Olive Leaves Part 6

With patience and even cheerful serenity of countenance, she endured the pains of her disease, and to her mourning friends said, "I pray you not to weep for me. G.o.d by this sickness calleth me to the enjoyment of a better life." It was on the 9th of June, 1572, that she departed, with the prayer of faith on her lips, and the benignity of an angel."

"Was your grandfather in Paris at the time of the marriage of Henry and Margaret?"

"He was, and attentively observed the splendid scene. The 18th of August was appointed for the nuptial ceremony. An ample pavilion was erected opposite to the great church of Notre Dame. It was magnificently covered with cloth of gold. The concourse of spectators was immense, and their shouts seemed to rend the sky, as the youthful pair appeared in their royal garments. When Henry, bowing almost to the feet of his beautiful bride, took from his brow the coronet of Navarre, the ladies admired his gracefulness, and the freshness of his auburn hair, which inclining to red, curled richly around his n.o.ble forehead. The princess had a highly brilliant complexion, and was decorated with a profusion of splendid jewels.

The Cardinal of Bourbon received their vows. There seemed some degree of displeasure to curl his haughty lip. Probably he was dissatisfied that all the ceremonies of the Romish church were not observed. For as the prince was a Protestant, and the princess Catholic, the solemnities were of a mixed nature, accommodated to both. It had been settled in the marriage contract, that neither party should interfere with the other, in the exercise of their different religions. To give public proof of this, as soon as the nuptial ceremony was performed, the bride left the pavilion to attend ma.s.s, and the bridegroom to hear the sermon of a Protestant divine. Acclamations and music from countless instruments loudly resounded, when the royal couple again appeared, and proceeded together to the magnificent bridal banquet. Charles presented his sister with 100,000 crowns for her dower, and in the festivities which succeeded the marriage, who could have foreseen the dreadful ma.s.sacre of St. Bartholomew?"

"I have read in my history of that frightful scene. Dear Grandfather, how soon did it follow the nuptials which you have described?"

"Less than a week intervened. The ringing of the bells for morning prayers, at three o'clock, on Sunday, August 24th, was the signal for the Catholics to rush forth and murder the Protestants. The holy Sabbath dawned in peace. The matin-bell, calling the devout to wors.h.i.+p a G.o.d of mercy, was heard. Man came forth to shed the blood of his unsuspecting brother. The work of destruction began in many parts of the city, at the same moment. Tumult and shrieks and uproar increased, until they deepened into a terrible and universal groan. The streets were filled with infuriated soldiers, and almost every habitation of the Huguenots became a slaughter-house. Infants were transfixed on pikes, and women precipitated themselves from high windows and battlements, that they might die without outrage. Thirty thousand fell victims in this horrible ma.s.sacre, which extending itself from Paris to the provinces, was not satiated until more than twice that number had been sacrificed."

"What became of your grandfather during this scene of horror?"

"At the commencement of the tumult, his father hastily armed himself, and supposing it some temporary disturbance, went forth to aid in quelling it, commanding him to remain in the house. He obeyed until he was no longer able to endure the tortures of suspense, and then rushed out in search of a father whom he was never more to behold. Hasting to the quarters of Lord Teligny, his friend and benefactor, he found him mortally wounded, and faintly repeating the names of his wife and children. He then flew to the Hotel de St. Pierre, where Admiral Coligny lodged. But his headless trunk was precipitated from the window, and dragged onward by blood-smeared men, with faces scarcely human.

He had been wounded previous to the ma.s.sacre. On Friday, the 22nd, he was coming from the Louvre, with a group of n.o.blemen. He walked slowly, reading a pet.i.tion which had been presented him. As he pa.s.sed the cloister of St. Germain, he was shot by an arquebus loaded with three b.a.l.l.s. His left arm was deeply wounded, and the fore-finger of his right hand carried away. No trace of the a.s.sa.s.sin, who had been employed by the Duke of Guise, could be found, though the friends of the Admiral made persevering search.

As the surgeon on examination feared that the copper b.a.l.l.s were poisoned, this ill.u.s.trious man supposed that his hour had come, and turning to his lamenting friends, said,

"Why do you weep? For myself, I am honoured to receive these wounds, for the holy cause of my G.o.d. Pray him to strengthen me."

The ma.s.sacre commenced while it was yet dark, on Sunday morning, and the Duke of Guise, dreading lest Coligny, notwithstanding his injuries, should escape, and by his courage and influence reanimate the Protestants, hastened to his lodgings with three hundred soldiers.

