upon

lies, beggared by confiscations, unskil led in any craft, art, or science that would procure them a maintenance among sober citizens; too proud to stoop to what they would call servile drudgery; too poor to be able to emigrate and "seek their fortunes" abroad; the brand of "caste them to mar and thwart their exertions at home; trained to field exercises, unerring marksmen, dashing riders, untiring runners, brave, athletic, hardy, the life of a freebooter in an unsettled country like Ireland suggested itself of course what else could be expected from them?-what else remained? What were ruined Roman Catholic gentlemen to do, when they could not get into some foreign military service? Poor, haughty, untaught to earn their bread, often prevented from trying to learn; sorely tried by natural heartburnings at seeing themselves driven destitute from the lands, the homes, nay, the very tombs of their fathers, to make room for strangers-then followed the train of reasoning by which they persuaded themselves of the justice, nay, almost the duty, of reprisals. The speech of Roderick Dhu ("Lady of the Lake," Canto 5), in defence of his predatory habits, is as applicable to the condition and actuating motives of the gentlemen outlaws of Ireland, forced to fly to rocks and mountains, as if Scott had them in his mind when he wrote.* We seek not to justify their transgressions: to trace their causes, with a charitable allowance for human temptation and human frailty, is but to account for, not to justify. Well would it have been for society and for themselves, had these misguided men been able to apply the Christian precept-" In your patience possess ye your souls;" but the wild times of Ireland's commotions were not

*These fertile plains, that soften'd vale,
Were once the birth-right of the Gael;
The stranger came with iron hand,
And from our fathers rent the land.
Where dwell we now! see rudely swell
Crag over crag, and fell o'er fell.
Ask we this savage heath we tread,
For fattened steer, or household bread;
Ask we for flocks these shingles dry;
And well the mountain might reply,-
To you, as to your sires of yore,
Belong the target and claymore!
I give you shelter in my breast,
Your own good blades must win the rest.'

favourable to the growth of the Christian graces on any side; and we must recollect the prevalence of ideas of which we now can scarcely form a just estimate, and the state of education and of the community, so different from that to which we are accustomed.

An honourable exception to the false principles that actuated so many unfortunate persons, is found in Christopher Fleming, twentieth Lord Slane. At the time of the battle of the Boyne, he was but a minor; he took no part in the civil wars, but he extended the hospitality of his roof, for one night, to James II., whom he had been taught to regard as his lawful sovereign, and who had been the friend of his family. For such venial transgression, this harmless offender, and unrebelling "rebel," forfeited all he possessed, even his title. With a

heavy heart this disinherited and distitled stripling must have passed through the gate that shut him out for ever from that lovely vale, watered by the Boyne, where stood the castle that, from the twelfth century, had never lacked a Fleming for its lord, and where the tomb of his mother still exists, amid the ruins of St. Erc's hermitage. But he wreaked no vengeance on society; he warred not with the laws that he might have considered as warring with him-he submitted to their authority, and became a good servant of the English crown. In 1707, Queen Anne granted him a pension of £500 a-year "for his military services:" and in consideration of his youth, at the period of the confiscation, he was restored in blood, but not to the lands and title of his fathers, from which he was barred by a former act of the Irish Parliament. As indemnity, he was created Viscount Longford, in 1713. Thus guided by well-regulated senti

Pent in this fortress of the north,
Think'st thou we will not sally forth,
To spoil the spoiler as we may,
And from the robber rend the prey?
Ay, by my soul!-while on yon plain
The Saxon rears one shock of grain:
While, of ten thousand herds, there strays
But one along yon river's maze-
The Gael, of plain and river heir,
Shall with strong hand redeem his share.
Where live the mountain chiefs who hold
That plundering lowland field and fold,
Is aught but retribution true?
Seek other cause 'gainst Roderick Dhu."

ments, he won his way to distinction by those martial qualities which others perverted to a wretched carcer of brigandage.*

