APPENDICES 545
frenche IGnges hath passed alongest the sea coastes of Normandy and hath
taken the names of the principall masters and marryners in thos partes. The
leke brute of warres and preparacion for the same ys in Bryttayne as I have
learned by a barke of Lyme w c came from S t Malos and aryved in this Isle
upon Sonday last at night, who declareth that they were prevely admonished
w th all speede to departe from thens, and that Mons Martigues governo r of
Bryttayne was appointed to com this present Tusday with a greate company
in to the sayd towne of S t Malos where greate preparation was made for the
receyving of him and his retynewe. Thes ar the specialst and most credybel
yntellygences w ch I have as yet lerned from thos partes, the presumpcions
wherof as they ar very manyfest and dangeros so can they not be to myche
credyted and dyl/igently prevented, wherefore I have w th all speede sent
this bearer unto yo u w th thes my advertysementes whom I have charged not
to slacke his duty in conveyaunce of the same, to thend that yo u being
enfourmed of thes premysses may returne youre pleasure and advise for
ower better procedinges in the same, as to yor discrete wysdom may seme
most expedyent, beseching you yt may be as briefly as ys possyble. And
in this meane tyme I shal/ not fayle God willing to enforce and make redy
the power of this castle and isle for the resisting of all daungers and sudden
attemptes w ch may be geven by the ennymy to the uttermost of ower power.
Although the estate and furnyture of this castle ys not unknowen unto yoU,
yet have I thought good to send herew th enclosed a byll of suche necessaryes
as ar specyally wanting in the same. There ys no other speciall matter worthy
the certifyeng for this present from this yo r charge where all thinges remayne
in thaccoustomed good and quyet estate thankes be to God, whom I beseche
long to preserve yo u. From Iersey the xxij th of Aprill i567.
Yowr most obedyent sonne
GEORGE POULET
[4ddressed] To his fight wurshlpfull father
S r Hugh Poulet Knight.
[Endorsed] 22 April, i567.
Mr George Poulett to his father
S r Hugh Poulet from Jersey.
APPENDIX XI
[P. 336, n. 3]
STATE PAPERS, FOREIGN
ELtZEa'g, VoL. XCIV, No. x,338
[Sir Henry Norris to Queen Elizabeth]
Yt may like yo r Majesty to be advertized .... Wryttin at Paris this
last of Septemb r i567, in haste.
552
THE WARS OF RELIGION IN FILNCE
cagione, b ragione pur finta, b apparente; non ch con autorit, et giusto
titolo, sotto colore di uolersi fare riformatori d Preti diformati, et disobedienti,
pigliano 1' armi contrail R, 1o minacciano, faccino le battaglie seco, Io mettino
helle necessitb., doue Sua lkI ta, stata, et si truoua tuttauia, et li diano le leggi
piutosto, che castlgare chi 1o merita, et reintegrare la giustitia, et la Religione
nel suo Dominio, senza le quali due cose mai si uisse, n si potr uiuere retta-
mente in alcun luogo.
Anzi troppo chiara cosa, come questo male non corretto: rob. cosi tra-
sandato andart augumentando si ogni giomo maggiormente di sorte, che si
habbia da mutare Imperio, come si uede che desiderano, et procurano con
ogni diligenza gli Ugonotti che segua. E adunque la pace, cosi fatta peri-
colosa, et dannosa, come si dimostro, sicome al punir li malfattori sara.
sempre trouato necessafio, honesto, et utile. Bisogna hora poi comiderare,
pcsto, che si debba fare se il R hb. il modo da reintegrarsi nel suo prestino
Stato, et autoritt, et obedienza, et di cib forse si potrebbe uenire in certa
cognitione col misurare qual sia pitt il numero de Cat ci b quello degli Ugonotti,
qual siano maggiori, et pitt gagliarde le forze, et armi de ribdli, b quelle del
R, quale delle due parti habbia pitt facile il modo da cauare gente forastiera,
et sia meglio appoggiata d'amicitie de Prencipi Potentati, et de danari.
Et in fine secondo tali propositioni fame la conseguentia, per due Ugonotti,
che siano nel Regno, si ode calcolare, che si ha da contraporre pitt di otto
Cat. cl gli ribelli hanno perduto helle battaglie oltre alla reputatione, et la quan-
titb. degli huomini molti Capi grandi, che haueuano come il Prencipe di CondO,
Dandalotto, et tanti altri, talmente che non accade far paragone dell' armi
sue a quelle del R, essi sono senza denari, et non possono coil a Ioro posta
pitt cauare nuoui soccorsi d'Alemagna, et Sua M t ne ha da sborsare ad essi a
millione, et pub hauer Reistri, Suizzari, Italiani, et Spagnuoli quanto li place,
et purch uolesse sarebbe aiutato da tutta la Christianith, et quello che importa
non meno di tutto il Resto, ha ad arbitrio, et disposition sua la giustitia,
con la quale sola non dubbio, che sarebbe bastante de regolare il tutto.
Sono accettate queste ragioni perch non si pub negare, Ma si risponde,
che la Nobiltb. di Francia, che quella dalla quale depende il Popolo, total-
mente corrotta per la maggior parte, et da questo procede tutto il male, cbe
la grandezza dd R proprio in ogni tempo stata prindpalmente per il seguito,
et obedienza de i Nobili, et mancandogli essi Sua M ta resterebbe debolissima,
et allegano le battaglie guadagnate per diuina dispositione, che non si sono
poi proseguite, n cauatone quel frutto, che si speraua, et douenasi. Onde
si ub. imprimendo nell' animo di Sua M ta che per quel verso mai si potr, uedere
il fine, et che perb manco mal sia essere ricorso all' accordo in quei modi, che
si i potuto, perch il tempo far. ben lui. Le quali fallacie sono troppo pal-
pabili, toccandosi con mano, et uedendosi con l'occhio chiaramente doue
stb. la magagna: percioche il Re uorr, recarsi la mente al petto, e redursi a
APPENDICES 553
memoria delle cagioni, perch non fh seguitata la Vittoria dopo la battaglia
dl San Dionigi, et perch si dlede tempo tante, et tante settimane alli Ribelli
dl riunirsi, et stabilirsi nelloro capo, et non si uolse mai obedire d'andare a
cauarli da Monteri, o Faulnona, come sa chiunque si troub, che si poteua
fare senza alcun pericolo, et perch a Craton in Campagna, quando si segui-
tauano li Ribelli non si uolse combatterli, n manco andarli appresso da
uicino, b tagliargli i passi, come palese, che si poteua per non impedlrgli
la congiuntione con i| soccorso, che ueniua loro di Germania, conoscer mani-
festamente Sua M ta di essere stata tradita, et sa da chi, et io proua da far
punire i malfattori per giustitia, ma non stata consigliata da uenirne mai
all' esecutione, perch Sua M t non hh. uoluto consigliarsi con altri, che con
coioro chela tradiscono. Veggasi quel che segul poi con l'altra pace fatta
con mira, et intentione di dare la stretta alli capi di quella maledetta setta,
dopo che hauessero deposte 1' armi, et resole Fortezze; accioch con tal mezo
si conseguisca 1' intento, che si deue hauere senza tanto sangue per non de-
bilitate le forze proprie. Ma i traditori, che dauano il Consiglio, o almeno
erano partecipi di esso, seppero guidare le cose in modo, et si lascib uscire
la uolpe dalla tana, et portb il caso, che appunto quelli di cui aitfi si fidaua
pii, et che haueua l'ordine di fare 1' essecutione, auuertissero si a tempo i
Ribelli, che furono i primi a repigliare 1' armi, et uscirne di Noyrs, et con-
seruaronsi la Roccella, et hebbero in ordine di poter pigliare Angoslen per
Ioma, prima che le/orze del Re fossero unite esse da opponesseli, che anco
questo, come il resto uiene procedette tutto dalli traditori tiranti adrieto le
prouisioni Regie per dar tempo a complici di lauorare, Piacque put poi a Dio,
che miracolosamente fosse ammazzato, il Prencipe di CondO, et disfatto parte
delle genti di Moners, ma non si seguitb, come si poteua doueua, et conueniuasi.
Venne ancora il Duco di Dupponti, che si poteua combatterlo, et uincerlo al
sicuro, et non si fece per le cagioni, che si seppero, et pure non ci si prouidde.
Fu seguitato, et verso Limoges si hebbero diuerse occasioni di romperlo senza
alcun risico, et non fit esseguito per la colpa di chin' impediua la essecutione
con l'autoritt, che haueua nell' essercito Regio; accioche si lasciasse se unite col
Coligni, anzi ti procurato con buona cura di guardare 1' Essercito Regio in
forma, et in siti, chela fame, et gli stenti 1' hauessero a fare sbandare, dando
andito, commoditA, et aiuto h ribelli di godere il Paese, et d'impatronirsi de'
magazzeni, de ulttouaglie munitioni, et artigliarie preparate da alcune persone,
che si era troppo apparentemente ueduto, che erano colpeuoli, in cib si uenne
al paragone, come questi tall scellerati traditori erano di piit autoritA, essi
appresso le ioro Maestt, che qualunque recordaua la salute, t il seruitio di
esse, come riusci similmente quando si era fatta deliberatione de Suizzeri,
et Italiani, cosl all' ingrosso, che il Re auesse facolt di farsi la ragione con 1'
armi A malgrado de Francesi, chela seruiuano male, i quali misem sh Mons r
Duca d'Angiit chela impregnb, come cosa che offendesse la dignitY., et honor
554
THE WARS OF RELIGION IN FRANCE
proprio di Sua Altezza, conoscendo chiaramente, che 1' intenteone de chi
gouernaua, et consigliaua Sua M ta non era uolta ad altro fine, che fargli inimici,
ouero diffidenti tutti gli ahri Prencipi, et in somma priuaflo di tutti gli aiuti
esterni.
Le difficolth, che furono interposte, per consumar tempo nell' andare al
soccorso di Poiters, sono anco loro ben note, perch tthebbero da interuenire
diuersi capi, che andarono con le genti Italiane, finalmente, come Piacque
a Dio segul la battaglia di Moncontor, dopo la quale il R medesimo sa, come
ftt tenuto a bada sotto San Giouanni d'Angelin, n si uolse mai mandare parte
della Cauallaria, non che tutto l'Essercito dietro alli Ribelli rotti, et in fuga,
di sorte che non era possibile, che si rlunissero, se non se gli fusse lasciato
in preda le migliori, et pitt opulenti Prouincie di Francia per accrescere Ioro
il seguito de Padroni, et lasclarli reinferscare, et rimettere insieme. Dalle
quali cose si ode, che il R medesimo ha scorto qualche cosa, che gli ha fatto
nausea. Ma essendo Sua l,i ta attorniata di genre, che 1o cerca d'ingannare,
et tradire per ogni uerso, ella non pub discernere i Lacci, che gli sono tesi ne
i pericoli doue si troua, perb e da cercare di far la molto ben capace delle
sopradette cose, mostrandoli, che es non si lleua da torno quei ribaldi, che
cercauano cosl grandi artificij di rouinarla, ella si prouochert 1' ira di Dio,
ne douerk pitt sperare nella sua diuina misericordia, che cosi miracolosamente
1' ha sostenuto, et protetto fino al presente, ma restarh in preda di coloro, che
non hanno altra mira, che di fare andare in precipitio la Sua Corona.
Di sopra e fatto mentione di alcuni particolari d pitt sostantiali, accioche
accadendosi si sappiano addurre per essempio al R, alia persona del quale
pare, che si debba far capo direttamente, et parlare a Sua I ta senza maschera,
perch certo non se gli pub far maggior benefitio, che id storarli le orecchie,
et aprirgli occhi, et la mente per farli bene intendere liberamente, come non
resta, che da lei medesima, se non uorrh porre rimedio a tanti mall, k quail
tutti pub prouedere facilmente, con punire quelli, che nominatamente si
daranno in una lista, et degli altri, che gli paia, che 1o meritino, secondo il
riscontro, che trouarh su le scritture cauate da Casa Coligni, et ancora, che
alll ribelli dl Christo, et suoi, che hanno fatto tutte, et si grandi, et inaudite
sceleratezze, secondo 1' opinione di alcuni, non accade considerare di guardar
Fede b promessa fatta, nondimeno si pub fare di castigare solo quelli, che hanno
tradlto, mentre seruiuano nel campo, b nel Consiglio regio, che fia senza
alcun dubio a bastanza-
Hassi d' auuertire ancora il R, come fin che Sua -M t sen' ita presso alle
grida, et stata con effetti del tutto Ingannata, ella pub esser scusata appresso
Dio, et al Mondo, ma dopo che saranno scoperte le magagne, et mppresen-
tatole la uerith, et il modo di non star pitt in preda, et alia descrittione de'
traditori se non ci pub: uederb, la colpa di tutti i male, si ridurranno sopra le sue
spalle, et restarh abbandonata da Sua Diuina 1I ta appresso della quale piit"
APPENDICES 555
non uarranno i prieghi, et oratione del Papa, et de gli buoni, et fedeli, che
forse hanno giouato piia di ogni altro aiuto humano a sostenerla. Vedesi,
che gli Heredi uanno cercando sottilmente a qualunque occasione di fare che
il R offenda Dio per prouocargli il suo giusto sdegno, mettendogli inanzi con
la sua pelosa caritt di conseruarsi 1' amicitia del Turco di usurpare i ben i
Ecc ci. et fino a mettersi a fare nuove Imprese fuora del Regno col mezo delle
loro Armi, la qual ultima cosa non incredibile in alcun mode se gi. ii Re
non uolesse darsi loro in preda del tutto, percioch: quando quell' arrni si
uoltassero contra qualunque si sia stato di Prencipe Catholico Nostro Sig re
non potrebbe mancare di far quanto si appartiene al debito dell' offitio suo,
senza risguardo d' altra mondana consideratione, trattandosi della gloria d i
Dio, et conseruatione della Sua Santa Legge, nel qual caso Sua Beatitudine
strebbe forzata di procurare con la medesima caldezza di souuenire, et aiutare
altri contra gli Heretici, che ha fatto con il R Catco. et con Venettiani, la qual
Lega si ht da ricercare, che sia uolta contra gli Heretici, et Infedeli, piutosto,
che altroue.
Sopra la competenza, et gara de gmndi, si possono dir moltj particolari
in uoie, che stri troppo lunga cosa mettere in scrittura, basra, che tutto
seruono a negare la debita obedienza al Padrone, et al uoler portar 1' armi
con le quail s' impedisce la giustitia, et fino a tanto che il Re non punisce a
qualche uno de buoni, c.he 1o meriti, perch altri non preuarichi poi in modo,
che una pane, et 1' altre si chiarisca per effetto, come Sua M ta uuole con-
seruarsi la superiori, che se gli conuiene, mai sara. libera da queste molestie,
et sempre si starb, in preda di ogni uno.
E. uefisimile, che [a Reina ami pi di tutti gli altri lo Stato, et la uita
del Re et 1' unione, et conseruatione de gli altri suoi Figliuoli, essendo essa
prudente quanto si sa, et hauendo tanta cognitione delli humori, quanta le
ha fatta imparare la lunga amministratione del Gouerno, cbe ella ha hauuto,
perb non si pub dubitare, che Sua M ta per ambitione di conseruarsi 1' autorit.
preuarichi in parte alcuna di quel che deue, ma la proua ci ammonisce troppo,
che da lei non si pub aspettare quelle esecutioni, che ha mostro al Duca d'Alua
in Fiandm, che basta a stabilire le solleuationi, et ribellione, perch il sesso
non gli 1o promette, et anco in uerit di essere scusata, essendo stata Fora-
stiera, et senza appoggio di potersi reggere secondo lei in simili casi, bisog-
nando ddle coral deliberationi persona di gmn cuore, et che habbia oltre 1"
autorith I' attitudine di fare con le mani proprie, quando 1' occasioni 1o ricerchi,
perb con la I ta ddla Reina, non pare che accada pensare di poter profittare
per tal uerso, si che il trattarne con essa non si deue hauere per opportuno,
et anco di questo si potrebbe pigliar Conseglio sul luogo per gouernarsene
secondo che giudicassero meglio qudli che si s., che sono buoni, et ueri Catci
et che non hanno pifi mira alle passioni particolari per il desiderio di hauer
maggior partecipatione tlel Gouerno, che al seruitio, et ben publico.
APPENDICES 557
giA non si potranno a modo alcuno conseruare da Sua M ta. Cat ca quail remedij
ella presume di farci, et sapere, acdoche si potesse disponere, et pensare se
con i Vinetiani et altri Prencipi si potesse fare simili ofitij per tastarli il poiso
douendo essi presumere, che sempre, che fusse mosso guerra alli Stati del
Re di Spagna a loro non rincrescesse di potersi aiutare della Lega fatta, ma
necessario, non che opportuno, in ogni caso pare il far prouisione qua de
danari, de quail Sua Beat he. ha a ualersi grossamente, si per aiutare quelle cose,
come per diffendere Italia, et il resto della ChristianitA dalle forze di questa
scelerata setta. Et perch le deliberationi di tanta importanza, nella quale
si tratta della salute del Regno, et della conseruatione della Santa Sede, et
della ChristianitA si hanno da fare con matura consideratione, si potrebbe
per auentura discernere meglio qual partito fosse da pigliare prima, o poi, et
come, et fino a qual termine udendone il parere di quelle persone, che pares-
sero, et fussero giudicate intelligenti, et confidenti. Quanto aile richieste
fatte adesso dal Re, la risposta fatta da N ro Sig re sopra la dispensa del Duca
di Ghisa, et della Prendpessa di Portiano, non pub essere pii giusta, ma
facile a temperarla col mandare la dispensa del tutto spedita per chi andasse,
accioche si uaglia di darla, o non appalesarla, secondo, che trouerh, che sia
pih a proposito per li humori; Conciosiache se si conclude affatto il lXIatri-
monio di Portogallo, come da stimare, che sia il disegno, chi sa che Madama
Margherita non diuentasse moglle del Duca di Ghisa, piutosto che del Pren-
cipe di Nauarra. Et circa il permettere che gli Ugonotti possino habitare
sicuramente nella CittA, et Contado di Auignone, non parche accada stare in
dubbio, che Sua SantitA, non lo pub, ne deue concedere, ma di restituire i
Ioro beni, et fasciarli contrattare, perchb ne sgombrano, si pub ben forse
hauerd consideratione, se con questa gratia fatta al Re si uedesse di accomodare
con Sua M ta qualche una delle cose pi?a sostantiali, et anco cib pare, che bisogni
rimettere alia descrittione, et prudenza di chi si uolesse mandate, il quale deue
hauere per massima, che sempre, che il Re uoglia essere cosi impio, che si risolua
di fare quello, che pub per leuare al Papa, et alia Santa Sede quello Stato, non ci
rimedio a diffendersi, ne essendo Auignone troppo circondato dalle sue forze,
perb conuiene auitarsi di conseruarselo, come si fatto per l' adietro in tutti
i tempi con 1' autoritA, et beneuolenza, et fauore del Re, al quale se pub rimo-
strare che .N ro Sigre. non uuole, ne intende tenere con 1' armi perturbato il suo
Regno, m. solo tanta guardia nella CittA, et Terre, che ui sono, che basti a non
lasciarle rubbare per tradimento a quattro di quei scalzi Ugonotti, come ne
sono state tolte tante a Sua l'ta.
Douendo questa scrittura seruire solo per informatione delli humori di
quel Regno, non pare, che accade farla ordinata, ne limitata, perb sara fatta,
come si potuto all' imprescia &c.
558
THE WARS OF RELIGION IN FRANCE
APPENDIX XIV
[P- 354, n. I]
STATE PAPERS, FOREIGN
ELIZABETra, VOL. XCVII, No. X,TtI
[Printed pamphlet o] 6 pages]
[Title page]
ESTABLISSE
MENT DE LA FRATERNITE
DES CATHOLICQUES DE CHAALON SUR
SAONE ERIGIE L'ttONNEUR
DU BENOIST SAINCT
ESPRIT EN L'AN
I568
[Woodcul represenling the Holy Trinity]
Atr NoM DE Dmv
AeN
Nous soubscritz bien I acertenez que la sain [cte Eglise Catholiquel ne
peut faillir, errer, ny I vaciller en l'observan I ce de la pure, sincere I & vraye
volont de Iesu-Christ nostre I souverain Dieu, comme estant co llumne &
fermet de veritY, qui est, & I dolt estre de consequent fonde & estalblie
sur la doctrine des Prophetes, des[ Evangelistes, & des Apostres. Dont
Je I su-christ mesme est la maistresse Pierre I angulaire qui a voulu le sainct
Esprit Idemeurer t iamais tant que le monde lsera monde eternellement
avec sadictelEglise Catholique. Dont n'est t croy[re, comme nous ne
croyons que I Dieu ayt perrnis son peuple Chre I stien vivant soubz ladite
Eglise, estre ] par aveuglement en erreur, & idolatrie I par l'espace de rail
cinq cens & plus[d'ans. Soit par les celebrations de la sainlcte Messe,
assistance du peuple & cere I monies d'icelle, entretenue par tant de I sainctz
& grandz personages en scavoir, I religion, saincte vie, martyriss pour le [
nom de Dieu, Confesseurs vivans austere I ment en route parfaicte doctrine,
Vier I ges, que autres bons fiddles d'icele Egli I se catholique. Par l'approba-
tion de la ] quelle (non autrement) nous avons pure I credence des sainctes
escritures, du Viel I & Nouueau Testament, donc d'icellellon ne se doit
devoyer, retirer, ny demen [ tir en maniere, que ce soit, sans blasphe I me,
erreur, & damnation. Mais doit lon I par l'ayde supplication, & prieres t I
Dieu, & illumination de son S. Esprit I estre fermes & stables, reiectant tous
flots I des persuasions de nouvelle doctrine, I soubs quelconque pretexte quelle
puis ] se estre suggere.
A ceste consideration par in I tention Chrestienne soubs la divine puis I"
sance & espoir par l'inflammation du I benoist S. Esprit d'estre maintenus
& I conservez en nos consciences, en l'union, I mansuetude, crainte, & obeis-
sance d'icel I le Eglise catholique, t l'imitation de la I maiest du Roy nostre
sire, & soubs sa[protection & bon plaisir, desirans nouslefforcer de luy
APPENDICES 559
rendre & rapporter sub I mission & prompte obeissance, en tou Ites les choses,
que nous voyons, &sca ]vons estre observes, selon la saincte vo I iont6 de
Dieu, au saint eternal de nos I ames, par sadicte maiest royale & ses ] tresex-
cellens predecesseurs, qui ont ve ] scu& sont decedez puis l'heure qu'ilz ] ont
estez oinctz & sacrez de la celeste ] unction par le mystere de la saincte Mes I se
dont ilz remportent le nora de tres I chrestiens. ]
Nous avons soubz ledict bon you ] loir & plaisir du Roy faict entre nous
& ] pour tous autres Catholiques qui ad I ioindre se vouldront une fraternitd
qui]s'appellem Confrairie & soci6t6 des Ca ltholicques. En laquelle sera
esleu un I Prieur pour luy obeir es choses & en ] droicts concernans les poincts
dessusdicts ] circonstances & deppendances b. mesme ] fin sera chascun diman che
a noz fraizlcelebree une Messe du Benoist sainct ] Esprit en l'eglise de
nostre dame des Carl rues de Chaalon & aultres [ours qui sera [arise par
ledict Prieur ou seront tenuz ] d'assister ceulx qui seront appellez pour ] ladicte
assemblee en bonne & Iouable de I rot[on & continuer en prieres qu'il plaise I
b. nostre pete celeste conserver sa dicte I Eglise & la purger de toutes pertur-
ba [ tions & remettre icelle en une seule roy & ] donner prosperit a nostre
Roy en tons ] ses affaires & luy prolonger la vie a la gloi ] re & sanctification
du nora de Dieu b. l'avan ] cement & manutention de la religion Ca [ tholique
& courone de France & sil adve I noit (que Dieu ne vueille) que quelques [
uns par une effrenee volont entreprins I sent contre l'intentlon de sa dicte
maie [st d'user d'emotions, injures, detractionslcontre ladicte reli6on
Catholique, vio[lences sacrileges, invasions, conventicules, lb. l'effect des-
susdict, batteries, meurtres, [ pilleries d'Eglise, rouptures d'aultelz [ images,
croix, & choses dediees au servi I ce divin. Promettons y resister par tous [
deux moyens tant par promptz advertis [ semens aux superieurs & iusques
b. sa dl [ cte maiest que aultrement comme il sera I de besoin. Et si les
effortz estoyent si peltulentz qu'ilz requissent prompt empelschement:
Promettoas y tenir par une ] unanimitd la main & faire tout ce que I par nos
superieurs sera ordonnd pour la [ manutention de ladicte religion, resister[
aux entreprinses contraires. Et au cas I qu'il advint que Dieu ne vueille que
les[ persones de sa maiest & de messieurs I ses freres qui maintiennent &
maintien [ dront nostredicte religion & Corone fus I sent oppressees de sorte
que ne sceussions[ avoir advertissemens de leurs volontez. ]Promettons
rendre toute obeissance aulgeneral chef qui sera esleu sur la presen] te
socidtC En tesmoin desquelles cholses susOictes & pour l'observance &
aclcomplissement d'icelles, Nous les avons]tous soubsignez & marquez
de noz I seings & marques accoustumez audict } Chaalon, le dimanche vingt-
cinquiesme ] [our du mois d'Avril Fan mil cinq cens ] soixante huict.
Comme Secretaires esleus en ladicte fraternit & par ordon-
nance du superieur en icelle.
L.BERT.
, This letter is printed V. and is altered in ink to B.
APPENDICES 56 I
la conference quils ont eue tous ensemble, la noblesse sest chargee du reigle-
ment pour assembler et dresser les gens de guerre et ceulx qui peuvent porter
les armes et dadviser et eslire les chefz pour leur communte. Et les presbytres
et le tiers estat sen sont de tout submys a la noblesse. Ils font signer & jurer
par les bourgades aux procureurs & plus apparentz des parroisses.
Lesgail sest faict en la ville du Mans pour la solde des harquebuziers a
cheval pour mons r le seneschal de lIaine Et ayant a son arrivee trouve les
portes assez real gardies a faict publier la garde avec injunction des peynes.
[Not signed]
[Endorsed] Copie de lassociation faicte ] par les provinces.
STATE PAPERS, FOREIGN
ELIZABETH, VOL. C, No. 1,863
Cest le Roole de la saincte union contenant quarante rooles en
parchemin cestluy compris.
Nous soubsignez confederez & al|iez par saincte et divine aliance es Duch
Canton et Cont du Maine, pour la continution et manutention de l'honneur
deu a Dieu notre createur, de ses sainctz comandementz, et ordonnances de
la saincte Eglise catholicque, apostolicque et Romaine: Et pour la manu-
tention de lestat du Roy treschrestien et treScatholicque notre Souverain
Prince, esleu eta nous baflle par la grace et providence divine pour notre
Chef et Souverain terrien dominateur et conservate r de lad. saincte Eglise
Catholicque, Apostolicque et Romaine, et des sainctz decretz et conciles
d'icelle, et de lobeyssance que nous et tous ses bons subiectz luy debuons,
eta tous nos Seigneurs ses freres aussy treschrestiens et trescatholicques
Princes, repos de son Royaume, et de tout son peuple: Et afro de maintenir
lad. s te eglise et Religion catholicque, Apostolique et Romaine, por obvier
par tous moyens licites raisonnables et permis de Dieu, aux damnees entre-
prinses, machinations et conspirations que Sathan a raises es cueurs d'aucuns
malheureux qui ont tendu et tendent par tous artz diaboliques de non seule-
ment imminuer mais du tout subvertir lad. Religion catholique; Prince tres-
chrestien et legitime defenseur, et de nosd. Sieurs ses freres. Et pour tenir
moyennant layde de Dieu, consentement et accord de leurs maiestez, tout le
peuple en repos pour servir a Dieu et rendre lobeyssance deue a leursd es maie-
stes, faire obeyr la justice, tant de ses Cours de parlement que aultres des
juges et magistratz. Promettons et jurons vivre et mourir en lade Religion
Catholique Apostolique et Romaine et obeyssance deue ausdes lXIaiestes Aus-
quelles Maiestez et Iustice nous promettons et jurons route obeyssance, secours,
et ayde, et de nos personnes empescher et courir sus, aveq leurs authorltez,
a tous perturbateurs, innovateurs, et contrevenants a lad. Religion, et Estatz
desdes Maiestez, eta leurs sainctz et catholiques Edictz, et ordonnances divines
et llitiques: Et nous secourir les uns les autres aux effectz susdes par tous
THE WARS OF RELIGION IN FRANCE
moyens contre tous rebelles, beretiques, sectaires tendantz a fin contraires
Le tout jusques a la mort inclusivement. Faict et arrest au Mans lunzme
jour de Iullet 1568.
[Not signed]
[Endorsed in Cecil's hand]
Copy of a Conspyracion by I vow, in France by the ] Catholicques
ag. the contraryes.
