A A JCSO 1 UTHERrjREGI 2 3 6 7 )NAL LIBRARY FACILIT 3 ^^' k::^^' ':.ii>^:^:'S'. 1 D^. ■ : ^ JACQUES CCEUR, THE FRENCH ARGONAUT, AND HIS TIMES. BY LOUISA STUART COSTELLO, // AUTHOR OP " MEAKJIIIS 01' ESMNENT ENGMSHWOMEN," "tHK ROSE- GARDEN OF PERSIA," ETC. I am sick of this felse world ; and will love nought But even the mere necessities iijjon it. Then, Timon, presently prepare thy grave : Lie where the light foam of tiie sea may heat Thy gravestone daily : make thine epitaph, Tliat death in me at other's lives may laugh. What viler thing upon the earth, than friends Who can bring noblest minds to basest ends ! Shakspeare. LONDON: RICHARD BENTLEY, NEW BURLINGTON STREET. i3ul)U£(l)ci- in (J^rlitnAii.) to fcn iBajrsiti). M.nCCO.XLVII. LONDON : Printed by S. & J. Bentley, AVilson, and Flf.y, Bangor House, Shoe Lane. PREFACE. Some explanation may perhaps be considered necessary relative to the Illustrations which ac- company this volume. The Portrait of Jacques Coeur was seen by the Author at Bourges during her visit to that re- markable town, a few years since. It exists in a small chamber used for legal purposes in the Mairie, which is no other than the mansion of the celebrated merchant. The Author made a sketch of the picture at the time, having been much struck with its character, and has since completed it from lithographic drawings copied from the original. There exists another portrait of Jacques Coeur, of which an engraving is given in Denis Godc- froid's " Life of Charles the Seventh." It has a different head-dress, but the features and ex- pression are identical. In that he appears in a a 2 IV PREFACE. small close ca]), furred at tlie edge, instead of the remarkable turban he is generally represent- ed as wearing, and which, although apparently Oriental, is merely the costume of the period, worn always by persons of distinction. There is, in an illuminated manuscript in the British Mu- seum, a portrait of the Duke of Burgundy similar- ly arrayed ; and it never happens that the Argen- tier, in the sculptures which adorn his house, is otherwise dressed. In a work which appeared in numbers in 1834, called " Notices Pittoresques sur les Antiquites et les Monumens du Berri," published at Bourges by M. Haze, may be found a variety of extremely interesting details respecting the house of Jacques Coeur, together with an extensive collection of lithographic sketches, representing almost every part of this singular building with exceeding cor- rectness. From this work those few Woodcuts are taken which appear in this volume ; and, as the Author is well acquainted with the locality, she can answer for their fidelity. It was her original intention that many more should have been appended to this Memoir, as she conceived they possessed unusual interest, and would have rendered her description more comprehensive. PREFACE. V The Vessel represented at the end of the Pre- liminary Remarks is part of a piece of sculpture in high relief, which formerly existed in what was called the Salle des GaUres. It was placed over one of the doors, and is now a mere fragment, thrown aside, with other precious bits, in a dark chamber seldom looked into. It is on a single stone about three feet high, and represents an antique two-masted vessel, bearing a banner with fleurs-de-lis on one, and on the other a sort of balcony, in which are placed three men armed at all points ; but of these figures the heads are wanting. One of the men seems occupied in hurling down stones from a sack ; above these one leg of a soldier can still be discerned, who appeared to be employed still higher up the mast. Several soldiers wearing helmets and cuirasses are busy rowing : the oars are broken away ; but their attitudes tell the tale sufficiently. Nothing is wanting in this sculpture : there are the cordages, the iron-work of the vessel, the holes for the oars, and a variety of details indi- cating different parts of the construction. Be- neath, as it were in the sea, divers marine plants, and the head of a seal, or some such animal, are VI PREFACE. figured. The delicacy and minuteness of ttie work is remarkable, and the artist has been scru- pulous in neglecting no part of his subject. It was originally painted and gilded, as may still be seen in some parts : the ground was blue, the sea green, and the fleurs-de-lis were gilded. Another of the Woodcuts which appear at the head of some of these Chapters represents a por- tion of the stone gallery which formerly ran along great part of the walls, and of which some re- mains are still to be seen. That part which is most conspicuous is about three feet high, and is composed of large stones worked very elaborately in medallions, having in its pattern hearts and shells, and a long scroll drawn out through the foliaged wreath, on which the device of the Ar- gentier appears: "A vaillans cceurs rien im- possible." The stone tablet over the chief entrance, repre- senting three Oriental trees, with flowers beneath them, and the motto "Dire: Faire: Taire: De MA JOIE," is shewn in another. One is a copy of two of the compartments of stone sculpture which adorn the principal en- trance-tower, and represents Jacques Coeur and his lady, Mac^e de Leodepart, in habits of cere- PREFACE. Vll mony ; the former holding a flower, and bearing a trowel. The curious lock of the private study of the merchant is also copied ; and the remarkable sculpture, which is described at length in this work as having ornamented Jacques Coeur's secret chamber, appears amongst the text. A drawing is given of the only remaining squares of painted glass still to be seen, in which the jester with a padlock on his mouth, and the motto " En boiiche close n'entre mouche" is seen. The exterior of the house next the street is also given, and one side of the interior court ; but, on so very small a scale, little idea can be conveyed of the beauty of the original struc- ture. In giving the details of the house of Jacques Coeur, there is so much to describe, that a whole volume might be occupied if full justice were done to the interesting subject, and the illustrations which could be introduced would occupy a very considerable space. As the work of M. Haze, of which mention has been made, is entirely devoted to the subject of the curiosities of Bourges, numerous interesting descriptions are oivcn in it : amongst others, he names one of the Vlll PREFACE. remarkable chimney-pieces which formerly adorn- ed one of the chief salles of the mansion of the Argentier. As the others are sculptured with chivalrous subjects, so this, executed with equal care, is a caricature of the habits and manners of the great of the period. Singularly enough, the whole of it is an evi- dent satire on the tournaments and knightly occupations of the day, everything being turned into ridicule, and represented in the most gro- tesque manner. There is still enough of the ruin left to enable the curious to trace the history de- tailed ; but M. Haze's drawing supplies what is wanting in the original as it now exists. Instead of knights and their chargers, peasants are represented mounted on asses, tilting against each other with sticks for lances : their shields are made of basket-work, and their stirrups of rope. Some wear a grotesque imitation of a helmet and visor, and they have cock's feathers instead of flowing plumes. The valets and squires are in peasants' costume, and bear cows' horns, which do duty for warlike trumpets ; and in place of lances they carry a bundle of sticks, ready to supply their master in the tourney. There is something peculiarly comic in the PREFACE. IX pompous character given to these groups, and the whole work is farcical in the extreme. A caricature in stone is a somewhat heavy proto- type of the " Punch" of our days ; but no doubt it afforded as much mirth to the lovers of fun in the fifteenth century, as that witty and caustic gentleman's productions do in the nineteenth. It is by no means unusual to see comic repre- sentations of serious things in very early manu- scripts; often the illuminated borders of missals exhibit, amidst fruit and flowers, absurd figures of asses, foxes, and other animals, grotesquely at- tired as friars and monks ; these were intended to ridicule different orders in the Church ; and the satire was sometimes directed against heretics and schismatics; but this ponderous mode of lauffhinff at one's neidibour is, I should conceive, unique in its kind. As Jacques Coeur was a man of the people, he might not be sorry occasionally to show contempt for the privileged classes, from whom, no doubt, as is always the case with regard to persons who have gained a position in which they were not born, he frequently received checks and inso- lences mortifying to his pride. It is probable that sports like these were usual with the lower X PREFACE. orders, amongst whom there is seldom ;iny want of wit, ever ready to be launched against the arrogance of those above them, and generally pointed at the reigning customs of the aristo- cracy. London, March 26, 1847. CONTENTS. PAGB Introddction, . . . . .1 Preliminary Remarks. — Charles VII. and his Argentier. . . . . . .5 CHAPTER I. Isabeau de Baviere. — Duke Frederic. — The Duchess of Brabant. — The Pilgrimage. — Vanity encouraged. — Extra- vagant Costume. — Wigs. — Expense. — Rich Furs. — Robes. 15 CHAPTER II. The Carmelite. — The Hennin. — The discomfited La- dies. — The Triumph of Brother Thomas. — Popularity. — The Sequel.— The Close.— William de I'Ollive. . 24 CHAPTER III. The Bride. — Froissart's Account of the Entry into Paris of Isabeau de Baviere. — Devices. — Progress of the Proces- sion. — The King en croupe. — The masked Ball. — Factions. — Valentina. . . . . .33 CHAPTER IV. Destitution of tlie King. — Simonet Cuboche. — J'envie : .le tiens. — Reconciliation. — The Messenger. — Tlie Assas- sination. — Escape of the Assassins.— Consternation. — Sus- picion. — The knotted Club planed. . . .43 XI 1 CONTENTS. CHAPTER V. FACE The Widow. — Sorcery. — Accusations. — The Appeal. — Royal Family leave Paris. — The Annagnacs. — Azincourt. — Justice soudaine. — Maniac Leader. — Henry of England. — Montereau. — Assassination of Jean sans Peur. — Treaty of Troyes. — Death of Isabeau. . . . .54 CHAPTER VI. Charles le Bien Instruit. — Le Roi de Bourges. — Charac- ter of the King. — Labourer's Song. — Golden Age. — The King's Position. — His Favourites. — His Hopelessness. . 68 CHAPTER VIL Poets. — Alain Chartier. — Marguerite d'Ecosse. . 77 CHAPTER VIIL Bourges Cathedral. — The Romans. — Louis XL — Arms of Bourges. — The Holy Ass. . . . .85 CHAPTER IX. Jacques Coeur's Father. — Nicolas Flamel. — Paul Lucas, — The Book. — The Ked Stone — Ferrand de Cordube. — His Disappearance. — Magic Stone. — Supernatural Wealth. 9i CHAPTER X. Damascus. — Blades. — Greek Fire. — Moorish Secrecy. — Trade with the East. — Low Esteem of Traders. — House of Jacques Coeur. . . . . .103 CHAPTER XI. House of Jacques Coeur described. — Chapel. — Secret Chambers. — Mystery. — Vaults. — Roofs. — Furniture of the Periods . . , . . .112 CONTENTS. XUl CHAPTER XII. PACE Furniture of the Period.— House at Montpellier. — The Lodge. — Bureau of the Treasury. — Royal Gratitude.— Necromancy. . . ' • • .134 CHAPTER XIII. The Dining-hall. — Buffets.— The Table.— Lights.— Trancher la Nappe. — Banquets. — Artists in France.— Foucquet and Mellin. . . . .141 CHAPTER XIV. Jacques Coeur's Knowledge. — Lahire and Poton. — Poverty of the King. — Expenses. — Destitution of the Court. — Friendship of Jacques Coeur. — Marie d'Anjou. . 156 CHAPTER XV. La Demoiselle de Fromenteau. — Louis XI. and the Monks. — Pragmatic Sanction. — Mehun-sm-Yevre. — Castles of Agnes. — Art in the Fifteenth Century. — Loches. 1C7 Antoinette de Maignelais. . . . .187 CHAPTER XVL Golden Crowns. — Letters of Nobility. — Knights of St. John. — Assembly of Throe Estates. — Genoa. — Rome.— Amadeo. • • . • • .198 CHAPTER XVII. History of the Poet Prince, Charles of Orleans : his Captivity: his Works. — Ballad. . . . iil3 CHAPTER XVIII. Continuation of the History of Charles of Orleans. . 22G XIV CONTENTS. CHAPTER XIX. PAOX Literature of the Age. — Poets. . . • 242 CHAPTER XX. State of the Army. — Ecorcheurs, — Conquest of Nor- mandy. — Antoine de Chabannes. — The Dauphin. — Dunois. — Ready Aid, — Infringement of the Truce. — Rouen Sur- rendered. — Triumphal Entry. .... 259 CHAPTER XXI. Ways and Means. — Chivalry. — The Fair Pilgrim — The Knight of Beau Jardin. . . . . .280 CHAPTER XXII. Harfleur. — Reverses. — Death of Agnes Sorel. — Accusa- tion. — Jacques Coeur's Family. — Ingratitude. — The Se- neschal. — Charlotte de France. — Marriette. . . 289 CHAPTER XXIII. Height of Wealth. — St. Fargeau. — Xaincoins. — Dau- phin. — The King's Faith shaken. — Otto Castellani. — De Chabannes. . . . . . .303 CHAPTER XXIV. Loans to the Dauphin. — Mission to Lausanne. — Jacques Coeur's Magnificence. — Arrest. — Jeanne de Vendome. — A Dungeon. — The Judgment. .... 312 CHAPTER XXV. Judges. — Debtors. — Charges. — Tortures. . . 326 CHAPTER XXVI. The Soldan's Letter. — Strange Animal. — Early Tra- vellers. — Bawme. — Spikenard. .... 336 CONTENTS. XV CHAPTER XXVII. PACK French Name. — La Brocquiere. — Bad Odours — Joan of Arc. — Jean de Luxembourg. — Laon. . . . 354 CHAPTER XXVIII. Death of Macee de Leodepart. — Jean Coeur's Protest. — Condemnation. — Amende Honorable. — The Lady of Mon- tagne. — Rapid Appropriation. — Claim of the Church re- jected — Division of Spoil. — Estates. . . . 362 CHAPTER XXIX. Jean de Village. — Honesty .— Beaucaire. — The Letter. —The Brother.— The Tablets.— The Factors.— The Boat. — Escape. — The Pope Sickness. — Death of Pope Nicolas. — His Successor. — Settlement of Affairs. . . 376 CHAPTER XXX. Siege of Constantinople. — Loss. — The Appeal to Chris- tendom. — Letter. — The Vow. .... 380 CHAPTER XXXI. The Banquet. — Check. — The Captain General. — Scio. — Various Accounts. — Romance. — Letter to the King. — Restitution. . . . . . .399 CHAPTER XXXII. Chabannes. — Peace and Policy. — Jacques Coeur's Fac- tors. . . . . . . .417 Appendix ...... 423 INTRODUCTION. It is a fact whicli cannot fail to awaken in- terest as well as surprise, that the great efforts which are at present being made on the con- tinent of Eiiroj)e, to secure a direct communi- cation with the East, are but a repetition of the endeavours which constantly occupied the attention of the politic merchants of the Mid- dle Ages. The struggle between France, Italy, and Germany, to establish through their respec- tive countries the overland route to India, is in reality of old date. Marseilles was the rival of Venice and Genoa on the one hand, and of tlie great Hanseatic League on the other. The point de mire then, as now, was Alex- andria. The Venetians and Genoese strove earnestly to render their respective ports the avenues through which the produce of the East should difluse itself over western Europe ; while the great commercial cities of Germany exerted themselves to make Nuremberg the grand en- B l: INTRODUCTION. trepot for Oriental commerce, in opposition to Lyons and other inland cities of France. The maritime advantages of the Italian ports were great, and at a very early period were fully appreciated. The Crusades also, which drained the rest of Europe of its wealth, were highly serviceable to them, for it was in their harbours that the great armies bound for the Holy Land generally assembled, and from thence were dis- patched to Egypt and Syria the immense sup- plies which were necessary for their support. Commerce went hand in hand with these war- like enterjjrises, or rather extended itself to the carrying nations as a necessary consequence; and, at the commencement of the fifteenth cen- tury, the republics of Genoa and Venice were, with Florence, become a maritime city by the reduction of Pisa and the acquisition of Leg- horn, the monopolists of the trade with the East. UjD to this period the commercial views of France had been limited in their object and restricted in their course. In point of anti- quity, JNIarseilles might claim precedence over all the cities situated on the Mediterranean, and from the period of its foundation by a Ph ocean colony to the time of Charlemagne, it continued, though with various fortune, to be one of the principal ports of southern Europe. Other places in France, in the interior as well INTRODUCTION. 3 as on the coast of Langucdoc, derived advan- tages also from the trade with the Levant; and had a continuous policy, which was permitted to the Italian republics, been possible, the com- merce of France might still have made head against its formidable rivals, nor have suffered that declension which fell upon it during the Middle Ages. Though the country was of vast extent, throughout which the two varieties of the French tongue, the languages of oc and oil, were spoken, and though these eventually were fused, and it owned one nominal head, it was in reality divided into numerous states, clogged by conflicting interests and harassed by perpetual warfare with enemies at home as well as abroad. It is true, that, by the exertions of St. Louis, a code was drawn up which served as the basis for the future commercial statutes of France, but in the disastrous wars with England in the fourteenth century, there was neither inclination nor opportunity on the part of her monarclis to turn the provisions of the pious Crusader's foresight to account. When Charles V., — the Wise, as he was rightly named, — came to the throne, he issued many salutary ordinances in favour of commerce. During his reign the French navy became more respectable than it had been since the time of Charlemagne ; by his vigilant care the navigation of the kingdom Avas released from its tril)utary position towards 11 'J 4 INTRODUCTION. foreigners, who had always possessed the power of hiring or selling their vessels, either for com- mercial freights or military expeditions. But the terrible misfortunes which befel the coun- try during the long anarchy which goes by the name of the reign of Charles VI., extin- guished all the hopes that were entertained in France from the wise regulations of his prede- cessor, and her commerce fell into a state of the deepest neglect. It is always reserved for a master-spirit to bring about a great good, the want of which has long been felt, and it was still in the midst of the troubles which agitated his unhappy land, that a simple individual arose, who by industry, perseverance, and devotion to the cause he had adopted, succeeded in placing the commerce of France on an equal footing with that of any other nation. This personage was Jacques Coeur, at first a merchant of Bourges, and afterwards chief ad- viser and governor of the finances of Charles VII. of France. D.C. PRELIMINARY RExMARKS. CHARLES THE SEVENTH AND UI8 ARGENTIER. After the death of Charles the Wise, king of France, during whose judicious and })rudeiit reign the country had in some measure revived and begun to recover from the disasters that followed the battle of Poictiers, a long minority ensued, and faction, ambition, and disorder had too ample a field for growth. Charles VI. was but twelve years of age when his father died, and, left to the guardianship of his three uncles, he had no power but theirs: he was kept as much as possible in a state of ignorance, his passions encouraged, and his violence unre- strained. With generous impulses and good sense, had this unfortunate prince been of more mature age when he came to the crown, had he been allowed the advantage of his wise father's in- structions, he would no doubt have ma<]e an excellent ruler, and even the fatal disorder un- der which he laboured might probably have been subdued. But the interest of those about him was to keep him every way in sul)jection, B 3 6 PRELIMINARY REMARKS. and lie bocanio a victim, as well as the devoted country wliich called him king*. As an instance of the noble feelings which were fostered by his father, and might have de- veloped themselves hereafter, had he not been too early left to less judicious counsellors, the following anecdote, told by Jean Jouvenal dcs Ursins, the chronicler, is remarkable : — " One day the king, his father, made a great banquet and invited many guests ; and after the table was cleared he ordered a very rich and fine crown to be brought, together with a bas- net. These he shewed to his son Charles, and asked him which he preferred, whether to be crowned king with the crown, or to wear the basnet and be subject to the perils and fortunes of war? To which question the prince plainly replied, that he liked best the basnet, for that the crown should belong to him only if he was a good knight." On several occasions he proved that he pos- sessed courage, and that his heart went with his words. AVhen still a mere boy he married a young girl, just out of her infancy; beautiful, head- strong, and as inexperienced as himself, but without a spark of that goodness which occa- sionally shone forth from his obscured mind ; and promised so much, that, with all his draw- backs, Charles was the idol of his people. PRELIMINARY REMARKS. 7 Isabeau de Baviere had nothing but her trans- cendent beauty to boast : her mind was a blank on which designing persons Mrote every vice and crime, and as they were congenial to her nature, the impression remained fixed. The ill-fated son of a wise king was persecuted by fortune to the utmost extremity of her seve- rity : his wife was false and treacherous ; his nearest relatives betrayed and ruined him ; his nobles were perfidious ; and a foreign foe was at his gates, encouraged by the incessant quarrels of those great lords, in whose hands lay the des- tinies of France. INIeantime the rest of his subjects were not behindhand in following the example of turbu- lence set them by the higher orders. Ceaseless and fierce quarrels took place between the clergy and the laity, between the monks and the Uni- versity of Paris. The people took part with the opposite factions of Armagnacs and Burgundians, and tore each other to pieces in their fury ; ar- mies of robbers banded together and ravaged the country, desolating and destroying whatever they approached, and, glorying in their crimes, assumed the most horrible titles expressive of their atro- cious deeds. In the midst of all this, religious processions were made and feasts and revelry abounded ; the poor died in the streets of plague ; assassinations took place in every quarter of the cities ; massa- 8 PRELIMINARY REMARKS. cres, tortures, outrages of every description pre- vailed; and in this general confusion the king went mad. While this state of things was at the height, the early youth of Charles VII. was passed in the centre of anarchy and misrule: even in in- fancy he learnt to know the unliappy position of affairs, now seized upon by one party, now torn away by another ; he was witness to constant contention and was made the hero of endless struggles. Deprived of the affection of his pa- rents, one of whom was suffering under mental aberration and the other given over to intrigue and worldly pleasure, he was hunted from place to place, and obliged to seek shelter from native and foreign foes, uncertain who were his friends, and scarcely able to rely on one who professed to have his interest at heart. Disinherited and proscribed, poor and desolate, the unfortunate prince, by the time he had reached the age of manhood, had felt almost all the ills that flesh is heir to, and had had more sad experience of the mutability of fortune than usually falls to the lot of so young a person, even in the lowest walks of life. But notwithstanding these misfortunes, few sovereigns have had more staunch and reso- lutely faithful friends ; and that he did not re- ward them when it was in his power to do so, according to their merits, is the blot upon his PRELIMINARY REMARKS. 9 character, which partial writers have in vain endeavoured to clear away, for the remark of a modern historian is unfortunately but too well deserved. *' Ainsi Charles Sept, que I'histoire a surnora- Tn6 ' Le Victorieux' parceque Jeanne d'Arc lui preta son epde et Jacques Coeur son argent, a laiss6 brfder la premiere sur la place de Rouen, et a sacrifid le second aux seigneurs de la cour." It has been thought, with no little justice, that Charles's chief merit was in submitting to salu- tary advice, and in following the direction of superior minds, but he also allowed himself to be guided by others for evil as well as good, and thus permitted injustice to triumph, if he did not himself encourage misdeeds. He occupies, says M. Thierry, a prominent place in history, not so much from his own acts as from what was done in his name. Ilis argentier and counsellor, Jacques Copur, the subject of this memoir, was one of the most remarkable personages of his age, of which an historian, alluding to his wealth and mercantile speculations, has called him ' The Rothschild.' To him the monarch owed in a great measure his restoration to his rights; and to him France is indebted for the establishment of her commercial importance. To M. Bonamy the literary world is the most indebted for a clear and correct account of the 10 PRELIMINARY REMARKS. great merchant Jacques Coeur, and it is tliat learned authority whom M. le Baron Trouve has chiefly followed in the life he has written of the argentier. M. Bonamy, in his " Memoire de TAcademie des Inscri])tions et Belles Lettres," calls the atten- tion of the French nation to a citizen distin- guished for the love of his country and his king, and worthy of admiration for the great qualities of his mind and heart. " Devoted to the public good, he never separat- ed his private interests from those of the state. If he employed his wealth in making great acqui- sitions ; if he profited by the favour of the king to obtain elevated positions for his family, it is no less true that the king found in him a zealous subject, always grateful and always ready to assist him in all his necessities." It was he who established for Charles VII. the good order that reigned in his finances, who suppressed the abuses which had crept into the fabrication of money, and re-established that commerce, entirely lost to the kingdom during the desolating wars which existed between France and England. In fine, it is principally to him that is due the glory of the reign of Charles VII., for, without attempting to lower the reputation of the heroes whose valour did so much, it must be allowed that they could never have shone so brightly if PRELIMINARY REMARKS. 11 Jacques Coeur had not by his care jirocured for the army the necessary funds, as well as artillery and supplies, without which these efforts would have been paralysed. Nevertheless, the name of Jacques Coeur has not descended to posterity surrounded with the splendour which waits on those of Dunois, Lahire Santrailles, De Chabannes, and others who fought the battles of their king, for the nature of the services of the argentier were of a less apparent nature, and less calculated to dazzle the Avorld. The title of argentier, by which he is always designated, is significant of a personage to whom all the royal treasurers were bound every year to transmit a certain sum of money to supi)ly the revenues of the King, and to be employed in the expenses of his household. The argentier in his turn was bound to render a report of sums so collected to the chamber of accounts. He was called also counsellor of the kinjr ; and it is evident that on all important matters he was consulted by Charles, who ceased not to employ him in his service as long as he con- tinued in favour. Those who read the history of his services, and are acquainted with the ob- ligations which he conferred on his country and his king, cannot fail to be astonished at the injustice and ingratitude which ruined his for- tunes, disgraced his name, and drove him forth to exile and to death. 12 PRELIMINARY REMARKS. " His wealth," says La Thaumassi^re, " was his chief crime, and caused the vultures of the court to stoop upon him, greedy as they were of his possessions, and resolved to partake in the spoils of his gigantic fortune." His fortune was, indeed, shared by all whom he had ever obliged ; and the triumph of his enemies was complete, although not a single ac- cusation brought against him was proved at the time of his sentence, and all was acknowledged to be false afterwards. Even at the moment of his iniquitous trial, however, the first charge, no less than that of murder, brought against him was abandoned, and his accuser was punished, only to leave the field open to charges more artfully managed, and more powerfully supported. The advocates of parliament, when his sentence was revoked, expressed their opinion that, the trial exhibited " nullity, injustice, manifest ini- quity, and error express." In the letters granted by Louis XI. to the sons of Jacques Coeur, he states that "he was made prisoner at the instance of several of his enemies and ill-wishers, desirous of despoiling him, and of enriching themselves." It is to be regretted that the minute details of his life are unknown, and that the blanks in his history must be filled up by conjecture. It would, indeed, be interesting to follow his steps PRELIMINARY REMARKS. 13 in the East, and to know all his adventnrcs by sea and land, at home and abroad. He has left a curious memorial of himself at bis native town of Bourges en Berry, in the mag- nificent house he erected there : and his name, surrounded as it is with mystery, occurs in all the chronicles of his time, coupled with that of his master, Charles of France, Ic Bien Servi. The chronicler, Mathieu de Coussy, in his quaint language thus introduces the celebrated merchant to his readers. "King Charles had in his kingdom a man of small lineage, m'Iio was called Jacques Coeur, the which, by his sense, boldness, and good conduct, so managed, that he undertook divers great mer- cantile works, and was made argentier of King Charles, in which office he remained a long space of time, in prosperity and honour. " lie had many clerks and factors under him, who disposed, of his merchandise in all lands and countries belonging to Christians, and even in the realm of the Sarasins. He had on the seas several large vessels which went into Barbary, and as far as Babylon, carrying on trade by the license of the Soldan and the infidel Turks; also, by paying them tribute, he brought from those countries cloths of gold, and silk of all fashions, and of all colours; also furs suitable both for men and women, of divers sorts, such as martins, qe- nctte.s, and other straui^e thinos, which could 14 PRELIMINARY REMARKS. never l)efore be got for gold or silver in any mar- kets besides. "He caused to be sold by his factors, both at the hotel of the king, and in many places in the said kingdom of France, every sort of merchan- dise for Avear that man can think of or imagine ; at which many persons, as well nobles as mer- chants and others, were much amazed. He gain- ed alone, every year, more than all the other merchants in the kingdom put together." MEMOIR OP JACQUES C(EUR. CHAPTER I. ISABEAD DE BAVIERE. DUKE FREDERIC. THE DUCHESS OF BRABANT. THE PILGRIMAGE. VANITY ENCOURAGED. — EXTRA- VAGANT COSTUME. WIGS. EXPENSE. — RICH FURS. ROBES. In order to enter fully into the state of France at this period, it is necessary to pass in review the life of tliat too famous Queen and unnatural motlier, Isabeau de Bavierc, wife of Charles VI., whose enmity to her son was one of the chief causes of his early misfortunes. Isabeau de Baviere, the "fair and fatal enemy" of Charles VI. and of France, was the daughter of Stephen II., called the Young, Duke of Ba- varia, and of Thadea Visconti of Milan, daugliter 10 ISABEAU DE BAVIERE.— DUKE FREDERIC. of Bariifibo Visconti. Charles the Wise, anxious to fortify himself against the power of England by a German alliance, left directions at his death that a bride should be sought for his son amongst the most considerable of the houses of the empire. The high reputation of the family of Bavaria, and the great beauty of young Isabeau, made it appear that no more judicious alliance could be found than the one chosen for the youthful king. The uncle of Isabeau, Frederic of Bavaria, was a firm friend of France; and when he visited Charles VI. and his guardian uncles, it was inti- mated to him that nothing could be more pleas- ing to the country than the circumstance of a relative of his becoming the Queen of France. Frederic had no daughter, but flattered and de- lighted with the prospect of the aggrandise- ment of his family, he named at once the fact of his brother Stephen being possessed of a trea- sure, so peerless, that she seemed formed by nature to fill the exalted station offered her. He represented Isabeau, then between thirteen and fourteen years of age, as a miracle of beauty, and was far from disguising the satisfaction that would be felt by his brother if the match could be brought about. Nothing was, however, at this time communi- cated to the young king on the subject, which was dropped, as his uncles were yet undecided on THE DUCHESS OF BRABANT. 17 whom to fix. A question was even started relative to a princess of Lorraine ; and the daughter of the Duke of Lancaster was also proposed. Meanwhile, Frederic had returned to Bavaria, full of the possibility of his niece's advance- ment, and related to his brother the confer- ences he had had with the uncles of the kinjr respecting his future wife. The whole family was enraptured at the prospect, and set about plans to bring it to a happy result. Stephen considered that the best way would be to send his daughter to France; but the dan- ger was of the scheme not answering, and some dishonour and mortification ensuing, without great care and prudence. At this juncture Marguerite de Flandres, Duchess of Brabant, stepped forward in aid of this matrimonial plot; and, having taken her measures, sent an invitation to Duke Frederic and his young niece, recommending them to join her at Amiens, where the King and his council then were, together with the two brides and bride- grooms of Bavaria and Burgundy, Mdiose double alliances had just been concluded at Cambrai. On tlic pretext of performing a pilgrimage to St. Jean d' Amiens, Isabeau and her uncle arrived at that town, where all had been pre- pared for her reception. Charles VT. Mas then between sixteen and seventeen years of age, and of an enthusiastic and excitable disposition ; he c 18 VANITY ENCOURAGED. li.'id been greatly moved by the description given him of the l)eauty of the Bavarian princess, and at last his imjiatience to behold her rose to such a height that he never ceased, when he heard of her intended visit to Amiens, enquiring when the oj)portunity would be afforded him of seeing so lovely a creature. Too soon for his peace they met ; but i)revi- ously the fair sorceress had been instructed in the ])art she was to play, and every means that could be devised was resorted to to render the effect of her charms irresistible. She was clothed in the most becoming and sumptuous apparel, and tutored to use every art to attract the vo- latile and uncertain lover for whom she was destined. Delighted at the novelty of her situation, her young heart opened at once to the vanity and ambition set before her as the chief good of ex- istence, and from the moment when she saw herself in the brilliant costume in which her friends had decked her person, that inordinate love of dress and splendour, so fatally conspi- cuous in her after life, took deep root, and was never afterwards eradicated. The Duchess of Brabant, " a prudent and wise princess," as Froissart calls her, was shocked when she first beheld the simple habit in which the pretty child Isabeau appeared before her, and without loss of time caused her to be de- EXTRAVAGANT COSTUME. 19 corated in a manner suitable to the liigh fortune which awaited her. When one considers the cumbrous dress of the day, it is difficult to con- ceive that the young beauty of fourteen could be much embellished by it, particularly if the Ba- varian costume, sufficiently ungraceful at the present day, was equally so then, which is probable. In the time of Bran tome, the fa- shions of the time of Charles VI. were consi- dered, in com])arison with those in vogue in the sixteenth century, as " droleries, bifferies, et gros- sieres." The ladies of this early period are reproached by the preachers of the time for wearing robes of immoderate length, which swept the ground as they walked for several yards. These robes were lined with rich furs, and confined at the waist by broad silken sashes, to which hung rosaries of gold and precious jewels, of which their neck- laces were also composed, and were of remark- able magnificence. The fashionable head-dress was either a huge sort of turban, coming for- ward on the temples, and divided into two horns covered with jewels, which could not, however, disguise the ugliness of its form ; or the high- peaked cap was adojited, of which those still worn in Normandy convey a correct idea, the diffi-'rence, however, being, that from the extre- mity of the ])eak, generally three quarters of an ell high, depended a veil which reached to the c 2 20 WIGS. ground. If tliis veil were made of light mate- rials, it migiit be worn without inconvenience; but when, as frequently appears in the pictures of the time, the material of which it was formed was heavy, the fatigue of supporting such a weight on the head may be conceived. False hair was much in favour at this period, as it continued to be, more or less, for several centuries both in France and England. Red and yellow hair appears to have been chiefly held in esteem, as the poets, a race ever ready to catch at the ridiculous, have recorded in verses of the time. A Paris, un tas de bejaunes, Lavent, trois fois le jour, leur tetes Afin qu'ils aient les cheveux jaunes. * * * * Hector se promene au soleil Pour faire secher sa perruque. The men wore wigs of horse-hair dyed flaxen : De la queue d'un cheval peinte Quant leur cheveux sont trop petits, lis ont une perruque feinte. Ladies wore wigs of various colours, and paint- ed their faces in an extravagant manner. But whatever might have been the luxury of dress indulged in by Isabeau de Baviere, the reproaches cast upon her for the enormity of possessing two chemises of linen, instead of those generally worn, of serge, appear at the present day not a little extraordinaiy. EXPENSE. 21 Certainly the expense entered into by the la- dies at this period must have been very great, and they were not content with merely j)rovid- ing themselves with one costly habiliment at a time, for they ordered a series of dresses at once, of a price startling even at the present day ; nor do their lords appear to have been behindhand in this respect. Chroniclers have divulged the fact of charges for dress, which seem well to warrant the anger of the reforming clergy of the time ; for instance, an account occurs of Jehan de Sau- mur for shoes for the king, Charles VI., as follows : — " For thirty-two pairs of shoes d poulains, and fifty pairs of shoes, white, black, red, and feustres." The Duchess of Orleans' bill for shoes enume- rates those lined and trimmed with fur of (/ris rouge, and boots of delicate colours, lined with rich furs, a relcver de nuit ; by which it appears that the ladies of that age understood comfort and luxury extremely well. She has also " sou- liers noirs ct escoi'chies^' ornamented and open- worked slippers, no doubt of exquisite workman- ship, and worthy of a Paris Morkman of the present day. The passion for furs, which appeared to be extremely expensive, was carried to a great ex- tent, as was that of goldsmiths' work : the king's expenses, in 1404, for the latter are computed at 22 RICH FURS. four thousand five hundred livres ; for fur he ex- pended four thousand two hundred livres. The robes worn by the great were of extra- ordinary richness, as the following account shows: To Symonet Monart, for the lining of a houp- pelande (long mantle), three hundred and twenty- eight Prussian sables. For another, six hundred and seventeen backs of gris Jin. For the trim- ming of a robe for the Duke of Orleans, two thousand seven hundred and forty-six skins of menu vair (the bellies only). For the lining of a robe to rise in at night, two thousand seven hundred and forty-one backs of gris fin. For the entire trimming of a robe, thus described, " pour la cloche, pour le seurcot cloz, pour le seurcot ouvert, pour le chaperon," in all, one thousand seven hundred and sixty-two skins of menu vair. Gloves were also an important and expensive article of attire : they were very carefully made, and must have been an ornamental part of the costume, as they are described as being fringed, embroidered, notched and variously ornamented ; they were charged from six sous to sixteen sous a pair, equal to twice as many francs, or more, of the present date. Combs, brooches, and mirrors of ivory are also spoken of as being very costly. Charles VI. wore robes made of crimson velvet figured with gold, green, white, and black, gar- ROBES. 23 nished vvitli borders of Hack London cloth ; and one gown is spoken of as bordered \vitli drap de Moiistier — Viller moitic blanc moitie noir. The sleeves were of immense size, and sometimes of different quality, as they are separately named, sometimes as being of drap de sole de Lucques. There is, however, an instance of prudent eco- nomy in an entry relative to certain sleeves ecC- changed by the king for pourpoints, to a mercer. It was not uncommon for the nobles and even the king, to put their clothes in pawn when they wanted money, and the usurers were well content to furnish the gallants of the court with means for such considerations. The expenses for embroidery in the different MS. accounts which exist, are heavy, and seem to indicate considerable skill, for instance in the charges for dress of Charles VI. " A Robert de Varennes, brodeur et varlet de chambre du roy, pour les broderies par luy faictes sur hi manche sinistre d'une houppelande bas- tarde, c'est assavoir sur icelle autour du bras un cha])el de branche de may et de genestre, tout faict d'or de Chypre, cousu de soyc, 8 liv." a fg um»A ID \ "m&u^ ri^E i^ -•■' -> "' '■> ^ ' V JJ 'S- m«>^\m^M\iiMMJWi if^^immwM: \^^ mm CHAPTER II. THE CARMELITE. THE HENNIX THE DISCOMFITED LADIES. THE TRIUMPH OF BROTHER THOMAS. POPULARITY. THE SE- QUEL. THE CLOSE. WILLIAM DE l'oLLIVE. MoNSTRELET gives ail account of a famous preacher whose denunciations were directed against the extravagant attire then in fashion, and the ladies were the chief objects of his in- dignation. Brother Thomas Conecte, a Carmelite friar, was the hardy individual who ventured to direct attention to abuses of this kind, and who suc- ceeded in gaining golden opinions, at least from the lower orders, whose " withers were unwrung" by his reproaches, and who rejoiced in hearing the rich and great vituperated. Brother Thomas came from Brittany, and by his predications ac- quired such popularity, that in every town where THE IIENNIN. 25 he appeared he ^vas welcomed with enthusiasm, at first by the nobles and townspeople, as well as those of lower estate, who caused scaffolds in the open places of the towns he passed through to be erected for him to preach from, and had them adorned with rich tapestry, to do him honour. On this platform was erected an altar, at which he said mass, accompanied with others of his order, and his disciples, a concourse of whom followed him wherever he went, riding, as was his wont, on a small mule. His sermons were very long, and directed against the sins of the age, and particularly against those of the clergy, which he described as many and great. He likewise, says the chronicler, bhhnoit ct diffamoit trh ecvcellentement les femmes, not sparing any of the highest rank. The high head-dress, called hennin, he at- tacked especially, so that no female wearing those most in fashion dared appear before him ; for lie was accustomed when he saw any to excite against them all the little children of the quarter* and even went so far in his zeal as to accord them certain days of pardon, on condition that they followed the wearers of the obnoxious head- gear, crying vehemently in derision, " Au hennin! au hennin !" The pious votaries thus selected were not likely to disappoint the zealous i)reacher, but entered into his views with infinite ahicrity. not 2G THE DISCOMFITED LADIEb. merely exclaimiii*:^ and pointing at the conspi- cuous ])iece of vanity so distasteful to holy minds, but endeavouring to pull the same off the heads of the gentle and noble dames who were so in- cautious as to come within reach of tlicir re- proaches : — " Taut qu'il convenait qu'icelles femmes se sau- vassent et misscnt a sauvet^ en aucun lieu." As might be expected, this amusing sort of piety was not received very quietly, and continual rencontres took place between the zealots and the attendants on their victims, which but little tended to preserve the public peace. Nevertheless brother Thomas continued, and ceased not to inveigh against the vanities of immoderate apparel till he had entirely shamed the females of every class who indulged in it. Many ladies retired to their country houses in an apparently improved frame of mind, '* ayant grand vergogne des honteuses et injurieuses paroles qu'elles avaient ouies au dit prechement, se dis- pos^rent a mettre sus leur atours." The fair penitents adopted, instead of horns and peaks, low caps and hoods, " semblable que portoient femmes de beguinage." But this humble mode lasted a very brief pe- riod, " and as," continues the chronicler, " after the example of the snail, when one })asses by him he draws in his horns, so when he no longer fears any one he shoots them forth again. Thus acted THE TRIUMPH OF BROTHER THOMAS. 