Footnote 1: The passion for dwarfs as attendants in great houses was so universal in France at this time, that the most extravagant sums were given for them. Henry III. is reported to have had no less than nine at one time; and at his court there was a regulartailleurandvalet des nains.
Footnote 2: This speech of the dwarf applies to various modes of travelling then known in France, which it might be tedious to explain more fully in this place.
Footnote 3: The Duke of Guise, who held the throne of Henry III. and was afterwards barbarously assassinated by command of that monarch, had been his bosom friend in youth.
Footnote 4: In English, a mortgage. This sort of encumbrance was but too frequently created in France during the wars of the League and the epoch of debauchery which preceded, accompanied, and followed them.
Footnote 5: I have, in another romance, published long since this work was written, given a description of the phenomenon here mentioned, and have in that tale attempted to depict it as it appeared to the Royalists.