dispossess him of his kingdom. He saw his error when it was too late, and was obliged to solicit that assistance which he had rejected when offered. He had disgraced himself by acts of the most impolitic cruelty, and, unable to crush the schemes of the duke of Guise by a manly resistance and vigorous exertions of authority, he meanly employed assassins to murder that prince, and his brother, the cardinal of Lorraine, in the castle of Blois. This cruel and dissolute tyrant continued to reign for fifteen years. His kingdom was at length delivered from him by the hand of a fanatic enthusiast. Jacques Clement, a Jacobin monk, actuated by the belief that he was doing an act of consummate piety, insinuated himself into the palace, and stabbed the king with a knife in the belly. The assassin was put to death on the spot by the king's guards, and Henry died in a few days of

the wound.

As the succeeding monarch of France had begun before this time to display his illustrious talents, I shall give a short, uninterrupted sketch of his memorable life.

At

Henry of Navarre, the first of the house of Bourbon who sat on the throne of France, was descended, in a direct male line, from Robert count of Clermont and lord of Bourbon, the sixth son of Louis IX., surnamed Saint Louis. His mother was Jane d'Albret, daughter of Henry d'Albret, king of Navarre. tached to the party of the Calvinists, she had educated her son in the same principles, and from those talents which he very soon Degan to display, the party of the Huguenots in France looked up to him as the great support of their interest. In 1569, being at that time only sixteen years of age, he was declared, at Rochelle, chief of the Huguenot party; and the prince of Condé, his uncle, with the admiral Coligni, were named to act under him as his lieutenants. They were unsuccessful at the battle of Jarnac, where Condé lost his life, and likewise in the succeeding engagement at Moncontour. In the following year Charles IX. made peace with the protestant party, in the diabolical view of accomplishing by treachery what he found himself unequal to achieve by his arms. To prove the sincerity of his reconciliation with the Huguenot chiefs, he invited young Henry of Navarre to Paris, and bestowed upon him his sister Margaret of Valois in marriage. The party thus lulled asleep, the barbarous monarch a'tempted, as we have seen, to extinguish them by a single blow, and in the horrible eve of St. Bartholomew about 100,000 fell by the sword. Henry of Navarre, saved from this massacre of his party by declaring himself a catholic, remained, after this event, about three years a prisoner. After the death of Charles IX., having found means to escape to Alençon, in the year 1576, he put himself once more at the head of the protestants. The conduct of the party we have already seen during the reign of Henry III. This monarch, on his death-bed, had acknowledged

Henry of Navarre the lwful heir to the crown. Three sons of Henry II. had now reigned consecutively; and, having no chil dren, Henry of Navarre, descended from Louis IX., was indeed the first prince of the blood, and consequently the nearest in succession to the throne. But he had to combat the formidable opposition of The League, who chose for their sovereign the cardinal of Bourbon, Vendôme. The pope was of necessity Henry's enemy; and Philip II. of Spain encouraged his son-inlaw, the duke of Savoy to invade Dauphiné and Provence. Henry had nothing to support him but the justice of his cause, his own courage, and the zeal of his small party. The first successful effort of his arms was at Arques, in the neighborhood of Dieppe, where with 5000 men he defeated the army of the league under the duke of Mayenne, consisting of 25,000 men. His numbers now increased to 10,000, and he defeated Mayenne a second time, in the celebrated battle of Ivry. He pursued his advantages, and marched directly to Paris. This city, which was strongly in the interest of the league, made a most obstinate resistance; but the Parisians would have been compelled by famine to open their gates to Henry, had not Philip II. sent the duke of Parma with a powerful army to their relief. This event deprived him of the fruit of his victories: but he took such wellconcerted steps, that his enemies were able to gain no considerable advantages. The nation, aware of the ambitious views of Philip, began to be afraid of falling under a foreign yoke. Henry was made to understand, that the greatest obstacle to the success of his wishes was his religion. His counsellor Rosni, the cele brated duke of Sully, told him in plain terms, that it was neces sary for the salvation of France that he should embrace the catholic faith. The disorders of the kingdom could not otherwise have been composed, nor the schemes of the Spanish monarch defeated. Henry yielded to the necessity of circumstances: he made a formal abjuration at St. Denis, and was crowned king, at Chartres, in the year 1594. The city of Paris was chiefly garrisoned by the Spaniards, but the marshal de Brisac, with infinite address, formed an association of the magistrates and principal citizens, and opened to Henry the gates of the town. He made his public entry into the capital of his kingdom almost without the effusion of blood, and he gave a free pardon to all the partisans of the league; ordering, at the same time, the whole foreign troops instantly to evacuate his dominions. Yet Henry was far from being in possession of the whole of the kingdom of France; and he was obliged to have recourse to as many intrigues as battles, in order to recover it by degrees. Almost his whole life was spent in fighting against one chief or another, in negotiating, and even in purchasing, the submission of his enemies; and, at length, in what situation was this kingdom when he recovered it? The revenues of the state were

