ST.-GERMAIN-L'AUXERROIS.
The Massacre of St. Bartholomew--The Events that preceded it--Catherine
de Medicis--Admiral Coligny--"The King-Slayer"--The Signal for the
Massacre--Marriage of the Duc de Joyeuse and Marguerite of Lorraine.
One of the oldest and most interesting churches in Paris is that of
St. Germain l'Auxerrois, which, dating from the last days of Lutetia,
before the name of Parisius, or Paris, had been finally adopted for the
gradually expanding city, is closely associated with the most terrible
event in French history. Still, at the present time, in a perfect
state of preservation, it was built about the year 572; and just one
thousand years afterwards, in 1572, the signal for the massacre of St.
Bartholomew's Day was sounded from its belfry. Philip II., King of
Spain, Pope Pius IV., and the Guises, especially Cardinal de Lorraine,
were the authors of the massacre. Catherine de Medicis and her son
Charles IX., King of France, were but accomplices and executants in
the atrocious plot. Before speaking of the principal incidents of this
ghastly day, a glance is necessary at the events which preceded it.
Charles IX. and his sister Elizabeth, wife of Philip II., had brought
together at Bayonne, in 1565, all the most distinguished members of
the French Court. But the dominating figure of the assembly was the
too famous Duke of Alva, worthy confidant and adviser of Philip II.
Catherine de Medicis had frequent conferences with the duke, and in
spite of the secrecy with which they were conducted, certain words
reached the ear of the Prince of Béarn, afterwards Henry IV., whose
extreme youth disarmed all suspicion, but who perceived, nevertheless,
that the object of these conversations was to determine the best method
of destroying the Protestants in France. The young prince hastened to
tell the Queen of Navarre, his mother, and she informed the Prince de
Condé and Admiral de Coligny, chiefs of the Protestant party, who at
once took counsel as to how the blow with which they were threatened
could be averted.
The next year, in 1566, the assembly at Moulins furnished an opportunity
for bringing about a reconciliation between the Catholic house of Guise
and the Protestant house of Châtillon. But so little sincerity was there
in the compact of peace, that just after the assembly had broken up
Coligny was apprised that a plot had been formed for his assassination.
He complained to the king, and was now more than ever on his guard.
The whole of the Protestant party became filled with mistrust; and
observing this, Catherine de Medicis determined to strike her blow at
once. It was difficult, of course, to raise troops without alarming the
Huguenots. But it so chanced that an army sent by the King of Spain
to the Low Countries was then marching along the French frontiers.
As if apprehensive for the safety of her dominions, Catherine raised
6,000 Swiss troops, and after the Spaniards had passed towards their
destination, marched them to the centre of the kingdom. Everything
seemed to favour Catherine's designs. But someone having informed the
Calvinists of the peril which threatened them, they assembled in the
house of the admiral at Châtillon, and there resolved to seize upon the
Court, which was enjoying the fine weather at Monceau, in Brie, without
the least precaution for its own safety; as though it had nothing to
fear from that body of men whose destruction it notoriously meditated.
The design of the Protestants was to drive away the Guises, and place
the king and queen at the head of their own party. The attempt, however,
failed through the firm attitude of the Swiss troops, who repulsed the
attack of Andelot and La Rochefoucauld, and brought the king from Meaux
to Paris surrounded by a strong battalion.
The war began again, and the Calvinists, commanded by the Prince
de Condé, were defeated, the prince himself being slain, or rather
assassinated, during the conflict. He had just surrendered to Dargence,
when Montesquieu, captain of the Duke of Anjou's guard, on learning who
he was, shot him in the head, exclaiming, "Tuez! Tuez, Mordieu!"
