"But it is in the cause of your religion that I have conspired, my good woman, and that I am now compelled to fly," replied La Mole; "it was for one, who, as chief of your party, would have espoused your quarrel, and re-established your influence in the land."

"Ay, for your master, the shallow Duke of Alencon," responded Perrotte coldly. "False, hollow ambition all! And ye call that the cause of religion—Mockery! Yes, I know you well, Philip de la Mole, who in the hour of bloodshed," she continued, growing more and more excited, "could approve the hellish deed, and who now can babble of sacrifice and self-offering in the cause of our religion."

"You belie me, woman," said La Mole proudly.

"Yes, I know you, Philip de la Mole," pursued the old woman with knitted brows and flashing eyes; "you, who, to amuse your hours of idleness, could talk of love to a poor trusting girl, heedless how you destroyed her peace of mind, had you but your pastime and your jest of it."

"Grandmother!" cried Jocelyne in the bitterest distress.

"It was he, then!" exclaimed Alayn, advancing upon the fugitive nobleman, with the gun-barrel raised in his arm.

"If you love me, forbear!" screamed his cousin, flinging herself before him.

"I had hoped to have found shelter among honest hearts, whom misfortune should have taught pity," said the fugitive proudly, and unmoved; "and I have erred—unjust hate, prejudice, inhospitality, are the only virtues practised beneath this roof. I will again brave the danger, and seek elsewhere that kindly feeling I find not here. Jocelyne, my sweet pretty Jocelyne, farewell!"

With these words La Mole moved towards the door. The old woman regarded him motionless, and with the same cloud of irritation on her brow. Alayn seemed equally inclined to prosecute his first hostile intention; but Jocelyne sprang after the retreating nobleman and caught him by the arm.

"Grandmother," she said, drawing herself up to her full height, and leaning fondly against La Mole—"if any one have erred, it is I, and I alone. It was I chose him forth as the noblest, the brightest, the best among those who glittered about the court, in which we humbly lived. I had given him my heart ere he had deigned to cast a look upon me. If I have loved him—if I love him still—it is because I alone have sought it should be so."

"Jocelyne! be still, sweet girl," said La Mole, affected, and moving towards the door.

"And were he our bitterest enemy," continued the excited girl, still clinging to his arm, "he is now a proscribed fugitive—no matter why—God sends him to us—and it is ours to save, not to condemn him."

"But it is said, that the enemy of the righteous shall perish from the earth," said her grandmother sternly; "it is not I condemn or kill him. If it be the will of God that his cause of error cease, let him go forth and die."

"If he die, mother," exclaimed Jocelyne with energy, "I shall die too. I have given him my heart, my life, my soul—punish me as you will—trample me at your feet. But I love him, mother; and, if you drive him forth to be hunted by his enemies to the death, your child will not survive it."

Alayn had turned away in bitterness of heart, and the old Huguenot woman, although giving way more and more to that excitement, which, at times, fully troubled her reason, only wrung her hands, as if moved by the address of the agitated girl.

"Stay! stay, Monseigneur," continued Jocelyne, as La Mole again pressed her hand and turned to depart. "She relents—she has a kind heart; and she would not, surely, deliver up the guest who begs shelter at her threshold, into the hands of those who seek to capture and to kill him."

"Let me go forth, Jocelyne! farewell!" repeated La Mole.

"Mother!" again commenced the unhappy girl, throwing herself down to clasp the knees of her grandmother, who, overcome by the violence of her feelings, had sunk back again into her chair. "Mother! would your husband, or your son, have driven even their deadliest enemy from their door?"

"Speak not of my son, girl; or you will drive me mad!" cried Perrotte, clasping her hands before her face.

Jocelyne sprang up with a look of despair, and returned to detain once more La Mole.

As they thus stood, and before the old woman had again stirred, or Alayn interfered, a rumour from the street formed by the bridge, caught the ear of the excited girl.

"What is that?" she exclaimed, starting in alarm.

"The agents of the Queen-mother sent in my pursuit, probably," replied La Mole coolly, and disengaging himself from the convulsive embrace of Jocelyne. "How they have tracked me, I know not. So be it, then. I had hoped for the sake of others to avoid their hands; but I am prepared to meet my fate."

"No, no," screamed Jocelyne. "It cannot be! Mother—mother, would you see him made a prisoner in your own house—murdered, perhaps, before your very face!"

Alayn moved towards the door; and the girl sprang to intercept him.

"Would you be so base? Would you have me hate you?" cried the poor girl in despair, to her cousin.

Many steps were now heard ascending the lower stair. The old woman, who trembled in every limb, stirred not from her chair; but, removing one hand from her face, she stretched it out towards a corner of the room.

"Ah! I understand you, mother," exclaimed Jocelyne. "That secret closet where our books of religion are deposited, where our old priest, during the massacre, was hid!"

"Whilst my son perished—a victim—a martyr!" groaned the old woman, fearfully agitated.

"Come, come, Monseigneur," pursued the excited girl; and, in spite of the unwillingness of La Mole to profit by a hospitality thus bestowed, she dragged him to one corner of the room, and pushing back the spring of one of those secret recesses then so commonly constructed in all houses, as well of the bourgeois as the nobles, on account of the troubles and dangers of the times, she compelled him by her entreaties to enter a dark nook—then hastily closing the aperture, she exclaimed, "God shield him!" and sank down into the stool by her grandmother's side.

"Alayn!" she said, in a low hurried tone, as the heavy steps still mounted the stairs, "you will be silent, will you not? You will not betray him, and see the poor girl, whom you profess to love, die at your feet!"

The youth shook his head with a gesture of resignation, although the frown upon his brow showed how painful were the feelings that he suppressed.

"Mother!" whispered Jocelyne once more to the old woman. "Calm your agitation—oh! let not a word, a gesture, betray our secret! Stay! I will read to you!" And she seized the Bible, then a dangerous book to produce thus openly before Catholic agents of the court, and took it on her lap.

Perrotte answered not a word, but continued to rock herself with much agitation from side to side in her chair.

The noise of the arquebuses of soldiery was now, in truth, heard on the landing-place. A heavy blow was given on the panels of the door; and, without waiting for permission to enter, a man in the military accoutrements of the period, whose head was crowned with a high hat, adorned with a short red feather, advanced into the room with an air which betrayed at once a strange mixture of effrontery and hypocrisy.

"Landry!" exclaimed together both Jocelyne and Alayn.

"Captain Landry, at your service," said the man; "or, if you will, at the service of her majesty the Queen-mother. Good-day, my gentle cousins both. Good-day to you, my good aunt Perrotte. How goes it with her now? Her head was somewhat ailing as I heard, since she had left the court." And he touched his forehead significantly with his finger.

"She is well!" answered Jocelyne hastily, trembling in spite of her efforts to be calm.

"But this is no visit of ceremony, my good friends," continued Captain Landry, with some haughtiness of manner. "I come upon state affairs. A criminal of rank, who has conspired against the life and person of the king, has escaped; and we are sent in his pursuit. We have contrived to track him of a surety to this neighbourhood; and, as I bethought me that this same delinquent was a friend of my fair cousin Jocelyne, who, although she has received my offers of affection with disdain, could look upon another with more favour, I doubted not that I should find news of him in her company. Know you of none such here, sweet cousin?"

"I know not of whom you speak," said Jocelyne, her colour varying from the flush of emotion to the deadly paleness of fear.

"And you, Alayn, boy, since our fair cousin's memory is so short, can doubtless tell me. Has no one entered here within the last half hour?"

"No one!" answered Alayn sturdily; but he then turned and moved to the window to hide his confusion.

The Queen's agent shrugged his shoulders.

"And my good aunt has had no visitors?" he resumed, advancing towards the old woman.

Perrotte lifted her head, and regarded the captain fixedly, and with a look of scorn, but said not a word.

"Search!" said the officer, turning to the soldiers, who had waited without.

The men entered; and in a few instants the scanty and small rooms attached to the principal apartment were examined. The captain was informed that no one could be found. For a moment he looked disappointed, and paused to reflect.

"Their trouble is evident," he murmured to himself. "He may still be here. The reward for his capture is too great to be given up lightly; and, besides, I hate the fellow for the love she bears him—I will leave no stone unturned."

"Dame Perrotte!" he said returning to the old woman, and speaking to her in a low tone of voice—"A criminal of state has escaped from the king's justice. In spite of the protestations of your grandchildren, I cannot doubt that he is concealed hereabouts; and you must know where. You will not fail, I am sure, to indicate the place of his retreat, when you know that, as the friend of those who have proved the bitterest enemies of your religion, he must also be your deadly enemy."

"And is it Landry, the recreant, the apostate, the only seceder of our family from the just cause, who speaks thus?" said the old woman lifting her head with a haggard expression.

"The necessary policy of the times," whispered the captain, sitting down on the stool by her side, and approaching himself confidentially nearer, "has compelled me, like many others, to be that in seeming which we are not in heart. Has not our chief, Henry of Navarre, yielded also to the pressure of the circumstances in which he lives? Judge me not so harshly, good aunt. But this criminal—he is one of those who have hunted and destroyed, who have cried—'Down with them; down with the Huguenots—pursue and kill;' and you would withdraw him from the punishment he merits?"

"He! he! Was it, so?" muttered Perrotte, with eyes staring at the vacancy before her.

"Do you not fear to pass for the accomplice of his crimes?" continued Captain Landry in her ear. "Know you not that he has attainted the life of your nursling by deeds of sorcery, and that Charles IX., our king, now lies upon his death-bed."

"Who speaks of Charles?" exclaimed the old woman with increasing wildness and excitement. "Charles and death! Yes, they go hand in hand!"

"Landry! You shall not torture our poor mother thus," cried Jocelyne springing towards them, in order to interrupt a conversation which she had been witnessing in agony, although she could not hear it, and the effect of which upon her grandmother's unsettled mind became every moment more visible.

"Fair cousin, with your leave!" replied the captain. "I am bound to do the duties of my office. I shall be grieved to use constraint." And, waving his hand to her to withdraw, he made a sign to the soldiers to approach both Jocelyne and Alayn, and prevent their interference.

Jocelyne wrung her hands.

