which Charles VI. was afflicted. It is, at all events, the only, or at least the best excuse, that can be offered in his favour. However, Charles VI. did not display these propensities before the period of his madness; while on the contrary, Louis XI., during the full vigour of his faculties mental and corporeal, while he was conceiving and executing vast and well-organized plans for the aggrandisement of his power, shewed himself always suspicious, false, treacherous, and cruel. A certain portion of this cruelty must, in fairness, be put to the account of the barbarity of the times in which he lived; few if any of the princes of that period being exempt from charges of this nature. Knowing or employing no other means than terror and cruelty to quell the turbulence of their subjects, they took vengeance for barbarous insurrections by still more barbarous punishments. In the long struggle between Louis and Charles the Bold, the famous Duke of Burgundy, a struggle which renders the annals of this reign so interesting, we are presented with a regular trial of skill between the bad faith, treachery, and cruelty of the two rivals. It has been pretended that Charles the Bold was naturally good and generous, and that it was the vices of Louis XI. that forced him to adopt the use of similar weapons. But this, we think, is giving too great an extension to charitable surmise. It would be a strange effect of rivalry to make Charles thus adopt the crimes and bad qualities of his adversary. A more reasonable supposition is, that the unprincipled and atrocious conduct of both was the result of the savage sentiments so generally prevalent at that period, pushed to excess under the baleful influence of violent passions and uncontrolled power. Dumesnil, who has been already cited, has remarked some extraordinary coincidences between the lives of Louis XI. and Tiberius. The commencement of the career of both these princes began by a long exile. Louis at the court of Burgundy practised an equal degree of dissimulation with Tiberius during his sojourn at Rhodes. They were both equally addicted to astrology, and put a like faith in superstitious practices and relics. They were both equally anxious to avoid war, not from motives of humanity, but that they considered the conquests or acquirements made by political intrigue, as reflecting more personal credit upon them, and the honour of which they were not obliged to divide with their military forces. After a harsh and tyrannous reign, both these princes precipitately retired into seclusion, and sought to shun the sight of their subjects, except those chosen from amongst them to be immolated as victims before their eyes. It is also said, that Louis, like Tiberius, divided the last hours of his existence between alternate debaucheries and cruelties. Notwithstanding these points of resemblance, these two tyrants are widely distinguished from each other by the different motives of their dissimulation, their cruelty, and their seclusion. The moving principle of Tiberius was, hatred and scorn of mankind; that of Louis, an insatiable love of sway. The latter retired into seclusion for the purpose of building up an artificial power, capable of resisting the approaches of old age and infirmities. He confounded and astonished the neighbouring princes by the rapidity of his negotiations, by the number of ambassadors and political agents that he sought to multiply in foreign courts. When there was no treaty on the tapis to countenance their presence, he took care to employ them in administering to his fancies or caprices. He sent agents aff over Europe to purchase the most celebrated coursers and the rarest dogs. Sweden and Denmark were put under contribution for the wild beasts of their forests; lions and leopards were brought at an immense expense from the burning deserts of Africa. Nothing was talked of but the magnificence and spirit of the monarch: which was the object he had in view, as he was desirous of concealing the approaches of death by the affectation of youthful sports and caprices. This pretended trait of policy may, however, have been nothing more than an access of folly that developed itself in solitude. Happy would it be for their people, if the follies of kings were only exhibited in such harmless vagaries. It is, however, certain that a remorse of conscience weighed heavily upon Louis towards the close of his life, and this might have been one of the means he employed to escape from it. He ordered an inquiry to be made, whether his subordinate agents had not abused the powers intrusted to them: a rather extraordinary scruple on the part of a prince who had delivered thousands of his subjects into the hands of the hangman. He exhorted the parliament to be less free in receiving accusations. About the same time he made a bargain for his monument with Conrad de Cologne, a goldsmith, and Laurence Wear, a brass-founder, to whom he engaged to pay a thousand golden crowns. And in order that his bust might be an accurate resemblance of him in his best days, he ordered the artists to examine his former portraits, and add from them whatever old age might have altered or effaced in his features. Some modern authors, in seeking an excuse to extenuate the crimes of Louis XI., have chosen rather untenable ground