The Prince of Béarn now became the chief of the Protestant party, and
as such, directed their forces at the Battle of Jarnac, with Coligny
as second in command. The result of this engagement was a temporary
peace, by which certain privileges were granted to the Protestants: not
to be enjoyed, but simply to inspire a false confidence. It was not so
easy to deceive Admiral Coligny, who, observing that the Guises had
lost nothing of the influence they exercised over the king and queen,
resolved to remain still upon his guard. At last, however, Catherine
de Medicis succeeded in enticing him to the Court, and with him the
Queen of Navarre, the Prince of Béarn, and the foremost chiefs of the
Protestant party. Catherine spoke in a confiding tone to the old admiral
about the war she pretended to contemplate against Flanders, and the
king said to him, with a familiar slap on the shoulder: "I have you now,
and don't intend to let you go." Flattered by these attentions, he felt
secure, though many of his friends still doubted the sincerity of the
king and queen. Their suspicions were confirmed by the sudden death of
the Queen of Navarre, which was attributed to poison. Vainly, however,
did they attempt to awaken the brave old admiral to his danger. He had,
by express permission of the king, made a journey to Châtillon, and
many of the Protestant chiefs warned and entreated him on no account to
return to the Court. One of them, Langoiran by name, asked the admiral's
permission to quit his service. "Why?" said Coligny, in astonishment.
"Because," replied Langoiran, "they are loading us with caresses, and
I would rather fly like a dog than die like a dupe." Nothing, however,
could disturb the confidence of the admiral, who returned to Paris only
to throw himself into the arms of his assassins.
The young King of Navarre, the future Henry IV., was about to be married
to the sister of the King of France, and the ceremony was to be made the
occasion of all kinds of entertainments and festivities. The enemies
of the Protestants were meanwhile preparing their massacre; and in the
first place the death of Coligny was resolved upon.
When Richard III., in Shakespeare's play, says to one of his pages,
"Know'st thou a murderer?" the ingenuous youth replies--
"I know a ruined gentleman
Whose humble means match not his haughty tastes."
A gentleman of this sort (and it was precisely from such material during
the Renaissance that murderers were formed) presented himself in La
Brie, the favourite country of witchery and bedevilment. He was called
Maurevel, and surnamed, for no obvious reason, "the King-slayer." Hired
for the purpose, he concealed himself in a house in the Rue des Fossés
Saint Germain l'Auxerrois, whence, just as Coligny passed by, on his
way from the Louvre to dine at his house in Rue Béthizi, he fired at
him with an arquebus, wounding him severely in the left arm and cutting
off the forefinger of his left hand. Without showing much emotion,
Coligny pointed to the house from which the shots had proceeded (the
arquebus was loaded with several bullets), and tried to get the assassin
arrested; but he had already fled. Then, leaning on his servants, he
finished the journey to his own house on foot.
The king was playing at tennis when the news of the infamous act was
brought to him. "Shall I never have any peace?" he exclaimed, as he
threw down his racquet. The admiral's friends resolved to complain at
once to the king, and to demand justice. For this purpose Henry, King of
Navarre, accompanied by the Prince de Condé, went to the palace, when
Charles replied, with an oath, that he would inflict punishment. It was
evident, he added, that a crime of this kind was a threat against the
life of the king himself, and that no one would henceforth be safe if it
were left unavenged.
The king, profanely as he spoke, was sincere; nor had the remotest
thought of a massacre yet entered his head. The very day of the
attack on Coligny he paid a visit of sympathy to the wounded admiral,
accompanied by his mother, the Duke of Anjou, and a brilliant suite.
He called him the bravest general in the kingdom, and assured him that
his assailant should be terribly punished, and the edict in favour of
Protestants in France absolutely obeyed.
Hitherto the queen had not dared to breathe to the king a word of her
murderous designs, fearing an explosion of indignation on his part; and
Charles's first bursts of passion were always terrible. But as they were
returning to the Louvre from their visit to the admiral she succeeded in
frightening her royal son by hinting at the dark and foul projects which
she attributed to the admiral. So enraged was the king that she could
now fearlessly own to him that everything had taken place by her orders
and those of the Dukes of Anjou and Guise.
The too credulous Charles vowed that in face of such nefarious plots on
the part of the Protestants, Coligny should die, and the Huguenots be
put wholesale to the sword, so that not one should survive to reproach
him with the act.
