To
the officers in immediate charge it was intimated that "those of the
new religion" designed "to rise against the king's authority, to the
trouble of his subjects and the city of Paris. For the prevention of
which conspiracy the king enjoined the Provost to possess himself
[127] of the keys of the various city gates, and seize all boats
plying on the river, to the end that none might enter or depart."
And just before the lists close around the doomed, Gaston has bounded
away on his road homeward to the bed of the dying grandfather, after
embracing his wife, anxious, if she might, to share his journey, with
some forecast of coming evil among those dark people.
The white badges of Catholicism had been distributed, not to every
Catholic (a large number of Catholics perished), to some Huguenots
such as La Rochefoucauld, brave guerrier et joyeux compagnon, dear to
Charles, hesitating still with some last word of conscience in his
ear at the very gate of the Louvre, when a random pistol-shot, in the
still undisturbed August night, rousing sudden fear for himself,
precipitates the event, and as if in delirium he is driven forth on
the scent of human blood.
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