was calm and cold as Reason herself.  I condemned the Huguenots without pity, it is true, but without anger.  If I had been Queen of England, I would have done the same to the Catholics if they had been seditious.  Our country required at that time one God, one faith, one master.  Luckily for me, I have described my policy in a word.  When Birague announced to me the defeat at Dreux—­well, I said, we must go to the Conventicle.—­Hate the Huguenots, indeed!  I honoured them greatly, and I did not know them.  How could I hate those who had never been my friends?’

“’But, madame, instead of that horrible butchery, why did you not try to give the Calvinists the wise indulgences which made the reign of the Fourth Henry so peaceable and so glorious?’

“She smiled again, and the wrinkles in her face and brow gave an expression of the bitterest irony to her pale features.

“‘Henry committed two faults,’ she said.  He ought neither to have abjured, nor to have left France Catholic after having become so himself.  He alone was in a position to change the destinies of France.  There should have been either no Crosier or no Conventicle.  He should never have left in the government two hostile principles, with nothing to balance them.  It is impossible that Sully can have looked without envy on the immense possessions of the church.  But,’ she paused, and seemed to consider for a moment—­’is it the niece of a pope you are surprised to see a Catholic?  After all,’ she said, ’I could have been a Calvinist with all my heart.  Does any one believe that religion had any thing to do with that movement, that revolution, the greatest the world has ever seen, which has been retarded by trifling causes, but which nothing can hinder from coming to pass, since I failed to crush it?  A revolution,’ she added, fixing her eye on me, ’which is even now in motion, and which you—­yes, you—­you who now listen to me—­can finish.’

“I shuddered.

“’What! has no one perceived that the old interests and the new have taken Rome and Luther for their watchwords?  What!  Louis the Ninth, in order to avoid a struggle of the same kind, carried away with him five times the number of victims I condemned, and left their bones on the shores of Africa, and is considered a saint; while I—­but the reason is soon given—­I failed!’

“She bent her head, and was silent a moment.  She was no longer a queen, but one of those awful druidesses who rejoiced in human sacrifices, and unrolled the pages of the Future by studying the records of the Past.  At length she raised her noble and majestic head again.  ’You are all inclined,’ she said, ’to bestow more sympathy on a few worthless victims than on the tears and sufferings of a whole generation!  And you forget that religious liberty, political freedom, a nation’s tranquillity, science itself, are benefits which Destiny never vouchsafes to man without being paid for them in blood!’