Frondeurs, and in 1655, in the capacity of grand admiral of France, de- feated the Spanish fleet off Barcelona. He left two sons, Louis and Francois, the latter of whom was the celebrated duke of Beaufort. (See BEAUFORT, FRANCOIS DE VENDOME, duke of.) II. Louis, duke de, son of the preceding, known as the duke de Merco?ur during his father's life, born in 1612, died in Aix, Aug. 6, 1669. He served abroad, returned to France after Richelieu's death, and became in 1649 viceroy and commander of the French troops in Catalonia. He married in 1651 Laura Mancini, a niece of Cardinal Mazarin, was made commander in Provence, and placed in 1656 at the head of the French army in Lombardy. On his wife's death (1657) he be- came a priest, was made cardinal, and held the