Ay, this is he who wears the wreath of bays
Wove by Apollo and the Sisters Nine,
Which Jove's dread lightning scathes not. He hath doft
The cumbrous helm of steel, and flung aside
The yet more galling diadem of gold;
While, with a leafy circlet round his brows,
He reigns the King of Lovers and of Poets.
A cautious approach to the chimney--that is, the favourite walk of the
King, who is described by Shakspeare as bearing
the style of King of Naples,
Of both the Sicilies, and Jerusalem,
Yet not so wealthy as an English yeoman,
gave Arthur the perfect survey of his Majesty in person. He saw an old
man, with locks and beard, which, in amplitude and whiteness, nearly
rivalled those of the envoy from Schwitz, but with a fresh and ruddy
colour in his cheek, and an eye of great vivacity. His dress was showy
to a degree almost inconsistent with his years; and his step, not only
firm but full of alertness and vivacity, while occupied in traversing
the short and sheltered walk, which he had chosen rather for comfort
than for privacy, showed juvenile vigour still animating an aged
frame. The old King carried his tablets and a pencil in his hand,
seeming totally abstracted in his own thoughts, and indifferent to
being observed by several persons from the public street beneath his
elevated promenade.
Of these, some, from their dress and manner, seemed themselves
Troubadours; for they held in their hands rebecks, rotes, small
portable harps, and other indications of their profession. Such
appeared to be stationary, as if engaged in observing and recording
their remarks on the meditations of their Prince. Other passengers,
bent on their own more serious affairs, looked up to the King as to
some one whom they were accustomed to see daily, but never passed
without doffing their bonnets, and expressing, by a suitable
obeisance, a respect and affection towards his person, which appeared
to make up in cordiality of feeling what it wanted in deep and solemn
deference.
René, in the meanwhile, was apparently unconscious both of the gaze of
such as stood still, or the greeting of those who passed on, his mind
seeming altogether engrossed with the apparent labour of some arduous
task in poetry or music. He walked fast or slow as best suited the
progress of composition. At times he stopped to mark hastily down on
his tablets something which seemed to occur to him as deserving of
preservation; at other times he dashed out what he had written, and
flung down the pencil as if in a sort of despair. On these occasions,
the Sibylline leaf was carefully picked up by a beautiful page, his
only attendant, who reverently observed the first suitable opportunity
of restoring it again to his royal hand. The same youth bore a viol,
on which, at a signal from his master, he occasionally struck a few
musical notes, to which the old King listened, now with a soothed and
satisfied air, now with a discontented and anxious brow. At times his
enthusiasm rose so high that he even hopped and skipped, with an
activity which his years did not promise; at other times his motions
were extremely slow, and occasionally he stood still, like one wrapped
in the deepest and most anxious meditation. When he chanced to look on
the group which seemed to watch his motions, and who ventured even to
salute him with a murmur of applause, it was only to distinguish them
with a friendly and good-humoured nod; a salutation with which,
likewise, he failed not to reply to the greeting of the occasional
passengers, when his earnest attention to his task, whatever it might
be, permitted him to observe them.
At length the royal eye lighted upon Arthur, whose attitude of silent
observation and the distinction of his figure pointed him out as a
stranger. René beckoned to his page, who, receiving his master's
commands in a whisper, descended from the royal chimney to the broader
platform beneath, which was open to general resort. The youth,
addressing Arthur with much courtesy, informed him the King desired to
speak with him. The young Englishman had no alternative but that of
approaching, though pondering much in his own mind how he ought to
comport himself towards such a singular specimen of royalty.
When he drew near, King René addressed him in a tone of courtesy not
unmingled with dignity, and Arthur's awe in his immediate presence was
greater than he himself could have anticipated from his previous
conception of the royal character.
"You are, from your appearance, fair sir," said King René, "a stranger
in this country. By what name must we call you, and to what business
are we to ascribe the happiness of seeing you at our court?"
Arthur remained a moment silent, and the good old man, imputing it to
awe and timidity, proceeded in an encouraging tone.
"Modesty in youth is ever commendable; you are doubtless an acolyte in
the noble and joyous science of Minstrelsy and Music, drawn hither by
the willing welcome which we afford to the professors of those arts,
in which--praise be to Our Lady and the saints!--we have ourself been
deemed a proficient."
"I do not aspire to the honours of a Troubadour," answered Arthur.
