Chapter XIX (3)

Upon the king himself the results of the fearful atrocities which he had been induced by his mother and brother to sanction, were equally lasting and disastrous. The change was startling even to those who were its chief cause: from a gentle boy he had become transformed into a morose and cruel man. "The king is grown now so bloody-minded," writes one who enjoyed good opportunities of observing him, "as they that advised him thereto do repent the same, and do fear that the old saying will prove true," "_Malum consilium consultori pessimum_."[1226] The story of the frenzy of Charles who, on one occasion, seemed to be resolved to take the lives of Navarre and Conde, unless they should instantly recant, and was only prevented by the entreaties of his young wife, may be exaggerated.[1227] But certain it is that the unhappy king was the victim of haunting memories of the past, which, while continually robbing him of peace of mind, sometimes drove him to the borders of madness. Agrippa d'Aubigne tells us, on the often repeated testimony of Henry of Navarre, that one night, a week after the massacre, Charles leaped up in affright from his bed, and summoned his gentlemen of the bedchamber, as well as his brother-in-law, to listen to a confused sound of cries of distress and lamentations, similar to that which he had heard on the eventful night of the butchery. So convinced was he that his ears had not deceived him, that he gave orders that the new attack which he fancied to be made upon the partisans of Montmorency should at once be repressed by his guards. It was not until the soldiers returned with the assurance that everything was quiet throughout the city, that he consented to retire to his rest again. For an entire week the delusive cries seemed to return at the self-same hour.[1228] These fancies--the creations of his fevered brain--may soon have left him, not to return until the general closing in at the death-bed. But there were marks of the violence of the passions of which he was the victim in his altered mien and deportment. Even before the event that has fixed upon him an infamous notoriety, he acted at times like a madman in the indulgence of his whims and coarse tastes. Sir Thomas Smith, five months before the fatal St. Bartholomew's Day, wrote of "his inordinate hunting, so early in the morning and so late at night, without sparing frost, snow or rain, and in so desperate doings as makes her (his mother) and them that love him to be often in great fear."[1229] But now the picture, as faithfully drawn by the friendly hand of the Venetian ambassador, early in the year 1574, is still more pitiful. His countenance had become sad and forbidding. When obliged to give audience to the representatives of foreign powers, as well as in his ordinary interviews, he avoided the glance of those who addressed him. He bent his head toward the ground and shut his eyes. At short intervals he would open them with a start, and in a moment, as though the effort caused him pain, he would close them again with no less suddenness. "It is feared," adds the writer, "that the spirit of vengeance has taken possession of him; formerly he was only severe, now his friends dread lest he will become cruel." He must at all hazards find hard work to do. He was on horseback for twelve or fourteen consecutive hours, and pursued the same deer for two or three days, stopping only to take nourishment, or snatch a little rest at night. His hands were scarred and callous. When in the palace, his passion for violent exercise drove him to the forge, where for three or four hours he would work without intermission, with a ponderous hammer fashioning a cuirass or some other piece of armor, and exhibiting more pride in being able to tire out his gentle competitors, than in more royal accomplishments.[1230] We have no means of tracing accurately the influence of the massacre upon others. The Abbe Brantome, however, early pointed out the remarkable fact that of those who took a principal part in the work of murder and rapine many soon after met with violent deaths, either at the siege of La Rochelle or in the ensuing wars, and that the riches they had so iniquitously accumulated profited them little.[1231]

[Sidenote: How far was the Roman Church responsible?]

Before dismissing the consideration of the stupendous crime for which Divine vengeance--to use the words of Sully--"made France atone by twenty-six consecutive years of disaster, carnage, and horror,"[1232] it is at once interesting and important to glance at a historical question which still agitates the world, and for a correct and impartial solution of which we are, perhaps, more favorably situated than were even the contemporaries of the event. I allude to the inquiry respecting the extent to which the Roman Church, and the Pope in particular, must be held responsible for the Massacre of St. Bartholomew's Day.

So far as Queen Catharine was concerned (and the same is true of some of her advisers), it is admitted by all that no zeal for religion controlled her conduct. A dissolute and ambitious woman, and, moreover, almost an avowed atheist, she could not have acted from a sincere but mistaken belief that it was her duty to exterminate heresy. But among the inferior agents it can scarcely be doubted that there were some who believed themselves to be doing God service in ridding the world of the enemies of His church. Had not the preachers in their sermons extolled the deed as the most meritorious that could be performed, and as furnishing an unquestionable passport to paradise? The number, however, of these _religious_ assassins--if so we may style them--could be but small in comparison with the multitude of those to whom religion served merely as a pretext, while cupidity or partisan hatred was the true motive; men who, nevertheless, derived their incentive from the lessons of their spiritual guides, and who would never have dreamed of giving loose rein to their passions, but for the suggestions of these sanguinary teachers. At the bar of history the priesthood that countenanced assassination must be held no less accountable for the actions of this class than for the deeds of more sincere devotees.

It is immaterial to the question of the responsibility of the Papal Church, whether the queen mother and the king's ministers were honest, or were Roman Catholics, or, indeed, Christians only in name. If the Pope had for years, by letter and by his accredited agents, been insinuating that the life of a heretic was a thing of little value; if he systematically advocated a war of extermination, and opposed every negotiation for peace, every truce, every edict of pacification that did not look to the annihilation of the Huguenots; if he had familiarized the minds of king and queen with the thought of justifiable massacre, it is of little importance to ascertain whether his too ready pupils executed the injunction from a pure desire to further the interests of the Papal See, or with more selfish designs. Unfortunately for humanity and for religion, the course I have indicated was that which had been consistently and indefatigably pursued during the entire pontificate of Pius the Fifth, and during the few months that had elapsed since the election of his successor.

[Sidenote: Gregory probably not aware of the intended massacre.]

Contrary to the firm persuasion of the Protestants who wrote contemporary accounts of the massacre, we must in all probability, as we have already seen,[1233] acquit Gregory the Thirteenth of any knowledge of the disaster impending over the admiral and the Huguenots. It was what he wished for and prayed for, but with little hope of seeing the accomplishment. In fact, he was brought to the verge of despair in respect to the hold of the papacy upon the kingdom of France. Nuncio Salviati, at Paris, had, indeed, conceived the hope that some disaster would befall the Huguenots in consequence of Coligny's imprudence and the desperation of the queen mother and of the Roman Catholic party at finding the authority slipping from their hands. But his astonishment and that of the pontiff at the general massacre of the Protestants was surpassed only by their common delight. The fragments of the despatches from Salviati to the Roman secretary of state, which have been suffered to find their way into print, seem to settle this point beyond all controversy.