"Do you not fear the reproaches of your murdered son?" continued Captain Landry, turning to Perrotte, with an expression of perfidious hypocrisy in his eyes, and again pouring his words lowly, but distinctly, into her ear. "Do you not fear that he should rise from his tomb, and, showing the bloody wounds of that fatal night, cry for vengeance on his murderers, and curse the weakness of that mother who would screen and shelter them? Do you not fear that Heaven should condemn you as a friend to the destroyers of the righteous? Think on your slaughtered kindred, woman!"

"Mercy! mercy! my son!" cried the old woman, springing up with her hands outstretched, as if to repel a spectre. "Oh! hide that streaming blood! Look not so angry on me! Blood shall have blood, thou say'st; so be it. Vengeance is the Lord's! and He shall avenge his people!"

"Where is he?" enquired Landry, also rising, and watching her every movement.

"There! there!" exclaimed the excited woman, pointing to the corner of the room.

In spite of the attempt of Jocelyne, who was now restrained by the soldiers, to interrupt him, Captain Landry walked to the corner indicated, and after a few attempts succeeded in discovering the secret of the concealed recess.

"Count Philip de la Mole, you are my prisoner, under warrant of his majesty the King, and by order of the Queen-mother," he said, as the young nobleman appeared to view.

Jocelyne uttered a cry of despair.

"Conduct me where you are bidden, sir," said La Mole, offering his sword. "My sweet Jocelyne, farewell!—your kindly interest in my fate I shall never forget. But we shall meet again. Fear nothing for me; I will prove my innocence."

The unhappy girl fell at the feet of the captured nobleman, and wetted his outstretched hand with her tears, as she pressed it to her lips.

"My strict orders," said Captain Landry, "were to arrest all those who should be convicted of harbouring the criminal. Forget not, then, cousin Jocelyne, that I spare you so hard a lot. But my duty compels me to adopt other measures. Come, sir!"

When Philip de la Mole had been conducted from the room by the agents of the Queen-mother, Jocelyne turned to her grandmother, without rising from the ground, and exclaimed in the bitterest despair—

"Mother—mother—you have killed me!"

"Who spoke of Charles? Who said he lay upon his death-bed?" cried Perrotte, walking up and down with the uncertain step of the deranged of mind, and unheeding her unhappy grandchild; "Charles dying! and I shall see him no more—shall he die without a warning word from her who loved and cherished him so long—die without repentance? What was that voice that tortured my very soul? Who said he was about to die, and that I should see him no more?"

Jocelyne sprung up from the ground, as if a sudden thought had crossed her mind.

"Yes, mother, yes," she cried, "the king is dying. Come to him. See him once more. He will hear your words upon his death-bed, and extend his pardon to the innocent—for Philip de la Mole is innocent, my mother. He will save him who is unjustly condemned; and you will save his repentant soul. Come, mother, come—come," she continued, as if speaking to a child, "the king is waiting for you!"

"Charlot—my nursling—dying!" murmured the old woman—"Yes—let us go."

"Alayn will accompany us," said Jocelyne, turning to the youth, who stood at the window unhappy and confused.

Without waiting for any addition to their dress, the eager girl seized her grandmother's hand, and led her to the door.

When it was opened, two soldiers appeared upon the threshold, stationed to prevent all egress of the inhabitants; and one of them, placing his arquebuse across the door-stall, cried, in a rude voice—

"On ne passe pas."

The two women drew back in alarm.

CHAPTER IV.

"Sweet Isabel, take my part; Lend me your knees, and all my life to come I'll lend you all my life to do you service."

SHAKSPEARE.

"Your suit's unprofitable; stand up, I say."

IDEM.

Again the scene changes to the palace of the Louvre, where so many dark intrigues surrounded the rich chamber of the dying king; where, instead of the sympathy of friends, and the tears of relations, jarring ambition, and rivalry, and hatred, between brethren and kindred, between mother and children, escorted him on his passage to the tomb, and darkened the last hours of his reign. Such might have been supposed by a moralist to be the punishment, inflicted, even upon this earth, on him, who, if he did not instigate, ordained and prosecuted the horrible massacre of St Bartholomew.

The state of the miserable Charles grew hourly worse, and he rapidly approached his last moments. None knew better than his heartless mother, as she had herself admitted, that he must die; but yet, with so much artifice and intrigue did she envelope in mystery his lost condition, that, even in the Palace of the Louvre, his own nearest relations were ignorant how near approached the hour, which, by leaving the crown as heirloom to a successor far away in a distant country, opened a field to the ambitious designs of so many struggling parties in the state.

Unconscious, as many others, of the rapid advance of that fatal event, sat in her chamber Margaret of Valois, Queen of Navarre, the sister of the dying king. Her beautiful head was reclined languidly against the tapestry of the wall, the dark colours of which formed an admirable background to that brilliant and bejewelled portrait. A lute, of the fashion of the day, lay upon her lap; music, dresses, scraps of poetry in her own handwriting, caskets with jewellery, manuscripts, and illuminated volumes, were littered in various parts of the room. A handsome spaniel slumbered at her feet; whilst two of her ladies sat on chests at a respectful distance, occupied in embroidery. A look of soft pensiveness pervaded the delicate and highly expressive features of the young Queen; but her thoughts were not bent, at that moment, either on her suffering brother, or on those ambitious views for her husband, which, spite of her little affection for him, she entertained, partly out of a sort of friendship for the man she esteemed, although her hand had been so unwillingly bestowed upon him; partly out of that innate ambition and love of intrigue, which formed, more or less one ingredient in the character of all the children of the crafty Catherine de Medicis. No! they rambled unrestrained upon the souvenir of an object of woman's preference and princess's caprice, who for some time past had no more crossed her path. It was on that account her brow was clouded, and that a trait of sadness shaded her smiling mouth.

As she still lay thus languidly, one of the ladies was called by an officer from the room, and shortly returned to announce that there was a young girl without, who besought, with earnest supplication, to see her Majesty.

Although astonished at this request, Margaret, eager for any subject of passing occupation that might enliven, even for a moment, an hour's ennui, desired that she might be admitted; and shortly after a simply dressed girl, whose sunken head could not conceal her exquisite beauty, was ushered in. Her step as ill-assured and trembling; her face was deadly pale.

"What would you, maiden, with the Queen of Navarre?" said Margaret kindly. "How came you here?"

The girl raised her head, but still struggled with her emotion before she could speak.

"Ah! I remember me," pursued the princess with a smile. "You are the pretty Jocelyne, the fair grand-daughter of my brother Charles's favourite old nurse, Dame Perrotte; you are she of whom all our gallants spake with so much praise, to the great detriment and neglect of all our ladies of the court. Nay, blush not—or rather blush—blush, it becomes your pale face well, my dainty one. But I thought that you had left the court with Dame Perrotte, the sturdy Huguenot, ever since. Oh yes! I recall it all now," she continued, checking herself with a sort of shudder. "But what brings you hither? Speak. Have you any favour to ask that the Queen of Navarre can grant?"

"I would speak with you, madam, and alone, upon a matter of urgency and importance," stammered Jocelyne.

The thought, that as the fair girl before her belonged to a Huguenot family, she might have been used by the Calvinist party as a secret agent to convey her some intelligence connected with the various plots ripe at that period to place Henry of Navarre in a post of influence about the crown, if not upon the throne, crossed the mind of Margaret, and she gave instant orders that her ladies should retire. To her surprise, as soon as they were left alone, the lovely girl threw herself sobbing at her feet.

"Save him! save him!" cried Jocelyne, with outstretched arms. "You have influence—you can approach the king—you can save him if you will. And you will save him—will you not?"

"Of whom do you speak, my pretty maiden?" said the princess in surprise.

"Of Monseigneur the Count Philip de la Mole!" sobbed Jocelyne.

"Philip de la Mole!" exclaimed Margaret aghast. "What ails him, girl? You bid me save him—Why? What mean you?"

"Oh! madam, know you not," pursued the sobbing girl, "that he has been arrested for treason—for a conspiracy against the life of the king? that he is at this moment a prisoner, and that his life is threatened?"

"La Mole! arrested! accused of attempting the life of Charles!" cried the Queen of Navarre in the highest agitation. "And I knew naught of this? Is it true? How did you learn the story? Do you come from him? Speak, girl, speak, I say!"

"He was arrested, madam, in our very house," stammered Jocelyne, wringing her hands. "He had sought a refuge there—and he there lay concealed. But, alas! my poor grandmother, her wits are at times unsettled. Oh! she knew not what she did. Believe me she did not know. A treacherous villain worked upon her wavering mind—she betrayed him. They took him from the room a prisoner. I would have led my grandmother to seek his pardon at the feet of the king, who loved her so well that he would refuse her nothing; but soldiers guarded our doors; they would not let us pass. Then I bethought myself of the window. Our house is on the bridge, and looks upon the river. Below was a mill and the miller's boat. He is a good man, and kind of heart. I knew that he would row me to the shore. Alayn, my cousin, would have prevented me; but I would not hear him. What was the rushing stream, or the whirling mill-wheel to me? I saw not danger when I thought I could save the noble Count."

"Brave girl! brave girl!" interrupted Margaret, in palpitating excitement.

"There were beams and posts that descended to the water's edge," pursued Jocelyne, her eyes sparkling and her cheek now flushed with the animation of her tale. "Alayn aided me, although unwillingly, with cord and linen. I reached the mill—the boat. The miller rowed me to the shore. I knew I could not approach the king; but I bethought me of you, madam—for they say—they say, you love him well." At these words Jocelyne hesitated, with a mixture of feelings, in which bashful timidity struggled with her jealousy of the great lady before whom she knelt.

"Pursue, girl, pursue," said Margaret, an instantaneous blush again colouring that cheek, from which alarm had driven all colour.

"Yes; and I knew that you would save him," continued the excited girl, stretching out her hands in anguish. "He is your own brother—he—the king, the dispenser of life and death; and he will listen to you. And you will save the Count, will you not?"

"Yes—yes, girl! I will do all I can!" said the princess walking up and down in agitation. "Rise, rise—your tale is confused. I know not what all this may mean; but the truth is there. He is a prisoner! Oh, La Mole! La Mole! Whether has your imprudence driven you? And were it for me that he has done thus. Yes—yes I will to my brother Charles—I will learn all—supplicate—save him!"