"I believe you," answered the King, "for your speech smacks of the
northern, or Norman-French, such as is spoken in England and other
unrefined nations. But you are a minstrel, perhaps, from these
ultramontane parts. Be assured we despise not their efforts; for we
have listened, not without pleasure and instruction, to many of their
bold and wild romaunts, which, though rude in device and language, and
therefore far inferior to the regulated poetry of our Troubadours,
have yet something in their powerful and rough measure which
occasionally rouses the heart like the sound of a trumpet."
"I have felt the truth of your Grace's observation, when I have heard
the songs of my country," said Arthur; "but I have neither skill nor
audacity to imitate what I admire--My latest residence has been in
Italy."
"You are perhaps, then, a proficient in painting," said René; "an art
which applies itself to the eye as poetry and music do to the ear,
and is scarce less in esteem with us. If you are skilful in the art,
you have come to a monarch who loves it, and the fair country in which
it is practised."
"In simple truth, Sire, I am an Englishman, and my hand has been too
much welk'd and hardened by practice of the bow, the lance, and the
sword, to touch the harp, or even the pencil."
"An Englishman!" said René, obviously relaxing in the warmth of his
welcome. "And what brings you here? England and I have long had little
friendship together."
"It is even on that account that I am here," said Arthur. "I come to
pay my homage to your Grace's daughter, the Princess Margaret of
Anjou, whom I and many true Englishmen regard still as our Queen,
though traitors have usurped her title."
"Alas, good youth," said René, "I must grieve for you, while I respect
your loyalty and faith. Had my daughter Margaret been of my mind, she
had long since abandoned pretensions which have drowned in seas of
blood the noblest and bravest of her adherents."
The King seemed about to say more, but checked himself.
"Go to my palace," he said; "inquire for the Seneschal Hugh de Saint
Cyr, he will give thee the means of seeing Margaret--that is, if it be
her will to see thee. If not, good English youth, return to my palace,
and thou shalt have hospitable entertainment; for a King who loves
minstrelsy, music, and painting is ever most sensible to the claims of
honour, virtue, and loyalty; and I read in thy looks thou art
possessed of these qualities, and willingly believe thou mayst, in
more quiet times, aspire to share the honours of the joyous science.
But if thou hast a heart to be touched by the sense of beauty and fair
proportion, it will leap within thee at the first sight of my palace,
the stately grace of which may be compared to the faultless form of
some high-bred dame, or the artful yet seemingly simple modulations of
such a tune as we have been now composing."
The King seemed disposed to take his instrument, and indulge the youth
with a rehearsal of the strain he had just arranged; but Arthur at
that moment experienced the painful internal feeling of that peculiar
species of shame which well-constructed minds feel when they see
others express a great assumption of importance, with a confidence
that they are exciting admiration, when in fact they are only exposing
themselves to ridicule. Arthur, in short, took leave, "in very shame,"
of the King of Naples, both the Sicilies, and Jerusalem, in a manner
somewhat more abrupt than ceremony demanded. The King looked after
him, with some wonder at this want of breeding, which, however, he
imputed to his visitor's insular education, and then again began to
twangle his viol.
"The old fool!" said Arthur. "His daughter is dethroned, his dominions
crumbling to pieces, his family on the eve of becoming extinct, his
grandson driven from one lurking-place to another, and expelled from
his mother's inheritance,--and he can find amusement in these
fopperies! I thought him, with his long white beard, like Nicholas
Bonstetten; but the old Swiss is a Solomon compared with him."
As these and other reflections, highly disparaging to King René,
passed through Arthur's mind, he reached the place of rendezvous, and
found Thiebault beneath the steaming fountain, forced from one of
those hot springs which had been the delight of the Romans from an
early period. Thiebault, having assured his master that his retinue,
horse and man, were so disposed as to be ready on an instant's call,
readily undertook to guide him to King René's palace, which, from its
singularity, and indeed its beauty of architecture, deserved the
eulogium which the old monarch had bestowed upon it. The front
consisted of three towers of Roman architecture, two of them being
placed on the angles of the palace, and the third, which served the
purpose of a mausoleum, forming a part of the group, though somewhat
detached from the other buildings. This last was a structure of
beautiful proportions. The lower part of the edifice was square,
serving as a sort of pedestal to the upper part, which was circular,
and surrounded by columns of massive granite. The other two towers at
the angles of the palace were round, and also ornamented with pillars,
and with a double row of windows. In front of, and connected with,
these Roman remains, to which a date has been assigned as early as the
fifth or sixth century, arose the ancient palace of the Counts of
Provence, built a century or two later, but where a rich Gothic or
Moorish front contrasted, and yet harmonised, with the more regular
and massive architecture of the lords of the world. It is not more
than thirty or forty years since this very curious remnant of antique
art was destroyed, to make room for new public buildings, which have
never yet been erected.
