FOOTNOTES:
[430] The most authentic account of these important interviews is that given by François de la Noue in his Mémoires, chap. xi. It clearly shows how much Davila mistakes in asserting that "the prince, the admiral, and Andelot persuaded them, without further delay, to take arms." (Eng. trans., London, 1678, bk. iv., p. 110.) Davila's careless remark has led many others into the error of making Coligny the advocate, instead of the opposer, of a resort to arms. See also De Thou, iv. (liv. xlii.) 2-7, who bases his narrative on that of De la Noue, as does likewise Agrippa d'Aubigné, l. iv., c. vii. (i. 209), who uses the expression: "L'Amiral voulant endurer toutes extremitez et se confier en l'innocence."
[431] "Ains avec le fer."
[432] "Une armée gaillarde." La Noue, ubi supra.
[433] Mém. de Castelnau, liv. vi., c. iv., c. v.; La Noue, c. xi.; De Thou, iv. (liv. xlii.) 5, 6. Davila, l. iv., p. 110, alludes to the accusation, extorted from Protestant prisoners on the rack, that "the chief scope of this enterprise was to murder the king and queen, with all her other children, that the crown might come to the Prince of Condé," but admits that it was not generally credited. The curate of Saint Barthélemi is less charitable; describing the rising of the Protestants, he says: "En ung vendredy 27e se partirent de toutes les villes de France les huguenots, sans qu'on leur eust dit mot, mais ils craignoient que si on venoit au dessein de leur entreprise qui estoit de prendre ou tuer le roy Charles neuvième, qu'on ne les saccagea ès villes." Journal d'un curé ligueur (J. de la Fosse), 85.
[434] La Noue, and De Thou, ubi supra.
[435] The historian, Michel de Castelnau, sieur de Mauvissière, had been sent as a special envoy to congratulate the Duke of Alva on his safe arrival, and the Duchess of Parma on her relief. As he was returning from Brussels, he received, from some Frenchmen who joined him, a very circumstantial account of the contemplated rising of the Huguenots, and, although he regarded the story as an idle rumor, he thought it his duty to communicate it to the king and queen. Mémoires, liv. vi., c. iv.
[436] Mém. de Castelnau, ubi supra. It is probable that the French court partook of Cardinal Granvelle's conviction, expressed two years before, that the Huguenots would find it difficult to raise money or procure foreign troops for another war, not having paid for those they had employed in the last war, nor holding the strongholds they then held. Letter of May 7, 1565, Papiers d'état, ix. 172.
[437] Mém. du duc de Bouillon (Ancienne Collection), xlvii. 421.
[438] La Fosse, p. 86, represents Charles as exclaiming, when he entered the Porte Saint Denis: "Qu'il estoit tenu à Dieu, et qu'il y avoit quinze heures qu'il estoit à cheval, et avoit eust trois alarmes."
[439] Mém. de Castelnau, liv. vi., c. v.; La Noue, c. xiii. (Anc. Coll., xlvii. 180-185); De Thou, iv. 8; J. de Serres, iii. 129-131; La Fosse, 86; Agrippa d'Aubigné, Hist. univ., i. 210.
[440] "Ravi d'avoir allumé le feu de la gùerre," says De Thou, iv. 9.
[441] De Thou, ubi supra.
[442] The circumstance of two messengers, each bearing letters from the same person, while the letters made no allusion to each other, following one another closely, struck Alva as so suspicious, that he actually placed the second messenger under arrest, and only liberated him on hearing from his own agent on his return that the man's credentials were genuine.
[443] Alva proposed to detach 5,000 men to prevent the entrance of German auxiliaries into France, and protect the Netherlands.
[444] Letter of Alva to Philip, Nov. 1, 1567, Gachard, Correspondance de Philippe II., i., 593.
[445] "Que la ley sálica, que dizien, es baya, y las armas la allanarian." Ibid, i. 594.
[446] The price of wheat, Jehan de la Fosse tells us (p. 86) advanced to fifteen francs per "septier."
[447] Journal d'un curé ligueur (J. de la Fosse), 86.
[448] In one of Charles's first despatches to the Lieutenant-Governor of Dauphiny, wherein he bids him restrain, and, if necessary, attack any Huguenots of the province who might undertake to come to Condé's assistance, there occurs an expression that smacks of the murderous spirit of St. Bartholomew's Day: "You shall cut them to pieces," he writes, "without sparing a single person; for the more dead bodies there are, the less enemies remain (car tant plus de mortz, moins d'ennemys!)" Charles to Gordes, Oct. 8, 1567, MS. in Condé Archives, D'Aumale, i. 563.
[449] Davila (i. 113) makes the latter her distinct object in the negotiations: "The queen, to protract the time till supplies of men and other necessary provisions arrived, and to abate the fervor of the enemy, being constrained to have recourse to her wonted arts, excellently dissembling those so recent injuries, etc."
[450] Of course "Sieur Soulier, prêtre" sees nothing but perversity in these grounds. "Ils n'alleguèrent que des raisons frivolles pour excuser leur armement." Histoire des édits de pacification, 64.
[451] Davila is certainly incorrect in stating that the Huguenots demanded "that the queen mother should have nothing to do in the government" (p. 113).
[452] October 7th, Soulier, Hist. des édits de pacification, 65.
[453] De Thou, iv. (liv. xlii.) 10-15; Jean de Serres, iii. 131, 132; Davila, bk. iv. 113-115; Agrippa d'Aubigné, Hist. universelle, l. iv., c. 6, 7 (i. 211, 212); Castelnau, l. vi., c. 6.
[454] So closely was Paris invested on the north, that, although accompanied by an escort of sixty horse, Castelnau was driven back into the faubourgs when making an attempt by night to proceed by one of the roads leading in this direction. He was then forced to steal down the left bank of the Seine to Poissy, before he could find means to avoid the Huguenot posts. Mémoires, l. vi., c. 6.
