ARTHUR BLANE;
OR,
THE HUNDRED CUIRASSIERS.
CHAPTER I.
THE PRETTY MASK.
It was about the end of April, 1634—twelve had tolled from the huge dark towers of Notre Dame, and the night was dark and gusty.
I found myself bewildered among the intricate and gloomy streets of old Paris; having lost the way to my hotel, the Golden Fleur de Lys, in the ancient Rue d'Ecosse. In my ignorance of the thoroughfares and of their names, having been repeatedly misled by wicked gamins and practical jokers, midnight found me completely entangled among the narrow alleys that bordered on the terrible locality of the Place de la Grève, the lofty, quaint and peculiar mansions of which towered on three sides, while on the fourth, lay the Seine, whose muddy waters have hidden the gashed corpse of many a murdered man—have swept away the red débris of many a massacre, and been the last refuge of many a desperate and despairing heart.
Against the dark sky, I could distinguish the darker outlines of the steep sharp gables that overhung the Place, with their fronts covered by grotesque sculptures in wood and stone. A few lights twinkled feebly amid the masses of that great pillared edifice of the days of Charles V., named from him. the Maison au Dauphin; and the flickering oil lamps that swung mournfully to and fro, at the ends of the dark alley, cast a sickly light upon the fantastic projections of the houses, and on the whitewashed turret of the ancient pillory and stone gibbet, whereon so many thousands of human beings, during ages past, have died in agony and disgrace.
Here then, in this place of pleasant associations, I—who had arrived in Paris but the night before—found myself alone, wandering in ignorance of the way, at midnight—I, a Scot and stranger, with my whole worldly possessions about me, to wit, ten of those gay louis d'ors (first coined by Louis XIII.), a good suit of black velvet, a fair cloak of serge de Berri, worth about ten pistoles; but having a good sword, that had notched more than one crown in its time, with a pair of steel Scottish pistols in my girdle engraved with my coat of arms and the significant legend,
"He who gives quickly, gives twice."