Arthur really experienced some sensation of the kind which the old
King had prophesied, and stood looking with wonder at the ever-open
gate of the palace, into which men of all kinds seemed to enter
freely. After looking around for a few minutes, the young Englishman
ascended the steps of a noble portico, and asked of a porter, as old
and as lazy as a great man's domestic ought to be, for the seneschal
named to him by the King. The corpulent janitor, with great
politeness, put the stranger under the charge of a page, who ushered
him to a chamber, in which he found another aged functionary of higher
rank, with a comely face, a clear composed eye, and a brow which,
having never been knit into gravity, intimated that the seneschal of
Aix was a proficient in the philosophy of his royal master. He
recognised Arthur the moment he addressed him.
"You speak northern French, fair sir; you have lighter hair and a
fairer complexion than the natives of this country--You ask after
Queen Margaret--By all these marks I read you English--Her Grace of
England is at this moment paying a vow at the monastery of Mont St.
Victoire, and if your name be Arthur Philipson, I have commission to
forward you to her presence immediately--that is, as soon as you have
tasted of the royal provision."
The young man would have remonstrated, but the seneschal left him no
leisure.
"Meat and mass," he said, "never hindered work--it is perilous to
youth to journey too far on an empty stomach--he himself would take a
mouthful with the Queen's guest, and pledge him to boot in a flask of
old Hermitage."
The board was covered with an alacrity which showed that hospitality
was familiarly exercised in King René's dominions. Pasties, dishes of
game, the gallant boar's head, and other delicacies were placed on the
table, and the seneschal played the merry host, frequently apologising
(unnecessarily) for showing an indifferent example, as it was his duty
to carve before King René, and the good King was never pleased unless
he saw him feed lustily as well as carve featly.
"But for you, Sir Guest, eat freely, since you may not see food again
till sunset; for the good Queen takes her misfortunes so to heart that
sighs are her food, and her tears a bottle of drink, as the Psalmist
hath it. But I bethink me you will need steeds for yourself and your
equipage to reach Mont St. Victoire, which is seven miles from Aix."
Arthur intimated that he had a guide and horses in attendance, and
begged permission to take his adieu. The worthy seneschal, his fair
round belly graced with a gold chain, accompanied him to the gate with
a step which a gentle fit of the gout had rendered uncertain, but
which, he assured Arthur, would vanish before three days' use of the
hot springs. Thiebault appeared before the gate, not with the tired
steeds from which they had dismounted an hour since, but with fresh
palfreys from the stable of the King.
"They are yours from the moment you have put foot in stirrup," said
the seneschal; "the good King René never received back as his property
a horse which he had lent to a guest; and that is perhaps one reason
why his Highness and we of his household must walk often a-foot."
Here the seneschal exchanged greetings with his young visitor, who
rode forth to seek Queen Margaret's place of temporary retirement at
the celebrated monastery of St. Victoire. He demanded of his guide in
which direction it lay, who pointed, with an air of triumph, to a
mountain three thousand feet and upwards in height, which arose at
five or six miles' distance from the town, and which its bold and
rocky summit rendered the most distinguished object of the landscape.
Thiebault spoke of it with unusual glee and energy, so much so as to
lead Arthur to conceive that his trusty squire had not neglected to
avail himself of the lavish hospitality of _Le bon Roy René_.
Thiebault, however, continued to expatiate on the fame of the mountain
and monastery. They derived their name, he said, from a great victory
which was gained by a Roman general, named Caio Mario, against two
large armies of Saracens with ultramontane names (the Teutones
probably and Cimbri), in gratitude to Heaven for which victory Caio
Mario vowed to build a monastery on the mountain, for the service of
the Virgin Mary, in honour of whom he had been baptised. With all the
importance of a local connoisseur, Thiebault proceeded to prove his
general assertion by specific facts.
"Yonder," he said, "was the camp of the Saracens, from which, when the
battle was apparently decided, their wives and women rushed, with
horrible screams, dishevelled hair, and the gestures of furies, and
for a time prevailed in stopping the flight of the men." He pointed
out, too, the river, for access to which, cut off by the superior
generalship of the Romans, the barbarians, whom he called Saracens,
hazarded the action, and whose streams they empurpled with their
blood. In short, he mentioned many circumstances which showed how
accurately tradition will preserve the particulars of ancient events,
even whilst forgetting, misstating, and confounding dates and persons.
