Biographical Illustrations.

LOUIS XI.

The character of this prince in Quentin Durward is a first-rate specimen of fine moral painting; every feature nicely discri minated, strongly defined, and vividly brought out, with an harmony and consistency in its toute ensemble, that proclaims its truth to nature, and its accurate likeness of a real subject. The novelist, in fact, has, in the production of it, merely adorned and illuminated what history had already prepared for his pencil; for there is not a single eccentricity in conduct, deformity in morals, or obliquity in feeling, attributed by him to the French monarch, in which he is not sanctioned by the authority of contemporary writers.* Louis's public career of wickedness commenced in revolting from his.

Comines, Monstrelet, Du Tillet, &c.

father Charles VII., and in devising schemes for his secret destruction; a conduct which brought the parent to an untimely grave, by his abstaining from food, in consequence of the information he had received of his son's intention to take him off by poison. No sooner had Louisthus obtained the crown, than, determined to aggrandize it, by depressing the power of the nobles, and re-uniting the great fiefs to the monarchy, he dismissed from his councils every man of high and honourable spirit, and selected from the lower classes the most subtle, deceitful, unfeeling, and cruel characters he could find, as proper agents to execute his dark schemes of base and wicked policy. the sacrifice of every virtue, and good feeling, he succeeded in adding to the possessions of the crown, Burgundy, and Roussillon, and Cerdagne, and the county of Bologne ; but his acquisitions thus obtained 'could only be secured by the merited execution of his atrocious ministers, the Bishop of Verdun and Cardinal Balue; by the poisoning of his brother Charles; and the decapitation of the Constable de St. Paul, the Count of Armagnac, and

By

the Dukes Alencon and Nemours.* But guilt is always cowardly. That "the wicked fleeth

• Mezerai informs us, that when the Duke of Nemours was beheaded, Louis commanded his two infant sons to be placed under the scaffold, that the father's blood might fall upon the children's heads! He put to death upwards of four thousand persons by various modes of torture, and without any form of trial; and frequently attended their execution in person, to glut at once his thirst for blood, and his desire of revenge. Iron cages were constructed by hiз order, in which many of the nobility were inclosed, carried about, exhibited to the populace, and afterwards handed over to the favourite agents of his cruelties, Tristan l'Hermite, Trois Eschelles, and Petit Andrè, in order to be dispatched; whilst others of his victims were immured in dark and dreary dungeons, where they perished by famine or secret assassination.—-Du Clos; Comines. "In the Tower of London,” Mr. Pennant remarks, “is a narrow room, or dungeon, called Little Ease; but this will appear a luxurions habitation compared with the inventions of Louis XI., with his iron cages, in which persons of rank lay for whole years; or his oubliettes, dungeons made in the form of reversed cones, concealed with trap-doors, down which dropped the unhappy victims of the tyrant, brought there by Tristan l'Hermite, his companion, and executioner in ordinary. Sometimes their sides were plain, sometimes set with knives or sharp-edged wheels; but in both eases they were true oubliettes—the devoted were certain to fall into

when no man pursueth," is a truth, established both by revelation and experience; and Louis, in his high career of accomplished or meditated crime, was the victim of perpetual terror, and the despicable slave of the most groveling superstition. It was this vague but unconquerable alarm, which induced him, towards the conclusion of his reign, to immure himself in the castle of Plessis la Tours; and to secure it from entrance, and even approach, by every contrivance of art. "He encompassed the castle," says Comines, "with great bars of iron, in form of a grate, and placed, at the four corners of the house, four watchtowers of iron-strong, massy, and thick. The said grates were without the wall, on the other side of the ditch, and went to the bottom; several spikes of iron were fastened into the wall, set as thick by one another as was possible. He placed, likewise, ten bowmen in the said ditches, to shoot at any man who should come near, before the gate was opened; and ordered that they should lie in

the land where all things are forgotten."-London, p. 258.

the said ditches, but retire to the watch-towers upon occasion.

"The gate of du Plessis was not opened, nor the drawbridge let down, before eight in the morning; at which time the courtiers were let in, and the captains ordered their guards to their several posts, with a main guard in the middle of the court, as in a town upon the frontiers that was closely besieged; nor was any man permitted to enter but by the wicket, and those only by the king's order, unless it was the steward of his household, and such officers as came not into his presence."

And again" In the first place, nobody was admitted into Plessis du Pare, (which was the place where he kept himself,) but his domestic servants and his archers, which were four hundred; some of which kept constant guard at the gate, whilst others walked continually about, to prevent any surprise. No lord, nor great person, was suffered to lodge in the castle, nor to enter with his train; nor, indeed, did any of them come in, but Monsieur de Beaujeu, the present duke of Bourbon, who was his son-in-law. Round about the castle