Black companies and white companies were everywhere seeking employment. But Bayard was not of this sort. "Sire, I know of but two masters, the God in heaven and the King of France on the earth." Even at the hour of death he could not overlook the desertion of one's standard. When Bourbon, who, if any could be justified. in such a desertion, expressed his grief, writhing in pain the dying man said: "I thank you for your sympathy, but I desire no pity at your hands. I die like a true man, in the service of my King and my country. Save your pity for yourself, who are bearing arms against your faith, your sovereign, and your nation." And in a few moments expired, murmuring, -the ruling passion strong in death," God and my country!"

Chivalry said the true knight must not descend to rapine and violence with the conquered. But the habit of the age was the reverse. When a city was taken, every innocent burgher had to tremble for his property, his own life, and the honor of his family. Note, now, the language of the knight, who in this respect certainly was without reproach. When told that, if he did not take a poor man's money, somebody else would, he answers: "My lord, I do that which I ought. God has not set me in this world to live by pillage or rapine. And, moreover, this poor man can go and hide his money, and when the war shall have passed out of the country he will be able to help himself therewith, and will pray to God for me." Note his practice. His works and his faith were yoked together equally. When he retired from a town which he had occupied, he first paid the good man or woman at whose house he had lodged a proper recompense, then remained the last man, that no mean camp follower might linger to insult and plunder.

A town in Naples revolted againt the King of France, who then held sway. At the entrance of the French general the frightened people flocked around him, humbly begging clemency, and bringing as a peace offering their poor store of silver, to the value of about $3,000. Their lives were granted. Then, looking round, the commander espied the good Chevalier. "Take these vessels," he said, "I present them to you for your kitchen." "My lord, I thank you humbly for your consideration; but for God's sake I pray of you not to make me take into mine house that which has belonged to this wretched people." Then, taking the vessels, he presented them piece by piece to each one present, without retaining one. And he but twenty-two, with not ten crowns that he could call his own! One saying of the good knight deserves to be written in letters of gold everywhere: "All empires, realms, and provinces, without justice, are forests full of brigands."

If there was any duty which the fourteenth, fifteenth, and sixteenth centuries set at naught, it was that which says that the strong must care for the defenceless, the widows and children who have none to look to for aid. Every hamlet was at the mercy of the spoiler. Every city stormed witnessed a saturnalia. But this was the very rule which was at the foundation of chivalry. We may say that it was the chief reason for its creation. It could not make wars to cease. It could strive to rob war of some of its needless horrors. Bayard in this respect was a true child of chivalry. This is the story which is told of the capture of Brescia. That unhappy town was taken, retaken, and taken again, the last time by the French. A scene ensued, not so awful as at Rome and Magdeburg, but terrible to the sufferers and disgraceful to the actors, "full," as the historian.

says, "of profligacies and enormities." Our knight was severely wounded at the moment of the capture, and was borne on a door to the house of a wealthy inhabitant. Grievously wounded as he was, he ordered the door of the mansion to be bolted, and set two archers to guard it, that no unauthorized person should enter. The lady of the house fell on her knees and said, "The house and all that is in it is yours by the right of war. But save my life and honor, and the life and honor of my two daughters." "Madam, I know not that I shall be able to escape from the wound that I have, but so long as I live neither to you nor to your daughters shall any offence be done." So this one house dwelt in safety amid the surrounding revelry. When at the end of a month he was able to go, the grateful woman brought a box containing two thousand five hundred ducats as an offering. This with thanks he declined. Seeing that she was pained at his refusal, he said, "Summon your two daughters," who had given him much diversion in his weakness by singing and playing on the lute and spinet. The two damsels, who were fair to look on, quickly came. He bid them spread out their aprons and then poured a thousand ducats into each. "For my recompense, pray to God for me." Then, turning to the mother, he adds, "Madam, I will take these five hundred ducats for my own profit, to distribute them among the poor convents of ladies who have been plundered, and thereof I give you the charge, for you will understand better than any other where the need is." This unbounded generosity was a part of himself. He carried out to the full the precept of ancient chivalry: "Be generous, give largesse, despise parsimony." He might have been rich. Into the purse of so successful a soldier the ransom money of captured knights and

their equipments poured more than a hundred thousand crowns. But he gave it all to those poorer than he, and died having little more than the small patrimony which he received by inheritance.

With this I close my insufficient account of one of the most brilliant and attractive figures which lights up the darkness and softens the harshness of the military annals of that period. The outlines of that life are an inalienable part of French history. But I am well aware that the anecdotes which fill up the outline are drawn from the report of one who calls himself "The Loyal Serviteur," and who was a soldier under Bayard, and served as his secretary. None but a really great and good man can be a hero to his valet. Nor could any commander inspire a humble dependant with such reverence, and lead him with no hope of reward to write with such childlike eloquence, unless his master had been a great and a good man too. Within this last thirty years many a saying and many a story have gathered around the memory of our martyr President, Abraham Lincoln, which may not be true to the letter, but so far as I know them they are true to the spirit. They let you into the real soul of the man. So these stories undoubtedly give you the genuine flavor of the life. "You can cheat one man, but you cannot cheat all men," is the French proverb. Especially you cannot cheat a whole generation. The chorus of praise, without one discordant sound, which comes down to us, cannot be disputed. Shall we not add our little note and say "the knight without fear and without reproach," or translate it into modern phrase, and call him "a saint and hero of the Middle Ages"?

FRANCIS DRAKE AND HIS TIMES.

LECTURE DELIVERED BEFORE THE CONCORD LYCEUM,
JANUARY 26, 1870.

"A SHORT, sturdy, plainly dressed man, with keen

gray eyes, bullet head of crisp brown hair, wrinkled forehead, high cheek-bones, short square face, the temples broad, the lips thick but firm as granite. A coarse plebeian stamp of a man. Yet the whole figure and attitude are full of boundless determination, self-possession, and energy."

Here is a portrait from a competent hand. The original was Francis Drake, mariner, buccaneer, world encompasser, vice admiral, in all capacities the pride of his countrymen, and feared and hated by Spaniards. To-day Francis Drake is scarcely more than a traditional name; and exploits which once startled all Europe take their place almost side by side with mediæval legends. But Francis Drake was the most robust reality of the sixteenth century. A sailor wellnigh from his cradle, the ablest navigator of his generation, in temper audacious yet prudent, in counsel secret, in preparation patient, in execution swift and fiery, he was the type of a great bold sea captain. If his achievements to our modern eyes smack of piracy, not on that account was he less fitted to play his part manfully in a contest not by any means waged according to Grotius and Vattel.

Glance for a moment at the nature and origin of that conflict in which Drake was so prominent an actor. In