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But though that particular genus of outlaws of which we speak has passed away, the influence their career exercised over the minds of the peasantry has not, even yet, died out. To that influence we may clearly trace the general sympathy of the lower class (especially in the south and west) for offenders, and their anxiety to screen them from justice. When a forfeited and ruined gentleman had become a freebooter, all the compassionate feelings of a naturally warm-hearted and romantic people were enlisted in his favour. They saw in him the representative of a family to whom they had ever looked with affection and respect (for the Irish peasant always observed the Oriental, nay Scriptural rule of reverence to superiors; he could not degrade himself to the coarse bluster of the low English bully, who sets his arms a-kimbo at a gentleman with, "I'm as good as yourself any day"); they saw one who had been reared in affluence a fallen man, worse than a beggar, because more sensitive to privations; then would they recount the former glories of the race "that had lived among them for ages, and always kept the warm house and the open hand," and descant on the perfections and the wrongs of their heir, "turned out for a stranger, and forced to shelter among the woods and rocks, and to starve, or help himself by the strong hand." So, respecting his birth, pitying his adversity, admiring his bravery, abetting his wild deeds, and aiding him to baffle pursuit, they clung to the man of fallen fortunes (on such the genteel world turns its back) with a kind of feudal loyalty; amid all their own poverty gold could not bribe them to betray the head consecrated in their eyes by misfortune. Res est sacra miser, said a Roman sage; but the axiom was never so true anywhere as among the Irish peasants in the old troubles.

The feats of the outlaws, and the

songs composed on them, were handed down by tradition to posterity; and around their graves the peasantry still gather in groups after mass, or after a funeral, to talk of the old times. Thus they do round a tomb in the rural churchyard of Syddan (Meath), emblazoned with armorial bearings, now much defaced, but still bearing an inscription to the purport, that "This monument was erected by Gerald Fleminge, son of Patrick Fleminge and Mary Hussey, in memorial of his grandfather; and his uncles, James and Patrick Fleminge, of Syddan ; and for himself and his posterity, 1687.” These Fleminges sprang from the same stock as the Flemings, Barons of Slane, and forfeited in the civil wars. The "uncles," James and Patrick Fle. minge, became celebrated freebooters, and are still remembered and lamented

as

"the poor gentlemen that were forced to turn highwaymen."

The peasantry, when once they had been accustomed to sympathise with men under ban, and to support and abet them, continued to cherish the inclination, though the objects of their interest had become degraded from the romantic outlaw (now extinct) to the vulgar ruffian, the mere robber and murderer; wanting the power of just discrimination, they classed all alike,

as

"poor fellows in trouble." The feeling which originally sprung from virtues, from fidelity, generosity, and respect, has tended downwards to utter degradation-such is the danger of hostility, under almost any circumstances, to established and recognised authority. Like some plants-whose root is medicinal, but whose flowers are offensive, or whose berries are poisonousthe sentiment which at its birth was respectable, in its maturity has become vicious.

We seem to have rambled away from the "Poets of Munster" in particular, to the bandits of Ireland in general; but the text from which our gloss has extended was furnished by one, who, celebrating his own wild life in song, combined the characters of the outlaw and the poet, Edmund O'Ryan.

Ar the commencement of the fifteenth century, the long contests between the rival houses of Lorraine and Bar seemed likely to be terminated by the extinction of both families. The sole representative of the latter house was the Cardinal of Bar, an aged prelate; while the destinies of Lorraine hung on the life of a feeble infant, daughter of its chivalrous duke, Charles, and his exalted consort, Margaret of Bavaria.

The little Isabelle, on whose frail existence so much depended, was tended, cherished, almost idolised, by her future subjects, as well as by her fond parents. As she grew in years and bodily vigour, the faculties of her precocious mind were developed under the judicious care of her wise mother and gifted father. Charles of Lorraine was the most accomplished prince of his day. He had proved himself a brave and skilful warrior in his campaigns in Germany and Hungary. He had commanded the forces of the Teutonie Knights in Prussia, and had been the main stay of the Hungarian monarch in his war with the Turks. The Duke of Lorraine was no less skilled in the

arts of peace. A poet of no mean excellence, his refined and liberal mind, his elegant tastes, and his graceful and winning manners, are praised by the historiographers of his own time, who ever found a welcome at his hospitable

court.

Under these beneficent influences the little Isabelle passed her childhood and early girlhood, not quite com panionless, for her playmate from the cradle-to whom she was ever fondly attached was the fair and gentle Agnès Sorel, whose singular adventures we are about to narrate.