for their approbation. Duclos, for instance, asserts, that Louis XI. was, of all the French monarchs, he who best knew how to manage or turn to his own advantage, the States who then represented the kingdom, and eulogizes him for his prudence in not convoking them but when the malcontents and the factions pushed their enterprises to excess. He admires the policy of Louis in inflaming the choice of the deputies, and by thus making sure of their suffrages beforehand, being enabled in some measure to dictate the decisions of an assembly, of which he wished to make an instrument and not a partner in power. This, in the present day, would be called, and properly so, a corrupting of the national representation. Under Louis XV. when Duclos wrote, they must have entertained but very loose and erroneous ideas of the dignities and duties of the representatives of the nation, for Duclos thus to hold up as an object almost of eulogium, one of the greatest crimes which the French nation has to lay to the charge of the despot of Plessis les Tours. Louis corrupted the judges as well as the deputies of the people, and enriched them with the spoils of those whom they condemned. An * It would be endless to enumerate the absurdities to which he had recourse to ward off death, which he so much feared. We shall merely mention two. He had brought from Cologne some of the pretended bones of the three Eastern Kings who are said to have visited the infant Christ, and which bones were supposed to be of sovereign virtue in the cure of royal ailments. In a letter of Louis's to one of the Priors of Notre Dame de Salles, he vehemently entreats of Our Lady to grant him a quartan fever, as his physicians assure him that this is the only malady which is good for the health. author little known out of France, Pierre Mathieu, who had the impudence to write an eulogium of Louis XI., says of this monarch, "that justice put her sword more frequently than her balance into his hand, which he made many of the nobles severely feel, whose trial was generally preceded by their execution." This, notwithstanding Pierre Mathieu's admiration for his royal master, sounds more like an epigram upon him than any thing else. Some authors have set down as a trait of profound policy, Louis's familiarizing himself with the people, visiting obscure citizens, enquiring into their family affairs, sitting at their tables and partaking of their humble fare, and in turn permitting them to appear at his own royal banquets. As he wished to lessen the influence of the nobles, it was good policy, as they suppose, on his part, to make himself beloved by the people and give them consideration. But it is probable that there was more of fancy and whim than of policy in these familiarities; and that, being naturally affable, inquisitive, and anxious to discover the truth, he had adopted an equal condescension towards every class of his subjects. If he had been so desirous of securing the good will and affection of the middling and lower classes, he would not have caused to be thrown into the Seine, bound in pairs, several citizens of Paris, whom he suspected of a correspondence with his enemies. He would have treated with less barbarity the unfortunate inhabitants of the towns and cities that he conquered. The most striking peculiarity of his character is, perhaps, the ascendancy which he allowed some of those in menial situations about his person to acquire over him. Some of these so captivated his confidence, that he entrusted them with several most important missions and affairs of state. But still more extraordinary and altogether odious was the degrading familiarity which existed between him and his prevot, the atrocious Tristan the Hermit, a wretch who took a ferocious delight in executing the cruel orders of his master. This horrid being he called his gossip. With the exception of the barbarian Czar Peter I. of Russia, the history of modern times offers no other example of a prince who took a pleasure in witnessing with his own eyes the executions he had ordered, and who afterwards amicably pressed the hand of the executioner, still dripping with the blood of his victims. Louis may be more easily pardoned for having conferred the title of Count de Meulan upon his barber Olivier le Dain, who served him faithfully and proved himself a brave captain. But unfortunately this valiant barber had a spice of the villain in him, like most of those who enjoyed the favour or confidence of Louis: he was hanged in the following reign for having, during the time of his power and credit, caused to be strangled, the husband of a lady, whose life he had promised to spare as the price of the wife's submission to his desires. This trait proves him to have been a worthy favourite of such a despot. It is difficult to imagine how Jaques Coittier, his physician, contrived to inspire Louis with so wholesome a fear of him; he obtained from him any thing and every thing he wished; he spoke to him with arrogance, and even insolence, without bringing down upon himself the wrath of the tyrant. He often said to him, "I know that you will serve me some fine morning as you have served so many others, but I swear to you that you shall live but eight days after." By this extravagant threat he worked upon Louis's credulity and