Part 54 (1/2)
THE CONSPIRACY OF AMBOISE (1560).--The foregoing notice of parties and their chiefs will render intelligible the events which we now have to narrate. The harsh measures adopted against the reformers by Francis II., who of course was entirely under the influence of the Guises, led the chiefs of the persecuted party to lay a plan for wresting the government from the hands of these ”new Mayors of the Palace.” The Guises were to be arrested and imprisoned, and the charge of the young king given to the Prince of Conde. The plot was revealed to the Guises, and was avenged by the execution of more than a thousand of the Huguenots.
THE Ma.s.sACRE OF Va.s.sY (1562).--After the short reign of Francis II. (1559- 1560), his brother Charles came to the throne as Charles IX. He was only ten years of age, so the queen-mother a.s.sumed the government in his name.
Pursuing her favorite maxim to rule by setting one party as a counterpoise to the other, she gave the Bourbon princes a place in the government, and also by a royal edict gave the Huguenots a limited toleration, and forbade their further persecution.
These concessions in favor of the Huguenots angered the Catholic chiefs, particularly the Guises; and it was the violation by the adherents of the Duke of Guise of the edict of toleration that finally caused the growing animosities of the two parties to break out in civil war. While pa.s.sing through the country with a body of armed attendants, at a small place called Va.s.sy, the Duke came upon a company of Huguenots a.s.sembled in a barn for wors.h.i.+p. His retainers first insulted and then attacked them, killing about forty of the company and wounding many more.
Under the lead of Admiral Coligny and the Prince of Conde, the Huguenots now rose throughout France. Philip II. of Spain sent an army to aid the Catholics, while Elizabeth of England extended help to the Huguenots.
THE TREATY OF ST. GERMAIN (1570).--Throughout the series of lamentable civil wars upon which France now entered, both parties displayed a ferocity of disposition more befitting pagans than Christians. But it should be borne in mind that many on both sides were actuated by political ambition, rather than by religious conviction, knowing little and caring less about the distinctions in the creeds for which they were ostensibly fighting. [Footnote: What are usually designated as the _First_, _Second_, and _Third Wars_ were really one. The table below exhibits the wars of the entire period of which we are treating. Some make the Religious Wars proper end with the Edict of Nantes (1598); others with the fall of La Roch.e.l.le (1628).
First War (ended by Peace of Amboise) ... ... . 1562-1563.
Second War (ended by Peace of Longjumeau) ..... 1567-1568.
Third War (ended by Peace of St. Germain) ..... 1568-1570.
Ma.s.sacre of St. Bartholomew's Day, Aug. 24... .....1572.
Fourth War (ended by Peace of La Roch.e.l.le)..... 1572-1573.
Fifth War (ended by Peace of Chastenoy) ... ... 1574-1576.
Sixth War (ended by Peace of Bergerac)... ... ... .1577.
Seventh War (ended by Treaty of Fleix)... ... . 1579-1580.
Eighth War (War of the Three Henries) ... ... . 1585-1589.
Henry of Bourbon, King of Navarre, secures the throne . .1589.
Edict of Nantes ... ... ... ... ... ... ...1598.
Siege and fall of La Roch.e.l.le ... ... ..... 1627-1628.
By the fall of La Roch.e.l.le the political power of the Huguenots was completely prostrated.]
Sieges, battles, and truces followed one another in rapid and confusing succession. Conspiracies, treacheries, and a.s.sa.s.sinations help to fill up the dreary record of the period. The Treaty of St. Germain (in 1570) brought a short but, as it proved, delusive peace. The terms of the treaty were very favorable to the Huguenots. They received four towns,--among which was La Roch.e.l.le, the stronghold of the Huguenot faith,--which they might garrison and hold as places of safety and pledges of good faith.
