FOOTNOTES:
[1079] Charles IX. to Mondoucet, August 26th, Compte rendu de la com. roy. d'histoire, Brussels, 1852, iv. 344.
[1080] "Estant croiable que ce feu ainsy allumé ira courant par toutes les villes de mon royaume, lesquelles, à l'exemple de ce qui s'est faict en cestedite ville, s'assureront de tous ceulx de ladite religion." Charles to Mondoucet, Aug. 26th, ubi supra, iv. 345
[1081] "Car puisqu'il a pleu à Dieu conduire les choses ès termes où elles sont, je ne veulx négliger l'occasion, non seulement pour remectre, s'il m'est possible, ung perpétuel repos en mon royaume, mais aussy servir à la chrestienté."
[1082] "Au surplus, quelque commandement verbal que j'aye peu faire à ceulx que j'aye envoyé tant devers vous que autres gouverneurs ... j'ay révocqué et révocque tout celà, ne voulant que par vous ne autres en soit aucune chose exécuté." Charles IX. to Mandelot, Governor of Lyons, Correspondance, etc. (Paris, 1830), 53, 54; the same to the Mayor of Bourges, Mém. de l'estat (Archives curieuses), vii. 313. The variations of language are trifling.
[1083] He seems at this time to have been at his castle of Montsoreau, situated six or seven miles above Saumur, on the left bank of the Loire, and within a short distance of Candes. M. de Montsoreau himself is described as "gentilhomme de Poictou fort renommé pour beaucoup de pillages et violences, qui finalement luy ont fait perdre la vie, ayant esté tué depuis en qualité de meurtrier." Mém. l'estat, 349.
[1084] These letters, and some others relating to the massacre at Angers, contained in the archives of the municipality, are printed in the Bulletin de la Soc. de l'hist. du prot. français, xi. (1862) 120-124.
[1085] I know, however, of no letters of this kind signed by Charles IX. himself. They all seem to have been written by his inferior agents, such as Puigaillard in the case of Saumur, or Masso and Rubys in that of Lyons. The advantage of this course was apparent. The king could not be proved to have ordered any massacre; he could throw off the responsibility upon others. On the other hand, such politic governors as Mandelot were naturally reluctant to act upon instructions which could at any moment be disavowed. The verbal messages of Charles himself would seem, from the Mandelot correspondence, to have been less definite—perhaps going to no greater lengths than to order the arrest of the persons and the sequestration of the effects of the Huguenots. May we not naturally suppose that the king and his council counted upon such subsequent massacres of the imprisoned Protestants as occurred in many places?
[1086] Mémoires de l'estat, 132, 133. Compare De Thou, iv. (liv. lii.) 601.
[1087] Relation of Olaegui, Simancas MSS., Bulletins de l'académie royale de Belgique, xvi. (1849) 254, 255.
[1088] The names of nine are given. Archives curieuses, vii. 264.
[1089] The procureur Cosset did not neglect his own interests, if, as we are informed, his house and courtyard were so full of stolen furniture that it was scarcely possible to enter the premises.
[1090] Mémoires de l'estat, apud Archives curieuses, vii. 261-270.
[1091] See ante, chapter xviii., p. 432.
[1092] Recordon, le Protestantisme en Champagne (from the MSS. of N. Pithou, seigneur de Chamgobert), Paris, 1863, 174-192; Mém. de l'estat, Archives curieuses, vii. 271-292.
[1093] Dr. Henry White, besides mistaking the Huguenot for the Papist, has incorrectly stated the circumstances. Massacre of St. Bartholomew, 450. See Mém. de l'estat, ubi supra, 295, and De Thou, iv. (liv. lii.) 601.
[1094] Mémoires de l'estat, ubi supra, 295. "Le mesme fut fait à Paris et en d'autres lieux aussi," writes the same historian.
[1095] Ibid., ubi supra.
[1096] Ibid., 296.
[1097] Mémoires de l'estat de France, ubi supra, 297.
[1098] Mém. de l'estat, 298, 299.
[1099] Ibid., 299, 300.
[1100] A horrible story is told of the discovery of some human relics several weeks later. Ibid., 305.
[1101] See ante, p. 502.
[1102] Mém. de l'estat, 309-315.
[1103] Mém. de l'estat, ubi supra, 349-351. "Puigaillard ... homme au reste indigne de vivre pour l'acte détestable par luy commis en la personne de sa première femme tuée à sa sollicitation pour en espouser une autre qu'il entretenoit." (P. 351.)
[1104] Registres consulaires, apud "La Saint-Barthélemy à Lyon et le gouverneur Mandelot," by M. Puyroche, p. 311. This monograph which I quote from the Bulletin de la Soc. de l'hist. du prot. français, in which it first appeared (vol. xviii., 1869, pp. 305-323, 353-367, and 401-420), is by far the most accurate and complete treatise on this subject, and contains a fund of fresh information based upon unpublished manuscripts, especially the local records.
[1105] Charles IX. to Mandelot, Aug. 22, 1572, Correspondance du roi Charles IX. et du sieur de Mandelot, published by P. Paris, 1830 (pp. 36, 37). A portion of this letter has already been given.
[1106] Charles IX. to Mandelot, Aug. 24, 1572, Correspondance, etc., 39-42.
[1107] "Monsieur de Mandelot, vous croirez le present porteur de ce que je luy ay donné charge de vous dire." Ibid., 42.
[1108] "Suivant icelles (the king's letters of Aug. 22d and 24th) et ce que le sieur du Perat m'auroit dict de sa part, je n'auroit failly pourveoir par toutz moyens à la seureté de ceste ville: sy bien, Sire, que et les cors (corps) et les biens de ceulx de la relligion auroient esté saisiz et mis soubz votre main sans aucun tumulte ny scandale." Mandelot to Charles IX., Sept. 2, 1572, Correspondance, etc., 45.
