mil turn against the Monarchy and against you,
"I have had enough of fighting ideas with weapons that
cannot touch them. Let us see whether Protestantism can
make its way if left to itself; above all, let us see what the
spirit of that faction means to attack. The Admiral, God
ABOUT CATHERINE DE' MEDICI 263
be merciful to him, was no enemy of mine. He swore to me
that he would restrain the revolt within the limits of spiritual
feeling, and in the temporal kingdom secure mastery to the
King and submissive subjects. Now, gentlemen, if the thing
is still in your power, set an example, and help your sovereign
to control the malcontents who are disturbing the peace of
both parties alike. War robs us of all our revenue, and ruins
the country ; I am weary of this troubled State — so much so,
that, if it should be absolutely necessary, I would sacrifice my
mother. I would do more; I would have about me a like
number of Catholics and of Protestants, and I would hang
Louis XI. ^s axe over their heads to keep them equal. If
Messieurs de Guise plot a Holy Alliance which endangers the
Crown, the executioner shall begin on them.
"I understand the griefs of my people, and am quite
ready to cut freely at the nobles who bring trouble on our
country. I care little for questions of conscience; I mean
henceforth to have submissive subjects who will work, under
my rule, at the prosperity of the State.
"Gentlemen, I give you ten days to treat with your ad-
herents, to break up your plots, and return to me, who will
be a father to you. If you are refractory, you will see great
changes. I shall make use of smaller men who, at my bid-
ding, will rush upon the great lords. I will follow the ex-
ample of a king who pacified his realm by striking down
greater men than you are who dared to defy him. If Catholic
troops are wanting, I can appeal to my brother of Spain to
defend a threatened throne; nay, and if I need a Minister
to carry out my will, he will lend me the Duke zi. Alva."
"In that event. Sire, we can find Germans to fight your
Spaniards," said one of the party.
"I may remind you, cousin," said Charles IX. coldly, "that
my wife's name is Elizabeth of Austria; your allies on that
side might fail you. But take my advice; let us fight this
alone without calling in the foreigner. You are the object
of my mother's hatred, and you care enough for me to play
the part of second in my duel with her — well, then, listen.
264 ABOUT CATHERINE DE' MEDICI
Y ou stand so high in my esteem, that I offer you the office of
High Constable; you will not betray us as the other has
done.'*
The Prince thus addressed took the King's hand in a
friendly grasp, exclaiming :
"God's 'ounds, brother, that is indeed forgiving evil ! But,
Sire, the head cannot move without the tail, and our tail
is hard to drag along. Give us more than ten days. We
still need at least a month to make the rest hear reason. By
the end of that time we shall be the masters."
"A month, so be it; Villeroy is my only plenipotentiary.
Take no word but his, whatever any one may say."
"One month," said the three other gentlemen; "that will
be enough time."
"Gentlemen," said the King, "we are but five, all men of
mettle. If there is any treachery, we shall know with whom
to deal."
The three gentlemen left the King with every mark of deep
respect and kissed his hand.
As the King recrossed the Seine, four o'clock was striking
by the Louvre clock.
Queen Catherine was still up.
"My mother is not gone to bed," said Charles to the Comte
de Solern.
"She too has her forge," said the German.
"My dear Count, what must you think of a king who is
reduced to conspiracy?" said Charles IX. bitterly, after a
pause.
"I think. Sire, that if you would only allow me to throw
that woman into the river, as our young friend said, France^
would soon be at peace."
"Parricide ! — and after Saint-Bartholomew's !" said the
King. "No, no — Exile. Once fallen, my mother would not
have an adherent or a partisan."
"Well, then. Sire," the Count went on, "allow me to take
her into custody now, at once, and escort her beyond the
frontier; for by to-morrow she will have won you round."
ABOUT CATHJERINE DE' MEDICI 265
^Well," said the King, "come to my forge ; no one can hear
us there. Besides, I am anxious that my mother should know
nothing of the arrest of the Ruggieri. If she knows I am
within, the good lady will suspect nothing, and we will con-
cert the measures for arresting her."
When the King, attended by Solern, went into the low
room which served as his workshop, he smiled as he pointed
to his forge and various tools.
"I do not suppose," said he, "that of all the kings France
may ever have, there will be another with a taste for such a
craft. But when I am really King, I shall not forge swords ;
they shall all be sheathed."
