In Kings' Byways

by Stanley John Weyman

Such were the reasons, which would have led me had I followed the promptings of my own sagacity to oppose the return of the Jesuits. It remains for me to add that these arguments lost their weight when set in the balance against the safety of my beloved master. To this plea the King himself for once condescended, and found those who were most strenuous to dissuade him the least able to refute it; since the less a man loved the Jesuits, the more ready he was to allow that the King's life could not be safe while the edict against them remained in force. The support which I gave to the King on this occasion exposed me to the utmost odium of my co-religionists, and was in later times ill-requited by the Order. But an incident which occurred while the matter was still in debate, and which I now for the first time make public, proved the wisdom of my conduct.

Fontainebleau was at this time in the hands of the builders, and the King had gone to spend his Easter at Chantilly, whither Mademoiselle d'Entragues had also repaired. During his absence I was seated one morning in my library at the Arsenal, when I was informed that Father Cotton, he who at Nancy had presented the petition of the Jesuits, and who was now in Paris pursuing that business under a safe conduct, craved leave to wait upon me. I was not surprised, for I had been before this of some service to him. The pages of the Court while loitering outside the Louvre, as their custom is, had insulted the father by shouting after him, "Old Wool! Old Cotton!" in imitation of the Paris street cry. For this the King at my instigation had caused them to be whipped. I supposed that the Jesuit desired to thank me for this support—given in truth out of regard to discipline rather than to him; and I bade them admit him.

His first words uttered before my secretaries retired, indicated that this was his errand; and for a few moments I listened to such statements, and myself made such answers as became our positions. Then, as he did not go, I conceived the notion that he had come with a further purpose; and his manner, which seemed strangely lacking in ease, considering that he was a man of skill and address, confirmed the notion. I waited therefore with patience, and presently he named his Majesty with some expressions of devotion to his person. "I trust," said he, "that the air of Fontainebleau agrees with him, M. de Rosny."

"You mean, good father, of Chantilly?" I answered. "He is there."

"Ay, to be sure!" he rejoined. "I had forgotten. He is, to be sure, at Chantilly."

He rose after that to depart, but was delayed by the raptures into which he fell on the subject of the fire, which the weather being cold for the time of year, I had caused to be lit. "It burns so brightly," said he, "that it must be of boxwood, M. de Rosny."

"Of boxwood?" I exclaimed, astonished.

"Ay, is it not?" he asked, looking at me with much simplicity.

"No!" I made answer rather peevishly. "Who ever heard of people burning boxwood in Paris, father? In the south, perhaps."

He apologized for his ignorance on the ground of his southern birth, and took his departure, leaving me in doubt as to the real purport of his visit. I was, indeed, more troubled by the uncertainty I felt than another less conversant with the methods of the Jesuits might have been; for I knew that it was their habit to drop a word where they dared not speak plainly, and I felt myself put on my mettle to interpret the father's hint. My perplexities were increased by the belief that he would not have intervened in a matter of small moment; hence the conviction grew upon me that while I stood idle before the hearth, the greatest interests might be at stake.