anions to the episcopal
palace, and waited for the service to be over. When notified of its
conclusion by Marshal Damville, Henry and his suite returned to the choir,
and with his bride and all the attending grandees soon sat down to a
sumptuous dinner in the episcopal palace.

Among those who had been admitted to the choir of Notre Dame after the
close of the mass, was the son of the first president of parliament, young
Jacques Auguste de Thou, the future historian. Happening to come near
Admiral Coligny, he looked with curious and admiring gaze upon the warrior
whose virtues and abilities had combined to raise the house of Chatillon
to its present distinction. He saw him point out to his cousin Damville
the flags and banners taken from the Huguenots on the fields of Jarnac and
Moncontour, still suspended from the walls of the cathedral, mournful
trophies of a civil contest. "These will soon be torn down," De Thou heard
Coligny say, "and in their place others more pleasing to the eye will be
hung up." The words had unmistakable reference to the victories which he
hoped soon to win in a war against Spain. It is not strange, however, that
the malevolent endeavored to prove that they contained an allusion to the
renewal of a domestic war, which it is certain that the admiral detested
with his whole heart.[930]

[Sidenote: Entertainment in the Louvre.]

Later in the day, a magnificent entertainment was given by Charles in the
Louvre to the municipality of Paris, the members of parliament, and other
high officers of justice. Supper was succeeded by a short ball, and this
in turn by one of those allegorical representations in which French fancy
and invention at this period ran wanton. Through the great vaulted saloon
of the Louvre a train of wonderful cars was made slowly to pass. Some were
rocks of silver, on whose summits sat in state the king's brothers,
Navarre, Conde, the prince dauphin, Guise, or Angouleme. On others
sea-monsters disported themselves, and the pagan gods of the water,
somewhat incongruously clothed in cloth of gold or various colors,
serenely looked on. Charles himself rode in a chariot shaped like a
sea-horse, the curved tail of which supported a shell holding Neptune and
his trident. When the pageant stopped for a moment, singers of surpassing
skill entertained the guests. Etienne le Roy, the king's especial
favorite, distinguished himself by the power and beauty of his voice.[931]

The entertainme