"Sire," said the Comte de Solern, "the fatigues of tennis,
your work at the forge, hunting, and — may I say it ? — love-
making, are chariots lent you by the Devil to hasten your
journey to Saint-Denis."
"Ah, Solern !" said the King sadly, "if only you could feel
the fire they have set burning in my heart and body. Nothing
can slake it. — Are you sure of the men who are guarding
the Ruggieri?"
"As sure as of myself.^'
"Well, m the course of this day I shall have made up my
mind. Think out the means of acting, and I will give you
my final instructions at five this evening, at Madame de
Belleville's.^'
The first gleams of daybreak w^ere struggling with the
lights in the King's workshop, where the Comte de Solern
had left him alone, when he heard the door open and saw
bis mother, looking like a ghost in the gloom. Though
Charles IX. was highly strung and nervous, he did not start,
although under the circumstances this apparition had an
ominous and grotesque aspect.
"Monsieur," said she, "you are killing yourself "
"I am fulfilling my horoscopes," he retorted, with a bitter
smile. "But you, madame, are you as ill as I am ?"
"We have both watched through the night, monsieur, but
266 ABOUT CATHERINE DE' MEDICI
with very different purpose. When you were setting out
to confer with your bitterest enemies in the open night, and
hiding it from your mother, with the connivance of Tavannes
and the Gondis, with whom you pretended to be scouring the
town, I was reading dispatches wliich prove that a terrible
conspiracy is hatching, in which your brother the Due
d' Alengon is implicated with your brother-in-law, the King of
Navarre, the Prince de Conde, and half the nobility of your
kingdom. Their plan is no less than to snatch the Crown
from you by taking possession of your person. These gentle-
men have already a following of fifty thousand men, all good
soldiers."
"Indeed !" said the King incredulously.
"Your brother is becoming a Huguenot," the Queen
went on.
"My brother Joining the Huguenots ?" cried Charles, bran-
dishing the iron bar he held.
"Yes. The Due d'Alencon, a Huguenot at heart, is about
to declare himself. Your sister, the Queen of Navarre, has
scarcely a tinge of affection left for you. She loves Monsieui
le Due d'Alencon, she loves Bussy, and she also loves littlo
la Mole."
"What a large heart !" said the King.
"Little la Mole, to grow great," the Queen went on, "can
think of no better means than making a King of France to
his mind. Then, it is said, he is to be High Constable."
"That damned Margot !" cried the King, "This is what
comes of her marrying a heretic "
"That would be nothing; but then there is the head of the
younger branch, whom you have placed near the throne
against my warnings, and who only wants to see you all kill
each other ! The House of Bourbon is the enemy of the
House of Valois. Mark this, monsieur, a younger branch
must always be kept in abject poverty, for it is born with
the spirit of conspiracy, and it is folly to give it weapons
when it has none, or to leave them in its possession when it
takes them. The younger branches must be impotent for
ABOUT CATHERINE DE' MEDICI 26?
mischief — that is the law of sovereignty. The sultans of
Asia observe it.
"The proofs are npstairs in my closet, whither I begged
you to follow me when we parted last night, but you had
other projects. Within a month, if we do not take a high
hand, your fate will be that of Charles the Simple."
"Within a month !" exclaimed Charles, amazed at the
coincidence of this period with the term fixed by the princes
that very night. "In a month we shall be the masters,"
thought he to himself, repeating their words. "You have
proofs, madame?" he asked aloud.
"They are unimpeachable, monsieur; they are supplied
by my daughter Marguerite. Terrified by the probable out-
come of such a coalition, in spite of her weakness for your
brother d'Alengon, the throne of tlie Valois lay, for once,
nearer to her heart than all her amours. She asks indeed,
as the reward of her revelation, that la Mole shall go scot
free; but that popinjay seems to me to be a rogue we ought
to get rid of, as well as the Comte de Coconnas, your brother
d'Alengon's right-hand man. As to the Prince de Conde,
that boy would agree to anything so long as I may be flung
into the river; I do not know if that is his idea of a hand-
some return on his wedding-day for the pretty wife I got
him.
"This is a serious matter, monsieur. You spoke of predic-
tions ! I know of one which says that the Bourbons will
possess the throne of the Valois; and if we do not take care,
it will be fulfilled. Do not be vexed with your sister, she has
acted well in this matter."