With these words, half murmured to herself, half addressed to Jocelyne, the Queen of Navarre paced her room. Then making another sign to the unhappy girl to rise and remain, she took a whistle lying on a table, and whistled to call those without.

The hangings of the door were parted. But instead of one of her attendant ladies, it was the calm imposing form of Catherine de Medicis that entered the apartment.

Margaret started back as if she had seen a spectre.

"My mother!" burst involuntarily from her lips in a tone of alarm; for she divined, by rapid instinct, that such a visit could bode naught but evil.

The Queen-mother cast a searching glance over the two agitated females, and smiled as if, with that quickness of intelligence which characterised her cunning mind, she had discovered at once the meaning of the scene before her. With an imperious wave of the hand she signified her desire that the damsel should leave the room, since she would speak with her daughter. In spite of her agitation and distress, Margaret of Valois, with that implicit obedience to her mother's will which, in common with all the children of Catherine de Medicis, (except the unhappy Charles in the latter years of his hardly wrought and dearly paid emancipation from her authority,) she never ventured to refuse. She bid Jocelyne leave them; and the fair girl retired with trembling steps and sinking heart. The apparition of the Queen-mother had appalled her.

Catherine motioned to her daughter to be seated on a low stool, and taking herself a high-backed chair, smiled with her usual bland and treacherous smile.

"You seem agitated, Margaret, ma mie," commenced the Queen-mother, after a due pause. "I have come to condole and sympathise with you in your distress. Much as I may have blamed your misplaced and unbecoming attachment to an obscure courtier, almost an adventurer in this palace, I cannot but feel that you must suffer from the discovery of the utter baseness of this man. Look not thus surprised. I see you have already learned his arrest—your whole manner betrays it."

"You speak of ——," stammered Margaret, trembling.

"I speak of Philip de la Mole," said the Queen coldly.

"It is true, then?" pursued her daughter. "He is arrested on a charge of treason. Oh, no! It cannot be! He is innocent!"

"He is guilty!" said Catherine coldly. "I have evidence the most incontrovertible, that he has conspired against the life of the king, your brother, by the foulest acts of sorcery. A wax figure, fashioned as a king, pierced to the heart by his very hand, has been laid before me. Your brother's illness, his mortal pains, his malady so incomprehensible, all declare that the hellish deed has but too much succeeded up to this hour."

Margaret shook her head with a smile of contempt and doubt.

"But for what purpose was designed this murderous act?" pursued the Queen-mother. "In despite of the rights of Henry of Anjou, to place his master, your brother, the Duke of Alencon, upon the throne upon the death of Charles. We have every proof that so it was."

"For Alencon!" stammered the princess.

"It was for him," continued Catherine, unheeding this interruption, but with an increasing smile of satisfaction, "that these treasonable plots were designed, and partly executed. The ambitious favourite thought, by his master's hand, to rule the destinies of France. But the traitor will now reap the fruits of his black treachery."

"For Alencon!" repeated Margaret in a tone of regret.

"Doubt not that I sympathise in all your sorrow at this discovery, my child," resumed the Queen-mother. "Bitterly indeed must you feel how the base traitor has betrayed and forgotten the woman who loved him so fondly, so imprudently."

"For Alencon!" again muttered Margaret with sunken head.

"Be this the punishment of your folly, and its reparation," pursued Catherine, after a pause. "Long ago should you have ceased to cherish an attachment for one so unworthy. But you have too soft a heart, Margaret, my girl; you are too kind. I wonder and admire the sacrifice of your own feelings, and the woman's weakness with which you could hear and compassionate the supplications of his mistress."

"Madam!" said the princess lifting her head in surprise.

"But even now I saw her at your feet," continued her mother, with a slight sneer, "begging you to intercede to obtain his pardon."

"His mistress! speak you of La Mole, madam?" exclaimed Margaret.

"What! you knew not, child, what all the court can tell you," replied Catherine, "that of this chit-faced grandchild of that old Huguenot, whom Charles so favoured, Philip de la Mole had made his light o' love? Ay, so it was. It was the talk and scandal of the palace. Where was he discovered on his arrest? In the girl's chamber, as I hear. And now she dares to come and tear her hair, and whine out for mercy for her paramour, at your feet—at yours! Effrontery could go no further!"

"Philip! could he be so base?" murmured Margaret to herself. "But yes—her tears—her agony! Oh! it is true! And he must love her well, that she should thus, at the hazard of her life"——

The Queen-mother smiled with satisfaction, as she saw that mistrust had entered Margaret's mind; but to make her purpose sure, she remained long, to comfort and console her daughter, as she said, with words of false sympathy, and hypocritical advice.

When at last she saw Margaret thus convinced of La Mole's utter unworthiness, and knew that injured pride and offended dignity had usurped in her heart the place, where, so shortly before, love alone had throned, Catherine de Medicis rose and retired.

Margaret did not weep. She was one lightly moved by the more violent as the tenderer feelings of a woman's heart, and she was proud. She sat still, unmoved, with her hands clenched before her, when a slight movement in the apartment startled her. Upon raising her head she saw Jocelyne before her.

"You here, my mistress?" she exclaimed in anger.

"They would have bid me begone," said Jocelyne timidly; "but I concealed myself; and when her majesty the Queen-mother had gone forth, I returned unperceived."

"And you again dare to affront my presence?" said Margaret rising. "This is unheard of insolence."

"Alas, madam!" replied Jocelyne trembling, "I did but seek a last assurance that you would save him."

"Away with you, mistress," continued the princess, her eyes flashing with anger. "La Mole is but a traitor, as are men all. Let him meet his deserts. But I wonder at myself that I should bandy words with you. Go to your lover, girl, and comfort him as best you may."

"My lover! he!" murmured Jocelyne; "alas! he never loved me!"

Overwhelmed with the rude reception she had so unexpectedly received from the princess, who, but a short time before, had listened to her with so much eager interest, the poor girl moved with unsteady step towards the door.

"He loved you not, say you?" burst forth Margaret as to recall her. "Speak! He loved you not—this—young Count?"

"Madam," said Jocelyne, turning her head, but with downcast eyes, "in this dreadful moment, when he lies a prisoner, his life in danger, I can avow, what I could scarcely dare avow even to myself, that I loved him with a passionate and unrequited love. I loved him with an eager and devoted affection, although his heart was not mine—poor simple uncourtly girl as I am—although it was another's. He too loved, I know—but it was a great and noble lady, more worthy of him than was I. Pardon me, madam, if I dared to think she loved him too."

"Come hither, maiden, once again," said the princess in agitation. "He loved another, you say—this Count de la Mole—and who was she?"

"Madam," replied Jocelyne in embarrassment, "I have already craved your pardon that I should have ventured even to surmise it!"

"Ah!" sighed forth Margaret with a gleam of satisfaction in her face. "Come back, my girl, come back!" she resumed. "I have treated you harshly. I knew not what I did. Hear me—this Count has proved a traitor to his king; perhaps, I may fancy, a traitor to others also; he has conspired to turn away the rightful succession of the crown. But I believe him not guilty of all the black arts of which he is accused. I would save him from the unhappy consequences of his error, if I could. But what can I do? My mother is fearfully incensed against him!"

"Oh, madam, you have access to the king!" cried Jocelyne imploringly. "He is your brother—and the power to save or to destroy is his. He will not refuse you, if you entreat his pardon and mercy for the Count."

Margaret shook her head doubtfully.

"Alas!" she said, with a look of distress, "other influences are at work which mine cannot resist. I knew not all—but now I tremble."

Jocelyne still entreated, in all the agony of despair; and the young Princess, again calling to her ladies, and learning that the Queen-mother had returned to her own apartment, at last departed from her chamber, bidding her fair suppliant await her return.

Long, eternally long, appeared those minutes, as the unhappy girl still waited for that return which she imagined was to bring her the news of life or death. To calm the agitation of her mind, she prayed. But her thoughts were far too disturbed for prayer; and the prayer brought her no comfort.

At length the Queen of Navarre came back to her apartment—as Jocelyne looked in her face, she could scarcely repress a scream; that face was one of sorrow, and disappointment—the poor girl trembled in every limb, and did not dare to speak.

"I have done all I could," said Margaret—"His door was obstinately closed to me—I could not see him—it was she—it was my mother, who has done this. I know it well."

"What is to be done? whether turn for help?" cried Jocelyne in dispair. "Oh! would that I could lay down my life to save his."

"Noble girl!" exclaimed the princess. "Thus devoted, whilst he loves another! How far more generous than was I; ay, I believe thee—couldst thou lay down thy life for him, thou wouldst do it."

"And is there no hope of seeking pardon at his hands?" resumed the afflicted girl.

"In time, perhaps—at another opportunity," replied Margaret; "but now my mother's influence triumphs."

"Another opportunity!" sobbed Jocelyne. "In time! Alas! such words are words of mockery—the king is dying—at his death the Queen-mother will command; and what have we then to hope?"

"Dying? the king—my brother!" exclaimed the Queen of Navarre—you rave, girl! he is ill—I know, but"——

"Know you not, madam," interrupted Jocelyne, "what all the city of Paris knows—that the king cannot live long—not many hours, perhaps—that he lies upon his death-bed?"

"Charles—dying! And my mother has concealed it from me!" cried Margaret. "I see through all her designs! she would keep us from his presence, that he bestow not upon my husband, whom he loves, the reins of power at his death. Charles—dying! Then there lies our only hope. If he die, let Henry of Navarre be Regent—he will listen to my prayer—and La Mole is saved. Yes, there lies the only chance. I will to my husband. We may have still time to effect our purpose, and secure the Regency, in these few last hours of the reign."

CHAPTER V.

"O cousin, thou art come to set mine eye; The tackle of my heart is crack'd and burn'd; And all the shrouds, wherewith my life should sail, Are turned to one thread, one little hair; My heart hath one poor string to stay it by—

* * *

"All this thou see'st is but a clod, And module of confounded royalty."

* * *

"But now a king—now thus— This was now a king, and now is clay."

SHAKSPEARE.

