We must now entirely change the scene. The spot is no longer the
same--the actors different. From the mountains of Savoy, the feudal
castle, the lonely chapel, and the humble inn, let us turn to the
capital of France, her stately palaces, and the gay and glittering hall
where laughed and revelled the bright, the brave, the fair, and the
witty of that splendid epoch which began with Francis the First, and
ended with his immediate successor. The personages, too, have changed
with the scene. The young warrior and his fair bride, the wily Italian
and the supercilious and unprincipled Count de Meyrand, are no longer
before us. Even good Father Willand himself is left behind, and one for
whom we owe no slight affection, Corse de Leon, is, for the time, off
the stage.
At the door--or rather, we may say, beyond the door, for they were not
actually in the chamber--stood two of the king's guard, with their
halberds resting on their shoulders, embroidered on which appeared the
well-known cognisance of the salamander. They were there merely to
perform the place of a living gate, barring the way against any who
would enter, till such time as the orders of the king threw open the
halls of the Louvre.
Henry himself, in the prime of his years, graceful, handsome, vigorous,
with a countenance full of fire, but still kindly and good-humoured,
stood at the farther end of the large and nearly vacant reception room,
close to one of the windows, which looked out upon the river Seine,
speaking with a lady, on whose appearance we may well be expected to
pause for a moment. That lady was the celebrated Diana of Poitiers; and,
though the period had by this time passed by when her dazzling beauty
captivated all eyes as well as those of her royal lover, she was
certainly still very handsome. But she had also in her countenance an
expression of power and resolution, of quickness of understanding and of
sparkling vivacity, which at once displayed many of the chief points of
her character. As one stood and looked at her, and saw the play of her
fine features, the rapid changes, the sudden lighting up of the eyes,
the occasional look of intense eagerness, the shade of momentary
meditation, succeeded by the bright smile, the gay laugh, the eyes cast
up to heaven, it was easy to understand what manifold powers of charming
and persuading lay beneath, and to perceive that, whatever might have
been at any time the mere beauty of feature and expression, the chief
loveliness of that lovely countenance must ever have been in its
wonderful variety.
What was it that moved her now? What was the eager scheme that she was
urging upon the king with such a host of wiles, and charms, and graces,
that it was hardly possible to expect that he should resist? Lo! how she
hangs upon his arm with those two fair hands, and gazes up into his face
with those speaking eyes! Now comes a shade of vexation over her brow.
One hand drops from his arm. Her head is partly turned away: a tear dims
the eye for an instant, then leaves it brighter than before. Now, again,
how merrily she laughs, with the clear, joyous, ringing laugh that we so
seldom hear but from the lips of infancy; and then, again, that look of
bright and eloquent thoughtfulness, while with her extended hand she
argues with the monarch on some mighty theme, and carries high
conviction on her lofty brow! What a wonderful picture does she form
there, even at this very moment, changing by her words the destinies of
Europe, and with smiles, and tears, and laughter, and high thoughts, all
mingled in a wondrous antidote, curing one of those spoiled children of
fortune that we call kings of that venomous and pestilential sickness,
the love of war!
"Well," said the king, "well, you have triumphed. He shall have the
powers, although it goes against my soul to yield anything to that cold
and haughty Spaniard. What though Fortune have, with all her fickleness,
left at the last a momentary balance in the scale against France, have
we not already retrieved much, and are we not daily retrieving?"
"True, sire, true," replied Diana of Poitiers, "your armies are
retrieving all that was once lost. But your country, sire, alas! your
country is not. France suffers, France groans even, while Spain is
wounded, and each blow that you strike at the enemy but injures yourself
far more."
The king was about to reply, but she stopped him eagerly: "I am foolish
to argue with you," she continued; "You have said I have triumphed, you
have said I shall have the powers; and, though he may conquer me in
argument, my Henry's word is never broken. Besides," she added, "have I
not a private suit to be heard and granted also?"
"Ha!" said the king, after pausing thoughtfully for a moment or two, as
if he were still unconvinced, and unwilling to leave the subject on
which they had just been conversing, "ha! I had forgot! You did mention
some private suit--what, I remember not now, sweet Diana. But yet it is
hard even to hear of peace after defeat. Were we just hot from
victory--were we flushed with triumph, and our enemy reduced to lowly
supplication--then, indeed, then we might hear of terms of peace, and
grant them liberally and willingly. But after this accursed battle of
St. Laurence; after so total, so signal, and terrible a defeat--the
constable himself taken, one half of the nobility of the land wounded or
slain, our soldiers scattered, and our provinces, invaded--it is bitter
indeed to hear the name of peace."
"As bitter to Henry's heart," replied the lady, "as the sound of war to
many another man. But you have promised, sire. You have promised
Montmorency the full powers, and--you have forgotten my petition."
"Well, well," said the king, with a sigh, "what is your petition? I know
that you have no private interest in this matter, Diana, You never were
a friend to Montmorency."
