our great virtues and our chief faults are born and die with us. My
faults, alas! have been many and great. In my youth I knew but one virtue:
to love my friend; and that was strong within me. How fortunate for us it
would be if we could begin our life in wisdom and end it in simplicity,
instead of the reverse which now obtains!

I remained with my granduncle, the Great Duke, and was brought up amid the
fighting, vice, and piety of his sumptuous court. I was trained to arms,
and at an early age became Esquire in Waiting to his Grace of Guise. Most
of my days between my fifteenth and twenty-fifth years were spent in the
wars. At the age of twenty-five I returned to the château, there to reside
as my uncle's representative, and to endure the ennui of peace. At the
château I found a fair, tall girl, fifteen years of age: Mary Stuart,
Queen of Scotland, soon afterward Queen of France and rightful heiress to
the English throne. The ennui of peace, did I say? Soon I had no fear of
its depressing effect, for Mary Stuart was one of those women near whose
fascinations peace does not thrive. When I found her at the château, my
martial ardor lost its warmth. Another sort of flame took up its home in
my heart, and no power could have turned me to the wars again.

Ah! what a gay, delightful life, tinctured with bitterness, we led in the
grand old château, and looking back at it how heartless, godless, and
empty it seems. Do not from these words conclude that I am a fanatic, nor
that I shall pour into your ears a ranter's tale; for cant is more to be
despised even than godlessness; but during the period of my life of which
I shall write I learned--but what I learned I shall in due time tell you.

While at the court of Guise I, like many another man, conceived for Mary
Stuart a passion which lay heavy upon my heart for many years. Sweethearts
I had by the scores, but she held my longings from all of them until I