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SOME ACCOUNT OF PARIS, HISTORICAL AND DESCRIPTIVE.

PART THE THIRD.

HISTORY OF THE MASSACRE OF ST. BARTHOLOMEW, IN 1572.

THE city of Paris has attained a fearful celebrity on account of the numerous and extensive scenes of slaughter and devastation which cause so many of the pages of its history to be written in characters of blood. Among all these transactions, perhaps the most cruel and heartless is that which is commonly called THE BARTHOLOMEW, or the Massacre of St. Bartholomew's, which was perpetrated on the day of that saint, viz., 24th August, 1572.

The dark and bloody scenes of that terrible day are deeply written in the hearts and memories of Protestants, nor can they view the merciless slaughter of their brethren, committed under the mask of friendship, and preceded by every expression of regard, without feelings of the deepest regret, indignation, and abhorrence. The events which preceded this memorable massacre, and the position of public affairs at the time it took place, can be but briefly described in this place, but some notice of them will be necessary to enable such of our readers as may be unacquainted with the subject, to understand the full atrocity of the transactions of the 24th August.

Protestantism in France, at the time we are speaking of, had not the advantage of being sanctioned or tolerated by the ruling powers. In England, its progress was aided by the civil magistrate, and a sort of compromise was effected between those who had embraced the reformed religion, and the adherents to Popery, but the Huguenots, as the French Protestants were called, were very differently circumstanced. Discountenanced, and at length persecuted by the court, they became a separate people, united to each other by the closest bonds of fellowship and religion, but opposed, in principle and practice, to the prevailing religion of their country. Dreadful persecutions of the Protestants had taken place during the reigns of Francis the First, and of his son Henry the Second: pillages, massacres and burnings, every where became the lot of that devoted party.

In 1560, the fires of martyrdom were less frequently lighted up, but civil war began to distract the country. The princes of the House of Bourbon, alarmed at the increasing authority and imperious conduct of the Cardinal of Lorraine and the family of the Guises, sought to fortify themselves against these powerful strangers, by an alliance with numbers of the persecuted Protestants and others, who, on their side, were glad to embrace the protection thus offered them. Though we have previously mentioned the term Huguenot, it was not until this period that it was conferred. It was derived, according to some, from a Swiss term signifying sworn, or bound by an oath; according to others, it was a contemptuous appellation derived from the smallest coin then in use, which had been first circulated in the time of Hugo Capet. The party opposed to the Huguenots (that is, the Guises, and their uncle the Cardinal of Lorraine,) had the powerful support of the Pope and the court of Rome, and also of the courts of France and Spain, and were called the Popish or Catholic party. Unhappy was it for the poor Protestants that they were thus led to cling for protection to a party, and induced to join in the civil strife which followed, and in which the leaders on either side, appear in many cases, to have been actuated by political animosity alone, and to have made a show of their religious differences while they were secretly gratifying their own ambitious views.

Between the years 1560 and 1570, treaties of peace were twice concluded between these rival powers, but were shamelessly broken, as it suited the purpose of the Guise party; and in the latter year, when peace was offered a third time, it is not to be wondered that the Protestants received the proposal with some mistrust, especially as unusual favour was shown to them in the terms of the treaty. It will be necessary, however, to describe the character of the reigning Sovereign at this important period. The government of France was nominally in the hands of Charles IX., who, on the death of his elder brother, Francis II., had succeeded to the throne at the early age of ten years. The actual ruler of the country was his mother, Catherine de Medicis,

widow of Henry II. This woman was ambitious to the
highest degree, and impatient of control: her nature was
cruel, and she practised the arts of perfidy and dissimula-
tion in such a manner as to show that she was alike un-
restrained by religion and humanity. From the time that
her son became king, she used all her endeavours to cor-
rupt and enfeeble the mind of her own child, in order that,
as he advanced in years, he might, retaining the mere name
of king, leave all real power in her hands. In these at-
tempts, she partly succeeded, and at the age of twenty-two,
we find the king second only to his wicked parent in trea-
chery, cruelty, and selfishness. He did not possess her
resoluteness and inflexibility of purpose, but he was obsti-
nate and wayward; the superior talents of which he had
shown some proofs, had been checked and perverted by the
evil influences of those around him, and all the vicious parts
of his character had expanded and increased with baneful
luxuriance. Such were the hands in which supreme au-
thority was vested, and from such an unexpected quarter
did the Protestants now receive advantageous offers of
peace. Tired of civil war and its miseries, the Protest-
ant leaders accepted the conditions proposed to them, and
a peace, afterwards called la paix boiteuse, the lame peace,
was concluded between the parties. The principal leader
of the Protestants, at that time, was Gaspard de Coligny,
Lord of Châtillon, and admiral of France. He was a brave
and virtuous man, grave in his manners, upright in his
intentions, cool and collected in danger, and displaying the
greatness of his character more especially in the time of
adversity and distress. The chiefs of highest rank were
the two young princes, Henry, king of Navarre, (after-
wards Henry IV.,) and the Prince of Condé, who had
sworn to avenge the death of his father, who had been assas-
sinated by the opposite party.