The miserable king lay, indeed, upon his bed of death. He had refused to quit the room which he usually occupied, all encumbered as it was with his favourite hounds, his hunting accoutrements, and these horns, the winding of which had been his favourite amusement, and had contributed so powerfully to affect his lungs, and undermine his constitution. A sort of couch had been prepared for him of mattresses and cushions upon the floor; and upon that rude bed was the emaciated form of the dying monarch extended. To his customary attacks of blood-spitting, had succeeded a strange, and, until then, unknown symptom of malady, from which the very physicians recoiled with horror. Drops of red moisture, which bore all the appearance of blood, had burst, like perspiration, from the pores of the body; and there were moments when the wretched man writhed on his couch in the double anguish of body and mind, that, in spite of the efforts of the physicians to remove this extraordinary appearance, he might have been thought to be bathed in gore.

It was indeed an agony, and a bloody sweat!

The physicians had long since declared that there was no hope. In one of those fitful bursts of anger, in which Charles from time to time indulged, even in his state of exhaustion and in his dying moments, he had desired to be left by his doctors and attendants, and he slumbered his last slumber in this world, before closing his eyes for ever in the great sleep of death, to wake upon another. One person alone sat by the side of his couch; and that person was one, whom the incessant intriguing efforts of his mother would have taught him was his bitterest enemy.

That ivory paleness which had been so characteristic a trait of Charles, and had added at once to the melancholy and majesty of his face, was now of a yellow waxen colour, which might be said to increase from minute to minute in lividness of hue. His large nose stood frightfully prominent from those hollow sunken cheeks; his lips, in life, red almost to bleeding, were now ashy pale. Beneath his thin lids, the eyeballs, sunken into the deep cavities of his eyes, might be seen to roll and palpitate; whilst from his open and distorted mouth burst forth, even in his troubled sleep, moans, and then words of anguish.

The man who sat by his side, listened with varying feelings. Sometimes he started back with a movement of horror; sometimes he again bent forward in compassion, and with a kerchief lightly wiped away that fearful perspiration which burst from the hollow temples of the young man. The aspect of this personage was noble; his forehead was bold; his nose formed with that eagle curve which seems fashioned for command. The expression of his grey eyes denoted both resolution and wariness; whilst a general look of good temper and openness, which amounted almost to insouciance, pervaded the whole face. He was clothed in black. It was Henry of Navarre, the ill-used and betrayed victim of Catherine's policy.

During the whole reign of Charles IX., the Queen-mother had used every effort to instil into his mind suspicions of the loyalty of the man, who, were the Valois to die childless, would be heir to the throne of France; and whom the decrees of Providence finally led, through the wiles and plots set to snare his liberty and his life, and in the midst of the clashing of contending parties, to rule the destinies of the country, as Henry the Fourth. Henry of Navarre, whom the artifice and calumny of a Medicis had done their best to separate and estrange from his king and brother-in-law during life, was now the only attendant upon his last moments—the only friend to press his dying hand and close his eyes. By a last exercise of his authority, Charles had declared that it was his will that Henry of Navarre, and he alone, should be permitted to approach his couch, and receive his last instructions; and in spite of all the manoeuvres of the crafty Catherine, who no longer ventured openly to oppose her son's commands, the two princes were united in this supreme and awful hour.

And now Henry of Navarre sat and watched his dying relation with oppressed and anxious heart, aware that, were the king to die without providing for his safety by a last exercise of his power, his liberty, and even his life, would be in danger from the manoeuvres of the revengeful Catherine; that his only chance of escape was in flight before the death of the expiring king; and yet, too noble and generous to leave the man who, at such a time, had called him to his side, he sat and watched.

Presently the king rolled convulsively upon his couch; his parted lips quivered horribly; and with a mutter, which increased at last into a distinct and piercing scream, he let fall the words—

"Away—away—torment me not! Why do you haunt me thus? Fire—fire! Kill—kill! No—spare them—spare them, and spare me a hopeless misery. Ah! they fly—they bleed—they fall. And the poor old Admiral—his grey heirs are dabbled with blood. Away—away—it was not I—not I! Ah!"——

With a sudden start of horror, the king lifted his head from his pillow, and for a time gazed with staring and glassy eyes, as if the hideous vision which had tortured his sleep were still before him. Then with a bitter groan, he again fell back upon his couch. Again he raised his head, and, looking upon Henry, said, with a faint and plaintive voice, that contrasted strangely with these brusque and harsh tones which were natural to him,

"Why do they ever pursue me thus—those Huguenots, who perished with the Admiral? It was not I—it was my mother who was the cause of all. And yet, I myself, arquebuse in hand, I hunted them to the death. Oh! but my remorse has been long and bitter, Henry. What I have suffered none on earth can tell. Since that fatal night, I have never enjoyed a moment's peace of mind. Do kings ever enjoy peace of mind, Henry? Oh, be glad that thou art not a reigning king! Peace of mind is not for them. If there be a purgatory, Henry, in another world, I have already endured all its tortures on this earth. Is not remorse the worst purgatory? ay—the most damning hell. But why, then, do they pursue me thus in hideous visions still?"

The wretched king buried his head in his pillow.

"Strive to be calm," said Henry of Navarre, bending over him to lift up his head, and arrange his cushions. "Those visions will leave you."

"Yes! in the grave—perhaps!" replied Charles, again looking up with a shudder.

"Let us hope better things," continued Henry. "With more tranquillity of mind, you will regain your strength, and"——

"No—all is past," murmured the king. "I feel that I am dying. Know you not that there is one accused of practising sorcery upon me. Folly! madness! An evil deed has been practised upon me. Yes—the thought will not leave me. I would drive it away, but it still rankles in my heart. Evil has been done me, but not by sorcery. And yet the sorcerer must die. The world must believe that it was he who worked my death; but it was another. Come here, Henry; bend your ear to me, for I can no longer rise. Wouldst thou know who it was?"

A noise in the further part of the room startled the young King of Navarre at this moment, and he turned his head. The only living creature present was the favourite green ape of the king, that sat and grinned and moaned, as if in mockery of his dying master.

"Come nearer, Henry," pursued the king, "for I would speak that to thee, that not the very walls may hear. Know you what has caused my death—who has been my murderer?"

Henry bent his head over the dying man, more to satisfy a caprice of the sufferer, than in the expectation of any serious revelation; and, as Charles whispered in his ear, he started back in horror.

"Oh, sire, think not so! Drive away so miserable a suspicion!" he said. "It were too horrible. It is impossible!"

"Impossible!" repeated the king, with a faint ironical laugh. "To some hearts all things are possible."

"You had a mother once," continued Charles, after a painful pause. "But she was good and kind; and she is dead. Know you how she died?—Mine still lives—and now it is I who die."

"Speak not thus, I entreat you, sire!" interrupted Henry. "This is horrible!"

"Horrible! is it not?" repeated the wretched king with the same harrowing laugh. "Henry! trust not yourself to the tender mercies of my mother!"

Again the same strange noise struck upon the ear of Henry of Navarre.

"Nor shall my people, my poor suffering people, be trusted to her care," continued the king with more energy. "Henry, thou art the only one, in this my palace of the Louvre, who loves me. In spite of all that has been said and done, thou alone hast left me in repose, hast never troubled my last days by conspiracies against my crown, and against my life—ay, my life! Brother has been set against Brother in bitter hatred. Thou alone hast not hated me, Henry. Thou alone, in spite of all the wrongs I have done thee—thou hast loved me. To thee I commend my poor patient wife—to thee I commend my people!"

"But, sire, should it please Heaven to take you from us—and may you live long, I pray"—resumed Henry of Navarre, whilst the king shook his head—"it will be your mother who will claim the regency, until the return from Poland of your brother, Henry of Anjou. It will be hers probably to command!"

"When I bid you not trust yourself to her tender mercies," replied Charles, "think not I spoke as a child. My life is ebbing fast, I know, but my mind is clear. Give me that paper!" He pointed to a paper laid upon a table close by his side. "This is my last and binding command, which I shall now sign with my own hand," he continued, as Henry brought him the desired paper, and laid it upon his couch. "This declares, that, by my last will, I appoint you as Regent of this realm until the return of the King of Poland. The name is still in blank; for I would not that those who drew it up should know my purpose, and bring my mother clamouring to my side, to thwart my last wish by her reproaches. Give me a pen, Henry. Now, support me—so—in your arms. Where is now the paper? My sight is troubled; but I shall find strength to see and strength to trace that name."

Raised up in the arms of the King of Navarre, Charles took the pen placed in his hand, and laid it on the paper.

"When you are regent, Henry," he paused to say, "remove my mother from your court. It is I who bid you do it. She would hate you with a mortal hatred; for power is her only aim in this world, and for that she would forfeit her salvation in the next. Not a moment would your life be in safety. She would poison you, as she has poisoned her miserable son."

"Sire! retract those words!" said a voice close by the dying king.

Before the couch of her son stood Catherine de Medicis. Her face was cold and passionless as ever, although her dark eyes gleamed with unusual fire, and her pallid face was still more pale.

"What would you have with me, madam?" said Charles, shuddering, as she approached. "Have I not desired to be alone with my good brother Henry upon affairs of state?"

"Retract those words, sire!" pursued his mother, unheeding him. "You have brought against me the most awful accusation that malice can lay to the charge of a human being. Would you leave this world, if so it please the saints above, with so hideous a lie upon your lips? Sire! retract those words!"

"Leave me, woman! Leave me to die in peace!" said Charles, with an effort of energy, struggling with his weakness and the violence of his emotions. "Be you guilty of this deed, or be you not, may Heaven forgive you your misdeeds, as I pray it may forgive me mine."

"My son! my son!" cried Catherine, kneeling down by his side, whilst the tears, which were ever ready at her command, and might now have been natural tears of rage, rolled down her cheeks, "I cannot leave you thus, a victim to the most horrible suspicion. I may have erred against you, but it has been unconsciously. I have ever sought your honour and your glory, perhaps by means you now condemn; but I have acted, like a weak, fallible mortal, for the best. No—no—you really cannot entertain thoughts so terrible. It cannot be. This is the suggestion of my enemies—and my enemies are yours, my son." And, as she said these words, Catherine darted a cold, sharp look of rage at Henry of Navarre, who had risen, and now remained an unwilling spectator of so terrible a scene—a scene of the most fearful passions of the human heart between mother and son, and upon the bed of death. "No—no—you will retract your words. You will say you did not entertain that frightful thought."

As the Queen-mother spoke, her eyes were fixed upon the paper, which was to consign the regency to Henry of Navarre; and, in spite of the animation with which she addressed her son, it was evident that upon that paper her chief thoughts were directed.

