warned as usual to beware of the approaching month of May, and at
length, irritated by his scepticism, the professor of the black art
predicted to him not only the day but the very hour which was to
terminate his existence.[426]

A short time subsequently a nobleman of Bearn arrived in Paris and
requested an audience of the King, which he had no sooner obtained than
he informed him that he had been instructed in a vision to seek his
presence in order to warn him of his approaching death. Henry, however,
who piqued himself in public upon denying credence to these supernatural
revelations, and who, moreover, imagined that the object of his
countryman was to obtain a recompense for his zeal, treated the matter
lightly and ordered three hundred crowns to be presented to the stranger
to defray his travelling expenses. This present he, however,
respectfully refused, protesting that he had acted only upon a principle
of duty, and that he should be amply recompensed should his warning
suffice to induce the monarch to adopt such precautions as would enable
him to escape the threatened peril.[427]

Only a few nights previous to her coronation the Queen suddenly awoke
from a profound slumber uttering a piercing shriek and trembling in
every limb. Alarmed by her evident state of agony, the monarch, having
at length succeeded in restoring her to a state of comparative
composure, urged her to explain the cause of her terror, but for a
considerable time she refused to yield to his entreaties. Overcome at
last, however, by his evident anxiety and uneasiness, she informed him
that she had just had a frightful dream, in which she had seen him fall
under the knife of an assassin.[428]

Two remarkable coincidences also demand mention, particularly as they
occurred at a distance from the capital. On the day of the King's
assassination his shield, bearing his blazon, which was attached to the
principal entrance of the chateau of Pau in Bearn, fell heavily to the
ground and broke to pieces; while immediately afterwards the cows of the
royal herd, which had previously been grazing quietly in the park, began
to low in a frightful manner, and suddenly the bull known as _the king_
rushed violently against the gate whence the trophy had fallen and then
sprang into the moat, where it was drowned. The effect produced upon the
inhabitants of the district was instantaneous; loud and lamentable
shouts of "The King is dead!" arose on all sides, and wi