27 these (lames ; for, in brief, no sooner had the said preacher quitted the country than they recom- menced as before, and forgetting his doctrine, went bit by bit back to their first estate, such as, or even more extravagant than, they had worn them before." Yet it was not alone his attack on the high head-dresses that gained brother Thomas the love of the people, but his unsparing censures on the clergy, who heard with equal indignation, as did these fair friends, his extraordinary denuncia- tions. Nevertheless, they feared openly to show their vexations, and kept their vengeance for a convenient occasion ; not less annoyed than the ladies, but more politic: — Vain privilege poor women have of tongue^ Men can stand silent and resolve on wrong. Meantime brother Thomas triumphed, and was treated as an apostle returned to earth to extir- pate wickedness and folly. Meetings were held in the open fields to hear him ; knights, nobles, and people flocked to listen, and he was always conducted back to his dwelling in the town, whicli was usually at the house of the richest of the Inirghers, the bridle of his mule being held by persons of condition. His disciples were treated with equal consideration, and every one who had the honour of entertaining them looked upon it as a distinction. But brother Thomas kept al- ways apart in tiie room given to him, in solitary 28 POPULARITY. iiiusiiig-, allowing access to few : occasionally he issued forth, and took occasion to inveigh against, and threaten with everlasting punishments, those who permitted their houses to be encumbered with such vehicles of the pastimes of evil as chess-boards, cards, dice, or any instruments which could be used for games of chance. He constrained the women to bring to his feet their hennins, and having caused a bonfire to be kindled at the foot of the platform M'here he preached, he ordered all to be thrown into it, amidst the exulting cries of the delighted lookers on. As JNIonstrelet expresses it, he reigned in the country in this fashion for the space of five or six months, visiting many notable cities, decrying the luxury of the great, and upholding the lower orders, who ran after him in such multitudes, that there was frequently not less than from sixteen to twen- ty thousand persons assembled at his discourses. He caused the men to range themselves on one side, and the women on the other, with a cord extended between the two lines. He refused money, nor would he allow collec- tions to be made, but he did not decline accept- ing rich ornaments for the church, nor did he object to his own and his disciples' expenses being paid wherever they sojourned. He was looked upon with sucli reverence as being a perfectly pure and holy being, that all persons contended for the happiness of serving THE SEQUEL. 29 him, and many to this end left their families and enrolled tlicmselves amongst his followers. Amongst others were several noblemen, who con- sidered themselves honoured by his notice. After this time, without his having met with any opposition or annoyance from the clergy, not- withstanding their known indignation, he quitted the country, much lamented, and embarking at St. Vallery, returned to Brittany his native land. The end of this story is somewhat startling, and may serve, as no doubt was intended, to prove that the holy church will not allow her members to be insulted with impunity. Brother Thomas the Carmelite, not content with his first success, returned to the charge, and was incautious enough not only to reappear at Rheims, where he was as bitter as ever against abuses, but to travel still further, and at length to beard the lion in his den at Rome, having arrived there in company with ambassadors from Venice. He was well received, and lodged at San Paolo, but in a short time Pope Eugenie sent to desire his presence, not, it was asserted, with any intent to injure him, but merely for his pleasure, as he had heard him much spoken of. Brother Thomas, however, was seized with a panic, and declined visiting his Holiness, keeping himself close, and beginning to fear for his own safety. The Pope's message was repeated, and tlirco times tlie Car- 80 THE CLOSE. mclite refused to obey the summons: but to escape was now out of Lis power, the toils were around him and his fate was near. A messenger was sent to San Paolo to summon him a fourth time ; but hardly had he reached the threshold of the chamber in which brother Thomas was, than the latter threw himself from the window in an agony of fear : he was instantly pursued as he fled for his life, and dragged to the papal palace, where the Pope having called to his aid the Car- dinals of Rouen and Navarre, examined the fugi- tive with the utmost strictness, and, no doubt to their great sorrow, discovered him to be an arch- heretic, worthy of condign punishment, which they resolved should not be long delayed. His trial did not take up much time, and his sentence of death having been passed, he was publicly burnt in Rome, for the edification of the peojile and the offended clergy. This was a period when punishment was freely administered to those whose opinions were too openly expressed relative to the conduct of the Catholic clergy, and many were the victims of attempted reform. Amongst others, Du Clercq relates the fate of a certain heretic whose exe- cution took place at Evreux in Normandy, in 1453, when any opportunity was gladly seized to exhibit religious zeal, as a set-off to the dis- comfiture lately experienced in the taking of Constantinople by the Infidels. WILLIAM DE L'OLLIVE. 31 The sacrifice in this case was William de rOUive, a doctor of theology, and prior of St. Germain en Laye, accused by certain Augus- tine monks of heresy and Vaudoisism, that is to say, of dealiaigs with the powers of evil to obtain worldly advantages, never, in these in- stances, very clearly defined. It seemed that the prior, " by the exhorta- tion and tem])tation of the enemy of mankind, gave liimself up, body and soul, to be his ser- vant, in return for permission to enjoy all kinds of delights in this world, but especially to ob- tain the love of a lady of condition." Although, under such circumstances, it would have been more natural, and certainly more con- venient, to choose an easy and agreeable mode of transporting himself and his fair favourite to a given place, where the Evil One waited for an interview with them, it seems the pair were accustomed to seat themselves on a broomstick, and thus travel at a railroad pace to the coun- cil of the lord of darkness, who was accustomed to make his appearance to his friends in the harmless likeness of a sheep. For many years the prior had amused him- self in this questionable manner, and had ob- tained from his Moolly patron all the enjoyments he desired, till at last he was found out, much to the horror and scandal of the virtuous monks, who had lonsf l)ehei(l his riches and luxuries 32 WILLIAM DE L'OLLIVE. witli abhorence, contrasting such unholy plea- sures with their own hard crusts and cohl stone cells. At length they combined and resolved to put an end to these rural meetings of the lovers and the wolf in sheep's clothing, and the facts became known. The prior was arrested and thrown into prison, when his own confession, most authentically attested by his accusers, put an end to any doubts of his unholy conduct. The inquisitor who examined him inquired severely into the doctrines which he had been in the habit of promulgating to the people in times past, when he was sent through the coun- try to preach the faith of Jesus Christ, and se- vere were the reprimands given by the pious interrogator. " After which remonstrance," says the chronicler, " the said master William, know- ing full well that he had been a great sinner towards our Redeemer and Creator, began to weep and lament his misdeeds, and to cry for mercy to God and justice, recommending him- self to the prayers of all present. Then was he taken to the ditch prepared, to atone for the horrible crime of which he was guilty." CHAPTER III. THE BRIDE. FROISSART's ACCOUNT OF THE ENTRY INTO PARIS OF ISABEAU DE BAVIERE. DEVICES. PROGRESS OF THE PRO- CESSION. THE KING EN CROUPE. — THE MASKED BALL. — FAC- TIONS. VALENTIN A . The beautiful Isabeau de Baviere, to wliose history it is necessary to return, no sooner ap- jiearcd before the expectant king, Charles VT.' than his heart was immediately enslaved. She knelt on both knees before him, Mith the most perfect modesty and humility, and he, with hasty gallantry, raised her in the tenderest manner; " regarding her," say tlie chronicles, *' with a sort of transport," The Constable de Clisson v/ho stood by, exclaimed as he marked this first interview, — "By my faith, tliis lady will stay Avitli us — the king cannot take his eyes off her." The rapturous exclamations of the susceptible D 34 THE 15R1DE. Charles left no room to doubt the impression the fair stranger had made on him : he not only at once declared his intention of making her his wife, but requested of his uncles that no time might be lost in arranging the marriage, which he desired might take place, on the spot, at Amiens instead of at Arras, which place was proposed. Accordingly the ceremony was con- cluded in about three months after their first meeting; and Charles VI. received as his com- panion for life one of the most unworthy al- though the most beautiful of her sex. It is natural to suppose that for the first few years of her married life Isabeau, happy and content with the jirofusion of luxury which sur- rounded her, showed none of the evil propen- sities of her nature. The extravagance of her young bridegroom equalled her own ; his pas- sion for her knew no bounds, and he had nei- ther the prudence nor the desire to control any of her wishes, which she had no idea of restrain- ing. It is said of Charles VI. that he was so profuse and fond of squandering money, that, where his father was accustomed to give a hun- dred crowns, he would give a thousand. The fetes he gave in honour of the birth of several children, were extraordinarily magnificent, and he resolved that the public entry into Paris of his adored queen should be attended with splen- dours and expense hitherto unthought of. FROISSARI'S ACCOUNT. 35 Froissart describes the grand entry of Isabeau de Baviere into Paris at lenofth in the following terms, and his account is too characteristic not to excite interest. " On Sunday the 20th day of June, in the year of our Lord 1399, there were such crowds of people in Paris it was marvellous to see them : and on this Sunday the noble ladies of France who were to accompany the queen, assembled in the afternoon at St. Denis, with such of the nobility as were appointed to lead the litters of the queen and her attendants. The citizens of Paris, to the amount of twelve hundred, were mounted on horseback, dressed in uniforms of green and crimson, and lined each side of the road. " The Queen of France, attended by the Duchess of Berri, the Duchess of Burgundy, the Duchess of Lorraine, the Countess of Ne- vers, the Lady of Coucy, with a crowd of other ladies, began the procession in open litters, most richly ornamented. The Duchess of Touraine was not in a litter, but, to display herself the more, was mounted on a palfrey, magnificently caparisoned. " The litter of the queen was led by the Dukes of Touraine and Bourbon at the head : the Dukes of Berri and Burgundy were in the centre, and the Lord Peter of Navarre and the Count d'Ostrevant behind the litter, which was D 2 36 DEVICES. open, and beautifully ornamented. The Duchess of Touraine followed on her palfrey, led by the Count de la Marcho and the Count de Nevers, the whole advancing slowly at a foot's pace. After her came the Duchess of Burgundy and her daughter, the Lady Margaret of Ilainault, in an open litter led by the Lord Henry de Bar and Sir William, the young Count of Na- mur. Then came the Duchess of Berry and the daughter of the Lord de Coucy, in an open and ornamented litter, led by Sir James de Bourbon and Sir Philip d'Artois ; then the Duchess of Bar and her daughter, led by Sir Charles d'Albret and the Lord de Coucy. There was no parti- cular mention made of the other ladies and dam- sels who followed in covered chariots or on pal- freys, led by their knights. " Sergeants and others of the king's officers had full employment, in making way for the procession, and keeping off the crowd ; for there were such numbers assembled, it seemed as if all the world had come thither. "At the gate of St. Denis that opens into Paris, was the representation of a starry firmament, and M'ithin it were children dressed as angels, whose singing and chaunting were melodiously sweet. There was also an image of the Virgin, holding in her arms a child, ivJio at times amused himself with a ^vindmill made of a larcje tcahiut. The upper part of this firmament was richly adorned PROGRESS OF THE PROCESSION. 37 with the arms of France and Bavaria, with a brilliant sun dispersing its rays through the hea- vens ; and this sun was the king's device at the ensuing tournaments. The Queen of France and the ladies took delight in viewing this as they passed, as indeed did all who saw it. The queen then advanced slowly to the fountain in the street of St. Denis, which was covered and de- corated with fine blue cloth, besprinkled over with golden fleurs-de-lis. The pillars that sur- rounded the fountain were ornamented with the arms of the chief barons of France ; and in- stead of water, it ran in great streams of Claire, and excellent Piement, Around this fountain were young girls, handsomely drest, having on their heads caps of solid gold, who sang so sweetly it was a pleasure to hear them, and they held in their hands cups of gold, offering these liquors to all who chose to drink. The queen stopped there to hear and look at them, as did the ladies as they passed by. " Below the monastery of the Trinity there was a scaffold erected in the street, and on this scaf- fold a castle, with a representation of the battle with King Saladin, performed by living actors; the Christians on one side, and the Saracens on the other. All the lords of renown who had been present, were represented with their blazon- ed war coats, such as were worn in those times. A little above was the person s PiCTOiN E 2 62 SUSPICION. ])ornc to the church of tlie Celestins, where the unfortniiate prince was buried with many tears and groat honour. The first suspicion fell on Messire Aubert de Chauny, who was known to have a mortal enmity to the duke for having seduced his wife, whom he retained as a favourite, and who had borne him a son — for the morality of the duke was by no means remarkable — but it soon became evi- dent that a more powerful hand had dealt the blow. As soon as the news reached the queen, weak as she was, her terror overcame her illness, and causing herself to be placed on a litter by her brother, Louis of Bavaria, and accompanied by him and his people, she was taken to the Hotel St. Pol, and lodged in a chamber next to that of the king for greater security. That night many of the great lords, amongst them the Count of St. Pol, armed themselves and their followers, and hastened to establish themselves in the king-'s palace for his defence, not knowing what dangers might threaten the person of the sovereign. Whatever might have been the suspicious en- tertained by the princes, who assembled in great numbers to consult on what should be done, no one ventured to name the Duke of Burgundy, who at first appeared to expect to escape detection; but seeing that unlikely, he came to the resolution of boldly avowing himself to be the murderer of THE KNOTTED CLUB PLANED. 53 tlie king's brother, after which he retired from Paris with all convenient secrecy and speed. The rage of the Orleans party was extreme ; and it was with difficulty the King of Sicily could restrain the impetuosity of those armed followers of the late duke, who resolved to follow and take summary vengeance on the murderers. The people of Paris, who were inimical to the Duke of Orleans, heard of his tragical death un- moved, saying softly to each other, " The knotted club is planed," in allusion to the devices of the rival factions. "All this," says Monstrelet, "happened in the year of the hard winter 1407, when the frost lasted sixty-six days with terrible severity ; and when the thaw occurred, the Pont Neuf of Paris was precipitated into the Seine, and great damage was done by the frost and the floods throughout the kingdom of France." m^^mnim:immL jm m fe££i1 CHAPTER V. THE WIDOW. — SORCERY. ACCUSATIONS. — THE APPEAL. ROYAL FAMILY LEAVE PARIS. THE ARMAGNACS. AZINCOURT. JUSTICE SOUDAINE. — MANIAC LEADER. HENRY OF ENGLAND. — MONTEREAU. ASSASSINATION OF JEAN SANS PEUR. TREATY OF TROYES. — DEATH OF ISABEAU. Mournful were the scenes which ensued when the unfortunate Valentin a of ISIilan, widow of the murdered prince, presented herself to the king, with her orphan sons, of which she had three. The tears and lamentations, and the sad spectacle which the bereaved family presented, deeply affected King Charles, who raised her from her knees with tears and embraces, and jjromised her that justice should be done on the traitors who had committed so execrable a crime. The duchess and her young daughter-in-law, the widowed Queen of England, daughter of THE WIDOW. 55 Charles of France, who was married to the eldest son of the late duke, although he was but thirteen years old, then retired from the king's presence, and placed themselves, with tlie princes, in the care of their friends, returning to Blois, where they usually resided. The hopes of Valentina that justice would be done on her husband's assassin were, how- ever, frustrated, for the power of the Duke of Burgundy was such, and he was so extremely popular amongst the lower orders in France, that it was considered impolitic to pursue him too far, and, retired into his own dominions, he drew round him so great a number of adhe- rents that he was able to dictate to those who arraigned him. He caused a clever lawyer to plead his cause, and to set forth the propriety of the step he had taken to rid France and her sovereign of a dangerous enemy, which he in- sisted upon the late Duke of Orleans having been. Nothing can be so futile and absurd as this defence ; nor did it impose on any one, but the power of the duke obliged those who heard it to profess themselves satisfied, and they lis- tened with what patience they might to such folly as the following charges. That Louis of Orleans had practised magical arts to cause the death of the king by a slow distemper, coveting his rank and possessions. That he had employed several devil!?, by means 66 SORCERY. of certain j)roficiciits in the black art, to enchant a sword and a ring, destined to injure the king. Four persons had been gained by his bribes to undertake this diabolical work, and had car- ried on their incantations in an old tower called La Tour de Montjay, near Lagny-sur-Marne, and were accustomed to repair to a hill in the neigh- bourhood, where they met certain devils, who delivered to them the instruments they required for their design, directing them to complete the charm, to place a magic ring they gave in the mouth of a dead man, for which end they re- paired to the gibbet of Montfaucon by night, and from thence carried off a dead malefactor on a horse to their tower of Montjay; but day- light surprising them, they were obliged to con- ceal their prey in a stable attached to a house in Paris belonging to one of them, where they completed their wicked plot by placing the ring in the mouth of the corpse, and putting the sword in its body ; and thus, says IVIonstrelet, " in great abomination and horror it remained for several days, according as the devils had ordered." After this these instruments of evil were taken to the Duke of Orleans, and he was also fur- nished with powder made of the bones of a malefactor, which the duke wore in a bag next his skin, with what intent is not named ; and the discovery of so vile a practice of his bro- ACCUSATIONS. 57 ther's alto":ether tlisofustcd the kiii"' with him when he came to know it. All the mental attacks of the ill-fated king; were charged upon the duke as having been brought about by charms and witchcrafts, some- times by one means, sometimes by another: and the ravings of his madness were understood to be conscious accusations against the malevolence of his brother. lie was said to have exclaimed — '' Oh take away the sword wliich pierces my heart, which my brother Orleans has put there :" and again, he cried out, " I must kill him ! " meaning that one or other of those two must be the victim. Also the Duke of iNlilan and his daughter Valentina were accused of being subtle sorcerers, and aiding with the Duke of Orleans in endea- vouring to injure the king by their magic arts, which, though often tried, by the grace of God had failed of their entire effect, although the king had suffered much by them. There were not wanting i)ersons to swear to the truth of such stories as these : That once the Duke of Orleans and the king- being at the Chaste! de Ntaufle, supi)ing with la Reine J31anc]ie, and sleeping there, the duke had attemj>ted to poison his brother in a dish, passing through the kitchen and throwing a white powder on the meat he was to vat. Tlii^ plot failed in consequence of ("iiailcs refusing 58 THE APPEAL. the meat ; Ijiit the queen's almoner, happening to touch it as he put it into a basket to be distributed to the poor, the mere contact caused him at once to fall as if dead, and he lost his beard, hair, and nails in consequence, fell into a languor, and finally died. And that la Reine Blanche had herself discovered the whole transaction, re- proached the duke and informed the king of it. A fatal accident had befallen several of the noble guests at a banquet given by King Charles, at which they were burnt, in consequence of being dressed as savages, and a torch, approach- ing them too nearly, having ignited the skins they were wrapped in; the king escaped only through the presence of mind of INladame de Berry, who wrapped him, flaming as he was, in her robe. Every one knew that this sad event was purely accidental ; but the Duke of Burgun- dy insisted that it was a preconcerted scheme of the Duke of Orleans to cause the king's death. Amongst many other absurdities, the duke was accused of having sent a poisoned apple to the dauphin, which being intercepted by a nurse who held a child in her arms, and given by her to the child, the latter died almost im- mediately after. All these things were gravely asserted and lis- tened to by those who found themselves too weak to combat them. But, on the other hand, Queen Isabeau, who ROYAL FAMILY LEAVE PARIS. 59 had loft Paris and retired to Meluii with lier children for greater safety, excited the Duchess of Orleans to make a public appeal against her husband's murderer, and accordingly they ail re- turned to the capital — the widow, her sons, and her friends, in deep mourning, and making a great show of their grief and their wrongs. An harangue was made by the lawyers of the duchess, quite as tedious and strange as that by the Duke of Burgundy's advocate, in which all sorts of authorities are cited to prove the neces- sity of punishment falling on the guilty. Saint Gregory, Valerius IMaximus, Ovid, St. James, Aris- totle, the book of JNIaccabees, and many other sin- gularly jumbled judges are produced in argument, and every charge brought against the murdered duke altogether refuted point by point. The Duke of Burgundy was pronounced guilty, and a severe sentence of banishment was passed on him, but there was no means of enforcing this by the weaker party, and he laughed at these threats and denunciations. The king, the queen, and all their family, were injudiciously advised to leave Paris and go to Tours, and no sooner had they done so, than the Parisians informed the Duke of Burgundy of the fact, and invited him to return, which he did in great triumph, amidst cries of " Noel ! " and loud acclamations. He was now undisputed master, and could dictate laws to his adversaries, uliich GO THE ARMAGNACS.— AZINCOURT. fact so afflicted the unfortunate Duchess of Orleans, that she died of grief, leaving her three sons at the mercy of their enemies. A strange scene now took i)lace at Chartres, where the two eldest orphan princes of Orleans were taken, in order that a temporary reconcilia- tion might be formed, and there, by means of a few false oaths which cost nothing, the Duke of Burgundy was allowed to clear himself of the im- putation of murder, and the queen once more agreed to become his partisan. Nothing could equal the horrible state of the Parisians at this period, divided and torn to pieces alternately by the different parties to which the city fell a prey. A faction with a new name had now sprung up, which was destined long to fill a lamentable part in the ceaseless con- flicts which desolated France. Charles of Or- leans, now a widower, though still scarcely more than a child, had espoused secondly, Bonne d'Ar- magnac, the daughter of the Count d'Armagnac, constable of France, who, constituting himself the head of that party opposed to the Burgundian, carried on the conflict which these apparent, but hollow, reconciliations had left undecided. Just at this juncture war was declared by Henry V. of England, against France. Then followed the disastrous battle of Azin- court, where the French left twenty-five thousand men dead on the field, and the flower of the AZINCOURT. 61 French nobility was either killed or taken pri- soner ; amongst the latter were the two Princes, Charles of Orleans, and the Duke of Bourbon. The Dauj)hin, Louis, survived this fatal defeat only two months, and his brother Jean scarcely a year more, dying, as it was sujiposed, of poison. By these events Charles of France became the heir of the throne, and he was at this time only thirteen years of age : his father's madness had be- come confirmed, and the intrigues and perfidy of his mother rendered his position one of the most hazardous and difl^cult that could be imagined. Accustomed to look upon the Burgundian jmrty with detestation, the young Dauphin gave himself up entirely to the direction of the Count d'Ar- magnac, whose efforts were directed to thwart the designs of the queen. Tsabeau had contrived to amass enormous sums in jewels and plate, which for security she had deposited in different churches, and this treasure the Count d'Armagnac seized in the name of Charles the Dauphin, for the service of the state, to supi)ly funds requisite to carry on the war with England. Isabeau, in despair, fled to Vincennes, but was there arrested and sent, under surveillance, to Tours, as it Avas more than susi)ected that she entertained relations not only with the Duke of Burgundy, but with the English, who were pre- paring for another descent on the devoted G2 JUSTICE SOUDAINE. country. Tlie irregularity of Isaboan's conduct had of late been undisguised, and public morality rendered it necessary that she should be separat- ed from her unworthy favourites, and that the course of her levity should be violently checked. So daring had the insolence of her friends be- come, that they threw aside all outward respect for the king, who, on one occasion, riding in the vicinity of Vincennes, was met by Boisbourdon, a young man who was known to stand too high in the queen's favour. This person, instead of salut- ing the king in a proper manner, rudely passed him and continued his way, with the air of a prince who had met an inferior; whereupon Charles VI., who was quite aware of the history attached to him, transported with rage, command- ed the provost of Paris to hasten after him and conduct him to Paris a prisoner. The insolent young man fearfully expiated his imprudence, for he was immediately placed in a dungeon, heavily ironed, the torture applied to him, and his career closed by strangulation, after which his body was cast into the river, according to what was then called justice soiidaine. It appears that Isabeau had always felt an aver- sion to her younger son, and enraged at his rang- ing himself with her enemies, she resolved to sa- crifice everything to revenge. She contrived to give the Duke of Burgundy notice of her position, and it was not long before he effected her libera- MANIAC LEADER. 63 tion, carrying her oft" with liim to Cliartres, where their good understanding, for the evil of France, became more securely cemented than it had ever been before. Under tliis protection Isabeau wrote letters to all the towns in France, pro- claiming the fact of the king having, at the com- mencement of his malady, constituted her sole protector and regent of the kingdom ; command- ing them all to pay her allegiance ; and, in order to gain their suffrages, promising to remit nu- merous taxes, at the same time forbidding that any should be paid to the dauphin. A desperate struggle ensued, in which the whole country suffered every extremity of misery ; anarchy and confusion reigned triumphant ; and Paris, falling into the hands of the Burgundians, was given up to pillage and massacre. With his friends murdered around him, the unfortunate daui)liin, who happened to be asleep when the tumult reached the place where he resided, was taken from his bed by Tanneguy du Chatel, who, wrapping him in his sheets, bore him in his arms to the Bastile, and afterwards managed to conduct him in safety to jSIelun and Montargis. At midnight of the 14th July, 1418, a dread- ful scene was acted ; the king, raving as he was, was seized upon, and forced to head the party of Burgundy, being tutored to command the people to deliver uj) the Armagnacs. 'J'he jiopulace being thus excited, all acted like G4 HENRY OF ENGLAND. maniacs, and tho slaughter aTid destruction are terrible to record. The Duke of Burgundy, who, with the queen, had kept out of sight during these scenes, now re-entered Paris in triumph, having entire posses- sion of the royal family, with the exception of the dauphin, who was fortunately out of his reach, and in whose person was concentred the last remnant of the monarchy of France. Every art was used to induce Charles to join his mother in Paris : but his friends rallied round him, and inspiring him with firm resolution to resist every offer and every snare, he escaped the machinations of his enemies, and fortified himself against attacks which menaced him on all sides, both from domestic perfidy, and the ambition of England, now in possession of great part of his desolated country. Henry V. of England, invited to a negotiation with the Duke of Burgundy and Isabeau, was offered the hand of the beautiful princess Cathe- rine ; but he was too politic a prince to be soon taken with the bait ; and, insisting on more ad- vantages than the Burgundian thought it Mise to concede, their conference was broken off, and all arrangements stopped for the time. Henry then made a proposition to the dauphin to assist him in obtaining possession of his rights; but to his great honour, notwithstanding the dis- tressing position of his affairs, he at once refused MONTEREAU. Qb his aid, fearing to bring against his country a more formidable foe than any that had yet devas- tated it. Having rejected this tempting offer of assist- ance, Charles l)egan to consider the proj)riety of attempting to negotiate with the other party, in order by this means to ])ut some check on tlie destructive civil commotions which desolated France. The Duke of Burgundy had at length become so unpopular, tliat he thought his interest more likely to be served if he could gain over the dau- phin, and he therefore readily listened to proposals of accommodation coming from him. A scene of violence and treachery now followed, only equal- led by that of the murder of the Duke of Orleans some years before. The partisans of the dauj>hin were well aware that, in the event of a reconcili- ation, not one of them would be safe from the vengeance of their inveterate foes, and they therefore resolved to take the afl'air at once into their own hands. A meeting had been agreed upon at Montereau- faut-Yonne between the dauphin and his })owerful and wily rival, and there it was resolved that a deed should be done which should for ever put an end to contentions, unlikely to discontinue without some forcible step was taken from which there could be no ai)peal. Tanneguy du Chatel in i)articiilar felt that he r (JG ASSASSINATION OF JEAN SANS PEUR. was a particular object of enmity to Duke Jean, and several others were equally ready to rid the country of a dangerous foe, who was known to be plotting with England, and who had consented to deliver up the country to the power of her natu- ral enemy, in order to secure his own advantage. It was believed also by many that the duke had caused both the dauphins to be poisoned, and that the life of Charles was by no means secure against his treachery. It required, however, very few arguments to satisfy men determined on a purpose that they were acting conscientiously, and there was no he- sitation in the minds of any of the conspirators when they met Jean Sans Peur at the bridge of Montereau, and, on a signal from Tanneguy du Cliatel the redoubtable Duke of Burgundy fell, pierced with a mortal wound. But this stroke of questionable policy was far from being attended with the happy results antici- pated by the actors. The fury of Isabeau on hearing of the catastrophe knew no bounds ; and her inveteracy against her son rose to its height ; she immediately sent messengers to the successor of Duke Jean, offering her aid to revenge the death of his father: and she also sent to invite the Kins: of England to join in a league against the dau- phin Charles. Henry of England acceded to the offers of peace made to him, and on the 21st of May, 1420, the disgraceful treaty of Troyes was TREATY OF TROYES. — DEATH OF ISABEAU. G7 signed, by which it was agreed that Henry should espouse Catherine of France, that after tlie death of Charles VI. the crown of France should be- come his inheritance, to the exclusion of the right- ful heir; and that in the mean time he should receive the oaths and the homage of the vassals of the crown. It was stipulated that Henry should use all his endeavours to subdue the partisans of the dauphin, and he was in future to take the title of heir and regent of France, while the real heir was styled the " soi-disant dauphin." The after-fate of this unnatural mother who had been to France by choice what the innocent Florinda was to Spain, by the introduction of a foreign sway, was such as her crimes deserved : after all parties had availed themselves of her instrumentality to gain their own ends, she fell into such complete contempt, that her existence seemed hardly noticed ; and the taunts heaped upon her, the detestation in which she was held, and her mortification on finding that her plots had failed in subduing the spirit or repressing the victorious arms of her son, all combined to over- whelm her with shame and sorrow, which finally ended her life. She died in Paris at the Hotel St. Pol, the last day of Septcmljer, 1435, and was buried without honour by her grudging partisans the English, who considered four tapers and four mourners sufficient ceremony for the burial of this once gorgeous and magnificent princess. CHAPTER VI. CHARLES LE BIEN INSTRUIT. — LE EOI DE BOURGES. — CHARACTER OF THE KING. LABOURER'S SONG. GOLDEN AGE. THE king's POSITION. HIS FAVOURITES. HIS HOPELESSNESS. In the midst of anarchy and confusion, bis throne usurped by strangers, his wife a traitor to bim and her country, bis heir proscribed, and him- self insane, the ill-starred Charles the Well- beloved, of France, breathed his last, and young Henry VI. of England was proclaimed king over his bier. This was in October, 1422, and the tidings of bis being a king without a king- dom were taken to Charles the dauphin, then called the Duke of Touraine : they reached him in Le Velay, where he had taken refuge with a few followers near Le Puy in Auvergne, at a small castle belonging to the Bishop of Le Puy, called Espally. CHARLES LE BIEN INSTRUIT. 69 The castle of Espally has sustained many sieges since that time, and is now a mass of wikl ruins, based on basaltic rocks, a fitting scene for the meeting of so desolate a band as that of Charles le Bien Instruit, as the prince was then called. Tn the vaults of that castle he was proclaimed king of France. He received the news of his father's death with great sorrow and many tears, for he no doubt thought of all the miseries and misfortunes that had been the lot of that persecuted monarch ; and he mourned also over his own inability for- merly to have assisted him, or at the present moment to rescue his kingdom from its fearful state of civil and foreign aggression. For the first day he habited himself in mourn- ing, and wept abundantly: the next morning a solemn mass was performed, at which he assisted, clothed in a royal scarlet robe, while his followers exhibited the l)lazons of their rank. The baimer of France was then raised in the chapel, and cries were uttered of "Vive le Roi!" The ser- vice then proceeded, l)ut no other ceremony fol- lowed. From that day all those attached to him gave him the title of King of France. In other parts of the kingdom, however, ho was known by the insulting title of " Hoi de Bourges,"" given him by the English, for it was in tliat city of Berry where he chiefly resided, and where he was first receivu it for my sake." After his death the four confessors, being in- terrogated, declared these last commands of the constable ; on which my lord chancellor rej)lied' that with regard to the crowns of gold and the diamond, they are at liberty to use them as had been directed, but as for the said stone, it must be delivered to the king, to do his good pleasure with. This belief in the power of obtaining super- natural wealth was not confined to the century in which Jacques Coeur was born : scarcely a ])erson existed who had risen from comparative poverty to affluence on whom the suspicion of unlawful knowledge did not fiill, both at that time and up to a comparatively recent period. The elixir pos- sessed by Jacques Coeur was probably one, not of easy but of j»ossible attainment to |»cMS('V('r:inc(N industry, genius, and good rorlunc. Tlicrc are 102 SUPERNATURAL WEALTH. never wanting persons ready and willing to de- l)reciate a great man, either during his success, which excites envy, or on his downfall, when his friends fall off, and the world is disposed to listen to circumstances which bring him down to an ordinary level. There appears to be no doubt that Jacques Coeur, at all events, by the time he had reached manhood, was in the possession of a large for- tune, and was a merchant of great importance. He was married to a woman of good family, named Mac^e de Leodepart, the daughter of the provost of Bourges, who was in the house- hold of Jean, Duke de Berri, called the Magni- ficent. The brother of Jacques was a canon in the Sainte Chapelle of Bourges, and after- wards became Bishop of Lu^on. CHAPTER X. DAMASCUS. BLADES. — GREEK FIRE. — MOORISH SECRECY.— TRADE WITH THE EAST LOW ESTEEM OF TRADERS. — HOUSE OF JACQUES C(EUR. The great and patriotic object of Jacques CoQur was to elevate the commerce of France, wliicli, at the period at which he lived, was exceedingly behind that of other nations. He made many voyages in Italy and in the East, and succeeding in establishing extensive rela- tions with merchants there. Venice, Genoa, Pisa, and Florence had hitherto monoj)olised all the commerce of the ISIediterranean ; Barcelona also flourished, and had great dealings with Damascus ; but the ports of France were empty of vessels, and in a languishing condition. In a short time, by his energy and genius, the merchant of Bourges changed this state of things, and, visiting in person countries whose negotia- tions he desired to attract, he gained his object and attained the noljje end he sought. Bertrandon do hi iirocquiere, couiisiHor ami 104 DAMASCUS. first esquire, carver to Philij^pe lo Bon, Duke of Burgundy, travelled to Palestine in the year 1433, and relates, amongst his numerous adven- tures, the circumstance of his having met Jacques Coeur, in these words : " I found there* many Genoese, Venetian, Calabrian, Florentine and French merchants. The last were come thither to purchase several articles, and particularly spiceries, with the in- tention of taking them to Baruth (Beyrout), and embarking them on board the galley expected from Narbonne. Among them was Jacques Coeur, who has since acted a great part in France, and was argentier to the king. He told us that the galley was then at Alexandria, and that probably Sir Andrew (de Toulongeon) and his three companions (Pierre de Vaudrei, Geoffroi de Toisi and Jean de la Roc, who had accompanied de la Brocquiere, and meant to return home by sea,) would embark on board at Baruth." In speaking of Damascus he says: "There is a khan in the town, appropriated as a de- posit and place of safety to merchants and their sroods. It is called Khan Berkot, from its hav- ing been originally the residence of a person of that name. For my part, I believe that Berkot was a Frenchman; and what inclines me to this opinion is, that on a stone of the * In Damascus. BLADES. 105 house are carved fleurs-de-lis, which appear as ancient as the walls." It is not, perhaps, unreasonable to conclude that this stone may have been erected by one of the factors of Jacques Coeur who traded at Damascus, if not by himself. The chief commodity for which trade was carried on was for spices, although Damascus blades, furs, and many other valuables formed part of the commerce. La Brocquiere gives a particular description of the Damascus blades, "the best throughout Syria." " It is," says he, " a curious thing to see how they polish them. An operation is performed before it is tempered : they have for the pur- pose a little bit of wood, in which an iron is enclosed; this is passed over the blade to re- move irregularities, the same as with a plane those of wood are removed ; the steel is then tempered and then polished, which polish is so fine, that when a man would arrange his turban, the sword serves for a mirror. As for the tem- per, it is so perfect that no where have I seen swords that cut so well. " At Damascus also are made mirrors of steel which enlarge objects like a burning glass. I have seen some which, wlien exposed to tlie sun, pierced a i)Uuilv at fifteen or sixteen feel distance, and set it on fire." 106 GREEK FIRE. No doubt Jac(iue.s Coeur, with a mind so in- c|iiiring, took care to make himself familiar with all the secrets of the land which, as the voyager says, can be bought for money ; and if the Bur- gundian provided himself with such knowledge as he recounts, the French merchant was not behind hand in securing the same advantages to his country. One of the sons of Jacques Coeur was married to a daughter of Jean Bureau, baron of Montglat, grand master of the artillery of France ; who, with Gaspard Bureau, his brother, particularly distinguished himself in the wars against the English, and more especially at the recovery of Normandy and Guienne. There is good reason to think that whatever valuable information Jacques Coeur could impart, would not be with- held from so near a connexion; and it is very likely that some of the dangerous objects named by La Brocqui^re were made known by him to the master of the king's artillery. The following is the account given by the traveller of what he witnessed " amono-st the Moors," of rocket-practice, probably Greek fire. " The galley arrived from Alexandria two or three days afterward ; but, during this short in- terval, we witnessed a feast celebrated by the JNloors in their ancient manner. It began in the evening at sunset. Numerous companies, scat- tered here and there, were singing and uttering MOORISH SECRECY. 