[455] Castelnau was instructed to ask for three or four regiments of Spanish or Italian foot, and for two thousand cavalry of the same nations.
[456] I have deemed it important to go into these details, in order to exhibit in the clearest light the insincerity of Philip the Second—a prince who could not be straightforward in his dealings, even when the interests of the Church, to which he professed the deepest devotion, were vitally concerned. My principal authority is the envoy, Michel de Castelnau, liv. vi., c. 6. Alva's letter to Catharine de' Medici, Dec., 1567, Gachard, Correspondance de Philippe II., i. 608, 609, sheds some additional light on the transactions. I need not say that, where Castelnau and Alva differ in their statements, as they do in some essential points, I have had no hesitation in deciding whether the duke or the impartial historian is the more worthy of credit. See, also, De Thou, iii. (liv. xli.) 755.
[457] Mém. de Fr. de la Noue, c. xiv. (Ancienne coll., xlvii. 189); Davila, bk. iv. 116; Agrippa d'Aubigné, Hist. universelle, i. 212, 213; De Thou, iv. 22; Martin, Hist. de France, x. 246. There is some discrepancy in numbers. There is, however, but little doubt that those given in the text are substantially correct. D'Aubigné blunders, and more than doubles the troops of the constable.
[458] Agrippa d'Aubigné relates an incident which has often been repeated. Among the distinguished spectators gathered on the heights of Montmartre, overlooking the plain, was a chamberlain of the Turkish sultan, the same envoy who had been presented to the king at Bayonne. When he saw the three small bodies of Huguenots issue in the distance from Saint Denis, and the three charges, in which so insignificant a handful of men broke through heavy battalions and attacked the opposing general himself, the Moslem, in his admiration of their valor, twice cried out: "Oh, that the grand seignior had a thousand such men as those soldiers in white, to put at the head of each of his armies! The world would hold out only two years against him." Hist. univ., i. 217.
[459] "Autant de volontaires Parisiens bien armez et dorez comme calices." Agrippa d'Aubigné, l. iv., c. 8 (i. 213). "Tenans la bataille desjà achevée, tout ce gros si bien doré print la fuitte." (Ibid., i. 215.)
[460] At Marignano, in 1515.
[461] He was taken prisoner by the Emperor Charles V. at Pavia, in company with Francis I.; at the battle of Saint Quentin, in 1557; and in 1562, at the battle of Dreux, by the Huguenots. It was rather hard that the story should have obtained currency, according to the curé of Mériot, that Constable Montmorency was shot by a royalist, who saw that he was purposely allowing himself to be enveloped by the troops of Condé, in order that he might be taken prisoner, "comme telle avoit jà esté sa coustume en deux batailles!" Mém. de Claude Haton, i. 458.
[462] Even Henry of Navarre, in a letter of July 12, 1569, published by Prince Galitzin (Lettres inédites de Henry IV., Paris, 1860, pp. 4-11) states that he is unable to say whether it was Stuart, "pour n'en sçavoir rien;" but asserts that "il est hors de doubte et assez commung qu'il fut blessé en pleine bataille et combattant, et non de sang froid."
[463] Mémoires de Fr. de la Noue, c. xiv.; Jean de Serres, iii. 137, 138; De Thou, iv. 22, etc.; Agrippa d'Aubigné, Hist. univ., i. 214-217; Castelnau, liv. vi., c. 7; Claude Haton, i. 457; Jean de la Fosse, 88, 89; Charles IX. to Gordes, Nov. 11, 1567, Condé MSS., D'Aumale, i. 564.
[464] "La mort dudit connestable fut plaincte de peu de gens du party des catholicques, à cause de la huguenotterie de l'admiral, du card. de Chastillon, et d'Andelot, ses nepveux, qui estoient, après le Prince de Condé, chefz des rebelles huguenotz françoys et des plus meschant; et avoient plusieurs personnes ceste oppinion du connestable, qu'il les eust bien retirez de ceste rebellion s'il eust voulu, attendu que tous avoient esté avancez en leurs estatz par le feu roy Henry, par son moyen." Claude Haton, i. 458.
[465] Charles IX. to Gordes, Nov. 17, 1567, Condé MSS., Duc d'Aumale, i. 565.
[466] This exposé, committed to writing by the elector palatine's request, and translated for Frederick's convenience into German, is published by Prof. A. Kluckholn, in a monograph read before the Bavarian Academy of Sciences: "Zur Geschichte des angeblichen Bündnisses von Bayonne, nebst einem Originalbericht über die Ursachen des zweiten Religionskriegs in Frankreich." (Abhandlungen, iii. Cl., xi. Bd., i. Abth.) Munich, 1868. The Huguenot envoys were Chastelier Pourtaut de Latour and Francour. The document is probably from the pen of the former (p. 13).
[467] De Thou, iv. 28, 29; Castelnau, liv. vi., c. 8; Jean de Serres, iii. 144, 146. Agrippa d'Aubigné, Hist. univ., i. 217, 218. Wenceslaus Zuleger's Report is printed in full by F. W. Ebeling, Archivalische Beiträge, 48-73, and by A. Kluckholn, Zwei pfälzische Gesandtschaftsberichte, etc. Abhandl. der Bayer. Akad., 1868, 189-205.
[468] It is needless to say that no authentic coins or medals bearing Condé's head, with the designation of "Louis XIII.," have ever been found. After the direct contradiction by Catharine de' Medici, no other testimony is necessary. The Jesuits, however, impudently continued to speak of Condé's treason as an undoubted truth, and even gave the legend of the supposed coin as "Ludovicus XIII., Dei gratia, Francorum Rex primus Christianus." See "Plaidoyé de Maistre Antoine Arnauld, Advocat en Parlement, pour l'Université de Paris ... contre les Jesuites, des 12 et 13 Juillet, 1594." Mémoires de la ligue, 6, 164. Arnauld stigmatizes the calumny as "notoirement fausse."
