[874] Pius the Fifth—Saint Pius, for his name is commemorated in the prayers of the Church on the 5th of May—was, we are told by his biographer, a model of severity to his own kindred; and, if the fact that he elevated his grand-nephew, Michael Bonelli, to the sacred college should be alleged as casting some doubt upon this characteristic of his, we must hasten to add that he did so, we are assured, only in consequence of the urgent solicitations of Cardinal Farnese and others. He deserves the credit, however, of yielding to their persuasions with reasonable promptness, for the nomination of his nephew took place within two months of the Pope's accession. Michael, being like his uncle a native of the vicinity of Alessandria, in Piedmont, naturally succeeded to the designation of "il cardinale Alessandrino," which Pius relinquished on assuming the tiara. Gabutius, Vita Pii Quinti Papæ, apud Acta Sanctorum (Bolandi) Maii, § 48, p. 630.
[875] The Guises, in the same spirit, had at one time proposed as a candidate for Margaret's hand the Cardinal of Este, for whom they hoped easily to obtain from the Pope a dispensation from his vow of celibacy. Walsingham to Cecil, Feb. 18, 1571, Digges, 42.
[876] Capilupi, Lo stratagema di Carlo IX., 1573, Orig. edit., p. 11; Gabutius, Vita Pii Quinti, ubi supra, § 244-246, p. 676.
[877] So also says Tavannes: "Il est renvoyé avec paroles générales que Sa Majesté ne feroit rien au prejudice de l'obéissance de Sa Saincteté." Mémoires (ed. Petitot), iii. 198. Tavannes is explicit in his declarations that the massacre was not premeditated. "Tant s'en faut que l'on pensast faire la Sainct Barthélemy à ces nopces, que sans Madame, fille du Roy, qui y avoit inclination, il se deslioit" (iii. 194). "L'entreprise de la Sainct Barthélemy, qui n'estoit pas seulement pourpensée, et dont la naissance vint de l'imprudence huguenotte." Ibid., iii. 198.
[878] E.g.: "Si j'avois quelque autre moyen de me vanger de mes ennemis, je ne ferois point ce mariage; mais je n'en ai point d'autre moyen que cetui-ci." Cardinal D'Ossat's letter of Sept. 22, 1599, to Villeroy, Lettres (ed. of 1698), ii. 100. It must be noticed that D'Ossat had a particular purpose in producing testimony to show that Charles IX. constrained his sister to marry, as it would assist him in obtaining a divorce for Henry IV. If, as D'Ossat affirms, the Cardinal of Alessandria exclaimed, on hearing of the massacre, "God be praised! The King of France has kept his word to me," this would agree equally well with the supposition that Charles IX. had contented himself with general promises.
[879] "The foolish cardinal," wrote Sir Thomas Smith, English ambassador at the French court during Walsingham's temporary absence (March 3, 1571/2), "went away as wise as he came; he neither brake the marriage with Navarre, nor got no dismes of the Church of France, nor perswaded the King to enter into the League with the Turk, nor to accept the Tridentine, or to break off Treaty with us; and the foolishest part of all, at his going away, he refused a diamond which the King offered him of 600 crowns, yet he was here highly feasted. He and his train cost the King above 300 crowns a day, as they said." Digges, 193. Gabutius adds that after the death of Pius V.—probably after the massacre—Charles IX. sent the ring to the cardinal with this inscription upon the bezel: "Non minus hæc solida est pietas, ne pietas possit mea sanguine solvi." Vita Pii Quinti, ubi supra, § 246, p. 676. The inscription had doubtless been cut since the first proffer of the ring. It appears to me most probable that the ring was offered by Charles to the cardinal with the idea that its acceptance would bind him to support the king in his suit for a dispensation for the marriage of Henry and Margaret, and that the prudent churchman declined it for the same reason. Subsequently, with the same view, Charles sent it to his ambassador at Rome, M. de Ferralz, instructing him to give it to the Cardinal of Alessandria. But Ferralz, on consultation with the Cardinal of Ferrara and others in the French interest, came to the conclusion that the gift would be useless, and so retained it, at the same time notifying his master. The reason may have been either that Alessandria had too little influence, since his uncle's death, to effect what was desired, or that the matter was of less consequence when once Charles had resolved to go on with the marriage without waiting further for the dispensation. So I understand Charles's words to Ferralz (Aug. 24, 1572): "J'ai aussi sceu par vostre dicte mémoire, que par l'avis de mon cousin le cardinal de Ferrare, vous avez retenu le diamant que je vous avois envoyé pour le donner de ma part au cardinal Alexandrin, puisque mon dict cousin et mes autres ministres trouvent que le don seroit inutile et perdu." Mackintosh, iii., App. C., p. 348.
[880] Despatch of March 29, 1572, Digges, 182, 183. It must be noticed that the permission to have mass celebrated in Béarn had been purposely left out in the original basis.
[881] Jeanne d'Albret to Henry of Navarre, Tours, Feb. 21, 1572, Rochambeau, Lettres d'Antoine de Bourbon et de Jehanne d'Albret (Paris, 1877), 340.
[882] Jeanne d'Albret to M. de Beauvoir, Blois, March 11, 1572, ibid., 345.
[883] "'Il m'a donc dit quelque chose.' 'Je croy bien qu'ouy, Madame, mais c'est quelque chose qui n'approche point de cela.' Elle se prist à rire, car nottez qu'elle ne parle à moy qu'en badinant." Same letter, ibid., 348. How keenly Jeanne felt this treatment may be inferred from a characteristic sentence: "Je vous diray encores que je m'esbahis comme je peux porter les traverses que j'ay, car l'on me gratte, l'on me picque, l'on me flatte, l'on me brave, l'on me veult tirer les vers du nez, sans se laisser aller, bref je n'ay que Martin seul qui marche droict, encores qu'il ait la goutte, et M. le comte (Nassau) qui me faict tous les bons offices qu'il peut." Same letter, ibid., 353.