Part 38

“Master Olivier, the princes who rule the great lordships, such as kings and emperors, must not allow sumptuousness to be engendered in their houses; for from thence that fire spreads through the province.—So, master Olivier, take this as said. Our expenditure increases every year. The thing displeases us. How now, by God! until '79 it did not pass thirty-six thousand livres. In '80 it reached forty-three thousand six hundred and nineteen livres—I have the figure in my head—in '81, sixty-six thousand six hundred and eighty livres; and this year, by the faith of my body! it will reach eighty thousand livres! Doubled in four years! Monstrous!”

He stopped, out of breath, then resumed with vehemence: “I see around me none but those who fatten on my leanness! You suck the crowns from me through every pore!”

All kept silence. It was one of those rages that are let run their course. He continued:

“It is the same with that petition in Latin from the lordship of France, that we should re-establish what they call the great offices of the crown! Charges indeed! charges that crush! Ah! gentlemen! you say we are not a king, to reign _dapifero nullo, buticulario nullo_[127]! We shall show you, by God! if we are not a king!”

Here he smiled in the sense of his power, his ill humour softened, and he turned toward the Flemings:

“Do you see, gossip Guillaume? the great panetier, the great butler, the great chamberlain, the great seneschal are not worth the least varlet.—Bear this in mind, gossip Coppenole—they are good for nothing. In thus standing useless about the king, they give me the effect of the four evangelists that surround the dial of the great clock of the Palais, which Philippe Brille has just renewed. They are gilded, but they do not mark the hour; and the hand can do without them.”

He remained a moment thoughtful, and added, shaking his old head:

“Ho! Ho! by Our Lady, I am not Philippe Brille, and I shall not regild the great vassals. I am of the opinion of King Edward: save the people and kill the lords.—Continue, Olivier.”

The person whom he designated by that name took up the book from his hands, and began again to read aloud:

“... To Adam Tenon, clerk in charge of the seals of the provostship of Paris, for the money, fashioning and engraving of the said seals which have been made anew because the former ones, by reason of their antiquity and decay, could no longer properly serve.—Twelve livres parisis.

“To Guillaume Frère, the sum of four livres four sols parisis, for his pains and wages in having fed and nourished the doves of the two dovecotes of the Hôtel des Tournelles, during the months of January, February and March of this year; and for this he gave seven sextiers of barley.

“To a cordelier, for the confession of a criminal, four sols parisis.”

The king listened in silence. From time to time he coughed. Then he raised the goblet to his lips and drank a draught, making a grimace.

“In this year were made by order of justice, with sound of trumpet through the crossroads of Paris, fifty-six proclamations.—Account to be settled.

“For having searched and sought in certain places, both in Paris and elsewhere, for money said to have been hidden there, but nothing was found therein;—forty-five livres parisis.”

—To bury a crown to dig up a sou! said the king.

“... For having set in place, at the Hôtel des Tournelles, six panels of white glass where the iron cage is, thirteen sols.—For having made and delivered, by the king's command, on the day of the monsters, four escutcheons with the arms of the said lord, bordered all around with hats of roses, six livres.—For two new sleeves to the king's old doublet, twenty sols.—For a box of grease to grease the king's boots, fifteen deniers.—A sty made anew to lodge the king's black pigs, thirty livres parisis.—Several partitions, planks and traps made to enclose the lions near Saint-Paul, twenty-two livres.”

—Those are beasts that are costly, said Louis XI. No matter! it is a fine kingly magnificence. There is a great red lion that I love for his pretty ways.—Have you seen him, master Guillaume?—Princes must have these wondrous animals. For us kings, our dogs must be lions, and our cats tigers. The great befits crowns. In the time of the pagans of Jupiter, when the people offered to the churches a hundred oxen and a hundred sheep, the emperors gave a hundred lions and a hundred eagles. That was fierce and very beautiful. The kings of France have always had these roarings about their throne. Nevertheless justice shall be done me that I yet spend less money on them than they, and that I have a greater modesty of lions, bears, elephants and leopards.—Go on, master Olivier. We wished to say this to our friends the Flemings.”

