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owry; but he had expended immense sums in the national cause, and his private life was as extravagant as that of a prince in a fairy tale. At his castle of Champtoce he dwelt in almost royal state; indeed, his train when he went hawking or hunting exceeded in magnificence that of the King himself. His retainers were tricked out in the most gorgeous liveries, and his table was spread with ruinous abundance. Oxen, sheep, and pigs were roasted whole, and viands were provided daily for five hundred persons. He had an insane love of pomp and display, and his private devotions were ministered to by a large body of ecclesiastics. His chapel was a marvel of splendour, and was furnished with gold and silver plate in the most lavish manner. His love of colour and movement made him fond of theatrical displays, and it is even said that the play or mystery of Orleans, dealing with the story of Jeanne Darc, was written with his own hand. He was munificent in his patronage of the arts, and was himself a skilled illuminator and bookbinder. In short, he was obviously one of those persons of abnormal character in whom genius is allied to madness and who can attempt and execute nothing except in a spirit of the wildest excess. The reduction of his fortune merely served his peculiar and abnormal personality with a new excuse for extravagance. At this time the art of alchemy flourished exceedingly and the works of Nicolas Flamel, the Arabian Geber, and Pierre d'Estaing enjoyed a great vogue. On an evil day it occurred to Gilles to turn alchemist, and thus repair his broken fortunes. In the first quarter of the fifteenth century alchemy stood for scientific achievement, and many persons in our own enlightened age still study its maxims. A society exists to-day the object of which is to further the knowledge of alchemical science. A common misapprehension is current to the effect that the object of the alchemists was the transmutation of the baser metals into gold, but in reality they were divided into two groups, those who sought eagerly the secret of manufacturing the precious metals, and those who dreamed of a higher aim, the transmutation of the gross, terrestrial nature of man into the pure gold of the spirit. The latter of these aims was beyond the fevered imagination of such a wild and disorderly mind as that of Gilles de Retz. He sent emissaries into Italy, Spain, and Germany to invite adepts in the science to his castle at Champt
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