The lady coloured slightly, but replied at once. "I never was his
friend, sire, while haughty fortune smiled upon him, and when he urged
measures harsh and injurious to the country upon your majesty; but I
will own that I am his friend now, when, bearing his adversity with
calmness and with dignity, he would fain persuade your majesty to that
which is most necessary for the safety of your realm. So much, indeed,
am I his friend, your majesty, now, that I have promised to mingle our
families together by the marriage of our sweet Henrietta with his son
Damville. Nay, start not, sire, I told you of this before."
"Did you?" exclaimed the king, "did you? I recollect it not. Yet now
methinks I do remember something thereof; but I must have been thinking
of other things. How can I consent to such a contract?" continued the
king. "Recollect, dear lady! Is there not a story current of Damville,
like his brother, having bound himself by a secret marriage to an
Italian woman?"
"There is some tale of the kind, sire," replied the Duchess of
Valentinois, "but I believe without foundation. Even were it so,
however, sire," she continued, eagerly, "what matters it, in truth? The
connexion has long ceased: the pope will annul the marriage instantly;
and, not many months ago, your majesty vowed that you would give an
edict rendering clandestine marriages of no effect, and declaring all
illegal but such as have the full consent of the nearest surviving
relative of both parties, always under your majesty's good pleasure."
"I recollect," replied the king. "The edict was drawn up, but never
signed, because, as it deeply affected ecclesiastical matters, it was
thought best to have the sanction of our holy father in Rome, and he
made manifold objections. But that edict, even had it issued, could not
affect the past."
"Your majesty will pardon me," replied the lady. "It had a clause which
rendered it retrospective--at least I am so informed, in a letter which
I received not many hours ago from your faithful subject the good Count
of Meyrand, whom you intrusted to carry the edict to Rome. Had it not
that retrospective sense," she added, eagerly, "the hopes and
expectations of Montmorency and myself would both be very bitterly
disappointed."
The king's brow grew somewhat cloudy, and she added suddenly, "Not for
myself, sire! I speak not for myself, and with no reference to this
proposed marriage between Henriette de la Mark and the young Damville.
But there is one thing for which I know the good constable has long
sighed. The duke, his eldest son, is more ambitious than your majesty
dreams of."
"Indeed!" said the king, with a slight smile. "What do you mean, fair
lady? Is his ambition dangerous to the state?"
"Nay, nay, sire, not so," replied the duchess, with a smile, seeing that
the king, while affecting ignorance, in reality understood what she
meant. "There is a certain lovely lady bearing the same name as my more
humble self, and somewhat near to the affections of your royal
person--near, even as a daughter, some men say. She has now wept for
some time in widowhood; and the young Duke of Montmorency, daringly
priding himself upon the royal blood that flows also in his veins, has
ventured to sigh for this fair lady's hand. But the great impediment is
that fatal contract which he signed with Mademoiselle de Pienne, without
his father's knowledge and consent."
"I have heard something of this before," said the king, to whom the idea
of uniting his natural daughter to the high race of Montmorency was not
a little grateful. "But does the constable desire this marriage for his
son? If so, why did he not speak long since?"
"Most humbly, sire, does he desire it," replied the lady, "and has
commissioned me to sue, by every means of persuasion and entreaty, that
your majesty would condescend to grant your consent to the union of his
son with Madame de Farnese. He overrates my means, I know; but he does
calculate that your majesty has some affection still for me, as well as
some regard and esteem for him."
"Much, much for both, dear lady," replied the king; and then, falling
into a fit of thought, he added, as if speaking to himself, "This
marriage is most unfortunate. But that a rash boy should pay, by a whole
life of celibacy and regret, for the idle folly of signing his name to a
promise extracted from him by an artful woman, is indeed too much. I
would fain see the draught of the edict which was proposed."
"Here is the chancellor, sire, hard by," replied the lady, pointing to a
group of three or four persons who had followed her into the hall at her
first entrance, but who had remained gathered together in a group at the
other end of the chamber, conversing in a low voice. "Here is the
chancellor, sire: perhaps he may have a copy of the edict with him now."
"Perchance he may, fair dame," replied the king, laying his hand fondly
upon her shoulder, and smiling, at the same time, at the evident
preparation of the whole affair, "perchance he may. Ho! my good
chancellor, we would fain speak with you here a while."
At the very first word the king addressed to him, a tall and somewhat
meager man, in the rich and gorgeous habit of one of the princes of the
Roman Church, took a step forward from the rest of the group, and,
bowing low, advanced towards the king. He was dark and pale in
countenance, and his features were of an Italian cast, while a look of
shrewd, calm cunning, which that cast is so well calculated to assume,
was the predominant expression.
"His majesty, my Lord Cardinal," said the duchess, addressing the famous
John Bertrandi, and having marked well the shrewd smile upon the king's
countenance, "his majesty, my Lord Cardinal, would fain see a copy of
that edict referring to clandestine marriages, which was drawn up some
months ago, but never signed. I besought you this morning to seek for
it: has it been found?"
"I have it here, madam," replied the chancellor at once, opening a
portfolio which he carried under his arm; "may I present it to your
majesty:" and, selecting from among a number of papers which the
portfolio contained the one that was required at the moment, he put it
into the hands of Henry the Second.
