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Erlanbte sie mir jemals ein Geschenk
Von hóherm Werth, als eine frúhe Blume
Im Winter oder seltue Frucht! Von mir
Nimmt sie kein Opfer an, und bringt mir
alle!

Wagt ihren ganzen Reichthum und Besitz
Grossmüthig an mein untersinkend Glück."

An anecdote has been transmitted to us, which illustrates her playful yet judicious interference in the military measures of Charles the Seventh. An astrologer, in whose predictions the monarch placed much reliance, was closeted with him on one occasion when Agnès was present. Charles, discouraged by some recent failures, and the predictions of the soothsayer, was more than ordinarily disheartened, and disposed to inaction-Agnès interrupted the conference by extending her hand to the magician: "I also would read my destiny," she said.

Madam, you will be beloved by the greatest monarch in Europe," readily replied the flattering astrologer, well aware of her relation to the King. Charles smiled at the implied compli ment to himself; but Agnès rose, and playfully addressed him, "Will your Majesty grant me your royal safeconduct, for I would not willingly run counter to my destiny," she said, archly. "I must go to the King of England, for I see clearly he is the greatest monarch, since he retains, in addition to his own dominions, the richest provinces of France, from which its sovereign makes no effort to dislodge him, fearing, it would seem, to assert his legitimate claim." Charles blushed under the merited, though sportive rebuke. Such a persuasive Mentor seldom spoke in vain: but her influence was most practically felt by bringing, as with extraordinary sagacity she did, under the notice of the King, brave knights and skilful warriors, whose courage and prudence achieved many a victory for the national cause.

The

Charles made his first entry into Paris in the November of 1437. procession which accompanied him. was truly splendid; and the details are dwelt on with the utmost minuteness, by contemporary writers. A thousand archers, some of them composing Charles's body-guard, led the way; then rode the King, clad in brilliant silver armour-the trappings of his noble steed were of blue velvet which swept the

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ground, embroidered with fleur-de-lis. The Queen was also splendidly attired; but as far surpassing her in magnificence, as she did in beauty, Agnès Sorel rode by her side. The only weakness recorded of "la belle des belles," is her fondness for sumptuous dress; and the only unamiable speech she was ever heard to utter was on this occasion. The Parisians murmured when they beheld her costly and rich costume, excelling in splendour that of the rightful and justly popular queen. Les Parisiens ne sont que vilains," she, contemptuously exclaimed: "et si javais su qu'ils ne m'eussent pas fait plus d'honneurs, je n'aurais jamais mis le pied dans leur ville.' But to return from the offended and pettish beauty. The royal pages; the nobles of the household; and the young dauphin, afterwards Louis the Eleventh, succeeded, and the procession was closed by a corps of one thousand men-at-arms, the élite of the French armies, headed by their gallant commander, the Count de Dunois. His armour was sparkling with gold and silver, and surpassed in splendour that of the monarch himself. The populace were not behindhand in their preparations. We can scarcely refrain from smiling when we read of their arrangements for an effective reception of the King, now, for the first time, entering his capital. The seven cardinal virtues, and the seven cardinal sins, met him on the threshold, if we may so speak; then, on various platforms which lined the way, were represented those mysteries, or sacred dramas, which had for the middle such significant import, and were so popular with all classes. The preaching of St. John the Baptist, the nativity of the Saviour, the adoration of the shepherds, the passion, crucifixion, and resurrection of our Lord, were all represented: even the despairing Judas figured aloft, apparently hanging himself in his hopeless grief.

ages

A short time previously, the Dauphin Louis had wedded the young Margaret of Scotland, daughter to the chivalrous James I. This princess, then only in her twelfth year, was fondly loved by her mother-in-law, Queen Marie, who lavished on the gifted and interesting Dauphiness that tenderness which even her maternal breast could not feel for the wayward and unamiable Louis. The young couple were from the first un

happy. This jealous, crafty, intriguing young man, "mauvais fils, mauvais père, mauvais frerè, mauvais sujet, mauvais allié, mauvais mari, et ennemi dangereux," was indeed ill-matched with the ardent, susceptible, and romantic Scottish princess. Margaret found her sole happiness in the mutual affection which subsisted between her, her mother-in-law, and the gentle Agnès. These high-souled women passed many blissful hours together, cultivating those elegant tastes in which they alike found solace and enjoyment. Margaret in particular had inherited from her father, the royal poet of Scotland, a genius and feeling for this refining art. She spent her nights in composing ballads, which seem to have been not unworthy of the daughter of him who sang "The King's Quhair." Her patronage of men of genius was liberal and discriminating. A little incident connected with Alain Chartier may be worth recording. Passing through one of the saloons in the palace, she perceived the poet asleep on a chair. To the astonishment of the ladies who attended her, she softly approached him, and kissed his lips. In reply to their amazed glances she said to them:-"Ce n'est point à l'homme que jai donné un baisir, c'est à la bouche d'où sortent de si belles paroles."

