Marshal had a royal passport intended for the
use of two persons in his service — that is to
say, of his steward, the Sieur de Fraisse, and
of one of the pages, who was accustomed to
carry his written orders to the commanding
officer of a troop of soldiers, then in garrison
in the country. It was arranged that the
steward should make use of the passport
immediately, and that he should take Jacques
with him in the character of page.

At the gate of the city by which they
passed out, they found the Sieur de Born
waiting to lend them his assistance, in case
of any difficulties. He introduced Jacques
to the official persons who examined the
passport, as a relation of his own, who
had recently entered the service of the
Marshal de Birou. Thanks to this
recommendation, the passport proved effectual;
and the steward and the page rode through
the gate without hindrance and without
question.

As soon as they passed the guard, Jacques
asked where they were going to. "We are
going into the country, if it pleases God,"
said the Sieur de Fraisse. "I hope from
my heart it may please Him," answered
Jacques. And away they went along the
high road.

After two days' riding they put up at an
inn, where they met with a Person of
Quality, who had arrived before them, and
who rejoiced in a train of seven mounted
servants. The Person of Quality was a
zealous Papist, and talked in high spirits of
the successful slaughtering of the scoundrelly
Huguenots, as he called them. He also took
a great fancy to Jacques, and proposed, as
they were travelling the same way, to offer
him the protection of his train of seven
mounted servants. Jacques and the steward
were afraid to decline this offer. So the next
day they all travelled together.

When they put up again for the night, the
Person of Quality, ordered his dressing-
gown to make himself comfortable after the
journey. Jacques recognised the pattern the
moment the dressing-gown was produced. It
had belonged to his father.

Once wrapped up comfortably, with his
boots off and his legs on a chair, the Person
of Quality, resumed his rejoicings over the
massacre of the Huguenots. He said that
only one mistake of any consequence had been
committed in the execution of that righteous
butchery, and that was caused by allowing
the Sieur de Caumont (Jacques' uncle) to
escape. This circumstance the Person of
Quality sincerely regretted; but he was
consoled by calling to mind that M. de la Force
and both his children had perished, at any
rate; and he was not without hope that he
might yet find out the place of the Sieur de
Caumont's retreat, and have the satisfaction
of killing that detestable Huguenot with his
own hands.

This discourse and the discovery of the
dressing-gown had such an effect on Jacques,
that he took the first opportunity of
entreating the steward to find out some
means of continuing their journey alone, the
next day. The Sieur de Fraisse was only
too anxious to grant the request. He and
Jacques rose the next morning before
daybreak, paid their bill, called for their horses,
and rode off, while the Person of Quality was
fast asleep.

They encountered other dangers from stray
Papist travellers, from which they escaped,
however, with very little difficulty. The
further they got from Paris, the fewer risks
they ran. On the eighth day after their
departure, they reached a large building,
situated in a very remote place, and called
Castlenau. This was the end of their journey;
for here the Sieur de Caumont had
flown for refuge, after riding out to the
Pré-aux-Clercs with the rest of the Huguenot
fugitives.

"Nobody," says the ancient chronicler from
whose pages these particulars are taken—
"nobody would believe, if I tried to relate it,
how the Sieur de Caumont rejoiced over the
recovery of the nephew whom he had given
up for dead. From that time forth he loved
the boy as if he had been his son; and the
first lesson he taught him was to thank God,
on his knees, night and morning, for his
deliverance from death."

It is good to know that Jacques showed
himself well worthy of his uncle's affection
and care. He entered the army, and rose to
the highest distinction as a soldier. In
French history his name is famous, as the
Marshal de la Force. He escaped death on
the field of battle as marvellously as he had
escaped it in the streets of Paris, and he
lived prosperously to the ripe old age of
eighty-four years.

This is all there is to tell of the escape
of Jacques from the Massacre of St.
Bartholomew's Day.

A NEW IDEA OF AN OLD SLAVE-CAPTAIN.

THERE is probably scarcely a full-grown
person in this kingdom, who, in connection
with the slave-trade, has not heard of the
"horrors of the middle passage." The
pictures that we have had presented to us of the
treatment of negroes in their transit from
Africa to America have invariably been of
the most horrible and heart-rending kind.
Doubtless there is much painful truth in the
statements of the sufferings of the slaves in
their journey from the interior to the coast,
and afterwards in their passage across the
Atlantic, even after allowing for the pardonable
colouring imparted to such statements
by the sensitive humanity of those noble and
disinterested men, who, amidst all the false
principles and venal legislation of the latter
part of the last, and the commencement of