exhausted, the provinces ruined by neglect and by the ravages of the armies, and the country depopulated. France stood in need of a prince like Henry IV., a genius who understood the arts of peace as well as of war, who was capable of searching into the wounds of the state, and knew how to apply the most effectual remedies!

The ambitious Philip had been far from laying aside his views upon the accession of Henry. His armies continued to ravage the provinces. It was, therefore, necessary for Henry to bend his attention in the first place to the extirpation of these invaders. By the indefatigable industry of his counsellor, Sully, and by loans from his subjects, he found means to raise those supplies which were necessary for the support of a regular army. He was successful against the Spaniards, who were forced to conclude with him the peace of Vervins, the only advantageous treaty that France had made since the reign of Philip Augustus.

From that time forward he devoted his whole attention to the improvement of his kingdom, and the advancement of the happiness of his subjects. He disbanded all his superfluous troops; he introduced order and economy into the administration of the finances; he reformed the laws, repressed every species of persecution, and brought about the most difficult of all coalitions--a perfect harmony and good understanding between the protestants and catholics. A spirit of commerce and manufactures, the certain proofs of a wise and equitable government, began to diffuse itself through all the provinces of the kingdom. The cities were enlarged and embellished; the capital decorated with magnificent buildings; and the fine arts encouraged by the munificent patronage of a prince whose taste was equal to his liberality.

Henry, whom the pope in the beginning of his career had anathematized, as an heretic and usurper, was now the darling son of the church, and the highest favorite of the see of Rome. Such was his credit with pope Paul V., that the pontiff chose him as his mediator with the state of Venice, and at the request of one who had been formerly excommunicated himself, took off a sentence of excommunication which he had denounced against that republic.

His great political talents were equalled by his private virtues He was the kindest master, the most affectionate parent, and the warmest friend. His manners were noble without the smallest tincture of severity, and he possessed that engaging affability of behavior, which in him, deriving its origin from a native goodness of heart, was very different from that affected complaisance, the usual courtly engine of acquiring popularity. There was a greatness of soul in this prince, which manifested itself in the whole of his character. That generosity in the forgiveness of injuries, which is ever the attendant of a noble mind, was in him most remarkable. Many of those who, in the

earlier period of his life, had taken the most violent part against him, and who, according to the common rules of human conduct, had nothing to expect after he had attained the throne but punishment, or at least disgrace, were astonished to meet not only with entire forgiveness, but even with marks of favor and confidence. He knew how much even the best natures may be perverted by the spirit of faction. He could not harbor resentment against a humbled adversary, and his own good heart informed him, that an enemy forgiven might become the most valuable of friends. It was thus that he won to himself the affections of those nobles, the chief supporters of the league which so violently opposed his succession to the crown. Of all his enemies, the marshal Biron was the only one who suffered a capital punishment; and to him he had three times offered mercy, on the condition of his making a confession of his crimes.*