Soon after her marriage her royal father, too enlightened for a barbarous age, perished the victim of a villanous treachery. Here, too, we are among the records of the loyalty and heroism of women. It was in resisting the approach of James's assassins that the noble Catherine Douglas thrust her own fair arm into the bolt-rings of the door, and kept it so fastened until the brutal murderers broke the bone. Margaret herself bade adieu to life ere she had attained her twenty-first year. Young as she was, existence had long been distasteful to her. She has been accused of having voluntarily injured her health by eating in excess unripe fruits and other acids, with the design of preventing herself from becoming the mother of children to so hateful a husband. In her last illness, when those around her expressed hopes of her recovery, she shudderingly exclaimed, "Fi de la vie, qu'on ne m'en parle plus!"

The death of the hapless Dauphiness deeply impressed the mind of

Agnès Sorel, who, soon after, asked and obtained permission from the King to retire from court. She chose for the scene of her seclusion the castle which Charles had built for her in the neighbourhood of Loches, and in the architectural details of which may yet

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be seen the device (A Sur-elle), which identifies it with her name. She selected it in preference to her more picturesque château of Beautè Sur Marne-that romantic spot, formerly the favourite retreat of the murdered Louis of Orleans, father to her friend the Count de Dunois-because she proposed to herself to spend the remaining years of her life in devotional exercises; and in the canons of Loches -to whose cathedral she had ever proved a liberal patroness—she hoped to find pious and worthy instructors.

Agnès Sorel was still in the prime of life-she was thirty-six when she voluntarily parted from her royal and still faithful lover. She had the consolation of reflecting that, during the fifteen years she had influenced his mind and his counsels, she had been the disinterested advocate of all that was "worthy and of good report." She left him surrounded by tried and faithful friends, most of them attached to his cause by her influence and exertions. Jacques Cœur, the goldsmith of Bourges whose vast monetary resources, acquired by his trade in the East, through her instrumentality had been placed at the disposal of the monarch, and had mainly conduced to the successful issue of his warlike undertakings-was her tried and dearest friend. She had named him the executor of her will, in which she had devised all her wealth to pious uses. For five years longer she was all-powerful with the King, who frequently visited her, and took counsel with her on affairs of state. His peace during these years was disturbed by the machinations of the Dauphin, who took every possible opportunity of annoying his father, and thwarting his projects. One grievance, on which he frequently insisted-his only real onewas the insult shown to his mother by the elevation of Agnès Sorel, towards whom he manifested an irreconcileable hostility. As for the meek Queen, when reminded of her wrongs, she would only answer, "C'est mon seigneur; il a tout pouvoir sur mes actions,

et moi auenn sur les siennes." She well knew, in truth, that the influence which the Lady of Beauté exercised over his mind was exercised in her favour, and was beneficial to her, as well as to the interests of the kingdom.

Her

In the winter of 1449-50, Charles, who had recently subjugated Normandy, took up his abode in the Abbey of Jumieges. The cold was intense: this inclement season in France had never brought more severe and dreary weather. He was surprised to receive an unannounced visit from his fair Agnès. She had left Loches, and braved the winter's snow, to warn him of a conspiracy which might endanger his life, and in which the rebellious Dauphin was prime mover. Having conveyed her precautionary warning, she retired to the neighbouring hamlet of Mesnil, where she was seized by sudden and alarming illness. Her health, which had long been delicate, had been impaired by the trying journey she had just accomplished. She felt with that intuitive perception which is given to many on the brink of eternity-that the grave would soon open its portals to receive her; and that she must prepare for her pilgrimage to that "bourne whence no traveller returns." agonies of mind and body were intense. She reviewed, with self-upbraiding, her past life: lamented the fatal gift of beauty, but for which she might have accomplished her youth's early promise; lived in innocent happiness, and died in peace. To the Count de Tancarville, who stood by her death. bed, she spoke of her fears for the future: nor could she gain a moment's tranquillity, but by reflecting on the mercy shewn by the Saviour to Mary Magdalen, the woman, who, like her, was "a great sinner." She repeated, incessantly, passages from the confessions of St. Bernard, which she had copied with her own hand, feeling that they were applicable to her case. At length, exhausted by mental and bodily suffering, she breathed her last sigh in the arms of the King. Her heart was bequeathed to the monks of Jumiegès; her body was interred in the middle of the choir of the cathedral church at Loches, where a beautiful monument was erected to her memory by her royal lover. She is represented in a recumbent posture; graceful drapery veils her figure, and a circlet round her brow confines her flowing tresses;