[Sidenote: Pius the Fifth instigates the French court.]

[Sidenote: He indorses the cruelties of Alva.]

We have in previous chapters seen the Pope assisting Charles with money and troops in the prosecution of the last two wars against the Huguenots. But this aid was accompanied with perpetual exhortations to do the work thoroughly, and not to repeat the mistakes committed by his predecessors. "That heresy cannot be tolerated in the same kingdom with the worship of the Catholic religion," writes Pius the Fifth to Sigismund Augustus of Poland, "is proved by that very example of the kingdom of France, which your Majesty brings up for the purpose of excusing yourself. If the former kings of France had not suffered this evil to grow by neglect and indulgence, they would easily have been able to extirpate heresy and secure the peace and quiet of their realm."[1234] Of all the leaders of the day, the Duke of Alva alone earned, by his unrelenting destruction of heretics, the unqualified approval of the pontiff. When the tidings of the successes of the "Blood Council" reached Rome, Pius could not contain himself for joy. He must congratulate the duke, and spur him on in a course upon which the blessing of Heaven so manifestly rested. "Nothing can occur to us," said he, "more glorious for the dignity of the Church, or more delightful to the truly paternal disposition of our mind to all men, than when we perceive that warriors and very brave generals, such as we previously knew you to be and now find you in this most perilous war, consult not their own interest, nor their own glory alone, but war in behalf of that Almighty God who stands ready to crown His soldiers contending for Him and His glory, not with a corruptible crown, but with one that is eternal and fadeth not away."[1235]

[Sidenote: He repeatedly counsels exterminating the Huguenots.]

With this express indorsement of Alva's merciless cruelty before us, it is not difficult to understand what Pius demanded of Charles of France. Early in 1569, while sending the Duke of Sforza with auxiliaries, he wrote to the king: "When God shall by His kindness have given to you and to us, as we hope, the victory, it will be your duty to punish the heretics and their leaders with all severity, and thus justly to avenge not only your own wrongs, but those of Almighty God: in order that, by your execution of the righteous judgment of God, they may pay the penalty which they have deserved by their crimes."[1236] After the battle of Jarnac and Conde's death, we have seen that Pius wrote promptly, bidding Charles "pursue and destroy the remnants of the enemy, and wholly tear up not only the roots of an evil so great and which had gathered to itself such strength, but even the very fibres of the roots." He begged him not to spare those who had not spared God nor their king.[1237] To Catharine and to the Duke of Anjou, to the Cardinal of Bourbon, and to the Cardinal of Lorraine, the same language was addressed. Again and again the Pope held up the example of Saul, who disregarded the commands of the Lord through Samuel and spared the Amalekites, as a solemn warning against disobedience. To the queen mother he said: "Under no circumstances and from no considerations ought the enemies of God to be spared.[1238] If your Majesty shall continue, as heretofore, to seek with right purpose of mind and a simple heart the honor of Almighty God, and shall assail the foes of the Catholic religion openly and freely even to extermination,[1239] be well assured that the Divine assistance will never fail, and that still greater victories will be prepared by God for you and for the king your son, until, _when all shall have been destroyed_, the pristine worship of the Catholic religion shall be restored to that most illustrious realm."[1240] The Duke of Anjou was urged to incite his brother to punish the rebels with great severity, and to be inexorable in refusing the prayers of all who would intercede for them.[1241] Charles was given to understand that if, induced by any motives, he should defer the punishment of God's enemies, he would certainly tempt the Divine patience to change to anger.[1242]

The victory of Moncontour furnished an occasion for fresh exhortations to the king not to neglect to inflict upon the enemies of Almighty God the punishments fixed by the laws. "For what else would this be," said Pius, "than to make of no effect the blessing of God, namely, victory itself, whose fruit indeed consists in this, that by just punishment the execrable heretics, common enemies, having been taken away, the former peace and tranquillity should be restored to the kingdom. And do not allow yourself, by the suggestion of the empty name of pity, to be deceived so far as to seek, by pardoning Divine injuries, to obtain false praise for compassion; for nothing is more cruel than that pity and compassion which is extended to the impious and those who deserve the worst of torments."[1243] The work begun by victories in the field was, therefore, to be completed by the institution of inquisitors of the faith in every city, and the adoption of such other measures as might, with God's help, at length create the kingdom anew and restore it to its former state.[1244]

As often as rumors of negotiations for peace reached him, Pius was in anguish of soul, and wrote to Charles, to Catharine, to Anjou, to the French cardinals, in almost the same words. He protested that, as light has no communion with darkness, so no compact between Catholics and heretics could be other than feigned and full of treachery.[1245] As the prospect of peace grew more distinct, his prognostications of coming disaster grew darker, and sounded almost like threats. Even if the heretics, in concluding the peace, had no intention of laying snares, God would put it into their minds as a punishment to the king. "Now, how fearful a thing it is to fall into the hands of the living God, who is wont not only to chastise the corrupt manners of men by war, but, on account of the sins of kings and people, to dash kingdoms in pieces, and to transfer them from their ancient masters to new ones, is too evident to need to be proved by examples."[1246] When at last the peace of Saint Germain was definitely concluded, the Pope did not cease to lament over "a pacification in which the conquered heretics imposed upon the victorious king conditions so horrible and so pernicious that he could not speak of them without tears." And he expressed at the same time his paternal fears lest the young Charles and those who had consented to the unholy compact would be given over to a reprobate mind, that seeing they might not see, and hearing they might not hear.[1247]