[1109] Puyroche, 319.
[1110] "Il n'était pas d'avis," dit-il, "que tout le peuple s'en mêlat, craignant quelque désordre, mêmement un sac." Puyroche, 320.
[1111] "Quelques deux cens," says Mandelot to Charles IX., Sept. 2d; but he was anxious to make the number as small as possible. Jean de Masso, "receveur général" (Sept. 1st), says, "sept à huit vingt," and sieur Talaize (Sept. 2d), "deux cent soixante et trois." So also Coste (Sept. 3d). Puyroche, 365, 366.
[1112] Mandelot tells Charles IX. (Sept. 17th) that he had sent all the poorer Huguenots to other prisons; that he had left here only the rich and those who had borne arms for the Protestant cause. To exhibit his own incorruptibility, he added that there were among them, of his own certain knowledge, at least twenty who would have paid a ransom of thirty thousand or even forty thousand crowns, "qui estoit assez," he significantly adds, "pour tenter ung homme corruptible." Correspondance du roi Charles IX. et du Sieur de Mandelot, 71, 72.
[1113] Correspondance, etc., p. 46, 47.
[1114] Puyroche, La Saint-Barthélemy à Lyon et le gouverneur Mandelot, ubi supra; Mém. de l'estat, ubi supra, 321-343; Crespin, Hist. des martyrs, 1582, p. 725, etc., apud Époques de l'église de Lyon (Lyon, 1827), 173-185; De Thou, iv. (liv. lii.) 602-604, etc.; Jean de Serres (1575), iv., fol. 45, etc. The number of Huguenots killed is variously estimated, by some as high as from twelve hundred to fifteen hundred (Crespin, ubi supra). It must have been not less than seven hundred or eight hundred; for private letters written immediately after the occurrence by prominent and well-informed Roman Catholics state it at about seven hundred, and they would certainly not be inclined to exaggerate. The rumor at Paris even then set it at twelve hundred. See the letters in Puyroche, 365-367. Among the one hundred and twenty-three names that have been preserved, the most interesting is that of Claude Goudimel, who set Marot's and Beza's psalms to music, and who was killed by envious rivals. At the time of his death he was engaged in adapting the psalms to a more elaborate arrangement, according to a contemporary writer: "Excellent musicien, et la mémoire duquel sera perpétuelle pour avoir heureusement besogné les psaumes de David en français, la plupart desquels il a mis en musique en forme de motets à quatre, cinq, six et huit parties, et sans la mort eût tôt après rendu cette œuvre accomplie." Sommaire et vrai discours de la Félonie. etc, Puyroche, 402.
[1115] "Faisant cependant contenir ce peuple par toutes les remontrances et raisons que je puis leur persuader de ne s'émouvoir à aucune sedition ni tumulte, comme je m'aperçois qu'il y en peut avoir quelque danger auquel toutes fois j'espère prévenir." Mandelot to Charles IX., Aug. 31, 1572, Puyroche, 356. This letter is not contained in Paulin Paris, Correspondance de Charles IX. et du sieur de Mandelot.
[1116] Mém. de l'estat, 330; De Thou, iv. (liv. lii.) 603.
[1117] "Je ne veulx estre le premier à en demander à votre Majesté; m'asseurant que si elle a commencé par quelques autres, elle me faict tant d'honneur de ne m'oblier (oublier)." Mandelot to Charles IX., September 2, 1572, Correspondance, p. 49. I find the clearest evidence both of Mandelot's having had no hand in the massacres of August 31st, and of his utter want of principle, in the craven apology he makes, in his letter of September 17th, for not having done more, on the ground that he only knew his Majesty's pleasure as it were in a shadow, and very late, and that he had rather feared the king would be angry at what the people had done, than that so little had been done! "La pouvant asseurer sur ma vie que si elle n'a esté satisfaitte en ce faict icy, je n'en ay aucune coulpe, n'ayant sceu quelle estoit sa volunté que par umbre, encores bien tard et à demy; et ay craint, Sire, que votre Majesté fust plustost courroucée de ce que le peuple auroit faict, que de trop peu, d'aultant que par toutes les autres provinces circonvoysines il ne s'est rien touché." Correspondance, etc., 72, 73.
[1118] It is given word for word, from the MS. registers of the parliament, by Floquet, Hist. du parlement de Normandie, iii. 81-85.
[1119] Ante, chapter xvii., p. 374.
[1120] "Encor qu'il se soit tousjours monstré fort peu amy de telles inhumanitez." Mémoires de l'estat, 371.
[1121] "Receut lettres du Roy qui luy mandoit et commandoit expressément d'exterminer tous ceux qui faisoyent profession de la religion audit lieu, sans en excepter aucun." Mém. de l'estat, Arch. cur., vii. 370.
[1122] Ibid., 371.
[1123] "Il n'y a aultre que vous," said they, "qui puisse commander aux armes céans, contenir le peuple en l'obéissance au roy, et la ville en paix." Reg. secr. du parlement, 9 Septembre, 1572, apud Floquet, 120. See also Reg. de l'hôtel-de-ville de Rouen, 7 Septembre, ibid.
[1124] Floquet, 122.
[1125] Mém. de l'estat, apud Archives curieuses, vii. 373.
[1126] Mémoires de l'estat, apud Arch. curieuses, vii. 372; Floquet, iii. 127. Floquet is incorrect in stating that the names of only about a hundred are known. We have (Mém. de l'estat. Archives curieuses, vii. 372-378) a partial list of 186 men, whose names and trades are generally given, and of 33 women—that is 219, besides a reference to many others whose names the writer did not obtain.
[1127] "Les autres estoyent accommodez à coups de dague. Les massacreurs usoyent de ce mot accommoder, l'accommodans à leur bestiale et diabolique cruauté." Mém. de l'estat, ubi sup., 372.
