Chapter XIV: The Council of State

The council assembles in a sombre chamber panelled with dark oak, crossed by open rafters--a chamber that had remained unaltered since the days of Louis XI. A long table stands in the centre surrounded with leather chairs heavily carved, on which are seated the members of the council. Condé, who is of royal blood, takes the highest place on the Calvinist side. He is somewhat below middle height and delicately formed. His complexion is fair, his face comely; his dark eyes, sunk deep in his head, bright with the power of intellect, are both cunning and piercing. Nevertheless, it is a veiled face and betrays nothing. His dress is dark and simple, yet studiously calculated to display to the best advantage his supple and elegant figure. There is an air of authority about him that betrays itself unwittingly in every glance he casts around the room. He is a man born to command.

Next to him is a man older, sturdier, rougher; a powerfully built man, who sits erect and firm in his chair. His head is covered with long white hair; he has overhanging eyebrows, a massive forehead, and a firmly-closed mouth. His weather-beaten face and sunken cheeks show that he has lived a life of exposure and privation--a man thus to meet unmoved peril or death. He wears a homely suit of black woollen stuff much worn, and as he sits he leans forward, plunged in deep thought. This is Admiral Coligni. Beside him is his brother D’Andelot, slighter and much younger: he is dressed with the same simplicity as the Admiral, but wants that look of iron resolve and fanatic zeal which at the first glance stamps Coligny as a hero. Châtillon has placed himself beside his brother prelate of Lorraine. Each wears the scarlet robe of a cardinal, over which falls a deep edging of open guipure lace; their broad red hats, tasselled with silken cords, lie on the table before them. Lorraine is thin and dark, with a treacherous eye and a prevailing expression of haughty unconcern. Châtillon is bland and mild, but withal shrewd and astute; a smile rests upon his thin lips as his eyes travel round the table, peering into every face, while from time to time he whispers some observation to the Cardinal de Lorraine, the Minister of State, who effects not to hear him.

A door opens within a carved recess or dais raised one step from the floor, and Francis and Mary appear. The whole council rises and salutes the young King and Queen. They seat themselves under a purple velvet canopy embroidered in gold with fleurs-de-lys and the oriflamme. They are followed by Catherine and Francis Duc de Guise, a man of majestic presence and lofty stature. He is spare, like the Cardinal, but his eager eye and sharply cut features, on which many a wrinkle has gathered, proclaim the man of action and the warrior, ardent in the path of glory, prompt, bold, and unscrupulous. At the sight of Coligni, Condé, and Châtillon he knits his brows, and a sinister expression passes over his face which deepens into a look of actual cruelty as he silently takes his place next to Catherine de’ Medici.

The young King and Queen sit motionless side by side, like two children who are permitted to witness a solemn ceremony upon the promise of silence and tranquillity. They are both curious and attentive. Not all Mary Stuart’s questions have elicited further information from her uncles, and Francis, too feeble in health to be energetic, is satisfied with the knowledge that the Queen-mother occupies herself with affairs of state.

The Queen-mother, with a curious smile upon her face, stands for a few moments on the estrade facing the council-chamber. She coldly receives the chiefs of the Reformed faith, but her welcome is studiously polite. With the same grave courtesy she greets the Guises, Nemours, and the other Catholic princes. All are now seated in a circle of which Francis and Mary, motionless under the canopy of state, form the centre. Catherine rises from her chair and in a guarded address speaks of danger to the Crown from the Huguenot party, darkly hinting at a treasonable plot in which some near the throne are implicated, and she calls on those lords favourable to the Reformed religion for advice and support in this emergency.

As she speaks an evil light gathers in her eye, especially when she declares that she has at this time summoned her son’s trusty counsellors of the Calvinist faith in order to consider an edict of pacification, calculated to conciliate _all_ his Majesty’s subjects, and to rally _all_ his faithful servants round his throne.

