Agnes Sorel: A Novel

by G. P. R. James

The gardener's habit, however, with the blue cloth stockings bound on with leathern straps, was so apparent in the present instance, that Jean Charost, who was unconscious of having a gardener, could not for an instant conceive who the personage was, till the face of Martin Grille, waxen like that of the moon at the end of the second quarter, grew distinct to recollection.

"He says true, my good friend, Monsieur de Brecy," said Jacques Cœur, "and right glad I am, his care should have so provided that your first sight of your own house, on your return from captivity should be a pleasant one. The only share I have had in this, as your agent, has been to let him do what he would."

"'Tis explained in a word, sir," said Martin Grille. "You told me you could not afford to keep me while you were a prisoner; and I thought I could afford to keep myself, out of the waste ground about the castle, and keep the castle in good order too. I had always a fancy for gardening when I was a boy, and had once a whole crop of beans in an old sauce-pan, on the top of the garret where my mother lived in Paris. The first five sous I ever had in my life was for an ounce of onion seed which I raised in a cracked pitcher. I was intended by nature for digging the earth, and not for digging holes in other people's bodies; and the town of Bourges owes me some of the best cabbages that ever were grown, when I am quite sure I should have reaped any thing but a crop of glory if I had cultivated the fields of war. However, here I am, ready to take up the trade of valet again, if you will let me; and, to show that I have not forgotten the mystery, I rubbed up all your old arms last night, brushed coats, mantles, jerkins, houseaux, and every thing else I could find, and swept up every room in the house to save poor old Augustine's unbendable back."

In more ways than one, the house was well prepared for the return of its lord, and, thanks to the care of good Martin Grille, a very comfortable supper had not been forgotten. It was a strange sensation, however, for Jean Charost, when the sun had gone down and the sconces were lighted, to sit once more in his own hall, a free man, with friendly faces all about him--a pleasant sensation, and yet somewhat overpowering. The tears stood in Madame De Brecy's eyes more than once during that evening; but Agnes, whose spirits were light, and who had fewer memories, was full of gay joyfulness.

Jean Charost himself was very calm; but he often thought, had he been alone, he could have wept too.

Thus some thought and some feeling was given to personal things; but the fate, the state, the history of his country during his absence occupied no small portion of his attention. In those days news traveled slowly. Great facts were probably more accurately stated and known than even now; for there was no complicated machinery for the dissemination of falsehood, no public press wielded by party spirit for the purpose of adulterating the true with the false. A certain generosity, too, had survived the pure chivalrous ages, and men, even during life, could attribute high and noble qualities to an enemy; but details were generally lost. Jean Charost was anxious to hear those details, and when they gathered round the great chimney and the blazing hearth--for it was now October, and the nights were frosty--Jacques Cœur undertook to give his young friend some account of all that had taken place in France since the battle of Azincourt, somewhat to the following effect.

"You remember well, my friend," he said, "that, after the fall of Harfleur, John of Burgundy only escaped the name of traitor by a lukewarm offer to join his troops to those of France in defense of the realm. But he was distrusted, and probably not without cause. You were already a prisoner in England when the Orleanist party obtained entire preponderance at the court, and the young duke being in captivity like yourself, the leading of that faction was assumed by his father-in-law, the Count of Armagnac. Rapid, great, and perilous was his rise, and fearless, bold, and bloody he showed himself. The sword of constable placed the whole military power of France at his disposal, and the death of the dauphin Louis left him no rival in authority or favor. Happy had it been for him had he contented himself with military authority; but he must grasp the finances too; and in the disastrous state of the revenues of the crown, the imposts, only justified by a hard necessity, raised him up daily enemies. His rude and merciless severity, too, irritated even more than it alarmed, and it was not long before all those who had been long indifferent went to swell the ranks of his adversaries. True, his party was strong; true, hatred of the Burgundian faction was intense in a multitude of Frenchmen. But the great lords, and many of the princes attached to the house of Orleans, were absent and powerless in English prisons. By every means that policy and duplicity could suggest, John of Burgundy strove to augment the number of his friends. All those who fled from the persecution of Armagnac were received by him with joy and treated with distinction. He increased his forces; he hovered about Paris; he treated the orders of the court to retire, if not with contempt, with disobedience. At length, however, he seemed to give up the hope of making himself master of the capital, and retreated suddenly into Artois.

"Not judging his enemy rightly, the Count of Armagnac resolved to seize the opportunity of an open path, in order to strike a blow for the recovery of Harfleur; and, leaving a strong garrison in Paris, he set out upon his expedition. No sooner was he gone, than John of Burgundy hastened to profit by his absence, and rapid negotiations took place between him and his partisans within the walls of Paris. You know the turbulent and factious nature of the lower order of citizens in the capital. Many of them were animated with mistaken zeal for the house of Burgundy; more were eager for plunder, or thirsty for blood; and one of the darkest and most detestable plots that ever blackened the page of history was formed for the destruction of the whole Armagnac party, and that, too, with the full cognizance of the Duke of Burgundy. It was determined that, at a certain hour, the conspirators should appear in arms in the streets of Paris, seize upon the queen, the king, and the young dauphin, John, murder the-whole of the Armagnac faction, and, after having seized the Duke of Berri and the King of Sicily, load them with chains, and make a spectacle of them in the streets of Paris mounted on an ox, and then put them to death likewise.