fears. It was owing to the same causes that he spared the life of an astrologer, whom he had doomed to death, but, wishing to prove the fallacy of his art, he asked him if he could foretell the period of his own death, to which the wily juggler replied with apparent sang froid, that it would take place exactly three days before that of his majesty. The King's dread of his physician will appear the less surprising, if we recollect in what continual fear of death the monarchs of that day were; when their distrust and dread of treachery were such, that at their interviews they were separated from each other by strong bars of wood or iron, through the intervals of which they passed their hands. It was thus, that Edward of England and Louis met at Pequigny. "On the middle of the bridge," says Comines," was erected a strong palisading of wood, similar to that of which the cages of lions are made, and the distances between the bars were only large enough to allow an arm to pass through." In like manner it was with a strong grating between them that Louis and the Constable of France met to treat of their differences. Louis and his brother monarchs knew too well the danger of putting confidence in each other's honour. It was for having blindly confided in the word of the Duke of Burgundy, that Louis found himself a prisoner in the chateau of Peronne, and was obliged, as the price of his liberty, to assist the duke in exterminating the revolted inhabitants of Liege. Louis, however, seemed to have had as little regard to his word as the Duke of Burgundy: he judged of others by himself, and in that age he was not often mistaken in so doing. A favourite expression of his was, "he that knows not how to dissemble, knows not how to reign." If this be true, few kings knew better how to reign than he. It was only when he swore upon the true cross of St. Lo, that he considered himself bound;—as for all other oaths, he held himself dispensed from observing them, unless when it was his interest to do so. Louis is the first of the French monarchs, who took the title of " Most Christian," though there is scarcely one of the number who had less of the spirit of Christianity, but, as a compensation, no one could be a more scrupulous observer of devotional practices and the dues of the church. In 1481, he visited for seven days successively the tomb of Saint Martin, and gave an offering, each time, of thirty-one golden crowns: this was his usual donation when he visited a church, or heard mass, in company with the Queen. On Assumption day, he gave three times as many golden crowns as he was years old; and during the last years of his life, he was so profuse of donations to the churches, that the greater part of his domains passed into the hands of the clergy. Notwithstanding his tyranny and superstition, France was near being indebted to him for a general code of laws, and a unity of weights and measures, of which he had conceived the idea. But these wise and useful intentions did not receive their execution till the revolution at the close of the last century. The posts for the conveyance of letters, which he established for his own personal service, have become a general advantage. It was Louis also, who first introduced Swiss stipendiaries to serve as his life-guards, as if Frenchmen were not the fittest guardians of the throne and monarch of France. D. S. HARP OF ZION.-NO. II. The Song of Deborah. On the wing of the whirlwind Jehovah hath past, The Canaanite came like the grasshopper down- Oh proudly the war-horse was pawing the plain And his bride look'd forth from her latticed tower, And she watch'd till the last dim star of the night "Why tarry his chariot-wheels thus?" she cried, But far from his bridal bower away, In the tent of the stranger proud Sisera lay With the dust for his couch-and the worm at his side,-- W. C. BISHOP BLAISE, THE ASH-WADDLer. STROLLING One morning in the Spring of 18- through a village in the north of merry Devon, I observed young Isaac Wall (better known by the name of Bishop Blaise,) the roving ash-waddler, in hot argument with his worship the Justice. Isaac was mounted on a fine athletic ass, garnished on all sides with tinker's tools and bags of woodashes. On the beast's withers crouched a young otter snarling at the Justice as he flourished his staff at the waddler; who, with the end of a long, brown, polished, and rudely-carved pastoral crook, restrained his little amphibious friend from attacking his worship. He occasionally took the mitre from his head, and shook it in the Justice's face; and ever and anon shed a cloud of dust from his patched clerical gown on his worship's garments. These were quite in the old fashionquaint, bizarre, imposing, and affected. The style is now perhaps rooted out from its few strong holds even in the heart of Devon. He wore a blue coat, bedecked with silver coins, cuffed and collared with rich crimson velvet. His vest was a long-flapped flowery brocade --a cravat of fine muslin, with a running pink border, encircled his neck. His nether garments were greasy buckskins and yarn stockings of the old card pattern, wherein kings, queens, and knaves shouldered each other, ace shouldered deuce, diamond flamed cheek by jowl with spade and every card in the pack flaunted 'twixt ankle and knee-band. |