But be sure, my friend"-- and as the speaker's tone changed and grew full and proud, his form seemed to swell with it--"be sure the cruel shall not live out half their days! No.

He that takes the knife shall perish by the knife! And go to his own place! I shall not see it, but you will!" His words made no great impression on me then.

My hardihood was returning.

I was throbbing with fierce excitement, and tingling for the fight.

But years afterwards, when the two who stood highest in the group about Coligny's threshold died, the one at thirty-eight, the other at thirty-five--when Henry of Guise and Henry of Valois died within six months of one another by the assassin's knife--I remembered Pavannes' augury.