"My son," she went on, after a pause, with an assumption
of tenderness in her tone, "many evil-minded persons, in
the Interest of the Guises, want to sow dissension between
you and me, though we are the only two persons in the realm
whose interests are identical. Reflect. You blame yourself
now, I know, for Saint-Bartholomew's night; you blame me
for persuading you to it. But Catholicism, monsieur, ought
to be the bond of Sj^ain, France, and Italy, three nations
268 ABOUT CATHERINE DE' MEDICI
which by a secretly and skilfully worked scheme may, in the
course of time, be united under the House of Valois. Do not
forfeit your chances by letting the cord slip which includes
these three kingdoms in the pale of the same faith.
"Why should not the A'^alois and the Medici carry out, to
their great glory, the project of Charles V., who lost his head ?
Let those descendants of Jane the Crazy people the new
world which they are grasping at. The. Medici, masters of
Florence and Eome, will subdue Italy to your rule ; they will
secure all its advantages by a treaty of commerce and alliance,
and recognize you as their liege lord for the fiefs of Piedmont,
the Milanese, and Xaples over which you have rights. These,
monsieur, are the reasons for the war to 'the death we are
waging with the Huguenots. Why do you compel us to repeat
these things ?
"Charlemagne made a mistake when he pushed northwards.
France is a body of which the heart is on the Gulf of Lyons,
and whose two arms are Spain and Italy. Thus we should
command the Mediterranean, which is like a basket into
which all the wealth of the East is poured to the benefit of
the Venetians now, in the teeth of Philip II.
"And if the friendship of the Medici and your inherited
rights can thus entitle you to hope for Italy, force, or alliance,
or perhaps inheritance, may give you Spain. There you must
step in before the ambitious House of Austria, to whom the
Guelphs would have sold Italy, and who still dream of pos-
sessing Spain. Though your wife is a daughter of that line,
humble Austria, hug her closely to stifle her ! There lie the
enemies of your dominion, since from thence comes aid for
the Eeformers. — Do not listen to men who would profit by our
disagreement, and who fill your head with trouble by repre-
senting me as your chief enemy at home. Have I hindered
you from having an heir? Is it my fault that your mistress
has a son and your wife only a daughter? Why have you not
by this time three sons, who would cut off all this sedition at
the root? — Is it my part, monsieur, to reply to these ques-
tions? If you had a son, would Monsieur d'Alengon conspire
against you?"
ABOUT CATHERINE DE' MEDICI 269
As she spoke these words, Catherine fixed her eyes on
Charies IX. with the fascinating gaze of a bird of prey on
its victim. The daughter of the Medici was beantiful in her
way; her real feelings illumined her face, which, like that
of a gambler at the green-table, was radiant with ambitious
greed. Charles IX. saw her no longer as the mother of one
man, but, as she had been called, the mother of armies and
empires {mater castrorum) . Catherine had spread the
pinions of her genius, and was boldly soaring in the realm
of high politics of the Medici and the Valois, sketching the
vast plans which had frightened Henri II., and which, trans-
mitted by the Medici to Eichelieu, were stored in the Cabinet
of the House of Bourbon. But Charles IX., seeing his mother
take so many precautions, supposed them to be necessary,
and wondered to what end she was taking them. He looked
down; he hesitated; his distrust was not to be dispelled by
words.
Catherine was astonished to see what deeply founded sus-
picion lurked in her son's heart.
"Well, monsieur," she went on, "do you not choose to un-
derstand me? What are we, you and I, compared with the
eternity of a. royal Crown? Do you suspect me of any pur-
poses but those which must agitate us who dwell in the sphere
whence empires are governed?"
"Madame," said he, "I will follow you to your closet — we
must act "
"Act ?" cried Catherine. "Let them go their way and take
them in the act; the law will rid you of them. For God's
sake, monsieur, let them see us smiling."
The Queen withdrew. The King alone remained standing
for a minute, for he had sunk into extreme dejection.
"On which side are the snares?" he said aloud. "Is it she
who is deceiving me, or they? What is the better policy?
Deus! discerne causam meani/' he cried, with tears in his
eyes. "Life is a burden to me. Whether natural or com-
pulsory, I would rather meet death than these contradictory
torments," he added, and he struck the hammer on his anvil
270 ABOUT CATHERINE DE' MEDICI
â– vilh such violence that the vaults of the Louvre quaked.
"Great God !" he exclaimed, going out and looking up at
the sky, "Thou for whose hoi}- religion I am warring, give
me the clearness of Thine eyes to see into my mother's heart
hy questioning the Euggieri."