The massacre being thus decided upon, it now only remained to put the
infamous project into execution. In a conference at the Tuileries
between the king, the Duke of Anjou, the Duke of Nevers, the Count of
Angoulême, illegitimate brother of the king, the keeper of the seals,
Birague, Marshal de Tavanne and Count de Retz, the slaughter was fixed
for Sunday, August 24th, 1572, the day of the Feast of St. Bartholomew.
There was a difference of opinion as to whether the King of Navarre,
the Prince de Condé, and the Montmorencys should be included in the
massacre. Then Tavanne summoned Jean Charron, provost of the merchants,
and in the king's presence ordered him to arm the Citizen Companies, and
to march them at midnight to the Hôtel de Ville for active service.
[Illustration: CHURCH OF ST.-GERMAIN-L'AUXERROIS.]
The ferocious impatience of the Duke of Guise, who had undertaken the
murder of Coligny, did not allow him to await the signal agreed upon for
the massacre. He hurried, at two o'clock in the morning, to the house
of the admiral, and ordered the gates to be opened in the name of the
king. An officer, commanding the guard stationed in the court-yard to
protect the admiral's person, turned traitor, and admitted the assassins
with a deferential salute. Three colonels in the French army, Petrucci,
Siennois, and Besme; a German, a native of Picardy named Attin,
Sarlaboux, and a few other gentlemen, rushed up the staircase, shouting,
"Death to him!" At these words Coligny, understanding that his life was
as good as lost, got up, and leaning against the wall, was saying his
prayers, when the assassins broke into his room. Besme advanced towards
him. "Are you Coligny?" he asked, with the point of his sword at the
old man's throat. "I am," he replied with calmness; "but will you not
respect my age?" Besme plunged his sword into the admiral's body, drew
it out smoking, and then struck his victim several times in the face.
The admiral fell, and Besme, hastening to the window, cried out to the
Catholic noblemen who were waiting in the court-yard, "It is done!" "M.
d'Angoulême will not believe it till he sees the corpse at his feet,"
replied the Duke of Guise. Sarlaboux and Besme seized the body and threw
it into the court-yard. The Duke of Angoulême wiped the admiral's face
with his handkerchief; Guise said, "It is really he"; and both of them,
after kicking the body with ferocious delight, leaped on horseback, and
exclaimed, "Courage, soldiers! we have begun well; let us now see to
the others. By order of the King!"
[Illustration: THE PRINCIPAL STREETS OF PARIS.]
This crime had scarcely been consummated when the great bell of
St.-Germain-l'Auxerrois gave the signal for the massacre, which soon
became general. At the cries and shrieks raised round them, the
Calvinists came out of their houses, half-naked and without arms, to
be slain by the troops of the Duke of Guise, who himself ran along
the streets, shouting "To arms!" and inciting the people to massacre.
The butchery was universal and indiscriminate, without distinction of
age or sex. The air resounded with the yells of the assassins and the
groans of their victims. When daylight broke upon the hideous picture,
bodies bathed in gore were everywhere to be seen. Dead and dying were
collected, and thrown promiscuously into the Seine. Within the precincts
of the palace, the royal guards, drawn up in two lines, killed with
battle-axes unhappy wretches who were brought to them unarmed and thrust
beneath their very weapons. Some fell without a murmur; others protested
with their last breath against the treachery of the king, who had sworn
to defend them. At daybreak the king went to the window of his bedroom,
and seeing some unfortunate Protestants making a frantic attempt to
escape by swimming across the river, seized an arquebus and fired upon
them, exclaiming, "Die, you wretches!"
Marsillac, Count de la Rochefoucauld, one of the king's favourites,
had passed a portion of the night with him, when Charles, who had some
thought of saving his life, advised him to sleep in the Louvre. But he
at last let him go, and Marsillac was stabbed as he went out.
