[804] Letter of the Queen of Navarre to the queen mother, Dec. 17, 1570, Rochambeau, Lettres d'Antoine de Bourbon et de Jehanne d'Albret (Paris, 1877), 306. A few lines of this admirable paper (which is, however, much mutilated) may be quoted as having an almost prophetic significance: "Et vous diray, Madame, les larmes aus yeulx, avecq une afection pure et entière que, s'il ne plaist au Roy et à vous nous aseureur nos tristes demandes, que je ne puis espérer qu'une treve ... en ce royaulme par ceste guerre siville, car nous y mourrons tous plustost que quiter nostre Dieu et nostre religion, laquelle nous ne pouvons tenir sans exersise, non plus qu'un corps ne sauré vivre sans boire et manger.... Je vous en ay dit le seul moyen; ayés pitié de tant de sang répandu, de tant d'impiétés commises en la ... de ceste guerre et que vous ne pourrez bien d'un seul mot faire cesser." "Et sur cella, Madame, je supliray Dieu qui tient les cueurs des Roys en sa main disposer celui du Roi et le vostre à mectre le repos en ce royaulme à sa gloire et contentement de Vos Majestés, maugré le complot de M. le Cardinal de Lorrayne, dont il a descouvert la trame à Villequagnon," etc.
[805] Discours du massacre fait à Orange, from the Mém. de l'état de France sous Charles IX., Archives curieuses, vi. 459-470; De Thou, iv. 483.
[806] Floquet, Histoire du Parlement du Normandie, iii. 87-112, whose account is in great part derived from the registers of the parliament and the archives of the Hôtel de Ville of Rouen. De Thou, iv. (liv. l.) 483, certainly greatly underestimates the number of Protestants killed, when he limits it to five.
[807] See ante, chapter xvi.
[808] Jehan de la Fosse (Sept., 1571), 132.
[809] Ibid. (Nov., 1571), 133.
[810] Jehan de la Fosse (Dec., 1571), 134.
[811] Agrippa d'Aubigné, ii. 4 (liv. i., c. 1); De Thou, iv. (liv. l.) 487-489; Discours de ce qui avint touchant la Croix de Gastines (from Mém. de l'état de Charles IX.), in Cimber et Danjou, Arch. cur., vi. 475, 476; Jehan de la Fosse, ubi supra. According to the recently published journal of La Fosse, Charles the Ninth expressed himself to the preachers of Paris, who had come to remonstrate with him in language which may at first sight appear somewhat suspicious: "attestant ledict roy vouloir vivre et mourir en la religion de ses prédécesseurs roys, religion catholique et romaine, toutefois qu'il avoit fait abattre la croix pour certaine cause laquelle il vouloit taire et avoir faict plusieurs choses contre sa conscience, toutefois par contrainte à cause du temps, et supplioit les prédicateurs n'avoir mauvaise opinion de luy" (pp. 138, 139). There is good reason, however, to believe that the secret reason which the king was unwilling to name was not a contemplated massacre of the Protestants, but rather the Navarrese and English marriages, and the war with Spain in the Netherlands.
[812] Walsingham to Burleigh, Dec. 7, 1571, Digges, p. 151. "Marshal Montmorency repaired to this town the third of this moneth accompanied with 300 horse. The next day after his arrival he and the Marshal de Coss conferred with the chief of this town about the plucking down of the cross, which was resolved on, and the same put in execution, the masons employed in that behalf being guarded by certain harquebusiers."
[813] Queen Elizabeth was born September 7, 1533; Henry was born in September, 1551 (the day is variously given as the 18th, 19th, and 21st), and was just nineteen.