To his last breath Pius retained the same thirst for the blood of the heretics of France. He violently opposed the marriage of the king's sister to Henry of Navarre, and instructed his envoy at the French court to bring up again that "matter of conciliation so fatal to the Catholics."[1248] His last letters are as sanguinary as his first. Meanwhile his acts corresponded with his words, and left the King of France and his mother in no doubt respecting the value which the pretended vicegerent of God upon earth, and the future Saint,[1249] set upon the life of a heretic; for, when the town of Mornas was on one occasion captured by the Roman Catholic forces, and a number of prisoners were taken, Pius--"such," his admiring biographer informs us, "was his burning zeal for religion"--ransomed them from the hands of their captors, that he might have the satisfaction of ordering their public execution in the pontifical city of Avignon![1250] And when the same holy father learned that Count Santa Fiore, the commander of the papal troops sent to Charles's assistance, had accepted the offer of a ransom for the life of a distinguished Huguenot nobleman, he wrote to him complaining bitterly that he had disobeyed his orders, which were that every heretic that fell into his hands should straightway be put to death.[1251] As, however, Pius wanted not Huguenot treasure, but Huguenot blood, with more consistency than at first appears, he ordered the captive nobleman whose head had been spared to be released without ransom.[1252]

With such continual papal exhortations to bloodshed, before us, with such suggestive examples of the treatment which heretics ought, according to the pontiff, to receive, and in the light of the extravagant joy displayed at Rome over the consummation of the massacre, we can scarcely hesitate to find the head of the Roman Catholic Church guilty--if not, by a happy accident, of having known or devised the precise mode of its execution, at least of having long instigated and paved the way for the commission of the crime. Without the teachings of Pius the Fifth, the conspiracy of Catharine and Anjou would have been almost impossible. Without the preaching of priests and friars at Lent and Advent, the passions of the low populace could not have been inflamed to such a pitch as to render it capable of perpetrating atrocities which will forever render the reign of Charles the Ninth infamous in the French annals.

* * * * *

[Sidenote: A German account of the massacre at Orleans.]

One of the most vivid accounts of the massacre in any city
outside of Paris is the contemporary narrative of Johann
Wilhelm von Botzheim, a young German, who was at the time
pursuing his studies in Orleans. It forms the sequel to the
description of the Parisian massacre, to which reference has
already been made several times, and was first published by
Dr. F. W. Ebeling, in his "Archivalische Beitraege zur
Geschichte Frankreichs unter Carl IX." (Leipsic, 1872),
129-189. It was also translated into French by M. Charles
Read, for the number of the Bulletin de la Societe de
l'histoire du protestantisme francais issued on the occasion
of the tercentenary of the Massacre of St. Bartholomew's Day.
The chief interest of the narration centres in the anxieties
and dangers of the little community of Germans in attendance
upon the famous law school. Besides this, however, much light
is thrown upon the general features of the bloody
transactions. The first intimation of Coligny's wounding
reached the Protestants as they were returning from the
preche, but created less excitement because of the statement
accompanying it, that Charles was greatly displeased at the
occurrence. That night a messenger arrived with letters
addressed to the provost of the city, announcing the death of
the admiral and the Huguenots of Paris, and enjoining the like
execution at Orleans. Although the letters bore the royal
seal, the information they contained appeared so incredible
that the provost commanded the messenger to be imprisoned
until two captains, whom he at once despatched to Paris,
returned bringing full confirmation of the story. The provost,
a man averse to bloodshed, issued, early on Monday morning as
a precautionary measure, an order to guard the city gates. But
the control of affairs rapidly passed out of his hands, and,
threatened with death because of his moderate counsels, the
provost was himself forced to take refuge for safety in the
citadel. Ten captains at the head of as many bands of
soldiers, ruled the city, and were foremost in the work of
murder and rapine that now ensued. But there were other bands
engaged in the same occupation, not to speak of single persons
acting strictly on their own account. Moreover, four hundred
ruffians came in from the country, intent upon making up for
losses which they pretended to have sustained during the late
civil wars. They showed no mercy to the Huguenots that fell
into their hands. Of the Protestants scarcely one made
resistance, so hopeless was their situation. Pierre Pillier, a
bell founder, had indeed barred his door with iron, but,
finding that his assailants were on the point of forcing the
entrance, he first threw his money from a window, and then,
seizing his opportunity when the miscreants were scrambling
for their prize, deluged them with molten lead, after which he
set fire to his house, and perished, with his wife and
children, in the flames.

There is, happily, no need of repeating here the shocking
details of the butchery told by the student. As a German, and
not generally known to be a Protestant, he managed to escape
the fate of his Huguenot friends, but he witnessed, and was
forced to appear to applaud, the most revolting exhibitions
both of cruelty and of selfishness. His favorite professor,
the venerable Francois Taillebois, after having been twice
plundered by bands of marauders, was treacherously conducted
by the second band to the Loire, despatched with the dagger,
and thrown into the river. "The last lecture, which he gave on
Monday at nine o'clock," says his pupil, "was on the _Lex
Cornelia_ [de sicariis] of which he made the demonstration by
the sacrifice of his own life." It is pitiful to read that
even professors in the university were not ashamed to enrich
their libraries by the plunder of the law-books of their
colleagues, or of their scholars. The writer traced his own
copies of Alciat, of Mynsinger and "Speculator," to the
shelves of Laurent Godefroid, Professor of the Pandects, and
the entire library of his brother Bernhard to those of his
neighbor, Dr. Beaupied, Professor of Canon Law.

In the midst of the almost universal unchaining of the worst
passions of human or demoniacal nature, it is pleasant to note
a few exceptions. Some Roman Catholics were found not only
unwilling to imbrue their hands in the blood of their Huguenot
neighbors and friends, but actually ready to incur personal
peril in rescuing them from assassination. Such magnanimity,
however, was very rare. All respect for authority human or
divine, all sense of shame or pity, all fear of hell and hope
of heaven, seemed to have been obliterated from the breasts of
the murderers. The blasphemous words of the furious Captain
Gaillard, when opposed in his plan to destroy Botzheim and his
fellow Germans, truly expressed the sentiments which others
might possibly have hesitated to utter so distinctly. "Par la
mort Dieu! il faut qu'il soit.... Il n'y a ny Dieu, ny
diable, ny juge qui me puisse commander. Vostre vie est en ma
puissance, il fault mourir.... Baillez-moy mon espee, je
tuerai l'ung apres l'autre, je ne saurois tuer trestous a la
fois avec la pistolle." Men, with blood-stained hands and
clothes, boasted over their cups of having plundered and
murdered thirty, forty, fifty men each. At last, on Saturday
afternoon, after the Huguenots had been almost all killed, an
edict was published prohibiting murder and pillage on pain of
death. Gallows, too, were erected in nearly every street, to
hang the disobedient; but not a man was hung, and the murders
still continued. Soon after a second edict directed the
restoration of stolen property to its rightful owners; it was
a mere trick to entice any remaining Huguenot from his refuge
and secure his apprehension and death. The Huguenots were not
even able to recover, at a later time, the property they had
intrusted to their Roman Catholic friends in time of danger,
and did not dare to bring the latter before courts of justice.
The Huguenots killed at Orleans, in this writer's opinion,
were at least fifteen hundred, perhaps even two thousand, in
number.

