Chapter X: The Tour of the Provinces.814 the Bayonne Episode (2)

Valenciennes still remained the most prominent place of disaffection,[935] but Brussels was much infected.[936] But more formidable than local spirit was the marked tendency toward a union of the provinces[937] and the growing interest of the Huguenots in the Dutch and Flemish cause,[938] so much so that Cardinal Granvella strongly hinted at Spanish pressure being forcibly exerted upon France for the reduction of the Huguenots.[939] The cardinal hoped to see Charles IX and his mother more docile in receiving the advice of Spain since the withdrawal of Chantonnay, who was made Philip II’s ambassador at Vienna. But the theft of Alava’s cipher by the Huguenots threw him into despair.[940] The reciprocal connection between politics and religion in France and the Low Countries made the Spanish government watch the movement of events in France with vigilance.[941] So acute was the situation owing to Huguenot sympathy with the cause of insurrection across the border,[942] that although Granvella ridiculed the wild rumor that Montgomery was coming to Flanders, he nevertheless apprehended the possibility of a rupture with France and was relieved to know that precautions had been taken against any chance enterprise of the Huguenots along the edge of Artois and Hainault.[943]

Margaret of Parma and the nobles sent ambassadors to Spain to ask concession on two points: (1) that the provinces be governed by native officials; (2) that the punishment of heresy be moderated. The King hesitated long. It was not until October 17, 1565, that he gave decisive pronouncement in dispatches issued from Segovia. In them he ordered the maintenance of the Inquisition, the enforcement of the edicts, and the impoverishment of those who resisted. In a word, Philip II would not yield. The discontent against the administration of the King of Spain now turned against the King himself. William of Orange used the notable words, “We are witnessing the beginning of a great tragedy.”

In the face of the growing resistance the duke of Alva strongly advised Philip II to convert the towns into fortresses.[944] For the Flemish cities were, as yet, commercial groups, not fortified burgs. With the possible exception of Gravelines, no one of them was capable of making a sustained defense.

This suggestion happened to coincide with the English occupation of Havre-de-Grace and the possible return of Calais to England in return therefor. Such a contingency could but be viewed with anxiety by Spain,[945] and this fact, coupled with the uncertainty of developments in France induced Philip to follow out Alva’s suggestion by strengthening Gravelines. France at once became alarmed over Calais and protested in the same breath against the building of fortifications at Gravelines and the duty upon her wines.[946] In retaliation the French government also strengthened the garrisons on the edge of Picardy, under the direction of the prince of Condé (who was governor of the province), to the immense indignation of Spain.[947] The Spanish erections around Gravelines reacted also upon the state of things in Flanders. For new and heavier taxation was the indispensable point of departure for carrying out such measures, “unless one were willing to see everything said upon the subject vanish in smoke.” The sole effective remedy for the state of things prevailing in the Flemish provinces was, of course, to reorganize the finances and the administration of justice in accordance with the demands made by the nobles. But instead of attempting to do this, the government aimed to weaken the opposition by dividing the leaders, and the long silence of Philip II covered an attempt to draw away Egmont, who was regarded as the ringleader of the Flemish nobles at this time.[948] The Spanish government dreaded to summon the estates, as Orange insisted should be done, for fear of things in Brabant and the other provinces going the road of things in France under like conditions.[949]

In order, therefore, to provide for funds without asking the estates to vote subsidies, over which there was sure to be a conflict, the Spanish government in the Netherlands undertook to raise the needed money by tariffs. The cloth trade of England and the wine trade of France were the two commodities so taxed. In 1563 a duty was laid on French wine.[950] In the case of England, the excuse given for the high duty placed on imported cloth was precaution against the plague.[951] France at once protested against the tariff and threatened to retaliate by taxing the herring and cod trade, though the Spanish ambassador at Paris represented that such action would entirely destroy the wine trade and would compel reprisal.[952]

