ot Henry IV. BY JOHN S. C. ABBOTT W>TH ENGRAVINGS NEW YORK AND LONDON HARPER & BROTHERS PUBLISHERS 1904 Entered, according to Act of Congress, In the year one thousand eight hundred and fifty-six, by HARPER & BROTHERS, Copyright, 1881, by SUSAN ABBOT MHAIX jgf PREFACE. HISTORY is our Heaven-appointed instructor. It is the guide for the future. The calamities of yesterday are the protectors of to-day. The sea of time we navigate is full of perils. But it is not an unknown sea. It has "been traversed for ages, and there is not a sunken rock or a treacherous sand-bar which is not marked by the wreck of those who have pre- ceded us. There is no portion of history fraught with more valuable instruction than the period of those terrible religiou" wars which desolated the sixteenth century. There is no romance so wild as the veritable history of those times. The majestic outgoings of the Almighty, as de- veloped in the onward progress of our race, in- finitely transcend, in all the elements of pro- foundness, mystery, and grandeur, all that man's fancy can create. viii PREFACE. The cartoons of Raphael are beautiful, but what are they when compared with the heav- ing ocean, the clouds of sunset, and the pinna- cles of the Alps ? The dome of St. Peter's is man's noblest architecture, but what is it when compared with the magnificent rotunda of the skies ? JOHN S. C- ABBOTT. Brunswick, Maine, 1856. CONTENTS. Chapter Pag* I. CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH 13 II. CIVIL WAR 45 III. THE MARRIAGE 68 IV. PREPARATIONS FOR MASSACRE 93 V. MASSACRE OF ST. BARTHOLOMEW 109 VI. THE HOUSES OF VALOIS, OF GUISE, AND OF BOURBON - 137 VII. REIGN OF HENRY III - 167 VIII. THE LEAGUE 196 IX. THE ASSASSINATION OF THE DUKE OF GUISE AND OF HENRY III 220 X. WAR AND WOE 256 XI. THE CONVERSION OF THE KING 281 XII. THE REIGN OF HENRY IV. AND HIS DEATH . . . 30C ENGRAVINGS. THE BIRTH OF HENRY OF NAVARRE 19 THE FLIGHT OF THE QUEEN OF NAVARRE 52 THE MARRIAGE 87 THE MASSACRE OF ST. BARTHOLOMEW __ 115 THE ASSASSINATION OF FRANCIS, DUKE OF GUISE 161 THE ASSASSINATION OF HENRY, DUKE OF GUISE 228 THE ASSASSINATION OF HENRY III 238 THE ACT OF ABJURING PROTESTANTISM 292 THE RECONCILIATION WITH MAYENNE . . . 309 KING HENRY IV, CHAPTER I. CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH. Navarre. ABOUT four hundred years ago there was a small kingdom, spreading over the cliffs and ravines of the eastern extremity of the Pyr- enees, called Navarre. Its population, of about five hundred thousand, consisted of a very sim- ple, frugal, and industrious people. Those who lived upon the shore washed by the stormy waves of the Bay of Biscay gratified their love of excitement and of adventure by braving the perils of the sea. Those who lived in the sol- itude of the interior, on the sunny slopes of the mountains, or by the streams which meandered through the verdant valleys, fed they 1 flocks, and harvested their grain, and pressed rich wine from the grapes of their vineyards, in the en- joyment of the most pleasant duties of rural life. Proud of their independence, they were 14 KING HENRY IV. [1475. Catharine de Foix. Ferdinand and Isabella. ever ready to grasp arms to repel foreign ag- gression. The throne of this kingdom was, at the time of which we speak, occupied by Cath- arine de Foix. She was a widow, and all her hopes and affections were centred in her son Henryj an ardent and impetuous boy six or seven years of age, who was to receive the crown when it should fall from her brow, and transmit to posterity their ancestral honors. Ferdinand of Aragon had just married Isa- bella of Castile, and had thus united those two populous and wealthy kingdoms ; and now, in the arrogance of power, seized with the pride of annexation, he began to look with a wistful eye upon the picturesque kingdom of Navarre. Its comparative feebleness, under the reign of a be- reaved woman weary of the world, invited to the enterprise. Should he grasp at the whole territory of the little realm, France might inter- pose her powerful remonstrance. Should he take but the half which was spread out upon the southern declivity of the Pyrenees, it would be virtually saying to the French monarch, 44 The rest I courteously leave for you." The armies of Spain were soon sweeping resistlessly through these sunny valleys, and one half of her empire was ruthlessly torn from the Queen 1475.] CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH. 15 Dismemberment of Navarre. Plans for revenge. of Navarre, and transferred to the dominion of imperious Castile and Aragon. Catharine retired with her child to the colder and more uncongenial regions of the northern declivity of the mountains. Her bosom glow- ed with mortification and rage in view of her hopeless defeat. As she sat down gloomily in the small portion which remained to her of her dismembered empire, she endeavored to foster in the heart of her son the spirit of revenge, and to inspire him with the resolution to regain those lost leagues of territory which had been wrested from the inheritance of his fathers. Henry imbibed his mother's spirit, and chafed and fretted under wrongs for which he could ob- tain no redress. Ferdinand arid Isabella could not be annoyed even by any force which feeble Navarre could raise. Queen Catharine, howev- er, brooded deeply over her wrongs, and laid plans for retributions of revenge, the execution of which she knew must be deferred till long after her body should have mouldered to dust in the grave. She courted the most intimate alliance with Francis L, King of France. She contemplated the merging of her own little king- dom into that powerful .monarchy, that the in- fant Navarre, having grown into the giant 16 KING HENEY IV. [1553. Death of Catharine. Marriage of Henry and Margaret France, might crush the Spanish tyrants into humiliation. Nerved by this determined spirit of revenge, and inspired by a mother's ambi- tion, she intrigued to wed her son to the heir- ess of the French throne, that even in the world of spirits she might be cheered by seeing Hen- ry heading the armies of France, the terrible avenger of her wrongs. These hopes invigor- ated her until the fitful dream of her joyless life was terminated, and her restless spirit sank into the repose of the grave. She lived, how- ever, to see her plans apparently in progress to- ward their most successful fulfillment. Henry, her son, was married to Margaret, the favorite sister of the King of France. Their nuptials were blessed with but one child, Jeanne d'Albret. This child, in whose destiny such ambitious hopes were centred, bloomed into most marvelous beauty, and became also as conspic- uous for her mental endowments as for her per- sonal charms. She had hardly emerged from the period of childhood when she was married to Antony of Bourbon, a near relative of the royal family of France. Immediately after her marriage she left Navarre with her husband, to take up her residence in the French metropolis. One hope still lived, with undying vigor, in 1553.] CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH. 17 lingering hope^ of Henry. Jeanne returns to Navarre. the bosom of Henry. It was the hope, the in- tense passion, with which his departed mother had inspired him, that a grandson would arise from this union, who would, with the spirit of Hannibal, avenge the family wrongs upon Spain. Twice Henry took a grandson into his arms with the feeling that the great desire of his life was about to be realized ; and twice, with almost a broken heart, he saw these hopes blighted as he committed the little ones to the grave. Summers and winters had now lingered wea- rily away, and Henry had become an old man. Disappointment and care had worn down his frame. World-weary and joyless, he still clung to hope. The tidings that Jeanne was again to become a mother rekindled the lustre of his fad- ing eye. The aged king sent importunately for his daughter to return without delay to the pa- ternal castle, that the child might be born in the kingdom of Navarre, whose wrongs it was to be his peculiar destiny to avenge. It was mid- winter. The journey was long and the roads rough. But the dutiful and energetic Jeanne promptly obeyed the wishes of her father, and hastened to his court. Henry could hardly restrain his impatience as he waited, week after week, for the advent of the 132 18 KING HENHY IV. [1553. Birth of Henry IV. Tha royal nur.na long-looked-for avenger. With the characteris- tic superstition of the times, he constrained his daughter to promise that, at the period of birth, during the most painful moments of her trial, she would sing a mirthful and triumphant song, that her child might possess a sanguine, joyous, and energetic spirit. Henry entertained not a doubt that the child would prove a boy, commissioned by Providence as the avenger of Navarre. The old king re- ceived the child, at the moment of its birth, into his own arms, totally regardless of a mother's rights, and exultingly enveloping it in soft folds, bore it off, as his own property, to his private apartment. He rubbed the lips of the plump little boy with garlic, and then taking a golden goblet of generous wine, the rough and royal nurse forced the beverage he loved so well down the untainted throat of his new-born heir. "A little good old wine," said the doting grandfather, *' will make the boy vigorous, and brave." We may remark, in passing, that it was wine, rich and pure : not that mixture of all abomina- tions, whose only vintage is in cellars, sunless, damp> and fetid, where guilty men fabricate poi- son for a nation. 1553.] CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH. 21 Name chosen for the young prince. This little stranger received the ancestral name of Henry. By his subsequent exploits he filled the world with his renown. He was the first of the Bourbon line who ascended the throne of France, and he swayed the sceptre of energetic rule over that wide-spread realm with a degree of power and grandeur which none of his descendants have ever rivaled. The name of Henry IV. is one of the most illustrious in the annals of France. The story of his strug- gles for the attainment of the throne of Charle- magne is full of interest. His birth, to which we have just alluded, occurred at Parr, in the kingdom of Navarre, in the year 1553. His grandfather immediately assumed the di- rection of every thing relating to the child, ap- parently without the slightest consciousness that either the father or the mother of Henry had any prior claims. The king possessed, among the wild and romantic fastnesses of the mount- ains, a strong old castle, as rugged and frown- ing as the eternal granite upon which its foun- dations were laid. Gloomy evergreens clung to the hill-sides. A mountain stream, often swollen to an impetuous torrent by the autumnal rains and the spring thaws, swept through the little verdant lawn, which smiled amid the stern sub- 22 KING HENRY TV. [1560. The castle of Couranse. limities surrounding this venerable and moss- covered fortress. Around the solitary towers the eagles wheeled and screamed in harmony with the gales and storms which often swept through 1 hese wild regions. The expanse around was sparsely settled by a few hardy peasants, who, by feeding their herds, and cultivating lit- tle patches of soil among the crags, obtained a humble living, and by exercise and the pure mountain air acquired a vigor and an atliletic- hardihood of frame which had given them much celebrity. To the storm-battered castle of Courasse, thus lowering in congenial gloom among these rocks r the old king sent the infant Henry to be nur- tured as a peasant-boy, that, by frugal fare and exposure to hardship, he might acquire a peas- ant's robust frame. He resolved that no French delicacies should enfeeble the constitution of this noble child. Bareheaded and barefooted, the young prince, as yet hardly emerging from infancy, rolled upon the grass, played with the poultry, and the dogs, and the sturdy young mountaineers, and plunged into the brook or paddled in the pools of water with which the mountain showers often filled the court-yard. His hair was bleached and his cheeks bronzed 1562.] CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH. 23 Education of Henry. Death of the King of Navarre. by the sun and the wind. Few would have im- agined that the unattractive child, with his un- shorn locks and in his studiously neglected garb, was the descendant of a long line of kings, and was destined to eclipse them all by the grand- eur of his name. As years glided along he advanced to ener- getic boyhood, the constant companion, and, in all his sports and modes of life, the equal of the peasant -boys by whom he was surround- ed. He hardly wore a better dress than they ; he was nourished with the same coarse fare. With them he climbed the mountains, and leap- ed the streams, and swung upon the trees. He struggled with his youthful competitors in all their athletic games, running, wrestling, pitch- ing the quoit, and tossing the bar. This active out-door exercise gave a relish to the coarse food of (lie peasants, consisting of brown bread, beef, cheese, and garlic. His grandfather had decided that this regimen was essential for the educa- tion of a prince who was to humble the proud monarchy of Spain, and regain the territory which had been so unjustly wrested from his ancestors. When Henry was about six years of age, his grandfather, by gradual decay, sank sorrowing- 24 KING HENRY IV. [1558. Jeunne d'Albret ascends the throne. Residence in Bourn. ly into his grave. Consequently, his mother, Jeanne d'Albret, ascended the throne ot'Navarre. Her husband, Antony of Bourbon, was a rough, fearless old soldier, with nothing to distinguish him from the multitude who do but live, fight, and die. Jeanne and her husband were in Par- is at the time of the death of her father. They immediately hastened to Beam, the capital of Navarre, to take possession of the dominions which had thus descended to them. The little Henry was then brought from his wild mount- ain home to reside with his mother in the royal palace. Though Navarre was but a feeble king- dom, the grandeur of its court was said to have been unsurpassed, at that time, by that of any other in Europe. The intellectual education of Henry had been almost entirely neglected ; but the hardihood of his body had given such vigor and energy to his mind, that he was now pre- pared to distance in intellectual pursuits, with .perfect ease, those whose infantile brains had been overtasked with study. Henry remained in Beam with his parents two years, and in that time ingrafted many courtly graces upon the free and fetterless car- riage he had acquired among the mountains. His mind expanded with remarkable rapidity, 1558.] CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH. 25 Marriage of Mary, Queen of Scots. Betrothal of Henry. and he became one of the most beautiful and engaging of children. About this time Mary, Queen of Scots, was to be married to the Dauphin Francis, son of the King of France. Their nuptials were to be celebrated with great magnificence. The King and Queen of Navarre returned to the court of France to attend the marriage. They took with them their son. His beauty and vivacity ex- cited much admiration in the French metropolis. One day the young prince, then but six or sev- en years of age, came running into the room where his father and Henry II. of France were conversing, and, by his artlessness and grace, strongly attracted the attention of the French monarch. The king fondly took the playful child in his arms, and said affectionately, " Will you be my son ?" "No, sire, no! that is my father," replied the ardent boy, pointing to the King of Na- varre. "Well, then, will you be my son-in-law?" de- manded Henry. " Oh yes, most willingly," the prince replied. Henry II. had a daughter Marguerite, a year or two younger than the Prince of Navarre, and it was immediately resolved between the two 26 KING HENEY IV. [1558. Henry's tutor. Remark of Dr. Johnson. parents that the young princes should be con- sidered as betrothed. Soon after this the King and Queen of Na- varre, with their son, returned to the mountain- ous domain which Jeanne so ardently loved. The queen devoted herself assiduously to the education of the young prince, providing for him the ablest teachers whom that age could afford. A gentleman of very distinguished attainments, named La Gaucherie, undertook the general su- perintendence of his studies. The young prince was at this time an exceedingly energetic, active, ambitious boy, very inquisitive respecting all matters of information, and passionately fond of study. Dr. Johnson, with his rough and impetuous severity, has said, " It is impossible to get Latin into a boy un- less you flog it into him." The experience of La Gaucherie, however, did not confirm this sentiment. Henry always went with alacrity to his Latin and his Greek. His judicious teacher did not disgust his mind witli long and laborious rules, but introduced him at once to words and phrases, while gradually he developed the grammatical structure of the lan- guage. The vigorous mind of Henry, grasping 1560.] CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH. 27 Henry' 1 ; m^tto. La Gauoherie's method of instruction. eagerly at intellectual culture, made rapid prog- ress, and he was soon able to read and write both Latin and Greek with fluency, and ever re- tained the power of quoting, with great facility and appositeness, from the classical writers of Athens and of Home. Even in these early days he seized upon the Greek phrase "77 VLKUV rj d-oOavelv," to conquer or to die, and adopted it for his motto. La Gaucherie was warmly attached to the principles of the Protestant faith. lie made a companion of his noble pupil, and taught him by conversation in pleasant walks and rides as well as by books. It was his practice to have him commit to memory any fine passage in prose or verse which inculcated generous, and lofty ideas. The mind of Henry thus became rilled with beautiful images and noble senti- ments from the classic writers of France. These gems of literature exerted a powerful influence in moulding his character, and he was fond of quoting them as the guide of his life. Such passages as the following were frequently on the lips of the young prince : " Over their subjects princes bear the rule, But God, more mighty, governs kings themselves." Soon after the return of the King and Queen 28 KING HENRY IV. [1560. Death of Henry II. Catharine de Medicis regent. of Navarre to their own kingdom, Henry II. of France died, leaving the crown to his son Charles, a feeble boy both in body and in mind. As Charles was but ten or twelve years of age, his mother, Catharine de Medicis, was appoint- ed regent during his minority. Catharine was a woman of great strength of mind, but of the utmost depravity of heart. There was no crime ambition could instigate her to commit from which, in the slightest degree, she would recoil. Perhaps the history of the world retains not an- other instance in which a mother could so far forget the yearnings of nature as to endeavor, studiously and perseveringly, to deprave the morals, and by vice to enfeeble the constitu- tion of her son, that she might retain the power which belonged to him. This proud and dis- solute woman looked with great solicitude upon the enterprising and energetic spirits of the young Prince of Navarre. There were many providential indications that ere long Henry would be a prominent candidate for the throne of France. Plutarch's Lives of Ancient Heroes has per- haps been more influential than any other un- inspired book in invigorating genius and in en- kindling a passion for great achievements. Na- 1560.] CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH. 29 Influence of Plutarch. Religious agitation. poleon was a careful student and a great ad- mirer of Plutarch. His spirit was entranced with the grandeur of the Greek and Roman he- O roes, arid they were ever to him as companions and bosom friends. During the whole of his stormy career, their examples animated him, and his addresses and proclamations were often in- vigorated by happy quotations from classic sto- ry. Henry, with similar exaltation of genius, read and re-read the pages of Plutarch with the most absorbing delight. Catharine, Avith an eagle eye, watched these indications of a lofty mind. Her solicitude was roused lest the young Prince of Navarre should, with his commanding genius, supplant her degenerate house. At the close of the sixteenth century, the pe- riod of which we write, all Europe was agitated by the great controversy between the Catholics / / and the Protestants. The writings of Luther, Calvin, and other reformers had aroused the at- tention of the whole Christian world. In En- gland and Scotland the ancient faith had been overthrown, and the doctrines of the Reforma- tion were, in those kingdoms, established. In France, where the writings of Calvin had been extensively circulated, the Protestants had also become quite numerous, embracing prenerally 30 KING HENRY IV. [1560. The Huguenots. The present controversy. the most intelligent portion of the populace. The Protestants were in France called Hugue- nots, but for what reason is not now known. They were sustained by many noble families, and had for their leaders the Prince of Conde, Admiral Coligni, and the house of Navarre. There were arrayed against them the power of the crown, many of the most powerful nobles, and conspicuously the almost regal house of Guise. It is perhaps difficult for a Protestant to write upon this subject with perfect impartiality, how- ever earnestly he may desire to do so. The lapse of two hundred years has not terminated the great conflict. The surging strife has swept across the ocean, and even now, with more or less of vehemence, rages in all the states of this new world. Though the weapons of blood are laid aside, the mighty controversy is still unde- cided. The advocates of the old faith were determ- ined to maintain their creed, and to force all to its adoption, at whatever price. They deemed heresy the greatest of all crimes, and thought and doubtless many conscientiously thought that it should be exterminated even by the pains of torture and death. The French Parliament 1560.] CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH. 31 TUe Sorbonne. Purging the empire. adopted for its motto, "One religion, one law, one king." They declared that two religions could no more be endured in a kingdom than two governments* At Paris there was a celebrated theological school called the Sorbonne, It included in its faculty the most distinguished doctors of the Catholic Church. The decisions and the de- crees of tlie Sorbonne were esteemed highly au- thoritative The views of the Sorbonne were al- most invariably asked in reference to any meas- ures affecting the Church. In 1525 the court presented the following question to the Sorbonne: ''How can we sup- press and extirpate the damnable doctrine of Luther from this very Christian kingdom, and purge it from it entirely ?" The prompt reply was, " The heresy has al- ready been endured too long. It must be pur- sued icith the extremest rigor, or it will over- throw the throne." Two years after this, Pope Clement VII. sent a communication to the Parliament of Paris, stating, " It is necessary, in this great and astound- ing disorder, which arises from the rage of Sa- tan, and from the fury and impiety of his instru- 32 KING HENRY IV. [1533. The burning chamber. Persecution of the Protestants. merits, that every body exert himself to guard the common safety, seeing that this madness would not only embroil and destroy religion, but also all principality, nobility, laws, orders, and ranks." The Protestants were pursued by the most unrelenting persecution. The Parliament estab- lished a court called the burning chamber, be- cause all who were convicted of heresy were burned. The estates of those who, to save their lives, fled from the kingdom, were sold, and their children, who were left behind, were pursued with merciless cruelty. The Protestants, with boldness which relig- ious faith alone could inspire, braved all these perils. They resolutely declared that the Bible taught their faith, and their faith only, and that no earthly power could compel them to swerve from the truth. Notwithstanding the perils of exile, torture, and death, they persisted in preach- ing what they considered the pure Gospel of Christ. In 1533 Calvin was driven from Paris. When one said to him, " Mass must be true, since it is celebrated in all Christendom ;" he replied, pointing to the Bible, " There is my mass." Then raising his eyes to heaven, he solemnly said, " O Lord, if in 1535.] CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH. 33 Calvin and his writings. the day of judgment thou chargest me with not having been at mass, I will say to thee with truth, * Lord, thou hast not commanded it. Be- hold thy law. In it I have not found any other . sacrifice than that which was immolated on the altar of the cross.' ' In 1535 Calvin's celebrated " Institutes of the Christian Religion" were published, the great reformer then residing in the city of Basle. This great work became the banner of the Prot- estants of France. It was read with avidity in the cottage of the peasant, in the work-shop of the artisan, and in the chateau of the noble. In reference to this extraordinary man, of whom it has been said, " On Calvin some think Heaven's own mantle fell, While others deem him instrument of hell," Theodore Beza writes, "I do not believe that his equal can be found. Besides preaching ev- ery day from week to week, very often, and as much as he was able, he preached twice every Sunday. He lectured on theology three times v O/ a week. He delivered addresses to the Consist- ory, and also instructed at length every Friday before the Bible Conference, which we call the congregation. He continued this course so con- stantly that he never failed a single time except 133 34 KING HENRY IV. [1564. Calvin's physical debility. Continued labors. in extreme illness. Moreover, who could re- count his other common or extraordinary la- bors ? I know of no man of our age who has had more to hear, to answer, to write, nor things of greater importance. The number and qual- ity of his writings alone is enough to astonish any man who sees them, and still more those who read them. And what renders his labors still more astonishing is, that he had a body so feeble by nature, so debilitated by night labors and too great abstemiousness, and, what is more, subject to so many maladies, that no man who saw him could understand how he had lived so long. And yet, for all that, he never ceased to labor night and day in the work of the Lord. We entreated him to have more regard for him- self; but his ordinary reply was that he was do- ing nothing, and that we should allow God to find him always watching, and working as he could to his latest breath." Calvin died in 1564, eleven years after the birth of Henry of Navarre, at the age of fifty- five. For several years he was so abstemious that he had eaten but one meal a day.* * In reference to the execution of Servetns for heresy, an event which, in the estimation of many, has seriously tar- nished the reputation of Calvin, the celebrated French his- 1560.] CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH. 35 Inhabitants of France. Execution of Servetus. At this time the overwhelming majority of the inhabitants of France were Catholics it has generally been estimated a hundred to one ; but the doctrines of the reformers gained ground un- til, toward the close of the century, about the time of the Massacre of St. Bartholomew, the Protestants composed about one sixth of the population. The storm of persecution which fell upon them was so terrible that they were compelled to protect themselves by force of arms. Grad- ually they gained the ascendency in several cit- ies, which they fortified, and where they pro- torian, M. Mignet, in a very able dissertation, establishes the following points : 1. Servetus was not an ordinary heretic ; he was a bold pantheist, and outraged the dogma of all Christian commun- ions by saying that God, in three persons, was a Cerberus, a monster with three heads. 2. He had already been con- demned to death by the Catholic doctors at Vienne in Dau- phiny. 3. The affair was judged, not by Calvin, but by the magistrates of Geneva ; and if it is objected that his advice must have influenced their decision, it is necessary to recol- lect that the councils of the other reformed cantons of Switz- erland approved the sentence with a unanimous voice. 4. It was of the utmost importance for the Reformation to sep- arate distinctly its cause from that of such an unbeliever as Servetus. The Catholic Church, which in our day accuses Calvin of having participated in his condemnation, much more would have accused him, in the sixteenth century,, with having solicited his acquittal. 36 KING HENRY IV, [1560. Antony of Bourbon. Jeanne d'Albret tected refugees from the persecution which had driven them from the cities where the Catholics predominated. Such was the deplorable con- dition of France at the time of which we write. In the little kingdom of Navarre, which was tut about one third as large as the State of Massachusetts, and which, since its dismember- ment, contained less than three hundred thou- sand inhabitants, nearly every individual was a Protestant. Antony of Bourbon, who had mar- ried the queen, was a Frenchman. With him, .as with many others in that day, religion was merely a badge of party politics. Antony spent much of his time in the voluptuous court of France, and as he was, of course, solicitous for popularity there, he espoused the Catholic side of the controversy. Jeanne d'Albret was energetically a Protest- ant. Apparently, her faith was founded in deep religious conviction. When Catharine of Med- ici advised her to follow her husband into the Catholic Church, she replied with firmness, " Madam, sooner than ever go to mass, if I had my kingdom and my son both in my hands, I would hurl them to the bottom of the sea be- fore they should change my purpose." Jeanne had been married to Antony merely 1560.] CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH. 37 The separation. Different life. as a matter of state policy. There was noth- ing in his character to win a noble woman's love. With no social or religious sympathies, they lived together for a time in a state of re- spectful indifference ; but the court of Navarre was too quiet and religious to satisfy the taste of the voluptuous Parisian. He consequently spent most of his time enjoying the gayeties of the metropolis of France. A separation, mutu- ally and amicably agreed upon, was the result. Antony conveyed with him to Paris his son Henry, and there took up his residence. Am idst the changes and the fluctuations of the ever- agitated metropolis, he eagerly watched for op- portunities to advance his own fame and for- tune. As Jeanne took leave of her beloved child, she embraced him tenderly, and with tears entreated him never to abandon the faith in which he had been educated. Jeanne d'Albret, with her little daughter, re- mained in the less splendid but more moral and refined metropolis of her paternal domain. A mother's solicitude and prayers, however, follow- ed her son. Antony consented to retain as a tutor for Henry the wise and learned La Gau- cherie, who was himself strongly attached to the reformed religion. 