[469] Frederick, Elector Palatine, to Charles IX., Heidelberg, Jan. 19, 1568. Printed in full in F. W. Ebeling, Archivalische Beiträge, 74-82.
[470] Agrippa d'Aubigné, ubi supra.
[471] November 13th, "Hier au soyr, vers les sept heures," says Charles to Gordes, Nov. 14, 1567, MS. Condé Arch., D'Aumale, i. 565. The king naturally represents the movement as confused—"une bonne fuyte"—and confidently states that he will follow, and, by a second victory, put a speedy end to the war.
[472] Agrippa d'Aubigné, liv. iv., c. 11 (i. 219).
[473] Ibid., i. 219, 220.
[474] La Noue, c. xiv.; De Thou, iv. 37; Jehan de la Fosse, 89, 90; Agrippa d'Aubigné, i. 227. Davila, bk. iv., pp. 119, 120, represents Brissac's attack (which, according to him, was not made till after the expiration of the truce) as a part of a projected general assault. Anjou's main body failed to come up, and so Condé was saved. The blame was thrown on Marshal Gonnor (Cossé) and on M. de Carnavalet, the king's tutor, whom some suspected of unwillingness to allow so much noble blood to be shed. Others accused the one of too much friendship with the Châtillons, the other of a leaning to heresy ("de sentir le fagot") Agrippa d'Aubigné, i. 227. See also Cl. Haton, i. 503. These two noblemen were accused of advocating other designs which were very obnoxious to the Roman Catholic party. "La vérité est," says Jehan de la Fosse, in his journal, p. 90, under date of December, 1567, "que aulcuns grands seigneurs entre lesquels on nomme Gonor [et] Carnavallet donnoient à entendre que si Monsieur, frère du roy, voloit prendre une partie de ces gens et les joindre avec le camp des huguenots, qui [qu'ils] le feroient comte de Flandre."
[475] De Thou, iv. 37-41; Castelnau, liv. vi., c. 8; La Fosse, 91.
[476] Catharine de' Medici to Alva, Dec. 4, 1567, Gachard, Correspondance de Philippe II., i. 607.
[477] Alva to Catharine de' Medici, Dec., 1567, Gachard, Correspondance de Philippe II., i. 608, 609.
[478] It is told of one lackey that he contributed twenty crowns.
[479] The scene is described in an animated manner by François de la Noue, c. xv. (Ancienne Collection, xlvii. 199-201); De Thou, iv. 41. "Marque le lecteur," writes Agrippa d'Aubigné, in his nervous style, "un trait qui n'a point d'exemple en l'antiquité, que ceux qui devoient demander paye et murmurer pour n'en avoir point, puissent et veuillent en leur extreme pauvreté contenter une armée avec 100,000 livres à quoi se monta cette brave gueuserie; argument aux plus sages d'auprès du roi pour prescher la paix; tenans pour invincible le parti qui a la passion pour difference, et pour solde la nécessité." Hist. univ., i. 228. D'Aubigné is mistaken, however, in making the army contribute the entire 100,000. Davila and De Thou say they raised 30,000; La Noue, over 80,000.
[480] Mém. de Fr. de la Noue, c. xv.
[481] Ibid., ubi supra.
[482] Mémoires de Claude Haton, i. 500-503.
[483] Ibid., ii. 517. "Et dès lors fut le pillage mis sus par les gens de guerre des deux partis; et firent tous à qui mieux pilleroit et rançonneroit son hoste, jugeant bien en eux que qui plus en pilleroit plus en auroit. Les gens de guerre du camp catholicque, excepté le pillage des églises et saccagemens des prebstres, estoient au reste aussi meschans, et quasi plus que les huguenotz."
[484] Ménard, Hist. de Nismes, apud Cimber et Danjou, vii. 481, etc.; Bouche, Histoire gén. de Languedoc, v. 276, 277. Prof. Soldan, Geschichte des Protestantismus in Frankreich, ii. 274-276, whose account of an event too generally unnoticed by Protestant historians is fair and impartial, calls attention to the following circumstances, which, although they do not excuse in the least its savage cruelties, ought yet to be borne in mind: 1st, That no woman was killed; 2d, that only those men were killed who had in some way shown themselves enemies of the Protestants; and, 3d, that there is no evidence of any premeditation. To these I will add, as important in contrasting this massacre with the many massacres in which the Huguenots were the victims, the fact that the Protestant ministers not only did not instigate, but disapproved, and endeavored as soon as possible to put an end to the murders.
[485] De Thou, iv. 33-35.
[486] Agrippa d'Aubigné, i. 211.
[487] Henri Martin (Histoire de France, x. 255), on the authority of Coustureau, Vie du duc de Montpensier, states that the Rochellois had, after the peace of 1563, bought from Catharine de' Medici, for 200,000 francs, the suppression of the garrison placed in their city by the Duke of Montpensier, and remarks: "Ces 200,000 francs coutèrent cher!" The authority, however, is very slender in the absence of all corroborative evidence, and Arcère, more than a century ago, showed (Histoire de la Rochelle, i. 625) how improbable, or, rather, impossible the story is. If any gift was made to Catharine by the city, it must have been far less than the sum, enormous for the times and place, of 200,000 crowns; and, at any rate, it could not have been for the purchase of a privilege already enjoyed for hundreds of years. See the illustrative note at the end of this chapter.
