History of the Rise of the Huguenots Volume II Part 19

[376] Cartas que el Duque de Alba scrivio, etc. Papiers d'etat du card. de Granvelle, ix. 315.

[377] "Yo me altere _terriblemente_ de oirselo, y le dixe que me maravillava mucho." Ibid., ix. 317.

[378] "La junta pa.s.sada de adonde comencaron todas las desverguencas que al presente ay en este reyno." Ibid., ix. 317.

[379] "En la otra el cardenal de Lorena havia sido el que avia hecho todo el dano, pensando poder persuadir a los ministros." Ibid., _ubi supra_.

[380] "Parecenos que quiere con esta semblea (i.e., a.s.semblee), que ellos llaman, remendar lo que falta en el rigor necessario al remedio de sus vasallos, y plega a Dios no sea," etc. Ibid., ix. 318.

[381] Letter of Granvelle, Aug. 20, 1565, Papiers d'etat, ix. 481.

[382] "Depuis l'arrivee n'y eust mention que de festins, recreations et pa.s.se-temps de diverses manieres." Relation du voyage de la reine Isabelle d'Espagne a Bayonne, MSS. Belgian Archives, Compte Rendu de la commission royale d'histoire, seconde serie, ix. (1857) 159. This paper was drawn up by the Secretary of State Courtewille, and sent to President Viglius.

[383] Over the first triumphal arch was a representation of Isabella (or Elizabeth) trampling Mars under foot, with the mottoes _Sacer hymen pacem n.o.bis contulit_ and _Deus n.o.bis haec otia fecit_, and below the lines:

elizabeth, de roy fille excellente, Vous avez joint ung jour deux rois puissans; France et l'Espaigne, en gloire permanente, Extolleront voz ages triumphans, etc.

Over a second arch at the palace gate, which was reached by a street hung with tapestry and decorated with the united arms of France and Spain, was suspended a painting of Catharine with her three sons and three daughters, and the inscription:

C'est a l'entour de royalle couronne Que le jardin hesperien floronne: Ce sont jardins de si belle feconde, Qui aujourd'huy ne trouve sa seconde; Ce sont rameaux vigoureux et puissans; Ce sont florons de vertu verdissans.

Royne sans per (paire), de grace decoree, Vous surmontez Pallas et Cytheree.

Catharine's portraits scarcely confirm the boast of her panegyrist that she surpa.s.sed Venus, however well she might match Minerva in sagacity.

[384] Agrippa d'Aubigne, Histoire universelle, i. 1.

[385] "Le feu bon homme Monsieur de La Gaucherie y marchoit en rondeur de conscience, et mesme mon filz lui doibt et aux siens cette rasine (racine) de piete qui lui est, par la gra.s.se de Dieu, si bien plantee au cueur par bonnes admonitions, que maintenant, dont je loue ce bon Dieu, elle produit et branches et fruitz. Je lui suplie qu'il luy fa.s.se ceste gra.s.se qu'il continue de bien en mieulx." Letter of Dec. 6, 1566, MSS. Geneva Library, Bulletin de la Soc. de l'hist. du prot. francais, xvi. (1867) 65.

[386] "Ung tournoy a pied."

[387] It will be remembered that the Spaniards never acknowledged the claim of Antoine or his wife to the t.i.tle of sovereigns of Navarre. In all Spanish doc.u.ments, therefore, such as that which we are here following, their son Henry is designated only by the dukedom of Bourbon-Vendome which he inherited from his father.

[388] Relation du voyage de la reine Isabelle a Bayonne, MSS. Belgian Archives, _ubi supra_, ix. 161, 162.

[389] See Jean de Serres, iii., 53, for the fraternities of the Holy Ghost in Burgundy. Blaise de Montluc's proposition of a league with the king as its head had been declined; the monarch needed no other tie to his subjects than that which already bound them together. Agrippa d'Aubigne, Hist. univ., liv. iv., c. v. (i. 206.)

[390] Letter of Charles IX. to M. de Matignon, July 31, 1565, _apud_ Capefigue, Hist. de la Reforme, de la Ligue, etc., ii. 419, 420. The same letter stipulated for the better protection of the Protestants by freeing them from domiciliary visits, etc.

[391] Maniquet to Gordes, August 1, 1565, Conde MSS. in Aumale, i. 528.

[392] Letter of Villegagnon to Granvelle, May 25, 1564, Papiers d'etat, vii. 660. The Huguenots figure as "les _Aygnos_, c'est-a-dire, en langue de Suisse, rebelles et conjures contre leur prince pour la liberte."

[393] Letter of May 27, 1564, Ibid., vii., 666.

[394] Letter of N. de St. Remy, June 5, 1564. Ibid., viii. 24, 25. "Le peuple l'aymeroit trop mieulx pour roy que nul aultre de Bourbon."

[395] Catharine never forgave Amba.s.sador Chantonnay for having boasted that, with Throkmorton's a.s.sistance, he could overturn the State. "Jusqu'a dire que Trokmarton, qui estoit amba.s.sadeur d'Angleterre au commencement de ces troubles, pour l'intelligence qu'il a avec les Huguenots, et luy pour celle qu'il a avec les Catholiques de ce royaume, sont suffisans pour subvertir cet Estat." Letter to the Bishop of Rennes, Dec. 13, 1563, La Laboureur, i. 784.

[396] Granvelle to Philip II., July 15, 1565. Papiers d'etat, ix. 399, 402, etc.

[397] See Alex. Sutherland's Achievements of the Knights of Malta (Phila., 1846), ii. 121, which contains an interesting popular account of this memorable leaguer.