38 KING HENRY IV. [1560. R.ige of the Pope. Growth of Prote. tantisin. The inflexibility of Jeanne d'Albret, and the refuge she ever cheerfully afforded to the perse- cuted Protestants, quite enraged the Pope. As a measure of intimidation, he at one time sum- moned her as a heretic to appear before the In- quisition within six months, under penalty of losing her crown and her possessions. Jeanne, unawed by the threat, appealed to the monarchs of Europe for protection. None were disposed in that age to encourage such arrogant claims, and Pope Pius VI. was compelled to moderate his haughty tone. A plot, however, was then formed to seize her and her children, and hand them over to the "tender mercies" of the Span- ish Inquisition. But this plot also failed. In Paris itself there were many bold Protest- ant nobles who, with arms at their side, and stout retainers around them, kept personal persecu- tion at bay. They were generally men of com- manding character, of intelligence and integri- ty. The new religion, throughout the country, was manifestly growing fast in strength, and at times, even in the saloons of the palace, the rival parties were pretty nearly balanced. Although, throughout the kingdom of France, the Catho- lics were vastly more numerous than the Prot- estants, yet as England and much of Germany 1560.] CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH. 39 Catharine's blandishment*. Undecided action. had warmly espoused the cause of the reform- ers, it was perhaps difficult to decide which par- ty, on the whole, in Europe, was the strongest. Nobles and princes of the highest rank were, in all parts of Europe, ranged under either banner. In the two factions thus contending for domin- ion, there were, of course, some who were not much influenced by conscientious considera- tions, but who were merely struggling for polit- ical power. When Henry first arrived in Paris, Catharine kept a constant watch over his words and his actions. She spared no possible efforts to bring him under her entire control. Efforts were made to lead his teacher to check his enthusi- asm for lofty exploits, and to surrender him to the claims of frivolous amusement. This de- testable queen presented before the impassion- ed young man all the blandishments of female beauty, that she might betray him to licentious indulgence. In some of these infamous arts she was but too successful. Catharine, in her ambitious projects, was oft- en undecided as to which cause she should es- pouse and which party she should call to her aid. At one time she would favor the Protest- ants, and again the Catholics. At about this 40 KING HENRY IV. [1562. Seizure of the queen. Civil war. time she suddenly turned to the Protestants, and courted them so decidedly as greatly to alarm and exasperate. the Catholics. Some of the Catholic nobles formed a conspiracy, and seized Catharine and her son at the palace of Fontainebleau, and held them both as captives. The proud queen was almost frantic with indig- nation at the insult. The Protestants, conscious that the conspir- acy was aimed against them, rallied for the de- fense of the queen. The Catholics all over the kingdom sprang to arms. A bloody civil war ensued. Nearly all Europe was drawn into the conflict. Germany and England came with ea- ger armies to the aid of the Protestants. Cath- arine hated the proud and haughty Elizabeth, England's domineering queen, and was very jealous of her fame and power. She resolved that she would not be indebted to her ambitious rival for aid. She therefore, most strangely, threw herself into the arms of the Catholics, and ardently espoused their cause. The Prot- estants soon found her, with all the energy of her powerful mind, heading their foes. France was deluged in blood. A large number of Protestants threw them- selves into Rouen. Antony of Bourbon headed 1562.] CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH. 41 Death of Antony of Bourbon. Effects of the war. an army of the Catholics to besiege the city. A ball struck him, and he fell senseless to the ground. His attendants placed him, covered with blood, in a carriage, to convey him to a hospital. While in the carriage and jostling over the rough ground, and as the thunders of the cannonade were pealing in his ears, the spir- it of the blood-stained soldier ascended to the tribunal of the God of Peace. Henry was now left fatherless, and subject entirely to the con- trol of his mother, whom he most tenderly loved, and whose views, as one of the most prominent leaders of the Protestant party, he was strong- ly inclined to espouse. The sanguinary conflict still raged with un- abated violence throughout the whole kingdom, arming brother against brother, friend against friend. Churches were sacked and destroyed ; vast extents of country were almost depopu- lated ; cities were surrendered to pillage, and atrocities innumerable perpetrated, from which it would seem that even fiends would revolt. France was filled with smouldering ruins ; and vhe wailing cry of widows and of orphans, thus made by the wrath of man, ascended from every plain and every hill-side to the ear of that God who has said, " Thou slialt love thy neighbor as thyself." 42 KING HENRY IV. [1562. Liberty of worship. Indignation and animosity. At last both parties were weary of the hor- rid strife. The Catholics were struggling to extirpate what they deemed ruinous heresy from the kingdom. The Protestants were repelling the assault, and contending, not for general lib- erty of conscience, but that their doctrines were true, and therefore should be sustained. Terms of accommodation were proposed, and the Cath- olics made the great concession, as they regard- ed it, of allowing the Protestants to conduct public worship outside of the watts of towns. The Protestants accepted these terms, and sheathed the sword ; but many of the more fa- natic Catholics were greatly enraged at this tol- eration. The Guises, the most arrogant family of nobles the world has ever known, retired from Paris in indignation, deqlaring that they would not witness such a triumph of heresy. The decree which granted this poor boon was the fa- mous edict of January, 1562, issued from St. Germain. But such a peace as this could only be a truce caused by exhaustion. Deep-seated animosity still rankled in the bosom of both parties ; and, notwithstanding all the woes which desolating wars had engendered, the spirit of religious intolerance was eager again to grasp the weapons of deadly strife. 1562.] CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH. 43 Religious toleration. Belief of the Romanists. ' During the sixteenth century the doctrine of religious toleration was recognized by no one. That great truth had not then even dawned upon the world. The noble toleration so earn- estly advocated by Bayle and Locke a century later, was almost a new revelation to the human mind ; but in the sixteenth century it would have been regarded as impious, and rebellion against God to have affirmed that error was not to be pursued and punished. The reform- ers did not advocate the view that a man had a right to believe what he pleased, and to dissem- inate that belief. They only declared that they were bound, at all hazards, to believe the truth; that the views which they cherished were true, and that therefore they should be protected in them. They appealed to the Bible, and chal- lenged their adversaries to meet them there. Our fathers must not be condemned for not be- ing in advance of the age in which they lived. That toleration which allows a man to adopt, without any civil disabilities, any mode of wor- ship that does not disturb the peace of society, exists, as we believe, only in the United States. Even in England Dissenters are exc luded from many privileges. Throughout the whole of Catholic Europe no religious toleration is rec- 44 KING HENRY IV. [1562. Establishment of freedom of conscience. ognized. The Emperor Napoleon, during his reign, established the most perfect freedom of conscience in every government his influence could control. His downfall re-established through Europe the dominion of intolerance. The Reformation, in contending for the right of private judgment in contradiction to the claims of councils, maintained a principle which necessarily involved the freedom of conscience. This was not then perceived ; but time devel- oped the truth. The Reformation became, in reality, the mother of all religious liberty. CIVIL WAR. 45 llimry but little acquainted with his parents. Indecision of Henry. CHAPTER II. CIVIL WAR. WHILE France was thus deluged with the blood of a civil war, young Henry was busily pursuing his studies in college. He could have had but little affection for liis father, for the stern soldier had passed most of his days in the tented field, and his son had hardly known him. From his mother he had long been separated ; but he cherished her memory with affectionate regard, and his predilections strong- ly inclined him toward the faith which he knew that she had so w r armly espoused. It was, how- ever, in its political aspects that Henry mainly contemplated the question. He regarded the two sects merely as two political parties strug- gling for power. For some -time he did not ven- ture to commit himself openly, but, availing him- self of the privilege of his youth, carefully stud- ied the principles and the prospects of the con- tending factions, patiently waiting for the time to come in which he should introduce his strong arm into the conflict. Each party, aware that 46 KING HENRY IV. Hypocrisy of Catharine. She desires to save Henry, his parents had espoused opposite sides, and re- garding him as an invaluable accession to either cause, adopted all possible allurements to win his favor. Catharine, as unprincipled as she was ambi- tious, invited him to her court, lavished upon him, with queenly profusion, caresses and flat- tery, and enticed him with all those blandish- ments which might most effectually enthrall the impassioned spirit of youth. Voluptuousness, gilded with its most dazzling and deceitful en- chantments, was studiously presented to his- eye. The queen was all love and complaisance. She received him to her cabinet council. She affected to regard him as her chief confidant. She had already formed the design of perfidi- ously throwing the Protestants off their guard by professions of friendship, and then, by indis- criminate massacre, of obliterating from the kingdom every vestige of the reformed faith. The great mass of the people being Catholics, she thought that, by a simultaneous uprising all over the kingdom, the Protestants might be so generally destroyed that not enough would be left to cause her any serious embarrassments. For many reasons Catharine wished to save Henry from the doom impending over his friends, CIVIL WAR. 47 A significant reply. Indications of future greatness. if she could, by any means, win him to her side. She held many interviews with the highest ec- clesiastics upon the subject of the contemplated massacre. At one time, when she was urging the expediency of sparing some few Protestant nobles who had been her personal friends, Hen- ry overheard the significant reply from the Duke of Alva,"The head of a salmon is worth a hund- red frogs." The young prince meditated deep- ly upon the import of those words. Surmising their significance, and alarmed for the safety of his mother, he dispatched a trusty messenger to communicate to her his suspicions. His mind was now thoroughly aroused to vigilance, to careful and hourly scrutiny of the plots and counterplots which were ever forming around him. While others of his age were ab- sorbed in the pleasures of licentiousness and gaming, to which that corrupt court was aban- doned, Henry, though he had not escaped un spotted from the contamination which surround- ed him, displayed, by the dignity of his demean- or and the elevation of his character, those ex* traordinary qualities which so remarkably dis- tinguished him in future life, and which indi- cated, even then, that he was born to command. One of the grandees of the Spanish court, th 48 KING HENEY IV. [ 1565 - The prophecy. Visit of Catharine. Duke of Medina, after meeting him incidental- ly but for a few moments, remarked, " It appears to me that this young prince is either an emperor, or is destined soon to become one." Henry was very punctilious in regard to eti- quette, and would allow no one to treat him without due respect, or to deprive him of the position to which he was entitled by his rank. Jeanne d'Albret, the Queen of Navarre, was now considered the most illustrious leader of the Protestant party. Catharine, the better to disguise her infamous designs, went with Henry, in great splendor, to make a friendly visit to his mother in the little Protestant court of Beam. Catharine insidiously lavished upon Jeanne d'Albret the warmest congratulations and the most winning smiles, and omitted no courtly blandishments which could disarm the suspi- cions and win the confidence of the Protestant queen. The situation of Jeanne in her feeble dominion was extremely embarrassing. The Pope, in consequence of her alleged heresy, had issued against her the bull of excommunication, declaring her incapable of reigning, forbidding all good Catholics, by the peril of their own sal- vation, from obeying any of her commands. / ." 1567.] CIVIL WAR. 49 Endeavors of Catharine to influence the young prince. her own subjects were almost all Protestants, she was in no danger of any insurrection on their part ; but this decree, in that age of su- perstition and of profligacy, invited each neigh- boring power to seize upon her territory. The only safety of the queen consisted in the mutu- al jealousies of the rival kingdoms of France and Spain, neither of them being willing that the other should receive such an accession to its po- litical importance. The Queen of Navarre was not at all shaken in her faith, or influenced to change her meas- ure; by the visit of the French court to her cap- ital. She regarded, however, with much solic- itude, the ascendency which, it appeared to her, Catharine was obtaining over the mind of her son. Catharine caressed and flattered the young Prince of Navarre in every possible way. All her blandishments were exerted to obtain a commanding influence over his mind. She en- deavore,! unceasingly to lure him to indulgence in all forbidden pleasure, and especially to crowd upon his youthful and ardent passions all the temptations which yielding female beauty could present. After the visit of a few weeks, during which the little court of Navarre had witnessed an importation of profligacy unknown before, 134 50 KING HENRY IV. [1567. The return visit. Obstacles to the departure. the Queen of France, with Henry and with her voluptuous train, returned again to Paris. Jeanne d'Albret had seen enough of the bland- ishments of vice to excite her deepest maternal solicitude in view of the peril of her son. She earnestly urged his return to Navarre; but Cath- arine continually threw such chains of influence around him that he could not escape. At last Jeanne resolved, under the pretense of returning the visit of Catharine, to go herself to the court of France and try to recover Henry. With a small but illustrious retinue, embellished with great elegance of manners and purity of life, she arrived in Paris. The Queen of France received her with every possible mark of respect and af- fection, and lavished upon her entertainments, and fetes, and gorgeous spectacles until the Queen of Navarre was almost bewildered. Whenever Jeanne proposed to return to her kingdom there was some very special celebra- tion appointed, from which Jeanne could not, without extreme rudeness, break away. Thus again and again was Jeanne frustrated in her endeavors to leave Paris, until she found, to her surprise and chagrin, that both she and her son were prisoners, detained in captivity by bonds of the most provoking politeness. Catharine 1567.] CIVIL WAR. 53 'I he stratagem. Its success. managed so adroitly that Jeanne could not en- ter any complaints, for the shackles which were thrown around her were those of ostensibly the most excessive kindness and the most unbound- ed love. It was of no avail to provoke a quar- rel, for the Queen of Navarre was powerless in the heart of France. At last she resolved to effect by stratagem that which she could not accomplish openly. One day a large party had gone out upon a hunt- ing excursion. The Queen of Navarre made arrangements with her son, and a few of the most energetic and trustworthy gentlemen of her court, to separate themselves, as it were ac- cidentally, when in the eagerness of the chase, from the rest of the company, and to meet at an appointed place of rendezvous. The little band, thus assembled, turned the heads of their horses toward Navarre. They drove with the utmost speed day and night, furnishing themselves with fresh relays of horses, and rested not till the clatter of the iron hoofs of the steeds were heard among the mountains of Navarre. Jeanne left a very polite note upon her table in the palace of St. Cloud, thanking Queen Catharine for all her kindness, and praying her to excuse the liberty she had taken in avoiding the pain of 54 KING HENEY IV. [1567. Home again. Description of tae prince. words of adieu. Catharine was exceedingly an- noyed at their escape, but, perceiving that it was not in her power to overtake the fugitives, she submitted with as good a grace as possible. Henry found himself thus again among his native hills. He was placed under the tuition of a gentleman who had a high appreciation of all that was poetic and beautiful. Henry, un- der his guidance, devoted himself with great de- light to the study of polite literature, and gave free wing to an ennobled imagination as he clambered up the cliffs, and wandered over the ravines familiar to the days of his childhood. His personal appearance in 1567, when he was thirteen years of age, is thus described by a Roman Catholic gentleman who was accustom- ed to meet him daily in the court of Catharine. *' We have here the young Prince of Beam. One can not help acknowledging that he is a beautiful creature. At the age of thirteen he displays all the qualities of a person of eighteen or nineteen. He is agreeable, he is civil, he is obliging. Others might say that as yet he does not know what he is ; but, for my part, I, who study him very often, can assure you that he does know perfectly well. He demeans him- self toward all the world with so easy a carriage, 1567.] CIVIL WAR. 55 Evil effects of dissolute society. that people crowd round wherever he is ; and he acts so nobly in every thing, that one sees clearly that he is a great prince. He enters into conversation as a highly-polished man. He speaks always to the purpose, and it is remark- ed that he is very well informed. I shall hate the reformed religion all my life for having car- ried off from us so worthy a person. Without this original sin, he would be the first after the king, and we should see him, in a short time, at the head of the armies. He gains new friends every day. He insinuates himself into all hearts with inconceivable skill. He is highly honored by the men, and no less beloved by the ladies. His face is very well formed, the nose neither too large nor too small. His eyes are very soft ; his skin brown, but very smooth ; and his whole features animated with such un- common vivacity, that, if he does not make prog- ress with the fair, it will be very extraordinary." Henry had not escaped the natural influence of the dissolute society in the midst of which he had been educated, and manifested, on his first return to his mother, a strong passion for balls and masquerades, and all the enervating pleas- ures of fashionable life. His courtly and per- suasive manners were so insinuating, that, with- 56 KING HENRY IV. [1567. Influence of Jeanne d'Albret. Catharine's deity. out difficulty, he borrowed any sums of money lie pleased, and with these borrowed treasures he fed his passion for excitement at the gaming- table. The firm principles and high intellectual ele- vation of his mother roused her to the immedi- ate and vigorous endeavor to correct all these radical defects in his character and education. She kept him, as much as possible, under her own eye. She appointed teachers of the high- est mental and moral attainments to instruct him. By her conversation and example she im- pressed upon his mind the sentiment that it was the most distinguished honor of one born to command others to be their superior in intelli- gence, judgment, and self-control. The Prince of Navarre, in his mother's court at Beam, found himself surrounded by Protestant friends and influences, and he could not but feel and admit the superior dignity and purity of these his new friends. Catharine worshiped no deity but ambition. She was ready to adopt any measures and to plunge into any crimes which would give sta- bility and lustre to her power. She had no re- ligious opinions or even preferences. She es- poused the cause of the Catholics because, on 1567.] CIVIL WAR. 57 Principle of Jeanne d'Al'oret. the whole, she deemed that party the more pow- erful ; and then she sought the entire destruc- tion of the Protestants, that none might be left to dispute her sway. Had the Protestants been in the majority, she would, with equal zeal, have given them the aid of her strong arm, and unre- lentingly would have striven to crush the whole papal power. Jeanne d'Albret, on the contrary, was in prin- ciple a Protestant. She was a woman of re- flection, of feeling, of highly-cultivated intellect, and probably of sincere piety. She had read, with deep interest, the religious controversies of the day. She had prayed for light and guid- ance. She had finally and cordially adopted the Protestant faith as the truth of God. Thus guided by her sense of duty, she was exceed- ingly anxious that her son should be a Protest- ant a Protestant Christian. In most solemn prayer she dedicated him to God's service, to defend the faith of the Reformers. In the dark- ness of that day, the bloody and cruel sword was almost universally recognized as the great champion of truth. Both parties appeared to think that the thunders of artillery and musket- ry must accompany the persuasive influence of eloquence. If it were deemed important that 58 KING HENRY IV. [1567. The cannon the missionary. Devastation. one hand should guide the pen of controversy, to establish the truth, it was considered no less important that the other should wield the sword to extirpate heresy. Military heroism was thought as essential as scholarship for the defense of the faith. A truly liberal mind will find its indignation, in view of the atrocities of these religious wars, mitigated by comparison in view of the igno- rance and the frailty of man. The Protestants often needlessly exasperated the Catholics by demolishing, in the hour of victory, their church- es, their paintings, and their statues, and by pouring contempt upon all that was most hal- lowed in the Catholic heart. There was, how- ever, this marked difference between the two parties : the leaders of the Protestants, as a general rule, did every tiling in their power to check the fury of their less enlightened follow- ers. The leaders of the Catholics, as a general rule, did every thing in their power to stimulate the fanaticism of the frenzied populace. In the first religious war the Protestant soldiers broke open and plundered the great church of Orleans. The Prince of Conde and Admiral Coligni has- tened to repress the disorder. The prince point- ed a musket at a soldier who had ascended a 1568.] CIVIL WAK. 59 Indecision of the prince. Argumtnts pro and con. ladder to break an image, threatening to shoot him if he did not immediately desist. " My lord" exclaimed the fanatic Protestant, "wait till I have thrown down this idol, and then, if it please you, I will die." It is well for man that Omniscience presides at the day of judgment. " The Lord knoweth our frame ; he remembereth that we are dust." Europe was manifestly preparing for anoth- er dreadful religious conflict. The foreboding cloud blackened the skies. The young Prince of Navarre had not yet taken his side. Both Catholics and Protestants left no exertions un- tried to win to their cause so important an aux- iliary. Henry had warm friends in the court of Navarre and in the court of St. Cloud. He was bound by many ties to both Catholics and Protestants. Love of pleasure, of self-indul- gence, of power, urged him to cast in his lot with the Catholics. Reverence for his mother inclined him to adopt the weaker party, who were struggling for purity of morals and of faith. To be popular with his subjects in his own king- dom of Navarre, he must be a Protestant. To *be popular in France, to whose throne he was already casting a wistful eye, it was necessary for him to be a Catholic. He vacillated between 60 KING HENRY IV. [1568. Chances of a crown. War again. these views of self-interest. His conscience and his heart were untouched. Both parties were aware of the magnitude of the weight he could place in either scale, while each deemed it quite uncertain which cause he would espouse. His father had died contending for the Catholic faith, and all knew that the throne of Catholic France was one of the prizes which the young Prince of Navarre had a fair chance of obtaining. His mother was the most illustrious leader of the Protestant forces* on the Continent, and the crown of Henry's hereditary domain could not repose quietly upon any brow but that of a Prot- estant. Such was the state of affairs when the clangor of arms again burst upon the ear of Europe. France was the arena of woe upon which the Catholics and the Protestants of England and of the Continent hurled themselves against each other. Catharine, breathing vengeance, headed the Catholic armies. Jeanne, calm yet inflex- ible, was recognized as at the head of the Prot- estant leaders, and was alike the idol of the common soldiers and of their generals. The two contending armies, after various marchings and countermarchings, met at Rochelle. The whole country around, for many leagues, was ii- 1568.J CIVIL WAR. 61 Arrival of the Queen of Navarre. laminated at night by the camp-fires of the hos- tile hosts. The Protestants, inferior in num- bers, with hymns and prayers calmly awaited an attack. The Catholics, divided in council, were fearful of hazarding a decisive engagement. Day after day thus passed, with occasional skir- mishes, when, one sunny morning, the sound of trumpets was heard, and the gleam of the spears and banners of an approaching host w r as seen on the distant hills. The joyful tidings spread through the ranks of the Protestants that the Queen of Navarre, with her son and four thou- sand troops, had arrived. At the head of her iirm and almost invincible band she rode, calm and serene, magnificently mounted, with her proud boy by her side. As the queen and her son entered the plain, an exultant shout from the whole Protestant host seemed to rend the skies. These enthusiastic plaudits, loud, long, reiterated, sent dismay to the hearts of the Cath- olics. Jeanne presented her son to the Protestant army, and solemnly dedicated him to the de- fense of the Protestant faith. At the same time she published a declaration to the world that she deplored the horrors of war ; that she was not contending for the oppression of others, biU 62 KING HENRY IV. [1568. Education of the prince. The 1'rinco of Condi' 1 . to secure for herself and her friends the right to worship God according to the teachings of the Bible. The young prince was placed under the charge of the most experienced generals, to guard his person from danger and to instruct him in military science. The Prince of Conde was his teacher in that terrible accomplishment in which both master and pupil have obtained such world- wide renown. Long files of English troops, with trumpet tones, and waving banners, and heavy artillery, were seen winding their way along the streams of France, hastening to the scene of conflict. The heavy battalions of the Pope were mar- shaling upon all the sunny plains of Italy, and the banners of the rushing squadrons glittered from the pinnacles of the Alps, as Europe rose in arms, desolating ten thousand homes with conflagrations, and blood, and woe. Could the pen record the smouldering ruins, the desolate hearthstones, the shrieks of mortal agony, the wailings of the widow, the cry of the orphan, which thus resulted from man's inhumanity to man, the heart would sicken at the recital. The summer passed away in marches and counter- marches, in assassinations, and skirmishes, and battles. The fields of the husbandmen were 1568.] CIVIL WAR. 63 Slaughter of the Protestants. The battle. trampled under the hoofs of horses. Villages were burned to the ground, and their Avretched inhabitants driven out in nakedness and starv- ation to meet the storms of merciless winter. Noble ladies and refined and beautiful maidens fled shrieking from the pursuit of brutal and li' centious sbldiers. Still neither party gained any decisive victory. The storms of winter came, and beat heavily, with frost and drifting snow, upon the worn and weary hosts. In three months ten thousand Protestants had perished. At Orleans two hundred Protestants were thrown into prison. The populace set the prison on fire, and they were all consumed. At length the Catholic armies, having become far more numerous than the Protestant, ven- tured upon a general engagement. They met upon the field of Jarnac. The battle was con- ducted by the Reformers with a degree of fear- lessness bordering on desperation. The Prince ofConde plunged into the thickest ranks of the enemy with his unfurled banner bearing the motto, " Danger is sweet for Christ and my country." Just as he commenced his desperate charge, a kick from a wounded horse fractured his leg so severely that the fragments of the bone protruded through his boot. Pointing to 64 KING HENRY IV. [1568. Courage of the Prince of Condi-. The defeat. the mangled and helpless limb, he said to those around him, "Remember the state in which Louis of Bourbon enters the fight for Christ and his country." Immediately sounding the charge, like a whirlwind his little band plunged into the midst of their foes. For a moment the shock was irresistible, and the assailed fell like grass before the scythe of the mower. Soon, however, the undaunted band was entirely sur- rounded by their powerful adversaries. The Prince of Conde, with but about two hundred and fifty men, with indomitable determination sustained himself against the serried ranks of five thousand men closing up around him on every side. This was the last earthly conflict of the Prince of Conde. With his leg broken and his arm 'nearly severed from his body, his horse fell dead beneath him, and the prince, del- uged with blood, was precipitated into the dust under the trampling hoof's of wounded and fran- tic chargers. His men still fought with des- peration around their wounded chieftain. Of twenty-five nephews who accompanied him, fif- teen were slain by his side. Soon all his de- fenders were cut down or dispersed. The wounded prince, an invaluable prize, was taken prisoner. Montesquieu, captain of the guards 1568. J CIVIL WAR. 60- Death of the Prince of Conde. Retreat of the Protestants. of the Duke of Anjou, came driving up, and'as lie saw the prisoner attracting much attention, besmeared with blood and dirt, " Whom have we here ?" he inquired. " The Prince of Conde," was the exultant re- piy* "Kill him! kill him!" exclaimed the cap- tain, and he discharged a pistol at his head. The ball passed through his brain, and the prince fell lifeless upon the ground. The corpse was left where it fell, and the Catholic troops pursued their foes, now flying in every direc- tion. The Protestants retreated across a river, blew up the bridge, and protected themselves from farther assault. The next day the Duke of Anjou, the younger brother of Charles IX., and who afterward became Henry III., who was one of the leaders of the Catholic army, rode over the field of battle, to find, if possible, the body of his illustrious enemy. " We had not rode far," says one who accom- panied him, " when we perceived a great num- ber of the dead bodies piled up in a heap, which led us to judge that this was the spot where the body of the prince was to be found : in fact, we found it there. Baron de Magnac took the corpse by the hair to lift up the face, which was 135 66 KING HENRY IV. [1568. Fiendish barbarity. Advice ef the Pope. turned toward the ground, and asked me if I recognized him ; but, as one eye was torn out, and his face was covered with blood and dirt, I could only reply that it was certainly his height and his complexion, but farther I could not say." They washed the bloody and mangled face, and found that it was indeed the prince. His body was carried, with infamous ribaldry, on an ass to the castle of Jarnac, and thrown contempt- uously upon the ground. Several illustrious prisoners were brought to the spot and butcher- ed in cold blood, and their corpses thrown upon that of the prince, while the soldiers passed a night of drunkenness and revelry, exulting over the remains of their dead enemies. Such was the terrible battle of Jarnac, the first conflict which Henry witnessed. The tid- ings of this great victory and of the death of the illustrious Conde excited transports of joy among the Catholics. Charles IX. sent to Pope Pius V. the standards taken from the Protest- ants. The Pope, who affirmed that Luther was a ravenous beast, and that his doctrines were the sum of all crimes, wrote to the king a letter of congratulation. He urged him to extirpate every fibre of heresy, regardless of all entreaty, and of everv tie of blood and affection. To en- 1568.] CIVIL WAR. 6> Incitement to massacre. The protectorate. courage him, he cited the example of Saul ex- terminating the Amalekites, and assured him that all tendency to clemency was a snare of the devil. The Catholics now considered the condition of the Protestants as desperate. The pulpits resounded with imprecations and anathemas. The Catholic priests earnestly advocated the sentiment that no faith was to be kept with her- etics ; that to massacre them was an action es- sential to the safety of the state, and which would secure the approbation of God. But the Protestants, though defeated, were still unsubdued. The noble Admiral Coligni still remained to them ; and after the disaster, Jeanne d'Albret presented herself before the troops, holding her son Henry, then fourteen years of age, by one hand, and Henry, son of the Prince de Conde, by the other, and devoted them both to the cause. The young Henry of Navarre was then proclaimed generalissimo of the army and protector of the churches. He- took the following oath : "I swear to defend the Protestant religion, and to persevere in the common cause, till death or till victory has se- cured for all the liberty which we desire." 