107 loud cries. While this was passing, the cannon of the castle were fired, and the people of the town launched into the air, ' bien hault et bien loing, une mani^re de feu plus gros que le plus gros fallot que je veisse oncques allum^,' They told me they sometimes made use of such at sea, to set fire to the sails of an enemy's vessel. It seems to me that, as it is a thing easy to be made, and of little expense, it may be equally well employed to burn a cam]) or a thatched village, or in an engagement with cavalry to frighten the horses. Curious to know its com- position, I sent the servant of my host to the person who made this fire, and requested him to teach me the method. He returned for an- swer that he dared not, for that he should run great danger were it known ; but as there is nothing a ]\Ioor will not do for money, I offered him a ducat, which quieted his fears, and he taught me all he knew, and even gave me the moulds in wood and other ingredients, which I have brought to France." At the commencement of the hostilities which preceded the conquest of Normandy by Charles VII., JNIathieu de Coussy mentions the assault of the town of Pont-Eau-de-JMer, which, after a vigorous resistance, was taken at last by tlie French, " en ])artie i)ar le moyen du feu (pie les Fran(,'ois avoient jet6 dedans." This was very likely some of those rockets 108 TRADE WITH TIIH EAST. which De la Brocquieie mentions, and wliich Jacques Cceur had no doubt introduced. The observations made by Jacques Coiur of men and things, the rai)idity of his conce]^tions, and correctness of his calculations, led him on in the way of success with unerring truth, so that he was soon able to execute a plan he had formed for the good of France, that of establisliing the trade of JNIarseilles, which city was almost ruined in consequence of the unfortunate contentions of the house of Anjou, to recover the kingdom of Naples. He made Montpellier the centre of his operations, and from thence he directed his expe- ditions. So happy were his ventures that he was soon able to arm and equip ten or twelve vessels, which he dispatched to the Levant, and wliich carried on an uninterrupted trade with Egypt. Every year his power and wealth increased, and the merchants of Italy, who had hitherto been without a rival, beheld with jealousy and amaze- ment the rapid strides he had made to fortune, and the prosperity which, through his means, was pouring into the ports of France. His credit, in the mean time, in Egypt was im- mense : his assents were received with the hi«i:hest resj)ect and consideration : they were men well chosen and trustworthy, and in the end proved themselves as devoted to their employer in the day of his reverses as they were earnest in his cause during his success. Noble, just, and liberal, LOW ESTEEM OF TRADERS. I (>!J he ol)taine(l the admiration and confidence of all those M'ith -whom he had dealings; and his influ- ence with the soldan of Egypt, on more than one occasion, was exerted in favour of his rivals, who had offended by their rapacity and want of faith. Christian traders appear, indeed, to have been held in very low esteem. " They are," says La Brocquiere, " only looked upon at Damascus with hatred. Every evening the merchants are shut up in their houses by per- sons appointed for this purpose, and the next day the doors are again opened as they see good." The traveller who relates this himself expe- rienced the inconvenience of being considered as belonofing to those Christian cities whose bad faith had gained them so evil a reputation. He was believed to be a Venetian, and was thrown into prison, from which he was only released by proclaiming himself a native of France, without specifying that he was of Burgundy. The influence of Jacques Coeur is proved by this circumstance, for doubtless it was his probity and good management that had caused the French character to be so highly esteemed above that of other nations. He is known to have fre- quently exerted his influence with the soldan to obtain a mitigation of various rigorous sentences, particularly in the case of the Venetians, whom the sovereign had driven from his dominions in the year 1442, having confiscated their jiropertv 110 HOUSE OF JACQUES C(EUR. in consequence of wrongs of which his subjects liad to complain. In the course of twenty years Jacques Coeur had more commercial power than all the rest of the merchants of the Mediterranean put together. Three hundred of his agents resided at the dif- ferent ports, not only of Europe, but of the East, and in all the nations contiguous to France. Everywhere his vessels were respected, as though he had been a sovereign prince; they covered the seas wherever commerce was to be cultivated, and from farthest Asia they brought back cloths of gold and silk, furs, arms, spices, and ingots of gold and silver, still swelling his mighty stores, and filling Europe with surprise at his adventur- ous daring, and his unparalleled perseverance. Like his great prototype, Cosmo de Medici, who, from a simple merchant, became a supreme ruler, Jacques Coeur, the Medicis of Bourges, became illustrious and wealthy, and sailed long in the favourable breeze of fortune, admired, envied, feared, and courted by all. His wealth gave rise to a proverb, long retained by the citizens of his native town : " As rich as Jacques Coeur," expressed all that could be con- ceived of prosperity and success. Popular tradi- tion asserts, that, so great was the profusion of the precious metals that he possessed, that his horses were sliod ivith silver ; a common reputa- tion, even at the present day, enjoyed by persons HOUSE OV JACQUES CfEUR. Ill of singular woaltli. The adornment of Bourses, where he was born, was not one of the least ]iro- jeets of the great merchant, and having, with a large sum, purchased a considerable tract of land in the town, he began, in 1443, to build that magnificent mansion which still remains a noble relic of his taste and wealth. CHAPTER XI. HOUSE OF JACQUES C(EUR DESCRIBED. — CHAPEL. SECRET CHAM- BERS. MYSTERY. VAULTS. ROOFS. FURNITURE OF THE PERIOD. It was with the intention of erecting a man- sion for his family that Jacques Coeur bought of Jacques Belin, for the sum of one thousand two hundred old crowns, that is sixty-four to the 7narc, the fief of La Chaussee, then a tower situated in the court of the Hotel de Limoges. He then built the tower which looks towards the Place Berry, and between these two towers was erected the main body of the hotel. The whole erection cost him one hundred and thirty-five thousand livres. The plan of the building is extremely irregular, for the space was somewhat confined, on one side being hemmed in by the ancient Roman ramparts, and on the other, by the wooden houses of the JACQUES CCEUR'S HOUSE AT BOURGKS. 113 town. The two fa evades of the mansion were in different characters ; tliat on the rampart side being somewhat fortified, three towers being- erected here at nnequal distances, and of different forms. One only is ornamented by a balustrade, the others are now of various heights, and present nothing imposing to the eye. From the street the house has entirely a peace- able aspect ; it is of stone, and has nothing to indicate defence. On one side there is a pavilion flanked by a small tower, surmounted by orna- mental carving in i\\Q Jiamboyant style. Between these runs a balcony, with a rich open balustrade, in which may be read the remarkable sentence constantly repeated in different parts of the house, "S baillantsi cocur^ ricu impo^^iblc." On each side of this beautiful balcony are two false windows, half open, from each of which a figure in stone, one male the other female, as large as life, is seen bending forward, as if look- ins: into the street on the watch. These fisrures have been puzzling to most persons to ex})lain : popular tradition calls them Jean de Village the faithful factor, and his wife, the niece of Jacques Coeur. In the central pavilion is a beautiful chapel of singularly small dimensions, where there scarcely appears room for the merchant, his wife, and liis children (o have been assembled. No (loiil»l, I 114 JACQUES C(EUR'S iiousi<: therefore, the other members of his household were placed in an adjoining gallery. There is a fine twisted stair-case leading to this chapel, which is, in itself, one of the most exqui- site pieces of ornamented architecture imaginable. The ceiling is covered with frescoes of such ex- treme beauty and finish, that they are worthy of the pencil of Hemling, or Jean de Bruges. They represent angels in white robes, on a vivid blue* ground of great intensity, covered with scattered stars of gold, still shining in the greatest purity The stars are in relief and the gold as bright as if newly applied. The figures are most gracefully drawn, and the draperies are bold and grand ; but nothing can surpass the beauty of the heads, which really give an idea of heavenly attractions ; all are varied, and the attitude of each is of singular and admirable grace. These lovely beings hold bande- roles, which sweep from one to the other in a thou- sand curves, and they are inscribed with sentences from scripture. To this oratory the master of the house and his wife had access from their own apartments. There is a fire-place, and a fine win- dow still retaining a portion of beautiful painted glass. No doubt it Mas fitted up with every at- tention to comfort, as much as any tribune in a modern private chapel. * The offer of a large sum of money was made by an artist to the authorities for the fine ultramarine of this ceiling, but fortunately it was rejected. AT BOURGES. 115 Instead of priests and choristers, the frequen- ters of the beautiful place are now clerks and scriveners, and the visitor who wishes to explore it disturbs half a dozen functionaries from their occupations, for it is divided into several portions connected with the mairie. From the chapel, on each side, both towards the street and the court yard, project niches or tribunes, once exquisitely ornamented, although a good deal of the sculptured foliage is now de- stroyed, and unfortunately the figures for which they were erected are gone. One Mas an eques- trian statue of Charles VII. armed at all points ; and the other was Jacques Coeur, mounted on a mule, whose feet were shod the wrong umy. This mystery has never been explained, like many others in the house. This beautiful specimen of art in the middle ages, even in its present state, is most admirable and valuable ; the ignorance of the Revolution- ists, who could not distinguish friend from foe, and directed their vengeance as much against one as the other, caused these two fine statues to be destroyed; and the tribunes where they stood are now void. There is something similar on the facade of the palace of Blois, where the figures of Louis XII. and Anne of Brittany appear in a j)rojecting niche over the grand entrance. The house, even in its present state, is justly considered one of the most remarkable speci- I 2 116 JACQUES C(EUll'S HOUSE mens of the style of tliat age, exliibited in private dwellino-s; it was constructed, in some measure, on the plan of those which the pro- prietor had observed and admired in Venice and the East ; but there is an originality alto- gether peculiar in the building, which makes it stand alone as a work of art, worthy of the admiration of Europe. Although time and neg- lect and modern repair have dealt hardly with this beautiful structure, there is enough remaining to excite the highest interest and admiration, and to make the desolate old town of Bourges worthy of being a place of pilgrimage to the traveller of taste. After passing through the principal entrance towards the street by a vaulted porte-cochere, with a low door at the side which conducts to the chapel tower, a spacious court-yard is entered, round which stand the buildings which compose the mansion, every part of which is so elaborately finished, that it requires much time and attention to do justice to the beautiful details. The chief entrance tower, of an octagon form, is encrusted with stone pictures, exquisitely executed, of orange, palm, and cocoa-nut trees, to indicate the merchant's trade in eastern lands : and on the ground between these trees are certain flowers, probably first introduced by him into France. Over every door is a re])resentation of some scene indicative of the use to which the chamber was xVT 150URGES. 117 put to wliicli it led ; for instance, tliat over the kitchen entrance represents a scene of cooking. Under many of the finely decorated windows are similar ornaments, all in the best style of art. The chief device of Jacques Coeur occurs con- stantly in every part of the building, together with many others, secret and mysterious and un- explained. On many of the walls and windows may even now be read, not only the celebrated motto which the persevering merchant lind ado))ted, " A vaillants cciours vicii ini])ossll>le," 118 CHAPEL. but that of " faire, dire, taire," is frequently met with, and that of "taire" repeated alone. An- other, expressive of some knowledge kept from vulgar view, is "en bouche close n'entre mouche;" sometimes the words " taire de ma joie " are in- troduced amidst figures of hearts and cockle- shells, to express Jacques, the pilgrim or voyager, and Coeur. Like the famous E. S., and all the mottoes of the Countess of Shrewsbury, at Hard- wick Hall in Derbyshire, which are introduced in painting and in stone from the high parapet to the basement of her fine dwelling, so do the hearts and shells of Jacques Coeur appear scat- tered all over his house, speaking eternally of the architect of his own fortune. In one of the stone compartments still remaining, he appears in a rich garb covered with hearts and shells, accompanied by his lady in a habit of ceremony ; he holds in one hand a mason's hammer, and presents to his wife a bouquet with the other. This is seen over the grand tower staircase, where there are ten other figures in a kind of frame of stone. Over the door of the chapel are four bas-re- liefs of figures, representing priests and choristers and beggars asking alms, mass being performed, and a lady and attendants proceeding to prayers with their books, a child opening the chapel door for them, having his finger on his lip to enjoin silence, and over another door is an Adoration with holy personages and angels. THE MYSTERIOUS SCULPTURE. 119 Then come orange and olive trees, roses and wreaths, and mottoes in profusion, with grotesqne figures, having asses' ears and grinning faces and heads, crowned with a fool's cap. There was no want of private ways in this remarkable dwelling. One in particular is so mysterious in its cha- racter, that it deserves especial mention : none of the bas-reliefs which adorned this, a secret cham- ber leading from the study of the merchant, are, unfortunately, now in existence, but drawings re- main of them very curious and interesting. They seem to tell so extraordinary a tale, that a curious theory might be founded upon them. If Jacques Coeur possessed a secret of great importance, he evidently found it impossible to conceal it with- in his own breast, and has sculptured it on his walls in a manner to excite the most intense curiosity, without satisfying the inquirer. Who the characters are whom he has depicted, it is impossible to do more than guess at ; they stand thus : — A figure in the dress in which Jacques Coeur is usually represented, that is, in a furred gown and chain, and wearing a headdress of a turban shape with long ends, is cautiously, but with ra- pid steps, approaching a tree, whether a seurelle^^ or not, it is not easy to determine ; a lady is re- clining beneath this tree, and slic looks towards * The device of Agnes Sorel. 120 TIIR MYSTERIOUS SCULPTOR K. him as if in expectation. Her liand is raised to her head, apparently to remove a crown which she wears. Not far off, but placed a little in the back ground, is another tree, peeping through the branches of which appears a crowned and bearded head, and above a banderole, the in- scription on which is effaced ; this face is full of surprise and anxiety, and is reflected in a foun- tain at the foot of the tree. At the opposite extremity of the bas-relief, which appears to have run round the chamber continuously, is a third tree, behind which is seen a fool, with bauble, cap? and bells ; his finger is placed on his grinning mouth, and he seems looking on and enjoying the scene before him. In the borders, which make a sort of frame to the picture, are the usual favourite mottoes of " dire, faire, taire," and "en bouche close n'entre mouche." It is not impossible that this sculpture was executed after Jacques Coeur's memory was re- established, and perhaps at the same time as those two strange figures in the windows looking over the street; if so, the statue, on the mule shod the wrong way, of the argentier himself, may also have replaced another ; but yet there appears every reason to suppose that all these inexplicable sculptures were erected in the life- time of the first master. However, as a great many papers and parch- ments, formerly in the hotel, have been destroyed SALLE DU TRESOR. 1'21 and cast into corners, the real explanation of tiic riddle is not likely to come to light, unless some very active researches are entered into, a circum- stance much to be desired. The fool in this sculptured enigma holds his bauble in one hand, and with the other is try- ing to catch flies which are running up a tree, on which a bird is quietly seated. Jacques Coeur appears in full costume, his sur- coat bordered with minever, and his dagger by his side; he points with one hand to a fountain at the foot of an oak tree, where is seen reflected the crowned head which ajipcars above amongst the branches. The reclining female figure is in a court costume, and in a very negligent attitude. The collar or necklace she wears is covered with magnificent jewels of great richness. The scene seems to pass in a wood or garden, for there are several trees and a profusion of flowers on the ground. The air of secret meaning given to the argen- tier, the anxious exi)ression of the crowned head in the tree, and the jester's scofl^ng and sinister smile, all excite the most intense curiosity and interest. This mysterious chamber is on the third story of the largest tower, originally Roman, as its first story indicates by the remains of Roman brick it exhibits; Jacques Coeur himself built up the remainder, which is singulailv irreuular; 1 22 MYSTERY. and here he ostal)lislied his own private cabinet, which is that containing tlie singular sculpture de- scribed, and which is called the Salle du Tr^sor. The door has a frame work of iron of great thickness, covered with plates of the same me- tal, contrived with great art to close over each other : on this is a secret lock of the most com- plicated construction ; the hinges of the door were concealed, so that if the key of this extra- ordinary lock were by chance left inside when the door was closed, there w^ould be no way of entrance but by demolishing the wall of the room. The corbels which support the mouldings of the arches of the ceiling, represent angels hold- ing, one a scroll, others a guitar, a shield, and a sort of lantern. The arms of the master are also there. This hall is lighted by two windows divided into two parts, one of these has a stone seat in the embrasure, formed out of the thick- ness of the wall ; and there is a simple fire-place between the two ; opposite this formerly stood an immensely large press, unfortunately destroyed to give place to one more convenient for the papers kept here. The flooring of this room is formed of several large squares of stone, but where this press stood, the pavement was simply laid in ranges, which seems to prove that this piece of furniture was there from the time of the construction of the chamber. MYSTERY. 123 It was behind this press, on its removal, that the sculpture, which throws so mysterious an in- terest over this part of the building, was found. That part which has been preserved is a kind of corbel, and is in very high relief, detached, as it were, from the wall in a most surprising manner ; part of one of the trees is broken, as well as the lady's crown, and the lower part had been cut so as to admit the press described. More of these picture-secrets might have ex- isted, and might have served to explain the rest; ])ut these are all that are known, and they tell nothing. Could they relate to some secret at- tachment between the friend of Charles VTI. and the beautiful Agnes ? or between the adven- turous merchant and the Queen herself? Yet 124 VAULTS.— ROOFS. wliy be so inc*aiiti and magnificence : and here, doubtless, the king of Bourges and his heroes often feasted, and the fair Agnes heard her praises sung. None of the windows of this edifice are in a line, a circumstance frequently observable in houses and castles of this period : but here this peculiarity is evidently the effect of design, as it appears to have been the wish of the architect to create sur})rises and contrasts of every kind, wherever he had an opportunity of doing so. GLASS. 129 The doors are all of ditterent heights, and some extremely low and narrow; so that in one or two instances there seems scarcely room for two persons to enter at the same time. One of the three doors of entrance leads by a long vaulted passage to the place Berry from the court: the passage inclines considerably, and is very dark and narrow. The modern oaken doors of the chief entrance, well imitated from the old, are studded with nails, all in the form of hearts : the original doors still, however, exist, and the wood of which they are made is finely sculptured, far beyond the modern workmanship which su])plies them, al- though it is a sufficiently faithful copy. They are carved in an open pattern, with endless hearts and shells, and an exquisitely graceful centre-piece. In one of the folds of these doors is a wicket with a beautifully carved iron grating and a knocker, worked with extreme delicacy. There are still several fragments and squares of coloured glass left, the most curious of which are the following : — The square is surrounded by a wreathed scroll, on which the favourite motto, "A vaillants coeurs rien impossible," is inscribed, as well as the words " faire, taire, dire, de ma joie." The shield of Jacques Coeur, with its hearts and shells, is encompassed by a garland of hearts and fea- thers and orange branches with their flowers, all K 130 MOTTOES AND DEVICES. in various colours; and above are figures, on each side of a column, one representing a per- sonage in a jester's habit, wearing a green dress and a yellow hood with large ears ; the mouth of the figure is closed by a padlock, to which the hand points, and round a scroll which curls near is read the legend, " En ])ouche close n'entre mouche." The fool holds a bauble sur- mounted by a goat's head. Behind him appears part of a door. The other figure is in blue, with a red collar turned down, and he has also a hood with large ass's ears ; behind him is a branch of orange tree with two oranges, and part of the panel of a wall. This figure has his left hand placed on his breast, and in his right he holds a scroll on which the word " Taire" appears, and in its other fold is seen " E. S." and " Toi." In the first letter of the word "Dire" a profile which seems feminine is introduced, and in an "O" occurs the same. The arms are contrary to the rules of heraldry, — colour on colour, and metal on metal ; but this was probably to suit the effect of the glass paint- ing. Another square is damasked all over the ground which bears the shield, and is surrounded by fea- thers and hearts in a graceful garland ; below are white flowers with yellow leaves, and in one compartment a Cupid is lying playing on the THE MAIRIE. 131 .trumpet; on eacli side stands a wand, surmount- ed by two feathers, red and blue, which en- close a golden shell ; round each wand is twisted a scroll bearing the inscription " Dire, faire de mayme." These mottoes and devices may, perhaps, allude to the alchemical knowledge of Jacques Coeur : the feathers may typify the famous eastern bird spoken of by the poets of Persia and Arabia, as having a mysterious existence, only known to adepts in science ; and the flowers were jirobably brought by the merchant from far climes, and then first introduced into France. The oranges, no doubt, are emblematic of his traffic in cli- mates where they grew, and there is little doubt that he was the means of making them well known in the south of France. This superb abode of the great merchant now belongs to the town of Bourges as the JNIairie. On the 8th of October, 1501, Jacques Coeur, the gi'andson of the argcntier, sold the fief and the Hotel de la Chauss(^e to Antoine Turpin, Sicur de Nozay, for the sum of 15,000 livres, and fifteen ells of black velvet, and fourteen ells of camclot : a curious circumstance, demonstrative of the value of such merchandise at the period, but somewhat laughable, according to modern notions, in an agreement for the price of a domicile. In 1538 Francois Chambellan, commissioner K 2 132 THE MATRIE. of war, came into possession of the mansion, in right of Claude Turpin, his wife. Claude dc I'Aub^pine, secretary of state, ac- quired it in December, 1552, from Frangois Chambellan, Sieur de la Garonne^ and Jean de Sauzay, Sieur de Moulet. It was sold by a decree passed on Charles de I'Aub^pino, Marquis de Clia- teauneuf, and adjudged, the 13th of May, 1679, to Jean Baptiste Coll)ert, minister of state, who granted it in January, 1682, to the mayor and sheriffs of Bourges. It was accepted the 22nd of the following February, in a general assembly of the inhabitants, on the condition of paying a golden crown annually to the marquisate of Cha- teauneuf, and to furnish the lord of Chateauneuf every four years, when the mayor of Bourges was changed, a silver medal worth ten livres, on one of the sides of which should be the arms of the Marquis de Chateauneuf, and on the other those of the town of Bourges, with an inscription of the names of the lord of Chateauneuf and the mayor of Bourges, and, besides this, a premium of 33,000 livres.-" * The remarks of M. Michelet on the subject of Jacques Coeur and his house are so much in accord with the impression produced on my own mind by the latter, however I may ven- ture to differ with him in some points respecting the former, tliat I feel unwilling to withhold them from the reader in the original, the style of M. Michelet being too characteristic to permit of the same spirit being conveyed in any translation. — See Appendix. GARDENS OF JACQUES CCEUR. 133 Although the art of gardening had not arrived at great perfection in the fifteenth century, the rich merchant, whose frequent visits to the East had familiarised him with the rose gardens of Damascus, no doubt did all that the know- ledge of his time allowed to embellish his fine domicile with all the skill that could be procured in this department. Wlien the ancient defences of the town were destroyed, and the ditches filled up, the argentier caused a part of the ground attached to his newly erected mansion to be formed into a gar- den. Where it once bloomed is now the place called De Berry : it would be more appropriate- ly named Place de TArgentier, as the market square before the house is still called Place de Jacques Cceur. CHAPTER XII. FUENITURE OF THE PERIOD. — HOUSE AT MONTPELLIER. — TUE LODGE. — BUREAU OF THE TREASURY, ROYAL GRATITUDE. NECROMANCY. Not only was the furniture at this period, and for many years before, of extreme richness, and exliibiting the most refined taste, but the ceilings of rooms were ornamented with sculpture of the most elaborate beauty. They were often made of Irish oak, and the walls of the apartments were of the same material, costly and durable. It was also the custom to have small, portable staircases, which may explain the mystery which frequently suggests itself in the ruins of feudal castles, where, except certain towers and chambers, all the rooms appear inaccessible, as no vestiges of staircases remain. These were of wood, in the form of a tower, sometimes extremely delicate. FURNITURE. 135 Monteil speaks of one not more than three feet in diameter, as being worked in the most exqui- site manner, and perfectly transparent, with sculj)- tured forms of the smallest and most fairy-like workmanship. The bedsteads, chairs, benches, all were adorned with similar sculpture, and this minute style was called menuiserie de la petite cognce. It was, ho^\■- ever, except in state rooms or on state occasions, the custom to use coffers as seats ; probably the chairs belonged more particularly to the ladies, for whom these coffers must have offered no very comfortable resting-places. In the account of expenses in the palace of Charles VI. coffers are mentioned as beino: of wood, covered with leather, and closed with se- veral locks : these were destined to hold the robes of the lord or lady of the mansion; they were lined with cloth, and adorned with brass nails in devices. Sometimes the leather coverings were coloured very richly; and the effect must have been good, when they were ranged along the walls on occasion of a numerous assembly. In his superb abode at Bourges Jacques Ca3ur doubtless lived in all the splendour which his great riches and the magnificent tastes which he was able to indulge warranted. It is said that no utensil used in his house was of inferior metal to silver, and that the display of his plate on even ordinary occasions was almost incredibly 13G HOUSE AT MONTPELLIEII. grand. This was one of the circumstances cited against him in his reverse of fortune, although it was, considering his extensive means, openly ac- counted for as the produce of many years' suc- cessful trading, by no means extraordinary in the richest subject in France, able to purchase back a kingdom for his sovereign. Of the house of the great merchant at JNJont- pellier, which was probably equally magnificent with that of Bourges, there is nothing now re- maining. It is described by Borel as very cu- rious, and bore the name of " La Loge," by which it would seem probable that Jacques Coeur be- longed to the fraternity of Freemasons ; indeed, his being represented on the friezes of his house with a trowel in his hand gives indication of the fact. It is thus that the historian of the " Anti- quites Gauloises" mentions the residence alluded to: — " With respect to ' La Loge' at Montpellier, which lie built, three portals may there be seen in the form oi furnaces, similar to those of Ni- colas Flamel. On one there is on one side a sun all over fleurs-de-lis, and on the other a full moon, also covered with fleurs-de-lis, and sur- rounded by a hedge or crown, as it were, of thorns, which seems to denote the solar and lunar stone arrived at perfection, " On another portal is seen, on one side a fruit tree with branches, of roses at its foot, and on THE LODGE. 137 tlio tree the arms of Jacques Coeur; on the other there is an escutcheon, and within it what wouhl appear to present tlie chymic character of the sun. " On the third portal, which is in the midst, there is, on one side, a stag bearing a banner, and havino* a collar of fleurs-de-lis, environed with a branch of a tree, which represents JMcrcury, or the philosophical matter, which at the commence- ment is volatile and light as in the stag; on the other side is a shield of France, supported by two griffins. "All this is enriched by colours and inscrip- tions, which must be seen in order to explain them. " Adjoining the Lodge is a house which likewise belonged to Jacques Cceur, where may be seen on the outside of the wall a winged figure with- out a head, which, in consequence of the large- ness of the neck, appears as if it had supported two, and might thus have represented the andro- (jtpie of philosophers. There are ermines in the left hand of this figure, to indicate its dignity." I cannot agree with a modern author, who alto- gether repudiates the idea of these scul])tures re})resenting symbolical figures of the great icork, because the search for the philosopher's stone was a mania of the time, and I think it by no means unreasonable that Borel should thus interpret them. Tliere was considerable aftinity. 138 BUREAU OF THE TREASURY. too, between the seekers after the great secret and the associated brothers of the masonic art. Mystery was at this period the very keystone of all knowledge, and every sort of ingenuity was employed to make that which was clear as dim as possible, and that which was diffi- cult more so. The great power possessed by Jacques Coeur in the East w^as, doubtless, as- sisted by the reputation he enjoyed of superior knowledge, and his character as an adept and a mason would, of course, greatly facilitate his designs. His house at Montpellier was certainly the chief depot of his merchandise, and from the large platform which extended along the top of the building he was accustomed to watch the arrival of his vessels from the Levant, which dis- charged their cargoes at the port of Lates, for from that height the wide sea could be plainly surveyed by the expectant merchant. In 1737 the fai^ade of the house next to " La Loge'' was still standing, and was the bureau of the treasurers of France. It was built of the same stone, and was in the same taste as the Lodge itself. A benefactor wherever he appeared, Jacques Coeur was particularly so to the town of INIont- pellier, which, through his care and at his ex- pense, was plentifully supplied with good water. To this end he caused search to be made on the ROYAL GRATITUDE. 139 neighbouring hills for all the springs that might exist there, Lad them all collected into a solid reservoir, from whence the waters issued into a wide canal, in order to be conveyed into the Font Putanelle,* in the town. The arms of Jacques Coeur, says Aigrefeuille, in his *' History," similar to those on the walls of La Loge, may still be seen on the fountain ; they are what is called " par- lantes ;" " savoir, trois coeurs, deux et un, a la face chargee de trois coquilles." The water thus supplied is so abundant that it is never exhausted, and so pure that it is re- sorted to during violent heats as having sanatory properties. After the disgrace of his friend, the king gave the Lodge to the merchants of Montpellier, Mitli permission to efface the arms of Jacques Coeur, and to substitute those of France ; but it seems that the townsmen of the great merchant had more feeling and more gratitude than the monarch, who wished to wipe out all memory of the be- nefits he had received. The citizens added the fleurs-de-lis, and placed their own cognizance of a tortoise ; but the hearts and shells of the former proprietor remained in the house of him to whom they felt themselves so much indebted. After the Revolution of 1789 the Lod^e was sold as national i)roperty, and purchased by an iiulividual who rebuilt it almost entirely, carry- * From the Liitiii word jikUih!, a well. 140 NECROMANCY. iiig out the wish of Charles le Bien Servi, by effacing all record whatever of his argentier. That a man possessing so much wealth and consequent power as Jacques Coeur should be looked upon by the commonalty as the master of supernatural knowledge, is by no means surpris- ing: when the time in which he lived is consi- dered. The instances are innumerable, of men of genius being regarded with awe as necromancers; and when it was plain that he held in his hand a wand which could conjure obedience from the great soldan himself, it is not singular that his wealth was thought to be a product of the stone of power, and his genius the gift of the spirits who obeyed him. CHAPTER Xni. THE DINING HALL. — BUFFETS. — TUE TABLE. LIGHTS. FRAN- CHEB. LA NAPPE BANQUETS. ARTISTS IN FRANCE. FOUC- QUET AND MELLIN. Although the kino^ of Bouim'S was unal>lo, during liis forced sojourn in that capital of his little dominion, to exhibit the splendour Mhioli shone in his mother's court wlien at the height of extravagance, yet it only required funds sucli as Jacques Coeur actually possessed, to enable the great at that period to enjoy conveniences and luxuries Mhich would not shame a modern estab- lishment. It was in their table in particular that the noblemen of that day delighted to dis})lay their wealth and taste. They indulged in contests of the most absurd expense; and all the rigour of the sumptuary laws, which it was found necessary to renew at the commencement of every reign, was unable to curb the torrent of tlie frenetic prodigality which ruined so many. 142 THE DINING-IIALL. In fact, (observes a moflom French writer, there was no way for a great lord, shut up in his fortress in the country, to make an exhibition of his riches, except by displaying his heaps of gold and silver plate. This generally occurred on the occasion of some magnificent entertainment, an- nounced long before it took place, and to which were invited all the nobles and gentry in the country where his castle was situated. The eating-hall was almost always the most spacious apartment in the castle. On the walls, which were covered with tapestry, w^ere figured scenes taken from the most favourite fablieaux and romances of chivalry. If there were no car- pets on the floors, they were neatly strewn with rushes or flowers, and sometimes had mats, plaited with some ingenuity; indeed, it is not to be sup- posed, that an art, known to the most savage nations, should fail to be exercised by a people who were evidently sufficiently acquainted with the means of enjoyment and comfort. In the centre of the dining-hall, then, stood the long table, destined for substantial display ; and, at the other end, the dressoir, or diifet, or evidence, as these sideboards were called. They were sometimes to the number of three, one for silver, one for silver gilt, and one for gold. Disposed in shelves, one rising above another, they sus- tained rich basins and dishes and vases, enrich- ed with precious stones, objects merely used, BUFFETS. 143 as in moflern clays, for cxliil)ition. These buffets, of wliioli many are vet rcmaininf^, and of which one of the finest collections is still to be seen in the interesting Hotel de Cluny at Paris, were formed of very precious and rare wood, and covered with the most elaborate carving, the per- fection of which has amazed the eyes of amateurs after the lapse of centuries, for, in spite of the ])oasted improvement of art, nothing so original or so beautiful can now be accomplished. Although to cover any part of such marvels appears to be an absurdity, no means of osten- tations display was allowed to escape, and occa- sionally these fine pieces of furniture were hung with cloth of gold. A buffet-cover, worked in gold, was presented by the town of Orleans to the emperor Charles IV., which was worth no less than 8000 livres tournois. In France, the custom of exhibiting this piece of furniture in dining-rooms is con- fined to the peasantry in the remote provinces : in Brittany, for instance, the armoire holds an important place in a menage ; and in our own country the display on a sideboard still forms a very conspicuous portion of a modern entertain- ment. It is not to be supposed that the board Mas left bare; on the contrary, the doiihlier was another vehicle for the evidence of riches, being worked in the most elalmrate patterns, and of 144 THE TABLE. singular fineness and beauty. Tliis clotli covered the whole table ; and at the end of the repast, pages came round with napkins and an acquiere, which were offered to each of the guests to wash with. Before every person was a plate, either of silver or enamelled china, always very costly ; and beside that, the coupe, hanap, estamore, quart, or whatever else the drinking- vessel was called, according to its properties, for some were very remarkable. For instance, there were cups, of which a specimen is in the museum at Bourges, curiously Avorked at the edges, out of which it required much ingenuity to drink, as the pipes which conveyed the liquor to the lips of the drinker were concealed in the pattern, and if lifted up at the wrong side, no doubt, by the spilling of the wine, caused infinite mirth amongst the assembled diners. Another cup was formed to create similar hilarity, for it was, according to description, formed like an hour-glass, and being filled at both ends, the guest was ex- pected to drink off the contents of each end without spilling a drop ; how this was contrived, appears indeed a mystery. There were little bell-shaped glasses for liqueurs, placed by the side of the large ones. The knives were elaborately adorned at the handles; and some of them, which have been preserved to our times, were Mrought in extremely graceful patterns. The points of these knives TIIK TABLE. 145 were rounded, of course for the greater conve- nience of conveying meats to the moutli. The salt-cellars were important appendages to the table, as above or below where they were placed indicated the place of honour and its de- gree. These pieces of plate were always very rich, as also was the moiitardier, which it was the office of one of the attendants to hand or wheel round the table during the repast. It some- times weighed twenty marks. At the two extremities of the table were dishes called surtouts, which exhibited in silver or in enamel alto-relievo representations of dif- ferent condiments : they M'ere for show ; by which it appears that the modern fashion of handing round the dishes which are to be eaten of must have been practised at that period. Here and there amidst the dishes were placed fountains, which continued playing either wine, rose-water, or orange-flower-water, difliising a pleasant odour round. The vase holding these essences was called clepsydre, and was supplied with sufficient liquid to last during the repast : it was usually crowned by a vase of flowers, and must have been pecu- liarly elegant, and deserves to be adopted at the present day. With respect to forks, they do not ai)pear to have been common, but cannot be suj)posed unknown, as especial mention is made of both forks and L 146 TIIK LIGHTS, spoons ill the inventory of tlw jewels of Charles V. of France, who possessed no less than forty-three forks and spoons of gokl, adorned witli precious stones. In a detailed account of the reception of the Archduke by Louis XI. the same are noticed. The spoon-handles were beautifully carved in ivory, and might perhaps have been introduced from the East ; of course, therefore, there was no want of them in the establishment of Jacques Coeur, nor of enamel and filigree cups: the fa- shion, indeed, of ornamented knife-handles might have also been brought by the great merchant from the same region. The poet Regnier, in speaking of an ill-natured man, says of him, Dont la maussade mine Ressemble un de ces dieux des couteaux de la Chine. The light at these repasts was furnished by pages who stood round the table, each bearing- torches in superb candelabra of gold or silver : in later times these candlesticks were placed on pedestals of various forms. Cellini made twelve golden figures, of great height, to hold lights for Francis I., which were no doubt ranged beside the board at festivals. But there was a custom which by no means belonged to festivity, and which was an affront that nothing but blood could wash away. The consternation which it must have created amongst the guests may be easily imagined, when an offended lord took the oi)portuiiity of giving so TllANClIER LA xN'APPF-. WINES. 147 startling- a hint to one of their number, tliat his welcome had ceased. There is an expression peculiar to the early portion of the middle ages, trancher la nappe, which is thus explained : — A herald was de- spatched to the table, who was directed to cut in two that part of the douhlier which was before the offending party, and to overturn his bread and his cup. This was a signal of hos- tility never misunderstood, and what followed may be readily conceived. With such preparations for conviviality, it is natural to inquire what were those ftmious wines so much prized in this age. Infusions of herbs were common, which would seem to infer that the flavour of the vintage was not so delicate as that of modern produce : 'pimpernelle aronia- tisante was placed in the cups, on which wine, probably hot, was poured ; and this was doubt- less a winter drink. Clarctte, a name common to English ears, but unrecognised in France, was not simple vin de Bordeaux, but a sort of hy- dromel, composed of wine mixed with honey. The vin (TArbois was a great favourite, and seems to have possessed the qualities of cham- pagne; but Beaune and iNlacon were famed then as now ; and the wines of Bar Saint Pourcain, of the Loire, of Saint Jangon, Garlardon, Gre- nache, muscadine wines, and others, are spoken of as held in esteem. L 2 148 BANQUETS. Music sounded during the repasts, the instru- ments used being the rebeck, the contreviole, the lute, the tynipanon, and the musette of Poitou, not unlike the Highland bagpipe. A jester was always at table, whose office it was to keep up continued merriment ; and the feast concluded by a fresh donner a laver, spices, and the grace cup, which was the most potent of all that had gone before. This maitresse coupe sometimes held three bottles, and was quaffed to the health of those most dear. The Wiederkom of the Ger- mans was of similar dimensions and destination. The splendours of a banquet in the fifteenth century are curiously exhibited in the following details of an entertainment offered by Gaston, Infant of Navarre, on the occasion of his mar- riage with a daughter of Charles VII., then, in 1458, in possession of all his rights, and no longer obliged to generous and devoted friends for even his daily bread : — " Prince Gaston made the most triumphant banquet that ever had been seen before. In the great hall of St. Julian, at Tours, had been pre- pared twelve tables, each of them containing seven ells in length, and two and a half in breadth. At the first table was seated the kins: and the chief princes of the blood, as also the queen and the daughters of France. The maitres d'hotel were the Counts Gaston de Foix, de Dunois, de la IMarche, and the great seneschal BANQUETS. 1 49 or steward of Normandy. The first service was made with wliite hypocras and toasts; the second consisted of boiled ivcll fatted capom^, and f/am- mons of Jxicon, accompanied with seven kinds of broths or pottages, all in dishes of silver, each service for the several tables having a hundred and fifty silver dishes. The third course was of meats roasted, yet not any other but pheasants, partridges, conies, peacocks, bitterns, herons, bus- tards, green geese, woodcocks, swans, teal, and all kind of fowls of the river that could be thought on. Besides, in this service, were like- wise wild goats, harts or stags, with all manner of venisons. After this, twelve men brought (as an intercourse) a castle, with four goodly towers at four corners, erected upon a rock : in the midst of the castle stood a great tower, in form of a donjon, which had four windows, in which were placed four beautiful ladies richly apparelled ; at other four windows stood four gallant young boys, singing most sweetly before the presence ; and, to speak truly, this intercourse seemed a terrestrial Paradise, for on the tops and pinnacles of the towers and donjon were fixed the es- cutcheons and banners of France richly painted and emblazoned in colour, as also the devices of King Charles VII., and the order of the star in white and carnation. " The fourth service consisted of fowls, as well great as small, the whole being sumptuously !;')() BANQUETS. gilded. Tills was followed by a second inter- course in the shape of a boast called a ty(jei\ which, by cunning art, disgorged fire from his mouth and nostrils : about his neck was a rich collar, whereat hung the arms and devices of the king, very richly and curiously formed. This was carried by six men, each of them having a mandiUion and bonnet made after the fashion of Bearne; and they danced before the lords and ladies, according to the manner of the coun- try, which moved much mirth and laughter : and this intercourse was commended, above all the rest, in regard of the new dancing. "The fifth service was of pies, tarts, dishes of cream, orangeades, and citrons, confected. Then came another intercourse, which was a great hill or mountain, borne by men : on the mountain stood two fair artificial fountains; from the one flowed abundantly rose-water, and from the other musk-water, yielding an admirable smell over all the hall. From divers quarters and parts of the said mountain issued forth young living conies, and sundry kinds of small birds ; and in hollow places of the hill stood four youths and a dam- sel, attired like savages, who came forth at a passage in the rock, dancing, by good direction, an excellent morisco before the assembly. " This being done. Count Gaston caused to be given to the heralds and trumpets, who waited and sounded all the dinner-time, two hundred BANQUETS. 