FOOTNOTES:[A]This has been recently the subject of a decision of the Court of Queen's Bench, in the case ofEganv.The Guardians of the Kensington Union, 3 Queen's Bench Reports, p. 935, note (a). The same rule applies to physicians.Veitchv.Russell,ib.928.[B]Leading counsel, indeed all counsel much engaged in business, necessarily place their time almost altogether at the disposal of their clerks, whose duty it is to keep an exact record of their employer's engagements, and see that no incompatible ones are made for him. Counsel find quite enough to do, in adequately attending to the matters actually put before them by their clerks, without being harassed by adjusting the very troublesome arrangements and appointments, for time and place, where their duties are to be performed or, at all events, doing more than keeping a general superintendence over their arrangements thus made. To all this must be added those innumerable contingencies in the arrangements of the courts, and the course of business, which no one can possibly foresee; and which often derange a whole series of arrangements, however cautiously and prudently made, and render counsel unable, after having carefully mastered their cases, to attend at the trial or argument.[C]The clerk of a barrister has a fee on every fee of his employer, in a long-settled proportion of 2s. 6d. on all fees under five guineas; from, and inclusive of five guineas, up to ten guineas, 5s.; from ten guineas, 10s., and so on for higher fees.[D]Phil.c. vi. sec. 7.[E]Adapted from Edmund Burke.[F]Sir Walter Raleigh—History of the World, last paragraph.
[A]This has been recently the subject of a decision of the Court of Queen's Bench, in the case ofEganv.The Guardians of the Kensington Union, 3 Queen's Bench Reports, p. 935, note (a). The same rule applies to physicians.Veitchv.Russell,ib.928.
[A]This has been recently the subject of a decision of the Court of Queen's Bench, in the case ofEganv.The Guardians of the Kensington Union, 3 Queen's Bench Reports, p. 935, note (a). The same rule applies to physicians.Veitchv.Russell,ib.928.
[B]Leading counsel, indeed all counsel much engaged in business, necessarily place their time almost altogether at the disposal of their clerks, whose duty it is to keep an exact record of their employer's engagements, and see that no incompatible ones are made for him. Counsel find quite enough to do, in adequately attending to the matters actually put before them by their clerks, without being harassed by adjusting the very troublesome arrangements and appointments, for time and place, where their duties are to be performed or, at all events, doing more than keeping a general superintendence over their arrangements thus made. To all this must be added those innumerable contingencies in the arrangements of the courts, and the course of business, which no one can possibly foresee; and which often derange a whole series of arrangements, however cautiously and prudently made, and render counsel unable, after having carefully mastered their cases, to attend at the trial or argument.
[B]Leading counsel, indeed all counsel much engaged in business, necessarily place their time almost altogether at the disposal of their clerks, whose duty it is to keep an exact record of their employer's engagements, and see that no incompatible ones are made for him. Counsel find quite enough to do, in adequately attending to the matters actually put before them by their clerks, without being harassed by adjusting the very troublesome arrangements and appointments, for time and place, where their duties are to be performed or, at all events, doing more than keeping a general superintendence over their arrangements thus made. To all this must be added those innumerable contingencies in the arrangements of the courts, and the course of business, which no one can possibly foresee; and which often derange a whole series of arrangements, however cautiously and prudently made, and render counsel unable, after having carefully mastered their cases, to attend at the trial or argument.
[C]The clerk of a barrister has a fee on every fee of his employer, in a long-settled proportion of 2s. 6d. on all fees under five guineas; from, and inclusive of five guineas, up to ten guineas, 5s.; from ten guineas, 10s., and so on for higher fees.
[C]The clerk of a barrister has a fee on every fee of his employer, in a long-settled proportion of 2s. 6d. on all fees under five guineas; from, and inclusive of five guineas, up to ten guineas, 5s.; from ten guineas, 10s., and so on for higher fees.
[D]Phil.c. vi. sec. 7.
[D]Phil.c. vi. sec. 7.
[E]Adapted from Edmund Burke.
[E]Adapted from Edmund Burke.
[F]Sir Walter Raleigh—History of the World, last paragraph.
[F]Sir Walter Raleigh—History of the World, last paragraph.
The words chosen as the subject of the following verses, form the first line of an antiquated song, of which the remainder seems not to have been preserved.—See Mr Dauney's "Ancient Scotish Melodies," p. 227.
"Let never Cruelty dishonour Beauty"—Be no such war between thy face and mind.Heaven with each blessing sends an answering duty:It made thee fair, and meant thee to be kind.Resemble not the panther's treacherous seeming,That looks so lovely to beguile its prey;Seek not to match the basilisk's false gleaming,That charms the fancy only to betray.See the great Sun! God's best and brightest creature—Alike on good and ill his gifts he showers:Look at the Earth, whose large and liberal natureTo all who court her offers fruits or flowers.Then, lady, lay aside that haughty scorning—A robe unmeet to deck a mortal frame;Mild be thy light, and innocent as morning,And shine on high and humble still the same.Bid thy good-will, in bright abundance flowing,To all around its kindly stream impart;Thy love the while on One alone bestowing,The fittest found, the husband of thy heart!
"Let never Cruelty dishonour Beauty"—Be no such war between thy face and mind.Heaven with each blessing sends an answering duty:It made thee fair, and meant thee to be kind.
Resemble not the panther's treacherous seeming,That looks so lovely to beguile its prey;Seek not to match the basilisk's false gleaming,That charms the fancy only to betray.
See the great Sun! God's best and brightest creature—Alike on good and ill his gifts he showers:Look at the Earth, whose large and liberal natureTo all who court her offers fruits or flowers.
Then, lady, lay aside that haughty scorning—A robe unmeet to deck a mortal frame;Mild be thy light, and innocent as morning,And shine on high and humble still the same.
Bid thy good-will, in bright abundance flowing,To all around its kindly stream impart;Thy love the while on One alone bestowing,The fittest found, the husband of thy heart!
"A deep and mighty shadowAcross my heart is thrown,Like a cloud on a summer meadow,Where the thunder wind hath blown!"Barry Cornwall.
"A deep and mighty shadowAcross my heart is thrown,Like a cloud on a summer meadow,Where the thunder wind hath blown!"
Barry Cornwall.
At this period of French history, and even up to a period much later, the bridges which crossed the Seine, and connected the two separate parts of the city of Paris, were built over with houses, and formed narrow streets across the stream. These houses, constructed almost entirely of wood, the beams of which were disposed in various directions, so as to form a sort of pattern, and ornamented with carved window-sills and main-beams, were jammed together like figs in a cask, and presented one gable to the confined gangway, the other to the water, which, in many cases, their upper story overhung with a seemingly hazardous spring outward. Towards the river, also, many were adorned with wooden balconies, sheltered by the far-advancing angles of the roofs; whilst beneath, upon the water, the piles of the bridge were encumbered by many water-mills, to the incessant noise of which, habit probably reconciled the inhabitants of the houses above.
In an upper room in one of the houses which, after this fashion, lined thePont au Change, sat, on the evening of the day on which Philip de la Mole had escaped from the Louvre, three persons, the listlessness of whose attitudes showed that they were all more or less pre-occupied by painful reflections.