The little house inhabited by the Lady of Belleville, where
Charles had left his prisoners, was the last but one in the
Eue de I'Autruche, near the Eue Saint-Honore. The street-
gate, guarded by two little lodges built of brick, looked very
plain at a time when gates and all their accessories were so
elaborately treated. The entrance consisted of two stone
pillars, diamond-cut, and the architrave was graced with the
reclining figure of a woman holding a cornucopia. The gate,
of timber covered with heavy iron scroll-work, had a wicket
peephole at the level of the eye for spying any one who de-
sired admittance. In each lodge a porter lived, and Charles'
caprice insisted that a gatekeeper should be on the watch day
and night.
There was a little courtyard in front of the house paved
with Venetian mosaic. At that time, when carriages had not
been invented, and ladies rode on horseback or in litters, the
courtyards could be splendid with no fear of injury from
horses or vehicles. We must constantly bear these facts in
mind to understand the narrowness of the streets, the small
extent of the forecourts, and various other details of the
dwellings of the fifteenth century.
The house, of one story above the ground floor, had at the
top a sculptured frieze, on which rested a roof sloping up
from all the four sides to a flat space at the top. The sides
were pierced by dormer-windows adorned with architraves
and side-posts, which some great artist had chiseled into deli-
cate arabesques. All the three windows of the first-floor
rooms were equally conspicuous for this embroidery in stone,
thrown into relief by the red-brick walls. On the ground
iloor a double flight of outside steps, elegantly sculptured — the
balcony being remarkable for a true lovers' knot — led to the
ABOUT CATHERINE DE' MEDICI 271
house door, decorated in the Venetian style with stone cut
into pointed lozenges, a form of ornament that was repeated
on the window-jambs on each side of the door.
A garden laid out in the fashion of the time, and full of
rare flowers, occupied a space behind the house of equal ex-
tent with the forecourt. A vine hung over the walls. A
silver pine stood in the centre of a grass plot ; the flower bor-
ders were divided from the turf by winding paths leading to
a little bower of clipped yews at the further end. The garden
walls, covered with a coarse mosaic of colored pebbles, pleased
the eye by a richness of color that harmonized with the hues
of the flowers. The garden front of the house, like the front
to the court, had a pretty balcony from the middle window
over the door; and on both facades alike the architectural
treatment of this middle window was carried up to the frieze
of the cornice, with a bow that gave it the appearance of a
lantern. The sills of the other windows were inlaid with fine
marbles let into the stone.
Notwithstanding the perfect taste evident in this building,
it had a look of gloom. It was shut out from the open day by
neighboring houses and the roofs of the Hotel d'Alengon,
which cast their shadow over the courtyard and garden;
then absolute silence prevailed. Still, this silence, this sub-
dued light, this solitude, were restful to a soul that could give
itself up to a single thought, as in a cloister where we may
meditate, or in a snug home where we may love.
Who can fail now to conceive of the interior elegance of
this dwelling, the only spot in all his kingdom where the
last Valois but one could pour out his heart, confess his suf-
ferings, give play to his taste for the arts, and enjoy the
poetry he loved — pleasures denied him by the cares of his
most ponderous royalty. There alone were his lofty soul
and superior qualities appreciated; there alone, for a few
brief months, the last of his life, could he know the joys of
fatherhood, to which he abandoned himself with the frenzy
which his presentiment of an imminent and terrible death
lent to all his actions.
272 ABOUT CATHERINE DE' MEDICI
In the afternoon of this day, Marie was finishing her toilet
in her oratory — the ladies' boudoir of that time. She was
arranging the curls of her fine black hair, so as to leave a
few locks to turn over a new velvet coif, and was looking at-
tentively at herself in the mirror.
"It is nearly four o'clock ! That interminable Council
must be at an end by now," said she to herself. "Jacob is
back from the Louvre, where they are greatly disturbed by
reason of the number of councillors convened, and by the
duration of the sitting. What can have happened, some dis-
aster? Dear Heaven! does lie know how the spirit is worn
by waiting in vain? He is gone hunting, perhaps. If he is
amused, all is well. If I see him happy, I shall forget my
sorrows "
She pulled down her bodice round her waist, that there
might not be a wrinkle in it, and turned to see how her dress
fitted in profile; but then she saw the King reclining on a
couch. The carpeted floors deadened the sound of footsteps
so effectually, that he had come in without being heard.
"You startled me," she said, with a cry of surprise, which
she instantly cheeked.