"Madam!" said Charles faintly, raising himself with difficulty on one elbow, and struggling with internal pain—"you have received my last words of pardon. Let my last moments be undisturbed."

"Charles, Charles!" exclaimed his mother, wringing her hands. "Let me remove these horrible ideas from your mind. What shall I say? What shall I do? Can a son think thus of a mother who has ever loved him? Oh, no!—it is impossible. Your mind wandered. You did not think it."

"Enough, madam!—enough!" replied the King. "It was the passing fancy of a wandering brain, if you will have it so. It is gone now. I think of it no more. Now leave me."

"But, my son," persisted Catherine, "I have such secrets to reveal to you, as you alone may hear. They are necessary to the safety of the state—necessary to the salvation of your soul hereafter. I cannot, must not, leave you. It is my bounded duty to remain."

"The time is past, madam," gasped her son, "when I can listen to such matters. My moments are counted—and I have that to do that can brook no delay."

Catherine sprung up with a feeling of despair, and turned away for a moment.

"It is near noon," she muttered to herself. "And it was to be at noon, said the astrologer. Oh! a few minutes—but a few minutes"——

"My son," she continued aloud, again approaching the bed of the king, and having recourse once more to that importunity, which, in the latter days of his reign, was the only weapon with which she could contrive to work upon the mind of Charles, "but I have that to reveal which deeply affects the honour of our family. Would you that other ears should listen to our shame?"

"Aye, ever shame—ever blood—ever remorse!" murmured Charles, turning his head upon his pillow.

"Would you refuse the last request of her who is, after all, your mother?" exclaimed Catherine, with the well acted accent of extreme despair.

The king uttered not a word.

"Leave us, sir," said the Queen-mother, with an imperious sign of her hand to Henry of Navarre, upon seeing these symptoms of the wavering resolution of her son.

The young prince remained unmoved, to await the will of the dying king.

"Leave us, Henry," said the Monarch; "you will return to me anon. This is her last request—these are her last words. When she is gone, let me see you instantly."

Henry of Navarre shook his head with a look of mournful resignation, and then bowed and left the apartment.

"Now speak, madam," said the king, "and quickly. What would you reveal to me?"

"That Henry of Navarre conspires against your throne," commenced Catherine, rapidly; "that he has been proved to be in connexion with that sorcerer who has aimed at your life; that the chiefs of the accursed Huguenot party are concealed in Paris, awaiting but your death to place the crown upon his brow; that he also looks to this event to abjure once more the true Catholic faith, and return into the bosom of heresy; that by giving power into his hands, you endanger the safety of the state; that by committing the rule of the country to a Heretic and a Seceder, you endanger the safety of your own soul; that, by such a step, the honour of our House will be eternally lost; that in all the countries of Catholic Christendom, we shall be pointed at with the finger of scorn and shame."

"Madam, you have deceived me with words of equivocation to gain my ear," replied the king, mustering all the strength that still remained to him, "and you deceive me now."

"I deceive you not, my son," pursued Catherine, eagerly. "Each word that I pronounce is God's own truth. Could you then confide into the power of a base and lying Heretic, one who seeks your death, but to grasp himself the Crown, the government of a Catholic and a Christian country? Hear you not already the anathema of our holy father, the Pope, that curses even in the tomb that soul lost by a step so rash? See you not already our blessed Virgin, and all the saints of Heaven, turn from you their glorious faces, and refuse to look on one who has despised them, and set them at nought by a deed so unholy? Feel you not already the torture of that punishment to which the Heretic, and the aider and abettor of the Heretic, are eternally condemned? Have I deceived you when I said that you endanger the welfare of your own immortal soul?"

"But you err, madam," said her miserable son, shuddering at the picture thus placed before him, to work upon his mind in these last moments. "Henry is become a good and fervent Catholic."

"All is ready for his abjuration at the moment of your death," continued the Queen-mother. "To resume a powerful party among the Huguenots, he will renounce our religion. My son—my son—pause, reflect, before you thus sacrifice your own salvation, and throw your unhappy country beneath the Papal ban."

"Heaven aid me!" cried the miserable Charles. "On all sides darkness and despair, in this world and the next."

"Heaven shall aid you, my son," pursued his wily mother, "if you but trust the guidance of your kingdom to such hands as shall maintain it in the true religion. The paper that resigns your country to the hands of a regent, lies, I see, before you. Can you hesitate? Can you a moment doubt? Whose name should fill that space, where but just now you would have written the traitorous name of Henry of Navarre?"

"God guide my unhappy France!" sighed the king, turning his face away and closing his eyes. "In His hands I leave it."

Catherine smiled with a look of scorn, and then picking up the pen, which had fallen by the bedside, calmly fetched some ink from the table, and attempted to place the pen in her son's hand.

Before her purpose could be fulfilled, a noise was heard in the outer room. The voice of a woman clamoured loudly for admittance. Charles heard that voice, opened his eyes, and attempted to raise his head.

"Ah, it is she!" he cried, with choking voice. "At last!—at last! Let her come in."

Catherine de Medicis rose, for the purpose, probably, of opposing the order of her son; but before she could reach the door, an old woman, simply attired, and of a strange appearance and expression, had entered the room.

"What means this intrusion, and at such a moment?" exclaimed the Queen-mother.

"Perrotte!" stammered Charles. "Ah! thou art come at last to console and to forgive me."

Catherine clenched her teeth tightly together with rage; but she no longer attempted to oppose the entrance of the old woman.

The old Huguenot nurse advanced with solemn step into the room, and with a stern and troubled brow; but, on a sudden, a host of recollections seemed to crowd upon her mind at the sight of that emaciated form, and, hurrying to the side of the king, she flung herself down upon the couch and sobbed bitterly.

"Perrotte—my darling old Perrotte!" sobbed forth the dying king. "Art thou come then at last to thy poor nursling? Thou wast a mother to me, and yet thou couldst desert thy poor boy; but he deserved his lot. Perrotte! Perrotte! Thou knowest not what I have suffered since thou hast left me."

"My son," said Catherine, advancing, "is this a moment to bestow your tenderness upon a miserable woman like this? Greet her if you will, but bid her leave us."

"She was a mother to me—she"——continued Charles unheeding her, and, drawing forth his emaciated hand from beneath the coverlid, he held it forth towards the old woman, who lay stretched across his feet.

"Charlot," said the old woman, raising up her head with a haggard look, "they told me that thou wast dying; and I forgot all—all that thou hast done of evil—to see thee once more—to hear the words of repentance from thy own lips—to console and guide. They would have opposed my coming. They had placed guards about my door; but my Jocelyne, my grandchild, found means to lure them from their post, and I escaped them. I had promised her—what had I promised her? Oh, my poor Charlot! my brain wanders strangely at times. No matter. Here, in your palace of the Louvre, too, they would have shut the doors to me; but they knew you loved me, Charlot, and they dared not refuse my supplications. Oh my boy, my boy, that I should see you thus!"

"Perrotte! hast thou forgiven me?" said the king with a violent effort, for his breath was now fast failing him. His mother watched the scene with folded arms and haughty mien. Each ebbing of the breath brought her nearer to her much-desired power.

"Hast thou forgiven me?" sobbed the king.

"May God forgive the injuries thou hast done to others, as I now forgive thee on thy bed of suffering, those thou hast done to mine," said the old woman solemnly; and rising from her recumbent position, she advanced to the head of the couch, and took the dying man in her arms, as it were an infant she clasped to her bosom.

"And how can I repay thee, mother?" said Charles to his nurse; "speak quickly, for my moments are but few!"

"By thy repentance, my poor son," replied the Huguenot woman earnestly. "There is still time to repair thy errors. If thy remorse has reconciled thee to thy God, let thy last act reconcile thee to thy injured fellow-creatures. Ay! it is of that I would have spoken. That was my promise. Let thy last act of government as King, depute thy power into the hands of him who alone can pacify the unhappy religious discords of thy state, and thus thou mayst still save the life of the innocent and unjustly condemned."

"Woman! do you dare even in my presence?" said Catherine advancing.

"Silence, madam. I have heard you," interrupted her son: "let me now hear her who has been my real mother."

"My son, can you listen to the vile insinuations of an accursed heretic? Think on your soul," cried Catherine.

"Yea, think on thy soul, my son," said Perrotte solemnly, "and earn its salvation by thy repentance."

"Let that woman be dragged from our presence, who thus dares to utter treason and blasphemy in our face," exclaimed the Queen-mother, forgetting her forbearance in her wrath.

"My son, my son! Let peace and pardon await thee," urged the old Huguenot nurse, her face growing more wild with the excitement of the moment.

"Madam," said Charles faintly to the Queen-mother, "would you shorten the few moments still accorded to me of life? Perrotte, give me that pen, guide my hand to that paper. Quickly, as thou lovedst me, woman!"

"Never," exclaimed Catherine, violently grasping the arm of her dying son, as it approached the paper.

Charles raised his head to speak to her; but his emotions were too violent for his feeble frame. His lips quivered; the blood rose to his mouth, and choked his utterance. He fell back on his pillow, whilst a hollow rattling sounded in his throat; the pen remained between his powerless fingers.

"Ah! he is no more! he is dead!" screamed the nurse in despair, and she flung herself upon the bed.

"No—no," said the Queen-mother to herself. "There is still life. My son! Son," she continued aloud, "give me thy hand. If thou wilt sign that paper—be it signed." And grasping his hand, she conducted it to the place of signature on the paper. Mechanically the fingers followed the impulse she bestowed upon them. But four letters only of the name of Charles had been traced, when Catherine uttered a fearful scream. A rough hand had grasped her own, and lacerated its skin. The first thought of her superstitious mind was, that the arch-fiend himself had risen up in bodily form before her. On to the bed had sprung the ape; with a movement of detestation to the Queen-mother, which the animal had always evinced, when she approached its master; it bit the hand that held that of the dying king.

Catherine drew back with another cry, but after a moment she again advanced her hand to grasp that of her son. When she took it within her own it was utterly motionless; but, nothing daunted in her purpose, she again fixed the pen between the dead fingers, and thus guiding them, contrived to trace the three remaining letters, regardless of the stream of blood, which, trickling from her wounded hand, besmeared that fatal signature. Then letting fall the dead man's hand, she wrote her own name firmly into the blank space.

