The siege went on for a month longer without making any more impression; and the imperial troops kicked against any fresh assaults. “I was wont once upon a time to be followed to battle,” Charles V. would say, “but I see that I have no longer men about me; I must bid farewell to the empire, and go and shut myself up in some monastery; before three years are over I shall turn Cordelier.” Whilst Metz was still holding out, the fortress of Toul was summoned by the Imperialists to open its gates; but the commandant replied, “When the town of Metz has been taken, when I have had the honor of being besieged in due form by the emperor, and when I have made as long a defence as the Duke of Guise has, such a summons may be addressed to me, and I will consider what I am to do.” On the 26th of December, 1552, the sixty-fifth day since the arrival of the imperial army and the forty-fifth since the batteries had opened fire, Charles V. resolved to raise the siege. “I see very well,” said he, “that fortune resembles women; she prefers a young king to an old emperor.” His army filed off by night, in silence, leaving behind its munitions and its tents just as they stood, “driven away, almost, by the chastisement of Heaven,” says the contemporary chronicler Rabutin, “with but two shots by way of signal.” The ditty of the soldier just quoted ends thus:—
“At last, so stout was her defence, From Metz they moved their guns away; And, with the laugh at their expense, A-tramping went their whole array. And at their tail the noble Lord Of Guise sent forth a goodly throng Of cavalry, with lance and sword, To teach them how to tramp along.”
Guise was far from expecting so sudden and decisive a result. “Sing me no more flattering strains in your letters about the emperor’s dislodgment hence,” he wrote on the 24th of December to his brother the Cardinal of Lorraine; “take it for certain that unless we be very much mistaken in him, he will not, as long as he has life, brook the shame of departing hence until he has seen it all out.”
Irritated, and, perhaps, still more shocked, at so heavy a blow to his power and his renown, Charles V. looked everywhere for a chance of taking his revenge. He flattered himself that he had found it in Therouanne, a fortress of importance at that time between Flanders and Artois, which had always been a dependency of the kingdom of France, and served as a rampart against the repeated incursions of the English, the masters of Calais. Charles knew that it was ill supplied with troops and munitions of war; and the court of Henry II., intoxicated with the deliverance of Metz, spoke disdainfully of the emperor, and paid no heed to anything but balls, festivities, and tournaments in honor of the marriage between Diana d’Angouleme, the king’s natural daughter, and Horatio Farnese, Duke of Castro. All on a sudden it was announced that the troops of Charles V. were besieging Therouanne. The news was at first treated lightly; it was thought sufficient to send to Therouanne some re-enforcements under the orders of Francis de Montmorency, nephew of the constable; but the attack was repulsed with spirit by the besiegers, and brave as was the resistance offered by the besieged, who sustained for ten hours a sanguinary assault, on the 20th of June, 1553, Francis de Montmorency saw the impossibility of holding out longer, and, on the advice of all his officers, offered to surrender the place; but he forgot to stipulate in the first place for a truce; the Germans entered the town, thrown open without terms of capitulation; it was given up as prey to an army itself a prey to all the passions of soldiers as well as to their master’s vengeful feelings, and Therouanne, handed over for devastation, was for a whole month diligently demolished and razed to the ground. When Charles V., at Brussels, received news of the capture, “bonfires were lighted throughout Flanders; bells were rung, cannon were fired.” It was but a poor revenge for so great a sovereign after the reverse he had just met with at Metz; but the fall of Therouanne was a grievous incident for France. Francis I. was in the habit of saying that Therouanne in Flanders and Acqs (now Dax) on the frontier of Guienne were, to him, like two pillows on which he could rest tranquilly. [Histoire universelle, t. ii. p. 352.]
