A Gentleman from Gascony: A Romance of the Huguenots — page 113: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

‘THE KING'S PHYSICIAN. 109 “It is true,” said one. “Henri de Bourbon has recanted.” “Impossible!” “Peste! Whynot? The king offered him his choice: Death, mass, or the Bastile, and he chose the easiest— mass.” The chevalier’s first impulse was to turn and give | the young man the lie in his teeth, but fortunately “Look before you leap” flashed across his mind and he refrained in time. For any one openly championing the cause of the King of Navarre, with the temper of the populace such as it was,.would undoubtedly have been slain, in spite of the king’s edict. ' Not for one moment did Raoul believe the young man’s statement was true. And yet in this case his confidence was misplaced, as he was destined to know beyond a doubt at no distant date. The King of Na- varre fad recanted. It is no place here to question this act of him who was destined to be one of the greatest kings France has ever known. It was all a question of policy, and, looked at in that light, perhaps justified. At all events the recantation was afterward publicly disavowed, and Henri de Bourbon lived and died in the faith in which he was reared by his martyr mother. Raoul received a warm welcome from Beppa on his arrival at the Green Dragon, and was installed in the innkeeper’s own private room, which led off of the chief apartment of the inn, corresponding to what is known in modern times as the café. The horse had arrived, and the chevalier at once proceeded to make acquaintance with it. It was a magnificent animal of pure Castilian breed. Raoul stroked its glossy neck, and the animal, with a low whinny, laid its velvet muzzle against his cheek. At (©) Comicbooks