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This became the subject of conversation one evening at the coucher of Louis XV. 'You will see, Sire, said a courtier, whose office placed him in close communication with the King, 'that all this will make it absolutely necessary to assemble the States General!
I followed his advice and went; nobody spoke to me, but as I was unknown everyone looked at me and enquired who I was. The Abbe Gama asked me which was the lady who appeared to me the most amiable, and I shewed one to him; but I regretted having done so, for the courtier went to her, and of course informed her of what I had said.
She started, and a half smile came across her beautiful face. Melville himself for the first time in his life, felt embarrassed-but he spoke up, and in the tone of a courtier, said: "Fair maiden-can a poor confectioner offer you anything this morning." "What have you?" said she, with a sweet smile.
"A man who looks to me half courtier, half soldier." Chicot heard these words, and advanced. "It is I, sire." "What! M. Chicot in Navarre! Ventre St. Gris! welcome, dear M. Chicot!" "A thousand thanks, sire." "Quite well? Ah, parbleu! we will drink together, I am quite delighted. Chicot, sit down there." And he pointed to a grass bank. "Oh no, sire!"
After that outcry, made by a man who was really in despair, the young courtier gave a bound, dagger in hand, and reached the landing. But the myrmidons of the grand provost were accustomed to such proceedings.
Lauzun, like a skilful courtier, made all possible use of the two Courts, and procured for himself many interviews with the King, in which he received minor commissions.
A large part of William Penn's life as a courtier was spent in rescuing prisoners, exiles, and condemned persons of all sorts, and not merely those of his own faith. So the undertaking to make of Jersey two colonies, one a refuge for Quakers and the other a refuge for Covenanters, was natural enough, and it was a very broad-minded plan for that age.
"I hate its mean stupidities, I hate the sound of its voice, and the look on its face it's so ugly, it's so little. Courtier, I suffer purgatory from the thought that I shall scrape in by the votes of the mob. There is sin in using this creature and I am expiating it." To this strange outburst, Courtier at first made no reply.
There he first began to hear of the plans of a group of Quakers to found colonies on the Delaware in America. Forty years afterwards he wrote, "I had an opening of joy as to these parts in the year 1661 at Oxford." And with America and the Quakers, in spite of a brief youthful experience as a soldier and a courtier, William Penn's life, as well as his fame, is indissolubly linked.
But something in the strangeness of the king's preface, although I had it in my heart to die for him, gave me check, and I answered, with an air of great humility, 'You will think me but a poor courtier now, sire, yet he is a fool who jumps into a ditch without measuring the depth. I would fain, if I may say it without disrespect, hear all that you can tell me.
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