The Nice Valour is the shortest play in the Beaumont/Fletcher folios, and inconsistencies in the text (the setting shifts between France and Genoa with no explanation) suggest revision by a hand other than that of the original author.
Early critics, observing obvious differences from the normal style of Fletcher and Beaumont, postulated the participation of Middleton and perhaps William Rowley; their twentieth-century successors were able to refine that determination with a close study of the play's stylistic and linguistic preferences.
A second odd fellow is a kinsman of the Duke, who is subject to wild mood swings, from joy to love to melancholy to rage; he is the "passionate madman" of the subtitle.
Egged on by her brothers, the young woman disguises herself as a Cupid among the court masquers, as part of a plan to manipulate the "passionate madman" to the altar.
The Duke's kinsman survives his wound, and the shock of his experience jolts him out of his mental state; he recovers his wits and acknowledges the young woman "Cupid" as his intended bride.
The Duke's apology to Shamont after touching him with his whip is thought to represent an incident at court between King James and John Gibb.