Guillaume Rym bowed low, while Coppenole, with his surly look, had the air of one of those bears of whom His Majesty spoke. The king took no heed of it. He had just dipped his lips in the goblet, and spat out the drink, saying: “Faugh! the nasty tisane!” He who read continued:

“For the feeding of a knave footpad locked up for six months in the little cell of the flaying-house, awaiting what shall be done with him.—Six livres four sols.

—What is that? interrupted the king. To feed what should be hanged! By God! I shall give no more a sou for that feeding.—Olivier, speak of the matter with monsieur d'Estouteville, and this very evening make me ready the wedding of the gallant with a gibbet.—Resume.”

Olivier made a mark with his thumb at the article of the _knave footpad_ and passed on.

“To Henriet Cousin, master executioner of the high works of the justice of Paris, the sum of sixty sols parisis, to him taxed and ordained by my lord the provost of Paris, for having bought, by the ordinance of my said lord the provost, a great sword with a leaf-shaped blade serving to execute and behead the persons who by justice are condemned for their misdeeds, and the same made furnished with scabbard and all that belongs thereto; and likewise has caused to be set in order and repaired the old sword, which had split and chipped in doing justice upon messire Louis de Luxembourg, as more fully may appear...”

The king interrupted: “It is enough. I ordain the sum with a great heart. These are expenses whereon I look not. I have never regretted that money.—Follow.”

“For having made anew a great cage...

—Ah! said the king, taking in both hands the arms of his chair, I knew well that I had come to this Bastille for something.—Wait, master Olivier. I wish to see the cage myself. You shall read me the cost thereof while I examine it.—Gentlemen the Flemings, come see this. It is curious.”

Thereupon he rose, leaned on the arm of his interlocutor, signed to the sort of mute who stood before the door to go before him, to the two Flemings to follow him, and went out of the chamber.

The royal company was augmented, at the door of the retreat, by men-at-arms all laden with iron, and by slim pages who bore torches. It journeyed some time within the gloomy donjon, pierced with staircases and corridors even into the thickness of the walls. The captain of the Bastille marched at the head, and caused the wickets to be opened before the old sick and bent king, who coughed as he walked.

At each wicket, all heads were obliged to stoop save that of the old man bowed by age. “Hum! said he between his gums, for he had no longer any teeth, we are already quite ready for the gate of the sepulchre. At low gate, passing bent.”

At length, after having crossed a last wicket so encumbered with locks that a quarter of an hour was spent in opening it, they entered a high and vast vaulted hall, at the centre of which, by the light of the torches, one distinguished a massive cubical block of masonry, iron and wood. The interior was hollow. It was one of those famous cages for state prisoners which were called _the king's fillettes_. There were in the walls two or three little windows, so thickly trellised with heavy iron bars that the glass was not seen. The door was a great flat slab of stone, like those of tombs. Of these doors which serve never but to enter. Only, here, the dead was a living man.

The king began to walk slowly around the little edifice, examining it with care, while master Olivier, who followed him, read aloud the memorial:

“For having made anew a great cage of wood of great beams, frames and sleepers, containing nine feet in length by eight in width, and in height seven feet between two floors, lathed and bound with great iron bands, which has been set in a chamber being at one of the towers of the bastide Saint-Antoine, in which cage is put and detained, by command of the king our lord, a prisoner who dwelt previously in an old decayed and decrepit cage.—There have been employed upon the said new cage ninety-six beams laid and fifty-two upright, ten sleepers of three toises in length; and there have been occupied nineteen carpenters to square, work and cut all the said wood in the court of the Bastille during twenty days...

—Fair oak hearts, said the king, knocking with his fist on the timber.

“... There has entered into this cage, pursued the other, two hundred and twenty great iron bands, of nine feet and of eight, the rest of middling length, with the washers, bosses and counter-bands serving the said bands, all the said iron weighing three thousand seven hundred and thirty-five livres; besides eight great iron staples serving to attach the said cage, with the cramps and nails weighing together two hundred and eighteen livres of iron, not counting the iron of the trellises of the windows of the chamber where the cage was placed, the iron bars of the door of the chamber, and other things...

—Here is much iron, said the king, to contain the lightness of a spirit!