"You were thinking of me, then?" said the King.
"When am I not thinking of you ?" she asked him, sitting
down by his side.
She took off his cap and cloak, and passed her hands
through his hair as if to comb it with her fingers. Charles
submitted without speaking. Marie knelt down to study her
royal Master's pale face, and discerned in it the lines of
terrible fatigue and of a more devouring melancholy than
any she had ever been able to scare away. She checked a
tear, and kept silence, not to irritate a grief she as yet knew
nothing of by some ill-chosen word. She did what tender
wives do in such cases ; she kissed the brow seamed with pre-
cocious wrinkles and the hollow cheeks, trying to breathe the
freshness of her own spirit into that careworn soul throigh
its infusion into gentle caresses, which, however, had no ef-
fect. She raised her head to the level of the King's, embrac-
ABOUT CATHERINE DE' MEDICI 273
ing him fondly with her slender arms, and then laid hei
face on his laboring breast, waiting for the opportune moment
to question the stricken man.
"My Chariot, will you not tell your poor, anxious friend
what are the thoughts that darken your brow and take the
color from your dear, red lips?"
"With the exception of Charlemagne," said he, in a dull,
hollow voice, "every King of France of the name of Charles
has come to a miserable end."
"Pooh !" said she. "What of Charles VIII. ?"
"In the prime of life," replied the King, "the poor man
knocked his head against a low doorway in the chateau d'Aro.-
boise, which he was decorating splendidly, and he died in
dreadful pain. His death gave the Crown to our branch."
"Charles VII. reconquered his kingdom."
"Child, he died" — and the King lowered his voice — "of
starvation, in the dread of being poisoned by the Dauphin,
who had already caused the death of his fair Agnes. The
father dreaded his son. Xow, the son dreads his mother !"
"Why look back on the past?" said she, remembering the
terrible existence of Charles VI.
"Why not, dear heart? Kings need not have recourse to
diviners to read the fate that awaits them; they have only
to study history. I am at this time engaged in trying to
escape the fate of Charles the Simple, who was bereft of his
crown, and died in prison after seven years' captivity."
"Charles V. drove out the English !" she cried triumph-
antly.
"Not he, but du Guesclin; for he, poisoned by Charles of
Navarre, languished in sickness."
"But Charles IV. ?" said she.
"He married three times and had no heir, in spite of the
masculine beauty that distinguished the sons of Philip the
Handsome. The first A^alois dynasty ended in him. The
second Valois will end in the same way. The Queen
has only brought me a daughter, and I sliall die without leav-
ing any child to come, for a minority would be the greatest
274 ABOUT CATHERINE DE' MEDICI
misfortune that could befall the kingdom. Besides, if I had
a son, would he live ? — Charles is a name of ill-omen, Charle-
magne exhausted all the luck attending it. If I could be
King of France again, I would not be called Charles X."
"Who then aims at your crown?"
"My brother d'Alengon is plotting against me. I see ene-
mies on every side "
"Monsieur," said Marie, with an irresistible pout. "Tell
me some merrier tales."
"My dearest treasure," said the King vehemently, "never
sail me Monsieur, even in jest. You remind me of my mother,
who incessantly offends me with that word. I feel as if she
deprived me of my crown. She says 'My son' to the Due
d'x\njou, that is to say, the King of Poland."
"Sire," said Marie^ folding her hands as if in prayer,
"there is a realm where you are adored, which your Majesty
fills entirely with glory and strength; and there the word
Monsieur means my gentle lord."
She unclasped her hands, and with a pretty action pointed
to her heart. The words were so sweetly musical — musiquees,
to use an expression of the period, applied to love songs — that
Charles took Marie by the waist, raised her with the strength
for which he was noted, seated her on his knee, and gently
rubbed his forehead against the curls his mistress had ar-
ranged with such care.
Marie thought this a favorable moment ; she ventured on
a kiss or two, which Charles allowed rather than accepted;
then, between two kisses, she said :
"If my people told the truth, you were scouring Paris all
night, as in the days when you played the scapegrace younger
son ?"
"Yes," said the King, who sat lost in thought.
"Did not you thrash the watch and rob certain good citi-
2ens? — And who are the men placed under my guard, and
who are such criminals that you have forbidden all communi-
cation with them? No girl was ever barred in with greater
severity than these men, who have had neither food nor drink.
ABOUT CATHERINE DE* MEDICI 275
Solern's Germans have not allowed any one to go near the