too, of whom he should beware, and who must not be suffered to come near him.”  He sent for the chancellor from Paris, and bade him go and take the seals to the king.  “Go to the king,” he said to the captains of his guards, to his archers, to his huntsmen, to all his household.  “His speech never failed him after it had come back to him,” says Commynes, “nor his senses; he was constantly saying something of great sense and never in all his illness, which lasted from Monday to Saturday evening, did he complain, as do all sorts of folk when they feel ill. . . .  “Notwithstanding all those commands he recovered heart,” adds Commynes, “and had good hope of escaping.”  In conversation at odd times with some of his servants, and even with Commynes himself, he had begged them, whenever they saw that he was very ill, not to mention that cruel word death; he had even made a covenant with them, that they should say no more to him than, “Don’t talk much,” which would be sufficient warning.  But his doctor, James Coettier, and his barber, Oliver the Devil, whom he had ennobled and enriched under the name of Oliver le Daim, did not treat him with so much indulgence.  “They notified his death to him in brief and harsh terms,” says Commynes; “’Sir, we must do our duty; have no longer hope in your holy man of Calabria or in other matters, for assuredly all is over with you; think of your soul; there is no help for it.’  ’I have hope in God that He will aid me,’ answered Louis, coldly; ’peradventure I am not so ill as you think.’

“He endured with manly virtue so cruel a sentence,” says Commynes, “and everything, even to death, more than any man I ever saw die; he spoke as coolly as if he had never been ill.”  He gave minute orders about his funeral, sepulchre, and tomb.  He would be laid at Notre-Dame de Clery, and not, like his ancestors, at St. Denis; his statue was to be gilt bronze, kneeling, face to the altar, head uncovered, and hands clasped within his hat, as was his ordinary custom.  Not having died on the battle-field and sword in hand, he would be dressed in hunting-garb, with jack-boots, a hunting-horn, slung over his shoulder, his hound lying beside him, his order of St. Michael round his neck, and his sword at his side.  As to the likeness, he asked to be represented, not as he was in his latter days, bald, bow-backed, and wasted, but as he was in his youth and in the vigor of his age, face pretty full, nose aquiline, hair long, and falling down behind to his shoulders.  After having taken all these pains about himself after his death, he gave his chief remaining thoughts to France and his son.  “Orders must be sent,” said he, “to M. d’Esquerdes [Philip de Crevecoeur, Baron d’Esquerdes, a distinguished warrior, who, after the death of Charles the Rash, had, through the agency of Commynes, gone over to the service of Louis XI., and was in command of his army] to attempt no doings as to Calais.  We had thought to drive out the English from this