Book III, chap. xvi, and La Noue, _Mém. milit._, chap. x, have vivid

accounts of this siege; cf. also De Thou, Book XXXIV.

[672] Barbaro gives details of the havoc wrought by this explosion (_C. S. P. Ven._, January 28, 1563); cf. _C. S. P. For._, No. 239, § 3, No. 323, § 18, February 17, 1563.

[673] Throckmorton wrote to Cecil on February 21: “He is to be pitied, for every hour he is in danger of his life and of being betrayed by his reiters.”—_C. S. P. For._, No. 333, §§1, 5, 9, February 20, 1563; No. 339, February 21, 1562.

[674] _Ibid._, No. 374, March 1, 1563; Forbes, II, 332.

[675] Montgomery to the Rhinegrave, Dieppe, 8 fevrier, 1563: “Les habitans du plat pays m’ont faict entendre qu’ils seroient prestz de se joindre à moy si je me vouloys metre en campagne pour les deffendre des oppressions, pilleries et sacagementz qu’ilz disent estre exercés par ceux qui vous suivent. Monsieur l’admiral [Coligny] n’est [pas] au pays [l’Orléannais] que me mandez ou à tout le moings qu’il a faict une extrème diligence et est plus près de nous qu’on ne cuyde, en delliberation de metre bientost une fin à ces troubles, pour nous faire tous jouyr du rang que nous debrons tenir prez la personne du Roi comme ses vrays subjets et loyaulx serviteurs.”—Fillon Collection.

[676] _C. S. P. For._, No. 352, Warwick to the council, February 25, 1563; cf. Forbes, II, 336; _C. S. P. Eng. For._, No. 327, §3, February 18, 1563; Forbes, II, 334, 380, March 1, 1563; cf. Nos. 333, 344.

[677] The money reached Havre on February 25 and was brought by Beauvoir, Briquemault, and Throckmorton under guard of eight pieces of artillery to Caen at once (Delaborde, II, 226, 227). The reiters received their pay at once. For some curious information about the avarice of the reiters and the pay given them, see _Papiers d’état du cardinal de Granvelle_, VIII, 129, note; VII, 407.

[678] _C. S. P. For._, 391; Forbes, II, 346.

[679] Catherine wrote with truth: “Ce royaume est réduit en telle extrémité que la necessité veut que l’on ne perde l’occasion de faire pacifier, principalement pour jeter hors les étrangers, mêmement les Anglais.”—_L’Ambassade de St. Sulpice_, 101.

[680] “La guerre,” said Catherine with words of simple dignity, which were repeated in the instructions of the special envoys sent to notify the court of Vienna and Madrid, the Vatican and the Council of Trent, “a tellement appauvri le royaume qu’il est réduit à un état digne de commisération. La voie des armes était impossible; le remède propre à un tel mal, l’expérience a démontré, c’est un libre et général concile.”—_Corresp. de Cath. de Méd._, II, Introd., v. Philip II, reproached the regent of Parma for not lending assistance to France. See her letter justifying her conduct in Gachard, _Correspondance de Philippe II sur les Pays-Bas_, I, 266, August 12, 1563.

[681] The marshal Brissac succeeded to the command (_L’Ambassade de St. Sulpice_, 120). For the influence of the death of the duke of Guise in France, see Forneron, _Hist. des ducs de Guise_, II, 80; upon Flanders, _Papiers d’état du cardinal de Granvelle_, VII, 52, 61, 65; Gachard, _Philippe II sur les Pays-Bas_, I, 245. For interesting details see D’Aubigné, Book III, chap. xx; _Mém. de Condé_, IV, 243; _C. S. P. For._, No. 332, February 20, 1563; No. 354, §§2-5, February 26, 1562, both from Smith to Queen Elizabeth, written from Blois. Cf. Forbes, II, 159; 361, §§1-8, 17, February 26, 424, §10 March 8, 1563; _C. S. P. Ven._, letters of February 23, 27, and March 2, 23, 1563. It is said the duke received warning from Montluc and Madame de St. André, but that the word arrived too late. The news of his death was kept from Mary Stuart for some time. See _C. S. P. Scotland_, VI, No. 1,173, March 10, 1563; VIII, No. 17, March 18, 1563; No. 30, April 1, 1563; No. 31, April 10, 1563. On the political theory of assassination, see Weill, 69.

Poltrot was put to death on March 18; for the trial, see _Mém.-journ. de François, de Lorraine_ (Michaud Coll.), 506, 537 ff.; Paulin Paris, _Cabinet hist._, I^[ère] part., III, 49 ff. A conspicuous instance of the high-mindedness of Jeanne d’Albret is the letter of consolation she wrote to the duchess of Guise after the assassination of the duke (La Ferrière, _Rapport_, 39).

[682] _C. S. P. For._, No. 422, March 8, 1562; Forbes, II, 350, 354, 356; _C. S. P. For._, No. 437, March 12, 1563; _ibid._, No. 424, §§25-27; No. 435, March 11, 1562, Condé to Smith.

[683] _Ibid._, No. 473; 481, March 20, the Rhinegrave to Warwick on the basis of a letter of the queen mother (Beza, II, 17, ed. 1841).

[684] _C. S. P. For._, Nos. 395, §2, March 3, 1563; 419, §5, March 7; 424, §§3, 4; Forbes, II. “La retarder d’un jour,” said De Losses in one of the sessions of the King’s council, “c’était exposer la ville de Paris au sac et au pillage, laisser le roi et la reine à la merci des protestants encore aux armes.” M. Gonnor, later the marshal Matignon, dwelt upon the miserable state of the country and concluded: “Je parle sans passion. Je ne suis pas huguenot et je supplie la cour de ne pas différer l’enrégistrement de l’édit.”—_Corresp. de Cath. de Méd._, II, Introd., iii.