Knocking at the outer gate, they demanded admission in the name of the king. The gentleman who opened it, fell, stabbed to the heart.

The wounded Admiral, in his apartment, was engaged in prayer with a minister who attended him. A terrified servant rushed in, exclaiming,

"My Lord, the inner gate is forced. We have no means of resisting."

"It is long since," replied Coligny, calmly, "that I prepared myself to die. Save yourselves all who can. Me, you cannot defend. I commend my soul to the mercy of G.o.d."

He arose from his bed, and being unable to stand upright, on account of his wounds, supported himself with his back against the wall. The first who burst into his chamber was a grim German, servant to the Duke of Guise.

"Are you the Admiral?"

"Yes. I am he."

And the ill.u.s.trious man, fixing his eyes without emotion on the naked sword of his murderer, said, with the dignity of a Christian,

"Young man! you ought to respect my age and infirmities."

The answer of the a.s.sa.s.sin was to plunge his weapon deep in that n.o.ble bosom. The Duke of Guise traversed the court below, with breathless impatience. To his fierce spirit, every moment seemed an age.

"Is the work done?" he asked.

"It is finished, my Lord!"

He demanded to see it, with his own eyes. They raised the body of the Admiral to cast it down to him. Still faintly respiring, it seemed to cling to the cas.e.m.e.nt.

At length, the ruthless murderers precipitated it into the court-yard.

Guise wiped with his handkerchief the face suffused with blood, and gazing intensely upon it by the flaring lamps, exclaimed,

"It is the man."

Rus.h.i.+ng into the streets, he bade, with hoa.r.s.e cries, the work of death to proceed, in the name of the king.

While our ancestor was hurrying in amazement and terror from place to place, he met a boy of nearly his own age, whose placid countenance and unmoved deportment strongly contrasted with the surrounding horrors. Two soldiers apparently had him in charge, shouting "_To ma.s.s! to ma.s.s!_"

while he, neither in compliance nor opposition, calmly continued his course, until they found some more conspicuous object of barbarity, and released him from their grasp. This proved to be Maximilian Bethune, afterwards the great Duke of Sully, prime minister of Henry IV., who by a wonderful mixture of prudence and firmness, preserved a life which was to be of such value to the realm. He was at this time making his way through the infuriated mob, to the College of Burgundy, where in the friends.h.i.+p of its princ.i.p.al, La Faye, he found protection and safety."

"Please not to forget what befell our relative."

It was in vain that he attempted to imitate this example of self-command. Distracted with fear for his father, he searched for him in scenes of the utmost danger, wildly repeating his name. A soldier raised over his head a sword dripping with blood. Ere it fell, a man in a black habit took his arm through his, and with some exertion of strength led him onward. They entered less populous streets, where carnage seemed not to have extended, before he perfectly recovered his recollection. Then he would have disengaged himself, but his arm was detained, as strongly as if it were pinioned. "Let me seek my father!"

he exclaimed. "Be silent!" said his conductor, with a voice of power that made him tremble. At length he knocked at the ma.s.sive gate of a monastery. The porter admitted them, and they pa.s.sed to an inner cell.

Affected by his pa.s.sionate bursts of grief, and exclamations of 'Father, dear father!' his protector said, 'Thank G.o.d, my son, that thy own life is saved. I ventured forth amid scenes of horror, hoping to bring to this refuge a brother, whom I loved as my own soul. I found him lifeless and mangled. Thou wert near, and methought thou didst resemble him. Thy voice had his very tone, as it cried, 'Father, father!' My heart yearned to be as a father to thee. And I have led thee hither through blood and death. Poor child, be comforted, and lift up thy soul to G.o.d.'"

"Was it not very strange, that a Catholic should be so good?"

"There are good men among every sect of Christians, my child. We should never condemn those who differ from us in opinion, if their lives are according to the Gospel. This ecclesiastic was a man of true benevolence. Nothing could exceed his kindness to him whose life he had saved. It was ascertained that he was not only fatherless but an orphan, for the work of destruction, extending itself into many parts of the kingdom, involved his family in its wreck. The greatest attention was paid to his education, and his patron instructed him in the sciences, and particularly from the study of history he taught him the emptiness of glory without virtue, and the changeful nature of earthly good. He made him the companion of his walks, and by the innocent and beautiful things of nature, sought to win him from that melancholy which is so corrosive to intellect, and so fatal to peace. He permitted him to take part in his works of charity, and to stand with him by the beds of the sick and dying, that he might witness the power of that piety which upholds when flesh and heart fainteth.