151 crowns, besides ten ells of velvet to the king of arms of the order, to make him a robe. "The next service was of red ij)0cras, witli wafers of divers sorts ; and then came, carried in, a man mounted on horseback, very artificially fonned, and attired in crimson velvet, but the whole consisting of goldsmiths' work. Tu the midst was a small garden, and therein stood n poet, gathering all kinds of roses, and other flowers, made of wax, which he delivered to the ladies, who made high esteem of such presents. " The seventh service was of ijiocras, and con- fections made in the forms of lions, swans, harts, and such like ; and each of them wore the arms and devices of the king. " After which was carried a living peacock in a goodly great ship. The peacock carried about his neck the arms of the Queen of Navarre. Round about the ship were banderoles, containing the arms of all the princesses and ladies of the court, who were not meanly proud that the count had so highly honoured them. " In the midst of the hall was a scaftbld, where- on were concerts of singular voices, with all kinds of instruments. After the banquet Count Gaston caused to be openly ]iroclaimed a joust for all comers on the 18th of June next following, with articles and conditions such as are usual in jousts and tournaments." "'' * Favine's Theatre (if Honour. 1 52 BANQUETS. WIicii the time consumed in tlicse entertain- ments is considered, the heat, the noise, and tlie crowd, it is not surprising to read, that, on the occasion of similar feasts given in honour of Isabeau de Baviere on her triumphal entry into Paris, both tlie queen and several of the prin- cesses fainted away before the close of the day's festivities, and the king was obliged to command the halls to be cleared to give them air. At a grand banquet given by Duke Philip of Burgundy and other princes at Lille, in 1453, on occasion of the vows they made to go to Turkey to fight against the infidels, some of the entremets are described by De Coussy, with great satisfaction, as singularly superb. Amongst others, he mentions, that at the opening of the grand door there entered " a monster, or lutin, strangely disfigured ; for he was made in his lower parts like a grifiin, all hairy, with great nails to his hands and feet, and his upper parts appeared as those of a man. He was dressed in green silk, striped with white; his jacket close to his body, and the hood attached to it : his face and beard were in strange fashion, and he carried in his hands two arrows and a target, and on his head he had a man standing up on his feet, who sustained himself by his two hands on the shoulders of the said monster, who was mounted on a wild boar, great and marvellous to behold, which was very richly covered with green silk. ARTISTS IN FRANCE. 153 according with the habiliments of the said mon- ster, icho appeared to me a most strange persmiage. Then, after he had made the circuit of the liall, he returned from whence he had come." At the period when Jacques Coeur erected his splendid house at Bourges there was no want of artists in France, cither native, or attracted from Italy by the certainty of adequate reward for their labours. The custom of illuminating books with gorgeous colours and gold caused many of these artists to employ their talents on those minute subjects whicli still excite surprise and admiration by their delicacy, finish, and taste. The greatest masters at a later period did not disdain to paint in prayer-books, and their pupils followed such illustrious examples. King Rend of Anjou, whose more important pictures are, probably, all lost, illuminated several manuscripts with his own hands in a style of extreme beauty, and it was only time and printing which caused this art to die away by degrees, turning genius into a more expansive channel. The hand of the painter accustomed to minia- ture is seldom very bold, and therefore, when higher works of art ap])ear executed by one used to this style, surprise is great that so much per- fection is attained in a new attemj)t. This fre- (piently occurs in the pictures of illuminators, and this is apparent on the walls of the chai)el of .Jacques Coiur's house, where the remaining 154 PAINTERS : FOUCQET AND MELLIN. fireserved specimens in the glorious cathedral of Bourges. One of the chapels of this cathedral and the sacristy were added by the great merchant, and of course he did not fail to employ the same artists in his own dwelling. The exquisite arabesques in stone which adorn liis house were also, without doubt, the works of Italian or French artists of the highest merit which then existed. CHAPTER XIV. JACQUES CCEURS KNOWLEDGE. LAHIRE AND POTON. POVERTY OF KING. EXPENSES. DESTITUTION OF THE COURT. FRIENDSHIP OF JACQUES C(EUR. — MARIE d'aNJOU. One of the great accomplishments of Jacques Coeur, calculated to serve his country, was his extensive attainment in the science of metallurgy, in which branch of knowledge he excelled most learned persons of his time. Several mining dis- tricts in the neighbourhood of Lyons had been confided to him,* and in them he employed an * In a volume of MSS. entitled " Minute Journal," pre- served in the archives of the Cour des Comptes, is the fol- lowing entry: — "Jacques Cuer, argentier du roy, a presente certaines lettres royaux, par lesquelles le roy lui a bailie et adcence certaines mines a Lyon, jusques a douze ans, pour le prix et somme de 200/." Again : — '•' Charles, par la grace de Dieu roy de France . . . avons donne et octroye congie, licence, auctorite, de mettre sus JACQUES CCEUR'S KNOWLEDGE. 157 immense number of workmen, obtaining from the rich veins he found a prodigious quantity of gokl, silver, and other metals: his skill and foresisht in this pursuit probably caused his success, which at the same time gave rise to the popular belief of his obtaining the precious metals by occult means. Besides this resource, his vessels brousfht continually from the East large supplies of cop- per coins, such as are mentioned by an Oriental writer on Mussulman coins as being called feh^ and being eagerly sought for and melted down by French merchants, as well as others of gold and silver. Nothing seemed unknown in commerce, or neglected in improvement, by this extraordi- nary man, who aided himself by every means which knowledge, ingenuity, boldness, and perse- verance could achieve. Owing to the great distresses of Charles VI T. during the period of the English sway, the money of the realm was from time to time greatly dete- riorated, and it required infinite management to restore it to its real value when circumstances permitted. This was strictly watched by Jacques Coeur when master of the mint, first at Bourgcs, the capital of his master's dwindled kingdom, and afterwards at Paris. Great were the services he rendered the king in this particular ; yet the very efforts by which he saved the realm Mere, in due et ouvrir . , . les mynes tant d'or que d'a7.ur,d'argent, d'estaing, plomb, cuyvrc, Icton, acicr, comme aultie metail." 158 LAniRi-: and poton. time, when his st;ii- )x!gan to wtiiic, brought tbr- wurd ugjiiiist him, and turned to his discredit. The strict friendship and affection whicli for a series of years existed between Charles VII. and Jac(iucs Coeur was proved at the time of .the young king's marriage to Marie d'Anjou, when Bourges was the chief residence of the disinherit- ed and persecuted j^rince. So destitute was the king of money, that com- mon necessaries were out of his. reach, and it was the wealthy merchant who supplied him, not only with gold for his expenses, but even the royal table with provisions. A writer of the time mentions the startling fact in these words : " The king was reduced to such extremity, that Jacques Coeur sent him for his dinner two fowls and a loin of mutton." Martial d'Auvergne in his " Vigiles de Charles VII.," has a quaint passage to the same effect : — " One day Lahire and Poton came To see their royal friend, and feast ; But all the cheer these men of fame Found on the board was of the least : A lorn of mutton was their scanty fare, Which, and two chickens, they were glad to share." While the English and the faithless Burgun- dians ruled France at their will, the "king of Bourges " kept his little court in the most humble manner, as a record of expenses proves, ke])t pro- bably not long after his marriage : — EXPENSES. 159 " Thursdarj, XWi day of Jidij. — The Queen and Madame Katherine to Pontoise, for fruit : Cherries and fruits for the queen, 2 sous. To Jehan la Nattier, for a knife, 2 sous. Sum for day's expenses, 38 livres, 2s." While tlie Duke of Burj^undy adorned himself with the richest and most valualjlc jewels, and even the cap Avhich he ordinarily wore was cover- ed with gems of great price, the king was obliged to comb his hair with a wooden comb : — " To ]\Iahiet Gourdin, barber of the king's household, the sum of 30 sous toumois, for the payment of twelve wooden combs, the which the said lord has taken and accepted for his person." Frequently the destitute Roi de Bourges, in order to conceal his poverty from the eyes of his courtiers, was accustomed to shut himself up in his apartment with his queen, where their coarse and poor meals were served to them without any witness of their poverty. The fact of Charles ac- cepting such assistance as the poet records from Jacques Coeur, proves the familiarity between them, and the estimation in which the king must have held his generous subject, from whom he did not conceal the necessities which he strove to hide from others. Tliis extreme misery j)robably occurred about the time when the infant Ifenry VT. of Kngland was made to usurp the throne of the ill-fated 160 FRIENDSHIP OF JACQUES CCEUR. father of Charles VTI., and when France was torn by the numerous factions which threatened to destroy the country ; for the fortunes of Charles were at that time at the very lowest ebb ; there appeared very little hope that he would ever be able to regain his rights ; without power, without friends, without money, driven into a small nook of his own kingdom, depressed, dis- pirited, indolent, despairing, nothing could be expected from him, and any friendship which he then received must have been indeed disinterest- ed. His little court was crowded with needy fol- low^ers, all ruined like himself, no one of whom could then assist him, even with their valour, which was their only possession ; but Jacques Coeur was rich, noble-minded, affectionate, de- voted, and energetic, and his friendship was as unwearied as it was sincere. While, by his ex- tensive commercial pursuits, he enriched himself daily, it no doubt added to the pride and plea- sure which success naturally excites, to reflect, that the wealthier he became, the more he should be in a condition to assist his sovereign when the moment arrived at which he could come forward with the sums requisite to assure the triumph of France. The brilliant, though mournful, episode of the heroine of Orleans, which changed the fortune of the legitimate king, and paved the way to his future restoration, would scarcely have accom- JEANNE D'aRC. 101 plislied its end, had not the sinews of war been supplied by the magnificent merchant, whose overflowing coffers were phiced at the disposal of the king. Alas ! at this moment of his rising fortunes, the reflection naturally occurs, that if Charles VI T. had really been worthy of the de- votion of his subjects, he would have employed some of the wealth thus cast at his feet, to rescue that holy victim and martyr whom he allowed to perish in the flames, kindled by the enemies of France, before his eyes ! But the " beloved mo- narch " turned away his regard from her whose mission was at an end, and reserved his resources for another occasion, pausing from his first tri- umph, and content to await the result of events. The fate of the unhappy and heroic Jeanne might have been to Jacques Coeur a foreshadow- ing of his own destiny. Abandoned like her to his enemies, like her his name and fame were tardily re-established in the country they had both so faithfully served ! Charles was indeed La Bien Servi, with his poor court full of heroes; his subjects, though un- able to show their loyalty to the full, being kept down by a strong hand, all devoted to him; pos- sessing a friend in Jacques Cceur ever ready with substantial assistance ; a wife in Marie d'Anjou, faithful, loving, and attached; and a fair favour- ite, who, unlike the usual style of such person- ages, excited him only to noble deeds. 162 MARIE D'ANJOII. Tlie amiable Marie d' Aiijou, sister of Ren6, the troubadour Kiiif( of Sicily and Naples, so well known in poetical history, was contracted to Charles when he was Count of Ponthieu, at the castle of Tours, where Charles VI. and his beau- tiful bane, the wicked Isabeau de Bavi^re, re- sided. Charles was at this time only eleven years of age, and as he had four brothers older than himself, he was, to all appearance, at a great distance from the crown. The bride had only reached her ninth year, so that the young couple were not in reality united at that time. It was not till 1422, the year of Charles VI.'s death, that their marriage was celebrated : the young king had little then to offer her but affec- tion, and that she seems fully to have deserved, by her extreme amiability, gentleness, and good- ness : her patience, of which chroniclers so often make mention, she probably had not, at first, so much occasion to exercise as in after years, when her husband's volatile fancies gave her cause for regret and sorrow. The morality of other princes of the day was no better, or perhaps was less than his own. It is related of Philippe le Bon, Duke of Bur- gundy, that his infidelities caused great sorrow and distress of mind to his wife, for he was accustomed to admit the objects of his low amours to the balls and f&tes of the court, with- out the slightest regard to the feelings of his MARIE D'aNJOU. 1G3 duchess. In this particular, at least, Charles exhibited more decency ; but when the Duchess of Burgundy visited the Queen of France at Chalons in Champagne, the two princesses fre- quently, it was said, indulged in mutual reve- lations and complaints of the wrongs they had endured from the unkindness of their husbands. " They had," says Olivier de la Marche, " the same grief and malady, which is called jealousy." If the two princes were alike in this respect, they found their punishment the same, for each had in after times to deplore the ill-conduct of a son: unfortunately the calamity fell as much on the innocent mothers of the disobedient young men, though, towards his mother, Louis XI. re- deemed himself in some measure by showing affection and respect. Poor and depressed as were the fortunes of Charles when he was first married, he occasion- ally made a few progresses in his small domi- nions, and visited the banks of the Loire from time to time ; now the royal pair made a sojourn at Saumur, now at Chinon and at Angers, where is still displayed in the church of St. JSIaurice, the splendid ta})estry which was their gift. It is on every f6te day, even now, hung from the pillars, and exhibits a curious specimen of the work held in esteem in the fifteenth century. In the church of Notre Dame de Nantilly at Saumur, which is also rich in similar tapestry, 164 MARIE D'ANJOU. are several other memorials of Marie d' Anjou ; one, very interesting, is a marble slab engraved with the following lines, put up by the royal foster-children, herself and her brother King Ren^, to their nurse's memory : a touching instance of the simple affection of both. EPITAPH.* Cy gist la nourice, Thuphaine, La magme qui ot grand paine A nourir de let en enfance Marie d' Anjou Raine de France ; Et apres son frere Rene Due d'Amon, et de plus nOme Come encor est Roy de Sicile, Qui a voulu en cette ville Pour grand amour de nouriture, Faire faire la sepulture De la nourice de sousdicte, Qui a Dieu rendit I'ame quiete, P"" avoir grace et tout deduit. L'an cccc cinquant et huit, Au mois de Mars 8 jour ; Je vous prie tout, par bonne amour, Affin qu'elle ait ung pou du vostre, Donnez luy bone patemostre. Of this amiable princess it is recorded, that, " with respect to her mind and her virtue, al- though satire was then so much in vogue, prin- * The author gives this inscription as she copied it from the marble slab against the pillar of the church, of which some account is given, together with details of the towns and castles on the Loire inhabited by Charles, in her work entitled " A Summer amongst the Socages and tlie Vines." MARIE D'aNJOU. 165 cipally as regarded personages of the first rank, so that it was almost impossible to avoid it, no scandal was ever ventured regarding IMarle d'An- jou ; which proves not only that she was exempt from the faults common to those who composed the court of Charles VIT., but that no suspicion of the propriety of her conduct had ever existed." Marie was as just and moderate in her coun- sels, as in her actions, and was not only esteemed by the court, but loved by the people, who are generally quick in their appreciation of character. She survived her husband about eighteen months, dying the 29th of November 14G3, at the abbey of Chastelliers in Poitou, on her return from a pious pilgTimage to the shrine of St. James of Galicia. Monstrelet alludes to her death in these terms : " She had, during her whole life, a good renown, being esteemed an excellent and devout lady, and very charitable and patient." Iler advice frequently checked the career of disobedience too much })crsevered in by her son, Louis, who, though a good king for France, was, as a private character, as detestable as could well be conceived ; and the only trait in his favour appears to be the respect in which he held his mother. She brought her husband twelve children, and throughout his life showed him undiminished regard and affection. They had been married about ten years when Isabella of Lorraine, one 166 THE FAIR STRANGER. of the most accomplished princesses of her time, the wife of Ren^ d'Anjou, brother of the queen, came to the court of Charles VII., to entreat his aid for her husband, who had lately expe- rienced great reverses in his struggles for the possession of the kingdom of Naples. In her suite was a fascinating creature, her intimate and particular friend, nine years younger than Queen Marie, and in all the bloom of a beauty which knew no parallel in France. This was the too celebrated Agnes Sorel, who instantly attracted the attention of the susceptible Charles, and her wit, sense, grace, and desire to please gained her admirers everywhere ; amongst the rest Marie d' Anjou, to whom the praises of Agnes were recounted by her sister-in-law, was delighted to welcome her as a friend, and, whe- ther from her own wish, or by the suggestion of her husband, she was induced to request of Isabelle that the charming Agnes might be left in her native Touraine, and be in future consi- dered in the service of the Queen of France. CHAPTER XV. LA DEMOISELLE DE FROMENTEAU. LOUIS XI. AND THE MONKS. — PRAGMATIC SANCTION. — MEHUN-SUR-TEVKE. — CASTLES OF AGNES. ART IN THE FIFTEENTH CENTURY. — LOCHES, La Demoiselle de Fromenteau, as she was then called, accordingly entered on her new office, and, notwithstanding all that has been said respecting her liaison with the king, the friendship of Qneen Marie and herself aj)pears to liave been uninterrnpted and sincere. This it is difficult to account for, under all the cir- cumstances, unless, indeed, INIarie d' Anjou pos- sessed the politic qualities of the haughty Ca- therine de Medici, who, in after times, endured with apparent patience, the ])resence and the power of Diane de Poictiers. The characters of the two queens are so different, that it is the more strange they should resemble each other in this particular. l(j« AGNES SOREL. Charles long concealed his passion for the beautiful maid of honour, whose fair fame was guarded by the countenance of her confiding mistress ; and so much mystery always hung around their loves, that time has never disclosed the secret of their intercourse. Historians pass lightly over the reports of the intimacy of Agnes and the king, and but that there are circumstances, which make it unlikely that their attachment iii^s altogether pure, one would fain believe tlmt Ih^ ties which bound them together were those cemented by patriotism alone, and that the indulgence of her royal mis- tress for Agnes arose from the same exalted source. Certain it is that the queen and the favourite worked together for the good of Charles and of their country, and that the conduct of Agnes in other respects, if indeed she were faulty in this, went far to redeem her errors. The testimony of Francis I. in her favour may not have much weight as regards the purity of her life, as his morality was not of a very strict order ; but the respect and reverence with which he names her, in his celebrated epitaph, prove the estimation in which slie was held : it is the only instance on record in which a favourite receives such honours from so high a quarter. She is described as singularly beautiful, and full of grace and spirit, animated and amusing in her manners and conversation, remarkably AGNES SOREL. 169 gay, and though replete with wit and cheerful- ness, solid sense and just judgment quite as much distinguished her. As, of course, in a court where there were so many contending interests, she could not fail to have enemies, some have represented her as frivolous and extravagant in her habits and her dress, and she is reproached for infringing the laws which regulated the costume of females under the rank of sovereign princesses and duchesses. She is said to have Morn the same furs, gold ornaments, velvets, and jewels as the queen, and an anecdote is related of her, that on hearing that her presumption in this respect was complained of by the Parisians, she was very indignant, and exclaimed, that " the Parisians were ignorant people, and if she had fancied they would not have shown her more honour* she would not have set foot in the capital." Probably she felt that her services to the country claimed from them, at least, that her fame should be respected. For five years she remained in the queen's service, and that seems to have been the period when the gaiety of the court was at its height, and when the magni- ficent towers of Chinon and Loches echoed with the sound of revelry. There is still amongst the beautiful ruins of Chinon the Tour d' Agnes Sorel, where one of her apartments is the most entire of any in the castle; — what is singular 170 AGNES SOREL. and strangely characteristic of the times is, that imiiiodiatcly beneath this chamber is a horrible oubliette. Ag-nes, it has been observed, was accused of excessive extravagance in dress, and it was the extraordinary magnificence she displayed, as well as the advancement of her family, that gave rise to the first rumours injurious to her honour. Even though the famous anecdote be a fabrica- tion which is generally related of her, when she wished to excite Charles to exertion," still it proves that she was believed to have used all her influence to rouse him from the lethargy into which lie had permitted himself to fall. Not only was Agnes beloved by the queen, but though, from her favour with Charles, she had many enemies at court, those the most sincerely attached to him held her in the greatest esteem. * The popular anecdote alluded to is the following : — Charles was one day in her presence consulting the Court astrologer, a personage always entertained as a necessary appendage at that period ; she in her turn desired to know her fate, and the answer of the " cunning man" was, that she was destined to be for a long time the adored object of the greatest monarch of the age. Agnes, taking advantage of the opportunity to convey to the king her opinion of his supineness, with a grave air saluted him, saying, " Sire, if the oracle speaks sooth, I intreat you to permit me to leave you and repair to the Court of England, in order that I may fulfil my destiny, for certainly King Henry, who is about to annex your crown to his own, must be the greatest monarch of the two." Charles, shamed by this judicious sarcasm, from that moment threw off the sloth which repressed his valour, and showed himself worthy of the character that she sought. LOUIS XI. AND THE MONKS OF LOCHES. 171 Amongst these the chiefest was Jacques CcEiir , and, in spite of tlie absurd accusation made against him on her sudden death, the best proof of her regard for him was, that she named him her executor in her will. Even the wicked, wil- ful, and incorrigible dauphin, afterwards Louis XI. who was said at one time to be her bitter enemy, and suffered under the same accusation of having taken her life as Jacques Coeur, showed the re- spect he had for her memory by the contemp- tuous answer he returned to the monks of Loches, when, with a view of pleasing him, they offered to remove her ashes from the church which she had endowed. He recommended them, if they did so, to relinquish at the same time all the benefits which they enjoyed by her donations to their establishment. This, of course, put a stoj) to their zeal, and the beautiful monument of La Belle Agnes, which still adorns the church of Loches, was permitted to remain, nor did the monks decline a further grant from the king which he made in her honour of 6,000 livres. Had Louis XL held the memory of Agnes in contempt, he would scarcely have acted thus. There were, doubtless, moments in his after life iu which he felt remorse for his unfilial conduct to his father. Politic as he was, he could not but be aware that there were j^oints in the cha- racter of Agnes Sorel to be admired, and what- ever might have been his feelings of jealousy 172 POISON. towards the fair favourite, he must have appre- ciated all that was valuable in her conduct. One of the anecdotes told of him is, that when a young man at his father's court, Louis, dis- gusted at the assumption of Agnes, had been so far carried away by passion, that he had struck the beautiful favourite, and was, in consequence, banished by Charles to Dauphine. There is no doubt of the turbulence of Louis, or of his con- tinual ill conduct; but whether he really had any personal contest with the Demoiselle de Beaute cannot be altogether ascertained. If, however, this was the case, he did not show any resentment to her memory when he was of a mature age, and more able to judge of her merits. The sudden death of Agnes has been attributed to poison, administered to her by the agents of the dauphin, in consequence of her having discovered and informed the kinof of a conspiracy in which he w^as engaged ; but Jacques Coeur, her personal friend, was also accused of being her murderer, as well as of being in the plot with Louis against his father — accusations which were got up for the purpose of effecting his ruin, and which were clearly disproved. At that period if any personages of note died without previous illness, poison was always sup- posed to have been employed by some enemy to dispatch them ; but if it had been desired to put Agnes Sorel out of the way, the time of her ACCUSATION. 173 retirement from court Mould surely not have been chosen. Her favour had evidently waned, and she M'as no longer so powerful as before, her removal was, therefore, of less importance to those whose ambitious views her ])rudence and wisdom might have thwarted. In her will it will be seen that she left Jacques Coeur one of her executors, which proves her opinion of his integrity. Those associated with him were Robert Poitevin, her physician, and Etienne Chevalier, her devoted friend, the trea- surer of the king, and a staunch ally of the great merchant. To the hour of her death, therefore, Agnes considered Jaccjues Coeur true to her in- terests, and the contradiction of his being accused of her murder is the more incomprehensible. He is said to have been at one time opposed to her, disapproving of the expenses into which her magnificent style of living led the king; but this was, i)robably, only a passing cloud which ob- scured their friendship, and her good qualities no doubt soon effaced the unfavourable impression, for as both were patriots, they had one common cause, which united their interests. It is a known fact, that many of the nobles attached to the cause of Charles VIL, excited by the noble example of Agnes Sorel, who gave up all her plate and jewels to supply funds for the army, made offerings to the king of their richest possessions in this kind, not being provided, as at 174 PRAGMATIC SANCTION. that time Jacques Coeur himself was, with real money to place at his service. It was not till after all was gained that these generous impulses faded away, and those who had sacrificed so much began to long for all the stores, yet undiminished, of the wealthy merchant. It is recorded to the honour of the monks of St. Denis, that they supplied, to the amount of forty marks of silver, vessels of plate belonging to their refectory, so that, if the good ecclesi- astics lived in state, their riches served a good purpose, since the money thus produced was des- tined to defray the expenses of the re-conquest of their country from the victorious strangers in whose possession it had been too long. Dissensions having arisen between Pope Eu- genius IV. and the council of Bale, the pope declared this council dissolved, and convoked another at Ferrara. The council, however, in- stead of separating, occupied itself with discus- sions relative to the deposition of the successor of St. Peter. With the hope of dissipating this schism, Charles VII. assembled the clergy of France at Bourges, where, on the decision of the council of Bale, he instituted the Pragmatic Sanction, which he issued as the law of the kingdom, regulating the nominations and elections to ecclesiastical benefices, and declared it also intended to serve as a rule in several other matters of discipline. MEHUN-SUR-YEVRE. 175 This occurred in 1428, aiul it was at this period tliat the king conferred on Jacques Coeur the charge of master of the mint of Bourges, which had been already partially under his care. The palace of Duke John, the Magnificent, the great uncle of Charles VII., which was at that time one of the chief ornaments of the town, was unfortunately destroyed in a fire, which occurred in 1G95. It was here, doubtless, that the king resided ; and here, in an immense saloon, said to be the largest in the kingdom, this famous meet- ing of the clergy took place. The chamber was 156 French feet long and sixty high, and the roof was supported without columns or pillars, like some of the Palazzi Ragione in the north of Italy. The ordinary residence of Charles VII. when in Berry, appears to have been at the castle of Dun le Roi, of which a few ruined walls alone remain. As this castle and the town it protected were very strongly fortified, the king, doubtless, found it a secure hold during the attacks he was exposed to from the English and Burgundians, who usurped his authority in France; but in more peaceful times, or at least those less peril- ous, his favourite retreat was the chateau of JMehun-sur-Yevre, once the residence of Jean le Magnifique. Charles VII. almost entirely re- built this castle, which he rendered extremely fine, and surrounded, as was but too necessary at the time, with powerful defences. One high 176 CASTLES OF AGNES. tower, tradition relates, was a|)proi)riated to his private apartments, and from tlience lie caused a sort of telcgrai)liic communication to pass be- tween this castle and a neigbbouring fortress, situated at about the distance of eight leagues. Either La Belle Agnes and her lover must have had eyes ])eculiarly sharpened by love, or the distance between them must be exaggerated, for it is difficult to imagine how they contrived to see each other's signals. Romance, however, to which nothing is impossible, affirms that when the divided lovers wished to be informed of their respective occupations, they placed a vase of flowers, or a lighted torch, in the windows of their towers, and knew by those tokens when each rose in the morning and retired to repose at night. Agnes had two castles near, one was small, and called le Chateau de Dame. This is now destroyed ; but in the museum of Bourges is still to be seen some of the furniture which be- longed to it, and which presents curious speci- mens of the art of those days. There are several cabinets and chairs of carved wood, as finely wrought as any of later date, and a secretaire, which it would be difficult for modern ingenuity to surpass, either in design or execution. It is adorned with figures of singular good proportion, and has pannels painted in rich blue and gold, representing antique heads and armorial bear- ings ; another piece of furniture is a toilette table CASTLES OF AGNES. 177 of cedar-wood, delicately i)ut together, and hav- ing interior com])artments in low-relief, showing groups representing scenes in the life of the Virgin Mother and her Son, admirably done. One cabinet has a cornice, supported by statuettes of Charles VII. in the character of the god Mars, Agnes Sorel as Venns, and other figures. There are also some medallions, which probably once adorned a chamber. One of these is a por- trait, in carved wood, of Agnes, and one of Charles VII. as Hercules, surrounded by a group of warriors, who seem entreating him to leave Omphale : beneath it, written in golden letters, " Veritable portraicture de Ilercule, emmaillott6 de peau de lion : donne par le roy a la tendro Agnes, 1451." The other castle possessed by the favourite, from whence the same signals to her royal friend or lover were sent, was one at Vorly, near Boui- ges, called at first Bois Trousseau, but afterwards, by Agnes herself, Bois Sire-aim^, in allusion to her devotion to Charles. La Dame de Beaut^ had many possessions besides, but these now spoken of were in the vicinity of Bourges, and here she resided while in the plenitude of that favour which gave rise to injurious rumours. Amongst the treasures in the museum of Bourges, besides the furniture from the castles of Agnes, one of the identical vases is preserved which formerly adorned the towers of Mchun- N 178 CASTLES OF AGNES. sur-Yovre : it is of cliiiia, liigli and large, and is ornauionted with open-work, wliicli gives it a transparent effect : the form is graceful, and the whole is entire. It conveys a remarkable idea of the advance of art in those days, and is an inter- esting relic of the mysterious liaison between the king and the fair Demoiselle de Beaut(^. The art of working in china seems to have attained great perfection at this period, as is proved by many specimens which time has spared. In this same museum are two other porcelain vases, one white, most delicately and elaborately carved ; and an- other is one of those drinking-cups mentioned elsewhere in this volume, which are cut in an open pattern round the edge, so that it must have required singular skill to drink out of them without spilling the liquor contained within. Limoges was in the height of its fame during the reign of Charles VII., and many are the plates and cups which the curious treasure from its manufactories : there are some of these enamels at Bourges, but the author has seen at Chenon- ceau a china plate of Limoges on which Charles and Agnes are represented riding both on the same horse ; the king in a costume like that of a monk in robe and cowl, as Henry VI. is gene- rally represented in the ]\ISS. of the time, and Agnes in a tight gown fitting close to an attenu- ated form, wdiich gives little notion of her ex- treme beautv : the faces of both are indeed sin- PERSON OF CHARLES. 179 gularly ugly, and their steed is a heavy lumbering dray-horse, with the tail tied up in a liuge knot. The person of Charles VII. is described by contemporary historians in this manner : — " His physiognomy was agreeable; but he was not tall, and his legs were small and thin. He looked to most advantage when he wore his mantle, but he preferred in general appearing in a close short vest made of green cloth, which dis- agreeably displayed his meagre legs and thick knees." Although he is represented in the enamel in the robe which suited him best, the artist has not contrived to offer a very flattering picture either of the king or the beautiful Agnes. Agnes lived a good deal at Loches, where the king had built her a magnificent suite of apart- ments, called in the country Les Salles : they were situated on the side of the rising sun, and commanded a splendid view of extended meadows on one hand, and immense forests on the other. Nothing can equal the beauty of this prospect, which may still ])e seen by the traveller who visits Loches, and ascends the high tower of La Belle Agnes, a square building of great antiquity, where tradition records, that when the king went out hunting he was accustomed to lock up his treasured mistress, " lest his jewel he should tine." Her usual residence, however, was at Beaulieu, separated only by a bridge from the castle of 180 DEATH OF AGNES. Loches, and her abode was called L'Hotel de Madame de Beaiit^. The king bestowed on her the county of Pen- thievre, in Brittany, from whence she was called the Countess of Penthievre ; and her chA.teau of Beautc-sur-Marne, near Vincennes, built by Charles V., gave her another title which pleased her royal admirer. The domains of Roqueserien, of Issoudun en Berry, of Vernon-sur-Seine, also formed part of her possessions, which, it will be seen, were in- deed considerable enough to excite surmises in most people, that the friendship of Charles was something more than ordinary. Nevertheless, after she had been retired for five years at one or other of her castles, being no longer in attendance on the queen, Marie d'Anjou expressed a desire for her society, and sent mes- sages to beg her return to court, appointing her to come to Paris in 1449. This was about the time that the siege of Har- fleur was going on. The king was at the abbey of Jumieges, and there Agnes had just joined him, when she was seized with a rapid illness, of which she died at the age of forty. Her epitaph may be read in the chapel of the castle of Loches, over her tomb ; it runs thus : — " Cy git noble Demoiselle Agnes Seukelle, en son vivant Dame de Beaute, de Roqueserien, d'Issoudun, et de Vernon- sur-Seine, piteuse envers toutcs gens, ot qui largement donnoit HER EPITAPH. 181 de ses biens aux eglises et aux pauvres : laquelle tiepassa le neuvieme jour de Fevrier, I'an de grace mil fjuatre cent qua- rante neuf. Priez Dieu pour Tame d'elle. Arnen." Tliere are, besides, a great many Latin verses engraved on the walls in her honour, in Mhich the title of duchess is given her, and the initials of her name are made to commence every line, in the quaint style of the poets of the day. There exists also at Loches a large manuscript book full of acrostic verses in her honour. Enguersaud de Monstrelet speaks of her death and of the pious end she made: "The said Ag- nes," he says, " was very charitable and large in her donations to the poor and the church. Dur" ing her illness she sheM'ed great contrition and repentance of her sins, remembering Mary Mag- dalen, who was also a sinner, and invoking de- voutly God and the Virgin Maiy to aid her : and like a good Catholic, after having received the sacraments, she asked for the book of Hcures, to repeat the verses of Saint Bernard which she had written in the book with her own hand ; and afterwards made many vows, which were put into writing in order to be accomplished by the exe- ecutors of her will, ordering certain alms to be given and sums jiaid to her servants, to the amount of sixty thousand crowns. Ilcr said execu- tors were Jacques Ca^ir, councillor and argentier of the king. Master Robert Poitevin, physician, and Master Etienne Chevalier, treasurer of the 182 ETIENNE CHEVALIER. king; and her command was, tliat the king alone, and for all, was to be placed above those three persons named. "Finding her malady increasing, she summoned her confessor, made several reflexions on the nothingness of human life, and entreated to be absolved from her sins in virtue of an absolu- tion, which she declared existed at Loches; the which her confessor did according to her desire." Her death caused much grief in the hearts not only of Charles, but of her numerous friends, to whom she was extremely dear. It has been sur- mised that Etienne Chevalier was more deeply attached to her than mere friendship dictated, and the belief is founded on the singular rebuses on her name which filled his house : the same might perhaps be said of Jacques Coeur. No doubt, a person of so much beauty and talent would have inspired a passion of no ordinary strength in many a bosom, whether she smiled on them in return, or kept all her tenderness for Charles or for France. It has been said that her physician, when called upon to give evidence on the trial of Jacques Coeur for her murder, reported that she died giving birth to a child, thereby refuting the charges brought against her friend and executor, but at the same time establishing the fact, that her liaison with the king was not merely friendly. It might be, that the mystery with which Charles ATTACHMENT OF AGNES AND CHARLES. 183 had always judiciously surrounded their attach- ment was considered too sacred to be infringed, and the secret of her situation was insisted upon by the king himself, until it became impossible any longer to conceal the truth ; if so, Charles is even more to blame than for the rest of his con- duct, to allow a charge of murder, which he knew to be false, to weigh down the unfortunate minis- ter he permitted to be oppressed. Yet, in sj)ite of appearances, there are not wanting historians, who have asserted that the connexion between Charles and Agnes was purely Platonic. While she was living at court, it is asserted that Agnes was never in the habit of receiving the king alone, but was seen continually in company with other ladies of the court, when he repaired to jdaces wdiere she was ; that no familiarities were ever known to pass between them, but that honour, respect, and esteem were her portion from the monarch, who evidently looked upon her as a superior person, to whose counsel he owed immense obligations. If their attachment was friendship alone, it was one worthy to be an example to the world ; if not, and if the scandal })romulgated by other historians is founded on fact, one can but mourn that beauty and merit should be too weak for passion, and that great names should be sullied by great faults. Which seas of tears Can never wash away. 184 THE CASTLE OF MESNIL. Agnes Sorel has always been the theme of the poets of France, wlio were never weary of singing her i)raises and exalting iier virtues, contrary to tliat which usually happens to a flattered favou- rite, whose renown seldom lasts beyond the reign of the monarch who distinguishes her. The poet de Baif thus sings of Agnes, in a poem on the castle of Mesnil la Belle, which she once occupied. The verses, though possess- ing little merit, are yet a proof of the esteem in which Agnes was held ; they were probably writ- ten about 1560 : — " c'eST Id LE MENIL," ETC. This then is Mesnil, named from her whose charms Above all other themes the poet warms : Agnes, the star of Charles, whose early fate Left his fond heart forlorn and desolate. Here perfmiied airs amidst each secret shade Tell of their ancient loves that cannot fade ; These ruin'd walls seem mourning in decay That worth and beauty should be swept away ; The wind moans round them sad and heavily — An echo of fair Agnes' latest sigh. She, bright as Grecian Helen, famed in song. Whose eyes held Charles in love's devotion long, — Another Paris, who would fain have been A shepherd youth with her his rural queen : To live for her was all he cared to do, She his ambition and his glory too. From wars and high contentions he removed, Content with her to love and be beloved. THE CASTLE OF MEsNlL. J 85 But envious rumour whisper'd of disgrace, Of tarnish'd name and of degenerate race ; Of one who at his lady's feet bow'd down, Forgot his country, honour, and renown. Without a blush such words could Agnes hear, And bear reproaches on a name so dear ? With tender eloquence she woke the theme. And bade her lover rouse him from his dream : " Since, lowly as I am, on me thy light Has shone so fondly and so purely bright. And I have dared to answer to thy flame, 111 it becomes me to eclipse thy fame. Shall it be said, effeminate and base, Bow'd to my will, enamour'd of my face. Thou canst forget thy honour for my sake 1 My king, my friend, my love, arise 1 — awake I Arm 1 arm! and lead thy subjects forth once more, And drive the haughty English from thy shore. Let my ambition and thine own agree, — To see a hero and my love in thee. Oh, let my words dispel this idle trance. Let Agnes be esteem'd in grateful France. I w^ould not honour made thee love forego, But let love teach thee honour's laws to know ! " She spoke : her gen'rous zeal the monarch moved. And virtue waken'd at the voice he loved : A brighter flame in his roused bosom burst From the same torch which had effaced it hrst ; And by the love for which reproach he bore. He vow'd the English pride should be no more. Then Victory, that, untrue to friend or foe. With restless flight had hover'd to and fro. Declared for us at last, and rescued France Beheld her banners to the skies advance ! 