Antoine of Clermont Renel, running away in his shirt, was massacred by
his cousin, Bussy d'Amboise. Count Teligni, who, ten months before,
had married Admiral de Coligny's daughter, possessed such an agreeable
countenance and such gentle manners that the first assassins who entered
his house could not make up their minds to strike him. But they were
followed by others less scrupulous, who at once put the young man to
death. An advocate named Taverny, assisted by one servant, resisted at
his house a siege which lasted nine hours; though, after exhausting
every means of defence, he was at last slain. Several noblemen attached
to the King of Navarre were assassinated in his abode. The prince
himself and Condé, his cousin, were arrested, and threatened with death.
Charles IX., however, spared them on their abjuring Calvinism.
A few days before the massacre Caumont de la Force had bought some
horses of a dealer, who, chancing to be in the immediate neighbourhood
when Admiral de Coligny was assassinated, hastened to inform his
customer, well known as one of the Protestant leaders, of what had taken
place. This nobleman and his two sons lived in the Faubourg St.-Germain,
which was not yet connected with the right bank by any bridge. The
horse-dealer, therefore, swam across the Seine to warn La Force, who,
however, had already effected his escape. But as his children were not
following him, he returned to save them, and had scarcely set foot in
his house when the assassins were upon him. Their leader, a man named
Martin, entered his room, disarmed both father and sons, and told them
they must die. La Force offered the would-be murderers a ransom of 2,000
crowns, payable in two days. The chief accepted, and told La Force and
his children to place in their hats paper crosses, and to turn back
their right sleeves to the shoulder: such being the signs of immunity
among the slaughterers. Thus prepared, Martin conveyed them to his house
in the Rue des Petits Champs, and made La Force swear that neither he
nor his children would leave the place until the 2,000 crowns were
paid. For additional security, he placed some Swiss soldiers on guard,
when one of them, touched with compassion, offered to let the prisoners
escape. La Force, however, refused, preferring, he said, to die rather
than fail in his word. An aunt of La Force's furnished him with the
2,000 crowns, and he was about to count them out to Martin, when a
French nobleman came to inform La Force that the Duke of Anjou wished
to speak to him. On this pretext the emissary conducted both father and
sons from the house without their caps: with nothing, that is to say, to
distinguish them from the victims of assassination. They were at once
set upon. La Force's eldest son fell, crying out "_Je suis mort._" The
father, pierced to the heart, uttered a similar exclamation; on which
the youngest La Force had the presence of mind to throw himself to the
ground as if dead. Supposed to be a corpse, he was gradually stripped
of his clothes, until a man who intended to steal from him a pair of
woollen stockings, of which he had not yet been divested, could not
restrain, as he looked upon the boy's pallid face, some expression of
sympathy. Seeing that the stranger had taken pity on him, young La Force
whispered that he was not dead. He was told to keep quiet; and the man
with a taste for woollen stockings wrapped him up in his cloak and
carried him away. "What have you there?" asked an assassin. "My nephew,"
replied the man. "He went out last night and got dead drunk, and I mean,
as soon as I get him home, to give him a good thrashing." Young La Force
made his preserver a present of thirty crowns, and had himself conveyed
in safety to the Arsenal, of which his uncle, Marshal de Biron, was
governor.
The most famous, or rather infamous, of those who took part in the
massacre as leaders or principal agents were Jean Férier, an advocate,
and at that time captain of his quarter, Peyou, a butcher, and Curcé, a
goldsmith, who, with upturned sleeves and bloody arms, boasted that 400
Huguenots had died beneath his blade. The massacre lasted in Paris with
diminishing fury for a whole month. It was enacted, moreover, in nearly
all the large towns; though in some few the governors refused to execute
the orders transmitted to them. At Lyons 4,000 were killed. Here the
governor, Mandelot by name, finding after several days' massacre that
there were still a number of Huguenots to slay, ordered the executioner
to despatch them; on which that functionary replied that it was his
duty to execute criminals convicted of violating the laws of State, but
that he was not an assassin, and would not do assassins' work. This
spirited reply recalls Joseph de Maistre's celebrated paradox about the
executioner and the soldier: the former putting to death only the worst
offenders in virtue of a legal mandate, yet universally loathed; the
latter plunging his sword into the body of anyone he is told to slay,
yet universally honoured. The explanation of the ingenious paradox is,
after all, simple enough. The executioner kills in cold blood, without
danger to himself; the soldier risks his life in the performance of his
duty.
