Curiosities of Literature, Vol. II | Page 5

number of halberdiers and arquebusiers in ranks, he would have
returned, when the viscount and the captain reassured him that no harm
should happen to him. The soldiers bowed, and their behaviour was
respectful. By a private staircase he entered the chamber of the king,
who, immediately on perceiving him, turned towards him, and
stretched out his arms. The King of Navarre was affected; he sighed
and wept, and fell on his knees at the side of the bed. Charles embraced,
and having kissed him, said, 'My brother, you lose a good master and a
good friend. I know it is not you who occasions me so much trouble;
had I believed what they said, you would not have been alive; but I
have always loved you. It is to you alone I trust my wife and daughter;
earnestly do I recommend them to your care. Do not trust the queen;
but God protect you!'
"The queen mother here interrupted him, 'Ah, sir, do not say that!'--'Yes,
madam, I must say it; it is the truth. Believe me, my brother; love me;
assist my wife and daughter, and implore God for mercy on me. Adieu,
my brother, adieu!' The King of Navarre remained till his majesty
expired."
The following minute particulars are drawn from the journal of Pierre
de L'Etoile. In the simplicity of his narration, so pleasing in the old
writers, the nurse and the monarch,--the religious remorse of the one,
and the artless consolations of the other,--become interesting objects.
"King Charles, two days before his death, having called for Mazzille,
his chief physician, and complaining of the pains he suffered, asked
him if it was not possible that he, and so many other celebrated
physicians that were in his realms, could give some alleviation to his
disorder; 'for I am,' said he, 'cruelly and horridly tormented.' To which
Mazzille replied, that whatever had depended on them had been tried,
but that in truth God only could be the sovereign physician in such
complaints. 'I believe,' said the king, 'that what you say is true, and that
you know nothing else. Draw from me my custode (or large cap), that I
may try to rest.' Mazzille withdrew, and left orders that all should leave
the king except three, viz., La Tour, St. Pris, and his nurse, whom his
majesty greatly loved, although she was a Huguenot. As she had just

seated herself on a coffer, and began to doze, she heard the king groan
bitterly, weeping and sighing; she then approached the bed softly, and
drawing away his custode, the king said to her, giving vent to a heavy
sigh, and shedding tears plentifully, insomuch that they interrupted his
discourse--'Ah! my dear nurse! my beloved woman, what blood! what
murders! Ah! I have followed wicked advice! O my God! pardon me,
and be merciful. I know not where I am, they have made me so
perplexed and agitated. How will all this end!--What shall I do? I am
lost for ever! I know it.'--Then the nurse thus addressed him:--'Sire, be
the murders on those who forced you to order them; your majesty could
not help it, and since you never consented, and now regret them,
believe God will never impute them to you, and will cover them with
the mantle of justice of his Son, to whom alone you should look for aid.
Ah! for the honour of God, let your majesty cease from this weeping.'
Having said this, she rose for a handkerchief, for his was drenched with
tears: Charles having taken it from her, made a sign that she should
retire and leave him to repose."
The dreadful narrative of the massacre of St. Bartholomew is detailed
in the history of De Thou; and the same scene is painted in glowing,
though in faithful colours, by Voltaire in the Henriade.--Charles, whose
last miserable moments we come from contemplating, when he
observed several fugitive Huguenots about his palace in the morning
after the massacre of 30,000 of their friends, took a fowling-piece, and
repeatedly fired at them.
Such was the effect of religion operating, perhaps not on a malignant,
but on a feeble mind!

ROYAL PROMOTIONS.
If the golden gate of preferment is not usually opened to men of real
merit, persons of no worth have entered it in a most extraordinary
manner.
Chevreau informs us that the Sultan Osman having observed a gardener

planting a cabbage with some peculiar dexterity, the manner so
attracted his imperial eye that he raised him to an office near his person,
and shortly afterwards he rewarded the planter of cabbages by creating
him beglerbeg or viceroy of the Isle of Cyprus.
Marc Antony gave the house of a Roman citizen to a cook, who had
prepared for him a good supper! Many