'Twas then, with conqucr'd Normandy his prize. The lover from long battles turn'd his ryes, 186 EPITAPH BY FRANCIS I. And 'uiidst the shades of lone Geniirge* sought 'I'he lovely object of his tenderest thought. Then Agnes came — she heard of treachery, And flew to warn hiui of the danger nigh. But Fate had led her to this holy fane, And doom'd her ne'er to quit those walls again. Alas ! fond lover, after all thy care, Thy toil, thy valour, was all hope but air 1 All thy heart promised void ? The trial past. Is death and sorrow thy reward at last ! Death ! has beauty, then, no power to move ? Deaf art thou thus to constancy and love 1 But great although thy power, and fell thy sway, And in her youthful prime she fell thy prey. The wrong is less than if, as Fortune will'd. The days by Nature granted had been fill'd ; And those soft features and those eyes so bright In dim and faded age had lost their light ; And that renown of Beauty's Queen no more The world would give her, since its power was o'er. No I to the last so lovely and so dear. Her peerless star shone ever bright and clear I Fair Agnes lives in never-ending fame As long as Beauty shall be Beauty's name ! The celebrated epitaph of Francis I. on La Belle Agnes is to this purpose : — Here lies entomb'd the fairest of the fair. To her rare beauty greater praise be given Than holy maids in cloister'd cells may share, Or hermits that in deserts live for Heaven ; For by her charms recover'd France arose. Shook off her chains and triumph 'd o'er her foes. Now Jumieges. CHAPTER XV. ANTOINETTE DE MAIGXELAIS. While the fair Agnes was yet living, tliere had been at the court of Charles VII. a cousin of hers, much younger, and almost her equal in beauty, the daughter of her mother's brother, Jean de JNJaignelais. From an early age she was accustomed to be with Agnes, and was in great favour with the king, indeed so much so, that it has been supi)osed that their intimacy gave cause for jealousy on the part of Agnes. It is certain, that, oidy six months before the death of her cou- sin, Antoinette de jNIaignelais received a gift from Charles of an estate which had formerly belong- ed to her family, and which the king took Irom the Duke de Bourbon to present to her. This estate had been the object <»f a long law- 188 ANTOINETTE UE MAIGNELAIS. suit between the [^iike iirifl Uaoul de Maigiielaif?, an ancestor of the young lady's, and had en;, he enjoyed the society of his friends, to whom he is represented reading his poems in a splendid apartment, adorned with all the ceremonials due to royalty. Nor do his strains sound like those of one who suflfcred from other causes than the regret of absence from his country and lii^ fiiciids 224 CAPTIVITY OF in France. They arc generally of a pensive cha- racter, bnt are occasionally gay and lively. At one period, indeed, when his hopes had been highly raised only to be again crushed, he utters very mournful laments, and alludes afterwards to his sickness, and the report of his death from grief; but his elastic mind recovered from the disap- pointment, and he goes on singing sweetly in his cage as before. Twice he was allowed to go to Calais in order to negotiate for his release; and twice, having failed, he was re-conducted to his prison in Eng- land. The restoration of peace was the great object of his desire, and he expresses his feel- ings on the subject in eloquent numbers. When the news reached him of the successes of the arms of Charles VII., he bursts forth in the following exulting song : — BALLAD. " COMMENT VOY-JE LES ANGLAIS ESBAUIS." 1 SEE the English pride brought low. Rejoice my country, France, once more ! God shows his hatred to our foe. Her courage and her strengtii are o'er. Too long in servitude abhorr'd Her victim, France, was doom'd to bow ; But God at length has drawn the sword, And on our side is fighting now. He hears, and to his people's cry Gives back Guienne and Normandy ! CHARLES OF ORLEANS. 225 Wlien English hordes came pouring down, Vain was thy valour, vain thy fame ; And for thy sins Heav'n's angry frown Hath doom'd thee to a sullied name. In chains and tears, midst woe and wrong, In just disgrace didst thou abide, While England held her sabbath long In pomp, and revelry, and pride. But God, who hears the mourner's cry. Gives back Guienne and Normandy ! The treach'rous English, faithless still. Their kings desert, their land betray ; And factious chiefs assert their will, — The crown, — the people, — discord's prey. The wrath of God is o'er them cast, And with one blow shall crush them all, My country shall revive at last, And gain fresh vigour from her fall. Her star has risen bright and high — Guienne is ours, and Normandy ! CHAPTER XVIII. CONTINUATION OF THE HISTORY OF CHAKLES OF ORLEANS. The general style of the poetry of the Duke of Orleans may perhaps be judged of by a few specimens. The fashion of the time was a fond- ness for allegory, which is always tiresome, accord- ing to present notions, even when employed by a great master, yet it is singular how many centuries it pleased. Charles of Orleans carried it to a great length, and his verses are filled with personages such as Desplaisance, Confort, Dueil, JM^rencolie, Doulx-Souvenir, Bon-Espoir, and, above all, Le Dieu d' Amour. Nevertheless, he sometimes escapes from these trammels, and when he does, as his thoughts are beautiful and his language also, his ballads cannot fail to charm, for the dic- tion is by no means so difficult to understand or so antiquated as it appears a century later. POETRY OF CHARLES OF ORLEANS. 227 His verses are very numerous, and have been frequently collected, and, within a few years, liave become much known, both in France and England. BALLAD. "JE GUIDE QUE CE SONT NODVELLES." Once more fresh rumours reach my ear. Once more comes news amidst my pain : Alas ! what may a captive hear, To yield him pleasure yet again 1 Too oft the joys from Hope I drew Have vanish'd into empty air ; I know not what she means to do — This sweet deceiver, false as fair ! If neither good nor happy now The tidings that my fortune brings, My heart has learnt so well to bow, It yet can wait for better things. Then let me slumber calmly on, And lull awhile the thought of care, Nor wake to Hope's enchanting tone — That sweet deceiver, false as fair ! Alas ! my heart, 'twere hard indeed Should'st thou the good there is conceal, For I have served thee at thy need. And long thy pain have sought to heal. But, come what may, 'tis now too late For stealing age and anxious care, To trust soft Hope, with joy elate — That dear deceiver, false as fair ! My lips no more shall breathe her name, And Reason shall my burthen bear. Be mine the son'ow, her's the blame — That sweet deceiver, false as fair ! Q 2 228 POETRY OF RONDEL. "POTTRQUOI MOY, PLUS QUE LE3 AUTRES NE FONT. Why feel I more than others do The woes that Fortune deals to all ? Still forced fleet comfort to pursue, That shuns my grasp and slights my call. Must I for ever sail in vain In seas whose shores no port reveals ? Why feel I more than others pain And woes to all that Fortune deals. I ask for Hope, above, below — But she is sleeping, or is dead, Or feigns, the more to scorn my woe — Comfort and Hope from me are fled, I know not what my grief shall heal — Why feel I more than others feel I RONDEL. "LE MONDE EST ENNUYE DE MOY." Alas I the world of me is tired. And I of all am weary too : Nought that my heart has e'er desired Has now a pleasure to my view. Whate'er I see but yields me care. And grief is mine, whate'er befal ; The world is tired of my despair, And I am weary too of all. Ah ! honest faith is hard to find. Long have I sought, but reach it not : Blame not my ever restless mind. But think upon my adverse lot. I turn from all my weary \dew — Of me the world is weary too. CHARLES OF ORLEANS. 229 " LOUE SOIT CELUY QUI TROUVA." Thrice blest is he by whom the art Of letters first was taught ! Sweet solace to the lover's heart, With painful inem'ry fraught. When lonely, sad, and far away, His woes he may not tell, A letter can at once convey His secret thoughts — how well ! The truth, the fond affection prove Of him, the faithful slave of love. By doubt and anxious dread opprest, Tho' hope may be denied. Still to his watchfid, trembling breast Some comfort is supplied. And if she read with eye benign The tale he dares to trace. Perhaps each pleading mournful line May yet obtain her grace. And pity in her bosom move For him, the faithful slave of love. For me, full well I know the joy This blissful art can give ; And when new griefs my soul annoy, Its magic bids me live. To her I write for whom alone My weary life I bear ; To her make all my sorrows known, And claim her tender care. My chains, my bars it can remove, Tho' I be still the slave of love. Oh, that I could behold once more Tliose charms, so vainly dear ! That happy moment would restore, — The shade of many a year ! And all my future life should prove How true a slave 1 am to lovo ! 230 POETRY OF "ballades, chansons, et complaintes SONT par MOY MISES EN OUBLY." Ballads, songs, and mournful lays, Are forgot in my despair ; Sorrow fills my weary days, And I sleep to dream of care. If my grief it could beguile, I would sing as oft of yore. And awake those tones awhile Which have soothed my heart before ; But I find both voice and lute Are in soitow hoarse and mute. All the pleasant words I spoke Are extinct and pass'd away. Lo I the spell of song is broke. And no sweetness marks my lay. Those who once have heard me sing. Full of youth, and hope, and joy, Pity now the falt'ring string, Which but echoes my annoy. Lost my voice, and sad my lute. Both in sorrow hoarse and mute ! The following rondel on the return of spring has a great deal of sparkling grace in the ori- ginal : — LE RENOUVEAU. Le temps a laissie son manteau De vent, de froidure, et de pluye, Et s'est vestu de broderie — De soleil luisant, clair et beau. II n'y a beste, ne oiseau Qu'en son jargon ne chante ou crie : " Le temps a laissie son manteau De vent, de froidure, et de pluye I" CHARLES OF ORLEANS. 231 Riviere, fontaine, et ruisseau Portent en livree jolie Gouttes d'argent, d'orfa\Terie, Chascun s'habille de nouveau : Le temps a laissie son manteau De vent, de froidure, et de pluye ! Nature has thrown the mantle by She wore in wind and rain and cold, And clothed her in embroidery Of glowing sunshine rich with gold. There/s not a creature but rejoices, The birds lift up their joyous voices, And send to heaven the cheerful cry — " Nature has thrown her mantle by ! " The streams and foimtains with delight Put on fresh dresses, new and rare, — All silver drops and gold- work bright, Dancing and sparkling in the air : Prank'd in young Nature's livery, Who now has thrown her mantle by. After the battle of Azincourt, Henry V. of England addressed his prisoners, who were la- menting their hard fate, in the words which Juvenal des Ursins has recorded. He bade them be comforted, and not feel astonished that victory had declared itself against them, for which he claimed no glory to himself, knowing it to be the work of God, who was adverse to France in con- sequence of her sins, for there was no crime nor wickedness to which that country was not given up : she kept neither faith nor loyalty with any created creature, neither in marriages nor other things ; she robbed and destroyed the people 232 POETRY OF without reason, and for this reason no good coiihl come to the nation. Cliarles of Orleans seemed to consider that the words of Henry were not without foundation, for he expresses himself in these lines in much the same spirit : — " FRANCE, JADIS ON TE SOULOIT NOMMEK." France ! once thy name in ev'ry land Was prized as truth and honour's gem ; Thy sons could from all realms demand Of courtesy the diadem : Religion, courage, sense, and skill By friend and foe allow'd thee still. But, now, behold ! what cloud of shame, Bold land of France, has veiled thy name ! Know'st thou whence comes this grief and wail ? Know'st thou why falls the heavy blow ? Hearken, for I must tell the tale ; 'Tis wise the fatal truth to know. Thy sloth, thy cruelty, thy pride, Thy luxury, and waste beside. Have kindled Heaven to wrath and flame, And left thy sins to blast thy name. But, oh I despair not, even now, For Heaven hath store of mercy yet ; In humble penance learn to bow With tears of sorrow and regret. How joyously would God once more Thy former glorious state restore ! And He, who died a death of shame — • For thee, for all — will guard thy name ! Remember how, in days gone by. The lilies deck'd thy azure shield. " Montjoye, par Hesse ! " was thy cry, — A note that forced thy foes to yield. CHARLES OF ORLEANS. 233 Remember all thy former pride ; Repent, and turn this wrath aside. Again the Oriflamme advance, Christian, frank, and noble France ! In 1437 the duke authorized his illeofitimate brother, tlie famous Dunois, to raise upon his do- mains the sum of forty-two thousand crowns, with which to pay his ransom and that of the otlicr princes. It appears, however, that obstacles still existed, and the next year Charles, for the second time, was permitted to go to Calais to negotiate, but still, as far as his liberty was concerned, was unsuccessful, although he was able to obtain part of his object in certain treaties agreed on by the two nations. In 1439 he was still at Calais, and at that period bought numerous jewels and fine wines, to offer as presents to the agents of both countries, who were arranging the preliminaries of peace. It was not, however, till February, 1440, that conferences were held at Gravelines on national affairs, the first result of which was the deliverance of the Duke of Orleans. The sum demanded was no less than one hundred and twenty thousand gold crowns. The dauphin and a great number of the nol)les of France were sureties for its pay- ment ; and, at length, after five and twenty years' captivity, Charles of Orleans returned free to his beloved native country. Nothing could exceeil his joy at his release, and, with an exulting heart, 234 THIRD MARRIAGE AND PROGRESS OF he proceeded to Gravelines, where he was met by the Duchess of Burgundy, who had been chiefly instrumental in obtaining his liberty. The Duke of Burgundy arrived soon after with all his court. Their meeting was very affecting ; the two princes embraced each other repeatedly with the greatest affection, and with the warmest expressions of congratulation and friendship. From Gravelines they went to St. Omer, where a series of fetes took place, and presents were offered to Duke Charles. From every part of the neighbouring country the nobility flocked to the spot, and the whole kingdom was a scene of delighted rejoicing. It was immediately agreed that the duke, who was now a widower for the second time, should marry Marie de Cleves, niece of the Duke of Burgundy; and the marriage took place in November, 1440, with unequalled pomp. A grand chapter extraordinary was held by the Duke of Burgundy to receive the Duke of Or- leans into the order of the Golden Fleece, who, in exchange, requested him to wear the collar of his order of the Porcupine. " At length," says the chronicler, " after ten days passed in great diversions, the Duke of Burgundy went to Ghent, where he parted from the Duke and Duchess of Orleans. The cortege of the French prince became every day more numerous, so that by the time they separated CHARLES OF ORLEANS. 235 the Duke of Orleans bad archers, and a train of more than three hundred horse, all the money necessary for their entertainment being furnish- ed by the Duke of Burgundy. "In this state he passed through the French towns, everywhere received and feasted as if he had been the king. lie arrived in Paris the 14th of January, and there an equally distin- guished reception awaited him. "All this jiomp and demonstration of attach- ment, however, was not looked upon by the King of France with satisfaction ; and he let the duke understand that he would willingly receive him, but not with so numerous a retinue." Charles of Orleans, disgusted at this want of cordiality, immediately retired into his lordship of the Orleanois, and repaired at once to his castle of Blois. It was from thence that he dated one of the first poems he wrote on his return from exile, and his feelings are clearly expressed by its pensive character : — BALLAD. " EN TIRANT d'oRLEANS A BLOIS." My bark along the pleasant Loire With gentle motion onward went ; From Orleans to the towers of Blois My course, too long delay'd, was bent. And many were the glittering sails That lightly pass'd with joyous air, Fann'd by the soft and favouring gales, For them both wind and tide were fair. 236 CHARLES OF ORLEANS AT BLOIS. My tliouglits upon their voyage hung As long I watch'd their forward way, And in my heart fond wishes sprung — Oh, would I were as sure as they ! The sail of comfort I might raise, And court, like them, the flatt'ring air, If I could hope, to crown my days. For me the wind and tide were fair. But I have been so often cross'd, And found so changing Fortune's tide. And in the world's frail bark been toss'd, Without a hope my course to guide ; So stay'd by troubles and regret. So kept by wishes closed in care ; That now I scarce dare ask if yet For me the wind and tide are fair. These vessels, whose free course I mark, With buoyant joy the stream ascend, While I, in my descending bark, May still with angry waves contend. Oh ! when will Heaven, to end my care, Proclaim both wind and tide are fair ? Monstrelet, in speaking of the final deliver- ance of the Duke of Orleans, has these some- what significant remarks, to Mhich the unfriendly conduct of Charles VII., on his return, gives peculiar meaning : — " The English desired but little that he should obtain his release, because many of them were highly paid for his entertainment. And that was one of the chief causes why he was so long de- tained prisoner, according to the report of seve- IN BRITTANY. 237 ral English themselves, who were in the secrets of the King of England. *' Certain it is, that if the King of France, and those who had the government of the duke's revenues, had long before resisted the great demands made for his maintenance, and had withheld the necessarv finances, there is no doubt that he would have been delivered much sooner." Charles met with a no less friendly reception in Brittany, than he had done in France. The Duke of Brittany and all the princes there vied with each other in showing him respect; and the country was enlivened by feasts and enter- tainments. It Avas not without a political intention that Charles made these visits. He was anxious to gain friends and supporters in the approaching contentions for the bien public, which now occu- pied the attention of all. There existed much dissatisfaction amongst the princes, who had re- solved to force the king to listen to their com- plaints. The Duke of Burgundy was the great instigator of this new dispute, which it required much j)olicy to soften. Charles of Orleans ex- erted all his interest on the occasion in favour of the king, and succeeded in moderating the bitter feeling afloat. For this Charles VII. could not but be thankful, and probably felt that his in- terest was deeply concerned in securing the 238 CHARLES OF ORLEANS AT HOME. friendsliii) of his cousin. He expresses his sense of these services in letters-patent, dated May, 1442, when he made liberal presents to the Duke of Orleans. The attempt to obtain possession, in right of his mother, of the Milanaise, now occupied Charles for some time : the eiForts he made were frustrated, and he returned from Italy, where he had been in person at Asti, leaving a faithful servant and friend in the governor of that town, Louis de Montjoye. He now took up his final abode in his castle of Blois, devoted entirely to literary pursuits, and surrounding himself with men of genius from all parts of the kingdom, so that his court became as famous throughout France, as that of Ren6 d'Anjou had been in Provence. Painters and illuminators found encouragement there, and the arts were both understood and appreciated by him and those enlightened friends whom he associated in his pursuits. His court must have been the most refined and elegant of the age, and, in the midst of peace and the restored pros- perity of the kingdom, Charles of Orleans may have passed some very happy years, after the long night of sorrow and imprisonment which had shrouded his early years. The Duchess of Orleans was also a poet, and entered entirely into all the taste and views of her husband. The lords, his companions, were of THE DUCHESS OF ORLEANS. 239 the same mind, and everything was propitious to the enjoyment of literature and the arts. All ancient customs were kept uj) at his court, and nothing was neglected that could tend to the advancement of taste and refinement, according to the ideas of the day. It was the habit at that period to entertain jesters, both male and female, and several of the fraternity of celebrity are mentioned as having been welcomed and supported at the court of the Duke of Orleans. Mattre Colas was the fool attached to the service of the prince, and Dame Bclon was his companion and the favourite of the duchess. The Duke de Bourbon had a female jester in whom he took much pride, called Tliom- mie, and a male named Jehannet, remarkable for his wit. These were frequently brought in con- tact with Colas and Bclon, and the war between them afforded infinite amusement to the court, who took pleasure in these exhibitions and trials of skill. The most renowned of these unfortu- nate beings, to whom nature, in denying the cus- tomary growth of mortals, had granted superior wit and sharpness, was the fool of the Bishop of Macon, who generally carried away the prize from the rest. This tranquil life of liberality and devotion to the most elegant pursuits of literature attracted all lovers of such pursuits to the court of ]3Iois, where they were sure of being received with 240 DEATH OF CIIARLKS OF ORLEANS. welcome and distinction. Tlio kindness and bene- volence of the duke to liis subjects secured to him their attachment and regard, and he was respected by his friends and allies throughout the kingdom. This was a happy reward after all he had endured, and he seems to have enjoyed it to the full, till rumours reached him that the King of France, Louis XL, having then succeeded his father, beheld his happiness with jealous eyes and desired to trouble his repose. It seemed that Fortune was never tired of tormenting him, and he found an unkind and envious rival in Louis XL, who chose to indulge in injurious suspicions, and to resent the affec- tion shewn by all to the duke, whose age was now advanced, but whose energy had, as yet, experienced no decay. However, at a meeting of the states at Tours, he was destined to ex- perience the brutality of the miworthy monarch, who respected neither his age nor his character ; and when he spoke in favour of the Duke of Brittany, Louis replied to him in such sharp and contemptuous terms, that the sensitive mind of the poet prince could not endure the rude treat- ment he met with. He retired immediately to Amboise, and never left that castle again, dying on the 4tli of January, 1465, regretted by all but the king whose unkindness had shortened his life. DEATH OF CHARLES OF ORLEANS. 241 Thus ended the varied career of the most accomplished prince of his time, whose memory must ever be dear to France, as the father of the " Father of his country," Louis XII., and the uncle of the patron of literature, Francis I. CHAPTER XIX. LITEKATUEE OF THE AGE. — POETS. It will be observed that there existed at this period a singular mixture of coarseness and re- finement, of brutality and courtliness, of dissipa- tion and propriety ; and, although the long trou- bles which had desolated France seemed sufficient to extinguish every spark of the old Troubadour spirit, yet it is curious to observe, that seldom has poetry flourished more than at the different courts of France, Burgundy, and Sicily, at this very time. The encouragement given to learning by the wise monarch Charles V., throughout his long reign, had had its influence ; and in spite of the troublous years which succeeded, and the extra- vagance of the court, the graceful arts were not lost sight of. In the adversity of Charles VII. the Muses were not silent, and though the theme of the POETS. 243 poets of the day was mournful, yet it tended pro- bably to impart a certain degree of refinement to thought, which continued success generally fails to give. It is not on record that Jacques Coeur was himself a poet, although it is evident from Mliat remains of his taste, that he had a mind quite capable of appreciating genius in all its branches: that he encouraged sculpture and painting there can be no question, and he was the intimate friend of two of the most refined princes then living, Rene of Anjou, who in his reverses used every means to protect his interests, and Charles of Orleans, whose reconciliation with Charles VIT. it is more than probable that he effected, being, as he was, so fast a friend of his celebrated brother Dunois. No poems of Charles VII. have been handed down to us, but many of the princes of his court were poets. The Duchess of Orleans wrote verses which her husband answered ; but, what is more surprising, some of the fiercest of the warriors of Charles's camp sang lays of love and |)hilosopliy. It is true that violence in war or cruelty in peace do not appear incompatible with the ex- pression of the most delicate and generous senti- ments, as is instanced in the case of the Bishop of Toulouse, Folquet de JVIarseilles, the first originator of the Inquisition, the furious perse- cutor of the Albigenses, and the " gentil troii- 244 POETS. badour," who, at the sacking of Beziers, ex- claimed, as he led on his exterminating bands, who were attacking friend and foe, "Kill all! God Mill know his own ! " Yet this bigot, deaf to the cries of humanity, could write such lines as to ensure him the commendation of the ten- der Petrarch, and address his lady love in soft strains like the following : — If I must fly thee, turn away Those eyes where love so sweetly dwells ; Be veil'd thy cheek, be hush'd thy lay, And cease thy smile with all its spells. Discard those gentle wiles that won me, And those soft words which have undone me. Then I may quit without regret All that I cannot now forget ; Then may I leave thee, nor despair To lose a gem without compare I Bertrand de Born, also, that terrible warrior who fomented the fatal quarrels between Henry II. of England and his turbulent sons, and who is placed by Dante in a fearful position amidst the horrors of his " Inferno," could utter the tenderest addresses to the " dame de ses pen- s^es," and might pass, in his verses, for one of the softest and most effeminate of swains. In the East, the most cruel tyrants were frequently exquisite poets : the fierce Bajazet, in the intervals of his massacres, apostrophises the morning breeze — " O zephyr ! say to that POETS. 245 false friend, who has spread the snare of deceit, 'Thou art fallen into the pit which thou hadst prepared for thy neighbour ! ' " Certain it is that at this time, when France was torn to pieces by civil and foreign conten- tions, — when bands of the most ruthless robbers infested the country, and the manners of the nobles were rough in the extreme, if we may judge by their actions, — the spirit of poetry ruled the court, the camp, the grove ; and amongst the fashionable poets may be num- bered those personages whose hands, it might have been presumed, Avere more formed to wield a battle-axe than to guide a pen, and more used to brandish the torch which was to consume a castle or a town, than to tune the lute to please a lady's ear. One is startled to read the names of the harsh warriors of the camp of Charles VII. coupled with that of the graceful Charles of Orleans; yet Pierre de Bourbon, Jacques de la Tr^mouille, Pierre de Brez^ seneschal of Anjou, the murderer of his wife ! the Duke de Lor- raine, the Duke de Clermont, both famous in the wars for the public good, the Duke de Nevers, the Duke d'Alen9on, and a host of others, all wrote verses, and are cited as famous for their knowledge and skill in the (/r//V science. One of the motives assigned by liis rival for 246 POETS. the murder of Louis of Orleaus, father of tlie poet, was, that the prince, with too little re- serve, recorded the praises of the Duchess of Burgundy's beauty in songs of his own compo- sition. To this his son adverts in one of his poems, in which he makes the god of love enjoin secrecy of him, if he become one of his votaries. " NOBLE PRINCE, CE POINT CY FORT VODS TOUCHE." And, noble prince, thy promise plight, — For, ah ! too much it touches thee, — That lover's words, unvell'd and light. Have caused great dole and woe to be. Incautious looks and careless lays May envy and destruction raise. Vow, therefore, shouldst thou happy prove. And be advanced by prosp'rous Love, No boasting songs shall tell the boon. For deadly vengeance comes too soon ! Though French poetry may be said to have been almost in its infancy at the period when Alain Chartier and the Duke of Orleans, both real poets, wrote, yet, as generally happens in all countries, some of the earliest were the best poets ; for, though the language in which they composed improved and changed in the course of time, yet the grace of their thoughts, their noble sentiments, and expressive simplicity, are little impaired. This is the case with our own Chaucer and a few others ; and this one cannot but feel in reading the poems of the minstrels CHRISTINE DE PISAN. '247 of the time of Charles V., VI., and VII. of France. Few verses can be found more touching than the sad rondeaux of the pensive Christine de Pisan, the fair historian of Charles the Wise, who had to struggle with hard adversity, and felt the sorrows which she describes in such simple and j^laintive strains as these : — " EN ESPERANT DE MIEULX AVOIR." I live in hopes of better days. And leave the present hour to chance, Although so long my wish delays, And still recedes as I advance. Although hard Fortune, too severe, My life in mourning weeds arrays, Nor in gay haunts may I appear, I live in hopes of better days. Though constant care my portion prove, By long endurance patient grown, Still with the time my wishes move, Within my breast no murmur known. Whate'er my adverse lot displays, I live in hopes of better days. She thus sings on the death of her father : — *' COM TURTRE SUIS, SANS PER, TOUTE SEULETE." A mourning dove, whose mate is dead, A lamb, whose shepherd is no more, Even such am I, since he is fled Whose loss I cease not to deplore. Alas I since to the grave they bore My sire, for whom these tears are shed. What is there left for me to love ? A mournincf dnve ! 248 RENK OF ANJOU. Oh ! that his grave for me had room, Where I at length might cahnly rest ! The world to me is saddest gloom, And ev'ry scene appears unblest ; My hope is only in his tomb. To lay my head on his cold breast. Who left his child nought else to love — A mourning dove I But little of the poetry of the accomplished and amiable Troubadour-king Rene of Anjou, has reached us; yet he was held as no mean poet in his day, and took rank with many of those cele- brated sons of song who flocked to his brilliant court, and found a welcome beneath his hospi- table roof. He has been reproached by historians with carelessness and want of warlike qualities, as he was at the period in which he lived by his ambitious and turbulent daughter IMarguerite of many sorrows, the fugitive Queen of England, who in vain sought to disturb his philosophy, and to make him see that there was more glory in the field than in a court of love ; but Rene was content to afford shelter and sympathy to dis- tress, and where he felt powerless to draw the sword to assist, he was ready to tune the lute to console the unfortunate. Many anecdotes are re- lated of his firmness or indifference to calamities which would have shaken an ordinary mind: he could continue his favourite occupation of minia- ture painting, even when it was told him that he had lost his kingdom, as the beautiful partridges RENIi OF ANJOU. 249 and flowers on tlie margin of the famous Book of Hours which he is said to have executed with his own diligent hand can testify, for they are still to be seen, in all their delicacy and freshness, in the library at Poitiers. Though averse to combats, he understood well the art of mimic war, and one of the treasures of the king's library at Paris is a finely illuminated manuscript, containing a code of chivalric laws, entirely written and illustrated by himself. In many towns of Anjou are still shewn certain pictures, discoloured by time, which tradition ascribes to his pencil ; and his memory is even at this distant period held in veneration throughout that part of France as well as in the south, where he chiefly resided during the latter part of his peaceful life. He corresponded with all the literati of the time, and kept up a continued intercourse with Charles of Orleans during his captivity. A few lines, however, are all that can be gleaned of this poetical correspondence, and these are in the usual style of the time, wlien it was the custom of princes and poets to be wretched, to show they had wit. He thus addresses Charles of Orleans, in a somewhat affected strain of melancholy; for the good king's grief, whatever it might be at the moment, could scarcely compare to that of the long-detained prisoner of Azincourt. 250 COUNT DE CLERMONT. "si V0U9 ESTIEZ COMME MOY," &C. If you had lialf my cause of care, You well might seek in tears relief, For of my woes the smallest share Is greater than your greatest grief. Yes, you might speak of love's despair. If you had half my cause of care. For I, tho' full of heavy woe. Which more than death itself I fear, Must feign a joy I cannot know, And, sighing, seem of lively cheer. This would you do, this must you bear. If you had half my cause of care. The Duke of Orleans answers the Kinof of Sicily in the following strain : — "CHASCUNE VIEILLE SON DUEIL PLAINCT. ' All mourners love to tell their woe. You think none ever grieved like you ; But I would e'en that joy forego. And scarcely dare my grief review : For ah ! too little do I feign, Too sad, too real is my pain ; And verse no solace can bestow, Though mourners love to tell their woe. Yet would I turn my tears away. And do, perforce, as others do ; Would strive with fortune, if I may. And fly the cares that still pursue. Too well what wrings the heart I know, Although I dare not tell my woe. The Count de Clermont was a poet of his day, and wrote some lively lines, encouraged by his friend the Duke of Orleans, to whom he dedicated DUCHESS OF ORLEANS. 251 them: they show the character of the times, when, in tlie midst of the hardest struggles, warriors amused themselves with trifles like this : — "que cuidez-vous qu'on verra AVANT QUE PASSE l'aNNEE 1 " What think you we shall see Before the year be past ? Many tilings will be Hither, thither cast. Here and there, how all Will be toss'd and thrown ! — What think you will befal Before the year is flown ? But yet, come what come may, Tis Fate that rules us still ; Be we sad or gay, In vain is strife or skill. If a new world we should see. Think you what that world would be ? The Duchess of Orleans was probably in earnest when she bewails her sorrows, though there is seldom much truth in the expression of those woes which are so adroitly arranged to a refrain : — RONDEL. " l'abit le moine ne fait pas." 'Tis not the habit makes the friar. Alas ! whatever guise I choose, My heart is robed in black attire. And every comfort will refuse. In courtly dance and royal show My trembling steps no measure know : Still mourning weeds my thoughts attire. — 'Tis not the habit makes the friar. 252 MARTIAL DE PARIS. My constant eyes their habit keep To count with tears the hours that pass : I move in pain, I wake to weep, And hide myself to cry " Alas ! " I know no pleasure nor desire. — 'Tis not the habit makes the friar ! Martial de Paris, or d'Auvcrgne, one of the poets whose genius gave lustre to the period of which this Avork treats, w^as of an Auvergnat family, but born in Paris about the middle of the fifteenth century. Jean de Troyes, the historian, thus mentions him in his chronicles of the year 14(36, under somewhat peculiar circumstances : — " In the said month of June, when beans flourish and become good, it happened that se- veral persons, both men and w^omen, lost their reason, and particularly at Paris. Among the rest was a young man named Master Martial d'Auvergne, advocate in the court of Parliament and notary of the Chastelet of Paris, who, after he had been married three weeks to one of the daughters of Master Jacques Fournier, counsel- lor of the king in his said court of Parliament, lost his senses in such a manner, that, on the day of our lord Saint John the Baptist, about nine o'clock in the morning, such a frenzy took him, that he threw himself from a window in his chamber into the street, and broke his thigh and otherwise injured himself by bruises, so that he was in great danger of his life. This frenzy MARTIAL DE PARIS. 253 continued on him for a consideraljle period, after which he recovered and became perfectly sane." His death occurred in 1508. He was looked upon as the most witty and spirited writer of his day. Of course, like all those of the pe- riod, he could not escape inflicting on the world a work having for its subject " Les Ar- rets de la Cour d' Amour; " and so pleased was he, as well as his readers, with it, that he car- ried on these sentences to the number of fifty- three : they were in prose, with an introduction of seventy-four lines in verse. The work thus opens, in the usual style of the day, when poets thought they should not be understood excei)t they were precise as to the time when they begun their lays : — Environ la fin de Septembre, Que faillcnt violettes et flours, Je me trouvay en la grant chamlire Du noble parlement d'Amours. These courts of love were not exactly the same as those so popular amongst the trouba- dours and trouv^res, though love-questions form- ed part of their business, but they were com- posed of men of letters, who communicated their works to each other, and gave judgments regarding the quarrels of lovers and authors. Tt must be acknowledged that they had enough to do. The most celebrated work of Martial d'Au- 254 MARTIAL DE PARIS. vergne is one called " Les Vigil es de la Mort du Roy Charles VII." It is a history of that monarch's reign, in six or seven thousand lines, and in different measures. Notwithstanding the occasional ruggedness of the verse, there are fine sentiments and much grace and beauty in the work, particularly in those parts in which the author speaks of the king. His pastoral scenes have considerable merit ; the following may convey some idea of their style : — " MIEULX VAULT LIESSE l'accueil ET ADRESSE," tkc. More worth the fehcity, Love and simplicity, Welcome and kind address, Laughter and tenderness, Shepherds enjoy, Than riches and treasure In o'erflowing measure, And glory and pleasure, With care and annoy, That great lords feel ever With all their endeavour : For more their distresses. And Fate seldom blesses Their dwelhng like ours. For we have, unceasing. In labour our blessing, And meadows and flowers ; And odours sweet smelling, And fruit ripely swelling ; MARTIAL DE PARIS. 255 No teiTors to harm us, All nature to charm us, And peace in our bowers. If selling all my store. My sheep and oxen all, Could from his grave once more Our dear lost king restore ; I 'd yield them without pain, I 'd give them with good-will, To see him once again Alive and happy still. All for the sweet delight He gave his shepherds long, Who fiourish'd in his sight, And moum him in their song. When my brown bread I share, Whatever clothes I wear. Tending my flocks with care, For him I '11 ever pray : And for his lilies fine, So precious, so divine. None may with them compare, So noble and so fair, I '11 honour them for aye ! Martial d'Auvergne's description of the lady judges in the court of Love is curious, as it presents a picture of the customs of the time : — Leur habits sentoient le cypres Et le muse si abondamment. Que Ton n'eust sceu estre ou plus prcs Sans etemuer largement. Outre plus, en lieu d'herbe vert Qu'on a accoustume d'espandre. Tout le parquet estoit convert De romarin et de lavandre. 256 VILLON. He has some good lines on "The Advantages of Adversity," whicli are applied to Charles VII., who had, indeed, known adversity, Though bom in such a high degree. " PRINCES QUI ONT DE LA MISERE." The prince who Fortune's falsehood knows With pity hears his subjects' woes, And seeks to comfort and to heal Those griefs the prosp'rous cannot feel. Warn'd by the dangers he has run, He strives the ills of war to shun ; Seeks peace, and with a steady hand Spreads truth and justice through the land. When poverty the Romans knew. Each honest heart was pure and true; But soon as wealth assumed her reign, Pride and ambition swell'd her train. When hardship is a monarch's share. And his career begins in care, 'Tis sign that good will come, though late, And blessings on the future wait. When Charles of Orleans kept his court at Blois, and gathered round him all the poets of the day, one, too famous in his day, a worthless man and the author of worthless and immoral verses was not left out. This was Villon, a gTeat master of language, and one to whom his native tongue is said to be extremely indebted, but who has left few but specimens of his jirofligate turn of mind to warrant his popularity. He had much VILLON. 257 caustic wit, which, too gross and coarse to be now endured, no doubt was highly rehshed in his own day, and must have formed a striking contrast to the delicate productions of his patron. Oc- casionally, in the midst of his satires, a few lines may be met with, which show that he possessed reflection, and that the spark of genius within him might have been turned to a good purpose, if a life of profligacy had not extinguished it. Villon is much lauded by all French writers on the subject of the early poetry of their country, as having understood, better than any poet who went before him, the mechanism of verse, and as possessing a perfect mastery over rhyme. IVIarot formed himself on his model, and La Fontaine is said to be infinitely indebted to him ; but his works are only Avorthy of the oblivion into wliich they have justly fallen in a more refined age. As exercising considerable influence over the lan- guage of the fifteenth century, and as being con- temporary with others more interesting, he, how- ever, deserves mention. These are a few of his lines: — . " MES JOURS s'eN SONT ALLEZ ERRANTS . . . . " My life has all too wand'ring been .... Where are they now who reign'd so long, — Of sparkling wit, of joyous mien, — So full of mirth, and jest, and song ? '2^8 VILLON. Some stiff in death, and pale and cold, With notliing left of what they were ; While others, still as gay and bold. Are mighty lords without a care. Some begging alms in whining tone, Who bread in windows see alone. Some in a lonely convent dwell, A Celestins' or Chartreux' cell: — Divided, scatter' d, great and small, What varied fate attends on all ! nummA^imaui^t^. CHAPTER XX. STATE OF THE ARMY. ECORCHEURS. CONQUEST OF NORMANDY. ANTOINE DE OUABANNES. THE DAUPHIN. DUN0I3. — READY AID. — INFRINGEMENT OF THE TRUCE. ROUEN SURRENDERED. — TRIUMPHAL ENTRY. Charles VII.'s cherished project was a de- sign to re-conquer Normandy, and drive from thence tlie intruding English, wlio still retained their footing in his dominions. Doubtless, he had frequent conferences with his argentier on the subject, and to his judicious advice and assistance he owed the execution of his plans to eftect that desirable end. The army at that pcri(Kl was raised under cir- cumstances which altogether prevented its being regulated by the ordinary discipline at present understood. AVhen a monarch required aid, lie applied to his nobles and his vassals, who got together troops for the time, ready to follow s 2 2G() STATE or TIIR ARMY. tlieir Icaflcrs to conquest which secured to them pillage and power; but the struggle over, the troops were dismissed, and their captains had no longer any responsibility or controul over them. During the long continuance of civil war the authority of the monarch was of no avail in rebel- lions : funds were always wanting to them to keep up a regular army ; and when the soldiers were no longer employed, their excited minds refused to return to peaceful pursuits ; they there- fore formed themselves into bands of adven- turers, who overran the country in all directions, devastating and ruining all they approached, and compromising the state by their outrages. Such were the bands know-n in the annals of France as guilty of the most revolting crimes — the Ecor- cheurs, Braban^ons, Grandes compagnies, Rou- tiers, Trente mille diables, Quinze mille diables, &c. It is calculated that this rabble rout amounted to no fewer than a hundred thousand men, who knew neither law nor mercy, and who were never- theless not without illustrious commanders ; for many of the younger sons of noble families, and most of the illegitimate branches, did not disdain to head these marauders, having no nobler end in view than that which actuated the lowest of their band of robbers. Olivier de la Marche, devoted admirer as he is of the order of chivalry, speaks out on this sub- ject :— ^CORCHEUUS. 