[1128] Mém. de l'estat, ubi sup., 378.
[1129] Ibid., 379. The story of the massacre is well told in the Mém. de l'estat, and by M. Floquet, whose original sources of information throw a flood of light upon the transactions; also by De Thou, iv. (liv. lii.) 606; Agrippa d'Aubigné, ii. 27; Jean de Serres (1575), iv., fol. 50.
[1130] One of them, Jean Coras, had committed an unpardonable offence. When passing in 1562 with the Protestant army through Roquemadour, in the province of Quercy, he had taken advantage of the opportunity to examine the relics of St. Amadour, of whom the monks boasted that they possessed not only the bones, but also some of the flesh. He was never forgiven for having exhibited the close resemblance of the holy remains to a shoulder of mutton. De Thou, iv. 606, note.
[1131] Mém. de l'estat, Archives curieuses, vii. 381-385; De Thou, ubi supra; Agrippa d'Aubigné, ii. 27, 28 (liv. i., c. 5); Jean de Serres (1575), iv., fol. 50.
[1132] President Lagebaston even says that, had this been suffered to go on a week longer—so rapidly were the Protestants flocking to the mass—there would not have been eight Huguenots in town.
[1133] Registers of Parliament, in Boscheron des Portes, Hist. du parl. de Bordeaux (Bordeaux, 1877), i. 241.
[1134] Letter of President Lagebaston to Charles IX., October 7, 1572, Mackintosh, Hist. of England, iii., App. E, 351-353. See also De Thou, iv. 651, 652, and Agrippa d'Aubigné, ii. 27. Lagebaston was "first president" of the Bordalese parliament, but, so far from being able to prevent the massacre, received information that his own name was on Montferrand's list, and fled to the castle of Ha, whence he wrote to the king. His remonstrances against a butchery based upon a pretended order which was not exhibited, his delineation of the impolitic and disgraceful work, and his reasons why an execution, that might have been necessary to crush a secret conspiracy at Paris, was altogether unnecessary in a city "six or seven score leagues distant," where there could be no thought of a conspiracy, render his letter very interesting.
[1135] Registres du Parlement, Boscheron des Portes, i. 246, 247.
[1136] Boscheron des Portes, ubi supra.
[1137] Claude Haton waxes facetious when describing the sudden popularity acquired by the sign of the cross, and the numbers of rosaries that could be seen in the hands, or tied to the belt, of fugitive Huguenot ladies.
[1138] Tocsain contre les massacreurs, 156. See ante, chapter xviii., p. 491.
[1139] De Félice, Hist. of the Protestants of France (New York, 1859), 214, and Henry White, 455, from Maimbourg, Histoire du Calvinisme, 486. I refer the reader to Mr. L. D. Paumier's exhaustive discussion of the story in his paper, "La Saint-Barthélemy en Normandie," Bulletin de la Soc. de l'hist. du prot. français, vi. (1858), 466-470. Mr. Paumier has also completely demolished the scanty foundation on which rested the similar story told of Sigognes, Governor of Dieppe, pp. 470-474. See also M. C. Osmont de Courtisigny's monograph, "Jean Le Hennuyer et les Huguenots de Lisieux en 1572," in the Bulletin, xxvi. (1877) 145, etc.
[1140] Tocsain contre les massacreurs, 156; Odolant Desnos, Mémoires historiques sur la ville d'Alençon, ii. 285, apud Bulletin de la Soc. de l'hist. du prot. français, viii. (1859), 68. The truth of the story as to Alençon seems to be proved by the circumstance that when, in February, 1575, Matignon marched against Alençon, in order to suppress the conspiracy which the duke, Charles's youngest brother, had entered into to prevent Henry of Anjou from succeeding peaceably to the throne of France, the grateful Protestants at once opened their gates to him. Ibid., 305, Bulletin, ubi supra.
[1141] Tocsain, 156.
[1142] "Par lesquelles vous me mandez n'avoir receu aucun commandement verbal de moy, ains seulement mes lettres du 22, 24 et 28 du passé, dont ne vous mettrez en aucune peine, car elles s'adressoyent seulement à quelques-uns qui s'estoyent trouvez près de moy." Charles IX. to Gordes, Sept. 14, 1572, Archives curieuses, vii. 365, 366.
[1143] Ibid., 367, 368.
[1144] Mémoires de l'estat, Archives curieuses, vii. 366, 367; De Thou, iv. 605. The Tocsain contre les massacreurs, however, p. 156, gives credit instead to M. de Carces.
[1145] Dr. White has shown some reasons for doubting the accuracy of the story. Among the Dulaure MSS. is preserved a full account of the manner in which a Protestant, fleeing from Paris, fell in with the messenger who was carrying the order to St. Hérem or Héran, and robbed him of his instructions. The Protestant hastened on to warn his brethren of their danger, while the messenger could only relate to the governor the contents of the lost despatch. Notwithstanding this, eighty Huguenots were murdered in one city (Aurillac) of this province. Massacre of St. Bartholomew, 454, 455.
[1146] Adiram d'Aspremont.
