THE present chapter will embrace the history of ten years in the life of Palissy—years full of terrible interest to France, during which there were two more bursts of civil war, with intervals of peace between, and followed by that event of world-wide renown in the annals of crime and blood, the massacre of St. Bartholomew. During those years Bernard was quietly and laboriously engaged, protected from harm by the patronage of the court, and probably also, having learned from experience the necessity of a prudent restraint in the utterance of his opinions. [Picture: Palissy dishes] Arrived at Paris, he established his workshop in a place allotted to him in the precincts of the Tuileries, and the gardens that partly occupied the site of the new palace, and surrounded by the debris of buildings that had to be removed, and the scaffolding of workmen who were engaged about the new erections. At no great distance was the Louvre itself, then a new structure and the royal residence; and queen Catherine, attended by her courtiers, frequently went to watch the progress of the buildings, and to direct, with her admirable taste, the works of Palissy, familiarly known as “Master Bernard, of the Tuileries.” There is still in existence, in the royal library at Paris, a MS., containing an account of the queen’s expenditures, dated 1570, among which is a note of payment “to Bernard, Nicole, and Mathurin Palissy, sculptors in earth, for the sum of 2,600 livres, for all the works in earth, baked and enamelled, which have yet to be made to complete the _quatre pans au pourtour_, (the four parts of the circumference) of the grotto commenced by the queen, in her palace, near the Louvre at Paris, according to the agreement made with them.”