68 KING HENRY IV. [1568. ''.motions of Henry. His military sagacity. CHAPTER III. THE MARRIAGE. YOUNG Henry of Navarre was but about fourteen years of age when, from one of the hills in the vicinity, he looked upon the terrible battle of Jarnac. It is reported that, young as he was, he pointed out the fatal errors which were committed by the Protestants in all the arrangements which preceded the battle. "It is folly," he said, "to think of fighting, with forces so divided, a united army making an attack at one point." For the security of his person, deemed so pre- cious to the Protestants, his friends, notwith- standing his entreaties and even tears, would not allow him to expose himself to any of the perils of the conflict. As he stood upon an em- inence which overlooked the field of battle, sur- rounded by a few faithful guards, he gazed with intense anguish upon the sanguinary scene spread out before him. He saw his friends ut- terly defeated, and their squadrons trampled in the dust beneath the hoofs of the Catholic cav- alry. 1568.] THE MARRIAGE. Cft Enthusiasm inspired by Jeanne. The Protestants, without loss of time, Rallied anew their forces. The Queen of Navarre soon saw thousands of strong arms and brave hearts collecting again around her banner. Accompa- nied by her son, she rode through their ranks, and addressed them in words of feminine yet heroic eloquence, which roused their utmost en- thusiasm. But few instances have been record- ed in which human hearts have been more deep- ly moved than were these martial hosts by the brief sentences which dropped from the lips of this extraordinary woman. Henry, in the most solemn manner, pledged himself to consecrate all his energies to the defense of the Protestant religion. To each of the chiefs of the army the queen also presented a gold medal, suspended from a golden chain, with her own name and that of her son impressed upon one side, and on the other the words " Certain peace, complete victory, or honorable death." The enthusiasm of the army was raised to the highest pitch, and the heroic queen became the object almost of the adoration of her soldiers. Catharine, seeing the wonderful enthusiasm with which the Protestant troops were inspired by the presence of the Queen of Navarre, visit- ed the head-quarters of her own army, hoping. 70 KING HENRY IV. [1569. The failure of Catharine. Tin- second defeat. that s*he might also enkindle similar ardor. Ac- companied by a magnificent retinue of her brill- iantly-accoutred generals, she swept, like a gor- geous vision, before her troops. She lavished presents upon her officers, and in high-sounding phrase harangued the soldiers ; but there was not a private in the ranks who did not know that she was a wicked and a polluted woman. She had talent, but no soul. All her efforts were unavailing to evoke one single electric spark of emotion. She had sense enough to perceive her signal failure and to feel its morti- fication. No one either loved or respected Cath- arine. Thousands hated her, yet, conscious of her power, either courting her smiles or dread- ing her frown, they often bowed before her in adulation. The two armies were soon facing each other upon the field of battle. It was the third of October, 1569. More than fifty thousand com- batants met upon the plains of Moncontour. All generalship seemed to be ignored as the ex- asperated adversaries rushed upon each other in a headlong fight. The Protestants, outnum- bered, were awfully defeated. Out of twenty- five thousand combatants whom they led into the field, but eight thousand could be rallied 1569.] THE MAURI AGE. 71 The wounded friends. The reserve force. around their retreating banner after a fight of but three quarters of an hour. All their can- non, baggage, and munitions of war were lost. No mercy was granted to the vanquished. Coligni, at the very commencement of the battle, was struck by a bullet which shattered his jaw. The gushing blood under his helmet choked him, and they bore him upon a litter from the field. As they were -carrying the wounded admiral along, they overtook another litter upon which was stretched L'Estrange, the bosom friend of the admiral, also desperately wounded. L'Estrange, forgetting himself, gazed for a moment with tearful eyes upon the noble Coligni, and then gently said, "It is sweet to trust in God." Coligni, unable to speak, could only look a reply. Thus the two wounded friends parted. Coligni afterward remarked that these few words were a cordial to his spir- it, inspiring him with resolution and hope. Henry of Navarre, and his cousin, Henry of Conde, son of the prince who fell at the battle of Jarnac, from a neighboring eminence witness- ed this scene of defeat and of awful carnage. The admiral, unwilling to expose to danger lives so precious to their cause, had stationed them there with a reserve of four thousand men un- 72 KING HENRY IV. [1569. Misfortunes of ColignL His letter. der the command of Louis of Nassau. When Henry saw the Protestants giving way, he im- plored Louis that they should hasten with the reserve to the protection of their friends ; but Louis, with military rigor, awaited the com- mands of the admiral. " We lose our advant- age, then," exclaimed the prince, "and conse- quently the battle." The most a-wful of earthly calamities seemed now to fall like an avalanche upon Coligni, the noble Huguenot chieftain. His beloved broth- er was slain. Bands of wretches had burned yal match. RepOgftMM of Jeanne cl'Albrct. become tlieir most prominent leader, with new ability to defend their rights and to advocate their cause. It is a singular illustration of the hopeless corruption of the times, that the noto- rious profligacy of Marguerite seems to have been considered, even by Henry himself, as no obstacle to the union. A royal marriage is ordinarily but a matter of state policy. Upon the cold and icy emi- nence of kingly life the flowers of sympathy and affection rarely bloom. Henry, without hesita- tion, acquiesced in the expediency of this nup- tial alliance. He regarded it as manifestly a very politic partnership, and did not concern himself in the least about the agreeable or dis- agreeable qualities of his contemplated spouse. He had no idea of making her his companion, much less his friend. She was to be merely his wife. Jeanne d'Albret, however, a woman of sincere piety, and in whose bosom all noble thoughts were nurtured, cherished many misgivings. Her Protestant principles caused her to shrink from the espousals of her son with a Roman Catho- lic. Her religious scruples, and the spotless purity of her character, aroused the most lively emotions of repugnance in view of her son's 1571.] THE MARRIAGE. 79 Objections overcome. Perjury of Chin lea IX. connection with one who had not even the mod- esty to conceal her vices. State considerations, however, finally prevailed, and Jeanne, waving her objections, consented to the marriage. She yielded, however, with the greatest reluctance, to the unceasing importunities of her friends. They urged that this marriage would unite the two parties in a solid peace, and thus protect the Protestants from persecution, and rescue France from unutterable woe. Even the Ad- miral Coligni was deceived. But the result proved, in this case as in every other, that it is never safe to do evil that good may come. If any fact is established under the government of God, it is this. The Queen of Navarre, in her extreme re- pugnance to this match, remarked, " I would choose to descend to the condition of the poorest damsel in France rather than sac- rifice to the grandeur of my family my own soul and that of my son." With consummate perjury, Charles IX. de- clared, " I give my sister in marriage, not only to the Prince of Navarre, but, as it were, to the whole Protestant party. This will be the stron- gest and closest bond for the maintenance of peace between my subjects, and a sure evidence of my good-will toward the Protestants." 80 KING HENRY IV. [1571. Displays of friendship. Indifference of Marguerittv Thus influenced, this noble woman consent- ed to the union. She then went to Blois ta meet Catharine and the king. They received her with exuberant displays of love. The fool- ish king quite overacted his part, calling her "his great aunt, his all, his best beloved." As the Queen of Navarre retired for the night,. Charles said to Catharine, laughing, " Well, mother, what do you think of it t Do I play my little part well ?" " Yes," said Catharine, encouragingly, " very well; but it is of no use unless it continues." "Allow me to go on," said the king, "and you will see that I shall ensnare them." The young Princess Marguerite, heartless, proud, and petulant, received the cold addresses of Henry with still more chilling indifference. She refused to make even the slightest conces- sions to his religious views, and, though she made no objection to the decidedly politic part- nership, she very ostentatiously displayed her utter disregard for Henry and his friends. The haughty and dissolute beauty was piqued by the reluctance which Jeanne had manifested to to an alliance which Marguerite thought should have been regarded as the very highest of all earthly honors. Preparations were, however, 1571.] THE MARKIAGE. 81 Preparations for the wedding. Death of Jeanne. made for the marriage ceremony, which was to be performed in the French capital with unex- ampled splendor. The most distinguished gen- tlemen of the Protestant party, nobles, states- men, warriors, from all parts of the realm, were invited to the metropolis, to add lustre to the festivities by their presence. Many, however, of the wisest counselors of the Queen of Na- varre, deeply impressed with the conviction of the utter perfidy of Catharine, and apprehend-' ing some deep-laid plot, remonstrated against the acceptance of the invitations, presaging that, " if the wedding were celebrated in Paris, the liveries would be very crimson." Jeanne, solicited by the most pressing letters from Catharine and her son Charles IX., and urged by her courtiers, who were eager to share the renowned pleasures of the French metropo- lis, proceeded to Paris. She had hardly enter- ed the sumptuous lodgings provided for her in the court of Catharine, when she was seized with a violent fever, which raged in her veins nine days, and then she died. In death she manifested the same faith and fortitude which had embellished her life. Not a murmur or a groan escaped her lips in the most violent par- oxysms of pain. She had no desire to live ex- 136 82 KING HENRY IV. [1572. Demonstrations of grief. Different reports. cept from maternal solicitude for her children, Henry and Catharine. "But God," said she, "will be their father and protector, as he has been mine in my great- est afflictions. I contide them to his provi- dence." She died in June, 1572, in the forty-fourth year of her age. Catharine exhibited the most ostentatious and extravagant demonstrations of grief. Charles gave utterance to loud and poignant lamentations, and ordered a surgeon to examine the body, that the cause of her death might be ascertained. Notwithstanding these efforts to allay suspicion, the report spread like wildfire through all the departments of France, and all the Protestant countries of Europe, that the queen had been perfidiously poisoned by Catharine. The Protestant writers of the time assert that she fell a victim to poison communi- cated by a pair of perfumed gloves. The Cath- olics as confidently affirm that she died of a natural disease. The truth can now never be known till the secrets of all hearts shall be re- vealed at the judgment day. Henry, with his retinue, was slowly travel- ing toward Paris, unconscious of his mother's sickness, when the unexpected tidings arrived THE M A ii 11 1 A G E. 83 The King of Navarre. Indifference. of her death. It is difficult to imagine what must have been the precise nature of the emo- tions of an ambitious young man in such an event, who ardently loved both his mother and the crown which she wore, as by the loss of the one he gained the other. The cloud of his grief was embellished with the gilded edgings of joy. The Prince of Beam now assumed the title and the style of the King of Navarre, and honored the memory of his noble mother with every man- ifestation of regret and veneration. This mel- ancholy event caused the postponement of the marriage ceremony for a short time, as it was not deemed decorous that epithalamiums should be shouted and requiems chanted from the same lips in the same hour. The knell tolling the burial of the dead would not blend harmo- niously with the joyous peals of the marriage bell. Henry was not at all annoyed by this de- lay, for no impatient ardor urged him to his nuptials. Marguerite, annoyed by the opposi- tion which Henry's mother had expressed in regard to the alliance, and vexed by the utter indifference which her betrothed manifested to- ward her person, indulged in all the wayward humors of a worse than spoiled child. She stu- diously displayed her utter disregard for Hen- 84 KING HENRY IV. [1572. Coligni lured to Paris. He is remonstrated with. ry, which manifestations, with the most provok- ing indifference, he did not seem even to notice. During this short interval the Protestant no- bles continued to flock to Paris, that they might honor with their presence the marriage of the young chief. The Admiral Coligni was, by very special exertions on the part of Catharine and Charles, lured to the metropolis. He had received anonymous letters warning him of his danger. Many of his more prudent friends openly remonstrated against his placing himself in the power of the perfidious queen. Coligni, however, was strongly attached to Henry, and, in defiance of all these warnings, he resolved to attend his nuptials. " I confide," said he, " in the sacred word of his majesty." Upon his arrival in the metropolis, Catharine and Charles lavished upon him the most un- bounded manifestations of regard. The king, embracing the admiral, exclaimed, " This is the happiest day of my life." Very soon one of the admiral's friends called upon him to take leave, saying that he was immediately about to retire into the country. When asked by the admiral the cause of his unexpected departure, he replied, " I go because they caress you too much, and I would rather save myself with fools than perish with sages." 1572.] THE MARRIAGE. Sh The nuptial day. At length the nuptial day arrived. It was the seventeenth of August, 1572. Paris had laid aside its mourning weeds, and a gay and brill- iant carnival succeeded its dismal days of gloom. Protestants and Catholics, of highest name and note, from every part >f Europe, who had met in the dreadful encounters of a hund- red fields of blood, now mingled in apparent fraternity with the glittering throng, all inter- changing smiles and congratulations. The un- impassioned bridegroom led his scornful bride to the church of Notre Dame. Before the mass- ive portals of this renowned edifice, and under the shadow of its venerable towers, a magnifi- cent platform had been reared, canopied with the most gorgeous tapestry. Hundreds of thousands thronged the surrounding amphithe- atre, swarming at the windows, crowding the balconies, and clustered upon the house-tops, to witness the imposing ceremony. The gentle breeze breathing over the multitude was laden with the perfume of flowers. Banners, and pen- nants, and ribbons of every varied hue waved in the air, or hung in gay festoons from window to window, and from roof to roof. Upon that conspicuous platform, in the presence of all the highest nobility of France, and of the most il- 86 KING HENRY IV. [1572. Small favors gratefully received. lustrious representatives of every court of Eu- rope, Henry received the hand of the haughty princess, and the nuptial oath was administered. Marguerite, however, even in that hour, and in the presence of all those spectators, gave a ludicrous exhibition of her girlish petulance and ungoverned willfulness. When, in the progress of the ceremony, she was asked if she willingly received Henry of Bourbon for her husband, she pouted, coquettishly tossed her proud head, and was silent. The question was repeated. The spirit of Marguerite was now roused, and all the powers of Europe could not tame the shrew. She fixed her eyes defiantly upon the officia- ting bishop, and refusing, by look, or word, or gesture, to express the slightest assent, remain- ed as immovable as a statue. Embarrassment and delay ensued. Her royal brother, Charles IX., fully aware of his sister's indomitable res- olution, coolly walked up to the termagant at bay, and placing one hand upon her chest and the other upon the back of her head, compelled an involuntary nod. The bishop smiled and bowed, and acting upon the principle that small favors were gratefully received, proceeded with the ceremony. Such were the vows with which Henry and Marguerite were united. Such is too often love in the f 1572.] THE MARRIAGE. 89 National festivities. The Roman Catholic wife, unaccompanied by her Protestant husband, who waited at the door with his retinue, now entered the church of No- tre Dame to participate in the solemnities of the mass. The young King of Navarre then sub- missively received his bride and conducted her to a very magnificent dinner. Catharine and Charles IX., at this entertainment, were very specially attentive to the Protestant nobles. The weak and despicable king leaned affection- ately upon the arm of the Admiral Coligni, and for a long time conversed with him with every appearance of friendship and esteem. Balls, il- luminations, and pageants ensued in the even- ing. For many days these unnatural and chill- ing nuptials were celebrated with all the splen- dor of national festivities. Among these enter- tainments there was a tournament, singularly characteristic of the times, and which certainly sheds peculiar lustre either upon the humility or upon the good-nature of the Protestants. A large area was prepared for the display of one of those barbaric passes of arms in which the rude chivalry of that day delighted. The inclosure was surrounded by all the polished in- tellect, rnk, and beauty of France. Charles IX., with his two brothers and several of the 90 KING HENRY IV. [1572. The tournament. Strange representations. Catholic nobility, then appeared upon one side of the arena on noble war-horses gorgeously ca- parisoned, and threw down the gauntlet of de- fiance to Henry of Navarre and his Protestant retinue, who, similarly mounted and accoutred, awaited the challenge upon the opposite side. The portion of the inclosure in which the Catholics appeared was decorated to represent heaven. Birds of Paradise displayed their gor- geous plumage, and the air was vocal with the melody of trilling songsters. Beauty displayed its charms arrayed in celestial robes, and am- brosial odors lulled the senses in luxurious in- dulgence. All the resources of wealth and art were lavished to create a vision of the home of the blessed. The Protestants, in the opposite extreme of the arena, were seen emerging from the desola- tion, the gloom, and the sulphurous canopy of hell. The two parties, from their antagonistic realms, rushed to the encounter, the fiends of darkness battling with the angels of light. Gradually the Catholics, in accordance with pre- vious arrangements, drove back the Protestants toward their grim abodes, when suddenly nu- merous demons appeared rushing from the dun- geons of the infernal regions, who, with cloven 1572.] THE MARRIAGE. 91 Kegal courtesy. Impediments to departure. hoofs, and satanic weapons, and chains forged in penal fires, seized upon the Protestants and dragged them to the blackness of darkness from whence they had emerged. Plaudits loud and long greeted this discomfiture of the Protestants by the infernal powers. But suddenly the scene is changed. A wing- ed Cupid appears, the representative of the pi- ous and amiable bride Marguerite. The demons fly in dismay before the irresistible boy. Fear- lessly this emissary of love penetrates the realms of despair. The Protestants, by this agency, are liberated from their thralldom, and conduct- ed in triumph to the Elysium of the Catholics. A more curious display of regal courtesy histo- ry has not recorded. And this was in Paris ! Immediately after the marriage, the Admiral Coligni was anxious to obtain permission to leave the city. His devout spirit found no en- joyment in the gayeties of the metropolis, and he was deeply disgusted with the unveiled li- centiousness which he witnessed every where around him. Day after day, however, impedi- ments were placed in the way of his departure, and it was not until three days after the mar- riage festivities that he succeeded in obtaining an audience with Charles. He accompanied 92 KING HENRY IV. [1572. Mission from the Pope. The reply. Charles to the racket-court, where the young monarch was accustomed to spend much of his time, and there bidding him adieu, left him to his amusements, and took his way on foot to- ward his lodgings. The Pope, not aware of the treachery which was contemplated, was much displeased in view of the apparently friendly relations which had thus suddenly sprung up between the Catholics and the Protestants. He was exceedingly per- plexed by the marriage, and at last sent a legate to expostulate with the French king. Charles IX. was exceedingly embarrassed how to frame a reply. He wished to convince the legate of his entire devotion to the Papal Church, and, at the same time, he did not dare to betray his intentions ; for the detection of the conspiracy would not only frustrate all his plans, but would load him with ignominy, and vastly augment the power of his enemies. "I do devoutly wish," Charles replied, "that I could tell you all ; but you and the Pope shall soon know how beneficial this marriage shall prove to the interests of religion. Take my word for it, in a little time the holy father shall have reason to praise my designs, my pi- ety, and my zeal in behalf of the faith.' : 1572.] PREPARATIONS. 93 The attempted assassination of Ooligni. Escape of the assassin. CHAPTER IV. PREPARATIONS FOR MASSACRE. AS the Admiral Coligni was quietly passing- through the streets from his interview with Charles at the Louvre to his residence, in preparation for his departure, accompanied by twelve or fifteen of his personal friends, a letter was placed in his hands. He opened it, and began to read as he walked slowly along. Just as he was turning a corner of the street, a mus- ket was discharged from the window of an ad- joining house, and two balls struck him. One cut off a finger of his right hand, and the other entered his left arm. The admiral, inured to scenes of danger, manifested not the slightest agitation or alarm. He calmly pointed out to his friends the house from which the gun had been discharged, and his attendants rushed for- ward and broke open the door. The assassin, however, escaped through a back window, and, mounting a fleet horse stationed there, and which was subsequently proved to have belong- ed to a nephew of the king, avoided arrest. It 94 KING HENRY IV. [1572. Christian submission of Coligni. Arrival of Henry. was clearly proved in the investigations which immediately ensued that the assassin was in connivance with some of the most prominent Catholics of the realm. The Duke of Guise and Catharine were clearly implicated. Messengers were immediately dispatched to inform the king of the crime which had been perpetrated. Charles was still playing in the tennis-court. Casting away his racket, he ex- claimed, with every appearance of indignation, 44 Shall I never be at peace?" The wounded admiral was conveyed to his lodgings. The surgeons of the court, the min- isters of the Protestant Church, and the most illustrious princes and nobles of the admiral's party hastened to the couch of the sufferer. Henry of Navarre was one of the first that ar- rived, and he was deeply moved as he bent over his revered and much-loved friend. The intrep- id and noble old man seemed perfectly calm and composed, reposing unfailing trust in God. 44 My friends," said he, " why do you weep ? For myself, I deem it an honor to have received these wounds for the name of God. Pray him to strengthen me." Henry proceeded from the bedside of the ad- miral to the Louvre. He found Charles and 1572.] PEEPARATIONS. 95 Indignation of Henry. Artifice of Catharine and Charles. Catharine there, surrounded by many of the no- Lies of their court. In indignant terms Henry reproached both mother and son with the atroc- ity of the crime which had been committed, and demanded immediate permission to retire from Paris, asserting that neither he nor his friends could any longer remain in the capital in safe- ty. The king and his mother vied with each other in noisy, voluble, and even blasphemous declarations of their utter abhorrence of the deed ; but all the oaths of Charles and all the vociferations of Catharine did but strengthen the conviction of the Protestants that they both were implicated, in this plot of assassination. Catharine and Charles, feigning the deepest in- terest in the fate of their wounded guest, hasten- ed to his sick-chamber with every possible as- surance of their distress and sympathy. Charles expressed the utmost indignation at the mur- derous attempt, and declared, with those oatlis which are common to vulgar minds, that he would take the most terrible vengeance upon the perpetrators as soon as he could discover them. "To discover them can not be difficult," cool- ly replied the admiral. Henry of Navarre, overwhelmed with indig- 96 KING HENRY IV. [1572. Perplexity of the Protestants. Secret preparations. nation and sorrow, was greatly alarmed in view of the toils in which he found himself and his friends hopelessly involved. The Protestants, who had been thus lured to Paris, unarmed and helpless, were panic-stricken by these indica- tions of relentless perfidy. They immediately made preparations to escape from the city. Hen- ry, bewildered by rumors of plots and perils, hesitated whether to retire from the capital with his friends in a body, taking the admiral with them, or more secretly to endeavor to effect an escape. But Catharine and Charles, the moment for action having not quite arrived, were unwearied in their exertions to allay this excitement and soothe these alarms. They became renewedly clamorous in their expressions of grief and in- dignation in view of the assault upon the ad- miral. The king placed a strong guard around the house where the wounded nobleman lay, os- tensibly for the purpose of protecting him from any popular outbreak, but in reality, as it sub- sequently appeared, to guard against his escape through the intervention of his friends. He also, with consummate perfidy, urged the Prot- estants in the city to occupy quarters near to- gether, that, in case of trouble, they might more 1572.] PREPARATIONS. 97 Feeble condition of the Protestants. easily be protected by him, and might more ef- fectually aid one another. His real object, how- ever, was to assemble them in more convenient proximity for the slaughter to which they were doomed. The Protestants were in the deepest perplexity. They were not sure but that all their apprehensions were groundless ; and yet they knew not but that in the next hour some fearful battery would be unmasked for their de- struction. They were unarmed, unorganized, and unable to make any preparation to meet an unknown danger. Catharine, whose depraved yet imperious spirit was guiding with such con- summate duplicity all this enginery of intrigue, hourly administered the stimulus of her own stern will to sustain the faltering purpose of her equally depraved but fickle-minded and imbe- cile son. Some circumstances seem to indicate that Charles was not an accomplice with his mother in the attempt upon the life of the admiral. She said to her son, "Notwithstanding all your prot- estations, the deed will certainly be laid to your charge. Civil war will again be enkindled. The chiefs of the Protestants are now all in Paris. You had better gain the victory at once here than incur the hazard of a new campaign." 137 98 KING HENRY IV. [1572. The visit. The secret council. "Well, then, "said Charles, petulantly, "since you approve the murder of the admiral, I am content. But let all the Huguenots also fall, that there may not be one left to reproach me." It was on Friday, the 22d of August, that the bullets of the assassin wounded Coligni. The next day Henry called again, with his bride, to visit his friend, whose finger had been amputated, and who was suffering extreme pain from the wound in his arm. Marguerite had but few sympathies with the scenes which are to be wit- nessed in the chamber of sickness. She did not conceal her impatience, but, after a few com- monplace phrases of condolence with her hus- band's bosom friend, she hastened away, leaving Henry to perform alone the offices of friendly sympathy. While the young King of Navarre was thus sitting at the bedside of the admiral, recounting to him the assurances of faith and honor given by Catharine and her son, the question was then under discussion, in secret council, at the pal- ace, by this very Catharine and Charles, wheth- er Henry, the husband of the daughter of the one and of the sister of the other, should be in- cluded with the rest of the Protestants in the massacre which they were plotting. Charles 1572.] PREPARATIONS. 99 Preparations to arm the citizens. manifested some reluctance thus treacherously to take the life of his early playmate arid friend, his brother-in-law, and his invited guest. It was, after much deliberation, decided to protect him from the general slaughter to which his friends were destined. The king sent for some of the leading officers of his troops, and commanded them immediate- ly, but secretly, to send his agents through ev- ery section of the city, to arm the Roman Cath- olic citizens, and assemble them, at midnight, in front of the Hotel de Ville. The energetic Duke of Guise, who had ac- quired much notoriety by the sanguinary spirit with which he had persecuted the Protestants, was to take the lead of the carnage. To pre- vent mistakes in the confusion of the night, he had issued secret orders for all the Catholics " to wear a white cross on the hat, and to bind a piece of white cloth around the arm." In the darkest hour of the night, when all the senti- nels of vigilance and all the powers of resist- ance should be most effectually disarmed by sleep, the alarm-bell, from the tower of the Pal- ace of Justice, was to toll the signal for the in- discriminate massacre of the Protestants. The bullet and the dagger were to be every where 100 KING HENRY IV. [1572. Directions for the massacre. Signals. employed, and men, women, and children were to be cut down without mercy. With a very few individual exceptions, none were to be left to avenge the deed. Large bodies of troops, who hated the Protestants with that implacable bitterness which the most sanguinary wars of many years had engendered, had been called into the city, and they, familiar with deeds of blood, were to commence the slaughter. All good citizens were enjoined, as they loved their Savior, to aid in the extermination of the ene- mies of the Church of Rome. Thus, it was declared, God would be glorified and the best interests of man promoted. The spirit of the age was in harmony with the act, and it can not be doubted that there were those who had been so instructed by their spiritual guides that they truly believed that by this sacrifice they were doing God service. The conspiracy extended throughout all the provinces of France. The storm was to burst, at the same moment, upon the unsuspecting vic- tims in every city and village of the kingdom. Beacon-fires, with their lurid midnight glare, were to flash the tidings from mountain to mountain. The peal of alarm was to ring along from steeple to steeple, from city to hamlet, from 1572.] PREPARATIONS. 101 Feast at the Louvre. Embarrassment of Henry. valley to hillside, till the whole Catholic popu- lation should be aroused to obliterate every ves- tige of Protestantism from the land. While Catharine and Charles were arranging all the details of this deed of infamy, even to the very last moment they maintained with the Protestants the appearance of the most cordial friendship. They lavished caresses upon the Protestant generals and nobles. The very day preceding the night when the massacre com- menced, the king entertained, at a sumptuous feast in the Louvre, many of the most illustri- ous of the doomed guests. Many of the Prot- estant nobles were that night, by the most press- ing invitations, detained in the palace to sleep. Charles appeared in a glow of amiable spirits, and amused them, till a late hour, with his pleas- antries. Henry of Navarre, however, had his suspi- cions very strongly aroused. Though he did not and could not imagine any thing so dread- ful as a general massacre, he clearly foresaw that preparations were making for some very extraordinary event. The entire depravity of both Catharine and Charles he fully understood. But he knew not where the blow would fall, and he was extremely perplexed in deciding as to 102 KING HENRY IV. [1572. Tlie Duke of Lorraine. His hatred toward the Protestants. the course he ought to pursue. The apartments assigned to him and his bride were in the pal- ace of the Louvre. It would be so manifestly for his worldly interest for him to unite with the Catholic party, especially when he should see the Protestant cause hopelessly ruined, that the mother and the brother of his wife had hes- itatingly concluded that it would be safe to spare his life. Many of the most conspicuous mem- bers of the court of Navarre lodged also in the capacious palace, in chambers contiguous to those which were occupied by their sovereign. Marguerite's oldest sister had married the Duke of Lorraine, and her son, the Duke of Guise, an energetic, ambitious, unprincipled profligate, was one of the most active agents in this conspiracy. His illustrious rank, his near relationship with the king rendering it not im- probable that he might yet inherit the throne his restless activity, and his implacable hatred of the Protestants, gave him the most promi- nent position as the leader of the Catholic par- ty. He had often encountered the Admiral Co- ligni upon fields of battle, where all the malig- nity of the human heart had been aroused, and he had often been compelled to fly before the strong arm of his powerful adversary. He felt 1572.J PREPARATIONS. 