WILLIAM AND MAKY.

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the boar and packs for the wolf, gerfalcons for the heron andhaggards for the wild duck. Iiis presence chamber and hisantechamber were in outward show as splendid as when he wasat Whitehall. He was still surrounded by blue ribands andwhite staves. But over the mansion and the domain brooded aconstant gloom, the effect, partly of bitter regrets and of de-ferred hopes, but chiefly of the abject superstition which hadtaken complete possession of his own mind, and which wasaffected by almost all those who aspired to his favour. Hispalace wore the aspect of a monastery. There were threeplaces of worship within the spacious pile. Thirty or fortyecclesiastics were lodged in the building; and their apartmentswere eyed with envy by noblemen and gentlemen who had fol-lowed the fortunes of their Sovereign, and who thought it hardthat, when there was so much room under his roof, they shouldbe forced to sleep in the garrets of-the neighbouring town.Among the murmurers was the brilliant Anthony Hamilton.He has left us a sketch of the life of Saint Germains, a slightsketch indeed, but not unworthy of the artist to whom we owethe most highly finished and vividly coloured picture of theEnglish Court in the days when the English Court was gayest.He complains that existence was one round of religiousexercises; that, in order to live in peace, it was necessary topass half the day in devotion or in the outward show’ of devo-tion; that, if he tried to dissipate his melancholy by breathingthe fresh air of that noble terrace which looks down on thevalley of the Seine, he was driven away by the clamour of aJesuit who had got hold of some unfortunate Protestant loyalistsfrom England, and was proving to them that no heretic couldgo to heaven. In general, Hamilton said, men suffering undera common calamity have a strong fellow feeling and are disposedto render good offices to each other. But it was not so at SaintGermains. There all was discord, jealousy, bitterness of spirit.

Macaulay, History. VII. 13

CHAP.

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J i>03.