APPENDIX XVI
[P- 359, n. ]
STATE PAPERS, DOMESTIC
ELIZABETII, VOL. XLVII, No. 7 2
[Walsinharn to Cecil]
Notwthstandynge my frend doothe assure me that he is advertysed by sooche
as he doothe imploye in that behalfe, that ther wet of late certeyne lodged in
Sowthewerke whoe howe are departed, whos dos keping of them selves gave
great cause of susp)rtion of no dyrect meanynge. At this prsent s r I am re-
quested by him to advertyce you that in taulke that passed of late betwene the
new come Cardynaule and him, towching the undyrect dealynges of the Car-
dynaule of Loreyne emongest other thinges he shewed him that thre of late
were sent by the sayde Car. of Loreyne to exequte the lewde practyce in the
searche wherof )rt pleasethe you to imploye us two of the partyes, he thus
descrybed them unto him as followethe. The one to be of natyon an englyshe-
man, of complexion sangwine, his beard read, and cot (as commonly they terme
yt marchesetto) of vysage leane, of stature bye. The other of natyon an
Italyan, of complexion cholerycke and swarte, his bearde of leeke hue, and cot,
of vysage full faced, of stature and proportyon lowe, and sooche as commonly
we tearme a trubbe. After I had herde the descryptyon of them I declared
unto him that alreadye ye were advertysed of the leeke and that you towld
me that thos descryptyons were so generayle, as they myght as well towche
the innocent as the gyltye. I further towlde him (as of my selfe) that the Car-
dynall Shatyllglion myght use this as a meane to make his ennemye the more
odyowse to this estate. To the fyrst he replyed, that the rather he had cause
to be iealowse of thos descryptyons, for that he knewe an Inglysheman of
leeke descryptyon, havinge the Italyan tonge verry well, and the Frenche
reasonably well, that passed to and fro betwene the pope and the Card. of L.
and also the seyde partye resorted myche to the noble man that at that tyme
was lodged in my frendes howse; and therfor the rather he seyde he was leeke
to be imployed in so lewd a practyce. To the seconde he seyd that he hath
564
THE WARS OF RELIGION IN FRANCE
Mon: le Conte de Montgommery est de l'autre bord de la riviere de la
Garonne tenant tout le pals de la jusqs en Beam et jusques a Lengon, et
au hault de la riviere jusqs a Haultvillar qui de son coste amasse ie plus de
finances quil peut. Il ny a point dennemys qui facent teste, ou donnent
empeschemt Ilz se tiennent dos & couverts dedans les villes et lalssent la
campaigne libre aux dictzs rs Princes. Mons. le 1Mar a Danville se tient a
Tholose, et mons r de Montluc a Agen. Ilz ont des forces mais separees
& real unies de voluntez et de lieux. Le S r de la Vallette avoit este env'
pour les rassembler et s'essayer de faire plus que lesditz S rs Danville et Montluc
mais il s'en est retourll sans rien faire.
Mons r de Pilles et ceux qui estoient dedans S t Iehan sont venuz au camp
bien sains et gaillards, ayahs soubstenu le siege tant que les pouldres ont dur
& faict acres aussy belliqueux & magnanimes qui se sount falctz de notre cage
en siege de ville.
I1 avoit este faict un pont a batteaux sur lad. rlviere de la Garonne sur
lequel hommes, chivaux charettes et artillerie avoient pass huyt jors duram,
mais tant pr la rive des eaux que par la faulte dung qui estoit alle prendre ung
moulin des ennemys po r lamener aud. port de S te Marie. lad. moulin luy est
eschappe et a choque et rompu led. pont. Si est ce quon y a depuis donne tel
ordre quon ne laisse de passer.
I1 y a plus rs advertissements quil y a quatre rail Espaignolz a la frontiere
d'Lespaigne & que le Prince Daulphin s'en va les trouver avec une troupe de
cavalerie po r le r faire escoVte.
M r de Lavauguyon est venu entre les deux rlvieres de la Dordogne et du
Loth avec vingt corllettes de cavalerle pour tenir les passages desdictes rivleres.
doubtant que Messrs les Princes les veillent repasser, mais cela na empesch
le S r de Pilles de passer le Loth, et saprocher desdictes cornettes, esperant les
reveoir de plus pres en brief.
Les reistres des dictz seigneurs Princes ont receu ung payement, et son,
si bien satisfaictz et contens que jamais ne fut veu une plus obeissante nationt
IIz sont pattie dela la riviere auec M. le Conte de Montgommery et partie decha,
ne faisans difficulte de se separer et recevoir le commandant de tous ceux quil
est ordonn et d'aller en tous lieux ou il le r est commande.
Mons. le Conte de Mansfeld faict infiniz boris offices tous les jors,esquelz
il monstre ung zele . ceste cause avec une magnanimitY, de laquelle il ne cede
a person quelconques. Et ne fault doubter que Dieu ne layt envoy pour ung
tresgrand bien et necessaire comme aussy le Conte Ludovic de Nassau prince
tresvertueux et fort advisC
Quand a la negotiation de la paix, ies admis de la Rochelle portent que
ung moys durant le Roy et la Royne ont souvent envoye devers la Royne de
Navarre pour l'exhorter a entendre au bien de la paix et haster les deputez.
lesquelz ont longuement differ a cause des difficultez qui ont este raises en
avant tant po r le peu de seurete quon trouvoit aux passeportz qui estoient
566
THE WARS OF RELIGION IN FRANCE
APPENDIX XVIII
[P. 387, n.
STATE PAPERS, FOREIGN
ELXZABETt, VOL. CVIII, No. 359
Catherine de Medici lo the duke o] Aniou
[i569, September
Extraict de la lettre de la Royne escritte de sa propre main a Monseigneur
le Duc du dix me Sep re Dclxix escrltte au Plessis les Tours.
Mon filz, Sanger irent tout a ceste heure darriver de vostre frere par lequel
nous a mande la bonne et utile nouvelle de I heureux desassiegement de Poittiers
avec ung tresgrand honeur de mons r de Guise et de tous ceulx qui y estoient
pour le grand et notable service quilz ont fair a Dieu au roy eta ce royaume
et de vostre frere de les avoir si bien secouruz qen faisant semblant dassieger
Chastellerault et de donner ung faulx assault il a fait a quil vouloit et pourquoy
le roy lavoit envoye et a ceste heure il regardera de mettre peine dabreger
toute ceste guerre que avec layde de Dieu il mettra bien tost le repoz en ce
royaume et me semble que jamais ny eust plus doccacion de remercier Dieu
et le continuer de prier a fin quil nous mette hors de tant de maulx.
[No address] [No signature]
[Endorsed] Copie de la lettre de la Royne a Monseigneur le Duc.
APPENDIX XIX
[P. 389, n. 41
STATE PAPERS, FOREIGN
ELIZABETI:I, VOLUME CIX, No. 444
[Norris to Cecil]
Right honorable .... The Admirall bathe lately written to the Cal
of la Cbarite that praise be givin to Gode he maye now joyne w th the vicountes
at his pleas & that he hadd forces sufficient to make hedd to his Ennemis,
Praying the Governo to loke carefully to the places on the frontiers & provide
all thinges necessarie for the commyng of Mons de Lizy, withe the Armey
of Allemagnes whiche puttithe these in great feare & use all meanes to treat
a Peax that possibly the can .... Wrytten at Tours thise i9th of December
I569 .... Yo honours ever assuride to commaunde
HENRY NoRREYS
[Addressed] to the Right Honorable S r William Cisill Knight principall
Secretarie to the Quene's most Excellent Maiestie & of hit
highnes preavy Cownsell.
[Emtorsed] 19 xbr 569
S r Henry Norreys to my m r
from Tours.
572
THE WARS OF RELIGION IN FRANCE
justice a lencontre de ceulx contre lesqudz ilz vouldroient pretendre
sil falloit entrer en cognoissance de cause et reparation des dommages
souffertz dune part & dautre.
IIne s'est jamais veu et ne se peult faire sinon par une tirannie extreme
(ce que nous n'estimons pas que sa Ma te face jamais) qu'en France les otciers
n'ayant forfaict soient deposez de leur charge, si que quand les Roys lont
voulu procurer les particuliers ont tousjours en droict gaigne leur cause contre
les Roys mesmes. Et quant a largent despens il y a assez de moyens recouvrer
argent par la rendition des biens tempordz des ecclesiastiques Car puisque
nous ne sommes point autheurs des troubles, ains deffendeurs en necessit
extreme, que ceulx qui se pouvoient bien passer de la guerre et vivre en paix,
en leurs maisons, puis quilz ont tant desir la guerre quilz ne cornoyent entre
chose doibvent aussy en porter la folle enchere comme encores silz ne nous
font autre raison nous esperons que Dieu la nous fera et en briefe Que si il
estolt question d'entrer en compensation il se trouvera que nous avons souffert
infinies pertes plus que les autheurs des troubles, en quoy quil y ayt tant de
gens et bien meurdriz par des juges et otciers massacrez par le peuple depuis
la derniere pacification tant de femmes violees par les gens de guerre et mesmes
des plus remarquez qui cela surpasse route perte & que toutes lois nous esperons
que Dieu ne laissera pour impuny quoy que les vivans en rien ne regardans
point aux jugemens quil en a desja faictz sur les plus mauvais d'entreulx qui
se jouoient ainsy de son Nom de Ma te glorleuse.
Voulant sadite Ma te pour lobservation des choses susdites avec toute
bonne foy & syncerit leur bailler routes leurs seuretez qui sont en
son pouvoir et quilz luy vouldront honnestement & raisonnablement
requerir lesquelles seuretez le Roy fera esmolloguer & passer par ses
courtz de parlemens & autres juges quil appartiendra.
Les bons subgectz (telz que nous sommes) n'ont point acoustum6 de
demander les formes de seuretez cest a sa ]Xia te de nous les donner bonnes et
asseurees, et puis quil na este en sa puissance de nous garder sa foy il nous
donnera sil luy plaist les moyens de nous garentir contre ceulx qui la vouldroient
enfraindre en notre endroict, et quant a ses courtz de parlemens nous ne
pensons pas que pendant quelles serons composees de telles gens quelles sont
quil nous garde foy et administre justice veu quilz sont noz parties formelles.
Veut et entend sadite Ma te que les dessusditz reciproquement pour
luy rendre la fidele obeissance quilz luy doibvent ayent a se departir
de route alliance, confederation, et association quilz, ont avec les
Princes Potentatz ou Communautez estrangeres hors du Roiaulme
pareillement de toutes intelligences praticques & associations quilz
ont dedans & dehors icelluy.
Quilz ne feront aucunes assembles contribution ne cullettes de deniers
sans expresse permission du Roy declare par ses lettres patentes.
APPENDICES 573
Quanta ces deux ar des sa Ma te scait que nous n'avons den promis que
nous n'ayons tenu ce que nous ferons encores la paix estant bien asseurer.
Quentieront & feront sortir hors sondit Roiaulme dedans ung moys
apres la conclusion de ladite Pacification par le chemin qui leur sera
prescript par sadite Ma t sans toulle ne oppression de ses subgectz tous
estrangers estans a lear service, et conviendront avec eux de leur
paiement aleurs propres coustz & despens. Eta ceste fin leur don-
hera le Roy teile permission quil sera besoing pour entr'eulx leuer
les sommes qui leur seront necessaires.
Cest ar de est impossible en toutes ses parties, car ies estrangers ne pouvent
en ung mois se retirer, ilz ne peuvent ny ne doibvent sortir par le chemin qui
leur sera prescript sinon quilz veulent se precipiter eulx mesmes a leur mort,
ce que nous ne leur conseilleront jamais, plustcst choisirons nous de mourir
avec eulx. Et davantage ilz sont assez fortz pour se faire voye par ou bon
leur semblera. Si nous promectons que les subgectz de sa Ma te ne soient
point foullez cest une trappe, car nestant aucunement en notre puissance de
laccomplir ceulx de Guise diront que nous avons rompu la paix. IIne nous
est non plus possible de les paier de noz deniers particuliers car la cruaut6 de
noz ennemys nous a ost6 tousles moyens que nous avions au paravant et
mesmes dedans ung mois une telle cuillette ne sa pourroit 1aire et quand elle
le seroit il nous souvient comment nous fusmes traictez a Auxerre et qui est le
pis les particuliers ne vouldront contribuer, se souvenans bien comme ilz ont
est6 traictez pour avoir contribud aux troubles precedens suyvant les tres
patentes de sa Ma re.
Laisseront aussy les armes et separeront toutes leurs autres forces
tant de pied que de cheval par met & par terre se retireront chacun
en leurs maisons qon bon leur semblera incontinent apres la con-
clusion de ladite paix pour la ou ilz seront vivre paisiblement.
Les seuretez de la paix estans bonnes se departiront voluntairement des
armees, mais ilz se ressentent de plus de dix rail hommes des leurs qui ont
est cruellement meurdriz aux dernitres troubles obeissans a ung semblable
article que cestuy Partant ii est necessaire que sa Mate y pourveoie.
Remectront entre les mains du Roy ou de ceulx quil commectra les
villes chasteaux & places quliz detiennent pour le present et en feront
sortir les forces quiiz y ont y d611aissant semblablement lartillerie
& autres munitions qui sont en icelles, au pouvoir de ceulx qu'ordon-
nera sadite Ma te.
Et generallement restitueront de bonne foy a sadite Mate ou a ceulx
quil commectra routes les choses a elle appartenantes qui se trouveront
encores en nature soit es villes & places quilz tiennent ou autres
lieux quilz soient ou par met ou par terre. Faict a Angiers le iiije jour
de Feburier 57o. Ainsy signe CHARLES et au dessoubz DE
LAUBESPINE.
APPENDICES 5 7 7
soubz les enseignes et compaignies retenues pour la gare et deffence des villes
tenues soubz I'obeyssance du Roy et desdictz Sieurs Princes,de in continent
et sans delay se rendre en leur arme pour y estre employez au service de
Dieu et du Roy sellon leur degr6 et quallit6, et ce, sur peyne d'estre tenuz
pour ennemys de la cause de Dieu et de la religion. Enjoinct aux gouver-
neurs des villes ou ilz seront sans expresse licence desdictz S rs Princes, d'iceulx
faire vuyder et desloger promptement, deffendre leur estre baill logis ne
vivres et les soldatz desvaliz6s et desgrad6s de leurs armes et chevaulx. Sy
ont lesdictz Sienrs Princes estroictement deffendu et inhib a toutz capitaines,
soldatz et aultres estns de h presente arme de brusler, desmolir ny ruyner
aulcuns chasteaulx, maisons ne ediffices apartenans aux gentilzhommes de
qudque religion qu'ilz soyent, ne aussy des paisans et peuble estans ez bourez
et villages du plat pals. Et d'aultant que les Courtz de Parlement et aultres
officiers de la justice et conseil des villes, principalement ceulx de la ville de
Tholouze se Sont renduz, par une hayne trop cruelle et incapable, refracteurs,
voyre directement oppoz6.s g la publication et entretenement de la paciffica-
tion demierement establye en ce royaulme, jusques g faire mourir inhumaine-
merit et ignominieusement le Sieur Rappin, maistre d'hosteldu Sieur fen prince
de Cend6, nostre tres chere et tres am6 oncle et tres honnor6 seigneur et pere,
contre toute foyet seuret publique a luy octroye tant par le edict de paciffica-
tion que par expres sauf conduict et posseport a luy baill6s especiallement par
Sa Majest aux fins d'apporter et faire publyer ledict edict de la paciffication;
oultre le cruel menrtre contre les loix et debvoirs de la guerre commis en la
personne du baron de Castehaau et aultres gentilzhommes, capitaines et
soldatz prins en guerre durant les troubles. Lesdictz Sieurs Princes, pour
reprimer et faire cesser de leur pouvoir relies inhumanitez non ouyes entre les
plus barbares nations de la terre, et, par le chastiment des perturbateurs de la
paix et foy publicque, parvenir b. quelque tranquillit stable entre ceulx qui
desirent la seuret et conservation de cest Estat et cronne de France, ont
habandonn6 en proye, pillage et feu toutes maisons, ediffices, bestail, meubles,
danres et biens quelzquonques qui se trouveront appartenir aux presidents
conseilliers de ladicte Court de Parlement de Tholouze et aultres lieux, justiciers
et administratenrs et generallement officiers de ladicte ville, pappistes ou
atteistes; et pour cest effect permis aux capitaines, soldatz et aultres quelz-
conques estans en ceste arme uzer de tous lesdictz actes d'hostillit g
I'endroict des dessusdictz. Deffendant tres expressement mesfaire en aulcune
fagon, ains conserver de tout leur pouvoir les maisons et biens appartenans /t
ceulx qui font profession de la religion reforme, de quelque qualit ou con-
dition qu'ilz soyent Et, affin que nul ne puisse ignorer lesdictes deffences
et provision, ensemble les causes et occasions d'icelle, ont volu ces presentes
estre cryes a cry publicque tant en la ville de Montauban que en la presente
arm6e.
Faict h Montauban, au mois de janvier rail cinq cens soixante dix.
578 THE WARS OF RELIGION IN FRANCE
APPENDIX XXIV
[P. 4x2, n. 21
ARCHIVES NATIONALES
K 1515, PicE No. 68
[II mars I57O. ]
[.4 u dos, propria manu] Lo que se dlxo de parte de los Principes de Bearne y
Conde a Biron.
Dicho y pronunciado a los XI de marco, atres horas despues de medlodia,
delante de Mos res los Principes y Almirante, gentileshombres y cabe(;as de lex-
ercito de los dlchos Sefiores Principes.
Mos de la Cae ha dicho a Mos de Biron que tenia mandamiento de
todos los Sefiores y gentileshombres del exercito para dezirle:
Que, como ellos loan infinitamente a Dios por la gracia que ha hecho al
Rey de le tocar el coraon e inclinarle a la paz tan necessaria, assi davan muy
humildes gracias a Su Magestad de la buena voluntad que tenia de les esteder
sus braocs y abraallos como buenos y tides subditos, mas, porque estiman
y creen que la privacion de los exercicios de la religion es para ellos mas dura
muerte que ninguna que se les pudiesse dar, supplican muy humilmente a
Su Magestad les otorgue un medio con que acquieten sus consciencias para
con Dios, al qual si se mostrassen desleales, Su Magestad no podria esperar
que ellos le fuessen muy tides, porque quien no es fiel Dios no 1o puede set
los hombres, que no es libertad de consciencia estar sin palabra de Dios, sino
una insoportable servidumbre, que si huvieran consentido de vivir e esta
licencia llamandola libertad de consciencia, Su Magestad con razon devria
tomar resolucion de no se fiar jamas dellos y de no los tener jamas en estima
de hombres de bien.
Que Dios dize que sobre nosotros ha embiado la muerte, es a saber que
cien muertes nos vienen mas a cuenta que alexarnos voluntariamente dd
derecho camino de la vida eterna.
En lo demas dize que ellos havian (con muy grande desplazer suyo) sido
forados por muchas causas de emplear sus vidas por defender a los que
avian sido sus defensores, cosa que no les devia ser imputada a mal, ni delante
de Dios, ni delante de los hombres, sino solo a aquellos que contra justicia y
contra las leyes han siempre oprimido sus consciencias y sus honrras y sus
vidas. AI presente, dessearian por quanto su dever les obliga, podellos
emplear en el servicio de Su Magestad y cumplimiento de su Estado, en pre-
juyzio de aquellos que se reyan de sus miserias comunes y esperavan dello
provecho.
Por el particular de Mos r de Biron, el dize que todos sentian una grande
obligacion para con el, por la buena intencion que mostrava al acresceaata-
miento del reposo publico, que si fuesse en su mano de le poder mostrar quanto
580
THE WARS OF RELIGION IN FRANCE
bon leur sembleroient en leur religion alibi nusquam itaque ilz ont demande
temps de ddiberer & feront respons dedans six sepmaines. Ce Chateaubriant
ce iiij e May x57o.
[Enclosed in a letter by Sir Henry Norris to Sir William Cecil from Paris,
May 24, 57 o]
APPENDIX XXVI
[P. 417, n. 3]
ARCHIVES NATIONALES
K. x,5r5, eciE No. xx8
[Au dos, alia manu] Copia de carta del Nuncio a Su Magestad. De Madrid
al Escurial, a 26 de Junio r57o.
Para escrivir a Francia, como se hizo. Lo de Mos. de Fox.
Copia di una lettera, che il Nuntio scrisse a S. 1V[ta Catca.]
Mi doluto assai intendere che V. M ta Cat ca senta qualche indispositione
di stomaco, il che deve ser residuo de la incomoditS, del camino. I1 Signor
Dio la mantenga sana longamente, con ogni contento et felicita.
Per le ultime lettere d'Italia ch'io trovai in Madrid, quali sono di 7 de
maggio, S. S t mi avvlsa d'havere inteso chela Regina di Fmncia sta in anirno
di far cancelliere di quel regno di Francia Mons r di Foys, hora Imbasciatore
in Venetia. Et perche questo homo, oltre l'essere indiciato gmndemente
nel Santo Offitio de la Inquisitione di Roma e parente e dependente da quella
buona donna chiamata la Regina di Navarra, et persona superba, inquieta
di spirito, arnica, di novita et discordia, et di piu si tiene offeso da Sua Santith
per non havere consentito ch' egli vadi a Roma, et credo il medesimo sia con
V. M t por una causa simile di non haverlo accettato in Spagna; queste cause,
dico, et altre che Sua Santita considera, gli da gran sospetto che, se questo
homo fosse posto in tale administratione, la quale pub infinitamente in quel
regno, come nel Cancellier passato s' veduto per esperientia, non cercarebbe
altro che di unire le voluntb, de queste due donne, et non solo, faorendo la
parte ugonota, travagliare le cose di Francia (pur troppo travagliate), ma
anchora quelle de li circunvicini, maxime nelli Stati ecclesiastici et di V. l th
Cat.c% non solo per vendetta de la offesa, et per 1' odio che a I' uno et !' altro
verisimilmente porta, ma anchora per la propria indinatione sua. Onde
Sua Beatitudine, facendo sopra cio quello che puo per la sua parte, desidera e
ne prega V. i,[ tt a volere similmente cercare ogni via di impedire tale elettione.
et quando non si possi altro, si degni scrivere a l'Imbasciatore, et vedendo
passar inanti tal cosa, si unisca con il Nuntio, et insieme si lassino intendere
apertamente dalla Regina che Sua Beatitudine et S. M t Cat c haveranno
per male ch' ella dia uno officio di tanta importantia in mano di persona tale
il che non deve fare, si ella desidera di essere tenuta fautrice de la fede cattolica
desiderosa de la grandezza et quiete del Re suo figliuo 1o et ddla unione e
58
THE WARS OF RELIGION IN FRANCE
pouppe, et quil faict des mariages telz quil scavroit souhaiter. I1 ne se ser'e
de l'occassion & faveur du temps et pendant que les amis simulez paistront
la jeunesse animeuse et la rempliront de grande espoirance, luy prometant
par adventure des plus grandes choses (combien quelles ne soient pas aysees a
trouver, et pour moy je ne les scay pas ilz prendront cest advantage sur la
partye et renforceront leur grandeur de la puissance et faveur d'un royaulme
qui nest point petit Et vous ose bien dire quil y a de la part de ceux en qui
gist la resolucion de cest affaire une grande inclinacion et une grmade con-
sideracion de long service de cest ancyen serviteur et de la subjection et humili-
acion quil a monstree de la quelle vous scavez que le sexe se delecte. Ausv
est ce leur fagon de regner la quelle toutes veulent exercer, tant plus les roynes.
Il ne fault penser que les dificultes pour la religion puissent engendrer quelques
difficultez aux capitulacions qui facent plus de retardement. Car je scay
par la bouche de la dame et ausy par ceux qui ont sceu route ceste negotlacion
passee, et par ung qui y a este employe qui ne parle pour metre le beau devers
elle nestant de ses subjects mais estranger, que la charte blanche luy a este
donnee. Et sest contente l'Archeduc pour le faict de la religion de si peu que
celia se doibt estimer pour rien. Davantage la consideracion de lage qui est
plus vivill et meur donne ung beau lustre aux persuasions et jugement de ceux
qui tendent de ce cost6 la. Avec ses advantages du long service et age conve-
nable, je crains que ceux qui tiennent le party contraire ne persuadent avec
aparence a cause du trop long silence ou froide poursuite quil y aye du con-
temnement ou de la froideur en ceux de la France estant chose propre au sexe
de faire plus de choses par despit que par amour est a craindre quel la froideur
de ceste part ne soit cause de I'eschauffer et faire haster plus quelle ne fairoit
s;t nestoit pour se faire regretter apres a loisir par ceulx qui se seroient portez
trop froidement en son endroit Lartide de la lettre du gentilhomme qui vous
porta ma lettre (qui me faict craindre que en voulant traicter de la part de la
France avec fort grand respect et par adventure prendre l'honneur devers
nous l'affaire nen sera pire) est quil dict que si Ion estoit asseure par dega de
la bonne volonte de ceux de dela la mer on y pouroit entendre ce qui me semble
estrange de vouloir qu'une ville se rende avant quelle soit sommee. II me
semble que cest beaucoup quelle parlamente, sans avoir ouyr parler le canon.
Et nest par peu de chose qu'estant sa principalle defence de la difference de
laage et de linconstance de la jeunesse et la crainte destre dicy a quelques
anees, peu aymes et mesprisee et en danger de veoir de ses yeulx aymer dautres,
lon luy a faict abandonner ceste contre escarppe et le corrider tellement que
lon peult veoir au pied de la muraille que je vous asseure nest point veue de
flans. Des particularitez et moyens que lon a tenue en ses approches jusques
la jen ay dice quelque chose a ce gentilhomme qui est fort affectionne a cest
affaire en faveur du bien de la France. Et dabondant en ha)me de ia grandeur
qui se voit preparer a la maison d Autriche si elle s'impatronize de ce royaume,
tellement quil nest a craindre si non que la tradiuite ne donne loisir a ceux
APPENDICES 583
qui de long temps ont faict deseing de se saisir de ce pais de venyr au bout de
leur intencions lesquelles sont fort favorablement receues, et croy quils jouyront
en bref si leurs conseilz ne sont troublez par une diuersion & par obiect nouveau
plus desirable que celuy quice presente Ce qui me semble estre indubitable-
ment en la jeunesse d'un prince qui a la reputacion davoir le sens meur devant
les ans et ausi courageux et dausy grande espoirance que prince ne soit ne de
lage des hommes. Monsieur vous scavez trop bien combien la maisson d'Au
triche seroit agrandie sur ia maison de France si elle estoit renforcee de ce
royaume. Et ny a point de doubte quelle ne donnast pour tousjours par cy
apres la loy a la France et est chose seure quelle contraindroit le roy a rompre
la paix quil a donnee a ses subiectz. Davantage si par ce mariage nest donne
satisfaction au grand coeur de mons r frere du roy pour loccuper et luy donner
matiere de faire plus grandz deseingz IIne fault point doubter que tous ceux
qui prennent la couleur et pretexte de la religion pour advancer les moiens de la
divission et ruyne de la France afro d'agrandir la maison d'Autriche neproposent
a monsieur duc danjou quelques marlages qui sera au despens de la couronne de
France si la bonne nature et amitie dentre les freres ne resiste a leur malicieux
deseingz. Mais il ne sen scauroit proposer du quel se doive espoirer plus de gran-
deur, non seulement a luy mais a toute la maison de France en gaignant le dessus
sur la maison d Autriche, la quelle veult soubz couverture & douceur du marl-
age du roy faire avaller ceste curee & gaigner ung royaume sans ce quil luy soit
donne empesehement et ne fault point doubter que si le mariage de larcheduq
se faict quil ne soit en peu de temps mieulx obey que na este le roy Philippe
et ce moiennant le danger de la religion et leur sera aise de nous donner la loy
ou pour le mains de nous faire redoubler la ruyne de la France par division
et guerre civille. Au contraire sice bien est resceue pour noz princes il y
aura bien de quoy rendre la pareille a ceux qui ont dresse tous leurs conseilz
a procurer que la France se ruynast par une guerre civille Voyans que par
guerres ouvertes jamais ilz n'auroient peu paruenir a leur intencion. Pour
amour du real quilz ont faict mons r pouroit iustement avec forces du roy
faveur dangleterre et moiens du prince dorenge avoir la confiscacion de la
Flandre par droict de feodalite pour felonnie commise. Et ausy la maison
d Autriche qui se bastit lempire hereditaire et la monarchie se trouveroit en
ung instant deux freres roys ausy puissans lun que lautre pour contrepois
de son ambition liggnez avec les princes protestans de lallemaigne et auroient
les deux freres plus de part en lempire que ceux qui se veulent at:ibuer par
la ru)-ne des anciennes maisons de la Germanye come de la maison de Saxe
et des princes palatins qui sont amateurs de la couronne de France. Le
partage de monsieur d allen,:on seroit aise a trouver en la duche de Millan
auec la faueur de lallemaigne, des Sulses ausy et des princes Italliens devotieux
de la France Et si besoing estoit pot le recouvrement du royaume de Naples,
la fave du Turc se trouveroit par apres ung apropos. Mons r il ma semble
que cela est si aparent, et si facille a persuader que puis que vous en aurez
APPENDICES 591
Balas ville riche, episcopale
Le mont de Marsan; forte
Tout le conte de Bigorces et les pays de Marsan, Tarsan Garardan
Tarbe . villes episcopales
Aire t
La principaute de Beam
La basse Navarre
Le Pays des basques, a quoy on a donne tiel ordre que nouristant la palx il
ne si changera rien.
Au contrarie de puis la paix Grenade Beaumont et Verdun villes ont reconut
le Roy de Navarre pr governeur et se sont raises soubz sa protection et
tous les jours si la paix tient quelque peu si en mettra de nouvelles. M.
L. Amirall a assiege Beaumont a cause de cela ou il a este tresbien battu.
M. le lcounl
de Terides
Pays de Quercy nous tenons
Montauban imprenable et une des belles villes de guerre du monde.
hi. la |;icount
de Gourdon
Figeac capitale de Haut Quercy
Caussade
Realville
S t Antonin
Villemur &c. en ces villes tout le peuple est de la religion.
I'icont
de Paulini
Au pays de Rourgue.
lIillaut ville eplscopale
Vabres x'ille episcopale
Creissel et-autres en grand hombre fortes d'assietes dont nous ne scavons le
nora. Le peuple aussi est de fort longtemps de la religion et sont en
tous ces pays des relliques des vleux.
Le Baron de
A don
En Languedoc, toute la Conte de Foix qui tient depuls les montz Pirenees
jusques aux portes de Thoulouse Patrimonie du R. de N. en icdle sont
Pasmicas ville forte peuplee, presque de la religion episcopale.
Folx ville et chasteu imprenable.
Sa Verdan
Mazores
Le Carla
APPENDICES 593
pied en campagne et mille gentilihomines et fournir l'equippage de six canons
et deux couleurines &c. et quand il sera joinct avec ies forces de Languedoc
(car le Daulphine a le Rhosne entredeux) il poura faire estat de xoooo hommes
de pied 2ooo chevaux des meilleurs qui se virent jamais en France, et xo canons,
quatre couleurines et la pouldre et munitions et equipage d'iceux.
Pour les affaires de la guerre en son consei| il est assist de M r de Meru.
Monsieur de Turene qui a esgarde sur la Perigort et Lymosin en sa absence.
AI r de la Nou6 chef et superintendant de sa maison.
AI r de viconte de Terride, Baron de Serignac, vieux Capitaine.
M r de S t Geniez, vieux Capitaine et homme de bon entendement.
.M r le Baron de Lusignan. Gouverneur de Agenois.
