paid, what the landlord was accustomed to expect, or what was the relative value of the different houses-this was the established rule.

The next thing was to provide food-for your travellers are always hungry; and here again much trouble of haggling and chaffering was saved by the intervention of a little wholesome authority. The prévôt de l'hôtel merely went round the markets, proclaiming-such is the price of a pound of bread! of a pound of beef, mutton, bacon, and so forth! And thus the dealers knew at once the real value of their goods, and the purchasers what price they were to pay. If any individual, however, presumed to cook his own dinner at home, it was considered, as the regulation says, (1st January, 1585,) "pour estre chose trop deshonnête et indigne du respect que l'on doibt porter à sa majesté ;" and the offender was justly punished for his want of sociality by expulsion from the court,-"la honte d'estre délogé du dit chasteau.'

When the courtiers presented themselves at the château, some in chariots, some on horseback, with their wives mounted behind them, (the ladies all masked,) they were subjected to the scrutiny of the captain of the gate. The greater number he compelled to dismount; but the princes and princesses, and a select few who had brevets of entrance, were permitted to ride within the walls.

At court the men wore sword and dagger; but to be found with a gun or pistol in the palace, or even in the town, subjected them to a sentence of death. To wear a casque or cuirass was punished with imprisonment. The laws of politeness were equally strict. If one man used insulting words to another, the offence was construed as being given to the king; and the offender was obliged to solicit pardon of his majesty. If one threatened another

by clapping his hand to the hilt of his sword, he was to be assommé according to the ordonnance; which may either mean knocked down, or soundly mauled-or the two together. If two men came to blows, they were both assommé. A still more serious breach of politeness, however, was the importunity of petitioners. The king would not hear, any more than God, for much speaking; and Francis II at length erected a gallows in terrorem, as high, we take it, as that of Haman, it being higher than the tower of the parish-church.

Since the reign of Henry II everybody was uncovered in the presence of the king; but in other respects a falling-off was observable in point of courtly magnificence. At dinner, for instance, the beak and claws of grey partridges were not plated with silver, nor those of red partridges with gold; nor were birds of all kinds stuffed, as formerly, with musk, amber, and other perfumes. The dress of the courtiers, however, could not well be richer at any period. The men, indeed, mounted on their shoes à cric, with ruffs round their necks spread out on plates of wood or tin, and their powdered hair frizzled in small curls, may have looked a little queer; but the ladies !-with a petticoat of silver tissue, swoln out like a balloon, and confined at the waist by their whalebone boddice covered with cloth of gold, and the train of their gown supported by one lackey in the middle and another at the end-nothing could have been finer-no, nothing! Fancy one of these gorgeous creatures so attended, sweeping into the room, like a procession, and plunging upon her knees before the king to ask a favour!

When the king hunted he was accompanied by a hundred pages, two hundred esquires, and often four or five hundred gentlemen; sometimes by the queen and princesses,

OBSEQUIES OF GABRIELLE D'ESTREES.

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with their hundreds of ladies and maids of honour, mounted on palfreys saddled with black velvet.

When the king died, ("Did you think I was immortal?" said Louis XIV,) the body was exposed in state, and then embalmed and placed in a leaden coffin. The mighty monarch being thus shut up, played the remainder of his part in effigy. A figure, composed of wax and white lead, modelled from the body, was placed in the grand hall of feasting, and served with dinner and supper, at the usual hours, for forty days! This custom-the very sublime of proud imbecility-was also observed with the queen, and in at least one other instance with a lady of inferior rank.

This lady was the beautiful Gabrielle. She lay in state at the deanery of Saint Germain-l'Auxerrois, dressed in a mantle of white satin. The bed, draperied and covered with crimson velvet, was surrounded by six immense tapers, planted at regular distances, and eight priests singing psalms without intermission. When at length placed in the coffin, her effigy was served by a gentleman-waiter with dinner and supper for three days, with all the forms which she would have exacted if living. The meal was blessed by the almoner; the meat was carved as usual, wine filled out and presented at the times when she had been accustomed to drink; and, finally, thanks were returned, and the repast concluded with washing hands.

When the king had been thus feasted in effigy for the prescribed time, the coffin was carried to the church of Notre Dame, and thence to Saint Denis. This last procession was magnificently mournful. The streets through which it passed were hung with black, and before every house was planted a lighted torch of white wax. First came the capuchins, with their coarse mantles girdled with ropes, and bearing the immense wooden cross of their

order, nearly a foot thick, and crowned with a chaplet of thorns. Then five hundred poor, marshalled by their bailiff, all in mourning; then the magistrates and the courts of justice; then the parliament clothed with rich furs; then the high clergy, in purple and gold; and then the funeral car, drawn by horses, covered with black velvet crossed with white satin, and followed by the long train of officers of the household.

Onward flowed the mighty procession, voiceless, breathless; while ever and anon a wild and melancholy swell of music arose from the royal band, whose instruments were hung with black crape. Arrived at the church of Saint Denis, which blazed with the light of innumerable lamps and tapers, the bier was set down in the middle of the choir, and a service commenced which lasted for several days. At the end of this time the body was let down into the vault, and Normandy, the most ancient king of arms, summoned, with a loud voice, the high dignitaries of the state to deposit therein their ensigns and truncheons of command. When this was done, and when at length the banner of France had been laid down upon the coffin, the king of arms cried three times, while the tones echoed wailingly through the recesses of the vault-"The king is dead! The king is dead! The king is dead!"

After a pause of deep and awful silence, the same voice proclaimed-" Long live the king!" and all the other heralds repeated-"Long live the king!" The ceremony was finished.

The queen could not stir out of the chamber in which she received the intelligence of the king's death for an entire year. During the first six weeks of this time she was not permitted to see the light of day; funereal lamps burnt dimly around her, and reminded her of the darkness of the grave.

APPROACH TO THE CAPITAL.

THE distance from Saint Germain to Paris, by the direct road, is only five or six leagues; but it is our business to follow the eccentric windings of the Seine, which become more extravagant as we approach the capital.

We leave Marly at some distance to the right. The road leading to it is bordered with genteel houses; and the view, opening at every step, is so varied and so beautiful, that the traveller thinks for a moment he is really approaching the paradise of Louis XIV, and prepares to exclaim with Delille

"C'est le palais d'Armide! C'est le jardin d'Alcine!"

"What detestable spirit of avarice," demands M. de Villiers, "brought down the hammer of destruction upon this enchanted palace? What Vandal dared to attack these twelve magnificent pavilions-these twelve temples of trees, by which they were separated-this multitude of statues, bowers, terraces, cascades-and all those chefsd'œuvres of painting and sculpture which adorned this abode of delight? The speculator, I am informed, who committed such a sacrilege, unmindful of the memory of the greatest of kings, while thus heaping ruin upon ruin, at length ruined himself. O that it would please God to inflict a similar vengeance on every demolisher of our days!" By the "greatest of kings," M. de Villiers probably means the