During his residence here, the death of Charles IX. took place. He was a king in whom his people and even his nearest friends had no confidence.

After the savage ma.s.sacre of St. Bartholomew, which was conducted under his auspices, he had neither satisfaction nor repose. He had always a flush and fierceness upon his countenance, which it had never before worn. Conscience haunted him with a sense of guilt, and he could obtain no quiet sleep. He seemed to be surrounded by vague and nameless terrors. He fancied that he heard groans in the air, and suffered a strange sickness which forced blood from all the pores of his body.

He was attended in his illness by a faithful old nurse, to whom, notwithstanding she was a Huguenot, he affectionately trusted. One who has described the close of his life, says, that two nights before his death, she was sitting near him on a chest, almost overcome with the drowsiness of fatigue. She was aroused by hearing the king bitterly moan and weep. As she softly approached his bed, he exclaimed, through sighs and sobs, so interrupting his voice that it was difficult to understand him,

"Ah! my nurse, my dear nurse, what blood! what murders! Alas! what evil counsels have I followed! Oh my G.o.d! pardon me! and have mercy on me, if thou canst. What shall I do? I am lost! I see it but too well."

The pitying nurse answered with tears.

"Sire! let the guilt rest on those who counselled you to it. For if you consented not in your heart to those murders, and are repentant, trust that G.o.d will not charge them to you, but will cover them with the mantle of his Son's great love, to whom alone you should turn."

He listened mournfully to her words, and taking from her hand a handkerchief, his own being saturated with tears, gave a sign that she should retire, and take a little rest.

His attachment to this pious nurse was strongly contrasted with his shrinking aversion whenever his mother approached him. He viewed her as the instigator to that horrible ma.s.sacre which troubled his conscience, and her presence greatly distressed him. This miserable monarch died on the 30th of May, 1574, at the age of 23, having sinned much and suffered much, though his years were few.

He was succeeded by his brother Henry III., against whom, and Catharine, the Queen-mother, three powerful armies were opposed, one led by the King of Navarre, one by the Prince of Conde, and the other by the Duke of Anjou. The tidings of these civil wars penetrated into the seclusion of the religious house where my grandfather had already pa.s.sed three years in quiet study. They kept alive the martial spirit which he inherited, and quickened his desire to partake in their tumultuous scenes. At length he communicated to his patron his discontentment with a life of inaction, and his irrepressible wish to mingle again with the world. Unusual paleness settled on the brow of the venerable man, as he replied,

"I have long seen that thy heart was not in these quiet shades, and I have lamented it. Yet thus it is with the young: they will not be wise from the experience of others. They must feel with their own feet, the thorns in the path of pleasure. They must grasp with their own hand, the sharp briers that cling around the objects of their ambition. They must come trusting to the world's broken cisterns, find the dregs from her cup cleaving in bitterness to their lip, and feel her in their bosom, ere they will believe."

The youth enlarged with emotion on his grat.i.tude to his benefactor. He mentioned the efforts he had made to comply with his desires, and lead a life of contemplative piety, but that these efforts were overpowered by an impulse to mingle in more active pursuits, and to visit the home of his ancestors.

"Go, then, my son, and still the wild throbbings of thy heart over the silent beds of those who wake no more till the resurrection morn. Think not that I have read thy nature slightly, or with a careless glance. The spirit of a warrior slumbers there. Thou dost long to mix in the battle.

I have marked, in thy musings, the lightning of thine eye shoot forth, as if thou hadst forgotten Him who said: 'Vengeance is mine.' Would that thou hadst loved peace. Go; yet remember, that 'he who taketh the sword shall perish by the sword.' As for me, my path on earth is short, or I should more deeply mourn thy departure. Thou hast been but too dear to me; and when thou art gone, my spirit shall cast from its wings the last c.u.mbrance of earthly love."

He gave him his benediction with great tenderness and solemnity, and the parting was tearful and affectionate. But the young traveller soon dismissed his sorrow, for the cheering influence of the charms of nature, and the gladness of liberty.

The genial season of spring diffused universal beauty. The vales spread out their green mantles to catch the showers of blossoms, with which every breeze covered them. Luxuriant vines lifted up their fragrant coronets. Young lambs playfully cropped the tender leaves. Quiet kids stood ruminating by the clear streams. Music was in all the branches.

The father-bird cheered his companion, who, patient on her nest, brooded their future hopes.

"Surely," thought he, "the peasant is the most happy of men, dwelling in the midst of the innocence and beauty of creation."