Her composed and serious countenance, the grave deliberation of her discourse, her frank yet stately avowal of peril to the State and desire for counsel in an hour of danger, are all so admirably simulated that those not aware of her perfidy are completely duped.

Francis, her son, listens with wonder to his mother’s words, believing, as he does, that she is both indignant and alarmed at the machinations of that very party she has called to Amboise and which she now proposes to propitiate.

The Duc de Guise, who perfectly understands her drift, secretly smiles at this fresh proof of the dissimulation and astuteness of his cousin who caresses ere she grasps her prey. When she has ended he loudly applauds her conciliatory resolutions, and by so doing astonishes still more the unsuspicious Francis, as well as his niece Mary whose wondering eyes are fixed on him.

As to Coligni and the other Protestants, they fall blindfolded into the snare spread for them by Catherine, all save the Prince de Condé, who, crafty and treacherous himself, is more suspicious of others. He has marked, too, the Queen-mother’s words, “some near the throne,” and thinks he knows to whom they are applied. However, he immediately rises and in a few well-chosen phrases declares himself ready to defend the royal cause with his life. The Admiral next speaks, and in an eloquent harangue he unsuspectingly dilates on his own views of the present administration, and reproves the ambition of those princes who usurp the government of France. “There are two millions of Protestants in the kingdom,” he says, “who look to the heads of their own faith for relief from the tyranny and injustice under which they have long languished. Two millions,” repeats Coligni in a grave, sad voice, looking steadfastly round the circle, “who seek to live at peace, industrious, tranquil, loyal. But these two millions demand that they shall enjoy equal privileges with the least of his Majesty’s Catholic subjects. This is now refused. They ask to be neither suspected, watched, nor wilfully persecuted. If any conspiracy exists, such as is known to her Majesty the Queen-mother--and I accept her statement as true with the deepest sorrow--it can only arise from the bitter feeling engendered by the disgrace of these Calvinistic subjects of this realm who are uniformly treated as aliens, and repulsed with cruel persistency from such places of trust and honour as their services have entitled them to enjoy. Let these heavy grievances be removed, let his Majesty reign for himself _alone_”--and Coligni’s eye rests on the Duc de Guise and the Queen-mother--“with equal favour over both parties, Catholic as well as Protestant. Let the conciliatory edict now before the council be made public, and I, Gaspard de Coligni, bind myself upon my plighted word as a noble and upon my conscience as a devout Calvinist, that the House of Valois will for ever live in the hearts of our people, and receive from them as entire a devotion as ever animated subject to his sovereign.”

A deep silence follows Coligni’s address, and the Duc de Guise and the Cardinal de Lorraine exchange glances of indignation.

Francis has become more and more mystified. Timid and inexperienced, he fears to betray his absolute ignorance of state affairs, and perhaps incense his mother by indiscreet questions. But when the parchment, heavy with seals of state, is produced and borne to him by the Chancellor for signature, he can no longer conceal his astonishment that he should be called on to sign an edict giving both liberty and protection to those very persons whom the Queen-mother and his uncles had represented to him as his mortal enemies. He looks so long and earnestly at Catherine, that she, fearing that by one mistaken word he is about to destroy the whole fabric of her masterly dissimulation, rises quickly from the arm-chair in which she sits, and advancing quickly towards him with a commanding look and imperious gesture, takes the pen from the hand of the Chancellor and presents it to him herself.

“Sign, my son,” says she, “this edict which has been framed by the unanimous advice of your council in favour of your loyal subjects. Fear not to sanction this royal act of mercy. Your Majesty is still too young to understand the far-seeing wisdom of the act. Take it on my word, Sire, take it _now_ on my word. You will understand it better later.”

“Truly, madame,” replies the King, “I call God to witness that I desire the good of all my subjects, Huguenot and Catholic.” So saying he takes the pen and signs the edict. The council forthwith breaks up, and with what wondering curiosity on the part of the King and Mary, who dare ask no questions, cannot be told.