MY PRETTY PENITENT.
'This is passing strange!' thought I, as we trotted along the highway
towards Meaux, the cathedral spire of which rose above the mosses of
the ville on the right bank of the Marne; 'here am I, Blane of that
Ilk and Blanerne, a Chevalier of the Garde du Corps Ecossais, and so
forth, acting gentleman usher to a French waiting-maid--a squire o'
the stirrup to a wandering damsel, and that damsel a soubrette!'
And yet, as these irritating and ungenerous thoughts occurred to me
while peeping at my companion from time to time, I became impressed
by the grace with which she managed her horse, by her youth, her
beauty, and loveliness; and, above all, by a purity of thought and
choice of language in her conversation which convinced me that Nicola
was somewhat better than she seemed; and from some remarks she let
fall, I discovered that her father was a reputable citizen of Nanci,
whom the fortune of war had forced into the ranks of Duke Charles
IV.; that her mother was dead, and her stepmother, to whom she was
returning, disliked and ill used her.
I have said again and again that Nicola was lovely; but as the hours
of our companionship were prolonged, and as we rode side by sicle
between the long green hedgerows, the blooming orchards and graperies
that bordered the banks of the Marne, and were ripening as the spring
grew into summer, I began to discover new and dangerous graces and
attractions--a lofty bearing, an enchanting purity, that would have
graced even the vaunted Marie Louise of Lorraine, of whose far-famed
beauty Nicola seemed very proud, and of whom she spoke a hundred
times during our pleasant journey, often ridiculing, I remember, the
manner and character of Wolfgang the young Count Pappenheim, to whom
Charles IV. meant to marry her. Thus I began to forget the
waiting-maid, in the little sister of the hospital, and daily took
more care of my toilet, pointing up my moustache, curling my hair,
&c., &c., striving to appear to the best advantage in her eyes, with
what end I scarcely knew.
We passed Meaux, of which the illustrious Bossuet was then bishop,
and rode on, chatting and laughing, and quite forgetting to visit, in
our characters of an abbé and soeur de la charité, the famous shrine
of St. Fiacre. Ouf! the very name recals to me the image of Martin
Omelette, and that devilish old historical chamber in the Bastille,
from which he was so loth to release me! We lodged at a quiet little
inn in the marche, where Nicola's costume, as a follower of Father
Vincent of Paule, won her every respect and attention from our host,
while my moustache and sword obtained the same from madame the buxom
hostess, who soon 'detected the man-at-arms under my cassock,' as she
told me with a smile.
A ride of twenty-three miles next day brought us to Château Thierri,
an old town of the eighth century, having a castle of Charles Martel
on a hill overhanging it, and in this direction we progressed, as I
chose a route pretty far to the left of the main road to Lorraine,
being--for various reasons--desirous of avoiding the line of march
formerly taken by our army.
Here we put up at an auberge, opposite to the house in which the
celebrated De la Fontaine was born. The people being old Huguenots,
who remembered the wars of the League, were somewhat crusty, and loth
to admit two passengers attired as Nicola and I were; but a twist of
my moustache, and a display of that which is the most convincing
argument in the modern world and in practical philosophy, money,
silenced all their scruples, and we were immediately accommodated
with apartments.
Epernay, where Marechal Biron was killed by a cannon-ball, was our
next halting-place; and there at our inn we saw a picture of
Guilleriz, the famous robber, who built a castle in the wood of
Gralla in Brittany, where, after being besieged by five thousand men,
he was taken prisoner, and broken alive upon the wheel in 1608. Now,
as Epernay lies only fourteen miles south of Rheims, I began to
perceive that we were travelling a little too fast, and that the time
when I must part from my delightful companion drew nearer by every
hour and mile.