[962] F. Fr. 20,647, fol. 11. For other details of the preliminaries of Bayonne, see L’Ambassade de St. Sulpice, 335-38, 347, 350, 351, 353, 354, 357-60, 362, 363, 366, 374-78, 382.
[963] Cf. Recueil des choses notables qui ont esté faites à Bayonne Paris, 1566; and the Mémoires de Marguerite de Navarre, Book I.
[964] See De Thou, Book XXVII; Mathieu, Histoire de France, I, 283; La Popelinière, Book XI, 8. The prince of Orange and William of Hesse both believed that the massacre of St. Bartholomew was concerted at Bayonne (Archives de la maison d’Orange-Nassau, III, 507; IV, 108).
[965] Some of the literature upon this famous interview is as follows: E. Marcks, Die Zusammenkunft von Bayonne: Das französ. Staatsleben u. Spanien in d. J. 1563-67, Strassburg, 1889; Combes, L’entrevue de Bayonne de 1565, Paris, 1882; Maury, in Journal des savants, 1871; Loiseleur La St. Barthelémy, Paris, 1883; Lettenhove, La conférence de Bayonne, 1883; La Ferrière, R. Q. H., XXXIV, 457, and the same in Correspondance de Catherine de Médicis, II, Introd.; Philippson, L’Athénæum belge, July 1, 1882; De Croze, Les Guises, les Valois et Philippe II; Boutaric, La Saint Barthélemy, d’après les archives du Vatican (Bib. de l’Ecole des Chartes, sér. V, III, 1); Raumer, Frankreich und die Bartholomäusnacht, Leipzig, 1854; Wuttke, Zur Vorgeschichte der Bartholomäusnacht; Soldan, La Saint Barthélemy (French trans.), 1854.
[966] R. Q. H., XXXIV, 483, and n. 2.
[967] For Alva’s judgment on the government of France see Papiers d’état du cardinal de Granvelle, VII, 276; cf. L’Ambassade de St. Sulpice, 341-43.
[968] Nég. Tosc., III, 523; R. Q. H., XXXIV, 492-512, n. 4. Alva frankly said that he wished the constable were gone with the rest—“el condestable que valierá mas que faltára como los otros.”—Papiers d’état du cardinal de Granvelle, VII, 277.
[969] The duke of Montpensier was a notoriously bigoted Catholic. The Venetian ambassador said of him: “Il quale è tenuto più atto a governare un monasterio di frati che a comandare ad eserciti.”—Rel. vén., II, 155.
[970] R. Q. H., XXXIV, 485. Montluc put a memoir in Alva’s hands which proposed an alliance between the crowns of France and Spain for the purpose of crushing the Protestants in France. In event of the French king’s refusal to become a party to this alliance, Montluc outlined the means of defense which Philip II would have to resort to. This memoir is published by the baron de Ruble in Commentaires et lettres de Montluc, V, 23 ff. In this striking document the veteran soldier, after setting forth his favorite thesis that French Calvinism was antimonarchical in its nature, makes a survey of the religious state of the provinces. He concludes that while Protestantism was rampant everywhere in France, in five-sixths of the country the Catholics were superior. The place of great danger is Guyenne. The mutual safety of France and Spain requires the subjugation of this province. France cannot or will not do this alone (cf. Correspondance de Catherine de Médicis, I, 342, n. 3; 343, n. 4). It remains, therefore, for the king of Spain to do so. This is the historical argument for all of Montluc’s subsequent course of treason with Philip II.
[971] This has been triumphantly proved by Count Hector de la Ferrière, who has shown that M. Combes, L’Entrevue de Bayonne de 1565 et la question de St. Barthélemy d’après les archives de Simancas, Paris, 1881, has mistranslated the very documents upon which he relied (R. Q. H., XXXIV, 511 ff.).