The assassin humiliated.
He then discharged the two pistols in the air, and permitted the humiliated man to mount his horse and ride away unharmed.
Chapter IX.
The Assassination of the Duke
of Guise and of Henry III.
1589
Imbecility of the king.
The war, again resumed, was fiercely prosecuted. Henry III. remained most of the time in the gilded saloons of the Louvre, irritable and wretched, and yet incapable of any continued efficient exertion. Many of the zealous Leaguers, indignant at the pusillanimity he displayed, urged the Duke of Guise to dethrone Henry III. by violence, and openly to declare himself King of France. They assured him that the nation would sustain him by their arms. But the duke was not prepared to enter upon so bold a measure, as he hoped that the death of the king would soon present to him a far more favorable opportunity for the assumption of the throne. Henry III. was in constant fear that the duke, whose popularity in France was almost boundless, might supplant him, and he therefore forbade him to approach the metropolis.
Haughtiness of the Duke of Guise.
The duke goes to Paris.