KENILWORTH CASTLE.
On Saturday, the 8th of February, Elizabeth signed the warrant for Norfolk's execution on the Monday; but late on Sunday night she sent for Cecil—now more commonly called Burleigh—and commanded the execution to be stayed, revoking the warrant, to the great disappointment of the good citizens of London, who had seen all the preparations made for the spectacle. Elizabeth soon after signed a fresh warrant which, as the time of execution approached, she also revoked. As she herself hung back, the preachers and the Commons took it up, and demanded the duke's death, for the security of both the sovereign and the State. When the public excitement had reached its height, then the queen slowly and reluctantly yielded, and issued a third warrant, which she did not revoke, for now it was become the act of the nation rather than her own. On the 2nd of June, 1572, at eight o'clock in the morning, the duke was brought out of the Tower to a scaffold on Tower Hill, the drawing to Tyburn and all its revolting accompaniments being dispensed with on account of his high rank. He addressed the people, confessing the justice of his sentence, though he still denied all treason. On being offered a handkerchief to bind his eyes, he refused, saying he was not afraid of death; and after a prayer he stretched his head across the block, and it was severed at a stroke.
Meanwhile, Elizabeth had been making a gay procession amongst her subjects, and had been royally feasted at the castle of her favourite, Leicester, at Kenilworth, and was at Woodstock, on her return towards town, when she was met by one of the most horrible pieces of news which ever flew across affrighted Europe. This was the massacre of St. Bartholomew.
The pacification which had been patched up between the Romanists and the Huguenots in France had no sincerity in it. All the old hatred and resentment were fomenting beneath the surface. The Huguenots had no faith in the Papists, and the Papists longed to annihilate the Huguenots as heretics. None thirsted so much for their blood as the queen-mother, Catherine de Medicis. She entered into the most subtle and daring schemes for their destruction, and the imbecile Charles IX. was mere wax in her hands. Her plans ripened, the massacre broke out on St. Bartholomew's day, August 24th, 1572, and it continued until many Protestants of all ages had been cruelly murdered.
A sensation of horror was diffused all over Europe by the news of this unexampled atrocity of bigotry, which was greatly augmented in England by the crowds of Protestants who fled thither for refuge. The body of the nation called for instant war, to avenge on the sanguinary French Government this infamous treatment of the Reformed church. The French ambassador hastened to apologise to the Queen of England for what he termed this unfortunate accident. Burleigh carefully impressed upon Elizabeth the necessity of the death of Mary as "the only means of preventing her own deposition and murder;" and Sandys, the Bishop of London, sent in a paper of necessary precautions to be adopted, the first and foremost of which was to "forthwith cut off the Scottish queen's head." The nation also clamoured for her execution. Elizabeth listened to the advice, but was too politic to imbrue her hands in the blood of the Queen of Scotland, without exerting herself first to transfer the odium to some other person. Killigrew was therefore sent down to Scotland to see if the execution of the queen could not be effected there. His ostensible mission was to arrange, if possible, the terms of an armistice between the adherents of Mary and those of the young king in Scotland, at the head of which parties were Huntly and Morton. But the private and real object was to lead the Protestant lords to the point of removing Mary from the hands of Elizabeth, "to receive that she had deserved by order of justice." But before an answer could be received the Regent Mar died suddenly. This occurred on the 28th of October, 1572, and on the 9th of November Morton, by the influence of Elizabeth, was elected Regent in his place. Thus Elizabeth had obtained the appointment to be guardian of the young king of the very man who had for many years been in her pay, and was ready to execute any designs demanded by her policy. Both Mary and her son might now be said to be in her hands. No sooner was Morton in power than he managed, with the help of Elizabeth, who had always weighty persuasions at hand, to bring over Mary's chief friends the Hamiltons, and Huntley's people the Gordons, and he demanded the immediate and unconditional surrender of the castle of Edinburgh. Kirkaldy, Maitland, and Hume, who held it, however, refused to give it up, and thus put them at the mercy of their enemies. On this, Elizabeth ordered Drury, the marshal of Berwick, to advance to Edinburgh with a strong force furnished with a powerful battering train, and, if necessary, lay the castle in ashes. In this extremity the besieged lords, and Mary from her prison in England, implored the King of France to hasten to their assistance, and not to allow Elizabeth to extinguish the last spark of opposition in Scotland. But Charles replied that it was quite out of his power, for Elizabeth, on the very first movement, would send a fleet to La Rochelle, where he was besieging the Huguenots. The castle was consequently compelled to surrender on the 9th of June, 1573, after a siege of thirty-four days, and the King's party was for the time being triumphant.