Mr de Fontralles, 3,I r le Baron d' Audon.
Mr de Guitry qui sont tous des meilleurs Cap: de France.
Pour le mainement des negogiations, outre les susd. il est assiste de .Xl r
de Grateinx son Chauncelier, Air des Aginz President et M r des Requestes
et plus 's autres de mesme reing.
Outre ceux y y a plusieurs Princes, Seignurs, Vicontes, et Barons ffectes
de tout temps au party de la religion. Toutesfois je les ay lieu voulu mettre
icy croire ilz me sont vennues en memorie.
Le R. de N. Le Baron de Mombardices
M' le P. de Conde Le Vicount de Lalant
M. de Rohan Le Baron de Montanhils
M. de Nemours Le Baron de Monlieu
M. de Laval Le Baron de la Rochalais
M de Rochebernard son frere Le Prince de Chaiais
M. de Meru M. de Mouy
M. de Thore M. de la Forse gendre de -M. de Biron
M. de Turene Le Vicont de Chasteauneuf
M. de Chastillon Le Baron de Piersebuffiere
M. de Clermont Le Baron de Salignac
M. de la Nou6 Le Baron de Beinac
M. de S. Genie et ses freres Le Baron de Bresol|es
M. le Viconte de Tirrede Le Vicont de Paulini
M. de St. Romain Le Vicont de Panart
Le Baron de Fontrailles Le Vicont de Gourdon
Le Baron de Ardon Le Vicont de Arpajon
Le Baron de Senegaz Le Baron de Cabrere
Le Baron de Mirambeau M. de Ediguires
M. de Languillier M. de Guitry
Le Baron de Verac Le Baron de Longa
Le Vic: de Savailhan M. de Campagnac
Le Baron de S. Gehniz M. de Boesse
APPENDICES 597
est disciplina ab fills quorum novum est ancupium qui se Jesuistas appellant,
& perfecti volunt esse, juxta illud. Estote perfecti sicut ego sum, inter quos
Darbesherus noster non est minimus apostolorum si noster dicendus est qui
& nos & seipsum deservit & aliam vitam alios mores sequitur, illi autem quos
dixi Cives qui tantum opibus valent, clientelis miseorum opificum in quos
imperium habent & suis divitiis freti, pecuniam sibi imperari non patiuntur,
sciunt enim neminem esse qui eos cogere possit, cure rex parum fisus nobilibus,
tutelam urbium anna, machinas, bellicas, mcenia, & quicquid est roboris illis
commiserit, rogati autem immensas & crebras pfiores pensitationes & tributa
causantur itaque pauxillulam tandem aliquam pecuniam prout nec causa
postulat tanquam ab invitis quasi vi sibi exprimi Fatiuntur. Jam Episcopi
Abbates & alii quibus opima sunt sacerdotia cure videant omnium oculos in
se ac bona sua esse conjectos nec aliquam aliam esse rationem conficiende
pecunie nisi que e eorum bonis & prediis distrahendis redigatur. Quis erit
(inquiunt) tandem nostfi expilandi finis si bellum adhuc duret An non sex
decimas annuas fructuum nostrorum pensitamus. Vix annus adhuc est quod
octingenta millia francorum que sunt centena millia librarum nostrarum in
profectionem Polonicam dedimus jamque nos urgent Questores regii ad solu-
tionem unius millionis & dimidie francorum, que summa est quingentorum
millium coronatorum gallicorum, quos rex approbante pontifice nobis extor-
quet: cujus pecunie solvende rationem nullam adhuc habemus. Non tametsi
pontifex ad rein tam piam nempe ad bellum intestinum alendum, predia
ecdesiastica ad eum summam venire permiserit, emptores tamen non reperiun-
tur, coguntque nos officiales & ministri regii pecuniam quam non habemus,
nostro periculo representare: recepturos aliquando ex distractione bonorum,
si qui tandem reperiantur, qui tam dubio jure litem futuram presenti pecunia
velint comparare, non enim ignote sunt artes pomificie: Veniet namque
facile tempus cure Pontifex iste aut successor aliquis ejus restitutionem in in-
tegrum pro ecclesia non sine dirarum etiam imprecatione a se impetrari
facillime patiatur, nulla habita eorum ratione qui in bona ecclesiastica pecuniam
impenderunt. Itaque eo venture est ut hi quorum causa bellum hoc geritur
& qui evangelicos plurimum oderunt hi nunc pacem maxim, expetant, & quem-
vis Dei culture potius permittant, quam se indies argento emungi patiantur
ira/5 quidvis inquiunt potius in malam rein doceant Hugonoti, neque eriim
magis ab fills quam ab istis possumus expilari Nec est illorum non inepta san:
oratio. Jam homines miseri qui sedibus pulsi patria carent, inopes vagantur,
quibus insidie undique tenduntur, supplicia & mortes intentantur, qui deserti
ab omnibus, perpetuas excubias ad sese tuendos agunt hi pacem si unqam
antehac nunc certb fessi ac defatigati miserb cupiunt, ut aliquis tandem sit
laborum finis & patria terra quiescere liceat. Nemo est igitur qui non uno
ore pacem affectet, ad pacem oculos, animum & omnes cogitationes convertat.
Quin & Pontifex ipse sibi timens & veritus quem res nec sit habitura exitum,
598
THE WARS OF RELIGION IN FRANCE
& precipu de comitatu Avinionensi sollicitus, alios non lacessitos esse malit,
quam de suis rebus in periculum venire: sperans futurum ut rex intermisso
bello integris viribus eos facile opprimat, quos nunc lacerato regno satis vexare
non possit. Ex qua re factum est, ut sermonibus hominum certa pax facta,
& negocium prorsus transactum esse diceretur, & ea lama per uniuersum
orbem sparsa sit, pacem jam manibus teneri. Sed cum de pacis conditionibus
agi ceptum est, longe fuerunt alie hominum voluntates, long alius rei exitus.
Nam quibus antea sua facilitate impositum est, ne in idem discrimen inciderenl
Evangelice libertati & saluti sue presidiis, urbibus ac rebus aliis que ad
vitam tuendam pertinent sibi consulere voluerunt, nec se aliorum fidei com-
mittendos esse censuerunt quirt rebus omnibus integris arma sumere possent,
ut si non melior at saltem non deterior istis pactionibus illorum conditio fieret.
Alii contra qui spe miseros illos homines devorarant & sibi occasionem egre-
giam oblatam existimabant, incautos homines vafricia.& insidiis prorsus
opprimendi, cum viderent non esse locum dolls quirt potius futurum ut Evan-
gelium propagaretur, nec esse in illorum potestate, ut istis conditionibus
homines Evangelici exterminarentur, quidvis potius faciendum esse suadebant,
quam locum illis daft quos extinctos esse cupiunt, hi & se & sua omnia regi
offerunt, & quoduis discrimen subeundum esse censent. Itaque nunc Pontifex
bellum afioqui formidans pecuniam mutuam satis amplam u(l)troneus offert:
(sibi tamen saris callide pignoribus cavens) ut regis.animum a pacis cogitatione
avertat. Sunt etiam alii viri providi & rebus suis prospicientes, qui sciunt
vetus illud esse, mobilia esse gallorum ingenia ad suscipiendum bellum (neque
enim in tanta penuria & tantes difficultatibus de aliis perturbandis desinunt
cogitare, nec istis unquam aut voluntas aut pecunia ad alios vexandos deest)
qui ista penitius perspiciunt & sibi prudenter cavent, hi frigidam suffundunt,
pristinam gloriam nominis gallici commemorantes, & ignominiam ob oculos
ponentes, si tale dedecus subeatur ut quasi victi marius tendere, & leges jam
non dare sed accipere cogantur, futurum ut tempore vires regia crescant, alii
contra vel simultatibus solvantur, vel insidiis opprimantur, vel premiis &
pollicitationibus separentur, qua ex re fiet aliquando ut rex victor stirpem
illam hominum prorsus exterminet, & ecdesie Romane vindex eternam sibi
famam ad posteros transmittat. Hic ego si tibi que fuerint postulata, que
responsa, que argumenta in utramque partem adducta, qua constantia per-
mansum sit in petitis, quibus artibus Evangelicorum legati tentati sint, quibus
intercessoribus res tractata sit, historiam tibi non epistolam scriberem nolo
tamen tibi ignotum esse egregiam fuisse in hac re Helvetiorum protestantium
operam, ego autem quod potui porro ut est apud comicum nostrum. His
igitur rebus effectum est ut post multas & longas de pace disceptationes incer-
tiores simus multo quam dudum, pacem enim facere noluit bellum autem
gerere non possunt.
Cure ista superiora aliquot dies scripta apud me haberem, nec describendi
602 THE WARS OF RELIGION IN FRANCE
of her mat. Notwtstandyng they suffered the Admyrall and vyceadmirall
to come in to the porte of Darmouthe: whet as the gentlemen advertyce yt is
thowght they wyll lande some treasvre to be conveyed by lande unto London
The rest of the ships are gon towardes Dunkyrke. The Generall of them is
Don Petro de Baldis whoe maryed Petro iMalendas daughter. The arryvall
of this armye makethe me greatly to dowbt the P. of Oranges well doinge:
whoe alreadye seamethe to be in retry harde case. I pmye God owre mer-
chauntes fynde them good neyghebowres. Owt of the northe we have hearde
nothing laetly And so having nothing ells to advertyce I commyt your L. to
Goods good kepyng most humbly takyng my leave. At Rycot the vjth of
Octobre 1575.
yr L. to commavnde
F,a: WASnGnAt
[Addressed] To the right honorable
my vearie good Lord the
L. treasurer.
[Endorsed] 6. Octob. 1575.
M r Secret: Walsingharn
the Spanish flete in
the west.
INDEX
606
THE WARS OF RELIGION IN FRANCE
Amboise, 14o; drownings at, 154; royal
chest at, 346- See also Ambo{se,
Edict of.
Amboise, conspiracy of: origin, 28-
31; participation of D'Andelot in,
3o; secretof, discovered, 32; crushed,
.33-39; Cond accused of complicity
m, 4o; Catherine de Medici accused
of being secret party to, by Tavannes,
42, n.; return of French exiles after.
i94; memory of, haunts Catherine
de Medici, 288.
Amboise, Edict of, I9I; hostility of
Spain to, I94; cannot be enforced,
2o7; overtures to break, 2o9; rupture
of, 250; amendments to, 295 , 318.
Amiens, three-fourths of population
said to be Huguenot, 23o.
Amsterdam, endangered, 444; all Hol-
land lost to Spian, save Rotterdam
and, 446-
Andelot, Francois de Chtillon, sieur
d', 6, 8; in conspiracy of Amboise,
3o; counsels Catherine de 1Medici,
128; Spanish ambassador objects
to presence of, at court, i33; joins
Condt at Meaux, 137; . appears
before Paris, I37; overtures made by,
i39; lieutenant to CondO, 14o;
destroys bridge at Jargeau, 151 ; sent
to Germany for assistance, 154 , n.,
158; plans to cut Paris off, 159;
gives Aumale the slip, I62; German
horse of, 172; serious position of,
in Orleas, 86; asks aid of Queen
Elizabeth, 187; quarrels with Cath-
erine de Medit'i, 238; sent to Switzer-
land, 3o7; sent to protect Cham-
llane against Alva, 31.: sent to
seize Poissy, 332; proposition to
marry son of, to sister of duke of
Guise, 345; mentioned, 358; death
of, 378.
Anduze, Catholic league at, 355-
Angennes, 255.
Angers, Huguenot outburst at, 95, I27;
mentioned, I4o; cruelties at, 148 ,
2,q8; duke of Alenon demands,
508.
Angouhme, bishop of, French ambas-
sador in Rome, 57, 283; duke of
Anjou raises siege of, 378, 405, 4o6;
Charles IX offers to yield to Hugue-
nots, 416; revolts, 5o2; duke of
Alenon demands, 5o8.
Angoumois, revolt in, 15o; duke of
Anjou in, 38i.
Anjou, I41, 154 , 286; Catholic league
in, 216.
Annates, 80.
Antinori, agent of Plus IV, 5 o.
Antoine of Bourbon, -king of Navarre,
wife of Jeanne d'Albret and father
of Henry IV: mentioned: 8; char-
acter and policy of, 23, 24; attends
Elizabeth of Valois into Spain, 24;
suspected of complicity in conspiracy
of Amboise, 42; Huguenot overtures
to, 63; appreciated by Catherine
de Medici, 72; promised Sardinia,
73; inclines to Spain, 96; nominal
authority of, 99; hopes for restora-
tion of Navarre, ioo; relations of,
with Spanish ambassador,
uncertain conduct of, ii6, i17; plot
against, i9; hopes to compound
with Philip II, i31; negotiates with
Vatican, 131; promised "kingdom"
of Tunis, i32; instructed in Catholic
faith, 132; quarrels with Jeanne
d'AIbret, 32; offended at Coligny,
133; surrenders to Triumvirate,
137; protests against Charles IX's
removal to Blois, 137; supports duke
of Guise, i38; overtures to Cather-
ine de Medici, 39; weakens, 14;
publishes proclamation against Hu-
guenots in Paris, 49; at Vernon,
152; at BIois, i54; mortally wounded
at siege of Rouen, 169; dies, 17o;
confesses religion of Augsburg, 17 I, n.
Antwerp, population of, 314; Alva
determines to retire his forces into,
444-
Aosta, duke of Alva at, 31i.
Aquitaine, 26, 45-
Aragon, Ferdinand of, 395-
Argentan, Montgomery takes, 472.
Argenteuil, 327.
Armagnac, cardinal of: helps form
Catholic league at Toulouse,
revives Catholic league at Toulouse,
354, 397-
Arnay-le-Duc, battle of, 416-
Arpajon, viscount of, 94, 395-
Artnis, frontier difficulty with France,
263; revolt in, 265; mentioned, 267-
Association: of Huguenots in Lan-
guedoc, 2o7; Catholic associations,
620
THE WARS OF RELIGION IN FRANCE
and bourgeoi,ie, 39 z, 4[2; demands
of, 392, 303; Joyeuse tries to prevent
co-operation of, east and west of
Rhone, 396; council at Milhaud,
396; strength of, in Provence and
Languedoc, 405; strength of, in
southwestern France, 4o8-xo; new de-
mantis of, for peace, 4x6; papal nuncio
protests against, in Avignon, 47;
demand restoration of William of
Orange and Louis oI Nassau, 47,
feudal interests of, 4x 7 and n.
excluded from universities, 420;
organization of, formed at Montauban
in t573, 461; deputies of, from Lan-
guedne and Dauphin plan to meet
Charles IX, 469; make common cause
with Politiques, 47; declaration of,
of La Rochelle, 472; division in party
of, 474; political theory of, 475, 476;
demand of, 486; provincial system of,
480, 490; union with Politiqnes, 499,
500; relations with England, 503;
terms of, in Peace of Monsieur, 5,6,
5x7 .
Hyres, court at, 25 x.
Ile-de-France, I48; wheat dear in, 286;
Huguenot leaders in, 358; Torcy
made lieutenant-general in, 473-
Industry, revolution in, 28, 2t 9.
Inquisition, urged in France under
Henry II, i2; Philip II orders main-
tenance of, in Flanders, 267.
Interest, rates of, in fifteenth century,
83; in sixteenth century, 85, 86, n.
Ireland, 434-
Italians, in battle of La Roche l'Abeille,
383; at siege of Poitiers, 387 . See
also Strozzi.
Italy, lottery introduced from, 82;
wars in, 220, 228; Philip II and, 245;
French interests in, 453; French
ambition in, 467 .
Jacquerie, 502. See also Peasantry.
Jagiello house, last king of, in Poland
dies, 464 .
Jargeau, attempt to take,
Jarnac, battle of, 376, 377, 397-
Jazeneuil, Cond defeated at, 369, n.
Jemmingen, Louis of Nassau defeated
at, 36L
Jesuits, x32 and n., 254.
Joinville, I3I, 68; duke of Deuxponts
passes by, 379; Madame de Guise
flees from, 502.
Joinville, prince de, and Triumvirate,
98.
Joyeuse, viscount of, xz5; Pius V sends
troops to aid of, 57; campaign in
valley of Rhone, fails to take Pont
St. Esprit, 348; takes Loudun,
Orsennes, andTresques, 348; defeats
Montbrun, 348; garrisons towns
of Lower Languedoc and returns to
Avignon, 348; tries to prevent
operation of Huguenots on both
banks of the Rhone River, 396; joins
duke of Anjou, 397; blocks viscount
of Rapin, 448; fails in attempt to
seize Damville, 483.
Juana, sister of Philip II, marriage
with Henry duke of Anjou suggested,
247, 277-
Junius, Francis, driven from Antwerp
97, n.
La CharitY, rising in, i56; captured by
duke of Deuxponts, 380, 405; unsuc-
cessfully assaulted by Lansac, 383;
Marshal Coss sent to recover, 405,
46; Charles IX, offers to trade
Perpignan or Lansac for, 4t6; mas-
sacre of St. Bartholomew at, 450;
duke of Alenon demands, 508.
La Fre, 7x; duke of Alenon demands,
5o8; dispute over cession of, 5 x x, 5
La Fert-sous-Jouarre, Synod of, 246.
Lagebaston, president of parlement of
Bordeaux, complains of conduct of
Montluc, 2z6.
Lagny, 327 .
La Haye, plots to seize La Rochelle,
471; secedes to Politiques, 49 .
La Marche, duke of Deuxponts dies
in, 382.
La Mare, valet-de-chambre to Henry
II, 8.
La Mole, arrest and execution of, 48%
48I.
La Mothe Gondrin, 53; killed,
Langres, duke of Deuxponts passes by,
379; duke of Alenon demands, 508.
Languedoc, loans in, 83; Huguenots of,
qS, u7; militia of, 207, 208; Charles
IX strengthens garrisons of, 306;
civil war in, 347; Damville's govern-
ment oL 347; Catholic league in
66
THE WARS OF RELIGION IN FRANCE
Navarre, Philip II fears attack upon,
146.
Navarrens, siege of, by Terride, 398,
399; raised by Montgomery, 399,
4oo.
Nemours, duke of: made governor
of Champagne, 92; implicated in
plot to kidnap Henry, duke of Orleans-
Anjou, t19; forsakes his wife and
marries duchess of Guise, 293;
breaks CondCs blockade of Paris,
332; ordered to intercept duke of
Deuxponts, 38o.
Nemours, Madame de (duchess of
Guise): complicity of, in massacre of
St. Bartholomew, 45o; demands
governorship of Normandy for hus-
band, 498 .
Nrac, Huguenot church at, 156; Mont-
gomery at, 4o7; revolts, 5o2.
Netherlands, progress of heresy in, i97;
critical situation in, 2ii; Philip II
and, 245; revolt of, 263, 264, 36o; con-
nection of revolt of, with Huguenots,
_066, 296; Huguenot preachers in,
297; fear lest Montgomery come,
298; influence of France upon, 359,
36o; proposed alliance for liberation
of, 425. See also Alva; Egmont; Flan-
ders; Granvella; Holland; Hoorne;
LouisofNassau; Margaret of Parma;
Philip II; Valenciennes; William of
Orange.
Nevers, 218; captured by duke of
Deuxponts, 38o.
Nevers, duke of, claims government of
Normandy, 498 -
Newhaven. See Havre-de-Grace.
Nimes, Protestantism at, 228; court at,
25-0.
Niort, -083; La Noue relieves, 384;
Coligny falls back on, after battle of
Moncontour, 389; duke of Alenon
demands, 5o8.
Nivernais, Protestantism in, 228.
Nobility, policy of, in i559, 9; impover-
ishment of, 344-
Noizay, chateau de, rendezvous of
conspirators of Amboise, 34-
Nonio, an astrologer, 344-
Normandy, 26, 4 r, 45, 6o, 76; loans
made in, 83; Huguenots in, 95, r42,
r48, 23-0; Coligny made governor
of, 126; fear of English intervention
in, xSO; formidable nature of revolt
in, i62; militia of, 208; Protestant-
ism in, 228, 23o; coast defense of,
3o7; war of partisans in Lower, 326,
43o; apprehension in ports of, 471;
dispute over governorship of, 408-
See also Bayeux; Caen; Caudebec;
Dieppe; Havre; Rouen.
Norris, Sir Henry, English ambassador,
protests innocence of English govern-
ment's conduct, 373; urges marriage
of Queen Elizabeth with duke of
Anjou, 422.
Nostradamus, astrologer, 25 .
Nuncio, papal, demands that Cardinal
Chtillon resign, 289; at Madrid,
3x5; protests against Huguenots in
Avignon and Verre, 47. See also
Ferrara; Salviati; Santa Croce.
Niirnberg, 2i 9.
Olivier, chancellor, 34; death, 43-
Oran, Philip II's expedition to, 248.
Orange, cruelties practiced at, i55.
Orange, William of, at deathbed of
Henry II, i2; leader of revolt of
Netherlands, -064; tactics of, _065;
insists upon convocation of States-
General, 268; alliedwith Gueux, 207;
relations with Condr, 297; with
Egmont and Hoorne, 298; leaves
Flanders, 312; seeks to use reiters
of Casimir, 36o; enters France, 369;
anxiety over movements of, 369;
effects junction with Deuxponts,
373, 374- See also Egmont; Gueux;
Hoornc; Louis of Nassau; Nether-
lands.
Orlannais, 2o 7; Protestantism in,
228, 230.
Orleans, 36, 6i, 63, 64, 70, 74, 27, 34;
Huguenot worship at, 80; States-
General at, 91; 2_01, 29o; Cond6
assumes command of Huguenot
forces at, 39, 14o; troops pour into,
r42; Grammont fails to reach, 146;
fear lest supplies be cut off from, 15;
condition of counrty around, 15;
Cond6 retires to, 153; Catholic
garrisons around, 7_0; Huguenot
center at, i8i; D'Andelot's serious
position in, i86; siege of, 86-88;
demolition of walls of, 2o7; captured
by La Noue, 33t; plot to seize, by
(atholics, 35 o; Catholic headquarters
at, 367; relief of, 396; massacre of
St. Bartholomew at, 45 o.
INDEX
63I
St. Jean de Maurienne, Alva at, 3II.
St. /t, demolition of wails of, 207;
Huguenot forces in. 472-
St. Louis (Louis IX), 367.
St. Marceau, Catholic camp in fau-
bourg of, 343-
St. Martin-des-champs, 334-
St. Mathurin, x6i.
St. Maur-des-Fosses, 293-
St. Omer, "Spanish Fury" at. 305.
St. Ouch, 327.
St. Palais, Catholic league at, 355-
St. Pierre, abbey of, Cond imprisoned
in, 182.
St. Quentin, battle of, 8.
St. Roman, viscount of, made Huguenot
governor in Languedoc, 46t.
St. Sulpice, French ambassador in
Spain: Catherine de Medici's cor-
respondence with, 247, 249; dis-
covers plot to kidnap Jeanne d'Al-
bret and seize Bdarn, 266; succeeded
by Fourquevaux, 283, 424.
Saintes, 283; arms secretly stored at,
363, 4o6-
Saintonge, exempt from gabelle, 85;
revolt in, 15o; mentioned, 379; duke
of Anjou in, 38i; La None in, 408.
Salic Law, 337-
Salzedo. See Cardinal's War.
Sancerre, count of, 33-
Sancerre, siege of, 46o.
Santa Croce, cardinal of, z05-
Sardinia. 73; offered to Antoine of
Bourbon, x32; troops from, 3o.
Saumur, 41; garrison at, 3o9; Coligny
plans to take, 385; duke of Alengon
demands, 508.
Sauveterre (in Barn), captured by
Terride, 398.
Saverne, conference between dukes of
Guise and Wtirtemburg at, 123.
Savigny, lieutenant in Touraine, 63, 64.
Savoy., x19, 144, 246; dowry of duchess
of, 2o8; Alva's march through, 3H;
troops of, 329 .
Savoy, Emanuel Philibert, duke of,
marries sister of Henry II, ; urges
extirpation of heresy, 2to; mission
of Don Juan de Acuna to, 3o8;
treaty of. with Bern, 3o9; interview,
with Damville, 488, 40I-
Saxony, John William, duke of, 52.
Schomberg, German colonel in service
of France, 37I; missions of, to Ger-
many, 463, 467, 504.
Scotch Guard, history of, 7; reduced,
208; meeting of, 342; supplanted
by Swiss Guard, 342, n. See also
Montgomery.
ScotLand, French troops sent to, x99;
alliance with France, 243; Philip II
and, 245; relations of, with England,
433, 434- See also Cardinal of
Lorraine; Mar.'," Stuart.
Sedan, duke of Bouillon at, 472.
Seine River, guard of, 38; mouth of,
48; line of, xg; Coligny unable
to cross, 185; Cond unable to cross,
371 .
Seize (Sixteen) nucleus of Holy League
in Paris, 3t8.
Sons, archbishop of, i x4; Huguenots of,
x27, I28; riot at, 133; mentioned,
209, 2g, 232, 333, 330; highroad to,
held by Huguenots, 327 .
Sevignac, viscount of, 394-
Sforza, Ludovico, 7 o.
Shakerly, Thomas, an Englishman, 26.
Sicily, troops from, 31o.
Siena, Montluc at, 56.
Sigismund Augustus of Poland, death
of, 464-
Silly, Jacques de, representative of
noblesse in States-General, 77-
Sipierre, lieutenant in Orlannais, 63,
69.
Sluys, Spanish fleet in, dispersed, 446;
captured by Sir Humphrey Gilbert,
446.
Smith, English ambassador in France,
tries to dissuade Huguenots from
ma'ldng peace, t08: demands resti-
tution of Calais, 204; description of
plague at Lyons, 36-38; saying of,
about cardinal of Lorraine, 9o;
writes to Burghley, 290; interest of, in
marriage negotiations of Elizabeth
and duke of Anjou, 429 .
Soissons (Soissonais), wheat dear in,
286; captured by Huguenots, 33i;
plot to seize, 35o.
Somarive, cruelties of, x55-
Sorbonne, hostility of, to Huguenots, 96;
students of, 27-
INDEX
635
440, 44J; issues proclamation from
Dillenberg, 444; at Frankfort Fair,
446; overtures of France to, 462;
treaty with England, 463, .; plots in
Franche Comtt, 492, 493; possible
marriage of daughter of, to duke of
Alengon, 5o 3.
Windmills, burned by Huguenots in
faubourgs of Paris, 327.
Worcester, earl of, serif to Frace 455-
Wiirtemburg, conference of duke
Guise with duke of, at Saverne,
sister of duke of, proposed as wife of
Henry of Navarre, 422.
Zealanders, disperse Spanish fleet at
Sluys, 446-
Zurich, alarmed at approach of duke of
Alva, 308; neutrality of, 37J-
1-,,,,_. ,,
TO
MARY ItAWES WILMARTIt
THE LARGESS OF SVHOSE SPIRIT HAS MADE THE
SVORLD RICHER AND LIFE NOBLER
rill PREFACE
seigneur de St. Sulpice de i562 i565 (Paris, i9o2), edited by
M. Edmond Cabin, and the Dpches de M. Fourquevaux, ambas-
sadeur du roi Charles 1X en Espagne, i565-72 , in three volumes,
edited by the Abb Douais (Paris, i896 ). Other sources which
have seen the light within the last three decades are 1I. Delaborde's
Vie de Coligny (3 vols., x877-), the title of which is somewhat mis-
leading, for it is really a collection of Coligny's letters strung upon
the thread of his career; the Baron Alphonse de Ruble's Antoine
de Bourbon et Jeanne d'Albret (4 vols., x88i); M. Ludovic La-
lannc's new annotated edition of D'Aubign (886), and the new
edition of Beza's Histoire ecclsiastique (cd. of Baum, x883).
Finally, among sources should be included many volumes in the
"Calendar of State Papers." Professor Baird has rightly said that
"Too much weight can scarcely be given to this source of
mformaton and illustration." His praise would probably have
been even greater if he could have used the correspondence of Dale
and Smith as freely as he did that of Throckmorton and Norris.
When we pass from sources to authorities the list of notable
works is even longer. La Fcrrire's Le XI'F sicle et les l'alois
thc fruit of researches in the Record Office in Londonappcared
in i879; M. Forncron's Hisloire de Philippe 11 (4 vols.) was
published in t887, and is even more valuable than his earlier
Histoire des ducs de Guise (877). Besides these, in the decade of
the 8o's, are Duricr's Les Huguenots en Bigorre (t884); Com-
munay's Les Huguenots darts le Bdarn ct la Navarre (886); Let-
tenhove's Les Huguenots et les Gueux (i885) ; the baron de Ruble's
Le lrail de Caleau-Cambrdsis (889), and the abb6 Marchand's
Charles de Coss, Comte de Brissac (i889). M. de Cruc's notable
Anne, duc de Montmorency appeared in the same )'ear and his
no less scholarly Le parti des politiques au lend, main de Saint Bar-
th(lemy three )'ears later. M. Marlct's Le comte de Montgomery
was published in 89o; M. Georges Weill's Les theories sur le
pouvoir royal cn France Dendan! les guerres de religion, in r89r ;
M. Henri Hauser's Francois de La Noue in x89_; M. Bernard de
I,acombe's Catherine de M(dicis entre Guise et Cond in i899, and,
most recently of all, M. Courteault's Blaise de Montluc (I9o8).
PREFACE
ix
Many contributions in the Revue historique, the Revue des questions
historiques, the English Historical Review, the Revue d'histoire
diplomatique, the Revue des deux mondes, and one article in the
American Historical Review, January, 9c3, bv M. Hauser, "The
Reformation and the Popular Classes in the Sixteenth Century,"
are equally valuable, as the notes will show. I have also consulted
many articles in the proceedings of various local or provincial
historical societies, as the Soci6t6 de Paris et de l'Ile de France;
the Socit de l'histoire de Normandie, the Socit d'histoire et
d'arch6ologie de Genbve, etc., and the admirable series known
as the Bulletin de la Socit da, protestantisme francais, which is a
mine of historical lore.
While the present work falls in the epoch of the French Refor-
mation, no attempt has been made to treat that subject in so far
as the Reformation is assumed primarily to have been a religious
manifestation. Doctrine, save when it involved polity, has been
ignored. But into the political, diplomatic, and economic
activities of the period I have tried to go at some length. As to the
last feature, it is not too much to say that our interpretation of
the sixteenth century has been profoundly changed within the last
twenty years by the progress made in economic history. Such
works as Weiss's La chambre ardente and Hauser's Ouvriers du
temps pass have revolutionized the treatment of this subject.
