[1147] Agrippa d'Aubigne, Hist. univ., ii. 28 (liv. i., c. 5). The

authenticity of this letter has been much disputed, partly because of the

Viscount's severe and cruel character (which, however, D'Aubigne himself

notices when he tells the story), partly because it rests on the sole

authority of D'Aubigne. It is to be observed, however, that although he

alone relates it, he alludes to it in several of his works, as _e.g._, in

his Tragiques. But the truth of the incident is apparently placed beyond

all legitimate doubt by its intimate and necessary connection with an

event which D'Aubigne narrates considerably later in his history, and from

personal knowledge. Hist. univ., ii. 291, 292 (liv. iii., c. 13). In 1577,

D'Aubigne, having lost much of Henry of Navarre's favor through his

fidelity or his bluntness (see Mem. de d'Aubigne, ed. Panth., p. 486),

retired from Nerac to the neighboring town of Castel-jaloux, of which he

was in command. Making a foray at the head of a small detachment of

Huguenot soldiers, he fell in with and easily routed a Roman Catholic

troop, consisting of a score of light horsemen belonging to Viscount

D'Orthez, and a number of men raised at Bayonne and Dax, who were

conducting three young ladies condemned at Bordeaux to be beheaded. The

vanquished Roman Catholics threw themselves on the ground and sued for

mercy. On hearing who they were, D'Aubigne called to him all those who

came from Bayonne and then cried out to his followers to treat the rest in

memory of the massacre in the prisons of Dax. The Huguenots needed no

further reminder. It was not long before they had cut to pieces the

twenty-two men from Dax who had fallen into their hands. On the other hand

they restored to the soldiers of Bayonne their horses and arms, and, after

dressing their wounds in a neighboring village, sent them home to tell

their governor, Viscount D'Orthez, "that they had seen the different

treatment the Huguenots accorded to _soldiers_ and to _hangmen_." A week

later, a herald from Bayonne arrived at Castel-jaloux, with worked scarfs

and handkerchiefs for the entire Huguenot band. Nor did the exchange of

courtesies end here. The mad notion seized Henry of Navarre to accept an

invitation to a feast extended to him by the Bayonnese. Six Huguenots

accompanied him, of whom D'Aubigne was one. The table was sumptuous, the

presents were rare and costly. D'Aubigne being recognized, was overwhelmed

with thanks, "his courtesy being much more liberally repaid than he had

deserved;" while the King of Navarre and his Huguenots, at the table, "at

the expense of the rest of France, extolled to heaven the rare and

unexampled act and glory of the men of Bayonne." It is certainly an easier

supposition that D'Aubigne has faithfully reproduced D'Orthez's letter to

Charles IX., than that he has manufactured so long and consistent a story.

The discussion in the Bulletin de la Soc. de l'histoire du prot. franc. is

full, xi. 13-15, 116, etc., xii. 240.

[1148] Letter of Louis de Bourbon, Duke of Montpensier, Aug. 26th (it

should evidently be the 25th; for the Duke speaks of Coligny as killed

"ledit jour d'hier," and the mythical Huguenot plot was to have been

executed "hier ou aujourd'hui"). Bulletin de la Soc. de l'hist. du prot.

fr., i. (1852) 60, and Soldan, Geschichte des Prot. in Frankreich, ii.,

App., 599.

[1149] The words are those of an inscription of the seventeenth or the

early part of the eighteenth century, in the Hotel de Ville of Nantes.

Bulletin, i. (1852) 61.

[1150] Mem. de l'estat, Archives cur., vii. 385, 386.

[1151] See a table in White, Massacre of St. Bartholomew, 461.

[1152] Narrative appended to Capilupi, Stratagema di Carlo IX. (1574). The

cardinal's adulatory letter to Charles IX., on receipt of the king's

missive, is strongly corroborative of the view to which everything forces

us, that the massacre was not long definitely premeditated. "Sire," he

said, "estant arrive le sieur de Beauville avecques lettres de Vostre

Majeste, qui confirmoyent les nouvelles des tres-crestiennes et heroicques

deliberation et exequutions faictes non-seulement a Paris, mais aussi

partout voz principales villes, je m'asseure qu'il vous plaira bien me

tant honorer ... que de vous asseurer que entre tous voz tres humbles

subjects, je ne suis le dernier a an (en) louer Dieu et a me resjouir. Et

veritablement, Sire, c'est tout le myeus (mieux) que j'eusse ose jamais

desirer ni esperer. Je me tienz asseure que des ce commencement les

actions de Vostre Majeste accroistront chacung jour a la gloire de Dieu et

a l'immortalite de vostre nom," etc. Card. Lorraine to the king, Rome,

Sept. 10, 1572, MSS. Nat. Library, _apud_ Lestoile, ed. Michaud et

Poujoulat, 25, 26, note.

[1153] Conjouissance de Mr. le Cardinal de Lorraine, au nom du Roy, faicte

au Pape, le vije jour de sept. 1572, sur la mort de l'Admiral et ses

complices. Correspondance diplom. de La Mothe Fenelon, vii. 341, 342. Also

Jean de Serres (1575) iv., fol. 56, and in a French translation appended

to Capilupi, Lo stratagema di Carlo IX. (1574), 111-113, and reproduced in

Mem. de l'estat, Arch, cur., vii. 360.

[1154] "Literis romanis aureis majusculis descriptum, festa fronte

velatum, ac lemniscatum, et supra limen aedis Sancti Ludovici Romae

affixum."

[1155] The genuineness of this medal, in spite of the clumsy attempts made

to discredit it, is established beyond all possible doubt. The Jesuit

Bonanni, in his "Numismata Pontificum" (2 vols. fol., Rome, 1689), has

figured and described it as No. 27 of the medals of Gregory XIII. A

translation of his account and a facsimile of the medal may be seen in the

Bulletin de la Societe de l'hist. du prot. francais, i. (1852) 240-242. It

is also admirably represented in the Tresor de Numismatique (Delaroche,

etc., Paris, 1839), Medailles des papes, plate 15, No. 8. The late

Alexander Thomson, Esq., of Banchory, Aberdeenshire, purchased at the

papal mint in the city of Rome, in 1828 or 1829, among other medals for

which he applied, not less than seven copies of this medal, six of them

struck off expressly for him from the original die still in possession of

the mint. See his own account, given in his Memoir by Professor Smeaton,

and reproduced in the _New York Evangelist_ of October 17, 1872.

[1156] Recueil des lettres missives de Henri IV., i. 36.

[1157] See Pistolesi, Il Museo Vaticano descritto ed illustrato (Roma,

1838) vol. viii. 97. There are three paintings, of which the first

represents "the King of France sitting in parliament, and approving and

ordering that the death of Gaspard Coligny, Grand Admiral of France, and

declared to be head of the Huguenots, be registered." "The mischance of

Coligny is delineated in the following picture in a spacious square, among

many heads of streets (capistrade) and facades of temples. The admiral,

clothed in the French costume of that period, is carried in the arms of

several military men; although lifeless (estinto, read rather, _faint_),

he still preserves in his countenance threatening and terrible looks." The

third is the massacre of St. Bartholomew's day itself, in which the

beholder scarcely knows which to admire most, the artistic skill of the

painter, or his success in bringing into a narrow compass so many of the

most revolting incidents of the tragedy--the murder of men in the streets,

the butchery of helpless and unoffending women, the throwing of Coligny's

remains from the window of his room, etc. Dr. Henry White gives a sketch

of this painting, taken from De Potter's Lettres de Pie V. Of the fresco

representing the wounding of Coligny there is an engraving in Pistolesi,

_ubi supra_, vol. viii. plate 84. By an odd mistake, both the text and the

index to the plates, make this belong to the reconciliation of Frederick

Barbarossa and the pontificate of Alexander III.--on what grounds it is

hard to imagine. The character of the wound of the person borne in the

arms of his companions, indicated by _the loss of two fingers of his right

hand_, from which the blood is seen to be dropping, leaves no doubt that

he is the Admiral Coligny. Unfortunately, Pistolesi's splendid work is

disfigured by other blunders, or typographical errors, equally gross. In

describing other paintings of the same Sala Regia (pp. 95, 96), he

assigns, or is made by the types to assign, various events in the quarrel

of Barbarossa and Adrian IV. and Alexander III., to the years 1554, 1555,

1577, etc.

[1158] Ferralz to Charles IX., Rome, Sept. 11, 1572, _apud_ North British

Review, Oct., 1869, p. 31.

[1159] Prospero Count Arco to the emperor, Rome, Nov. 15, 1572, _ubi

supra_.

[1160] "Il pontefice, e universalmente tutta d'Italia grandemente se ne

rallegro, facendo pardonare cotale effetto al Re e alla Reina, che molte

cose avevano sostenuto di fare in benefizio di quella parte." G. B.

Adriani, Istoria de' suoi tempi, ii. 378.

[1161] Cuniga to Philip, Sept. 8th, Simancas MSS. Gachard, Bull. de

l'acad. de Bruxelles, xvi. 249, 250.

[1162] "A. N. S. mi faccia gratia di basciar i piedi in nome mio, col

quale mi rallegro con le viscere del cuore che sia piaciuto alla Dva. Msa.

d'incaminar, nel principio del suo pontificato, si felicemente e

honoratamente le cose di questo regno." Salviati to Card. sec. of State,

Aug. 24, Mackintosh, iii., App. G., p. 355.

[1163] "Non si risolvo a credere che si fusse fatto tanto a un pezzo."

Ibid., _ubi supra_.

[1164] "De quoy nous aseurons que en leoures Dieu aveques nous, tant pour

nostre particulier coment pour le bien qui en reviendre a toute la

cretiente et au service et honeur et gloyre de Dieu," etc.

[1165] "Et randons par cet ayfect le temognage de nos bonnes et droyctes

yntantions, cor ne les avons jeames eu aultre que tendant a son honneur,"

etc. Letter of Catharine de' Medici to Philip II., Aug. 28, 1572, in Musee

des archives nationales; documents originaux de l'hist. de France, exposes

dans l'Hotel Soubise (published by the Gen. Directory of the Archives,

1872), p. 392.

[1166] Philip had evidently no intimation that a massacre was in

contemplation. When Mr. Motley says (United Netherlands, i. 15): "It is as

certain that Philip knew beforehand, and testified his approbation of the

massacre of St. Bartholomew, as that he was the murderer of Orange," the

statement must be interpreted in accordance with that other statement in

the same author's earlier work (Rise of the Dutch Republic, ii. 388): "The

crime was not committed with the connivance of the Spanish government. On

the contrary, the two courts were at the moment bitterly opposed to each

other," etc. As the eminent historian can scarcely be supposed to

contradict himself on so important a point, we must understand him to mean

that Philip had, indeed, long since instigated Catharine and her son to

rid themselves of the Huguenot leaders by some form of treachery or other,

but was quite ignorant of, and unprepared for, the particular means

adopted by them for compassing the end.

[1167] St. Goard to Charles, Sept. 12th, Bodel Nijenhuis, Supplement to

Groen van Prinsterer, Archives de la maison d'Orange Nassau, 124-126. St.

Goard was not deceived by Philip's pious congratulations. "Ce faict," he

writes to Catharine, a week later (ibid., pp. 126, 127), "a este aussi

bien pris de se (ce) Roy comme on le peult penser, _pour luy estre tant

profitable pour ses affaires_; toutesfois, comme il est le prince du monde

qui scait et faict le plus profession de dissimuler toutes choses, si n'a

il sceu celler en ceste-cy le plaisir qu'il en a receu, et encores que je

infere touts ses mouvements procedder du bien que en recepvoient ses

affaires, lesquelles il voioit pour desplorer sans ce seul remedde, si a

il faict croire a tout le monde par ces aparens (apparences) que c'estoit

pour le respect du bon succez que voz Majestez avoient eu en si haultes

entreprises, tantost louant le filz d'avoir une telle mere, l'aiant si

bien garde," etc.

[1168] See the Mondoucet correspondence, Compte rendu de la commission

royale d'histoire, second series, iv. (Brux., 1852), 340-349, pub. by M.

Emile Gachet, especially the letter of Charles IX. of Aug. 12th, 1572.

[1169] "El dicho embaxador me propuso ... con grande instancia, que sin

dilacion se devia executar la justicia en Janlis (Genlis) y en los otros

sus complices que hay estan presos, y en los que se tomassen en Mons."

Philip to Alva, Sept. 18th. Simancas MSS. Gachard, Particularites inedits

sur la St. Barthelemy, Bulletin de l'academie royale de Belgique, xvi.

(1849), 256.

[1170] Charles IX. to Mondoucet, Aug. 31st, Mondoucet correspondence, p.

349; see also another letter of the same date, p. 348.

[1171] "Estant _l'un plus grands services_ que se puisse faire pour la

Chrestiente, que de la _prendre et passer tout au fil de l'espee_." St.

Goard to Charles IX., Sept. 19th, Supp. to Archives de la maison d'Orange

Nassau, 127.

[1172] Philip to Alva, _ubi supra_.

[1173] Alva to Philip, Oct. 13th, Gachard, Correspondance de Philippe II.

(Brux., 1848), ii. 287.

[1174] Mondoucet to Charles IX., Aug. 29th, Bull. de l'acad. roy. de Brux.

[1175] Bulletin de l'acad. roy. de Bruxelles, ix. (1842), 561.

[1176] Philip to Alva, _ubi supra_.

[1177] Bulletin of Alva from the report of his agent, the Seigneur de

Gomicourt, published by M. Gachard, from MSS. of Mons, in Bull. de l'acad.

de Bruxelles, ix. (1842), 560, etc.

[1178] Despatch of Sept. 14, 1572, Correspondance diplomatique, v, 121.

[1179] Charles IX. to La Mothe Fenelon, Aug. 22, 1572, Corresp. dipl.,

vii. 322, 323.

