"D and H intertwined" we answered in chorus.
At this the guide laughed merrily and explained that there were different opinions about the monogram; some persons said that King Henry had boldly undertaken to interlace the initial letters of Catherine and Diane with his own, but he for his part believed that the letters were two Cs with an H between them and, whether by accident or design, the letter on the left, which looked more like a D than a C, gave the key to the monogram, "and this," he added with the air of a philosopher, "made it true to history; the beautiful favorite on the left hand was always more powerful than the Queen on the right, not that the ways of King Henry II were to be commended; but," with a frank smile, "one is always pleased to think of that wicked woman getting what was owing her."
"Rousseau thought that both the initials were those of Diane; he says in his Confessions: 'In 1747 we went to pass the autumn in Touraine, at the castle of Chenonceaux, a royal mansion upon the Cher, built by Henry II for Diane de Poitiers, of whom the ciphers are still seen.'"
We turned, at the sound of a strange voice, to find the Frenchman of the Bon Laboureur standing quite near us.
"These guides have a large supply of more or less correct history at hand, and this one, being a philosopher, adds his own theories to further obscure the truth." This in the most perfect English, accompanied by a shrug of the shoulders entirely French. "Chenonceaux being Diane's château and this her own room, what more natural than that her cipher should be here, as Rousseau says? And yet, as Honoré de Balzac points out, this same cipher is to be found in the palace of the Louvre; upon the columns of la Halle au Blé, built by Catherine herself; and above her own tomb at Saint Denis which she had constructed during her lifetime. All the same, it must have pleased Henry immensely to have the royal cipher look much more like D H than like C H, and there is still room for conjecture which, after all, is one of the charms of history, so, Monsieur et Mesdames, it is quite à votre choix," with a graceful bow in our direction.
Evidently Monsieur Crapaud does not consider us savages, despite Walter's unsavory remarks about the cuisine of his country, and noticing our interest he added with French exactness: "Of course, the château was not built for Diane, although much enlarged and beautified by her, and when Catherine came into possession she had the good sense to carry out some of Diane's plans. Francis I came here to hunt sometimes, and it was upon one of these parties of pleasure, when his son Henry and Diane de Poitiers were with him, that she fell in love with this castle on the Cher, and longed to make it her own. Having a lively sense of the instability of all things mortal, kings in particular, she took good care to make friends with the rising star, and when Francis was gathered to his fathers and his uncles and his cousins,—you may remember that his predecessor was an uncle or a cousin,—Henry promptly turned over Chenonceaux to Diane."
"There is a curious old story," said Monsieur Crapaud, "about Chenonceaux having been given to Diane to soothe her vanity, which had been wounded by the publication of some scurrilous verses, said to have been instigated by her enemy, Madame d'Etampes. Naturally, the petted beauty, whose charms were already on the wane, resented satirical allusion to her painted face, false teeth and hair, especially as she was warned, in very plain language, that a painted bait would not long attract her prey. These verses were attributed to one of the Bohiers, a nephew or a son of the old councillor who had built the château, and, to save his neck, he offered Chenonceaux to Henry, who begged Diane to accept it and forget her woes."
"Which she did, of course," said Walter, "as she always seemed to have had an eye to the main chance."
"I cannot vouch for the truth of the story; I give it to you as it came to me. There is no doubt, however, that certain satirical verses were written about the Duchesse de Valentinois, in which she and the King also are spoken of with a freedom not to be expected under the old régime. Perhaps you are not familiar with the quatrain:
"'Sire, si vous laissez, comme Charles désire,
Comme Diane veut, par trop vous gouverner,
Foudre, pétrir, mollir, refondre, retourner,
Sire vous n'êtes plus, vous n'êtes plus que cire.'"