The principal personage of this group—a woman between fifty and sixty years of age—lay back on a large wooden chair, her eyes fixed on vacancy. Her dress was of simple dark stuff, very full upon the sleeves and below the waist, and relieved by a small white standing collar; a dark coif, of the fashion of the period, covered the grizzled hair, which was drawn back from the forehead and temples, leaving fully exposed a face, the rude features and heavy eyebrows of which gave it a stern character. But in spite of this severity of aspect, there naturally lurked an expression of goodness about the mouth and eyes, which spoke of a kindliness of disposition and tenderness of heart, combined with firmness and almost obstinacy of character. Those eyes, however, were now vacant and haggard in expression; and that mouth was contracted as if by some painful thought.
By her side, upon a low stool, was seated a fair girl, whose attire was as plain as that of the more aged woman; but that lovely form needed no aids of the toilet to enhance its beauty. The fair brown hair brushed off from the white brow, in the graceless mode of the day, hid nothing of a face which had all the purity of some beautiful Madonna; although the cheek was pale, and the lines of the physiognomy were already more sharpened than is usual at years so young. Her head, however, was now bent down over a large book which lay upon her knees, and from which she appeared to have been reading aloud to the elder woman; and, as she sat, a tear dropped into its pages, which she hastily brushed away with her fair hand.
The third person, who completed the group, was a young man scarcely beyond the years of boyhood. His good-looking round face was bronzed and ruddy with fresh colour, and his dark eyes and full mouth were expressive of natural gaiety and vivacity. But he, too, sat leaning his elbows upon his knees, and gazing intently, and with a look of anxiety, upon the fair girl before him; until, as he saw the tear fall from her eye, he turned impatiently upon his stool, and proceeded to polish, with an animation which was not that of industry, the barrel of a gun which lay between his knees.
The room which formed the groundworkto the picture composed of these three personages, was dark and gloomy, as was generally the interior of the houses of the time; a large wardrobe of black carved wood filled a great space of one of the walls; presses and chests of the same dark and heavy workmanship occupied considerable portions of the rest of the room. The low casement window, left open to admit the air of a bright May evening, looked out upon the course of the rapid Seine, and gave a cheering relief to the dark scene. The hazy rays from the setting sun streamed into the room; and from below rose up the sound of the rushing waters, and the wheels of the mills, mixed with occasional cries of men upon the river, and the more distant murmur of the city. The scene was one of calmness; and yet the calmness of those within that room was not the calmness of repose and peace.
It was the youth who first spoke.
"Jocelyne," he said in a low tone, approaching his stool nearer to that of the fair girl, and then continuing to polish his gun-barrel without looking her in the face—"if you knew how it grieves me to see you thus! You sit and droop like a bird upon the wintry branch, when I would fain see you lift your head and chirp, as in days gone by, now that summer begins to gladden around us."
The maiden thus addressed looked at him with a languid smile, and then faintly shook her head.
"How would you have me gay, Alayn," she said softly, "when our grandmother continues thus?"
Alayn made a gesture of doubt, as if he would have said, that solicitude for her grandmother was not the only cause of Jocelyne's sadness; but he made no observation to that effect, and, nodding his head towards the older woman, asked in a low tone—
"How is Dame Perrotte to-day? She did not answer my greeting on my entrance; and during your reading from that forbidden book of Scripture, she has uttered not a word."
"You may speak aloud," replied Jocelyne. "When she is in this state, she does not hear us. She is fully absorbed in her sad thoughts. I have seldom seen her more troubled than she has been for some few days past. One would suppose that the return of sunny summer days recalls more fearfully to her mind that epoch of carnage and destruction at the fête of St Bartholomew, when the heavens above were so joyous and bright, whilst below the earth was reeking with blood, and your poor father perished, Alayn, for his religion's sake. I have ever remarked, when the sun shines the cheeriest, her spirit is the darkest."
"Will she not speak to me?" enquired Alayn.
"No," replied his cousin. "When in these deepest moods of melancholy, she will not speak but upon the subject of those fatal days, or if her attention be aroused by the mention of her slaughtered kindred; and Heaven forbid that an unguarded word from me should excite so terrible a crisis as would ensue!"
"And she remains always thus now?" asked the youth.
"Not always," answered Jocelyne. "There are times when she is as of old, and speaks to me with calmness. But at these better hours she makes no mention of the past."
"She never talks, then, of returning to the palace?" continued Alayn, with an evident air of satisfaction upon his round ruddy face.
"Never," replied the girl, with an involuntary sigh.
"And yet her foster-son, the king, has often sent for her."
"Hush!" interrupted Jocelyne. "Let not that name strike upon her ear. Although she hears us not, the very word might, perchance, call up within her recollections I would were banished from her mind for ever. The name of her nursling, whom she once loved as were she his own mother, and he had not worn a crown, is now a sound of horror to her. Often has she cursed him in the bitterness of her heart," she continued in a low tone of mystery, as if fearful lest the very walls should hear her confidence, "as the slayer of the righteous. She never can forgive him the treacherous order given for that murderous deed of slaughter and destruction."
"But he protected her from all harm in that general massacre of our party in religion, from which so few of us escaped," said Alayn.
"She would rather have died, I verily believe," pursued the fair girl shuddering, "than have lived to see her own son fall, so cruelly murdered by the son of her fostering care."
"And she never will return to him again?" enquired the young man with another gleam of satisfaction.
Jocelyne shook her head.
"So much the better. So much the better," pursued Alayn stoutly. "For then I can see you when I will, fair cousin Jocelyne, and come and sit by your side as I do now, to continue my work with the permission of my master the armourer, who, whatever he may say, is as good a Calvinist at heart as ourselves, I am sure. And you will return no more with my grandmother among those villanous popinjays about the court, who are ever for telling you soft tales of love, and swearing that your eyes are the brightest in creation—as, to be sure, they are; and that never such an angel walked the earth—as, to be sure, there never did; but who mean it not well with you, cousin Jocelyne, and would but have their will to desert you and leave you to sorrow, and who, with all their gilded finery, are not worth one inch of the coarse stuff of a stout-hearted honest artisan who loves you, and would see you happy; although I say it, who should not say it."
Jocelyne drew up her head proudly as if about to speak; but, as her melancholy pale hazel eyes met those of her cousin, sparkling with animation and good-humour, she only turned herself away, whilst a bright flush of colour overspread that cheek but a moment before so pale.
"Why, look ye, cousin Jocelyne," continued the youth once more, after a moment's pause; "it will out, in spite of me, all that I have got to say. I cannot see your pale cheek and tearful eye, and hear the sigh that ever and anon breaks so painfully from your bosom, but that, all simple as I be, I can tell it is not only for our poor grandmother you sorrow. Mayhap I have heard what I have heard, and seen what I have seen besides; but never mind that. Believe me, you sorrow for those who love you not truly as there are others who love you—you pain your heart until you will break it, for those who play you false."
"Alayn, I can hear no more of this! You know not what you say!" cried the fair girl hastily; and, laying down upon the table her book, she arose and walked away from him to lean out of the window.
"Nay, pardon me, cousin Jocelyne," exclaimed the youth in a pained tone, also rising and advancing towards the window. "I do but speak as I should and must speak, being your well-wisher—I mean you well, God knows. And the time will come when you too will knowhowwell!"
Jocelyne turned her eyes, which were moist with tears, to her cousin; and, stretching out her hand to him, she said, with all that romantic fervour of the ingenuous girl which almost wears the semblance of inspiration—
"Alayn, I know you love me, and that you mean it well with me. You are a kind and sincere brother to me. But, oh! you cannot read the deep deep feelings of the heart, or judge how little words have the power, like the charms we read of, to heal its wounds and wrench asunder the chains that bind it for ever and ever! The ivy, when torn from the stem to which it clings, may wither and die, but it cannot be attached to another trunk, however skilful the hand of the gardener who would attach it."
