One in a Thousand; or, The Days of Henri Quatre

by G. P. R. James

Mayenne, however, could not afford to quarrel with a person of so much importance to his cause; and acting with wisdom and moderation, an explanation soon ensued, which cleared either party in the opinion of the other. As D'Aubin, however, giving way to the natural impetuosity of his disposition, had not waited to put the troops in motion which he had collected in Maine, he returned thither after one day's rest, while Mayenne marched forwards towards Dieppe.

Accompanied by some of the first officers in France, and supported by an overwhelming force, it seemed that the great leader of the League was about to drive the handful of men which opposed him, and their heroic monarch, into that sea which was already bearing to their aid the expected succour from England. Strongly posted, however, and powerful both in courage and in right, Henry IV. calmly awaited the attack of his adversary; and, after several preliminary movements, the day of Arques dawned heavy and dull, without a breath of air to stir the trees or to dispel the autumn fog that obscured the scene of that memorable fight.

It were tedious here to tell all the minute particulars of the glorious day, when, attacked at all points, and assailed in all manners, not only by the arms of the enemy, but by the treason or folly of part of his own troops, Henry IV. defended the hill of Arques against forces more than six times the number of his own.

Every one has heard how, when monarch and soldiers were alike wearied out with sustaining through a long day the unceasing attacks of infinitely superior numbers, when scarcely a horse could bear his rider to the charge, and scarcely a hand could wield a sword, the little band of Royalists beheld the powerful and yet untouched cavalry of the League wheeling round upon their flank, while a light wind springing up tended to clear the air, and showed to both armies the insignificance of the one and the tremendous advantages of the other. But in stricken fields, as in the daily strife of life, the event which seems destined to seal our misfortunes is often but the harbinger of unexpected success. The wind, it is true, rose higher, and rolling the sea-fog, in heavy clouds, away down the valley of Arques, left the few gallant defenders of that long-contested hill exposed, in all their need, to the eyes of the mighty host that swept round them in dreadful array; but, at the same time, the full sunshine poured upon the advancing squadrons of the League as they came on to the charge, and those upon the hill, for the first time during the day, could distinguish clearly the separate masses of friends and foes. The cannon of the castle of Arques opened at once, with tremendous effect, upon the cavalry of Mayenne; the first ranks were swept down as they advanced; the second rolled over their dying comrades; the horses, mad with pain and terror, broke through the ranks behind; and the charge of a few hundred men, at that critical moment, put all the gallant array into irremediable flight. Mayenne saw that the day was not for him; and withdrawing his masses in slow and soldierly order, he retreated for several miles, and left the field of Arques to the glory of Henry IV.

CHAPTER XXVII.

It was in a cottage by the sea-side--a mere hut, belonging in former times to a fisherman--that Eugenie de Menancourt sat one autumn day beside Beatrice of Ferrara watching the clouds of mist roll over the waters, as the exhalations which night had left behind struggled with a light wind and a still powerful sun for place upon the bosom of the ocean. It was a mere hut, as we have said, but there was something picturesque in its position, seated halfway up, halfway down a sand-cliff to the east of Dieppe, with a projecting shoulder of the rock sheltering it from the winds of the Atlantic, and a few trees and shrubs--stunted in size and not very luxuriant in foliage, it is true, but still green and fresh--keeping it company in the warm nook where it was placed. It is not impossible that the very picturesque beauty of its situation might be the reason why it had been selected by one who had more poetry in her heart and soul than half the poets of the land in which she lived. But, at the same time, there was another motive which she would have assigned if she had been asked, and which was, that the shore beneath formed a little bay in which the waves seldom broke boisterously, but even in very stormy weather seemed to play there in innocent sport, while their parent sea was all in trouble and contention without, as we may have seen the children of a warrior playing in peace by their cottage-door while their father was urging the bloody strife upon the battle plain. In this sheltered bay lay a small vessel, and on the beach were two or three boats, while up above upon the cliff were several more cottages, from which to that we have described a winding and somewhat difficult path led down the face of the crag. Although the cottage had not contained more than ten days its two fair tenants, who had now resumed their appropriate dress, yet they had contrived to ornament it with a very different sort of taste from that which was displayed by any of the neighbouring dwellers on the shore: for Beatrice had her full share of that knowledge and love of what is beautiful in art or nature which was then general in her native land; and although she had daily talked of returning soon to Paris to play her appointed part upon that busy scene, yet she had lingered with a fond clinging to the peaceful moments she spent there, musing away her time upon the ever-varying sea-shore, or decorating the cottage she had hired for Eugenie with somewhat whimsical care. As if her journey to Paris had been a duty, for the neglect of which she owed an apology to her own heart, she often spoke of the difficulties and dangers of reaching the capital when two hostile armies were interposed: but difficulties or dangers had rarely stopped Beatrice of Ferrara when she willed to go in any direction upon earth; and, perhaps, the real reason of her delay might be, that Philip d'Aubin was not in the metropolis, and that she knew it.

As we have said, however, beside her Eugenie de Menancourt; upon an autumn day, little more than a fortnight after we last left them. Their eyes were bent upon the sea-fogs rolling along over the bosom of the waters below, and contending in vain against a rising wind, which every now and then swept them away, and showed to old Ocean the blue eyes of Heaven looking upon his slumbering waves, when the curtain of the mist was withdrawn by the soft hand of the morning air.

"See, Eugenie! see!" cried Beatrice of Ferrara, as, with their arms twined in each other, they gazed forth upon the changing scene; "see how the soft and downy masses of fog roll dark above the sea, and how, every now and then, a scanty gleam of light breaks in, and gilds the moving vapour and the waves below! Do you know, dear Eugenie, that the bosom of that sea seems to me like my own fate, wrapped up, as it has been for many years, in clouds and gloom, with every now and then a gleam of brightness breaking through, for a brief moment, and obscured again almost as soon as given. Do you know, dear girl, I could stand and gaze upon that sea, and, with all the superstition of the ancient days, I could play the augur to my own heart, and read my after-lot in the changes that come over the bosom of the water."

"Well, let me read it!" cried Eugenie: "see, see, Beatrice, what a long bright gleam is coming now!"

"Ay! but the clouds roll up behind," replied her friend.