[1147] Agrippa d'Aubigné, Hist. univ., ii. 28 (liv. i., c. 5). The authenticity of this letter has been much disputed, partly because of the Viscount's severe and cruel character (which, however, D'Aubigné himself notices when he tells the story), partly because it rests on the sole authority of D'Aubigné. It is to be observed, however, that although he alone relates it, he alludes to it in several of his works, as e.g., in his Tragiques. But the truth of the incident is apparently placed beyond all legitimate doubt by its intimate and necessary connection with an event which D'Aubigné narrates considerably later in his history, and from personal knowledge. Hist. univ., ii. 291, 292 (liv. iii., c. 13). In 1577, D'Aubigné, having lost much of Henry of Navarre's favor through his fidelity or his bluntness (see Mém. de d'Aubigné, éd. Panth., p. 486), retired from Nérac to the neighboring town of Castel-jaloux, of which he was in command. Making a foray at the head of a small detachment of Huguenot soldiers, he fell in with and easily routed a Roman Catholic troop, consisting of a score of light horsemen belonging to Viscount D'Orthez, and a number of men raised at Bayonne and Dax, who were conducting three young ladies condemned at Bordeaux to be beheaded. The vanquished Roman Catholics threw themselves on the ground and sued for mercy. On hearing who they were, D'Aubigné called to him all those who came from Bayonne and then cried out to his followers to treat the rest in memory of the massacre in the prisons of Dax. The Huguenots needed no further reminder. It was not long before they had cut to pieces the twenty-two men from Dax who had fallen into their hands. On the other hand they restored to the soldiers of Bayonne their horses and arms, and, after dressing their wounds in a neighboring village, sent them home to tell their governor, Viscount D'Orthez, "that they had seen the different treatment the Huguenots accorded to soldiers and to hangmen." A week later, a herald from Bayonne arrived at Castel-jaloux, with worked scarfs and handkerchiefs for the entire Huguenot band. Nor did the exchange of courtesies end here. The mad notion seized Henry of Navarre to accept an invitation to a feast extended to him by the Bayonnese. Six Huguenots accompanied him, of whom D'Aubigné was one. The table was sumptuous, the presents were rare and costly. D'Aubigné being recognized, was overwhelmed with thanks, "his courtesy being much more liberally repaid than he had deserved;" while the King of Navarre and his Huguenots, at the table, "at the expense of the rest of France, extolled to heaven the rare and unexampled act and glory of the men of Bayonne." It is certainly an easier supposition that D'Aubigné has faithfully reproduced D'Orthez's letter to Charles IX., than that he has manufactured so long and consistent a story. The discussion in the Bulletin de la Soc. de l'histoire du prot. franç. is full, xi. 13-15, 116, etc., xii. 240.
[1148] Letter of Louis de Bourbon, Duke of Montpensier, Aug. 26th (it should evidently be the 25th; for the Duke speaks of Coligny as killed "ledit jour d'hier," and the mythical Huguenot plot was to have been executed "hier ou aujourd'hui"). Bulletin de la Soc. de l'hist. du prot. fr., i. (1852) 60, and Soldan, Geschichte des Prot. in Frankreich, ii., App., 599.
[1149] The words are those of an inscription of the seventeenth or the early part of the eighteenth century, in the Hôtel de Ville of Nantes. Bulletin, i. (1852) 61.
[1150] Mém. de l'estat, Archives cur., vii. 385, 386.
[1151] See a table in White, Massacre of St. Bartholomew, 461.
[1152] Narrative appended to Capilupi, Stratagema di Carlo IX. (1574). The cardinal's adulatory letter to Charles IX., on receipt of the king's missive, is strongly corroborative of the view to which everything forces us, that the massacre was not long definitely premeditated. "Sire," he said, "estant arrivé le sieur de Beauville avecques lettres de Vostre Majesté, qui confirmoyent les nouvelles des tres-crestiennes et héroicques délibération et exéquutions faictes non-seulement à Paris, mais aussi partout voz principales villes, je m'asseure qu'il vous plaira bien me tant honorer ... que de vous asseurer que entre tous voz très humbles subjects, je ne suis le dernier à an (en) louer Dieu et à me resjouir. Et véritablement, Sire, c'est tout le myeus (mieux) que j'eusse osé jamais désirer ni espérer. Je me tienz asseuré que des ce commencement les actions de Vostre Majesté accroistront chacung jour à la gloire de Dieu et à l'immortalité de vostre nom," etc. Card. Lorraine to the king, Rome, Sept. 10, 1572, MSS. Nat. Library, apud Lestoile, éd. Michaud et Poujoulat, 25, 26, note.
[1153] Conjouissance de Mr. le Cardinal de Lorraine, au nom du Roy, faicte au Pape, le vije jour de sept. 1572, sur la mort de l'Admiral et ses complices. Correspondance diplom. de La Mothe Fénélon, vii. 341, 342. Also Jean de Serres (1575) iv., fol. 56, and in a French translation appended to Capilupi, Lo stratagema di Carlo IX. (1574), 111-113, and reproduced in Mém. de l'estat, Arch, cur., vii. 360.
[1154] "Literis romanis aureis majusculis descriptum, festa fronte velatum, ac lemniscatum, et supra limen aedis Sancti Ludovici Romæ affixum."
[1155] The genuineness of this medal, in spite of the clumsy attempts made to discredit it, is established beyond all possible doubt. The Jesuit Bonanni, in his "Numismata Pontificum" (2 vols. fol., Rome, 1689), has figured and described it as No. 27 of the medals of Gregory XIII. A translation of his account and a facsimile of the medal may be seen in the Bulletin de la Société de l'hist. du prot. français, i. (1852) 240-242. It is also admirably represented in the Trésor de Numismatique (Delaroche, etc., Paris, 1839), Médailles des papes, plate 15, No. 8. The late Alexander Thomson, Esq., of Banchory, Aberdeenshire, purchased at the papal mint in the city of Rome, in 1828 or 1829, among other medals for which he applied, not less than seven copies of this medal, six of them struck off expressly for him from the original die still in possession of the mint. See his own account, given in his Memoir by Professor Smeaton, and reproduced in the New York Evangelist of October 17, 1872.
[1156] Recueil des lettres missives de Henri IV., i. 36.
