uis the Great, dead!" cried my companion.

"Louis the Great?" said a sullen-looking man,--"Louis the persecutor!"

"Ah, he's a Huguenot!" cried another with haggard cheeks and hollow
eyes, scowling at the last speaker. "Never mind what he says: the King
was right when he refused protection to the heretics; but was he right
when he levied such taxes on the Catholics?"

"Hush!" said a third--"hush: it may be unsafe to speak; there are spies
about; for my part, I think it was all the fault of the _noblesse_."

"And the Favourites!" cried a soldier, fiercely.

"And the Harlots!" cried a hag of eighty.

"And the Priests!" muttered the Huguenot.

"And the Tax-gatherers!" added the lean Catholic.

We rode slowly on. My comrade was evidently and powerfully affected.

"So, he is dead!" said he. "Dead!--well, well, peace be with him!
He conquered in Holland; he humbled Genoa; he dictated to Spain; he
commanded Conde and Turenne; he--Bah! What is all this!--" then, turning
abruptly to me, my companion cried, "I did not speak against the King,
did I, Sir?"

"Not much."

"I am glad of that,--yes, very glad!" And the old man glared fiercely
round on a troop of boys who were audibly abusing the dead lion.

"I would have bit out my tongue rather than it had joined in the base
joy of these yelping curs. Heavens! when I think what shouts I have
heard when the name of that man, then deemed little less than a god, was
but breathed!--and now--why do you look at me, Sir? My eyes are moist; I
know it, Sir,--I know it. The old battered broken soldier, who made his
first campaigns when that which is now dust was the idol of France and
the pupil of Turenne,--the old soldier's eyes shall not be dry, though
there is not another tear shed in the whole of this great empire."

"Your three sons?" said I; "you did not weep for them?"

"No, Sir: I loved them when I was old; but I loved Louis _when I was
young_!"

"Your oppressed and pillaged country?" said I, "think of that."

"No, Sir, I will not think of it!" cried the old warrior in a passion.
"I will not think of it--to-day, at least."

"You are right, my brave friend: in the grave let us bury even public
wrongs; but let us not bury their remembrance. May the joy we read in
every face that we pass--joy at the death of one whom idolatry once
almost seemed to deem immortal--be a lesson to future kings!"

My comrade did not immediately answer; but, after a pause and we had
turned o