from unbroken harmony, and has decreed that peace and faith are blessings too sacred to be allotted to any except the good. When Alva was thus compelled to relinquish his prey, he was succeeded by don Juan de Requesens, grand commander of Castile and viceroy of Lombardy; a man of moderate and pacific character, who, if sent sooner, might have reconciled the parties. But it is the remark of contemporaries, that this step of Spain towards concession became fruitless, and perhaps mischievous, by being delayed beyond the propitious moment, which flies before an obstinate government sees it. The impolicy of delay was now rendered apparent by its exposing affairs to danger from unforeseen accident. Mutinies of the ill-paid garrisons in the Belgic towns palsied the arm of the conciliatory viceroy. After his death, don Juan of Austria — popular by his recent victory at Lepanto over the Turks was sent to the Netherlands, to lure the Belgians into the snares of their ancient oppressors. The speciousness of the project, and the recent negotiations for his marriage with the queen of Scots, alarmed Elizabeth so much, that she determined at last, in the year 1577, openly to succour the insurgents. * A defensive and offensive alliance between the queen and the states-general was concluded at Brussels, in January, 1578; in which, besides the common conditions of so close an union, it was stipulated that the states should conclude no other treaty, nor adopt any important measure, without the assent of the queen of England; to whose determination, in the event of disputes between the provinces, it was agreed that all parties should submit.† It now becomes necessary to return to an incident in the year 1572, which connects the civil wars of France with those of the Netherlands, and throws a strong light upon the origin of both in the treaty of Bayonne. Shortly after the taking of Brille‡, count Louis of Nas+ May 25. 1572. Grot. Ann. lib. iii. sub initio. † Rym. Fœdera, xv. 784. sau surprised Mons, a place then of great importance, from its position near the French frontiers, which facilitated the co-operation of the protestants with those of the Netherlands. In August Alva besieged this fortress; and the prince of Orange advanced to relieve it. One evening, when it had become dark, the prince was astonished at the extraordinary demonstrations of joy and triumph in the camp of Alva; where three rounds of musketry were discharged, martial music swelled into its most exulting tones, and bonfires were lighted on all the rising grounds around the encampment. His wonder was changed into horror when he learned from his scouts that those military rejoicings were on account of a massacre of several thousand huguenots, which had taken place two days before at Paris.* The massacre of Paris, on St. Bartholomew's eve, is the most memorable state-crime of a century characterised by public atrocities. The murders of Sinigaglia sink into a minor delinquency when compared with it.† Cæsar Borgia, under the mask of negotiation, entrapped and strangled four persons, his avowed enemies, and familiar as himself with perfidy and cruelty. Charles IX., inspired by his mother's counsels and his own heart, surprised and slaughtered, without distinction of sex or age, many thousands of his subjects, whilst they obeyed him as their sovereign, confided in him as their protector, and offended only in rejecting his dogmas as a theologian. The politic tyrant may equal or surpass the religious bigot in utter recklessness of good faith and pity; but the bigot, armed with supreme power, is immeasurably the more grievous scourge of the human Some writers would extenuate this transcendent crime by maintaining that it was the result of circum race. * Strada, De Bello Belgico, lib. vii. edit. 1651. Mogunt. p. 250. The cool judgment of this eloquent jesuit, written in his study at Rome about sixty years after the event, deserves the attention of the reader:-" Insigne certè facinus, sed MERITUM CONJURATE IN REGEM FACTIONI SUPPLICIUM." The last words, that though the massacre "was a signal deed, yet it was a punishment deservedly incurred by a faction of conspirators against their sovereign," would have imported that it was a deliberate act, if they had been used by a more precise and less rhetorical writer. † See Machiavelli, Modo tenuto dal' Duca Valentino, &c. stances, and an emergency, not of long premeditation; and by charging the horrors of indiscriminate slaughter upon the ungovernable impulses of a savage populace, not upon the policy of extermination adopted by an inhuman court. Contradictory judgments and historic doubts on points so material, revived and multiplied at the present day*, together with the direct bearing of the massacre on the position and counsels of Elizabeth, demand a more than passing notice of it in this place. The extirpation of protestantism in France and the Low Countries, if not actually concerted, was at least brooded over by Catherine of Medicis and the duke of Alva, in 1565, at Bayonne. From that period to the pacification of 1570, whilst Alva was frankly fulfilling his mission by fire and sword in Flanders, no step appeared to be taken by Catherine, in the spirit of her particular counsels †, in France. Hence a presumption has been advanced against the alleged object of the interview of Bayonne, and the existence of premeditation, so early as 1565. But St. Sulpice, the French ambassador at Madrid, whilst negotiating the interview, covertly, yet intelligibly, states the political