[1180] See _ante_, chap, xviii., p. 490.

[1181] "Ni que j'y aye aucune volonte."

[1182] "C'est bien la chose que je deteste le plus."

[1183] Despatch of Aug. 24th, Corresp. diplom., vii. 324, 325.

[1184] Charles IX. to La Mothe Fenelon, Aug. 25, 1572, ibid., 325, 326.

[1185] Charles IX., Aug. 26th and 27th, Corresp. dipl., vii. 331, etc.,

and a justificatory "Instruction a M. de la Mothe Fenelon."

[1186] Letter of Burleigh, etc., Sept. 9th, to Walsingham, Digges, 247.

The truth of the statement is called in question by M. Cooper, editor of

La Mothe Fenelon's Correspondance diplomatique.

[1187] The interview is described both by La Mothe Fenelon (Corresp.

diplom., v. 122-126), and by the English council, despatch of Sept. 9th to

Walsingham (Digges, 247-249). Hume has a graphic account, History of

England, chap. xl.

[1188] This striking, and, certainly, somewhat undiplomatic speech is

reported by the ambassador himself in his despatches (Corresp. dipl., v.

127). It looks as if the honest Frenchman was not sorry to let the court

know some of the severe criticisms that were uttered respecting a crime

with which he had no sympathy. La Mothe Fenelon tells of the impression,

proved erroneous by the king's letter, "qu'ilz avoient que ce fut ung acte

projecte de longtemps, et que vous heussiez accorde avecques le Pape et le

Roy d'Espaigne de faire servir les nopces de Madame, vostre seur, avec le

Roy de Navarre, a une telle execution pour y atraper, a la foys, toutz les

principaulx de la dicte religion assembles." La Mothe Fenelon to Charles,

Sept. 2, 1572, _ubi supra_, v. 116.

[1189] La Mothe Fenelon endeavored, he says, to persuade the English that

there were not over five thousand, and that Catharine and Charles were

sorry that one hundred could not have answered. Corr. diplom., v. 155.

[1190] See the despondent despatch of October 2d, Corresp. diplom., v.,

155-162.

[1191] La Mothe Fenelon to Catharine, ibid., v. 164.

[1192] Letter of Sept. 26th, Digges, 262.

[1193] See _ante_, chapter xviii., p. 495.

[1194] As well as by the queen mother's assurances respecting the massacre

in the provinces--too heavy a draft upon the credulity of her royal

sister. "Pour ce qu'ilz disent que, voyant les meurtres qui ont este

faictz en plusieurs villes de ce royaume par les Catholiques contre les

Huguenotz, ils ne se peuvent asseurer de l'intantion et volonte du Roy,

qu'ilz n'en voyent quelque punission et justice et ses edictz mieux

observes, _elle cognoistra bientost que ce qui est advenu es autres lieux

que en ceste ville, a este entierement contre la volonte du Roy_, mon dict

sieur et filz, lequel a delibere d'en faire faire telle pugnition et y

establir bientost ung si bon ordre que ung chascun cognoistra quelle a

este en cest endroit son intantion." Catharine to La Mothe Fenelon, Cor.

dipl., vii. 377.

[1195] Walsingham to Sir Thomas Smith, Sept. 14th, Digges, 242.

[1196] Tocsain contre les massacreurs, 150.

[1197] It is true that when their sentences were read to them, and

particularly that portion which branded with infamy their innocent

children, the courage of the old man of seventy, Briquemault, momentarily

failed, and he condescended to offer to do great services to the king in

retaking La Rochelle whose fortifications he had himself begun; and when

this proposal was rejected, it is said that he made more humiliating

advances. But the constancy and pious exhortations of his younger

companion, who sustained his own courage by repeating many of the psalms

in Latin, recalled Briquemault to himself, and from that moment "he had

nothing but contempt for death." De Thou (iv. 646), a youth of nineteen,

who was present in the chapel when the sentence was read, remembered the

incident well. Cf. Agrippa d'Aubigne, ii. 32 (bk. i., c. 6). Walsingham,

when he says in his letter of Nov. 1, 1572, that "Cavannes (Cavaignes)

showed himself void of all magnanimity, etc.," has evidently confused the

persons. Here is an instance where the later account of an eye-witness--De

Thou--is entitled to far more credit than the contemporary statement of

one whose means of obtaining information were not so good.

[1198] "N'ayant regret sinon que vous ayez voulu profaner le jour de sa

nayssence par ung si fascheus espectacle qu'allastes voir en greve."

Corresp. diplom. de la Mothe Fenelon, v. 205; Tocsain contre les

massacreurs, 151, 152; Reveille-Matin, Arch, cur., vii. 206; Walsingham to

Smith, Nov. 1, 1572, Digges, 278, 279.

[1199] Froude, x. 444, 445.

[1200] "Entre autres choses, il me dist qu'on luy avoit escript de Rome,

n'avoit que trois semaines ou environ, sur le propos des noces du Roy de

Navarre en ces propres termes: 'que a ceste heure que tous les oyseaux

estoient en cage, on les pouvoit prendre tous ensemble.'" M. de Vulcob to

Charles IX., Presburg, Sept. 26th, _apud_ De Noailles, Henri de Valois et

la Pologne en 1572 (Paris, 1867), iii., Pieces just., 214.

[1201] See in Kluckholn, Briefe Friedrich des Frommen, ii. 482, a short

letter of Charles IX. to the elector palatine, Aug. 22, 1572, referring

him for details to the account which Schomberg would give him verbally;

and, ibid., ii. 483, 484, the narrative signed by Charles IX. and Brulart,

secretary of state, in a translation evidently made at the time for the

elector's use.

[1202] "Toute ma negociation s'en estoit allee en fumee." Schomberg to M.

de Limoges, Nov. 8th, De Noailles, iii. 300.

[1203] A large number of Schomberg's despatches are inserted in De

Noailles, iii. 286, etc.

[1204] "Als die sonder zweifel _die welsche bibel_ 'El principe

Macchiavelli' auch studirt."

[1205] Landgrave William to the Electors of Saxony and Brandenburg,

Cassel, Sept. 5, 1572; same to Frederick, elector palatine, Sept, 6th. A.

Kluckholn, Briefe Friedrich des Frommen, ii. 496-498.

[1206] Bp. of Valence to M. Brulart, Konin, Nov. 20th, Colbert MSS. _apud_

De Noailles, iii. 218.

[1207] Montluc to Charles IX., January 22, 1573, De Noailles, iii. 220.

Does not the frank suggestion furnish a clue to the method which was

sometimes practised in other cases?

[1208] Montluc to Brulart, Jan. 20, 1573, De Noailles, iii. 223. The

worthy bishop, who was certainly at any time more at home in the cabinet

than in the church, did not intermit his toil or yield to discouragement.

If we may believe him, he "had not leisure so much as to say his prayers."

The panegyrists of the massacre, and especially Charpentier, had done him

good service by their writings, and at one time he greatly desired that

the learned doctor might be sent to his assistance, particularly as (to

use his own words) "all the suite of Monsieur de l'Isle and myself do not

know enough of Latin to admit a deacon to orders, even at Puy in

Auvergne." _Ubi supra._

[1209] Beza to Thomas Tilius, Sept. 10, 1572, Bulletin, vii. 16.

[1210] Registres de la compagnie, 1er aout, 1572, _apud_ Gaberel, Histoire

de l'eglise de Geneve, ii. 320.

[1211] Reg. du conseil, 30 aout, 1572; Reg. de la compagnie, Gaberel, ii.

321.

[1212] Gaberel, ii. 321, 322.

[1213] Ibid., ii. 322.

[1214] Ibid., ii. 307. See also in the Pieces justificatives, pp. 213-217:

"Liste des refugies de la St. Barthelemy dont les familles existent de nos

jours a Geneve."

[1215] Gaberel, ii. 325. The author of the really able and learned article

on the massacre, in the North British Review for October, 1869, conveys an

altogether unfounded and cruel impression, not only with regard to Beza,

but respecting his fellow Protestants, in these sentences: "The very men

whose own brethren had perished in France were not hearty or unanimous in

execrating the deed. There were Huguenots who thought that their party had

brought ruin on itself, by provoking its enemies and following the rash

counsels of ambitious men. This was the opinion of their chief, Theodore

Beza, himself," etc. The belief of Beza that the French Protestants had

merited even so severe a chastisement as this at the hands of God, by

reason of the ambition of some and the unbelief or lack of spirituality of

others, was a very different thing from failing to execrate the deed with

heartiness. If the words of Bullinger to Hotman, quoted in support of the

first sentence ("sunt tamen qui hoc factum et excusare et defendere

tentant") really referred to Protestants at all, it can only have been to

an insignificant number who took the position from a love of singularity,

and who were below contempt. The execration of the deed was pre-eminently

unanimous and hearty.

[1216] Gaberel, ii. 326.

[1217] Beza to T. Tilius, Dec. 3, 1572, Bulletin de la Soc. de l'hist. du

prot. fr., vii. 17.

[1218] Gaberel, ii. 330-333.

[1219] Nearly four years later, on the 8th of June, 1576, Monsieur de

Chandieu received the news of the publication of Henry III.'s edict of

peace permitting the refugees to return home. All the Protestants who had

not adopted Switzerland as their future country congregated at Geneva. A

solemn religious service was held in the church of Saint Pierre, where

French and Genevese united in that favorite Huguenot psalm (the 118th)--

La voici l'heureuse journee

Que Dieu a faite a plein desir--

the same which the soldiers of Henry IV. set up on the field of Coutras

(Agrippa d'Aubigne, iii. 53). M. de Chandieu then rendered thanks in

tender and affectionate terms to all the departments of government,

exclaiming: "We shall always regard the Church of Geneva as our

benefactress and our mother; and from all the French reformed churches

will arise, every Sunday, words of blessing, in remembrance of your

admirable benefits to us." The next day the refugees started for their

homes, accompanied, as far as the border, by a great crowd of citizens.

Gaberel, ii. 337, 338.

[1220] Les ambassadeurs de Charles IX. aux cantons suisses protestants,

Bulletin, iii. 274-276. A copy was sent by Beza to the consuls of

Montauban, together with a letter, Oct. 3. 1572. Also Mem. de l'estat

(Arch. cur., vii. 158-161.)

[1221] Harangue de M. de Bellievre aux Suisses a la diette tenue a Baden,

Mackintosh, Hist. of England, iii., Appendix L.

[1222] Bellievre to Charles IX., Baden, Dec. 15, 1572, Mackintosh, App. L,

p. 360. De Thou, iv. (liv. liii.) 642.

[1223] As early as September 3d the superintendent of the mint submitted

specimens of two kinds of commemorative medals: the one bearing the

devices, "_Virtus in Rebelles_" and "_Pietas excitavit Justitiam_;" and

the other, "_Charles IX. dompteur des Rebelles, le 24 aoust 1572_." The

Mem. de l'estat (Archives cur., vii. 355-357) contain the elaborate

description furnished by the designer, accompanied with comments by the

Protestant author. The Tresor de Numismatique, etc. (Paul Delaroche,

etc.), Med. francaises, pt. 3d, plate 19, Nos. 3, 4, and 5, gives

facsimiles of _three_ medals, the first two mentioned above, and a third

on which Charles figures as Hercules armed with sword and torch

confronting the three-headed Hydra of heresy. The motto is, "Ne ferrum

temnat, simul ignibus obsto."

[1224] Smith to Walsingham, Digges, 252.

[1225] Leicester to Walsingham, Sept. 11th, Digges, 251.

[1226] Walsingham to Smith, Nov. 1, Digges, 279. The politic Montluc,

Bishop of Valence, seems to allude to the same alteration in his master:

"Au diable soyt la cause qui de tant de maux est cause, et qui d'ung bon

roy et humain, s'il en fust jamais, l'ont contrainct de mectre la main au

sang, qui est un morceau si friant, que jamais prince n'en tasta qu'il n'y

voulust revenir." De Noailles, iii. 223, 224.

[1227] Agrippa d'Aubigne, ii. 29, 30.

[1228] Agrippa d'Aubigne, ii. 29 (liv. i., c. 6).

[1229] Letter of May 22, 1571/2, Digges, 193.

[1230] Relation of Sigismondo Cavalli. I follow the resume of Baschet, La

diplomatie venitienne, 556, 562.

[1231] "Leurs butins et richesses ne leur proffitarent point, non plus

qu'a plusieurs massacreurs, sacquemens, pillardz et paillards de la feste

de Sainct-Barthelemy que j'ay cogneu, au moins des principaux, qui ne

vesquirent guieres longtemps qu'ils ne fussent tuez au siege de la

Rochelle, et autres guerres qui vindrent empres, et qui furent aussi

pauvres que devant. Aussi, comme disoient les Espagnolz pillards, '_Que el

diablo les avia dado, el diablo les avia llevado_.'" OEuvres, i. 277 (Ed.

of Hist. Soc. of Fr., 1864). I need only refer to the fate of the famous

assassin who boasted of having killed four hundred men that day with his

own arm, and who afterward, having embraced a hermit's life, was finally

hung for the crime of murdering travellers (Agrippa d'Aubigne, ii. 20);

and to that of Coconnas, put to death for the part he took in the

conspiracy of which I shall shortly have to speak.

[1232] Memoires de Sully, i. 28, 29.

[1233] See _ante_, p. 530-532.

[1234] Apostolicarum Pii Quinti Epistolarum libri quinque. Letter of March

26, 1568, p. 73.

[1235] Pii Quinti Epistolae, 111.

[1236] Ibid., 150.

[1237] Ibid., 152. See _ante_, chapter xvi, p. 308.

[1238] "Nullo modo, nullisque de causis, hostibus Dei parcendum est."