[488] Agrippa d'Aubigné, i. 218. "Plus absolument et avec plus d'obeïsance que les Rochellois, qui depuis ont tousjours tenu le parti réformé, n'en ont voulu deferer et rendre aux princes mesmes de leur parti, contre lesquels ils se sont souvent picquez, en resveillant et conservant curieusement leurs privileges."
[489] Others were beaten and banished, and suffered the other penalties denounced by the Edict of Châteaubriant, as Soulier goes on to show with much apparent satisfaction. Hist. des édits, etc., 67, 68. The text of the joint sentence of Couraud, Constantin, and Monjaud is interesting. It is given by Delmas, L'Église réformée de la Rochelle (Toulouse, 1870), pp. 19-25.
[490] Martin, Hist. de France, x. 254.
[491] Agrippa d'Aubigné, ubi supra; Davila, bk. iv. 122; De Thou, iv. 27 seq.; Soulier, 69. According to Arcère, Hist. de la Rochelle, i. 352, the mayor's correct name was Pontard, Sieur de Trueil-Charays.
[492] The commission was dated from Montigny-sur-Aube, January 27, 1568, Soulier, 70. De Thou's expression (ubi supra), "peu de temps après," is therefore unfortunate.
[493] Soulier, Hist. des édits de pacification, 70.
[494] Norris to Queen Elizabeth, January 23, 1568, State Paper Office. I retain the quaint old English form in which Norris has couched the marshal's speech. It is plain, in view of the perfidy proposed by Santa Croce, even in the royal council, that Condé was not far from right in protesting against the proposed limitation of Cardinal Châtillon's escort to twenty horse, insisting "que la qualité de mondict sieur le Cardinal, qui n'a acoustumé de marcher par païs avecques si peu de train, ny son eage (age) ne permectent pas maintenant de commencer." Condé to the Duke of Anjou, Dec. 27, 1567, MS. Bibl. nat., Aumale, Prince de Condé, i. 568.
[495] The "seven viscounts"—often referred to about this period—were the viscounts of Bourniquet, Monclar, Paulin, Caumont, Serignan, Rapin, and Montagut, or Montaigu. They headed the Protestant gentry of the provinces Rouergue, Quercy, etc., as far as to the foot of the Pyrenees. Mouvans held an analogous position in Provence, Montbrun in Dauphiné, and D'Acier, younger brother of Crussol, in Languedoc. Agrippa d'Aubigné, i. 220, 221; De Thou, iv. 33; Duc d'Aumale, Princes de Condé, i. 327. When "the viscounts" consented, at the earnest solicitation of the second Princess of Condé, to part with a great part of their troops, they confided them to Mouvans, Rapin, and Poncenac.
[496] The village of Cognac, or Cognat, near Gannat, in the ancient Province of Auvergne (present Department of Allier), must not, of course, be confounded with the important city of the same name, on the river Charente, nearly two hundred miles further west.
[497] Jean de Serres, iii. 146, 147; De Thou, iv. 48-51; Agrippa d'Aubigné, i. 226.
[498] Opinions differed respecting the propriety of the movement. According to La Noue, Chartres in the hands of the Huguenots would have been a "thorn in the foot of the Parisians;" while Agrippa d'Aubigné makes it "a city of little importance, as it was neither at a river crossing, nor a sea-port;" "but," he adds, "in those times places were not estimated by the standard now in vogue."
[499] "Car encore que les Catholiques estiment les Huguenots estre gens à feu, si sont-il toujours mal pourveus de tels instrumens," etc. Mém. de la Noue, c. xviii. For the siege of Chartres, besides La Noue, see Jean de Serres, iii. 148; De Thou, iv., 51-53; Agrippa d'Aubigné, i. 229-232.
[500] "Ils eussent esté par trop lourds et stupides, s'ils n'en eussent évité la feste."
[501] "Cessons donc de nous esbahir s'ils ont un pied en l'air et l'œil en la campagne."
[502] The whole of this remarkable memorial is inserted in the older Collection universelle de mémoires, xlv. 224-260. Its importance is so great, as reflecting the views of a mind so impartial and liberal as that of Chancellor L'Hospital, that I make no apology for the prominence I have given to it. Besides the omission of much that might be interesting, I have in places rather recapitulated than translated literally the striking remarks of the original.
[503] La Noue, c. xviii.
[504] Castelnau, who was behind the scenes, assures us that had "the Huguenots insisted upon keeping some places in their own hands, for the performance of what was promised, it would have been granted, and, in all probability, have prevented the war from breaking out so soon again," etc. Mém., liv. vi., c. 11.
[505] Jean de Serres, iii. 149-154; De Thou, iv. 54, 55; Davila, bk. iv. 124; Castelnau, ubi supra; Agrippa d'Aubigné, i. 260, etc.
[506] "L'Amiral maintenoit et remonstroit que cette paix n'estoit que pour sauver Chartres, et puis pour assommer separez ceux qu'on ne pourroit vaincre unis." Agrippa d'Aubigné, i. 232.
[507] "Le Prince de Condé plus facile, desireux de la cour, où il avoit laissé quelque semence d'amourettes, se servit de ce que plusieurs quittoient l'armée," etc. Ibid., ubi supra.
[508] La Noue, c. xviii.
[509] La Noue, c. xix.
[510] "La paix fourrée," Soulier, Histoire des édits de pacification, 73. "Ceste meschante petite paix," La Noue, c. xix. Agrippa d'Aubigné, Hist. universelle, i. 260, and, following him, Browning, Hist. of the Huguenots, i. 220, and De Félice, Hist. of the Protestants of France, 190, say that this peace was wittily christened "La paix boiteuse et mal-assise;" but, as we shall see, this designation belongs to the peace of Saint Germain-en-Laye, in 1570, concluding the third religious war.