The youth took her hand, and, as she again turned to the window to hide her increasing emotion, shook his head sadly and doubtfully; then, returning to his stool, he took the gun-barrel between his knees with a movement of impatience, and continued his occupation of polishing it, although his eyes were constantly fixed askance upon the graceful form of the girl as she leant upon the window sill.
Presently the old woman moved uneasily in her chair, and, placing her hands firmly upon its arms, as if about to rise from her seat, she exclaimed aloud—
"Vengeance is mine, saith the Lord, and I will avenge the blood of the righteous!"
Both Jocelyne and Alayn turned; but, before the fair girl could hurry toher grandmother's side, she had sunk down again into her chair, murmuring—
"No, no! enough of blood! enough of vengeance! God pardon him, and turn the hearts of those who counseled him to this deed."
"Give me my Bible, Jocelyne my girl," said again the old woman after a pause. "It seems I have not read it for many a long hour. God forgive me! But my poor head wanders strangely. Ah! is it you Alayn? Good-day to you," she continued, as if she had then first become aware of the presence of her grandson.
Jocelyne hastily gave her grandmother the volume which she had laid down upon the table; and whispering in her cousin's ear, as she passed, "She has spoken, she will be better now," sat down once more by her side.
A silence again pervaded that still room, when suddenly a noise of steps resounded upon a wooden stair. They approached the door, upon which a hurried knocking was now heard. Before Jocelyne, who, at the sound of these steps, had clasped her hands before her, with an expression of surprise and almost of alarm, had fully risen from her seat, the door was flung open, and a man enveloped in a cloak, and with a jewelled hat sunk low upon his brow, entered hastily.
He closed the door, and then gazed with a rapid glance around him.
Jocelyne had sprung up with a suppressed cry.
"Ah! I am not mistaken," said the man advancing, and removing his hat. "Jocelyne! Dame Perrotte! I am a fugitive, and I seek a shelter at your hands. I could not trust myself to those who call themselves my friends; others who might have protected me, I know not where to find, but I bethought myself of you—of you, Jocelyne—and"——
"Philip! Monseigneur," stammered the astonished girl. "You—here—and a fugitive!"
"Do you not know me?" said the fugitive to Dame Perrotte, who had risen from her chair, and stood staring at him as if with a return of troubled intellect.
"Not know you?" exclaimed the old woman rising. "I know you well, Philip de la Mole! And is it you, the Catholic, who seek a shelter beneath the roof of the proscribed and outlawed Huguenot?"
"But it is in the cause of your religion that I have conspired, my good woman, and that I am now compelled to fly," replied La Mole; "it was for one, who, as chief of your party, would have espoused your quarrel, and re-established your influence in the land."
"Ay, for your master, the shallow Duke of Alençon," responded Perrotte coldly. "False, hollow ambition all! And ye call that the cause of religion—Mockery! Yes, I know you well, Philip de la Mole, who in the hour of bloodshed," she continued, growing more and more excited, "could approve the hellish deed, and who now can babble of sacrifice and self-offering in the cause of our religion."
"You belie me, woman," said La Mole proudly.
"Yes, I know you, Philip de la Mole," pursued the old woman with knitted brows and flashing eyes; "you, who, to amuse your hours of idleness, could talk of love to a poor trusting girl, heedless how you destroyed her peace of mind, had you but your pastime and your jest of it."
"Grandmother!" cried Jocelyne in the bitterest distress.
"It was he, then!" exclaimed Alayn, advancing upon the fugitive nobleman, with the gun-barrel raised in his arm.
"If you love me, forbear!" screamed his cousin, flinging herself before him.
"I had hoped to have found shelter among honest hearts, whom misfortune should have taught pity," said the fugitive proudly, and unmoved; "and I have erred—unjust hate, prejudice, inhospitality, are the only virtues practised beneath this roof. I will again brave the danger, and seek elsewhere that kindly feeling I find not here. Jocelyne, my sweet pretty Jocelyne, farewell!"
With these words La Mole moved towards the door. The old woman regarded him motionless, and with the same cloud of irritation on her brow. Alayn seemed equally inclined to prosecutehis first hostile intention; but Jocelyne sprang after the retreating nobleman and caught him by the arm.
"Grandmother," she said, drawing herself up to her full height, and leaning fondly against La Mole—"if any one have erred, it is I, and I alone. It was I chose himforthas the noblest, the brightest, the best among those who glittered about the court, in which we humbly lived. I had given him my heart ere he had deigned to cast a look upon me. If I have loved him—if I love him still—it is because I alone have sought it should be so."
"Jocelyne! be still, sweet girl," said La Mole, affected, and moving towards the door.
"And were he our bitterest enemy," continued the excited girl, still clinging to his arm, "he is now a proscribed fugitive—no matter why—God sends him to us—and it is ours to save, not to condemn him."
"But it is said, that the enemy of the righteous shall perish from the earth," said her grandmother sternly; "it is not I condemn or kill him. If it be the will of God that his cause of error cease, let him go forth and die."
"If he die, mother," exclaimed Jocelyne with energy, "I shall die too. I have given him my heart, my life, my soul—punish me as you will—trample me at your feet. But I love him, mother; and, if you drive him forth to be hunted by his enemies to the death, your child will not survive it."
Alayn had turned away in bitterness of heart, and the old Huguenot woman, although giving way more and more to that excitement, which, at times, fully troubled her reason, only wrung her hands, as if moved by the address of the agitated girl.
"Stay! stay, Monseigneur," continued Jocelyne, as La Mole again pressed her hand and turned to depart. "She relents—she has a kind heart; and she would not, surely, deliver up the guest who begs shelter at her threshold, into the hands of those who seek to capture and to kill him."
"Let me go forth, Jocelyne! farewell!" repeated La Mole.
"Mother!" again commenced the unhappy girl, throwing herself down to clasp the knees of her grandmother, who, overcome by the violence of her feelings, had sunk back again into her chair. "Mother! would your husband, or your son, have driven even their deadliest enemy from their door?"
"Speak not of my son, girl; or you will drive me mad!" cried Perrotte, clasping her hands before her face.
Jocelyne sprang up with a look of despair, and returned to detain once more La Mole.
As they thus stood, and before the old woman had again stirred, or Alayn interfered, a rumour from the street formed by the bridge, caught the ear of the excited girl.
"What is that?" she exclaimed, starting in alarm.
"The agents of the Queen-mother sent in my pursuit, probably," replied La Mole coolly, and disengaging himself from the convulsive embrace of Jocelyne. "How they have tracked me, I know not. So be it, then. I had hoped for the sake of others to avoid their hands; but I am prepared to meet my fate."
"No, no," screamed Jocelyne. "It cannot be! Mother—mother, would you see him made a prisoner in your own house—murdered, perhaps, before your very face!"
Alayn moved towards the door; and the girl sprang to intercept him.
"Would you be so base? Would you have me hate you?" cried the poor girl in despair, to her cousin.
Many steps were now heard ascending the lower stair. The old woman, who trembled in every limb, stirred not from her chair; but, removing one hand from her face, she stretched it out towards a corner of the room.
"Ah! I understand you, mother," exclaimed Jocelyne. "That secret closet where our books of religion are deposited, where our old priest, during the massacre, was hid!"
