the Bastille before the parliament. "My lord of St.
Pol," said the chancellor to him, "you have always passed for being the
firmest lord in the realm; you must not belie yourself to-day, when you
have more need than ever of firmness and courage;" and he read to him the
decree which sentenced him to lose his head that very day on the Place de
Greve. "That is a mighty hard sentence," said the constable; "I pray God
that I may see Him to-day." And he underwent execution with serene and
pious firmness. He was of an epoch when the most criminal enterprises
did not always preclude piety. Louis XI. did not look after the
constable's accomplices. "He flew at the heads," says Duclos, "and was
set on making great examples; he was convinced that noble blood, when it
is guilty, should be shed rather than common blood. Nevertheless there
was considered to be something indecent in the cession by the king to the
Duke of Burgundy of the constable's possessions. It seemed like the
price of the blood of an unhappy man, who, being rightfully sacrificed
only to justice and public tranquillity, appeared to be so to vengeance,
ambition, and avarice."

In August, 1477, the battle of Nancy had been fought; Charles the Rash
had been killed; and the line of the Dukes of Burgundy had been
extinguished. Louis XI. remained master of the battle-field on which the
great risks and great scenes of his life had been passed through. It
seemed as if he ought to fear nothing now, and that the day for clemency
had come. But such was not the king's opinion; two cruel passions,
suspicion and vengeance, had taken possession of his soul; he remained
convinced, not without reason, that nearly all the great feudal lords who
had been his foes were continuing to conspire against him, and that he
ought not, on his side, ever to cease from striving against thorn. The
trial of the constable, St. Pol, had confirmed all his suspicions; he had
discovered thereby traces and almost proofs of a design for a long time
past conceived and pursued by the constable and his associates--the
design of seizing the king, keeping him prisoner, and setting his son,
the _dauphin_, on the throne, with a regency composed of a council of
lords. Amongst the declared or presumed adherents of this project, the
king had found James d'Armagnac, Duke of Nemours, the companion and
friend of his youth; for his father, the Count of Pardiac, had been
governor to Louis, at that time _daup