103- The assassin's revenge. Anxiety of the Duchess of Lorraine. that now the hour of revenge had come, and with an assassin's despicable heart he thirsted for the blood of his noble foe. It was one of his paid agents who fired upon the admiral from the window, and, mounted upon one of the fleet- est chargers of the Duke of Guise, the wretch made his escape. The conspiracy had been kept a profound se- cret from Marguerite, lest she should divulge it to her husband. The Duchess of Lorraine, however, was in all their deliberations, and, fully aware of the dreadful carnage which the night was to witness, she began to feel, as the hour of midnight approached, very considerable anxiety in reference to the safety of her sister. Con- scious guilt magnified her fears ; and she was apprehensive .lest the Protestants, when they should first awake to the treachery which sur- rounded them, would rush to the chamber of their king to protect him, and would wreak their vengeance upon his Catholic spouse. She did not dare to communicate to her sister the cause of her alarm ; and yet, when Marguerite, about 11 o'clock, arose to retire, she importuned her sister, even with tears, not to occupy the same apartment with her husband that night, but to sleep in her own private chamber. Catharine 104 KING HENRY IV. [1572. Scene in Henry's chamber. Rumors of trouble. sharply reproved the Duchess of Lorraine for her imprudent remonstrances, and bidding the Queen of Navarre good-night, with maternal au- thority directed her to repair to the room of her husband. She departed to the nuptial cham- ber, wondering what could be the cause of such an unwonted display of sisterly solicitude and affection. When she entered her room, to her great sur- prise she found thirty or forty gentlemen as- sembled there. They were the friends arid the supporters of Henry, who had become alarmed by the mysterious rumors which were floating from ear to ear, and by the signs of agitation, and secrecy, and strange preparation which ev- ery where met the eye. No one could imagine what danger was impending. No one knew from what quarter the storm would burst. But that some very extraordinary event was about to transpire was evident to all. It was too late to adopt any precautions for safety. The Prot- estants, unarmed, unorganized, and widely dis- persed, could now only practice the virtue of heroic fortitude in meeting their doom, whatever that doom might be. The gentlemen in Hen- ry's chamber did not venture to separate, and not an eye was closed in sleep. They sat to- 1572.] PREPARATIONS. 105 Assembling for work. Alarm in the metropolis. gether in the deepest perplexity and consterna- tion, as the hours of the night lingered slow- ly along, anxiously awaiting the developments with which the moments seemed to be fraught. In the mean time, aided by the gloom of a starless night, in every street of Paris prepara- tions were going on for the enormous perpetra- tion. Soldiers were assembling in different places of rendezvous. Guards were stationed at important points in the city, that their vic- tims might not escape. Armed citizens, with loaded muskets and sabres gleaming in the lamp- light, began to emerge, through the darkness, from their dwellings, and to gather, in motley and interminable assemblage, around the Hotel de Ville. A regiment of guards were stationed at the gates of the royal palace to protect Charles and Catharine from any possibility of danger. Many of the houses were illuminated, that by the light blazing from the windows, the bullet might be thrown with precision, and that the dagger might strike an unerring blow. Agita- tion and alarm pervaded the vast metropolis. The Catholics were rejoicing that the hour of vengeance had arrived. The Protestants gazed upon the portentous gatherings of this storm in utter bewilderment. 106 KING HENRY IV. [1572, Inflexibility of Catharine. The faltering of Charles. All the arrangements of the enterprise were left to the Duke of Guise, and a more efficient and fitting agent could not have been found. He had ordered that the tocsin, the signal for the massacre, should be tolled at two o'clock in the morning. Catharine and Charles, in one of the apartments of the palace of the Louvre, were impatiently awaiting the lingering flight of the hours till the alarm-bell should toll forth the death-warrant of their Protestant subjects. Catharine, inured to treachery and hardened in vice, was apparently a stranger to all compunc- tious visitings. A life of crime had steeled her soul against every merciful impression. But she was very apprehensive lest her Son, less ob- durate in purpose, might relent. Though im- potent in character, he was, at times, petulant and self-willed, and in paroxysms of stubborn- ness spurned his mother's counsels and exert- ed his own despotic power. Charles was now in a state of the most fever- ish excitement. He hastily paced the room, peering out at the window, and almost every moment looking at his watch, wishing that the hour would come, and again half regretting that the plot had been formed. The companions and the friends of his childhood, the invited 1572.] PREPARATIONS. 107 Nerved for the work. The knell of death. guests who, for many weeks, had been his asso- ciates in gay festivities, and in the interchange of all kindly words and deeds, were, at his com- mand, before the morning should dawn, to fall before the bullet and the poniard of the midnight murderer. His mother witnessed with intense anxiety this wavering of his mind. She there- fore urged him no longer to delay, but to antic- ipate the hour, and to send a servant immedi- ately to sound the alarm. Charles hesitated, while a cold sweat ran from his forehead. "Are you a coward ?" taunting- ly inquired the fiend-like mother. This is the charge which will always make the poltroon squirm. The young king nervously exclaimed, " Well, then, begin." There were in the chamber at the time only the king, his mother, and his brother the Duke of Anjou. A messenger was immediately dis- patched to strike the bell. It was two hours after midnight. A few moments of terrible sus- pense ensued. There was a dead silence, nei- ther of the three uttering a word. They all stood at the windows looking out into the ray- less night. Suddenly, through the still air, the ponderous tones of the alarm-bell fell upon the ear, and rolled, the knell of death, over the city. 108 KING HENRY IV. [1572. Vive Dieu et le roi !" Its vibrations awakened the demon in ten thou- sand hearts. It was the morning of the Sab- bath, August 24th, 1572. It was the anniver- sary of a festival in honor of St. Bartholomew, which had long been celebrated. At the sound of the tocsin, the signal for the massacre, armed men rushed from every door into the streets, shouting, " Vive Dieu et le roi /" Live God and the king ! 1574.1 THE MASSACRE. 109 The commencement of the massacre. CHAPTER V. MASSACRE OF ST. BARTHOLOMEW. AS the solemn dirge from the steeple rang out upon the night air, the king stood at the window of the palace trembling in every nerve. Hardly had the first tones of the alarm- bell fallen upon his ear when the report of a musket was heard, and the first victim fell. The sound seemed to animate to frenzy the de- moniac Catharine, while it almost froze the blood in the veins of the young monarch, and he pas- sionately called out for the massacre to be stop- ped. It was too late. The train was fired, and could not be extinguished. The signal passed witli the rapidity of sound from steeple to stee- ple, till not only Paris, but entire France, was roused. The roar of human passion, the crack- ling fire of musketry, and the shrieks of the wounded and the dying, rose and blended in one fearful din throughout the whole metropolis. Guns, pistols, daggers, were every where busy. Old men, terrified maidens, helpless infants, ven- erable matrons, were alike smitten, and mercy 110 KING HENRY IV. ^1572. The house forced. Flight of the sen-ants. had no appeal which could touch the heart of the murderers. The wounded Admiral Coligni was lying help- less upon his bed, surrounded by a few person- al friends, as the uproar of the rising storm of human violence and rage rolled in upon their ears. The Duke of Guise, with three hundred soldiers, hastened to the lodgings of the admiral. The gates were immediately knocked down, and the sentinels stabbed. A servant, greatly ter- rified, rushed into the inner apartment where the wounded admiral was lying, and exclaimed, " The house is forced, and there is no means of resisting." "I have long since," said the admiral, calm- ly, "prepared myself to die. Save yourselves, my friends, if you can, for you can not defend my life. I commend my soul to the mercy of God." The companions of the admiral, having no possible means of protection, and perhaps add- ing to his peril by their presence, immediately fled to other apartments of the house. They were pursued and stabbed. Three leaped from the windows and were shot in the streets. Coligni, left alone in his apartment, rose with difficulty from his bed, and, being unable to 1572.] THE MASSACRE. Ill Death of Admiral Coligni. stand, leaned for support against the wall. A desperado by the name of Breme, a follower of the Duke of Guise, with a congenial band of accomplices, rushed into the room. They saw a venerable man, pale, and with bandaged wounds, in his night-dress, .engaged in prayer. "Art thou the admiral?" demanded the as- sassin, with brandished sword. "I am," replied the admiral; "and thou, young man, shouldst respect my gray hairs. Nevertheless, thou canst abridge my life but a little." Breme plunged his sword into his bosom, and then withdrawing it, gave him a cut upon the head. The admiral fell, calmly saying, "If I -could but die by the hand of a gentleman in- stead of such a knave as this !" The rest of the assassins then rushed upon him, piercing his body with their daggers. The Duke of Guise, ashamed himself to meet the eye of this noble victim to the basest treach- ery, remained impatiently in the court -yard below. "Breme!" he shouted, looking up at the win- dow, " have you done it?" "Yes," Breme exclaimed from the chamber, "he is done for." 112 KING HENRY IV. [1572. Brutality. Fate of the Duke of Guise. " Let us see, though," rejoined the duke. " Throw the body from the window." The mangled corpse was immediately thrown down upon the pavement of the court-yard. The duke, with his handkerchief, wiped the blood and the dirt from his face, and carefully scrutinized the features. "Yes," said he, "I recognize him. He is the man." Then giving the pallid cheek a kick, he ex- claimed, " Courage, comrades ! we have happily begun. Let us now go for others. The king commands it." In sixteen years from this event the Duke of Guise was himself assassinated, and received a kick in the face from Henry III., brother of the same king in whose service he had drawn the dagger of the murderer. Thus died the Admi- ral Coligni, one of the noblest sons of France. Though but fifty-six years of age, he was pre- maturely infirm from care, and toil, and suf- fering. For three days the body was exposed to the insults of the populace, and finally was hung up by the feet on a gibbet. A cousin of Coligni secretly caused it to be taken down and buried. The tiger, having once lapped his tongue in 1572.] THE MASSACRE. 113 Excitement of the Parisians. Fiendish spirit of Charles. blood, seems to be imbued with a new spirit of ferocity. There is in man a similar temper, which is roused and stimulated by carnage. The excitement of human slaughter converts man into a demon. The riotous multitude of Parisians was becoming eacli moment more and more clamorous for blood. They broke open the houses of the Protestants, and, rushing into their chambers, murdered indiscriminately both sexes and every age. The streets resounded with the shouts of the assassins and the shrieks of their victims. Cries of " Kill ! kill ! more blood!" rent the air. The bodies of the slain were thrown out of the windows into the streets, and the pavements of the city were clotted with human gore. Charles, who was overwhelmed with such compunctions of conscience when he heard the first shot, and beheld from his window the com- mencement of the butchery, soon recovered from his momentary wavering, and, conscious that it was too late to draw back, with fiend-like eager- ness engaged himself in the work of death. The monarch, when a boy, had been noted for his sanguinary spirit, delighting with his own hand to perform the revolting acts of the slaughter- house. Perfect fury seemed now to take pos- 138 114 KING HENRY IV. [1572. Fugitives butchered. Terror of Marguerite. session of him. His cheeks were flushed, his lips compressed, his eyes glared with frenzy. Bending eagerly from his window, he shouted words of encouragement to the assassins. Grasp- ing a gun, in the handling of which lie had be- come very skillful from long practice in the chase, he watched, like a sportsman, for his prey; and when he saw an unfortunate Protestant, wounded and bleeding, flying from his pursuers, he would take deliberate aim from the window of his palace, and shout with exultation as he saw him fall, pierced by his bullet. A crowd of fugitives rushed into the court-yard of the Louvre to throw themselves upon the protection of the king. Charles sent his own body-guard into the yard, with guns and daggers, to butcher them all, and the pavements of the palace-yard were drenched with their blood. Just before the carnage commenced, Marguer- ite, weary with excitement and the agitating conversation to which she had so long been lis- tening, retired to her private apartment for sleep. She had hardly closed her eyes when the fear- ful outcries of the pursuers and the pursued fill- ed the palace. She sprang up in her bed, and heard some one struggling at the door, and shrieking "Navarre! Navarre!" In a parox- 1572.] THE MASSACRE. 117 Flight of Marguerite. Terrors of the night. ysm of terror, she ordered an attendant to open the door. One of her husband's retinue in- stantly rushed in, covered with wounds and blood, pursued by four soldiers of her brother's guard. The captain of the guard entered at the same moment, and, at the earnest entreaty of the princess, spared her the anguish of seeing the friend of her husband murdered before her eyes. Marguerite, half delirious with bewilderment and terror, tied from her room to seek the apart- ment of her sister. The palace was rilled with uproar, the shouts of the assassins and the shrieks of their victims blending in awful con- fusion. As she was rushing through the hall, she encountered another Protestant gentleman flying before the dripping sword of his pursuer. He was covered with blood, flowing from the many wounds he had already received. Just as he reached the young Queen of Navarre, his pursuer overtook him and plunged a sword through his body. He fell dead at her feet. No tongue can tell the horrors of that night. It would require volumes to record the frightful scenes which were enacted before the morning dawned. Among the most remarkable escapes we may mention that of a lad whose name aft- 118 KING HENRY IV. [1572. Remarkable escape of Maximilian. erward attained much celebrity. The Baron de Rosny, a Protestant lord of great influence and worth, had accompanied his son Maximilian, a very intelligent and spirited boy, about eleven years of age, to Paris, to attend the nuptials of the King of Navarre. This young prince, Max- imilian, afterward the world-renowned Duke of Sully, had previously been prosecuting his stud- ies in the College of Burgundy, in the metropo- lis, and had become a very great favorite of the warm-hearted King of Navarre. His father had come to Paris with great reluctance, for he had no confidence in the protestations of Catharine and Charles IX. Immediately after the attempt was made to assassinate the admiral, the Baron de Rosny, with many of his friends, left the city, intrusting his son to the care of a private tutor and a valet de chambre. He occupied lodgings in a remote quarter of the city and near the col- leges. Young Maximilian was asleep in his room, when, a little after midnight, he was aroused by the ringing of the alarm-bells, and the confused cries of the populace. His tutor and valet de chambre sprang from their beds, and hurried out to ascertain the cause of the tumult. They did not, however, return, for they had hardly reach- 1572.] THE MASSACRE. Effort? to save his life. The disguise. ed the door when they were shot down. Max- imilian, in great bewilderment respecting their continued absence, and the dreadful clamor con- tinually increasing, was hurriedly dressing him- self, when his landlord came in, pale and trem- bling, and informed him of the massacre which was going on, and that he had saved his own life only by the avowal of his faith in the Cath- olic religion. He earnestly urged Maximilian to do the same. The young prince magnani- mously resolved not to save his life by false- hood and apostasy. He determined to attempt, in the darkness and confusion of the night, to- gain the College of Burgundy, where he hoped to find some Catholic friends who would protect him. The distance of the college from the house in which he was rendered the undertaking desper- ately perilous. Having disguised himself in, the dress of a Roman Catholic priest, he took a large prayer-book under his arm, and trembling- ly issued forth into the streets. The sights which met his eye in the gloom of that awful night were enough to appal the stoutest heart. The murderers, frantic with excitement and in- toxication, were uttering wild outcries, and pur- suing, in every direction, their terrified victims. 120 KING HENRY IV. [1572. Scene in the street. Women and children, in their night-clothes, hav- ing just sprung in terror from their beds, were flying from their pursuers, covered with wounds, and uttering fearful shrieks. The mangled bod- ies of the young and of the old, of males and females, were strewn along the streets, and the pavements were slippery with blood. Loud and dreadful outcries were heard from the interior of the dwellings as the work of midnight assas- sination proceeded ; and struggles of desperate violence were witnessed, as the murderers at- tempted to throw their bleeding and dying vic- tims from the high windows of chambers and attics upon the pavements below. The shouts of the assailants, the shrieks of the wounded, as blow after blow fell upon them, the incessant reports of muskets and pistols, the tramp of sol- diers, and the peals of the alarm-bell, all com- bined to create a scene of terror such as human eyes have seldom witnessed. In the midst of ten thousand perils, the young man crept along, protected by his priestly garb, while he frequent- ly saw his fellow-Christians shot and stabbed at his very side. Suddenly, in turning a corner, he fell into the midst of a band of the body-guard of the king, whose swords were dripping with blood. They 1572.] THE MASSACRE. 121 The talisman. Arrival at the college. seized him with great roughness, when, seeing the Catholic prayer-book which was in his hands, they considered it a safe passport, and permitted him to continue on his way uninjured. Twice again he encountered similar peril, as he was seized by bands of infuriated men, and each time he was extricated in the same way. At length he arrived at the College of Bur- gundy ; and now his danger increased tenfold. It was a Catholic college. The porter at the gate absolutely refused him admittance. The murderers began to multiply in the street around him with fierce and threatening questions. Max- imilian at length, by inquiring for La Faye, the president of the college, and by placing a bribe in the hands of the porter, succeeded in obtain- ing entrance. La Faye was a humane man, and exceedingly attached to his Protestant pu- pil. Maximilian entered the apartment of the president, and found there two Catholic priests. The priests, as soon as they saw him, insisted upon cutting him down, declaring that the king had commanded that not even the infant at the breast should be spared. The good old man, however, firmly resolved to protect his young friend, and, conducting him privately to a secure chamber, locked him up. Here he remained 122 KING HENRY IV. [1572. His protection. Henry taken before the king. three days in the greatest suspense, apprehen- sive every hour that the assassins would break in upon him. A faithful servant of the presi- dent brought him food, but could tell him of nothing but deeds of treachery and blood. At the end of three days, the heroic boy, who af- terward attained great celebrity as the minis- ter and bosom friend of Henry, was released and protected. The morning of St. Bartholomew's day had not dawned when a band of soldiers entered the chamber of Henry of Navarre and conveyed him to the presence of the king. Frenzied with the excitements of the scene, the imbecile but pas- sionate monarch received him with a counte- nance inflamed with fury. With blasphemous oaths and imprecations, he commanded the King of Navarre, as he valued his life, to abandon a religion whicli Charles affirmed that the Prot- estants had assumed only as a cloak for their rebellion. With violent gesticulations and threats, he declared that he would no longer submit to be contradicted by his subjects, but that they should revere him as the image of God. Henry, who was a Protestant from con- siderations of state policy rather than from Christian principle, and who saw in the conflict 1572.] THE MASSACRE. 123 He yields. Paris on the Sabbath following. merely a strife between two political parties, ingloriously yielded to that necessity by which alone lie could save his life. Charles gave him three days to deliberate, declaring, with a vio- lent oath, that if, at the end of that time, he did not yield to his commands, he would cause him to be strangled. Henry yielded. He not only went to ma.-s himself, but submitted to the deg- radation of sending an edict to his own domin- ions, prohibiting the exercise of any religion ex- cept that of Rome. This indecision was a se- rious blot upon his character. Energetic and decisive as he was in all his measures of gov- ernment, his religious convictions were ever fee- ble and wavering. When the darkness of night passed away and the morning of the Sabbath dawned upon Par- is, a spectacle was witnessed such as the streets even of that blood-renowned metropolis have seldom presented. The city still resounded with that most awful of all tumults, the clamor of an infuriated mob. The pavements were covered with gory corpses. Men, women, and children were still flying in every direction, wounded and bleeding, pursued by merciless assassins, riotous with demoniac laughter and drunk with blood. The report of guns and pis- 124 KING HENRY IV. [1572. Encouragement by the priests. The massacre continued. tols was heard in all parts of the city, sometimes in continuous volleys, as if platoons of soldiers were firing upon their victims, while the scat- tered shots, incessantly repeated in every sec- tion of the extended metropolis, proved the uni- versality of the massacre. Drunken wretches, besmeared with blood, were swaggering along the streets, with ribald jests and demoniac howlings, hunting for the Protestants. Bodies, torn and gory, were hanging from the windows, and dissevered heads were spurned like footballs along the pavements. Priests were seen in their sacerdotal robes, with elevated crucifixes, and with fanatical exclamations encouraging the murderers not to grow weary in their holy work of exterminating God's enemies. The most distinguished nobles and generals of the court and the camp of Charles, mounted on horseback with gorgeous retinue, rode through the streets, encouraging by voice and arm the indiscriminate massacre. " Let not," the king proclaimed, " one single Protestant be spared to reproach me hereafter with this deed." For a whole week the massacre continued, and it was computed that from eighty to a hund- red thousand Protestants were slain throughout the kingdom. 1572.J THE MASSACRE. 125 Exultation of the Catholics. Triumphal procession. Charles himself, with Catharine and the high- born but profligate ladies who disgraced her court, emerged with the morning light, in splen- did array, into the reeking streets. The ladies contemplated with merriment and ribald jests the dead bodies of the Protestants piled up be- fore the Louvre. Some of the retinue, appalled by the horrid spectacle, wished to retire, alleg- ing that the bodies already emitted a putrid odor. Charles inhumanly replied, " The smell of a dead enemy is always pleasant." On Thursday, after four days spent in hunt- ing out the fugitives and finishing the bloody work, the clergy paraded the streets in a tri- umphal procession, and with jubilant prayers and hymns gave thanks to God for their great victory. The Catholic pulpits resounded with exultant harangues, and in honor of the event a medallion was struck off, with the inscription "La piete a reveille la justice" Religion has awakened justice. In the distant provinces of France the mas-- sacre was continued, as the Protestants were hunted from all their hiding-places. In some departments, as in Santonge and Lower Lan- guedoc, the Protestants were so numerous that the Catholics did not venture to attack them. 126 KING HENRY IV. [1572. Extent of the massacre. In some other provinces they were so few that the Catholics had nothing whatever to fear from them, and therefore spared them ; and in the sparsely-settled rural districts the peasants re- fused to imbrue their hands in the blood of their neighbors. Many thousand Protestants throughout the kingdom in these ways escaped. But in nearly all the populous towns, where the Catholic population predominated, the mas- sacre was universal and indiscriminate. In Meaux, four hundred houses of Protestants were pillaged and devastated, and the inmates, with- out regard to age or sex, utterly exterminated. At Orleans there were three thousand Protest- ants. A troop of armed horsemen rode furi- ously through the streets, shouting, " Courage, boys ! kill all, and then you shall divide their property." At Rouen, many of the Protestants, at the first alarm, tied. The rest were arrested and thrown into prison. They were then brought out one by one, and deliberately murdered. Six hundred were thus slain. Such were the scenes which were enacted in Toulouse, Bordeaux, Bourges, Angers, Lyons, and scores of other cit- ies in France. It is impossible to ascertain with precision the number of victims. The Duke of Sully estimates them at seventy thousand ; the 1572.] THE MASSACKE. 127 Magnanimity of Catholic officers. Bishop Perefixe at one hundred thousand. This latter estimate is probably not exaggerated, if we include the unhappy fugitives, who, fleeing from their homes, died of cold, hunger, and fa- tigue, and all the other nameless woes which accrued from this great calamity. In the midst of these scenes of horror it is pleasant to record several instances of generous humanity. In the barbarism of those times dueling was a common practice. A Catholic officer by the name of Vessins, one of the most fierce and irritable men in France, had a private quarrel with a Protestant officer whose name was Regnier. They had mutually sought each other in Paris to obtain such satisfaction as a duel could afford. In the midst of the massa- cre, Regnier, while at prayers with his servant (for in those days dueling and praying were not deemed inconsistent), heard the door of his room broken open, arid, looking round in expectation of instant death, saw his foe Vessins enter breathless with excitement and haste. Regnier, conscious that all resistance would be unavail- ing, calmly bared his bosom to his enemy, ex- claiming, "You will have an easy victory." Vessins made no reply, but ordered the valet 128 KING HENRY IV. [1572. The Bishop of Lisieux. to seek his master's cloak and sword. Then leading him into the street, he mounted him upon a powerful horse, and with fifteen armed men escorted him out of the city. Not a word was exchanged between them. When they ar- rived at a little grove at a short distance from the residence of the Protestant gentleman, Ves- siris presented him with his sword, and bade him dismount and defend himself, saying, "Do not imagine that I seek your friend- ship by what I have done. All I wish is to take your life honorably." Regnier threw away his sword, saying, " I will never strike at one who has saved my life." "Very well!" Vessins replied, and left him, making him a present of the horse on which he rode. Though the commands which the king sent to the various provinces of France for the mas- sacre were very generally obeyed, there were examples of distinguished virtue, in which Cath- olics of high rank not only refused to imbrue their own hands in blood, but periled their lives to protect the Protestants. The Bishop of Lisieux, in the exercise of true Christian char- ity, saved all the Protestants in the town over which he presided. The Governor of Auvergnc 1572.J THE MASSACEE. Noble replies to the king's decree. replied to the secret letter of the king in the fol- lowing words : " Sire, I have received an order, under your majesty's seal, to put all the Protestants of this province to death, and if, which God forbid, the order be genuine, I respect your majesty still too much to obey you." The king had sent a similar order to the commandant at Bayonne, the Viscount of Or- thez. The following noble words were returned in reply : " Sire, I have communicated the commands of your majesty to the inhabitants of the town and to the soldiers of the garrison, and I have found good citizens and brave soldiers, but not one executioner ; on which account, they and I humbly beseech you to employ our arms and our lives in enterprises in which we can con- scientiously engage. However perilous they may be, we will willingly shed therein the last drop of our blood." Both of these noble-minded men soon after very suddenly and mysteriously died. Few entertained a doubt that poison had been ad- ministered by the order of Charles. The law of France required that these Prot- estants should be hunted to death. This was 13-9 130 KING HENKY IV. [1572. The higher law. Attempted justification. the law promulgated by the king and sent by his own letters missive to the appointed officers of the crown. But there is there is a HIGHER LAW than that of kings and courts. Nobly these majes- tic men rendered to it their allegiance. They sealed their fidelity to this HIGHER LAW with their blood. They were martyrs, not fanatics. On the third day of the massacre the king assembled the Parliament in Paris, and made a public avowal of the part he had taken in this fearful tragedy, and of the reasons which had in- fluenced him to the deed. Though lie hoped to silence all Protestant tongues in his own realms in death, he knew that the tale would be told throughout all Europe. He therefore stated, in justification of the act, that he had, " as if by a miracle," discovered that the Protestants were engaged in a conspiracy against his own lite and that of all of his family. This charge, however, uttered for the moment, was speedily dropped and forgotten. There was not the slightest evidence of such a design. The Parliament, to give a little semblance of justice to the king's accusation, sat in judgment upon the memory of the noble Coligni. They sentenced him to be hung in effigy ; ordered his 1572.] THE MASSACEE. 