The Huguenot woman, aroused by her scream, had gazed upon the daring deed with horror.

For a moment not a sound was heard.

On one side of the corpse knelt the nurse, who had loved so well that erring man. On the other stood the Queen-mother, trembling in spite of her cold and dauntless nature. At the bed's head sat the hideous ape, grinning a fearful grin, as it were the evil spirit that had arisen to claim the lost soul of him who had thus passed away.

"Charles the King is dead," exclaimed the Queen-mother, "and Catherine de Medicis is Regent of the Realm!"

"It is false! That signature is a forgery," cried Perrotte, starting up, her eyes staring before her with all the expression of the deranged in mind. "I saw it done. To the world I will proclaim that—that Catherine de Medicis is a false Queen, and a usurping Regent."

Catherine smiled a smile of scorn; and advancing to the door of the outer room, she flung it open with the words.

"The King is dead!"

"The King, is dead!" was repeated along the corridors of the Louvre.

A pause ensued.

"The King is dead! Long live the King, Henry the Third of France!" again said Catherine.

"Long live the King!" was once more shouted from mouth to mouth.

"Gentlemen, his Majesty has been pleased, before his death, to sign a warrant appointing his mother Regent of France," announced Catherine once more to those assembled without.

"Long live the Queen Regent," was the cry which announced to many an anxious heart of the various parties in the State, that the reign of the dreaded Queen-mother had commenced.

"Let some of those without advance and seize that woman!" was the first order of the Regent. "Heed not her words! She is mad!"

Catherine of Medicis spoke with greater truth than she herself believed. The shock of that scene of death, and strife, and evil passions, had again turned the old woman's brain.

CONCLUSION.

One of the first acts of the Regency of Catherine de Medicis, was to give directions for the hastening the trial of La Mole, upon the charge of sorcery against the life of the late King. Although, with the Regency in her power, and in daily expectation of the return from Poland of her favourite son, whose weak and pliant mind she was aware she could bend to her own will in every thing, and thus have the whole power of the government within her own grasp, yet she still pursued her vengeance against the man who, in conspiring to place another of her sons upon the throne, had thwarted her designs. The wax figure formed by Ruggieri, who himself was fully screened by the Queen-mother, was made to form a prominent feature in this celebrated trial; and it is well known that the unfortunate La Mole fell a victim to an ambition, which, in the confused and distracted state of affairs at the time, could scarcely have been looked upon as a crime.

Among those who thronged to witness his execution was one, whose thread of life was nearly torn asunder by the blow of that axe which severed the beloved head from the trunk. Poor Jocelyne only recovered from the state of insensibility into which she fell, to linger on a few months of a wretched existence, during which she never spoke. Her heart was broken. The King's nurse was conveyed by the order of the Queen Regent to a place of security; but as soon as it was known that her senses were really lost, she was allowed to be taken back to her own home. Jocelyne's only thought for the living before her own death, was concentrated in her grandmother; when her bright spirit fled, it was Alayn who performed the mournful task of care for the welfare of the miserable old woman.

Henry of Anjou returned from Poland to claim his Crown; and, as Henry the Third of France, he filled the country with the scandals of that folly, licentiousness, and weakness of mind, which were fostered by his mother, Catherine de Medicis, in order to retain the power she coveted, completely within her own grasp.

Upon the assumption of the Regency, Henry of Navarre contrived to fly, in spite of the plans laid to entrap him by the Queen-mother, to his own country; his wife Margaret accompanied him to his solitude; and paid the penalty of her lightness of conduct at the court of France, in sorrow and ennui.

Despised and rejected by all parties, the weak Duke of Alencon, after a vain and abortive attempt to raise himself into a position of greater distinction, as the husband of Elizabeth of England, in whose eyes he found no grace or favour, died early, unlamented, and speedily forgotten.



A CAMPAIGN IN TEXAS.[G]

"A meeting of citizens"—so ran the announcement that, on the morning of the 11th October 1835, was seen posted, in letters a foot high, at the corner of every street in New Orleans—"a meeting of citizens this evening, at eight o'clock, in the Arcade Coffeehouse. It concerns the freedom and sovereignty of a people in whose veins the blood of the Anglo-Saxon flows. Texas, the prairie-land, has risen in arms against the tyrant Santa Anna, and the greedy despotism of the Romish priesthood, and implores the assistance of the citizens of the Union. We have therefore convoked an assembly of the inhabitants of this city, and trust to see it numerously attended.

"The Committee for Texas."

The extensive and fertile province of Texas had, up to the period of Mexico's separation from Spain, been utterly neglected. Situated at the north-eastern extremity of the vast Mexican empire, and exposed to the incursions of the Comanches, and other warlike tribes, it contained but a scanty population of six thousand souls, who, for safety's sake, collected together in a few towns, and fortified mission-houses, and even there were compelled to purchase security by tribute to the Indians. It was but a very short time before the outbreak of the Mexican revolution, that the Spaniards began to turn their attention to Texas, and to encourage emigration from the United States. The rich soil, the abundance of game, the excellence of the climate, were irresistible inducements; and soon hundreds of hardy backwoodsmen crossed the Sabine, with their families and worldly goods, and commenced the work of colonization. Between the iron-fisted Yankees and the indolent cowardly Mexicans, the Indian marauders speedily discovered the difference; instead of tribute and unlimited submission, they were now received with rifle-bullets and stern resistance; gradually they ceased their aggressions, and Texas became comparatively a secure residence.

The Mexican revolution broke out and triumphed, and at first the policy of the new government was favourable to the Americans in Texas, whose numbers each day increased. But after a time several laws, odious and onerous to the settlers, were passed; and various disputes and partial combats with the Mexican garrisons occurred. When Santa Anna put himself at the head of the liberal party in Mexico, the Texians gladly raised his banner; but they soon discovered that the change was to prove of little advantage to them. Santa Anna's government showed a greater jealousy of the American settlers than any previous one had done; their prayer, that the province they had colonized might be erected into a state of the Mexican union, was utterly disregarded, and its bearer, Stephen F. Austin, detained in prison at Mexico; various citizens were causelessly arrested, and numerous other acts of injustice committed. At last, in the summer of 1835, Austin procured his release, and returned to Texas, where he was joyfully received by the aggrieved colonists. Presently arrived large bodies of troops, under the Mexican general, Cos, destined to strengthen the Texian garrisons; and at the same time came a number of ordinances, as ridiculous as they were unjust. One of these ordered the Texians to give up their arms, only retaining one gun for every five plantations; another forbade the building of churches. The tyranny of such edicts, and the positive cruelty of the first-named, in a country surrounded by tribes of Indian robbers, are too evident to require comment. The Texians, although they were but twenty-seven thousand against eight millions, at once resolved to resist; and to do so with greater effect, they sent deputies to the United States, to crave assistance in the struggle about to commence.

The summons of the Texian committee of New Orleans to their fellow-citizens was enthusiastically responded to. At the appointed hour, the immense Arcade Coffeehouse was thronged to the roof, speeches in favour of Texian liberty were made and applauded to the echo; and two lists were opened—one for subscriptions, the other for the names of those who were willing to lend the aid of their arms to their oppressed fellow-countrymen. Before the meeting separated, ten thousand dollars were subscribed, and on the following afternoon, the steamer Washita ascended the Mississippi with the first company of volunteers. These had ransacked the tailors' shops for grey clothing, such being the colour best suited to the prairie, and thence they received the name of "The Greys;" their arms were rifles, pistols, and the far-famed bowie-knife. The day after their departure, a second company of Greys set sail, but went round by sea to the Texian coast; and the third instalment of these ready volunteers was the company of Tampico Blues, who took ship for the port of Tampico. The three companies consisted of Americans, English, French, and several Germans. Six of the latter nation were to be found in the ranks of the Greys; and one of them, a Prussian, of the name of Ehrenberg, who appears to have been for some time an inhabitant of the United States, and to be well acquainted with the country, its people, their language and peculiarities, survived, in one instance by a seeming miracle, the many desperate fights and bloody massacres that occurred during the short but severe conflict for Texian independence, in which nearly the whole of his comrades were slain. He has recently published an account of the campaign; and his narrative, highly characteristic and circumstantial, derives a peculiar interest from his details of the defeats suffered by the Texians, before they could succeed in shaking off the Mexican yoke. Of their victories, and especially of the crowning one at San Jacinto, various accounts have already appeared; but the history of their reverses, although not less interesting, is far less known; for the simple reason, that the Mexicans gave no quarter to those whom they styled rebels, and that the defeat of a body of Texians was almost invariably followed by its extermination.

Great was the enthusiasm, and joyful the welcome, with which the Texian colonists received the first company of volunteers, when, under the command of Captain Breece, they landed from their steamboat upon the southern bank of the river Sabine. No sooner had they set foot on shore, than a flag of blue silk, embroidered with the words, "To the first company of Texian volunteers from New Orleans," was presented to them in the name of the women of Texas; the qualification of Texian citizens was conferred upon them; every house was placed at their disposal for quarters; and banquets innumerable were prepared in their honour. But the moment was critical—time was too precious to be expended in feasts and merry-making, and they pressed onwards. A two days' march brought them to San Augustin, two more to Nacoydoches, and thence, after a short pause, they set out on their journey of five hundred miles to St Antonio, where they expected first to burn powder. Nor were they deceived in their expectations. They found the Texian militia encamped before the town, which, as well as its adjacent fort of the Alamo, was held by the Mexicans, the Texians were besieging it in the best manner their imperfect means and small numbers would permit. An amusing account is given by Mr Ehrenberg of the camp and proceedings of the besieging force:—