[1239] "Catholicae religionis hostes aperte ac libere ad internecionem

usque oppugnaverit." Ibid., 155.

[1240] "Deletis omnibus," etc. Ibid., 155.

[1241] Ibid., 160, 161.

[1242] Ibid., 166.

[1243] "Nec vero, vano pietatis nomine objecto, te eo usque decipi sinas,

ut condonandis divinis injuriis falsam tibi misericordiae laudem quaeras:

nihil est enim ea pietate misericordiaque crudelius, quae in impios et

ultima supplicia meritos confertur." Ibid., 242.

[1244] "Haereticae pravitatis inquisitores per singulas civitates

constituere." Ibid., 242.

[1245] Letter of Jan. 29, 1570, ibid., 267.

[1246] Letter of April 23, 1570, ibid., 275.

[1247] Letter to Cardinal Bourbon, Sept. 23, 1570, ibid., 282, 283.

[1248] Letter to Charles IX., January 25, 1572, ibid., 443.

[1249] Saint Pius V. is, I believe, the only pope that has been canonized

since Saint Celestine V., near the end of the thirteenth century.

[1250] "Qui autem a militibus captivi ducebantur, eos Pius pretio

redemptos, in jusque sibi vindicatos, atque Avenionem perductos, publico

supplicio afficiendos _pro ardenti suo religionis studio_ decrevit."

Gabutius, Vita Pii Quinti, Acta Sanctorum Maii, Sec. 97, p. 642.

[1251] "Id Pius ubi cognovit, de Comite Sanctae Florae conquestus est, quod

jussa non fecisset, dudum imperantis, _necandos protinus esse haereticos

omnes quoscumque ille capere potuisset_." Ibid., Sec. 125. It must not be

forgotten that, in holding these sentiments, Pius V. did not stand alone;

his predecessors on the pontifical throne were of the same mind. We have

seen the anger of Paul IV., in 1558, upon learning that Henry II. had

spared D'Andelot (see _ante_, chapter viii., vol. i., p. 320). Paul was

for instantaneous execution, and _did not believe a heretic could ever be

converted_. He told the French ambassador "que c'estoit abus d'estimer que

un heretique revint jamais; que ce n'estoit que toute dissimulation, et

que c'estoit un mal ou il ne falloit que le feu, et soubdain!" The last

expression is a clue to the attitude of the Roman See to heresy under

every successive occupant of the papal throne. Letter of La Bourdaisiere

to the constable, Rome, Feb. 25, 1559, MS. Nat. Lib. Paris, Bulletin,

xxvii. (1878) 105.

[1252] Gabutius, _ubi supra_.

CHAPTER XX.

THE SEQUEL OF THE MASSACRE, TO THE DEATH OF CHARLES THE NINTH.

[Sidenote: Widespread terror.]

The blow had been struck by which the Huguenots were to be exterminated.

If a single adherent of the reformed faith still lived in Paris, he dared

not show his face. France had, as usual, copied the example of the

capital, and there were few districts to which the fratricidal plot had

not extended. Enough blood had been shed, it would seem, to satisfy the

most sanguinary appetite. After the massacre in which the admiral and all

the most noted leaders had perished--after the defection of Henry of

Navarre and his more courageous cousin, it was confidently expected that

the feeble remnants of the Huguenots, deprived of their head, could easily

be reduced to submission. The stipulation of Charles the Ninth, when

yielding a reluctant consent to the infamous project, would be fulfilled:

not one of the hated sect would remain to reproach him with his crime.

And, in point of fact, throughout the greater number of the cities of

France, even where there had been no actual massacre, so widespread was

the terror, that every Protestant had either fled from the country or

sought safety in concealment, if he had not actually apostatized from the

faith.[1253]

[Sidenote: La Rochelle and other cities in Protestant hands.]

But when the storm had spent its first fury, and it became once more

possible to look around and measure its frightful effects, it was found

that the devastation was not universal. A few cities held for the

Huguenots. La Rochelle and Sancerre--the former on the western coast, the

latter in the centre of France--with Montauban, Nismes, Milhau, Aubenas,

Privas, and certain other places of minor importance in the south, closed

their gates, and refused to receive the royal governors sent them from

Paris.[1254] Not that there were wanting those, even among the

Protestants, who interposed conscientious scruples, and denied the right

of resistance to the authority of the king;[1255] but with the vast

majority the dictates of self-preservation prevailed over the slavish

doctrine of unquestioning submission. The right to worship God as He

commands cannot, they argued, be abridged even by the legitimate

sovereign; and in this case there is even the greatest probability that he

acts under constraint, or that wily courtiers forge his name, since the

most contradictory orders emanate ostensibly from him.

[Sidenote: Nismes.]

Such was the attitude assumed by the brave inhabitants of Nismes. Here the

Roman Catholics had displayed a more charitable disposition than in many

other places. The "juge mage," on receipt of secret orders to massacre the

Protestants, instead of complying, gave directions for assembling the

extraordinary council, consisting of the magistrates and most notable

citizens. By this council, upon his recommendation, it was unanimously

resolved to close all the gates of Nismes, with the exception of one. This

was to be guarded in turn by the Roman Catholics and the Protestants. All

the citizens were directed to take a common oath that they would assist

each other without distinction of creed, and maintain order and security,

in obedience to the king's authority, and according to the provisions of

his edict of pacification. It was a solemn scene when all those present in

the great municipal meeting, the vicar-general of the diocese among the

number, with uplifted hands called upon God to witness their

engagement.[1256] The oath was well observed. The Viscount of Joyeuse,

acting as lieutenant-governor of Charles in Languedoc, at first approved

the compact; for the king's early letters, as we have seen, expressed

indignation at Coligny's murder, and ascribed it to the personal enmity of

the Guises. But the viscount took a different view of the matter when the

monarch, throwing off the mask, himself accepted the responsibility.

Joyeuse now called on the citizens of Nismes to lay down their arms, to

expel all the refugees, and to receive a garrison. But the Nismois firmly

declined the summons, grounding their refusal partly on their duty to

themselves, partly on the manifest inhumanity of surrendering their

fellow-citizens to certain butchery. As was true in more than one

instance, it was the _people_ that, by their decision, saved the rich from

the inevitable results of their own timid counsels. Most of the judges of

the royal court of justice, and most of the opulent citizens, advocated a

surrender of Nismes to Joyeuse, which must have been the prelude to a

fresh and perhaps indiscriminate massacre.[1257]

[Sidenote: Montauban.]

Scarcely less important to the Protestants of southern France was the

refuge they found in Montauban. Regnier, the same Huguenot gentleman who

had himself been rescued from slaughter at Paris by the magnanimity of

Vezins,[1258] was the instrument of its deliverance. On finding himself

safe, his first impulse was to hasten to Montauban and urge his brethren

to adopt instant measures for self-defence. But despair had taken

possession of the inhabitants. They had heard that the dreaded black

cavalry of the ferocious Montluc, the men-at-arms of Fontenille, and

other troops, were on the march against them. Their enemies were already

reported to be so near the city as Castel-Sarrasin. Not a gate, therefore,

would the panic-stricken citizens close; not a sword would they draw.

Nothing was left but for Regnier, with the little band of less than forty

followers he had gathered, to abandon the devoted place. As he was

wandering about the country, uncertain whither to betake himself, he

unexpectedly fell in with the very enemy before whom Montauban was

quailing. Neither Regnier nor his handful of followers hesitated. It was a

glorious opportunity for the display of heroism in a good cause, for there

were ten Roman Catholics to one Protestant. Happily the ground was

favorable to the display of individual prowess; a river and a tributary

brook rendered the field so contracted that only a few men could fight

abreast. "Brethren and comrades," cried Regnier, "whether for life or for

combat, there is no other road than this." Then putting forward a

detachment of ten horsemen headed by an experienced leader, when he saw

the enemy pause to put on their helmets, he seized the opportunity in true

Huguenot fashion to act as the minister of his followers, and uttered a

brief prayer, devout and courageous. Next came the charge, such as those

men of iron determination knew well how to make. The van of the enemy made

no attempt to resist them; the cavalry in the centre was driven back in

confusion upon the mounted arquebusiers of the rear. The fight became in a

few minutes a disgraceful rout, and for a whole league the handful of

Huguenots continued the pursuit. Of nearly four hundred royalists, eighty

were killed and fifty captured. When Regnier, returning to Montauban,

brought the flags of the enemy and a body of prisoners outnumbering his

own band, the citizens renounced their fears, accepted the omen as a

pledge of Divine assistance, and cast in their lot with their brethren of

La Rochelle.[1259]

[Sidenote: La Rochelle the centre of interest.]

For La Rochelle had now become the centre of interest, and Montauban,

Nismes, and even Sancerre, whose brave and obstinate siege will soon

occupy us, were for the time almost wholly dismissed from consideration.

The strongly fortified Protestant town, the only point upon the shores of

the ocean which during the former civil wars had defied every assault of

the papal leaders, was now the safe and favorite refuge of the Huguenots,

and the coveted prey of the enemy. Within a very short time after the

massacre, a stream of fugitives set in toward La Rochelle. It was not long

before her hospitable walls sheltered fifty of the Protestant nobles of

the neighboring provinces, fifty-five ministers, and fifteen hundred

soldiers, chiefly from Saintonge, Aunis, and Poitou. Among the new-comers

were not a few who had with difficulty escaped from the bloody scenes at

Paris.[1260] All were inspired with the same courage, all possessed by the

same determination to sell their lives as dear as possible; for the

successive accounts of the cruelties perpetrated in all parts of France

left no doubt respecting the fate of the Rochellois should they too

succumb.

[Sidenote: A spurious letter of Catharine de' Medici.]

And there were not wanting circumstances of an alarming nature. At

Brouage, then a flourishing port some twenty-five miles south of La

Rochelle, a considerable body of troops had been gathered under Philip

Strozzi, the chief officer of the French infantry, while a fleet was in

course of preparation under the well-known Baron de la Garde. This

occurred previously to the massacre. The force, it was given out, was

intended for a secret expedition against the Spaniards. While the

Huguenots of Coligny, forming a junction with the troops of William of

Orange, should attack Alva in Flanders, Strozzi and La Garde were to make

a diversion upon the coasts of Spain itself. But the inhabitants of La

Rochelle gave little credit to this explanation, and even the personal

assurances of the admiral had not entirely removed their fears that their

own destruction was intended. It is not strange, therefore, that they

accepted the Massacre of St. Bartholomew's Day as a complete demonstration

of the correctness of their suspicions, and at once took measures for

protecting their city against surprise or open assault. Nor is it

altogether easy to ascertain how far their apprehensions were unfounded.

There were intelligent and well-informed contemporary writers, who felt no

doubt that Strozzi was waiting with sealed orders for the coming of the

fatal twenty-fourth of August. Two months before, they say, there had been

sent him by Catharine de' Medici a packet which he was strictly forbidden

to open until that day. It proved to be a letter of instruction couched in

these words: "Strozzi, I notify you that this day, the twenty-fourth of

August, the admiral and all the Huguenots who were with him here have been

slain. Consequently, take diligent measures to make yourself master of La

Rochelle, and do to the Huguenots who shall fall into your hands the same

that we have done to those who were here. Take good heed that you fail

not, insomuch as you fear to displease the king my son, and myself.

CATHARINE."[1261]

If, as I can but believe, this letter be spurious, none the less may it

serve to indicate how firmly the persuasion was fixed in the minds of the

Protestants that insidious designs were cherished against La Rochelle.

[Sidenote: Designs upon the city.]

It was not long before those designs began to develop. Strozzi, to whom

the inhabitants had sent a deputation, avowedly to obtain explanations

respecting the circumstances of the massacre, but in reality to discover

the plans of the government, graciously offered some companies of his

soldiers for their protection. But the Rochellois with equal politeness

declined to accept such help. Meanwhile, they set themselves vigorously at

work, and not only organized the inhabitants and refugees into companies

for military defence, but repaired and manned the fortifications, and

introduced a great abundance of provisions and munitions of war into the

city.[1262] A few days later, letters were received from Charles himself,

which, while endeavoring to calm the minds of the inhabitants respecting

recent occurrences, promised them full protection in their religious

rights, proclaimed the king's unaltered determination to maintain his

edict, and called upon them to receive with due submission M. de Biron,

whom he sent them to be their governor. No better choice could have been

made among the Roman Catholics; for Biron, it was currently reported, so

far from approving of severity, had himself narrowly escaped being

involved in the massacre, and had owed his safety mainly to the fact that

he was in command at the arsenal.

The shrewd Rochellois, however, while they greeted the king's assurances

with all outward show of credit, were not willing to be duped. They

listened respectfully to the king's envoys, and professed themselves his

most devoted subjects; but they begged to be excused from receiving

Marshal Biron as their governor until the troops of Strozzi should have

been removed from their dangerous proximity to the city, and until the

fleet should have set sail from Brouage. Nor, indeed, could Biron himself

obtain better conditions, when, having sought an interview with the

deputies of La Rochelle outside of the walls, he entreated them, with

sincere or well-feigned emotion, to forestall the ruin impending over

them.[1263] In vain did he humor their claim, dating from regal

concessions and long prescription, that La Rochelle need receive no

garrison but of her own municipal militia.[1264] In vain did he offer to

make his entry with but one or two followers, and promise that, when they

had duly submitted, he would secure them from injury at the hands of the

royal troops, and would relieve them of the presence of a fleet. The

citizens were inflexible. The experience of Castres, where lately the

credulous inhabitants had inconsiderately admitted a governor sent them

by the king, and had paid for their folly with their lives, confirmed them

in the resolution rather to die with sword in hand than to be slaughtered

like sheep.[1265]

Two months (September and October) passed in fruitless

negotiations--precious time, which the citizens put to good service in

preparing for the inevitable struggle. It was not until the eighth of

November that the first skirmish took place, in which one of two royal

galleys sent to reconnoitre the situation of La Rochelle was captured and

brought into harbor by some Huguenot boats that had sailed out intending

to secure the neighboring Ile de Re for the Protestant cause.[1266]

[Sidenote: Mission of La Noue.]