131 Punishment of Coligui. arms to be dragged at the heels of a horse through all the principal towns of France ; his magnifi- cent castle of Chatillon to be razed to its founda- tions, and never to be rebuilt; his fertile acres, in the culture of which he had found his chief delight, to be desolated and sown with salt; his portraits and statues, wherever found, to be de- stroyed; his children to lose their title of nobil- ity ; all his goods and estates to be confiscated to the use of the crown, and a monument of du- rable marble to be raised, upon which this sen- tence of the court should be engraved, to trans- mit to all posterity his alleged infamy. Thus was punished on earth one of the noblest serv- ants both of God and man. But there is a day of final judgment yet to come. The oppressor has but his brief hour. There is eternity to right the oppressed. Notwithstanding this general and awful mas- sacre, the Protestants were far from being ex- terminated. Several nobles, surrounded by their retainers in their distant castles, suspicious of treachery, had refused to go to Paris to attend the wedding of Henry and Marguerite. Others who had gone to Paris, alarmed by the attack upon Admiral Coligni, immediately retired to their homes. Some concealed themselves in 132 KING HENRY IV. [1572. Valor -f the surv ivor.s. Pledges of aid. garrets, cellars, and wells until the massacre was over. As has been stated, in some towns the governors refused to engage in the mer- ciless butchery, and in others the Protestants hud the majority, and with their own arms could defend themselves within the walls which their own troops garrisoned. Though, in the first panic caused by the dread- ful slaughter, the Protestants made no resist- ance, but rither surrendered themselves submis- sively to the sword of the assassin, or sought safety in concealment or flight, soon indignation took the place of fear. Those who had fled from the kingdom to Protestant states rallied together. The survivors in France began to count their numbers and marshal their forces for self-preservation. From every part of Prot- estant Europe a cry of horror and execration simultaneously arose in view of this crime of un- paralleled enormity. In many places the Cath- olics themselves seemed appalled in contempla- tion of the deed they had perpetrated. Words of sympathy were sent to these martyrs to a pure faith from many of the Protestant king- doms, with pledges of determined and efficient aid. The Protestants rapidly gained courage. From all the country, they flocked into those 1572.J THE MASSACRE. 133 Prophecy of Knox. Apolog * of I he court. walled towns which still remained in their power. As the fugitives from France, emaciate, pale, and woe-stricken, with tattered and dusly garb, recited in England, Switzerland, and Germany the horrid story of the massacre, the hearts of their auditors were frozen with horror In Ge- neva a day of fasting and prayer was insl ituted, which is observed even to the present dav r . In Scotland every church resounded witli th< thrill- ing tale ; and Knox, whose inflexible spirit was nerved for those iron times, exclaimed, in lan- guage of prophetic nerve, " Sentence has gone forth against thar. mur- derer, the King of France, and the vengeance of God will never be withdrawn from his house. His name shall be held in everlasting execra- tion." The French court, alarmed by the indignation it had aroused, sent an embassador to London with a poor apology for the crime, by pretend- ing that the Protestants had conspired against the life of the king. The ernbassaJor A\as re- ceived in the court of the queen with appalling coldness and gloom. Arrangements were made to invest the occasion with the most impressive solemnity. The court was shrouded in mourn- 134 KING HENRY IV. [1572. Opinions of the courts of Kurope. ing, and all the lords and ladies appeared in sa- ble weeds. A stern and sombre sadness was upon every countenance. The embassador, overwhelmed by his reception, was overheard to exclaim to himself, in bitterness of heart, " I am ashamed to acknowledge myself a Frenchman." He entered, however, the presence of the queen, passed through the long line of silent courtiers, who refused to salute him, or even to honor him with a look, stammered out his mis- erable apology, and, receiving no response, re- tired covered with confusion. Elizabeth, we thank thee ! This one noble deed atones lor many of thy crimes. Very different was the reception of these tid- ings in the court of Rome. The messenger who -carried the news was received with transports of joy, and was rewarded with a thousand pieces of gold. Cannons were fired, bells rung, and an immense procession, with all the trappings of sacerdotal rejoicing, paraded the streets. An- thems were chanted and thanksgivings were sol- emnly offered for the great victory over the ene- mies of the Church. A gold medal was struck off to commemorate the event ; and Charles IX.. and Catharine were pronounced, by the infalli- 1572.] THE MASSACRE. 135 Rejuiciug> at Rome. Atrocity of the deed. ble word of his holiness, to be the especial fa- vorites of God. Spain and the Netherlands united with Rome in these infamous exulta- tions. Philip II. wrote from Madrid to Cath- arine, " These tidings are the greatest and the most glorious I could have received." Such was the awful massacre of St. Barthol- omew. When contemplated in all its aspects of perfidy, cruelty, and cowardice, it must be pronounced the greatest crime recorded in his- tory. The victims were invited under th,e guise of friendship to Paris. They were received with solemn oaths of peace and protection. The leading men in the nation placed the dagger in the hands of an ignorant and degraded people. The priests, professed ministers of Jesus Christ, stimulated the benighted multitude by all the appeals of fanaticism to exterminate those whom they denounced as the enemies of God and man. After the great atrocity was perpetrated, princes and priests, with bloodstained hands, flocked to the altiirs of God, our common Father, to thank him that the massacre had been accomplished. The annals of the world are filled with narra- tives of crime and woe, but the Massacre of St. Bartholomew stands perhaps without a parallel. 1.^6 KING HENRY IV. [1572. llrsul ,s of the massacre. Retribution. It has been said, " The blood of the martyrs is the seed of the Church." This is only true with exceptions. Protestantism in France has never recovered from this blow. But for this massacre -one half of the nobles of France would have continued Protestant. The Reformers would have constituted so large a portion of the population that mutual toleration would have been necessary. Henry IV. would not have ab- jured Mie Protestant faith. Intelligence would have been diffused ; religion would have been respected ; and in all probability, the horrors of the French Revolution would have been averted. God is an avenger. In the mysterious gov- ernment which he wields, mysterious only to our feeble vision, he "visits the iniquities of the fa- thers upon the children, even unto the third and fourth generation." As we see the priests of Paris and of France, during the awful tragedy of the Revolution, massacred in the prisons, shot in the streets, hung upon the lamp-posts, and driven in starvation and woe from the kingdom, we can not but remember the day of St. Bar- tholomew. The 24th of August, 1572, and the 2d of September, 1792, though far apart in the records of time, are consecutive days in the gov- ernment of God. VALOIS GUISE BOURBON. 137 Illustrious French families. The house of ValoU. CHAPTER VI. THE HOUSES OF VALOIS, OF GUISE, AND OF BOURBON. AT this time, in France, there were three illus- trious and rival families, prominent above all others. Their origin was lost in the remote- ness of antiquity. Their renown had been ac- cumulating for many generations, through rank, and wealth, and power, and deeds of heroic and semi-barbarian daring. As these three families are so blended in all the struggles of this most warlike period, it is important to give a brief history of their origin and condition. 1. The House of Valois. More than a thou- sand years before the birth of Christ, we get dim glimpses of France, or, as it was then called, Oaul. It was peopled by a barbarian race, di- vided into petty tribes or clans, each with its chieftain, and each possessing undefined and sometimes almost unlimited power. Age after age rolled on, during which generations came and went like ocean billows, and all Gaul was but a continued battle-field. The history of 138 KING HENRY IV. Early condition of France. Ulovis. each individual of its countless millions seems- to have been, that he was born, killed as many of his fellow-creatures as he could, and then, having acquired thus much of glory, died. About fifty years before the birth of Christ, Caesar, with his conquering hosts, swept through the whole country, causing its rivers to run red with blood, until the subjugated Gauls submit- ted to Roman sway. In the decay of the Roman empire, about four hundred years after Christ, the Franks, from Germany, a barbarian horde as ferocious as wolves, penetrated the northern por- tion of Gaul, and, obtaining permanent settle- ment there, gave the whole country the name of France. Clovis was the chieftain of this war- like tribe. In the course of a few years, France was threatened with another invasion by com- bined hordes of barbarians from the north. The chiefs of the several independent tribes in France found it necessary to unite to repel the foe. They chose Clovis as their leader. This was the origin of the French monarchy. He was but little elevated above the surrounding chiet- tains, but by intrigue and power perpetuated his supremacy. For about three hundred years the family of Clovis retained its precarious and oft- contested elevation. At. last, this line, enervated V ALOIS GUISE BOUKBON. The Carlovingian dynasty. Capet and Philiji. by luxury, became extinct, and another family obtained the throne. This new dynasty, under Pepin, was called the Carlovingian. The crown descended generally from father to son for about two hundred years, when the last of the race was poisoned by his wife. This family has been rendered very illustrious, both by Pepin and by his son, the still more widely renowned Charle- magne. Hugh Capet then succeeded in grasping the sceptre, and for three hundred years the Capets held at bay the powerful chieftains who alter- nately assailed and defended the throne. Thir- teen hundred years after Christ, the last of the Capets was borne to his tomb, and the feudal lords gave the pre-eminence to Philip of Valois. For about two hundred years the house of Va- lois had reigned. At the period of which we treat in this history, luxury and vice had brought the family near to extinction. Charles IX., who now occupied the throne under the rigorous rule of his infamous mother, was feeble in body and still more feeble in mind. He had no child, and there was no probability that he would ever be blessed with an heir. His exhausted constitution indicated that a pre- mature death was his inevitable destiny. His 140 KING HENRY IV. [1592. Decay of the house of Valois. House of Guise. brother Henry, who had been elected King of Poland, would then succeed to the throne ; but he had still less of manly character than Charles. An early death was his unquestioned doom. At his death, if childless, the house of Valois would become extinct. Who then should grasp the rich prize of the sceptre of France? The house of Guise and the house of Bourbon were rivals for this honor, and were mustering their strength and arraying their forces for the anticipated con- flict. Each family could bring such vast influ- ences into the struggle that no one could imag- ine in whose favor victory would decide. Such was the condition of the house of Valois in France in the year 1592. 2. Let us now turn to the house of Guise. No tale of fiction can present a more fascinat- ing collection of romantic enterprises and of wild adventures than must be recorded by the truth- ful historian of the house of Guise. On the western banks of the Rhine, between that river and the Meuse, there was the dukedom of Lor- raine. It was a state of no inconsiderable wealth and power, extending over a territory of about ten thousand square miles, and containing a million and a half of inhabitants. Rene II., Duke of Lorraine, was a man of great renown, VALOIS GUISE BOURBON. 141 The dukedom of Lorraine. Claude of Lorraine. and in all the pride and pomp of feudal power he energetically governed his little realm. His body was scarred with the wounds he had re- ceived in innumerable battles, and he was ever ready to head his army of fifty thousand men, to punish any of the feudal lords around him who trespassed upon his rights. The wealthy old duke owned large posses- sions in Normandy, Picardy, and various other of the French provinces. He had a large fam- ily. His fifth son, Claude, was a proud-spirit- ed boy of sixteen. Rene sent this lad to France, and endowed him with all the fertile acres, and the castles, and the feudal rights which, in France, pertained to the noble house of Lor- raine. Young Claude of Lorraine was present- ed at the court of St. Cloud as the Count of Guise, a title derived from one of his domains. His illustrious rank, his manly beauty, his princely bearing, his energetic mind, and brill- iant talents, immediately gave him great promi- nence among the glittering throng of courtiers. Louis XII. was much delighted with the young count, and wished to attach the powerful and attractive stranger to his own house by an al- liance with his daughter. The heart of the proud boy was, however, captivated by another 142 KING HENRY IV. Marriage of the Count of Guise. Francis I. beauty who embellished the court of the mon- arch, and, turning from the princess royal, he sought the hand of Antoinette, an exceedingly beautiful maiden of about his own age, a daugh- ter of the house of Bourbon. The wedding of this young pair was celebrated with great mag- nificence in Paris, in the presence of the whole French court. Claude was then but sixteen years of age. A few days after this event the infirm old king espoused the young and beautiful sister of Henry VIII. of England. The Count of Guise was honored with the commission of proceeding to Boulogne with several princes of the blood to receive the royal bride. Louis soon died, and his son, Francis I., ascended the throne Claude was, by marriage, his cousin. He couk/ bring all the influence of the proud house o Bourbon and the powerful house of Lorraine m support of the king. His own energetic, fear- less, war-loving spirit invested him with great power in those barbarous days of violence anc blood. Francis received his young cousin intv. high favor. Claude was, indeed, a young ma*, of very rare accomplishments. His prowess irv the jousts and tournaments, then so common, and his grace and magnificence in the drawing- VALOIS GUISE BOURBON. 143 The suggestion and its results. room, rendered him an object of universal ad- miration. One night Claude accompanied Francis I. to the queen's circle. She had gathered around her the most brilliant beauty of her realm. In those days woman occupied a very inferior po- sition in society, and seldom made her appear- ance in the general assemblages of men. The gallant young count was fascinated with the amiability and charms of those distinguished la- dies, and suggested to the king the expediency of breaking over the restraints which long usage had imposed, and embellishing his court with the attractions of female society and conversa- tion. The king immediately adopted the wel- come suggestion, and decided that, throughout the whole realm, women should be freed from the unjust restraint to which they had so long been subject. Guise had already gained the good-will of the nobility and of the army, and he now became a universal favorite with the ladies, and was thus the most popular man in France. Francis I. was at this time making preparations for the invasion of Italy, and the Count of Guise, though but eighteen years of age, was appointed commander-in-chief of a di- vision of the army consisting of twenty thou- sand men. 144 KING HENRY IV. llravery of the duke. His prominence, In all the perils of the bloody battles which soon ensued, he displayed that utter reckless- ness of danger which had been the distinguish- ing trait of his ancestors. In the first battle, when discomfiture and flight were spreading: through his ranks, the proud count refused to> retire one step before his foes. He was sur- rounded, overmatched, his horse killed from un- der him, and he fell, covered with twenty-two- wounds, in the midst of the piles of mangled bodies which strewed the ground. He was aft- erward dragged from among the dead, insensi- ble and apparently lifeless, and conveyed to his tent, where his vigorous constitution, and that energetic vitality which seemed to characterize his race, triumphed over wounds whose severity rendered their cure almost miraculous. Francis I., in his report of the battle, extolled in the most glowing terms the prodigies of valor which Guise had displayed. War, desolating war, still ravaged wretched Europe, and Guise, with his untiring energy, became so prominent in the court and the camp that he was regarded rather as an ally of the King of France than a his subject. His enormous fortune, his ances- tral renown, the vast political and military in- fluences which were at his command, made him VALOIS GUISE BOURBON. 145 Days of war. The bloody rout. almost equal to the monarch whom he served. Francis lavished honors upon him, converted one of his counties into a dukedom, and, as duke of Guise, young Claude of Lorraine had now attained the highest position which a subject could occupy. Years of conflagration, carnage, and woe roll- ed over war-deluged Europe, during which all the energies of the human race seemed to be expended in destruction; and in almost every scene of smouldering cities, of ravaged valleys, of battle-fields rendered hideous with the shouts of onset and shrieks of despair, we see the ap- parition of the stalwart frame of Guise, scarred, and war-worn, and blackened with the smoke and dust of the fray, riding upon his proud charger, wherever peril was most imminent, as if his body were made of iron. At one time he drove before him, in most bloody rout, a numerous army of Germans. The fugitives, spreading over leagues of coun- try, fled by his own strong castle of Neufcha- teau. Antoinette and the ladies of her court stood upon the battlements of the castle, gazing upon the scene, to them so new and to them so pleasantly exciting. As they saw the charges of the cavalry trampling the dead and the dy- 1310 146 KING HENRY IV. Scene from the castle. Claude the Butcher. ing beneath their feet, as they witnessed all the horrors of that most horrible scene which earth can present a victorious army cutting to pieces its flying foes, with shouts of applause they an- imated the ardor of the victors. The once fair- faced boy had now become a veteran. His bronzed cheek and sinewy frame attested his life of hardship and toil. The nobles were jeal- ous of his power. The king was annoyed by his haughty bearing ; but he was the idol of the people. In one campaign he caused the death of forty thousand Protestants, for he was the devoted servant of mother Church. Claude the Rutcher was the not inappropriate name by which the Protestants designated him. His brother John attained the dignity of Cardinal of Lorraine. Claude with his keen sword, and John with pomp, and pride, and spiritual power, became the most relentless foes of the Refor- mation, and the most valiant defenders of the Catholic faith. The kind-heartedness of the wealthy but dis- solute cardinal, and the prodigality of his char- ity, rendered him almost as popular as his war- like brother. When he went abroad, his valet de chambre invariably prepared him a bag fill- ed with gold, from which he gave to the poor VALOIS GUISE BOURBON. 147 The Cardinal of Lorraine. The reprimand. most freely. His reputation for charity was so exalted that a poor blind mendicant, to whom he gave gold in the streets of Rome, overjoyed at the acquisition of such a treasure, exclaim- ed, " Surely thou art either Christ or the Car- dinal of Lorraine. " The Duke of Guise, in his advancing years, was accompanied to the field of battle by his son Francis, who inherited all of his father's courtly bearing, energy, talent, and headlong valor. At the siege of Luxemburg a musket ball shattered the ankle of young Francis, then Count of Aumale, and about eighteen years of age. As the surgeon was operating upon the splintered bones and quivering nerves, the suf- ferer gave some slight indication of his sense of pain. His iron father severely reprimanded him, saying, " Persons of your rank should not feel their wounds, but, on the contrary, should take pleas- ure in building up their reputation upon the ruin of their bodies." Others of the sons of Claude also signalized themselves in the wars which then desolated Europe, and they received wealth and honors. The king erected certain lands and lordships be- longing to the Duke of Guise into a marquisate, 148 KING HENRY IV. Duke of Mayence. The family of Guise. and then immediately elevated the marquisate into a duchy, and the youngest son of the Duke of Guise, inheriting the property, was ennobled with the title of the Duke of Mayence. Thus there were two rich dukedoms in the same family. Claude had six sons, all young men of impe- rious spirit and magnificent bearing. They were allied by marriage with the most illustri- ous families in France, several of them being connected with princes of the blood royal. The war-worn duke, covered with wounds which he deemed his most glorious ornaments, often ap- peared at court accompanied by his sons. They occupied the following posts of rank and power x : Francis, the eldest, Count of Aumale, was the heir of the titles and the estates of the noble house. Claude was Marquis of Mayence ; Charles was Archbishop of Rheims, the richest benefice in France, and he soon attained one of the highest dignities of the Church by the reception of a cardinal's hat ; Louis was Bishop of Troyes, and Francis, the youngest, Chevalier of Lor- raine and Duke of Mayence, was general of the galleys of France. One of the daughters was married to the King of Scotland, and the others had formed most illustrious connections. Thus 1550.] VALOIS GUISE BOURBON. 149 Henry the Eighth. Death of Claude. the house of Guise towered proudly and sublime- ly from among the noble families in the midst of whom it had so recently been implanted. Henry VIII. of England, inflamed by the re- port of the exceeding beauty of Mary, daughter of the Duke of Guise, had solicited her hand ; but Claude was unwilling to surrender his daughter to England's burly and brutal old ty- rant, and declined the regal alliance. The ex- asperated monarch, in revenge, declared war against France. Years of violence and blood lingered away. At last Claude, aged and in- firm, surrendered to that king of terrors before whom all must bow. In his strong castle of Joinville, on the twelfth of April, 1550, the il- lustrious, magnanimous, blood-stained duke, after a whole lifetime spent in slaughter, breath- ed his last. His children and his grandchil- dren were gathered around the bed of the dy- ing chieftain. In the darkness of that age, he felt that he had been contending, with divine ap- proval, for Christ and his Church. With pray- ers and thanksgivings, and language expressive of meekness and humility before God, he as- cended to that tribunal of final judgment where there is no difference between the peasant and the prince. 150 KING HENRY IV. Francis, Duke of Guise. The dreadful wound. The chivalrous and warlike Francis inherit- ed his father's titles, wealth, and power ; and now the house of Guise was so influential that the king trembled in view of its rivalry. It was but the kingly office alone which rendered the house of Valois superior to the house of Guise. In illustration of the character of those times, and the hardihood and sufferings through which the renown of these chieftains was ob- tained, the following anecdote may be narrated. Francis, Duke of Guise, in one of the skir- mishes with the English invaders, received a wound which is described as the most severe from which any one ever recovered. The lance of an English officer "entered above the right eye, declining toward the nose, and piercing through on the other side, between the nape and the ear." The weapon, having thus penetrated the head more than half a foot, was broken off by the violence of the blow, the lance-iron and two fingers' breadth of the staff remaining in the dreadful wound. The surgeons of the army, stupefied by the magnitude of the injury, de- clined to attempt the extraction of the splinter, saying that it would only expose him to dread- fill and unavailing suffering, as he must inevi- tably die. The king immediately sent his sur- VALOIS GUISE BOURBON. 151 Le Balafro. Interview with the king. geon, with orders to spare no possible efforts to save the life of the hero. The lance-head was broken off so short that it Was impossible to grasp it with the hand. The surgeon took the heavy pincers of a blacksmith, and asked the sufferer if he would allow him to make use of so rude an instrument, and would also permit him to place his foot upon his face. " You may do any thing you consider nec- essary," said the duke. The officers standing around looked on with horror as the king's surgeon, aided by an expe- rienced practitioner, tore out thus violently the barbed iron, fracturing the bones, and tearing nerves, veins, and arteries. The hardy soldier bore the anguish without the contraction of a muscle, and was only heard gently to exclaim to himself, "Oh my God!" The sufferer re- covered, and ever after regarded the frightful scar which was left as a signal badge of honor. He hence bore the common name of Le Bala- fre, or The Scarred. As the duke returned to court, the king hur- ried forth from his chamber to meet him, em- braced him warmly, and said, "It is fair that I should come out to meet my old friend, who, on his part, is ever so ready to meet my enemies." 152 KING HENRY IV. Jealousy of the king. Arrogance of the Guises. Gradually, however, Francis, the king, be- came very jealous of the boundless popularity and enormous power acquired by this ambitious house. Upon his dying bed he warned his son of the dangerous rivalry to which the Guises had attained, and enjoined it upon him to curb their ambition by admitting none of the princes of that house to a share in the government ; but as soon as King Francis was consigned to his tomb, Henry II., his son and successor, rallied the members of this family around him, and made the duke almost the partner of his throne. He needed the support of the strong arm and of the inexhaustible purse of the princes of Lor*- raine. The arrogance of the Guises, or the princes of Lorraine, as they were frequently called, in consequence of their descent from Claude of Lorraine, reached such a pitch that on the oc- casion of a proud pageant, when Henry II. was on a visit of inspection to one of his frontier fortresses, the Duke of Guise claimed equal rank with Henry of Navarre, who was not only King of Navarre, but, as the Duke of Vendome, was also first prince of the blood in France. An an- gry dispute immediately arose. The king set- tled it in favor of the audacious Guise, for he VALOIS GUISE BOURBON. 153 Power of the house of Guise. Appointment of Francis. was intimidated by the power of that arrogant house. He thus exasperated Henry of Navarre, and also nurtured the pride of a dangerous rival. All classes were now courting the Duke of Guise. The first nobles of the land sought his protection and support by flattering letters and costly presents. " From all quarters," says an ancient manuscript, "he received offerings of wine, fruit, confections, ortolans, horses, dogs, hawks, and gerfalcons. The letters accompa- nying these often contained a second paragraph petitioning for pensions or grants from the king, or for places, even down to that of apothecary or of barber to the Dauphin." The monarchs of foreign countries often wrote to him soliciting his aid. The duke, in the enjoyment of this immense wealth, influence, and power, assumed the splendors of royalty, and his court was hardly inferior to that of the monarch. The King of Poland and the Duke of Guise were ri- vals for the hand of Anne, the beautiful daugh- ter of the Duke of Ferrara, and Guise was the successful suitor. Francis of Lorraine was now appointed lieu- tenant general of the French armies, and the king addressed to all the provincial authorities special injunction to render as prompt and ab- 154 KING HENRY IV. [1560. Thralldora of Henry II. Mary, Queen of Scots. solute obedience to the orders of the Duke of Guise as if they emanated from himself. "And truly," says one of the writers of those times, "never had monarch in France been obeyed more punctually or with greater zeal." In fact. Guise was now the head of the government, and all the great interests of the nation were or- dered by his mind. Henry was a feeble prince, with neither vigor of body nor energy of intel- lect to resist the encroachments of so imperial a spirit. He gave many indications of uneasiness in view of his own thralldom, but he was en- tirely unable to dispense with the aid of his sa- gacious ally. It will be remembered that one of the daugh- ters of Claude, and a sister of Francis, the sec- ond duke of Guise, married the King of Scot- land. Her daughter, the niece of Francis, was the celebrated Mary, Queen of Scots. She had been sent to France for her education, and she was married, when very young, to her cousin Francis, son of Henry II. and of the infamous Catharine de Medici. He was heir of the French throne. This wedding was celebrated with the utmost magnificence, and the Guises moved on the occasion through the palaces of royalty with the pride of monarchs. Henry II. was acci- 1560.] VALOIS GUISE Bo UK BON. 155 l-'raucis II. Troubles between the Protestants and Catholics. dentally killed in a tournament ; and Francis, his son, under the title of Francis II., with his young and beautiful bride, the unfortunate Mary, Queen of Scots, ascended the throne. Francis was a feeble-minded," consumptive youth of 16, whose thoughts were all centred in his lovely wife. Mary, who was but fifteen years of age, was fascinating in the extreme, and entirely de- voted to pleasure. She gladly transferred all the power of the realm to her uncles, the Guises. About this time the conflict between the Cath- olics and the Protestants began to grow more violent. The Catholics drew the sword for the extirpation of heresy ; the Protestants grasped their arms to defend themselves. The Guises consecrated all their energies to the support of the Papal Church and to the suppression of the Reformation. The feeble boy, Francis II., sat languidly upon his throne but seventeen months, when he died, on the 5th of December, 1560, and his brother, Charles IX., equally enervated in mind and with far less moral worth, succeed- ed to the crown. The death of Francis II. was a heavy blow to the Guises. The Admiral Co- ligni, one of the most illustrious of the Protest- ants, and the bosom friend of Henry of Na- varre, was standing, with many other nobles, at 156 KING HENRY IV. Admiral C'oligni. Antoinette the bedside of the monarch as he breathed his last. " Gentlemen," said the admiral, with that gravity which- was in accordance with his char- acter and his religious principles, " the king is dead. It is a lesson to teach us all how to live.'' The Protestants could not but rejoice that the Guises had thus lost the peculiar influence which they had secured from their near rela- tionship to the queen. Admiral Coligni retired from the death-bed of the monarch to his own mansion, and, sitting down by the fire, became lost in the most profound reverie. He did not observe that his boots were burning until one of his friends called his attention to the fact. " Ah !" he replied, "not a week ago, you and I would each have given a leg to have things take this turn, and now we get off with a pair of boots." Antoinette, the widow of Claude of Lorraine, and the mother of Francis, the then Duke of Guise, was still living. She was so rancorous in her hostility to the Protestants that she was designated by them '''Mother of the tyrants and enemies of the Gospel" Greatly to her annoyance, a large number of Protestants con- ducted their worship in the little town of Vassy, VALOIS GUISE BOURBON. 157 Massacre by the Duke of Guise. just on the frontier of the domains of the Duke of Guise. She was incessantly imploring her son to drive off these obnoxious neighbors. The duke was at one time journeying with his wife. Their route lay through the town of Vassy. His suite consisted of two hundred and sixty men &t arms, all showing the warlike temper of their chief, and even far surpassing him in bigoted hatred of the Protestants. On arriving at Vassy, the duke entered the church to hear high mass. It is said that while engaged in this act of devotion his ears were an- noyed by the psalms of the Protestants, who were assembled in the vicinity. He sent an imperious message for the minister and the lead- ing members of the congregation immediately to appear before him. The young men fulfilled their mission in a manner so taunting and in- sulting that a quarrel ensued, shots were ex- changed, and immediately all the vassals of the duke, who were ripe for a fray, commenced an indiscriminate massacre. The Protestants val- iantly but unavailingly defended themselves with sticks and stones ; but the bullets of their enemies reached them everywhere, in the houses, on the roofs, in the streets. For an hour the car- nage continued unchecked, and sixty men and KING HENRY IV. The Butcher of Vassy. .Remonstrance to the queen. women were killed and two hundred wounded. One only of the men of the duke was killed. Francis was ashamed of this slaughter of the defenseless, and declared that it was a sudden outbreak, for which he was not responsible, and which he had done every thing in his power to check ; but ever after this he was called by the Protestants "The Butcher of Vassy" When the news of this massacre reached Par- is, Theodore de Beza was deputed by the Prot- estants to demand of Catharine, their regent, se- vere justice on the Duke of Guise ; but Cath- arine feared the princes of Lorraine, and said to Beza, " Whoever touches so much as the finger-tip of the Duke of Guise, touches me in the middle of my heart." Beza meekly but courageously replied, "It assuredly behooves that Church of God, in whose name I speak, to endure blows and not to strike them ; but may it please your majesty also to remember that it is an anvil which has worn out many hammers." At the siege of Eouen the Duke of Guise was informed that an assassin had been arrested who had entered the camp with the intention of tak- ing his life. He ordered the man to be brought before him, and calmly inquired, VALOIS GUISE BOUEBON. 