Page:Biographical and critical studies by James Thomson ("B.V.").djvu/43

 RABELAIS 27 privilege of the king, dated 1550, protecting not only the books already published but also the sequel to " Pantagruel," yet to see the light. This privilege distinctly states that Rabelais had also published several works in Greek, Latin, French, and Tuscan ; but of these, other than those already mentioned, nothing is known. Thus secured against religious persecution, he was recalled to France, and was thenceforward in great measure attached to the powerful house of Lorraine, while faithful to his old protectors, the Du Bellays, who remained his stead- fast friends. The Cardinal de Guise had just bought from the Duchess d'Etampes, who had been mistress of Francis I., the fine estate of Meudon, where, it being near Paris, he could reside with his brother, Henri de Lorraine, Duke de Guise, without remitting attendance at the court and council of the king. Cardinal du Bellay, as Bishop of Paris, had the vicarage {cure) of Meudon in his gift, and hastened to appoint to it Rabelais, thus gratifying the Lor- raines as well as himself ; the vicar {cure) in posses- sion, of course, resigning at a hint from such great men, and being presumably indemnified with some other benefice. Accordingly, on the 19th January 1551, Rabelais was inducted vicar of the parish church of St. Martin de Meudon by the Bishop of Treves, vicar-general of the Cardinal du Bellay ; and, as Mr. Besant remarks, he has since been generally known as Cur^ of Meudon, though he was this but two years out of a life of seventy, he being sixty- eight when appointed. He now resolved or ventured to pubUsh the fourth book of " Pantagruel," more daring in its satire and scepticism than any of the L