We had arrived late in the night, and at sunrise a spectacle offered itself to us, totally different from any thing we had ever before beheld. To our left flowed the river St Antonio, which, although it rises but a few miles from the town of the same name, is already, on reaching the latter, six or eight feet deep, and eighteen or twenty yards broad. It here describes a curve, enclosing a sort of promontory or peninsula, at the commencement of which, upstream, the Texian camp was pitched. At the opposite or lower extremity, but also on the right bank of the river, was the ancient town of St Antonio, hidden from the camp by the thick wood that fringes the banks of all Texian streams. Between us and the town was a maize-field, a mile long, and at that time lying fallow; opposite to the field, on the left bank, and only separated from the town by the river, stood the Alamo, the principal fortress of the province of Texas. The camp itself extended over a space half a mile in length, surrounded by maize-fields and prairie, the latter sprinkled with muskeet thickets, and with groups of gigantic cactuses; in the high grass between which the horses and oxen of our troops were peaceably grazing. On entering the adjacent fields, the air was instantly darkened by millions of blackbirds, which rose like a cloud from the ground, described a few circles, and then again settled, to seek their food upon the earth. In one field, which had been used as a place of slaughter for the cattle, whole troops of vultures, of various kinds, were stalling about amongst the offal, or sitting, with open beaks and wings outspread, upon the dry branches of the neighbouring pecan-trees, warming themselves in the sunbeams, no bad type of the Mexicans; whilst here and there, a solitary wolf or prairie dog prowled amongst the heads, hides, and entrails of the slaughtered beasts, taking his breakfast as deliberately as his human neighbours. The reveille had sounded, and the morning gun been fired from the Alamo, when presently the drum beat to summon the various companies to roll-call; and the men were seen emerging from their tents and huts. It will give some idea of the internal organization of the Texian army, if I record the proceedings of the company that lay opposite to us, the soldiers composing which were disturbed by the tap of the drum in the agreeable occupation of cooking their breakfast. This consisted of pieces of beef, which they roasted at the fire on small wooden spits. Soon a row of these warriors, some only half-dressed, stood before the sergeant, who, with the roll of the company in his hand, was waiting their appearance; they were without their rifles, instead of which, most of them carried a bowie-knife in one hand, and a skewer, transfixing a lump of smoking meat, in the other. Several did not think proper to obey the summons at all, their roast not being yet in a state that permitted them to leave it. At last the sergeant began to call the names, which were answered to alternately from the ranks or from some neighbouring fire, and once a sleepy "here!" proceeding from under the canvass of a tent, caused a hearty laugh amongst the men, and made the sergeant look sulky, although he passed it over as if it were no unusual occurrence. When all the names had been called, he had no occasion to dismiss his men, for each of them, after answering, had returned to the fire and his breakfast.

We Greys, particularly the Europeans, looked at each other, greatly amused by this specimen of Texian military discipline. We ourselves, it is true, up to this time, had never even had the roll called, but had been accustomed, as soon as the reveille sounded, to get our breakfast, and then set forward in a body, or by twos and threes, trotting, walking, or galloping, as best pleased us. Only in one respect were we very particular; namely, that the quartermaster and two or three men, should start an hour before us, to warn the inhabitants of our approach, and get food and quarters ready for our arrival. If we did not find every thing prepared, and that it was the quarter-master's fault, he was reduced to the ranks, as were also any of the other officers who misbehaved themselves. I must observe, however, that we were never obliged to break either of our captains; for both Breece of ours, and Captain Cook of the other company of Greys, made themselves invariably beloved and respected. Cook has since risen to the rank of major-general, and is, or was the other day, quartermaster-general of the republic of Texas.

Towards nine o'clock, a party crossed the field between our camp and the town, to reinforce a small redoubt erected by Cook's Greys, and provided with two cannon, which were continually thundering against the Alamo, and from time to time knocking down a fragment of wall. The whole affair seemed like a party of pleasure, and every telling shot was hailed with shouts of applause. Meanwhile, the enemy were not idle, but kept up a fire from eight or nine pieces, directed against the redoubt, the balls and canister ploughing up the ground in every direction, and driving clouds of dust towards the camp. It was no joke to get over the six or eight hundred yards that intervened between the latter and the redoubt, for there was scarcely any cover, and the Mexican artillery was far better served than ours. Nevertheless, the desire to obtain a full view of the Alamo, which, from the redoubt, presented an imposing appearance, induced eight men, including myself, to take a start across the field. It seemed as if the enemy had pointed at us every gun in the fort; the bullets fell around us like hail, and for a moment the blasting tempest compelled us to take refuge behind a pecan-tree. Here we stared at each other, and laughed heartily at the absurd figure we cut, standing, eight men deep, behind a nut-tree, whilst our comrades, both in the camp and the redoubt, shouted with laughter at every discharge that rattled amongst the branches over our heads.

"This is what you call making war," said one of our party, Thomas Camp by name.

"And that," said another, as a whole swarm of iron musquitos buzzed by him, "is what we Americans call variations on Yankee Doodle."

Just then there was a tremendous crash amongst the branches, and we dashed out from our cover, and across to the redoubt, only just in time; for the next moment the ground on which we had been standing was strewn with the heavy boughs of the pecan-tree.

All was life and bustle in the little redoubt; the men were standing round the guns, talking and joking, and taking it by turns to have a shot at the old walls. Before firing, each man was compelled to name his mark, and say what part of the Alamo he meant to demolish, and then bets were made as to his success or failure.

"A hundred rifle-bullets to twenty," cried one man, "that I hit between the third and fourth window of the barracks."

"Done!" cried half a dozen voices. The shot was fired, and the clumsy artilleryman had to cast bullets all next day.

"My pistols—the best in camp, by the by"—exclaimed another aspirant, "against the worst in the redoubt."

"Well, sir, I reckon I may venture," said a hard-featured backwoodsman in a green hunting-shirt, whose pistols, if not quite so good as those wagered, were at any rate the next best. Away flew the ball, and the pistols of the unlucky marksman were transferred to Green-shirt, who generously drew forth his own, and handed them to the loser.

"Well, comrade, s'pose I must give you yer revenge. If I don't hit, you'll have your pistols back again."

The cannon was reloaded, and the backwoodsman squinted along it, as if it had been his own rifle, his features twisted up into a mathematical calculation, and his right hand describing in the air all manner of geometrical figures. At last he was ready; one more squint along the gun, the match was applied, and the explosion took place. The rattle of the stones warned us that the ball had taken effect. When the smoke cleared away, we looked in vain for the third and fourth windows, and a tremendous hurra burst forth for old Deaf Smith, as he was called, for the bravest Texian who ever hunted across a prairie, and who subsequently, with a small corps of observation, did such good service on the Mexican frontier between Nueces and the Rio Grande.

The restless and impetuous Yankee volunteers were not long in finding opportunities of distinction. Some Mexican sharpshooters having come down to the opposite side of the river, whence they fired into the redoubt, were repelled by a handful of the Greys, who then, carried away by their enthusiasm, drove in the enemy's outposts, and entered the suburbs of the town. They got too far, and were in imminent risk of being overpowered by superior numbers, when Deaf Smith came to their rescue with a party of their comrades. Several days passed away in skirmishing, without any decisive assault being made upon the town or fort. The majority of the men were for attacking; but some of the leaders opposed it, and wished to retire into winter quarters in rear of the Guadalupe river, wait for further reinforcements from the States, and then, in the spring, again advance, and carry St Antonio by a coup de main. To an army, in whose ranks subordination and discipline were scarcely known, and where every man thought his opinion as worthy to be listened to as that of the general, a difference of opinion was destruction. The Texian militia, disgusted with their leader, Burleson, retreated in straggling parties across the Guadalupe; about four hundred men, consisting chiefly of the volunteers from New Orleans and the Mississippi, remained behind, besieging St Antonio, of which the garrison was nearly two thousand strong. The four hundred melted away, little by little, to two hundred and ten; but these held good, and resolved to attack the town. They did so, and took it, house by house, with small loss to themselves, and a heavy one to the Mexicans. On the sixth day, the garrison of the Alamo, which was commanded by General Cos, and which the deadly Texian rifles had reduced to little more than half its original numbers, capitulated. After laying down their arms, they were allowed to retire beyond the Rio Grande. Forty-eight pieces of cannon, four thousand muskets, and a quantity of military stores, fell into the hands of the Texians, whose total loss amounted to six men dead, and twenty-nine wounded.

After two or three weeks' sojourn at St Antonio, it was determined to advance upon Matamoras; and on the 30th December the volunteers set out, leaving a small detachment to garrison the Alamo. The advancing column was commanded by Colonel Johnson; but its real leader, although he declined accepting a definite command, was Colonel Grant, a Scotchman, who had formerly held a commission in a Highland regiment, but had now been for many years resident in Mexico. On reaching the little fort of Goliad, near the town of La Bahia, which had a short time previously been taken by a few Texians under Demmit, they halted, intending to wait for reinforcements. A company of Kentuckians, and some other small parties, joined them, making up their strength to about six hundred men; but they were still obliged to wait for ammunition, and as the troops began to get impatient, their leaders marched them to Refugio, a small town and ruinous fort, about thirty miles further on. Here, in the latter days of January 1836, General Houston, commander-in-chief of the Texian forces, suddenly and unexpectedly appeared amongst them. He assembled the troops, harangued them, and deprecated the proposed expedition to Matamoras as useless, that town being without the proposed limits of the republic. Nevertheless, so great was the impatience of inaction, that two detachments, together about seventy men, marched by different roads towards the Rio Grande, under command of Grant and Johnson. Their example might probably have been followed by others, had not the arrival of some strong reinforcements from the United States caused various changes in the plan of campaign. The fresh troops consisted of Colonel Fanning's free corps, the Georgia battalion under Major Ward, and the Red Rovers, from Alabama, under Doctor Shackleford. Fanning's and Ward's men, and the Greys, retired to Goliad, and set actively to work to improve and strengthen the fortifications; whilst Colonel Grant, whose chief failing appears to have been over-confidence, continued with a handful of followers his advance to the Rio Grande, promising at least to bring back a supply of horses for the use of the army.

On the 5th of March, the garrison of Goliad received intelligence of the declaration of Texian independence, and of the appointment of a government, with Burnet as president, and Lorenzo de Zavala, a Mexican, as vice-president. At the same time, came orders from General Houston to destroy the forts of Goliad and the Alamo, and retreat immediately behind the Guadalupe. Santa Anna, with twelve thousand men, was advancing, by rapid marches, towards Texas. The order reached the Alamo too late, for the little garrison of a hundred and eighty men was already hemmed in, on all sides, by several thousand Mexicans, and had sent messengers, imploring assistance, to Fanning at Goliad, and to Houston, who was then stationed with five hundred militia at Gonzales, high up on the Guadalupe. A second despatch from General Houston gave Fanning the option of retiring behind the Guadalupe; or, if his men wished it, of marching to the relief of the Alamo, in which latter case he was to join Houston and his troops at Seguin's Rancho, about forty miles from St Antonio. Fanning, however, who, although a man of brilliant and distinguished courage, seems to have been an undecided and wrongheaded officer, did neither, but preferred to wait for the enemy within the walls of Goliad. In vain did a majority of his men, and especially the Greys, urge him to march to the rescue of their comrades; he positively refused to do so, although each day witnessed the arrival of fresh couriers from St Antonio, imploring succour.