Such an interpretation is merely a reflection of our own present-
day interest in economic and social problems. In this particular
it is the writer's belief that he is the first to present some of the
results of recent research into the economic history of sixteenth-
century France to English readers. My indebtedness to M.
Hauser is especially great for the help and suggestion he has given
me in the matter of industrial history. But I have tried to widen
the subject and attempted to show the bear----nhe
agricultural.uence of the failure of crops owing to
adve'se weather conditions, and the disintegration of society as
the result of inessarit war and the plague upon the progress of
the Huguen--ot movement. 'In an agricultural country like France
in the sixteenth century, the distress of the provinces through the
CHAPTER I
THE BEGINNING OF THE HUGUENOT REVOLT. THE CON-
SPIRACY OF AMBOISE
The last day of June, 559, was a gala day in Paris. The
marriages of Philip II of Spain with Elizabeth of France, daughter
of King Henry II and Catherine de Medici, and that of the French
King's sister, Marguerite with Emanuel Philibert, duke of Savoy,
were to be celebrated. But "the torches of joy became funeral
tapers"' before nightfall, for Henry II was mortally wounded in
the tournament given in honor of the occasion. 2 It was the rule
that challengers, in this case the King, should run three courses
and their opponents one. The third contestant of the King had
been Gabriel, sieur de Lorges, better known as the count of
Montgomery, captain of the Scotch Guard, 3 a young man, "grand
et roidde," whom Henry rechallenged because his pride was hurt
that he had not better kept his seat in the saddle in the first running.
Montgomery tried to refuse, but the King silenced his objections
M6m. de Tavannes, 39-
The constable Montrnorency, in a letter to Queen Elizabeth dated June 3 o,
x559, says that the accident happened "yesterday," i. e., June 9.C. S. P. Eng.
For., No. 698. Almost all the sources, however, give June 3 o. Cf. Castelnau,
Book I, chap. i. Throckmorton gives June 3 o. See p. 3, note .
3 The origin of the Scotch Guard goes back to the Hundred Years' War. In
x4o, five years after the battle of Agincourt, when Henry V was in possession of
all of northern France, the dauphin, Charles VII, sent the count of Vend6me to
Scotland to ask for assistance in virtue of the ancient league between the two
nations. In x4 a body of x,ooo Scots arrived in France under the earl of Buchan.
They fought at Baug in Anjou in that year, but vere almost all destroyed in 44
in the furious battle of Verneuil. The remnant, in honor of their services, became
the king's own guard. See Skene, The Bool o] Pluscarden, II, xix-xxi, xxwi-xxix;
Houston, L'Escosse ]ranois (Discours des alliances commences depuis l'an sept
cents septante, et continues jusques t present, entre les couronnes de France et
d'Escosse), Paris, x6o8; Forbes Leith, The Scots Men-at-Arms and Lile Guards
in France, ]rom Their Formation until Their Final Dissolution, vols., x88.
The Guard consisted of the principal captain, the lieutenant, and the ensign,
the marchal-de-loges, three commis, eighty archers o[ the guard, twenty-four
archers of the corps; the pay of whom amounted annually to 5x,8oo francs, or
6,475 pounds sterling.---C. S. P. For., No. 544, December, x55 9.
I
2 THE WARS OF RELIGION IN FRANCE
with a command and reluctantly' Montgomery resumed his place.
But this time the Scotch guardsman failed to cast away the trunk
of the splintered lance as he should have done at the moment of
l
MONTGOMERY IN TOURNAMENT COSTUME
(Bib. Nat., Estampes, Hist. de France, reg. Q. b.
the shock, and the fatal accident followed.. The jagged point
crashed through the King's visor into the right eye. 2 For a minute
x Claude Haton, whose Catholic prejudice was strong, believed this reluctance
to be feigned (M(moires, I, Io7).
2 D'Aubign6, Book II, chap. xiv, says the blow raised the King's visor, and
that the end of the lance, which was bound with a morne, or ring, to dull the point,
crashed through the helmet like a bludgeon. Tavannes, chap. xiv, says that the
King had failed to take the precaution to fasten his visor down.
BEGINNING OF THE HUGUEONT REVOLT I t
The Protestant issue was both a religious and a political one,
for to many men it seemed impossible to alter the religious beliefs
of the time without destruction of the state. Francis I recognized
this state of things in the rhyraed aphorism:
Un roi
Une loi
Une foi
and his son rigidly sustained the dictum. The Edict of Com-
pibgne, of July 24, I557' imposed the death penalty upon those
who publicly or secretly professed a religion other than the Catholic
apostolic faith; the preamble declaring that "to us alone who have
received from the hand of God the administration of the public
affairs of our realm," clearly shows the intimate relation of the
French state and the French church. It is significant that the
Ctambre ardenle was established to prosecute the Huguenots in
Henry II's reign. 2
furent appelltes Huguenots procbde de ce que les princes protestants d'AIlemagne
et Luthtriens ayant envoy une solemnelle amhassade au roy, . la requite des
Luthriens et protestants de France pour demander libre exercice du Luthranisme
en son royaume, en faveur des dits Luthriens fran:ais, comme le chef de cette
aml:.ssade voulut er sa premibre attdience parler latin devart le roy, .ssist des
messieurs de son conseil, il ne put jamais dire que les deux mots . s:avait 'huc nos'
et s'arresta tout court. Despuis les courtisans appellrent les Luthtriens frangois
'huc nos,' et en suite 'Huguenots.' "
z Isambert, XIII, 494-
2 Weiss, La ohambre ardente, Paris, x889, a study of liberty of conscience under
Henry II, based upon about five hundred arrts rendered by the Parlement of Paris
between May, 547, and March, x55 o. Before its creation heresy was dealt xvith by
the regular courts. In Bulletin de eomits historique (85o), r73 ("Inventaire des
lettres relatives . I'histoire de France aux archives de B.le "), there is noted a letter
of the King written in i55 to the effect that those who have been arrested for
heresy at Lyons shall not be dealt with unjustly; but the King reiterates his deter-
ruination not to permit any new religious doctrine to obtain. In the very month
before his death, in June, 559, the edict of Ecouan prescribed the death penalty for
all heretics, svithout the least limitation or restriction, and with injunctions to the
judges not to mitigate the punishment, as they had done for some years (Castelnau,
Book I, chap. iii). The Huguenots regarded Henry II's death as a judgment of
God.---C. S. P. For., No. 899, June 3 o, x559: "The), let not openly to say the King's
dissolute life and his tyranny to the professors of the gospel hath procured God's
vengeance." A letter of Diane de Poitiers in the Catalogue de la collection Trmont,
t No. 44, proves that some of the property confiscated from the Huguenots was given
le, by. the King to his favorite.
i6 THE WARS OF RELIGION IN FRANCE
merit ! and hastened the prosecution of Du Bourg, who was put to
death just a week later, on December -3, and led to some new
regulations. In order to protect the Parlement, it was commanded
to adjourn before four o'clock, from St. lXlartin's Eve (November
0) until Easter; a general police order forbade the carrying of
any firearms whatsoever 2 and in order to prevent their conceal-
ment, the wearing of long mantles or large hunting-capes was
forbidden.
It is to be observed that the Huguenots were concerted not only
for religious, but for political interests. The distinction was fully
appreciated at the time, the former being callcd" Huguenots of
religion" and the latter "Huguenots of state. ''4 The former were
Calvinists who were resolved no longer to endure the cruelties of
religious oppression; the latter--mostly nobles--those opposed
to the monopoly of power enjoyed by the Guises. s The weight
i D'Aubign, I, 55, II, chap. xvi. Two edicts were issued on December t 7
from Chambord. See Isambert, XIV, i2.
La Place, 28. 3 La Planche, 2o 9.
, La Place, 4I; Tavannes, 24x. "There be two kinds of the people whom
the Papists term Huguenots, viz., Huguenots of religion, and Huguenots ol State.
The one of these perceiving that the cardinal works to ruin them, and their own
peculiar force not sufficient to withstand his malice, have shown appearance that
they will join with the other, who seeing themselves excluded from all government,
and those of Guise to usurp the whole authority., presently practise a firm faction
and league betveen themselves, either part promising to support the other."--
C. S. P. For., No. 2,35, iay 31, o568.
s Rd. z,(n., I, 53-25; II, 57; Davila, VI, 359- Claude Haton emphatically
asserts the feudal purposes of the Huguenot noblesse: "Les grand seigneurs de la
ligue condienne et cause huguenotleque s'atendoient d'estre haults eslevez, non
s offices royaux, mals au partage du royaume qu'ilz eslroient falre entre eux en le
contonnant par provinces, desquelles ilz prtendoient d'estre seigneurs souverains,
sans recognoistre roy ni aultre personne par dessus eux."--I, 29. Tavannes
characterizes the Huguenot association in I57 as "demi-democratique et demi-
aristocratique" (Panth. lit., 43)- The identification of Calvinism with the political
purposes of the nobles is shown in the following letter of the cardinal de Tournon
to King Henri II, written "De Bains de Lucques, 9 juillet 559": "L'une des
principal ruses de ces malheureux est de commencer, s'ils peuvent, h semer leur
venin et mauvaise doctrine par les plus Grands, les attirer et gaigner eux, afin de
pouvoir aprs tout plus ais6ment & sans punition, infecter & gaster le reste & s'aider
h un besoin de leur force & authoritC"--Ribier, II, 8o 7.
The cardinal Tournon and the admiral Hennebault had been trusted with the
I8 THE WARS OF RELIGION IN FRAI
|
under Charles IX, and, above all, the dissatisfactior. J'prince
of the blood and the old aristocracy, like the Montmorencys, with
the upstart pretensions and power of the Guises--these causes
united to make the Huguenots of state a formidable political
party. Religion and together provoked the long series
of civil wars--w ose termination was not until Henrv IV brought
peace and prosperity to France again in i598."
It is necessary to picture the state of France at this time. The
French were not essentially an industrial or commercial nation
in the sixteenth century. France had almost no maritime power
and its external commerce was not great. The great majority
of the French people was composed of peasants, small proprietors,
artisans, and officials. If we analyze city society, we find first
some artisans and small merchants--the bourgeois and the gens-
de-robe forming the upper class. The towns had long since ceased
to govern themselves. Society was aristocratic and controlled
by the clergy and nobility. The upper clergy was very rich.
High prelates were all grand seigneurs, while the lower clergy was
very dependent. Monks abounded in the towns, and the curates
possessed a certain influence. The most powerful class was the
nobles, seigneurs, and gentlemen, who possessed a great portion
of the rural properties, and still had fortified castles. They were
wholly employed either at court or in war, or held appointments
as governors of provinces and captains of strongholds. The
nobles alone constituted the regular companies of cavalry, that
is to say, the dominant element of the army. This class was there-
fore of influence in the state and the most material force in society.
The government was an absolute monarchy. The king was
theoretically uncontested master and obeyed by all; he exercised
an arbitrary and uncontrolled power, and could decide according
to his pleasure, with reference to taxes, laws, and affairs both of
the state and of the church, save in matters of faith. He named
and revoked the commissions of all the governors and acted under
the advice of a council composed of the princes of the blood and
favorites. But this absolute authority was still personal. The
t See the observadons of La Place, 4x-45.
BEGINNING OF THE HUGUENOT REVOLT
king was only obeyed upon condition of giving the orders himself.
There was no conception of an abstract kingship. If the king
abandoned the power to a favorite, the other great personages
of the court would refuse to obey, and declare that the sovereign
vas a prisoner. Everything depended upon a single person. No
one thought of resisting Francis I or Henry II because they were
men grown at their accession. But after 1559 we find a series of
royal infants or an indolent monarch like Henry III. Then began
the famous rivalries between the great nobles, rivalries out of which
were born the political parties of the times, in which the Guises,
the Montmorencys, and the famous Chttillon brothers figure so
prominently.
Fundamentally speaking, the aims of both classes of Huguenots
were revolutionary, and were directed, the one against the authority
of the mediaeval church, the other against the authority of the
French monarchy. The latter was a feudal manifestation, not
yet republican. The republican nature of early political Hugue-
notisrn has been exaggerated. There was no such feeling at all
as earl; as 56o, ' and even at the _height of Huguenot activity and
pow____e_r in 57o-72, most men still felt that the state of France was
vrayernnt mnarchique, and that the structure of society and the
genius of the people was strongly inclined to the form of govern-
ment which eight centuries of devdopment had evolved; that it
was searching for false liberty by perilous methods to seek funda-
mentally to alter the state. 3 In a word, most politicalHuguenots
in 56o were reformers, not revolutionists; the extremists were
Calvinist zealots and those of sdfish purposes who were working
for their own ends. For in every great movement there are always
those who seek to exploit the cause. Mixed with both classes of
Huguenots were those who sought to fish in troubled waters, who,
under the guise of religion or the public good, took occasion to
z It is true that De Thou so says: "et tablir en France une rpublique sem-
blableit celle des Suisses," Book XXV, 5ox, but it is to be remembered that De Thou
was writing late in the reign of Hertry IV, and read back into the past the republi-
canism of 57 z.
2 See the eminently sane remarks of Tavannes, 26o.
3 Cf. Castelnau, Book I, chap. vi.
2o THE WARS OF RELIGION IN FRANCE
pillage and rob all persons, of whatever degree or quality; who
plundered cities, pulled down churches, carried off relics, burnt
towns, destroyed castles, seized the revenues of the church and
the king, informed for the sake of reward, and enriched themselves
by the confiscated property of others. Similar things are not less
true of the Catholics. For there were zealots and fanatics among
them also, who under pretext of religion and patriotism were guilty
of great iniquit} and heaped up much ill-gotten wealth.'
The ascendency of the Guises quite as much as the suppressive
measures of the government against Calvinism served to bring
this disaffection to a head. The issues, either way, cannot be sep-
arated. The practical aims of the Guises were large enough to
create dismay without it being necessary to believe that as early
as 56o they aimed to secure the crown by deposing the house of
Valois. It was unreasonable to suppose, though it proved to be
so in the end, that the four sons of Henry II would all die heirless,
and even in the event of that possibility, the house of Bourbon
still remained to sustain the principle of primogeniture.
The Guises came from Lorraine, their father having been
brother of the old duke of Lorraine; and through their mother
they were related to the house of Bourbon. They were thus
cousins-german of the king of Navarre and the prince of Cond
and related to the King and the princes of the blood. Their in-
come, counting their patrimony, church property, pensions and
benefits received from the king, amounted to 6oo,ooo francs
(nearly $5oo,ooo today), the cardinal of Lorraine alone having the
disposal of half that sum. This wealth, united with the splendor
of their house, their religious zeal, the popularity of the duke of
Guise, and the concord which prevailed among them, put them
ahead of all the nobles of the realm. The provincial governments
The avarice and dishonesty of the cardinal, it is said, even went so far as to
force Catherine de lX,Iedici to divide with him the fees arising from the confirmation
of ofces and the privileges accorded towns and municipal corporations in the
time of Henry II, which sums lawfully went to her and even then he is said to
have fraudulently estimated them in li,res instead of cus d'or.--La Planche, 2o8.
The cu d'or was worth two lii,res tournois in the reign of Francis I, so that the
cardinal's little trick cut the sum in half.
BEGINNING OF THE HUGUENOT REVOLT 33
Parlement named Avenelles, whose courage failed him at the
critical moment.' Thereupon, for precaution's sake, the court
moved from Blois to the castle of Amboise, which the duke, having
the King's authority to support him, immediately set about for-
tifying. He likewise secured the garrison and townspeople, and
found a plausible pretext to watch the prince of Cond6, by giving
CONSPIRACY OF AMBOISE
SURRENDER OF THE CH,TEAU DE NOIZA7
(Tortorel and Perissin)
him one of the gates to defend, but, at the same time, sent his
brother, the grand prior along with a company of men-at-arms
of assured fidelity. In view of alarming rumors a posse was sent
on March ii under command of the count of Sancerre to Tours,
where some ten or twelve of those in the plot, notablv the baron
' Castelnau, Book I, chap. viii; La Planche, 246 , 247- He received one
hundred cus and a judicial post in Lorraine (De Thou, II, 774, ed. 74o)-
BEGINNING OF THE HUGUENOT REVOLT 35
they consequently would be able to effect their purpose, as all the
princes and lords, like all the rest of the court, had no sort of defen-
sive armour except some coats of mail, and very few even of those,
while their offensive weapons were merely swords and daggers,
with a few pistols, whereas, on the contrary, the insurgents were
x'ell armed with both kinds of weapons and were for the most
part well horsed. Some boatmen saw the insurgents following
the course of the Loire, and their shouts aroused the castle. One
or two were killed, whereupon the rest took to flight toward the
.,.t. , ... , , ,_, , , ,, ; . -:'.,/.'.
THE EXECUTION OF AMBO1SE, DEATH OF CASTELNAU
(Tortord and Perlssin)
country. But several were captured and two of them having been
recognized as among the company who had been pardoned on the
evening before, the}- were instantly hanged, with two others taken
on the preceding day, on the battlements over the castle gate.
As a result of the new alarm there was a general scattering of
bands of arrest on the next day (March 5)- The marshal St. Andr6
was dispatched to Tours with nearly two hundred horse, with
orders to take five companies of men-at-arms from the garrison
in the immediate neighborhood. He was followed by Claude of
Guise, the duke d'Aumale, the duke de Nemours and the prince
68 THE WARS OF RELIGION IN PRANCE
marshals in suppressing sedition or illegal assemblies. Some
men thought the remedy lay in more drastic penalties and advo-
cated the abolishment of appeal in criminal causes, as in Italy- and
Flanders. 1 But history in many epochs shows that the social
maladies of a complex society cannot be so cured. Obviously
the true remedy lay in searching out the causes of the trouble and
destroying them, and this was the intent of the demand for the
States-General.
The summons of the States-General of Orleans and the further
act of the government in announcing that it would summon a na-
tional council of the French clergy to meet in Paris on January.
i56I, unless the Council General was called in the meantime,
were equivalent to promises that reform would be undertaken
in both state and church. The double announcement was the
simultaneous recognition of one necessity--reformation.
x La Place, 49-
THE STATES-GENERAL OF ORLEANS
and disliked the queen's supremacy.' Perceiving this obstacle,
the queen sent for the president of La Rochelle and told him to
have an autograph list made of all those who dissented and to
bring it to her. But no one dared to be the first to sign this list.
This was admirable adroitness on Catherine's part. She was
playing for a large stake, because if the estates treated with the
new government, they would in a certain way approve its legiti-
macy by general consent.
Finally, after a week's .delay, during which the cahiers of the
delegates were handed in and classified, deliberations were resumed.
The three chief questions before the estates of Orleans were reli-
gion, the finances, and the regulation of the courts of judicature.
The three estates in order, beginning with the commons, presented
each its cause. The orator of the third estate, an avocat du roi
at Bordeaux, demanded a general council for the settlement of
religious controversy; the discipline of the clergy, whom he de-
nounced in scathing terms; their reformation in manners and
morals; revision of justice, and alleviation of taxes. As whole,
the commons seemed to wish for a general pardon for all the
insurgents, and that everybody should be restored to favor; that
the election of prelates should be regulated, so as to insure the
nomination of fitting persons to reform the life and customs of the
clergy; and that the revenues of the churches should be limited
to persons appointed for that purpose. 3
The spokesman of the noblesse, one Jacques de Silly, sieur de
Rochefort, invoked biblical authority, besides Assyrian and classi-
cal history, to prove that the nobility had been ordained of God
and recognized by men of all times as the pillar of the state. The
harangue
was a carefully worded assertion of the political interests
and claims of the nobility. Even religion was subordinated to
their political ends, a written memorial being presented by some
Suriano, December 20; D'Aublgn6, I, 303, 304; La Place, 88, xo 9. "The
estates assembled on December x3, but have done little or nothing; divers of them
will not put forth such things as they were instructed in, now the king is dead."--
C. S. P. For., No. 832 ' December 31, 156o.
La Planche, 389-96; D'Aubign, I, 305, 306.
CL C. S. P. I'en., No. 237 , February i, i]6i.
8o
THE WARS OF RELIGION IN FRANCE
Even more favorable action toward the Huguenots might have
been taken if Catherine's caution and her fear of antagonizing
the Guises too much had not acted as a restraint. The pardon
of the government was theoretically not understood to be ganted
to those who preached the Calvinistic doctrine, nor to the King's
judges who had authority in the cities and provinces of France
who espoused it. But it was tacitly admitted that no one was to
be prosecuted for heresy on this account. In Orleans the people
worshiped in Huguenot form and in Paris--wonder of wonders--
Catholic preachers were admonished to cease inveighing against
"Lutherans" and Huguenots, and not to speak against their sects
or their opinions--an order generally interpreted as consent from
the Privy Council for all to follow such opinions about faith as
most pleased their ideas. '
A corollary to the question of religion was that touching the
government of the church. Several excellent ordinances were
passed for reforming the abuses of the church, particularly for
preventing the sale of benefices. The election of the bishops
was taken out of the King's direct jurisdiction and remitted to
the clergy, and to satisfy the people it was added that tweh'e noble-
men and twelve commoners together with the governor and judges
of the city in which a bishop was to be elected were to unite with
the clergy in election, giving laymen the same authority as ecclesi-
astics. Another matter also was determined which was sure to
displease the Pope, viz., that moneys should no longer be sent to
Rome for the annates or for other compositions on account of
benefices, on the ground that these charges drew large sums of
money from the kingdom and were the cause of its poverty. Even
the payment of the Peter's Pence was resented by some. The
bishop of Vienne publicly asserted that it was with astonishment
and sorrow that he observed the patience with which the French
people endured these taxes "as if," said he, "the wax and lead of
the King was not worth as much as the lead and the wax of Rome
which cost so much. ''2 As it would have seemed strange were
C. S. P. Ven., No. :z37. January 23, 56r; La Place, I24-26, practically
paraphrases the edicts.
2 Rel. vn., I, 443-
82 THE WARS OF RELIGION IN FRANCE
lions; his successor brought it up to five, the dCmes of the clerk-
being included. When the expenses of the government came
to exceed the receipts, Francis I had recourse to extraordinaLv
measures, that is to say, to augmentation of the taxes, to new loans,
or to new forms of taxation. In i539 he introduced the lotten-
from Italy. These extraordinary practices were not submitted
to any process of approval, not even in the pays d'Etat. Foreigners
were astonished at the ease with which the king of France procured
money at his pleasure. Francis I quadrupled the faille upon
land, and even had the effrontery to raise it to the fifth power. In
general the people paid without murmuring, although in 1535 an
insurrection broke out at Lyons on account of an alteration in the
aides demanded by the crown; and in i542 there was a serious
outbreak at La Rochelle owing to burdensome imposition of the
gabelle.
The author of the new financial measures of i539 was the chan-
cellor Poyet, a man of ability, who owed his advancement to the
favor of Montmorency. Several very excellent measures are due
to him, pre-eminently numerous ordinances relating to the inalien-
ability of the royal domain, which he promulgated as a fundamen-
tal law of the monarchy, a law which the weak successors of Henry
II repudiated. He also endeavored to suppress dishonest admin-
istration in the provinces. Thus he called to account both the
marshal Montjean, whose exactions in the Lyonnais produced
wide complaint, and Galiot de Genoullac, the sire d'Acir, whose
stealings were enormous. These measures would have had a salu-
tary effect if the administration of justice had been independent
and honest in France. Unfortunately Poyet's reputation for integ-
rity was not as great as it should have been in a minister, and his
policy made him many enemies.
The incomes of Francis I, great as they were, did not suffice
for Henry II, the renewal of the war continuing to increase his
necessities. Under him the increase of the gabdle and the tithes
and other special taxes brought the total of the revenues up to
six and a half million cus, which did not yet save the King from
z Dareste, Histoire de France, III, 456, 457-
9 o THE WARS OF RELIGION IN FRANCE
in order to complete the settlement of affairs,' for time was neces-
sary to make the arrangements with the church, since the prelates
present had not been commissioned to enter into such a compact.
i La Place, iii; C. S. P. For., No. 938, February I2, t56i. In aletter dated
January 22, 156x, to Peter Martyr, Hotman gives an admirable account of the session
of the States-General at Orleans. See Dareste, "Francois Hotman," Mrn. de
l'Acad, des so. moral, et polit., CIV, 654-56.
CHAPTER IV
THE FORMATION OF THE TRIUMVIRATE
The factional rivalry which had been engendered during the
course of the session of the States-Gcneral at Orleans was so great
that this discord, combined with the agitation prevailing on account
of religion, seemed ominous of civil war, and "every accident was "
interpreted according to the passions of the persons concerned. ''
The affair of the custody of the seal created bitter feeling for a
time between the duke of Guise and the king of Navarre, until the
former out of policy and the latter either from policy or lack of
courage, affected to become reconciled. The Guis,s realized that]
they had suffered a serious blow politically through the death of I
Francis II and Catherine was shrewd enough to "know that while I
she controlled the seal, she was the keeper of the King's authority..J
The prince of Cond was a double source of friction. In the first
place, his trial for treason was still pending before the Parlement
of Paris. 2 The queen mother was anxious to have the cause
settled out of court, for if condemned (vhich was unlikely) the
whole Bourbon family would be disgraced as formerly through
the treason of the constable Bourbon in x527, and if acquitted,
the prince would not rest until he had been avenged of his enemies.
Accordingly, she caused a letter to be written in the King's name
instructing the Parlement to dismiss the case. But the mettle-
some spirit of the prince resented this process, and his discontent
was increased to furious anger when the duke of Guise recom-
mended that all the evidence be burned and prosecution be dropped,
although his opinion was that legally Cond could not be acquitted
as the trial so far had proved him to have been implicated in the
revolt of LTons.3 To both parties Catherine de Medici steadily
replied that she had written the letter in order to adjust the affairs
of the prince of Cond to his honor and to the satisfaction of all,
Despatches o[ Suriano (Huguenot Society), March , x56t.
C. S. P. For., No. 49, 1March 18, X56L
Ibid., Vn., No. 4, March 3, 56L
9t
114 THE WARS OF RELIGION IN FRANCE
of things, together with the fact that the prolongation of the session
entailed great expense, brought about a change of plan. Five per-
sons, the bishop of Valence, the archbishop of Sens, and
Salignac, d'Espence, and Boutellier, were appointed by the queen
and agreed to by the clergy, to confer with five representatives of the
Calvinists, viz., Peter Martyr," Beza, De Gallars, Marborat, and
D'Espine. 3 Within ten days more the prelates and ministers had
ceased to confer and were taking their departure.4 The assembly
of Poissy dissolved of itself on October 18, having accomplished
nothing, s except doctrinally still further to disunite the Protestant
world, which otherwise might possibly have had a council of its
composed of French, Scotch, English, Germans, Danes, Swiss and
Swedes, to face the Council of Trent. 6
Two days later the cardinal and the duke of Guise departed
from the court, in spite of the urgency of the queen mother to have
them remain, accompanied by the dukes of Nemours and Longue-
ville and other great personages and mustering six or seven hun-
dred horse. Outwardly there was no sign of disaffection. Im-
mediately afterward the constable also left, expressing dissatis-
faction with the tolerant policy of the government. It was plain
I C. S. P. For., No. 5Ii, September I0, 156I.
2 Not being a Frenchman, but an Italian--his name a'as lietro Mart.ire Ver-
mlgli--he received a separate safe-conduct (Suriano [Huguenot Society], August
23; Re. hist., XCVII, March-April, 19o8 , p. 3o2).
La Place, 199.
.t C. S. P. For., No. 602, October 1,2 1561. For a description of the last days
o[ the Colloquy, see Despatches o] Suriano (Huguenot Society), October 16, 56t.
s C. S. P. For., No. 624, October i8, 156t. In K. 1,495, No. 66, is a rsum
by the Spanish chancellerb' of Chantonnay's dispatches dealing with the colloquy.
6 C. S. P. For., No. 753, from Strasburg, December 3 o, i561. Writing just
a week earlier, on December 23, to his sovereign, Chantonnay strongly condemned
the course of Catherine at Poissy because it had militated against the authority of
Trent, and had given courage to the heretics to continue their synods.--K. 1,494,
No. to4- Other references to the Colloquy of Poissy are De Thou, IV, 84 if-;
De Ruble, Antoine de Bourbon et Jeanne d'Albret, 76 ft.; Corresp. de Catherine de
lIdicis, I, Introd., ci, 239. Chantonnay's correspondence, covering both the
colloquy and the meeting of the estates at lontoise, is in K. 1,494, No. 89, August
5; -No. 9 o, August 20; No. toy, September 12 (especially valuable for the financial
settleiaent); No. lO2, September 15.
13o THE I,rARS OF RELIGION IX FRANCE
avoid litigation and confusion of property rights; and to refrain
from harboring any person who might be accused, prosecuted,
or condemned by the government, under penalty of a fine of ,ooo
crowns, to be devoted to charity, together with whipping and
banishment (Arts. 8, 9, i2). The use of reproachful or vituperative
language touching the faith or practice of the Catholic church was
made a misdemeanor (Art. o). Finally, all Protestant synods
or consistories were required to be held by permission of or in
presence of the lieutenant-general of the province concerned, or
his representative, and the statutes of the churches were to be
communicated to him (Art. 7, and supplementary declaration and
interpretation of February 14, 1562).
In order to prevent seditions, an edict was sent to the judges
of the towns, in the name of the King, by which the authorities
were ordered to disarm all Catholics in their towns of every species
of weapon and to make them deposit their arms in the local city
hall or other common point, xvhere they were to be kept under the
guard of the procureur and the chevins."
It is a question worth), of consideration, whether the preachings
of the Reformed might not have been peaceably maintained after
the Edict of January, the provisional form gradually being modi-
fied until complete religious toleration xvould have been secured,
if Spain had not continued to tamper with French politics, and
if the persistence of the political Huguenots had not continued
to push things to such a point that at last the two causes, originally
separate, became the obverse and reverse sides of the same issue
and had to stand or fall together. On the other hand, had not
these concessions of the crown been too long delayed ? Was the
edict "dead from birth," as Pasquier wrote
x Claude Platon, I, z77, and n.t. For other details see Castelnau, Book III,
chap. i; Re!.