Though the French king had refused to assist Mary's party in Scotland in their last extremity, for fear of Elizabeth's affording aid to the Huguenots besieged in La Rochelle by the Duke of Anjou, that did not prevent Elizabeth assisting the Rochellais. She allowed a strong fleet of Englishmen, under the nominal command of the Count de Montgomery, to assemble in Plymouth for their relief, and she promised them further help. To avert this, Charles IX. endeavoured to flatter Elizabeth into neutrality. He requested her to stand godmother to his infant daughter. The French Protestants, however, were so incensed at Elizabeth's compliance, which they regarded as an act of apostacy, that they attacked the squadron which conveyed the English ambassador, Elizabeth's proxy, seized one of his ships, slew some of his attendants, and put his own life in peril. Charles IX. saw in this a favourable opportunity for inducing Elizabeth to cause the Plymouth fleet to disperse. He therefore despatched an ambassador before the queen's anger could cool, requesting her to refuse a promised loan to these audacious Rochellais, and to disperse the hostile fleet at Plymouth. But Elizabeth referred the envoy to her ministers on that point, who assured him that they had no power whatever to impede the sailing of the fleet, for that Englishmen sailed on the plea of traffic wherever they pleased; and if they committed any acts of hostility on friendly powers, they were at the mercy of those powers to seize them and treat them as pirates.
Elizabeth was soon, however, punished for this flagrant equivocation. Montgomery sailed in April; but on discovering the strength of the French fleet moored under the forts and batteries of La Rochelle he was seized with terror, and returned to Plymouth without striking a blow. Elizabeth, indignant at his failure, then sent him word that she was highly displeased at his presuming to unfurl the English flag, and forbade his access to any of the English ports. In June, 1574, he was taken prisoner in Normandy, and on the 26th of that month he was executed as a traitor in Paris. The bravery of the people of La Rochelle, however, and the election of the Duke of Anjou to the throne of Poland, saved that city. A new pacification was entered into, but the peace of France was again disturbed by a coalition between the heads of the Huguenots and the Marshals Montmorency, De Cossé, and Damfont, the Papal leaders called the Politiques. This league was formed to get possession of the king, whose health was now fast failing, remove Catherine and the Duke of Guise from power, and proclaim Alençon as the successor to the crown in the absence of Anjou in Poland. Elizabeth was actively engaged in all these movements, especially in advising Alençon to place himself at the head of affairs. But the watchful genius of Catherine discovered and defeated the plot: Montmorency and Cossé were committed to the Bastille, Alençon and the King of Navarre were so closely watched that they were stopped in five attempts to escape, and numbers of the inferior actors were put to death.
In May, 1574, Charles IX. of France died a miserable death, full of remorse and horror, worn out with consumption, in the twenty-sixth year of his age. By the management of Catherine, the throne was secured by her next son, Anjou, notwithstanding his being absent in Poland. Anjou as ended the French throne under the title of Henry III., detested by all the Protestants for his share in the massacre of St. Bartholomew. In the following year a new plot was formed between the Protestant council at Millaud in Rovergne and the Romanists under Damville, to place Alençon on the throne—a scheme cordially supported by Elizabeth, in favour of her present lover, Alençon. Alençon effected his escape from Court in September, 1575; and Elizabeth, notwithstanding her recent renewal of the treaty of Blois, advanced him money to raise him an army of German Protestants. In February, 1575, the King of Navarre also escaped, and the two princes called on Elizabeth to declare war in their favour; but the demand was overruled in the Council, and Elizabeth offered herself as mediatrix between the king and his brother, Alençon, who was grown jealous of the ascendency of Navarre.
On the 21st of April a treaty was concluded by which the exercise of the Protestant religion was permitted to a certain extent; the king promised to call an assembly of the States to regulate the affairs of the kingdom, and Alençon succeeded to the appanage of his elder brother, and hence-forward was styled Anjou.