[1157] See Pistolesi, Il Museo Vaticano descritto ed illustrato (Roma, 1838) vol. viii. 97. There are three paintings, of which the first represents "the King of France sitting in parliament, and approving and ordering that the death of Gaspard Coligny, Grand Admiral of France, and declared to be head of the Huguenots, be registered." "The mischance of Coligny is delineated in the following picture in a spacious square, among many heads of streets (capistrade) and façades of temples. The admiral, clothed in the French costume of that period, is carried in the arms of several military men; although lifeless (estinto, read rather, faint), he still preserves in his countenance threatening and terrible looks." The third is the massacre of St. Bartholomew's day itself, in which the beholder scarcely knows which to admire most, the artistic skill of the painter, or his success in bringing into a narrow compass so many of the most revolting incidents of the tragedy—the murder of men in the streets, the butchery of helpless and unoffending women, the throwing of Coligny's remains from the window of his room, etc. Dr. Henry White gives a sketch of this painting, taken from De Potter's Lettres de Pie V. Of the fresco representing the wounding of Coligny there is an engraving in Pistolesi, ubi supra, vol. viii. plate 84. By an odd mistake, both the text and the index to the plates, make this belong to the reconciliation of Frederick Barbarossa and the pontificate of Alexander III.—on what grounds it is hard to imagine. The character of the wound of the person borne in the arms of his companions, indicated by the loss of two fingers of his right hand, from which the blood is seen to be dropping, leaves no doubt that he is the Admiral Coligny. Unfortunately, Pistolesi's splendid work is disfigured by other blunders, or typographical errors, equally gross. In describing other paintings of the same Sala Regia (pp. 95, 96), he assigns, or is made by the types to assign, various events in the quarrel of Barbarossa and Adrian IV. and Alexander III., to the years 1554, 1555, 1577, etc.
[1158] Ferralz to Charles IX., Rome, Sept. 11, 1572, apud North British Review, Oct., 1869, p. 31.
[1159] Prospero Count Arco to the emperor, Rome, Nov. 15, 1572, ubi supra.
[1160] "Il pontefice, e universalmente tutta d'Italia grandemente se ne rallegrò, facendo pardonare cotale effetto al Re e alla Reina, che molte cose avevano sostenuto di fare in benefizio di quella parte." G. B. Adriani, Istoria de' suoi tempi, ii. 378.
[1161] Cuñiga to Philip, Sept. 8th, Simancas MSS. Gachard, Bull. de l'acad. de Bruxelles, xvi. 249, 250.
[1162] "A. N. S. mi faccia gratia di basciar i piedi in nome mio, col quale mi rallegro con le viscere del cuore che sia piaciuto alla Dva. Msa. d'incaminar, nel principio del suo pontificato, si felicemente e honoratamente le cose di questo regno." Salviati to Card. sec. of State, Aug. 24, Mackintosh, iii., App. G., p. 355.
[1163] "Non si risolvo a credere che si fusse fatto tanto a un pezzo." Ibid., ubi supra.
[1164] "De quoy nous aseurons que en leoures Dieu aveques nous, tant pour nostre particulier coment pour le bien qui en reviendré à toute la cretienté et au service et honeur et gloyre de Dieu," etc.
[1165] "Et randons par cet ayfect le temognage de nos bonnes et droyctes yntantions, cor ne les avons jeamés eu aultre que tendant à son honneur," etc. Letter of Catharine de' Medici to Philip II., Aug. 28, 1572, in Musée des archives nationales; documents originaux de l'hist. de France, exposés dans l'Hôtel Soubise (published by the Gen. Directory of the Archives, 1872), p. 392.
[1166] Philip had evidently no intimation that a massacre was in contemplation. When Mr. Motley says (United Netherlands, i. 15): "It is as certain that Philip knew beforehand, and testified his approbation of the massacre of St. Bartholomew, as that he was the murderer of Orange," the statement must be interpreted in accordance with that other statement in the same author's earlier work (Rise of the Dutch Republic, ii. 388): "The crime was not committed with the connivance of the Spanish government. On the contrary, the two courts were at the moment bitterly opposed to each other," etc. As the eminent historian can scarcely be supposed to contradict himself on so important a point, we must understand him to mean that Philip had, indeed, long since instigated Catharine and her son to rid themselves of the Huguenot leaders by some form of treachery or other, but was quite ignorant of, and unprepared for, the particular means adopted by them for compassing the end.
[1167] St. Goard to Charles, Sept. 12th, Bodel Nijenhuis, Supplement to Groen van Prinsterer, Archives de la maison d'Orange Nassau, 124-126. St. Goard was not deceived by Philip's pious congratulations. "Ce faict," he writes to Catharine, a week later (ibid., pp. 126, 127), "a esté aussi bien pris de se (ce) Roy comme on le peult penser, pour luy estre tant profitable pour ses affaires; toutesfois, comme il est le prince du monde qui sçait et faict le plus profession de dissimuler toutes choses, si n'a il sceu celler en ceste-cy le plaisir qu'il en a reçeu, et encores que je infère touts ses mouvements procedder du bien que en recepvoient ses affaires, lesquelles il voioit pour desplorer sans ce seul remedde, si a il faict croire à tout le monde par ces aparens (apparences) que c'estoit pour le respect du bon succez que voz Majestez avoient eu en si haultes entreprises, tantost louant le filz d'avoir une telle mère, l'aiant si bien gardé," etc.
[1168] See the Mondoucet correspondence, Compte rendu de la commission royale d'histoire, second series, iv. (Brux., 1852), 340-349, pub. by M. Emile Gachet, especially the letter of Charles IX. of Aug. 12th, 1572.
[1169] "El dicho embaxador me propusó ... con grande instancia, que sin dilacion se devia executar la justicia en Janlis (Genlis) y en los otros sus complices que hay estan presos, y en los que se tomassen en Mons." Philip to Alva, Sept. 18th. Simancas MSS. Gachard, Particularités inédits sur la St. Barthélemy, Bulletin de l'académie royale de Belgique, xvi. (1849), 256.