FOOTNOTES:

[1079] Charles IX. to Mondoucet, August 26th, Compte rendu de la com. roy. d'histoire, Brussels, 1852, iv. 344.

[1080] "Estant croiable que ce feu ainsy allume ira courant par toutes les villes de mon royaume, lesquelles, a l'exemple de ce qui s'est faict en cestedite ville, s'assureront de tous ceulx de ladite religion." Charles to Mondoucet, Aug. 26th, _ubi supra_, iv. 345

[1081] "Car puisqu'il a pleu a Dieu conduire les choses es termes ou elles sont, je ne veulx negliger l'occasion, non seulement pour remectre, s'il m'est possible, ung perpetuel repos en mon royaume, mais aussy servir a la chrestiente."

[1082] "Au surplus, quelque commandement verbal que j'aye peu faire a ceulx que j'aye envoye tant devers vous que autres gouverneurs ... j'ay revocque et revocque tout cela, ne voulant que par vous ne autres en soit aucune chose execute." Charles IX. to Mandelot, Governor of Lyons, Correspondance, etc. (Paris, 1830), 53, 54; the same to the Mayor of Bourges, Mem. de l'estat (Archives curieuses), vii. 313. The variations of language are trifling.

[1083] He seems at this time to have been at his castle of Montsoreau, situated six or seven miles above Saumur, on the left bank of the Loire, and within a short distance of Candes. M. de Montsoreau himself is described as "gentilhomme de Poictou fort renomme pour beaucoup de pillages et violences, qui finalement luy ont fait perdre la vie, ayant este tue depuis en qualite de meurtrier." Mem. l'estat, 349.

[1084] These letters, and some others relating to the massacre at Angers, contained in the archives of the municipality, are printed in the Bulletin de la Soc. de l'hist. du prot. francais, xi. (1862) 120-124.

[1085] I know, however, of no letters of this kind signed by Charles IX. himself. They all seem to have been written by his inferior agents, such as Puigaillard in the case of Saumur, or Masso and Rubys in that of Lyons. The advantage of this course was apparent. The king could not be _proved_ to have ordered any massacre; he could throw off the responsibility upon others. On the other hand, such politic governors as Mandelot were naturally reluctant to act upon instructions which could at any moment be disavowed. The verbal messages of Charles himself would seem, from the Mandelot correspondence, to have been less definite--perhaps going to no greater lengths than to order the arrest of the persons and the sequestration of the effects of the Huguenots. May we not naturally suppose that the king and his council counted upon such subsequent massacres of the imprisoned Protestants as occurred in many places?

[1086] Memoires de l'estat, 132, 133. Compare De Thou, iv. (liv. lii.) 601.

[1087] Relation of Olaegui, Simancas MSS., Bulletins de l'academie royale de Belgique, xvi. (1849) 254, 255.

[1088] The names of nine are given. Archives curieuses, vii. 264.

[1089] The procureur Cosset did not neglect his own interests, if, as we are informed, his house and courtyard were so full of stolen furniture that it was scarcely possible to enter the premises.

[1090] Memoires de l'estat, _apud_ Archives curieuses, vii. 261-270.

[1091] See _ante_, chapter xviii., p. 432.

[1092] Recordon, le Protestantisme en Champagne (from the MSS. of N. Pithou, seigneur de Chamgobert), Paris, 1863, 174-192; Mem. de l'estat, Archives curieuses, vii. 271-292.

[1093] Dr. Henry White, besides mistaking the Huguenot for the Papist, has incorrectly stated the circumstances. Massacre of St. Bartholomew, 450. See Mem. de l'estat, _ubi supra_, 295, and De Thou, iv. (liv. lii.) 601.

[1094] Memoires de l'estat, _ubi supra_, 295. "Le mesme fut fait a Paris et en d'autres lieux aussi," writes the same historian.

[1095] Ibid., _ubi supra_.

[1096] Ibid., 296.

[1097] Memoires de l'estat de France, _ubi supra_, 297.

[1098] Mem. de l'estat, 298, 299.

[1099] Ibid., 299, 300.

[1100] A horrible story is told of the discovery of some human relics several weeks later. Ibid., 305.

[1101] See _ante_, p. 502.

[1102] Mem. de l'estat, 309-315.

[1103] Mem. de l'estat, _ubi supra_, 349-351. "Puigaillard ... homme au reste indigne de vivre pour l'acte detestable par luy commis en la personne de sa premiere femme tuee a sa sollicitation pour en espouser une autre qu'il entretenoit." (P. 351.)

[1104] Registres consulaires, _apud_ "La Saint-Barthelemy a Lyon et le gouverneur Mandelot," by M. Puyroche, p. 311. This monograph which I quote from the Bulletin de la Soc. de l'hist. du prot. francais, in which it first appeared (vol. xviii., 1869, pp. 305-323, 353-367, and 401-420), is by far the most accurate and complete treatise on this subject, and contains a fund of fresh information based upon unpublished manuscripts, especially the local records.

[1105] Charles IX. to Mandelot, Aug. 22, 1572, Correspondance du roi Charles IX. et du sieur de Mandelot, published by P. Paris, 1830 (pp. 36, 37). A portion of this letter has already been given.

[1106] Charles IX. to Mandelot, Aug. 24, 1572, Correspondance, etc., 39-42.

[1107] "Monsieur de Mandelot, vous croirez le present porteur de ce que je luy ay donne charge de vous dire." Ibid., 42.

