Chapter L. The Worn Path

ADVERTISEMENT

These papers were found among the archives of Philip Herault de Douglas, erewhile Lord of Cour Cheverney in Touraine, and Montreal, not far from Nantua in the Bugey. They have, as is evident, been originally written in the North English or Scots Lallan tongue by Margaret Douglas herself. But, by misfortune of years or lacune of transmission, parts of the lady’s narrative have been supplied in the French of a later period, probably by the hand of the aforesaid Philip Herault himself--who was sometime Chancellor to King Henry IV. of France, and claimed consanguinity, if not quite rectilineal descent, from the Scottish house of the Dukes of Touraine, Douglases of the Black. The worthy Chancellor has manifested the truth of the maxim--“like master, like man,” by adding to the simple Scots narrative many notes, of a nature calculated rather to please Maitre François of Meudon, or that high dame Marguerite of Navarre, than the discerning reader of other times, for whom the present transcript is intended. The editor has only glanced at these upon occasion, but the parts which have had to be translated over again from the French of Chancellor Philip (of the Bar Sinister) remain, in spite of all care of excision and rewriting to the original pattern, perfectly distinguishable to the critical eye.