Part 7 (1/2)
Antoinette, the widow of Claude of Lorraine, and the mother of Francis, the then Duke of Guise, was still living. She was so rancorous in her hostility to the Protestants that she was designated by them ”_Mother of the tyrants and enemies of the Gospel_.” Greatly to her annoyance, a large number of Protestants conducted their wors.h.i.+p in the little town of Va.s.sy, just on the frontier of the domains of the Duke of Guise. She was incessantly imploring her son to drive off these obnoxious neighbors. The duke was at one time journeying with his wife. Their route lay through the town of Va.s.sy.
His suite consisted of two hundred and sixty men at arms, all showing the warlike temper of their chief, and even far surpa.s.sing him in bigoted hatred of the Protestants.
On arriving at Va.s.sy, the duke entered the church to hear high ma.s.s.
It is said that while engaged in this act of devotion his ears were annoyed by the psalms of the Protestants, who were a.s.sembled in the vicinity. He sent an imperious message for the minister and the leading members of the congregation immediately to appear before him.
The young men fulfilled their mission in a manner so taunting and insulting that a quarrel ensued, shots were exchanged, and immediately all the va.s.sals of the duke, who were ripe for a fray, commenced an indiscriminate ma.s.sacre. The Protestants valiantly but unavailingly defended themselves with sticks and stones; but the bullets of their enemies reached them everywhere, in the houses, on the roofs, in the streets. For an hour the carnage continued unchecked, and sixty men and women were killed and two hundred wounded. One only of the men of the duke was killed. Francis was ashamed of this slaughter of the defenseless, and declared that it was a sudden outbreak, for which he was not responsible, and which he had done every thing in his power to check; but ever after this he was called by the Protestants ”_The Butcher of Va.s.sy_.”
When the news of this ma.s.sacre reached Paris, Theodore de Beza was deputed by the Protestants to demand of Catharine, their regent, severe justice on the Duke of Guise; but Catharine feared the princes of Lorraine, and said to Beza,
”Whoever touches so much as the finger-tip of the Duke of Guise, touches me in the middle of my heart.”
Beza meekly but courageously replied, ”It a.s.suredly behooves that Church of G.o.d, in whose name I speak, to endure blows and not to strike them; but may it please your majesty also to remember that it is an anvil which has worn out many hammers.”
At the siege of Rouen the Duke of Guise was informed that an a.s.sa.s.sin had been arrested who had entered the camp with the intention of taking his life. He ordered the man to be brought before him, and calmly inquired,
”Have you not come hither to kill me?”
The intrepid but misguided young man openly avowed his intention.
”And what motive,” inquired the duke, ”impelled you to such a deed?
Have I done you any wrong?”
”No,” he replied; ”but in removing you from the world I should promote the best interests of the Protestant religion, which I profess.”
”My religion, then,” generously replied the duke, ”is better than yours, for it commands me to pardon, of my own accord, you who are convicted of guilt.” And, by his orders, the a.s.sa.s.sin was safely conducted out of camp.
”A fine example,” exclaims his historian, ”of truly religious sentiments and magnanimous proselytism very natural to the Duke of Guise, the most moderate and humane of the chiefs of the Catholic army, and whose brilliant generosity had been but temporarily obscured by the occurrence at Va.s.sy.”
The war between the Catholics and Protestants was now raging with implacable fury, and Guise, victorious in many battles, had acquired from the Catholic party the name of ”Savior of his Country.” The duke was now upon the very loftiest summits of power which a subject can attain. In great exaltation of spirits, he one morning left the army over which he was commander-in-chief to visit the d.u.c.h.ess, who had come to meet him at the neighboring castle of Corney. The duke very imprudently took with him merely one general officer and a page. It was a beautiful morning in February. As he crossed, in a boat, the mirrored surface of the Loiret, the vegetation of returning spring and the songs of the rejoicing birds strikingly contrasted with the blood, desolation, and misery with which the hateful spirit of war was desolating France. The duke was silent, apparently lost in painful reveries. His companions disturbed not his thoughts. Having crossed the stream, he was slowly walking his horse, with the reins hanging listlessly upon his mane, when a pistol was discharged at him from behind a hedge, at a distance of but six or seven paces. Two bullets pierced his side. On feeling himself wounded, he calmly said,
”They have long had this shot in reserve for me. I deserve it for my want of precaution.”
[Ill.u.s.tration: THE a.s.sa.s.sINATION OF FRANCIS, DUKE OF GUISE.]
He immediately fell upon his horse's neck, and was caught in the arms of his friends. They conveyed him to the castle, where the d.u.c.h.ess received him with cries of anguish. He embraced her tenderly, minutely described the circ.u.mstances of his a.s.sa.s.sination, and expressed himself grieved in view of the stain which such a crime would inflict upon the honor of France. He exhorted his wife to bow in submission to the will of Heaven, and kissing his son Henry, the Duke of Joinville, who was weeping by his side, gently said to him,
”G.o.d grant thee grace, my son, to be a good man.”
Thus died Francis, the second Duke of Guise, on the twenty-fourth of February, 1563. His murderer was a young Protestant n.o.ble, Jean Poltrot, twenty-four years of age. Poltrot, from being an ardent Catholic, had embraced the Protestant faith. This exposed him to persecution, and he was driven from France with the loss of his estates. He was compelled to support himself by manual labor. Soured in disposition, exasperated and half maddened, he insanely felt that he would be doing G.o.d service by the a.s.sa.s.sination of the _Butcher of Va.s.sy_, the most formidable foe of the Protestant religion. It was a day of general darkness, and of the confusion of all correct ideas of morals.
Henry, the eldest son of the Duke of Guise, a lad of but thirteen years of age, now inherited the t.i.tles and the renown which his bold ancestors had acc.u.mulated. This was the Duke of Guise who was the bandit chieftain in the Ma.s.sacre of St. Bartholomew.
One day Henry II. was holding his little daughter Marguerite, who afterward became the wife of Henry of Navarre, in his lap, when Henry of Guise, then Prince of Joinville, and the Marquis of Beaupreau, were playing together upon the floor, the one being but seven years of age, and the other but nine.
”Which of the two do you like the best?” inquired the king of his child.
”I prefer the marquis,” she promptly replied.