[511] Leopold Ranke, Civil Wars and Monarchy in France in the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries (New York, 1853), 234.
[512] Norris to Cecil, Paris, March 30, 1568, State Paper Office.
[513] La Noue, c. xviii. (Anc. coll., 214).
[514] A fortnight had not elapsed since the date of the Edict of Pacification when Condé was compelled to call the king's attention to a flagrant outrage committed by Foissy, a royalist, against the Sieur d'Esternay. After having burned Esternay's residence at Lamothe during the preliminary truce, Foissy subsequently to the conclusion of peace returned and completed his work of devastation. Condé to Charles IX., April 5, 1568, MS., Archives du dép. du Nord, apud Duc d'Aumale, i. 572.
[515] "Nous avons fait la folie, ne trouvons donc estrange si nous la beuvons. Toutefois il y a apparence que le breuvage sera amer." La Noue, ubi supra.
[516] De Thou, iv. 55, 56; Jean de Serres, Comm. de statu, etc., iii. 160; Condé's petition of Aug. 23d, ibid., iii. 218; Mém. de Claude Haton, i. 357-359, who, however, makes the singular blunder of placing the incident of Rapin's death after the peace of Amboise in 1563. The curé's description of the zeal of the Toulouse parliament for the Roman Catholic Church confirms everything that Protestant writers have said on the subject: "Laditte court de parlement avoit tousjours résisté à laditte prétendue religion et faict exécuter ceux qui en faisoient profession, nonobstant édict à ce contraire faict en faveur d'iceux huguenotz." See also Raoul de Cazenove, Rapin-Thoyras, sa famille, sa vie, et ses œuvres (Paris, 1866), 47-49—a truly valuable work, and a worthy tribute to a distinguished ancestry.
[517] "Edictum promulgant, hac addita exceptione, Reservatis clausulis quæ secreto Senatus commentario continentur." J. de Serres, iii. 160, 161; De Thou, ubi supra. See the petition of Condé of Aug. 23d. J. de Serres, iii. 220, etc.
[518] Mém. de Claude Haton, ii. 527, etc.
[519] "Sire," said a nobleman, after listening to the arguments against the peace made by some of the remonstrants, and to Charles's replies, "it is too much to undertake to dispute with these canting knaves; it were better to have them strapped in the kitchen by your turnspits." Ibid., ii. 530.
[520] Playing upon the chancellor's name, Sainte Foy, one of the court preachers, exclaimed in the pulpit: "Be not astonished if the Huguenots demolish the churches, for they have turned all France into a hospital instead"—"donnant à entendre que par le chancelier nomme Hospital, la France estoit pauvre, pourtant qu'il a par trop encore de douceur pour les huguenots qui ont ruiné le pais de France." Jehan de la Fosse, 93, 94.
[521] Floquet, Hist. du parlement de Normandie, iii. 36-42.
[522] Mémoires de Claude Haton, ii. 533, 534. Similar regulations were made in many other places "cumplurimis in locis." Jean de Serres, iii. 156.
[523] Jean de Serres, iii. 158, 159.
[524] De Thou, iv. 77, 78; Castelnau, l. vii., c. 1; D'Aubigné, i. 260; La Fosse, 97; Motley, Dutch Republic, ii. 184.
[525] Charles was, however, near experiencing trouble with the reiters of Duke Casimir. He had, by the terms of the agreement with the Huguenots, undertaken to advance the 900,000 francs which were due, and on failing to fulfil his engagements his unwelcome guests threatened to turn their faces toward Paris. Mém. de Castelnau, liv. vi., c. 11. At last, with promises of payment at Frankfort, the Germans were induced to leave France. Du Mont, Corps diplomatique, v. 164, gives a transcript of Casimir's receipt, May 21, 1568, for 460,497 livres, etc.
[526] Mémoires de Castelnau, liv. vi., c. 9, c. 10. Duke John William of Saxe-Weimar was even more vexed at the issue of his expedition than Castelnau himself. It was with difficulty that he could be persuaded to accept an invitation to make a visit to the French court.
[527] Paris MS., apud Soldan, Gesch. des Prot. in Frankreich, ii. 300. Rumor, as is usual in such cases, outstripped even the unwelcome truth, and Norris wrote to Queen Elizabeth that the king had sent secret letters to two hundred and twelve places, charging the governors "to runne uppon them [the Huguenots] and put them to the sword." "Your Majestie will judge," adds Norris, "ther is smale place of surety for them of the Religion, either in towne or felde." Letter of June 4, 1568, apud D'Aumale, Les Princes de Condé, ii. 363, Pièces inédites.
[528] When the Protestants at Rouen begged protection, the king sent four companies of infantry, which the citizens at first refused to admit. At last they were smuggled in by night, and quartered upon the Huguenots. Floquet, Hist. du parlement de Normandie, iii. 43.
[529] Jean de Serres, iii. 157, 158.
[530] Ibid., ubi supra.
[531] Jean de Serres, iii. 161; Soldan, ii. 303.
[532] Soldan, ii. 306.
[533] Letter to Catharine, April 27, 1568, MS., apud Soldan, ii. 303.
[534] Jean de Serres, iii. 163, 164. Petition of Condé of Aug. 23d. Ibid., iii. 215, etc.
[535] MS. Bibl. nat., apud Mém. de Claude Haton, ii. App., 1152, 1153. Less correctly given in Lestoile's Mémoires. The title is "Sermens des Associez de la Ligue Chrestienne et Roiale," and the date is June 25, 1568.
