Although Henry IV. was much accustomed to call things by their own
names, the tent which he had spoken of was a handsome house in the
town of Chamberry, his camp the wide circuit of the city itself,
though, to say sooth, there were other tents, and another camp without
the walls. The purveyors of the royal household had not, it is true,
been much more careful in providing "cates divine" for the monarch's
table than they usually had been in times past. Perhaps no general
officer in his army fared so ill as Henry IV., for he was too
good-humoured to take notice of any little derelictions, and cared
less for an offence against his own person than one against the state.
Perhaps he was wrong; I believe he was: for a man who tolerates
disobedience of orders or default of duty in one instance, gives
encouragement to the same fault in another. But still men of great
genius have many roads open before them to the same ends; and the
rigid rule which one considers necessary to the attainment of his
objects, may be dispensed with by another without danger.
It may be true as an axiom, that the French nation can never remain
peaceable and prosperous--considering their peculiar national
characteristics--except under a tyrant. It may be true that Henry IV.,
had he been a tyrant, would never have perished by the knife of
Ravaillac. It may be true, that no _strong-minded_ tyrant ever fell
either by the hands of the assassin or the judgment of his people;
that it is the combination of weakness of character with despotic
theories, that has been the downfall of every monarch who has
succumbed to public indignation or private vengeance:--"The roar of
liberated Rome" itself was merely the exultation of a people who had
been cowed for years by a madman and a fool, at their liberation from
a yoke as pitiful as it was oppressive. But there is a power in love,
when excited by a being whose sterner and stronger qualities command
respect, which is powerful over great masses; and although Henri
Quatre passed over many small faults in those who surrounded him, I
believe his vigour and determination in great things would have
secured him against anything like popular caprice or versatility; and
that the only thing which he had to fear, as a consequence of his
good-humoured lenity in regard to personal offences, was the cowardly
means of private assassination.
However that may be, the king's table, on the day of which we have
been speaking, was certainly more poorly provided than that of many
private gentlemen of modern fortune. The pomp and circumstance of a
court waited around; but yet his scanty meal was no way royal, and the
king felt a little mortified that such penuriousness had been
displayed before a stranger.
Immediately after dinner, Henry left the fair Julia with Madame de
Rosni and some other ladies, and called Gowrie away to a small cabinet
of the house in which he had taken up his quarters. Seating himself,
he motioned his young guest to a chair, and then said, "I take it for
granted, my lord, that what you have said is actually the case, and
that you have not seen our good cousin of Savoy, nor know anything of
his affairs; but that you are simply travelling homeward with the
beautiful bird in your trap, intending, of course, to make her your
bride when you reach your native land?"
Gowrie merely bowed his head, saying, "I assure your majesty, I know
nothing of the Duke of Savoy whatever."
"Well, then," replied Henry, "there may be one, perhaps, whom you may
be well pleased to know--I mean Elizabeth, Queen of England. I will
therefore write her majesty a few lines in your favour; and you will
do well, when you reach Paris, to see her ambassador, Sir Henry
Neville, in order that he may second my recommendation. I can see the
time coming," continued the king, "when favour in England may be
highly beneficial to a Scottish nobleman. If you should attain it, use
it discreetly, for you have to deal with two people who have their
peculiarities. The one, with strong sense, has small sincerity, with
infinite policy combines many weaknesses, who can be a bitter enemy,
but not an honest friend, and who will always sacrifice to expediency
those who have served her--and there are none others--for their own
ends. It will be right for you to be well with her, but not too well.
The other has the greatest wit of any man I know, and the least
wisdom. Cunning as a fox, his policy is as wily as that of the beast,
and as pitiful. But his hatred is very dangerous, for it is strong in
proportion to his weakness, and will pursue paths as obscure as his
logic or his religion. To the latter personage you must have access
from your own rank; to the former I will give you a letter, which will
prove of good or bad effect on your own fortunes as you shall use it.
Wait a moment, and I will write. You have done me some wrong in your
own thoughts to-day; but I do not bear malice long; and I will not
tell the maiden queen that you were half afraid to trust yourself with
her brother of France, having a fair maiden in your company."
The king looked at him with a meaning smile as he spoke; but Gowrie
instantly replied, "It was doing your majesty no wrong to suppose that
you have great power over all hearts, and to be anxious to preserve
one at least from your sway."
