gn was ever
so imposing as this woman from the day when she succeeded in restraining
the Guises after the death of Francois II. Her black velvet cap, made
with a point upon the forehead (for she never relinquished her widow's
mourning) seemed a species of feminine cowl around the cold, imperious
face, to which, however, she knew how to give, at the right moment, a
seductive Italian charm. Catherine de' Medici was so well made that she
was accused of inventing side-saddles to show the shape of her legs,
which were absolutely perfect. Women followed her example in this
respect throughout Europe, which even then took its fashions from
France. Those who desire to bring this grand figure before their minds
will find that the scene now taking place in the brown hall of the
Louvre presents it in a striking aspect.

The two queens, different in spirit, in beauty, in dress, and now
estranged,--one naive and thoughtful, the other thoughtful and gravely
abstracted,--were far too preoccupied to think of giving the order
awaited by the courtiers for the amusements of the evening. The
carefully concealed drama, played for the last six months by the mother
and son was more than suspected by many of the courtiers; but the
Italians were watching it with special anxiety, for Catherine's failure
involved their ruin.

During this evening Charles IX., weary with the day's hunting, looked
to be forty years old. He had reached the last stages of the malady
of which he died, the symptoms of which were such that many reflecting
persons were justified in thinking that he was poisoned. According to
de Thou (the Tacitus of the Valois) the surgeons found suspicious
spots--_ex causa incognita reperti livores_--on his body. Moreover, his
funeral was even more neglected than that of Francois II. The body was
conducted from Saint-Lazare to Saint-Denis by Brantome and a few archers
of the guard under command of the Comte de Solern. This circumstances,
coupled with the supposed hatred of the mother to the son, may or
may not give color to de Thou's supposition, but it proves how little
affection Catherine felt for any of her children,--a want of feeling
which may be explained by her implicit faith in the predictions of
judicial astrology. This woman was unable to feel affection for the
instruments which were destined to fail her. Henri III. was the last
king under whom her reign of power was to last; that was the sole
consideration of her heart and min