angels, with extended wings, hover, as if waiting to convey to heaven the prayer which her clasped hands and half-parted lips seem to express; while two lambs, emblems of meekness and gentleness, lie passively crouched at her feet. The inscription is simple:

"Cy git noble Demoiselle Agnès Seurelle en son vivant Dame de Beauté de Roqueserein, d'Essoudun, et de Vernon-sur-Seine, piteuse envers toutes gens, et qui largement donnoit de ses biens aux églises et aux pauvres; laquelle trépassa le 9iem jour de Fevrier, l'an de grace 1449. Dieu pour l'âme d'elle. Amen."

Priez

It may seem a paradox to speak of the virtuous mistress of Charles the Seventh; and posterity-even allowing for the frailties and errors of fallible human nature-might still pronounce an unfavourable verdict on the character and conduct of Agnès Sorel, were it not for the negative evidence given in her favour by the contrast which is apparent in the actions of Charles during the twenty years in which her influence was paramount; and his conduct after her death. Then, as in his early youth, he abandoned himself to sensual indulgences. No longer conceding to his amiable Queen that respect and consideration she so well merited, he treated her with harsh and cruel neglect. He became unmindful of his friends, and ungratefully dismissed them at the suit of newer and unworthy favorites.

Jacques Coeur, to whom he owed so much, was the first who fell under his displeasure, or rather, we should say, his indifference, and he basely left him to fall a prey to his personal enemies. The great money-changer of Bourges had amassed, for that day, enormous riches. He had been a successful trader in the Levant; his argo. sies rode, richly laden with the treasures of the East, in all the southern harbours of France. In his commercial establishment he had three hundred factors receiving their orders from him, and devoted to his interests. His seigneurie of St. Fargeau enclosed twentytwo parishes. His house at Bourges still remains a monument of his rich and elegant taste in architecture. The King was his debtor to an enormous amount. When Charles undertook the conquest of Normandy in 1448, Jacques Coeur advanced him 200,000

crowns of gold, and entertained four armies at his own expense. "Il est aussi riche que Jacques Coeur," was a common proverb. The people believed that he had discovered the philosopher's stone, and could thus transmute the baser metals into pure gold. But the secret of his success was less magical ;may we not trace it in the punning device which yet stands, carved in bold relief, on his house at Bourges-" A VAILLANS (cœurs) RIEN IMPOSSIBLE." Truly the omnipotence of Will is great. He who steadily resolves, and bends every energy to obtain the prize, whatever it may be, which he proposes to himself, runs but little chance of failure. Still, when success has been attained, how often does it fail to give the happiness and satisfaction which its possessor looked for? So was it with Jacques Cœur. The sunshine of his prosperity brought forth the adder.

Soon after the death of Agnès Sorel, Chabannes, one of the enemies whom his riches had excited, being high in the favour of the King, obtained his consent to a "procès" against the goldsmith of Bourges. One of the absurd charges brought against him was, that he had poisoned his constant and true friend, the fair and gentle Lady of Beauté! With base injustice, Charles made his accuser his judge. After an indecent proceeding, in which every form of justice was violated, Jacques Coeur was condemned to perpetual banishment, with confiscation of his goods, in addition to a fine of 400,000 crowns to the royal coffers. The persecuted man fled to Rome, stripped of the wealth which he had acquired by the unremitting industry of years. He found the pontiff, Nicholas the Fifth, about to dispatch a fleet against the Turks, and solicited the command, which was readily granted him. But before his voyage was completed he fell sick, and died at Chio, where his mortal remains repose in a church of the Cordeliers. Popular rumour in France long refused credence to the tidings of his death. In the belief of many he lived to amass, anew, riches no less considerable than the fortune he had been stripped of in France with such cruel injustice.