A Lyons butcher, less scrupulous than the executioner, killed so many
Huguenots that, according to Dulaure, in his _Singularités Historiques_,
he was invited to dinner by the Pope's Legate, passing through Lyons on
his way to Paris. The number of Huguenots massacred throughout France
was estimated at 60,000. Though the murders were generally due to
fanaticism, many persons were put to death for purely private reasons.
Heirs killed those from whom they expected to inherit, lovers their
rivals, candidates for public offices those whom they wished to replace.
On the third day of the massacre Charles IX. went to Parliament,
and avowed that the slaughter of the Huguenots had taken place by
his command, and in order to anticipate an intended Huguenot rising
organised by Coligny. The Parliament accepted this announcement with
approval; and despite the absence of all evidence against the admiral,
it was decreed that his body should be dragged through the streets on
a hurdle, then exhibited in the Place de Grève, and ultimately hung by
the heels on a gibbet at Montfaucon. His house was at the same time
to be destroyed, the trees in his garden cut down, and the members of
his family reduced to the condition of plebeians, or _roturiers_, and
declared unable to hold any public office; which, however, did not
prevent Coligny's daughter from becoming soon afterwards the wife of the
Prince of Orange.
Not many years after the massacre of St. Bartholomew, the Church of
St.-Germain-l'Auxerrois, in September, 1581, was the starting-point of a
very different series of performances. "On Monday, September 18th," says
the writer of a contemporary account, "the Duc de Joyeuse (Henry III.'s
favourite 'minion') and Marguerite of Lorraine, daughter of Nicholas
de Vaudemont, and sister of the queen, were betrothed in the Queen's
Chamber, and the following Sunday were married at three o'clock in the
afternoon at the parish church of Saint-Germain-l'Auxerrois. The king
led the bride, followed by the queen, the princesses, and other ladies
in such superb attire that no one recollects to have seen anything like
it in France so rich and so sumptuous. The dresses of the king and of
the bridegroom were the same, and were so covered with embroidery,
pearls, and precious stones, that it was impossible to estimate their
value. Such an accoutrement had, for instance, cost ten thousand crowns
in the making; and at the seventeen feasts which were now from day to
day given by the king to the princes and lords related to the bride,
and by other great persons of the Court, the guests appeared each
time in some new costume, gorgeous with embroidery, gold, silver, and
diamonds. The expense was so great, what with tournaments, masquerades,
presents, devices, music, and liveries, that it was said the king would
not be quit for twelve hundred thousand crowns. On Tuesday, October
16th, the Cardinal de Bourbon gave his feast in the palace attached
to his abbey, St.-Germain-des-Prés, and caused to be constructed on
the Seine a superb barque in the form of a triumphal car, which was to
convey the king, princes, princesses, and the newly married pair from
the Louvre to the Pré-aux-Clercs in solemn pomp. This stately vehicle
was to be drawn on the water by smaller boats disguised as sea-horses,
Tritons, dolphins, whales, and other marine monsters, to the number of
twenty-four. In front, concealed in the belly of the said monsters,
were a number of skilled musicians, with trumpets, clarions, cornets,
violins, and hautboys, besides even some firework-makers, who, at dusk,
were to afford pastime not only to the king, but to fifty thousand
persons on the banks." The piece, however, was not well played, and it
was impossible to make the animals advance as was intended, so that
the king, after having from four o'clock in the afternoon till seven
watched at the Tuileries the movements and workings of these animals
without perceiving any effect, said sarcastically, "Ce sont des bêtes
qui commandent a d'autres bêtes," and drove away with the queen in
his coach, to be present at the cardinal's feast, which was the most
magnificent of all. Among other entertainments, his Eminence gave that
of an artificial garden, luxuriant with growing flowers and fruits, as
if it had been May or August.
[Illustration: SCENE DURING THE MASSACRE OF ST. BARTHOLOMEW.]
