188 MONTHLY mEVlEW OF LlTERATURfi. 



at length done in due form, and the proclamation published by sound of 

 trumpet. 



" ' This was a blow that almost upset the brain of Gilles de Retz, enfeebled 

 by continual debauchery. Was he to sink at once into the station of a 

 private individual, and drag through an ignominious life the remembrance of 

 his past glories converted into present shame ? Money, it seemed, was the one 

 thing needful the bauble which he was accustomed to play with and throw 

 away. Were there not other means of obtaining it than by the sale of estates ? 

 Could it not be dragged from the mine or the deep by other methods than the 

 employment of capital and the working of machinery ? His thoughts darted 

 themselves into every hole and corner of human and superhuman speculation ; 

 and he gave to things possible and impossible the same eager and devout atten- 

 tion. The following is the result, as related by a Breton historian : 



" ' God not having listened to the impious desires of the marshal, this war- 

 rior resolved to obtain by other methods the power and riches of which he was 

 ambitious. He had heard that there existed on the earth men who, for cer- 

 tain considerations, had been enabled to overstep the bounds of the known 

 world, and to tear away the veil which separates finite beings from forms of 

 incorporeal air, and that the spirits subjected to their power were compelled 

 to minister to their smallest wishes. On the instant his emissiaries set out 

 to traverse Italy and Germany, to penetrate into distant solitudes and the 

 depths of primeval forests, and to sound the gloomy caverns where report had 

 placed the servants of the prince of darkness. Soon malefactors, rogues, and 

 vagabonds of all orders formed the court of Gilles de Retz. He saw appari- 

 tions, he heard voices ; sounds of terrible import were muttered from the 

 bosom of the earth, and in a little while the subterranean vaults of the cha- 

 teau resounded to the cries of victims. 



" ' The most odious ideas that ever entered into the depraved brain of the 

 alchymist were put into practice to effect the transmutation of metals, and 

 obtain that philosopher's stone which was to confer on them riches and im- 

 mortality. Mysterious furnaces were burning night and day ; but the real 

 treasures which disappeared in them were not sufficient to satisfy the cupidity 

 of the adepts by whom he was surrounded. They presented to him, at length, 

 an Indian sage, who, as they informed him, had travelled over the whole 

 earth, and from whom nature had been unable to preserve a single secret. 



" ' An imposing and severe countenance, eyes that dazzled those on whom 

 they shone, and a beard as white as snow, distinguished the man of the east ; 

 while his simple but elegant manners announced that he had lived habitually 

 with the great ones of the earth. Nothing appeared new or strange to him ; 

 no person, no event. He was almost always buried in profound silence ; but, 

 when he did condescend to speak, his discourse was of things so extraordinary, 

 so wonderful, or so terrible, and all occurring in his own presence, that Gilles 

 deRetz became fascinated while he listened, and delivered himself up, with all 

 the remains of his fortune, to this remarkable stranger. 



" ' It was then that the dungeons of the chateau echoed with groans and 

 were watered with tears. It became necessary to call up the prince of the 

 fallen angels, the contemner of God, the devil, Satan himself; and the only 

 cuirass which could preserve the invoker from the first effects of his indigna- 

 tion must be cemented with human blood. Nay, the marshal himself must 

 plunge the poniard into the heart of the victim, and count the quick convul- 

 sions that preceded and accompanied the instant of death. 



" ' At a short distance from the chateau there was a forest as ancient as 

 the world, in the centre of which a little spring, bursting from a rock, was 

 absorbed and disappeared in the ground. A thousand fearful tales were told 

 of this solitary spot. Phantoms glided, shrieking, through the trees ; and if 

 any of the neighbours, attracted either by pity or curiosity, approached the 

 unhallowed precincts, they were never more seen. Their bodies, it was sup- 

 posed, were buried round the spring. It was here that the Indian proposed 