159 Magnanimity of the Duke of Guise. Religious \vaiv. " Have you not come hither to kill me?" The intrepid but misguided young man open- ly avowed his intention. "And what motive," inquired the duke, " im- pelled you to such a deed ? Have I done you any wrong?" " No," he replied ; "but in removing you from the world I should promote the best interests of the Protestant religion, which I profess." "My religion, then, " generously replied the duke, "is better than yours, for it commands me to pardon, of my own accord, you who are convicted of guilt." And, by his orders, the as- sassin was safely conducted out of camp. "A fine exam pie, "exclaims his historian, "of truly religious sentiments and magnanimous prosely tism very natural to the Duke of Guise, the most moderate and humane of the chiefs of the Catholic army, and whose brilliant generos- ity had been but temporarily obscured by the occurrence at Vassy." The war between the Catholics and Protest- ants was now raging with implacable fury, arid Guise, victorious in many battles, had acquired from the Catholic party the name of " Savior of his Country." The duke was now upon the very loftiest summits of power which a subject 160 KING HENRY IV. Assassination of the Duke of Guise. can attain. In great exaltation of spirits, he one morning left the army over which he was commander-in-chief to visit the duchess, who had come to meet him at the neighboring castle of Corney. The duke very imprudently took with him merely one general officer and a page. It was a beautiful morning in February. As he crossed, in a boat, the mirrored surface of the Loiret, the vegetation of returning spring and the songs of the rejoicing birds strikingly con- trasted with the blood, desolation, and misery with which the hateful spirit of war was deso- lating France. The duke was silent, apparent- ly lost in painful reveries. His companions disturbed not his thoughts. Having crossed the stream, he was slowly walking his horse, with the reins hanging listlessly upon his mane, when a pistol was discharged at him from be- hind a hedge, at a distance of but six or seven paces. Two bullets pierced his side. On feel- ing himself wounded, he calmly said, " They have long had this shot in reserve for me. I deserve it for my want of precaution/ He immediately fell upon his horse's neck, and was caught in the arms of his friends. They conveyed him to the castle, where the duchess received him with cries of anguish. ILe 1311 1563.J VALOIS GUISE BOURBON. 163 Death of the duke. Jean Poltrot. embraced her tenderly, minutely described the circumstances of his assassination, and express- ed himself grieved in view of the stain which such a crime would inflict upon the honor of France. He exhorted his wife to bow in sub- mission to the will of Heaven, and kissing his son Henry, the Duke of Joinville, who was weeping by his side, gently said to him, "God grant thee grace, my son, to be a good man." Thus died Francis, the second Duke of Guise, on the twenty-fourth of February, 1563. His murderer was a young Protestant noble, Jean Poltrot, twenty-four years of age. Poltrot, from being an ardent Catholic, had embraced the Prot- estant faith. This exposed him to persecution, and he was driven from France with the loss of his estates. He was compelled to support him- self by manual labor. Soured in disposition, exasperated and half maddened, he insanely felt that he would be doing God service by the as- sassination of the Butcher of Vassy, the most formidable foe of the Protestant religion. It was a day of general darkness, and of the con- fusion of all correct ideas of morals. Henry, the eldest son of the Duke of Guise, a lad of but thirteen years of age, noAV inherited 164 KING HENRY IV. Anecdote. Prediction of Francis. the titles and the renown which his bold ances- tors had accumulated. This was the Duke of Guise who was the bandit chieftain in the Mas- sacre of St. Bartholomew. One day Henry II. was holding his little daughter Marguerite, who afterward became the wife of Henry of Navarre, in his lap, when Hen- ry of Guise, then Prince of Joinville, and the Marquis of Beaupreau, were playing together upon the floor, the one being but seven years of age, and the other but nine. " Which of the two do you like the best ?" inquired the king of his child. "I prefer the marquis," she promptly replied. " Yes; but the Prince of Joinville is the hand- somest," the king rejoined. " Oh," retorted Marguerite, " he is always in mischief, and he will be master every where." Francis, the Duke of Guise, had fully appre- hended the ambitious, impetuous, and reckless character of his son. He is said to have pre- dicted that Henry, intoxicated by popularity, would perisli in the attempt to seat himself upon the throne of France. " Henry," says a writer of those times, " sur- passed all the princes of his house in certain natural gifts, in certain talents, which procured VALOIS GUISE BOURBON. 165 Enthusiasm of the populace. The house of Bourbon. him the respect of the court, the affection of the people, but which, nevertheless, were tarnished by a singular alloy of great faults and unlimit- ed ambition." " France was mad about that man," writes another, " for it is too little to say that she was in love with him. Her passion approached idol- atry. There were persons who invoked him in their prayers. His portrait was every where. Some ran after him in the streets to touch his mantle with their rosaries. One day that he entered Paris on his return from a journey, the multitude not only cried ' Vive Guise /' but many sang, on his passage, ' Hosanna to the son of David f" 3. The House of Bourbon. The origin of this family fades away in the remoteness of an- tiquity. Some bold chieftain, far remote in bar- barian ages, emerged from obscurity and laid the foundations of the illustrious house. Gen- eration after generation passed away, as the son succeeded the father in baronial pomp, and pride, and power, till the light of history, with its steadily-increasing brilliancy, illumined Eu- rope. The family had often been connected in marriage both with the house of Guise and the royal line, the house of Valois. Antony of Bour- 166 KING HENKY IV. The houses united. bon, a sturdy soldier, united the houses of Bour- bon and Navarre by marrying Jeanne d'Albret, the only child of the King of Navarre. Henry came from the union, an only son ; and lie, by marrying Marguerite, the daughter of the King of France, united the houses of Bourbon, Na- varre, and Valois, and became heir to the throne of France should the sons of Henry II. die with- out issue. This episode in reference to the condition of France at the time of which we write seems nec- essary to enable the reader fully to understand the succeeding chapters. DEATH OF CHAELES IX. 167 Henry, King of Poland. CHAPTER VII. THE DEATH OF CHARLES IX. AND THE ACCESSION OF HENRY III. AFTER the Massacre of St. Bartholomew, a large number of the Protestants threw themselves into the city of Rochelle. For sev- en months they were besieged by all the power which the King of France could bring against them. They were at length, weakened by sick- ness and exhausted by famine, compelled to sur- render. By their valiant resistance, however, they obtained highly honorable terms, securing for the inhabitants of Rochelle the free exercise of their religion within the walls of the city, and a general act of amnesty for all the Prot- estants in the realm. Immediately after this event, Henry, the broth- er of Charles IX., was elected King of Poland, an honor which he attained in consequence of the military prowess he had displayed in the wars against the Protestants of France. Ac- companied by his mother, Catharine de Medici, the young monarch set out for his distant do- 168 KING HENRY IV. Henry's journey through Germany. minions. Henry had been a very active agent in the Massacre of St. Bartholomew. At Lor- raine Catharine took leave of him, and he went on his way in a very melancholy mood. His election had been secured by the greatest efforts of intrigue and bribery on the part of his moth- er. The melancholy countenances of the Prot- estants, driven into exile, and bewailing the mur- der of friends and relatives, whose assassination he had caused, met him at every turn. His re- ception at the German courts was cold and re- pulsive. In the palace of the Elector Palatine, Henry beheld the portrait of Coligni, who had been so treacherously slaughtered in the Massa- cre of St. Bartholomew. The portrait was sus- pended in a very conspicuous place of honor, and beneath it were inscribed the words, "SUCH WAS THE FORMER COUNTENANCE OF THE HERO COLIGNI, WHO HAS BEEN RENDERED TRULY ILLUSTRIOUS BOTH BY HIS LIFE AND HIS DEATH." The Protestant Elector pointed out the pic- ture to the young king, whom he both hated and despised, and coolly asked him if he knew the man. Henry, not a little embarrassed, re- plied that he did. "He was," rejoined the German prince, "the most honest man, and the wisest and the great- DEATH OF CHARLES IX. 169 Enmity between the two brothers. est captain of Europe, whose children I keep with me, lest the dogs of France should tear them as their father has been torn." Thus Henry, gloomy through the repulses which he was ever encountering, journeyed along to Poland, where he was crowned king, notwithstanding energetic remonstrances on the part of those who execrated him for his deeds. The two brothers, Charles IX. and Henry, were bitter enemies, and Charles had declared, with many oaths, that one of the two should leave the realm. Henry was the favorite of Catha-. rine, and hence she made such efforts to secure his safety by placing him upon the throne of Poland. She was aware that the feeble Charles would not live long, and when, with tears, she took leave of Henry, she assured him that he would soon return. The outcry of indignation which the Massa- cre of St. Bartholomew called forth from com- bined Europe fell like the knell of death on the ear of the depraved arid cowardly Charles. Dis- ease began to ravage, with new violence, his ex- hausted frame. He became silent, morose, ir- ritable, and gloomy. He secluded himself from all society, and surrendered himself to the do- minion of remorse. He was detested by the 170 KING HENRY IV. Sickness of Charles IX. Protestants, and utterly despised by the Cath- olics. A bloody sweat, oozing from every pore, crimsoned his bed-clothes. His occasional out- cries of remorse and his aspect of misery drove all from his chamber excepting those who were compelled to render him service. He groaned and wept incessantly, exclaiming, " Oh, what blood ! oh, what murders ! Alas ! why did I follow such evil counsels ?" He saw continually the spectres of the slain, with ghastly, gory wounds, stalking about his bed ; and demons of hideous aspect, and with weapons of torture in their hands, with horrid and derisive malice, were impatiently waiting to seize his soul the moment it should pass from the decaying body. The day before his death he .lay for some time up6n his bed in perfect silence. Sudden- ly starting up, he exclaimed, "Call my brother.'' His mother, who was sitting by his side, di- rected an attendant to call his brother Francis, the Duke of Alen9on. "No, not him," the king replied ; "my broth- er, the King of Navarre, I mean." Henry of Navarre was then detained in princely imprisonment in the court of Catha- DEATH OF CHAKLES IX. 171 Remorse of the king. rine. He had made many efforts to escape, but all had been unavailing. Catharine directed that Henry should be call- ed. In order to intimidate him, and thus to prevent him from speaking with freedom and boldness to her dying son, she ordered him to be brought through the vaults of the castle, be- tween a double line of armed guards. Henry, as he descended into those gloomy dungeons, and saw the glittering arms of the soldiers, felt that the hour for his assassination had arrived. He, however, passed safely through, and Was ushered into the chamber of his brother-in-law and former playfellow, the dying king. Charles IX., subdued by remorse and appalled by ap- proaching death, received him with gentleness and affection, and weeping profusely, embraced him as he knelt by his bedside. "My brother," said the dying king, "you lose a good master and a good friend. I know that you are not the cause of the troubles which have come upon me. If I had believed all which has been told me, you would not now have been living ; but I have always loved you." Then turning his eyes to the queen mother, he said energetically, " Do not trust to Here Catharine hastily interrupted him, and prevent- 172 KING HENRY IV. Death of Charles IX. Chateaubriand. ed the finishing of the sentence with the words " my 'mother.' 1 '' Charles designated his brother Henry, the King of Poland, as his successor. He express- ed the earnest wish that neither his younger brother, Francis, the Duke of Alencon, nor Hen- ry, would disturb the repose of the realm. The next night, as the Cathedral clock was tolling the hour of twelve, the nurse, who was sitting, with two watchers, at the bedside of the dying monarch, heard him sighing and moaning, and then convulsively weeping. Gently she ap- proached the bed and drew aside the curtains. Charles turned his dimmed and despairing eye upon her, and exclaimed, " Oh, my nurse ! my nurse ! what blood have I shed! what murders have I committed! Great God! pardon me pardon me!" A convulsive shuddering for a moment agi- tated his frame, his head fell back upon his pillow, and the wretched man was dead. He died at twenty-four years of age, expressing satisfaction that he left no heir to live and to suffer in a world so full of misery. In reference to this guilty king, Chateaubriand says, " Should we not have some pity for this mon- arch of twenty-three years, born with fine tal- DEATH OF CHARLES IX. 173 Character of the king. Henry III. ents, a taste for literature and the arts, a char- acter naturally generous, whom an execrable mother had tried to deprave by all the abuses of debauchery and power ?" "Yes," warmly responds G. de Felice, "we will have compassion for him, with the Hugue- nots themselves, whose fathers he ordered to be slain, and who, with a merciful hand, would wipe away the blood which covers his face to find still something human." Henry, his brother, who was to succeed him upon the throne, was then in Poland. Catha- rine was glad to have the pusillanimous Charles out of the way. He was sufficiently depraved to commit any crime, without being sufficiently resolute to brave its penalty. Henry III. had, in early life, displayed great vigor of character. At the age of fifteen he had been placed in the command of armies, and in several combats had defeated the veteran generals of the Protestant forces. His renown had extended through Eu- rope, and had contributed much in placing him on the elective throne of Poland. Catharine, by the will of the king, was appointed regent until the return of Henry. She immediately dispatched messengers to recall the King of Po- land. In the mean time, she kept Henry of Na- 174 KING HENRY IV. The stratagem. Flight from the crowi. varre and her youngest son, the Duke ot Aleri- con, in close captivity, and watched them with the greatest vigilance, that they might make no movements toward the throne. Henry was by this time utterly weary of his Polish crown, and sighed for the voluptuous pleasures of Paris. The Poles were not willing that their king should leave the realm, as it might lead to civil war in the choice of a suc- cessor. Henry was compelled to resort to strat- agem to effect his escape. A large and splen- did party was invited to the palace. A wil- derness of rooms, brilliantly illuminated, Avere thrown open to the guests. Masked dancers walked the floor in every variety of costume. Wine and wassail filled the halls with revelry. When all were absorbed in music and mirth, the king, by a private passage, stole from the palace, and mounting a swift horse, which was awaiting him in the court-yard, accompanied by two or three friends, commenced his flight from his crown and his Polish throne. Through the long hours of the night they pressed their horses to their utmost speed, and when the morning dawned, obtaining fresh steeds, they hurried on their way, tarrying not for refreshment or repose until they had passed the frontiers of the king- DEATH OF CHARLES IX. 175 The sojourn in Italy. The three Henrys. dom. Henry was afraid to take the direct route through the Protestant states of Germany, for the Massacre of St. Bartholomew was still bit- terly remembered. He therefore took a circui- tous route through Italy, and arrived at Venice in August. In sunny Italy he lingered for some time, surrendering himself to every ener- vating indulgence, and even bartering the for- tresses of France to purchase the luxuries in the midst of which he was reveling. At last, sated with guilty pleasure, he languidly turned his steps toward Paris. There were now three Henrys, who had been companions in childhood, who were at the head of the three rival houses of Valois, of Bourbon, and of Guise. One of these was King of France. One was King of Navarre. But Henry of Guise was, in wealth and in the attachment of the Catholic population of France, superior to ei- ther. The war which ensued is sometimes call- ed The War of the three Henrys. As soon as his mother learned that he was approaching France, she set out from Paris with a magnificent retinue to meet her pet child, tak- ing with her his brother, the Duke of Alen9on, and Henry of Navarre. Dissipation had im- paired the mental as well as the physical ener- 176 KING HENRY IV. Marriage of Henry III. The Duke of Alenfon. gies of the king, and a maudlin good-nature had absorbed all his faculties. He greeted his broth- er and his brother-in-law with much kindness, and upon receiving their oaths of obedience, withdrew much of the restraint to which they previously had been subjected. Henry was now known as Henry III. of France. Soon after his coronation he married Louisa of Lor- raine, a daughter of one of the sons of the Duke of Guise. She was a pure-minded and lovely woman, and her mild and gentle virtues con- trasted strongly with the vulgarity, coarseness, and vice of her degraded husband. The Duke of Alenpon was, however, by no means appeased by the kindness with which he had been received by his brother the king. He called him the robber of his crown, and formed a conspiracy for attacking the carriage of his brother and putting him to death. The plot was revealed to the king. He called his brother to his presence, reproached him with his perfi- dy and ingratitude, but generously forgave him. But the heart of Alen9on was impervious to any appeals of generosity or of honor. Upon the death of Henry III., the Duke of Alencon, his only surviving brother, would ascend the throne. The Duke of Guise hated with implacable DEATH OF CHARLES IX. 177 Suspicions of poison. Invectives of the king. rancor the Duke of Alencon, and even proffered his aid to place Henry of Navarre upon the throne in the event of the death of the king, that he might thus exclude his detested rival. Francis, the Duke of Alencon, was impatient to reach the crown, and again formed a plot to poi- son his brother. The king was suddenly taken very ill. He declared his brother had poisoned him. As each succeeding day his illness grew more severe, and the probabilities became stron- ger of its fatal termination, Francis assumed an air of haughtiness and of authority, as if confi- dent that the crown was already his own. The open exultation which he manifested in view of the apparently dying condition of his brother Henry confirmed all in the suspicion that he had caused poison to be administered. Henry III., believing his death inevitable, called Henry of Navarre to his bedside, and heaping the bitterest invectives upon his broth- er Francis, urged Henry of Navarre to procure his assassination, and thus secure for himself the vacant throne. Henry of Navarre was the next heir to the throne after the Duke of Alen- 9on, and the dying king most earnestly urged Henry to put the duke to death, showing him the ease with which it could be done, and assur- 1312 178 KING HENRY IV. Recovery of the king. Disappointment of Francis. ing him that he would be abundantly supported by all the leading nobles of the kingdom. While this scene was taking place at the sick-bed of the monarch, Francis passed through the chamber of his brother without deigning to notice either him or the King of Navarre. Strongly as Hen- ry of Navarre was desirous of securing for him- self the throne of France, he was utterly incapa- ble of meditating even upon such a crime, and he refused to give it a second thought. To the surprise of all, the king recovered, and Francis made no efforts to conceal his disap- pointment. There were thousands of armed in- surgents ready at any moment to rally around the banner of the Duke of Aler^on, for they would thus be brought into positions of emolu- ment and power. The king, who was ready himself to act the assassin, treated his assassin- brother with the most profound contempt. No description can convey an adequate idea of the state of France at this time. Universal anar- chy prevailed. Civil war, exasperated by the utmost rancor, was raging in nearly all the prov- inces. Assassinations were continually occur- ring. Female virtue was almost unknown, and the most shameful licentiousness filled the cap- ital. The treasury was so utterly exhausted DEATH OF CHARLES IX. Fanaticism of the king. Escape of the Duke of Alonfon. that, in a journey made by the king and his reti- nue in mid-winter, the pages were obliged to sell their cloaks to obtain a bare subsistence. The king, steeped in pollution, a fanatic and a hypo- crite, exhibited himself to his subjects bare- headed, barefooted, and half naked, scourging himself with a whip, reciting his prayers, and preparing the way, by the most ostentatious penances, to plunge anew into every degrading sensual indulgence. He was thoroughly de- spised by his subjects, and many were anxious to exchange him for the reckless and impetu- ous, but equally depraved Francis. The situation of the Duke of Alei^on was now not only very uncomfortable, but exceed- ingly perilous. The king did every thing in his power to expose him to humiliations, and was evidently watching for an opportunity to put him to death, either by the dagger or by a cup of poison. The duke, aided by his profligate sister Marguerite, wife of Henry of Navarre, formed a plan for escape. One dark evening he wrapped himself in a large cloak, and issued forth alone from the Lou- vre. Passing through obscure streets, he ar- rived at the suburbs of the city, where a car- riage with trusty attendants was in waiting. 180 KING HENRY IV. The king aroused. War of the public good. Driving as rapidly as possible, he gained the open country, and then mounting a very fleet charger, which by previous appointment was pro- vided for him, he spurred his horse at the ut- most speed for many leagues, till lie met an es- cort of three hundred men, with whom he took refuge in a fortified town. His escape was not known in the palace until nine o'clock the next morning. Henry was exceedingly agitated when he received the tidings, for he knew that his en- ergetic and reckless brother would join the Prot- estant party, carrying with him powerful influ- ence, and thus add immeasurably to the distrac- tions which now crowded upon the king. For once, imminent peril roused Henry III. to vigorous action. He forgot his spaniels, his parrots, his monkeys, and even his painted con- cubines, arid roused himself to circumvent the plans of his hated rival. Letter after letter was sent to all the provinces, informing the govern- ors of the flight of the prince, and commanding the most vigorous efforts to secure his arrest. Francis issued a proclamation declaring the rea- sons for his escape, and calling upon the Prot- estants and all who loved the " public good" tc rally around him. Hence the short but merci- less war which ensued was called " the war of tiie public good." DEATH OF CHARLES IX. 181 Defeat of Guise. Perplexity of Catharine. The Duke of Alencon was now at the head of a powerful party, for he had thrown himself into the arms of the Protestants, and many of his Catholic partisans followed him. Henry III. called to his aid the fearless and energetic Duke of Guise, and gave him the command of his armies. In the first terrible conflict which ensued Guise was defeated, and received a hid- eous gash upon his face, which left a scar of which he was very proud as a signet of valor. Catharine was now in deep trouble. Her two .sons were in open arms against each other, head- ing powerful forces, and sweeping France with whirlwinds of destruction. Henry of Navarre was still detained a prisoner in the French court, though surrounded by all the luxuries and in> dulgences of the capital. The dignity of his character, and his great popularity, alarmed Catharine, lest, in the turmoil of the times, he should thrust both of her sons from the throne, and grasp the crown himself. Henry and his friends all became fully convinced that Catha- rine entertained designs upon his life. Margue- rite was fully satisfied that it was so, and, bad as she was, as Henry interfered not in the slight- est degree with any of her practices, she felt a certain kind of regard for him. The guards 182 KING HEXRY IV. The guard of honor. 1'lan of escape. who had been assigned to Henry professedly as a mark of honor, and to add to the splendor of his establishment, were in reality his jailers, who watched him with an eagle eye. They were all zealous Papists, and most of them, in the Massacre of St. Bartholomew, had dipped their hands deep in Protestant blood. Catha- rine watched him with unceasing vigilance, and crowded every temptation upon him which could enervate and ruin. Her depravity did but stim- ulate her woman's shrewdness and tact. Henry of Navarre sighed for liberty. He was, however, so closely guarded that escape seemed impossible. At last the following plan was formed for flight. A hunting-party was got up. Henry was to invite persons to attend the chase in whose fidelity he could repose confidence, while one only was to be intrusted with the secret. Others of his friends were secretly to resort to an appointed rendezvous with fresh horses, and all well armed and in sufficient num- bers to overpower the guard placed about his person. Henry was to press on in the chase with the utmost eagerness until the horses of the guard were completely exhausted, when his friends with the fresh steeds were to appear, rescue him from the guards, and accompany him DEATH OF CHARLES IX. 183 Successful artifice. The false rumor. in his flight. The guards, being drawn far from the palace, could not speedily obtain fresh horses, neither could they pursue him with their jaded animals. The Duke of Guise was now in great favor with Henry III. Henry of Navarre, during the few days in which he was making preparation for his flight, blinded the eagle eyes of the duke by affecting great confidence that he should ob- tain from the king the high office of Lieutenant General of France. The duke and Henry III. made themselves very merry over this supposed simplicity of Henry of Navarre, little aware that he was making himself equally merry at their expense. Two days before the execution of the scheme r a rumor spread through the court that Henry had escaped. For a short time great anxiety and confusion ensued. Henry, being informed of the report and of the agitation which filled the palace, hastened to the apartments where Catharine and the king were in deliberation, and laughingly told them that he had arrested the King of Navarre, and that he now surrendered him to them for safe keeping. In the morning of the day fixed for his flight, the King of Navarre held a long and familiar 184 KING HENRY IV. Escape accomplished. Trouble of the Duke of Alencon. conversation with the Duke of Guise, and urged him to accompany him to the hunt. Just as the moment arrived for the execution of the plot, it was betrayed to the king by the treach- ery of a confederate. Notwithstanding this be- trayal, however, matters were so thoroughly ar- ranged that Henry, after several hair-breadth escapes from arrest, accomplished his flight. His apprehension was so great that for sixty miles he rode as rapidly as possible, without speaking a word or stopping for one moment except to mount a fresh horse. He rode over a hundred miles on horseback that day, and took refuge in Alenon, a fortified city held by the Protestants. As soon as his escape was known, thousands of his friends flocked around him. The Duke of Alen9on was not a little troub- led at the escape of the King of Navarre, for he was well aware that the authority he had ac- quired among the Protestants would be lost by the presence of one so much his superior in ev- ery respect, and so much more entitled to the confidence of the Protestants. Thus the two princes remained separate, but ready, in case of emergence, to unite their forces, which now amounted to fifty thousand men. Henry of Navarre soon established his head-quarters on DEATH OF CHARLES IX. 185 Terms of settlement. Paix de Monsieur. the banks of the Loire, where every day fresh parties of Protestants were joining his standard. Henry III., with no energy of character, de- spised by his subjects, and without either money or armies, seemed to be now entirely at the mer- cy of the confederate princes. Henry of Na- varre and the Duke of Alencon sent an embas- sador to the French court to propose terms to Henry III. The King of Navarre required, among other conditions, that France should unite with him in recovering from Spain that portion of the territory of Navarre which had been wrest- ed from his ancestors by Ferdinand and Isabel- la. While the proposed conditions of peace were under discussion, Catharine succeeded in bribing her son, the Duke of Alen9on, to aban- don the cause of Henry of Navarre. A treaty of peace was then concluded with the Protest- ants ; and by a royal edict, the full and free ex- ercise of the Protestant religion was guaranteed in every part of France except Paris and a cir- cle twelve miles in diameter around the capital. As a bribe to the Duke of Alen9on, he was in- vested with sovereign power over the three most important provinces of the realm, with an an- nual income of one hundred thousand crowns. This celebrated treaty, called the Paix de Mon- 186 KING HENRY IV. [1576. Duke of Anjou. Arrival at Bochello. sieur, because concluded under the auspices of Francis, the brother of the king, was signed at Chastenoy the sixth of May, 1576. The ambitious and perfidious duke now as- sumed the title of the Duke of Anjou, and en- tirely separated himself from the Protestants. He tried to lure the Prince of Conde, the cousin and devoted friend of Henry of Navarre, to ac- company him into the town of Bourges. The prince, suspecting treachery, refused the invita- tion, saying that some rogue would probably be found in the city who would send a bullet through his head. " The rogue would be hanged, I know," he added, "but the Prince of Conde would be dead. I will not give you occasion, my lord, to hang rogues for love of me." He accordingly took his leave of the Duke of Alen9on, and, putting spurs to his horse, with fifty followers joined the King of Navarre. Henry was received with royal honors in the Protestant town of Rochelle, where he publicly renounced the Roman Catholic faith, declaring that he had assented to that faith from compul- sion, and as the only means of saving his life. He also publicly performed penance for the sin which he declared that he had thus been com' Belled to commit. DEATH OF CHARLES IX. 187 Conduct of Catharine and Henry III. Catharine and Henry III., having detached Francis, who had been the Duke of Alen9on, but who was now the Duke of Anjou,frorn the Prot- estants, no longer feigned any friendship or even toleration for that cause. They acted upon the principle that no faith was to be kept with her- etics. The Protestants, notwithstanding the treaty, were exposed to every species of insult and injury. The Catholics were determined that the Protestant religion should not be tol- erated in France, and that all who did not con- form to the Church of Rome should either