"The plot was frustrated by the fears or remorse of a woman, within a few minutes of the hour appointed for its execution. Precautions were taken; the royal family placed in safety; and Tanneguy du Châtel, at the head of his troops, issued forth from the Bastile, and made himself master of the houses and the persons of the conspirators. There was no mercy, my friend, for any one who was found in arms. Some suffered by the cord or hatchet, some were drowned in the Seine; and Armagnac returning, added to the chastisement already inflicted on individuals, the punishment of the whole city of Paris. Suspicion was received as proof, indifference became a crime, the prisons were filled to overflowing, and the very name of Burgundian was proscribed. The troops of the Duke of Burgundy, which had approached the city of Paris, were attacked in the open field, and civil war, in its most desolating aspect, raged all around the metropolis.

"Every sort of evil seemed poured out upon France, as if all the fountains of Heaven's wrath were opened to rain woes upon the land. Another dauphin was snatched away from us, and rumors of poison were very general; but the death of one prince was very small in comparison with the treason of another. There is no doubt, De Brecy, that John of Burgundy, frustrated in his attempt upon Paris, entered into a league with the enemies of his country, and secretly recognized Henry of England as king of France. Dissensions arose between the queen and the Count of Armagnac, in which our present dauphin, Charles, was so far compromised as to incur the everlasting hatred of his mother. Burgundy, the queen, and England, united for the destruction of the dauphin and the Count of Armagnac, and vengeance and ambition combined for the final ruin of the country. The politic King of England took advantage of all, and marched on from conquest to conquest throughout Normandy, while, by slow degrees, the Duke of Burgundy approached nearer and nearer to the capital. The perils by which he was surrounded appeared to deprive Armagnac of judgment: he seemed possessed of the fury of a wild beast, and little doubt exists that he meditated a general massacre of the citizens of Paris. But his crimes were cut short by the crimes of others. The troops of Burgundy were in possession of Pontoise. A well-disposed and peaceable young man, insulted and injured by a follower of Armagnac, found means to introduce his enemies into the city of Paris. At the first cry of Burgundy, thousands rose to deliver themselves from the tyranny under which they groaned, and, headed by a man named Caboche, retaliated, in a most fearful manner, on the party of Armagnac, the evils which it had inflicted. The prisons were filled; the streets ran with blood; and the Count of Armagnac, himself forced to fly, was concealed for a few hours by a mason, only to be delivered up in the end. The queen and the Duke of Burgundy encouraged the massacre; the prisons were broken into, the prisoners murdered in cold blood; the Châtelet was set on fire, and the unhappy captives within its walls were driven back into the flames at the point of the pike; and the leaders of the Armagnac faction were dragged through the streets for days before they were torn to pieces by the people. Tanneguy du Châtel alone showed courage and discretion, and obtained safety, if not success. He rescued the dauphin in the midst of the tumult, placed him in safety at Melun, returned to the capital, fought gallantly for some hours against the insurgents and the troops of Burgundy, and then retired to counsel and support his prince. The queen and the Duke of Burgundy entered the city in triumph; flowers were strewed before her on the blood-stained streets; and a prince of the blood-royal of France was seen grasping familiarly the hands of low-born murderers. But the powers, which he had raised into active virulence, were soon found ungovernable by the Duke of Burgundy, and he determined first to weaken, and then to destroy them. The troops of assassins fancied themselves soldiers, because they were butchers, and demanded to be led against the enemy. The duke was right willing to gratify them, and sent forth two bands of many thousands each. The first was beaten and nearly cut to pieces by the Armagnac troops. The remnant murdered their leaders in their rage of disappointment, but did not profit by the experience they had gained. The second party were defeated with terrible loss, and fled in haste to Paris; but the gates were shut against them; and dispersing, they joined the numerous bands of plunderers that infested the country, and were pursued and slaughtered by the troops of Burgundy. Thus weakened, the insurgents, who had brought back the Duke of Burgundy to Paris, were easily subjugated by the duke himself: their leaders perished on the scaffold; and thousands of the inferior villains were swept away by various indirect means. A still more merciless scourge, however, than either Armagnac or Burgundy was about to smite the devoted city--a scourge that spared no party, respected no rank or station. The plague appeared in the capital, and, in the space of a few months, the grave received more than a hundred thousand persons of every age, class, and sex. In some of these events perished Caboche, the uncle of your servant Martin Grille, who, with the courage of a lion and the fierceness of a tiger, combined some talents, which, better employed, might have won him an honorable name in history."