261 " The whole kingdom was full of towers and fortresses, the guardians of which lived by raj)ine and plunder ; and in the centre of France and the neighbouring countries assembled all manner of people collected into companies, calling them- selves ecorclieurs. These rode and travelled from country to country, and from province to province, seeking adventures and provisions: so that they found the means of living, they respected not the lands of the King of France, the Duke of Bur- gundy, nor any other prince ; they made prey of whatever fell into their hands, and all were in ac- cord as far as plunder went. Their chief ca])tains were the Bastard of Bourbon, Brusac, Geoffroi de St. Belin, Lestrac, the Bastard d'Armagnac, Ro- drigues de Villandras, Pierre Regnault, and An- toine de Chabannes Comte de Dammartin : and although Poton de Saintrailles and La Hire were two of the principal and most renowned captains of the French party, yet were they en- gaged in this pillage and this ecorcherie ; but they fought against the enemies of the country The said ecorclieurs did much mischief and injury to the poor peoi)le of France, and merchants and others." It is true, that these robbers received, in their turn, no mercy when taken; and the same histo- rian recounts, that so full were the rivers of Saone and Doubs of the bodies of the miscreants, that fishermen freciuently drew forth fn.ni llie 262 LA HIRE AND IIIS BROTHER. waters, instead of fish, tlic corpses of the ecor- cheurs, tied by twos and threes with cords. This summary justice had long occasion for existence, for this war of robbers and murderers lasted for many years, although it was at its height from 1435 to 1438. The lawless ravages committed by the free companies at this period were innumerable, and it required the exertion of great determination to repress them, for it has been said that the expeditions which had gain for their end were conducted by some of the chief personages of the court. The whole country which did not imme- diately belong to le Roi de Bourges was consi- dered fair game ; and all the younger and ille- gitimate sons of noble families thought it but right to provide for themselves by pillage. The renowned warrior La Hire, who did not himself disdain this method of recruiting his finances, encouraged his natural brother, Pierre Regnault, in the most daring adventures, one of which is thus told by Monstrelet : — " In the year 1440, Pierre Regnault, who held the chatel of Milly, near Beauvais, which he had lately repaired, set forth one day from thence with about 160 combatants, as well on horseback as on foot, with the view o^ foraging and scouring the country round Abbeville. " They took the castle of Yancourt and the lord within it, the which castle they pillaged entirely, PIERRE REGNAULT. 203 that is to say, of all the goods that it contained that were portable. The neM's of this afiair soon reached the town of Abbeville, where were then the lords of Auxy, Guillaume de Thiem- bronne, Phillippe de Wancourt, Guy dc Gourle, and several other gentlemen, who, immediately on hearing what had occurred, aroused themselves, mounted, and accompanied by some followers on foot, sallied forth about 300 strong, in order to set upon those who had committed this outrage, and to recover from them the goods they had obtained from the castle. " When Pierre Regnault and his companions heard this, and found their enemies so superior in number, they sent a message to the Seigneur d'Auxy, excusing themselves on the pretext that they had sought only to provide themselves with provisions, of which they stood in need; which explanation, however, by no means contented the offended parties. "Whereupon open war was declared, and Pierre Regnault, finding that the greater part of those who had issued forth from Abbeville were but of the common sort, resolved to brave them, and to break a passage through them, which he did with but little loss, and succeeded in discomfiting the party with considerable injury to them ; for there were twenty or thirty left dead on the field, and nine drowned, who had fled, endeavouring to cross the Somme, amongst others, Guy de Gourle; 264 JiCORCIIEURS. and more than sixty prisoners were made, the chief of whom were Messire Jean de Fay, a knight of Rhodes, the knight of Wancourt, and William de Thiembronne. " After this achievement the ' fine, gay, bold- faced villain,' Pierre Regnault, returned to his chateau de Milly, in high spirits, taking with him his booty and his prisoners, whom he set to ran- som, as the chronicles say, ' as if they had been English.' Nor did he let so prosperous a begin- ning lead to nothing, but, animated with fresh vigour, he, with others excited by his example, undertook fresh skirmishes in the territories of the Duke of Burgundy, who was by no means content with Pierre Regnault, and sent a remon- strance to Charles VII., desiring him to restrain his subjects from violating the peace then existing. The king excused himself as he best might, saying that this conduct was equally displeasing to him, and that he would do all in his power to prevent a continuance of it, and even gave the duke full permission to revenge himself as he chose on the men who had committed this breach of amity. Nevertheless, to the great prejudice and destruction of all the country, the pillaging and rapine went on as before, and the excitement becoming general, other followers of La Hire took the opportunity of indulging in similar pas- times, sallying forth from the chateau of Bonne, near Laon, and ravaging the countries of Hainault, l-CORCIIEURS. 2G5 Cambresis, antl otlier places under the jurisdiction of tlie Comte do St. Pol, who placed a strong garrison, without loss of time, in the town of Marie, the wJiich garrison set forth one day in like manner to harry the city of Reims, taking posses- sion of a fort by the river called Baca Berry, in which they placed thirty men and a captain. The people of La Hire upon this resolved to take vengeance, and joined with themselves the garrison of Valois, who had been lately occujiied in ravaging the country of Messire Jean de Luxembourg. Altogether they numbered 300 combatants, who ' incontinently and with great goodwill assailed the said fort, which they took, and put almost every one therein to the sword, and cast them into the river.' After which the French left a strong party in the fort to defend it. About sixteen days afterwards the people of Messire St. Pol, and those of his uncle, Jean de Luxembourg, Count of Ligny, assembled to attack the said fort, but the other party aban- doned it, leaving it to be demolished by those who arrived. And in this manner was the country about Reims, the Leonnois, and many other marches and districts, torn to pieces by the different j)ar- ties ; all, it was said, owing to the fact that Messire Jean de Luxembourg would not take the oaths to King Charles, and kej)t garrisons in all his towns to oppose the peo])le of the king. 266 ECORCIIEURS. There was no end to the frays and attacks on each other of the people of Bar and Lorrain, all attempts at restraining them by those of their chiefs who really desired to keep peace being use- less ; and the stray companies of France were only too happy to take part with whichever side it suited their humour to espouse, when they had no petty quarrel of their own to occupy their attention. To pillage a church of its rich plate and or- naments was considered a notable feat, and many fell a prey to these devastators. The country people and traders in the meantime were en- tirely ruined by all these contentions, for by each party they were injured. For instance, the Count de Vaudemont is represented, after he had retired from besieging the town of Bar, as being "so inclined and obstinate to destroy everything that lay in his way from fortress to fortress," including churches, that it was in vain some of his company attempted to prevent the desolation caused by his progress, and the more reasonable portion of his followers were overpowered by those whose delight was in violence. This same party of Le Vaudemont continued en route for the space of twenty-six days, and were greatly in want of provisions, which they seized wherever they found them ; and then, when no combatants appeared against them, ANTOINE DE CIIABANNES. 207 took their way back to the castle of their chief, ravaging all they discovered as they went. The good order established by Charles VII.'s government had greatly repressed these abuses ; but, when w^arlike expeditions were projected aneM% the same depredations and outrages fol- lowed. There was little desire on the part of the fiery lords who were associated with these ruflians to do away with their companies, and the king, and those who were really friends to their country, had to work out the reform almost alone. Jacques Coeur, with his accustomed acutencss and good sense, saw clearly the necessity of put- ting down the evil with a strong hand, and urged the king to be firm and peremptory on the subject. This, no doubt, was one of the causes which raised up against the able and conscientious mi- nister a powerful foe, whose bitter hatred nothing but his ruin could satisfy. The Count de Dam- martin, Antoine de Chabannes, whose pride could not brook interference, and whose turbulence required this vent for his unworthy exertion^ saw, with ill-concealed fury, the exertions which Jacques Cceur was making to redeem his country from the disgrace which had blemished its fame for so long a period; he, in common with all the imjioverished nobles of the court, was in- debted in large sums of money to the rich mer- 268 ANTOINE DK CIIABANNES. chant, whose purse was never closed to the ne- cessities of his countrymen. Their extravagance and profusion having only increased with their means, they all saw that some great effort must be made to efface tlieir accumulating debt, and cheerfully did the Count de Dammartin under- take to be their champion. A truce existed till 144G, between the English and French, and Charles VII. and his advisers considered this interval a proper time to attemjjt the desired reformation, and to create an army on which he could depend for the future. In spite of the opposition which he foresaw from inter- ested persons, he resolved to make the effort, and summoned to his councils the dauphin Louis, Rene of Anjou King of* Sicily, and his son the Duke of Calabria; Charles of Anjou Count of Maine ; the Count of Richemont Constable of France ; the Counts of Clermont, de Foix, de St. Pol, de Tancarville, de Dunois, and many others, both ecclesiastic and secular. The king was gratified to find his plan of re- form generally popular ; and its advantages soon became so evident to all, that no obstacle was openly thrown in his way. He was energeti- cally supported by the Constable de Richemont and his friends, and all succeeded as could be desired. The finances were placed in a position to answer all demands; a code of laws was drawn THE DAUPHIN. 2G9 up for the future maintenance of troops; all for- mer misdemeanours were forgiven, but the strictest penalties were exacted for any outrage hereafter to be committed. Things being thus settled, after the dismissal of thi* great body of his troops in 1445, Charles VII. retained for the maintenance of his power a per- manent army of 9000 cavalry and GOOO in- Wtrv. This establishment was an overwhelminfif blow to the power of the feudal aristocracy, for it rendered their ])ower almost null ; but great and salutary were the advantages which this wise measure produced to the country. Commerce began instantly to flourish, towns and villages to revive, labourers to resume their occupations, and all fear of ruin from the^ ferocious marauders who had so long desolated the kingdom was at an end. It seemed as though a golden age were dawn- ing upon France; and to whom was the king and the nation more indebted for this happy change, than to the friend of his country and his king, the argentier Jacques Camr? This happy state of circumstances was destined to be disturbed by the ingratitude and turb^ lence of the Dauphin Louis, who had already been pardoned for a revolt, which was called " La Praguerie," but who had quitted the court, and retired to Dauphin^, whence he continually dis- tressed and annoyed his father by his tyrannous and violent proceedings. 270 DUNOIS. The picture which P^ngland presented at this time was in sad contrast to tliat of France. The wars of the two Roses distracted the country from one end to the other, and the interests of the nation in its conquered provinces were for- gotten in domestic dissensions. The government of Normandy was left without money to repair fortifications or pay troops. The French, who had submitted to a foreign yoke, had become the more impatient of it as they observed the glory and success of their conquerors giving way before the star of their legitimate monarch, and many had entered into negotiations and plots against the English. The cruel execu- tion of the heroine of Orleans, although chiefly brought about by French treachery and cupidity, rankled in the hearts of the disgraced sons of the soil, and they looked to Dunois, the sworn brother in arms of the ill-fated Jeanne, to revenge her death. Dunois was at this date about the age of forty-six, and he was then grand-chamberlain of France. His courage was such as distinguished the Paladins of old ; his character was, like that of his half-brother, the poet Charles, superior to his time; he was adored by his soldiers, and every noble of the warlike court of Charles VII. was proud to combat under his banner. He had been for aw^hile led aw^ay from his allegiance by the arts of the dauphin, probably READY AID. 271 excited by his own tlesirc for action, and his fear of peace preventing him from carrying out tlic work of vengeance which he cherished ; but he soon returned to the loyalty and devotion he had always proved in the worst times to his king. Charles rewarded the frankness he shewed in the avowal of his fault, by naming him lieute- nant-general of the kingdom. The time seemed now arrived, both in tlic opi- nion of Dunois and Jacrpies Coeur, who was his intimate and particular friend, to make the great effort to expel the invading English, whose only hold was Normandy, The argentier had always continued to advance large sums of money to his royal master, and he saw with pain that too much was expended in luxury, Charles, in fact, left him- self nothing with which to execute the plan he had the patriotic idea of forming. He looked round him, and saw his treasure wasted in riotous living, for adversity and privation seldom teach prudence to monarchs. He grieved to behold the moment arrived when he might gain all but for his reckless weakness, and he turned away from his empty coffers with sorrow and»- confusion. But there was still a friendly hand ready to relieve him, one that had for years been ever stretched forth when his necessities demanded help, one that was never weary with giving, and whose bounty seemed but to grow with tlie oc- 272 READY AID. casion. Jacques Coeur, who observed and knew tljc cause of the king's depression of spirits, sought him in Iiis chamber, and thus addressed him : — " Sire," said he, " under the shadow of your protection I am aware that the great possessions I have were obtained : to you I am indebted for profit and honour, both at home and even in a pagan land ; for in honour of you has the soldan granted me a safe-conduct for my galleys, and my factors are safe, by his command, when they re- pair hither and thither to transact their commer- cial engagements. From all these advantages I have acquired great wealth. Sire, whatever I have is yours." Charles, touched with this generosity, at once communicated to him his necessity : " Lend me, good friend," said he, "a sum of money that I may be enabled to drive the English out of Nor- mandy." " On this," recounts his historian, Mathieu de Coucy, "Jacques Coeur immediately agreed to lend the king two hundred thousand crowns, the which he did." There was now no obstacle left, and, as if to hasten the catastrophe, the English themselves infringed the truce, which was to be in force for four years, having surprised the town of Fougeres, which they took, and likewise declared war against Spain and Scotland, both allies of France, contrary INFRINGEMENT OF THE TRUCE. 273 to the treaties entered into by botli parties. They had also committed various inroads in tlie neiirh- bourhood of Orleans, Chartres, Beaiivais, Amiens, and Paris. All remonstrance had been vain, and these incursions still continued : the English ap- peared to require some such excitement, for they were tired, not only of the truce, but of the indif- ference shewn by their government to all their applications for assistance to ena])le the gover- nor to maintain the expenses of his sojourn in Normandy. The intestine dissensions which tore Enjrland to pieces prevented proper attention being i)aid to the wants of those subjects to whom was left the care of the conquests in France; and the citi- zens of every town, seeing the success which at- tended Charles VTI., no longer concealed their wish to return to their allegiance. Not a moment was lost by the French : Du- nois was named commander of a chosen army, and set forth on an expedition which he panted to begin. Scarcely had he entered the field wliou all the towns situated on the Seine and lMn*e yielded to him, and he arrived at the gates of Rouen before the astonished English could re- cover from their amazement. The latter, commanded by the Duke of Somerset, and the celebrated warrior Talbot, en- deavoured to resist; but the inhabitants of thi» town had treated with Dunois, and, joining the T 274 ROUEN SURRENDERED. king's troops, tlic diiko found himself so closely pressed that ho was obliged to capitulate, and to give up the old palace and castle of Rouen, Ilon- fleur, Arques, Caudebec, Tancarville, Lillebonne, and Montivilliers ; to give freedom to the captives lie had taken, to engage himself to pay in the course of a year fifty thousand crowns of gold, and to leave for hostages the gallant Talbot and six other English captains. On these conditions Somerset and his duchess and family, and the whole of the garrison, with all their baggage except the heavy artillery, were permitted to retire with a safe-conduct. Harfleur, the first conquest of Henry V., the duke refused to surrender, and the French king allowed it to remain, for the moment, in the hands of the English. The great day of triumph was arrived, and Charles, the " Roi de Bourges," came in pomp and exultation, with all his court and all his army, to take possession of Rouen. To the generous argentier this achievement was mainly owing, and the king resolved that he should bear a con- spicuous part in the solemn ceremony of his en- trance. The chronicler Berry, king-at-arms, thus recounts the circumstances : — "On the 10th of November, 1449, the king set forth from St. Catherine to enter his city of Rouen. He was accompanied by the King of Sicily, the Counts of St. Pol and Nevers, the TRIUMPHAL ENTRY. 275 Counts of Maine and Clermont, tlie grand equerry Poton de Saintrailles, Juvenal des Ursins the chancellor of France, all magnificently habited, mounted, and equipped. Behind the king came on horseback the archbishop of the city, accompanied by several bishops, abb^s, and other churchmen. After them followed the Count de'Dunois, lieutenant-general, mounted on a charger covered with crimson velvet, with a large white cross. He wore a dress of the same colour, trimmed with fine sables, having on his head a hat of black velvet, and a sword by his side adorned with gold and precious stones, one ruby on the handle being worth twenty thousand crowns." Jacques Coeur, the argentier of the king, is named as riding with Dunois, together with De Brez4 Seigneur de la Varenne* and seneschal of Poitou, and the Seigneur de Gaucourt, first cham- berlain. These are described as wearing the same dresses as Dunois, and the caparisons of their horses as being similar, namely, covered with crimson satin, embroidered Avith fine gold and silk, except that the trapj)ings of the argentier's horse were adorned with the white cross, wliich the two other comi)anions did not bear. This last circumstance is worthy of note, as it has been advanced against Jacques Cann-, that, " so * The same De Breze who was afterwards accused, as well as Jacques CcEur, of crimes against the king. 270 TRIUMPHAL ENTRY OF CHARLES great was his presumption, and the splendour he assumed, desiring to eclipse the most illustrious chiefs in the richness of his apparel, that he en- tered Rouen by the side of Dunois, wearing a tunic and arms similar to that worn by the distin- guished warrior," as if he had no right so to do. Both Du Clerq, Berry, and De Coussy mention that he was attired like, and rode by, Dunois ; but it was clearly no assumjition on his part, for, as had been said, two others were in a similar habit, all of whom, of course, were directed so to ap- pear by order of the king; for there had been much consultation beforehand as to the order and the costume to be adopted on this important occasion, when all the splendour that the money of Jacques Coeur could provide was exhibited, to shine in the eyes of the expectant citizens. Every knight vied with his fellow in magnificent array, and no cost was spared to render the grand entry of the king as imposing as possible. The Seigneur de la Fayette, marshal of France, was attired in tan-coloured satin, while the baillie de Rouen appeared in blue velvet. The chancellor, Guillaume Juvenal des Ursins, was mounted on a white hackney, wearing a robe, mantle, and cap of scarlet, royally furred, before whom men on foot led an Irish hobby, bearing a lady's saddle covered with velvet sprinkled with gold fleurs-de-lis, and on this hobby was a small coffer with golden bands, which was about a INTO ROUEN. 277 foot long, or thereabouts, and held the king's seals. On this occasion a child, son of the Seigneur de Pressigny, aged about thirteen, was created a knight by the hand of the seneschal of Poitou. " There rode," says De Coussy, " after the chan- cellor, Jean de Fonteuil, squire of squires, and captain of Laon, who carried in a scarf a mantle of purple-scarlet, furred with ermine, which was the mantle of the king ; and he had on his head a hat, pointed before, of vermilion velvet ; and the hangings of his horse were also of velvet. " Poton de Saintrailles, one of the heroes of the day, first squire of the squires of the king, and baillie de Berry, was mounted on a large destrier, covered with azure velvet, fastened with great clasps of silver gilt, armed all in white, and Ijcar- ing in a scarf the sword of state of the king, the pommel and cross of which were of gold, and the belt and scabbard strewn with fleurs-de-lis of gold on blue velvet." Then came the king himself, the long-strug- gling and now triumphant prince, Charles le Vic- torieux, mounted on a palfrey of middling size, covered with a cloth of azure strewn with golden fleurs-de-lis, armed at all points, says the chronicle, " exceptees la salade et banniere; et si avoit sur son chef un chapeau de bievre (castor) gris, fourr6 de satin vermeil, avec une houi)pette dessus de 111 dor et ared to meet all tlir hardships and 284 THE FAIR PILORIM. difficulties which might assail hur, travelling by slow stages, and visiting as she went all the holy places she found in her path. " T had," says she, " gone on in tliis manner for some time, when fortune led me near to the sea-shore, at the end of a high forest, very tangled and dangerous, and there I came to the haunt of certain pillagers and robbers of the sea, who fiercely and frightfully came towards me and those in my company; and I had no other pro- spect before me, considering their demeanour, but to be taken prisoner or put to death, when by good chance a knight was riding that way, and hearing the outcry, came to the rescue, and so valiantly behaved himself, that he put the robbers to flight and delivered me and my companions from their hands. " Meanwhile I, who had been much affrighted at the danger, was fallen into a fainting fit on the ground, whence the knight lifted me up, and taking me gently in his arms, said, ' My dear lady, do not longer terrify yourself for anything : take heart and be comforted, for by the mercy of God you are delivered from the power of your ene- mies ; and if it is your pleasure, I am ready to conduct you and your company to some good town or place of safety in the neighbourliood." " When he had thus spoken," continues this true heroine of romance, whose style was much admired at the lime bv all the readers of her THE FAIR PILGRIM. '285 singular epistle, "and when \ had a little reco- vered and could speak, I thanked him witli a grateful heart for the great courtesy and goodness that he had shewn me. I then began to think very seriously of the peril and danger I was in, con- sidering what a long way 1 had yet to go to ac- complish my pilgrimage, and yet how distressing it would be to me to return to my own country with- out having done so, on which, bursting into tears, I said to the knight, ' Sir knight, I am the most distressed gentlewoman at present in this world, and I know not at this moment what to do." "When he heard me so speak, he replied, very gently, that, if there was anything in which his counsel might avail, or the body of a knight might with honour achieve, he would undertake it to serve me without hesitation." The lady then proceeds to relate to the knight the pious object which had led her so far on her journey, and, without further circumlocution, asks him boldly, l)y the pity and compassion which all gentle knights owe to distressed ladies, to be her escort throughout the romaindi-r of tlio perilous journey which her great devotion had caused her to undertake. The knight on this considered a little within himself, and then replied, that there was notliiiig he would M'illingly refuse her, and would do all in his power to prevent her meeting with either danger or discourtesy on her journey ; nevertheless, 28G TITE FAIR PILGRIM. it was necessary tliat slie should be informed that he had made a vow, which would prevent his undertaking this or any other enterprise until he had accomplished that to which he was bound. The vow he had made was to guard a pass in a place near the tour de Beau Jardin, on the road between Calais and St. Omer, in Picardy, in the diocese of Therouane, called hitherto the Place de Beau Jardin, but henceforth, he gallantly in- formed the lady, to be named La Croix de la Pe- lerine. This spot it was his intent to guard from the 15th of July, 1449, till the feast of our Lady in the middle of August, against all comers. The fair pilgrim, on hearing this, resolves to address letters to all the chief courts of Europe, praying the kings and governors of each to assist her pious purpose, by giving permission to their knights to accept the challenge of the knight of Beau Jardin, who, though it was his pleasure to remain unknown, was yet of high renown and noble lineage. She urges all persons, who regard their honour and the love of the ladies, to assist her undertak- ing by encouraging that of the unknown knight, who, she assures them, " has not been induced to this act by hatred or any bad feeling, but to keep in practice the noble art of chivalry, and occupy himself therewith ; because, God be praised ! at present in these marches there is sufficient repose from M'ar; added to which, he wishes to become THE KNIGHT OF REAU JAllDIN. 287 acquainted with the said knights of fame, that he may the more highly value them for the future." In order that no doubt may be entertained of the respectability of the knight, it is certified by Monseigneur le Comte d'Estampes, that he is known to him, and is a highly worthy per- sonage. The knight is then described by his fair friend as having established himself at the Croix de la Pelerine, where he has hung up a white shield with a bend gules, such as was formerly borne by that loyal and fortunate knight Lancelot du Lac ; and beside the shield is a lance and battle-axe hung on a stake, to which is also a hunting-horn appended. She now calls him Le Chevalier a la Pelerine, and goes on to set forth all tlie preparations he has made for his passage of arms in the style of Palamedes, who fought so well in his day for the ladies. The lady further adds, that to every knight who accepts the challenge she will j)rescnt " ung bourdon* d'or garni (Vun riclic ruby, priaut (|u"il lui plaise porter toute I'annee pour remcnil)rance." Her letters were despatched by different notable officers of arms in all directions; but it appears the enterprise was not considered with favour, and no enthusiasm followed the announcement of this chivalrous intent. • A tilting-lance. 288 THE KNIGHT OF I?EAU JARDIN. Charles VFI. by no means encouraged it, as he required the services of all his knights at that moment, and they were aware that there was plenty of occupation in store for them, now that open war had been declared against England. Tn Germany one knight answered the appeal, but he was aged, and probably looked with more respect on usages which appear to have been thought somewhat romantic and antiquated even in that day. In Berne, Bernard, bastard of Foix, accepted the challenge. In Spain, no knight was found to listen to the proposal. In Burgundy, a few came forward, but were forbidden to continue the enterprise by the King of France. In Normandy, the governor Somerset gave no encouragement to the envoys ; and everywhere there was the same disappoint- ment. The chronicler does not conclude his story except by mentioning who the valiant knight was who w^as thus baulked of his pas d'armes. He was no other than Jehan de Luxem1)ourg, batard de St. Pol, Seigneur de Haubourdin, counsellor and chamberlain to the Duke of Burgundy. What became of the fair pilgrim is also un- explained ; but it is to be presumed that she arrived safely in Rome under the escort of her gallant protector, if he had no other adventure on hand to detain him. CHAPTEU XXIT. IIARFLEUR. — REVEBSES DEATH OF AGNES SOREL. ACCUSA- TION. JACQUES C(EUR'S FAMILY. INGRATITUDE. — THE SE- NESCHAL. CHARLOTTE DE FRANCE. MARRIETTE. Charles, pursuing liis success, now detcrniint'd to attack Ilarflour, and it was hero that he exhi- bited a personal courage which ranked him witli the first warriors of his time. He fought in the trenches like a private soldier, exposing himself to all the dangers of the attack. Unahle to resist so resolute a body of men, the English were forced to surrender ; and the king went on towards Caen, with the intention of taking tliat city in person. At both of these attacks Jac(|ues Coeur accompanied his master, whether as a coun- sellor or a warrior, history has not recorded. A violent struggle took place for Caen, and after a tremendous loss the J*^ngHsh were de- feated. Cherbourg alitne now remained in the hands of the islanders, and vigorously and promptly attacked, was carried like the rest after u 290 REVERSES. useless resistance, and tlie Knglisli lost the last place they had called their own in France. One year had sufficed for all these successes, and Charles VII. was now indeed King of France. During the whole period of this conquest all those em})loyed in the service of the king were scrupulously paid every month with the money that the generous merchant had advanced for the service of his country. But, as the old ballad has it, Every white will have its black, And every sweet its sour. Charles VII. had reached the height of his ambition ; his foes had fled before him, and were driven into the sea, which henceforth should di- vide them from his restored kingdom. He was surrounded with faithful friends and brave war- riors, and the prospect of the future was all sun- shine and hope. But a dark cloud was sailing over the sky, and it paused before the star which was brightest in the firmament, extinguishing the light which had led forward the adventurous prince in all his undertakings. It has been already related how Agnes Sorel, from her retirement at one of her castles, had sought her royal lover at the abbey of Jumi^ges : her presence was unexpected, and one reason of her sudden appearance is given by historians in her design of warning Charles that a conspiracy DEATH OF AGNES SOREL. 291 was on foot against liim, \vl)icli she had dis- covered. The anxiety for his safety alone might, however, have induced the Dame de Beaut6 to seek him at this moment, or her enthusiastic participation in his glory might urge her to fly to congratulate him. It is possible that her presence was not desired by Jacques Coeur, who seemed always fearful of his royal friend's weakness ; and, al- though Agnes was a patriot and a woman of sense, yet she was fond of luxury and expense, and was far from discouraging her lover in his disposition to extravagance. It is said that Agnes had become jealous of the influence of the argentier, and that she sought Charles at this time, in the hope of re-animating a passion which she feared was fading in the brighter beams of the flood of glory which now environed him. Be this as it may, she was attacked with fever immediately after an interview with the king, when she had retired to a chateau she possessed, called du Manoir, near Jumi^ges, and death put at once an end to the fears of some, the jealousies of others, and the love of one mIio for many years had found his chief happiness in her society. It would seem difficult to any but the most malignant mind, out of the death of a person witli whom he was known to have lived in amity, and who had named him to a post of honour in her \ 2.92 ACCUSATION. last will, to imagine and concoct erimo and aorn- sation against Jacques dmw ; yet even from those very circumstances which should have pre- vented such suspicions as were thrown upon him, arose the wrong which annihilated his fortunes. The great object with those who envied and dreaded Jacques Coeur was to undermine him in the affection of the king. While Agnes lived, her superior mind probably directed him in many matters, and she had too much observa- tion not to see that the friendship and devotion of the argentier were sincere and valuable. But Jacques Coeur had now lost his advocate, if in- deed, till now, he ever required one ; and the king, tired of exertion, and secure in his posses- sions, gave way to that indolence of mind which was habitual to him, and which he had thrown off only at the urgent entreaty of others, jealous of his honour and anxious for the regeneration of their country. It is, nevertheless, inexplicable, that Charles VII., even at the very moment of a triumph which he owed to the aid of his friend, should cast him off and abandon him to the hatred and fury of his enemies without a struggle. Yet so it was; and the high position of the noble mer- chant once lost, he permitted him to be dragged from the throne to a dungeon, with as little re- morse as if he had been a recent favourite whose falsehood he had discovered, and whose fate was JACQUES CCEUR'S FAMILY. 293 as indifferent to liim as that of tlie worthless minion Giac. The advancement of the family of the great merchant had not been forgotten in his pro- sperity ; and no douht the high position which it occupied served to increase the hate and jea- lousy of those who envied him. His eldest son Jean was now Archbishop of Bourges, and his brother Nicolas was Bishoj) of Lu9on, as well as canon of the Sainte Chapelle of Bourges. Charles VII. had himself written to Pope Eugene IV., in 144G, recommending Jean Coeur to succeed to the archbishop, who had been dis- missed, and the request was granted, although he had scarcely reached the age of twenty-five years. The ])rudence and regularity of his conduct proved that a good choice had been made ; in fact, there never existed a more worthy and ex- emplary prelate than Jean. Together with his other virtues, he possessed a fund of liberality ; and there was not a single church in his dio- cese that he did not adorn, re])air, and enlarge, lie was abb6 of St. Sulpicede Bourges, and his liberal donations there were very extensive for reparations. He had, says a monk who has written his life, a cell contiguous to the other cells of tlic monas- tery, and in the same dormitory. The archbishop frequently retired thither to meditate alone in 294 JACQUES CCEUR'S family. this holy solitude, and to repose from the cares of his diocese. During his prelacy the city of Bourges was afflicted with a grievous pestilence. The arch- bishop mounted the pulpit, and exhorted his people to disarm the wrath of God by their j)rayers, that He might stay this terrible malady. His pathetic words occasioned the vow made by the mayor and magistrates on the 13th July, 1458, to celebrate for ever in future the fete of the Visitation by a solemn procession, in which all the dignitaries of the town assisted m their robes. It is to be hoped that some more substan- tial good resulted to the town than this latter cir- cumstance, which seems, however, greatly to have impressed the mind of the reverend historian. It was in his quality of patriarch that Jean Coeur accompanied, from Paris to St. Denis, the body of Charles VII., and that he read the service at his funeral ; for the archbishopric of Bourges involved great dignities and privileges, Bourges being considered the capital of the kingdom of Aquitaine. He held the first place by virtue of his ecclesiastical dignity, when the conclusion of the pragmatic sanction took place at Bourges. He was one of the chief promoters of the re- storation of the university of the city, re-estab- lished by Paul 11. in 1464. It appears by the documents of the church, that he died in his native town the 29th of June, 1482. INGRATITUDE. 295 The other children of Jacques Coeiir and Mac^e de Leodepart were, a daughter, Perrette, who married Jacques Trousseau, whose father was seigneur de Mareuil and de Sainte Palaye .♦ Henry was the dean of the church of Limoges and canon of the metropolitan and Saint Chapelle at Bourges. Of Renaud nothing is known. Geoffrey Coeur was lord of La Chauss^e, and married in 1463 Isabelle Bureau, daughter of Jean Bureau, Baron of Montglat, grand master of the artillery of France. His father's death had happened ten years before this; and it is one of the proofs of the estimation in which his memory was held, that the alliance of his son was sought by a man who, like Bureau, had known him well. Geoffrey became maitre d'hotel to Louis XI., who honoured him with the title of knight, in consideration of his services and those of his father. He died in Paris, and was l)urii'(l in the chapel called Des Bons Enfans, near tlie cloister of St. Honore. It would seem that the re-establislinicnt of Charles VH. on his throne was the signal, not of exhibiting the gratitude owing by hinisrH' and his court to those who had served him in their necessities, but of endeavouring, by accusations and charges of dishonesty, to get rid of all the ♦ See Appendix. 29() INGRATITUDE. obligations which wciirhod heavily on persons who might at lengtli ho ex])ectod to show some return for the devotion of faithful friends. Plots were got up by tlie needy courtiers against the rich, in the hope that the wealth they coveted would be transferred to their empty purses ; and if a case of dishonesty could be proveln)iil(l \)c .-illdwcd every advantage which the law could give to enable him to rei'ute their charges. 298 THE SENESCHAL. He offered to give himself up to the king, to constitute himself a prisoner whenever Charles should command, to be at the whole expense of his own trial, and to meet any of the persons who accused him without reserve. All this the king readily agreed to, for, it seems, he was no party to this plot, but regretted the attack on his seneschal, to whom he w^as much attached. He was still entirely confident of his servant's probity and honour ; but, says the chro- nicler, " he was very fearful, and always exceed- ingly apprehensive of the envy of his court ; and well be might, for he had seen great troubles and inconveniences arise amongst those who served him, to his great displeasure and prejudice." He referred, then, this cause to the court of Parliament, and it was pleaded and carried on for a long space of time, during which De Breze was deprived of Iris governments and appoint- ments, not one of all his commands being left him, and all this while it was yet undecided whether he were guilty or innocent. After a series of the most distressing persecu- tions, and all sorts of criminal accusations, which were brought forward in the hope of crushing him, he contrived to obtain a triumph, and was finally pronounced free of all these malicious charges. Nevertheless, though the king acknow- ledged himself perfectly contented, he was too timid to re-establish his friend on the same foot- CHARLOTTE DE FRANCE. 299 ing as before, and the power and influence of De Breze were, in a great measure, at an end, even when some of his governments were restored to him. That Charles himself was satisfied of his pu- rity, is evident by the aHiance he afterwards formed with him, marrying one of his natural daughters, Charlotte de France, who is said to have been the child of La belle Agnes, to Jacques de Brezd, Count de ISIaulevrier, who suc- ceeded his father as seneschal of Normandy, and who possessed very considerable property and numerous estates. The history attached to this marriage is very tragical, and presents a frightful picture of the times, when the law could be taken into the hands of an individual who conceived himself aggrieved. It appears that the Count de Maulevrier was of a morose and sullen disj)Osition, and a domestic tyrant. He had conceived jealousy of his beauti- ful young wife Charlotte, already the mother of his heir and two more children : he ko})! her away from court at one of his castles, and one fatal day she accompanied him on a hunting party, on their return from which every one retired to their respective chambers. Some designing friend took this opportunity of informing De Breze that his wife was closeted with his chief huntsman, Pierre de la Vergne, and 300 CHARLOTTE DE FRANCE. that his honour was ciulangerod by such inter- views, which had taken })lace more than once. De Brcze, in the height of his passion, rushed to his wife's apartment, and, breaking the door open, it is said discovered his servant there with the countess. Appearances being thus against her, and her husband too furious to hear explanations, Charlotte, in terror, rushed to hide herself in the bed where her children were asleep, while her enraged husband struck La Vergne dead at his feet, without a moment's question. He then proceeded to drag his wife from her con- cealment, who clung to her infants for protec- tion ; she struggled with him, and had fallen on her knees imploring his mercy, when he plunged his sword in her bosom, and she fell dead on the floor. The vengeance of the supposed injured hus- band being accomplished, he caused it to be given out that Charlotte had died suddenly, and made a magnificent funeral for her, erecting a monument to her memory, in which her con- jugal virtues are set forth with great pomj). In this tomb he afterwards directed to be himself buried : he had therefore, soon after his crime, probably discovered that his wife was inno- cent, or it is hardly likely that he would have desired to be buried by her side. She was the mother of that Louis de Breze whose wife was the famous Diana de Poitiers. MARIETTE. 301 Certain it is, that the latter is represented sharing- liis superb monument in tlie cathedral of Rouen, and appearing in the character of a disconsolate mourner beside his tomb. One victim had eluded the restless enemies of order and quiet, and it seemed necessary that another, less able to defend himself, should be produced, in order to prove the zeal of the party for the royal interest, and to show that such charges as they had brought were not altogether chimerical. Accordingly, they fixed upon one of the king's secretaries, ^Master William Mariette, and insisted upon the fact of his being guilty of enormous crimes and malefactions. The king, willing to atone for the part he had taken in the defence of De Breze, at once gave way in this instance, and Marietto Avas thrown into the prison of Tours, and from thence brought to Paris for examination, where he underwent all kinds of interrogatories, doubtless accompa- nied by the torture, till he was induced to make a confession, whether true or false, of having cheated the king, of counterfeiting his seal and that of the dauphin, of having issued letters of credit in the royal name, addressed to several noblemen, from whom he had thus obtained suj>- plies which he appropriated; of having invented falsehoods in order to create discord amongst the l)rinces and nobles of the land; in chief, having thus deceived Duke Philippe of Burgundy, heads 302 MARIETTE. of the county of Liege, and many others ; in fact, of having possessed himself of money in all ways but those of honest dealing. All this being established, the wretched man was taken back to Tours and there executed, with infinite cruelty, for the edification of the public. But there was more exalted game which these illustrious conspirators of the purse pursued, and the hour was approaching when their vigilance would be rewarded with full success. f^UPMmA'V I M8U imi ^mmd\:^M$J''^ V^SL^l CHAPTER XXIII. HEIGHT OF WEALTH. — ST. FARGEAU. XAINCOINS. DAUPHIN. THE king's FAITH SHAKEN. — OTTO CA8TELLANI. DE CHA- BANNES. Arrived at the greatest distinction, possessed of almost unlimited power, the aroenticr had no inclination to relax his efforts to render himself the richest commoner in the kingdom. Perhaps, surrounded as he was by impoverished men of rank, he felt that his greatest security was in his wealth, which kept those turbulent compa- nions in his power, for not one of them but was deeply in his debt ; and, again, as they were little in a condition to repay what they owed, he must have seen the policy of not depending upon their means or their principles of honour, which, ex- cept in cases where chivalry was concerned, sel- dom shone out very brilliantly. r>()4 HEIGHT OF WEALTH. The lovo of wealth, find consequent power, was no doubt the ruling- passion of Jacques Coeur; and though in a general way it scarcely deserves to be considered a noble aim, yet so magnificent and generous was he in the distribution of his gains, that he exalted the nature of his pursuit. Nothing sordid or grovelling found a place in his character: he was great and liberal in all that he did ; his objects were patriotic and be- nevolent, and he traded like a monarch rather than a merchant. His views were far beyond the mere accumulation of money, and his am- bition was to do good by means of his great possessions. That he did not disdain dignities, appears from the acquisition of property which he made : no less than forty estates called him master ; that of St. Fargeau alone containing more than twen- ty-two parishes. It was the lordship of this estate which drew upon him the envenomed jealousy which effected his i'uin in the end. It would have been better policy in the rich merchant to forego the acqui- sition of a coveted domain, which fell to him in consequence of the poverty of one of higher birth than himself. George de la Tremouille, a man of high lineage and powerful at the court, had entered into ne- gotiations with the JNIarquis of Montferrat for the purchase of the lands of Toucy, Puisaie, ST. FAUGEAU. 