While it is scarcely possible to believe Catharine to have been more sincere in the adoption of this peace than in any other event of her life, we may feel some confidence that her son was really in favor of peace for its own sake. He was weary of the war, jealous of his brother Anjou, disgusted with the Guises, and determined to attempt to conciliate his Huguenot subjects, whom he had in vain been trying to crush. Apparently he wished to make of the amnesty, which the edict formally proclaimed, a veritable act of oblivion of all past offences, and intended to regard the Huguenots, in point of fact as well as in law, as his faithful subjects. An incident which occurred about two months after the conclusion of peace, throws light upon the king's new disposition. Cardinal Odet de Châtillon, deprived by the Pope of his seat in the Roman consistory, had, on motion of Cardinal Bourbon, been declared by the Parisian parliament to have lost his bishopric of Beauvais, on account of his rebellion and his adoption of Protestant sentiments. All such judicial proceedings had indeed been declared null and void by the terms of the pacification, but the parliaments showed themselves very reluctant to regard the royal edict. In October, 1570, Charles the Ninth happening to be a guest of Marshal Montmorency at his palace of Écouen, a few leagues north of Paris, sent orders to Christopher de Thou, the first president, to wait upon him with the parliamentary records. Aware of the king's object, De Thou, pleading illness, sent four of his counsellors instead; but these were ignominiously dismissed, and the presence of the chief judge was again demanded. When De Thou at last appeared, Charles greeted him roughly. "Here you are," he said, "and not very ill, thank God! Why do you go counter to my edicts? I owe our cousin, Cardinal Bourbon, no thanks for having applied for and obtained sentence against the house of Châtillon, which has done me so much service, and took up arms for me." Then calling for the records, he ordered the president to point out the proceedings against the admiral's brother, and, on finding them, tore out with his own hand three leaves on which they were inscribed; and on having his attention directed by the marshal, who stood by, to other places bearing upon the same case, he did not hesitate to tear these out also.[798]
His assurances to Walsingham.
Gracious answer to the German electors.
To all with whom he conversed Charles avowed his steadfast purpose to maintain the peace inviolate. He called it his own peace. He told Walsingham, "he willed him to assure her Majesty, that the only care he presently had was to entertain the peace, whereof the Queen of Navarre and the princes of the religion could well be witnesses, as also generally the whole realm."[799] And the shrewd diplomatist believed that the king spoke the truth;[800] although, when he looked at the adverse circumstances with which Charles was surrounded, and the vicious and irreligious education he had received, there was room for solicitude respecting his stability.[801] There was, indeed, much to strengthen the hands of Charles in his new policy of toleration. On the twenty-sixth of November he married, with great pomp and amid the display of the popular delight, Elizabeth, daughter of the Emperor Maximilian the Second. This union, far from imperilling the permanence of the peace in France,[802] was likely to render it more lasting, if the bridegroom could be induced to copy the conciliatory and politic example of his father-in-law. Not long after Charles received at Villers-Cotterets an embassy sent by the three Protestant electors of Germany and the other powerful princes of the same faith. They congratulated him upon the suppression of civil disorder in France, and entreated him to maintain freedom of worship in his dominions such as existed in Germany and even in the dominions of the Grand Turk; lending an ear to none who might attempt to persuade him that tranquillity could not subsist in a kingdom where there was more than one religion. Charles made a gracious answer, and the German ambassadors retired, leaving the friends of the Huguenots to entertain still better hopes for the recent treaty.[803]
Catharine warned by the Huguenots.
Infringement on the edict at Orange.
It cannot be denied, however, that the Huguenots could see much that was disquieting and calculated to prevent them from laying aside their suspicions. There were symptoms of the old constitutional timidity on the part of Catharine de' Medici. She showed signs of so far yielding to the inveterate enemies of the Huguenots as to abstain from insisting upon the concession of public religious worship where it had been accorded by the Edict of St. Germain. No wonder that the Huguenots, on their side, warned her, with friendly sincerity and frankness, that, should she refuse to entertain their just demands, the present peace would be only a brief truce, the prelude to a relentless civil war. "We will all die," was their language, "rather than forsake our God and our religion, which we can no more sustain without public exercise than could a body live without food and drink."[804] Not only did the courts throw every obstacle in the way of the formal recognition of the law establishing the rights of the Huguenots, but the outbreaks of popular hatred against the adherents of the purer faith were alarming evidence that the chronic sore had only been healed over the surface, and that none of the elements of future disorder and bloodshed were wanting. Thus, in the little city and principality of Orange, the Roman Catholic populace, taking advantage of the supineness of the governor and of the consuls, introduced within the walls, under cover of a three days' religious festival, a large number of ruffians from the adjoining Comtât Venaissin. This was early in February, 1571. Now began a scene of rapine and bloodshed that might demand detailed mention, were it not that at the frequent repetition of such ghastly recitals the stoutest heart sickens. Men, and even mere boys, of the reformed faith were butchered in their homes, in the arms of their wives or their mothers. The goods of Protestants were plundered and openly sold to the highest bidder. Of many, a ransom was exacted for their safety. The work went on for two weeks. At last a deputy from Orange reached the Huguenot princes and the admiral at La Rochelle, and Count Louis of Nassau, who was still there, wrote to Charles with such urgency, in the name of his brother, the Prince of Orange, that measures were taken to repress and punish the disorder.[805]
The Protestants at Rouen attacked, March 4, 1571.
A much more serious infringement upon the protection granted to the Protestants by the edict, took place at Rouen about a month later. Unable to celebrate their worship within the city walls, the Protestants had gone out one Sunday morning to the place assigned them for this purpose in the suburbs. Meantime a body of four hundred Roman Catholics posted themselves in ambush near the gates to await their return. When the unsuspecting Huguenots, devoutly meditating upon the solemnities in which they had been engaged, made their appearance, they were greeted first with imprecations and blasphemies, then with a murderous attack. Between one hundred and one hundred and twenty are said to have been killed or wounded. The punishment of this audacious violation of the rights of the Protestants was at first left by parliament to the inferior or presidial judges, and the investigation dragged. The judges were threatened as they went to court: "Si l'on sçavoit que vous eussiez informé, on vous creveroit les yeux; si vous y mectez la main, on vous coupera la gorge!" The people broke into the prisons and liberated the accused. The civic militia refused to interfere. It was evident that no justice could be obtained from the local magistrates. The king, however, on receiving the complaints of the Huguenots, displayed great indignation, and despatched Montmorency to Rouen with twenty-seven companies of soldiers, and a commission authorized to try the culprits. The greater part of these, however, had fled. Only five persons received the punishment of death; several hundred fugitives were hung in effigy. Montmorency attempted to secure the Protestants against further aggression by disarming the entire population, with the exception of four hundred chosen men, and by compelling the parliament, on the fifteenth of May, to swear to observe the Edict of Pacification—precautions whose efficacy we shall be able to estimate more accurately by the events of the following year.[806]
The "Croix de Gastines" again.