And the order being obeyed, he
said to the astrologer, "Well, Mr. Lilly, your second prediction has
come to pass. We have had the Plague, and now we have the Fire. You may
thank my clemency that I do not order you to be cast into the flames,
like the poor wretch who has just perished before our eyes, as a wizard
and professor of the black art. How did you obtain information of these
fatal events?"
"By a careful study of the heavenly bodies, sire," replied Lilly, "and
by long and patient calculations, which, if your majesty or any of your
attendants had had leisure or inclination to make, would have afforded
you the same information. _I_ make no pretence to the gift of prophecy,
but this calamity was predicted in the last century."
"Indeed! by whom?" asked the king.
"By Michael Nostradamus," replied Lilly; "his prediction runs thus:--
'La sang du juste a Londres fera faute,
Bruslez par feu, le vingt et trois, les Six;
La Dame antique cherra de place haute,
De meme secte plusieurs seront occis.'[1]
And thus I venture to explain it. The 'blood of the just' refers to the
impious and execrable murder of your majesty's royal father of blessed
memory. 'Three-and-twenty and six' gives the exact year of the calamity;
and it may likewise give us, as will be seen by computation hereafter,
the amount of habitations to be destroyed.
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