305 Douaj, and St. Fargeau, for 20,000 gold crowns ; but being- unable to pay tlie sum agreed upon, the estates were offered to Jacques Coeur, who immediately paid down the whole sum and be- came lord of all. The castle of St. Fargeau* was of very an- cient construction, founded, in fact, in 998, by Ileribert, Bishop of Auxerre, natural brother of Hugues Capet ; and the castle of Toucy was of equal antiquity and importance. It was morti- fying to a noble of great family to see such estates pass into the hands of a man of the people ; and the lord of La Tr^mouille consi- dered his rights infringed, and himself ])erson- ally insulted, by the purchase of Jacques Coeur. He caused proceedings to be instituted in de- fence of what he considered his rights; and when the law decided in favour of the wealthy mer- chant, he insisted that he had procured the de- cision by undue influence. Retiring in disgust from the contest, La Tre- mouille vowed in the depth of his heart that the upstart millionaire should repent his daring ; and he never allowed his vengeance to slumber, till he had gained a signal triumph over a man who had injured him in nothing. With boundless riches at his command, enjoy- ing the intimate affection of his royal master, * The little town of St. Fargeau, on the river Loing, two leagues from its source, is the capital of La Puisaie. X :]<)() XAINCOINS. surrounded ))y a flourishing funiily, and iii pos- session of niag'iiificont estates ; with palaces ris- ing wherever he chose to buikl them, with suc- cessful commerce continually doubling his enor- mous means, Jacques Coeur was now at the utmost height of worldly power and enjoyment. There was much yet left for him to do to help his prostrate country ; but His bounty was as boundless as the sea, His love as deep. The more he gave, The more he had ; for both were Infinite. If he indulged in the luxury which his great wealth brought to his feet, he can scarcely be blamed for taking the good the gods provided, for it is not on record, even from the report of his enemies, that at any period of his brilliant career he neglected the interests of either his king or his country. But envy and hatred were at work to undermine him, even at the very top of his full-blown prosperity. So strong- was he in integrity as well as power, that cau- tion was necessary in attacking him, and the first blow fell on one of those employed under him in the administration of the king's affairs. The receiver-general at that period was a Florentine named Jean Xaincoins, whose wealth was so great and manner of living so magnificent, that it was little beneath that of the grand argentier himself, and excited suspi- XAINCOINS. 307 cions that he could scarcely liave won such enor- mous possessions honestly. A party, anxious to institute inquiry, and watching for the propitious moment when, susj)i- cion of those in power once awakened, further attempts might be ventured, accused Xaincoins of peculation : he was arrested, tried, tortured, and condemned to death, to the amazement of the greatest part of the lookers-on, who trembled as they beheld how far resolute enmity would pro- ceed. If Xaincoins were indeed guilty, he deserved condign punishment ; but if not, the leniency of the king in granting him his life, and taking pos- session of sixty thousand crowns of gold, which he was condemned to pay, was not sufficient. Guilty or innocent, the unfortunate receiver-ge- neral was ruined, and his coffers emptied into the royal treasury, while his enemies secretly whis- pered, that the great and rich parvenu Jacques Coeur knew more of his proceedings than was worthy of the confidence reposed in him. But this was merely a preliminary step, under- taken with a view to familiarise men's minds with accusation, and prepare them for the great at- tempt which a powerful body, working in secret, were aettinir rcadv for the destruction of the richest subject in the kingdom. The conduct of the dauphin greatly irritated the king, and it was thought a safe plan to in- 308 Tiir: king's faith shaken. sinuate to the latter that Jacques Coeur bad more intelligence with him than was consistent with his professed devotion to his master. Seve- ral noblemen, who were foes of the argcntier, boldly accused him to Charles of having given both counsel and money to the revolted prince, and represented that he knew his interest was likely to be better secured by paying court to the rising than the setting sun. Unlikely as was this assertion, the startled monarch, whose besetting weakness was terror of his son, a weakness which cost him his life in the end, listened to the fatal insinuation ; and though he might have exclaimed in his heart, like the British monarch of romance, who thought himself betrayed, God 1 whom may we ever trust, When such a knight so false can be ? yet he shuddered as he heard the words which attributed such baseness to the man in whom he had so long confided. Alas ! who were the accusers? had they been more zealous, more devoted, more useful, or more disinterested than Jacques Coeur ? No ; but they were persons of high rank, of his own class, and their authority was felt by him. Some of the highest names of France are to be found amongst the accusers of the argentier, and all were deeply his debtors for sums which OTTO CASTELLAN I. 809 they had neither the hope nor the wish to pay, but which they trusted to be relieved from dis- charging by his disgrace. Added to this conspiracy at his very hearth, there was no want of foreign enemies, who waited but an occasion to overwhelm him with their treachery. From the merchants of Genoa, Venice, and Tuscany, Jacques Coeur had wrested the monopoly of the Levant trade, and greatly reduced their profits. Numerous French mer- chants also felt their inferiority to him, and writhed under the infliction of his successes, not beholding, in their short-sightedness, that it was to him they owed the great extension of com- merce, which had i)laced them, as well as himself, in so flourishing a position. They merely cared to know that his downfall would leave a gap which any one of them might be fortunate enough to fill; and the thought of his failure rcyoiced their envious hearts. A willing agent of mischief was easily found in the person of Otto Castellani, a Florentine, wlio was treasurer of Toulouse, and receiver of customs for the court of Parliament in that town. He was the declared enemy of Jacques Coeur, and his a.mbition had long been to supplant him in his high aj)i)oiiitment at the head of the finances of the kingdom. His views were in the end ac- complished, and his punishment followed, th(Kigh it was scarcely adequate to his crime. M. Bon- 310 OTTO CASTELLAN I. amy informs us, that Otto or 0th on Castellan or Cliastclain had made his fortune in France, where he had established himself. In T44G he had a lawsuit against Marie d'Anjou, wife of Charles VII.; nevertheless he was made treasurer of Toulouse while Jacques C(jeur was still in fa- vour; perhaps, indeed, he owed his place to him. Otto Castellani was a creature of Antoine d( Chabannes, Count de Dammartin, a warrior, a man of rank, a patriot, and a hero, but unprincipled, revengeful, proud, cruel, and ungrateful. The terror of his name was spread, not only as a leader of a holy cause in which he fought by the side of the heroine of Orleans, but as a cap- tain of ucorcheurs, whose fell deeds made huma- nity shudder. He had revolted from his king and joined the rebellious dauphin in the conspi- racy of the Praguerie, but had returned to his allegiance like Dunois and La Trdmouille, and been forgiven as they were. It was through a fit of ungoverned fury that he deserted the cause of Charles, who having one day saluted him deri- sively with the title of " captain of the Ucor- cheurs,"* he had replied indignantly, " I have been so only to your enemies, and methinks their shins have brought more profit to you than to me." At a later period, when he was applied to by the dauphin to join him in a new conspiracy * Or skinners. DE CIIABAiNNES. oil against Cliarles, lie went at once to the king and revealed the plot; and being confronted with Louis, having received the lie from him, he boldly declared that he was ready to maintain the truth of his accusation with arms in his hand against any of the dauphin's peo])le who dared to deny the charge. So much boldness and valour were worthy of a better cause than that in Mhicli l)e Chaban- nes engaged when he placed himself in the lists of the most bitter hatred against his creditor, and a man who had injured him only by superior vir- tue and that superior wealth which had enabled him to be a benefactor to the ungrateful class who could not brook obligation from an inferior in birth. Passionate and energetic in all things, De Cha- bannes had given up his mind entirely for years to the object of destroying Jacques Coeur, and he had secretly been working at the mine which was to burst and overwhelm him. It was his voice that first dared to lift itself up against an innocent man, and, in the character of iiis master's champion, to accuse the argentier of treason. CHAPTER XXIV. LOANS TO THE DAUPHIN. — MISSION TO LAUSANNE. JACQUES CCEUR's magnificence. ARREST. JEANNE DE VENDOME. A DUNGEON. THE JUDGMENT. That Charles VII., however he might have been impressed with the accusation against Jacques Coeur of conspiring with the dauphin, did not continue to credit it, is plainly proved by the fact, that, neither in the public charge against him, nor in the pronounced judgment is a word, hint- ing at such a suspicion, inserted. It is by no means unlikely, nor does the fact involve any blame to the argentier, that he occa- sionally supplied the dauphin with money to meet his expenses : the poverty of his father consi- dered, and the natural extravagance of a young prince, make it extremely natural that he should. LOANS TO THE DAUPHIN. 313 when at the court, solicit aid from the same fruit- ful source Avhich sent forth its bounties to every noljleman there ; and notliing could be less extra- ordinary than that Louis should have been in- debted to Jacques Coeur in common with every other person, high and low, who required and j)rocured money from the general banker. Ilis continual occu])ation in public affairs of the utmost importance, besides his own extensive commercial relations, must have employed so en- tirely the time of the minister and ambassador, that there was no pause in which he could have had leisure, even if he had had inclination, for plots and conspiracies; and, as none knew so well as he the state of the finances, and no one had so much control over them, there was no reason why he should betray a long-cherished friend for an insolent and undutiful prince, to whom he was bound by no ties whatever. The absurdity of this charge ought, at once, to have annihilated all others; but, though that fell to the ground, others equally monstrous and improbable were perse- vered in and attended to. It has been thought that it was during the ab- sence of Jacques Coeur on his mission to Lau- sanne, that his enemies succeeded in undermining the king's regard and confidence in him. If it were so, Charles dissimulated well, for the favour in A\hich his faithful servant ajipeared after this was greater than ever, anersons of his accpiaintance whom he might choose ; but when, in indicating several, he named the Bishop of Agde, in whom he placed particular confidence, his presence was refused. He was then obliged to abandon all hope, and gave himself up, as he said, to the good grace of the king ; adding, " in respect of myself and all my ])ossessions, all are the king's, at his disposal to do with them as he sees fit." He made, however, one more effort, soliciting to be allowed to call upon his son Jean Coeur, Archbishop of Bourges, a prelate whose piety, probity, and liberality were respected by every one; he requested that he might give to the judges certain papers, which his factors would produce if the archbishop applied for them in his name. This was also refused. Two of his factors were at length named, both being men whom he had placed in the king's service, one the king's secretary, and one a clerk in the treasury; but neither of these Mere con- versant in matters connected with fniance, which 332 LUSIGNAN. circumstance lie represented in vain. The com- mission given them to obtain information in favour of their master in Languedoc, crippled all their efforts and made them of no avail. Oh castle of Melusine ! Oh Lusignan ! famous in romance and history, thou art now rased to the ground, with scarcely a vestige left even of that dungeon where the honest minister of an un- grateful prince languished, or the beautiful fairy bathed her serpent limbs in the fabled fountain, — but the memory of injustice, and the indignation of it, survive thy towers, and give thy site a moral ! From Lusignan the persecuted captive was removed to Maille, near Tours, there to await further treachery and tyranny. The reason of this removal was, that the Bishop of Poitiers had claimed the prisoner as belonging to his diocese, and as being a tonsured clerk,* subject to his jurisdiction. Jacques Coeur, finding, that, although the commissioners appointed to judge him were occasionally changed in order to make some show of justice, yet that new enemies appeared in the new appointments, and everything tended to his overthrow, saw no way but to j)lead the privilege of the tonsure, which rendered him amenable only to the clergy. On being removed to Tours, the archbishop * It was not unusual at this period for married men to belong to the Church. APPEALS. 333 there also came forward and reclaimed his ])ri- soner ; but, regardless even of the rights of the Church, the commissioners kept firm hold of thi'ir victim, and turned a deaf ear to every requisition in his favour. Meantime he ceased not strenuously to assert his innocence : he appealed to the Cardinal d'Es- touteville, the Bishop of Agde, and even to the king himself, to produce proofs that he asserted the truth. But it was far from answerinir the views of his judges to make any application to the king. All they would do was to accord to the accused a delay of two months, to obtain the means of his justification, beginning from the 1st of July, 1452, and ending on the 1st September following. This proposal came from Antoinc do Cha- bannes himself, who made this show of consi- deration to the man he injured. It was in- deed but a show, for the letters given to the two deputies appointed to seek documents in Lanji'uedoc were not dated for more than a fort- night afterwards, thus leaving no time for the difficult business they had to transact. Jacques Coeur, while he accepted this boon, remonstrated on its insufficiency; for it was necessary to seek in the different towns of Lan- guedoc the orders given by the king for the levy of supplies; receipts, which justified their eni])loy- ment; letters, by which a j)art of the money was o34 PRISONS. named as destined for liis own nse ; in fine, per- missions which he had obtained from the poi)es Eugenius and Nicolas V. for the transport of arms to the Saracens. If these jDermissions were not to be found at IMontpellier or at Aiguesmortes, it wouhl be necessary to seek them in the registers at Rome. They were in fact not found : good care had no doubt been taken that they should not be forth- coming ; yet that they existed there could be no question, for copies were afterwards obtained with certificates Mdiich prove their authenticity. The permission of Pope Eugenius is dated in 1445, and that of Pope Nicolas in 1451. For eleven months Jacques Coeur had languish- ed in prison. Not less than one hundred and fifty witnesses had been heard against him. The first respite granted was expired, a second had passed away, but the judges could gain nothing positive to criminate him. He was transferred from the chateau de Maille to that of Tours. On the 13th January, 1453, the king authorised another commission, addressed to Antoine d'Aubusson, Otto Castellani, and others, by which he in- vested them with powers to continue the trial and the interrogation of Jacques Coeur. The prisoner had again recourse to his only means, that of rejecting his judges as belonging to the laity, he being tonsured ; and he also ])ro- tested against them as being notoriously inimical TORTURES. 335 to liiin. Fatigued and exasperated witli his firiii- ness, his judges ordered, on tlie 22nd ]March, that he should be put to the question ! Tortures! for the man wlio had created the maritime commerce of France ; who had restored her king to his throne, and driven bold and victorious strangers from her shores ; M'hose wealth had propped the dignity of almost every family in the country; and whose connexion witli the most sacred class in the realm, amongst whom his son and brother held high offices, might at least have claimed for him respect and mercy. ffflrig EilHi^A<3? i m.8U \m t rm^imrd^^ ii^y mi^& CHAPTER XXVI. THE SOLBAN's letter. — STEANGE ANIMAL. EARLY TRAVELLERS. — BAWME. SPIKENARD. On the 23rd of March, 1453, Jacques Coeiir was brought before the commissioners. He was stripped and bound : in vain he insisted on his clerical capacity ; they were inexorable, and he was at length forced to give way, and consent to reply to some of the charges preferred. One of these was brought by two unworthy men, who had formerly been in his service, and were patrons of certain of his galleys. Their names were JMichel and Isaac Teinturier, and he recognised in them persons whom he knew to have hostile feelings towards him. Michel stated that it was in a vessel which he commanded that the runaway slave before mentioned had sought refuge, and that they brought him to France : LA BROCQUli-RE. 337 tliat he had been sent back to liis master, and had since apostatised. Jacques Coeur did not deny the fact, but stated, in the first place, that he had no reason to think the slave was a Christian ; in the next, he held that Michel had no right to carry off or furtively receive a slave who belonged to a Saracen, since, by agreement made with the Soldan of Egypt, it was expressly stipulated that the subjects of both nations should refrain from carrying off those in the employment of either. Several merchants had loudly protested against this act, urging that it compromised their safety; and he had received information from the grand master of Rhodes, of the intention of the SaraceiLs to make reprisals on the very first opportunity that occurred. Con- sequently, his agents at Alontpellier, after mature deliberation and consultation, had decided to send back the slave to his master; considering that they merely performed an act of justice, in obeying the articles of treaty which had been entered into by both nations. As a proof of the imderstanding between the Mahomedans and merchants trading with them, it is enough to read the contemporary travels of La Brocquiere, who relates in the fullest maimer what was expected of those vt'ho were admitted to the ports of the Levant. For instance, when describing the town of Bursa, which he names as the most considerable z 088 LA BROCQUIJiRE. of all the towns in the possession of the Turks, of great extent, and carrying on a considerable trade, " being situated at the foot of the north side of Mount Olympus, whence flows a river which, passing through the town, divides itself into seve- ral branches, forming, as it were, a number of small towns, that makes it look larger than it is ;" he relates that he was shocked by seeing the public market-house, where Christian slaves are sold; and he mentions, that several Florentine merchants here had interested themselves about a Spaniard, who, having been a slave to the sultan, found means to escape from Egypt and came to Bursa. " They begged I would take him with me : I carried him at my expense as far as Con- stantinople, where I left him ; but I am persuaded he was a renegade, and I have never heard any- thing of him since." No doubt this sort of character was common, and Jacques Coeur had too much penetration not to perceive at once that the whole scene of the pretended Christian slave was got up for an inte- rested purpose. Of course, therefore, he lost no time in restoring the runaway slave to his master, unwilling, for a worthless character, to expose his vessels to danger and the French name to dis- honour. La Brocqui^re states that the arrangements with regard to slaves were very strict at Constan- tinople ; and he says, " There are merchants THE soldan's armour. 339 from all nations in this town, but none so powerful as the Venetians, who have a bailiff that regulates their affairs, independent of the emperor and his officers. This privilege they have enjoyed for a long time : it is even said that they have twice, by their galleys, saved the town from the Turks, but for my part I be- lieve that God has spared it more for the holy relics it contains, than anything else. The Turks have also an officer to superintend their com- merce, who, like the Venetian bailiff, is independ- ent of the emperor ; they have even the privilege, that, if one of their slaves shall run away, and take refuge within the city, on their demanding him, the emperor is bound to give him up." As for the suit of armour sent to the soldan, the prisoner explained, that he never imagined any difficulty could arise respecting it, for he had not attempted to comply with the soldan's request till he had asked and obtained the con- sent of the king. He recalled on this occasion an interview he had with Charles, in which the king exposed to him the difficulties that prevent- ed his undertaking the conquest of Normandy; he recounted the fact of his having offered him his whole fortune if he pleased to take it, and that his majesty had honoured his servant by ac- cepting two hundred thousand crowns of gold. He added, that it was on this occasion, when, emboldened by his condescension, ho had named z 2 340 THE soldan's letter. to liini tlie request of the soldan, and was author- ised by him to expedite the armour, according to the wish of the pagan monarch.* When this was reported to Charles, he is said not to have expressly denied it, but to have pro- fessed his total inability to remember any such conversation or request : perhaps he also forgot the present which his argentier entreated him to accept. A startling reminiscence might have been found in the letter of the soldan to himself, brought back from that prince by Jean de Village, one of Jacques Coeur's chief factors, who had married his neice, and who was charged with the delivery of the armour, and the acknowledgment of it. The following curious document is the letter alluded to, which, remarkable as it is in it- self, and as regards the circumstances under which it was written, a few years had as entirely effaced from the royal memory, as the obligations which he owed to his ill-fated subject. The letter was accompanied by several rich presents to the king, which Jean de Village, who also received " beaux dons," such as robes of cloth of gold and jewels, from the grateful soldan, was * La Brocquiere speaks of the arms in use among the Sara- cens, as cross-bows, swords, and small harquebuses, which they fired off every now and then. " It is curious," says his editor, " that our portable fire-arms, the invention of which is very recent in Europe, were at that time in use amongst the Mo- hammedans of Asia." THE soldan's letter. 341 appointed to deliver to his majesty. The chroni- cler JMuthieu de Coussy thus introduces this re- markable document : — " In this year, 1447, Charles King of France received a letter from the Soldan of Babylon, which was translated from Saracen into French, and its tenor was what folloMs; and first the sujierscription : — " ' Let these letters be given to the lion, lord of the world, great as St. George who killed the dragon, lord of the country of France, benevolent king, king of kings, of whom all people demand l)ermission, lord of the earth and sea, lord of strong castles, very Christian in the name of Saint John, who baptized Christ, and of our lady, friend of the jNIoors and the lord of the Moors. Our lord gives thee health and long life, Charles King of France. The sultan of all cities, the great king of kings, Jamark, Muher-el-Dahcr, the wise monarch, the warrior and defender of the laws of the Moors, great sultan of the Moors and their faith, who does justice to all who war against each other, lord of the two seas and of many lands, liberal to the slaves of his country of the two churches of Lamcch and Abraham. God increase mine and give me good life, and to all my people, to whom I do much good.' 342 THE SOLDAN'S LETTER. '^Letter of the Soldan of EgyjH to Charles VII. " ' In the name of God be it so ! IMayst thou have long life, lord of the lion, of the dragon, of the wolf, of tlie forticion, who art the only Christian lord in the world, uncle of the lord who bears the yellow banner, that is to say, the King of Hungary, liberal, wise, and merciful, lord and counsellor of the other lords, lord of the land and the sea, and of all the Christians, powerful above all ; maintainer of the baptism and defender of the banner of Christ, Charles of France, friend of the Moors and of their lords, God keep thee in peace, grant thy prayers, and give thee a happy death ! " ' The Grand Sultan sends thee these letters, to assure thee that goocl friendship and accord reign between us. Thy letters we have seen and read, and believe that thou dost wish us well, as we do to thee. " ' Thy ambassador, a man of honour, a gentle- man, whom thou callest Jean de Village, is come to our Sublime Porte, and has presented the let- ters with the present which thou hast sent, and I have received them ; and what thou desirest of me to do, that have I done : therefore have I made peace with all thy merchants for all my coun- tries and sea-ports, as thy ambassador has de- manded. " ' The said ambassador came in great honour. THE SOLDAN'S LETTER. 343 and also Las taken his presents in great love and pleasure, for the love of thee. "'That which thou hast desired is written and done ; and I have sent to all the lords of my dominions, and especially to the Lord of Alexan- dria, that he show good-fellowship to all the merchants from thy country, and to all others having liberty to trade in my dominions, that honour and pleasure may be done them ; and when the consul of thy country is come, he shall have high favour amongst the other consuls. And I have ordained that good-fellowship shall be shewn to the pilgrims of thy country, who go to Jerusalem and Saint Catherine ; for the said ambassador has also begged this of me, and nothing shall be taken of them but what it is customary to pay to other sultans : they shall bo despoiled by none, nor injury of any sort done to them. And all that the said ambassador has asked for the pilgrims, and all other things, have I done for thy love, and thy ambassador departs from my Sublime Porte with his answers. And I have clothed him in a robe of honour according to custom, for thy honour, the which I have given him, having told the said ambassador that I consent that a consul shall be sent from tiiee to reside in my dominions, in order that peace may be between us. " * I send thee a present by the said ambassador, to wit, a balm made of our lioiv vine ; a tine 344 THE soldan's letter. leopard ; three basons of the porcelain of China; a dish of the same ; two great covered dishes of porcelain ; two green vases of porcelain ; two nosegays of porcelain ; a washing-bason, and a safe of open porcelain ; a jar of fine green ginger; a jar of almond kernels ; a jar of green pepper ; some almonds, and fifty pounds of our fine hamou- quet ; also a quintal of fine sugar, tlirice refined. " 'God lead thee to his salvation, Charles of France.' " What animal the forticlon is, mentioned in this letter by the soldan, it is difficult to decide. Early travellers beheld extraordinary creatures, as the following narrative by La Brocqui^re ex- emplifies : — " We thus travelled two days in the desert absolutely without seeing anything worthy of being related. Only one morning I saw, before sunrise, an animal running on four legs, about three feet long, but scarcely a palm in height. The Arabians fled at the sight of it, and the animal hastened to hide itself in a bush hard by. Sir Andrew and Pierre de Vaudier dis- mounted and pursued it, sword in hand, when it began to cry like a cat on the approach of a dog. Pierre de Vaudier struck it on the back witli the point of his sword, but did it no harm, from its being covered with scales like a stur- geon. It sprang at Sir Andrew, who, with a blow from his sword, cut the neck partly through, SIR JOHN MAUNDEVILE. 345 and flung it on its back with its feet in the air, and killed it. The head resembled that of a large hare ; the feet were like the hands of a young child, with a ju-etty long tail like that of the large green lizard." This mysterious creature was probably no other than the monitor lizard. With respect to the marvels that early tra- vellers beheld, it is useless to express surprise at them. La Brocquiere is by no means extrava- gant in his relations, and he makes no mention of a variety of wonders commonly believed before his time. It was evident that the frequent visits of merchants to Arabia and Syria had consider- ably enlightened the world since the days when Sir John Maundevile indulged in his unique de- scriptions of objects in natural history never seen since his time. The Venetian merchants were in the habit, in the century which had the advantage of Sir John's experiences, of selling, at the great fairs of St. Mark, plumes from the wings of the phoenix, which were supposed to be brought from the East; and the avidity with which they were pur- chased shewed the amount of credulity which permitted accounts like the following to influ- ence the eager buyers of such treasures : — " In Egypt in the city of Elyople,* that is to say, the City of the Sun, is a temple made round, after the fashion of the Temple of Jerusalem ; * St'c Travels ol" Sir Julni iMaundcviU". 34G THE PIIOilNIX. the priests of that temj)le have all their writings under the date of the fowl that is called fenix, and there is none but one in the world. And he cometh to burn himself upon the altar of the temple at the end of five hundred years, for so long he liveth. And at the five hundred years' end, the priests array the altar hojicstly, and put thereon spices and sulphur and other things that will burn lightly. And then the bird fenix cometh and burneth himself to ashes : and the first day next after, men find in the ashes a worm ; and the second day next after, men find a bird quick and perfect ; and the third day next after, he flyeth away. And so there is no more birds of that kind in all the w^orld but it alone, and truly that is a great miracle. " This bird men have seen oftentime flying in the countries, and he is not mickle more than an eagle, and he hath a crest of feathers upon his head more great than the peacock hath, and his neck is yellow, after the colour of an orielle, that is a stone well shining, and his beak is coloured blue, and his wings are of a purple colour, and the tail yellow and red, casting his tail again in travers. And he is a full fair bird to look upon against the sun, for he shineth fully gloriously and nobly. " Also in that country men find long apples in their season, called apples of Paradise, right sweet and of good savour ; and though you cut BAWME. 347 them in never so many gobettes, or parts, you shall ever find in the midst the figure of the holy cross ; and they have great leaves of a foot and a half long, and equally large. And here men find also the apple-tree of Adam, that has a bite at one of the sides." Perhaps the bamouquet, mentioned in tlie sol- dan's letter, may be explained by the following description : — " Also beside Cayre, without the city, is the field where bawmc groweth : and it cometh out on small trees that are no higher than a man's girdle, and they seem as wood that is of the wild vine : and in that field are seven wells that our Lord made with one of his feet when he went to play with other children. That field is not so well closed but that men may enter as they will, except in the season when the bawmc is grow- ing ; for then men are put there to guard it, so that no person may enter. This bawme grows in no place but only there, and if that men bring of the plants to j)lant in other countries, they grow well and fair, but bring forth no fruit. " Men cut the branches with a sharp flint-stone or sharp bone, for if they are cut with iron it would destroy the nature and the virtue. " The Saracens call this wood enonch bake, and the fruit they call abebissam, and the liquor that droppeth from the branches they call (lui/Ixtlsr. And men t*ause that bawme always tu be tilled 348 BAWME. by Christians, or else it would not fructify; so the Saracens say themselves, for it has been tried and proved. " This bawmc grows also in Inde, the more in the desert where the b'ees of the sun and moon spoke to Alea^ander; but I have not seen it." The traveller goes on to set forth the merits of the famous balm, held in such high esteem wherever it was known, and he proceeds to say : " A man ought to take good heed in buying of this bawme, for if he knows it not right well he may easily be deceived : for men sell a gum call- ed turhentyne instead of it, and they put thereto a little bawme to give it odour, and some put wax in oil of the wood of the fruit, and some distil cloves of gillyflower, and spikenard of Spain, and other spices that are sweet-smelling, and the buyer thinks he hath the bawme, and he hath it not. For the Saracens counterfeit it subtlely by craft, and after them the merchants and apothe- caries do the like, so that it is less worth and a great deal worse." Or this bamouqiiet may be that famous " wood wbich Cometh out of Paradise terrestrial, which is good for many divers medicines, and is right valuable ;" or that " thing that men call camhyhy which they eat instead of spice, and sell it. And let men make the hole where it is taken out of the earth ever so deep, or so wide, at the BAWME. 349 year's end it is full again to the sides, tlirougli the grace of God." Or conjecture may point to that wood, still more wonderful, " called by the Saracens di)yej that is of Abraham's time, and is named the dry tree : and they say that it hath been there since the beginning of the world, and was sometime green, and bare leaves until the time that our Lord died on the cross, and then it dried, and so did all the trees that were then in the world ; and some say, by prophecy, that a prince of the west side of the world shall win the land of promise with the help of Christian men, and he shall sing a mass under that dry tree, and then the tree shall become green, and bear both fruit and leaves. And through this miracle many Saracens and Jews shall be turned to the Christian faith ; and therefore they do great worship thereto, and keep it full carefully. And although it be dry yet is it of gi'eat virtue, for whoever bearcth a little of it upon him it healeth him of the falling evil, and his horse shall not be foundered; and many other virtues it hath, wherefore men hold it full precious." The " bamouquet " defines itself with no greater precision than the " forticion," whose etymology has already excited conjecture. Tt belongs to that class of unknown ol)jects of which Sir William Jones has justly said, " It is 350 SPIKENARD. painful to meet perpetually with words that con- vey no distinct ideas; and a natural desire of avoiding that pain excites us often to make in- quiries, the result of which can have no other use than to give us clear conceptions. Ignorance is to the mind what extreme darkness is to the nerves ; both cause an uneasy sensation ; and we naturally love knowledge, as we love light, even when we have no design of applying either to a purpose essentially useful." There is nothing which enables us to identify, with any degree of certainty the "bamouquet," of which fifty pounds weight were sent to Charles VII., with " the balm from our holy vine ;" but it is not improbable that the same thing is meant. The balm, which the soldan describes with a vagueness by no means satisfactory to a botanist, may possibly be the precious nard, which, up to a comparatively recent period, was looked upon as a remedy for all diseases, as sovereign as the unguent of Hollo way, or the celebrated "balm of Gilead." The learned Orientalist above quoted, who threw light on, and added interest to, every ob- ject to which he directed his attention, was at some pains to discover what the spikenard of the ancients really was, and devoted two separate papers to the inquiry. The conclusion which he arrived at is as follows, and it may not be consi- SPIKENARD. 351 dered irrelevant to introduce it as a paidant to Sir John Maimdevile's description of the " 1)awme of Cayre." Sir William Jones says : " My own inquiries have convinced me, that the Indian spikenard of Dioscorides is the siimbuhil Hind, and that the sumbuhil Hind is the jatamansi of Amarsinh. I am persuaded that the true nard is a species of valerian produced in the most remote and hilly parts of India, such as Nepal, Moi'ang, and Biitan, near which Ptolemy fixes its native soil. The commercial agents of the Devaraja call it also pampi ; and by their account, tlie dried specimens, which look like the tails of ermines, rise from the (jround, resembling ears of green ivheat both in fwm and colour ; a fact which perfectly accounts for the names stachijs, spica, sumbid, and khu- shah, which Greeks, Romans, Arabs, and Per- sians have given to the drug, though it is not properly a spike, and not merely a root, but the whole plant, which the natives gather for sale be- fore the radical leaves, of which the fibres only remain after a few months, have unfolded them- selves from the base of the stem. It is used, say the Butan agents, as a jierfumc and in me- dicinal unguents, but with other fragrant sub- stances, the scent and power of which it is thought to increase. As a medicine, they add, it is princi})ally esteemed for complaints in the 352 SPIKENARD. bowels. Tlioiigh considerable quantities of jata- mansi are In-ought in the caravans from Butan, yet the living plants, by a law of the country, cannot be ex})orted without a licence from the sovereign ; and the late Mr. Purling, on receiving this intelligence, obligingly wrote, for my satis- faction, to the Devaraja, requesting him to send eight or ten of the plants to Rangpur: ten were accordingly sent in pots from Tasisudan, with as many of the natives to take care of them under a chief, who brought a written answer from the Raja of Butan ; but that prince made a great merit of having comj^lied with such a request, and my friend had the trouble of entertaining the messenger and his train for several weeks in his own house, which they seem to have left with reluctance. An account of this trans- action was contained in one of the last letters that Mr. Purling lived to write ; but, as all the plants withered before they could reach Calcutta, and as inquiries of greater importance engaged all my time, there was an end of my endeavours to procure the first jatamansi, though not of my conviction, that it is the true nard of the ancients."" We must not look for similarity of name to guide us in endeavouring to show that the ba- mouquet of Egypt and the jatamansi of Nepal are identical, but refer for the likelihood of such being the fact to the esteem in which it was held in its native country, and the purposes SPIKENARD. 353 to which it was applied, and that the plant had engaged the attention of the great Egyptian his- torian, whose inquiries may have led to its in- troduction into central Egypt. That the soldan highly valued the drug, is evident from its being included with so many rare objects in a royal present. A A CHAPTER XXVII. fBENCH NAME. LA BROCQUIERE. BAD ODOURS. — JOAN OF ARC. JEAN DE LUXEMBOURG. LAON. So far from the French name having suffered by any act of Jacques Coeur during his commer- cial transactions with the soklan and his subjects, it is plain that the name of Frenchman was a spell to open a prison gate, as the narrative of the traveller La Brocquiere testilies. By this it appears that a native of France was considered in a superior light to Venetians, Genoese, or others known in those parts. " I returned to Damascus, and on the evening of the departure of the caravan settled my affairs and my conscience as if I had been at the point of death; but suddenly I found myself in great trouble. I have before mentioned the messen- LA BROCQUIERE. 355 ger whom the sultan had sent with orders to arrest all the Genoese and Catalonian merchants found within his dominions. By virtue of this order, my host, who was a Genoese, was arrested, his effects seized, and a Moor placed in his house to take care of them. I endeavoured to save all I could for him; and, that the Moor might not notice it, I made him drunk. I was arrested in my turn, and carried before one of the cadies, who are considered as somewhat like our bishops, and have the office of administering justice. This cadi turned me over to another, who sent me to prison with the merchants, although he knew I was not one; but this disagreeable a flair had been brought on me by an interpreter, who wanted to extort nioney from me, as he had before attempted on my first journey hither. " Had it not been for Antoine Mourrougin, the Venetian consul, T must have ])aid a sum of money ; but I remained in prison, and in the meantime the caravan set off. The consul, to obtain my liberty, was forced to make interces- sion, conjointly with others, to the Governor of Damascus, alleging that I had been arrested without a cause, which the interpr«^r well knew. Tiie Governor sent for a Genoese, named Gentil Imi)erial, a merchant emj)loyed by the Sultan to purchase slaves for him at Caifa. He asked nic who I was, and my business at [)amascus. On my replying tliuL I was a Trenchman returning A A 2 35G BAD ODOURS. from a pilgrimage to Jerusalem, he said they had done wrong to detain me, and that I might depart when I pleased." The traveller after this set out in high spirits, and probably resumed those " vermilion-coloured boots with spurs," which he mentions having bought, " such as are worn by men of fortune when they ride, and which come up to the knees." He describes himself afterwards as wearing " a high red hat with a huvette of iron round it." He wore the same dress when presented to the Duke of Burgundy on his return home. He speaks of a custom prevalent, particularly amongst the higher order of Turks, which is, to be baj)- tized in the Greek manner, as they assert that this process entirely destroys the unpleasant smell which is said to cling to all but Christians. " K\\ the grandees," says our author, " do this." There is an Oriental tradition that a certain tribe, for their sins, M'ere afflicted by Heaven with a disagreeable odour, to conceal which they are forced to use all kinds of powerful scents. The natives of the East are, at all times, remarkable for the strength or dulness of their olfactory nerves, and apge said to be able to endure smells which would nearly poison an European. The application of pure water may perhaps be found more effectual than all their usual per- fumes to remove impurity ; and this may account, in some measure, for their notion of the utility, in this respect, of baptism. JOAN OF ARC. 367 It appears that European matters were freely discussed by tlie Maliomedans and Greeks, who were in habits of intercourse with Euro})eans at this time, and they must afterwards have felt little less indignation when the persecution of their friend the great merchant reached their ears, than they did when the abandonment of Joan of Arc shocked their minds. What La Brocquiere says of the opinion of the Greeks respecting the fate of La Pucclle is sin- gular, and a reproach which it must have been difficult for the Burgundian subjects of France to remove. " I was lodged with a Catalonian merchant, who having told one of the officers of the palace that I was attached to my lord of Burgundy, the emperor caused me to be asked if it were true that the duke had betrayed the Pucelle d'Orleans, which the Greeks would scarcely believe. I told them truly how the matter had ])assed, at which they were greatly astonished." The atrocious vengeance of the duke's officer, Jean de Luxembourg, Count de Ligny, who sold the heroine to the English, had resounded through Europe. At Constantinople public rumour attri- buted it to the duke liimself, but the Greeks would not believe that a Christian prince could have committed such an act. The deeds, however, of Jean de Luxembourg, if all had been known to this nation which sliud- 358 JEAN DE LUXEMBOURG. derey his inexorable judges to prove that Jacques Coeur had never undergone the tonsure, and conse- quently did, in no way, belong to the Church, notwitlistanding the positive assertions of the three Bishops of Tours, Poitiers, and Bourges. Driven to despair by the evident malignity of his father's judges, Jean Coeur, Bishop of Bourges,' after using every effort to obtain access to the king and soften his ministers, repaired enrlv in 3G4 JEAN cceur's protest. the morning, on tlic eve of tlie judgment to be pronounced, to Gooffroy Garin, clerk and keeper of the royal seal at Poitiers, and caused a solemn act of appeal to be registered to this effect : — "That it had come to his knowledge and cog- nizance, that certain haters and malevolent ene- mies of Jacques Coeur, his father, had striven to establish certain preventives to his deliverance, which malicious intents he could expose and make manifest : he appealed and would appeal there and in all places, as much as in him lay> and would make use of all the powers he possess- ed that might serve him, then and at all times." But, in spite of every effort, iniquity gained its triumph. The king, from whom, even to the last doubtless, his family and friends looked for justice, — whose arrival at Lusignan, and examination of all the counts and papers connected with this sad affair, had raised hopes, — the king himself ordered the chancellor of France, Guillaume Juvenal des Ursins, to pronounce his sentence at the castle of Lusignan, the 19th May, 1453. He was condemned as worthy of death, but, in consideration of his services to the king, his life was granted — the only mercy shewn. His goods were confiscated ; he was declared incapable of ever holding any office in future ; and decreed to "Yiiake amende honorable bareheaded, without hood or belt, on his knees, holding in his hand a lighted torch weighing ten pounds of wax. by SENTENCE. 