To form a proper judgment of this most estimable man, it is necessary to read the Memoirs of the duke of Sully, where we see the picture of the greatest and the most amiable of princes delineated by the hand of a faithful servant, a counsellor, and a companion; a friend who was no less acquainted with the public schemes and the motives of his political conduct than with all the circumstances of his private life. "Should a faithful picture of this illustrious character," says Voltaire, "be drawn in the hearing of a judicious foreigner who had never before been acquainted with his name; and should the narrator conclude that this very man was at length assassinated in the midst of his people, after repeated attempts against his life by persons to whom he had never done the smallest injury, it would be impossible for him to believe it." Whether this atrocious deed arose from the designs of a party, or was the mere suggestion of a distempered brain in the wretch who perpetrated it, is to this day a matter of doubt and uncertainty. The regicide Ravaillac himself protested that he had no accomplices. On the 14th of May, 1610, as Henry, together with the duke d'Epernon, was on his way to the house of Sully, the prime minister, and while the coach was stopped by some

Pere ixe relates a little anecdote, which shows that this beautiful feature of Henry's character, the forgiveness of injuries, extended itself to the meanest ranks of his subjects. Being one day in his coach with the marshal d'Estrées, he desired that nobleman to observe one of the life-guards who walked at the coach-docr. That," said he, "is a brave fellow; it was he who wounded me at the battle of Aumale."

Who is there that can read without emotion the conversation that passed between this great man and his confidant Sully at Monceaux, when Henry attacked with a dangerous illness, thought himself dying. Mon ami, je n'op prehende nullement la mort, comme vous le savez mieux que personne, m'ayant và en tant de périls dont je me fusse bien pu exempter; mais je ne nierai point que je n'aie regret de partir de cette vie sans eslever ce royaume en la splendeur que je m'etois propose, et avoir tesmoigné a mes peuples, en les soulageant et deschargeant de tant de subsides, et les gouvernant amiablement, que je les aimois comme s'ils etoient mes enfans."-Sully, Economies Royales. tom. i., ch. 85.

embarrassment in the street, the king, suddenly turning towards one of the windows, was struck twice into the heart with a knife, and instantly expired. The affliction felt by his subjects on this great national calamity was such as no words can describe. There never, perhaps, existed a sovereign who more merited, or who more entirely possessed, the affections of his people. Henry had lived to the age of fifty-seven, and at the time of his death is said to have been employed in projecting one of the greatest and most extraordinary schemes that ever entered into the head of man.*

CHAPTER XXVIII.

ENGLAND AND SCOTLAND IN THE REIGNS OF ELIZABETH AND MARY, QUEEN OF SCOTS:- Personal Enmity of Elizabeth and Mary-Reformation in Scotland-Regency of Mary of Guise-John Knox-Intervention of EnglandConfession of Faith ratified by Parliament-Mary arrives in Scotland-Artful Measures of Elizabeth in Scotland-Murder of Rizzio-of Darnley-Forced Abdication of Mary-James VI. proclaimed - Battle of Langsyde - Mary imprisoned in England-Executed, 15×7—Ambitious Schemes of the Earl of Essex-Death and Character of Elizabeth.

WHILE France was torn by intestine convulsions, and bleeding under the infernal ravages of a merciless zeal, signalized by the memorable massacre of St. Bartholomew; while the inhabitants of the Netherlands had shaken off the yoke of Spain, and were bravely vindicating their rights and their religion,-the English nation had attained to a high degree of splendor under the gov erniment of a great and politic princess. Elizabeth had been educated in the school of adversity: she was a prisoner during the ren of her sister Mary, and had turned that misfortune to the best advantage, by improving her mind in every great and useful accomplishment. It were to be wished she hid cultivated likewise the virtues of the heart; and that her polley (which must be allowed to be extremely refined) hal breathed somewhat more of the spirit of generosity and humanity.

*The project of a perpetual peice The delineation of this great scheme, which was sin rularly e aaracteristic of fis gin us as well as the benevolence of its author, is to be found in the Memoirs of the duke of Sulle Though the preparations were actually begun for carrying it into effect, it must, in all probability, have failed of success, because it took not into account the pred vitnant pans and weakre » « of mankind, and the impossibility of reasoning with nations as with wise individuals