2 Ieltres de Pasquer, II, 96. Mignet characterizes the provisionS of the Edict
of January as "'gnruses, simples, et sages." Mignet, "Les lettres de Calvin"
(Journal des savants, 1859 , p. 76), and I-Iaag, La France protestante, Introd., xix,
as "le l:lus lib6ral dit qui ait t oblenu par les rforrn6s jusqu' ceIul de
Nantes. '
Cloud
HUGNOT kl CI
ORLEANS
March 29.-April Z. 1562
ScoJe of Mils
Co.
THE FIRST CIVIL WAR
45
did not know that already the Triumvirate had anticipated her re-
quest by asking the Spanish King to instruct the regent of Flanders
man throughout the Rhine provinces which attempted to neutralize the differences
between Calvinism and Lutheranism. (This curious pamphlet is printed in
Mm. d* Corut, II, 54; La Popelini:re, I, 35. In this capacity Hotman was
invaluable. Some of his letters at this time are in Mm. d* l'Acad.. CIV, 66-65. )
The German princes as a whole tried to prevent soldiers from going out of
German)'. The landgrave Philip of Hesse arrested an officer of cavalry who was
secretly enlisting horsemen in Hesse and who said he was doing so for Rnggendorf,
tore up the officer's commission before his face, and made him swear to leave
his castle without a passport. The duke of Wiirttemberg also took care that
no 'olunteers should march through Monthrliard into France, and Strasburg
torbade anyone to enlist under severe penalties. The hishop of the Rhine kept
quiet; only in Lorraine and the Three Bishoprics was Catholic enlisting unimpeded.
The recruiting-sergeant of the Guises in German)' was the famous Roggendorf,
a Frisian hy birth who had been driven out of his native land in i548 and since then
had lived the life of an adventurer, part of the time in Turkey. (See an interesting
note in Poulet, I, 54, with references.) On April 8 the king of Navarre in the
name of Charles IX, signed a convention with him engaging the services of ,2oo
German mounted pistoleers and four cornettes of footmen of 3o0 men each
(D'Aubign, 11, 3., n.). These torces entered France late in July and reached the
camp at Blois on August 7 (D'Auhign, II, 76, n. 3)-
One reason why the Protestant princes of Germany were unable immediately
to make strong protest to the French crown was that the envoys of the elector
palatine, the dukes of Deuxponts and Wiirttemberg, the landgrave of Hesse and
the margrave of Baden, were unprovided for a month with letters of safe conduct,
hy the precaution of the Guises, with the result that Roggendori led lt,2oo cavalry
in the first week in May across the Rhine and through TrOves into France for the
Guises, though the Protestant princes did all the), could to hinder the passage and
expostulated with the bishops of TrOves and Cologne for allowing them to be
levied in their territories. Failing greater things, the Protestant princes of Germany,
in July, 562, put Roggendorf under the ban in their respective states (cf. C. S. P.
Fr., Nos. 244 and 269, June 3 and July, t562 ). In the end, despite the enterprise
of the Guises, the French Catholics may be said to have been unsuccessful beyond
the Rhine, that is in Germany proper, hut not in Switzerland or the episcopal states.
D'Oysel, who was sent by Charles IX in July to Heidelberg (D'Aubign, II, 97,
and n. x; Le Laboureur, I, 43 o) received a short and definite answer "which showed
him how groundless were his hopes of aid from that quarter, a document to which
so much importance ,^.as attributed that it was forthwith printed for wider circula-
tion" (C. S. P. For., No. 44, August 3, x562, and the Introduction, xi).
The king of Spain's captains had money and were ordered that as soon as
soldiers were taken from Germany into France they should enlist men for the de-
fense of his territories (C. S. P. Far., No. Ii, May 2, 1562 ). In the bishopric of
TrOves soldiers were enrolled easily, as the passage from thence to France was
hort (ibid., No. 74, Xlay 9, 1562)-
In Swite.erland the Huguenots endeavored to prevail upon the Protestant
i66
THE WARS OF RELIGION IN FRANCE
reached itself. In spite of the importunities of Throckmorton,'
the English government was reluctant to venture its arms beyond
the seaboard, 2 although Throckmorton's arguments were rein-
forced by every other English agent in France, Rouen being repre-
sented as "such a jewel for them that by no means is it sufferable
to become an enemy. ''3 All urgency was in vain. The instruc-
tions to the earl of Warwick, the English commander in Havre-
de-Grace, were to the effect that if requested to send aid to Rouen
or other places he should make some "reasonable delay," without
offending them. 4 It is easy to see from such instructions and the
policy pursued by the English government in France that its inter-
est was purely practical and in no sense sentimental or religious.
England wanted to hold Havre-de-Grace in pawn for Calais, under
cover of pretending to support the Huguenots.
By mid-October, however, it had become plain that this narrow
policy could not be so rigidly adhered to. The success of the
Catholic armies in Normandy was even endangering Havre-de-
Grace, and Havre-de-Grace was not nearly so favorable a point of
vantage for the English as Calais had been, for there the pale
protected the city proper; in the city at the Seine's mouth the
fortifications were veak and, worst of all, the location was a poor
one for defense, s With the coming of winter, it would be possible
for the French with slight effort to prevent much intercourse by
sea between Havre and the English ports, while already the coun-
try roundabout was being devastated by the German fetters.
D'Aumale was reported to have said--and there was justification
of the statement--that the English garrison might make merry
as it pleased, the winter and famine would cause them to pack
homeward faster than they had come. Too late the English at
See his singular letter to Cecil of July 29, 562, in C. S. P. For., No. 389 .
a Cf. articles for the English agent Vaughan, of August 3 o, in Cecil's hand-
writing (ibid., No. 55o).
Ibid., No. 763, Vaughan to Cecil, October 4, I562; Forbes, II, 89.
'C. S. P. For., No. 79 o, October 7, x562; Forbes, II, 93-
s Cf. C. S. P. For., No. 8o3, October 8, x562; Forbes, II, xoi; report of a
military expert to Cecil.
CHAPTER VII
THE FIRST CIVIL WAR (Continued). THE BATTLE OF DREUX
(DECEMBER x9, x562). THE PEACE OF AMBOISE
(MARCH xg, x563)
After the fall of Rouen, the chief military design of the Guises
seems to have been to protract the war, without giving battle, until
the Germans with D'Andelot and Cond either deserted for lack of
l pay or were corrupted by them. Catherine's wish, on the other hand,
was to efld the war by composition and not by the sword, fearing
to have either party become flushed with success. In pursuance
of this policy numbers of the soldiers were permitted to go home,
the war being considered to be practically at an end until the spring,
except that garrisons of horse and foot were kept in the towns
round about Orleans after the manner of a flying siege (sige
volante). But the rapid advance of the prince toward Paris from
Orleans, where he had been waiting for D'Andelot, who mustered
his German horse in Lorraine in the middle of September, after
he learned of his brother's death, required the duke of Guise to
change his plans. Passing by Etampes, which the Guises aban-
doned at his approach, I the prince of Coaad5 marched toward Cor-
beil in order to win the passage of the Seine, where 4,00o footmen
and 2,000 horse of the enemy lay in order to keep the Marne and
the Seine open above Paris for provisioning the capital. The
Huguenot army numbered about 6,0oo footmen; 4,00o of them
Germans, and nearly 3,0oo horsemen. Most of the Germans
were well armed and mounted, and all "very Almain soldiers, who
spoil all things where they go. ''2
The duke of Guise, having received word of the approach of the
Huguenots upon Paris, abandoned his purpose of going to Hare,
z ,, II y eut toujours clans la ville quatre corps de garde, Charles IX ordonna
d'tablir b, Etampes un magasin de vivre bout fournir son arme."--Annales du
Gatinais, XIX, o 5.
2 C. S. P. Eng., No. I,o7o, November 20, 562.
accordn,lo
COMMANDANT d COYNAR'r
Co.
194 THE WARS OF RELIGION IN FRANCE
courts, and chimneys, in order to find booty. They even fell upon
the houses and chateaux of the nobles, where they passed, if they
saw they were not strong or well defended, t For this reason those
living in poorly fortified houses vacated them and fled to the towns.
Those who owned strong and well-fortified houses levied soldiers
for their defense. What happened at Provins happened, doubtless,
in many other places, too.
In the carrefours of Provins, it was proclaimed that no inhabi-
tant of the town, under pain of a fine of one hundred livres lournois
and imprisonment, should leave it, and that every man at the
hour of ten in the morning must report with his arms before the
house of his sergeant (di'.ainier) for the purpose of mounting guard
upon the walls, each in his own part of the city. Everybody in
the surrounding country began to vacate their houses and to drive
their cattle into the town. On the evening before Easter mes-
sengers of Provins reported that the reiters were near. At this
news watchers were set upon the wall of the toqa, and a corps de
garde posted by the town authorities. On the morning of the
morrow, which was Easter Sunday, the gates of the town were
not opened until eight o'clock, upon which there poured into the
town an infinite number of wagons and pack-animals laden with
the possessions of the villagers round about. There was hardly
room to bestow so many people and so manv animals. Divine
service was celebrated in the parish churches, for it was expected
that the fetters would take their course toward the town, and the
people were resolved not to let them enter, but to resist to the very
last drop of blood.
In order to ascertain what was the equipment and the arms of each in-
habitant of the town, a general meeting was called at midday for a view of
arms, but it was not possible to hold the meeting because all the streets and
squares were packed with the refugees and their animals. In consequence of
this, local meetings were held in each of the quarters of the city. Thus the
day wore on and consternation abated only when it was learned that the
reiters had gone off toward the Marne, which they crossed above Coulumiers.
On the morrow, Easter $londay, there was no procession in the streets as
x See the interesting account of an unsuccessIul attempt by the miters to
storm a chateau (Claude Haton, I, 347-49)-
THE WAR WITH ENGLAND 205
replying to the effect that the queen ought not to regret the loss
of Calais, knowing that of old it was the possession of the crown
of France, and that God had willed it to return to its first master,
and that the two realms ought to remain content with the frontiers
created for them by nature and with a boundary so clearly defined
as the sea.'
, c. s. P. Ven., 564, No. 388.
220 THE WARS OF RELIGION IN FRANCE
carrying the economic gospel of free labor and the religion of
Lutheranism with them. Naturally they imbued their French
fellow-workmen with their sentiments--and to such an extent
that for years, during the early course of the civil wars, the
[ Huguenots were commonly called "Lutherans." Before i56o , the
greater portion of the Protestant party was made up of wool-
combers, fullers, drapers, weavers, shoemakers, hosiers, dyers,
tailors, hatters, joiners, glaziers, bookbinders, locksmiths, cutlers,
pewterers, coopers, etc. I Even as late as 1572 , when the Hugue-
not movement had for twelve years been led by noblemen like
the Chtillons and the Rohans, the Venetian ambassador still
characterized the Huguenots as "a sect which consists for the most
part of craftsmen, as cobblers, tailors, and such ignorant people.""
Coupled with this religious and economic revolution, went also
a change in the manners of society, vhich pervaded all classes--
a change which began in the reign of Francis I and was continued
under Henry II. The new internationalism of France, due to the
Italian wars, was probably the initial cause of this. Returned
soldiers, laden with the pay of booty of warfare, brought back into
x Weiss, La chambre ardente, cxlv. The early identification of the French
nobility with Calvinism has been exaggerated. One must be cautious in the use
of the term "nobility," for it is to be remembered that the eldest son received the
largest share of the inheritance and that younger sons and small nobles, in many
instances, had much in common with the small farmers in the provinces. As
Mr. Armstrong aptly says: "All that separated them from their neighbors was
'privilege,' and to this they clung all the more desperately."--Armstrong, The
French Wars o] Religion, 4- In the decade between 155o and 156o there is an
increase in the number of aristocratic names identified with French Protestantism,
but it was not till 1557 that the first great noble espoused its cause and that
covertly. This was Antoine of Bourbon. In the same year Coligny and D'Ande-
lot also inclined to it (Whitehead, Gaspard de Coligny, Admiral o] France, 63-66).
On the whole matter, see Lavisse, Histolre de France, V, Pt. II, 238-42.
2 Relazione IV, 242. The great store-house oI information on this head is
M. Noel Weiss, La chambre ardente, i889---the trials for heresy during the years
x547-49 of the reign of Henry II--a book which has revolutionized the point of
view of the history of the French Reformation (see a review of this work in English
I.iist..Reviev, VI, 77o).
In the town of Provins there were but a few Huguenots. Among them wexe
i dnctor; 2 lawyers; a notary.; I barber and surgeon; dyer; 3 apothecaries; x
draper; x fuller; i salt dealer.---Claude Haton, I, I24, 125.
224 THE WARS OF RELIGION IN FRANCE
in the provinces. The Protestant local organizations were not so
highly developed, in a military sense, as early as this, nor were they
of the same form as those of the Catholics. Montluc himself, than
whom there is no better judge, testifies that in the war in Guv-
enne in 1562 "they showed themselves to be novices, and indeed
they were guided by their ministers." The Protestants had a
sort of triumvirate, it is true, in the two Ch.tillon brothers, and
the prince of CondO, but their work only remotely partakes of the
policy of the real Triumvirate; even their appeal to Elizabeth
did not contemplate such radical conduct as the Triumvirate
displayed.'
No Huguenot leader ever thought of subordinating the govern-
t ment of France to a foreign ruler for the maintenance of the faith
he believed in, 2 as the Guises, Montmorency, and St. Andr did.
Cond6's declaration that the civil war was caused by the Trium-
virate's action had much truth in it. The rules of the association
which the Huguenots formed at Orleans, on April ii, 1562 , were
as much a body of military regulations for the discipline of the
army as they were a political compact, as a reading of the articles
will prove. 3 There was little of the politico-military character of
Coligny expressly denied having made any promise to return Calais to
England, and as to the occupation of Havre, he said: "J'en ignorais les termes
jusqu', la venue de Throckmorton eta Normandie, et lorsque j'en ai sign la con-
firmation, je n'ai jamais pu croire qu'il y eut autre clause que l'assurance donme
h la reJne du remboursement des sommes qu'elle nous avanait."--Correspondamede
Catherine de Mdicis, II, Introd., xiii. See the extended discussion of this con-
troverted subject in Whitehead, Gaspard de Coligny, Appendix I, wbere he shows
that the admiral is to be exonerated from the odium of having sought to betray
Havre-de-Grace into the hands of the English and puts the blame for this article of
the treaty of Hampton Court upon the vldame de Chartres.
2 The conduct of La Rochelle in the fourth civil war is the most pronounced
instance of Huguenot willingness to subortinate French territory to a foreign
domination and this action was of the municipality, not of a single Huguenot
leader, nor did it, of course, imply the subjection of the government of France to
English rule as the Triumvirate contemplated in the case of Spain.
Mm. de Cond(, IV, 93: "Traict6 d'Association faicte par lXonseigneur
le Prince de Cond avec les Princes, Chevaliers de I'Ordre, Seigneurs, Capitaines,
Gentilhommes et autres de tous estats, qui sont entrez, ou entreront cy-apres0 en la
dicte association, pour maintenir l'honneur de Dieu, le repos de ce royaume, et
I'estat et libert6 du Roy sous le gouvernement de la Roy sa mere."
The third article pro,ides for implicit obedience to the prince of CondO, "chef
THE TOUR OF THE PROVINCES
237
of trade. Lyons paid dearly for its commercial pre-eminence,
for the ravages of the plague were terrible there.' It was at its
height when the court was there in July, i564. The English
ambassador, Smith, gives a fearful picture of the state of the city.
Men died in the street before his lodgings. His servant who
went daily for his provisions sometimes saw ten and twelve corpses,
some naked, lying in the streets where they lay till "men clothed
in yellow" removed them. A great many bodies were cast into
the river, "because they will not be at the cost to make graves.
This day," he writes on July i2, "from break of day till ten o'clock
there laid a man naked in the street, groaning and drawing his
last breath, not yet dead. Round the town there are tents of the
pestiferous, besides those which are shut up in their houses. ''*
Almost every third house was closed because of the plague. The
city authorities vainly tried to combat the disease by providing
that visits were to be made twice a day by those appointed; but
as there were but five "master surgeons" in the whole city, medical
attention must have been slight. Persons affected with the plague
were to be removed to the hospital--the oldest and one of the best
in Europe at that time. Corpses were to be buried at night and
the clothes of the dead burned. 3 "About the Rhone men dare
eat no fish nor fishers lay their engines and nets, because instead
of fish they take up the pestiferous carcasses which are thrown
in." New sanitary regulations were made. All filth was to be
cast into the river and not allowed to pollute the streets or the river
banks. Fires of scented wood were kept burning between every
ten houses in the street. Pigs and other animals were not allowed
at large. Meat, fish, and vegetable stalls were to be inspected
and all decayed provisions destroyed, a
It is interesting to observe the efforts made by local authorities
to prevent the spread of the disease and the relief measures that
, Vingtrinier, La peste Lyon, x9ox.
a C. S. P. For., No. 553 (564) -
3 On the state of medical science at this time see Franklin, "' I_at vie d'autrefois,"
Hygiene, chap. ii; cf. C. S. P. For., No. 544, July x, x564 (summary. of a pamphlet
printed by the city authorities).
4 Claude Haton, I, 224-8.
238 THE WARS OF RELIGION IN FRANCE
vere taken. As soon as the plague vas discovered, the town
authorities usually set guards to vatch the houses of those stricken
and appointed barbers and gravediggers to treat ill and to inter
the dead. These attendants vere supported and paid by a tax
laid upon the town. Those vho were ill were sent to a house
of isolation appointed to be a hospital, vhich vas often upon the
valls of the tovn, remote from the people. In Provins the church
and cemetery vere immediately adjacent to the hospital! The
mortality was great. In Provins in I562 there vere eighty persons
stricken, of vhom sixty died, among them four of the attendants.
Tvo of the barber-surgeons refused to serve and vere proceeded
against by the town bailiff and vere hanged in effigy because
the principals in the case had made their escape. Diseased houses
vere sprinkled with perfumes and aromatic herbs were burned
in them in order to purify them. As always, the dislocation of
society and the depravation of morals vorked havoc in the com-
munity. Crimes of violence were common. 2
Little by little, however, this picture of misery faded into the
background of the queen's mind and the question of political
expediency, vhich vas alwavs the lodestar of her policy, became
her primary consideration) The Catholics plucked up courage
as the court progressed 4 and Huguenot suspicion of the queen's
course vas early aroused. Shortly after the tour of the provinces
had begun, and vhile the court was till at Troyes pending the signa-
ture of the treaty of peace, there vas a jar between D'Andelot and
the queen mother, who would not permit him to choose his own
captains and other officers as vas customarily permitted to colonels.
Claude Haton, I, 332.
2 "Non-seulement la France rut agite en ceste annie de guerres, diminution
des biens de la terre et de peste, mais aussi fut remplie et fort tormente des voleurs
larrons et sacrileges, qui de nuict et de jour tenoient les champs et forcoient les
glises et maisons, pour vol!er et piller les blens d'icelles pour vivre et s'entretenir."
--Mrnolres de Claude Haton, I, 332 (1562).
Smith declared that Lyons was the "most fearful and inhuman town he had
ever seen. Men show themselves more fearful and inhuman than pagans."--
C. S. P. #'or., No. 553, July Is, 1564.
3 Castelnau, Book V, chap. x.
* Claude Haton, I, 378.
THE TOUR OF THE PROVINCES "65
from the country. This drastic policy called forth a mingled protest
and threat from the prince of Orange, whose wealth and German
connections, aside from other qualities he possessed, gave him
great influence. The government begged for money and troops,
"como la liga va cresciendo."' Orange's tactics were to persuade
the provincial estates to refuse to vote subsidies or to throw the
xxeight of the finances upon the church much after the manner of
things done at Pontoise. This he began to do in Brabant where
the indefinite postponement of a grant of money provoked mutiny
among the soldiers. In September De Berghes went out from
office, having distinguished himself by not putting a single heretic
to death. The change was immediately folloxved by the burning
alive of a Protestant preacher and the protestations of the quartet,
Orange, Hoorne, Egmont, and Montigny, became bolder. 2 Finally
the nobles of Flanders resolved to protest to the King of Spain.
Philip II, always hesitating and undecided, did not respond. To
a petition which was sent him demanding the recall of the cardinal,
he replied by a flat refusal. The nobles showed their offense by
absenting themselves from the Council of State and used their
influence to detach the regent from Granvella. At last, after
months of negotiation, Philip II yielded. Granvella retired to
his splendid palace at Besangon in Franche Corot6 and the nobles
resumed their seats in the council. But the four xvere irritated
at Philip II's delay in responding to their demands for reform.
It was evident, moreover, by November, 563, that something
like a common purpose actuated the chief provinces--Flanders,
Artois, Holland, Zealand, and Utrecht. 3
The Calvinists were especially ntmerous in the Walloon prov-
inces, and preachers from Geneva and England were active
among them. The government undertook to restrain their assem-
blies, and the conflict broke out. This conflict, it is important to
remark, did not turn upon the question of religion in and of itself,
but upon the manner of treating the heretics. Philip wanted to
z Gratvella to Perez, August 6, 1563, Papiers d'itat du cardinal de Granz, elle,
VII, 177.
= Ibld., 23. 3 Ibid., 262.
THE TOUR OF THE PROVINCES
275
The slaughter of the French Protestants as a sect was never advo-
cated by any prince in Europe, not even Philip II. There is no
evidence at the Vatican of any Catholic or papal league for the
extirpation of the Protestants. Such a solution of the religious
problem was not contemplated, save by one person in Europe at
this time--Pope Pius V. It is this pontiff who has the sinister
distinction of having advocated general destruction of the Prot-
estants, rather than a discriminating assassination of the Hugue-
not leaders. The most radical action touching the Huguenots
, Pius V was elected pope January iT, x566 (see Hilliger, Die IVahl Pius V
zum Piipste, 9o7)- He had been grand inqulsltm before his elevation, and imparted
a ferocious zeal to the holy office (see Bertelotti, Martiri di Libero Pensero e Vittime
della Sta. l nquisizione nei Secoli, X V I, X V I I, e X V I I I, Rome, 892). "The violence
of his character and his bigotry led to his committing several acts injurious to the
Catholic cause, but it was due to him that the Spanish, Venetian, and papal fleets
defeated the Turks at Lepanto. He wrote on 5arch u8, 569 to Catherine de
Medici: "Si Votre Majest6 continue, comme elle a fait constamment, dans la
rectitude de son ame et darts la simplicit de son cceur, h ne chercher que l'honneur
de Dieu toutpuissent, et b. comhattre ouvertement et ardemment les ennemis de la
religion catholique, jusqu" ee qu' ils soient tous rnassacr& (ad internecionem usque),
qu'elle soft assure que le secours divin ne lui manquera jamais, et quc Dieu lui
prrparera, ainsi qu'au roi, son ills, de plus grandes victoires: ce n'est que par l'ex-
termination entibre des hrrrtiques (deletis omnibus haeritics) que le roi pourra rendre
b. ce noble royaume l'ancien culte de la religion catholique."--Potter, Pie V, 35; letter
of the Pope to Catherine de iXiedici, March uS, 569 . The original Latin version
of this letter, the salient words of which are in parentheses above, is in Epistola
SS. Pii V, ed. Gouhan, III, i54 , Antwerp, x64o. The editor was secretary to
the marquis de Castel-Rodrigio, ambassador of Philip IV to the Holy See. An
abridged edition was published by Potter, Lettres de St. Pie V sur les affaires
religieuses de son temps en France, Paris, t86. "The letter is one of congratulation
written to Catherine de Medici upon the Catholic victory, of Jarnac and the death
of the prince of Condr. (CL the letter of April t 3, t569, on p. t56 to the same
effect.) Neverthele, even the Pope regarded the total destruction of the French
Protestants as a result more devoutly to be wished for than practicable. Pope Plus
V, however, was not the first advocate of destruction, for as early as t556 Francois
Lepicart gave the same advice to Henr 3" II : "Le roy devroit pour un temps contre-
faire le luthrrien parmi eux [the Protestants], afin que, prenant de 1. occasion de
s'assembler hautement partout, on pfit faire main-basse sur eux tous, et en purger
une b0nne fois le royaume."--Bayle's Dictionary, art. "Rose."
"The doctrine of assassination for heresy originally proceeded from the mediaeval
church, in which it can be traced back as far as the beginning of the Crusades.
Urban II asserted that it was not murder to kill an excommunicated person, pro-
vided it was done from religious zeal. ("Non enim eos homicidas arbitramur quod
adversus excommunicatos zelo catholicae rnatris ardentes, eoru m quoslibet trucidasse
282 THE WARS OF RELIGION IN FRANCE
I tions of the Valois was the least loss. The irrepara_blething
was th.gt--eited the confidence of her Protestant
ss. The secrecy t--hat enveloped the conference made the
Huguenots apprehensive of the worst. They believed that a
Franco-Spanish alliance was made at Bayonne for their over-
whelming; and the second civil war w.as the outcome of their
misgivings. And when finally, for other reasons, the massacre
of St. Bartholomew befell them, not merely Protestant France but
Protestant Europe was convinced that the false hypothesis had
been demonstrated. The count Hector la Ferrire admirably
summarizes the situation:
To maintain and loyally to adhere to the edict of pacification; to open to
the daring sailors of France the Indies and America, which Spain and Portugal
were endeavoring to close to them; and finally to rally Catholics and lrotestants
under the same banner against the foreigner--this was the only true French
policy. The Spaniard at this time was the enemy of France. She enc0unt-
ered him everywhere in her path; at Rome, at Vienna, at the Council of Trent
he disputed her precedence; in Switzerland by gold and by the menaces of his
agents he interfered with the renewals of the French treaties with the Catholic
cantons; at the very time when Catherine and Elizabeth of Valois were ex-
changing false promises of alliance and friendship, Menendez was sailing for
Florida, bearing orders for the massacre of all the French found there?
x For example La Noue, chap. xii (567).
Correspondance de Catherine de Mdicis, II, 509, 51o; /{. Q, H., .LXXIV.
292 THE WARS OF RELIGION IN FRANCE
changes in the judicial administration, and pledged the word of the crown to
appoint capable and bonest magistrates, x
It profoundly modified both the public and private law of
France. In the former sphere the ordinance strengthened the
legislative power of the crown by laying down the principle that
the King's ordinances must be observed in spite of remonstrances
on the part of the parlements, and even if the latter refused to
register them; the maitres des requites were enjoined to punish
severely any infraction or failure to observe the ordinances. The
powers of the governors in the provinces were much reduced; they
were forbidden to exercise the right of pardon, to levy taxes, or
to institute fairs and markets. The judicial power of the great
,illes was almost entirely suppressed. The communal judges
were deprived of all civil jurisdiction and retained cognizance only
of petty offenses; at the same time, the attempt was made to
restrain seigneurial jurisdiction. The right of written proof was
recognized in cases involving oo livres or more. No less than
,5oo superfluous offices, treasurerships, secretaryships, etc., were
abolished. In the matter of religion some of the articles were a
confirmation of the edict of x56 3. Another article abolished
entirely all confraternities, and prohibited the formation of all
leagues, s
The financial administration came in for a most searching
im-estigation. The flaunting arrogance of some of the King's
treasurers is remarkable. Numbers of them had had houses, and
even chateaux which rivaled the King's own in elegance, the means
to purchase and furnish which they had secured by plundering
the people and robbing the government. One treasurer--among
c. s. P. For., anno i566, Introd. The text of the ordonnance is in Isambert,
XIV, I89; De Thou, Book XXXIX, t78-84, has much upon it. It is he who
records the speeches of the King and the chancellor. It is interesting to observe
that very similar conditions prevailed in Germany at this time. See the account
of the Diet of Spires (I57O) in Janssen, History o] the German People, VIII, 75 If.
2 Cf. Cheruel, I-Iistoire de l'administration monarchique de la France, I, 196-
o3; Glasson, I-Iistore du drolt et des institutions de la France, VIII, I7o If.
a The clergy of Guyenne were so incensed at this prohibition that they threat-
ened to leave the country (Archives de la Gironde, XIII, I83).
THE TOUR OF THE PROVINCES 293
four who were hanged at Montfaucon--was found to owe the
crown over three million livres.'
The young duke of Guise, who had refused to be a party to
the farcical reconciliation between his house and the Chtillons
soon found means to leave the court. In May the duke of Nemours
and the duchess of Guise were married at St. Maur-des-Fosses.
It was a match which sowed dragon's teeth once more. For
Nemours forsook his wife, who was a Rohan, having induced the
Pope to nullify the marriage. The Huguenots murmured indig-
nantly against the insult done the Rohan clan whose powerful
family influence was now joined with the Chtillons and Mont-
morencys. 2
Catherine de Medici was not the ruler to govern France with
a firm yet facile hand under the circumstances that existed in 1566.
Irrespective of foreign influences, which we shall presently come
to, the economic distress 3 of the country, the rivalry of the great
houses, and the religious acrimony prevailing made a combination
of forces that needed another sort of ruler to reconcile them--a
ruler such as Henry of Navarre was to be. The queen mother,
while a woman of force, was so deficient in sincerity that no one
could have confidence in her; so jealous of power that she would
brook no other control of the King, whose sovereignty she con-
founded with her maternal oversight of him, making no distinction
* See the case of the mgnificence of the house of a Parisian shoemaker, who
had purchased the estate of a king's treasurer and enormously enriched himself
with gold and silver. Under a pretext the queen mother secured entrance to the
house. Claude Haton, I, 4t2, gives a detailed description of its magnificence.
According to an estimate of January i5, x572 , the income from the "Parties
Casuelles," that is to say, from orifices vacated by the death of particular possessors
thereof, and from the "Paulette," was two million francs and yet the corruption
in the administration was so great that the King received but a quarter of this
amount (Cheruel, I, 2o8).
De Thou, V, Book .LXX-VII, 85; D'Aubign, II, 224; C. S. P. For., Nos.
343, 344, 347. 387, April 28; May 3-4, i6, 566; Forneron, Hist. des dues de Guise,
II, 59-
"On ne sait encore quant on dlogera d'icy, combien que les laboureurs des
champs ayent ja faict presenter deux requestes au Roy pour se retirer et sa suite
t Paris jusques t ce que ia rcolte soit faict."--Tronchon to M. de Gordes, July 4,
I567; quoted by the duc d'Aumale, Histoire des princes de Condi, I, Appendix XVI.