Perceiving that Arthur lent him a not unwilling ear,--for it may be
supposed that the education of a youth bred up in the heat of civil
wars was not well qualified to criticise his account of the wars of a
distant period,--the Provençal, when he had exhausted this topic, drew
up close to his master's side, and asked, in a suppressed tone,
whether he knew, or was desirous of being made acquainted with, the
cause of Margaret's having left Aix, to establish herself in the
monastery of St. Victoire?
"For the accomplishment of a vow," answered Arthur; "all the world
knows it."
"All Aix knows the contrary," said Thiebault; "and I can tell you the
truth, so I were sure it would not offend your seignorie."
"The truth can offend no reasonable man, so it be expressed in the
terms of which Queen Margaret must be spoken in the presence of an
Englishman."
Thus replied Arthur, willing to receive what information he could
gather, and desirous, at the same time, to check the petulance of his
attendant.
"I have nothing," replied his follower, "to state in disparagement of
the gracious Queen, whose only misfortune is that, like her royal
father, she has more titles than towns. Besides, I know well that you
Englishmen, though you speak wildly of your sovereigns yourselves,
will not permit others to fail in respect to them."
"Say on, then," answered Arthur.
"Your seignorie must know, then," said Thiebault, "that the good King
René has been much disturbed by the deep melancholy which afflicted
Queen Margaret, and has bent himself with all his power to change it
into a gayer humour. He made entertainments in public and in private;
he assembled minstrels and Troubadours, whose music and poetry might
have drawn smiles from one on his deathbed. The whole country
resounded with mirth and glee, and the gracious Queen could not stir
abroad in the most private manner, but, before she had gone a hundred
paces, she lighted on an ambush, consisting of some pretty pageant, or
festivous mummery, composed often by the good King himself, which
interrupted her solitude, in purpose of relieving her heavy thoughts
with some pleasant pastime. But the Queen's deep melancholy rejected
all these modes of dispelling it, and at length she confined herself
to her own apartments, and absolutely refused to see even her royal
father, because he generally brought into her presence those whose
productions he thought likely to soothe her sorrow. Indeed she seemed
to hear the harpers with loathing, and, excepting one wandering
Englishman, who sung a rude and melancholy ballad, which threw her
into a flood of tears, and to whom she gave a chain of price, she
never seemed to look at, or be conscious of the presence of any one.
And at length, as I have had the honour to tell your seignorie, she
refused to see even her royal father unless he came alone; and that he
found no heart to do."
"I wonder not at it," said the young man. "By the White Swan, I am
rather surprised his mummery drove her not to frenzy."
"Something like it indeed took place," said Thiebault; "and I will
tell your seignorie how it chanced. You must know that good King René,
unwilling to abandon his daughter to the foul fiend of melancholy,
bethought him of making a grand effort. You must know, further, that
the King, powerful in all the craft of Troubadours and Jongleurs, is
held in peculiar esteem for conducting mysteries, and other of those
gamesome and delightful sports and processions, with which our Holy
Church permits her graver ceremonies to be relieved and diversified,
to the cheering of the hearts of all true children of religion. It is
admitted that no one has ever been able to approach his excellence in
the arrangement of the Fête-Dieu; and the tune to which the devils
cudgel King Herod, to the great edification of all Christian
spectators, is of our good King's royal composition. He hath danced at
Tarasconne in the ballet of St. Martha and the Dragon, and was
accounted in his own person the only actor competent to present the
Tarrasque. His Highness introduced also a new ritual into the
consecration of the Boy Bishop, and composed an entire set of
grotesque music for the Festival of Asses. In short, his Grace's
strength lies in those pleasing and becoming festivities which strew
the path of edification with flowers, and send men dancing and singing
on their way to heaven.
"Now the good King René, feeling his own genius for such recreative
compositions, resolved to exert it to the utmost, in the hope that he
might thereby relieve the melancholy in which his daughter was
plunged, and which infected all that approached her. It chanced, some
short time since, that the Queen was absent for certain days, I know
not where or on what business, but it gave the good King time to make
his preparations. So, when his daughter returned, he with much
importunity prevailed on her to make part of a religious procession to
St. Sauveur, the principal church in Aix. The Queen, innocent of what
was intended, decked herself with solemnity, to witness and partake of
what she expected would prove a work of grave piety. But no sooner had
she appeared on the esplanade in front of the palace, than more than a
hundred masks, dressed up like Turks, Jews, Saracens, Moors, and I
know not whom besides, crowded around, to offer her their homage, in
the character of the Queen of Sheba; and a grotesque piece of music
called them to arrange themselves for a ludicrous ballet, in which
they addressed the Queen in the most entertaining manner, and with the
most extravagant gestures. The Queen, stunned with the noise, and
affronted with the petulance of this unexpected onset, would have gone
back into the palace; but the doors had been shut by the King's order
so soon as she set forth, and her retreat in that direction was cut
off. Finding herself excluded from the palace, the Queen advanced to
the front of the façade, and endeavoured by signs and words to appease
the hubbub, but the maskers, who had their instructions, only answered
with songs, music, and shouts."