Flemish merchants were doubly alarmed at the state of things, for England, too, threatened reprisal by removing the cloth market from Antwerp to Embden and imposing tonnage duties on merchant ships of Flanders driven by stress of weather into English ports for safety during storm.[953] But the government in Flanders was obdurate. Granvella declared England’s threat to remove the staple to Embden to be “puerile rhodomontade.” He believed that not only would the prohibition against the import of English cloth compel Elizabeth to redress the grievances of Spanish subjects against England, but that it might even make the English government more lenient toward the Catholic religion. Furthermore, he argued, the tax would operate like a protective tariff to stimulate the manufacture of cloth in the Low Countries. “If not a single bolt of English cloth ever comes into Flanders again,” he wrote “it will be to the permanent profit of the Pays-Bas. We saw this clearly last year during the plague when the prohibition having temporarily suspended the importation of this kind of goods, there was manufactured in the single county of Flanders 60,000 pieces of cloth, or more than the sum total of the three preceding years.”[954] In the case of French wines the Flemish government even established a maximum law for their sale which cut the throat of French merchants worse than ever.[955] The French government carried the action of the Flemish government up to Madrid, where for months the duty on wine and the buttresses of Gravelines were matters of repeated interviews between St. Sulpice and the King, and were still unsettled questions at the time of the conference at Bayonne.[956] Meanwhile the conflict of the Flemish reform party became more acute because it became complicated with the question of religion.

In the light of all these circumstances, it is no wonder that Philip II hesitated long before giving his consent to an interview with Catherine de Medici.[957] Even then he imposed a number of conditions and regulations. He would not go in person to Bayonne—the place appointed; his wife was to be accompanied by the duke of Alva; display was to be avoided by either side both for motives of economy and to prevent having undue political significance attached to an interview which was to be understood to be purely personal. Philip II’s most striking regulations, however, were those which had to do with the French _entourage_. No one in the least tainted with heresy was to accompany the court. The queen of Navarre, whom the Spanish King carefully alluded to as “Madame de Vendôme,” the prince of Condé, the admiral, and the cardinal Châtillon were specifically named with abhorrence. The queen mother acquiesced in this prohibition, save in the case of the prince of Condé, protesting that, on account of his rank, it would give great offense to forbid his presence, as well as create belief among the Huguenots that the meeting contemplated something disadvantageous to them. History has shown that Catherine’s instincts were perfectly right in this particular; since after the massacre of St. Bartholomew the Huguenots—indeed almost the whole Protestant world—jumped to the conclusion that that disaster was preconcerted at Bayonne. In vain St. Sulpice argued political expediency, saying France and Spain must not be judged alike, and that “experience had proved that the way of arms had resulted in more dangers than profit to France.” Philip II’s answer was metallically hard; he would not consent to the presence either of Jeanne d’Albret or the prince of Condé at Bayonne, because it would be a reproach to him and to Spain for his wife to have had converse with a heretic.[958]

The last stage of Charles IX’s long tour of the provinces was from Bordeaux[959] to Bayonne[960] where the French court arrived on May 22, 1565. But that indolence of spirit which is so much associated with Spanish character seems as early as the sixteenth century to have become habitual,[961] so that the Spanish queen was forced to travel in the heat (six soldiers of Strozzi’s band died with their armor on from heat prostration), which aggravated the plague prevailing in certain parts.[962]

In conferences of state, especially international conferences, things of importance are confined within four walls. The sixteenth century was _par excellence_ the age of closet politics. The world upon the outside saw only the fêtes[963] that marked the interview at Bayonne. But these festivities were no more than the flecks or wreaths of glittering foam that float upon the bosom of the water for an instant and then are gone. The real business at Bayonne was politics. But the great importance for three hundred years[964] attributed to this famous interview is today proved to have had slight foundation in fact. The light of recent research has dissipated the traditional belief that Philip II and Catherine de Medici planned the massacre of the French Protestants at Bayonne, and finally consummated it on St. Bartholomew’s Day.[965] The truth is that not what was contemplated but _what was imagined was contemplated_ at Bayonne became the important historical influence of the future. An assumed fact came to have all the force of reality. The principals in this unfortunate conference, in point of truth, were far apart from one another. Philip II’s interests were wholly political, and personalities were merely incidental to his main purpose. On the other hand, the queen mother’s interests were chiefly personal, being centered in plans to achieve brilliant marriage alliances for her children, for whose sake she ruinously compromised herself and France.

