After the little Dauphin had made the poor woman happy with his gift, he returned for a moment to his mother to thank her again for the gold piece, and then went to give the King his morning greetings.
“What is this I hear, my dear Charles?” said the King, smiling and shaking his finger at the Prince. “M. Hue has been telling me strange things of you.” M. Hue was one of the Prince’s attendants.
“What things, papa?” asked the boy. “I don’t remember doing anything bad.”
“No? Think well, Charles. Yesterday, while you were reciting your lesson, you began to whistle. Did you not deserve a rebuke for that?”
The Prince colored. Then he answered quietly: “Yes, papa, I remember. I repeated my lesson so badly that I whistled to myself.”
“Nevertheless you see it was heard,” replied the King. “You may be forgiven for that, however, but we have not come to the end yet. Afterwards you were in such high spirits that you tried to run away and dash through the rose-bushes in the garden. M. Hue warned you, and said, ‘Monseigneur, a single one of those thorns might wound your face badly, or even put out your eye!’ And what answer did Monseigneur make?”
Somewhat abashed, the Prince lowered his eyes. “I said: ‘It is the thorny path that leads to glory!’ And is not that true, papa?”
The King’s face assumed a more serious expression. “Yes, yes, the principle is right,” he answered, “but you have misapplied it, my child. There is no glory in risking your eyesight merely to gratify a mischievous impulse. If it had been a question of killing a dangerous beast, of rescuing a human being from peril, in short, if you had risked your life to save another, that might have been called glory; but your act, Charles, was simply thoughtless and imprudent. Beside, child, you had better wait and not talk of glory until you are able to read the history of your ancestors and our French heroes like Guesclin, Bayard, Turenne, and many others who have defended our crown with their blood.”
This mild but earnest exhortation made a deep impression on the heart of the young Prince. He seized his father’s hand, kissed it, and said in a low voice, “Very well, dear papa, after this I will find my glory in following your counsels and in obeying you.”
“Then we are good friends again,” answered the King; “and now we will look over your exercises for a few moments, so that M. Hue and M. Daveaux may be pleased with you.”