One relic of the knightly days, however, survived to the period of the first French Revolution. In the domain of Rambouillet was the fief of Montorgueil. It was held by the prior of St. Thomas d’Epernon, on the following service: the good prior was bound to present himself yearly at the gate of Rambouillet, bareheaded, with a garland on his brow, and mounted on a piebald horse, touching whom it was bad service if the animal had not four white feet. The prior, fully armed like a knight, save that his white gloves were of a delicate texture, carried a flask of wine at his saddle-bow. In one hand he held a cake, to the making of which had gone a bushel of flour--an equal measure of wheat was also the fee of the lord. The officers of the latter examined narrowly into the completeness of the service. If they pronounced it imperfect the prior of Epernon was mulcted of the revenues of his fief for the year ensuing. In later days the ceremony lost much of its meaning; but down to the period of its extinction, the wine, the cake, and the garland, were never wanting; and the maidens of Rambouillet were said to be more exacting than the baronial knights themselves, from whom many of them were descended. The festival was ever a joyous one, as became a feudal lord, whose kitchen fireplace was of such dimensions that a horseman might ride into it, and skim the pot as he stood in his stirrups. It is a singular thing that scarcely a monarch has had anything to do with the knightly residence of Rambouillet, but mischance has befallen him. The kings were unjust to the knights, and the latter found for the former a Nemesis. Francis I. was hunting in the woods of Rambouillet when he received the news of the death of Henry VIII. that knight-sovereign, with whom he had struggled on the Field of the Cloth of Gold. With the news, he received a shock, which the decay sprung from various excesses could not resist. He entered the chateau as the guest of the Chevalier d’Angennes, in whose family the proprietorship then resided. The chamber is still shown wherein he died, roaring in agony, and leaving proof of its power over him, in the pillow, which, in mingled rage and pain, he tore into strips with his teeth.