The palace of the Louvre became rich in the spoils of Bearn: tapestry, pictures, furniture, objects of _virtu_ of all kinds were borne away, and nothing left in its original place.

Louis the Fourteenth and his successor occupied themselves little with the country, except to levy subsidies upon it: they knew nor cared nothing for Navarre; except as it supplied them with titles or gave them funds.

Louis the Sixteenth, the last of the Bourbons who took the oath to observe the _Fors_[28] of Bearn, promised to act differently, and to occupy himself with this forgotten nook of his dominions; but the fatal events, prepared by his profligate predecessors of the last two reigns, which hurled him from his throne, prevented the accomplishment of his intentions.
[Footnote 28: The celebrated Laws of Bearn are called _Les Fors_.] As for the sovereign people, when they became rulers, the contempt with which they overwhelmed everything aristocratic, was bestowed in full measure on the abode of him who had been their friend: and the triumph of vengeance, ignorance, and ingratitude, was complete, here as elsewhere.
The neglected castle of the sovereigns of Bearn,--for none of whom, except the immediate family of the brave and bold Henry, need one care to be a champion--remained then a mighty heap of ruin, which every revolving year threatened to bring nearer to utter destruction; when another revolution, like an earthquake, whose shock may restore to their former place, rocks, which a preceding convulsion had removed, came to "renew old AEson:" Louis Philippe, to whom every nook and corner of his extensive kingdom seems familiar, so far from forgetting the _berceau_ of his great ancestor, hastened to extend to the castle of Pau a saving hand, and to bring forth from ruin and desolation the fabric which weeds and ivy were beginning to cover, and which would soon have been ranged with the shells of Chinon, Loches, and other wrecks of days gone by.
When the architect, employed by the king to execute the Herculean labour of restoring the castle of Pau, first arrived, and saw the state of dilapidation into which it had fallen, he must have been appalled at the magnitude of his undertaking.

Seeing it, as I do now,[29] grim, damp, rugged, ruined, and desolate, even in its state of transition, after several years of toil have been spent upon its long-deserted walls; I can only feel amazed that the task of renovating a place so decayed should ever have been attempted; but, after what has been done, it may well be hoped and expected that the great work will be, in the end, fully accomplished; and ten years hence, the visitor to Pau will disbelieve all that has been said of the melancholy appearance of the chateau of Henri Quatre.
[Footnote 29: This was written on the spot.] What must have been the state of things before the pretty bridge, which spans the road and leads from the castle terrace to the walk, called La Basse Plante, existed?
I am told that a muddy stream, bordered with piles of rubbish, filled up this portion of the scene; but, in less than a year, all was changed, and the pleasant terrace and neat walks which adorn this side of the castle are promises of much more, equally ornamental and agreeable.
Some of the tottering buildings attached to the strangely-irregular mass, were, it seems, condemned by the bewildered architect to demolition, as possessing no beauty, and encumbering the plans of improvement; but the late Duke of Orleans came to visit the castle, and had not the heart to give consent that any of the old walls, still standing, should be swept away.

He looked at the place with true poetic and antiquarian feeling, and arrested the hand of the mason, who would have destroyed that part called _La Chancellerie_, which extends between the donjon of Gaston Phoebus to the Tour Montauzet.