[398] Papiers d'etat du card. de Granvelle, ix. 545, etc.

[399] Giovambatista Adriani, Istoria de' suoi tempi (Ed. of Milan, 1834), ii. 221.

[400] Sir Thomas Smith to Cecil, Nantes, Oct. 12, 1565, State Paper Office, Calendar.

[401] Sir Thomas Smith to Leicester, Nov. 23, 1565, State Paper Office.

[402] "Al qual tempo si riserv tale esecuzione per alcuni sospetti, che apparivano negli Ugonotti, e per difficolta di condurvegli tutti, e ancora perche piu sicuro luogo era Parigi che Molino." Giovambatista Adriani, Istoria de' suoi tempi (lib. decimottavo), ii. 221.

[403] De Thou, iii. (liv. x.x.xix.) 660-664; Castelnau, liv. vi., c. ii.; Jehan de la Fosse, 76; Davila, bk. iii. 98.

[404] The edict, of course, is not to be found in Isambert, or any other collection of French laws; but a letter in Lestoile (ed. Michaud, p. 19), to whom we are indebted for most of our knowledge of the event, refers to the very wording of the doc.u.ment ("ce sont les mots de l'edict"). The letter is ent.i.tled "Memoire d'un differend meu a Moulins en 1566, entre le Cardinal de Lorraine et le Chancellier de l'Hopital," and begins with the words: "Je vous advise que _du jour d'hier_," etc. M. Bonnet has discovered and published, in the Bulletin de la Soc. de l'hist. du prot.

franc., xxiv. (1875) 412-415, a second and fuller account, dated Moulins, March 16, 1566 (MS. French Nat. Library, Dupuy, t. lx.x.xvi., f. 158). As was seen above (p. 155), this altercation has been generally confounded with that of two years earlier. The letter given by Lestoile (see above) is also published in Mem. de Conde, v. 50, but is referred to the wrong event by the editor. Prof. Soldan (Gesch. des Prot. in Fr., ii. 199), follows the Mem. de Conde in the reference.

[405] Not many months before this occurrence a guest at the Prince of Orange's table told Montigny that there were no Huguenots in Burgundy--meaning the Spanish part, or Franche-Comte. "If so," replied the unfortunate n.o.bleman, "the Burgundians cannot be men of intelligence, since those who have much mind for the most part are Huguenots;" a saying which, reported to Philip, no doubt made a deep impression on his bigoted soul. Pap. d'etat du card. de Granvelle, vii. 187, 188. The Burgundians of France were equally intolerant of the reformed doctrines.

[406] "Je ne suis venu pour troubler; mais pour empescher que ne troubliez, comme avez faict par le pa.s.se, belistre que vous estes."

Lestoile and Mem. de Conde, _ubi supra_.

[407] See Prescott, Philip II., and Motley, Rise of the Dutch Republic.

[408] M. Charles L. Frossard, of Lille, discovered the MSS. on which the following account is wholly based, in the Archives of the Department du Nord, preserved in that city. As these papers appear to have been inedited, and are referred to, so far as I can learn, by no previous historian, I have deemed it proper to deviate from the rule to which I have ordinarily adhered, of relating in detail only those events that occurred within the ancient limits of the kingdom of France. However, the reformation at Cateau-Cambresis received its first impulses from France.

Mr. Frossard communicated the papers to the Bulletin de la Societe de l'histoire du protestantisme francais, iii. (1854), 255-264, 396-417, 525-538. They are of unimpeachable accuracy and authenticity.

[409] Lille MSS., _ubi supra_, 403.

[410] "De sorte qu'ils esperent que lesdits de la requeste et du compromis les adsisteront suyvant leur promesse, a ce qu'ils puissent jouyr de la mesme liberte accordez a Bruxelles, ascavoir, que l'exercise de la religion aye lieu par tout ou il a este usite auparavant, comme ceulx du Chastel en Cambresis ont eue aussy, et ce seulement par maniere de provision, jusques a ce que aultrement il y soict pourveu par le Roy avec l'advis des estatz, estimans que le Roy ne souffrira rien en son pays qui ne soict conforme ausdites ordonnances de l'empire." Lille MSS., _ubi supra_.

[411] Letter of P. de Montmorency, Sept. 11, 1566, Lille MSS., _ubi supra_.

[412] Motley, Dutch Republic, i. 458-462.

[413] Lille MSS., _ubi supra_.

[414] Memoires de Claude Haton, i. 416, 417.

[415] The satirical literature of the period would of itself fill a volume. The Huguenot songs in derision of the ma.s.s are particularly caustic. See M. Bordier, Le Chansonnier Huguenot, and the note to the last chapter. The Bulletin de la Soc. de l'hist. du prot. franc., x. (1861), 40, reprints a "dizain" commencing--

"Nostre cure est un fin boulanger, Qui en son art est sage et bien appris: Il vend bien cher son pet.i.t pain leger, Combien qu'il ait le froment a bon prix."

[416] "Chose indigne d'un prince tel qu'il se disoit." Journal d'un cure ligueur (Jehan de la Fosse), 73.

[417] See the moderate account of the dispa.s.sionate Roman Catholic De Thou, iii. (liv. x.x.xix.) 666-670. Also Agrippa d'Aubigne, liv. iv., c. vi.

(i. 208), and Discours des troubles advenus en la ville de Pamiers, le 5 juin 1566, Archives curieuses (Cimber et Danjou), vi. 309-343. The ma.s.sacre of Protestants at Foix was caused by an exaggerated and false account of the commotion at Pamiers, carried thither by a fugitive Augustinian monk.