"Whilst my son perished—a victim—a martyr!" groaned the old woman, fearfully agitated.
"Come, come, Monseigneur," pursued the excited girl; and, in spite of the unwillingness of La Mole to profit by a hospitality thus bestowed, she dragged him to one corner of the room, and pushing back the spring of one of those secret recesses then so commonly constructed in all houses, as well of the bourgeois as the nobles,on account of the troubles and dangers of the times, she compelled him by her entreaties to enter a dark nook—then hastily closing the aperture, she exclaimed, "God shield him!" and sank down into the stool by her grandmother's side.
"Alayn!" she said, in a low hurried tone, as the heavy steps still mounted the stairs, "you will be silent, will you not? You will not betray him, and see the poor girl, whom you profess to love, die at your feet!"
The youth shook his head with a gesture of resignation, although the frown upon his brow showed how painful were the feelings that he suppressed.
"Mother!" whispered Jocelyne once more to the old woman. "Calm your agitation—oh! let not a word, a gesture, betray our secret! Stay! I will read to you!" And she seized the Bible, then a dangerous book to produce thus openly before Catholic agents of the court, and took it on her lap.
Perrotte answered not a word, but continued to rock herself with much agitation from side to side in her chair.
The noise of the arquebuses of soldiery was now, in truth, heard on the landing-place. A heavy blow was given on the panels of the door; and, without waiting for permission to enter, a man in the military accoutrements of the period, whose head was crowned with a high hat, adorned with a short red feather, advanced into the room with an air which betrayed at once a strange mixture of effrontery and hypocrisy.
"Landry!" exclaimed together both Jocelyne and Alayn.
"Captain Landry, at your service," said the man; "or, if you will, at the service of her majesty the Queen-mother. Good-day, my gentle cousins both. Good-day to you, my good aunt Perrotte. How goes it with her now? Her head was somewhat ailing as I heard, since she had left the court." And he touched his forehead significantly with his finger.
"She is well!" answered Jocelyne hastily, trembling in spite of her efforts to be calm.
"But this is no visit of ceremony, my good friends," continued Captain Landry, with some haughtiness of manner. "I come upon state affairs. A criminal of rank, who has conspired against the life and person of the king, has escaped; and we are sent in his pursuit. We have contrived to track him of a surety to this neighbourhood; and, as I bethought me that this same delinquent was a friend of my fair cousin Jocelyne, who, although she has received my offers of affection with disdain, could look upon another with more favour, I doubted not that I should find news of him in her company. Know you of none such here, sweet cousin?"
"I know not of whom you speak," said Jocelyne, her colour varying from the flush of emotion to the deadly paleness of fear.
"And you, Alayn, boy, since our fair cousin's memory is so short, can doubtless tell me. Has no one entered here within the last half hour?"
"No one!" answered Alayn sturdily; but he then turned and moved to the window to hide his confusion.
The Queen's agent shrugged his shoulders.
"And my good aunt has had no visitors?" he resumed, advancing towards the old woman.
Perrotte lifted her head, and regarded the captain fixedly, and with a look of scorn, but said not a word.
"Search!" said the officer, turning to the soldiers, who had waited without.
The men entered; and in a few instants the scanty and small rooms attached to the principal apartment were examined. The captain was informed that no one could be found. For a moment he looked disappointed, and paused to reflect.
"Their trouble is evident," he murmured to himself. "He may still be here. The reward for his capture is too great to be given up lightly; and, besides, I hate the fellow for the love she bears him—I will leave no stone unturned."
"Dame Perrotte!" he said returning to the old woman, and speaking to her in a low tone of voice—"A criminal of state has escaped from the king's justice. In spite of the protestations of your grandchildren, I cannot doubt that he is concealedhereabouts; and you must know where. You will not fail, I am sure, to indicate the place of his retreat, when you know that, as the friend of those who have proved the bitterest enemies of your religion, he must also be your deadly enemy."
"And is it Landry, the recreant, the apostate, the only seceder of our family from the just cause, who speaks thus?" said the old woman lifting her head with a haggard expression.
"The necessary policy of the times," whispered the captain, sitting down on the stool by her side, and approaching himself confidentially nearer, "has compelled me, like many others, to be that in seeming which we are not in heart. Has not our chief, Henry of Navarre, yielded also to the pressure of the circumstances in which he lives? Judge me not so harshly, good aunt. But this criminal—he is one of those who have hunted and destroyed, who have cried—'Down with them; down with the Huguenots—pursue and kill;' and you would withdraw him from the punishment he merits?"
"He! he! Was it, so?" muttered Perrotte, with eyes staring at the vacancy before her.
"Do you not fear to pass for the accomplice of his crimes?" continued Captain Landry in her ear. "Know you not that he has attainted the life of your nursling by deeds of sorcery, and that Charles IX., our king, now lies upon his death-bed."
"Who speaks of Charles?" exclaimed the old woman with increasing wildness and excitement. "Charles and death! Yes, they go hand in hand!"
"Landry! You shall not torture our poor mother thus," cried Jocelyne springing towards them, in order to interrupt a conversation which she had been witnessing in agony, although she could not hear it, and the effect of which upon her grandmother's unsettled mind became every moment more visible.
"Fair cousin, with your leave!" replied the captain. "I am bound to do the duties of my office. I shall be grieved to use constraint." And, waving his hand to her to withdraw, he made a sign to the soldiers to approach both Jocelyne and Alayn, and prevent their interference.
Jocelyne wrung her hands.
"Do you not fear the reproaches of your murdered son?" continued Captain Landry, turning to Perrotte, with an expression of perfidious hypocrisy in his eyes, and again pouring his words lowly, but distinctly, into her ear. "Do you not fear that he should rise from his tomb, and, showing the bloody wounds of that fatal night, cry for vengeance on his murderers, and curse the weakness of that mother who would screen and shelter them? Do you not fear that Heaven should condemn you as a friend to the destroyers of the righteous? Think on your slaughtered kindred, woman!"
"Mercy! mercy! my son!" cried the old woman, springing up with her hands outstretched, as if to repel a spectre. "Oh! hide that streaming blood! Look not so angry on me! Blood shall have blood, thou say'st; so be it. Vengeance is the Lord's! and He shall avenge his people!"
"Where is he?" enquired Landry, also rising, and watching her every movement.
"There! there!" exclaimed the excited woman, pointing to the corner of the room.
In spite of the attempt of Jocelyne, who was now restrained by the soldiers, to interrupt him, Captain Landry walked to the corner indicated, and after a few attempts succeeded in discovering the secret of the concealed recess.
"Count Philip de la Mole, you are my prisoner, under warrant of his majesty the King, and by order of the Queen-mother," he said, as the young nobleman appeared to view.
Jocelyne uttered a cry of despair.
"Conduct me where you are bidden, sir," said La Mole, offering his sword. "My sweet Jocelyne, farewell!—your kindly interest in my fate I shall never forget. But we shall meet again. Fear nothing for me; I will prove my innocence."
The unhappy girl fell at the feet of the captured nobleman, and wetted his outstretched hand with her tears, as she pressed it to her lips.
"My strict orders," said Captain Landry, "were to arrest all those who should be convicted of harbouring the criminal. Forget not, then,cousin Jocelyne, that I spare you so hard a lot. But my duty compels me to adopt other measures. Come, sir!"
When Philip de la Mole had been conducted from the room by the agents of the Queen-mother, Jocelyne turned to her grandmother, without rising from the ground, and exclaimed in the bitterest despair—
"Mother—mother—you have killed me!"
