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We made an effort to see, or to fancy that we saw, an underground passage that was pointed out to us as that which once led to the dungeon upon whose stone foundation was placed the iron cage in which Cardinal la Balue was confined.
And it was Louis XI, that expert and past master in cruelty, who is said to have "perfected these prisons," which only needed the iron cage, designed to suit the King's good pleasure, to complete their horror. The invention of the iron cage has been accredited to Jean la Balue, Bishop of Angers, and also to the Bishop of Verdun.
Now, in his torments, not knowing if she were in the room, he came back and gave vent to a diabolical "Oh!" on beholding her near his master. "What do you mean?" exclaimed the king, looking at the priest in a way to give him the fever. "Sire," said La Balue, insolently, "the affairs of purgatory are in my ministry, and I am bound to inform you that there is sorcery going on in this house."
"I know nothing of either Louis XI. or Cardinal Balue; but the cage I speak of was an excellent invention, for all that." "Which you would like to prove to us by caging ourselves, eh?" "Sir Marmaduke Travers," continued Willis, "was an English gentleman, and he was travelling in Coromandel, no one knew why or for what purpose."
Balue, on beholding himself so near the boar, set up a dreadful cry for help, which, or perhaps the sight of the boar, produced such an effect on his horse, that the animal interrupted its headlong career by suddenly springing to one side; so that the Cardinal, who had long kept his seat only because the motion was straight forward, now fell heavily to the ground.
Historians have dwelt on his cruelty, perfidy, and superstition. Turbulent nobles, like St. Pol and Armagnac, were brought to the block; treacherous ministers, like Cardinal La Balue, were kept for years in iron cages; vulgar criminals swung from gibbets on every highroad.
Here rooms had been prepared for the king and a few of his suite, the others being quartered through the town. At the door Charles took his leave and Louis entered alone with Cardinal Balue and the attendants he had chosen to keep near him. These latter were nearly all of inferior birth, and were treated by their master with a familiarity very astonishing to the stately Burgundians.
Very different was the conduct of the proud Cardinal and Prelate, John of Balue, the favourite minister of Louis for the time, whose rise and character bore as close a resemblance to that of Wolsey, as the difference betwixt the crafty and politic Louis and the headlong and rash Henry VIII of England would permit.
De Commines tells us that the cage invented by Cardinal Balue, and in which he languished for eleven years, was narrower still. An average sized man could not stand therein upright. The bolts and bars are still in perfect order. Nothing more brings home to us the abomination of the whole thing than to see the official draw these Brobdingnagian bolts and turn these gigantic keys.
Before Balue could utter a word by way of answer or apology, his horse, seizing the bit with his teeth, went forth at an uncontrollable gallop, soon leaving behind the King and Dunois, who followed at a more regulated pace, enjoying the statesman's distressed predicament.
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