3(J5 confessing that he liad wickedly, iinhiwfully, and against reason, presented and sent harness and arms to the soldan, enemy of the Cliristian faith, — that he had restored a child to the Saracens, and transmitted to them a great quantity of white jnoney and gold, against the royal ordinances, and had caused by his extortions great distress and desolation in France : he was then to beg mercy of God and justice of the king. On this subject Etienne Pasquier has some curious remarks in a letter to M. de INIarilliac : — " There is a remarkable expression in the sen- tence of Jacques Coeur, ordaining that he shall make the amende honorable ' sans chaperon^ which has caused my thoughts to go back to I know not what ancient time of France, which T cannot help entertaining you with at this moment, while you, at Fcrrieres, are no longer entertaining vour fancies with your trees. Regarding the word chaperon^ it was anciently used in the sense which we moderns apply to caps ; we still say chape- ronner for bonneter, and from our ancestors wo have derived the expression ' two faces under one hood' meaning that two persons understand eacli other. " The sentence of Jacques Coeur specifies that he shall perform the amende honorable bare-headed, and without a hood. This was the ordinary nuxU' of punishment to })ersons in his position ; but lie is ordered also to a])pear without a f/inllr, which i 3f)() SENTENCE. never saw before in any sentence as far as I recol- lect. Why then should this command be added in this case? I will tell you. Our forefathers considered that in the girdle lay the general re- membrance of all our possessions : whether for our supi)ort, our sustenance, our defence, we bore the emblem in our girdle, as the sword for the profes- sion of arms, or the pen for men of the robe. At the girdle were worn the keys, the purse, or the ink-horn, according to the several necessities or occupations of the wearer. For this reason, when a man's goods were to be given u]), he was com- pelled, before the face of the judge, to take off his girdle — a custom still in use in our days — not as a mark of infamy, but as an emblem of having abandoned all possession. " My opinion therefore is, that the command of Jacques Coeur's appearing luithout a (jirdln was intended the more to express that all his worldly jroods were taken from him — that all he had was at once confiscated." He was commanded also to seek for and pur- chase the child who had been restored to the heathen, if he could be found, and cause him to be brought to INIontpellier, or else to buy a Chris- tian slave from the Sarasins, and have him brought to the said town. A receipt for two thousand crowns, borrowed by the lords of La Fayette and Canillac, was decreed to have been falsely and maliciously THE LADY OF MORTAGNE. 367 taken from them by Jacques Coeur, and wa-s declared to be void. One hundred thousand crowns falsely obtained from the king were to be restored, and a tine of three hundred thousand crowns paid over and above ; until the discharge of which sums the |)risoner was to remain in captivity. Besides this, all that belonged to him was declared forfeited to the crown, and he was banished perpetually from the kingdom of France during the good pleasure of the king. " With respect to the charge of poison," con- tinues the sentence, " since we are not in a state at present to judge that matter, we shall pass it over for that reason." It is remarkable that nothing whatever is said of any conspiracy with the dauphin throughout : — but there was sufficient to crinn"nate one whose fate had been decreed from the first ! To this document Charles VII. ]»ut his hand and seal, and the enemies of the great merchant were content. What is worthy to be observed, although the sentence sets forth that "in tlie atfair of the poisoning " they cannot decide, yet the same day that this judgment was given against Jac(pie« Coeur, the accusation of the Lady of Mortagne was declared false and calunniious, and ishe was condemned to the amende honorable towards him she had sought to injure, and to keep herself 368 THE church's interckssion. away in future ten leagues from any place inha- bited by the king or the queen. Her life was granted, in consideration of great services rendered to the state by her predecessors and her husband. So greedy were those who were to gain by the ruin of the argentier, that, the moment the papers were signed, the procureur-general of Parliament was sent to Jacques Coeur in his prison at Poi- tiers, commanding him instantly to pay the fines, which amounted to about four millions of the present money of France. The prisoner repre- sented that all he was worth would not produce so mucli, and he had no resource but to entreat the king to have pity on him and his poor chil- dren. By this he doubtless meant the ready money in his possession : indeed, as all his estates and goods were already seized, he could not expect to raise any sums on them ; they were, however, esti- mated at no less than twenty millions. If anything were required to show the futility of that part of the charge which accused Jacques Coeur of desiring to injure the Christian inter- ests, or to slight or cast reproach on the Catholic church, it would be enough that the most power- ful persons in the Church itself were his most de- termined defenders and supporters. That his son, the Bishop of Bourges, should have exerted every energy in his favour, is not surprising; but it is re- markable that a large body of the clergy did the same, and that at their head was the Pope him- THE CHURCH'S INTERCESSION. 309 self. Indeed, but for this powerful advocacy, it is possible that both torture and death would have been the portion of the unfortunate prisoner. Twenty-five days elapsed after his condemna- tion, and he was still kept in prison. At Icngtli the commissioners arrived at Poitiers, having the chancellor of France at their head, to announce the decision. The Church then made a fresh effort to spare Jacques Coeur the last humiliation with which he was threatened. Pierre de Chaumont, abbe of St. Cyprien, and Jean Tripault, vicar-general and official, deputed by the bishop, addressed the chancellor and the other members of the great council of the king, assembled at the judgment- hall of the palace, and demanded the body of Jacques Coeur, exhibiting the letters which de- clared him a subject of the Church. No answer was at first deigned them, and when they return- ed again, they were refused access to the hall, which was open to every body else. They were constrained to remain alone in an outer chamber, where two of the conmiissioners, Hugues de Couzay, lieutenant of the seneschal of Poitou, and Il^lie de Tourette, lieutenant of Saintonge, came to ask what their demand was, and to sig- nify to them, that, if it regarded their request of the day before, they were directed to say that they could not enter the council chamber, nor speak to the lords on any such sulyect. B 1) .S70 CLAIM OF THE CHURCH REJECTED. Tlie deputies replied, that their demand was just and reasonable ; that, if Jacques Coeur had offended, the Church, to whom he belonged, was ready to punish him, but that they protested against the power to do so being taken out of their hands, and appealed against the justice of the decision. They moreover supplicated that the sentence of Jacques Coeur should be suspended at least till they had an answer from the king, to whom a deputation from the Bishop of Poi- tiers was gone to entreat his consideration. No representations, however, took effect : the claims of the Church were derided ; all supplica- tions, entreaties, and appeals were unheeded, and the innocent and unfortunate victim of cupidity was brought forth from his dungeon to make sport for his enemies. After twenty-two months' imprisonment Jacques Coeur was forced, in the presence of an immense concourse of spectators, to go through all the humiliating ceremonies of his sentence — a sen- tence pronounced at the close of a trial which had pursued him from castle to castle, was ille- gally carried on, and in which witnesses summon- ed at the beginning were dismissed before the end, no one accuser confronted with another, and the first commissioners having given place to new ones. Each of the judges in this unjust cause obtain- ed a large share of the booty. Jean Dauvet, DIVISION OF THE SPOIL. 371 procureur-general, wlio had the charge of selling all the estates and effects of the condemned, came in for a ricli share; but the largest was awarded to the illustrious warrior and chamj)ion, Antoine de Chabannes Count of Dammartin. This portion was the castle of St. Fargeau, and the baronies of Toucy and Perreuse, that is to say, almost all the land in the district known as La Puisaie, con- sisting of more than twenty ])arishes. Guillaume Gouffier, the high chamberlain, had ten thousand crowns' worth of land and the lord- ship of La Motte, that of Boissy, and half of that of Roanne and Saint Aon. As for large sums of money due to Jacques Coeur, the king permitted the ])ayment to stand over at his pleasure. Besides the estates already mentioned, the rest of the enormous possessions of the argeutier are thus enumerated by La Thaumassiere in his his- tory of Berry : — " His house at Bourges called La Chaussee. " His house at Montpellier called La Loge, and two others. "At Lyons, a dwelling called La Rose, one called La Maison Ronde, and three others. "At Marseilles, the Maison de Ville, built by him. " At Beaucaire, the Maison de Ville. "At Beziers, several houses and grounds, " At Saint Pour^ain, one house. U ]i "J. {]72 JACQUES CCEUR'S ESTATES. *• At Sanccrre, one house. "The estate of St. Gerant de Vaux, bought from Philip (le Bourbon and his wife. " The heath of Aubepin. The villages of Barlieu, Ainay-le-Viel, Meaune, Villemot, Le Lis Saint Georges, Marmagnes, Mau- branches ; La Feillane, in the chatellanie of IMu- rat ; Meneton Salon, in Berry. " The mines of Chifflice. " The mines of Saint Pierre le Palud. " The silver mines of Pompalieu." Two houses at Paris are also named : one on the spot where part of the Palais Royal now stands, and one some remains of which are still to be seen in the Rue de I'Homme Arme. This lat- ter house was not completed at the time of his downfall, and was continued by Jean de la Balue, Bishop of Angers and Evreux, whose fortunes were as unstable as those of the first builder. The style of its construction excited much wonder at the time, and the bricks were thought to be of some rich metal ; they were in fact no more than glazed tiles, but, being uncommon, were looked upon with much awe and surprise. The president Barlllon afterwards inhabited this house, adding another to the list of those whose misfortunes seemed to condemn the dwell- ing as unlucky : — Jacques Coeur ruined and ex- iled ; Balue shut up in a cage of iron for eleven LETTER OF ETIENNE I'ASQUIER. 373 years by Louis XL ; and Barillon, long a captive, and at length dying in the citadel of Pignerol. Another fine chateau possessed by Jacques Coeur was that of Beaumont, in the Gatinais, which passed by inheritance to the family of Harlay, and from them to the Prince of Tingry, for whom the estate was erected into an heredi- tary duchy. There is said to be still in this castle some portions belonging to the time of Jacques Coeur, and some curious tapestry of his period. One of the letters of Etienne Pasquier on tlie subject of Jacques Coeur is very interesting, as showing the opinion entertained in his time, namely, about a century after the event, of the trial of the celebrated merchant, and also as ex- hibiting the estimation in which he was held. The letter is addressed to " M. de JMarilhac, Seigneur de Ferri^res, conseiller du roi, et maistre ordinaire en sa chambre des comptcs de Paris." " It is indeed as you say : I imagine that France never produced a man, who by his in- dustry, without any i)articular favour of the prince, arrived at so much eminence and riches as Jacques Coeur. " He was, in his way, both king and emperor; and, as we discover the grandeur of old Rome by its ruins, I may say the same of him. " It may justly be remarked of that great Con- stable de Luxembourg, under Loui^^ XI , that lie 374 LETTER OF ETIENNE FASQUIER. was another Jacques Coeur amongst princes ; and Jacques Coeur, under Charles VII., amongst per- sons of niiddh^ rank, was another Constable do Luxembourg, Both one and the other com- manded princes and maintained each his own grandeur; and in the end both received the usual reward accorded by the great to those who serve them — the one suffering an ignominious death, and the other condemned to an amende hmioraUe, and the general loss of all his possessions. At the same time, neither the one nor the other was so unfortunate as that his posterity did not be- come powerful: for the Constable de Luxem- bourg's eldest son's daughter' was afterwards al- lied by marriage with one of the first princes of France, and left great wealth; and Jacques Coeur had also a grand-daughter, who, in con- sequence of her riches, was united in marriage to one of the first families in Paris. " As for his sentence, but that it is on record, I should say it was altogether a calumny; but I cannot speak falsely in reporting, that it was the jealousy of the great men of Charles VII.'s court, which concocted this tragedy." After detailing the particulars of the trial, Etienne Pasquier goes on to remark : — " Judge, I pray you, if I were not right in say- ing that he was a monarch in his way, since one of the chief points of his accusation was a cor- respondence which he had with the Soldan of LETTKR OF ETIENNE PASQl'IER. 375 Egypt ; and remark also, that the Pope became the principal intercessor with the king, that his life might be spared. And again, perhaps, the most marvellous part of the story is, that after his condemuation there should be found sixty or eighty men, his ancient servants, who through his means had become possessed of great wealth, who were ready to lend him each a thousand crowns to aid him to overcome his difficulties, so that he was able after a time to re-establish his fortunes. This service, be it remembered, not being founded on any other ground than the obli- gations they owed their master, for his goodness to them in the days of his prosperity. " Nothing is more surprising than that a simple citizen should have been able to create such a fund of gratitude, except that beings so grateful should be found to remember him in his adver- sity. " It may well be said of him, that he was another Alexander, who produced many kings." CHAPTER XXIX. JEAN DE VILLAGE. — HONESTY. BEAUCAIRE. THE LETTER. — THE BEOTHER. THE TABLETS. THE FACTORS. THE BOAT. ESCAPE. — THE POPE. SICKNESS. DEATH OF POPE NICO- LAS. HIS SUCCESSOR. SETTLEMENT OF AFFAIRS. From the time that the unjust sentence was passed against Jacques Coeur, a veil of uncer- tainty has fallen over him, which historians have in vain endeavoured to remove. The probable events of his future life may be thus recorded, for they have satisfied the most zealous of his biographers, M. de Bonamy. Amongst the three hundred factors whom the great merchant employed, there seems to be none but those two who deposed against him that he had sent back a slave to the Sublime Porte, who were not faithful to their generous and trusting master ; and amongst those at the head of their JEAN DE VILLAGE. 377 large body, few stood more prominent, as an intrepid and worthy friend of the fonnder of all their fortunes, than Jean de Village, whom he had brought up as his own son, and had married to his neiee. When the harpies of the law, armed with powers from the monarch who had betrayed a trusting friend, arrived in Languedoc, greedy to seize the vessels belonging to the ruined man, Jean de Village was then in charge of great stores of merchandise belonging to his master. Thunderstruck at the blow which had fallen upon him, he resolved to resist the commissioners who claimed the vessels in the king's name. He in- sisted upon having a formal discharge, signed, not only by the king's own hand, but by that of his master, and resolutely defied his enemies to at- tempt taking possession of a single bale under his care. Before there was time for the enrafi^ed afjents to send a statement of their grievances to the king, Jean de Village had sailed away to Mar- seilles, which was out of the jurisdiction of France, and there he claimed protection from the good King Ren^ of Provence. At first he was secure, but a peremptory re- quisition soon arrived from the government of France, desiring that Ren6 should withdraw his countenance from the champion of Jac(|ues C'u'ur, and should immediately arrest his wife and tliil- 378 CAPTIVITY OF JACQUES CCEUR. (Iren, and seize on the goods and possessions of Jean dc Village, wlio liad only time to make a hasty flight and save himself in a foreign country. After his condemnation, since there was now nothing more, apparently, to be gained by keeping him in prison, Jacques "Coeur was permitted by the king to remove from his dungeon at Poitiers to Beaucaire, to a convent of Cordeliers, where he was ordered to remain as a prisoner at large, U7ider the safeguard of the king, a term which by no means implies that he was at liberty to leave this retreat when he wished it. He remained at Beaucaire for eighteen months, for it seems toler- ably well ascertained that he was there in 1455. To a mind like his this inactivity and restraint must have been intolerable ; at first the stunning nature of the blow might have paralysed his feel- ings, but as time wore on they would recover their tone, and hope spring up once again. After his long captivity he began to shake off the bur- then of grief and despair which had pressed upon him, and resolved to make every effort he could devise to recover his liberty. From amongst the brotherhood he selected one whom he gained over to his interests, and who suc- ceeded in conveying a letter to INIarseilles, which he found means of forwarding to Jean de Village. With what emotion must that faithful friend have read the letter of his imprisoned master, which entreated him for the love of God to take DEVOTION or JEAN DE VILLAGE. o7i) pity on his coiulition, and to find some means of saving- his life, by removing him from his present bondage. Tiie particulars of his conduct were afterwards related to Charles VII. by Jean de V^illage him- self, who sets forth, that, " considering that he M'as both a servant and a connexion of Jacques Canir, that all the worldly goods he possessed were entirely resulting from his protection and counte- nance, and that common rumour having bruited the report that a reconciliation was about to take place between him and the king, he did not con- sider that he was committing an act that could be blamed, by withdrawing him from the inveteracy of his enemies." Whether the report of the king's being dis- posed to restore his ancient friend to his favour was really spread abroad or not, it was perhaps })olicy in Jean de Village to assume it : if it were indeed so, Charles would appear more sinned against than sinning; and, but that he appropriated the great wealth of his ruined subject to his own uses, it might be susi)ected that he was not a free agent throughout the disgraceful transaction. At all events, Jean de Village, the instant liu received his master's letter, and thus ascertained where he was confined, at all risks to himself, re- paired to Tarascon, a town situated on the IJhone, opposite Beaucaire. He there lodged at a con- vent of Cordeliers, who agreed to receive him, 380 THE FRIENDLY MONK. perhaps not altogether ignorant of his motives in coming. One of the monks consented to apprise Jacques Coeur of his arrival, and, under pretence of paying a visit to the monks of Beaucaire, he found means to get speech of their prisoner. To tliis monk the master of Jean de Village confided some tablets, on which he had traced words to the effect, that, "relying on him as on his son, he entreated him to deliver him, for he had reason to fear that it was meditated to put him to death unknown to the king." Startled and terrified at this announcement, Jean hastened to assure him, by the intervention of the monk, that he would never cease his endeavours to set him at liberty, and bade him be of good cheer and hope the best. He consoled him with the great probability of his success, as he had the power of occasionally leaving the con- vent, and, in spite of the w^atch kept over him, he trusted that he should discover, by the help of God, the means he desired. Jean returned with all diligence to Marseilles, and communicated his design to two other of Jacques Coeur's factors, who were natives of Bour- ges, and devoted to their master. Their names were Guillaume Gymart and Gaillardet; both had been obliged to fly when Jacques Coeur was arrested, and were concealed under the protection of Rene of Anjou. Jean found in these men THE NIGHT MARril, 381 ready coarljiitors, and they encouraged liis hopes and offered him their utmost assistance. They soon managed to get togetlier nineteen or twenty determined men, firm in their interests, who had been soldiers in the late wars. Jean de Villajre had at his command several amied galleys, and these he placed in readiness, after which he, his two companions and his small body of troops, took their way to Beaucaire, where they lay con- cealed till the friendly monk had informed Jacques Cceur of their vicinity, and appointed him to leave the convent after having as usual heard matins, which ceremony took place at midnight. A difficulty now presented itself : the town of Beaucaire was surrounded by walls, and at first this seemed a formidable barrier to his escape ; but one of the soldiers of the party was aware of a breach in a certain part, which it was easy to enlarge so that they could pass through. They now obtained a boat which they hired, together with the necessaiy instruments for work- ing at the wall, and in the darkness of night cautiously crossed the river Rhone and silently pursued their labour, which they found easier than they had imagined. The breach was made sufficiently large for them to j)ass through, and while some remained as sentinels at the foot of the wall, Jean de Village and others stole to the convent, where, as soon as matins were over, to their infinite satisfaction they descried their mas- 382 JACQUES C(EUR'S ESCAPE. tor advancing towards them. Without a word or a moment's delay they liurried him off to the boat, which re-crossed tlie river witliout being challenged. With the utmost speed they then pursued their way across the country to Tour de Bouc, a little Provencal port, where Jean de Village had ordered one of his galleys to be lying ready. With trembling delight he saw his master and all his little band on board, and now he felt that he might congratulate him on his escape. They reached Marseilles safely and there landed, and for greater security carried him by land to Nice. Another galley was waiting there, which, with a favourable wind, bore them away to Pisa, and from thence Jacques Cceur pursued his unin- terrupted way to Rome. Jacques Coeur was received with the utmost cordiality and welcome by Nicolas V., the reign- ing Pope, to whom he had formerly gone as am- bassador with so splendid a train, at the time when he stood higher in the favour of fortune and the king than any man in France. Nicolas entertained for the liberal and enlightened mer- chant, whose feelings were congenial with his own, a disinterested and sincere attachment. He had heard of his ruin with deep regret, and had written in the most urgent manner in his favour to Charles VII., who had not, however, listened to his remonstrances, except as far as granting him his life. DEATH OF POPE NICOLAS V. 383 No doubt he was prej^ared l)y Jean de Village to expect Ills friend, and their nuitiial satisfaction was extreme when the captive arrived safely in his dominions. Pope Nicolas would allow him to lodge nowhere but in his own palace; and, es- tablished there, he once more felt himself free. But his long confinement, his distress of mind, and his recent anxiety and fatigue, brought on a severe illness, which threatened his life : he was throughout the crisis attended with the greatest care by the physicians of the Pope, who paid him frequent visits, and took the liveliest interest in his recovery. Scarcely had he risen from his bed of sickness and begun to enjoy the delight of thanking his kind protector, and of being comforted in his society, when Nicolas himself fell ill. So sudden was the attack, and so rapid its effects, that his death, which almost immediately followed, was by many attril)uted to poison ; but other histo- rians consider his demise to have been caused by the gout, to which he had long been sul)ject, and a fever, brought on by agitation of mind, occa- sioned by his regret at the taking of Constan- tinople. He had reigned eight years over the Churcli. and had restored peace to Italy. He was the protector of the arts he loved, and a man of ac- complished manners and enlightened mind. 1 It- was the founder of the librarv of the Vatican, and 384 LinRRALTTY OF NICOLAS. enriched it witli many valuable manuscri])ts in Greek and Latin. So great was his liberality, that he offered the sum of five thousand ducats to any one who should bring him the Gospel of Saint Mathew in Hebrew. He began several su- }>erb edifices for the embellishment of Rome, and adorned the churches of his capital with splendid tapestries and rich vessels of gold and silver. His disinterestedness equalled his liberality and piety: out of his private purse he spared sums to endow indigent young persons with marriage por- tions ; and his reign, one of singular purity, exhi- bited no examples of the sale of any ofliice. He was a man superior to the age in w^hich he lived, and worthy of the friendshii) of the most exalted persons of his time. Few circumstances speak more for the character of Jacques Coeur than the friendship of this excellent prelate for him, and deeply and deservedly was he regretted by the ill-used minister of the fickle and feeble- minded, if not ungrateful. King of France. The asylum that Jacques Coeur had found in Rome was not, however, lost to him by the death of Nicolas; and he found himself in security and undisturbed, able to attend to his affairs, and ex- amine the state of his revenues left in charge of his various factors, who, faithful to their trust, had continued to trade in his name during his misfortunes, and had kept up a commercial inter- course with several merchants in Italy and the BRIGHTER PROSPECTS. 385 Levant. His interests had been by no means neglected ; and, notwithstanding the confiscation of his property in France, he found that his re- sources were not exhausted, and he was still in ii condition to retrieve much of his ill-fortune. Jean de Village did not allow a very long time to elapse before he rejoined his master at Rome. "There," according to his own statement, "he had a strict conference with him respecting all the charge and administration of his galleys and merchandise, and all the transactions which he had conducted." They then agreed to a division of the profits of their commercial ventures, and parted from each other mutually content and satisfied ; the factor happy in the discharge of his duty, and the master in the proof of his servant's honour and attachment. Blest must Jacques C«rur have been in all his sorrows, to find that he had a steward so just, and now So comfortable ! C C CHAPTER XXX. SIEGE OF CONSTANTINOPLE. LOSS. — TUE APPEAL TO CHRISTEN- DOM. LETTER. — THE VOW. At the time that Jacques Coeiir souglit the hospitality of Nicolas V., the Pope's mind was occupied with great designs, which had for their object the re-capture of Constantinople from the Turks ; and doubtless not a little regret mixed with the sorrows of his friend, that he was no longer able to assist the Church with a portion of that wealth which had formerly preserved the kniofhts of Rhodes from the attacks of the Infidel. It was at the very time, some say on the very day, that the iniquitous sentence on Jacques Coeur was pronounced, that Constantinople fell a prey to Mahomet II. ; the date of that great event being 29th of May, 1453, when the imperial city was taken from the last of the Csesars, after a de- SIEGE OF CONSTANTINOPLE. 387 termined siege of fifty-one days, and after being defended with incredi])le couraoo by inferior num- bers, and resources wliich made the hope of suc- cess ahiiost hopeless. Amurath II., one of the greatest princes of the Ottoman race, had left his throne to his son jMa- horaet II., called by his subjects JNIahomct the Equitable, then only twenty-two years of ago, full of spirit, courage, and enterprise, and bent upon obtaining a name, higher even than that of his father, by a conquest on which every energy of his mind was set ; all his genius and knowledge, whicli was extensive and shining, had but one goal, and that was to establish himself on the throne of Constantinople, and to drive the Christians from those walls which they had too long profaned. Ferocious and inexorable as he was bokl and resolute, no obstacles deterred him, and no exer- tions were considered too extraordinary. He brought to the attack of the city by land an army of three hundred thousand men, and on the side of the sea a fleet of more than a hundred galleys, and a hundred and thirty other vessels; wliile the besieged could not muster more than five thousand Greeks and two thousand foreigners capable of military service. The Turkish relation of this siege is conceived in a true Oriental spirit; the historian, Saad- Eddin Eifendi, opens his account with the follow- ing poetical preface : — 888 SIEGE OF CONSTANTINOPLE. " The season of snows, of ice, and of storms Mas past; soft spring had succeeded, and had ah'eady decorated the meadows : the rose, like a shy beauty, allowed part of her charms to appear; the amorous nightingale began her soft com- plaints ; the earth, covered with a green carpet, seemed to wait for the legions of Mahomet the Equitable. Soon the tents of the Mussulmans arose in the midst of the flowery meads; the hills and the valleys were honoured with the presence of the troops of the faith." The command of his troops was given by the Christian Emperor to the brave Genoese general, Jan Justiniani, but the inhabitants of the city were more occupied with vain disputes than the defence of their country, and abandoned them- selves by turns to blind security and cowardly de- spair. Now they placed their reliance on a false oracle, that announced the end of the emjiire of the East as having arrived, and anon listened with credulous eagerness to a prophecy which j)roclaimed that the Turks, when they had once arrived at tlie column of Justinian, would be all at once exterminated by an avenging angel, who would descend from heaven for that purpose. An enormously strong iron chain, sustained at distances by heavy stone blocks, fixed in the water, closed the entrance of the port to the efforts of tlie enemy, and presented an insur- mountable barrier to their approach. The genius SIEGE O*' CONSTANTINOPLE. oS9 of Mahomet, however, discovered an expedient which set that formidable obstacle at nought. He conceived the bohl ])rojoct of causing tlie vessels which he had at the port which he had constructed, to be conveyed to the port behind Galata. He had many able mechanicians in his employ, who exerted their powers to the utmost, and the result was, that the immense vessels of the Mus- sulmans were fixed on carriages, which being j)ro- perly greased and prepared, were matle to slide over the unequal ground, and were thus borne along till they reached the oi)posite shore, and were launched on the waves that bathed the rami>arts of the town. The monks had meanwhile encouraged the be- sieged by recounting a prophecy to this effect : "That the taking of Constantinople was impos- sible, because it had been revealed by astrological indications, that the city would only be conquered by a sovereign whose vessels should glide over the earth with sails unfurled." And now a wood comes toward Duiisinane ! " When tlie unbelievers," says tSolak-Zaclch. "saw this marvel, they understood that their ruin was accomplished ; speech was arrested in their mouths, and the flame of despair was illu- mined in their hearts ! " This great achievement ;icc()jn|»lishetl, Mahomet 390 SIEGE OF CONSTANTINOPLE. caused a bridge to be erected on these vessels, and covered it with entrenchments. He then commanded his army to place on the extremities of their pikes and lances lanterns and tapers, and gave the word, that, " while the star of the fourth heaven cast its rays on the earth," his warriors should continue to combat, in order not to leave " to the contemptible unbelievers " a moment's rest or time to repair their breaches. It was not surprising that the resolute Infidels soon saw the standard of the Prophet floating on the walls of conquered Constantinople. To use their own in- flated language, " Soon the gates and the ram- parts of Constantinople, like to the heart of an un- fortunate love}', were pierced in a thousand places." They compare the effect of the lamps and tapers, reflected on the surrounding country, to a field covered with roses and tulips. The Turkish historian dwells with complacency on the feats performed by the soldiers of the Prophet. " The sun had now risen from the shades of the west, and having put to flight, with the darts and lances of his rays, the legions of stars, the general of the deceitful Franks mount- ed the ramparts, in order to drive back the co- horts of the faith. At the same moment, a young Mussulman, holding the cord of firm resolution, spo-ang like a spider on the walls, and having swung round his sword, like the crescent moon, with a single stroke he made the owl-like soul of SACKING OF CONSTANTINOPLE. '30\ this infidel fly forth from the nest of his inij)ure body." Twenty times did the Emperor Constantino throw himself into the midst of his enemies, sword in hand : overwhelmed by numbers, he fell pierced by a hundred wounds, and had at least the glory of dying in defence of the altars of his God, and for the wreck of that emj)ire which had given laws to the universe. His death was glorious, and he was worthy of a better fate. Then came the horrors of success ; then came the fatal consummation of the promise made to his soldiers by the jNIahomedan chief: for three days Constantinople was given uj) to pillage and excess, and Europe trembled at the recital of deeds done in that interval. More than forty thousand people fell beneath the sword of the victors, and sixty thousand were sold as slaves, or paid their ransom by their wciglit in gold. At the news of this a])])alling event, all na- tions were seized with terror and consternation; the boast and threat of JNIahomet II., that lie would set no bounds to his conquests, but would overrun Creece, Italy, France, and the whole of the ^\'est, was heard with a shudder, and Europe stood for a time paralysed at the extent of his daring and the success of his arms. " By the care of the fortunate monarch," says the Turkish chronicler, "the dust of the combat was laid, the sword of (lie warrior was susj»('nd(' the Duke of Burgundy vow OF PHILIP LE noN. 893 arrived at Lille at the moment Philij) le Bon was celebrating the victories wliit-h lie had gained over the rebellious inhabitants of Ghent, and the peace which he had granted them. The duke w^as forcibly struck with the picture placed before his eyes of the rapine and desolation committed in the city of Constantinople by the Turks, and having, at the same time, received a message from the Emperor of Germany inviting him to repair to Ratisbon, in order to assist at a consultation for the good of Christendom, he resolved to devote himself to that cause. He accordingly, at the close of his rejoicings, made a solemn vow to God, the Virgin, the ladies, and the pheasant, that, if the good pleasure of the most Christian king was to take the cross in defence of the Catholic faith, and to resist the enterprises of the Infidels, he would give his services and his power, and would, if required, himself take command of the army. His son, the Count de Charolois, took the same vow, and all the princes of his family and the lords of his court followed the example set them by their chiefs. If it had been according to the manners of the fifteenth century to turn into ridicule, as in our own times, every circumstance of a public and political nature which occurred, it would not be unreasonable to sup[)ose tliat the letter for- warded by the Po|i(' to the (M»iiit <>{' IJurguiuly 394 POPE NICOLAS'S LETTER. and to other courts, in onler to excite their zeal against the Infidels, was the composition of one of the privileged jesters of the period, and in- tended to amuse the world at the expense of the ignorant knights, who, probably unable to read the missive themselves, would listen with flash- ing eyes, and mailed hands grasping their swords, to the daring remonstrance of The foul Paynlm, Who believeth on Mahound ; and, drawing a long breath after the message of the " heathen hound " to the holy father of Christendom was concluded, would swear on the pheasant to do deeds of yet unheard of valour against miscreants, who prayed not only to the false traitor JNIahomet, but paid their vows to Jupiter and Neptune ! If almost all the chroniclers of the day had not mentioned this circumstance, and several had not given the letter, it would seem that so weak an invention could have gained no credit Mith thinking people, even in an age so ignorant as that in which it occurred. Those, of course, who were well aware of its futility, had their reasons for not enlightening their neighbours, and the letter passed as genuine; yet it may be surmiBed that the flimsy deception was seen through by many, and their zeal cooled towards the cause in consequence, by the unfavourable result of the LETTER TO THE POPE. 31)5 appeal, which was not responded to by a quarter of the persons who were ready enough to take part in the festivities consequent upon the vows. The following is the letter brought l)y the messengers of the Pope, and read to the assem- bled court: — ''Letter of the Grand Turk to Pope Nicolas. " Morbesant, Iloprevant, together with his brothers Callabilabra, collateral kniglits of the empire of Organcy, lord of the peninsula of Acha^ia, to the high priest of Rome, our well- beloved, according to his deserts. — " It is come to our knowledge, that, at the request of the Venetian people, you have published in all the churches of Italy, that all those who make war with us shall have full pardon in this world and life eternal in the next. This we have been informed by certain pilgrims of the cross who have lately crossed the seas in ships from V^cnice ; at which we feel much surprise ; for if God has given you such power, you ought to use it more reasonably, without exciting Chris- tians to make war on us, being, as we are, cer- tain that our predecessors have always main- tained that never were they consenting to your Jesus Christ being crucified, and as wc have not the Holy Land in our possession, and havi; al- ways hated the Jews since we lieard, by liistoiy and chronicles, that from envy and trea^<»n they 396 LETTER TO THE POPE. put your said pro})het into the hands of Pilate, president in Jerusalem for the Romans, who caused him to die on the cross. And, on the other hand, we are greatly displeased that the Italians should make war on us, since we enter- tain a natural love to them, for they are, as it were, a part of ourselves, as well as all their glory, power, and name, coming from Antenor, of the lineage of the great Priam, once lord of Troy, the great chief of the Turkish nation : as such, as his descendant, we propose to re-edify the said city of Troy, and to revive the dominion of the same, and bring back to our obedience the whole of Europe ; and, in particular, in ven- geance for the blood of Hector shed, and the subversion of the noble city of Troy, and the pollution of the great temple of Pallas, we have subjugated all Greece, and the inhabitants of the same, as successors and heirs of those who caused the destruction of Troy, as well as the lands belonging to the Venetians, by force taken by them, but by right ours, as foretold in prophecy. " We therefore ])ray and require of your pru- dence, that henceforth you will refrain from issuing such bulls, and desist from exciting the Christians to make war on us, for we by no means wish to fight against them on account of their faith and belief, but only for the maintenance of the temporal right that we have to the said lands by conquest; for though we do not adore Jesus LETTER TO THE POPE. :j97 Christ, we confess and acknowledge that he is your prophet. And, ])esides, we have often heard, that in your hiw it is forbidden to commit force : now we do not make war on the Venetians but by just right, because, without authority of prince or lord, they by their will and force have usurped the lands which they claim in Europe, which we neither can nor will suffer. " Thus, since the promised time is nearly come, Ave are deliberating to rescue the said lands from the tyranny of the Venetians, more especially as the said Venetians do not act in concert with the other nations of Italy, but think themselves greater than the rest, for which cause, by the aid of the great god Jupiter, we intend to bring down their pride, and reduce them altogetlier. " Nevertheless, if, in spite of all we have set forth, you do not cease moving the nations to war, we shall certainly exert all our power, and have recourse to the Empei^or of Orguant, and the other princes and kings of the East, wlio have liitherto feigned to sleep, and have not warred against you ; and we will assemble so great a j)ower that it will be impossible to resist us; not only directing it against your jiilgrims of the cross which you have sent, but, if you excite against us the Cxauls and the Latins, wt' will resist all their powers by the aid of Ntptunv, god (f the sea ; and by the power of our said navy we will conquer ////' is/e of Leaponte, and by that means en- 398 LETTER TO THE POPE. r ter into Croatia and Dalmatia, and tlio regions of Acquilon. " Given in our triumphant palace, in the tenth year of Mahomet, in the month of June."" This absurd epistle, in which the year of the Hegira 357 is transformed by the ignorant com- poser into the year 10, was sent forth with great ceremony, and would have been as likely to an- swer its purpose as a genuine letter, but for the pre-occupation of mind of most of the European princes at this period. When the knight who was its bearer had deli- vered it to the Duke Philip of Burgundy, he was treated with high honour, and was assured that no means should be neglected that could bring about the reduction of the pagan pride and assumption. He also hastened to dispatch four galleys, laden with ammunition, to the holy father, and pre- sented the messenger with rich gifts. Every occasion at this period was made a pre- text for fetes and tourneys; and such an one as now presented itself was not to be neglected. Lille, therefore, became the scene of gorgeous festivities; and as several princes of rank were then at the Duke of Burgundy's court, they all vied with each other in display and splendour, in honour of the vows to be made to extirpate the enemies of the Christian faith. CHAPTER XXXT. THE BANQUET. — CHECK. THE CAPTAIXGENERAL. — 8CI0. VARIOUS ACCOUNTS. — ROMANCE. LETTER TO THE KINO. RESTITUTION. Nothing comparable to the splendour of these rejoicings at Lille had ever been seen before : the fetes were announced in January, at a banquet given by the Duke of Cleves, where the Duke of Burgundy was a guest. The heralds proclaimed a solemn joust in the name of the Knight of the Swan, Ad()lj)hus, brother of the Duke of Cleves, and nephew of Philip le Bon. The grand prize of valour was to be a golden swan, bearing a gold chain adorned with rubies, and this was to be presented to the fortunate knight by the ladies. Tn an cntremet at this banquet was introduced a vessel in full sail, in which stood a knight whose armour was the blazon of Cleves, havin«;- a silver 400 THE BANQUET. swan in a gold cliain, which was attached to a collar round its neck. This figure was in allusion to a tradition, that a knight of old was conducted by a swan to the chateau of the lords of Cleves, on the Moselle, where he married the daughter of the chatelain, from whom the family de- scends; Du Clercq is careful to tell the reader that the swan was simulated : it was " de la gran- deur d'ung cheval, au moins la fachon, car c'^toit un homme vif dedans, lequel conduisait le dit chevallier a tout une longue chaine de fin or; et au cost^ du eigne alloient les fachons de deux hommes sauvages ; et le chevallier etoit environne de gens en forme d'aigles''' The array must have been, on the whole, more comical than imposing, according to modern notions. The Count de Charolois, son of the Duke of Burgundy, carried off the prize at the first day's tournament. A chaplet of flowers designated the personage who was in his turn to give a banquet to the. rest. On this night it was presented to the Count d'Estampes, who accordingly received his guests in great splendour ten days afterwards in his hotel at Lille. This custom of wearing chaplets of flowers at banquets was common in the middle ages, and appears to be a remnant of the usages of the THE BANQUET. 4()l ancients. In the romances of chivalry the knights are frequently represented as wearing garlands at grand entertainments, and roses were the flowers in the greatest request. It was usual, however, to wear wreaths of