Meantime the court, reluctant to undertake an enterprise so formidable as

the regular siege of La Rochelle seemed likely to prove, resorted to

pacific measures, and resolved to employ for the purpose a person the most

unlikely to be selected by Roman Catholics. This was none other than the

famous Francois de la Noue, a Protestant leader not less remarkable for

generalship than for literary ability, of whose "Political and Military

Discourses," written during a later captivity, it has been said with

justice that, in perspicuity, force, and good judgment, they are not

inferior to the most celebrated commentaries of antiquity.[1267] La Noue

was with Louis of Nassau in the city of Mons when the news of Admiral

Coligny's murder, and of the consequent failure of the promised support of

France, reached him. Mons soon after surrendered to the Duke of Alva, and

La Noue scarcely knew whither to turn for refuge, when he received from

his old friend, the Duke of Longueville, Governor of Picardy, a cordial

invitation to return to France. Not without many misgivings, he visited

Paris, where, contrary to his expectations, Charles greeted him very

graciously, and even restored to him the confiscated property of his

wife's murdered brother, Teligny. Taking advantage of the moment, the

king now requested La Noue to undertake the task of mediating between the

government and La Rochelle, and thus preventing the outbreak of a new

civil war and the effusion of more blood. At first La Noue positively

declined the appointment; but the king was urgent, and the arguments which

he adduced coincided with the Huguenot's own impressions of the

hopelessness of a struggle undertaken by a single city against the united

forces of the most powerful kingdom of Christendom. It was only after the

most solemn protestations of Charles, that he would not make use of him as

an instrument to deceive and ruin his Protestant brethren, that La Noue

reluctantly consented to accept a commission from which he was more likely

to reap embarrassment than glory.

[Sidenote: He is badly received by the Rochellois.]

And certainly his first reception by the Rochellois was far from

flattering. In a conference with the deputies of the city, in the suburban

village of Tadon[1268]--for La Noue was not permitted to enter the

walls--the burghers clearly revealed the suspicion with which they viewed

him. They bluntly told him, after listening to the propositions he brought

from the king, "that they had come to confer with M. de la Noue, but that

they did not recognize him in the person before them. The brave warrior so

closely bound to them in former years, and who had lost an arm in their

defence, had a different heart, never came to them with vain hopes, nor,

under the guise of friendship, invited them to conferences destined only

to betray them."[1269] But, in spite of this somewhat uncourteous

reception, the well-known and trusted integrity of the great Huguenot

captain soon broke through the thin crust of coolness, which, after all,

was rather assumed than really felt. La Noue was suffered to enter the

city, and at the echevinage, or city hall, was permitted to lay before the

general assembly, or municipal government, as well as the other citizens,

the full extent of the king's concessions. Amnesty for the past,

confirmation of the city's privileges, passports for any who might wish

to remove to England or Germany, safe return for those whom fear had

banished, free exercise of the Protestant religion in two quarters of the

city, with three ministers to be chosen by the people and approved by the

governor--all this he offered. On the other hand, a new church must be

built for the Roman Catholics, the strangers who had lately come must

remove elsewhere, and, of course, the governor must be admitted, although

the king kindly consented to let them designate any other sufficiently

distinguished and capable person, if they preferred to do so.[1270]

[Sidenote: The royal proposals rejected.]

Neither the exposition of the terms of the royal clemency, nor the dark

picture drawn of the ruin overhanging the city, shook the constancy of its

brave advocates. They replied that they would consent to receive neither

garrison nor royal governor, and they exhibited to La Noue their charters

granted by Charles the Fifth, and ratified both by Louis the Eleventh and

by the reigning monarch. They added, "that, with God's help, they hoped

not to be caught in their beds as their brethren had been at the Parisian

matins."[1271] Yet, even after this conference, the Rochellois were so far

from losing their respect for La Noue, that they made him three

propositions: either he might remain in La Rochelle as a private citizen;

or he might assume the military command, as their commander-in-chief; or,

if he should prefer so to do, he might pass over into England in one of

their vessels. La Noue went to consult with Marshal Biron and others, and

shortly returned. With their full concurrence he accepted the military

command--the unparalleled anomaly being thus exhibited of a general of

great experience and high reputation voluntarily given by the besiegers to

the besieged, because of the confidence they entertained that by his

moderation and pacific inclination he would restrain the excesses of the

mob and hasten the return of peace.[1272]

[Sidenote: Marshal Biron appears before La Rochelle.]

[Sidenote: Beginning of the fourth religious war.]

And now the siege, which the court had long hesitated to undertake, began

in earnest. On the fourth of December, Marshal Biron approached La

Rochelle with seven ensigns of horse and eighteen companies of foot, and

two larger cannon.[1273] Meantime the most strenuous efforts were put

forth to collect an adequate besieging force. When milder measures failed

to secure prompt obedience, recourse was had to threats, and the nobles

were summoned on pain, in case of disobedience, of losing their

privileges, and being reduced to the rank of "roturiers." The menace had

its effect, and in the month of January, 1573, the force under Biron had

swollen to sixty companies of foot, with not less than thirty-seven large

cannon--a considerable provision of artillery for that period.[1274]

[Sidenote: Description of La Rochelle.]

The city of La Rochelle occupies the head of a deep bay, stretching in a

north-easterly direction from the ocean, and serving at present as the

large and convenient harbor for its extensive commerce. The old town,

whose origin is lost in the mists of antiquity, covered only a small part

of the area since inclosed by walls. A narrow peninsula, protected on the

one side by a sheet of water and on the other by marshes, offered a

tempting site, and was first occupied. The larger inlet on the west was

the old, and probably for a long time the only haven; but long before the

middle of the sixteenth century the action of the tide, which washes in

great quantities of sand, combining with the gradual deposit of alluvium

made by the neighboring springs, had converted this inlet into a

marsh--"les Marais Salans"--intersected by ditches and used only in the

manufacture of salt. The marsh itself has since been entirely reclaimed.

The "new" harbor, as the smaller inlet was still called, at the period of

which I am speaking, was of much inferior capacity, and was included

within the circuit of the walls.[1275] A chain, extended between the two

towers guarding its narrow entrance, effectually precluded the passage of

hostile vessels.

For considerably more than one-half of their circuit, the walls of La

Rochelle were inaccessible to the land forces; and the deep foss skirting

them was full of water, except on the north and north-east. The

fortifications, everywhere formidable, had, therefore, been constructed

with extraordinary care in these directions; for it was here that the

brunt of the attack must be borne. With Puritan simplicity and faith, the

reformed inhabitants of La Rochelle had named the strong work at the

northwestern angle of the circuit the "Bastion de l'Evangile," or the

"Bastion of the Gospel." It was appropriately supported on the right by

the "Cavalier de l'Epitre." Other forts, such as that of Cognes at the

north-eastern angle, were but little inferior in importance; it was

evident, however, that upon the ability of the Rochellois to defend the

Bastion de l'Evangile must depend the salvation of the city.[1276]

[Sidenote: Resoluteness of the Rochellois.]

But the chief strength of the city was to be found in the manly resolution

of the inhabitants to secure for themselves and their children the right

to worship God according to the purer faith, or perish in the attempt. An

incident occurring about this time served to illustrate and to confirm

their courage. A short distance in advance of the Bastion de l'Evangile

there stood a solitary windmill, which, on account of its advantageous

position, the Rochellois were anxious to retain. The captain to whose

guard it was intrusted, recognizing the ease with which he might be

surprised and cut off, took the precaution to draw off at dusk the small

detachment which he had placed there by day, leaving but a single soldier

to act as sentry. Meantime, Strozzi had determined to capture the mill.

This he attempted to do, taking advantage of a moonlight night. To the

two culverines brought to play upon him, the solitary defender could

answer only with his arquebuse; but so briskly did he fire, and so well

did he counterfeit the voices of others, that the assailants believed an

entire company to be present. At last, when he no longer could hold out,

the soldier only surrendered after stipulating for the life of himself and

his entire band. Notwithstanding his promise, Strozzi, when once his

astonishment at the appearance of the single actor who had played so many

parts had given place to anger at the deceit practised upon him, was in

favor of hanging the Huguenot for his audacity. But Biron would only

consent to have him sent to the galleys, a punishment which he escaped by

finding means to slip away from the hands of the royalists.[1277]

[Sidenote: Their military strength.]

The entire military force of the besieged comprised about thirteen hundred

regular troops, besides two thousand citizens, well armed and drilled, and

under competent captains. There was an abundance of powder, of wine,

biscuit, and other provisions, although of wheat there was but

little.[1278] Meantime assistance was anxiously expected from England, and

the courage of the common people, incited by the exhortations of the

ministers, did not flag, notwithstanding the feebler spirit of the rich

and the actual desertion of a few leaders.[1279]

The besiegers were not idle. Besides occupying positions north, east, and

south of the city, which effectually cut off communication from the land

side, they built forts on opposite sides of the outer harbor, and stranded

at the entrance a large carack, which was made firm in its position with

stones and sand. The work, when provided with guns and troops, commanded

the passage, and was christened "le Fort de l'Aiguille." In vain did the

Rochellois attempt to destroy or capture it; the carack, while it proved

unavailing to prevent the entrance of an occasional vessel laden with

grain or ammunition, remained the most formidable point in the possession

of the enemy.

[Sidenote: Henry, Duke of Anjou, appointed to conduct the siege.]

In order to give her favorite son a new opportunity to acquire military

distinction, the queen mother now persuaded Charles to permit the Duke of

Anjou to conduct the siege. He arrived before La Rochelle about the middle

of February,[1280] with a brilliant train of princes and nobles, among

whom were Alencon, Guise, Aumale, and Montluc, besides Henry of Navarre

and his cousin Conde, who, as they had to sustain the role of good Roman

Catholics, could scarcely avoid taking part in the campaign against their

former brethren. In the ordinances soon after published by Anjou, he seems

to have hoped to weaken the Huguenots by copying their own strictness of

moral discipline. The very Catholic practice of profane swearing, in which

his Majesty was so proficient, was prohibited on pain of severe

punishment; and it was prescribed that a sermon should daily be preached

in the camp.[1281] A good round oath none the less continued to be

received by the soldiers, in all doubtful cases, as a sufficient proof of

loyalty to Mother Church, nor did they cease because of the ordinance from

ridiculing the idea that such good Christians as they needed preaching,

which was well enough for unevangelized pagans.[1282]

[Sidenote: The besieged pray and fight.]

In view of the impending peril, the Protestants had recourse, as their

custom was, to prayer and fasting. The sixteenth and eighteenth of

February were days of public humiliation. From their knees the Huguenots

went with redoubled courage to the ramparts. The crisis had at length

arrived. A series of furious assaults were given, directed principally

against the northern wall and the Bastion de l'Evangile. It was in one of

these attacks, on the third of March, that the Duke of Aumale was killed.

By the besieged the death of so eminent a member of the house of Lorraine

was interpreted as a signal judgment of God upon the most cruel member of

a persecuting family--another presage that the sword should never depart

from the princely stock which had begun the war, until it should be

altogether destroyed. The royalists, on the other hand, found in it a

great source of regret; while Catharine, terrified at the danger to which

her son might be exposed, wrote one of her ill-spelt letters to

Montpensier, entreating him and the other veterans not to suffer any of

the princes to go imprudently near the walls.[1283]

[Sidenote: Bravery of the women.]

It does not enter into the plan of this history to detail the progress of

the siege. Let it suffice to say that the enemy was met at every point and

repulsed. Not content with simply defending their walls, the Huguenots

made sorties, in which many of Anjou's followers were slain. Sometimes

dressing in the uniform of those they had killed or taken prisoners, they

returned and penetrated into the hostile camp, learned the plans of the

assailants, and cut off more than one man of note. The presence of women

among them became an element of strength; for these, surmounting the

weakness of their sex, did good service in the mines, or, donning armor,

defended the breach and drove the enemy into the ditch.[1284] It was

remarked that, as the supply of fresh provisions diminished, the lack was

in some degree compensated by such an abundance of cockles on the sands as

had never before been known. If the Protestants regarded this incident as

a providential interposition in their behalf,[1285] the Roman Catholics

sought to account for it by supposing that the operations of the siege had

permitted the fish to multiply undisturbed.[1286] However this might be,

the women of La Rochelle sallied forth to husband this new resource; but

their imprudence in straying beyond the range of the guns was rewarded

with insolent outrage on the part of such of the enemy as were in the

vicinity. Even this circumstance the Huguenots knew how to turn to

advantage. Disguising themselves in feminine attire, a troop of Huguenot

soldiers, a day or two later, issued from the city when the tide was out,

apparently bent on the same errand. It was not long before the royalists

undertook to repeat a diversion which seemed to offer little danger to

them. Scarcely, however, had they approached when the clumsy costume was

hastily thrown aside, and the assailants discovered too late the trap into

which they had fallen. Many a hot-headed soldier of Anjou atoned for his

temerity with his life.[1287]

[Sidenote: La Noue retires. Failure of diplomacy.]