"I would," said Arthur, "there had been a score of English yeomen in
presence, with their quarterstaves, to teach the bawling villains
respect for one that has worn the crown of England!"
"All the noise that was made before was silence and soft music,"
continued Thiebault, "till that when the good King himself appeared,
grotesquely dressed in the character of King Solomon"----
"To whom, of all princes, he has the least resemblance," said
Arthur----
"With such capers and gesticulations of welcome to the Queen of Sheba
as, I am assured by those who saw it, would have brought a dead man
alive again, or killed a living man with laughing. Among other
properties, he had in his hand a truncheon, somewhat formed like a
fool's bauble"----
"A most fit sceptre for such a sovereign," said Arthur----
"Which was headed," continued Thiebault, "by a model of the Jewish
Temple, finely gilded and curiously cut in pasteboard. He managed this
with the utmost grace, and delighted every spectator by his gaiety and
activity, excepting the Queen, who, the more he skipped and capered,
seemed to be the more incensed, until, on his approaching her to
conduct her to the procession, she seemed roused to a sort of frenzy,
struck the truncheon out of his hand, and breaking through the crowd,
who felt as if a tigress had leapt amongst them from a showman's cart,
rushed into the royal courtyard. Ere the order of the scenic
representation, which her violence had interrupted, could be restored,
the Queen again issued forth, mounted and attended by two or three
English cavaliers of her Majesty's suite. She forced her way through
the crowd, without regarding either their safety or her own, flew like
a hail-storm along the streets, and never drew bridle till she was as
far up this same Mont St. Victoire as the road would permit. She was
then received into the convent, and has since remained there; and a
vow of penance is the pretext to cover over the quarrel betwixt her
and her father."
"How long may it be," said Arthur, "since these things chanced?"
"It is but three days since Queen Margaret left Aix in the manner I
have told you.--But we are come as far up the mountain as men usually
ride. See, yonder is the monastery rising betwixt two huge rocks,
which form the very top of Mont St. Victoire. There is no more open
ground than is afforded by the cleft, into which the convent of St.
Mary of Victory is, as it were, niched; and the access is guarded by
the most dangerous precipices. To ascend the mountain, you must keep
that narrow path, which, winding and turning among the cliffs, leads
at length to the summit of the hill, and the gate of the monastery."
"And what becomes of you and the horses?" said Arthur.
"We will rest," said Thiebault, "in the hospital maintained by the
good fathers at the bottom of the mountain, for the accommodation of
those who attend on pilgrims;--for I promise you the shrine is visited
by many who come from afar, and are attended both by man and
horse.--Care not for me,--I shall be first under cover; but there
muster yonder in the west some threatening clouds, from which your
seignorie may suffer inconvenience, unless you reach the convent in
time. I will give you an hour to do the feat, and will say you are as
active as a chamois-hunter if you reach it within the time."
Arthur looked around him, and did indeed remark a mustering of clouds
in the distant west, which threatened soon to change the character of
the day, which had hitherto been brilliantly clear, and so serene that
the falling of a leaf might have been heard. He therefore turned him
to the steep and rocky path which ascended the mountain, sometimes by
scaling almost precipitous rocks, and sometimes by reaching their tops
by a more circuitous process. It winded through thickets of wild
boxwood and other low aromatic shrubs, which afforded some pasture for
the mountain goats, but were a bitter annoyance to the traveller who
had to press through them. Such obstacles were so frequent, that the
full hour allowed by Thiebault had elapsed before he stood on the
summit of Mont St. Victoire, and in front of the singular convent of
the same name.
We have already said that the crest of the mountain, consisting
entirely of one bare and solid rock, was divided by a cleft or opening
into two heads or peaks, between which the convent was built,
occupying all the space between them. The front of the building was of
the most ancient and sombre cast of the old Gothic, or rather, as it
has been termed, the Saxon; and in that respect corresponded with the
savage exterior of the naked cliffs, of which the structure seemed to
make a part, and by which it was entirely surrounded, excepting a
small open space of more level ground, where, at the expense of much
toil, and by carrying earth up the hill, from different spots where
they could collect it in small quantities, the good fathers had been
able to arrange the accommodations of a garden.