"Out, flatterer!" said the king; "do you think I do not know mankind,
when I have dealt with them, fought with them, negotiated with them,
and played at cards with them for seven-and-forty years? I knew what
was going on in your young heart better than you did yourself, and
would have teased you a little longer, but that I know myself too,
and am aware that it is dangerous sporting where a fair girl is
concerned--at least, with Gascon blood in one's veins. So you shall
go, and God speed you. I knew your father in my youth, when he was
here in France, and I would have saved his life if he had fled to me
at once, as he should have done. You are a sad race of rebels, you
Ruthvens; but all my best friends have been rebels in their day, and
therefore I must not exclude you."
Thus saying, the king began to write with a rapid and careless hand,
while the young earl, in whom some part of what he had said had
wakened painful memories, sat with his eyes bent upon the ground, and
his mind buried in thought.
Henry's letter, though somewhat quaint and formal, as his epistles to
Queen Elizabeth usually were, was conceived in a gay and light tone,
and intended beyond all doubt to do the young earl service with the
royal lady to whom it was addressed. After the usual form of
superscription, he went on to say, "I have learnt of your Majesty to
deal promptly with enemies, and therefore, though most unwilling to
have recourse to arms against our good cousin of Savoy. Being desirous
to live peaceably with all men, yet finding that he mistook us for
children, I judged it right to lead here, into the heart of his
territories, an army which, I think, is bringing him rapidly to a
better judgment. We have taken a number of his towns and castles, and
are now here in the very heart of the mountains, with Chamberry and
Montmeillant in our hands, and nothing but the citadels holding out.
In the midst of these successes, I have been visited by the noble
lord, the Earl of Gowrie, who will lay these at your feet; and as he
is exceedingly desirous of serving your Majesty, I trust my letter to
his care, being well assured of his honour and fidelity. Moreover, as
doubtless your Majesty well knows, he is bound to honour and serve
your royal person, even by the ties of blood, being descended, though
remotely, and by the female line, from that great prince who
terminated by the sword on Bosworth field the dissensions of York and
Lancaster. I doubt not that for his own sake you will grace him with
your favour, and whatever may be wanting in his own deserts to the
eyes of one who judges not lightly, I trust you will grant him, for
the sake of your Majesty's brother and grateful servant."
"HENRY."
"Now, a few words to good Sir Henry Neville," said the king, looking
up; "and then I will dismiss you, Gowrie, to your journey, that you
may say, you had nothing but good at the hands of the King of France."
He then wrote a letter, in rather a different strain, to the English
ambassador in Paris, recommending the young earl to his care and
notice, and begging him to forward to the utmost of his power,
consistently with his duty to his royal mistress, whatever views the
earl might have at the English court. Then starting up, he said, "Now
call the page, Gowrie, and let him bring wax and silk to seal these
epistles, after which we will to horse with all speed, for I must on
the way too. I have played Henry of France long enough to-day. I must
now play Henry of Navarre again, for I intend to have Charbonnieres
before to-morrow night."
The letters were soon sealed, and once more Lord Gowrie and his party
set out upon their way, the king himself accompanying them with a
small troop some three or four miles on their road. He then took leave
of them with a gallant speech to the fair Julia, and a gay jest with
the young earl; and wending onwards slowly, those whom he thus left
made the best of their way to Lyons, where some repose became
absolutely necessary.
As this book is not intended for an itinerary, I shall not dwell upon
the events of their farther journey, which was very much like all
other journeys in that day, when very few facilities were offered to
the traveller for proceeding at a rapid pace to the end of his
journey. Inns, indeed, were infinitely more numerous in France than
even at present, for the very slowness of progression rendered it
necessary that halting places should be provided at short distances;
and, of course, those inns were sometimes very good, and sometimes
very bad, according to the quality of the landlord, and the class of
guests whom he was accustomed to receive. Although it is probable
that, from the most barbarous ages down to the present time, some
sorts of machines on wheels, usually called carriages, have been used
amongst European nations, and that persons travelled in them from one
part of a country to another, yet very few persons in France at that
period ever adopted such a mode of conveyance, but performed their
journeys on horseback, when they were capable of so doing. I am not
aware, indeed, whether the horses which were provided for travellers
at different stations all along the high roads, were even fitted for
draft; and the usual plan, when either dignity or infirmity induced
any one to travel in a carriage, was to proceed with his own horses,
or to hire of the peasantry beasts of draft, which could usually be
obtained at any of the small towns on the road. For travellers
journeying with their own horses, the best inns were of course always
open; and the appearance of the party of the Earl of Gowrie secured
reverent reception from landlords and attendants. Nevertheless, the
inconvenience and fatigue to which the fair Julia was subjected during
her long journey were so great, that at Lyons Gowrie determined to
purchase a carriage and four horses for herself and her maid, and in
this conveyance they proceeded on their way, escorted by the rest of
the party on horseback. The length of time spent on the journey,
however, was by this means rendered much greater than it otherwise
would have been, for--tell it not in these days of railroads--the
utmost they could accomplish on the average was three-and-twenty miles
in the day.
