"The next day a tutor was appointed for Henri: he was a Roman Catholic
priest; but although he bore the character of a clergyman, he seemed to
have no thought of religion; he took great pains to teach Henri such
things as he thought would please his father and mother, and make him
appear clever before his fellow-creatures, but he had no desire to make
him a good man. Besides this tutor, Henri had masters to teach him
music and dancing and drawing, and all such things as were wont to be
taught to the children of the great men at that time in France. Thus
Henri's mornings were employed by attending on his masters; and his
mother often in the evening took him out to pay visits, and to balls
and public amusements. He was introduced several times to the King, and
became acquainted with all the nobility in Paris. But, amongst all
these worldly pleasures and enjoyments, God still held the heart of
Henri; so that he took no delight in all these fine things, and would
have preferred Claude's cottage to all the splendours of Paris.
"When Henri had been in Paris about six months, it happened that one
day his father went to the King's palace to pay his court: so it was,
that something had vexed the King that day, and he did not receive the
Marquis so cordially as he had been used to do. This affronted the
Marquis so much (for he was a very proud man) that from that time he
gave himself up altogether to abusing the King, and contriving how to
do him mischief; and he invited to his house all the people of
consequence in Paris who were discontented with the King: so that his
house was filled with bad people, who were always contriving mischief
against the King. These people used to meet almost every evening to sup
at the Marquis's; and you would be shocked if I were to repeat to you
the language which they used, and how they used to rail against their
King. On these occasions they drank abundance of wine; after which they
used to play at cards for large sums of money; and the Marquis and
Marchioness not being so clever in play as some others of the party,
lost a great deal of money; so that what with their extravagance, and
what with the money they lost at cards, they had almost wasted all they
possessed, and were in debt to everybody who supplied them with
anything.
"Poor Henri, although so young, understood very well the wicked way in
which his father and mother went on; and though he did not dare to
speak to his father about the manner of life he led, yet he spoke
several times to his mother. Sometimes the Marchioness would laugh at
Henri when he talked to her in this way; and sometimes she would be
quite angry, and tell him that he was meddling with things he could not
understand.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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