The ordinary wiles of Catharine were not left untried; but she effected

little or nothing by negotiation. The people were not so easily cajoled

and duped as their leaders had often been, and would accept no terms

except such as the court utterly refused to offer--the restoration of the

privileges conferred by the edict, its confirmation by oath, and the

interchange of hostages, to be kept in some neutral state in Germany, with

entire liberty of worship and exemption from royal garrison in and around

La Rochelle, Montauban, Nismes, and Sancerre.[1288] Even Francois de la

Noue became impatient at the excessive caution which the Huguenots seemed

to him to display, and, redeeming the promise he had given the king before

he took command, retired from the city (on the eleventh of March) when all

hope of reconciliation had apparently disappeared. With wonderful prudence

he had managed to forfeit the confidence of neither party. Yet on some

occasions, it must be admitted, his self-control was sorely tried. For

example, at one time a minister--not long after deposed from the sacred

office--so far forgot himself in the heat of angry discussion as to give

La Noue a sound box upon the ear. Even then the great captain refused to

order the offender's punishment, and confined himself to sending him,

under guard, to his wife, with directions to keep him carefully until he

should recover his reason.[1289]

[Sidenote: English aid miscarries.]

The assistance which La Rochelle had counted upon receiving from England

never came. Count Montgomery was a skilful negotiator. If he was unable to

prevail upon Elizabeth to give open countenance to the Huguenots, on

account of the league recently entered into, which Retz had been specially

sent by Charles to confirm, he at least succeeded in obtaining a sum of

forty thousand francs from various English, French, and Flemish

sympathizers, with which he was permitted, notwithstanding protests from

Paris, to fit out a fleet. Elizabeth, indeed, so far overcame her scruples

as to allow a large vessel of her own to follow. But when Montgomery's

squadron reached the roads of La Rochelle, the fifty-three ships of which

it was composed, and which carried eighteen hundred or two thousand men,

were so small and badly-appointed--in short, so inferior in strength to

the fewer vessels of the king standing off the entrance--that they avoided

coming to close quarters, stood off to Belle Isle, and finally returned to

England. Queen Elizabeth, at all times very doubtful respecting the

propriety of assisting subjects against their monarch, had meantime

disowned the enterprise as piratical, and expressed the hope the culprits

might be destroyed. It was not, in this case, merely her customary

dissimulation. The plundering by some French and Netherland sailors of the

vessel on which the Earl of Worcester was proceeding, in the queen's name,

to stand as sponsor at the baptism of Charles's infant daughter, had

greatly incensed her.[1290] Not, however, that Elizabeth lost any of that

remarkable interest which she had always taken in Count Montgomery, or

felt at all inclined to give him up to the French government for his

breach of the peace. For when, a little later, a demand was made for the

culprit, she assured the ambassador of Charles that she could swear she

was ignorant that the count was in her dominions. "But," she added, "were

he to come, I would answer your master as his father answered my sister,

Queen Mary, when he said, 'I will not consent to be the hangman of the

Queen of England.' So his Majesty, the King of France, must excuse me if I

can no more act as executioner of those of my religion than King Henry

would discharge a similar office in the case of those that were not of his

religion."[1291]

[Sidenote: Huguenot successes in the south.]

[Sidenote: Sommieres.]

[Sidenote: Villeneuve.]

In other parts of France it had fared no better with the attempt to crush

the Huguenots. Montauban and Nismes still held out. Various places in the

south-east fell into Huguenot hands. The siege of Sommieres, near Nismes,

by the Roman Catholics, was so obstinate, and the garrison capitulated on

such favorable terms, that the Protestants were rather elated than

discouraged. Marshal Damville had assailed it only in order to save his

credit, and the little town detained him nearly two months,--from the

eleventh of February to the ninth of April. Every device was employed to

retard his success. Streams of boiling oil were poured upon the heads of

the assailants, and red-hot hoops of iron were dexterously tossed over

their shoulders. In the end the garrison marched out with all the honors

of war.[1292] The Huguenots surprised Villeneuve, near the Rhone, by

effecting an entrance, much as they had entered Nismes in 1569, through

the grated opening by which the waters of a sewer issued from the

walls.[1293]

[Sidenote: Beginning of the siege of Sancerre.]

But it was Sancerre which, next to La Rochelle, occasioned the court the

greatest annoyance, both because of its central position[1294] and because

of its comparative proximity to Paris. Here the Protestants of Berry and

the adjacent provinces had found a welcome refuge. Citizens and refugees

refused to admit a royal garrison, and foiled the attempt to capture the

place by escalade. Treachery was at work, and, as usual, it was most rife

among the richer class. By their connivance the citadel or castle was

surprised by the troops sent by the governor of the province, M. de la

Chastre; but it was retaken on the same day.[1295] Notwithstanding this

warning, the people of Sancerre took none of the precautions which their

situation demanded, apparently unable to believe that, when such a city as

La Rochelle was in revolt, the king would undertake to subdue so small a

place as Sancerre. There were no stores of provisions, and the buildings

in proximity to the walls, from which an enemy could incommode the city,

had not been torn down, when, between the third and ninth of January,

1573, a force of five thousand foot and five hundred horse, under La

Chastre, besides many nobles and gentlemen of the vicinage, made its

appearance before the walls. The inhabitants now discovered their capital

mistakes, but it was too late to remedy them. Hunger began almost

immediately to make itself felt, while the places they had neglected to

destroy or preoccupy proved very convenient to the royalists for the next

two or three months, during which it was attempted to take Sancerre by

assault. Yet the direct attack proved a failure, and, on the twentieth of

March, the siege was changed to a blockade. Forts were erected in the most

advantageous spots, and a wide trench was dug around the entire

city.[1296] Sancerre was to be tried by the severe ordeal of hunger; and

certainly the most frightful among ancient sieges can scarcely be said to

have surpassed in horror that of this small city.[1297]

[Sidenote: The incipient famine.]

Did not the sufferings of the heroic inhabitants claim our sympathy, we

might read with entertainment the singular devices they resorted to in

grappling with a terrible foe whose insidious advances were more difficult

to oppose than the open assaults of the enemy. For the famine of Sancerre

boasts of a historian more copious and minute than Josephus or Livy. In

reading the narrative of the famous Jean de Lery[1298]--the same writer

to whom we are indebted for an authentic account of Villegagnon's

unfortunate scheme of American colonization--we seem to be perusing a

great pathological treatise. Never was physician more watchful of his

patient's symptoms than Lery with his hand upon the pulse of famishing

Sancerre. It would almost seem that the restless Huguenot, who united in

his own person the opposite qualifications of clergyman and soldier,

desired to make his little work a useful guide in similar circumstances,

for a portion of it, at least, has been appropriately styled "a cookery

book for the besieged."[1299]

Early in the siege, not without some qualms, the inhabitants made trial of

the flesh of a horse accidentally killed. Next an ass, and then the mules,

of which there was a considerable number, were brought to the shambles.

The butchers were now ordered to sell this new kind of meat, and a maximum

price was fixed. For a fortnight the supply of cats held out, after which

rats and mice became the chief staple of food. Dog-flesh was next

reluctantly tasted, and found, as our conscientious chronicler observes,

to be somewhat sweet and insipid.[1300] And so the spring of 1573 passed

away, and summer came; but no succor arrived for the beleaguered city. On

the contrary, there came the disheartening tidings from the west that a

peace had been concluded by the Huguenots of La Rochelle, in which no

mention was made of Sancerre.

[Sidenote: Losses of the royal army before La Rochelle.]

[Sidenote: Roman Catholic processions.]

So successful had been the defence of the citadel of Protestantism on the

shores of the ocean, so unexpectedly large the royal losses, that the

court was only waiting for a decent pretext to abandon the unfortunate

siege. Pestilence added its victims to those of the sword, and it was

currently reported that forty thousand of the besiegers were swept away

by their combined assaults.[1301] A more careful enumeration, however,

shows that, while the Rochellois, out of thirty-one hundred soldiers, lost

thirteen hundred, including twenty-eight "pairs," the king, out of a

little more than forty thousand troops, had lost twenty-two thousand, ten

thousand of whom died in the breach or in engagements elsewhere. Nor was

the loss of officers trifling; two hundred had died, including fifty of

great distinction, and five "maitres de camp."[1302] And, with all this

expenditure of life, and with the heavy drafts upon the public treasure,

little or nothing had been accomplished. Meanwhile, in other parts of

France there existed a scarcity of food amounting almost to a famine; nor

had the solemn processions to the shrines of the saints--processions for

the most part rendered contemptible by the irreverent conduct both of the

clergymen and the laity that took part in them[1303]--averted the wrath of

heaven. The poor suffered extremely. Selfishness gained such ascendancy in

some towns, that cruel ruses were adopted to remove the destitute that had

taken refuge within their walls. It was not strange that the extraordinary

mortality which soon fell upon the well-to-do burghers was viewed by many

as a direct punishment sent by the Almighty.[1304]

[Sidenote: Election of Henry of Anjou to the crown of Poland.]

The event which came just in time to free the court from its embarrassment

was the election of Henry of Anjou to the vacant throne of Poland. We have

already witnessed the perplexity of Bishop Montluc when the tidings of the

massacre first reached him.[1305] If he could have denied its reality, he

would have done so. This being impossible, he was forced to content

himself with misrepresenting the origin of the slaughter, slandering the

admiral and the other victims, and circulating the calumnies of

Charpentier and others who prated about a Huguenot conspiracy. A judicious

distribution of French gold assisted his own eloquent sophistry; and the

Duke of Anjou, portrayed as a chivalric prince and one who was not

ill-affected to religious liberty, was chosen king over his formidable

rivals. Charles and Catharine were alike delighted. The former could

scarcely find words to express his joy[1306] at the prospect of being

freed from the presence of a brother whom he feared, and perhaps hated;

while the queen mother's gratification was even more intense at the

peaceful solution of the prophecy of Nostradamus, than at the elevation of

her favorite son.

[Sidenote: Edict of Pacification, Boulogne, July, 1573.]

The peace between the king and the Rochellois was concluded in June, and

was formally promulgated in July, 1573, in a royal edict from Boulogne.

The chief provision was that the Protestants in the cities of La Rochelle,

Montauban, and Nismes should enjoy entire freedom of public worship, while

their brethren throughout the kingdom should have liberty of conscience

and the right to sell their property and remove wherever they might

choose, whether within or without the realm. Only gentlemen and others

enjoying high jurisdiction, who had remained constant in their faith, and

had taken up arms with the three cities, were to be allowed to collect

their friends to the number of ten to witness their marriages and

baptisms, according to the custom of the Reformed Church. Even this

privilege could not be exercised within the distance of two leagues from

the royal court or from the city of Paris; nor did the edict confer the

right to preach or celebrate the Lord's Supper.[1307] La Rochelle, Nismes,

and Montauban gained their point, and were to be exempted from receiving

garrisons or having citadels built, with the condition that they should

for two years constantly keep four of their principal citizens at court as

pledges of their fidelity. All promises of abjuration were declared null

and void. Amnesty was proclaimed, and, to cap the climax of absurdity, the

brave Huguenots who had defended their homes for months against Charles

were solemnly declared to be held the king's "good, loyal, and faithful

subjects and servants."

[Sidenote: Meagre results of the war.]

The results of the war on the king's side were certainly very meagre. To

have fought for the greater part of a year with the miserable Huguenots

that had escaped the massacre of St. Bartholomew's Day, and then to

conclude the war by such a peace, was certainly ignominious enough for

Charles and his mother. For the Huguenot party was now, more than ever, a

recognized power in the state, with three strongholds--one in the west and

two in the south. Into no one of these could a royal garrison be

introduced. La Rochelle, in particular, having repulsed every assault of

the best army that could be brought against it, was acknowledged

invincible by the exemptions accorded to it in common with Nismes and

Montauban. It was hardly by such expectations that Charles had been

prevailed upon to throw down the gage of war to his subjects of the

reformed faith.

[Sidenote: The siege and famine of Sancerre continue.]

Meanwhile, the inhabitants of Sancerre, not even named in the edict,[1308]

had been sustained under appalling difficulties by the confident hope of

assistance from the south. But the hope was long deferred, and they grew

sick at heart. The prospect was already dark enough, when, on the second

of June, a Protestant soldier, who had made his way into the city through

the enemy's lines, brought the depressing announcement that no aid must be

expected from Languedoc for six weeks. As but little wheat remained in

Sancerre, the immediate effect of the intelligence was that liberty was

given to some seventy of the poor to leave the city walls. At the same

time the daily ration was limited to half a pound of grain. A week later

it was reduced to one-quarter of a pound. Not long after only a single

pound was doled out once a week, and by the end of the month the supply

entirely gave out. The beginning of July reduced the besieged to the

necessity of tasking their ingenuity to make palatable food of the hides

of cattle, next of the skins of horses, dogs, and asses. The stock of even

this unsavory material soon became exhausted; whereupon, not very

unnaturally, parchment was turned to good account. Manuscripts a good

century old were eaten with relish. Soaked for a couple of days in water,

and afterward boiled as much longer, when they became glutinous they were

fried, like tripe, or prepared with herbs and spices, after the manner of

a hodge-podge. The writer who is our authority for these culinary details,

informs us that he had seen the dish devoured with eagerness while the

original letters written upon the parchment were still legible.[1309] But

the urgent necessities of their situation did not suffer the half-famished

inhabitants to stop here. With the proverbial ingenuity of their nation,

they turned their attention to the parchment on old drums, and subjected

to the skilful hands of cooks the discarded hoofs, horns, and bones of

animals, the harness of horses, and even refuse scraps of leather. There

seemed to be nothing they could not lay under contribution to furnish at

least a little nutriment.

And yet ghastly hunger little by little tightened her relentless embrace.

Almost all the children under twelve years of age died. In the universal

reign of famine there were at last found those who were ready to repeat

the horrible crime of feeding upon the flesh of their own kindred. It was

discovered that a husband and wife, with a neighboring crone, had

endeavored to satisfy the gnawings of hunger by eating a newly dead child.