"Who spoke of Charles? Who said he lay upon his death-bed?" cried Perrotte, walking up and down with the uncertain step of the deranged of mind, and unheeding her unhappy grandchild; "Charles dying! and I shall see him no more—shall he die without a warning word from her who loved and cherished him so long—die without repentance? What was that voice that tortured my very soul? Who said he was about to die, and that I should see him no more?"
Jocelyne sprung up from the ground, as if a sudden thought had crossed her mind.
"Yes, mother, yes," she cried, "the king is dying. Come to him. See him once more. He will hear your words upon his death-bed, and extend his pardon to the innocent—for Philip de la Mole is innocent, my mother. He will save him who is unjustly condemned; and you will save his repentant soul. Come, mother, come—come," she continued, as if speaking to a child, "the king is waiting for you!"
"Charlot—my nursling—dying!" murmured the old woman—"Yes—let us go."
"Alayn will accompany us," said Jocelyne, turning to the youth, who stood at the window unhappy and confused.
Without waiting for any addition to their dress, the eager girl seized her grandmother's hand, and led her to the door.
When it was opened, two soldiers appeared upon the threshold, stationed to prevent all egress of the inhabitants; and one of them, placing his arquebuse across the door-stall, cried, in a rude voice—
"On ne passe pas."
The two women drew back in alarm.
"Sweet Isabel, take my part;Lend me your knees, and all my life to comeI'll lend you all my life to do you service."Shakspeare.
"Sweet Isabel, take my part;Lend me your knees, and all my life to comeI'll lend you all my life to do you service."
Shakspeare.
"Your suit's unprofitable; stand up, I say."Idem.
"Your suit's unprofitable; stand up, I say."
Idem.
Again the scene changes to the palace of the Louvre, where so many dark intrigues surrounded the rich chamber of the dying king; where, instead of the sympathy of friends, and the tears of relations, jarring ambition, and rivalry, and hatred, between brethren and kindred, between mother and children, escorted him on his passage to the tomb, and darkened thelast hours of his reign. Such might have been supposed by a moralist to be the punishment, inflicted, even upon this earth, on him, who, if he did not instigate, ordained and prosecuted the horrible massacre of St Bartholomew.
The state of the miserable Charles grew hourly worse, and he rapidly approached his last moments. None knew better than his heartless mother, as she had herself admitted, that hemust die; but yet, with so much artifice and intrigue did she envelope in mystery his lost condition, that, even in the Palace of the Louvre, his own nearest relations were ignorant how near approached the hour, which, by leaving the crown as heirloom to a successor far away in a distant country, opened a field to the ambitious designs of so many struggling parties in the state.
Unconscious, as many others, of the rapid advance of that fatal event, sat in her chamber Margaret of Valois, Queen of Navarre, the sister of the dying king. Her beautiful head was reclined languidly against the tapestry of the wall, the dark colours of which formed an admirable background to that brilliant and bejewelled portrait. A lute, of the fashion of the day, lay upon her lap; music,dresses, scraps of poetry in her own handwriting, caskets with jewellery, manuscripts, and illuminated volumes, were littered in various parts of the room. A handsome spaniel slumbered at her feet; whilst two of her ladies sat on chests at a respectful distance, occupied in embroidery. A look of soft pensiveness pervaded the delicate and highly expressive features of the young Queen; but her thoughts were not bent, at that moment, either on her suffering brother, or on those ambitious views for her husband, which, spite of her little affection for him, she entertained, partly out of a sort of friendship for the man she esteemed, although her hand had been so unwillingly bestowed upon him; partly out of that innate ambition and love of intrigue, which formed, more or less one ingredient in the character of all the children of the crafty Catherine de Medicis. No! they rambled unrestrained upon the souvenir of an object of woman's preference and princess's caprice, who for some time past had no more crossed her path. It was on that account her brow was clouded, and that a trait of sadness shaded her smiling mouth.
As she still lay thus languidly, one of the ladies was called by an officer from the room, and shortly returned to announce that there was a young girl without, who besought, with earnest supplication, to see her Majesty.
Although astonished at this request, Margaret, eager for any subject of passing occupation that might enliven, even for a moment, an hour's ennui, desired that she might be admitted; and shortly after a simply dressed girl, whose sunken head could not conceal her exquisite beauty, was ushered in. Her step as ill-assured and trembling; her face was deadly pale.
"What would you, maiden, with the Queen of Navarre?" said Margaret kindly. "How came you here?"
The girl raised her head, but still struggled with her emotion before she could speak.
"Ah! I remember me," pursued the princess with a smile. "You are the pretty Jocelyne, the fair grand-daughter of my brother Charles's favourite old nurse, Dame Perrotte; you are she of whom all our gallants spake with so much praise, to the great detriment and neglect of all our ladies of the court. Nay, blush not—or rather blush—blush, it becomes your pale face well, my dainty one. But I thought that you had left the court with Dame Perrotte, the sturdy Huguenot, ever since. Oh yes! I recall it all now," she continued, checking herself with a sort of shudder. "But what brings you hither? Speak. Have you any favour to ask that the Queen of Navarre can grant?"
"I would speak with you, madam, and alone, upon a matter of urgency and importance," stammered Jocelyne.
The thought, that as the fair girl before her belonged to a Huguenot family, she might have been used by the Calvinist party as a secret agent to convey her some intelligence connected with the various plots ripe at that period to place Henry of Navarre in a post of influence about the crown, if not upon the throne, crossed the mind of Margaret, and she gave instant orders that her ladies should retire. To her surprise, as soon as they were left alone, the lovely girl threw herself sobbing at her feet.
"Save him! save him!" cried Jocelyne, with outstretched arms. "You have influence—you can approach the king—you can save him if you will. And you will save him—will you not?"
"Of whom do you speak, my pretty maiden?" said the princess in surprise.
"Of Monseigneur the Count Philip de la Mole!" sobbed Jocelyne.
"Philip de la Mole!" exclaimed Margaret aghast. "What ails him, girl? You bid me save him—Why? What mean you?"
"Oh! madam, know you not," pursued the sobbing girl, "that he has been arrested for treason—for a conspiracy against the life of the king? that he is at this moment a prisoner, and that his life is threatened?"
"La Mole! arrested! accused of attempting the life of Charles!" cried the Queen of Navarre in the highest agitation. "And I knew naught of this? Is it true? How did you learn the story? Do you come from him? Speak, girl, speak, I say!"
"He was arrested, madam, in ourvery house," stammered Jocelyne, wringing her hands. "He had sought a refuge there—and he there lay concealed. But, alas! my poor grandmother, her wits are at times unsettled. Oh! she knew not what she did. Believe me she did not know. A treacherous villain worked upon her wavering mind—she betrayed him. They took him from the room a prisoner. I would have led my grandmother to seek his pardon at the feet of the king, who loved her so well that he would refuse her nothing; but soldiers guarded our doors; they would not let us pass. Then I bethought myself of the window. Our house is on the bridge, and looks upon the river. Below was a mill and the miller's boat. He is a good man, and kind of heart. I knew that he would row me to the shore. Alayn, my cousin, would have prevented me; but I would not hear him. What was the rushing stream, or the whirling mill-wheel to me? I saw not danger when I thought I could save the noble Count."
"Brave girl! brave girl!" interrupted Margaret, in palpitating excitement.