To cement the treaty, Catherine de Medici now proposed that the Princess Marguerite, the sister of Charles IX., should be given in marriage to Henry of Bourbon, the new young king of Navarre. The announcement of the proposed alliance caused great rejoicing among Catholics and Protestants alike, and the chiefs of both parties crowded to Paris to attend the wedding, which took place on the 18th of August, 1572.
THE Ma.s.sACRE OF ST. BARTHOLOMEW'S DAY (Aug. 24, 1572).--Before the festivities which followed the nuptial ceremonies were over, the world was shocked by one of the most awful crimes of which history has to tell,--the ma.s.sacre of the Huguenots in Paris on St. Bartholomew's Day.
The circ.u.mstances which led to this fearful tragedy were as follows: Among the Protestant n.o.bles who came up to Paris to attend the wedding was the Admiral Coligny. Upon coming in contact with Charles IX., the Admiral secured almost immediately an entire ascendency over his mind. This influence Coligny used to draw the king away from the queen-mother and the Guises. Fearing the loss of her influence over her son, Catherine resolved upon the death of the Admiral. The attempt miscarried, Coligny receiving only a slight wound from the a.s.sa.s.sin's ball.
The Huguenots at once rallied about their wounded chief with loud threats of revenge. Catherine, driven on by insane fear and hatred, now determined upon the death of all the Huguenots in Paris as the only measure of safety. By the 23d of August, the plans for the ma.s.sacre were all arranged. On the evening of that day, Catherine went to her son, and represented to him that the Huguenots had formed a plot for the a.s.sa.s.sination of the royal family and the leaders of the Catholic party, and that the utter ruin of their house and cause could be averted only by the immediate destruction of the Protestants within the city walls. The order for the ma.s.sacre was then laid before him for his signature. The king at first refused to sign the decree, but, overcome at last by the representations of his mother, he exclaimed, ”I agree to the scheme, provided not one Huguenot be left alive in France to reproach me with the deed.”
A little past the hour of midnight on St. Bartholomew's Day (Aug. 24, 1572), at a preconcerted signal,--the tolling of a bell,--the ma.s.sacre began. Coligny was one of the first victims. After his a.s.sa.s.sins had done their work, they tossed the body out of the window of the chamber in which it lay, into the street, in order that the Duke of Guise, who stood below, might satisfy himself that his enemy was really dead. For three days and nights the ma.s.sacre went on within the city. King Charles himself is said to have joined in the work, and from one of the windows of the palace of the Louvre to have fired upon the Huguenots as they fled past. The number of victims in Paris is variously estimated at from 3,000 to 10,000.
With the capital cleared of Huguenots, orders were issued to the princ.i.p.al cities of France to purge themselves in like manner of heretics. In many places the instincts of humanity prevailed over fear of the royal resentment, and the decree was disobeyed. But in other places the orders were carried out, and frightful ma.s.sacres took place. The entire number of victims throughout the country was probably between 20,000 and 30,000.
The ma.s.sacre of St. Bartholomew's Day raised a cry of execration in almost every part of the civilized world, among Catholics and Protestants alike.
Philip II., however, is said to have received the news with unfeigned joy; while Pope Gregory XIII. caused a _Te Deum_, in commemoration of the event, to be sung in the church of St. Mark, in Rome. Respecting this it should in justice be said that Catholic writers maintain that the Pope acted under a misconception of the facts, it having been represented to him that the ma.s.sacre resulted from a thwarted plot of the Huguenots against the royal family of France and the Catholic Church.
REIGN OF HENRY III. (1574-1589).--The ma.s.sacre of St. Bartholomew's Day, instead of exterminating heresy in France, only served to rouse the Huguenots to a more determined defence of their faith. Throughout the last two years of the reign of Charles IX., and the fifteen succeeding years of the reign of his brother Henry III., the country was in a state of turmoil and war. At length the king, who, jealous of the growing power and popularity of the Duke of Guise, had caused him to be a.s.sa.s.sinated, was himself struck down by the avenging dagger of a Dominican monk. With him ended the House of Valois-Orleans.