One morning three men belonging to the small detachment which, under Colonel Grant, had gone upon the mad expedition to the Rio Grande, arrived at Goliad with news of the destruction of their companions. Only thirty in number, they had collected four hundred fine horses, and were driving them northward to rejoin their friends, when, in a narrow pass between thickets, they were suddenly surrounded by several hundred of the enemy's lancers, whose attack, however, seemed directed rather against the horses than the escort. Grant, whose courage was blind, and who had already witnessed many instances of the almost incredible poltroonery of those half-Indians, drew his sword, and charged the Mexicans, who were at least ten times his strength. A discharge of rifles and pistols stretched scores of the lancers upon the ground; but that discharge made, there was no time to reload, and the Texians had to defend themselves as best they might, with their bowie-knives and rifle-buts, against the lances of the foe, with the certainty that any of them who fell wounded from their saddles, would instantly be crushed and mangled under the feet of the wild horses, which, terrified by the firing and conflict, tore madly about the narrow field. Each moment the numbers of the Texians diminished, one after the other disappeared, transfixed by the lances, trampled by the hoofs. Colonel Grant and three men—those who brought the news to Goliad—had reached the outskirt of the melee, and might at once have taken to flight; but Grant perceived some others of his men still fighting heroically amongst the mass of Mexicans, and once more he charged in to rescue them. Every thing gave way before him, his broadsword whistled around him, and man after man fell beneath its stroke. His three followers having reloaded, were rushing forward to his support, when suddenly the fatal lasso flew through the air, its coils surrounded the body of the gallant Scot, and the next instant he lay upon the ground beneath the feet of the foaming and furious horses. In horrorstruck silence, the three survivors turned their horses' heads north-east, and fled from the scene of slaughter.

Besides this disaster, numerous detachments of Texians were cut off by the Mexicans, who now swarmed over the southern part of the province. Colonel Johnson and his party were surprised in the town of San Patricio and cut to pieces, Johnson and four of his followers being all that escaped. Thirty men under Captain King, who had been sent by Fanning to escort some settlers on their way northwards, were attacked by overpowering numbers, and, after a most desperate defence, utterly exterminated. The Georgia battalion under Major Ward, which had marched from Goliad to the assistance of King and his party, fell in with a large body of Mexican cavalry and infantry, and although, during the darkness, they managed to escape, they lost their way in the prairie, were unable to return to Goliad, and subsequently, as will hereafter be seen, fell into the hands of the enemy. The Alamo itself was taken, not a man surviving of the one hundred and eighty who had so valiantly defended it. On the other hand, we have Mr Ehrenberg's assurance that its capture cost Santa Anna two thousand two hundred men. In the ranks of the besieging army were between two and three thousand convicts, who, on all occasions, were put in the post of danger. At the attack on the Alamo they were promised a free pardon if they took the place. Nevertheless, they advanced reluctantly enough to the attack, and twice, when they saw their ranks mown down by the fire of the Texians, they turned to fly, but each time they were driven back to the charge by the bayonets and artillery of their countrymen. At last, when the greater part of these unfortunates had fallen, Santa Anna caused his fresh troops to advance, and the place was taken. The two last of the garrison fell by the Mexican bullets as they were rushing, torch in hand, to fire the powder magazine. The fall of the Alamo was announced to Colonel Fanning in a letter from Houston.

"The next point of the enemy's operations," said the old general, "will be Goliad, and let the garrison reflect on the immensity of the force that within a very few days will surround its walls. I conjure them to make a speedy retreat, and to join the militia behind the Guadalupe. Only by a concentration of our forces can we hope to achieve any thing; and if Goliad is besieged, it will be impossible for me to succour it, or to stake the fate of the republic upon a battle in the prairie, where the ground is so unfavourable to our troops. Once more, therefore, Colonel Fanning—in rear of the Guadalupe!"

At last, but unfortunately too late, Fanning decided to obey the orders of his general. The affairs of the republic of Texas were indeed in a most critical and unfavourable state. St Antonio taken, the army of volunteers nearly annihilated, eight or ten thousand Mexican troops in the country, for the garrison of Goliad no chance of relief in case of a siege, and, moreover, a scanty store of provisions. These were the weighty grounds which finally induced Fanning to evacuate and destroy Goliad. The history of the retreat will be best given in a condensed translation of the interesting narrative now before us.

On the 18th April 1836, says Mr Ehrenberg, at eight in the morning, we commenced our retreat from the demolished and still burning fort of Goliad. The fortifications, at which we had all worked with so much zeal, a heap of dried beef, to prepare which nearly seven hundred oxen had been slaughtered, and the remainder of our wheat and maize flour, had been set on fire, and were sending up black columns of smoke towards the clouded heavens. Nothing was to be seen of the enemy, although their scouts had for some days previously been observed in the west, towards St Antonio. All the artillery, with the exception of two long four-pounders and a couple of mortars, were spiked and left behind us. But the number of store and ammunition waggons with which we started was too great, and our means of drawing them inadequate, so that, before we had gone half a mile, our track was marked by objects of various kinds scattered about the road, and several carts had broken down or been left behind. At a mile from Goliad, on the picturesque banks of the St Antonio, the remainder of the baggage was abandoned or hastily thrown into the river, chests full of cartridges, the soldiers' effects, every thing, in short, was committed to the transparent waters; and having harnessed the oxen and draught horses to the artillery and to two ammunition waggons, we slowly continued the march, our foes still remaining invisible.

Our road lay through one of those enchanting landscapes, composed of small prairies, intersected by strips of oak and underwood. On all sides droves of oxen were feeding in the high grass, herds of wild-eyed deer gazed wonderingly at the army that thus intruded upon the solitary prairies of the west, and troops of horses dashed madly away upon our approach, the thunder of their hoofs continuing to be audible long after their disappearance. At eight miles from Goliad begins an extensive and treeless prairie, known as the Nine-mile Prairie; and across this, towards three in the afternoon, we had advanced about four or five miles. Myself and some of my comrades, who acted as rearguard, were about two miles behind, and had received orders to keep a sharp eye upon the forest, which lay at a considerable distance to our left; but as up to this time no signs of an enemy had been visible, we were riding along in full security, when, upon casually turning our heads, we perceived, about four miles off, at the edge of the wood, a something that resembled a man on horseback. But as the thing, whatever it was, did not appear to move, we decided that it must be a tree or some other inanimate object, and we rode on without taking further notice. We proceeded in this way for about a quarter of an hour, and then, the main body being only about a quarter of a mile before us, marching at a snail's pace, we halted to rest a little, and let our horses feed. Now, for the first time, as we gazed out over the seemingly boundless prairie, we perceived in our rear, and close to the wood, a long black line. At first we took it to be a herd of oxen which the settlers were driving eastward, to rescue them from the Mexicans; but the dark mass drew rapidly nearer, became each moment more plainly discernible, and soon we could no longer doubt that a strong body of Mexican cavalry was following us at full gallop. We sprang upon our horses, and, at the top of their speed, hurried after our friends, to warn them of the approaching danger. Its intimation was received with a loud hurra; all was made ready for the fight, a square was formed, and in this manner we marched on, as fast as possible certainly, but that was slowly enough. Fanning, our commander, was unquestionably a brave and daring soldier, but unfortunately he was by no means fitted for the post he held, or indeed for any undivided command. As a proof of this, instead of endeavouring to reach the nearest wood, hardly a mile off, and sheltered in which our Texian and American riflemen would have been found invincible, he resolved to give battle upon the open and unfavourable ground that we now occupied.

The Mexicans came up at a furious gallop to a distance of five or six hundred paces, and thence gave us a volley from their carbines, of which we took no notice, seeing that the bullets flew at a respectful height above our heads, or else fell whistling upon the earth before us, without even raising the dust. One only of the harmless things passed between me and my right hand man, and tore off part of the cap of my friend, Thomas Camp, who, after myself, was the youngest man in the army. We remained perfectly quiet, and waited for the enemy to come nearer, which he did, firing volley after volley. Our artillery officers, for the most part Poles, tall, handsome men, calmly waited the opportune moment to return the fire. It came; the ranks opened, and the artillery vomited death and destruction amongst the Mexicans, whose ill-broken horses recoiled in dismay and confusion from the flash and thunders of the guns. The effect of our fire was frightful, steeds and riders lay convulsed and dying upon the ground, and for a time the advance of the enemy was checked. We profited by this to continue our retreat, but had marched a very short distance before we were again threatened with a charge, and Fanning commanded a halt. It was pointed out to him that another body of the enemy was advancing upon our left, to cut us off from the wood, and that those who had already attacked us were merely sent to divert our attention whilst the manoeuvre was executed. But Fanning either did not see the danger, or he was vexed that another should be more quicksighted than himself, for he would not retract his order. At last, after much vain discussion, and after representing to him how necessary it was to gain the wood, the Greys declared that they would march thither alone. But it was too late. The enemy had already cut us off from it, and there was nothing left but to fight our way through them, or give battle where we stood. Fanning was for the latter course; and before the captains, who had formed a council of war, could come to a decision, the Mexican trumpets sounded the charge, and with shout and shot the cavalry bore down upon us, their wild cries, intended to frighten us, contrasting oddly with the silence and phlegm of our people, who stood waiting the opportunity to make the best use of their rifles. Again and again our artillery played havoc amongst the enemy, who, finding his cavalry so unsuccessful in its assaults, now brought up the infantry, in order to make a combined attack on all sides at once. Besides the Mexicans three hundred of their Indian allies, Lipans and Caranchuas, approached us on the left, stealing through the long grass, and, contemptible themselves, but formidable by their position, wounded several of our people almost before we perceived their proximity. A few discharges of canister soon rid us of these troublesome assailants.