3 oo THE WARS OF RELIGION IN FRANCE
Alexander VI's bull had divided the western hemisphere between
the Spanish and the Portuguese. Florida belonged to Spain. France
had built Fort Caroline on Spanish territory. As peace existed in
I565, France argued that the massacre by Menendez was a vio-
lation of international law. To this Spain replied that Florida
belonged to her by discovery and as all treaties between Spain
and France were silent as to any change of ownership, there really
had been no such change in law. Consequently the French settlers
were intruders and heretics to boot. The answer was crushing,
Fourquevaux was heavily handicapped, for he could not openly
espouse the cause of Frenchmen who were heretics. Before
news of the massacre reached France, Philip II, knowing the
facts, inquired if the French expedition had been commanded or
sanctioned by the French King. The only answer possible was a
negative. An affirmative answer would have been tantamount
to a declaration of war. "Then the incident is closed," was the
Spanish reply. This was followed by a demand that Coligny,
under whose sanction the expedition had sailed, should be punished.
France was likewise at odds with the Emperor. The reason
for this is to be found in the strong attitude the empire had lately
taken on the question of Metz. I Understanding of this question
entails a glance backward. In i564 the baron Bolwiller, a native
Introd., xv-xxi is admirable. In the Correspondencia espaola, II, x26-28, is to
be found Philip II's letter to Chantonnay, February 28, I566 in reply to the ambas-
sador's letter of advice about Coligny's enterprise. The blood of French colonists
who had been massacred in Florida cried out for vengeance, and from the hour of
its knowledge the subject of reprisal was a matter of common talk in the Norman
ports (C. S..P. Dorn., Add., XiII, 227). On September 24, x566, Sir Amyas Paulet,
the English ambassador informed his government that he had information that a
squadron was about to sail for this purpose, although it was "late for so long a
voyage" (ibid., 3z). On the whole history of this ill-fated colony see Galliard,
"La reprise de la Floride faite par le capit. Gourgues (i568)," Notices et extr.
des rnanuscr, de la Biblioth. Nat., IV, and VII (z799); Gourgues, La reprise de la
Floride, publi6e avec les variantes, sur les MSS de la Bibl. Nat. par lh. Tamizey
de Larroque, I867; Gafferel, ttistoire de la Floride ]ranfaise, x875; Parkman,
The French in North America. The newest literature upon the subject is Wood-
bury Lowery, "'Jean Ribaut and Queen Elizabeth," American Historical Review,
April, x9o4, and the same author's The Spanish Settlements within the Present
LirnRs o/ the United States: Florida, t562-74 (New York, i9o5).
De Thou, V, 37-4 o.
3 I2 THE WARS OF RELIGION IN FRANCE
On August 2, i567, the duke of Alva entered Brussels. Gen-
eral terror prevailed in the Low Countries upon his arrival. The
Prince of Orange left the land. Count Egmont, naively declaring
that he had done nothing wrong, remained; his friend Hoome
imitated his example. Alva at once sent away all the Flemish
soldiers and quartered the city with the new troops. In order
to facilitate his policy the duke created a special tribunal, not
composed of lawyers "because they would not condemn without
proofs." This was the famous Council of Troubles which the
people called the "Council of Blood." The members of it held
no commissions from the King, but were the simple agents of the
duke of Alva. The most celebrated of them was a certain Vargas,
a criminal himself, against whom action had been suspended in
return for his infamous services.
If the policy of the Spanish government in Flanders took a new
and different form with the coming of Alva, the revolution there
was no less changed. The cardinal Granvella some months
before this time had written to Philip II: "It is a general rule,
in matters of state, that popular enterprises, if they do not terminate
in the first outburst, generally vanish in smoke if the remedy for
them be applied before they have time to follow up the movement."'
He added that contemporary history afforded some striking
examples of the truth of this observation. But the provinces he
had lately governed were not of this category. For it is dear that
a change had taken place in the nature of the Flemish revolt in the
years x565q57. The revolution by this time had passed through
the earlier stages of defiance and rebellion and developed an organi-
zation with a definite, set purpose before it. The formation
of the Gueux was the clearest manifestation of this change. In
its inception this famous group was an aristocratic body, composed
solely of nobles, and the Spanish government had little fear then
of its becoming a popular association. 2 Granvella saw the simi-
t Poulet, II, 183, December 5, I566-
2 liorillon to Granvella, April 7, 566: 4'Pas ce boult veult l'on gaigner le
magistrat des villes et le peuple: que ne sera si facille comme l'on pense."--Poulet,
I, o 3. The following is explicit: "Et dict encores plus que, s'il se lust joirt
. la premiere lighe des seigneurs, la religion lust bien avant venue, car de I., dict-il,
THE SECOND CIVIL WAR
337
the cardinal's overtures, Alva said that if circumstances so devdoped
as to make such action on his part an imperative duty before the
King of France could be apprised, he would do so; and that if the
King were overwhelmed by the Huguenots, he would believe it
his duty for the sake of protecting the Catholic faith to occupy
the places offered by the cardinal, which might be held in pawn
by Spain as collateral for French repayment of her services.' But
the treasonable designs of the cardinal of Lorraine went even far-
ther than an offer to surrender some of the border fortresses of
France into Spanish hands. As early as this time the possible
deposition of the house of Valois was contemplated by the Guises
in favor of the Spanish-Hapsburg dynasty. For the cardinal
went on to say that in event of the early death of Charles IX and
his brothers Philip II of Spain would be heir to the throne of France
through his wife, Elizabeth of Valois. "The Salic law is a pleas-
antry," he added, "and force of arms could overcome any opposi-
tion" !* "This last," wrote Alva to Philip, "is a different matter
and I cannot risk taking a hand in it without express instructions
from your Majesty."
The habitual self-control of the Spanish monarch must have
been heavily taxed to subdue his emotion when he learned of this
astonishing negotiation. But he was true to his second-nature.
Without apparent excitement he endorsed the document thus:
"This point is one upon which more time is needed to reflect,
because it would be difficult to do what the cardinal asks without
compromise. On the other hand, it is hard to decline for such
a cause what is thrown into my arms. However, I think that a
, Gachard, ibid., I, 593, 594, Alva to Philip, Noveraher t, t567. On the
margin of this dispatch Philip wrote this piece of casuistry with his own hand:
"Me parece muy bien que hiziese io que aqui dice, y tanto masque aquello no hera
romper la paz pues yo no la hiz, ni la tengo, sino con el rey de Francia, y no con
sus vasallos ereges, como seria, si esto se hiziese no estando 1 libre, como aqui se
ce."
2 "Encaso de muerte del rey y de sus hermanos, tomarse ya la voz que el
cardinal dize de rey de Francia para V. M., por el derecho de la reyna nuestra
se.fiora; que la ley salicn, que dizen, es baya, y las armas la allanarian" (/b/d.
594)-
348 THE WARS OF RELIGION IN FRANCE
King of him, but also secretly connived with the doings of ultra-
Catholic partisans in Toulouse and elsewhere.'
So intense was the hatred in the south of France between the
Catholics and the Huguenots that there was scarce any intermission
of hostilities at all after the peace of Longjumeau, especially in
Provence. The duke of Joyeuse, who commanded the royal
forces here, was a man after Montluc's own heart. Early in i568
he had passed up the Rhone for the purpose of aiding the counts
of Tende and Suze. He had with him ,ooo foot and from five
to six hundred horse, and easily overcame the little fortresses until
he reached Pont St. Esprit in February. Failing to take this, the
army was divided. Joyeuse crossed the Rhone at Avignon on
March 7, tooh Loudun, Orsenne, and Tresques, then, retracing
his steps, he again joined the count of Tende and renewed the
siege of Pont St. Esprit. The Protestants under the command of
Montbrun gave battle in the plains of Montfran near Ammon,
and were badly defeated May 4, I568. When peace was made
Joyeuse returned to Avignon. Most of the towns of lower Langue-
doc were carefully garrisoned by him, but Montauban, Castres,
and Montpellier resisted. Everywhere he exacted disarmament
and the oath of fidelity?
x Montluc even ascribed the ravages of the plague to Damville in order to
create popular prejudice against him! (Hist. du Languedoc, V, 449)- His own
words are: "Pour se montrer au peuple, qui avoit une marvelleuse envie de le
voir, n'y pouvant arrter . cause de la grande peste qui y est." (Cf. his letters to
Damville, December 3h I567, and August 26, x569, in Commentaires et lettres de
Montluc, V, IO 3 and i59. ) Montluc was doubly incensed at this moment because
the peace of Longjumeau catceled orders which he had received in February to
attempt to take La Rochelle by sea (ibid., VII, 48 ft.; V, to 7 note, IO 0 note, 84
note).
2 Bulletin de la Soc. acad. du Vat., x876.
352 THE WAR8 OF RELIGION IN FRANCE
Ligue of i576 potentially exists now.' The federative tendency
of these associations was a natural result of their increase in nun-
ber and membership. It was not a haphazard development at
all. Design is evident throughout.2
The renewal of civil war in i567 had given a great impulse to
this spirit of association.s Nowhere was itmore pronounced than
in Burgundy. Tavannes, wo was governor of Burgundy, in
the year i567 (Jiy I), formed a league under-the name of the
Confr6rie du St. Esprit. Churchmen, the nobility of Burgundy,
and wealthy bourgeois who wished to preserve the Catholic religion
were united together in the service of the King. The version of
its origin in the Mmoires de Tavannes is so interesting that I
venture to quote it:
Seeing so much discontent and so many threatening enterprises among
the Huguenots, the queen, for safety's sake, in the beginning of the year 567
caused a levy of 9,ooo Swiss [the actual number was 6,ooo to be made under
pretext that they were to be for the service of the duke of Alva in the Flemish
War. The prevailing unrest and the rumors of insurrection gave the sieur de
Tavannes, who penetrated the designs of the queen and the purpose of the
Huguenots, the thought that a prudent man might also take precautions of
his own. He reasoned that the Huguenots did not have more zeal for their
cause than the Catholics for the old religion, and that those who would pre-
serve it would give their lives and employ their last sou to succor the King; in
a word, oppose league to league. He therefore organized the Confrrie du
St. Esprit, which in reality was a league of the ecclesiastics and the nobility of
Burgundy, with rich men from the towns, who voluntarily swore to serve in the
x The ordinance of Moulins specifically alluded to the growing popular nature
of these confraternities: "Qu'on abolisse entirement les confrries dtablies sous
pr6texte de religion parmi le petit peuple, les festins, les r6pas, les batons (bAtons
de Confr6rie, qui servent b. porter aux confr6ries l'Image de quelque saint, ou la
repr6sentation de quelque mystre) et autres choses semblables, qui donnent lieu
b. la superstition, aux troubles, b. la d6bauche, aux querelles, et aux monopeles"
(De Thou, V, Book XXXIX, p. x83, in the article prohibiting them). But it was
as impossible then as now to enforce a law in the face of a public opinion which did
not sympathize with the provision. Public opinion not merely favored their forma-
tion; the very oficers of the crown promoted their organization. La Popelinire,
XI, z, makes this point.
2 "DiscorsO sopra gli umori di Francia di M r. Nazaret, x57o," Barberini
Library 3,269, fol. 63. See Appendix XIll.
s D'Aubign6, III, 2.
354 THE WARS OF RELIGION IN FRANCE
And it is added--sign of omen--
Et au cas qu'il advint que Dieu ne veuille que les persones de sa majest
et de messieurs ses frbres .... fussent oppresses de sorte que ne sceussions
avoir advertisseraent de leurs volontez, promettons rendre toute obeissance
au gnral chef qui sera esleu, x
Six weeks later, on May 18, 1568 , through the activity of Ta-
vannes, a similar association was formed in Berry and was confirmed _
at Bourges by the archbishop, Jacques le R.oy. 2 A month later
La Ligue Chrtienne et Royale, "for the defense of the Catholic
church in France and for maintaining the royal authority in the
House of Valois," to vhich was appended the significant proviso,-
"so long as it shall govern in the Catholic and Apostolic religion"
appeared in Champagne under the auspices of Henry of Guise_,
then eighteen years of age and governor of the province. The
nobility, the bishop, and the clergy, in a meeting at Troyes, con-
cluded, signed, and took an oath to this league on June 25.3 Exactly
a month later, on July 25, the Beauvaisis followed the lead of
Burgundy, Berry, and Champagne, and formed an "Association
Catholique" for the same purpose. 4 The movement also spread
west of the Seine, into Maine and Anjou, where the clergy., the
nobility, and the third estate, on July 11, 1568 , established an
association whose members swore "de vivre et mourir en la religion
catholique et de nous secourir les uns et les autres contre les rebelles
et hrtiques sectaires de la nouvelle religion." Forty persons
signed the oath. 5
In Toulouse, the former league was revived in September,
1568 , vith new energ3' under the patronage of the cardinal of
Armagnac and actual leadership of a secular priest who preached
State Papers, Foreign, Elizabeth, XCVII, No. i 7- A printed pamphlet.
See Appendix XIV.
2 Raynal, Histoire du Berry, IV, 79-83. The text of the act is found in Thau-
vessire's I-Iistoire du Berry, x89.
3 The text is given in Claude Haton, II, I x52. Cf. Vicomte de Meaux, Luttes
religieuses en France, 177, 178; Capefigue, La r]orme et la ligue, 36o.
* Feret, Clermont-en-Beauvaisis pendant les troubles de la ligue, Clermont,
1853.
s State Papers, Foreign, Elizabeth, C, No. ,863. See Appendix XV.
364 THE WARS OF RELIGION IN FRANCE
it may be fairly said that Charles IX acted not only according to
his right, but according to policy in seeking to prevent the union
of the Huguenot and Dtttch interests. France was not yet pre-
pared to espouse an open anti-Spanish policy, though she was
already secretly so inclining,, and the projected alliance of the
prince of Condd and the prince of Orange 2 would have been cer-
tain seriously to compromise her with Spain. Finally, it may be
added, that there was not a little of self-ambition in Condd's action.3
This attempted co-operation of the prince of Cond and the
prince of Orange drew the French government into close associa-
tion with the duke of Alva. But the diplomatic relations now
established between the courts of Paris and Madrid were of much
greater importance and the negotiations were energetically for-
warded by the cardinal of Lorraine, who on November 21, sent the
cardinal of Guise into Spain charged to treat of marriage between
Philip II and Marguerite of Valois, 4 or if that proved unacceptable,
to suggest Philip's marriage with one of the daughters of the
Emperor, while Charles IX was to marry the other. At the same
time Alva proposed that the duke of Anjou--the future Henry III
---should marry the queen of Portugal. s The far-reaching effect
of such a series of alliances is manifest. The two houses of Haps-
burg would become dynastically united again in a common family
and politico-religious purpose, into which association France would
be woven.
The government had secretly prepared for the sudden invest-
x Languet, Epist. seer., I, 64, 69.
2 Ibid., I, 75; Archives de la maison d'Orange-Nassau, III, 284-86. The
prince of Orange at this time was near Cleves having an army but no money.
See a letter of the prince of Orange to the duke of Wtirttemberg and the margrave
of Baden asking for pecuniary assistance. September 7, x568 (ibid, III, 29tl.
His plans again failed. He tried to enter Picardy for the purpose of uniting
with the Huguenots. But the alertness of the marshal Coss again prevented
Genlis as it had foiled Cocqueville, and the prince was compelled to abandon
his purpose. At Strasburg his army was dissolved (ibid., III, 295, 3o3, 3x3-I6;
Languet, Epist. ad Caner., 89; Epist. seer., I, 75)-
3 Even La Noue, 804 and "Beza II, 277, assert this.
4 Elizabeth of Valois: queen of Spain. had died October 3, I568-
s C. S. P. For., Nos. 2,64o, z,666, November zz, December 8, I568.
oAubet.rre
AUTUMN AIGN
OF 158
THE THIRD CIVIL WAR 375
and complained of the damage done by the French army under
the duke of Aumale within the limits of the empire,' and recom-
mended that Charles try peaceful methods instead of force for
the pacification of his kingdom. 2 Parallel with the project to
co-operate with the prince of Orange and the duke of Deuxponts,
Coligny planned a revival of Huguenot activity in the south of
France so that this diversion would weaken resistance to the other.
The aim was, with the aid of the "viscounts" to break a way
across the upper Loire, and so open the road to German assistance, a
The combined array against D'Aumale was too great for him to
make head. 4 Nor was the adverse double military situation the
sole anxiety of the French government, llontmorency and the/]
duke of" Bouillon were so di.safected that there was even expecta-
tion of their openly joining the Huguenots. The cost of the two
armies amounted to 9oo,ooo livres a month, besides the gendar-
merie and artillery, which was about two million each quarter, s
There was owing to the gendarmerie i,ooo,ooo of livres for six
quarters; to the 6,oo Swiss with the duke of Anjou 300,000 livres;
to those with the duke of Aumale ioo,ooo livres besides what
was owing to the French infantry. Both of the King's command-
ers were so short of funds that they were forced to seize church-plate
and even reliquaries. 6
In these'extremities Charles IX viewed the renewal of war on
the opening of spring with alarm and began to think of making
peace for a term, with no intention of keeping it, but merely in
order to avoid a catastrophe and with the hope that some of the
Huguenots might be disarmed in the interim. But suddenly the
' D'Aumale at this time lay at Phalsburg and Saverne, with 4,000 reiters, 2,000
French horse, and o, ooo footmen. His penetration within the imperial frontier
oflended and alarmed Strasburg where a French faction had unsuccessfully
plotted to betray the town.
2 See News-Letter from La Rochelle, January, 1569, in Appendix XVII.
s C. S. P. For., No. o5, February to, x569.
* Ibid., No. 5i, lIarch 5, 569; Claude Haton, II, 5x7.
s Ibld., For., No. t55, llarch 5, x569; on the desertions from D'Aumale's
army see No. I72.
6 Ibid., No. Io5, February.to, x569.
Voyage ol the Prince| after the
Bigorre and Gacon, July - Nov. 1569
Union of Colign and Montgome
Dec. 1569 at Port St.
414 THE WARS OF RELIGION IN FRANCE
He had resolved to besiege the little fortified town of Rabastens,
near Tarbes, which he had chosen as the point of attack because
he could draw upon Gascony for supplies from this place more
easily than by beginning at St. Severs, which bordered on the
Landes, "a country only fruitful in sands."' But the expedition
came to an untimely end. In an unguarded moment Montluc
exposed himself and "a harquebus-shot clapt into his face" with
such force as to break his whole visage in, so that the cheek-bones
were taken out in splinters. The toxvn was taken, nevertheless.
How it suffered may be read in the words of him who meted out
its punishment.
.XIy Lieutenant, vho had marcht on the one hand of me when I went on to
the Assault .... came to see if I was dead, and said to me: "Sir, cheer up
3,our spirits, and rejoyce, we have entred the Castle, and the Soldiers are la34ng
about them, who put all to the sxvord; and assure your self we will revenge your
wound." I then said to him, "Praised be God that I see the Victory ours
before I dye. I now care not for death. I beseech you return back, and as
you have ever been my friend, so now do me that act of friendship not to suffer
so much as one man to escape with life." XVhereupon he immediately
returned and all my servants went along with him, so that I had no body left
xvith me but two Pages, Monsieur de Las, and the Chirurgeon. The), would
fain have sav'd the Minister, and the Governor, whose name was Captain
Ladon, to have hang'd them before my Lodging, but the Soldiers took them
from those xvho had them in their custody, whom the), had also like to have
kill'd for offring to save them, and cut them in a thousand pieces. The), made
also fifty or threescore to leap from the high Tower into the Moat, which were
there all drown'd. There were txvo only saved who were hid, and such there
were xvho offer'd four thousand Crowns to save their lives, but not a man of
ours would hearken to any Ransom; and most of the women xvere kill'd xvho
also did us a great deal of mischief with throwing stones. There xvas found
within a Spanish Merchant whom the Enemy had kept prisoner there, and
another Catholick Merchant also, who were both saved; and these were all
that were left alive of the men that we found in the place, namely the two that
some one help't away, and the txvo Catholick Merchants. Do not think,
(Commentaires et leltres de Montluc, III, 4oo). The consular registers of Agen
and Auch still preserve the records of his requisitions. According to the report
of a Spanish spy, in K. 1,576, No. 5, the forces consisted of lO, Ooo footmen, 1,5oo
horse, and 18 pieces of artillery. This is surely exaggerated. His Comrnentaires
imply that his men xvere few in number and he expressly says that he was short of
munitions and artillery.
t Commentaires et lettres de Montluc, IIl, 4oi.
42O
THE WARS OF RELIGION IN FRANCE
end of September the camps vere wholly broken up and the reiters
either over or on their way across the frontier.' To be sure,
radical Protestants continued to complain of infractions of the
eclict. 2 But the one serious infraction of the edict was in the
fifteenth article, providing that all scholars, the sick and the poor,
should be received in the universities, schools, and hospitals with-
out difference or distinction on account of religion. The Catholic
party, in the hope of abridging {he development of the competing
religion soon persuaded the King to nulli, this provision. In
compliance wi'th a petition praying that the crown would forbid
any of the Reformed religion from holding any post of authority in
the University of Paris, and also that the university authorities
might have power to search for and seize all heretical books,
ICharles IX on October 8, 57 o, issued a proclamation forbidding
any Calvinist from holding any office or teaching in the University
of Paris and giving the authorities thereof the right of search for
heretical books, s On November 20, this was followed bL more
sweeping decree forbidding any persons from keeping schools or
holding office in any college, or lecturing on any art or science in
public or in private unless recognized and approved by the Roman
church. 4 Nevertheless, these petitions, complaining of infractions
of the edict, were more smoke than fire. The only internal issue
of great importance was an economic one.
Apart from the destructiveness of the war, nature again dealt
* Sir Henry Norris under date of September 23, testifies that "the state here
is very. quiet, where all strife and old grudges seem utterly buried, and men live in
good hope of the continuance thereof, since the occasioner of all the troubles [the
cardinal of Lorraine] in this realm is out of credit" (C. S. P. For., No. ,285,
Norris to Cecil). The reiters in the course of their return home, pillaged the
fair of Champagne (Claude Haton, II, 592 and note).
2 Thirty articles complaining of infractions of the Edict of Pacification, and
desiring that they may be redressed, with the King's answers in the margin (C. S. P.
For., No. x,323, October, I57O).
s Ibid., No. 1,359. Pierre Ramus was excluded from the College of Presles
by this decree.
a Ordonnance du Roy sur les defences de tenir Escolles, Principaultez, Col-
leges; ny life en quelque art; ou science que ce soit, en public, priv ou en chambre,
s'ilz ne sont congenuz et approuvez est de la Religion catholique et romaine. Avec
l'Arrest de la court du Parlement. Poictiers, B. Noscereau, I57O.
THE THIRD CIVIL $$\R
hardly with France in this year. There were heavv rains over all
Europe which either rotted the grain in the fields or washed it out.
A great inundation of the Seine occurred on June 2, t57 o, and the
plague began to grow more virulent once more.' There was a
certain amount of reason in the demand for a new session of the
Estates to consider the economic distress of France, but the King
was wise in refusing the request, for in event of its meeting, the
enemies of Spain would have been sure to endeavor to fan the
aes of the late civil war into flames again. As a solace to those
demanding economic relief Charles IX promised to abolish sundry.
superfluous offices and to tax the nobles instead of the commons
for the relief of his debts which amounted to 37,ooo,ooo francs.
An earnest of this intention is manifest in an ordinance requiring
parish wardens to keep accounts and to make a declaration of the
revenue of their churches and to send this information to the royal
bailiffs. Every parish was forced to obey this edict, which was a
novelty indeed. But the parish authorities took advantage of the
situation and not merely rendered an account of their incomes,
but also gave the King a minute account of the ruin they had suf-
fered at the hands of the Huguenots. The bailiffs received these
declarations and sent them to the Prix T Council of the King, where
the evidence was reviewed and eyeD, church taxed accordingly.
The churches which had been burned by the Protestants were
lightly taxed, and those which were found to be incapable of pay-
ment were authorized to sell their possessions, their vessels, jewels,
or lands, or else impose a tax on the parish. 2
But the thrifty bourgeoisie of France were too lucrative a source
of income for the King to keep his promise not to tax them more.
In March, 57, an edict was issued providing that bolts of woolen
cloth should be sealed with a leaden seal before sale, and that each
bolt should be taxed 3 francs, 4 deniers. The new impost, which
was very unpopular, was ascribed to the Italian influence at court.3
i Claude Haton, II, 6io and 6x 7.
Ibid., 69- Ibid., 74 o.
432 THE WARS OF RELIGION IN FRANCE
two years younger than Elizabeth. This was, of course, an
enormous objection, or, at least, one which could always be urged.
His age is the official and public objection, but his face and stature
affected Elizabeth far more.' As to his character we have the
testimony of the English and Venetian ambassadors. Smith, in
January, i572 , calls him "a good fellow and a lusty prince" and
says "he is not so obstinate, papistical, and restive like a mule
as his brother is." Dale, in the quaint letter in a Hatfield !IS
says of him: "As touching his behavior he ys the most moderate
yn all the court; never present at an), of the licentious acts of his
brethren, nor here nor at Rochelle; of much credit, and namely
with them of the religion; thus he ys and hath ben hetherto; what
may be hereafter God knoweth." On the whole, the English
ambassadors favored him, Walsingham the least. Evidently
he was not an unpleasant person, but a young and inexperienced
lad, ambitious to do great things, resenting his treatment at the
court, and so plunged into the current of things, only to be de-
ceived and ruined by the superior cunning of his supposed friends.
His shortcomings may be excused on the ground of his environ-
ment and bringing up; may even be praised as being more manly
and significant than the effeminate Henry.
Alenon's motives in attempting to win Elizabeth are obvious.
His position in France was most unpleasant to him: suspected by
his brothers, made fun of and pestered by the Guises and the
"mignons" of the court; condemned to a life of subordination and
idleness by the accident of his birth, the prospect of the hand of
the Queen of England seemed most glowing, even though she
was a heretic and more than twenty years older than he. But
why should Catherine and Elizabeth ever consider such an intrin-
sically absurd proposition ?
Elizabeth was face to face with several problems, foreign and
domestic, upon the solution of which depended her throne and her
very existence. It is hard to remember as one looks back upon
her long and splendid reign that there vas hardly a moment in it
when she was free from the danger of overthrow and execution.
C. S. P. For., No. 502, July 23, x572, the Queen to Walsingham.
THE MASSACRE OF ST. BARTHOLOMEW 433
This danger, at this time, had just manifested itself in the Ridolfi
plot in which the duke of Norfolk, the greatest noblemen of Eng-
land, Spain, Mary Stuart, and the Pope had all combined. Natur-
ally the Catholic nobles rallied around Mary, the probable suc-
cessor to the throne, while the Protestants were at a loss to -know
what to do in view of the unsettled succession. So great was the
excitement that Elizabeth always hesitated to call a Parliament
for fear it would attempt to urge her on to marriage. Negotia-
tions, not to speak of marriage, with France would immensely
relieve the situation. They could be used before Parliament to
show that Elizabeth was doing her best; hopes of a settled suc-
cession would at once reassure the country and diminish Mary's
importance, both as a center of conspiracy and as a source of
danger in other ways. To be sure, this possible marriage might
excite the Catholics to renewed efforts to save their faith, but the
fact that France was Catholic and that from it might come much
of their help would militate against disturbance. Negotiations
might bring about most of these results and would in any case gain
time and postpone the solution of the difficulties.
A second problem before Elizabeth was the maintenance of
the Protestant faith. So far as this enters the negotiations it is
mostly a pretext, but there was, nevertheless, an actual problem.
Negotiations for marriage with a Catholic prince might stir up
the Catholics to renewed activities and raise hopes which it might
be difficult to allay, but, on the other hand, Elizabeth could hope
for relief from the Huguenot movement in France, and the rebel-
lious Dutch, while the alliance with a Catholic prince would im-
mensely strengthen her in her own middle ground. To allow
him to bring the mass with him might cause trouble, but still one
prince could not do much when queen and council were carefully
watching him.
Scotland was another urce of continual anxiety to the English
ministry. The government was unsettled and the power likely
to fall at any time into the hands of those who would turn it over
to France. Of course this danger would be entirely removed by
a French marriage, though as events proved, negotiations did not
434
THE WARS OF RELIGION IN FRANCE
stop the intrigues. A similar point of attack existed in Ireland
where the least encouragexnent was sure to raise rebellion. A
French marriage would make danger in that quarter also less
likely.
But perhaps the greatest source of danger was from Spain.
There were countless reasons why Philip should declare war--
religion, the seizure of his treasure by Elizabethan seamen, the
treatment of Mary (though this did not at first much concern
him), and Spanish repression in the Netherlands. English nego-
tiation with France would be of value to England, if for nothing
else, in keeping France and Spain apart. It was hoped, moreover,
that once England and France were united, the combination
might check Philip in his dealing with the Netherlands and the
English Catholics and in the cruelties visited on Englishmen in
Spain.
But there were grave objections to a marriage. It would in-
troduce a new and unknown element into English councils. Sup-
pose, as a Catholic, the King should join that party; or worse,
ally himself with Mary herself, plot the death of Elizabeth and a
Catholic restoration. Or suppose he should become king of
France ? or that his child should be heir to both thrones ? The
thought of beconaing a French dependency was intolerable to
England. In any case it would mean a break with Spain and how
could England be sure that France was not merely tempting her
to that, finally to leave her to face Spain alone ? Plainly, marriage
was too close and dangerous a union--as for negotiations, that
was another matter, and it was simply for the negotiations them-
selves that Elizabeth entered upon them. This is proved, I
think, by her entire policy. Whenever France seems most willing
she draws away; but when France seems likely to abandon such
fruitless endeavors, she at once becomes affable and yidding.
Sometimes her ministers urged her to definite and decided action,
but she ahvays managed to find a loop-hole, if either they or cir-
cumstance had forced her into too dangerous agreement.
France, on the other hand, could not be content with mere
negotiations. She, too, had several definite problems. Rent by
THE MASSACRE OF ST. BARTHOLOMEW 435
civil war, with enormously powerful barons on the one side and a
clamorous people on the other, while outside the realm stood
Spain and England, only too glad to promote and foster her diffi-
culties, the crown was in a struggle for existence as real as that of
Elizabeth. To join Spain would be for France to lose her in-
tegral existence and to be swallowed up in the maw of the Haps-
burgs. Therefore the English alliance was the only refuge.
