Turning to sorcery and magic, Charlemagne, it is said, had a talisman, to which frequent allusion is made in traditional history, and which the late Emperor Napoleon III., when Prince Louis Napoleon, was stated to have in his possession. This curiosity, which was described in the Parisian journals as “_la plus belle relique de l’Europe_,” has long excited much interest in the archæological circles on the Continent. It is of fine gold, of a round form, set with gems, and in the centre are two sapphires, and a portion of the Holy Cross. This talisman was found on the neck of Charlemagne when his tomb was opened, and was presented to Bonaparte, and by him to Hortense, the former Queen of Holland, at whose death it descended to her son Prince Louis, late Emperor of the French. Similarly, Henry VIII. had so great a superstitious veneration for the traditional virtues of a jewel which had for ages decked the shrine of Thomas à Becket at Canterbury, that he had it set in a ring, which he constantly wore on his thumb. The jewel was known as the “royal of France,” having been presented to the shrine of the murdered archbishop by Louis VII. in the year 1179. Indeed, amulets in one form or another have from early times been used by royalty; and we read in the old French chronicles how Gondebaud, King of Burgundy, in the fifth century sought as a talisman the aid of St. Sergius’s thumb--which, fastened to the right arm of a certain Eastern king, had always made him victorious--and how, when his request was not granted, he took by force a piece of the saint’s finger. And, likewise, on the death of Tippoo Saib, in the assault on his capital by the English troops, an English officer who was present at the discovery of his body among the slain, by permission of General Baird, took from the Sultan’s right arm the talisman which contained--sewed upon pieces of fine flowered silk--an amulet of a brittle, metallic substance of the colour of silver, and some magic words in Arabic and Persian characters. And, as a further instance of the superstitious tendency of Queen Elizabeth, Lady Southwell relates, “that the Queen, not being in very good health one day, Sir John Stanhope, Vice-Chamberlain, came and presented her Majesty with a piece of gold of the bigness of an angel, full of characters, which he said an old woman in Wales had bequeathed to her--the Queen--on her deathbed; and thereupon he discoursed how the said testatrix, by virtue of that piece of gold, had lived to the age of 120 years, and at that age, having all her body withered and consumed, she died, commanding the said piece of gold to be sent to her Majesty, alleging, further, that so long as she wore it on her body she could not die. The Queen, in confidence, took the gold and hung it round her neck.”