He seemed a young man fairly well set together, but with a head put somewhat low and awkwardly between his shoulders, the neck craning forward unpleasantly, giving a lowering look to a figure otherwise agreeable. As to his face, the forehead protruded, and heavy ridges above the eyes gave notice of a high temper; the nose was thick, and the upper lip protruded, while the lower one fell away. The eyes seemed of a greenish hue, and shifted from this side to that; the skin pale yellow, which showed the habitual derangement to which he was prey. But it was not a harsh face—only stupid and wistful—truthful, upon the whole, but weak; most unlike Catharine, who once rode beside him—that Jezebel from Italy, who thought that to be honest was to be a fool.
It was well into the month of January before word came again from Coligny summoning us to the Louvre. We knew that long communications had been sent by both Charles and Catherine de Medicis to Forquevaulx, at Madrid, asking reparation for the slaughter at San Augustin. The Duke d’Alava the Spanish Ambassador at Paris, had replied for his sovereign that Philip considered the French colonists pirates and intruders upon the domains of Spain, and that there could be no reparation. The position of Admiral Coligny was unchanged, and there, so far as we knew, the affair rested. Now however, we should perhaps learn something more. The summons from Coligny excited hope.
De Brésac and I, with M. de Teligny, passed by way of the Rue d’Averon and the Rue St. Germain l’Auxerrois to the Louvre, over the moat and through a stone arch into a great courtyard. The place was alive with men in armor, but M. de Teligny, having the entrée, was well known to the cornet of the guard, and we walked up the wide stairs to the Audience Chamber, where most of the general business of the King, Queen-mother or the Admiral was carried forward. The names of M. de Teligny and of De Brésac having been passed by the gentlemen in waiting, we were presently shown into the anteroom of his Majesty’s apartments, where Gaspard de Coligny was awaiting us.
He bore a most serious countenance as, dismissing those about him, he arose to greet us. “The King is within,” he said, “and I have wished him to see and speak with M. de Brésac and M. Killigrew. M. d’Alava has been here this morning and there is news from Madrid.”
Not knowing what was desired of us, we entered the King’s apartment after the great Admiral and stood inside the curtains. The room had more the appearance of an armory than of an audience chamber, for about the walls there hung halberds, pikes, spears, hunting horns, knives and arquebuses; while upon the floor were saddles, a morion and breastpieces, and a wolf-trap which his Majesty had but just devised. Foils and masks lay upon a chair by the chimney-piece, before which a great staghound bitch lay sleeping upon the hearth-rug. Here it was that the King took his fencing lessons with M. Pompée and wrote verses with M. Ronsard.
His Majesty, his back toward the door, sat before a table covered with books and papers, hawk-bells and nets. He was leaning over, his elbow upon a book, his chin in his hand, while his eyes in deep thought were cast upward toward the ceiling. So deeply engrossed was he upon the verses he was writing that he was not aware of our presence until the Admiral, waiting a moment, went forward and spoke.
The King started from his reverie.
“Sire,” said Coligny.
“Ah, mon père,” he exclaimed, rising and stretching forward a hand. “It is you? I was in a fine poetic frenzy, was I not?”
“Your Majesty has a ready gift.”