[844] I know not on what authority Miss Freer states (Henry III. of France, his Court and Times, i. 70) that "even Coligny was startled at the ominous significance of these words; the shadow, however, vanished before the warmth and frankness of Charles's manner." Compare Agrippa d'Aubigné, ii. 5.
[845] Walsingham's account in a letter of La Mothe Fénélon (Corresp. dipl., iv. 245, 246), its accuracy being vouched for by a letter of Charles IX. himself (ibid., vii. 268); Tocsain contre les massacreurs, Cimber et Danjou, vii. 34, 35; De Thou, iv. (liv. l.) 493.
[846] Charles IX. to Emmanuel Philibert, Blois, Sept. 28, 1571, apud Leger, Hist. gén. des églises vaudoises (Leyden, 1669), i. 47, 48.
[847] "Durant ce moys, Gaspard de Coligny, remis par l'édit de pacification en l'estat d'admiral, fut mandé par le roy et vint de la Rochelle trouver le Roy à Bloys, et se retira hors de la cour toute la maison de Guise, de sorte que le Roy estoit gouverné par ledit admiral et Montmorency." Jehan de la Fosse, Journal d'un curé ligueur, 132.
[848] Walsingham to Cecil, March 5, 1571. Digges, 48, 49.
[849] "And as for conference had with the Count Lewis of Nassau, he told him, that he was misinformed;" first letter of Walsingham to Burleigh, of Aug. 12th, Digges, 122. Yet the second letter of the same date gives a detailed account of this conference. It must be admitted that the diplomacy of the sixteenth century was sufficiently barefaced in its impostures. Louis of Nassau told Walsingham of an enterprise of Strozzi against Spain, determined upon by Charles IX. "onely to amaze the king there;" but, as to Strozzi, "the king here meaneth notwithstanding to disallow [him] openly." Ibid., 125.
[850] Digges, 122.
[851] Jehan de la Fosse, 134.
[852] "Et que ceulx qui estoient à la fenestre estoient bien aises de veoir jouer le jeu à mes despens." It is scarcely necessary to say that this characteristic expression alludes primarily to the King of Spain and the Duke of Alva in the Netherlands.
[853] Charrière, Négociations de la France dans le Levant, Documents inédits (publ. by the Imperial Government), Paris, 1853, iii. 200. Cf. Sir James Mackintosh, Hist. of England, vol. iii., App. A., pp. 345, 346, audience of Sr. de la Bourdaizière at Rome, cir. Sept., 1571.