His career is thus sketched by a contemporary:—
‘Il avoit esté de sa premiere profession jacobin, et la feue royne de Navarre Margueritte, qui aymoit les gens sçavans et spirituels, le cognoissant tel, le deffrocqua et le mena avec elle à la Court, le fit cognoistre, le poussa, luy ayda, le fit employer en plusieurs ambassades; car je pense qu’il n’y a guieres pays en l’Europe où il n’ayt esté ambassadeur et en negotiation, ou grande ou petite, jusques en Constantinople, qui fut son premier advancement, et à Venize, en Polongne, Angleterre, Escosse et autres lieux. On le tenoit Lutherien au commencement, et puis Calviniste, contre sa profession episcopalle; mais il s’y comporta modestement par bonne mine et beau semblant; la reyne de Navarre le deffrocqua pour l’amour de cela.’—Brantôme, iii. 52.
[37] Monsieur de Vulcob, French Ambassador at the Court of Maximilian. See Charrière, Négotiations de la France dans le Levant, iii. 596, note.
[38] Jean de Morvilliers was born at Blois in 1506. He was ambassador at Venice from 1546 to 1550, and was rewarded for his services by receiving the Bishopric of Orleans in 1552. After he became bishop, the Chapter of his cathedral, by a statute passed in November 1552, ordered him to shave off his beard. He refused to comply, and the quarrel raged fiercely for four years, till finally in 1556 it was appeased by a letter from the King to the Chapter, in which he declared that he required to send Morvilliers to various countries in which a beard was necessary, and therefore ordered the Chapter to receive him beard and all. He did not, however, take possession of his cathedral till 1559. Francis II. appointed him a Privy Councillor, and in 1561 he took part in the Conference of Poissy, and in the following year attended the Council of Trent, as one of the French representatives. He was afterwards ambassador to the Duke of Savoy, and in 1564 was one of the negotiators of the Treaty of Troyes, between Charles IX. and Queen Elizabeth. In the same year he gave up his Bishopric in favour of his nephew. On the disgrace of the Chancellor l’Hôpital, in 1568, he became Keeper of the Seals, but in 1571 had to resign them to Birague. In de Thou’s opinion (iii. 209), he was honest and prudent, but cautious to the verge of timidity, and therefore always pursued a policy of expediency. He was the head of the party who were in favour of peace but thought no religious reform was required, and who therefore, in order to remain on good terms with the extreme Catholic party headed by the Guises, did not hesitate to evade or violate the pledges given to the Protestants. See Thuanus, iii. 35. De Thou’s estimate of his character is borne out by a State-paper preserved by d’Aubigné (Histoire, vol. ii. bk. i. ch. ii.), written by Morvilliers at the request of Charles IX. in 1572, in opposition to Coligny’s project of war with Spain.
[39] Elizabeth’s marriage portion had never been paid, and Busbecq was afraid that this fact might be adduced as a reason for not paying her dower now she was a widow; and also, in case of the failure of Maximilian’s issue male, a claim might be set up on behalf of her daughter, that Elizabeth’s renunciation of her rights of succession was invalid for the same reason. That Busbecq’s fears were not ill-founded is shown by the fact that Louis XIV. argued that his wife’s renunciation of her rights to the Crown of Spain was invalid, as her marriage portion had never been paid.
[40] The Comte de Retz was the son of a Florentine banker at Lyons, named Gondi, Seigneur du Péron. His wife entered the service of Catherine de Medici, and took charge of her children in their infancy. She endeared herself to the Queen, who being Regent during the minority of Charles IX. advanced her children to the highest posts: the Comte de Retz became first Gentleman of the Chamber to the King, and a Marshal of France; he acquired enormous wealth. His brother, Pierre de Gondi, was made Bishop of Paris, and afterwards Cardinal; he had other preferments worth 30,000 or 40,000 livres per annum, and property worth 200,000 crowns; while a third brother was Master of the Wardrobe to the King.
[41] The following is an extract from a diary kept by a French official during this same year 1575:—‘Le mardi 6e juillet, fust pendu à Paris, et puis mis en quatre quartiers, un capitaine nommé la Vergerie, condamné à mort par Birague, chancelier, et quelques maistres des requestes nommés par la Roine-mère, qui lui firent son procès bien court dedans l’Hostel de ladite Ville de Paris. Toute sa charge estoit que, s’estant trouvé en quelque compagnie, où on parloit de la querelle des escoliers et des Italiens, il avoit dit qu’il faloit se ranger du costé des escoliers et saccager et couper la gorge à tous ces.... Italiens, et à tous ceux qui les portoient et soustenoient, comme estans cause de la ruine de la France: sans avoir autre chose fait ni attenté contre iceux.’—De l’Estoile, i. 69.
[42] Maximilian put on record his protest against the Massacre of Saint Bartholomew in a letter to Lazarus Schwendi:—‘Quod attinet ad præclarum illud facinus quod Galli in Amiralio ejusque sociis tyrannicè perpetrarunt, equidem id minimè probare possum, magnoque cum dolore intellexi Generum meum sibi persuaderi passum tam fœdam lanienam. Quanquam scio magis alios imperare quàm ipsum. Attamen hoc ad excusationem facti non sufficit, neque hoc satis est palliando sceleri.’—Maximilian to Laz. Schwendi. Leyden, 1603. 2nd edition.
[43] Jean St. Chaumont, being at Nismes with a picked body of soldiers, determined to make an attempt on Aigues-Mortes. Guided by some Protestants who had been driven out of the town, he contrived one night to blow open the gates; his troops rushed in and took possession of the place. The garrison fled to the tower of Constance, which two days later was compelled to surrender. See Thuanus, iii. 83.
[44] Stephen Bathory, Voivode of Transylvania. He and Maximilian were eventually both elected in 1576, and civil war was imminent in consequence; but the death of Maximilian a few months later left Bathory in undisputed possession of the Crown.