He soon wearied of the antechambers of the Louvre. It was
here, however, that his destiny awaited him, and the work of his life
was unfolded. Aymar de Chastes, Commander of the Order of St. John and
Governor of Dieppe, a gray-haired veteran of the civil wars, wished to
mark his closing days with some notable achievement for France and the
Church. To no man was the King more deeply indebted. In his darkest
hour, when the hosts of the League were gathering round him, when
friends were falling off, and the Parisians, exulting in his certain
ruin, were hiring the windows of the Rue St. Antoine to see him led to
the Bastille, De Chastes, without condition or reserve, gave up to him
the town and castle of Dieppe. Thus he was enabled to fight beneath its
walls the battle of Arques, the first in the series of successes which
secured his triumph; and he had been heard to say that to this friend in
his adversity he owed his own salvation and that of France.
De Chastes was one of those men who, amid the strife of factions and
rage of rival fanaticisms, make reason and patriotism their watchwords,
and stand on the firm ground of a strong and resolute moderation. He had
resisted the madness of Leaguer and Huguenot alike; yet, though a foe of
the League, the old soldier was a devout Catholic, and it seemed in his
eyes a noble consummation of his life to plant the cross and the
fleur-de-lis in the wilderness of New France.
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