Besides there vere man), other advantages. It would stop Eng-
land's meddling in French affairs and would calm and reassure the
Huguenots. But there was the rub: did the Huguenots need to
be reassured ? Could France safely commit herself to a liberal
policy ? To Catherine it was not so much that, as the question
of her own authority and personal ambition for her family; she
had no intention of giving place to the Huguenots any more than
she had to the Guises. And so she wavered when the Guises
were becoming too powerful, and helped along the marriage;
when the Huguenots began to be too authoritative, she frowned
on it.
T.__o t_he Huguenots the marriage was a question of enormous
advantage--if it were accomplished, the Calvinists might hope,
not only for success in France, but in the Low Counrties as well;
while to the Guises, on the contrary, the alliance meant the ruin
of their hopes for Mary and for absolute dominion in France.
But to all the risk was great. Elizabeth was by no means
firmly seated upon her throne and seemed to be manifesting a
rec'kless carelessness in the leniency of her treatment of the late
conspirators. The English ambassadors noted that any "round-
ness" of treatment at home at once caused a quickening of the
negotiations. The real objection, both with France and with
England, was fear of duplicity. Neither could trust the other.
Each insisted that the other should commit itself first; neither
would consent, with the result that all came to naught. This was
just what Philip expected. Naturally a French-English league
would have seriously hampered him, but he had found by long
and t-ing experience that when Elizabeth talked of marriage,
she was only amusing herself with a polite fiction. Not once does
43 6 THE WARS OF RELIGION IN FILNCE
he take the matter seriously. So the Spanish attitude was one of
unconcern, which in itself added to the fear of both Elizabeth and
Catherine, for each supposed some secret understanding with
Spain on the part of the other.
With such motives and in such troubled waters the negotiations
went on. In the end Elizabeth could not "digest the incon-
venience" of the proposed marriage, and failing to cement the
new friendship of France and England by this form of alliance,
it was then suggested that a political compact, not a marriage
alliance, be made between the two powers. , But there were
great difficulties in the way of this project. For, although the
English desired a closer union with France, they were nevertheless
not unprepared to treat with Spain, and to use the prospective
alliance with France for the purpose of bringing Philip II to
terms. England was unwilling yet to be considered as an open
enemy of Spain, in spite of the fact she was well aware of Alva's
plot with Lord Seton and other Scotch and English refugees in
Flanders."
Trade considerations were of great influence in governing this
attitude. England could not afford to forfeit her commercial
intercourse with Spain and Flanders for the none-too-sure friend-
ship of France, since the staple in Flanders was worth between
two and three millions. 3 France could not offer any staple or
x Walsingham to Lord Burghley: " . . . . and if he sees no hope then to
further what he may the league."--C. S. P. For., January xT, i572; Hatfield
Papers, II, 46-
2 Charles IX to /I. de la Mothe-Fenelon: Directs him to inform the queen
of England that the duke of Alva does all he can to encourage the 500 or 600 Eng-
lish refugees in Flanders in their enterprise against England, in which they will
be assisted by Lord Seton with 2,ooo Scots, who have determined to seize on the
prince of Scotland, and send him into Spain. Directs him and M. de Croc to
watch and do all in their power to frustrate this design (C. S. P. For., No. 33 o,
May 2, I572; cf. Introd., xii, xiii and No. 257 ).
3 On the efforts of Alva to revive the commerce of Flanders see D'Aubign,
Book V, chap. xxxli, p. 265; C. S. P. For., Nos. 94, 95, January. 28 and 3I: 57;
Motley, Rise o] the Dutch Republic, chap. v; Altmeyer, Histoire des relations
commerciales des Pays-Bas avec le Nord pendant le XV1 sibcle; Bru.xelles, I84o;
Reiffenberg, De l' etat de la population, des ]abriques et des rnanu]actures des Pays-
Bas pendant le Xl'e et le XVI e sikcle, Bruxelles, x822.
THE MASSACRE OF ST. BARTHOLO-MEW 437
p)rt advantages to England comparable with those England
enjoyed elsewhere.' England accordingly proposed that the
league be extended to include the Protestant princes of Germany
and that they should join together "in defense against any who for
matters of religion should use force against any of them;" sec-
ondly, that France would bind herself not to support the cause of
Mary Stuart in Scotland; and thirdly, that France would not seek
any greater trade advantages in the Low Countries than she had in
former times. France balked at the proposed extension of the
alliance to Germany and it was dropped; as to Scotland, she was
willing to make a partial sacrifice of honor for the sake of political
advantage.*
But England's fear of contributing to the aggrandizement of
France was too keen to permit her to have free rein in the Nether-
lands, 3 though Walsingham proposed a way to prevent the pos-
sibility of French ascendency there, and declared that the grandeur
of France abroad was less to be feared by England than the con-
tinuance of civil war in France or the destructive policy of Alva
in the Netherlands.4 Burghley was as cautious as his mistress.
"If the seaports fall into the hands of the French," he wrote,
"they will regulate not only the commerce of our merchants abroad
but the sovereignty of the Channel, which belongs to us. ''s The
* "The answer of the Merchant Adventurers to the French king's offer to
establish a staple in France" in C. S. P. For., No. 515, July, t572: It would be
no commodity for them to have a privilege in France, as those things in which they
are principally occupied, viz., white cloths, are chiefly uttered in Upper and Lower
Germany. Besides, if they alter their old settled trade, they would also have to-
seek for dressers and dyers in a place unacquainted with the trade. It is dan-
gerous to have the vent of all the commodity of the realm in one country, especially
seeing the French have small trade to England. There is besides such evil ob-
se.ance of treaties and so evil justice in France. The drapers of France so much
mislike the bringing of cloth into France that they will not endure it, insomuch as
January last, by proclamation, all foreign cloth xvas banished. The converting
of the whole trade of England into France would be hurtful to the navy, for that the
ports there are so small that no great ship may enter.
For the Merchant Adventurers in the sixteenth century see Burgon, Li]e
and Times o] Sir Thomas Gresham, I, 185-89.
C. S. P. For., No. 278, April 20, x572 , Queen Elizabeth to Charles IX.
s Walsingham, ibid., No. 35.
4 1bid., No i43 , September 26, 157i. s Ibid., No. 247-
438 THE WARS OF RELIGION IN FRANCE
jealous determination of England to monopolize the commerce
of the Low Countries vas, the greatest obstacle to the forma-
tion of the alliance. For England most of all feared lest France
would not content herself with Flanders and Artois.
In the delicate business of state which burdened him at this
season, Charles IX showed more acumen than either his new-found
friends of Protestant faith or the Catholics had expected to find,
because while exerting himself to keep the peace with Spain on the
one hand, on the other he endeavored to conciliate his Protestant
subjects. Unlike his eider brother, Francis II, Charles IX was of
strong physical frame, being big boned and vigorous, until the
fatal taint of his heritage and his excesses undermined his con-
stitution and brought on the disease of consumption of which he
died. He was gross, even brutish in inclination, rejoicing in base
physical sport and disinclined to books. 3 But in the present
Walsingham to Lord Burghley: Has been asked whether that enterprise
having good success, and the French king lending all his forces to the conquest of
Flanders, the queen of England would be content to enter foot in Zealand, lIiddle-
burgh being delivered into her hands. They fear that the French king will not
be content with Flanders, whatsoever is promised (C. S. P. For., No. 2,202,
December 3 I, I57I).
2 Rel. v(n., I, 543; C. S. P. For., No. 687, Februar.v i5, x57o. Sir Henry
Norris to Cecil. The King keeps his chamber, which they marvel not at who
know his diet.
3 For a character-sketch of Charles IX see Baschet, La diplomatic v(nitienne,
539-4x; cf. Rel. v(n., II, 43 and 16I. Lord Buckhurst, in a letter to Queen
Elizabeth of March 4, x57 I, gives an account of one of Charles' hunting parties
in the Bols de Vincennes, which illustrates his temperament. "After dinner,"
he relates, "the King rode to a warren of hares thereby, and after he had coursed
with much pastime, he flew to the partridge with a cast of very. good falcons; and
that done, entered the park of Bois de Vincennes, replenished with some store of
fallow deer. Understanding that Lord Buckhurst had a leash of greyhounds, he
sent to him that he might put on his dogs to the deer, which he did, but found that
the deer ran better for their lives than the dogs did for his pastime. After this the
King and all the gentlemen with him fell to a new manner of hunting, chasing the
whole herd with their drawn swords, on horseback, so far forth as the)" being em-
bosked were easily stricken and slain; they spared no male deer, but killed of all
sorts without respect, like hunters who sought not to requite an.v part of their
travail with delight to eat of the slain venison."- S. P. For., No. 1,589, March
4, I57- In the spring of x573 the French consul in Alexandria sent Charles three
trained leopards for deer-hunting (Coll. Godefroy, CCLVI, No. 5x). In
June, I57X, the King was somewhat seriously injured while hunting, by striking
444 THE WARS OF RELIGION IN FRANCE
At this juncture, when all Europe was keyed to concert pitch
of political tension, when anything seemed likelv to happen and
no one of the great powers dared make an overt move, the Gordian
-knot wascut. OnApril , 572, the most notable event in the Low
" Countries since the iconoclastic outburst occurred. For on that day
the count van der Marck,. commander of the Beggars of the Sea,
I captured the port of Brille. From that time onward the Dutch
and Flemings had a maritime point of their ovn on the mainland
and were no longer dependent on the precarious shelter of English
and Norman ports. The effect of this blow to Spain was great.
Within the week--on Easter Day--Flushing, and soon afterward
Middelburg, rebelled against the billeting of Spanish troops sent
by Alva to replace the Walloon garrison there.'
The Gueux were masters of the sea and vhen Dordrecht also
rebelled, the inland water routes were endangered too. No vessel
could come from Holland, Guelders, or Frisia and no communica-
tion could be made from the north with Brabant. Even Amster-
dam could be starved and Alva determined to retire all his forces
to Ghent and Antwerp. 2 On April 14 William of Orange issued
a proclamation from Dillenburg expressing his grief at the mis-
eries suffered from the exactions, outrages, and cruelties inflicted
by th_._e Spaniards, and assured the people of his determination to
of Saxony and the landgrave of Hesse were strong partisans of France (ibid.,
IV, Introd., 25).
The strongest advocate of France for the imperial crown was the elector
palatine, who burned with an ambition to "Calvinize the world," and embraced
with ardor a projectwhich could not fail to redound to the honor of the Huguenots.
The elector of Saxony and the landgrave were less complacent. The first was a
friend of the emperor Maximilian and expressed his indignation at the imperial
pretensions of Charles IX. Even William of Hesse, in spite of his hereditary
attachment to the crown of France, returned a guarded reply (ibid., IV, Introd.,
28 and 23).
x The revolt tck place on Easter Sunday,April 6, 572. On the whole sub-
ject of the revolt of the Netherlands at this time see Janssen, History o] the
German People, VIII, chap. ii; La Gravi:re, "Les Gueux de l'ier," Revue des deux
mondes, September 15, x89t, p- 347; November, I89I, p. 98; January 5, 189,
p. 389 .
See the letter of President Viglius to Hopper in Arch. de la maison d'Orange-
IX;assau IIl, 4x5, and C. S. P. For., No. 260, April x9, I572.
45 2
THE WARS OF RELIGION IN FRANCE
has proved this to the satisfaction of every unprejudiced historian,
whether Protestant or Catholic. The combination of causes that
led to the action; the motives of the prindpals; the responsibility
for the massacre are today known with as much certainty as moral
forces having relative and not absolute values can be. Even
unprejudiced contemporaries, La Noue and Henry IV himself,
did not believe the massacre to have been premeditated. A general
slaughter of the Protestants was an old idea, but never regarded
as a practical one, save by the papacy. The guilt of the massacre
in all its monstrous proportions and consequences rests upon
Catherine de Medici first of all. Fundamentally considered, it
was the crime of a tigerishly hateful and essentially cowardly
woman's heart. Catherine was the author and instigator of it.
The Guises entered into the plot chiefly to avenge themselves upon
the admiral and really had little interest in prosecuting it beyond
penslero e tutte le fore sue per istirparla atatto, recandosi a memoria quelle che
ella haveva fatto scrivere a sua Santit da Monsignor il Nuntio, che infra pochi
giorni non sarebbe pi un ugonotto in tutto il suo regno."--Bibliothque
Nationale MSS ItaL, 1,72. The Pope proclaimed a jubilee in honor of the
massacre.
Subjoined is a list of the leading authors and articles upon this subject. The
most recent consideration which sifts all preceding investigation is that by Whitehead,
Gaspard de Coligny, Admiral o] France, London, 19o4 , chaps, xv, xvi; Phillipson,
"Die rSmische Curie und die Bartholomaiisnact," West Europa, II, 255 It.; Bague-
nault de Puchesse, "La St. Barthlemy: ses origines, son xa-ai caractm, ses suites,"
R. Q.//., July-October, x866; "La premeditation de St. Barthlemy," R. Q. H.,
XXVII, 272 t.; Boutaric, "La St. Bartblemy d'aprs les Archivcs du Vatican,"
Bib. de l'$cole des Chartes, sr. III, 3; Theiner, Continuation of Baronius, I
(Salviati's letters); Gandy, "Le massacre de St. Barthlemy," Revue hist., July,
1879; cf. review in Bull. de la Soc. prof. ]ranais; Rajna, in Archivio storico
ital., sr. V, No. XXIII, January 15, 1899; Michiel et Cavalli, "Ia Saint-Bar-
thlemy devant le snat de Venise. Relation des ambassadeurs .... traduite
et ann. par W. Martin, Paris, 1872; Soldan, Hist. Taschenbuch, t854; G. P.
Fisher, "The Massacre of St. Bartholomew," New Englander, January, 88o;
Loiseleur, "Les nouvelles controverses sur la St. Barthlemy," Re'v. hist., XV,
1883, p. 83; "Nouveaux documents sur la St. Barthlemy," Rev. hist., IV, 877,
P- 345; Tamizey de Larroque, "Deux lettres de Charles IX," R. Q. /-/-., III, 1867,
p. 567; "La St. Barthlemy, lettres de MM. Baguenault de Puchesse et G. Gandy,"
R. Q.//., XXVIII, i88o, p. 268; Dareste, "Un incident de l'histoire diplomatique
de Charles IX," Acad. des sc. moral, etc., LXXI-II, 1863, p- 183; Laugel, "Coligny "
Revue des deux nondes, September, 1883. pp. I6Z-85-
THE MASSACRE OF ST. BARTHOLOMEW 453
his death.' The duke of Anjou and Tavannes were the fanatics.
Charles IX was the creature of his mother's malign influence and
the victim of his own ferocious temperament which he had long
indulged, and to which he now allowed monstrous license. For
the rest the massacre of St. Bartholomew was perpetrated by
men whose natures were compounded out of religious bigot', I]
political enmity, personal resentment or mere ruffianism and love " ]
of violence. The massacre of St. Bartholomew could not possibly [
have been of the remotest political benefit to any person. It was
both a crime and a blunder. But Catherine de Medici was a]
ruler whose political conduct was governed by her personal feelings[
and prejudices. In the crisis in which she was, she had not the
acumen to discern, or the courage to dare to follow, the course that
lay open before her if she had had eyes to see and an under-
standing instead of a passionate heart. That course lay toward
Italy and not toward the Netherlands. If France had reasserted
her claims to Naples and Milan, then in the possession of Philip II,
the.nation would have been united in a common cause that would
have appealed to ancient pride and achievement as well as existing
animosity against Spain. England would have had no reason to
be jealous, for her hand would have been free in Flanders. More-
over, in Italy France might have looked for support from Tuscany
and Ferrara. Switzerland would have supported the enterprise;
Venice would have made no opposition and the Emperor, for all
his Spanish attachments, could not have done so. With the
Turk in the Mediterranean on her side, France could have gone
into war with Spain and the Pope without fear and with great
promise of success. 2
, The duke of Guise is not so blood)-, neither did he kill any man himself but
,aved divers; he spake openly that for the admiral's death he was glad, for he knew
him to be his enemy. But for the rest, the King had put to death soch as might
have done him very good service tC. S. P. For., No. 584, September, r57 ).
" Montluc clearly appreciated that this was the case and developed the idea
in his Commentaires, VI, 23-33. Quite as remarkable are the observations of the
Venetian ambassador: Rel. ,in., II, 17r. Spain anticipated the possibility of a
French attempt to recover the Milanais: "The King of Spain being sospicious of
the said league has given commission that Italy and Milan be in readiness."--
C. S. P. For., No. o, Felcraary 7, 572, from Venice.
THE FOURTH CIVIL WAR 46I
cerre, the Midi still resisted. In Languedoc and Dauphin6 the
Huguenots were especially strong.' Their harvests were garnered
into walled towns; their army included ,ooo arquebusiers besides
the Huguenot gentry and they were well prepared for further
war." On the anniversary of the massacre (August 24, I573)
deputies of all the churches of the south convened at Montauban
and took the preliminary steps in the formation of the great
Huguenot confederation xvhich in December assumed the direction
of the war, the regulation of finances, civil administration, and
religious protection, s
Languedoc was divided into two governments with Montauban
and Nimes as centers under the authority of the viscounts of
Paulin and St. Romain, each assisted and controlled by a council.
The councils, in turn, in all important matters were required to
consult the local assemblies of Protestants. All these assemblies
were elective. The Protestant organization thus constituted an
all but full-fledged state within a state, asserting its own power
to lay taxes, to administer justice, to carry on war, and to make
peace. It was estimated that 2o,ooo men in these regions were
aisle to bear arms.
In consequence of the continuance of the war in the south the
Swiss and the rest of the soldiery not yet licensed were sent from
the camp before La Rochelle into Dauphin and Languedoc. But
the government vas heavily embarrassed financially and had been
compelled to resort to forced loans in Paris and the old shift of
mortgaging the revenue until the grant of the clergy was made in
t C. S. P. For., No. I,Iol, July 3, No. ,XOT, July 3x, t573- In Languedoc
and Dauphln the I:uguenots were strong, and possessed o many towns (see a
letter of Louis of Nassau in Archivts dt la maison d'Orange-,Vassau, IV, 75 and
the "Names of all the towns in the south of France of which the Huguenot party
could be sure of, together with a list of the noblemen attached to the party" in
Appendix XXXlII.
a Vie de La 1Voue, 99; C. S. P. For., No. 965, May I6, No. t,o95 , July 3,
t 573- A deputation of Huguenots of Languedoc came to Fontainebleau in Septem-
ber, x573 (cf. Letter ol Schomberg to Louis of Nassau, September 0, 573, Archh,es
dt la maison d'Orangt-2Vassau, IV, tt and Appendix XiT).
s Long, x5, x6. The instrument oI government contained 89 articles.
474 THE WARS OF RELIGION IN FRANCE
might be gained by the fusion of the Huguenots and the Politiques.
The significance of this development must not pass unnoticed.
The whole character of the war was ultimately changed by it.
La Noue first, and later Damville, became the genius of this alli-
ance. He negotiated with Damville, with Alennn, with Henry of
Navarre. He sent Du Plessis-Mornay to England. But his
greatest feat of diplomacy was the persuasion of the people of
La Rochelle to adopt the new course. It required all the elo-
quence, all the charm, and all the strategy of a born leader of men
to convince the hot-headed and impetuous Rochellois, but he
finally succeeded, and the alliance was at last concluded between
the Huguenots of religion and the Huguenots of state, the con-
necting link being the new party of the Politiques. I
The Protestants and the Politiques speedily converted theo-
ries into practice in the south of France, where their confedera-
tion spread over all Languedoc and much of Guyenne. Two
towns in each province were appointed as "Confederate towns."
Special padements pronounced upon all law cases which arose
between litigants of either group. Liberty of worship was recog-
nized as sacred right and this de facto government even undertook
the trial and condemnation of the authors of the massacre of
x572.
We get clear intimations of these new political ideas in the
literature of the time.
In the last days of Charles IX a political treatise appeared
entitled Du droit des magistrats sur les sujets, purporting to
have been published in Magdeburg, which advanced the thesis
that the kingship, although established by God, was a popular
institution, and that, if the king were unfaithful to his office,
he could be set aside? The Franco-Gallia of Hotman proclaimed
the sovereignty of the people and the dependency of the crown
upon its will. The same idea dominates the Junius Brutus of
Forneron, Histoire des ducs de Guise, II, 276. On the whole question see
De Crue, Le parti des Politiques au lendemain de la St. Barthleray, Paris, t89;
Weill, I33 ff-
Weill, 88, 89- The actual author was Beza.
THE CONSPIRACY OF THE POLITIQUES 477
The absence of Henry of Anjou at this critical stage filled
Catherine with alarm, and strenuous efforts were made to bring
about a settlement. A secret agent of the queen mother named
Pierre Brisson at this time tried to bribe La Noue bv the offer of
o,ooo cus de rente to retire to England. It must have been a
great temptation, for already the intrepid leader was ruined by the
war; but his nature was too noble to accept the terms. Charles
IX for a season shook himself out of the apathy of mortal illness,
while the Huguenots and the Politiques bent ever)- endeavor to per-
fect their plans during the absence of the heir to the throne in
Poland. The scheme was to declare Henry of Anjou deprived of
his rights to the crown and to recognize the duke of Alenon as heir-
presumptive with the title of lieutenant-general of the kingdom.
Elizabeth of England' and William of Orange were counted upon
for influence and assistance. With this purpose a conspiracy
was set on foot much like that attempted at Meaux in 1567. The
duke of Alenon and the king of Navarre were to make their
escape from court and effect a union with Guitery, chief of the
confederates in Normandy. The3" were then suddenly to seize St.
Germain and carry off the King and queen mother. The plot
was that the king of Navarre, the duke of Alenon, and some of
their gentlemen should go forth from the court on the morning
' Hume supposes (Courtships o] Queen Fdizabeth, x77 ) that Elizabeth,
knowing that this plot was in progress, again withdrew her permission for an inter-
view with the duke of Alenon. She feared the result if the interview were unsuc-
cessful; she would not allow a public visit under an), circumstances, and did not
wish a private. The recent expedition against La Rochelle had also angered her
subjects, so that now the negotiations were once more apparently at a standstill.
But we must not forget her private scheme. Nothing could be more in line with
Elizabeth's policy than to promote a family quarrel in the French royal house.
That she was well informed of the pint can scarcely be doubted, for March x6,
x574, we find a safe-conduct for Alenon in the foreign papers; and the permission
given for him to come to the Queen as soon as he has notified her of his arrival in
England. April x, moreover, Dale wrote to Walsingham, "'The Duke has hope
in the Queen and feareth much"--there is nothing more to explain the reference.
Hume does not explicitly state Elizabeth's connivance and the editor of Hall, Vol.
II, does not mention the plot at all (p. x); neither does Burlingham in his rsum.
It can scarcely be doubted, however, that Elizabeth vas actively interested or, at
least, informed of its progress.
482 THE WARS OF RELIGION IN FRANCE
tion which had made Catherine hesitate before August 24, I57.
A living dog was better than a dead lion. x "The King told that
he should bear in mind that while the duke and Navarre were alive,
he could do what he pleased, but if they were dead there would be
no remedy. ''2
The real motive and animus of the whole cruel affair--the
destruction of the Montmorencys by the Guises--was not long
in forthcoming. Hitherto the duke had been allowed guarded
freedom, even to go hunting. But within a few days after the
death of La Mole and Coconnas came word of the capture of
Damville, Montmorency's brother, in Languedoc. Immediately
the duke of Montmorency and the marshal Coss6 were shut up
in the Bastille. The ancient and bitter grudge of the Guises
against the Montmorency-Chfitillon house, half of which had
been paid in the murder of the admiral, narrowly missed being
sated at this hour. In the blood-thirsty mood in which the King
was, the purple of kingship probably would not have protected
i c. s. P. Ven., No. 584, April 19, 1574. Both Henry of Navarre and his
fellow-prlsoner seemed to have believed in these days that if Charles IX should die
their own expectation of living would be slender, and their only hope be in corrupt-
ing the guard. But they were without money. This is the purport of a cipher
dispatch, dated May 22, from Paris and sent to Burghley to be deciphered by
him personally. This he actually did, for the draft is in his handwriting (ibid.,
For., No. 1,422, 1574; cf. No. 1,431. His reply--to Walsingham--was sent three
days later (hy a slip of the pen he has, however, written ' March" instead of May).
2 C. S. P. For., No. 1,4o8, Dr. Dale to Burghley, May 5, I574" See a letter
of Emanuel Philibert of Savoy, to Charles IX protesting against the arrest of Mont-
morency, May 19, 1574, in Coll. Godefroy, CCLVI, No. 92. Elizabeth seems to
have interested herself very much in their fate and sent Thomas Leighton to France
in their behalf. The face of affairs thus was changed, for to give some credibility
to her stories of a happy family, Catherine had to allow the princes more liberty.
Besides, Leighton was captain of Guernsey, and could be of great assistance to
Montgomery so that he had to be well treated and his desires gratified. The
Guises, however, were gaining great influence in court again and in event of the
King's death, Alenon expected the Bastille. To escape this he desired money
from Elizabeth to brihe his guards and Burghley actually recommended that this
course be followed. De Thor6, the youngest of the constahle's sons, fled to Cassel
for safety (Claude Haton, II, 763 and note). The fury of the Guises pursued him
even in Germany (see a letter of one Davis to count John of Nassau, June 7, 574,
in Archives de la maison d'Orange-Nassau, IV, I9, giving some particulars on this
head, and one of Schomberg to the same, August 28, at p. 49)-
HENRY III AND THE POLITIQUES 491
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 ue of horsemen
against them impracticable. The Swiss were low-class mercena-
ries, 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 dis-
dpline, wasting the country "to make a Christian man's heart
bleed."' In one case the wretched peasantry followed their de-
spoilers 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 dis-
played 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 pene-.
trated--in Picardy, in Champagne, in Poitou. But Henry III
haxfing reached Avignon, discovered that he was no better off
for his success, lX[eanwhile 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. 2
When the King sent the cardinal of Bourbon to talk with him,
Damville sent back word that he thought the example of his brother
"too dangerous to come to court where they who sought the ruin
of his house had too much credit, ''s and advised the King to remove
For other interesting details see C. S. P..For., No. 1,568 , September 29, t574.
2 Le Laboureur, II,
a C. S. P. For., No. 1,584, October 23, x574-
HENRY III AND THE POLITIQUES
495
generated a breed of men who sprang from the soil like the dragon's
teeth of Greek fable, men who by observation and practice were
used to the matchlock and the sword, brutalized by oppression,
long made desperate by burdensome taxes and the wrongs of war.'
The weariness of vigil in the depth of winter and overconfidence
seem to have relaxed the alertness of Henry III's foes. At any
PIKEMAN AND COLOR-BEARER
(Tortore] and Perissln)
rate, having extorted 50,000 francs from the noblemen and gentle-
men in his train in order to pay the soldiery around him, the King,
raising the siege of Livron on January 24, 575, managed to slip
through the defiles to Rheims for his coronation. The coronation
* "La longa confinuazione della guerra, che tutti Ii paesani che prima erano
disarmati e vlissimi, tutti dati all' arte del campo e all' agricoltura, owero ad
alcuna delle arti mecardche, adesso sono tutti armati, e talmente essercitati e
agguerriti c.he non si distinguono dalli pRt veterani soldati; tutti fatti archibugieri
eccellenfissimi."---" Relazione del Giovanni Michel," Rel. vn., II, 23; cf. Long,
6: "Des violences et des outrages exerc par quelques pefits genfilhommes
HENRY III AND THE POLITIQUES 497
the factions around the throne. The queen mother bore the
Guises greater hatred than before because of their new ascendency
and had little less spleen toward the Montmorencys, but care-
fullydissimulated and sought on one pretext and another to remove
them from around her son. For this purpose Bellegarde, who
was an old attach of the house of Montmorency and oxved his
popularity with the King to a handsome face and a well-turned
ARQUEBUSlER
(Tortorel aud Perissiu)
leg, wasmadea'special ambassador to Poland in order to get him
out of the way. His comrade on the mission was Elbceuf--an ill-
matched pair indeed. Their business was to carry 2oo,ooo crowns
of the Paris bourgeois to Poland to bribe the Polish diet not to
elect a successor to the absent Henry. If the Poles were obdurate,
Elbuf was to advocate the election of the duke of Ferrara, who
had Guisard blood in his veins. At the same time Biron and
Matignon were made marshals to counterpoise the influence of
De Retz who forthwith resigned his office and vowed he would
"meddle no more." There were heart-burnings, also, over the
!
/
!
5oo THE WARS OF RELIGION IN FRANCE
Reading betxveen the lines of the constitution agreed upon at
Nimes, the republican nature of the government therein provided
for is noticeable.' The right to exercise the sovereign rights of
legislation, of justice, of taxation, of making war and peace,
of regulating commerce no longer were vested in the King where
t the Act of Union prevailed, but in a representative body. Langue-
doc, Provence, and Dauphin6 were de facto independent of the
crown. 2 Supplementary articles of Cond6 and Damxdlle, and of the
Catholics and Protestants of Languedoc, Provence, and Dauphin
demanded (i) that freedom of exercise of religion without distinc-
tion be permitted; (2) that the padements should be composed half
of Catholics, and half of Protestants, the latter to be nominated by
the prince of Cond; (3) that justice be done upon the authors of the
massacre of St. Bartholomew and the forfeit and attainder of the
admiral be reversed; (4) that the places at present held by the
Huguenots be retained besides Boulogne and La CharitY, and that
for additional defense the King should give them in each prov-
ince two out of three towns to be named to him by the prince of
CondO; (5) that the King pay 2oo,ooo crowns for expenses of the
war; (6) that neither the marshal de Retz, nor the chancellor
Biragues should have any part in the negotiations for peace; (7)
that the duke of lfontmorency and the marshal Coss6 should be
set at liberty, and their innocence declared in full Parlement "en
robe rouge;" (8) that the heirs of those who have been murdered
should have their estates returned to them; (9) that the queen of
England, the elector palatine, and the dukes of Savoy and Deux-
"L'organisation politique de cette Union (Union protestante) fut labore dans
les assembl6es tenues 5. Milhau, en dcembre, 1573, et en juillet, I574. La base
rut l'autonomie des villes, que usurpS:rent peu 5. peu l'adminlstration. La Rochelle
et Montauban confibrent l'autorit6 5. des chefs 61ectlfs, pris dans la bourgeoisie.