On Sunday, the 15th, the queen gave her feast at the Louvre, and after
the feast the ballet of "Circe and her Nymphs." This work, otherwise
entitled "Ballet Comique de la Reine," was represented in the large
Salle de Bourbon by the queen, the princes, the princesses, and the
great nobles of the Court. It began at ten o'clock in the evening,
and did not finish till three the next morning. The queen and the
princesses, who represented the Naiads and the Nereids, terminated
the ballet by a distribution of presents to the princes and nobles,
who, in the shape of Tritons, had danced with them. For each Triton
there was a gold medal with a suitable inscription; and the composer,
Baltazarini--or Beaujoyeux, as he was now called--received flattering
compliments at the end of the representation from the whole Court. His
genius was extolled and his glory celebrated in verses which hailed
him as one who "from the ashes of Greece had revived a new art," who
with "divine wit" had composed a ballet, and who had so placed it on
the stage that he surpassed himself in the character of "inventive
geometrician."
On the evening of Monday, the 16th, at eight o'clock, the garden of
the Louvre was the scene of a torch-lit combat between Fourteen Whites
and Fourteen Yellows. On Tuesday, the 17th, there were conflicts with
the pike, the sword, and the butt end of the lance, on foot and on
horseback. On Thursday, the 19th, took place the Ballet of the Horses,
in which Spanish steeds, race-horses, and others met in hostile fashion,
retired, and turned round to the sound of trumpets and clarions,
having been trained to it five months beforehand. "All this," says the
chronicler, "was beautiful and agreeable, but the finest feature of
Tuesday and Thursday was the music of voices and instruments, being the
most harmonious and most delicate that was ever heard. There were also
fireworks, which sparkled and burst, to the fright and joy of everyone,
and without injury to any."
It was in the Church of St.-Germain-l'Auxerrois, too, three centuries
earlier, that a priest astonished his congregation--and afterwards,
when the incident was reported, the whole of Europe--by his mode of
pronouncing the excommunication decreed by Pope Innocent IV. against
the Emperor Frederick II. "Hearken to me, my brethren," he said. "I am
ordered to pronounce a terrible anathema against the Emperor Frederick
to the accompaniment of bells and lighted candles. I am ignorant
of the reasons on which this judgment is based. All I know is that
discord and hatred exist between the Pope and the Emperor, and that
they are accustomed to overwhelm each other with insults. Therefore
I excommunicate, as far as lies in my power, the oppressor, and I
absolve the one who is suffering a persecution so pernicious to the
Christian religion." It has been said that a report of this strange
excommunication found its way all over Europe. The priest, as might have
been expected, was rewarded by the Emperor and punished by the Pope.
Nearly two centuries later, in 1744, the celebrated actress and singer,
Sophie Arnould, came into the world in the very room in which Admiral
de Coligny was assassinated. Sophie Arnould, of whose operatic career
mention is made elsewhere, was the only French actress of whom Garrick,
in narrating his experiences of Parisian theatrical life, could speak
with enthusiasm. As a singer she does not seem to have possessed much
power, for she writes in the fragment of her "Memoirs" which has come
down to us: "Nature had seconded my taste for music with a tolerably
agreeable voice, weak but sonorous, though not extremely so. It was,
however, sound and well balanced, so that, with a good enunciation, and
without any noticeable effort, not a word of what I sang was lost even
in the most spacious buildings." With regard to her personal appearance,
Sophie writes: "My figure is slender and regular, though I must admit
that I am not tall. I have a graceful frame, and my movements are
easy. I possess a well-formed leg and a pretty foot, with hands and
arms like a model, eyes well set and an open countenance, lively and
attractive." Collé, in his "Journal and Memoirs," declares that soon
after her _début_ Sophie was the recognised "Queen of the Opera," and
he adds: "I have never yet seen united in the same actress more grace,
more truthfulness of sentiment, nobility of expression, intelligence,
and fire, never beheld more touching pathos. Her physiognomy represents
every kind of grief, and while depicting horror her countenance does not
lose one feature of its beauty."
[Illustration: THE PONT-NEUF AND THE LOUVRE, FROM THE QUAI DES
AUGUSTINS.]