A bell summoned a lay brother, the porter of this singularly situated
monastery, to whom Arthur announced himself as an English merchant,
Philipson by name, who came to pay his duty to Queen Margaret. The
porter, with much respect, showed the stranger into the convent, and
ushered him into a parlour, which, looking towards Aix, commanded an
extensive and splendid prospect over the southern and western parts of
Provence. This was the direction in which Arthur had approached the
mountain from Aix; but the circuitous path by which he had ascended
had completely carried him round the hill. The western side of the
monastery, to which the parlour looked, commanded the noble view we
have mentioned; and a species of balcony, which, connecting the two
twin crags, at this place not above four or five yards asunder, ran
along the front of the building, and appeared to be constructed for
the purpose of enjoying it. But on stepping from one of the windows of
the parlour upon this battlemented bartizan, Arthur became aware that
the wall on which the parapet rested stretched along the edge of a
precipice, which sank sheer down five hundred feet at least from the
foundations of the convent. Surprised and startled at finding himself
on so giddy a verge, Arthur turned his eyes from the gulf beneath him
to admire the distant landscape, partly illumined, with ominous
lustre, by the now westerly sun. The setting beams showed in dark red
splendour a vast variety of hill and dale, champaign and cultivated
ground, with towns, churches, and castles, some of which rose from
among trees, while others seemed founded on rocky eminences; others
again lurked by the side of streams or lakes, to which the heat and
drought of the climate naturally attracted them.
The rest of the landscape presented similar objects when the weather
was serene, but they were now rendered indistinct, or altogether
obliterated, by the sullen shade of the approaching clouds, which
gradually spread over great part of the horizon, and threatened
altogether to eclipse the sun, though the lord of the horizon still
struggled to maintain his influence, and, like a dying hero, seemed
most glorious even in the moment of defeat. Wild sounds, like groans
and howls, formed by the wind in the numerous caverns of the rocky
mountain, added to the terrors of the scene, and seemed to foretell
the fury of some distant storm, though the air in general was even
unnaturally calm and breathless. In gazing on this extraordinary
scene, Arthur did justice to the monks who had chosen this wild and
grotesque situation, from which they could witness Nature in her
wildest and grandest demonstrations, and compare the nothingness of
humanity with her awful convulsions.
So much was Arthur awed by the scene before him, that he had almost
forgotten, while gazing from the bartizan, the important business
which had brought him to this place, when it was suddenly recalled by
finding himself in the presence of Margaret of Anjou, who, not seeing
him in the parlour of reception, had stept upon the balcony, that she
might meet with him the sooner.
The Queen's dress was black, without any ornament except a gold
coronal of an inch in breadth, restraining her long black tresses, of
which advancing years and misfortunes had partly altered the hue.
There was placed within the circlet a black plume with a red rose, the
last of the season, which the good father who kept the garden had
presented to her that morning, as the badge of her husband's house.
Care, fatigue, and sorrow seemed to dwell on her brow and her
features. To another messenger she would in all probability have
administered a sharp rebuke, for not being alert in his duty to
receive her as she entered; but Arthur's age and appearance
corresponded with that of her loved and lost son. He was the son of a
lady whom Margaret had loved with almost sisterly affection, and the
presence of Arthur continued to excite in the dethroned Queen the same
feelings of maternal tenderness which had been awakened on their first
meeting in the Cathedral of Strasburg. She raised him as he kneeled at
her feet, spoke to him with much kindness, and encouraged him to
detail at full length his father's message, and such other news as his
brief residence at Dijon had made him acquainted with.
She demanded which way Duke Charles had moved with his army.
"As I was given to understand by the master of his artillery," said
Arthur, "towards the Lake of Neufchatel, on which side he proposes his
first attack on the Swiss."
"The headstrong fool!" said Queen Margaret. "He resembles the poor
lunatic, who went to the summit of the mountain that he might meet the
rain halfway.--Does thy father, then," continued Margaret, "advise me
to give up the last remains of the extensive territories once the
dominions of our royal house, and for some thousand crowns, and the
paltry aid of a few hundred lances, to relinquish what is left of our
patrimony to our proud and selfish kinsman of Burgundy, who extends
his claim to our all, and affords so little help, or even promise of
help, in return?"