We must not close our notice of Agnès Sorel without reverting to the fate of her early playmate, Isabelle of Lorraine. She died long before her friend having survived her sons, who

were snatched from her ere they had attained the age of manhood. Her daughters, Yolande and Margaret, were celebrated for their charms, as the latter afterwards became for her sorrows and misfortunes. Yolande was betrothed to Ferry, son of Antoine de Vandemont, who had so long contested with René the succession to Lorraine and part of the disputed territory was settled on the young couple. Margaret, when scarcely fif teen, was solicited in marriage by Henry the Sixth of England; and one of the last occasions on which Agnès Sorel appeared in public, was the ceremony of the espousals at Nanci. "La Belle des Belles" was, as usual, sumptuously attired, and her presence was considered to give great éclat to the scene. When the youthful bride bade adieu to her native land, the King tenderly embraced her: "I seem to have done little for you, my niece," he said, addressing her, "in placing you on one of the mightiest thrones in Europe, for it is not worthy of possessing you." Poor Margaret could then but little anticipate the destiny that awaited her; doomed as she was to return to France, a heart-broken widow, a childless mother, a fallen and dis-crowned Queen-a suppliant for the penurious charity of others her beauty gone, her hopes blighted; waiting and longing until her weary pilgrimage on earth should be accomplished and ended.

No

The last hours of King Charles were scarcely less wretched. He survived his once-loved Agnès eleven years-a sufficient time to prove to himself and to others, how utterly he was unworthy of her devoted and faithful love. constant friend stood by his death-bed, or received his last sigh. He died from starvation!-fearing to partake of food, sustenance, or medicine, lest poison should be conveyed in them. His own son was the virtual parricide who thus hastened his end, and whose emissaries he dreaded in all those that surrounded him.

On the accession of Louis the Eleventh, the monks of Loches, anxious to propitiate the new sovereign, who had shown such rancorous hostility to Agnès Sorel, requested his permission to remove her monument, which, as we have stated, stood in the choir of their cathedral; alleging the scandal which it caused them in their

devotions. "I respect your scruples," replied the sneering Louis, "and grant you the permission you desire. Of course, you will not hesitate to reinstate in my coffers the large sums of money with which Agnès Sorel endowed you, and which it would be a sin against your tender consciences any longer to retain.”

The character of Agnès Sorel has since met with a juster appreciation. In the chapter-house of this very Cathedral of Loches is preserved a manuscript, containing one thousand sonnets or poems in her praise; most of them

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THE OLD MAN'S BEQUEST; A STORY OF GOLD.

THROUGH the ornamental grounds of a handsome country residence, at a little distance from a large town in Ireland, a man of about fifty years of age was walking, with a bent head, and the impress of sorrow on his face.

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"Och, yer honour, give me one sixpence, or one penny, for God's sake,' cried a voice from the other side of a fancy paling which separated the grounds in that quarter from a thoroughfare. "For heaven's sake, Mr. Lawson, help me as ye helped me before. I know you've the heart and hand to do it."

The person addressed as Mr. Lawson looked up and saw a woman whom he knew to be in most destitute circumstances, burdened with a large and sickly family, whom she had struggled to support until her own health was ruined.

"I have no money-not one farthing," answered John Lawson.

"No money!" reiterated the woman, in surprise; "isn't it all yours, then?-isn't this garden yours, and that house, and all the grand things that are in it yours?-ay, and grand things they are-them pictures, and them bright shinin' things in that drawingroon of yours; and sure you deserve them well, and may God preserve them long to you, for riches hasn't hardened your heart, though there's many a one,

and heaven knows the gold turns their feelin's to iron."

"It all belongs to my son, Henry Lawson, and Mrs. Lawson, and their children-it is all theirs;" he sighed heavily, and deep emotion was visible in every lineament of his thin and wrinkled face.

The poor woman raised her bloodshot eyes to his face, as if she was puzzled by his words. She saw that he was suffering, and with intuitive delicacy she desisted from pressing her wants, though her need was great.

"Well, well, yer honor, many's the good penny ye have given me and the childer, and maybe the next time I see you you'll have more change."

She was turning sadly away, when John Lawson requested her to remain, and he made inquiries into the state of her family; the report he heard seemed to touch him even to the forgetfulness of his own sorrows; he bade her stop for a few moments and he would give her some relief.

He walked rapidly towards the house and proceeded to the drawingroom. It was a large and airy apartment, and furnished with evident profusion; the sunlight of the bright summer-day, admitted partially through the amply-draperied windows, lit up a variety of sparkling gilding in pictureframes, and vases, and mirrors, and

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