e, as he had declared to his friend; but
his situation was that of a man who, placed by the side of the book
of life, should see hovering over it the hand which is to indite his
damnation or his salvation. He set out with Louis to Chambord, resolved
to take the first opportunity favorable to his design. It soon presented
itself.

The very morning of the day appointed for the chase, the King sent word
to him that he was waiting for him on the Escalier du Lys. It may not,
perhaps, be out of place to speak of this astonishing construction.

Four leagues from Blois, and one league from the Loire, in a small and
deep valley, between marshy swamps and a forest of large holm-oaks, far
from any highroad, the traveller suddenly comes upon a royal, nay, a
magic castle. It might be said that, compelled by some wonderful lamp, a
genie of the East had carried it off during one of the "thousand and one
nights," and had brought it from the country of the sun to hide it
in the land of fogs and mist, for the dwelling of the mistress of a
handsome prince.

Hidden like a treasure; with its blue domes, its elegant minarets rising
from thick walls or shooting into the air, its long terraces overlooking
the wood, its light spires bending with the wind, its terraces
everywhere rising over its colonnades, one might there imagine one's
self in the kingdom of Bagdad or of Cashmir, did not the blackened
walls, with their covering of moss and ivy, and the pallid and
melancholy hue of the sky, denote a rainy climate. It was indeed a
genius who raised this building; but he came from Italy, and his name
was Primaticcio. It was indeed a handsome prince whose amours were
concealed in it; but he was a king, and he bore the name of Francois I.
His salamander still spouts fire everywhere about it. It sparkles in
a thousand places on the arched roofs, and multiplies the flames there
like the stars of heaven; it supports the capitals with burning crowns;
it colors the windows with its fires; it meanders up and down the secret
staircases, and everywhere seems to devour with its flaming glances the
triple crescent of a mysterious Diane--that Diane de Poitiers, twice a
goddess and twice adored in these voluptuous woods.

The base of this strange monument is like the monument itself, full of
elegance and mystery; there is a double staircase, which rises in two
interwoven spirals from the most remote foundations of the edifice up to
the highest points, and e