[536] Prof. Soldan is certainly right (ii. 305) in his interpretation of the passage, "tant et si longuement qu'il plaira à Dieu que nous serons par eux régis en nostredicte religion apostolique et romaine," which Ranke (Civil Wars and Monarchy, p. 236), and, following him, Von Polenz (Gesch. des franz. Calvinismus, ii. 361), have construed as referring to "la maison de Valois." Involved as is the phraseology, I do not see how the word "eux" can designate any other person or persons than "ledit sr. lieutenant avec mesditz sieurs de la noblesse de cedit gouvernement et autres associez."
[537] Jean de Serres, iii. 164.
[538] "Den Erfolg des letzten Krieges," well observes Prof. Soldan, "hatten die Hugenotten nicht ihrer Anzahl, sondern der Organisation und dem Geiste ihres Gemeindewesens zu verdanken. Diese bewegliche, weitverzweigte, aus einem festen Mittelpunkte gleichmässig gelenkte und von Eifer für die gemeinsame Sache belebte Vereinsgliederung hatte über den lahmen und stockenden Mechanismus vielfach grösserer, aber in sich selbst uneiniger Kräfte einen beschämenden Triumph erlangt." Geschichte des Protestantismus in Frankreich, ii. 303.
[539] Relations des Amb. Vén., ii. 116.
[540] Cipierre, a young nobleman only twenty-two years of age, was returning, with a body-guard of about thirty-five men, from a visit to his cousin, the duke, at Nice, where he had been treated with great honor. When approaching Fréjus he perceived signs of treachery in a body of men lurking under cover of a grove, and betook himself for safety into the city, now, since his father's death, a part of the province of which his eldest brother was royal governor. The tocsin was rung, and his enemies, originally a band of three hundred men, being swollen by constant accessions to four times that number, the house in which Cipierre had taken refuge was assailed. After a heroic defence the small party of defenders surrendered their arms, on assurance that their opponents would at once retire. The papists, however, scarcely made a pretence of fulfilling their compact, for they speedily returned and massacred every one whom they found in the house. Cipierre himself was not among the number. To secure him a new breach of faith was necessary. The captain of the murderers pledged his own word to the magistrate that if Cipierre would come forth from his hiding-place he would spare his life. He discharged the obligation, so soon as Cipierre presented himself, by plunging a dagger into his breast. J. de Serres, iii. 166-168; Agrippa d'Aubigné, i. 262.
[541] Petition of Condé, Aug. 23, 1568, J. de Serres, iii. 210, 211.
[542] Vie de Coligny (Cologne, 1686), 349, 350; J. de Serres, iii. 166.
[543] Ibid., iii. 165; Recordon, from MSS. of N. Pithou, 155-157; MS. Mém. historiques des Antiquités de Troyes, by Duhalle, apud Bulletin de l'hist. du prot. fr., xvii. (1868) 376. Of the royal edicts guaranteeing the Protestants, the last author remarks that "ils firent plus de bruit que de fruit."
[544] Duc d'Aumale, Princes de Condé, ii. 364, Pièces justificatives.
[545] J. de Serres, iii. 168; Agrippa d'Aubigné, i. 262.
[546] Jean de Serres does not expressly state that he refers to the combatants, but I presume this to be his meaning.
[547] Relazione di Correro, Rel. des Amb. Vén., ii. 120.
[548] "Montauban, etc., faisoient conter les cloux de leurs portes aux garnisons qu'on leur envoyoit." Agrippa d'Aubigné, i. 261. It was the garrisons only that were refused; the royal governors were promptly accepted. M. de Jarnac, for instance, had no difficulty in securing recognition at La Rochelle; but he was not permitted to introduce troops to distress and terrify the citizens. See the letters of the "Maire, Echevins, Conseilliers et Pairs," of La Rochelle to Charles the Ninth, April 21st, June 6th and 30th, etc. Le Laboureur, Add. aux Mém. de Castelnau, ii. 547-551. They deny the slanderous accusation that the Roman Catholics have not been permitted to return since the peace, asserting, on the contrary, that they have greeted them as brethren and fellow-citizens. They appeal to M. de Jarnac himself for testimony to the good order of La Rochelle. "Meanwhile," they say, "we are preserving this city of yours in all tranquillity, and maintain it, under your obedience, with much greater security, devotion, affection, fidelity and loyalty, such as we have received from our predecessors, than would do all others who were strangers and mercenaries, and not its natural subjects and inhabitants." Norris to Queen Elizabeth, June 23, 1568: "The towne of Rochelle hathe now the thirde time bin admonished to render itself to the king." State Paper Office, Duc d'Aumale, ii. 367.
[549] His wife, Charlotte de Laval, whose brave Christian injunctions, as we have seen, decided the reluctant admiral to take up arms in the first religious war (see ante, chapter xiii., p. 35), lay dying of a disease contracted in her indefatigable labors for the sick and wounded soldiers at Orleans, whilst the admiral was at the siege of Chartres. On the conclusion of the peace he hastened to her, but was too late to find her alive. In a touching letter, written to her husband after all hope of seeing him again in this world had fled, a letter the substance of which is preserved by one of his biographers (Vie de Coligny, Cologne, 1686, p. 342), she lamented the loss of a privilege that would have alleviated the sufferings of her last hours, but consoled herself with the thought of the object for which he was absent. She conjured him, by the love he bore her and to her children, to fight to the last extremity for God and religion; warning him, lest through his habitual respect for the king—a respect which had before made him reluctant to take up arms—he should forget the obligations he owed to God as his first Master. She begged him to rear the children she left him in the pure religion, that they might one day be capable of taking his place; and, for their sakes, implored him not to hazard his life unnecessarily. She bade him beware of the house of Guise. "I do not know," she added, "whether I ought to say the same thing of the queen mother, as we are forbidden to judge evil of our neighbor; but she has given so many marks of her ambition that a little distrust is excusable." The earlier biographer of Coligny (Gasparis Colinii Vita, 1575, p. 63, etc.) gives an affecting picture of the deep sorrow and pious resignation of the admiral.
