uis had tempted
the people of Liege to rebel against their superior, Duke Charles, and
persecute and murder their Bishop. But Louis was not prepared for their
acting with such promptitude. They flew to arms with the temerity of a
fickle rabble, took the Bishop prisoner, menaced and insulted him, and
tore to pieces one or two of his canons. This news was sent to the Duke
of Burgundy at the moment when Louis had so unguardedly placed himself
in his power; and the consequence was that Charles placed guards on the
Castle of Peronne, and, deeply resenting the treachery of the king of
France in exciting sedition in his dominions, while he pretended the
most intimate friendship, he deliberated whether he should not put
Louis to death. Three days Louis was detained in this very precarious
situation, and it was only his profuse liberality amongst Charles's
favourites and courtiers which finally ensured him from death or
deposition. Comines, who was the Duke of Burgundy's chamberlain at the
time, and slept in his apartment, says Charles neither undressed nor
slept, but flung himself from time to time on the bed, and, at other
times, wildly traversed the apartment. It was long before his violent
temper became in any degree tractable. At length he only agreed to
give Louis his liberty, on condition of his accompanying him in person
against, and employing his troops in subduing, the mutineers whom
his intrigues had instigated to arms. This was a bitter and degrading
alternative. But Louis, seeing no other mode of compounding for the
effects of his rashness, not only submitted to this discreditable
condition, but swore to it upon a crucifix said to have belonged to
Charlemagne. These particulars are from Comines. There is a succinct
epitome of them in Sir Nathaniel Wraxall's History of France, vol.
i.--S.]

CHAPTER XXVIII: UNCERTAINTY

Then happy low, lie down;
Uneasy lies the head that wears a crown.

SECOND PART OF KING HENRY IV.

Forty men at arms, carrying alternately naked swords and blazing
torches, served as the escort, or rather the guard, of King Louis, from
the town hall of Peronne to the Castle; and as he entered within its
darksome and gloomy strength, it seemed as if a voice screamed in his
ear that warning which the Florentine has inscribed over the portal of
the infernal regions, "Leave all hope behind."

[The Florentine (1265-1321): Dante Alighieri, the greatest of Italian
poets. The Divine