[1108] "Suivant icelles (the king's letters of Aug. 22d and 24th) et _ce que le sieur du Perat m'auroit dict de sa part_, je n'auroit failly pourveoir par toutz moyens a la seurete de ceste ville: _sy bien, Sire, que et les cors_ (corps) _et les biens de ceulx de la relligion auroient este saisiz et mis soubz votre main_ sans aucun tumulte ny scandale." Mandelot to Charles IX., Sept. 2, 1572, Correspondance, etc., 45.

[1109] Puyroche, 319.

[1110] "Il n'etait pas d'avis," dit-il, "que tout le peuple s'en melat, craignant quelque desordre, memement un sac." Puyroche, 320.

[1111] "Quelques deux cens," says Mandelot to Charles IX., Sept. 2d; but he was anxious to make the number as small as possible. Jean de Masso, "receveur general" (Sept. 1st), says, "sept a huit vingt," and sieur Talaize (Sept. 2d), "deux cent soixante et trois." So also Coste (Sept. 3d). Puyroche, 365, 366.

[1112] Mandelot tells Charles IX. (Sept. 17th) that he had sent all the _poorer_ Huguenots to other prisons; that he had left here only the rich and those who had borne arms for the Protestant cause. To exhibit his own incorruptibility, he added that there were among them, of his own certain knowledge, at least twenty who would have paid a ransom of thirty thousand or even forty thousand crowns, "qui estoit assez," he significantly adds, "pour tenter ung homme corruptible." Correspondance du roi Charles IX. et du Sieur de Mandelot, 71, 72.

[1113] Correspondance, etc., p. 46, 47.

[1114] Puyroche, La Saint-Barthelemy a Lyon et le gouverneur Mandelot, _ubi supra_; Mem. de l'estat, _ubi supra_, 321-343; Crespin, Hist. des martyrs, 1582, p. 725, etc., _apud_ Epoques de l'eglise de Lyon (Lyon, 1827), 173-185; De Thou, iv. (liv. lii.) 602-604, etc.; Jean de Serres (1575), iv., fol. 45, etc. The number of Huguenots killed is variously estimated, by some as high as from twelve hundred to fifteen hundred (Crespin, _ubi supra_). It must have been not less than seven hundred or eight hundred; for private letters written immediately after the occurrence by prominent and well-informed Roman Catholics state it at about seven hundred, and they would certainly not be inclined to exaggerate. The rumor at Paris even then set it at twelve hundred. See the letters in Puyroche, 365-367. Among the one hundred and twenty-three names that have been preserved, the most interesting is that of Claude Goudimel, who set Marot's and Beza's psalms to music, and who was killed by envious rivals. At the time of his death he was engaged in adapting the psalms to a more elaborate arrangement, according to a contemporary writer: "Excellent musicien, et la memoire duquel sera perpetuelle pour avoir heureusement besogne les psaumes de David en francais, la plupart desquels il a mis en musique en forme de motets a quatre, cinq, six et huit parties, et sans la mort eut tot apres rendu cette oeuvre accomplie." Sommaire et vrai discours de la Felonie. etc, Puyroche, 402.

[1115] "Faisant cependant contenir ce peuple par toutes les remontrances et raisons que je puis leur persuader de ne s'emouvoir a aucune sedition ni tumulte, comme je m'apercois qu'il y en peut avoir quelque danger auquel toutes fois j'espere prevenir." Mandelot to Charles IX., Aug. 31, 1572, Puyroche, 356. This letter is not contained in Paulin Paris, Correspondance de Charles IX. et du sieur de Mandelot.

[1116] Mem. de l'estat, 330; De Thou, iv. (liv. lii.) 603.

[1117] "Je ne veulx estre le premier a en demander a votre Majeste; m'asseurant que si elle a commence par quelques autres, elle me faict tant d'honneur de ne m'oblier (oublier)." Mandelot to Charles IX., September 2, 1572, Correspondance, p. 49. I find the clearest evidence both of Mandelot's having had no hand in the massacres of August 31st, and of his utter want of principle, in the craven apology he makes, in his letter of September 17th, for not having done more, on the ground that he only knew his Majesty's pleasure as it were in a shadow, and very late, and that he had rather feared the king would be angry at what the people had done, than that so little had been done! "La pouvant asseurer sur ma vie que si elle n'a este satisfaitte en ce faict icy, je n'en ay aucune coulpe, n'ayant sceu quelle estoit sa volunte que par umbre, encores bien tard et a demy; et ay craint, Sire, que votre Majeste fust plustost courroucee de ce que le peuple auroit faict, que de trop peu, d'aultant que par toutes les autres provinces circonvoysines il ne s'est rien touche." Correspondance, etc., 72, 73.

[1118] It is given word for word, from the MS. registers of the parliament, by Floquet, Hist. du parlement de Normandie, iii. 81-85.

[1119] _Ante_, chapter xvii., p. 374.

[1120] "Encor qu'il se soit tousjours monstre fort peu amy de telles inhumanitez." Memoires de l'estat, 371.

[1121] "Receut lettres du Roy qui luy mandoit et commandoit expressement d'exterminer tous ceux qui faisoyent profession de la religion audit lieu, sans en excepter aucun." Mem. de l'estat, Arch. cur., vii. 370.

[1122] Ibid., 371.

[1123] "Il n'y a aultre que vous," said they, "qui puisse commander aux armes ceans, contenir le peuple en l'obeissance au roy, et la ville en paix." Reg. secr. du parlement, 9 Septembre, 1572, _apud_ Floquet, 120. See also Reg. de l'hotel-de-ville de Rouen, 7 Septembre, _ibid._

[1124] Floquet, 122.

[1125] Mem. de l'estat, _apud_ Archives curieuses, vii. 373.

[1126] Memoires de l'estat, _apud_ Arch. curieuses, vii. 372; Floquet, iii. 127. Floquet is incorrect in stating that the names of only about a hundred are known. We have (Mem. de l'estat. Archives curieuses, vii. 372-378) a partial list of 186 men, whose names and trades are generally given, and of 33 women--that is 219, besides a reference to many others whose names the writer did not obtain.

[1127] "Les autres estoyent _accommodez_ a coups de dague. Les massacreurs usoyent de ce mot _accommoder_, l'accommodans a leur bestiale et diabolique cruaute." Mem. de l'estat, _ubi sup._, 372.