Their guilt came speedily to light, and was punished according to the

severe code of the sixteenth century. The father was sentenced by the

council to be burned alive; his wife to be strangled and her body

consigned to the flames; while the corpse of the old woman who had

instigated the foul deed but had meanwhile died, was ordered to be dug up

and burned. But the feeling of the great majority of the besieged was far

removed from that despair which prompts to an inhuman disregard of natural

decency and affection. Near the close of July a boy of barely ten years,

as he lay on his death-bed, said to his weeping parents: "Why do you weep

thus at seeing me die of hunger? I do not ask bread, mother; I know you

have none. But since God wills that I die thus, we must accept it

cheerfully. Was not that holy man Lazarus hungry? Have I not so read in

the Bible?"[1310]

The catastrophe could not much longer be deferred. Within the city speedy

death stared every man in the face. Permission had, we have seen, been

accorded to the poor, early in June, to go forth from the city walls; but

the besieging force had mercilessly driven them back when they attempted

to gain the open country. Numbers, unwilling to accept a second time the

fatal hospitality of the city, preferred to remain in their exposed

situation, miserably dragging out a precarious existence by subsisting

upon snails, buds of trees and shrubs--even to the very grass of the

field.

[Sidenote: Sancerre capitulates.]

Happily for Sancerre, the political exigencies of the royal court insured

for the besieged Protestants, in the inevitable capitulation, more

favorable terms than they might otherwise have obtained. As early as the

eighteenth of July, Lery had been informed at a parley, by a former

acquaintance on the Roman Catholic side, that a general peace had been

concluded, and that Henry of Anjou had been elected to the throne of

Poland. This first intimation was discredited by the cautious Protestants,

not unused to the wiles of the enemy. But when, some twenty days later (on

the sixth of August), the statement was confirmed, and the Sancerrois

received the additional assurance that they would be mildly treated, their

surprise knew no bounds. The terms of surrender were easily arranged. A

ransom of forty thousand livres was to be exacted from the city. On the

thirty-first of August, M. de la Chastre made his solemn entry into

Sancerre, accompanied by a band of Roman Catholic priests chanting a _Te

Deum_ over his success. As was too frequently the case, the promise of

immunity to the inhabitants was but poorly kept. Scarcely had two weeks

passed before the "bailli" Johanneau,[1311] summoned from his house by the

archers of the prevot, on the plea that M. de la Chastre desired his

presence, was treacherously murdered on the way to the governor's house.

Besides assassination, other infractions of the capitulation were

committed; the gates of the city were burned, the walls dismantled, many

of the houses torn down. In fact, so unmercifully was Sancerre harried,

partly by the troops, partly by the peasantry of the neighborhood, and by

the "bailli" of Berry, that the reformed church of this place seems to

have been, for the time, completely dispersed.[1312]

Thus ended a siege which had lasted some eight months. The besieged had

lost only eighty-four men by the direct effects of warfare; but more than

five hundred persons perished during the last six weeks of sheer

starvation.[1313]

Sancerre owed its release from the horrors of the siege in great part to

the same causes that had powerfully contributed to the conclusion of the

peace. The Polish ambassadors, coming to proffer the crown to the king's

brother, Henry of Anjou, were about to reach the French court. They were

already not a little surprised at the discovery that the statements and

promises made in the king's name by that not over-scrupulous negotiator,

Montluc, Bishop of Valence, were impudent impostures, fabricated for no

other purpose than to secure at all hazards the success of the French

candidate for the Polish throne. To exhibit to them at this critical

juncture the edifying spectacle of a royal governor of the province of

Berry engaged in the reduction of a city the only crime of which was its

desire to enjoy religious liberty--this would have been a dangerous

venture. Consequently it was no fortuitous coincidence that Sancerre

capitulated the very day the Polish ambassadors made their appearance.

[Sidenote: Reception of the Polish ambassadors.]

We shall not dwell upon the pomp attending their reception. The banquet

held in the new palace of the Tuileries was brilliant. In the pageant

succeeding it was displayed a massive rock of silver, with sixteen nymphs

in as many niches, personating the provinces of the French kingdom. When,

after some verses well sung but indifferently composed, these nymphs

descended from their elevation, and took part in an intricate maze of

dance, the Polish spectators remarked, in the excess of their admiration,

that the French ballet was something that could be imitated by none of the

kings of the earth. "I would rather," dryly adds a contemporary historian,

"that they had said as much respecting our _armies_."[1314]

[Sidenote: Discontent of the south with the terms of peace.]

The Protestants of Southern France had been included in the Edict of

Pacification. In fact, Nismes and Montauban were as distinctly referred to

by name as La Rochelle.[1315] But the terms of peace were not to the taste

of the enterprising and self-reliant Huguenots of Languedoc and Guyenne.

They had learned, during the last ten years, to distrust all assurances

emanating from the court, even when claiming the authority of the king's

name. Experience had taught them that previous edicts were framed simply

to secure the destruction of those whom open warfare had failed to

destroy.[1316] Without, therefore, either definitely accepting or

rejecting the terms offered them, the Protestants of Nismes applied to

Marshal Damville, who, at the conclusion of the peace, found himself with

the royal troops at the hamlet of Milhaud, a league or two from their

gates,[1317] for a fortnight's suspension of hostilities. The request

being granted, a truce was established which was extended by successive

prolongations beyond the beginning of the next year.[1318]

[Sidenote: Assembly of Milhau and Montauban.]

Meantime the Protestants, notified by the Duke of Anjou of the conclusion

of the peace, sent messengers to his camp requesting that as the matter

was one vitally affecting the entire Protestant population, they might

receive permission to meet, under protection of the royal authority, and

deliberate respecting it. The king's consent having been obtained,

Protestant deputies from almost all parts of the kingdom came together,

late in the month of August, 1573, in the city of Milhau-en-Rouergue, from

which they shortly transferred their sessions to Montauban.

[Sidenote: Military organization of the Huguenots.]

This important assembly resolved to accept no peace unless based upon

equitable terms and secured by ample guarantees. In view of the

possibility of the recurrence of war, provision was made for a complete

military organization of the Huguenot resources in the south of France.

For this purpose Languedoc was divided into two "generalites" or

governments--the government of Nismes, or Lower Languedoc, placed under

command of M. de Saint Romain, and that of Upper Languedoc, with Montauban

for its chief city, to which the Viscount de Paulin was assigned as

military chief. Both governments were in turn subdivided into dioceses or

particular governments, each furnished with a governor and a deliberative

assembly. It was provided that in Nismes and Montauban respectively a

council should be convened consisting of deputies from all the dioceses of

the government, and that to this council, together with the governor,

should be intrusted the administration of the finances, with authority to

impose taxes alike upon Protestants and Roman Catholics. The organization,

it was estimated, could readily place twenty thousand men in the

field.[1319]

Such were the first attempts to perfect a system of warfare forced upon

the Huguenots by the treacherous assaults of their enemies--a fatal

necessity of instituting a state within a state, foreboding nothing but

ruin to France.

[Sidenote: Petition to the king.]

One of the chief results of the deliberations at Montauban was the

preparation of a petition to be laid before the king. This paper, which

has come down to us with the signatures of the viscounts, barons, and

other adherents of the Huguenot party, was intended to be an expression

not only of their own individual views, but also of the sentiments of the

churches they represented.[1320] The language is sharp and incisive, the

demands are unmistakably bold. For a sufficient justification of their

recent words and actions, the Huguenots of Guyenne point the monarch to

his own letter of the twenty-fourth of August, 1572, by which constraint

was laid upon them to assume arms. They call upon Charles, in accordance

with the promise contained in that letter, to follow up the traces there

alleged to have been found regarding the murder of Gaspard de Coligny, to

appoint impartial judges for this purpose, and to execute exemplary

justice upon the guilty. Not satisfied with claiming the annulling of all

judicial proceedings, the destruction of all monuments erected to

perpetuate the memory of the Massacre of St. Bartholomew's Day, and the

abolition of processions instituted by the parliaments of Paris and

Toulouse with the same end in view, they call on Charles to make a

declaration "that justly and for good reasons have 'those of the

religion' taken arms, resisting and warring in these last troubles, as

constrained thereto by the violent acts with which they have been assailed

and driven to distraction." They next demand those concessions which alone

can make the position of the Protestants in France secure and

endurable--freedom of worship and church discipline established by

perpetual provision, irrespective of place or time; the right of honorable

burial; immunity from taxation for the support of Roman Catholic

ceremonies; admission to schools and colleges; just regulations as to

marriage; amnesty; the power to hold civil office, etc. They request

permission to levy a sum of one hundred and twenty thousand livres among

themselves to pay off the indebtedness incurred by them in past wars. And

they go so far as not only to stipulate that the King of France shall

renounce all leagues he may have contracted with the enemies of his

Protestant subjects for their destruction, but even to propose that he

shall conclude a defensive alliance with the Protestant states of Germany,

Switzerland, England, and Scotland. Meanwhile, in order to prevent the

recurrence of "a conspiracy and Sicilian Vespers," of which the Huguenots

would be the victims, they ask to be permitted to hold forever the guard

of those cities which they now have in their possession, and in addition

some other cities in each of the provinces of the realm. The Protestant

cities, it is stipulated, shall retain their walls and munitions, and the

royal governors shall enter them accompanied only by a small retinue. The

observance of these articles the Huguenots insist shall be solemnly sworn

in privy and public council, and by the inhabitants of all places, the

oath to be renewed every five years.[1321]

Such stout demands did the Protestants of the south and south-west address

to Charles the Ninth on the first anniversary of the fatal matins of

Paris. They were, it must be admitted, somewhat different from what might

have been expected, a brief year before, from the fugitives who made their

escape from the bloody sword of their enemies. Moreover, the terms laid

down by the Huguenots of Lower Languedoc and Nismes were conceived in the

same brave language, and their demands were virtually identical. Huguenot

troops, paid by the king, to garrison both the cities now in the hands of

the Protestants, and two cities in each of the sixteen provinces required

for additional protection; free worship irrespective of place; new

parliaments in all the provinces, with Protestant judges to administer

justice to Protestants; liberty to levy tithes for the support of reformed

churches; punishment of the instigators and perpetrators of the atrocities

of the Massacre of St. Bartholomew's Day, as robbers and disturbers of the

public peace.[1322] The Tiers Etat of Provence and Dauphiny added to the

demands of Languedoc and Guyenne an urgent petition in favor of the

reduction of the onerous imposts under which the country was

groaning.[1323]

[Sidenote: "Les fronts d'airain."]

[Sidenote: Catharine's bitter reply.]

The bearers of these demands were well able to give them forcible and

fearless enunciation--Yolet, Philippi, Chavagnac, and others of the men

known by the expressive designation of "Les fronts d'airain."[1324]

Assuredly a brow of brass was not out of place, when the Protestant

deputies, after a delay of some weeks, were reluctantly admitted to an

audience. Charles the Ninth and his court were at this time at

Villers-Cotterets, on their way to the eastern frontiers of France,

accompanying the newly elected King of Poland as he slowly and unwillingly

journeyed toward the capital of a kingdom regarded by him in the light of

a detestable place of exile. Contemporary writers inform us that Yolet and

his companions were in no degree overawed by the splendor of the scene,

and made no weak abatement in the terms they had been instructed to

propose. Charles heard them through with patient attention. He was not a

little astonished at the extent of their demands, we may be certain; but

he made no comment upon the courageous assertion of Protestant rights. Not

so with the queen mother. When the deputies had at length finished their

harangue, Catharine could no longer contain her indignation. "Why," she

exclaimed with marked bitterness of tone, "if your Conde himself were

alive and in the heart of the kingdom with twenty thousand horse and fifty

thousand foot, and held the chief cities in his power, he would not make

half so great demands!"[1325]

[Sidenote: The Huguenots firm.]

Despite the unwelcome character of the claims of the Huguenot deputies,

some answer must be given. It was found impossible to induce the envoys to

modify them. They denied that they had the power, even if they had the

inclination, to alter the action of those who had sent them. They were

therefore dismissed with expressions of good-will and the assurance that

two royal commissioners, the Duc d'Uzes and the Chevalier de Caylus, would

be sent to treat with the delegates whom the Huguenots might choose.

Marshal Damville, governor of the province, was to participate in the

negotiations and to appoint some city in the vicinity of Montauban where

they might be held. Charles was to hear the result of their conference on

his return from the German borders. Meanwhile he promised to instruct

Damville to put an end to all hostilities, provided the Huguenots should

desist from everything tending to provoke retaliation.[1326] The Tiers

Etat received the answer to their petition more promptly. It was naturally

to the effect that a return to the meagre scale of imposts under Louis XI.

was utterly impracticable, in view of the burdens of the treasury arising

from recent wars and the pensions yearly payable to various members of the

royal family.[1327]

[Sidenote: Progress of the court to the borders of France.]

[Sidenote: Decline of the health of Charles IX.]

It would be out of place to describe here at any length the slow progress

of the French court as it escorted the King of Poland to the borders of

the realm. To none of the principal personages taking part was it the

occasion of much satisfaction. Catharine was as reluctant to part from

Henry, her favorite son, as he was himself averse to exchange the

pleasures of the Louvre and Saint Germain for the crown of an unruly and

half-civilized kingdom. As for Charles, the gratification he could not

conceal at the prospect of being soon freed from the presence of a brother

whom he both disliked and feared was more than counterbalanced by the

rapid decline of his own health. The boy of eleven, whom the Venetian

ambassador had described about the time of his accession to the throne as

handsome, amiable, and graceful in appearance, quick, vivacious, and

humane--in short, as possessing every quality from which a great prince

and a great king might be expected,[1328] was now a man of twenty-three.

But his constitution, never robust, had gained nothing. The violent

exercises to which he had been addicted even as a child, and which, though

princely, had been pronounced dangerous by the ambassador, had been

incessantly practised--the ball, horsemanship, arms--and bodily

feebleness, not strength, had been the result. Other excesses had

contributed to hasten the catastrophe. More than all, if we may believe

the testimony of those who were familiar with the young monarch's later

life, the mental and moral experience of the last eighteen months left

their impress on his physical system. Charles, with the Massacre of St.