Who is there now-a-days who would not declare such a journey very
tiresome? but yet, if the truth must be told, neither Lord Gowrie nor
his fair companion found it so. Bee-like, they extracted pleasure from
every flower on the way; and an impression seemed to have taken
possession of them, which we but too rarely obtain in life, that the
present may be rendered, if we please, the happiest part of existence.
There were no particular clouds in the horizon of the future. There
was nothing tangible which could make them dread the coming days; but
they felt that they were very happy in the society of each other; and
though they both longed for the hour when their fate would be
permanently united, every other change but that presented itself to
imagination as something fearful. Long as the journey from Lyons to
Paris was, it was at length accomplished; and as they approached the
barriers of the great city, Lord Gowrie rode on with a single servant,
to seek and prepare lodgings for his whole party. He commended Julia
to the care of Mr. Rhind, but spoke a few words, before he rode away,
to Austin Jute, directing him where to seek him in the city, and
trusting, if the truth must be told, more to his wit and capacity than
to any knowledge of the world possessed by his former tutor.
The carriage passed the gates of Paris without difficulty, and went
slowly on through the tortuous streets of the capital of France, the
way being so narrow in many places, that the servants who rode with
the vehicle were obliged to drop behind. Mr. Rhind had taken a place
in the coach at the barrier; but he could not refrain here and there
from drawing back the leathern curtains which covered that open space
which is defended by windows in more modern vehicles, but which was
then altogether destitute of glass. The motive he assigned to himself
and Julia for so doing was to see that the driver went right to the
Place Royale, where they were to meet the young earl; but, in truth,
the worthy gentleman's knowledge of Paris was much too limited to
enable him to give any accurate directions in case the man had gone
wrong, and perhaps curiosity might have as great a share in the act as
caution. However that may be, the proceeding proved unfortunate. The
sea remains long agitated after a storm, and the civil wars which had
desolated France for so many years had left a great deal of licence in
the capital, which not all the firmness and energy of the king had
been able to repress. Just as the carriage was turning out of the Rue
St. Antoine towards the river, and while the servants were yet behind,
a gay company of young men rode by at the very moment Mr. Rhind was
about to close the curtain again. The look which one of them gave into
the vehicle called the colour into Julia's cheek. It might be
difficult to explain what there was in the expression which caused the
blood to rush so quickly into her face--she never could explain it
herself; but she felt that it was insolent, if not insulting. The
curtain, however, was immediately drawn, and she thought the annoyance
past, when suddenly the clatter of a horse's feet at the side of the
carriage was heard, the curtain was pulled rudely back from without,
and the same face which she had before seen was thrust partly into the
carriage.
The stranger said something in a laughing tone, but Julia heard not
what it was, and almost at the same moment she saw an arm stretched
out, and a clenched fist strike the intruder a violent blow on the
side of the head, while the voice of Austin Jute exclaimed in English,
"Take that, for showing so much more impudence than wit. Never thrust
your snout where you can't get it out."
A scene of strange confusion instantly followed, of which she could
only behold or comprehend a small part. She saw Austin Jute off his
horse, and the stranger in the same situation. But then Mr. Rhind drew
the curtain tight, and tied the thongs. There was a clashing of
swords, however, and the combatants seemed to run round and round the
vehicle, which, by this time, had stopped, till at length there came a
low cry and a deep groan, and then the voice of Austin exclaimed
aloud, speaking to the driver, "On!--on to the Place Royale as quick
as possible!"