[1128] Mem. de l'estat, _ubi sup._, 378.

[1129] Ibid., 379. The story of the massacre is well told in the Mem. de l'estat, and by M. Floquet, whose original sources of information throw a flood of light upon the transactions; also by De Thou, iv. (liv. lii.) 606; Agrippa d'Aubigne, ii. 27; Jean de Serres (1575), iv., fol. 50.

[1130] One of them, Jean Coras, had committed an unpardonable offence. When passing in 1562 with the Protestant army through Roquemadour, in the province of Quercy, he had taken advantage of the opportunity to examine the relics of St. Amadour, of whom the monks boasted that they possessed not only the bones, but also some of the flesh. He was never forgiven for having exhibited the close resemblance of the holy remains to a shoulder of mutton. De Thou, iv. 606, note.

[1131] Mem. de l'estat, Archives curieuses, vii. 381-385; De Thou, _ubi supra_; Agrippa d'Aubigne, ii. 27, 28 (liv. i., c. 5); Jean de Serres (1575), iv., fol. 50.

[1132] President Lagebaston even says that, had this been suffered to go on a week longer--so rapidly were the Protestants flocking to the mass--there would not have been eight Huguenots in town.

[1133] Registers of Parliament, in Boscheron des Portes, Hist. du parl. de Bordeaux (Bordeaux, 1877), i. 241.

[1134] Letter of President Lagebaston to Charles IX., October 7, 1572, Mackintosh, Hist. of England, iii., App. E, 351-353. See also De Thou, iv. 651, 652, and Agrippa d'Aubigne, ii. 27. Lagebaston was "first president" of the Bordalese parliament, but, so far from being able to prevent the massacre, received information that his own name was on Montferrand's list, and fled to the castle of Ha, whence he wrote to the king. His remonstrances against a butchery based upon a pretended order which was not exhibited, his delineation of the impolitic and disgraceful work, and his reasons why an execution, that might have been necessary to crush a secret conspiracy at Paris, was altogether unnecessary in a city "six or seven score leagues distant," where there could be no thought of a conspiracy, render his letter very interesting.

[1135] Registres du Parlement, Boscheron des Portes, i. 246, 247.

[1136] Boscheron des Portes, _ubi supra_.

[1137] Claude Haton waxes facetious when describing the sudden popularity acquired by the sign of the cross, and the numbers of rosaries that could be seen in the hands, or tied to the belt, of fugitive Huguenot ladies.

[1138] Tocsain contre les massacreurs, 156. See _ante_, chapter xviii., p. 491.

[1139] De Felice, Hist. of the Protestants of France (New York, 1859), 214, and Henry White, 455, from Maimbourg, Histoire du Calvinisme, 486. I refer the reader to Mr. L. D. Paumier's exhaustive discussion of the story in his paper, "La Saint-Barthelemy en Normandie," Bulletin de la Soc. de l'hist. du prot. francais, vi. (1858), 466-470. Mr. Paumier has also completely demolished the scanty foundation on which rested the similar story told of Sigognes, Governor of Dieppe, pp. 470-474. See also M. C. Osmont de Courtisigny's monograph, "Jean Le Hennuyer et les Huguenots de Lisieux en 1572," in the Bulletin, xxvi. (1877) 145, etc.

[1140] Tocsain contre les massacreurs, 156; Odolant Desnos, Memoires historiques sur la ville d'Alencon, ii. 285, _apud_ Bulletin de la Soc. de l'hist. du prot. francais, viii. (1859), 68. The truth of the story as to Alencon seems to be proved by the circumstance that when, in February, 1575, Matignon marched against Alencon, in order to suppress the conspiracy which the duke, Charles's youngest brother, had entered into to prevent Henry of Anjou from succeeding peaceably to the throne of France, the grateful Protestants at once opened their gates to him. Ibid., 305, Bulletin, _ubi supra_.

[1141] Tocsain, 156.

[1142] "Par lesquelles vous me mandez n'avoir receu aucun commandement verbal de moy, ains seulement mes lettres du 22, 24 et 28 du passe, dont ne vous mettrez en aucune peine, car elles s'adressoyent seulement a quelques-uns qui s'estoyent trouvez pres de moy." Charles IX. to Gordes, Sept. 14, 1572, Archives curieuses, vii. 365, 366.

[1143] Ibid., 367, 368.

[1144] Memoires de l'estat, Archives curieuses, vii. 366, 367; De Thou, iv. 605. The Tocsain contre les massacreurs, however, p. 156, gives credit instead to M. de Carces.

[1145] Dr. White has shown some reasons for doubting the accuracy of the story. Among the Dulaure MSS. is preserved a full account of the manner in which a Protestant, fleeing from Paris, fell in with the messenger who was carrying the order to St. Herem or Heran, and robbed him of his instructions. The Protestant hastened on to warn his brethren of their danger, while the messenger could only relate to the governor the contents of the lost despatch. Notwithstanding this, eighty Huguenots were murdered in one city (Aurillac) of this province. Massacre of St. Bartholomew, 454, 455.

[1146] Adiram d'Aspremont.