Bartholomew's Day, had lost all the elasticity of youth. Remorse for

complicity in the crime then perpetrated co-operated with the persuasion

of the uselessness and complete failure of the attempt to exterminate the

Huguenots, and the consciousness of having incurred the indelible mark of

hatred and detestation of an impartial posterity. Even in his sleeping

hours the curse of the murdered victims pursued him and disturbed his

rest. Neither by day nor by night could he banish the remembrance of the

time when blood ran so freely in the streets of Paris.

No attentive observer could doubt that the end was drawing near. The court

had gone no farther on its way to Lorraine than the little town of

Vitry-le-Francais, on the river Marne, when Charles fell so seriously ill

as to be unable to prosecute his journey. As was usual in such cases,

while the physicians alleged as a sufficient explanation of the attack the

king's immoderate exercise in the chase and in blowing the trumpet, the

more suspicious frequenters of the court and the credulous people did not

hesitate to invent the story that he had been poisoned. But by whom the

crime had been committed was not settled. Some ascribed it to Catharine,

others to Henry of Anjou, while others still laid the guilt at the door of

a person of less note, whose honor the licentious king had offended.[1329]

[Sidenote: Project of an English match renewed.]

Meanwhile, neither the monarch's feeble health, nor the journeying of the

court, interrupted the prosecution of those diplomatic intrigues from

which Catharine still looked for valuable results. The election of Henry

to the Polish crown left but one of her sons upon whom the regal dignity

had not been conferred. The prophecy of Nostradamus might have its

complete fulfilment if only a kingdom could be found for Alencon.[1330]

Otherwise the superstitious queen mother did not doubt that she was fated

to see not only Charles, but Henry also die, to make place for her

youngest child on the throne of France. La Mothe Fenelon was therefore

instructed to put forth every exertion to bring Queen Elizabeth to the

point of consenting definitely to wed a prince her junior by about a score

of years. Nor did the negotiations appear altogether hopeless. The suitor

was, indeed, we have seen, as insignificant in body as he was contemptible

in intellectual ability. Moreover, the deep traces left on his face by the

small-pox rendered him sufficiently ungainly. The blemish was said to be

increasing, instead of diminishing, with his years.[1331] But the French

courtiers might perhaps have overcome this impediment had Elizabeth been

able to see it to be her interest to contract such close relations with

her neighbors across the channel. As it was, an agreement was actually

made that Alencon should visit England and press his suit in person; but

when the time arrived for him to cross to Dover, Catharine justified the

despatch of Marshal de Retz in his place, on the plea of her son's

illness. The excuse may have contained some truth,[1332] for, albeit

Francis of Alencon had received the baptismal name of Hercules, he was a

puny weakling, from whom no labors could ever be expected, but rather a

dull existence of sloth and imbecility. It was, however, a stretch even of

diplomatic assurance, for La Mothe Fenelon to suggest to the virgin queen

of England, as he deliberately reports that he did, that Alencon's malady

was probably due to his disappointment at Elizabeth's failure to

reciprocate his honest affection![1333] Possibly his mother and his

brother the king may about this time have begun to realize how impolitic

it would be to strengthen overmuch the personal consideration of the young

prince. Disgusted with the subordinate position assigned him at court, and

especially with the failure of his efforts to obtain the appointment of

lieutenant-general of the kingdom, lately held by Henry of Anjou, Alencon

was even now drifting into an association with the political and religious

malcontents whose existence could not altogether be ignored. The French

ambassador at the English court was, however, instructed by no means to

let the projected marriage drop.[1334]

With the patriots in the Low Countries and with the Protestant princes of

Germany, the French agents were in even more active conference. In the

Netherlands there was a possibility of securing some high position for

Anjou or Alencon, in Germany a chance to divert the imperial crown from

the Hapsburg to the Valois family, it may reasonably be doubted whether

the project was ever distinctly entertained, as the historian De Thou

asserts,[1335] of conferring upon Anjou the command in chief of the

confederates in Flanders, where it was expected that he would have a well

equipped fleet at his disposition; for the correspondence of Gaspard de

Schomberg, the French agent, contains no allusion to the proposal.

Certainly, however, France was, at least, anxious that England should gain

no advantage over her in this part of Europe. In fact, nothing but the

natural fear entertained of the great power and apparently limitless

resources of Spain deterred both Elizabeth and Charles from attempting to

secure the sovereignty of the revolted Netherlands.

[Sidenote: Intrigues with the German princes.]

In Germany the field for intrigue was more open. The imperial dignity had

not yet become purely hereditary. In choosing a new King of the Romans,

the presumptive heir of the German Empire, the three Protestant Electors,

if they could but secure the concurrence of one of the four Roman Catholic

Electors, might have it in their power to correct the mistake committed by

Frederick the Wise of Saxony, a half-century earlier, in declining the

crown in favor of Charles of Spain. Schomberg was therefore instructed to

recommend to the Protestants of Germany and the Low Countries, that one of

their own number should be placed in the line of succession to the Empire,

or, if they could find no German Protestant prince sufficiently powerful

to oppose the Hapsburgs, that the dignity should be offered to the King of

France. This was a somewhat startling suggestion to emanate from a king

who, but a brief twelvemonth before had been butchering his Protestant

subjects by tens of thousands. But the sixteenth century furnishes not a

few paradoxes equally remarkable. Both Protestants and Roman Catholics

often found it convenient to have very short memories. In this case,

however, the proposal to set aside the son of the tolerant Maximilian the

Second in behalf of a son of Catharine de' Medici met with little favor

at the hands of one at least of the Protestant leaders. The Landgrave of

Hesse declared he would have nothing to do with a project intended solely

to sow divisions in the empire. The French, since the successful issue of

their intrigues in Poland, he said, had become so arrogant that they

thought they must be nothing less than masters of the whole world.[1336]

As for himself, he was quite satisfied with the present emperor, whom he

prayed that God might long preserve, and then graciously provide them in

his place with a pious Christian leader who should rule the empire well

and faithfully.[1337]

[Sidenote: Death of Count Louis of Nassau.]

At Blamont, in the duchy of Lorraine, Catharine took leave of the King of

Poland. Here the old ally of the Huguenots, Louis of Nassau, accompanied

by Duke Christopher, younger son of the elector palatine, met them. Louis

had been unremitting in his efforts to obtain French assistance in the

desperate struggle in which he and his brother were engaged. If words and

assurances could be of any worth, he was successful. Catharine promised in

Charles's name that France would not be behind the German Protestant

princes in rendering assistance to the Dutch patriots. Louis was so

cordially received by the queen mother, and especially by Alencon, that he

departed greatly encouraged with the prospect. Alencon had pressed the

Dutch patriot's hand, and whispered in his ear: "I now have the

government, as my brother, the King of Poland formerly had it, and I shall

devote myself wholly to seconding the efforts of the Prince of

Orange."[1338] The promised succor from France Nassau never received. Four

months later (on the fourteenth of April, 1574) the brave young count, in

company with his friend and comrade, Duke Christopher, lost his life in

the fatal battle of Mook, on the banks of the Meuse.[1339] Not the Prince

of Orange nor Holland alone, but the entire Protestant world deplored the

untimely death of one of the boldest and most unselfish of the champions

of religion and liberty.

With the details of the journey of Henry of Anjou to take possession of

his new kingdom, we cannot here concern ourselves. One incident, however,

naturally connects itself with the fortunes of the French Huguenots.

[Sidenote: Anjou's reception at Heidelberg.]

[Sidenote: Frankness of the elector palatine.]

After traversing Alsace, Henry and his suite presented themselves,

unwelcome guests, at Heidelberg, capital of the palatinate. The Elector,

Frederick the Third, and his subjects were, perhaps, equally displeased at

the arrival of the prime mover in the Massacre of St. Bartholomew's Day.

But, while the people felt some freedom in the expression of their

disgust, motives of state policy prevented their prince from openly

displaying his antipathy. However, he neither could nor would conceal the

lively remembrance in which the events of August, 1572, were still held by

him. It was on Friday, the eleventh of December, that the French party,

under the escort of a large body of soldiers sent out to do them honor,

ascended to the castle, then as now occupying a commanding site

overlooking the valley of the Neckar.[1340] The King of Poland was

somewhat surprised when, on entering the portal, instead of the elector,

the rhinegrave, with two French refugees escaped from the massacre, came

to escort him to the rooms prepared for his reception. Frederick had

directed the rhinegrave to request Henry to excuse this apparent

discourtesy on the ground of his feeble health. It is more probable that

the true motive was the elector's desire to avoid incurring, by too great

complaisance, the displeasure of the emperor, who was naturally much

irritated at the success of the French intrigues in Poland. When, later,

Frederick made his tardy appearance, it was only to greet Anjou in a brief

address, reserving for the morrow their more extended conference. On

Saturday the elector politely conducted his guest through his extensive

picture gallery. Pausing before one painting the face of which was

protected from sight, he ordered an attendant to draw aside the curtain.

To his astonishment, Henry found himself confronted with a life-like

portrait of Gaspard de Coligny. To the question, "Does your Royal Highness

recognize the subject?" Henry replied with sufficient composure: "I do; it

is the late Admiral of France." "Yes," rejoined Frederick, "it is the

admiral--a man whom I have found, of all the French nobles, the most

zealous for the glory of the French name; and I am not afraid to assert

that in him the king and all France have sustained an irreparable loss."

Elsewhere Henry's attention was directed to a large painting representing

the very scenes of the massacre, and he was asked whether he could

distinguish any of the victims. Nor did Frederick confine himself to these

casual references. In pointed terms he exposed to the young Valois both

the sin and the mistaken policy of the events of a twelvemonth since. The

slaughter of the admiral and of so many other innocent men and women had

not only provoked the Divine retribution, but had diminished not a little

the reputation and influence of the French with all orders of persons in

Germany.[1341] Henry listened with commendable patience to the old

elector's denunciations, alleging by way of excuse that the French court

had been under the influence of the passions then running high, and

readily promised great caution and tolerance in future.[1342] He did,

indeed, strike on his breast and begged Frederick to believe him that

things had occurred otherwise than had been reported. But his auditor

dryly remarked that he was fully informed of what had taken place in

France.[1343] As the elector also took occasion to remind Anjou of sundry

miserable deaths of notorious persecutors, such as Herod the Great, Herod

Agrippa, and Maxentius; as he openly ridiculed the absurd suggestion that

Coligny, a wounded man, with both arms disabled in consequence of

Maurevel's shot, planned on his bed an attack on the king; and as,

furthermore, he plainly denounced the shocking immorality of Catharine de'

Medici's court ladies--it must be confessed that Frederick the Pious, on

the present occasion, made more of a virtue of frankness than of

diplomacy.[1344]

On Sunday the French left Heidelberg, with little regret on their own part

or on that of their hosts. Not to speak of their treatment by the elector,

which even the historian De Thou regarded as scarcely comporting with the

dignity with which Henry was invested,[1345] the followers of the Polish

king met with frequent insults, both in coming and in going. One of them

relates how he heard cries of "Those dogs from Lorraine! Those Italian

traitors!" And a German eye-witness of the scenes expresses it as his

opinion that the French nobles would not have been safe had they not been

escorted by the palatine troops. The sight of "that notable cut-throat,

the Duke of Nevers," of the Marshal de Retz, of Captain Du Gast, and "very

many others of that band of villains who so cruelly butchered the admiral

and other nobles in Paris," provoked the populace almost beyond endurance.

The very diamonds and jewels presented by Henry on his departure, to the

elector and to the ladies of his court, aroused the popular indignation;

for they were known, as we have already seen, to have constituted a part

of the plunder of a certain rich Huguenot jeweller, whose shop had been

robbed at the time of the Parisian matins.[1346] There were not wanting

those who would even have counselled the worthy elector to follow the

course indicated by the Spanish grandee, who informed Charles the Fifth

that he intended to burn his castle to the ground so soon as the

traitorous Constable de Bourbon had relieved it of his polluting

presence.[1347]

[Sidenote: Last days of Chancellor de l'Hospital.]

Meantime, within the borders of France all was ferment and disquiet. The

Roman Catholic element, comprising the overwhelming majority of the

people, had become split into two factions, both animated by

inextinguishable hatred, and each resolved to compass the destruction of

the other. Of conciliatory measures there was a dearth. Among the men of

wide influence there was no one to take the place of the virtuous Michel

de l'Hospital. That truly great statesman had died nine months before (on

the thirteenth of March, 1573). The storm of war at that moment raging

about La Rochelle was a fit expression of the utter failure of the aged

chancellor's policy. For a dozen years there had not been a candid and

sincere effort made to restore tranquillity to France which had not either

originated with him or received his cordial support. But of the sanguine

hopes of ultimate success entertained in the earlier stages of his

political career, he retained little toward its close. The last years of

his presence at court witnessed an uninterrupted struggle between the

chancellor and that family of Guise which he had come to regard as the

prime cause of the misery afflicting the kingdom. More than once the

latent personal hostility had broken out in an open quarrel between

L'Hospital and the Cardinal of Lorraine. Two or three exciting scenes of

recrimination, which the tact of Catharine de' Medici was scarcely able to

allay, have met us in this history. At length, when the third civil war

burst forth, L'Hospital, seeing himself altogether powerless to resist the

more violent counsels then in the ascendant, had received permission to

retire from the royal court to his estate in the vicinity of

Etampes.[1348] It was none the less an exile that it wore the appearance

of a voluntary withdrawal. Birague discharged the real functions of the

chancellor's office. Finally, after barely escaping a violent death in the

Massacre of St. Bartholomew's Day, the chancellor received, in January,

1573, the formal order to give up the guardianship of the seals, which for

more than four years had been only nominally under his control. His

touching reply to the royal summons is the last production of the

chancellor's pen that has come down to us. Interposing no obstacle to the

execution of the king's will, the writer invoked the testimony of the

queen mother that, in all things pertaining to the royal interests, "he

had been forgetful rather of his own advantage than of the king's service,

and had always followed _the great royal road_, turning neither to the

right hand nor to the left, and giving himself to no private faction."