If Catherine had been less vain and less foolishly affectionate, she would have striven harder for the solution of things more vital to France. It is true she was far from ignoring these issues entirely, but she weakened the cause of France in respect to them by subordinating these to her main purpose, so that she awakened the greater suspicion of Spain by her attempts to avoid answering in those matters of most concern to Philip II and by her continual harping upon the things that were nearest to her heart, but not of most moment either to France or to Spain. When the duke of Alva drove her into a corner and compelled her to answer the questions he put to her concerning greater politics, Catherine’s replies were fatal to her aspirations. What were these matters?

Alva’s instructions were strict. He was to demand the expulsion of the Huguenot ministers from France within thirty days; the interdiction of Protestant worship; acceptance of the decrees of the Council of Trent; profession of the Catholic religion by all office holders.[966] This policy of suppression and compulsion outlined by his sovereign was wholly in keeping with his, the duke’s, own judgment. But with greater penetration and less hesitation than Philip II, Alva recognized clearly the intimate connection between the politics of Flanders and the politics of France, and favored the adoption of a parallel line of conduct at once in the Low Countries. He was convinced that France was incapable of managing her own affairs and was a menace to other states, politically and religiously.[967] The means of repression which Spain had often urged had not produced the results desired: they had only delayed the total ruin of the nation. Suggestion and insinuation must be replaced by a more drastic policy. Assassination was a recognized, perhaps a quasi-legitimate political recourse in the eyes of the men of the sixteenth century. The old generation of French Catholics upon whom Spain could rely, the cardinal de Tournon, the duke of Guise, the marshal St. André, had passed away—one of them assassinated at the hands of a Huguenot. Tavannes and Vieilleville were reluctant to sacrifice country to religion, especially when a rival nation would profit thereby. The constable was the only old-time figure of prominence remaining, and he could not be relied on since the conflict between the marshal Montmorency and the cardinal of Lorraine, for he favored the side of his nephews and so was believed to be not far distant from the party of the admiral.[968] Power had fallen into the hands of the Huguenots, whose leaders now excelled in personal force. “The shortest, the most expeditious way, is to behead Condé, the admiral, D’Andelot, La Rochefoucauld, and Grammont,” Alva told the duke of Montpensier[969] and Montluc, the two most earnest French converts to this policy.[970]

But it was yet a far cry from this cool advocacy of assassination of the Protestant leaders to the wholesale slaughter of August 24, 1572. There is really no positive connection between the conference of Bayonne and the massacre of St. Bartholomew.[971] The slaughter of the French Protestants _as a sect_ was never advocated 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 Protestants, rather than a discriminating assassination of the Huguenot leaders.[972] The most radical action touching the Huguenots at large, it may safely be said, that was regarded practicable in 1564-65 was to forbid and prevent future conversion,[973] or else the wholesale exile of the Huguenots from the realm.[974] The alternative of total destruction was not contemplated anywhere in Europe or at any time, except in the single case mentioned.

No such crime as the massacre of the Huguenots was planned at Bayonne, nor perpetrated as the result of that conference. The principals in the case were too far apart in intention and conviction for so gigantic a programme. The paramount purpose of the queen mother was to marry Charles IX to the elder daughter of the Emperor, Margaret of Valois to Don Carlos, and the duke of Orleans (the future Henry III) to Donna Juana, Philip II’s sister. But Alva was crafty. By a series of adroit questions which tantalized her hopes and preyed upon her fears, he compelled Catherine de Medici to commit herself upon the very political issues which she wished to avoid discussing, until she was hopelessly compromised. In vain she doubled like a fox pursued by the hounds and tried to throw the duke off upon a false scent.