[1147] Agrippa d'Aubigne, Hist. univ., ii. 28 (liv. i., c. 5). The authenticity of this letter has been much disputed, partly because of the Viscount's severe and cruel character (which, however, D'Aubigne himself notices when he tells the story), partly because it rests on the sole authority of D'Aubigne. It is to be observed, however, that although he alone relates it, he alludes to it in several of his works, as _e.g._, in his Tragiques. But the truth of the incident is apparently placed beyond all legitimate doubt by its intimate and necessary connection with an event which D'Aubigne narrates considerably later in his history, and from personal knowledge. Hist. univ., ii. 291, 292 (liv. iii., c. 13). In 1577, D'Aubigne, having lost much of Henry of Navarre's favor through his fidelity or his bluntness (see Mem. de d'Aubigne, ed. Panth., p. 486), retired from Nerac to the neighboring town of Castel-jaloux, of which he was in command. Making a foray at the head of a small detachment of Huguenot soldiers, he fell in with and easily routed a Roman Catholic troop, consisting of a score of light horsemen belonging to Viscount D'Orthez, and a number of men raised at Bayonne and Dax, who were conducting three young ladies condemned at Bordeaux to be beheaded. The vanquished Roman Catholics threw themselves on the ground and sued for mercy. On hearing who they were, D'Aubigne called to him all those who came from Bayonne and then cried out to his followers to treat the rest in memory of the massacre in the prisons of Dax. The Huguenots needed no further reminder. It was not long before they had cut to pieces the twenty-two men from Dax who had fallen into their hands. On the other hand they restored to the soldiers of Bayonne their horses and arms, and, after dressing their wounds in a neighboring village, sent them home to tell their governor, Viscount D'Orthez, "that they had seen the different treatment the Huguenots accorded to _soldiers_ and to _hangmen_." A week later, a herald from Bayonne arrived at Castel-jaloux, with worked scarfs and handkerchiefs for the entire Huguenot band. Nor did the exchange of courtesies end here. The mad notion seized Henry of Navarre to accept an invitation to a feast extended to him by the Bayonnese. Six Huguenots accompanied him, of whom D'Aubigne was one. The table was sumptuous, the presents were rare and costly. D'Aubigne being recognized, was overwhelmed with thanks, "his courtesy being much more liberally repaid than he had deserved;" while the King of Navarre and his Huguenots, at the table, "at the expense of the rest of France, extolled to heaven the rare and unexampled act and glory of the men of Bayonne." It is certainly an easier supposition that D'Aubigne has faithfully reproduced D'Orthez's letter to Charles IX., than that he has manufactured so long and consistent a story. The discussion in the Bulletin de la Soc. de l'histoire du prot. franc. is full, xi. 13-15, 116, etc., xii. 240.

[1148] Letter of Louis de Bourbon, Duke of Montpensier, Aug. 26th (it should evidently be the 25th; for the Duke speaks of Coligny as killed "ledit jour d'hier," and the mythical Huguenot plot was to have been executed "hier ou aujourd'hui"). Bulletin de la Soc. de l'hist. du prot. fr., i. (1852) 60, and Soldan, Geschichte des Prot. in Frankreich, ii., App., 599.

[1149] The words are those of an inscription of the seventeenth or the early part of the eighteenth century, in the Hotel de Ville of Nantes. Bulletin, i. (1852) 61.

[1150] Mem. de l'estat, Archives cur., vii. 385, 386.

[1151] See a table in White, Massacre of St. Bartholomew, 461.

[1152] Narrative appended to Capilupi, Stratagema di Carlo IX. (1574). The cardinal's adulatory letter to Charles IX., on receipt of the king's missive, is strongly corroborative of the view to which everything forces us, that the massacre was not long definitely premeditated. "Sire," he said, "estant arrive le sieur de Beauville avecques lettres de Vostre Majeste, qui confirmoyent les nouvelles des tres-crestiennes et heroicques deliberation et exequutions faictes non-seulement a Paris, mais aussi partout voz principales villes, je m'asseure qu'il vous plaira bien me tant honorer ... que de vous asseurer que entre tous voz tres humbles subjects, je ne suis le dernier a an (en) louer Dieu et a me resjouir. Et veritablement, Sire, c'est tout le myeus (mieux) que j'eusse ose jamais desirer ni esperer. Je me tienz asseure que des ce commencement les actions de Vostre Majeste accroistront chacung jour a la gloire de Dieu et a l'immortalite de vostre nom," etc. Card. Lorraine to the king, Rome, Sept. 10, 1572, MSS. Nat. Library, _apud_ Lestoile, ed. Michaud et Poujoulat, 25, 26, note.

[1153] Conjouissance de Mr. le Cardinal de Lorraine, au nom du Roy, faicte au Pape, le vije jour de sept. 1572, sur la mort de l'Admiral et ses complices. Correspondance diplom. de La Mothe Fenelon, vii. 341, 342. Also Jean de Serres (1575) iv., fol. 56, and in a French translation appended to Capilupi, Lo stratagema di Carlo IX. (1574), 111-113, and reproduced in Mem. de l'estat, Arch, cur., vii. 360.

[1154] "Literis romanis aureis majusculis descriptum, festa fronte velatum, ac lemniscatum, et supra limen aedis Sancti Ludovici Romae affixum."

[1155] The genuineness of this medal, in spite of the clumsy attempts made to discredit it, is established beyond all possible doubt. The Jesuit Bonanni, in his "Numismata Pontificum" (2 vols. fol., Rome, 1689), has figured and described it as No. 27 of the medals of Gregory XIII. A translation of his account and a facsimile of the medal may be seen in the Bulletin de la Societe de l'hist. du prot. francais, i. (1852) 240-242. It is also admirably represented in the Tresor de Numismatique (Delaroche, etc., Paris, 1839), Medailles des papes, plate 15, No. 8. The late Alexander Thomson, Esq., of Banchory, Aberdeenshire, purchased at the papal mint in the city of Rome, in 1828 or 1829, among other medals for which he applied, not less than seven copies of this medal, six of them struck off expressly for him from the original die still in possession of the mint. See his own account, given in his Memoir by Professor Smeaton, and reproduced in the _New York Evangelist_ of October 17, 1872.

[1156] Recueil des lettres missives de Henri IV., i. 36.

[1157] See Pistolesi, Il Museo Vaticano descritto ed illustrato (Roma, 1838) vol. viii. 97. There are three paintings, of which the first represents "the King of France sitting in parliament, and approving and ordering that the death of Gaspard Coligny, Grand Admiral of France, and declared to be head of the Huguenots, be registered." "The mischance of Coligny is delineated in the following picture in a spacious square, among many heads of streets (capistrade) and facades of temples. The admiral, clothed in the French costume of that period, is carried in the arms of several military men; although lifeless (estinto, read rather, _faint_), he still preserves in his countenance threatening and terrible looks." The third is the massacre of St. Bartholomew's day itself, in which the beholder scarcely knows which to admire most, the artistic skill of the painter, or his success in bringing into a narrow compass so many of the most revolting incidents of the tragedy--the murder of men in the streets, the butchery of helpless and unoffending women, the throwing of Coligny's remains from the window of his room, etc. Dr. Henry White gives a sketch of this painting, taken from De Potter's Lettres de Pie V. Of the fresco representing the wounding of Coligny there is an engraving in Pistolesi, _ubi supra_, vol. viii. plate 84. By an odd mistake, both the text and the index to the plates, make this belong to the reconciliation of Frederick Barbarossa and the pontificate of Alexander III.--on what grounds it is hard to imagine. The character of the wound of the person borne in the arms of his companions, indicated by _the loss of two fingers of his right hand_, from which the blood is seen to be dropping, leaves no doubt that he is the Admiral Coligny. Unfortunately, Pistolesi's splendid work is disfigured by other blunders, or typographical errors, equally gross. In describing other paintings of the same Sala Regia (pp. 95, 96), he assigns, or is made by the types to assign, various events in the quarrel of Barbarossa and Adrian IV. and Alexander III., to the years 1554, 1555, 1577, etc.

