withheld her; that some guardian angel whispered within her its sad monitions, and filled the heart of this sweet child with a mournful presentiment of her coming doom. At court, the young princess pursued her studies with renewed ardor, under the direction of her uncle, the cardinal of Lorraine. When only ten years old, she was well versed in French, Latin, and Italian; and, according to Brantome, at the age of thirteen, pronounced a latin discourse before the king and his court, maintaining that females should be instructed in literature and the liberal arts. Her instructor in latin was George Buchanan; in rhetoric, Claude Fauchet; Etienne Pasquier in history, and Pierre Poussard in the study of poetry, which was one of her favourite pursuits. Though a part of each day was set aside for study, yet she entered with all the hilarity of a young heart into the gay and chivalrous pastime of the French court, and took particular delight in the healthy and exhilirating exercise of the chase. Thus ten happy years of Mary's life stole rapidly away, in the charms of study and the amusements of society. She was now in the fresh full bloom of youthful beauty. In person she was tall and finely proportioned, with a carriage remarkable for its grace and dignity. Her auburn hair fell in natural ringlets over a high and intellectual forehead; her eyes were of a chesnut color, dark, clear, and expressive; her nose Grecian; her lips full and voluptuous; her chin round and dimpled; and her skin of such dazzling whiteness, that, in the language of her old historian Brantome," it outrivalled the whiteness of her veil." The same historian speaks of her beautiful voice, fort doux, mignard, et fort agréable parler; and says, "that she sung well to the music of a lute which she touched prettily with her fair white hand and delicate fingers." The biographers of Mary have spoken much of her personal beauty, and of its effects upon those around her. The history of the unfortunate Chatelard is almost too well known to need repetition. He was an accomplished gentleman of Dauphiny, and great nephew of the celebrated Chevalier Bayard, whom he is said to have resembled in person. He excelled in feats of arms and all athletic exercises, and was endowed by nature with a gallant and chivalrous spirit. He was, moreover, genteel in speech and skilful with the pen, and seems to have been a favourite among the court poets of the day. When the young queen returned to Scotland, he was one of her attendants. Deeply enamoured of his mistress, and listening only to the promptings of an unbridled passion, he twice secreted himself in her bed-chamber. The first offence was pardoned. the second cost him his life. He died, as his biographer expresses it, “ par outrecuydance, et non pour crime. His last words upon the scaffold were, "Adieu, la plus belle, et la plus cruelle princesse du monde." In the spring of 1558, when Mary had entered her sixteenth year, she was married to Francis the Second, then Dauphin of France, and but a year older than herself. The nuptials were celebrated in the church of Notre Dame at Paris; the most costly and sumptuous banquets were prepared in honor of the occasion, and universal rejoicing throughout the kingdom signalized an event which may be regarded as the first in that disastrous series, whose termination was the bloody tragedy of a death upon the scoffold. Francis had been from his cradle a feeble and sickly child, with a spirit too nearly akin to the week and enervated body which it animated. As if conscious of his own mental and physical inferiority, he shrunk away from the gaze of the world, and sought seclusion, and the peace it gives the aching heart, like a wounded deer that seeks the silent shade apart from the gallant heid of its fellows. He is spoken of in history as a meek and gentle spirit, and by deep and devoted affection he atoned for the want of that high intellect and noble bearing which should have marked the husband of Mary Stuart. Indeed, his love for her was not that of a prince, but that of a poet; and it was met by the kindred affection of a refined and gentle heart, which seems to have been created as the home and shelter of love; for there is truth in the distich of the old Italian poet, To gentle hearts love doth for shelter fly, As seeks the bird the forests leafy shade. In the following year King Henry the second received his death wound at a tournament, from the spear of Count Mont gomery; and shortly afterwards, Francis was crowned at Rheims, and ascended the throne of France. By this un expected event, Mary Stuart saw herself suddenly exalted to a dizzy height of power. Queen of two kingdoms, and in the bloom and loveliness of youth, she was the cynosure of all eyes. But the glorious and dazzling vision soon departed. The hand of disease weighed more heavily upon the fainting heart of Francis, and the shadow of death stalked gloomily amid the pageantry of a court. His throne was but a stepping stone to the grave. In one short year, the young queen beheld herself an orphan and a widow. The news of her mother's death reached her at the very moment her husband was expiring in her arms. Stricken with this double misfortune, she retired from court to the house of a friend in the pleasant environs of Orleans. Here, in silence and solitude, she wept the loss of those who had been most dear to her on earth. It was doubtless in this retirement that she composed that simple elegy on her husband's death which seems inspired with all the sadness of recent bereavement : In accents sad and low, And tones of soft lament, I breathe the bitterness of woe Was ere such stern decree Ere blight so fair a state Who in the gentle spring And blossom of my years, Must bear misfortune's piercing sting, Sadness, and grief, and tears; Thoughts that alone inspire Regret and soft desire. What once was blithe and gay, The sad and glorious light of day, The world-the world has nought On this pale cheek of mine If towards his home above, When midnight hovers near, In labor, in repose, My heart his presence knows. In the year which followed these mournful events, La Reine Blanche, as Mary Stuart was called from her white mourning robes, returned to her native land, her heart filled with sad regrets and mournful forebodings. As the vessel which bore her away from her beloved France, sailed from the port of Calais, an event occurred which tended to deepen, in her sensitive and superstitious mind, the presentiments of coming ill. A little bark which was gaily entering the harbour, was wrecked in broad daylight, and sank with all her crew. The queen beheld the catastrophe from the deck of her galley, and turning to those around her, exclaimed, "Ah! mon Dieu! que augure de voyage est cecy!” As the vessel bounded on her course and the shores of France grew distant and indistinct, the queen stood gazing back upon them with tearful eyes, mournfully exclaiming, "Adieu France! Adieu France!" At length the night closed in, and as the last faint vestige of land disappeared in the misty horizon, she exclaimed, "The hour is come, my beloved France, when I must lose you from my sight; for the night is jealous of the pleasure I enjoy in gazing upon you, and drops her dark veil before mine eyes, to shut out from me so great a blessing. Farewell, then, my beloved France, I shall never see you more.' Having commanded the helmsman to awake her at day-break, if the land were still visible, she threw herself upon a couch that had been prepared for her upon deck. During the night the wind died into a calm, and, at daybreak, the shore of France was still visible, stretching like a faint blue line in the horizon. The unhappy queen arose, and gazed long and wistfully upon it, till it grew fainter and fainter, and melted into the sea. It was during this unwelcome passage that Mary Stuart composed the beautiful Farewell to France, which has been so often quoted : Farewell, beloved France, to thee! The cherished strand, That nursed my tender infancy? L. HOPE. Hope is the first great blessing here below, It is the staff of age-the sick man's health- It still holds on, nor quits us e'en in death. |