But Catherine refused to deal with any matter of state until the arrival of the King. She showed an almost feverish anxiety for her son’s coming, fearing that the duke of Alençon would be put forward for the crown by the Politiques.[1660] In Germany, at the same time, the Orange party, with the aid of Schomberg, labored to promote the cause of the Politiques and liberal Huguenots, and in September a deputation came from the count palatine to urge the cause of toleration in France.[1661] But it was slow and hard work, for as La Noue had bitterly said the year before: “The iron of the German nation was heavy and hard to work; it was silver that made things move.”[1662] Moreover, the agents of Spain and the Guises were encountered at every turn.
In the meantime Henry III had left Cracow on June 16, running away from his kingdom like a thief in the night,[1663] and came home by way of Italy, via Venice, where he was extravagantly entertained by the senate,[1664] Ferrara (July 29), Mirandola, Mantua, and Turin, which he left on August 28, and arrived at Lyons on September 6.[1665] Catherine, who showed great impatience, met him there (she arrived at Lyons on August 27). So fearful was she lest Alençon and Henry of Navarre would escape that the young princes had traveled in the coach with her.[1666] The procession moved as if through a hostile country by way of Burgundy and Chalons-sur-Saône, some of the guard marching in advance, the rest bringing up the rear. “Marshal de Retz was always on the wing of her. Some of the guard marched two leagues before and some two leagues after.”[1667]
Those who were at all optimistic had clung to the belief, until the development of events shattered their hopes, that Henry III would endeavor to pacify his subjects, arguing that if he were inclined to war, he would not have refused the assistance proffered him in Italy of men and money, and that the French crown could not further hazard the reduction of the kingdom piecemeal.[1668] Damville had met the King at Turin, having come there under a safe-conduct of the duke of Savoy, to persuade Henry III to adopt a conciliatory policy, which he at first inclined to follow.
But the moment he came under the sinister influence of Catherine de Medici, he cast this prudent advice to the winds. It was she who dissuaded him from what was wisely counseled[1669] and in advance of his arrival had made military preparations to resume the war by importing Swiss mercenaries and German reiters again.[1670] Accordingly, instead of extending the olive branch, the King expressed his determination to wage unremitting war upon the Huguenots and Politiques rather than grant the demands they made. The deputies of La Rochelle who came to Lyons, requesting a surcease of arms, were repulsed by the King and told it was but a scheme of the Huguenots to gain time for preparation. The establishment of three camps was ordered, one in Dauphiné, the second in Provence and Languedoc, and the third in Poitou. At the same time Schomberg and Fregoso were sent into Germany for assistance.[1671]
When Henry III definitely resolved to follow out a policy of suppression Damville was summoned to Lyons to answer for his governorship. It was a fatal blunder on the part of the King, for the action of the crown hardened the tentative co-operation of the Protestants and the Politiques into a positive alliance. At Milhau, in August, 1574 the Protestants recognized Damville, while he in turn admitted their leaders into his council. The form of government established at Montauban the year before acquired new strength and greater extent. Provincial and general assemblies were formed without distinction between Protestants and Politiques, upon the basis of mutual toleration; in places where the two creeds obtained each side promised to observe the peace and Damville engaged not to introduce the Catholic religion in any town of which the Huguenots were masters.
The men who took this step justified it by alleging that a foreign faction had acquired control over the sovereign; that it was destroying the kingdom, the nobles, the princes of the blood, and with them the very institutions and civilization of France; and that it was their hope to arrest this process. The programme of the Huguenot-Politique party, in addition to complete religious toleration, insisted upon the abolition of the practice of selling offices, the convocation of the States-General, the reduction of the taxes. In this demand they were supported by the provincial states of Dauphiné, Provence, and Burgundy. The confessional idea was deliberately kept in the background. Men no longer talked of a war of religion, but of a “Guerre du Bien Public” as in the reign of Louis XI.
With the nobles Damville’s was a name to conjure with. A large portion of the Catholic nobility, who for a long time had been severely reproached for not seriously opposing the Huguenots, sympathized with his attitude. If the bench and bar of France was strongly attached to the principles of the Catholic religion, the nobility who were hereditary enemies of the legists, whose teachings had for three centuries tended to abridge their feudal rights, out of sheer self-interest, aside from any other motives, now inclined toward the Calvinists. Only radical Calvinists, like Du Plessis-Mornay, opposed the union and were bitter in denunciation of the overtures made by their more moderate brethren, notably La Noue, to Damville and the Politiques.[1672]
A royal edict let the Huguenots understand what was to be expected. The King’s determination was to clear the valley of the Rhone from Lyons to Avignon with the aid of the Swiss and then to subdue Languedoc on the one side and Dauphiné on the other. Such a plan was more bold than practicable, and Henry was likely to find it too hard to accomplish, especially by winter sieges. The Protestants had fortified themselves in Livron on the left bank of the Rhone and at Pouzin across the river, which was inaccessible except by one approach and then only four men could advance abreast.
But there was another matter, the difficulty of which Henry III underestimated, namely the army. The Protestants were so entrenched in their strongholds as to make the use of horsemen against them impracticable. The Swiss were low-class mercenaries, good as ordinary footmen but useless for a siege. Moreover, all of them, reiters and Swiss, were not disposed to move unless they saw their pay in their hands and were utter strangers to discipline, wasting the country “to make a Christian man’s heart bleed.”[1673] In one case the wretched peasantry followed their despoilers to the confines of Lyons and fell upon them in desperation, recovering what had been taken from them. What did the King do? He actually had to punish these wretched subjects of his in order to retain the services of the reiters at all!
Yet the King for a moment showed some of the old fire he displayed at Moncontour and amazed the Protestants by taking Pouzin after three weeks of siege. The victory was marred, though, by the shameful conduct of the Swiss, the reiters, and the Italians in the royal army, who sacked and burned it. Much the same state of things prevailed wherever these riotous plunderers penetrated—in Picardy, in Champagne, in Poitou. But Henry III having reached Avignon, discovered that he was no better off for his success. Meanwhile Damville, with whom the duke of Savoy had honorably dealt, returned from Turin, and reached the vicinity of Montpellier and Beaucaire before the King was aware of it.[1674]