Quentin, Calais, Jarnac, and
elsewhere. My mother, though only the daughter of an armorer's workman,
was, in goodness, an angel. I thank God that she sometimes has the upper
hand in me, although too often it is my father that prevails in me." He
sighed heavily, and looked remorseful.
In subsequent talk, as we rode, I learned that he was a soldier who had
learned war, when a boy, under Coligny. He had fought at his father's
side against Italians, Spanish, and English, and against his father in
civil war. His father had died of a knife-wound, received, not in battle,
but from a comrade in a quarrel about a woman, during the sacking of a
town. His mother, when the news of the fate of her unworthy spouse
reached the village where she lived, died of grief. The son was now
returning from that village, which was near Orleans, and whither he had
been on a visit to his relations, to Gascony, where he had been employed
as a soldier in the small army with which Henri of Navarre made shift to
garrison his towns.
I told him that I hoped to find a place in that little army.
"You do well, monsieur," said the young soldier, whose intelligence and
native dignity made him, despite his peasant origin, one with whom a
gentleman might converse. "Some day they will learn in France of what
stuff the little Bearnaise King is made. I have stood watching him when
he little supposed that a common soldier might take note of such things,
and I have seen on his face the sign of great intentions.
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