[1170] Charles IX. to Mondoucet, Aug. 31st, Mondoucet correspondence, p. 349; see also another letter of the same date, p. 348.
[1171] "Estant l'un plus grands services que se puisse faire pour la Chrestienté, que de la prendre et passer tout au fil de l'espée." St. Goard to Charles IX., Sept. 19th, Supp. to Archives de la maison d'Orange Nassau, 127.
[1172] Philip to Alva, ubi supra.
[1173] Alva to Philip, Oct. 13th, Gachard, Correspondance de Philippe II. (Brux., 1848), ii. 287.
[1174] Mondoucet to Charles IX., Aug. 29th, Bull. de l'acad. roy. de Brux.
[1175] Bulletin de l'acad. roy. de Bruxelles, ix. (1842), 561.
[1176] Philip to Alva, ubi supra.
[1177] Bulletin of Alva from the report of his agent, the Seigneur de Gomicourt, published by M. Gachard, from MSS. of Mons, in Bull. de l'acad. de Bruxelles, ix. (1842), 560, etc.
[1178] Despatch of Sept. 14, 1572, Correspondance diplomatique, v, 121.
[1179] Charles IX. to La Mothe Fénélon, Aug. 22, 1572, Corresp. dipl., vii. 322, 323.
[1180] See ante, chap, xviii., p. 490.
[1181] "Ni que j'y aye aucune volonté."
[1182] "C'est bien la chose que je déteste le plus."
[1183] Despatch of Aug. 24th, Corresp. diplom., vii. 324, 325.
[1184] Charles IX. to La Mothe Fénélon, Aug. 25, 1572, ibid., 325, 326.
[1185] Charles IX., Aug. 26th and 27th, Corresp. dipl., vii. 331, etc., and a justificatory "Instruction à M. de la Mothe Fénélon."
[1186] Letter of Burleigh, etc., Sept. 9th, to Walsingham, Digges, 247. The truth of the statement is called in question by M. Cooper, editor of La Mothe Fénélon's Correspondance diplomatique.
[1187] The interview is described both by La Mothe Fénélon (Corresp. diplom., v. 122-126), and by the English council, despatch of Sept. 9th to Walsingham (Digges, 247-249). Hume has a graphic account, History of England, chap. xl.
[1188] This striking, and, certainly, somewhat undiplomatic speech is reported by the ambassador himself in his despatches (Corresp. dipl., v. 127). It looks as if the honest Frenchman was not sorry to let the court know some of the severe criticisms that were uttered respecting a crime with which he had no sympathy. La Mothe Fénélon tells of the impression, proved erroneous by the king's letter, "qu'ilz avoient que ce fût ung acte projecté de longtemps, et que vous heussiez accordé avecques le Pape et le Roy d'Espaigne de faire servir les nopces de Madame, vostre seur, avec le Roy de Navarre, à une telle exécution pour y atraper, à la foys, toutz les principaulx de la dicte religion assemblés." La Mothe Fénélon to Charles, Sept. 2, 1572, ubi supra, v. 116.
[1189] La Mothe Fénélon endeavored, he says, to persuade the English that there were not over five thousand, and that Catharine and Charles were sorry that one hundred could not have answered. Corr. diplom., v. 155.
[1190] See the despondent despatch of October 2d, Corresp. diplom., v., 155-162.
[1191] La Mothe Fénélon to Catharine, ibid., v. 164.
[1192] Letter of Sept. 26th, Digges, 262.
[1193] See ante, chapter xviii., p. 495.
[1194] As well as by the queen mother's assurances respecting the massacre in the provinces—too heavy a draft upon the credulity of her royal sister. "Pour ce qu'ilz disent que, voyant les meurtres qui ont esté faictz en plusieurs villes de ce royaume par les Catholiques contre les Huguenotz, ils ne se peuvent asseurer de l'intantion et volonté du Roy, qu'ilz n'en voyent quelque punission et justice et ses édictz mieux observés, elle cognoistra bientost que ce qui est advenu ès autres lieux que en ceste ville, a esté entièrement contre la volonté du Roy, mon dict sieur et filz, lequel a délibéré d'en faire faire telle pugnition et y establir bientost ung si bon ordre que ung chascun cognoistra quelle a esté en cest endroit son intantion." Catharine to La Mothe Fénélon, Cor. dipl., vii. 377.
[1195] Walsingham to Sir Thomas Smith, Sept. 14th, Digges, 242.
[1196] Tocsain contre les massacreurs, 150.
[1197] It is true that when their sentences were read to them, and particularly that portion which branded with infamy their innocent children, the courage of the old man of seventy, Briquemault, momentarily failed, and he condescended to offer to do great services to the king in retaking La Rochelle whose fortifications he had himself begun; and when this proposal was rejected, it is said that he made more humiliating advances. But the constancy and pious exhortations of his younger companion, who sustained his own courage by repeating many of the psalms in Latin, recalled Briquemault to himself, and from that moment "he had nothing but contempt for death." De Thou (iv. 646), a youth of nineteen, who was present in the chapel when the sentence was read, remembered the incident well. Cf. Agrippa d'Aubigné, ii. 32 (bk. i., c. 6). Walsingham, when he says in his letter of Nov. 1, 1572, that "Cavannes (Cavaignes) showed himself void of all magnanimity, etc.," has evidently confused the persons. Here is an instance where the later account of an eye-witness—De Thou—is entitled to far more credit than the contemporary statement of one whose means of obtaining information were not so good.
[1198] "N'ayant regret sinon que vous ayez voulu profaner le jour de sa nayssence par ung si fascheus espectacle qu'allastes voir en grève." Corresp. diplom. de la Mothe Fénélon, v. 205; Tocsain contre les massacreurs, 151, 152; Reveille-Matin, Arch, cur., vii. 206; Walsingham to Smith, Nov. 1, 1572, Digges, 278, 279.