"There were beams and posts that descended to the water's edge," pursued Jocelyne, her eyes sparkling and her cheek now flushed with the animation of her tale. "Alayn aided me, although unwillingly, with cord and linen. I reached the mill—the boat. The miller rowed me to the shore. I knew I could not approach the king; but I bethought me of you, madam—for they say—they say, you love him well." At these words Jocelyne hesitated, with a mixture of feelings, in which bashful timidity struggled with her jealousy of the great lady before whom she knelt.
"Pursue, girl, pursue," said Margaret, an instantaneous blush again colouring that cheek, from which alarm had driven all colour.
"Yes; and I knew that you would save him," continued the excited girl, stretching out her hands in anguish. "He is your own brother—he—the king, the dispenser of life and death; and he will listen to you. And you will save the Count, will you not?"
"Yes—yes, girl! I will do all I can!" said the princess walking up and down in agitation. "Rise, rise—your tale is confused. I know not what all this may mean; but the truth is there. He is a prisoner! Oh, La Mole! La Mole! Whether has your imprudence driven you? And were it for me that he has done thus. Yes—yes I will to my brother Charles—I will learn all—supplicate—save him!"
With these words, half murmured to herself, half addressed to Jocelyne, the Queen of Navarre paced her room. Then making another sign to the unhappy girl to rise and remain, she took a whistle lying on a table, and whistled to call those without.
The hangings of the door were parted. But instead of one of her attendant ladies, it was the calm imposing form of Catherine de Medicis that entered the apartment.
Margaret started back as if she had seen a spectre.
"My mother!" burst involuntarily from her lips in a tone of alarm; for she divined, by rapid instinct, that such a visit could bode naught but evil.
The Queen-mother cast a searching glance over the two agitated females, and smiled as if, with that quickness of intelligence which characterised her cunning mind, she had discovered at once the meaning of the scene before her. With an imperious wave of the hand she signified her desire that the damsel should leave the room, since she would speak with her daughter. In spite of her agitation and distress, Margaret of Valois, with that implicit obedience to her mother's will which, in common with all the children of Catherine de Medicis, (except the unhappy Charles in the latter years of his hardly wrought and dearly paid emancipation from her authority,) she never ventured to refuse. She bid Jocelyne leave them; and the fair girl retired with trembling steps and sinking heart. The apparition of the Queen-mother had appalled her.
Catherine motioned to her daughter to be seated on a low stool, and taking herself a high-backed chair, smiled with her usual bland and treacherous smile.
"You seem agitated, Margaret,ma mie," commenced the Queen-mother, after a due pause. "I have come to condole and sympathise withyou in your distress. Much as I may have blamed your misplaced and unbecoming attachment to an obscure courtier, almost an adventurer in this palace, I cannot but feel that you must suffer from the discovery of the utter baseness of this man. Look not thus surprised. I see you have already learned his arrest—your whole manner betrays it."
"You speak of ——," stammered Margaret, trembling.
"I speak of Philip de la Mole," said the Queen coldly.
"It is true, then?" pursued her daughter. "He is arrested on a charge of treason. Oh, no! It cannot be! He is innocent!"
"He is guilty!" said Catherine coldly. "I have evidence the most incontrovertible, that he has conspired against the life of the king, your brother, by the foulest acts of sorcery. A wax figure, fashioned as a king, pierced to the heart by his very hand, has been laid before me. Your brother's illness, his mortal pains, his malady so incomprehensible, all declare that the hellish deed has but too much succeeded up to this hour."
Margaret shook her head with a smile of contempt and doubt.
"But for what purpose was designed this murderous act?" pursued the Queen-mother. "In despite of the rights of Henry of Anjou, to place his master, your brother, the Duke of Alençon, upon the throne upon the death of Charles. We have every proof that so it was."
"For Alençon!" stammered the princess.
"It was for him," continued Catherine, unheeding this interruption, but with an increasing smile of satisfaction, "that these treasonable plots were designed, and partly executed. The ambitious favourite thought, by his master's hand, to rule the destinies of France. But the traitor will now reap the fruits of his black treachery."
"For Alençon!" repeated Margaret in a tone of regret.
"Doubt not that I sympathise in all your sorrow at this discovery, my child," resumed the Queen-mother. "Bitterly indeed must you feel how the base traitor has betrayed and forgotten the woman who loved him so fondly, so imprudently."
"For Alençon!" again muttered Margaret with sunken head.
"Be this the punishment of your folly, and its reparation," pursued Catherine, after a pause. "Long ago should you have ceased to cherish an attachment for one so unworthy. But you have too soft a heart, Margaret, my girl; you are too kind. I wonder and admire the sacrifice of your own feelings, and the woman's weakness with which you could hear and compassionate the supplications of his mistress."
"Madam!" said the princess lifting her head in surprise.
"But even now I saw her at your feet," continued her mother, with a slight sneer, "begging you to intercede to obtain his pardon."
"His mistress! speak you of La Mole, madam?" exclaimed Margaret.
"What! you knew not, child, what all the court can tell you," replied Catherine, "that of this chit-faced grandchild of that old Huguenot, whom Charles so favoured, Philip de la Mole had made his light o' love? Ay, so it was. It was the talk and scandal of the palace. Where was he discovered on his arrest? In the girl's chamber, as I hear. And now she dares to come and tear her hair, and whine out for mercy for her paramour, at your feet—at yours! Effrontery could go no further!"
"Philip! could he be so base?" murmured Margaret to herself. "But yes—her tears—her agony! Oh! it is true! And he must love her well, that she should thus, at the hazard of her life"——
The Queen-mother smiled with satisfaction, as she saw that mistrust had entered Margaret's mind; but to make her purpose sure, she remained long, to comfort and console her daughter, as she said, with words of false sympathy, and hypocritical advice.
When at last she saw Margaret thus convinced of La Mole's utter unworthiness, and knew that injured pride and offended dignity had usurped in her heart the place, where, so shortly before, love alone had throned, Catherine de Medicis rose and retired.
Margaret did not weep. She was one lightly moved by the more violent as the tenderer feelings of a woman'sheart, and she was proud. She sat still, unmoved, with her hands clenched before her, when a slight movement in the apartment startled her. Upon raising her head she saw Jocelyne before her.
"You here, my mistress?" she exclaimed in anger.
"They would have bid me begone," said Jocelyne timidly; "but I concealed myself; and when her majesty the Queen-mother had gone forth, I returned unperceived."
"And you again dare to affront my presence?" said Margaret rising. "This is unheard of insolence."
"Alas, madam!" replied Jocelyne trembling, "I did but seek a last assurance that you would save him."
"Away with you, mistress," continued the princess, her eyes flashing with anger. "La Mole is but a traitor, as are men all. Let him meet his deserts. But I wonder at myself that I should bandy words with you. Go to your lover, girl, and comfort him as best you may."
"My lover! he!" murmured Jocelyne; "alas! he never loved me!"
Overwhelmed with the rude reception she had so unexpectedly received from the princess, who, but a short time before, had listened to her with so much eager interest, the poor girl moved with unsteady step towards the door.
"He loved you not, say you?" burst forth Margaret as to recall her. "Speak! He loved you not—this—young Count?"
"Madam," said Jocelyne, turning her head, but with downcast eyes, "in this dreadful moment, when he lies a prisoner, his life in danger, I can avow, what I could scarcely dare avow even to myself, that I loved him with a passionate and unrequited love. I loved him with an eager and devoted affection, although his heart was not mine—poor simple uncourtly girl as I am—although it was another's. He too loved, I know—but it was a great and noble lady, more worthy of him than was I. Pardon me, madam, if I dared to think she loved him too."
