Around them were the royal confessor, Father Leslie, Principal of the Jesuit College of Toulouse, a tall, grave, and stern-looking Scot; the Masters of the Horse and of the Household; the Grand Chamberlain, M. le Duc de Bouillon, who was entirely dressed in cloth of gold, and the four gentlemen of the chamber—viz., the Dukes de Gevrès, de la Tremouille, de la Beauvillier, and d'Aumont; with the four Captains of the Scots and French Gardes du Corps—the Marquis de Gordon being on the King's right hand. Then came the Grand Almoner and the officers of the chapel; the Admiral of France; the General of the Galleys; the Grand Master of the Artillery; the Grand Ecuyer; the Colonel-General of the French Guards, and the Premier President of the Parliament of Paris. Here I also saw the veteran John Louis, Duc d'Epernon, Colonel-General of France and Governor of Guyenne, the oldest peer, general, and knight in the kingdom; Lieutenant-General Francis de Bethune, Surveyor of France, Governor of St. Maixant, and once Campmaster of the ancient Regiment de Picardie; Philibert de Nerestan, the aged Grand Master of the Knights of St. Lazare, and the Duc de St. Simon, whom Louis XIII. had made a peer and marshal of France because he was a good judge of dogs, and could blow on a hunting-horn without spitting through it.
This fortunate peer was in close conversation with the Abbé la Rivière, the first man who ever wore a peruke; and such was the profusion of its curls, that it weighed two pounds—to make up for the lightness of his brain, as my comrade the Viscount suggested.
'Bravo, M. l'Abbé!' said Raynold Cheyne; 'a dealer in souls with a perfumed periwig!'
Surrounded by musketeers and light horse, with the twenty-four gentlemen of the Scottish Guard, who were the immediate custodiers of the royal person, and escorted by all these peers and soldiers of high rank and sounding name, glittering with jewels, embroidery, and brilliant dresses of silk, velvet, cloth of gold, and cloth of silver, and having all the knightly orders of Europe sparkling on their breasts—Louis was conducted to solemn high mass in the chapel of the Louvre, where the Grand Almoner had all his staff waiting to perform one of those grand musical efforts, which shook the building to its centre.
The moment mass was over, the King repaired to luncheon, after seeing his hounds fed, however, and then we were dismissed. I galloped to our stables, gave Dagobert, my Spanish barb, to his groom, and without taking time to change my trappings, threw myself into a fiacre, or hackney-coach, and ordered the driver to spare neither whip nor speed until he reached the chateau d'Amboise, as I had not seen my patroness for four entire days.
CHAPTER XII.
THE MOTH AND THE CANDLE.
Remembering the injunctions of the Countess, I avoided the elaborately-carved Porte Cochère, under which a few of the Comte de Treville's musketeers were loitering—so publicly and in defiance of all scandal did Louis XIII. honour this lady with his favour; and dismissing the fiacre at an angle of the road, I made a detour among the trees of the lawn, and reached unseen the little private postern door, which was hidden in a corner of the château, between a broad round tower and a mass of clematis, that overhung a species of bastion projecting into the fosse. The latter was now drained and covered with the smoothest turf. Here I rang a bell, and on being admitted by Antoine, was at once conducted by a private staircase to the apartments of the Countess.
Antoine ushered me into a reception-room, which had hangings of violet-coloured silk, starred with silver, and furniture of walnut-wood, exquisitely carved. Through an arch, festooned with yellow brocade on one side, I saw the sleeping apartment of the Countess, and it was worthy of her beauty. The bed was of richly-carved wood; the curtains were of rose-coloured velvet, and at the head was framed in oak a curious Flemish painting of the loves of Vertumnus and Pomona, taken from Ovid.
On the other side an archway, also festooned with yellow brocade, revealed an antechamber, hung with saffron-coloured damask, and on an ebony table a magnificent ruby-coloured Bohemian dessert-service, all pencilled in gold; dishes of silver piled with fruit, and vases and flasks of wine in iced coolers were arranged for a repast.