"Long live the King!" was once more shouted from mouth to mouth. "Gentlemen, his Majesty has been pleased, before his death, to sign a warrant appointing his mother Regent of France," announced Catherine once more to those assembled without. "Long live the Queen Regent," was the cry which announced to many an anxious heart of the various parties in the State, that the reign of the dreaded Queen-mother had commenced. "Let some of those without advance and seize that woman!" was the first order of the Regent. "Heed not her words! She is mad!" Catherine of Medicis spoke with greater truth than she herself believed. The shock of that scene of death, and strife, and evil passions, had again turned the old woman's brain. CONCLUSION. One of the first acts of the Regency of Catherine de Medicis, was to give directions for the hastening the trial of La Mole, upon the charge of sorcery against the life of the late King. Although, with the Regency in her power, and in daily expectation of the return from Poland of her favourite son, whose weak and pliant mind she was aware she could bend to her own will in every thing, and thus have the whole power of the government within her own grasp, yet she still pursued her vengeance against the man who, in conspiring to place another of her sons upon the throne, had thwarted her designs. The wax figure formed by Ruggieri, who himself was fully screened by the Queen-mother, was made to form a prominent feature in this celebrated trial; and it is well known that the unfortunate La Mole fell a victim to an ambition, which, in the confused and distracted state of affairs at the time, could scarcely have been looked upon as a crime. Among those who thronged to witness his execution was one, whose thread of life was nearly torn asunder by the blow of that axe which severed the beloved head from the trunk. Poor Jocelyne only recovered from the state of insensibility into which she fell, to linger on a few months of a wretched existence, during which she never spoke. Her heart was broken. The King's nurse was conveyed by the order of the Queen Regent to a place of security; but as soon as it was known that her senses were really lost, she was allowed to be taken back to her own home. Jocelyne's only thought for the living before her own death, was concentrated in her grandmother; when her bright spirit fled, it was Alayn who performed the mournful task of care for the welfare of the miserable old woman. Henry of Anjou returned from Poland to claim his Crown; and, as Henry the Third of France, he filled the country with the scandals of that folly, licentiousness, and weakness of mind, which were fostered by his mother, Catherine de Medicis, in order to retain the power she coveted, completely within her own grasp.