The king took and read it attentively. "And is this, my lord," he
demanded, "in all due form, and ready for promulgation?"
"It is, sire," replied the chancellor: "wanting nothing but your
majesty's signature and the seal."
Henry paused thoughtfully. "And is it," he asked, "and is it altogether,
and in all parts, in strict accordance with the laws of France?"
"_Que veut le roi, veut le loi_," replied the chancellor. "What the king
wills, the law wills;" and, with that tyrannical axiom, the attempted
enforcement of which, in France, has caused more bloodshed than perhaps
any other line that ever was written, John Bertrandi satisfied his
conscience in sanctioning that which was contrary to the true spirit of
all law.
Henry himself, however, was not satisfied! Although it is so easy for
base counsellors--on whom be eternal shame--to find specious arguments
in favour of those things which monarchs wish, however evil; and
although it certainly was the case that the King of France himself,
eagerly desiring the marriage of his natural daughter with the heir of
Montmorency, had potent tempters in his own bosom to second the words of
Bertrandi, still he was not satisfied that the retrospective act
proposed to him was right. He looked first at the cardinal; next turned
his eyes for a moment to the countenance of Diana of Poitiers; smiled
doubtfully, and then said, "Put it up, my Lord Cardinal, put it up! I
will take one day more to consider of it. Nay, look not grieved, fair
dame, it shall have favourable consideration. Forget not that both our
wishes run in the same way. Now let us speak of other things, Diana. Do
you come to our gay hall to-night? Nay, you must not be absent," he
added, seeing that the duchess looked down somewhat mournfully;
"Henriette de la Mark must dance a gaillarde with her lover Damville."
"But can her lover ever be her husband?" demanded Diana, gazing
reproachfully in the king's face; and then adding, with consummate skill
in the management of that monarch, "It matters not! Since I have
accomplished what I sought for the good of the country, even if I have
failed in what I sought for my own pleasure, it matters not! My good
Lord Chancellor, the king has been pleased to promise that powers shall
be immediately granted to the noble constable of Montmorency to treat
with Spain and with the empire for a good and perfect peace. Let it be
said that this has been obtained by the solicitations of one who could
obtain nothing for herself! but still, not to her honour let it be, but
to the king's, inasmuch as he overcame in his own heart the love of
glory and the thirst of victory for the sake of his good land of France.
Will you, sire," she continued, "will you not order the chancellor at
once to expedite the powers for the good constable? It cannot be done
too rapidly."
"Why so?" demanded Henry. "There is, surely, no such haste."
"Because, sire," replied the lady, "there are two great and fortunate
men, whose first wish must be to change your majesty's counsels in this
regard. The conqueror of Calais may well have a say in matters of peace
and war. The Cardinal of Lorraine is still at your majesty's ear. The
purpose may evaporate and pass away, war be continued gloriously and
long, and France be ruined."
"Nay, nay," replied the king, looking at the duchess reproachfully, "I
am not so vacillating in my purposes. The Guises have not the influence
you think."
"They have had the influence, sire," replied Diana, boldly, "they have
had the influence to delay, for months, that very edict, drawn up by the
orders of the king himself, for the security and protection of the
French people, and to guard against the evils under which half of the
noble families of France now smart, from alliances contracted in wild
youth with races of inferior blood."
"The Guises had nothing to do with that--have nothing to do with it,"
replied the king, impatiently. "What interest have they in this matter?
I remember, it is true, the Cardinal of Lorraine did oppose the edict,
but upon motives of general justice. What interest had he, or his
brother either, for or against the edict?"
"To keep down the house of Montmorency," replied Diana of Poitiers. "To
blast the expectations of the young duke, in the hopes which he, perhaps
presumptuously, had entertained."
"I believe that it is so, indeed, sire," said the chancellor. "There is
much reason to think that the opposition of our holy father the pope was
raised up by the instigations of the Cardinal of Lorraine. You are well
aware, sire, that a messenger from the cardinal outstripped even the
Count de Meyrand, and that the latter gentleman found the holy father
already prepared to oppose the edict."
"I will think of the matter," said the king again. "If the opposition be
but factious, we will give it no head; but I would fain, before I
promulgate the edict, have some cause before me to justify it, in which
my own personal wishes, and yours, fair lady, are not interested. I must
have time for thought upon it. Now let the doors be opened, for we have
kept our court too long without."
The doors of the anteroom were accordingly thrown open. The guards, with
their halberds, drew back, and in a few minutes the great hall of
reception was crowded with the nobles of France. While the king, with
affable condescension, received his subjects, spoke with many of them,
and smiled upon all, and the buzz of voices, steps, and rustling
garments raised a sort of whispering murmur through the halls, the
chancellor was seen speaking, in a low voice, to the Duchess of
Valentinois; and some one who was passing heard the latter say, "Not
only that, my lord, but the abbey of St. Martin also, if we succeed. The
revenues are twelve thousand crowns a year."
The chancellor bowed low, with an humble and obsequious smile, and the
duchess turned to speak to some one else.