“... The whole amounts to three hundred and seventeen livres five sols seven deniers.

—By God! cried the king.

At this oath, which was the favourite of Louis XI, it seemed that someone awoke within the cage; one heard chains which scraped the floor thereof with noise, and there rose a faint voice which seemed to issue from the tomb: “Sire! Sire! mercy!” One could not see him who spoke thus.

“Three hundred and seventeen livres five sols seven deniers! resumed Louis XI.

The lamentable voice which had issued from the cage had frozen all the bystanders, master Olivier himself. The king alone seemed not to have heard it. At his order, master Olivier resumed his reading, and His Majesty continued coldly the inspection of the cage.

“... Besides that, there has been paid to a mason who made the holes to set the gratings of the windows, and the floor of the chamber where the cage is, because the floor could not have borne this cage by reason of its weight, twenty-seven livres fourteen sols parisis...”

The voice began again to moan:

“Mercy! Sire! I swear to you that it is monsieur the cardinal of Angers who committed the treason, and not I.”

—The mason is harsh! said the king. Continue, Olivier.”

Olivier continued:

“... To a joiner, for windows, beds, close-stool and other things, twenty livres two sols parisis...”

The voice continued also:

“Alas! Sire! will you not hear me? I protest to you that it is not I who wrote the thing to my lord of Guyenne, but monsieur the cardinal La Balue!

—The joiner is dear, observed the king.—Is that all?

—No, Sire.—... To a glazier, for the glass of the said chamber, forty-six sols eight deniers parisis.

—Show mercy, Sire! Is it not enough that all my goods have been given to my judges, my plate to monsieur de Torcy, my library to master Pierre Doriolle, my tapestry to the governor of Roussillon? I am innocent. Lo, fourteen years that I shiver in a cage of iron. Show mercy, Sire! you shall find it again in heaven.

—Master Olivier, said the king, the total?

—Three hundred and sixty-seven livres eight sols three deniers parisis.

—Our Lady! cried the king. Here is an outrageous cage!”

He snatched the book from master Olivier's hands, and began to count himself upon his fingers, examining by turns the paper and the cage. Meanwhile one heard the prisoner sob. That was lugubrious in the shadow, and faces looked at one another, paling.

“Fourteen years, Sire! lo fourteen years! since the month of April 1469. In the name of the holy mother of God, Sire, hear me! You have enjoyed all that time the warmth of the sun. I, wretched, shall I never see the day again? Mercy, Sire! Be merciful. Clemency is a fair royal virtue which breaks the currents of anger. Does Your Majesty believe that it is at the hour of death a great contentment for a king, to have left no offence unpunished? Besides, Sire, I betrayed not Your Majesty; it is monsieur d'Angers. And I have at the foot a very heavy chain, and a great iron ball at the end, far heavier than is reasonable. Eh! Sire! have pity on me!

—Olivier, said the king shaking his head, I note that they charge me the bushel of plaster at twenty sols, which is worth but twelve. You shall redo this memorial.”

He turned his back on the cage, and made ready to leave the chamber. The miserable prisoner, at the withdrawing of the torches and the noise, judged that the king was going away.

“Sire! Sire! cried he with despair.

The door closed. He saw no more, and heard only the hoarse voice of the turnkey, who sang in his ears the song:

_Master Jean Balue_ _Has lost the sight_ _Of his bishoprics;_ _Monsieur of Verdun_ _Has not one of them,_ _All are dispatched._

The king remounted in silence to his retreat, and his cortège followed him, terrified by the last moanings of the condemned. All at once, His Majesty turned toward the governor of the Bastille.

“By the way, said he, was there not someone in that cage?

“Pardieu, Sire! answered the governor, stupified at the question.

—And who then?

—Monsieur the bishop of Verdun.”

The king knew that better than anyone. But it was a mania of his.

“Ah! said he with the air of one naïvely thinking of it for the first time, Guillaume de Harancourt, the friend of monsieur the cardinal La Balue. A good devil of a bishop!”

At the end of some instants, the door of the retreat had opened again, then closed again upon the five personages whom the reader saw there at the beginning of this chapter, and who had resumed their places, their half-low conversations, and their attitudes.