[1199] Froude, x. 444, 445.
[1200] "Entre autres choses, il me dist qu'on luy avoit escript de Rome, n'avoit que trois semaines ou environ, sur le propos des noces du Roy de Navarre en ces propres termes: 'que à ceste heure que tous les oyseaux estoient en cage, on les pouvoit prendre tous ensemble.'" M. de Vulcob to Charles IX., Presburg, Sept. 26th, apud De Noailles, Henri de Valois et la Pologne en 1572 (Paris, 1867), iii., Pièces just., 214.
[1201] See in Kluckholn, Briefe Friedrich des Frommen, ii. 482, a short letter of Charles IX. to the elector palatine, Aug. 22, 1572, referring him for details to the account which Schomberg would give him verbally; and, ibid., ii. 483, 484, the narrative signed by Charles IX. and Brulart, secretary of state, in a translation evidently made at the time for the elector's use.
[1202] "Toute ma negociation s'en estoit allée en fumée." Schomberg to M. de Limoges, Nov. 8th, De Noailles, iii. 300.
[1203] A large number of Schomberg's despatches are inserted in De Noailles, iii. 286, etc.
[1204] "Als die sonder zweifel die welsche bibel 'El principe Macchiavelli' auch studirt."
[1205] Landgrave William to the Electors of Saxony and Brandenburg, Cassel, Sept. 5, 1572; same to Frederick, elector palatine, Sept, 6th. A. Kluckholn, Briefe Friedrich des Frommen, ii. 496-498.
[1206] Bp. of Valence to M. Brulart, Konin, Nov. 20th, Colbert MSS. apud De Noailles, iii. 218.
[1207] Montluc to Charles IX., January 22, 1573, De Noailles, iii. 220. Does not the frank suggestion furnish a clue to the method which was sometimes practised in other cases?
[1208] Montluc to Brulart, Jan. 20, 1573, De Noailles, iii. 223. The worthy bishop, who was certainly at any time more at home in the cabinet than in the church, did not intermit his toil or yield to discouragement. If we may believe him, he "had not leisure so much as to say his prayers." The panegyrists of the massacre, and especially Charpentier, had done him good service by their writings, and at one time he greatly desired that the learned doctor might be sent to his assistance, particularly as (to use his own words) "all the suite of Monsieur de l'Isle and myself do not know enough of Latin to admit a deacon to orders, even at Puy in Auvergne." Ubi supra.
[1209] Beza to Thomas Tilius, Sept. 10, 1572, Bulletin, vii. 16.
[1210] Registres de la compagnie, 1er août, 1572, apud Gaberel, Histoire de l'église de Genève, ii. 320.
[1211] Reg. du conseil, 30 août, 1572; Reg. de la compagnie, Gaberel, ii. 321.
[1212] Gaberel, ii. 321, 322.
[1213] Ibid., ii. 322.
[1214] Ibid., ii. 307. See also in the Pièces justificatives, pp. 213-217: "Liste des réfugiés de la St. Barthélemy dont les familles existent de nos jours à Genève."
[1215] Gaberel, ii. 325. The author of the really able and learned article on the massacre, in the North British Review for October, 1869, conveys an altogether unfounded and cruel impression, not only with regard to Beza, but respecting his fellow Protestants, in these sentences: "The very men whose own brethren had perished in France were not hearty or unanimous in execrating the deed. There were Huguenots who thought that their party had brought ruin on itself, by provoking its enemies and following the rash counsels of ambitious men. This was the opinion of their chief, Theodore Beza, himself," etc. The belief of Beza that the French Protestants had merited even so severe a chastisement as this at the hands of God, by reason of the ambition of some and the unbelief or lack of spirituality of others, was a very different thing from failing to execrate the deed with heartiness. If the words of Bullinger to Hotman, quoted in support of the first sentence ("sunt tamen qui hoc factum et excusare et defendere tentant") really referred to Protestants at all, it can only have been to an insignificant number who took the position from a love of singularity, and who were below contempt. The execration of the deed was pre-eminently unanimous and hearty.
[1216] Gaberel, ii. 326.
[1217] Beza to T. Tilius, Dec. 3, 1572, Bulletin de la Soc. de l'hist. du prot. fr., vii. 17.
[1218] Gaberel, ii. 330-333.
[1219] Nearly four years later, on the 8th of June, 1576, Monsieur de Chandieu received the news of the publication of Henry III.'s edict of peace permitting the refugees to return home. All the Protestants who had not adopted Switzerland as their future country congregated at Geneva. A solemn religious service was held in the church of Saint Pierre, where French and Genevese united in that favorite Huguenot psalm (the 118th)—
|
La voici l'heureuse journée Que Dieu a faite à plein désir— |
the same which the soldiers of Henry IV. set up on the field of Coutras (Agrippa d'Aubigné, iii. 53). M. de Chandieu then rendered thanks in tender and affectionate terms to all the departments of government, exclaiming: "We shall always regard the Church of Geneva as our benefactress and our mother; and from all the French reformed churches will arise, every Sunday, words of blessing, in remembrance of your admirable benefits to us." The next day the refugees started for their homes, accompanied, as far as the border, by a great crowd of citizens. Gaberel, ii. 337, 338.
[1220] Les ambassadeurs de Charles IX. aux cantons suisses protestants, Bulletin, iii. 274-276. A copy was sent by Beza to the consuls of Montauban, together with a letter, Oct. 3. 1572. Also Mém. de l'estat (Arch. cur., vii. 158-161.)
[1221] Harangue de M. de Bellièvre aux Suisses à la diette tenue à Baden, Mackintosh, Hist. of England, iii., Appendix L.