Whilst these events were passing in Lorraine and Flanders, Henry II. and his advisers were obstinately persisting in the bad policy which had been clung to by Charles VIII., Louis XII., and Francis I., that, in fact, of making conquests and holding possessions in Italy. War continued, from Turin to Naples, between France, the emperor, the pope, and the local princes, with all sorts of alliances and alternations, but with no tangible result. Blaise de Montluc defended the fortress of Sienna for nine months against the Imperialists with an intelligence and a bravery which earned for him twenty years later the title of Marshal of France. Charles de Brissac was carrying on the war in Piedmont with such a combination of valor and generosity that the king sent him as a present his own sword, writing to him at the same time, “The opinion I have of your merit has become rooted even amongst foreigners. The emperor says that he would make himself monarch of the whole world if he had a Brissac to second his plans.” His men, irritated at getting no pay, one day surrounded Brissac, complaining vehemently. “You will always get bread by coming to me,” said he; and he paid the debt of France by sacrificing his daughter’s dowry and borrowing a heavy sum from the Swiss on the security of his private fortune. It was by such devotion and such sacrifices that the French nobility paid for and justified their preponderance in the state; but they did not manage to succeed in the conduct of public affairs, and to satisfy the interests of a nation progressing in activity, riches, independence, and influence. Disquieted at the smallness of his success in Italy, Henry II. flattered himself that he would regain his ascendency there by sending thither the Duke of Guise, the hero of Metz, with an army of about twenty thousand men, French or Swiss, and a staff of experienced officers; but Guise was not more successful than his predecessors had been. After several attempts by arms and negotiation amongst the local sovereigns, he met with a distinct failure in the kingdom of Naples before the fortress of Civitella, the siege of which he was forced to raise on the 15th of May, 1557. Wearied out by want of success, sick in the midst of an army of sick, regretting over “the pleasure of his field-sports at Joinville, and begging his mother to have just a word or two written to him to console him,” all he sighed for was to get back to France. And it was not long before the state of affairs recalled him thither. It was now nearly two years ago that, on the 25th of October, 1555, and the 1st of January, 1556, Charles V. had solemnly abdicated all his dominions, giving over to his son Philip the kingdom of Spain, with the sovereignty of Burgundy and the Low Countries, and to his younger brother, Ferdinand, the empire together with the original heritage of the House of Austria, and retiring personally to the monastery of Yuste, in Estramadura, there to pass the last years of his life, distracted with gout, at one time resting from the world and its turmoil, at another vexing himself about what was doing there now that he was no longer in it. Before abandoning it for good, he desired to do his son Philip the service of leaving him, if not in a state of definite peace, at any rate in a condition of truce with France. Henry II. also desired rest; and the Constable de Montmorency wished above everything for the release of his son Francis, who had been a prisoner since the fall of Thorouanne. A truce for five years was signed at Vaucelles on the 5th of February, 1556; and Coligny, quite young still, but already admiral and in high esteem, had the conduct of the negotiation. He found Charles V. dressed in mourning, seated beside a little table, in a modest apartment hung with black. When the admiral handed to the emperor the king’s letter, Charles could not himself break the seal, and the Bishop of Arras drew near to render him that service. “Gently, my Lord of Arras,” said the emperor; “would you rob me of the duty I am bound to discharge towards the king my brother-in-law? Please God, none but I shall do it;” and then turning to Coligny, he said, “What will you say of me, admiral? Am I not a pretty knight to run a course and break a lance, I who can only with great difficulty open a letter?” He inquired with an air of interest after Henry II.‘s health, and boasted of belonging himself, also, to the house of France through his grandmother Mary of Burgundy. “I hold it to be an honor,” said he, “to have issued, on the mother’s side, from the stock which wears and upholds the most famous crown in the world.” His son Philip, who was but a novice in kingly greatness, showed less courtesy and less good taste than his father; he received the French ambassadors in a room hung with pictures representing the battle of Pavia. There were some who concluded from that that the truce would not be of long duration. [Histoire d’Espagne, by M. Rosseeuw Saint-Hilaire, t. viii. p. 64.]
And it was not long before their prognostication was verified. The sending of the Duke of Guise into Italy, and the assistance he brought to Pope Paul IV., then at war with the new King of Spain, Philip II., were considered as a violation of the truce of Vaucelles. Henry II. had expected as much, and had ordered Coligny, who was commanding in Picardy and Flanders, to hold himself in readiness to take the field as soon as he should be, if not forced, at any rate naturally called upon, by any unforeseen event. It cost Coligny, who was a man of scrupulous honor, a great struggle to lightly break a truce he had just signed; nevertheless, in January, 1557, when he heard that the French were engaged in Italy in the war between the pope and the Spaniards, he did not consider that he could possibly remain inactive in Flanders. He took by surprise the town of Lens, between Lille and Arras. Philip II., on his side, had taken measures for promptly entering upon the campaign. By his marriage with Mary Tudor, Queen of England, he had secured for himself a powerful ally in the north; the English Parliament were but little disposed to compromise themselves in a war with France; but in March, 1557, Philip went to London; the queen’s influence and the distrust excited in England by Henry II. prevailed over the pacific desires of the nation; and Mary sent a simple herald to carry to the King of France at Rheims her declaration of war. Henry accepted it politely, but resolutely. “I speak to you in this way,” said he to the herald, “because it is a queen who sends you; had it been a king, I would speak to you in a very different tone;” and he ordered him to be gone forthwith from the kingdom. A negotiation was commenced for accomplishing the marriage, long since agreed upon, between the young Queen of Scotland, Mary Stuart, and Henry II.‘s son, Francis, dauphin of France. Mary, who was born on the 8th of December, 1542, at Falkland Castle in Scotland, had, since 1548, lived and received her education at the court of France, whither her mother, Mary of Lorraine, eldest sister of Francis of Guise and queen-dowager of Scotland, had lost no time in sending her as soon as the future union between the two children had been agreed upon between the two courts. The dauphin of France was a year younger than the Scottish princess; but “from his childhood,” says the Venetian Capello, “he has been very much in love with her Most Serene little Highness the Queen of Scotland, who is destined for his wife. It sometimes happens that, when they are exchanging endearments, they like to retire quite apart into a corner of the rooms, that their little secrets may not be overheard.” On the 19th of April, 1558, the espousals took place in the great hall of the Louvre, and the marriage was celebrated in the church of Notre-Dame.
