The true northerner. [volume] (Paw Paw, Mich.) 1855-1920, 1874-05-27
The Man in the Iron Mask.

No prisoner has ever occasioned so
much wonder, or led to as many ques-
tons as the famous man in the iron
mask" He appeared in several prisons
in France during the reign of Louis
XIV, being first seen in 1919. He was
always guarded with the greatest care,
and treated in a style which induced
many to believe that he was royal or q
princely parsonage. He wore mask
of iron, and it was commonly said that
the portion about the month was con-
trived with springs, so that he could eat
or drink without removing it. 1t was
believed to have been riveted upon his
head, and that he was compelled to
sleep in it.
When questions were asked, it was
answered, :" 1t is secret of state, and
can never be revealed" People would
often stand at distance, looking up to
the window of the apartment in which
this man was an unwilling inmate, and
would listen to the strange stories that
were told of him, which, L need not say,
were generally without foundation.
Some said that he was connected with
the royal family of France some that
gland, who had risen in rebellion
against his king others that he was the
son of Oliver Cromwell or an Armenian
patriarch.
Once, when moved from one prison to
another the man wore black mask of
velvet and oilcloth was thrown over
him, so that he could hold no commune
cation with his carriers or with the
outside world. In this journey, for
want of air, he nearly expired. Eleven
years of his captivity he spent on the
Isle of st. Margaret, on the southern
coast of France. His lonely chamber
overlooked the sea, and was lighted by
one grated window,
While here one day he scratched
some sentences on a metal plate with
the point of knife, and threw it from
the window upon the beach. A fisher
man, who could not read, carried the
plate to st. Mars, the keeper of the
castle, who was at first considerably
alarmed, but ascertaining that the man
could not real, and that he knew
nothing of what had been written, he
felt easier.
When ST. Mars was appointed gov
ernor OF the Bastile, the terrible prison
of Paris, the man in the iron mask
went with him. Here, as at the other
prisons, he appeared to the people out
side as the same mysterious hero. He
was still fond of music, but he did not
play upon the guitar so often as for
merly, for he was growing old. He
died in the year 1903.
1t was finally discovered that the
Man in the Iron Mask was not very
romantic or celebrated after all. He
was an Italian named Matthioli, man
of noble family, educated for the law.
Being ambitious, he entered into a
secret plan to sell Casal, an Italian
city, to Louis XIV, which would open
the door to his occupation of the Milan
territories.
The imprudent Matthioli could moi
keep the secret for sum of money
he sold it to some agents of the Span.
ish government, and thus he exasper
ated Louis, whose trickery was now
exposed. For this act he was enticeC
into France, arrested and imprisoned
for life.
The splendid reign of Louis XIV. is
considerably the French a bright pag,
in their history, but it was noted fol
kingly tyranny, vainglory and gross
imm Qualities. Abuses of power ant
wickedness in high places so debased {
proud people that they fell more anC
more into corruption, and suffered thu