"Come hither, maiden, once again," said the princess in agitation. "He loved another, you say—this Count de la Mole—and who was she?"
"Madam," replied Jocelyne in embarrassment, "I have already craved your pardon that I should have ventured even to surmise it!"
"Ah!" sighed forth Margaret with a gleam of satisfaction in her face. "Come back, my girl, come back!" she resumed. "I have treated you harshly. I knew not what I did. Hear me—this Count has proved a traitor to his king; perhaps, I may fancy, a traitor to others also; he has conspired to turn away the rightful succession of the crown. But I believe him not guilty of all the black arts of which he is accused. I would save him from the unhappy consequences of his error, if I could. But what can I do? My mother is fearfully incensed against him!"
"Oh, madam, you have access to the king!" cried Jocelyne imploringly. "He is your brother—and the power to save or to destroy is his. He will not refuse you, if you entreat his pardon and mercy for the Count."
Margaret shook her head doubtfully.
"Alas!" she said, with a look of distress, "other influences are at work which mine cannot resist. I knew not all—but now I tremble."
Jocelyne still entreated, in all the agony of despair; and the young Princess, again calling to her ladies, and learning that the Queen-mother had returned to her own apartment, at last departed from her chamber, bidding her fair suppliant await her return.
Long, eternally long, appeared those minutes, as the unhappy girl still waited for that return which she imagined was to bring her the news of life or death. To calm the agitation of her mind, she prayed. But her thoughts were far too disturbed for prayer; and the prayer brought her no comfort.
At length the Queen of Navarre came back to her apartment—as Jocelyne looked in her face, she could scarcely repress a scream; that face was one of sorrow, and disappointment—the poor girl trembled in every limb, and did not dare to speak.
"I have done all I could," said Margaret—"His door was obstinatelyclosed to me—I could not see him—it was she—it was my mother, who has done this. I know it well."
"What is to be done? whether turn for help?" cried Jocelyne in dispair. "Oh! would that I could lay down my life to save his."
"Noble girl!" exclaimed the princess. "Thus devoted, whilst he loves another! How far more generous than was I; ay, I believe thee—couldst thou lay down thy life for him, thou wouldst do it."
"And is there no hope of seeking pardon at his hands?" resumed the afflicted girl.
"In time, perhaps—at another opportunity," replied Margaret; "but now my mother's influence triumphs."
"Another opportunity!" sobbed Jocelyne. "In time! Alas! such words are words of mockery—the king is dying—at his death the Queen-mother will command; and what have we then to hope?"
"Dying? the king—my brother!" exclaimed the Queen of Navarre—you rave, girl! he is ill—I know, but"——
"Know you not, madam," interrupted Jocelyne, "what all the city of Paris knows—that the king cannot live long—not many hours, perhaps—that he lies upon his death-bed?"
"Charles—dying! And my mother has concealed it from me!" cried Margaret. "I see through all her designs! she would keep us from his presence, that he bestow not upon my husband, whom he loves, the reins of power at his death. Charles—dying! Then there lies our only hope. If he die, let Henry of Navarre be Regent—he will listen to my prayer—and La Mole is saved. Yes, there lies the only chance. I will to my husband. We may have still time to effect our purpose, and secure the Regency, in these fewlast hours of the reign."
"O cousin, thou art come to set mine eye;The tackle of my heart is crack'd and burn'd;And all the shrouds, wherewith my life should sail,Are turned to one thread, one little hair;My heart hath one poor string to stay it by—* * *"All this thou see'st is but a clod,And module of confounded royalty."* * *"But now a king—now thus—This was now a king, and now is clay."Shakspeare.
The miserable king lay, indeed, upon his bed of death. He had refused to quit the room which he usually occupied, all encumbered as it was with his favourite hounds, his hunting accoutrements, and these horns, the winding of which had been his favourite amusement, and had contributed so powerfully to affect his lungs, and undermine his constitution. A sort of couch had been prepared for him of mattresses and cushions upon the floor; and upon that rude bed was the emaciated form of the dying monarch extended. To his customary attacks of blood-spitting, had succeeded a strange, and, until then, unknown symptom of malady, from which the very physicians recoiled with horror. Drops of red moisture, which bore all the appearance of blood, had burst, like perspiration, from the pores of the body; and there were moments when the wretched man writhed on his couch in the double anguish of body and mind, that, in spite of the efforts of the physicians to remove this extraordinary appearance, he might have been thought to be bathed in gore.
It was indeed an agony, and a bloody sweat!
The physicians had long since declared that there was no hope. In one of those fitful bursts of anger, in which Charles from time to time indulged, even in his state of exhaustion and in his dying moments, he had desired to be left by his doctors and attendants, and he slumbered his last slumber in this world, before closing his eyes for ever in the great sleep of death, to wake upon another. One person alone sat by the side of his couch; and that person was one, whom the incessant intriguing effortsof his mother would have taught him was his bitterest enemy.
That ivory paleness which had been so characteristic a trait of Charles, and had added at once to the melancholy and majesty of his face, was now of a yellow waxen colour, which might be said to increase from minute to minute in lividness of hue. His large nose stood frightfully prominent from those hollow sunken cheeks; his lips, in life, red almost to bleeding, were now ashy pale. Beneath his thin lids, the eyeballs, sunken into the deep cavities of his eyes, might be seen to roll and palpitate; whilst from his open and distorted mouth burst forth, even in his troubled sleep, moans, and then words of anguish.
The man who sat by his side, listened with varying feelings. Sometimes he started back with a movement of horror; sometimes he again bent forward in compassion, and with a kerchief lightly wiped away that fearful perspiration which burst from the hollow temples of the young man. The aspect of this personage was noble; his forehead was bold; his nose formed with that eagle curve which seems fashioned for command. The expression of his grey eyes denoted both resolution and wariness; whilst a general look of good temper and openness, which amounted almost toinsouciance, pervaded the whole face. He was clothed in black. It was Henry of Navarre, the ill-used and betrayed victim of Catherine's policy.
During the whole reign of Charles IX., the Queen-mother had used every effort to instil into his mind suspicions of the loyalty of the man, who, were the Valois to die childless, would be heir to the throne of France; and whom the decrees of Providence finally led, through the wiles and plots set to snare his liberty and his life, and in the midst of the clashing of contending parties, to rule the destinies of the country, as Henry the Fourth. Henry of Navarre, whom the artifice and calumny of a Medicis had done their best to separate and estrange from his king and brother-in-law during life, was now the only attendant upon his last moments—the only friend to press his dying hand and close his eyes. By a last exercise of his authority, Charles had declared that it was his will that Henry of Navarre, and he alone, should be permitted to approach his couch, and receive his last instructions; and in spite of all the manœuvres of the crafty Catherine, who no longer ventured openly to oppose her son's commands, the two princes were united in this supreme and awful hour.
And now Henry of Navarre sat and watched his dying relation with oppressed and anxious heart, aware that, were the king to die without providing for his safety by a last exercise of his power, his liberty, and even his life, would be in danger from the manœuvres of the revengeful Catherine; that his only chance of escape was in flight before the death of the expiring king; and yet, too noble and generous to leave the man who, at such a time, had called him to his side, he sat and watched.