"And now," he added, "that my maladies and my age have rendered me useless

to do you service, just as you have seen the old galleys in the port of

Marseilles, which, though dismantled, are yet regarded with pleasure, so I

very humbly beg you to view me both in my present state and my past, which

shall be an instruction and an example to all your subjects to do you good

service. God give you grace to choose servants and counsellors more

competent than I have been, and as affectionate and devoted to your

service as I am." The closing words were characteristic of the life-long

advocate of toleration: a recommendation of gentleness and clemency, in

imitation of a long-suffering and pardoning God.[1349] Two months later

Michel de l'Hospital ended his eventful life. France could ill afford to

lose at this juncture a magistrate[1350] so upright--a statesman who "had

the lilies of France in his heart."[1351]

[Sidenote: The party of the "Politiques."]

[Sidenote: Hotman's Franco-Gallia.]

Since the siege of La Rochelle, or more properly since the day of the

massacre, a new party had been forming, of those who could not bring

themselves to approve the cruel acts of the court, or who, for any reason,

were jealous of the faction now in power. As opposed to the Italian

counsellors by whom the queen mother had surrounded the throne, it was

pre-eminently a French or patriotic party. It demanded the expulsion of

Florentines and of Lorrainers from the kingdom, or at least from the

management of public affairs. The "Malcontents," or "Politiques," as they

now began to be called,[1352] demanded a return to the former usages of

the kingdom, in accordance with which the most important decisions were

never made without consulting the States General. Two books appearing

about this time made a deep impression. In an anonymous treatise entitled

"Franco-Gallia," the authorship of which was speedily traced to the

eminent jurist Francis Hotman, attention was drawn to the original

constitution of the kingdom; and the writer showed by irrefragable proofs

that the regal dignity was not hereditary like a private possession, but

was a gift of the people, which they could as lawfully transfer from one

to another, as originally confer. The participation of women in the

administration of the government was declared to be abhorrent to the

ideas of the founders of the French monarchy.[1353] In another work

appearing not long after, the principle was enunciated that an unbounded

obedience is due to the Almighty alone, while obedience to human

magistrates is in its very nature subject to limitations and exceptions.

The supreme authority of kings and other high magistrates was explained to

be of such a nature "that if they violate the laws, to the observance of

which they have bound themselves by oath, and become manifest tyrants,

giving no room for better counsels, then it is lawful for the inferior

magistrates to make provision both for themselves and for those committed

to their charge, and oppose the tyrant."[1354] The circumstance is not

without significance that in a Huguenot work, published early in the

succeeding year, the guilty king who authorized the butchery of his

innocent subjects on St. Bartholomew's Day, is for the first time

distinctly designated as the "tyrant."[1355]

[Sidenote: Treacherous attempt on La Rochelle.]

The lesson that no trust could be reposed in Charles and his court was one

which the world had learned pretty thoroughly before this; and the events

at La Rochelle during the month of December, 1573, were well calculated to

prevent it from being forgotten. The definite peace, made five months

before, guaranteed the safety of the Protestants, and secured to them the

free exercise of their religious rights. None the less was a project set

on foot to introduce a royal garrison into the city by treachery. M. de

Biron and other captains had been unable to conceal their disgust at the

abandonment of the siege of La Rochelle, when, as they pretended, it must

very shortly have fallen into the king's hands, and Biron had been soundly

berated by Anjou for his pains. He had not, however, given up the notion

of making himself master of the Huguenot stronghold, and there were others

in the royal army intent upon the same end. A scheme to smuggle soldiers

through the gates, in wagons covered with branches of trees, was so freely

talked of that it reached the citizens' ears, and only augmented their

suspicions. A more serious plot was set on foot, in accordance with which

one Jacques du Lyon, Seigneur de Grandfief, prominent in the late defence

of La Rochelle, was to gain possession of one of the city gates, and admit

Puigaillard, who, for this purpose, had massed considerable numbers of

royal soldiers at Nuaille, on the east, and at Saint-Vivien, on the south

of La Rochelle. Happily the treacherous design was itself betrayed by an

accomplice. Grandfief was killed while defending himself against those who

had been sent to arrest him. Several of the supposed leaders[1356] were

condemned to be broken on the wheel, and the barbarous sentence was

executed. The papers discovered in the house of Grandfief clearly proved

that the plot had received the full approval not only of Biron, but of the

queen mother herself. After inflicting summary vengeance on the miserable

instruments of perfidy, the Rochellois, therefore, addressed their

complaints to the French court. It need not surprise us, however, to learn

that they received in reply letters from Charles not only disowning the

conspiracy, but assuring them that he heartily detested it, and approved

the rigorous measures adopted.[1357]

[Sidenote: The Huguenots reassemble at Milhau.]

[Sidenote: They complete their organization.]

Shortly before the discovery of the conspiracy at La Rochelle, the

Huguenots had again assembled at Milhau-en-Rouergue. The delegates, about

one hundred in number, represented very fully the gentry and tiers etat of

the south and south-west of France, while a few names from the central and

northern provinces indicated the weaker hold gained by Protestantism in

that portion of the kingdom.[1358] Ostensibly meeting, with the royal

permission, to receive the report of the commissioners sent to the king,

and to entertain the terms proposed by Marshal Damville, the Huguenots

availed themselves of the opportunity to perfect the organization of their

party which had been sketched in previous political assemblies. Accepting

it as notorious that, whether in time of peace, or of open war, or of

truce, the Protestants were in peril from the daily intrigues and assaults

of their enemies, all tending to their complete ruin, the Huguenot

assembly renewed and swore to maintain a permanent union comprising all

their brethren of the same faith not only in France proper, but in the

papal Comtat Venaissin, the principality of Orange, and other districts

less closely united to the crown. To this end they determined that the

"States General," composed of a delegate from the nobility, the tiers

etat, and the magistracy of each "generalite" or government, should meet

every six months; while the particular assemblies of the governments

should be convened at least as often as once in three months. The

functions of the generals and their councils were expressly limited to the

military and financial concerns of the Huguenots, with other matters of

public interest. They were strictly forbidden from intermeddling, under

any pretext, with the discharge of civil or criminal justice. This last

function was to be referred to the royal courts, save that, instead of

appealing to the parliaments, known to be too hostile to Protestantism to

afford hope of obtaining justice, arbitrators were to be chosen by the

Protestants among themselves.[1359] Not forgetting their common religious

bond, the Huguenots at Milhau declared it to be the duty of the ministers

of God's word and of the consistories to keep watch over criminal and

dissolute behavior, and denounce it for punishment to the civil

magistrate. At the same time, in order that the ministers might be the

better able to devote themselves to their sacred functions, it was

directed that they be regularly paid from the common funds "without

making any further use of notices (billettes) or other unworthy and

illusory methods, as has been done heretofore, to the great scandal of all

good people." The levy of imposts and the creation of loans were made the

exclusive right of the particular states, while the administration of the

funds arising from the royal revenues was to be intrusted to the

provincial councils.[1360]

Such were the chief features in a plan for organization evidently looking

to the speedy renewal of the warfare temporarily suspended by virtue of

the truce.

[Sidenote: The Duke of Alencon.]

While the revelation of the treacherous attempt of the royal party upon La

Rochelle proved to the Politiques, or Malcontents, the impossibility of

relying upon the assurances given in the name of Charles the Ninth, the

resolutions of the Huguenots in Milhau encouraged them in their project to

remove the present advisers of the king. In the absence of any better

leader, they looked to the Duke of Alencon as their head. He alone of the

royal family was guiltless of the Massacre of St. Bartholomew's Day. His

antagonism to Anjou and to his mother was well known. It was even reported

that he had himself been exposed to serious danger by reason of his avowed

sympathy with the imprisoned King of Navarre and his cousin of Conde. In

fact, he was himself little better than a captive at the court of

Charles--eyed with suspicion, unable to obtain favors for his friends, and

vainly suing to be appointed to the office of lieutenant-general of the

kingdom. It was perhaps not strange that, in looking about for a nominal

head, the Politiques should have settled upon Alencon, who received their

overtures with undisguised satisfaction and large promises of support. And

yet there could scarcely have been a more unhappy selection. Of the feeble

children of Catharine de' Medici, he was undoubtedly the feeblest. He

possessed neither the courage to undertake nor the fortitude to prosecute

any really bold enterprise. All who had the misfortune at any time to

credit his plighted word discovered in their own cases a fresh and pointed

application of the warning against putting trust in princes. Of him

Busbec, the emperor's ambassador, gave a life-like delineation when he

characterized him as "a prince who allowed himself to be ensnared by the

bad counsels of unskilful ministers, who could not distinguish friends

from flatterers, nor a great from a good reputation; ready to undertake,

still more ready to desist; always inconstant, restless, and frivolous;

always prepared to disturb the best established tranquillity."[1361]

[Sidenote: Glandage plunders the city of Orange.]

Circumstances almost beyond their control seemed now to be forcing the

Huguenots to make common cause with the Malcontents. Yet there were not

wanting those who looked upon the alliance as more likely to retard than

to advance their true interests, and who pointed with convincing force to

the disastrous results of a similar union in the time of the tumult of

Amboise, fourteen years before. The cloak of the reformed name, they

argued, would certainly be assumed by men having no desire for a

reformation of manners or morals--men whose lives would only dishonor the

cause with which they were supposed to be identified. Nor was the fear an

idle one, as was shown by an incident that occurred about this very time.

The truce which had been made for Languedoc did not extend to the Comtat

Venaissin. Naturally enough, there were many in the Huguenot ranks who,

remembering past injuries received at the hands of the troops of the Pope,

were not unwilling to turn their arms in this direction. But their leader

was no Huguenot. M. de Glandage, a gentleman of Dauphiny, was a soldier of

fortune, and would doubtless have fought with as little reluctance against

the Protestants as for them, had it been to his advantage to enlist under

the papal standard. As it was otherwise, he made himself master of the

city of Orange, with the assistance of a party of citizens, and expelled

Berchon, who, in the name of William the Silent, had strictly abstained

from acts of hostility against the neighboring pontifical towns. Not so

with the new governor of Orange. The city became the starting-point for a

continuous series of incursions. It was not war, but open rapine. The very

traders were plundered of their wares when they fell into his hands. One

might have fancied that a mediaeval robber-baron had reappeared on the

banks of the Rhone. It was true that Glandage, making a virtue of

bluntness, was wont to say that "there was nothing Huguenot about him but

the point of his sword." None the less did his violent acts bring

discredit upon the Huguenots.[1362]

[Sidenote: Montbrun's exploits in Dauphiny.]

Although war had not yet been formally resumed, there were parts of France

in which it already raged, or rather where peace had never been restored.

This was the case in particular on both banks of the Rhone, in Dauphiny

and in Vivarez and the adjoining districts. So rapid had been the

movements of the veteran Huguenot chief Montbrun, and so successful every

blow he struck, that terror spread far and wide. Important towns fell into

his hands; a rich abbey but a few miles from Grenoble was plundered, and

the silent monks of St. Bruno, in the secluded retreat of the Grande

Chartreuse--the mother house of their order--were glad to summon troops to

defend their rich fields from a similar fate.[1363] From Lyons to Avignon

the Huguenots were stronger than the king's forces.[1364]

[Sidenote: La Rochelle resumes arms. Beginning of the fifth religious

war.]

But the time for hollow truce and a desultory and irregular warfare was

rapidly passing away. It was but little more than a month after the

beginning of the new year before the conflagration again burst forth. The

Protestants of all parts of the kingdom were at length of one mind; there

was no room for doubt that any hopes offered them had as their sole

object to sow discord among the adherents of the reformed faith. If

anything had been wanting to prove this, it was made clear by the refusal

of the court to extend the benefits of the Edict of Pacification of July,

1573, to the whole of France. The limitation of the liberty of worship by

the provisions of that edict to La Rochelle, Montauban, and Nismes, was

evidently intended to render the inhabitants of the three strongest

Huguenot cities selfishly indifferent to the injustice done to their

brethren in other parts of France. In fact, this result was partially

effected in the first of the cities named. The Rochellois were at first

very reluctant to resume hostilities, and began to plead conscientious

scruples forbidding them to break the compact made with the king. Happily

their hesitation was removed by Francois de la Noue, who, returning in a

capacity entirely different from that in which he had last appeared, used

all the arts of persuasion to induce the Huguenot stronghold by the sea to

become again the rallying-point for the Protestants of the west. It was

not difficult to show the citizens, when once they would listen to reason,

that the starving of Sancerre and numberless murders of adherents of the

reformed doctrine throughout France were violations of the peace quite

sufficient to justify its formal abrogation by the injured party. The

fears dictated by apparent weakness were dispelled by pointing to the

signal success that had crowned the arms of Montbrun in Dauphiny,[1365]

while the reluctance of loyal subjects to rise in arms against their

lawful sovereign, even in order to redress great wrongs, unless authorized

by the leadership of a prince of the blood, was answered by the assurance

that they would have a head of much higher rank than any under whose

protection the Huguenots had heretofore taken the field.[1366] It was

clear that the personage thus hinted at could be no other than the king's

brother. No wonder that the Rochellois yielded to La Noue's arguments, for

almost every Roman Catholic whose hands were clean of the blood shed in

the massacre applauded the justice of the new uprising.[1367]