[1222] Bellièvre to Charles IX., Baden, Dec. 15, 1572, Mackintosh, App. L, p. 360. De Thou, iv. (liv. liii.) 642.
[1223] As early as September 3d the superintendent of the mint submitted specimens of two kinds of commemorative medals: the one bearing the devices, "Virtus in Rebelles" and "Pietas excitavit Justitiam;" and the other, "Charles IX. dompteur des Rebelles, le 24 aoust 1572." The Mém. de l'estat (Archives cur., vii. 355-357) contain the elaborate description furnished by the designer, accompanied with comments by the Protestant author. The Trésor de Numismatique, etc. (Paul Delaroche, etc.), Med. françaises, pt. 3d, plate 19, Nos. 3, 4, and 5, gives facsimiles of three medals, the first two mentioned above, and a third on which Charles figures as Hercules armed with sword and torch confronting the three-headed Hydra of heresy. The motto is, "Ne ferrum temnat, simul ignibus obsto."
[1224] Smith to Walsingham, Digges, 252.
[1225] Leicester to Walsingham, Sept. 11th, Digges, 251.
[1226] Walsingham to Smith, Nov. 1, Digges, 279. The politic Montluc, Bishop of Valence, seems to allude to the same alteration in his master: "Au diable soyt la cause qui de tant de maux est cause, et qui d'ung bon roy et humain, s'il en fust jamais, l'ont contrainct de mectre la main au sang, qui est un morceau si friant, que jamais prince n'en tasta qu'il n'y voulust revenir." De Noailles, iii. 223, 224.
[1227] Agrippa d'Aubigné, ii. 29, 30.
[1228] Agrippa d'Aubigné, ii. 29 (liv. i., c. 6).
[1229] Letter of May 22, 1571/2, Digges, 193.
[1230] Relation of Sigismondo Cavalli. I follow the résumé of Baschet, La diplomatie vénitienne, 556, 562.
[1231] "Leurs butins et richesses ne leur proffitarent point, non plus qu'à plusieurs massacreurs, sacquemens, pillardz et paillards de la feste de Sainct-Barthélemy que j'ay cogneu, au moins des principaux, qui ne vesquirent guières longtemps qu'ils ne fussent tuez au siége de la Rochelle, et autres guerres qui vindrent emprès, et qui furent aussi pauvres que devant. Aussi, comme disoient les Espagnolz pillards, 'Que el diablo les avia dado, el diablo les avia llevado.'" Œuvres, i. 277 (Ed. of Hist. Soc. of Fr., 1864). I need only refer to the fate of the famous assassin who boasted of having killed four hundred men that day with his own arm, and who afterward, having embraced a hermit's life, was finally hung for the crime of murdering travellers (Agrippa d'Aubigné, ii. 20); and to that of Coconnas, put to death for the part he took in the conspiracy of which I shall shortly have to speak.
[1232] Mémoires de Sully, i. 28, 29.
[1233] See ante, p. 530-532.
[1234] Apostolicarum Pii Quinti Epistolarum libri quinque. Letter of March 26, 1568, p. 73.
[1235] Pii Quinti Epistolæ, 111.
[1236] Ibid., 150.
[1237] Ibid., 152. See ante, chapter xvi, p. 308.
[1238] "Nullo modo, nullisque de causis, hostibus Dei parcendum est."
[1239] "Catholicæ religionis hostes aperte ac libere ad internecionem usque oppugnaverit." Ibid., 155.
[1240] "Deletis omnibus," etc. Ibid., 155.
[1241] Ibid., 160, 161.
[1242] Ibid., 166.
[1243] "Nec vero, vano pietatis nomine objecto, te eo usque decipi sinas, ut condonandis divinis injuriis falsam tibi misericordiæ laudem quæras: nihil est enim ea pietate misericordiaque crudelius, quæ in impios et ultima supplicia meritos confertur." Ibid., 242.
[1244] "Hæreticæ pravitatis inquisitores per singulas civitates constituere." Ibid., 242.
[1245] Letter of Jan. 29, 1570, ibid., 267.
[1246] Letter of April 23, 1570, ibid., 275.
[1247] Letter to Cardinal Bourbon, Sept. 23, 1570, ibid., 282, 283.
[1248] Letter to Charles IX., January 25, 1572, ibid., 443.
[1249] Saint Pius V. is, I believe, the only pope that has been canonized since Saint Celestine V., near the end of the thirteenth century.
[1250] "Qui autem a militibus captivi ducebantur, eos Pius pretio redemptos, in jusque sibi vindicatos, atque Avenionem perductos, publico supplicio afficiendos pro ardenti suo religionis studio decrevit." Gabutius, Vita Pii Quinti, Acta Sanctorum Maii, § 97, p. 642.
[1251] "Id Pius ubi cognovit, de Comite Sanctæ Floræ conquestus est, quod jussa non fecisset, dudum imperantis, necandos protinus esse hæreticos omnes quoscumque ille capere potuisset." Ibid., § 125. It must not be forgotten that, in holding these sentiments, Pius V. did not stand alone; his predecessors on the pontifical throne were of the same mind. We have seen the anger of Paul IV., in 1558, upon learning that Henry II. had spared D'Andelot (see ante, chapter viii., vol. i., p. 320). Paul was for instantaneous execution, and did not believe a heretic could ever be converted. He told the French ambassador "que c'estoit abus d'estimer que un hérétique revint jamais; que ce n'estoit que toute dissimulation, et que c'estoit un mal où il ne falloit que le feu, et soubdain!" The last expression is a clue to the attitude of the Roman See to heresy under every successive occupant of the papal throne. Letter of La Bourdaisière to the constable, Rome, Feb. 25, 1559, MS. Nat. Lib. Paris, Bulletin, xxvii. (1878) 105.
[1252] Gabutius, ubi supra.