per- ish or be driven from the kingdom. Many of the Protestants were men of devoted piety, who cherished their religious convictions more tena- ciously than life. There were others, however, who joined them merely from motives of polit- ical ambition. Though the Protestant party, in France itself, was comparatively small, the great mass of the population being Catholics, yet the party was extremely influential from the intelligence and the rank of its leaders, and from the unconquerable energy with which all of its members were animated. The weak and irresolute king was ever vacil- lating between the two parties. The Duke of Guise was the great idol of the Catholics. Hen- 188 KING HENRY IV. Complexity of politics. Francis and Queen Elizabeth. ry of Navarre was the acknowledged leader of the Protestants. The king feared them both. It was very apparent that Henry III. could not live long. At his death his brother Fran- cis, Duke of Anjou, would ascend the throne. Should he die childless, Henry of Navarre would be his lawful successor. But the Catholics would be horror-stricken at the idea of seeing a heretic on the throne. The Duke of Guise was laying his plans deep and broad to array all the Catholic population of France in his own favor, and thus to rob the Protestant prince of his rights. Henry III., Henry of Navarre, Henry, Duke of Guise, and Francis, Duke of Anjou, had all been playmates in childhood and class- mates at school. They were now heading ar- mies, and struggling for the prize of the richest crown in Europe. Francis was weary of waiting for his brother to die. To strengthen himself, he sought in marriage the hand of Queen Elizabeth of En- gland. Though she had no disposition to re- ceive a husband, she was ever very happy to be surrounded by lovers. She consequently play- ed the coquette with Francis until he saw that there was no probability of the successful term- ination of his suit. Francis returned to Paris DEATH OF CHARLES IX. 189 New assaults on the Protestants. bitterly disappointed, and with new zeal conse- crated his sword to the cause of the Catholics. Had Elizabeth accepted his suit, he would then most earnestly have espoused the cause of the Protestants. Henry III. now determined to make a vigor- ous effort to crush the Protestant religion. He raised large armies, and gave the commanjl to the Duke of Anjou, the Duke of Guise, and to the brother of the Duke of Guise, the Duke of Mayenne. Henry of Navarre, encountering fear- ful odds, was welcomed by acclamation to head the small but indomitable band of Protestants, now struggling, not for liberty only, but for life. The king was very anxious to get Henry of Navarre again in his power, and sent most flat- tering messages and most pressing invitations to lure him again to his court ; but years of captivity had taught a lesson of caution not soon to be forgotten. Again hideous war ravaged France. The Duke of Anjou, exasperated by disappointed love, disgraced himself by the most atrocious cruelties. He burned the dwellings of the Prot- estants, surrendered unarmed and defenseless men, and women, and children to massacre. The Duke of Guise, who had inflicted such an 190 KING HENKV IV. Anecdote of the Protestants. ineffaceable stain upon his reputation by the foul murder of the Admiral Coligni, made some atonement for this shameful act by the chival- rous spirit with which he endeavored to miti- gate the horrors of civil war. One day, in the vicinity of Bayonne, a party of Catholics, consisting of a few hundred horse and foot, were conducting to their execution three Protestant young ladies, who, for their faith, were infamously condemned to death. As they were passing over a wide plain, covered with broken woods and heath, they were en- countered by a body of Protestants. A desper- ate battle immediately ensued. The Protest- ants, impelled by a noble chivalry as well as by religious fervor, rushed upon their foes with such impetuosity that resistance was unavailing, and the Catholics threw down their arms and im- plored quarter. Many of these soldiers were from the city of Dux. The leader of the Prot- estant band remembered that at the Massacre of St. Bartholomew all the Protestants in that city had been slain without mercy. With a most deplorable want of magnanimity, he caused all the prisoners who belonged to that place to be separated from the rest, and in cold blood they were slaughtered. DEATH OF CHARLES IX. 191 Gratitude of the citizens of Bayonne. The remainder of the prisoners were from the city of Bayonne, whose inhabitants, though Catholics, had nobly refused to imbrue their hands in the blood of that horrible massacre which Charles IX. had enjoined. To them, after they had seen their comrades surrendered to butchery before their eyes, he restored their horses and their arms, and gave them their en- tire liberty. "Go," said he, "to your homes, and there tell the different treatment which I show to sol- diers and to assassins." The three ladies, thus rescued from impend- ing death, were borne back in triumph to their friends. Eight days after this, a trumpet was sounded and a flag of truce appeared emerging from the gates of Bayonne. The friends of the Catholic soldiers who had been thus generously restored sent a beautifully embroidered scarf and a handkerchief to each one of the Protest ant soldiers. It is a singular illustration of the blending of the horrors of war and the courtesies of peace, that in the midst of this sanguinary conflict, Henry of Navarre, accompanied by only six com- panions, accepted an invitation to a fete given by his enemies of the town of Bayonne. He 192 KING HENRY IV. [1577. Anecilote of Henry of Navarre. Another peace. was received with the utmost courtesy. His table was loaded with luxuries. Voluptuous music floated upon the ear; songs and dances animated the festive hours. Henry then return- ed to head his army and to meet his entertain- ers in the carnage of the field of battle. There was but little repose in France during the year 1577. Skirmish succeeded skirmish, and battle was followed by battle ; cities were bombarded, villages burned, fields ravaged. All the pursuits of industry were arrested. Ruin,, beggary, and woe desolated thousands of once happy homes. Still the Protestants were un- subdued. The king's resources at length were entirely exhausted, and he was compelled again to conclude a treaty of peace. Both parties im- mediately disbanded their forces, and the bless- ings of repose followed the discords of war. One of the Protestant generals, immediately upon receiving the tidings of peace, set out at the utmost speed of his horse to convey the in- telligence to Languedoc, where very numerous forces of Protestants and Catholics were prepar- ing for conflict. He spurred his steed over hills and plains till he saw, gleaming in the rays of the morning sun, the banners of the embattled hosts arrayed against each other on a vast plain. DEATH OF CHARLES IX, 193 The battle arrested. Pledge of peace. The drums and the trumpets were just beginning to sound the dreadful charge which in a few moments would strew that plain with mangled limbs und crimson it with blood. Tae artillery on the adjoining eminences was beginning to utter its voice of thunder, as balls, more destruct- ive than the fabled bolts of Jove, were thrown into the massive columns marching to the dread- ful onset. A few moments later, and the cry, the uproar, and the confusion of the battle would blind every eye and deafen every ear. La Noue* almost frantic with the desire to stop the need- less effusion of blood, at the imminent risk of being shot, galloped between the antagonistic ar- mies, waving energetically the white banner of peace, and succeeded in arresting the battle. His generous effort saved the lives of thousands. Henry III. was required, as a pledge of his sincerity, to place in the hands of the Protest- ants eight fortified cities. The Reformers were permitted to conduct public worship unmolested in those places only where it was practiced at the time .of signing the treaty. In other parts of Frarice they were allowed to retain their be- lief without persecution, but they were not per- mitted to meet in any worshiping assemblies. But even these pledges, confirmed by the Edict 1313 194 KING HENRY IV. [1597. .Morality in France. Disgraceful fete. of Poitiers on the 8th of October, 1597, were speedily broken, like all the rest. But in the midst of all these conflicts, while every province in France was convulsed with civil war, the king, reckless of the woes of his subjects, rioted in all voluptuous dissipation. He was accustomed to exhibit himself to his court in those effeminate pageants in which he found his only joy, dressed in the flaunting robes of a gay woman, with his bosom open and a string of pearls encircling his neck. On one occasion he gave a fete, when, for the excitement of novelty, the gentlemen, in female robes, were waited upon by the ladies of the court, who were dressed in male attire, or rather undressed, for their persons were veiled by the slightest pos- sible clothing. Such was the corruption of the court of France, and, indeed, of nearly the whole realm in those days of darkness. Domestic pu- rity was a virtue unknown. Law existed only in name. The rich committed any crimes with- out fear of molestation. In the royal palace itself, one of the favorites of the king, in a par- oxysm of anger, stabbed his wife and her wait- ing-maid while the unfortunate lady was dress- ing. No notice whatever was taken of this bloody deed. The murderer retained all his DEATH OF CHARLES IX. 195 Murder in the royal palace. offices and honors, and it was the general senti- ment of the people of France that the assassi- nation was committed by the order of the sov- ereign, because the lady refused to be entirely subservient to the wishes of the dissolute king. 196 KING HENRY IV. Formation of the league. CHAPTER VIII. / THE LEAGUE. ABOUT this time there was formed the celebrated league which occupies so con- spicuous a position in the history of the six- teenth century. Henry III., though conscious that his throne was trembling beneath him, and courting now the Catholics and again the Prot- estants, was still amusing himself, day after day, with the most contemptible and trivial vices. The extinction of the house of Valois was evi- dently and speedily approaching. Henry of Navarre, calm, sagacious, and energetic, was ral- lying around him all the Protestant influences of Europe, to sustain, in that event, his undeni- able claim to the throne. The Duke of Guise, impetuous and fearless, hoped, in successful usurpation, to grasp the rich prize by rallying around his banner all the fanatic energies of Catholic Europe. Henry III. was alike despised by Catholics and Protestants. His brother Francis, though far more impulsive, had but few traits of char- THE LEAGUE. 197 Politics in the pulpit. The League. acter to command respect. He could summon but a feeble band for his support. Henry of Guise was the available candidate for the Cath- olics. All the priestly influences of France were earnestly combined to advance his claims. They declared that Henry of Navarre had forfeited every shadow of right to the succession by be- ing a heretic. The genealogy of the illustrious house of Guise was blazoned forth, and its de- scent traced from Charlemagne. It was assert- ed, and argued in the pulpit and in the camp, that even the house of Valois had usurped the crown which by right belonged to the house of Guise. Under these circumstances, the most formida- ble secret society was organized the world has ever known. It assumed the name of The League. Its object was to exterminate Prot- estantism, and to place the Duke of Guise upon the. throne. The following are, in brief, its cov- enant and oath : THE LEAGUE. In the name of the Holy Trinity, Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, this League of Catholic princes, lords, and gentlemen shall be instituted to maintain the holy Catholic, apostolical, and 198 KING HENKY IV. Object of the League. The otth. Roman Church, abjuring all errors to the con- trary. Should opposition to this league arise in any quarter, the associates shall employ all their goods and means, and even their own per- sons unto death, to punish and hunt down those opposing. Should any of the Leaguers, their associates or friends, be molested, the members of the League shall be bound to employ their bodies, goods, and means to inflict vengeance upon those thus offending. Should any Leaguer, after having taken the oath, withdraw from the association under any pretext whatever, the re- fractory member shall be injured, in body and goods, in every manner which can be devised, as enemies of God, rebels, and disturbers of the public peace. The Leaguers shall swear im- plicit obedience to their chief, and shall aid by counsel and service in preserving the League, and in the ruin of all who oppose it. All Cath- olic towns and villages shall be summoned se- cretly, by their several governors, to enter into this League, and to furnish arms and men for its execution. OATH. I swear by God the Creator, touching the Evangelists, and upon the pain of eternal dam- THE LEAGUE. 199 Influence of the League. Its extension. nation, that I have entered into this holy Cath- olic League loyally and sincerely, either to com- mand, to obey, or to serve. I promise, upon my life and honor, to remain in this League to the last drop of my blood, without opposing or retiring upon any pretext whatever. Such was the character of secret societies in the sixteenth century. A more atrocious con- federacy than this the human mind could hard- ly have conceived. It was, however, peculiarly calculated to captivate the multitude in those days of darkness and blood. Though at first formed and extended secretly, it spread like wildfire through all the cities and provinces of France. Princes, lords, gentlemen, artisans, and peasants rushed into its impious inclosures. The benighted populace, enthralled by the su- perstitions of the Church, were eager to mani- fest their zeal for God by wreaking the most jiwful vengeance upon heretics. He who, for liny cause, declined entering the League, found himself exposed to every possible annoyance. His house and his barns blazed in midnight conflagrations ; his cattle were mutilated and slain ; his wife and children were insulted and stoned in the streets. By day and by night, 200 KING HENRY IV. Vast power of the League. Alarm of the Protestants. asleep and awake, at home and abroad, at all times and every where, he was annoyed by ev- ery conceivable form of injury and violence. Soon the League became so powerful that no farther secrecy was needful. It stalked abroad in open day, insulting its foes and vaunting its invincibility. The gigantic plan it unblushing- ly avowed was to exterminate Protestantism by fire and the sword from France ; then to drown it in blood in Holland ; then to turn to England and purify that kingdom from the taint of her- esy ; then to march upon Germany ; and thus to advance from kingdom to kingdom, in their holy crusade, until Protestantism should be ev- ery where ingulfed in blood and flame, and the whole of Europe should be again brought back to the despotism of Rome. The Duke of Guise was the soul of this mam- moth conspiracy, though Philip II., the bigoted King of Spain, was its recorded commander-in- chief. The Protestants were justly alarmed by the enormous energy of the new power thus sud- denly evoked against them. The Pope, though at first hostile, soon, with his cardinals, espoused the cause of the League, and consecrated to its support all the weapons which could be wielded by the Vatican. From France, the demoniac THE LEAGUE. 201 Adroit measures of Henry III. organization spread through all the kingdoms of Europe. Hundreds of thousands were arrayed beneath its crimson banner. Even Henry III. in the Louvre, surrounded by his parasites and his concubines, trembled as he saw the shadow of this fearful apparition darkening his court. He immediately perceived that he must mount the car or be crushed by it. Adroitly he leap- ed into the seat of the charioteer and seized the reins. The demands of the League he adopted as his own, and urged them with energy. He issued a proclamation commending the League to his subjects, and announcing that he, to set them an example, had signed its covenant and its oath. The Duke of Guise and his followers were quite bewildered by this unexpected step. The League had demanded the assembling of the States-General, a body somewhat resem- bling the Congress of the United States. The king immediately summoned them to meet. They declared war against the Protestants. The king adopted the declaration as his own decree, and called loudly for supplies to prosecute the war with vigor. He outleagued the most vio- lent of the Leaguers in denunciations of the Prot- estants, in declaring that but one religion should be tolerated in France, and in clamoring for 202 KING HEXRY IV. Embarrassment of the Leaguers. Kxcommunication of Henry IV. arms and munitions of war, that heresy might be utterly extirpated. The Leaguers thus found, to their great perplexity, the weapon which they had forged wrested from their hands and wield- ed against them. They had organized to drive the imbecile Henry III. from the throne. He had seized upon that organization, and was us- ing it to establish himself more firmly there. The situation of Henry of Navarre was now extremely critical. Pope Sextus V., besides giving the League his Papal blessing, had ful- minated against the King of Navarre the awful thunders of excommunication. The bull of excommunication was exceeding- ly coarse and vulgar in its denunciatory terms, calling the King of Navarre " this bastard and detestable progeny of Bourbons" Henry replied to this assault in accents in- trepid and resolute, which caused Catholic Eu- rope to stand aghast. "Henry," said this bold document, "by the grace of God King of Navarre, sovereign prince of Beam, first peer and prince of France, resists the declaration and excommunication of Sextus V., self-styled Pope of Rome, asserts it to be false, and maintains that Mr. Sextus, the self- styled Pope, has falsely and maliciously lied ; 1585.] THE LEAGUE. 203 IJold retort. Edict of Nemours. that he himself is heretic, which he will prove in any full and free council lawfully assembled ; to which if he do not consent and submit, as he is bound by the canons, he, the King of Na- varre, holds and pronounces him to be anti- Christ and heretic, and in that quality declares against him perpetual and irreconcilable war." This energetic protest was placarded in most of the towhs of France, and by some fearless fol- lowers of the prince was even attached to the walls of the Vatican. The Pope, though at first much irritated, had the magnanimity to express his admiration of the spirit manifested by Henry. " There are but two princes in Europe," said he, " to whom I could venture to communicate the grand schemes revolving in my mind, Hen- ry of Navarre and Elizabeth of England ; but, unfortunately, they are both heretics." Henry III., having no moral principles to guide him in any thing, and having no generous affections of any kind, in carrying orft his plan of wielding the energies of the League without any scruples of conscience, issued the infamous Edict of Nemours in 1585, which commanded every Protestant minister to leave the kingdom within one month, and every member of the Re- formed faith either to abjure his religion and ac- 204 KING HENRY IV. Anguish of Henry of Navarre. Death of Francis. cept the Catholic faith, or to depart from France within six months. The penalty for disobedi- ence in either of these cases was death and the confiscation of property. This edict was exe- cuted with great rigor, and many were burned at the stake. Henry of Navarre was amazed, and, for a time, overwhelmed in receiving the news of this atrocious decree. He clearly foresaw that it must arouse France and all Europe to war, and that a new Iliad of woes was to commence. Leaning his chin upon his hand, he was for a long time lost in profound reverie as he pon- dered the awful theme. It is said that his an- guish was so intense, that when he removed his hand his beard and mustache on that side were turned entirely gray. But Henry rose with the emergence, and met the crisis with a degree of energy and magna- nimity which elicited, in those barbarous times, the admiration even of his enemies. The Prot- estants heroically grasped their arms and ral- lied together for mutual protection. War, with all its horrors, was immediately resumed. Affairs were in this condition when Francis, the Duke of Anjou, was taken sick and sudden- ly died. This removed another obstruction from THE LEAGUE. 205 Redoubled energies. Toleration. the field, and tended to hasten the crisis. Hen- ry III. was feeble, exhausted, and childless. Worn out by shameless dissipation, it was ev- ident to all that he must soon sink into his grave. Who was to be his successor? This was the question, above all others, which agi- tated France and Europe. Henry of Navarre was, beyond all question, legitimately entitled to the throne ; but he was, in the estimation of France, a heretic. The League consequently, in view of the impending peril of having a Prot- estant king, redoubled its energies to exclude him, and to enthrone their bigoted partisan, Henry of Guise. It was a terrific struggle. The Protestants saw suspended upon its issue their property, their religious liberty, their lives, their earthly all. The Catholics were stimu- lated by all the energies of fanaticism in de- fense of the Church. All Catholic Europe es- poused the one side, all Protestant Europe the other. One single Avord was enough to arrest all these woes. That word was TOLERATION. When Henry III. published his famous Edict of Nemours, commanding the conversion, the expulsion, or the death of the Protestants, Hen- ry of Navarre issued another edict replying to the calumnies of the League, and explaining his 206 KING HENRY IV. The challenge. Efforts to raise an army. actions and his motives. Then adopting a step characteristic of the chivalry of the times, he dispatched a challenge to the Duke of Guise, defying him to single combat, or, if he objected to that, to a combat of two with two, ten with ten, or a hundred with a hundred. "In this challenge," said Henry, "I call Heaven to witness that I am not influenced by any spirit of bravado, but only by the desire of deciding a quarrel which will otherwise cost the lives of thousands." To this appeal the duke made no reply. It was by no means for his interest to meet on equal terms those whom he could easily out- number two or three to one. Though the situation of Henry of Navarre seemed now almost desperate, he maintained his courage and his hope unshaken. His es- tates were unhesitatingly sold to raise funds. His friends parted with their jewels for gold to obtain the means to carry on the war. But, with his utmost efforts, he could raise an army of but four or five thousand men to resist two armies of twenty thousand each, headed by the Duke of Guise and by his brother, the Duke of Mayenne. Fortunately for Henry, there was but little military capacity in the League, and, THE LEAGUE. 207 The Leaguers baffled. The hostile meeting. notwithstanding their vast superiority in num- bers, they were continually circumvented in all their plans by the energy and the valor of the Protestants. The King of France was secretly rejoiced at the discomfiture of the Leaguers, yet, expressing dissatisfaction with the Duke of Guise, he in- trusted the command of the armies to one of his petted favorites, Joyeuse, a rash and fearless youth, who was as prompt to revel in the car- nage of the battle-field as in the voluptuousness of the palace. The king knew not whether to choose victory or defeat for his favorite. Vic- tory would increase the influence and the renown of one strongly attached to him, and would thus enable him more successfully to resist the en- croachments of the Duke of Guise. Defeat would weaken the overbearing power of the Leaguers, and enable Henry III. more securely to retain his position by the balance of the two rival parties. Joyeuse, ardent and inexperi- enced, and despising the feeble Band he was to encounter, was eager to display his prowess. He pressed eagerly to assail the King of Navarre. The two armies met upon a battle-field a few leagues from Bordeaux. The army of Joyeuse was chiefly of gay and effeminate courtiers and 208 KING HENRY IV. [1589. Appearance of the two armies. Tiie chargn. young nobles, who had too much pride to lack courage, but who possessed but little physical vigor, and who were quite unused to the hard- ships and to the vicissitudes of war. On the morning of the 20th of October, 1589, as the sun rose over the hills of Perigord, the two armies were facing each other upon the plains of Coutras. The Leaguers were decked with un- usual splendor, and presented a glittering array, with gorgeous banners and waving plumes, and uniforms of satin and velvet embroidered by the hands of the ladies of the court. They num- bered twelve thousand men. Henry of Navarre, with admirable military skill, had posted his six thousand hardy peasants, dressed in tattered skins, to meet the onset. And now occurred one of the most extraor- dinary scenes which history has recorded. It was a source of constant grief to the devout Protestant leaders that Henry of Navarre, not- withstanding his many noble traits of character, was not a man of pure morality. Just before the battle, Du Plessis, a Christian and a hero, approached the King of Navarre and said, " Sire, it is known to all that you have sin- ned against God, and injured a respectable citi- zen of Rochelle by the seduction of his daugh- THE LEAGUE. 209 Penitence of Henry of Navarre. Extraordinary j-cene. tor. We can not hope that God will bless our arms in this approaching battle while such a sin remains unrepented of and unrepaired." The king dismounted from iiis horse, and, un- covering his head, avowed in the presence of the whole army his sincere grief for what he had done ; he called all to witness that he thus pub- licly implored forgiveness of God, and of the family he had injured, and he pledged his word that he would do every thing in his power to re- pair the wrong. The troops were then called to prayers by the ministers. Every man in the ranks fell upon his knees, while one of the clergy implored God to forgive the sin of their chieftain, and to grant them protection and victory. The strange movement wag seen from the Catholic camp. "By death," exclaimed Joy- euse, " the poltroons are frightened. Look 1 they kneel, imploring our mercy." "Do not deceive yourself," replied an old cap- tain. "When the Huguenots get into that po- sition, they are ready for hard fighting." The brilliant battalions of the enemy now be- gan to deploy. Some one spoke of the splendor of their arms. Henry smiled and replied, " We shall have the better aim when the fight begins.'* 1314 210 KING HENRY IV. The battle of Coutras. Another ventured to intimate that the ministers had rebuked him with needless severity. He replied, "We can not be too humble before God, nor too brave before men." Then turning to his followers, with tears in his eyes, he address- ed to them a short and noble speech. He de- plored the calamities of war, and solemnly de- clared that he had drawn arms only in self-de- fense. "Let them," said he, "perish who are the authors of this war. May the blood shed this day rest upon them alone." To his two prominent generals, the Prince of Conde and the Count de Soissons, he remarked, with a smile, "To you I shall say nothing but that you are of the house of Bourbon, and, please God, I will show you this day that I am your elder." The battle almost immediately ensued. Like all fierce fights, it was for a time but a delirious scene of horror, confusion, and carnage. But the Protestants, with sinewy arms, hewed down their effeminate foes, and with infantry and cav- alry swept to and fro resistlessly over the plain* The white plume of Henry of Navarre was ever seen waving in the tumultuous throng wherever the battle was waged the fiercest. There was a singular blending of the facetious THE LEAGUE. 21.1 The victory. Exultation of the troop-*. with the horrible in this sanguinary scene. Be- fore the battle, the Protestant preachers, in earn- est sermons, had compared Henry with David at the head of the Lord's chosen people. Inrthe midst of the bloody fray, when the field was cov- ered with the dying and the dead, Henry grap- pled one of the standard-bearers of the enemy. At the moment, humorously reminded of the flattering comparison of the preachers, he shout- ed, with waggery which even the excitement of the battle could not repress, "Surrender, you uncircumcised Philistine." In the course of one hour three thousand of the Leaguers were weltering in blood upon the plain, Joyeuse himself, their leader, being among the dead. The defeat of the Catholics was so entire that not more than one fourth of their number escaped from the field of Goutras. The victors were immediately assembled upon the bloody field, and, after prayers and thanks- giving, they sung, with exultant lips, " The Lord appears my helper now, Nor is my faith afraid What all the sons of earth can do, Since Heaven affords its aid." Henry was very magnanimous in the hour of victory. When some one asked what terms 212 KING HENRY IV. Magnanimity of Henry of Navarre. Conduct of Marguerite. he should now demand, after so great a discom- fiture of his foes, he replied, "7% " I am told that you seek to kill me. You are now in my power, and I could easily put you to death ; but I will not harm you." He then discharged the two pistols in the air, and permitted the humiliated man to mount his horse and ride away unharmed. 220 KING HENRY IV. Imbecility of the king. Haughtiness of the Duke of Gui.-n. CHAPTER IX. THE ASSASSINATION OF THE DUKE OP GUISE AND OF HENRY III. r I ^HE war, again resumed, was fiercely prose- -- cuted. Henry III. remained most of the time in the gilded saloons of the Louvre, irrita- ble and wretched, arid yet incapable of any con- tinued efficient exertion. Many of the zealous Leaguers, indignant at the pusillanimity he dis- played, urged the Duke of Guise to dethrone Henry III. by violence, and openly to declare himself King of France. They assured him that the nation would sustain him by their arms. But the duke was not prepared to enter upon so bold a measure, as he hoped that the death of the king would soon present to him a far more favorable opportunity for the assumption of the throne. Henry III. was in constant fear that the duke, whose popularity in France was almost boundless, might supplant him, and he therefore forbade him to approach the metropolis. Notwithstanding this prohibition, the haughty duke, accompanied by a small party of his in- THE ASSASSINATION. 221 The duke goes to Paris. trepid followers, as if to pay court to his sover- eign, boldly entered the city. The populace of the capital, ever ripe for excitement and insur- rection, greeted him with boundless enthusiasm. Thousands thronged the broad streets through which he passed with a small but brilliant ret- inue. Ladies crowded the windows, waving scarfs, cheering him with smiles, and showering flowers at his feet. The cry resounded along the streets, penetrating even the apartments of the Louvre, and falling appallingly upon the ear of the king: "Welcome welcome, great duke. Now you are come, we are safe." Henry III. was amazed and terrified by this insolence of his defiant subject. In bewilder- ment, he asked those about him what he should do. " Give me the word," said a colonel of his guard, "and I will plunge my sword through his body." " Smite the shepherd," added one of the king's spiritual counselors, "arid the sheep will disperse." But Henry feared to exasperate the populace of Paris by the assassination of a noble so. pow- erful and so popular. In the midst of this con- KING HENKY IV. Interview with the king. sultation, the Duke of Guise, accompanied by the queen-mother Catharine, whom he had first called upon, entered the Louvre, and, passing through the numerous body-guard of the king, whom he saluted with much affability, present- ed himself before the feeble monarch. The king looked sternly upon him, and, without any word of greeting, exclaimed angrily, " Did I not forbid you to enter Paris ?" " Sire," the duke replied, firmly, but with af- fected humility, " I came to demand justice, and to reply to the accusations of my enemies." The interview was short and unrelenting. The king, exasperated almost beyond endur- ance, very evidently hesitated whether to give the signal for the immediate execution of his dreaded foe. There were those at his side, with arms in their hands, who were eager. instantly to obey his bidding. The Duke of Guise per- ceived the imminence of his danger, and, feigning sudden indisposition, immediately retired. In his own almost regal mansion he gathered around him his followers and his friends, and thus placed himself in a position where even the arm of the sovereign could not venture to touch him. There were now in Paris, as it were, two ri- THE ASSASSINATION. 