From that time Mary Stuart was styled in France queen-dauphiness, and her husband, with the authorization of the Scottish commissioners, took the title of king-dauphin. “Etiquette required at that time that the heir to the throne should hold his court separately, and not appear at the king’s court save on grand occasions. The young couple resigned themselves without any difficulty to this exile, and retired to Villers-Cotterets.” [Histoire de Marie Stuart, by Jules Gauthier, t. i. p. 36.]
Whilst preparations were being made at Paris for the rejoicings in honor of the union of the two royal children, war broke out in Picardy and Flanders. Philip II. had landed there with an army of forty-seven thousand men, of whom seven thousand were English. Never did any great sovereign and great politician provoke and maintain for long such important wars without conducting them in some other fashion than from the recesses of his cabinet, and without ever having exposed his own life on the field of battle. The Spanish army was under the orders of Emmanuel-Philibert, Duke of Savoy, a young warrior of thirty, who had won the confidence of Charles V. He led it to the siege of Saint-Quentin, a place considered as one of the bulwarks of the kingdom. Philip II. remained at some leagues’ distance in the environs. Henry II. was ill prepared for so serious an attack; his army, which was scarcely twenty thousand strong, mustered near Laon under the orders of the Duke of Nevers, governor of Champagne; at the end of July, 1557, it hurried into Picardy, under the command of the Constable de Montmorency, who was supported by Admiral de Coligny, his nephew, by the Duke of Enghien, by the Prince of Condo, and by the Duke of Montpensier, by nearly all the great lords and valiant warriors of France; they soon saw that Saint- Quentin was in a deplorable state of defence; the fortifications were old and badly kept up; soldiers, munitions of war, and victuals were all equally deficient. Coligny did not hesitate, however he threw himself into the place on the 2d of August, during the night, with a small corps of seven hundred men and Saint-Remy, a skilful engineer, who had already distinguished himself in the defence of Metz; the admiral packed off the useless mouths, repaired the walls at the points principally threatened, and reanimated the failing courage of the inhabitants. The constable and his army came within hail of the place; and D’Andelot, Coligny’s brother, managed with great difficulty to get four hundred and fifty men into it. On the 10th of August the battle was begun between the two armies. The constable affected to despise the Duke of Savoy’s youth. “I will soon show him,” said he, “a move of an old soldier.” The French army, very inferior in numbers, was for a moment on the point of being surrounded. The Prince of Conde sent the constable warning. “I was serving in the field,” answered Montmorency, “before the Prince of Conde came into the world; I have good hopes of still giving him lessons in the art of war for some years to come.” The valor of the constable and his comrades in arms could not save them from the consequences of their stubborn recklessness and their numerical inferiority; the battalions of Gascon infantry closed their ranks, with pikes to the front, and made an heroic resistance, but all in vain, against repeated charges of the Spanish cavalry: and the defeat was total. More than three thousand men were killed; the number of prisoners amounted to double; and the constable, left upon the field with his thigh shattered by a cannon-ball, fell into the hands of the Spaniards, as was also the case with the Dukes of Longueville and Montpensier, La Rochefoucauld, D’Aubigne, &c. . . . The Duke of Enghien, Viscount de Turenne, and a multitude of others, many great names amidst a host of obscure, fell in the fight. The Duke of Nevers and the Prince of Conde, sword in hand, reached La Fere with the remnants of their army. Coligny remained alone in Saint-Quentin with those who survived of his little garrison, and a hundred and twenty arquebusiers whom the Duke of Nevers threw into the place at a loss of three times as many. Coligny held out for a fortnight longer, behind walls that were in ruins and were assailed by a victorious army. At length, on the 27th of August, the enemy entered Saint-Quentin by shoals. “The admiral, who was still going about the streets with a few men to make head against them, found himself hemmed in on all sides, and did all he could to fall into the hands of a Spaniard, preferring rather to await on the spot the common fate than to incur by flight any shame and reproach. He who took him prisoner, after having set him to rest a while at the foot of the ramparts, took him away to their camp, where, as he entered, he met Captain Alonzo de Cazieres, commandant of the old bands of Spanish infantry, when up came the Duke of Savoy, who ordered the said Cazieres to take the admiral to his tent.” [Commentaire de Francois de Rabutin sur les Guerres entre Henri II., roi de France, et Charles Quint, empereur, t. ii. p. 95, in the Petitot collection.] D’Andelot, the admiral’s brother, succeeded in escaping across the marshes. Being thus master of Saint-Quentin, Philip II., after having attempted to put a stop to carnage and plunder, expelled from the town, which was half in ashes, the inhabitants who had survived; and the small adjacent fortresses, Ham and Catelet, were not long before they surrendered.