The "Demoiselle de Fromenteau," as she was styled, though of very inferior rank to her friend, could scarcely be regarded as a dependant. Her father, the Seigneur de Saint Gérand, was attached to the service of the Count de Clermont; and his little Agnès was tended and educated by the Duke and Duchess of Lorraine with the same care as their own daughter. In many traits of character the girls

resembled each other. Agnès, who was the elder by one year, was remarkable for her gentleness and winning sweetness of deportment. Isabelle had more vivacity, and greater brilliancy. They were both beautiful, but the same distinction might be ob served in the style of their personal charms. Isabelle, though without the shadow of vanity, pride, or hauteur, "looked every inch a queen;" the noble blood of the great Charlemagne flowed in her veins, and the high-born lady, destined to command, was apparent in every movement and gesture. Agnès has been likened to the "Madonna" of Raffaelle. Her fair and slender form, her large, soft, pleading eyes, bespoke a soul gentle, timid, and trusting. Yet Agnès was not a weak or insipid character. The most accomplished woman of her day-the most delightful converser-so much so, that even at that epoch, so fruitful in illustrious ladies, she was looked on as a prodigy-she owed her great and enduring influence more to her mental qualities than to her personal attractions. She fascinated all who came within her sphere; and occupying, though she afterwards did, a most anomalous and questionable position, she never made a personal enemy, but gained and retained the affectionate good-will of those who, we should naturally suppose, would have regarded her elevation to power and influence with envious and indignant feelings.

The aged Cardinal of Bar, feeling himself on the verge of the grave, anxiously desired to terminate, by a marriage between Isabelle and his grand-nephew René, the strife which had for generations been waged between the houses of Bar and Lorraine. The young prince, destined for this alliance, was the second son of Louis of Anjou and Yolande of Arragon, whose mother had been a princess of the house of Bar. The Cardinal had adopted and educated René, with the design of making him his heir, and had spared no pains to perfect him in those arts and exercises befitting his high rank and future

position; and although in some respects his nephew might scarcely aspire to the hand of the heiress of Lorraine, still the pretensions of the young count were not inconsiderable. His sister, Marie, was married to the Dauphin Charles, heir-apparent to the crown of France. His father, titular King of Naples and Sicily, although he had failed in establishing himself in this inheritance, bequeathed by Queen Joanna, could yet transmit his title to these rich possessions, which his children might hope eventually to inherit. Influenced, perhaps, less by these considerations, than by his personal merits, the Duke and Duchess declared themselves in favour of René's suit; and their youthful daughter became his bride ere she had attained her fifteenth year.

When Isabelle bade adieu to her native Lorraine, and accompanied her husband to Provence, she did not part from the friend of her girlhood. Aguès Sorel shared the joys, and sympathised in the sorrows of her wedded life. At first the horizon was bright and cloudless.

Isabelle, who was ever an adored wife, became the proud mother of four children, "the most beautiful ever scen"-so the cotemporary chroniclers assure us; but when her father's death made her heiress of Lorraine, the gathering clouds of war, and its attendant miseries, cast their lurid shadows around her: her cousin, Antoine de Vandemont, contested the succession, asserting that Lorraine was too noble a fief to descend to a female. Singu larly enough, the question had never before arisen: Charles of Lorraine was the first prince who had not left behind him male heirs. The Duke of Burgundy supported the claims of Antoine de Vandemont; and René, after bravely fighting for the inheritance of his wife, was taken prisoner at the battle of Bulligneville, and condemned to a rigorous captivity in the castle of Dijon.

This fatal battle was lost by the rash impetuosity of the young nobles of Lorraine and Bar, who fought in the ranks of their Duke René. The veteran general Barbazan had earnestly entreated his master to act on the defensive.

"Quand on a peur des feuilles, il ne faut pas aller au bois," said a young gallant, contemptuously.

"Ces paroles ne sont pas pour

moi," replied the brave old soldier; "Dieu merci, j'ai toujours vécu sans reproche; et encore aujourd'hui on verra si c'est la crainte on le bon conseil qui me font parler de la sorte."

The result justified his prediction: René, having done all that a brave man could do, and received many honourable wounds, fell into the hands of his enemy. When Isabelle learned the tidings of this disastrous fight, and heard that her beloved lord was in captivity, she hastened to Chinon, to entreat Charles's aid and mediation with the Duke of Burgundy to procure the freedom of her husband. But René owed his liberation from captivity to a more romantic cause than the intercession of his royal brother-inlaw. Philip of Burgundy having visited his captive, found him employed in painting. René had executed on glass very charming and faithful portraits of Philip and his father, Jeansans-peur. The kind-hearted Duke was touched and interested: he conversed frequently with the accomplished prince, and restored him his liberty, only stipulating that he should surrender himself a captive the following year, if the conditions annexed as the price of his freedom should not have been complied with.

