Two powerful parties were arrayed against the Huguenots, one of which consisted of their avowed and implacable enemies. This was headed by the Guises, with whom the Constable Montmorenci, and the Maréchal St. André had been induced to enter into league. Less fanatically violent, but far more formidable, through its false show of moderation and favor, was the party of the Queen-mother, Catherine de Medici. Catherine dreaded the power of the house of Guise; and was often glad to avail herself of the Protestant interest as a counterpoise against them. But though the jealousy which animated herself and her sons against the Princes of Lorraine was great, their hatred of the Huguenots was greater; and their occasional simulation of friendship enabled them to wreak it more malignantly and more completely.
They had sided with Coligni and Condé and the other Protestant chiefs in enacting the Edict of Pacification, and had thereby given a check to the power of the Duke of Guise and his confederates. But when their temporary purpose was served, the wise provisions of that edict were set at naught; the Protestants were again exposed to outrage and slaughter at the hands of their foes, nor could any redress be obtained from the royal tribunals. At length occurred the massacre of Vassi, where the armed followers of the Duke of Guise attacked a defenceless body of Protestants, while engaged in the services of their church, and slaughtered several hundreds of them under the eye of Guise, if not by his orders. Reeking from this carnage, the bands of the Lorraines entered Paris, where they were enthusiastically received by the fanatic populace, which was devoted to the Catholic cause.
Condé now left the capital, and summoned the Protestant nobility and gentry to rally round him in defence of their lives and their creed. Coligni long delayed joining him, and evinced a hesitation and a reluctance to embark in civil war, which emphatically attest the goodness while they in no degree detract from the greatness of his character. His wife, who naturally thought that anxiety on her account aided in restraining him, exhorted him in words of more than Roman magnanimity to arm in defence of the thousand destined victims, who looked up to him for guidance and protection. Coligni urged on her and on the friends who thronged round him, the fearful risks of the enterprise, and his earnest desire to wait in patience for better times, and rest upon the public faith rather than justify persecution by having recourse to violence. Unconvinced and undaunted, the heroine renewed her entreaties to the lingering hero. She told him that such prudence was not wisdom toward God. D'Aubigné professes to report this remarkable conversation from the lips of those who were present; and he states that she proceeded to urge on him these words:—
"God has bestowed on you the genius of a great captain—will you refuse the use of it to his children? You have confessed to the justice of their cause—is not the knightly sword you bear pledged to the defence of the oppressed? Sir, my heart bleeds for our slaughtered brethren—and their blood cries out to God and Heaven against you as the murderer of those whom you might have saved."
"Since," replied the Admiral, "the reasons which I have this evening alleged against an ineffectual resistance have made so little impression upon your mind, lay your hand upon your heart and answer me this question, Could you, without murmuring against Providence and the husband to whom Heaven has united you, receive the news of a general defeat? Are you prepared to endure the opprobrium of your enemies—the reproaches of your friends—the treachery of partisans—the curses of the people—confiscation, flight, exile—the insolence of the English, the quarrels of the Germans—shame, nakedness, hunger—and, what is worse, to suffer all this in your children? Are you prepared to see your husband branded as a rebel and dragged to a scaffold; while your children, disgraced and ruined, are begging their bread at the hands of their enemies? I give you eight days to reflect upon it, and when you shall be well prepared for such reverses, I will be ready to set forward, and perish with you and our mutual friends."
"The eight days are already expired!" she cried. "Go, sir, where your duty calls you. Heaven will not give the victory to our enemies. In the name of God, I call upon you to resist no longer, but to save our brethren, or die in the attempt."
On the next morning Coligni was on horseback, with all his retainers round him; and with a heavy heart but a clear conscience, he rode on his way to join Condé at Meaux, which was now, in the early spring of 1562, the head-quarters of the insurgent Huguenots.
The high rank of the Prince of Condé, as well as his brilliant abilities and chivalrous courage, caused him to be acknowledged as chief of the Protestant party; but Coligni was looked on by friends and foes as the main pillar of their cause; and it was he that gave organization to the volunteers who flocked around himself and the prince, first at Meaux, and afterward in greater numbers at Orleans, when toward the end of March they succeeded in occupying that important city, and making it a centre of operations for the Huguenot confederacy. Like Cromwell in after times, Coligni relied on the religious enthusiasm as well as the natural bravery of his troops. He exercised them by preaching and prayer as well as by drilling and manœuvring. He inspired them with his own spirit of austere devotion to their cause; and the Huguenot army was in its first campaigns as conspicuous for good order and morality as for valor; though by degrees it became tainted with a tendency to marauding and to brutal violence.
The Roman Catholic party now sought support from Philip II. of Spain, from the Duke of Savoy, the emperor and other foreign princes of their creed, and the Huguenots, to the deep regret of Coligni, were compelled to strengthen themselves by similar negotiations. The English queen, Elizabeth, promised succors in men and money, on condition of Havre (which city, like most of the other strong places in Normandy, was devoted to the Protestant cause) being placed in her power as a security for repayment. The German Lutheran princes permitted a large auxiliary force of lansquenets and heavy-armed cavalry to be raised among their subjects in behalf of the French Protestants; and Dandelot was despatched into Germany to place himself at their head, and lead them across the Rhine; a difficult operation, which he accomplished with great skill, and joined his brothers and Condé at Pluviers, near Orleans, late in the year, and at a crisis when the fortunes of the Protestant party appeared reduced to a very low ebb, as in the interval which had elapsed since the commencement of the war, though there had been no engagement between the main armies, the Royalists had gained numerous advantages, and had captured many towns, both in the South and in Normandy, which had originally declared for the insurgents.
Coligni and Condé with their own troops and their German allies now (December, 1562) marched upon Paris; but finding it hopeless to attempt the storm or siege of the capital, they led their army toward Normandy, desiring to form a junction with the English troops at Havre. The Royal forces, commanded nominally by the Constable Montmorenci and the Maréchal de St. André, but in which the Duke of Guise was also present, marched for some days on their flank, till the two armies came into collision on December 19th at Dreux, where the first battle of the civil wars was fought. In this action, after many vicissitudes of fortune, the Duke of Guise secured the victory for the Roman Catholics, and Condé was taken prisoner. Coligni led the remains of the Protestant army back to Orleans; whither the Duke of Guise, at the head of a largely recruited army, flushed by their recent victory, soon advanced, with the intention of crushing insurrection and Protestantism, by the capture of their stronghold.