En suite ces rpubliques urbaines se fed6rbrent. Il fut d6cid6 que chaque g6n6ralit6
aurait son assernble et que d61gu6s des g6n6ralit6s formeraient les 6tats g6n6raux
de l'Union. Ainsi se constitua au sein du royaume une r6publique fd6rative, oll
l'616ment aristocratique ne tarda pas 5. dominer (Lavisse et Rambaud, Histoire
gnrale, V, 147; cf. Cougny, "Le parti rpublicain sous Henri III," Mraeires de la
Sorbonne, I867; Hippeau, "Les id6es r6publicaines sous le rbgne de Henri III,"
Revue des Soc. savant, des dpart., IV e s6r., III.
2 L'Estoile, I, 3, 38.
504
THE WARS OF RELIGION IN FRANCE
"The French and the English are in correspondence, and both are
inspired by the same spirit of hostility against the Catholic religion
and against your majesty, as the sole protector thereof."'
The arrest of a secretary of Montmorency at Boulogne in March,
as he arrived from England, and who admitted he was going to
find Damville, * coupled with the absence of the prince of Cond
and Charles de Meru, the youngest Montmorency, in Germany,
so disquieted the King that early in June Schomberg was dispatched
across the Rhine to discover what Cond was doing; if he found
that levies of cavalry were being made for service in France, he
was instructed to enroll 8,000 soldiers forthe service of the King.
Schomberg proved a good agent, for he shortly afterward
wrote that he believed a secret engagement existed between Queen
Elizabeth, some of the German princes, and the enemies of the
French King at home; and that CondO, having expended 3o,o0o
crowns, had raised 8,ooo cavalry which might be expected to arrive
at the frontier by the middle of August, although it was given out,
and believed by some, that these reiters were intended for service
in the Netherlands. On the strength of these suspicions, espe-
, Corresponclance de Philippe II, III, 319, 320.
2 C. S. P. Ven., No. 622, March 22, I575. In Arch. nat., K. x537, No. 22,
is the report of a Spanish spy, written from Calais on March xS, 575, which con-
firms the suspicion of English tampering in France. Printed in Appendix XXXVI.
3 Schomberg's observations were absolutely just, for on July 23, I575, at
Heidelberg, an instrument was signed by Charles Frederick, the elector palatine,
Henry, prince of CondO, and Charles de Montmorency, in which the count palatine
acknowledged the receipt from the English Queen of 50,000 "crowns of the sun,
each crown being of the value of six English shillings sterling," which amount
was transferred to "Henri de Bourbon, prince de CondO, chief of those of the
religion in France, as well as of those Catholics with them associated" (i. e.,
the Politlques). Elizabeth's name was to be shielded throughout, the elector
assuming entire liability for repayment which was to be made "before the army
now levied in Germany for service in France shall depart td France" (see C. S. P.
For., No. 254, "The obligation and quittance of the prince of CondE," July 23,
i575, Heidelberg; cf. ibid., Ven., 627; July i2, I575, the guess of the Venetian
ambassador in France). Cf. ibid., No. 633, September 7, 1575- The Venetian
ambassador seems to have thought that trouble in Ireland would prevent England
from advancing any more to the Huguenots (ibid., No. 63I, August 9, I575)" The
harvest of x575 was generally good. But no invading army would enter France
before the grain was cut and stacked (cf. ibid.).
5o6
THE WARS OF RELIGION IN FRANCE
off toward the Loire in the hope of falling in with La Noue or
the viscount of Turenne. At the same time the duke of Guise
was ordered to make a vigorous resistance against the coming of
CondCs reiters. But even his army was in a bad state on account
of the defection of officers and men, who had gone over to Alenon,
so that new troops had to be sent him.' Almost all the soldier)."
in the service of the King was withdrawn from Dauphin and
Languedoc and concentrated in Burgundy and Champagne.'
Much depended upon the result of the coming battle with the
reiters. If the King's troops were beaten, Paris would be in a
serious strait between the King's enemies. Already, in conse-
quence of the withdrawal of troops, all Auvergne, Bourbonnais,
Nivernais, G,tinais, and the Beauce were in arms, and the gentle-
men of these regions had gone over to the duke of Alcnon. Only
the vigilance of the garrisons at Orleans and Tours, Moulins and
Nevers, enabled the crown to maintain the line of the Loire river.
The reiters attempted to evade Guise and find another way
of entrance into France, so that the duke left his artillery in Lor-
raine and by forced marches went to Sedan, with the intention of
giving battle there. But the reiters, about 2,500, under Thor,
avoided an engagement and maneuvered to join a Protestant force
of 2,000 Picards, and Guise fell back on Rheims in order to hold
the crossing of the Aisne, meantime asking the King for reinforce-
ments which were so slow in coming that the duke was compelled
to retire to the Marne. On October 9 he established his head-
quarters between Ch,teau-Thierry and Epernay, near Port-t-
Pinson. The encounter took place near Fismes, on the Marne,
above Dormans, on October io. Not more than fifty were -killed
on either side and the combat did not deter the reiters from con-
tinuing their course and crossing the Seine near Nogent-sur-Seine,
which they were able to do on account of low water. Their chief
loss was of two or three cornets of reiters whom Guise bribed to
x Claude Haton, II, 784, 785.
2 Paris furnished the King 4,000 soldiers at its own expense. The new troops
were lodged in the faubourgs of St. Germain, St. Marceau, and Notre-Dame des
Champs (ibid., 787)-
508
THE WARS OF RELIGION IN FRANCE
queen mother for everything that had happened, especially for
the escape of Alenon, and Catherine, by way of reply, is said to
have sent him a copy of Commines to read with the advice to emu-
late the policy of his crafty predecessor. But as a contemporaiy
scornfully observed, Henry of Valois was not Louis XI. What
could be expected from a King who spent his time "going from
abbey to abbey and devising with women. '' In sorrow and
anxiety, sustained by the dukes of Montmorency and Montpensier
and the fine old marshal Coss, Catherine made earnest efforts
to negotiate a truce with the duke of Alenon.
Prefacing his demands by the caution that he could not nego-
tiate finally without Cond or Damville, Alenon demanded sur-
render of Pont-de-C on the Loire, besides La CharitY, Bourges,
Angoulme, Niort, Saumur, and Angers for the Huguenots; and
Mezires in Champagne, Langres in Burgundy, or La Fre in
Picardy for the prince of CondO; 2 a large settlement for himself;
a promise that the States-General should be convened for the
Politiques; the crown to pay 2oo,ooo crowns to the Protestant
reiters; the exercise of Calvinist worship in as ample terms as
obtained in 1570 (till more fully provided for in the ultimate articles
of peace); the revolted provinces to remain in arms, except in
the case of mercenaries, it being understood that no acts of hostility
be done and commerce and trade to be free during the interim.
The King's council, when these sweeping terms were laid before
it, advised the King to yield, seeing no way out on account of lack
of means to carry on the war. But Henry III was furious and
threw the articles in the fire. In defiance of the advice of his
friends, who told him to employ what few funds he had in corrupt-
ing the reiters with CondO, he sent 3o,ooo crowns more to Germany
to purchase assistance.
In this strait, money came suddenly, as from heaven. The
C. S. P. For., No. 422, October 29, x575- The King called these pilgrimages
"nouaines" (cf. ibid., No. 5o6, Dr. Dale to Lord Burghley, December 2o, I575).
Protestant worship was provisionally authorized in the towns held by the
confederates. Angoulme and Bourges refused to open their gates to Alen$on and
so he was offered Cognac and St. Jean-d'Angly instead. The prince of Cond
was refused admittance to Mezires (Claude Haton, II, Sos, note).
5 lo THE WARS OF RELIGION IN FRANCE
In the meantime, fear prevailed in Paris lest the forces of Dam-
ville and the viscount of Turenne would effect a junction with
those of the duke of Alenon and the united body march upon
Paris, and garrisons were hastily put in Montereau, Corbeil,
Charenton, St. Cloud, and St. Denis. The old trenches on both
sides of the river were repaired and platforms erected in the fields
around the city. Montmartre especially was fortified. The
townspeople of the capital as well as villagers from the outside
were impressed into the work with picks, shovels, and baskets.
Mills were erected within the city, and the city was provisioned.
The King issued an edict ordering the peasantry within thirty
leagues around the capital to thrash their grain and to store it in
fortified towns known to be faithful to the crown, unless they were
dwelling within nine leagues of Paris, in which case the grain was
to be brought into the city. All the passages of the Loire were
guarded. The result of all this was a reign of terror in the Ile-de-
France. The soldiery indulged in all sorts of brigandage, so that
in sheer desperation the villagers sometimes fired their towns.
Provisions were commandeered without recompense. To such
outrages were the poor people subjected that the inhabitants of
one town, Jogny, begged the commander to have mercy upon
them. But instead of so doing, Puygaillard loaded the little depu-
tation with reproaches and had them beaten by the soldiers in the
presence of all.'
With the memory of the elder prince of CondO's presence before
the walls of Paris, and the battle of St. Denis, where the constable
Montmorency was killed, the Parisians were willing to labor in
the trenches for the safety of Paris. But they were not willing to
be taxed further. In a remarkable remonstrance, joined in by
the clergy, the Parlement, the Chambre des Comptes, the Cour des
Aides, the provost of Paris, and the bourgeois and citizens of every
quarter of the city, protest was lnade against the extortion of
ooo livres, which Henry III proposed to raise in this hour of
extremity. After reciting that civil discord had prevailed in France
since I56O, and that during the space of fifteen years the crown
Claude Haton, II, 806-8.
5 I2 THE WARS OF RELIGION IN FRANCE
the Spanish Netherlands, and he took the method of having Cond
take title to it as a means of concealing his purpose.
The possible disposal of any border fortress in Picardy in such
a way tremendously alarmed the king of Spain and the Guises
who concerted to break the peace.' This plan is the true origin
of the formation of the famous Holy League, which, although it
assumed organized form only after the peace of Bergerac (Septem-
ber 17, i576), nevertheless existed in a tentative state this early, in
the combined action of the dukes of Guise, Nemours, Mayenne,
and Nevers, Biragues the chancellor, and other satellites of the
house of Guise to prevent peace being made on such terms, and
to break it in event of its being made. 2 Twice this cabal called
upon the King to give battle before all the forces of the opposition
were united and twice the queen mother foiled their purpose by
securing delay. On February 22 a violent scene took place be-
tween her and the council--Henry III was sick--in which Cather-
ine branded those who said her son was a traitor as liars and
declared that in spite of opposition "it shall be peace."
The indifference of Henry III to the gravity of the situation and
his supreme egotism are remarkable, yet thoroughly in keeping with
his character. For hours together he would prate of poetry and
philosophy--" de primis causis, de sensu et sensibili and such like
questions"--with his favorites, in the retirement of a cabinet,while
the realm was going to rack and ruin. The Venetian ambassador
describes one of these symposiums with minute care in a dispatch
of February 3, 1576.
For the last few days [he says] his Majesty has taken his pleasure by
retiring into a small apartment which has no window, and to his apartment
i C. S. P. For., No.592, 'anuary r576: "The King of Spain makes the King
very great offers to break the peace."
2 Dr. Dale to Sir Thomas Smith and Waisingham. All the fair promises of the
delivery of Bourges and La Charit6 are like to come to nothing, as may appear by
the enclosed letter of Monsieur to the Court of Parliament. There is a secret
League between Guise, Nemours, Nevers, Maine, and others of that house, to-
gether with the Chancellor, against all that would have any peace, and if it should
be made, to begin a sharp war afresh (C. S. P. For., No. 583, am0 576). From
the first Languet was skeptical. He anticipated reaction (Epist. seer., I, Part
II, i8i, 2o5).
HENRY Ili AND THE POLITIQUES
57
and Rouen, and a new chamber in the Parlement of Paris with
two presidents and e_ighteen councilors, nine of them Catholic,
nine Protestant. Protestant advocates, procurers-gnraux and
grefliers civil and criminal were to be connected with each of these
mixed padements.
For further protection of the Huguenots, eight cautionary towns
were to be ceded to them, to wit: Aigues-lXiortes and Beaucaire
in Languedoc; P6rigueux and Le Mas de Verdun in Guyenne;
La Rochelle in Poitou; Yssoire in Auvergne; Nions and Serres (ch&-
teau included) in Dauphin6; Cennes "la grande tour et lc circuit"
in Provence. Additional demands were for general oblivion for
all conduct and action by persons of either side; revocation of all
decrees, judgments, and proclamations hitherto made; rehabili-
tation of the memory of Admiral Coligny and restoration of their
livings and honors to his children as well as in the cases of lXlont-
gomery, Montbrun, Bricquemault, and Cavagnies. No prose-
cution was to be made with regard to the actions done at St. Ger-
main-en-Laye and Bois de Vincennes.
Two of these provisions were received with great dissatisfaction
by the Huguenot deputies and when published were decried by
many of the Protestants. The first of them was the prohibition
of Protestant worship within the faubourgs of Paris, the act speci-
fically declarin-hat St. Denis, St. Maur-ds-F'osses, Pont-de-
Charenton, Bourg-la-Reine and Port de Neuilly were within the
prohibited confines. The other one which met with great objec-
tion was that touching the secur!ty towns, x The deputies de-
manded two towns in every government (there were fourteen gov-
ernments). But the Kingwould yield only eight, these to be chosen
from the towns already in possession of the Huguenots, a proviso
which eliminated such important points as Niort, Angoulme, and
Cognac. In the case of La Charit and Saumur, over which the
longest discussion arose, a compromise was reached by giving them
' Dr. Dale wrote truly to Lord Burghley saying that the Protestants had
"gotten more without any stroke stricken than ever could be had before this time
by all the wars, as appears by the note of the provinces that are to be under the
government of them and their friends."--C. S. P. For., No. 777, lXIay ii, 1576.
520
THE WARS OF RELIGION IN FRANCE
of the chief principals was willing to resign were included in the
grant to him. While technically all the territories so concerned
vere regarded as appanages, I it is plain that a distinction may
easily be made between the duchies of Alenffon, Maine, Anjou,
Touraine, and La Roche--which had originally been given him
as a prince of the blood--and places like Bourges, Moulins, Loches,
Saumur, La CharitY, Pont-de-Sel, Amiens, Moulans, and Mantes.
These latter possessions were practically a class apart of security
cities intrusted by compromise to the duke. This was particu-
larly true of Saumur and La CharitY, which insured the Protestants
of passage across the lower and upper Loire, and so linked the
South with Normandy on the North and the Palatinate and the
German Protestant states to the east. Moreover, Moulins in
Bourbonnais and Bourges in Berry assured the Protestants of
position there, so that the whole left bank of the Loire from Au-
vergne to Nantes was in their control. Mantes was meant to
compensate the Huguenots in the vicinity of Paris for the loss of
Charenton.
The Iing yielded the government of Picardy again to the
prince of CondC but the matter of what town should be his created
much heated argument. The prince himself at first stoutly con-
tended for Boulogne, although he did not say that its convenience
to England was the chief reason for his desire. But Henry III
as stoutly refused. Then Amiens was suggested, and as compro-
mise this city was given to the King's brother. Cond then de-
manded Peronne. Although the King would have preferred
Doulens or even St. Quentin to this concession, he yielded. The
only other detail concerning the prince was the obligation to pay
his and his father's debts in Germany, which the crown assumed.
Damville did not come in for as much honor as his colleagues,
but was far from being ignored. As the chief of the Politiques
or "les catholiques associez," as they were defined in the interest
of peace, Damville was and remained the leading man in Langue-
doc. Aside from the retention of Damville in his government,
promise was made the Politiques to summon the States-General
Maffert, Les apanages en France du XVI au XIX Mcle (19oo).
522 THE WARS OF RELIGION IN FRANCE
The terms of the Peace of Monsieur' were exceedingly unpopular
in Paris, whose citizens had been the heaviest contributors to the
expenses of the war thus closed and who had made strenuous mili-
tary preparations in defense of the capital, and the unpopularity of
Henry III was not enhanced in the eyes of the Parisians by the
King's repudiation of a part of the re,tes, the incomes of which were
the chief means of support with many. But when Charron, the pro-
vost of the merchants, and the counselor Abot, at the head of a
deputation of the foremost citizens of the capital protested against
this high-handed action to the King's own face, Henry III with
a sneer which carried with it a covert threat rejoined: "Hang a
man and he tells no tales. ''2
The camps of the duke of Alenon and the Protestants b-ere
broken up when the peace was published. The soldiery around La
Rochelle and in Poitou, Anjou, and Berry, returned home, except
some troops which were reserved until it was seen what Casimir
and his reiters, who were near Langres, would do. These mau-
rauders, with many French of Champagne and Brie, crossed the
Yonne above Sens and arrived in Champagne between lay io
and 11 and remained there for a week, living on the land. After
having sojourned six or seven days between the Seine and the
Vauluisant, on the x6th they moved on to a place between Troyes
and the village of Mery-sur-Seine, where they remained for
fifteen days to the distress of the people and absolutely destroyed
, The text of the Paix de Monsieur is in Isambert, XIV, 280. The sources for
the hlstorv are many. The correspondence of Dale, the English ambassador in
France, ad the other English agents, Wilkes and Randolph, in C. S. P. For., x876,
for March, April, and May, is full and detailed (cf. D'Aubign, Book VIII, chap.
xxvii; De Thou, Book LXXII). La Popelinire, III, 36o ff., gives the text o[ the
treaty and the letters-patent of the King. The act was registered in Parlement on
May I4, 576, though signed by the King on May 2.
Two days before this scene took place, the newly elected king of Poland
Stephen Bathori, prince of Transylvania, had written informing the deposed Valois
that he had assumed the Polish crown and desiring to know what Henry would
have done with the household stuff he had left behind in Poland (C. S. P. For.,
No. 789, May 29, I576)- The Emperor had had numerous partisans, but retused
to accept the condition that he fix his residence in Poland (Epist. seer., I, Part II,
143).
524
THE WARS OF RELIGION IN FRANCE
of Calvinism. But in the;hands of the French nobles these local
leagues, controlled by the .ristrocracy and welded into one mighty
organization under the leadership of the duke of Guise, backed
by Spanish gold, became new league of the public weal, which,
under the cloak of religi6n revived the feudal ambition of the
French nobility to acquire power at the expense of the crown.
GENEALOGICAL TABLES
525
526 THE WARS OF RELIGION IN FRANCE
GENEALOGICAL TABLES 527
APPENDICES
532 THE WARS OF RELIGION IN FILNCE
Car nous en avons cherche .... ' moyeaes possibles et mesmes pot essayer
si ceste Royne dangleterre s .... addoucir et contenir par qudques remedes
qui n'ont .... en son endroict, car apres avoir faict du coust du Roy tout
.... de penser pot luy oster la jalousie et le soupcon qu'elle monstre au
.... nous y avons employe le Roy catholicque tant que par son ambassadeur
il luy .... quil ne souffriroit pas que elle donnast faveur attx rebelles ....
aulcune chose au preiudice des droictz et authorite du Roy et de .... fille
en Escosse. Depuis y a este envoy l'evesque de Valence conseillier au ....
pot luy rendre raison plus pertinente de l'intention du Roy, et quil ne ch ....
l'obeissance de ses subiectz, resolu de retirer ses forces apres qu .... re-
stablles au bon chemin, tout cda n'a de rien servi si die n'a .... vous avez
peu veoir par les articles qu'elle a f .... son Ambassadeur si bonteux que
nous croyons qu'elle sass .... nous n'en ferions rien et par ainsy elle pas-
seroit oultre .... qui est de la guerre, dont nous veryons peu de moyen
de .... sice n'est pot .... refuge 1' . . . . de Sieur de Glayon quesr les
.... y envoye por luy en pader des grosses contz ayant ddibere si ....
obstinee de secourir le Roy de tout ce de luy qu'il vouldra et .... a accorde luy
bailler gens et vaiss .... pot remettre lobeissance .... dont il a este
prins au mot. Et y a este envoye .... scavoir de la duchesse de Parme de
qud nombre ou .... lad. dame charge expresse d'en accommoder le Roy
de tout .... Cependant Madame nous ne perdons point le temps a faire
ad .... qui sera dun si bon nombre de vaisseaulx et si bien formy de gens
et de routes choses convenables que nous esperons que lad. Royne ne ses
forces n'auront pas le moyen de les garder de vous secourir tout le p ....
veryons est qu'dle ne peult estre preste que vers la fin de Iuillet. Maissi ferons
nous tout ce que sera possible au monde por la mettre plustost a la voyle et ne
espargner argent soing ni diligence comme nous nous asseurons que vOus
croyez bien. Et neantmoins cherchons nous tous aultres moyens de vous faire
secourir de deniers soit de Flandres ou d'ailleurs et aussy ne craindrons nous
en adventurer par petites pommes cependant et pour y commencer axons
nous advise vous renvoyer .... eur dedans vng aultre petit vaisseau que
luy avons iaict equipper, ne luy .... espargne aussy argent car il a eu po
estre venu icy et le hazard qu'il a douze centz francz que le Roy luy a donnes
et trois centz escus pot son retour. Avecq luy nous vous envoyons par ung
clerc qui l'accompaigne la somme de mille livres et vingt cacques de pouldre
menue greve par ce que nous avons sceu par les lettres des sieurs de la Bmsse
et Doysell qui vous en avez besoing par dela ce sera pour attendre toutz jours
mieulx estantz bien deliberez de .... perdre une seule occasion de vous
secourir ainsy par le menu au danger ..... perdre quelque chose.
Cependant, Madame, il fauldra que de vostre coste vous faciez le mieulx
.... pourrez et sur tout qu'il soit donn ordre a tenir les places bien ....
Ellipses indicate places where the MS is faded or creased so as to be illegible.
534
THE WARS OF RELIGION IN FRANCE
she hath forgotten nothinge, wherby she might thinke to draw anye fruict
of her evell disposicion: yf she had fownde thinges in cace to go through wth
her businesse. Neverthelesse shee hath gyven us the fairest wordes of the
world. Wherunto the Frenche King hath not so touche trustyd but that he
hathe advertisid the king of Spaine of all that she hath doon who having well
considered the mater, hath made answer that there is no cause why to dis-
alow his entent specially to go through w th the maters on that side, and that to
chastise the Rebelles he will gyve the King, as manye vessells, men, and vitailes,
as he will, and so hath writen to the said queene, who knowing that she can
hope for nothing of that, that she maketh a rekening of, begynnithe to use
oth r languaige, and causythe her ambassad r to saye that that she hath done
hath ben for none oth r cause, but for the jalousye she hath of her Realme, and
fearinge to be sodaynly taken unwares. So that it seemithe, that she repentethe
to have gon so farre furth in the mater. And we beleeve that before theese
lettres come to yo r handes, yo" shall have well perceyved, that her intentes ar
waxed verye colde. And yf that which she hathe caused to be said by her
Ambassado r be true, yo " shall have understand all the hole storie, by a man
whome the S r de Sevre the kinges ambassad r in Englande, hathe sent unto
yo". Neverthelesse we have thought good to sende yo" backe againe this
said bearar, by the waye of Flandres to advertise yo", that we thinke that your
Rebelles wilbe farre from their rekeninge, yf they make their accompte of the
said Ladyes protection. Or elles there is much dissimulation.
And yet the King knowing after what sorte he must trust Englishemen,
leavithe not of, to prepare xxiiij great ships to thintent (yf neede requyre, and
that it do appeere, that the sayd Ladye doth contynue her evell dlsposicion)
to gyue ordre w th the same and oth r forces w ch he keepith in a readinesse, to
souccour yo w in such sorte, as he shall have the reason that he requyrethe, o[
thone and thoth r.
Yn the meane tyme he hathe sent the busshoppe of Valence, counsello r
in the K es pryvie counsell, towardes the Queene, to understande plalnely her
meaninge, and in cace that the same be good, then to come to yo w w th good and
large memorialles, to assaye to appease thinges on that side and to fynde the
meanes to wynne tyme.
The thing (Madame,) that greevithe us most, is, that the meanes is hindred
and stopped, to soucco r yow w th money as ofte and as readily as we wold be
glad to do, and as yo" have neede of it. Which we durst not aventure, nor also
o r brother Mons r le Marquis for the evident danger that might happen. But
yt cannot be longe before we see some waye open, and yow maye be sure
(Madame) that we will not lose one quarter of an houre.
Now (Madame) we must w th yo w, lament the Evell, that the mater of
religion maye bring into a Realme, which hath so gone to worke on this side,
that wtin these xij or xv dayes, there is discouvered a conspiracy, made to kill
536
THE WARS OF RELIGION IN FRANCE
en autre main que celuy de la Royne vostre mere, la sentans ferme et comtaute
a n'endurer leurs erreurs eta les punir. Depuis est arriv l'un de mes gem
avec deux pacquetz de lXlonsieur de Chantone, lesquelz j'ay faict mectre entre
les mainsde Sajas.' M'advertissant ladicte dame par le mesme courtier que
[e Roy de Navarre s'est momtr si conforme en tout ce qu'elle a desir et
peu approuvant la temerit de telles entreprinses, qu'il s'est accommod pour
aussi recevoir quelque lieu et contentemaut d'estre seul lieutenant general du
Roy vostre bon frere en France soubz ladicte dame, afin que la multitude des
autres seigneurs et gouvemeurs de tout le royaume n'amenast point la confuzion
qui y estoit, que l'on eust quelque adresse, et que, par ce moien aussi il feust
plus honnor6 et respect d'ung chascun sans aucune diminution de I'authorit
de ladicte dame, laquelle, Sire, demeure chef de toutes choses, ayant les quatre
secretaires d'Estat soubz elle, les pacquetz, finances, dons et autres graces
avec la personne du Roy, et commande au conseil aimi que de coustume,
tellement que chacun espere, comme aussi faict Sa Majest et ainsi qu'elle
me commande vous dire, Sire, que desormts il y a certaine apparance de
toute tranquilit et repos, car ce que dessus est passe, arrest et sign entre
eulx et de leurs mains pour articles irrevocables, ayant pour ceste came mand
aux Estatz tlu'ilz eussent t ne penser ne disputter plus sur telz pointz, ains
seulement en ce qui concerne le mesnaige du myaume, les reculans et remettans
a s'assambler a la fin de l'est prochain. Et ce pendant, suivant I'imtante
requeste du peuple, le Roy vostre bon frere, Sire, partira de Fontainebleau
incontinent aprts ce Quasimodo pour se faire sacrer A Reims dedans le XX e
de May, et incontinent aprs sm le mois de Juing faire son entr6e b. Paris,
d'autant que ces deux actes sollemnelz donnent plus d'authorit6 et contente-
merit t tous nos subjectz, et que, cela faict, la Royne vostre mre pourra aussi,
comme elle desire, plus soigneusement user de la main forte et justice en tout
ce qui se presentera. Ce que dessus, Sire, amandera, s'il vous plaist, en vostre
endroit l'opinion mauvaise que nous avions quant je parlay a Monsieur le
prince d'Evoly de l'yssue de noz Estatz, lesquelz, par ce remede, sont fmstrez
de plus rien toucher ne negotier qui concerne le gouvernement. Me com-
mandant tres expressement la Royne de remercier fort affectionneement
Vostre Majest6 des boris et roiddes offices desquelz Monsieur de Chanton
a us6 pros d'elle pendant ces disputz, et asseurant Vostre Majest que ce luy
est obligation telle qu'elle peult faire estat de son amour et affection antant
que de sa propre mre, comme de son cost elle se confie tant en sa bont et
amiti que, si l'on eust voulu faire plus de tord a son bonneur et preminance,
elle eust us de ce que Dieu a mis. Sire, soubz vostre obeissance, comme
de son meilleur amy, desirant que Vostre Majest face en semblable estat de
tout ce que sera en elle. Ceulx, Sire, qui avoient tram ce que dessus pen-
soient remuer en nostre conseil et autres endroitz les hommes et honneurs t
, Cayas, secretary to Philip II.
538 THE WARS OF RELIGION IN FRANCE
service du Roy bien et repoz de ce royaume. Cedit porteur est suffisant et
nauront noz chers cardinaulx que part ceste lettre comme aussi nostre mare-
schal de Brissac qui congnoistra quil yen a qui sont bien loing de leurs desseins.
Nostre mere et son frere ne jurent que par la toy quilz nous doibvent et quilz
ne veullent plus de consell que de ceulx que scavez qui vont le bon chemyn.
Conclusion la Religion reformee en nous conduisant et tenant bon sen va a
baz leaue et les amyraulx mal ce qui est de possible. Toutes noz forces nous
demeurent entierement les leurs rompues les billeez rendues sans parler dedictz
ne de preches et administracion des sacremens a leur mode. Ces boris seig-
neurs croiront sil leur plaist cedit porteur de ce qull leur dira de la part de
trois de leurs meilleurs amys et bayse la main. De Baugency ce xxve jour
de Iuing I562. [No signature]
[No address]
[Endorsed] Extraict dune lettre escripte de
la main de m r de Guyse au
Cardinal de Lorraine deXX.Ve
Iuing I562.
APPENDIX IV
[P. i55 , n. 2]
STATE PAPERS, FOREIGN
ELIZABETH, VOL..nLnLXIX, No. 2II, vj
[Letter o] the duke o] Anmale to Catherine de .lledic]
[i562 , laly 9]
Madame, je viens presentement de recevoyr la lettre quil vous a pleu
meseripre touchant quelques marchandz anglois que lambassadeur de leur
Royne vous a faict entendre avoyr este prys par les gens de guerre qui sont icy
pres de moy pour le service du Roy et le vostre. Dont encores Madame je
navois ouy parler, bien de quelques soldatz anglois qui furent pris y a assez
long temps par le s r Dallegre qui voulloient entrer a Rouen et lesquelz tost
aprez je feiz renvoyer sinon quelques ungs qui se sont voluntairement rays
a vostre service parmy noz bandes vous pourrant asseurer Madame, que tant
sen fault que je permecte relies choses Que tout ce que jay en plus grande
recommendation, est de les laisser librement et tousles autres estrangers qui
sont icy mesmes voz subiectz de quelque religion quilz soient de traffcquer
et negotier comme ilz faisoient au paravant ses troubles, sacbant trop bien de
quelle consequence celia est pour vostre service. Et ne puis penser dou
viendroit ceste prise sice nest par ceulx mesmes de Rouen Dieppe et le Havre
qui pillent et prennent indifferemment sur les ungs et les autres sans aucune