"I should have ill discharged my father's commission," said Arthur,
"if I had left your Highness to think that he recommends so great a
sacrifice. He feels most deeply the Duke of Burgundy's grasping desire
of dominion. Nevertheless, he thinks that Provence must, on King
René's death, or sooner, fall either to the share of Duke Charles, or
to Louis of France, whatever opposition your Highness may make to such
a destination; and it may be that my father, as a knight and a
soldier, hopes much from obtaining the means to make another attempt
on Britain. But the decision must rest with your Highness."
"Young man," said the Queen, "the contemplation of a question so
doubtful almost deprives me of reason!"
As she spoke, she sank down, as one who needs rest, on a stone seat
placed on the very verge of the balcony, regardless of the storm,
which now began to rise with dreadful gusts of wind, the course of
which being intermitted and altered by the crags round which they
howled, it seemed as if in very deed Boreas, and Eurus, and Caurus,
unchaining the winds from every quarter of heaven, were contending for
mastery around the convent of Our Lady of Victory. Amid this tumult,
and amid billows of mist which concealed the bottom of the precipice,
and masses of clouds which racked fearfully over their heads, the roar
of the descending waters rather resembled the fall of cataracts than
the rushing of torrents of rain. The seat on which Margaret had placed
herself was in a considerable degree sheltered from the storm, but
its eddies, varying in every direction, often tossed aloft her
dishevelled hair; and we cannot describe the appearance of her noble
and beautiful, yet ghastly and wasted features, agitated strongly by
anxious hesitation and conflicting thoughts, unless to those of our
readers who have had the advantage of having seen our inimitable
Siddons in such a character as this. Arthur, confounded by anxiety and
terror, could only beseech her Majesty to retire before the fury of
the approaching storm into the interior of the convent.
"No," she replied with firmness; "roofs and walls have ears, and
monks, though they have forsworn the world, are not the less curious
to know what passes beyond their cells. It is in this place you must
hear what I have to say; as a soldier you should scorn a blast of wind
or a shower of rain; and to me, who have often held counsel amidst the
sound of trumpets and clash of arms, prompt for instant fight, the war
of elements is an unnoticed trifle. I tell thee, young Arthur Vere, as
I would to your father--as I would to my son--if indeed Heaven had
left such a blessing to a wretch forlorn"----
She paused, and then proceeded.
"I tell thee, as I would have told my beloved Edward, that Margaret,
whose resolutions were once firm and immovable as these rocks among
which we are placed, is now doubtful and variable as the clouds which
are drifting around us. I told your father, in the joy of meeting once
more a subject of such inappreciable loyalty, of the sacrifices I
would make to assure the assistance of Charles of Burgundy, to so
gallant an undertaking as that proposed to him by the faithful
Oxford. But since I saw him I have had cause of deep reflection. I
met my aged father only to offend and, I say it with shame, to insult
the old man in presence of his people. Our tempers are as opposed as
the sunshine, which a short space since gilded a serene and beautiful
landscape, differs from the tempests which are now wasting it. I
spurned with open scorn and contempt what he, in his mistaken
affection, had devised for means of consolation, and, disgusted with
the idle follies which he had devised for curing the melancholy of a
dethroned Queen, a widowed spouse--and, alas! a childless mother,--I
retired hither from the noisy and idle mirth, which was the bitterest
aggravation of my sorrows. Such and so gentle is René's temper, that
even my unfilial conduct will not diminish my influence over him; and
if your father had announced that the Duke of Burgundy, like a knight
and a sovereign, had cordially and nobly entered into the plan of the
faithful Oxford, I could have found it in my heart to obtain the
cession of territory his cold and ambitious policy requires, in order
to insure the assistance which he now postpones to afford till he has
gratified his own haughty humour by settling needless quarrels with
his unoffending neighbours. Since I have been here, and calmness and
solitude have given me time to reflect, I have thought on the offences
I have given the old man, and on the wrongs I was about to do him. My
father, let me do him justice, is also the father of his people. They
have dwelt under their vines and fig-trees, in ignoble ease, perhaps,
but free from oppression and exaction, and their happiness has been
that of their good King. Must I change all this?--Must I aid in
turning over these contented people to a fierce, headlong, arbitrary
prince?--May I not break even the easy and thoughtless heart of my
poor old father, should I succeed in urging him to do so?--These are
questions which I shudder even to ask myself. On the other hand, to
disappoint the toils, the venturous hopes of your father, to forego
the only opportunity which may ever again offer itself, of revenge on
the bloody traitors of York, and restoration of the House of
Lancaster!--Arthur, the scene around us is not so convulsed by the
fearful tempest and the driving clouds, as my mind is by doubt and
uncertainty."