“France must be cleared of this vicious sect,” said Alva. In order to avoid replying, Catherine attempted, by a question, to turn the conversation to the subject of a universal league, whether it should be against the Turk or against the heretic. Alva was not thrown off. The queen resorted to sarcasm.

“Since you understand the evil from which France is suffering so well,” she said, “tell me the remedy.”

Alva sidestepped the direct shot, by suavely rejoining:

“Madame, who knows better than yourself?”

“The King, your master,” said Catherine ironically, “knows better than I everything that passes in France. What means would he employ to overcome the rebellious Protestants?”

Alva resorted to the Socratic method, hoping to involve the queen in the toils of argument.

“Has the religion gained or lost since the peace of Amboise?” he inquired insidiously.

“It has gained,” replied she.

The answer, in Spain’s eyes, was a condemnation of the policy of France; it was a thorn in the road of the queen’s ambitious hopes of marriage alliance. In her exasperation, Catherine upbraided her daughter for out-Spaniarding the Spaniard.

“I am a Spaniard, I admit,” said Elizabeth. “ It is my duty.”[975]

Catherine broached anew the possibility of Philip II consenting to have his sister marry her Benjamin—Henry duke of Orleans—and conferring Artois as dowry upon the pair.

“The king would never consent to sacrifice one of his provinces,” said Alva brusquely.

“But to give a Spanish province to the duke of Orleans,” argued the queen mother, blinded by maternal affection, “would be the same then as giving it to his own brother.”

Alva taxed the queen with maintaining a heretic, L’Hôpital, in the chancellorship, and of opposing the Tridentine decrees. Catherine emphatically denied the first charge, although her daughter again supported Alva’s indictment by declaring that even during the life of her father, L’Hôpital had passed for a Huguenot; as to the second, she said the crown of France objected to the political application of certain findings of the Council of Trent, which she hoped to have adjusted. Alva saw the vulnerable point in her reply and inquired if she aimed to call another assembly like the Colloquy of Poissy.

“I recognize the danger of such assemblies,” said Catherine, “but the king, my son, is strong enough to compel discussion only of those subjects which he may designate.”

“Was it so at Poissy?” sneered Alva.

The queen’s reply was a tirade against the cardinal of Lorraine, whom she blamed for the failure of the colloquy.

In the end there _was_ a promise given by the queen mother at Bayonne. But it was verbal, not written, and so governed by circumstances that the edge of Spain’s intentions was dulled. Compromising the agreement certainly was; convicting it is not, for, aside from the fact that its fulfilment was dependent upon an impossible condition of things, Catherine never permitted herself to express in writing what the terms of this promise were. Our knowledge of it is dependent upon Alva’s letters of June 15 and July 4; upon Philip II’s construction of it in a letter addressed by him to the cardinal Pacheco[976] on August 24, 1565, and the dispatch of the Venetian ambassador Suriano, who was with the French queen, to the senate on July 22, supplemented by what information St. Sulpice picked up during the last days of his mission in Spain.

It is evident from the careful reading of these documents that the real triumph at Bayonne was scored by the papacy; that Spain won a sterile victory, and France met an indecisive defeat. Spain and France, being unable to carry their own purpose through as each desired, compromised on a course which was an intermediate plane of agreement to them, but which, _according to the letter_, was a supreme triumph for Rome, and would have been a complete victory for Rome _if the terms had ever been executed_. The man of the hour was the cardinal Santa Croce, nuncio in France. His services are thus reported by the Venetian ambassador in France on July 2:

On the eve of departure, the queen, perceiving the discontent of the duke of Alva, summoned the nuncio, who was not far away, to Bayonne, in order to have him at hand. It is he who has found a solution; he has satisfied both parties. I shall be able to inform you shortly as to the nature of his solution.[977]