223 Two rival courts. The Swiss guard defeated. val courts, emulating each other in splendor and power. The one was that of the king at the Louvre the other was that of the duke in his palace. It was rumored that the duke was or- ganizing a conspiracy to arrest the king and hold him a captive. Henry III., to strengthen his body-guard, called a strong force of Swiss mercenaries into the city. The retainers of the duke, acting under the secret instigation of their chieftain, roused the populace of Paris to resist the Swiss. Barricades were immediately conr- structed by filling barrels with stones and earth ; chains were stretched across the streets from house to house ; and organized bands, armed with pikes and muskets, threatened even the gates of the Louvre. A conflict soon ensued, and the Swiss guard were defeated by the mob at every point. The Duke of Guise, though he secretly guided all these movements, remained in his palace, affect- ing to have no share in the occurrences. Night came. Confusion and tumult rioted in the city. The insurgent populace, intoxicated and mad- dened, swarmed around the walls of the palace, and the king was besieged. The spiritless and terrified monarch, disguising himself in humble garb, crept to his stables, mounted a fleet horse, 224 KING HENRY IV. Tumult in the city. Dignity of Achille de Ilarlar. and fled from the city. Riding at full speed, he sought refuge in Chartres, a walled town for- ty miles southeast of Paris. The flight of the king before an insurgent populace was a great victory to the duke. He was thus left in possession of the metropolis without any apparent act of rebellion on his own part, arid it became manifestly his duty to do all in his power to preserve order in the cap- ital thus surrendered to anarchy. The duke had ever been the idol of the populace, but now nearly the whole population of Paris, and es- pecially the influential citizens, looked to him as their only protector. Some, however, with great heroism, still ad- hered to the cause of the king. The Duke of Guise sent for Achille de Harlai, President of the Council, and endeavored to win him over to his cause, that he might thus sanction his usur- pation by legal forms ; but De Harlai, fixing his eyes steadfastly upon the duke, fearlessly said. " 'Tis indeed pitiable when the valet expels his master. As for me, my soul belongs to my Maker, and my fidelity belongs to the king. My body alone is in the hands of the wicked. You talk of assembling the Parliament. When the majesty of the prince is violated, the magis- THE ASSASSINATION. 225 Measures adopted by the duke. trate is without authority." The intrepid pres- ident was seized and imprisoned. The followers of Henry III. soon gathered around him at Chartres, and he fortified him- self strongly there. The Duke of Guise, though still protesting great loyalty, immediately as- sumed at Paris the authority of a sovereign. He assembled around him strong military forces, professedly to protect the capital from disturb- ance. For a month or two negotiations were conducted between the two parties for a com- promise, each fearing the other too much to ap- peal to the decisions of the sword. At last Henry III. agreed to appoint the Duke of Guise lieutenant general of France and high consta- ble of the kingdom. He also, while pledging himself anew to wage a war of extermination against the Protestants, promised to bind the people of France, by an oath, to exclude from the succession to the throne all persons suspect- ed even of Protestantism. This would effect- ually cut off the hopes of Henry of Navarre, and secure the crown to the Duke of Guise upon the death of the king. Both of the antagonists now pretended to a sincere reconciliation, and Henry, having re- ceived Guise at Chartres with open arms, re- 1315 226 KING HENKY IV. Endeavors to obtain an assassin. The king at Blois. turned to Paris, meditating how he might secure the death of his dreaded and powerful rival. Imprisonment was not to be thought of, for no fortress in France could long hold one so idol- ized by the populace. The king applied in per- son to one of his friends, a brave and honest sok dier by the name of Crillon, to assassinate the duke. "I am not an executioner," the soldier proud- ly replied, " and the function does not become my rank. But I will challenge the duke to open combat, and will cheerfully sacrifice my life that I may take his." This plan not meeting with the views of the king, he applied to one of the commanders of his guard named Lorgnac. This man had no scruples, and with alacrity undertook to perform the deed. Henry, having retired to the castle of Blois, about one hundred miles south of Par- is, arranged all the details, while he was daily, with the most consummate hypocrisy, receiv- ing his victim with courteous words and smiles. The king summoned a council to attend him in his cabinet at Blois on the 23d of December. It was appointed at an early hour, and the Duke of Guise attended without his usual retinue. He had been repeatedly warned to guard against the treachery of Henry, but his reply was. THE ASSASSINATION. 229 Assassination of the Duke of Guise. " I do not know that man on earth who, hand to hand with me, would not have his full share of fear. Besides, I am always so well attended that it would not be easy to find me off my guard." The duke arrived at the door of the cabinet after passing through long files of the king's body-guard. Just as he was raising the tapes- try which veiled the entrance, Lorgnac sprang upon him and plunged a dagger into his throat. Others immediately joined in the assault, and the duke dropped, pierced with innumerable wounds, dead upon the floor. Henry, hearing the noise and knowing well what it signified, very coolly stepped from his cabinet into the ante -chamber, and, looking calmly upon the bloody corpse, said, " Do you think he is dead, Lorgnac?" "Yes, sire," Lorgnac replied, "he looks like it." "Good God, how tall he is!" said the king. "He seems taller dead than when he was liv- ing." Then giving the gory body a kick, he exclaimed, "Venomous beast, thou shalt cast forth no more venom." In the same manner the duke had treated the remains of the noble Admiral Coligni, a solemn 230 KING HENRY IV. Interview between the king and Catharine. comment upon the declaration, "With what measure ye mete it shall be measured to you again." Cardinal Guise, the brother of the duke, was immediately arrested by order of the king, and sent to prison, where he was assassinated. Hen- ry III. soon after repaired to the bedside of Catharine his mother, who was lying sick in one of the chambers of the castle. Nothing can show more clearly the character of the times and of the personages than the following la- conic dialogue which ensued : "How do you do, mother, this morning?" inquired the king. " I am better than I have been," she replied. " So am I," Henry rejoined, gayly, " for I have made myself this morning King of France by putting to death the King of Paris." " Take care," this hardened woman exclaim- ed, " that you do not soon find yourself king of nothing. Diligence and resolution are now absolutely necessary for you." She then turned upon her pillow without the slightest apparent emotion. In twelve days from this time, this wretched queen, deformed by ev- ery vice, without one single redeeming virtue, breathed her last, seventy years of age. She THE ASSASSINATION. 231 Indignation of the League. Anathemas against the king. was despised by the Catholics, and hated by the Protestants. These acts of violence and crime roused the League to the most intense energy. The mur- der of the Duke of Guise, and especially the murder of his brother, a cardinal in the Church, were acts of impiety which no atonement could expiate. Though Henry was a Catholic, and all his agents in these atrocious murders were Catholics, the death of the Duke of Guise in- creased vastly the probability that Protestant influences might become dominant at court. The Pope issued a bull of excommunication against all who should advocate the cause of Henry III. The Sorbonne published a decree declaring that the king had forfeited all right to the obedience of his subjects, and justifying them in taking up arms against him. The cler- gy, from the pulpit, refused communion, abso- lution, and burial in holy ground to every one .who yielded obedience to "the perfidious apos- tate and tyrant; Henry of Valois." The League immediately chose the Duke of Mayenne, a surviving brother of the Duke of Guise, as its head. The Pope issued his anath- emas against Henry III., and Spain sent her armies to unite with the League. Henry now 232 KINO HENRY IV. The king seeks aid from the Protestants. found it necessary to court the assistance of the Protestants. He dreaded to take this step, for lie was superstitious in the extreme, and he could not endure the thought of any alliance with heretics. He had still quite a formidable force which adhered to him, for many of the highest nobles were disgusted with the arro- gance of the Guises, and were well aware that the enthronement of the house of Guise would secure their own banishment from court. The triumph of the League would be total discomfiture to the Protestants. No freedom of worship or of conscience whatever would be allowed them. It was therefore for the interest of the Protestants to sustain the more moderate party hostile to the League. It was estimated that about one sixth of the inhabitants of France were at that time Protestants. Wretched, war-scathed France was now dis- tracted by three parties. First, there were the Protestants, contending only in self-defense against persecution, and yet earnestly praying that, upon the death of the king, Henry of Na- varre, the legitimate successor, might ascend the throne. Next came those Catholics who were friendly to the claims of Henry from their re- spect for the ancient law of succession. Then THE ASSASSINATION. 233 I> solatioris of war. Compact with Henry of Navarre. came, combined in the League, the bigoted par- tisans of the Church, resolved to exterminate from Europe, with fire and sword, the detested heresy of Protestantism. Henry III. was now at the castle of Blois. Paris was hostile to him. -The Duke of May- enne, younger brother of the Duke of Guise, at the head of five thousand soldiers of the League, marched to the metropolis, where he was re- ceived by the Parisians with unbounded joy. He was urged by the populace and the Parlia- ment in Paris to proclaim himself king. But he was not yet prepared for so decisive a step. No tongue can tell the misery which now per- vaded ill-fated France. Some .cities were Prot- estant, some were Catholic ; division, and war, and blood were every where. Armed bands swept to and fro, and conflagration and slaugh- ter deluged the kingdom. The king immediately sent to Henry of Na- varre, promising to confer many political privi- leges upon the Protestants, and to maintain Henry's right to the throne, if he would aid him in the conflict against the League. The terms of reconciliation were soon effected. Henry of Navarre, then leaving his army to advance by rapid marches, rode forward with his retinue to 234 KING HENRY IV. Interview at Plessis les Tours. meet his brother-in-law, Henry of Valois. He found him at one of the ancient palaces of France, Plessis les Tours. The two monarchs had been friends in childhood, but they had not met for many years. The King of Navarre was urged by his friends not to trust himself in the power of Henry III. "For," said they, "the King of France desires nothing so much as to obtain reconciliation with the Pope, and no of- fering can be so acceptable to the Pope as the death of a heretic prince." Henry hesitated a moment when he arrived upon an eminence which commanded a distant view of the palace. Then exclaiming, " God guides me, and He will go with me,' ; he plunged his spurs into his horse's side, and galloped for- ward. The two monarchs met, each surrounded with a gorgeous retinue, in one of the magnificent avenues which conducted to the castle. For- getting the animosities of years, and remember- ing only the friendships of childhood, they cast themselves cordially into each other's arms. The multitude around rent the air with their acclamations. Henry of Navarre now addressed a manifesto to all the inhabitants of France in behalf of their THE ASSASSINATION. 2b5 The manifesto. Renewed war. woe-stricken country. "I conjure you all," said lie, " Catholics as well as Protestants, to have pity on the state and on yourselves. We have all done and suffered evil enough. We have been four years intoxicate, insensate, and furious. Is not this sufficient ? Has not God smitten us all enough to allay our fury, and to make us wise at last ?" But passion was too much aroused to allow such appeals to Ibe heeded. Battle after battle, with ever-varying success, ensued between the combined forces of the king and Henry of Na- varre on one side, and of the League, aided by many of the princes of Catholic Europe, on the other. The storms of winter swept over the freezing armies arid the smouldering towns, and the wail of the victims of horrid war blended with the moanings of the gale. Spring came, but it brought no joy to desolate, distracted, wretched France. Summer came, and the bright sun looked down upon barren fields, and upon a bleeding, starving, fighting nation. Henry of Navarre, in command of the royal forces, at the head of thirty thousand troops, was besieging Paris, which was held by the Duke of Mayenne, and boldly and skillfully was conducting his approaches to a successful termination. The 236 KING HENRY IV. Duchess of Montpensier. The flag of truce. cause of the League began to wane. Henry III. had taken possession of the castle of St. Cloud, and from its elevated windows looked out with joy upon the bold assaults and the advancing works. The leaders of the League now resolved to resort again to the old weapon of assassination. Henry III. was to be killed. But no man could kill him unless he was also willing to sacrifice his own life. The Duchess of Montpensier, sis- ter of the Duke of Guise, for the accomplish- ment of this purpose, won the love, by caress- ings and endearments, of Jaques Clement, an ardent, enthusiastic monk of wild and roman- tic imaginings, and of the most intense fanati- cism. The beautiful duchess surrendered her- self without any reserve whatever to the para- mour she had enticed to her arms, that she might obtain the entire supremacy over his mind. Cle- ment concealed a dagger in his bosom, and then went out from the gates of the city accompani- ed by two soldiers and with a flag of truce, os- tensibly to take a message to the king. He refused to communicate his message to any one but the monarch himself. Henry III., suppos- ing it to be a communication of importance, per- haps a proposition to surrender, ordered him to THE ASSASSINATION. 239 Assassination of Henry III. Arrival of Henry of Navarre. be admitted immediately to his cabinet. Two persons only were present with the king. The monk entered, and, kneeling, drew a letter from the sleeve of his gown, presented it to the king, and instantly drawing a large knife from its con- cealment, plunged it into the entrails of his vic- tim. The king uttered a piercing cry, caught the knife from his body and struck at the head of his murderer, wounding him above the eye. The two gentlemen who were present instantly thrust their swords through the body of the as- sassin, and he fell dead. The king, groaning with anguish, was un- dressed and borne to his bed. The tidings spread rapidly, and soon reached the ears of the King of Navarre, who was a few miles dis- tant at Meudon. He galloped to St. Cloud, and knelt with gushing tears at the couch of the dying monarch. Henry III. embraced him with apparently the most tender affection. In broken accents, interrupted with groans of an- guish, he said, "If my wound proves mortal, I leave my crown to you as my legitimate successor. If my will can have any effect, the crown will re- main as firmly upon your brow as it was upon that of Charlemagne." 240 KING HENRY IV. [1589. Dying scene. Henry IV. assumes the crown. He then assembled his principal officers around him, and enjoined them to unite for the preservation of the monarchy, and to sustain the claims of the King of Navarre as the indisputa- ble heir to the throne of France. A day of great anxiety passed slowly away, and as the shades of evening settled down over the palace, it became manifest to all that the wound was mortal. The wounded monarch writhed upon his bed in fearful agony. At midnight, Henry of Navarre, who was busily engaged superintending some of the works of the siege, was sent for, as the King of France was dying. Accompanied by a retinue of thir- ty gentlemen, he proceeded at full speed to the gates of the castle where the monarch was strug- gling in the grasp of the King of Terrors. It is difficult to imagine the emotions which must have agitated the soul of Henry of Na- varre during this dark and gloomy ride. The day had not yet dawned when he arrived at the gates of the castle. The first tidings he re- ceived were, The king is dead. It was the 2d of August, 1589. Henry of Navarre was now Henry IV., King of France. But never did monarch ascend the throne under circumstances of greater perplexi- 1589.] THE ASSASSINATION. 241 Difficulties of the new reign. ty and peril. Never was a more distracted king- dom placed in the hands of a new monarch. Henry was now thirty-four years of age. The whole kingdom was convulsed by warring fac- tions. For years France had been desolated by all the most virulent elements of religious and political animosity. All hearts were demor- alized by familiarity with the dagger of the as- sassin and the carnage of the battle-field. Al- most universal depravity had banished all re- spect for morality and law. The whole fabric of society was utterly disorganized. Under these circumstances, Henry developed that energy and sagacity which have given him a high position among the most renowned of earthly monarchs. He immediately assembled around him that portion of the royal army in whose fidelity he could confide. Without the delay of an hour, he commenced dictating let- ters to all the monarchies of Europe, announc- ing his accession to the throne, and soliciting their aid to confirm him in his legitimate rights. As the new sovereign entered the chamber of the deceased king, he found the corpse sur- rounded by many of the Catholic nobility of France. They were ostentatiously solemniz- ing the obsequies of the departed monarch. He 1316 242 KING HENRY IV. [1589. Danger of assassination. heard many low m titterings from these zealous partisans of Rome, that they would rather die a thousand deaths than allow a Protestant king to ascend the throne. Angry eyes glared upon him from the tumultuous and mutinous crowd, and, had not Henry retired to consult for his own safety, he also might have fallen the vic- tim of assassination. In the intense excite- ment of these hours, the leading Catholics held a meeting, and appointed a committee to wait upon Henry, and inform him that he must im- mediately abjure Protestantism and adopt the Catholic faith, or forfeit their support to the 44 KING HENRY IV. [1589. News of the death of Henry III. really dead ? What a gratification ! I am only grieved to think that he did not know that it was I who directed the blow." She rode out immediately, that she might have the pleasure herself of communicating the intelligence. She drove through the streets, shouting from her carriage, " Good news ! good news ! the tyrant is dead." The joy of the priests rose to the highest pitch of fanatical fer- vor. The assassin was eve"n canonized. The Pope himself condescended to pronounce a eu- logium upon the "martyr" and a statue was erected to his memory, with the inscription," St. Jaques Clement, pray for us." The League now proclaimed as king the old Cardinal of Bourbon, under the title of Charles X., and nearly all of Catholic Europe rallied around this pretender to the crown. No one denied the validity of the title, according to the principles of legitimacy, of Henry IV. His rights, however, the Catholics deemed forfeited by his Protestant tendencies. Though Henry immediately issued a decree promising every surety and support to the Catholic religion as the established religion of France, still, as he did not also promise to devote all his energies to the extirpation of the heresy of Protestant- 1589.J THE ASSASSINATION. 245 Abandoned By the Catholics. ism, the great majority of the Catholics were dissatisfied. Epernon, one of the most conspicuous of the Catholic leaders, at the head of many thousand Catholic soldiers, waited- upon the king imme- diately after the death of Henry III., and in- formed him that they could not maintain a Prot- estant on the throne. With flying banners and resounding bugles they then marched from the camp and joined the League. So extensive was this disaffection, that in one day Henry found himself deserted by all his army except six thousand, most of whom were Protestants. Nearly thirty thousand men had abandoned him, some to retire to their homes, and others to join the enemy. The army of the League within the capital was now twenty thousand strong. They pre- pared for a rush upon the scattered and broken ranks of Henry IV. Firmly, fearlessly, and with well matured plans, he ordered a prompt retreat. Catholic Europe aroused itself in be- half of the League. Henry appealed to Prot- estant Europe to come to his aid. Elizabeth of England responded promptly to his appeal, and promised to send a fleet and troops to the harbor of Dieppe, about one hundred miles 246 KING HENRY IV. [1589. The retreat. The stand at Dieppe. northwest of Paris, upon the shores of the En- glish Channel. Firmly, and with concentrated ranks, the little army of Protestants crossed the Seine. Twenty thousand Leaguers eagerly pursued them, watching in vain for a chance to strike a deadly blow. Henry ate not, slept not, rested not. Night and .day, day and night, he was every where present, guiding, encouraging, protecting this valiant band. Planting a rear guard upon the western banks of the Seine, the chafing foe was held in check until the Royalist army had retired beyond the Oise. Upon the farther banks of this stream Henry again rear- ed his defenses, thwarting every endeavor of his enemies, exasperated by such unexpected discomfiture. As Henry slowly retreated toward the sea, all the Protestants of the region through whioh lie passed, and many of the moderate Catholics who were in favor of the royal cause and hos- tile to the house of Guise, flocked to his stand- ard. He soon found himself, with seven thou- sand very determined men, strongly posted be- hind the ramparts of Dieppe. But the Duke of Mayenne had also received large accessions. The spears and banners of his proud host, now numbering thirty-five thou- 1589.] THE ASSASSINATION. 247 Henry urged to fly to England. Anecdote. sand, gleamed from all the hills and valleys which surrounded the fortified city. For near- ly a month there was almost an incessant con- flict. Every morning, with anxious eyes, the Royalists scanned the watery horizon, hoping to see the fleet of England coming to their aid. Cheered by hope, they successfully, beat back their assailants. The toils of the king were immense. With exalted military genius he guided every movement, at the same time shar- ing the toil of the humblest soldier. "It is a marvel," he wrote, " how I live with the labor I undergo. God have pity upon me, and show me mercy." Some of Henry's friends, apalled by the strength of the army pursuing them, urged him to embark and seek refuge in England. "Here we are," Henry replied, "in France, and here let us be buried. If we fly now, all our hopes will vanish with the wind which bears us." In a skirmish, one day, one of the Catholic chieftains, the Count de Belin, was taken cap- tive. He was led to the head-quarters of the king. Henry greeted him with perfect cordial- ity, and, noticing the astonishment of the count in seeing but a few scattered soldiers where he 248 KING HENRY IV. [1589. Arrival of the fleet from England. had expected to see a numerous army, he said, playfully, yet with a confident air, " You do not perceive all that I have with me, M. de Belin, for you do not reckon God and the right on my side." The indomitable energy of Henry, accompa- nied by a countenance ever serene and cheerful under circumstances apparently so desperate, inspired the soldiers with the same intrepidity which glowed in the bosom of their chief. But at last the valiant little band, so bravely repelling overwhelming numbers, saw, to their inexpressible joy, the distant ocean whitened with the sails of the approaching English fleet. Shouts of exultation rolled along their exhaust- ed lines, carrying dismay into the camp of the Leaguers. A favorable wind pressed the fleet rapidly forward, and in a few hours, with stream- ing banners, and exultant music, and resound- ing salutes, echoed and re-echoed from English ships and French batteries, the fleet of Eliza- beth, loaded to its utmost capacity with money, military supplies, and men, cast anchor in the little harbor of Dieppe. Nearly six thousand men, Scotch and En- glish, were speedily disembarked. The Duke of Mayenne, though his army was still double 1589.] THE ASSASSINATION. 249 Bigotry of the Catholics. Desolation of France. that of Henry IV., did not dare to await the on- set of his foes thus recruited. Hastily break- ing up his encampment, he retreated to Paris. Henry IV., in gratitude to God for the succor which he had thus received from the Protestant Queen of England, directed that thanksgivings should be offered in his own quarters according to the religious rites of the Protestant Church. This so exasperated the Catholics, even in his own camp, that a mutiny was excited, and sev- eral of the Protestant soldiers were wounded in the fray. So extreme was the fanaticism at this time that, several Protestants, after a san- guinary fight, having been buried on the battle- field promiscuously in a pit with some Catho- lics who had fallen by their side, the priests, even of Henry's army, ordered the Protestant bodies to be dug up and thrown out as food for dogs. While these scenes were transpiring in the vicinity of Dieppe, almost every part of France was scathed and cursed by hateful war. Every province, city, village, had its partisans for the League or for the king. Beautiful France was as a volcano in the world of woe, in whose seething crater flames, and blood, and slaughter, the yell of conflict and the shriek of agony, 250 KING HENRY IV. [1580. Ignoble conduct of the League. blended in horrors which no imagination can compass. There was an end to every earthly joy. Cities were bombarded, fields of grain trampled in the mire, villages burned. Famine rioted over its ghastly victims. Hospitals were filled with miserable multitudes, mutilated and with festering wounds, longing for death. Not a ray of light pierced the gloom of this dark, black night of crime and woe. And yet, unde- niably, the responsibility before God must rest with the League. Henry IV. was the lawful king of France. The Catholics had risen in arms to resist his rights, because they feared that he would grant liberty of faith and wor- ship to the Protestants. The League adopted the most dishonorable and criminal means to alienate from Henry the affections of the people. They forged letters, in which the king atrociously expressed joy at the murder of Henry III., and declared his de- termination by dissimulation and fraud to root out Catholicism entirely from France. No ef- forts of artifice were wanting to render the mon- arch odious to the Catholic populace. Though the Duke of Mayenne occasionally referred to the old Cardinal of Bourbon as the king whom he acknowledged, he, with the characteristic 1589.J THE ASSASSINATION. 251 Paris besieged. Assault of Etampes. haughtiness of the family of Guise, assumed himself the air and the language of a sovereign. It was very evident that he intended to place himself upon the throne. Henry IV., with the money furnished by Elizabeth, was now able to pay his soldiers their arrears. His army steadily increased, and he soon marched with twenty-three thou- sand troops and fourteen pieces of artillery to lay siege to Paris. His army had unbounded confidence in his military skill. With enthu- siastic acclamations they pursued the retreat- ing insurgents. Henry was now on the offens- ive, and his troops were posted for the siege of Paris, having driven the foe within its walls. After one sanguinary assault, the king became convinced that he had not with him sufficient force to carry the city. The Duke of Mayenne stood firmly behind the intrenchments of the capital, with an army much strengthened by re-enforcements of Spanish and Italian troops. Henry accordingly raised the siege, and march- ed rapidly to Etampes, some forty miles south of Paris, where a large part of his foes had es- tablished themselves. He suddenly attacked the town and carried it by assault. The un- happy inhabitants of this city had, in the course 252 KING HENRY IV. [1589. Letter from Lorraine. Military reprisals. of four months, experienced the horrors of three assaults. The city, in that short period, had been taken and retaken three times. While at Etampes, Hemy received a letter from the beautiful but disconsolate Louisa of Lorraine, the widow of Henry III., imploring him to avenge the murder of her husband. The letter was so affecting that, when it was read in the king's council, it moved all the members to tears. Many of the citizens of Paris, weary of the miseries of civil war, were now disposed to ral- ly around their lawful monarch as the only mode of averting the horrible calamities which overwhelmed France. The Duke of Mayenne rigorously arrested all who were suspected of such designs, and four of the most prominent of the citizens were condemned to death. Hen- ry immediately sent a message to the duke, that if the sentence were carried into effect, he would retaliate by putting to death some of the Cath- olic nobles whom he had in his power. May- enne defiantly executed two Royalists. Henry immediately suspended upon a gibbet two un- fortunate Leaguers who were his captives. This decisive reprisal accomplished its purpose, and compelled Mayenne to be more merciful. 1589.] THE ASSASSINATION. 253 Act vity of Henry. Dissension among the Leaguers. With great energy, Henry now advanced to Tours, about one hundred and twenty miles south of Paris, on the banks of the Loire, tak- ing every town by the way, and sweeping all opposition before him. He seldom slept more than three hours at a time, and seized his meals where he could. " It takes Mayenne," said Henry, proudly, *' more time to put on his boots than it does me to win a battle." " Henry," remarked Pope Sextus V., sadly, "will surely, in the end, gain the day, for he spends less hours in bed than Mayenne spends at the table." Though the armies of the League were still superior to the Royalist army, victory every where followed the banner of the king. Every day there was more and more of union and har- mony in his ranks, and more and more of dis- cord in the armies of the League. . There were variou^ aspirants for the throne in case Henry IV. could be driven from the kingdom, and all these aspirants had their partisans. The more reasonable portion of the Catholic party soon saw that there could be no end to civil war un- less the rights of Henry IV. were maintained. Each day consequently witnessed accessions of 254 KING HENRY IV. [1589. Triumphant progress of Henry. powerful nobles to his side. The great mass of the people also, notwithstanding their hatred of Protestantism and devotion to the Catholic Church, found it difficult to break away from their homage to the ancient law of succession. It was now manifest to all, that if Henry would but proclaim himself a Catholic, the war would almost instantly terminate, and the peo- ple, with almost entire unanimity, would rally around him. Henry IV. was a lawful monarch endeavoring to put down insurrection. May- enne was a rebel contending against his king. The Pope was so unwilling to see a Protestant sovereign enthroned in France, that he issued a bull of excommunication against all who should advocate the cause of Henry IV. Many of t lie Royalist Catholics, however, instead of yielding to these thunders of the Vatican, sent a humble apology to the Pope for their adherence to the king, and still sustained his cause. Henry now moved on with the strides of a conqueror, and city after city fell into his hands. Wherever he entered a city, the ever vacillating multitude welcomed him with acclamations. Re- gardless of the storms of winter, Henry drag- ged his heavy artillery through the mire and over the frozen ruts, and before the close of the 1589.] THE ASSASSINATION. 255 Wonderful escape. year 1589 his banner waved over fifteen forti- fied cities and over very many minor towns. The forces of the League were entirely swept from three of the provinces of France. Still Paris was in the hands of the Duke of Mayenne, and a large part of the kingdom was yet held in subjection by the forces of the League. At one time, in the face of a fierce cannon- ade, Henry mounted the tower of a church at Meulun to ascertain the position of the enemy. As he was ascending,