Presently the king rolled convulsively upon his couch; his parted lips quivered horribly; and with a mutter, which increased at last into a distinct and piercing scream, he let fall the words—
"Away—away—torment me not! Why do you haunt me thus? Fire—fire! Kill—kill! No—spare them—spare them, and spare me a hopeless misery. Ah! they fly—they bleed—they fall. And the poor old Admiral—his grey heirs are dabbled with blood. Away—away—it was not I—not I! Ah!"——
With a sudden start of horror, the king lifted his head from his pillow, and for a time gazed with staring and glassy eyes, as if the hideous vision which had tortured his sleep were still before him. Then with a bitter groan, he again fell back upon his couch. Again he raised his head, and, looking upon Henry, said, with a faint and plaintive voice, that contrasted strangely with these brusque and harsh tones which were natural to him,
"Why do they ever pursue me thus—those Huguenots, who perished with the Admiral? It was not I—it was my mother who was the cause of all. And yet, I myself, arquebuse in hand, I hunted them to the death. Oh! but my remorse has been long and bitter, Henry. What I have suffered none on earth can tell. Since that fatal night, I have never enjoyeda moment's peace of mind. Do kings ever enjoy peace of mind, Henry? Oh, be glad that thou art not a reigning king! Peace of mind is not for them. If there be a purgatory, Henry, in another world, I have already endured all its tortures on this earth. Is not remorse the worst purgatory? ay—the most damning hell. But why, then, do they pursue me thus in hideous visions still?"
The wretched king buried his head in his pillow.
"Strive to be calm," said Henry of Navarre, bending over him to lift up his head, and arrange his cushions. "Those visions will leave you."
"Yes! in the grave—perhaps!" replied Charles, again looking up with a shudder.
"Let us hope better things," continued Henry. "With more tranquillity of mind, you will regain your strength, and"——
"No—all is past," murmured the king. "I feel that I am dying. Know you not that there is one accused of practising sorcery upon me. Folly! madness! An evil deedhasbeen practised upon me. Yes—the thought will not leave me. I would drive it away, but it still rankles in my heart. Evilhasbeen done me, but not by sorcery. And yet the sorcerer must die. The world must believe that it was he who worked my death; but it was another. Come here, Henry; bend your ear to me, for I can no longer rise. Wouldst thou know who it was?"
A noise in the further part of the room startled the young King of Navarre at this moment, and he turned his head. The only living creature present was the favourite green ape of the king, that sat and grinned and moaned, as if in mockery of his dying master.
"Come nearer, Henry," pursued the king, "for I would speak that to thee, that not the very walls may hear. Know you what has caused my death—who has been my murderer?"
Henry bent his head over the dying man, more to satisfy a caprice of the sufferer, than in the expectation of any serious revelation; and, as Charles whispered in his ear, he started back in horror.
"Oh, sire, think not so! Drive away so miserable a suspicion!" he said. "It were too horrible. It is impossible!"
"Impossible!" repeated the king, with a faint ironical laugh. "To some hearts all things are possible."
"You had a mother once," continued Charles, after a painful pause. "But she was good and kind; and she is dead. Know you how she died?—Mine still lives—and now it is I who die."
"Speak not thus, I entreat you, sire!" interrupted Henry. "This is horrible!"
"Horrible! is it not?" repeated the wretched king with the same harrowing laugh. "Henry! trust not yourself to the tender mercies of my mother!"
Again the same strange noise struck upon the ear of Henry of Navarre.
"Nor shall my people, my poor suffering people, be trusted to her care," continued the king with more energy. "Henry, thou art the only one, in this my palace of the Louvre, who loves me. In spite of all that has been said and done, thou alone hast left me in repose, hast never troubled my last days by conspiracies against my crown, and against my life—ay, my life! Brother has been set against Brother in bitter hatred. Thou alone hast not hated me, Henry. Thou alone, in spite of all the wrongs I have done thee—thou hast loved me. To thee I commend my poor patient wife—to thee I commend my people!"
"But, sire, should it please Heaven to take you from us—and may you live long, I pray"—resumed Henry of Navarre, whilst the king shook his head—"it will be your mother who will claim the regency, until the return from Poland of your brother, Henry of Anjou. It will be hers probably to command!"
"When I bid you not trust yourself to her tender mercies," replied Charles, "think not I spoke as a child. My life is ebbing fast, I know, but my mind is clear. Give me that paper!" He pointed to a paper laid upon a table close by his side. "This is my last and binding command, which I shall now sign with my own hand," he continued, as Henry brought him the desired paper, and laid it upon his couch. "This declares, that, bymy last will, I appoint you as Regent of this realm until the return of the King of Poland. The name is still in blank; for I would not that those who drew it up should know my purpose, and bring my mother clamouring to my side, to thwart my last wish by her reproaches. Give me a pen, Henry. Now, support me—so—in your arms. Where is now the paper? My sight is troubled; but I shall find strength to see and strength to trace that name."
Raised up in the arms of the King of Navarre, Charles took the pen placed in his hand, and laid it on the paper.
"When you are regent, Henry," he paused to say, "remove my mother from your court. It is I who bid you do it. She would hate you with a mortal hatred; for power is her only aim in this world, and for that she would forfeit her salvation in the next. Not a moment would your life be in safety. She would poison you, as she has poisoned her miserable son."
"Sire! retract those words!" said a voice close by the dying king.
Before the couch of her son stood Catherine de Medicis. Her face was cold and passionless as ever, although her dark eyes gleamed with unusual fire, and her pallid face was still more pale.
"What would you have with me, madam?" said Charles, shuddering, as she approached. "Have I not desired to be alone with my good brother Henry upon affairs of state?"
"Retract those words, sire!" pursued his mother, unheeding him. "You have brought against me the most awful accusation that malice can lay to the charge of a human being. Would you leave this world, if so it please the saints above, with so hideous a lie upon your lips? Sire! retract those words!"
"Leave me, woman! Leave me to die in peace!" said Charles, with an effort of energy, struggling with his weakness and the violence of his emotions. "Be you guilty of this deed, or be you not, may Heaven forgive you your misdeeds, as I pray it may forgive me mine."
"My son! my son!" cried Catherine, kneeling down by his side, whilst the tears, which were ever ready at her command, and might now have been natural tears of rage, rolled down her cheeks, "I cannot leave you thus, a victim to the most horrible suspicion. I may have erred against you, but it has been unconsciously. I have ever sought your honour and your glory, perhaps by means you now condemn; but I have acted, like a weak, fallible mortal, for the best. No—no—you really cannot entertain thoughts so terrible. It cannot be. This is the suggestion of my enemies—and my enemies are yours, my son." And, as she said these words, Catherine darted a cold, sharp look of rage at Henry of Navarre, who had risen, and now remained an unwilling spectator of so terrible a scene—a scene of the most fearful passions of the human heart between mother and son, and upon the bed of death. "No—no—you will retract your words. You will say you did not entertain that frightful thought."
As the Queen-mother spoke, her eyes were fixed upon the paper, which was to consign the regency to Henry of Navarre; and, in spite of the animation with which she addressed her son, it was evident that upon that paper her chief thoughts were directed.
"Madam!" said Charles faintly, raising himself with difficulty on one elbow, and struggling with internal pain—"you have received my last words of pardon. Let my last moments be undisturbed."
"Charles, Charles!" exclaimed his mother, wringing her hands. "Let me remove these horrible ideas from your mind. What shall I say? What shall I do? Can a son think thus of a mother who has ever loved him? Oh, no!—it is impossible. Your mind wandered. You did not think it."