[550] Somewhat hyperbolically, the biographer of the admiral (Vie de Coligny, p. 346) says that the concourse at Châtillon and Noyers was so great that the Louvre was a desert in comparison! When ten gentlemen left by one gate, twenty entered by another. The churches raised a purse of 100,000 crowns, one-half of which was to go to him, and the other half to the Prince of Condé; but, though nearly ruined by the enormous expenses of his hospitality, he declined to receive his portion.
[551] Noyers and Tanlay are ten or twelve miles from each other, in the modern department of the Yonne.
[552] Jean de Serres, ubi supra. Cf. De Thou, iv. 142; Bulletin de la Soc. de l'hist. du prot. fr. (1854), iii. 239. This valuable periodical is mistaken in stating, vii. (1858) 120, that "D'Andelot s'était retiré dans ses terres de Bretagne à la conclusion de la paix." He did not leave Tanlay until after writing the letter referred to below, and shortly before Coligny's arrival: "partant de chez lui, pour se rendre chez son frère Andelot, il trouva qu'il étoit allé en Bretagne." Vie de Coligny, 350. D'Andelot was in Brittany at the outbreak of the third war. His adventures in escaping to La Rochelle will be narrated in the next chapter. Mr. Henry White is, of course, equally wrong when he says (Massacre of St. Bartholomew, New York, 1868, p. 291): "The admiral had gone to this charming retreat [Tanlay], to consult with his brother, to whom it belonged, and who had joined him there," and when he mentions D'Andelot as in the suite of Condé and Coligny in their celebrated flight (p. 292); "besides which, he (the prince) was accompanied by the admiral and his family, by Andelot and his wife," etc.
[553] Lettre de François d'Andelot à la Royne mère du Roy, de Tanlay, co 8me juillet, 1568. MS. Library of Berne. This letter has been twice printed in the Bulletin de la Soc. de l'hist. du prot. français, iv. (1856) 329-331, and vii. (1858) 121-123. The first reproduction is in one important part more correct than the second. It is not impossible, after all, that the author of the letter was not D'Andelot, but his brother, Admiral Coligny himself; for M. J. Tessier mentions (Bulletin, xxii. (1873) 47), that it exists in manuscript in the Paris National Library (MSS. Vc. Colbert, 24, f. 161), in the admiral's own handwriting, and signed with his usual signature, Chastillon. The whole tone, I must confess, seems rather to be his.
[554] Journal d'un curé ligueur (Jehan de la Fosse), 96.
[555] Norris to Queen Elizabeth, May 12, 1568, State Paper Office.
[556] Jean de Serres, iii. 170; Davila, bk. iv. 128; Condé to the king, Noyers, June 11, 1568, MS. Paris Lib., apud D'Aumale, ii. 351-353.
[557] As the prince had described the state of affairs in a letter to the king, of July 22, 1568: "Nous nous voions tuez, pillez, saccagez, les femmes forcées, les filles ravies des mains de leurs pères et mères, les grands mis hors de leurs charges," etc. All this injustice had been committed with complete impunity. In fact, to use his own forcible words, were the king to attempt to punish the outrages done to the Protestants, "the trees in France would have more men than leaves upon them"—"tous les arbres seroient plus couvertz d'hommes que de feuilles." MS. Paris Lib., apud D'Aumale, ii. 355, 356.
[558] J. de Serres, iii. 171-173; Davila, bk. iv. 128.
[559] The Bulletin de la Soc. de l'hist. du prot. français, ix. (1860) 217-219, published from MSS. in the Library of the British Museum, the letter of Charles the Ninth to the first president of the Parisian parliament, dated "du château de Bolongne, ce premier jour d'aoust," enclosing the formula. The pretext is "afin d'oster tout ce doubte et différend qui règne aujourd'huy parmi nos subjectz." The president is to associate with himself the seigneur de Nantouillet, provost of the city, and the seigneur de Villeroy, "prévôt des marchands."
[560] Bulletin, etc., ix. (1860) 218, 219; Jean de Serres, iii. 175, etc.
[561] Jean de Serres (Comm. de statu rel. et reipublicæ, iii. 174-183) inserts the reply of the Protestants to the proposed oath, article by article.
[562] Built by Francis I., and so named because constructed on the plan of the palace in which he lived when a captive in Spain.
[563] It is true the writer carefully avoids mentioning the cardinal's name, but there is no difficulty in discovering that he is intended.
[564] "Uti nimirum detur opera ut vires penes Regem sint, primoresque religionis illius occupentur, omnes conveniendi rationes illis demantur: ut ad illas angustias redacti, quemadmodum facillimum erit, possit hujusmodi colluvies regi regnoque adversaria, plane pessundari, omnesque adeo reliquiæ profligari: quoniam semen profecto esset in dies egerminaturum, nisi ea ratio observaretur, cujus a vicinis nostris adeo luculenta exempla demonstrentur." Jean de Serres, iii. 187.
[565] The letter is given entire, with the exception of some matters of no general interest, in the valuable chronicle of this period, by Jean de Serres (s. l. 1571), iii. 185-190.
[566] "Hæc sunt propemodum ipsa illius verba, quæ conatus sum memoriæ mandare, ut possem ad te de rerum omnium statu certius perscribere." Ib., iii. 188.
[567] "Et quoniam tunc vehementius quam assuevisset, rem illam mihi commemoravit, et fortasse regis domini sui, qui ibi tunc erat, mandatu, volui hac de causa te istarum rerum facere certiorem."
[568] This letter, which was also intercepted by the Huguenots, is preserved by Jean de Serres, iii. 184, 185. It bears unmistakable marks of authenticity.