Three weeks later (July 22) the promised word was sent to Venice in the form of a cipher dispatch,[978] the information in which had been communicated to him in strictest secrecy.[979] This intensely important document reads as follows:

Now that I have received positive information, I shall tell everything to your Signory that has happened. Since his arrival, the duke of Alva has not ceased to urge the queen to give his master a manifestation of her good will toward the cause of religion by some manifest act, and he had urged her to cause the decisions of the Council of Trent to be observed throughout the whole realm of France, for which his Catholic majesty would show his satisfaction. The queen had yielded readily to this proposition and had told him that she was very inclined to convene an assembly of prelates, of theologians, and savants, to examine the decisions made at Trent, _without occupying themselves with doctrine_, but confining themselves to the reform of abuses. The duke had found this offer strange and had not concealed his discontent over it. According to him, this was to oppose a council to a council, which would be the worst of results and mightily displease the king his master. Since he urged the necessity of this measure, before passing to any other consideration, and was so obdurate, the queen, being very pained to see him depart so unsatisfied, and things being so desperate, notified the nuncio, who was not lodged at Bayonne like all the ambassadors, and ordered the _mareschal de logis_ of the palace to prepare accommodation for him and to have him come immediately. He came at once and being informed by the queen, went to find the duke, but was very badly received by him. The duke blamed and reproached him for not remaining firm in his opinion. The queen holding to the idea of this assembly of prelates and theologians, and the duke opposing it, the nuncio found another expedient which seemed to give satisfaction to all. He broached it to the queen, and with her consent communicated it to the duke. This remedy, at the twelfth hour, was very opportune. It is this: This assembly shall be held: but under certain conditions. The first is that the persons chosen to participate in it shall be of such influence as to be able to demand that no Huguenot shall sit in it; secondly, the assembly must conform to that which the queen had at first proposed; that is to say, all disputes over dogma and doctrine shall be forbidden. The queen, having accepted this, authorized the nuncio to communicate her consent to the duke, who showed himself satisfied. Both of them then came together to find the queen again, and on the next day, in the presence of the queen of Spain, the cardinal Bourbon, the marshal Bourdillon, and the leading nobles, the whole was confirmed.

Great benefit can come from this: by eliminating everything that pertains to dogma, and avoiding doctrinal difficulties, all the other resolutions which are of less importance will be strengthened, especially as the Huguenots, the only ones who can give trouble will be excluded. There is no doubt about both the king and the queen being disposed to the Catholic religion, since they have given proofs of it. I am, moreover, assured by what the queen has said, that there is no intention to touch any of the privileges of the Holy See, nor, per contra, any of the concessions made by the popes to the kings who were predecessors of the king now reigning. The execution of this convention thus arranged is not to take place until the return of the king to Paris.

The King of Spain, in the letter cited to Cardinal Pacheco, expressed his contentment with this agreement,[980] not perceiving that the application of it was capable of a great amount of flexibility. In his blindness he thought that the nuncio had broken the loaf so as to give the greater portion to Spain; while in reality the greater part was in the hands of the Pope, Philip II having actually but the difference between a fragment and no bread. In fine, no plot was entered into at Bayonne; no crime was ever committed in pursuance of an agreement arranged there. The “plot” agreed upon at Bayonne between Catherine de Medici and Philip II of Spain consisted of an ambiguous promise, the fulfilment of which was dependent upon an impossible condition of things.[981]

The affair of Bayonne was not a crime; it was a colossal blunder. The destruction of the ambitious marriage expectations of the Valois was the least loss. The irreparable thing was that France forfeited the confidence of her Protestant subjects. The secrecy that enveloped the conference made the Huguenots apprehensive of the worst. They believed that a Franco-Spanish alliance was made at Bayonne for their overwhelming; and the second civil war was the outcome of their misgivings.[982] 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 Ferrière 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 Protestants 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 encountered 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 exchanging false promises of alliance and friendship, Menendez was sailing for Florida, bearing orders for the massacre of all the French found there.[983]