During the king's absence, there had been laid upon his table some despatches, whose seals he himself broke. Then he began to read them quickly one after another, signed to _master Olivier_, who seemed to have near him office of minister, to take a pen, and, without making him privy to the contents of the despatches, began to dictate to him in a low voice the answers, which the other wrote, quite uncomfortably kneeling before the table.

Guillaume Rym observed.

The king spoke so low that the Flemings heard nothing of his dictation, save here and there some isolated and little intelligible fragments like: “...Maintain the fertile places by commerce, the sterile by manufactures...—Show to the English lords our four bombards, the Londres, the Brabant, the Bourg-en-Bresse, the Saint-Omer...—Artillery is the cause that war is now made more judiciously...—To M. de Bressuire, our friend...—Armies are not maintained without tributes...” —Etc.

Once he raised his voice: “By God! monsieur the king of Sicily seals his letters with yellow wax, like a king of France. We are perhaps wrong to permit him. My fair cousin of Burgundy gave not arms with a field of gules. The greatness of houses is assured in the integrity of prerogatives. Note this, gossip Olivier.”

Another time: “Oh! oh! said he, the bulky message! What claims our brother the emperor?” And running his eyes over the missive, cutting his reading with interjections: “Certes! the Germanies are so great and powerful that it is scarce credible.—But we forget not the old proverb: The fairest county is Flanders; the fairest duchy, Milan; the fairest kingdom, France.—Is it not so, gentlemen the Flemings?”

This time Coppenole bowed with Guillaume Rym. The patriotism of the hosier was tickled.

A last despatch made Louis XI frown. “What is this? cried he. Complaints and querimonies against our garrisons of Picardy! Olivier, write in haste to monsieur the marshal of Rouault.—That disciplines are relaxed.—That the men-at-arms of the ordinances, the nobles of ban, the free-archers, the Swiss, do infinite evils to the husbandmen.—That the man of war, not content with the goods he finds in the house of the labourers, constrains them, with great blows of staff or glaive, to go seek wine in the town, fish, spices, and other excessive things.—That monsieur the king knows this.—That we intend to keep our people from inconveniences, larcenies and pillagings.—That it is our will, by Our Lady!—That moreover it pleases us not that any minstrel, barber, or varlet of war, be clad like a prince, in velvet, in silk cloth and rings of gold.—That these vanities are hateful to God.—That we content ourselves, we who are gentleman, with a doublet of cloth at sixteen sols the aune of Paris.—That messieurs the knaves may well abase themselves thus far, they also.—Send and ordain.—To monsieur de Rouault, our friend.—Well.”

He dictated this letter aloud, in a firm tone and by jerks. At the moment he finished, the door opened and gave passage to a new personage, who precipitated himself all aghast into the chamber, crying: “Sire! Sire! there is a sedition of the populace in Paris!”

The grave face of Louis XI contracted; but that which was visible of his emotion passed like a flash. He contained himself, and said with a tranquil severity:

“Gossip Jacques, you enter very abruptly!

—Sire! Sire! there is a revolt! resumed gossip Jacques, breathless.

The king, who had risen, took him roughly by the arm and said in his ear, so as to be heard by him alone, with a concentrated anger and an oblique glance toward the Flemings:

“Be silent, or speak low!”

The new-comer understood, and began to make him a very frightened narration in a low voice, which the king listened to with calm, while Guillaume Rym caused to be remarked by Coppenole the face and habit of the new-comer, his furred hood, _caputia fourrata_, his short epitoge, _epitogia curta_, his robe of black velvet, which announced a president of the Court of Accounts.

Scarcely had this personage given the king some explanations, than Louis XI cried out, bursting into laughter:

“In truth! speak aloud, gossip Coictier! What have you to speak so low? Our Lady knows that we have nothing hidden from our good friends the Flemings.”

—But, Sire...

—Speak aloud!”

The “gossip Coictier” remained mute with surprise.

“Then, resumed the king,—speak, monsieur,—there is a movement of villeins in our good city of Paris?

—Yes, Sire.

—And which, you say, is directed against monsieur the bailiff of the Palais of Justice?