[1158] Ferralz to Charles IX., Rome, Sept. 11, 1572, _apud_ North British Review, Oct., 1869, p. 31.

[1159] Prospero Count Arco to the emperor, Rome, Nov. 15, 1572, _ubi supra_.

[1160] "Il pontefice, e universalmente tutta d'Italia grandemente se ne rallegro, facendo pardonare cotale effetto al Re e alla Reina, che molte cose avevano sostenuto di fare in benefizio di quella parte." G. B. Adriani, Istoria de' suoi tempi, ii. 378.

[1161] Cuniga to Philip, Sept. 8th, Simancas MSS. Gachard, Bull. de l'acad. de Bruxelles, xvi. 249, 250.

[1162] "A. N. S. mi faccia gratia di basciar i piedi in nome mio, col quale mi rallegro con le viscere del cuore che sia piaciuto alla Dva. Msa. d'incaminar, nel principio del suo pontificato, si felicemente e honoratamente le cose di questo regno." Salviati to Card. sec. of State, Aug. 24, Mackintosh, iii., App. G., p. 355.

[1163] "Non si risolvo a credere che si fusse fatto tanto a un pezzo." Ibid., _ubi supra_.

[1164] "De quoy nous aseurons que en leoures Dieu aveques nous, tant pour nostre particulier coment pour le bien qui en reviendre a toute la cretiente et au service et honeur et gloyre de Dieu," etc.

[1165] "Et randons par cet ayfect le temognage de nos bonnes et droyctes yntantions, cor ne les avons jeames eu aultre que tendant a son honneur," etc. Letter of Catharine de' Medici to Philip II., Aug. 28, 1572, in Musee des archives nationales; documents originaux de l'hist. de France, exposes dans l'Hotel Soubise (published by the Gen. Directory of the Archives, 1872), p. 392.

[1166] Philip had evidently no intimation that a massacre was in contemplation. When Mr. Motley says (United Netherlands, i. 15): "It is as certain that Philip knew beforehand, and testified his approbation of the massacre of St. Bartholomew, as that he was the murderer of Orange," the statement must be interpreted in accordance with that other statement in the same author's earlier work (Rise of the Dutch Republic, ii. 388): "The crime was not committed with the connivance of the Spanish government. On the contrary, the two courts were at the moment bitterly opposed to each other," etc. As the eminent historian can scarcely be supposed to contradict himself on so important a point, we must understand him to mean that Philip had, indeed, long since instigated Catharine and her son to rid themselves of the Huguenot leaders by some form of treachery or other, but was quite ignorant of, and unprepared for, the particular means adopted by them for compassing the end.

[1167] St. Goard to Charles, Sept. 12th, Bodel Nijenhuis, Supplement to Groen van Prinsterer, Archives de la maison d'Orange Nassau, 124-126. St. Goard was not deceived by Philip's pious congratulations. "Ce faict," he writes to Catharine, a week later (ibid., pp. 126, 127), "a este aussi bien pris de se (ce) Roy comme on le peult penser, _pour luy estre tant profitable pour ses affaires_; toutesfois, comme il est le prince du monde qui scait et faict le plus profession de dissimuler toutes choses, si n'a il sceu celler en ceste-cy le plaisir qu'il en a receu, et encores que je infere touts ses mouvements procedder du bien que en recepvoient ses affaires, lesquelles il voioit pour desplorer sans ce seul remedde, si a il faict croire a tout le monde par ces aparens (apparences) que c'estoit pour le respect du bon succez que voz Majestez avoient eu en si haultes entreprises, tantost louant le filz d'avoir une telle mere, l'aiant si bien garde," etc.

[1168] See the Mondoucet correspondence, Compte rendu de la commission royale d'histoire, second series, iv. (Brux., 1852), 340-349, pub. by M. Emile Gachet, especially the letter of Charles IX. of Aug. 12th, 1572.

[1169] "El dicho embaxador me propuso ... con grande instancia, que sin dilacion se devia executar la justicia en Janlis (Genlis) y en los otros sus complices que hay estan presos, y en los que se tomassen en Mons." Philip to Alva, Sept. 18th. Simancas MSS. Gachard, Particularites inedits sur la St. Barthelemy, Bulletin de l'academie royale de Belgique, xvi. (1849), 256.

[1170] Charles IX. to Mondoucet, Aug. 31st, Mondoucet correspondence, p. 349; see also another letter of the same date, p. 348.

[1171] "Estant _l'un plus grands services_ que se puisse faire pour la Chrestiente, que de la _prendre et passer tout au fil de l'espee_." St. Goard to Charles IX., Sept. 19th, Supp. to Archives de la maison d'Orange Nassau, 127.

[1172] Philip to Alva, _ubi supra_.

[1173] Alva to Philip, Oct. 13th, Gachard, Correspondance de Philippe II. (Brux., 1848), ii. 287.

[1174] Mondoucet to Charles IX., Aug. 29th, Bull. de l'acad. roy. de Brux.

[1175] Bulletin de l'acad. roy. de Bruxelles, ix. (1842), 561.

[1176] Philip to Alva, _ubi supra_.

[1177] Bulletin of Alva from the report of his agent, the Seigneur de Gomicourt, published by M. Gachard, from MSS. of Mons, in Bull. de l'acad. de Bruxelles, ix. (1842), 560, etc.

[1178] Despatch of Sept. 14, 1572, Correspondance diplomatique, v, 121.