[685] “Traité politique par lequel en quelque sorte la gentilhommerie provinciale s’isolait du puritanisme de Génève.”—Capefigue, 260.

[686] “C’est trop grand pitié que de limiter ainssy certains lieux pour servir à Dieu, comme s’il ne vouloit estre en tous endroicts.”—Fillon Collection, 2,657, the admiral to the landgrave from Caen, March 16, 1563.

[687] “Edict et déclaration faite par le roy Charles IX sur la pacification des troubles de ce Royaume: le 19 mars 1563,” Par., _Rob. Estienne_, 1563; Isambert, XIV, 135. The various pieces showing the evolution of the edict are to be found in _Mém. de Condé_, IV, 305, 333, 356, 498, 504. Cf. _C. S. P. For._, Nos. 428, 430, 431 (March 10, 1563).

Biron was sent into Provence in 1563 with instructions to give an account to the King of the manner in which justice was administered there and how the edict was executed. He was also to find the count of Tendes and Sommerive and express the King’s displeasure of their conduct. The royal instructions are evidence of the sincerity with which the government started to execute the edict (La Ferrière, _Rapport_, 46; cf. _Collection Trémont_, sér. 3, p. 124).

[688] _C. S. P. For._, No. 424, §16; No. 590, April 8, 1563; Forbes, II, 379.

[689] _C. S. P. Ven._, March 23, 1563. “Response faicte par le Roy (Charles IX) et son Conseil, aux Presidens et Conseillers de sa Cour de Parlement de Paris: Sur la remonstrance faicte à sa dicte maiesté, concernant la déclaration de sa Maiorité, et ordonnance faicte pour le bien, et repos publique de son Royaume” (Lyons, Rigaud, 1563).

In the first week of May the King summoned the members of the Parlement of Paris and the authorities of the city to St. Germain, commanding them before the week was out to obey the Edict of Toleration, to release those imprisoned for religion, and to lay down their arms (_C. S. P. For._, No. 703, §3, May 4, 1563). Paris finally published the edict, but observed it slightly, the Parlement admitting the “graces” of the edict, but saying it could not in its conscience allow two religions (_ibid._, No. 1190, 835, June 2, 1563). For an example of the violence of the capital see No. 895, June 15, 1562. The public criers and the very horses which they used in the crying of the edict in the city of Paris were in danger of being killed by the populace, which poured out of the mouths of the streets (Claude Haton, I, 328).

[690] “Le peuple y est fort sedicieux.”—Fourquevaux to St. Sulpice, October 13, 1563, _L’Ambassade de St. Sulpice_, 165.

[691] _Correspondance de Catherine de Médicis_, II, Introd., iv.

[692] _C. S. P. Ven._, March 29, April 10 and 20, 1563. On the prince de Porcien, see Le Laboureur, I, 389; also an article by Delaborde in _Bulletin de la Soc. prot. franç._, XVIII, 2. Claude Haton gives some vivid details about this retirement of the reiters (Vol. I, p. 355). Cf. _Correspondance de Catherine de Médicis_, II, 15, 16, 42. On the case of the Three Bishoprics see St. Sulpice, _ibid._; _C. S. P. Ven._, March 29, April 10, 1563; _C. S. P. For._, Nos. 323, §8, and 419, §5, 420, 455; _Nég. Tosc._, III, 403.

[693] Claude Haton, I, 279, 280.

[694] See the interesting account of an unsuccessful attempt by the reiters to storm a château (Claude Haton, I, 347-49).

[695] Claude Haton, I, 354.

[696] Quoted by Forneron, I, 277, note 1.

[697] _C. S. P. Ven._, April 21, 1563.

[698] _Correspund de Cath. de Méd._ Introd., cxlv-vi; cf. _R. Q. H._, October 1869, 349-51. Charles IX was firmly resolved to enforce the national traditions of the French monarchy with reference to the papacy. The fearless speech of Du Ferrier occasioned a sensation in the council. France was accused of wishing, like England, to secede from Rome and found a national church and it was even proposed to hand the ambassador over to the Inquisition (Frémy, _Un ambassadeur libéral sous Charles IX et Henri III_, 1880, p. 49). So energetic were the remonstrances of Lansac that he was derisively called the “ambassador of the Huguenots” (Frémy, 21).

On April 15, 1563, the King wrote to the cardinal of Lorraine to inform him that, having grown impatient at the slowness of the Council of Trent, he was sending the president Biragues to Trent and then to the Emperor with a mission to have the council transferred to a freer place if possible. The King declared that if the reforms demanded by Christianity were not accorded and confirmed by the council, France would not hesitate to convoke a national council. (See the instruction to D’Oysel in _Corresp. de Catherine de Médicis_, II, 1-3, note.)

[699] “Articles de l’alégation de messieurs les ambassadeurs, estant de present à la cour; envoyez, l’un par nostre saint père le Pape, l’autre par l’Empereur, Roy des Romains, l’autre par le Roy d’Espaigne, et le Prince de Piedmont. Au Roy de France et princes de son sang, au mois de Fevrier, 1563,” _Mém. de Condé_, V, 406-8; cf. _L’Ambassade de St. Sulpice_, 135 and 167.

[700] Lansac and Du Ferrier were the ambassadors of France at Trent. Lansac’s instructions, which outline the policy of France, are in Baschet, _Journal du Concile de Trente_, etc., 251-65; add D’Aubigné,