[569] Condé himself alludes to these words of Charles the Ninth to his mother, in his letter of August 23d. Referring to the king's aversion to a resort to violence, he says: "Quod mihi repetitis literis sæpissime demonstrasti, et nuper quidem Reginæ matri, ex eo sermone quem cum illa habebas, quo significabas quantum odiosa tibi esset turbarum renovatio cum nimirum illam orabas, daret operam ut omnia pacificarentur, efficeretque ne rursus ad bella civilia rediretur, quæ non possent non extremum exitium afferre." Jean de Serres, iii, 193.
[570] Letter apud J. de Serres, iii. 188-190.
[571] De Thou, iii. 136; Castelnau, liv. vii., c. 1, where the sum is erroneously trebled; Davila, bk. iv., p. 130. See also Soldan, ii., 324, and Von Polenz, ii. 365.
[572] Norris, in a letter to Cecil, Sept. 25, 1568, gives almost the very words of the angry contestants. State Paper Office.
[573] Davila, bk. iv. 130; De Thou, iv. (liv. xliv.) 136.
[574] Ranke, Civil Wars and Monarchy in France, 236, 237.
[575] Davila and De Thou, ubi supra. De Thou seems certainly to be wanting in his accustomed accuracy when he represents—iv. (liv. xliv.) 136, 137—the submission of the test-oath to the Protestants as posterior to, and consequent upon the fall of L'Hospital: "La reine délivrée du Chancelier, et n'ayant plus personne qui s'opposât à ses volontés, ne songea plus qu'à brouiller les affaires, etc." I have shown that the papal bull which L'Hospital opposed was dated at Rome on the same day (August 1, 1568) on which Charles sent his orders to the president of the Parisian parliament to administer the oath to the Protestants of the capital. Yet, as early as on the 12th of May, 1568, the English ambassador, Norris, wrote to Cecil that Anjou, a cruel enemy of the Protestants, had a privy council of which Cardinal Lorraine was the "chiefest" member, and his own chancellor, who sealed everything submitted to him, "which thing he [the good olde chauncelor of the Kinges] hathe so to harte as he is retirid him to his owne house in the towne of Paris; and wheras the King's chauncelor I meane, who nether for love nor dread wolde seal enything against the statutes of the realme, or that might be prejudiciall to the same, this of Mr. d'Anjou's refusithe nothing that is proferid to him." State Paper Office, Duc d'Aumale, ii. 360.
[576] Jean de Serres, iii. 191; Davila, bk. iv., p. 128.
[577] See Soldan, Gesch. des Prot. in Frankreich, ii. 327, note 63. Yet Condé himself, shortly before the flight from Noyers, expressed himself in strikingly confident terms as to Tavannes's probity. In a letter to the king, complaining of the treacherous plots formed against himself, July 22, 1568, the prince says he is sure that Tavannes is not privy to these designs, "car je le cognois de trop longue main ennemy de ceulx qui ne veullent qu'entretenir les troubles. Parquoy je croy que cecy se faict à son desceu." MS. Paris Lib., apud D'Aumale, ii. 356.
[578] "Le cerf est aux toiles, la chasse est préparée." See Anquetil, Esprit de la ligue, i. 278.
[579] "Turbarum causas imputamus adversario illi tuo ac tuæ dignitatis hosti Cardinali Lotharingo et sociis, quorum nimirum pravis consiliis et arcta necessitudine et familiaritate quam cum Hispano habent, dissensiones et simultates inter tuos subjectos ab hinc sex annis continuantur, et misere foventur atque aluntur per cædes atque strages, quæ ipsorum nutu quotidie ubique perpetrantur." Jean de Serres, iii. 194. "Impurusne Presbyter, tigris, tyrannus," etc., ibid., iii. 196. "Cardinalis Lotharingus, quasi sicariorum ac prædorum patronus," etc., ibid., iii., 210.
[580] "Quodnam item de illo judicium tulerit Cæsar Maximilianus hodie imperans, cum ad te prescripsit, omnia bella et omnes dissensiones, quæ inter Christianos hodie vagantur, proficisci a Granvellano et Lotharingo Cardinalibus." Jean de Serres, iii. 234.
[581] This petition or protestation of Condé is among the longest public papers of the period, occupying not less than forty-three pages of the invaluable Commentarii de statu religionis et reipublicæ of Jean de Serres. It well repays an attentive perusal, for it contains, in my judgment, the most important and authentic record of the sufferings of the Huguenots during the peace. The reader will notice that I have made great use of its authority in the preceding narrative.
[582] Jean de Serres, iii. 241.
[583] The place is sufficiently designated by Ag. d'Aubigné (Hist. univ., i. 263) "à Bonni près Sancerre;" by Jean de Serres (iii. 242) "ad Sangodoneum vicum (Saint Godon) qui tribus ferme milliaribus distat ab ea fluminis parte, qua transiit Condæus;" by Hotman, Gasparis Colinii Vita, 1575 (p. 68), "ad flumen accessit, quo Sancerrani collis radices alluuntur," and by the "Vie de Coligny" (p. 351), "vis à vis de Sancerre." It will surprise no one accustomed to the uncertainties and perplexities of historical investigation, that while one author, quoted by Henry White (Mass. of St. Bartholomew, 292), puts the crossing "near les Rosiers, four leagues below Saumur," Davila (p. 129) places it at Roanne. The two spots are, probably, not less than 230 miles apart in a straight line.
[584] See De Thou, etc.
[585] Recueil des choses mém. (Hist. des Cinq Rois), 336. The Life of Coligny (1575), p. 68, states that the rise took place within three hours after the Huguenots crossed.
[586] Jean de Serres, iii. 192, and De Thou, iv. (liv. xliv.) 140. The dates of Condé's departure from Tanlay and arrival at La Rochelle are, as usual, given differently by other authorities.