"Alas," replied Arthur, "I am too young and inexperienced to be your
Majesty's adviser in a case so arduous. I would my father had been in
presence himself."
"I know what he would have said," replied the Queen; "but, knowing
all, I despair of aid from human counsellors--I have sought others,
but they also are deaf to my entreaties. Yes, Arthur, Margaret's
misfortunes have rendered her superstitious. Know, that beneath these
rocks, and under the foundation of this convent, there runs a cavern,
entering by a secret and defended passage a little to the westward of
the summit, and running through the mountain, having an opening to the
south, from which, as from this bartizan, you can view the landscape
so lately seen from this balcony, or the strife of winds and confusion
of clouds which we now behold. In the middle of this cavernous
thoroughfare is a natural pit, or perforation, of great but unknown
depth. A stone dropped into it is heard to dash from side to side,
until the noise of its descent, thundering from cliff to cliff, dies
away in distant and faint tinkling, less loud than that of a sheep's
bell at a mile's distance. The common people, in their jargon, call
this fearful gulf Lou Garagoule; and the traditions of the monastery
annex wild and fearful recollections to a place in itself sufficiently
terrible. Oracles, it is said, spoke from thence in pagan days, by
subterranean voices, arising from the abyss; and from these the Roman
general is said to have heard, in strange and uncouth rhymes, promises
of the victory which gives name to this mountain. These oracles, it is
averred, may be yet consulted after performance of strange rites, in
which heathen ceremonies are mixed with Christian acts of devotion.
The abbots of Mont St. Victoire have denounced the consultation of Lou
Garagoule, and the spirits who reside there, to be criminal. But as
the sin may be expiated by presents to the Church, by masses, and
penances, the door is sometimes opened by the complaisant fathers to
those whose daring curiosity leads them, at all risks, and by whatever
means, to search into futurity. Arthur, I have made the experiment,
and am even now returned from the gloomy cavern, in which, according
to the traditional ritual, I have spent six hours by the margin of the
gulf, a place so dismal, that after its horrors even this tempestuous
scene is refreshing."
The Queen stopped, and Arthur, the more struck with the wild tale that
it reminded him of his place of imprisonment at La Ferette, asked
anxiously if her inquiries had obtained any answer.
"None whatever," replied the unhappy Princess. "The demons of
Garagoule, if there be such, are deaf to the suit of an unfortunate
wretch like me, to whom neither friends nor fiends will afford counsel
or assistance. It is my father's circumstances which prevent my
instant and strong resolution. Were my own claims on this piping and
paltry nation of Troubadours alone interested, I could, for the chance
of once more setting my foot in merry England, as easily and willingly
resign them, and their paltry coronet, as I commit to the storm this
idle emblem of the royal rank which I have lost."
As Margaret spoke, she tore from her hair the sable feather and rose
which the tempest had detached from the circlet in which they were
placed, and tossed them from the battlement with a gesture of wild
energy. They were instantly whirled off in a bickering eddy of the
agitated clouds, which swept the feather far distant into empty space,
through which the eye could not pursue it. But while that of Arthur
involuntarily strove to follow its course, a contrary gust of wind
caught the red rose, and drove it back against his breast, so that it
was easy for him to catch hold of and retain it.
"Joy, joy, and good fortune, royal mistress!" he said, returning to
her the emblematic flower; "the tempest brings back the badge of
Lancaster to its proper owner."
"I accept the omen," said Margaret; "but it concerns yourself, noble
youth, and not me. The feather, which is borne away to waste and
desolation, is Margaret's emblem. My eyes will never see the
restoration of the line of Lancaster. But you will live to behold it,
and to aid to achieve it, and to dye our red rose deeper yet in the
blood of tyrants and traitors. My thoughts are so strangely poised,
that a feather or a flower may turn the scale. But my head is still
giddy, and my heart sick.--To-morrow you shall see another Margaret,
and till then adieu."
It was time to retire, for the tempest began to be mingled with
fiercer showers of rain. When they re-entered the parlour, the Queen
clapped her hands, and two female attendants entered.
"Let the Father Abbot know," she said, "that it is our desire that
this young gentleman receive for this night such hospitality as befits
an esteemed friend of ours.--Till to-morrow, young sir, farewell."
With a countenance which betrayed not the late emotion of her mind,
and with a stately courtesy that would have become her when she graced
the halls of Windsor, she extended her hand, which the youth saluted
respectfully. After her leaving the parlour, the Abbot entered, and,
in his attention to Arthur's entertainment and accommodation for the
evening, showed his anxiety to meet and obey Queen Margaret's wishes.