—There is appearance, answered _the gossip_, who stammered, still quite stunned by the sudden and inexplicable change which had just operated in the thoughts of the king.

Louis XI resumed: “Where did the watch meet the mob?

—Marching from the Grande-Truanderie toward the Pont-aux-Changeurs. I met it myself as I came hither to obey the orders of Your Majesty. I heard some of them who cried: Down with the bailiff of the Palais!

—And what grievances have they against the bailiff?

—Ah! said gossip Jacques, that he is their lord.

—Truly!

—Yes, Sire. These are knaves of the Court of Miracles. It is already long that they complain of the bailiff, whose vassals they are. They will recognise him neither as justiciar nor as wayward.

—Yes indeed! replied the king with a smile of satisfaction which he strove in vain to disguise.

—In all their petitions to the parliament, resumed gossip Jacques, they pretend to have but two masters, Your Majesty and their God, who is, I believe, the devil.

—He! he! said the king.

He rubbed his hands, he laughed that inward laugh which makes the face to shine. He could not dissemble his joy, though he essayed at intervals to compose himself. No one understood aught of it, not even “master Olivier”. He remained a moment silent, with a thoughtful air, but content.

—Are they in force? he asked suddenly.

—Yes certes, Sire, answered gossip Jacques.

—How many?

—At least six thousand.”

The king could not forbear to say: “Good!” He resumed:

—Are they armed?

—Scythes, pikes, hackbuts, picks. All sorts of very violent arms.”

The king seemed nowise uneasy at this display. Gossip Jacques thought he ought to add:

—If Your Majesty send not promptly to the succour of the bailiff, he is lost.

—We shall send, said the king with a false serious air. It is well. Certainly we shall send. Monsieur the bailiff is our friend. Six thousand! These are determined knaves. The boldness is marvellous, and we are thereof right angry. But we have few folk this night about us.—It will be time tomorrow morning.”

Gossip Jacques cried out. “At once, Sire! The bailiwick will have twenty times the leisure to be sacked, the lordship violated and the bailiff hanged. For God's sake, Sire! send before tomorrow morning.”

The king looked him in the face. “I have said tomorrow morning.”

It was one of those glances to which one replies not.

After a silence, Louis XI lifted his voice anew. “My gossip Jacques, you must know this? What was...” He corrected himself: “What is the feudal jurisdiction of the bailiff?

—Sire, the bailiff of the Palais has the rue de la Calandre as far as the rue de l'Herberie, the place Saint-Michel and the places vulgarly named the Mureaux situated near the church Notre-Dame-des-Champs (here Louis XI lifted the edge of his hat), which houses are to the number of thirteen, besides the Court of Miracles, besides the Maladerie called the Banlieue, besides all the causeway which begins at this Maladerie and ends at the gate Saint-Jacques. Of these divers places he is wayward, high, middle and low justiciar, full lord.

—Hum! said the king, scratching his left ear with his right hand, that makes a good bit of my city! Ah! monsieur the bailiff _was_ king of all that!”

This time he corrected himself not. He continued, dreamy and as if speaking to himself:

“Softly, monsieur the bailiff! you had there between your teeth a pretty morsel of our Paris.”

All at once he exploded: “By God! what is this that these folk who call themselves waywards, justiciars, lords and masters in our house? who have their toll at every turn, their justice and their hangman at every crossroads amid our people? so that, as the Greek counted as many gods as he had fountains, and the Persian as many as he saw stars, the Frenchman counts as many kings as he sees gibbets! Pardieu! this thing is evil, and the confusion displeases me. I would fain know if it be the grace of God that there be in Paris another wayward than the king, another justice than our parliament, another emperor than us in this empire! By the faith of my soul! the day must come when there shall be in France but one king, but one lord, but one judge, but one head-cutter, as there is in paradise but one God!”

He lifted his hat again, and continued, ever dreaming, with the air and accent of a hunter who stirs up and launches his pack: “Good! my people! bravely! break these false lords! do your work. Ho! ho! pill them, hang them, sack them!... Ah! you would be kings, my lords? Go! people! go!”

“Stories of the world, in your language.”