object ‡; it should not be presumed that Catherine was idle because no overt act appeared; and Davila expressly asserts, that her frequent attempts during this interval to inveigle the huguenots were frustrated by the difficulty of the enterprise, and failure or treachery of the agents employed. § The first scene of the drama which closed with so fearful a catastrophe appears to have been the pacification of 1570. Charles IX. was then only in his 21st * See Lingard's Hist. vol. viii. Edin. Rev. No. 87. Lingard's Vindication. Allen's Reply. Châteaubriand, Mél. Lit. M. Mignet, one of the most decidedly able and popular historians of his age, declares against premeditation, so far as he has yet proceeded with the work which he is preparing on the religious wars of France. It remains to be seen whether the theory which he has applied with a coup-d'œil so philosophical to the great popular movements of the French revolution, be equally applicable to the massacre of St. Bartholomew. + See page 195. antè. "En que s'accordans si bien les deux plus grands princes de l'Europe, aussi seraient induicts et contraincts leurs subjects à leur rendre l'obeissance due."-Despatch of St. Gouard to Charles IX., dated 16th Feb. 1564. MSS. Bib. du Roi. Dav, Stor. del Guer. Civ. in Fran. lib. v, year. Catherine, who well knew how deeply she was herself distrusted by the huguenots, put forward the young king as the chief performer. His youth and temperament combined, made him a proper instrument to deceive and to destroy. Open and impetuous in seeming, he was treacherous and ferocious in reality; and his mother had cultivated these auspicious dispositions, by placing about his person court adepts in vice and crime, who familiarised his mind with falsehood, and his sense with the spectacle of blood.* The coarsest ribaldries graced his ordinary conversation t; to serve his purpose he made light of imprecations and his oath ‡; he amused his leisure or displayed his prowess by killing brute animals, from rabbits, which he knocked on the head with a club, to pigs and asses which the royal executioner decollated with his sword at a blow. § He had a mistress; but neither the beauty of Marie Touchet nor the profligate gallantries of his mother's court could seduce or soften a heart so atrocious. In fine, the crocodile, the tiger, and Charles IX., seem formed for their respective destinations in the inscrutable order of nature and the moral world. If the court gave peace in order to compass its ends by secret practice after force had failed, the huguenots accepted it in order to establish themselves more firmly and securely at Rochelle, which, with some other strong places, they retained as a guarantee. || Coligny, having dismissed his German auxiliaries, and laid down his arms, retired into Rochelle with the protestant princes and the other chiefs. The huguenots were suspicious, vigilant, and sagacious, and the grand difficulty remained of luring them from their strong-hold into * Brantôme, Mém. de Charles IX. Lettres à Coligny (Vie de Coligny, par l'Abbé Perau, et apud Thuan. lib. lii.). Mém. de P. l'Est. Lettres de la Reine de Navarre (Vie de Coligny, par l'Abbé Perau). + Brantôme. Papirius Masso, Vita Caroli IX. Brant. "Faisants (the huguenots) alors bien estat de faire entre eux tous une plus ferme union et bonne correspondance que jamais, et establir par leur continuelle résidence en cette ville (Rochelle) un solide fondement à leurs affaires."-Sully, Econ. Roy. edit. orig. folio. the toils of the court. After some time passed in preliminary masked movements, Charles commenced his grand and decisive manoeuvre early in 1571. The queen of Navarre was at Rochelle. Marshal Biron arrived there, to propose, in the name of Charles, the marriage of his celebrated sister Margaret with Henry of Bourbon, prince of Navarre. The character of the negotiator inspired confidence, and he was unconscious of deceit. His proposal inflamed the ambition, touched the affections, and disturbed the ideas of the huguenot chiefs and the queen of Navarre, but without yet quieting their suspicions, or diverting them from their purpose. Jeanne d'Albret, the widow of a weak prince, had the rigid fanaticism of a huguenot, an experienced masculine capacity for public affairs, and a parent's views of ambition for her son. Recoiling with sectarian antipathy from the idea of his marrying a lady who invoked saints and went to mass, she yet saw the brilliant advantages which the marriage held out to him, and asked time for consultation with the theologians of her communion.* A separate temptation was thrown out to the admiral, in the pretended resolution of Charles to take part with the Flemings against Philip II. + This was a measure upon which he had set his heart both as a Frenchman and as a religionist. Charles desired his presence at court, not only to assist in the affair of the marriage, but to advise on the means of aiding the prince of Orange. The queen of Navarre could not yet conquer her aversion n; and Coligny was not yet deserted by his prudence. Minor discussions and fresh solicitations, the result of casual incidents, or of a profound under-current of design and intrigue, occupied the remainder of the year, and brought the huguenots gradually nearer to the court and to their doom. Whilst, if it may be so expressed, the angel of destruction hovered over their heads, they abandoned themselves in the security of * Mém. de l'Estat. Thuan. Hist. lib. 1. "Quo magis Colinio salivam moverent."— Thuan. Hist. lib. 1. |