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The visit of Isabelle to Chinon was, nevertheless, productive of important results. Agnès Sorel had accompanied her; and, in the interview which the princess of Lorraine and Bar had with her Sovereign, the grace and beauty of the "Demoiselle de Fromenteau" struck the ardent fancy of the young Charles. The impression she had made was observed by the wife and mother-in-law of the king. The latter, Yolande of Anjou, was a woman of masculine mind; she swayed the careless monarch, and, uncon sciously to him, had long guided his counsels. The passion alike of Yolande, of her daughter, Queen Marie, and of the beautiful stranger, was patriotism. France was in subjection. Charles its king, and who ought to have been its deliverer, was insensible of his dishonour, or too much devoted to pleasure, to make the necessary exertion for his country's safety. Marie, beautiful and amiable, was not beloved. The influence which alone could stir Charles to noble resolves, should spring from a passion which Yolande perceived her daughter could never

excite. She conceived the singular, we may say the unexampled design of exciting it by the charms of Agnès Sorel. Wonderful force of the sentiment of love of country! Marie, stranger still to record, assented. Hopeless herself of influencing Charles through his affections, and quite conscious of his passion for the beautitul stranger, Queen Marie listened without disapproval to the suggestions of the vigorous-minded Yolande, that they should wean the voluptuous monarch from his effeminate indolence and unworthy favoritism, by giving him as companion and friend, one who, they both saw, was gifted with a high and commanding intellect, and a gentle nature and constant heart. Surely we cannot wonder that such an age was rich in noble enthusiasm, when it witnessed a sacrifice of pride and feeling so extraordinary in persons so exalted. The disinterestedness of friendship has nothing to compare with this astonishing instance of patriotic devotion. But still we must not estimate the sacrifice at more than, in truth, it was worth; or suppose even these heroines capable of impossibilities. Marie had had frequent occasion to lament her husband's infidelities; her conjugal love could not be further outraged by the substitution of a comparatively virtuous attachment for those ephemeral amours which had hitherto marred the happiness of her wedded life. That influence over the mind of Charles which she had failed in securing might, she fondly hoped, be so wielded by the beautiful and spirituelle friend of the high-minded Isabelle of Lorraine, as to change the destinies of the hapless realm of France. She asked from her brother's wife permission to promote the fair Agnès to be her maid of honour. Isabelle felt keenly the unavoidable separation from her friend, should she yield to the Queen's entreaties; but she could not allow her selish affection to be a barrier to the advance. ment of Agnès Sorel. The young girl, ignorant of all that was designed for her, was from thenceforth to live at court, attached to the person of Marie of Anjou, who even personally had conceived a warm regard for one whom she designed to make, if possible, her own rival.

Queen Yolande, for she was titular sovereign of the two Sicilies, was a far

sighted and ambitious woman, unscru. pulous, as we have seen, in the choice of means which might enable her to obtain a desired end. When the fortunes of Charles were at their lowest ebb, she had never despaired, but courageously cheered and animated him to exertion. Let us cast a rapid glance at Charles's past career. The imbeci

lity of his father, King Charles VI., and the hatred which his unnatural mother had conceived for him, had made the Dauphin, in his earlier years, an outcast from the sweet charities of home. The tragical murder of Jeansans-peur of Burgundy, on the bridge of Montereau, had drawn down on his head the intense hatred of the Burgundian party, then the most powerful in France. Well might Francis I. exclaim, when he gazed, in the Chartreuse of Dijon, on the effigy of the murdered duke, "Through that gash," pointing to the wound which disfigured the forehead, "the English entered France!" The Dauphin always asserted, probably with truth, that he was innocent of this foul murder. Tannegui du Châtel struck the fatal blow; but Charles had expressly invited the Duke of Burgundy to this ill-fated conference, and the assassination was accomplished in his presence. Philip le Bon, son of the murdered Duke, thirsting for revenge, threw the weight of his vast power and influence into the opposing scale, and allied himself with the enemies of his country to avenge his father's death. By the conference at Arras (1419) he paved the way for the infamous treaty of Troyes (1420), which disinherited the Dauphin, and transferred the royal diadem to the English invader, Henry V. In the treaty, by which Charles VI. thus disowned his son, the following insulting clause occurs, which must have been peculiarly galling to the Dauphin :-

"Considérant les horribles et énormes crimes et délits commis par Charles, soi-disaut Dauphin de Viennois, il est accordé que nous, notre dit fils roi, ct aussi notre trèscher fils Philippe, Duc de Bourgoyne, nous ne traiterons aucunement de paix et de concorde avec le dit Charles, si non du consentement et du conseil de tous et de chacun de nous trois, et des trois états du royaume."

Two years later and the Dauphin found himself King, though he had but a scanty territory, and few adherents.