The Catholic and Protestant leaders, far from being reconciled or united by the false peace which existed between them, were ever on the watch, and mistrustful of each other. But it was not Catherine's purpose to keep up the fears of Protestants, for whom she had now begun to lay her deep and dreadful snare. It appears tolerably certain that as early as the year 1565, this treacherous woman had projected the "deliverance of the kingdom from the Protestant party," and that a council was held at Bayonne for the express purpose of forwarding such views, where the French, Spanish, and Papal powers came to an understanding on the subject of the massacre, which circumstances did not put in their power till seven years afterwards. Hints on the subject of that iniquitous conference accidentally escaped, and the Protestants were for awhile on their guard, but several years of comparative tranquillity having elapsed, they were lulled into a false security, by a series of the most artful devices, and at length the sincerity of the royal family seemed placed beyond all question by the proposal of Catherine to give her daughter, the sister of the reigning king, in marriage to the young protestant Prince of Navarre. The Queen of Navarre, with the young prince Henry, arrived at court to conclude the treaty, and met with the most flattering reception. The honourable and respectful treatment of them by the king, excited the surprise of every one.

After one of these scenes of dissimulation, we are told by Sully and other writers that Charles, on quitting the Queen of Navarre, said to his mother, "What do you think of me; do I not play my part well?" The queen, pleased with the duplicity of her son, replied, "Yes, very well, but to commence is nothing unless you go through with it." "Let me alone," said Charles, "and I will net them every one for you."

The court, which had hitherto been stationed at Blois, came to Paris to prepare for the approaching marriage. On the 9th of June, 1572, the Queen of Navarre died suddenly, and though it was given out that her death was caused by over-fatigue in preparing for the nuptials of her son and Margaret de Valois, it is generally believed that

Coligny afterwards complained that the last treaty of paci- Guises stirring up the people," said the king, "I will settle fication had been violated. The king answered that his it." The alarmed Protestants ventured to complain that a greatest desire was to maintain the treaty. "I have sent number of porters were engaged in carrying arms into the commissioners," he said, "charged to execute it rigorously; Louvre. The king's answer was ready; those arms were here is my mother, who can bear witness to it."- -" That is | required for an entertainment about to be given in the true," observed Catherine, "and you know it well."—"Yes," palace, in which was the representation of a besieged replied Coligny, "but among those commissioners there are fortress. It had been determined by the conspirators, that some who have condemned me to be hanged, and have of the lives of the King of Navarre and the Prince of Condé fered a reward of 50,000 crowns to any one who should bring should be spared; this decision has been variously attributed you my head."—"Well, then," rejoined the king, "we will to the suggestion of the Duke of Nevers, the Count de send others who shall not be suspected by you;" and then, Retz, and the Marshal de Tavannes. In the Memoirs of with an apparent wish to evade further explanation upon the Marshal, written by his son, we are told, that "to his the subject, he added: "My father, you heat yourself too single advice, and to his single voice, the great king Henry much, it will injure your health." and the Prince of Condé, owed their lives;" and that it was unfortunate for the Marshal's posterity that his majesty did not know the truth upon that point. However, as the time approached for the execution of the plot, the young princes were treated with much apparent kindness by the king, who affected to fear that the Guises might make an attempt upon their lives, and requested them, for their better security, to introduce their principal officers and gentlemen into the Louvre that night, and station them around their own apartments. The request was complied with; and by ten o'clock on the night of Saturday, the princes had retired to their chambers unsuspicious of the coming

A part of the conversation seems to have been held, at Coligny's request, between himself and the king alone; Charles commanding his mother and his brother to retire to a distance. Catherine afterwards confessed, that these were the most painful moments of her life: "Her consciousness of guilt, the interest with which Charles listened to the admiral, the crowds of armed men in constant motion through the house, their looks and whispers, and gestures, all conspired to fill her with terror." Unable to remain any longer in such a situation, she interrupted the conference, by pretending that silence and repose were necessary for the recovery of the admiral.

In the course of the same day, the Protestants held a meeting at which the late attempt upon the admiral's life formed the principal topic. "It is the first act of a tragedy which will end with the murder of us all," said Jean de Ferrières; "let us quit the city as soon as possible." But the young and generous Téligny indignantly repelled al! suspicions of the king's good faith; and succeeded in impressing his own feelings of confidence upon the bulk of the assembly.

storm.

During the night, the Duke of Guise was chosen to be the chief director of the horrible enterprise. He stationed the Swiss troops and some French companies around the Louvre, with strict orders, not to permit the departure of a single servant of the King of Navarre or the Prince of Condé; and similar instructions were forwarded to Cosseins at the hotel of Coligny. Detachments of military were likewise stationed along the bank of the river and in various streets; and the Provost of the Merchants was commanded to direct the captains of the different quarters to arm their companies, and to repair towards midnight to the Hôtel-deVille. The city had been parcelled out among the chiefs of the conspiracy, each of them having assigned to him a quarter in which he was to direct the massacre; the Duke of Guise reserved for himself that in which the admiral resided. The houses of the Protestants had been marked with white crosses; the perpetrators of the massacre were to be distinguished by white scarfs around their left arms and white crosses in their hats.

As the hour drew nigh for striking the fatal blow, Catherine felt apprehensive lest her son's resolution might fail him. She repaired to his chamber, and held a long conference with him; but finding him still hesitate, she reproached him with suffering the opportunity to escape which God offered him, of triumphing over his enemies. This imputation of pusillanimity determined his wavering mind; and he rashly consented to all that his mother required. It had been originally agreed, upon the advice of the Marshal de Tavannes, that the massacre should not begin before day-break, or between two and three o'clock in the morning, lest the darkness should facilitate the escape of any of the intended victims. Catherine wished the work of slaughter to be complete; but knowing the vacillating temperament of her son, she was anxious to secure his assent as soon as possible, and then take steps to render it irrevocable. Everything was in readiness; the armed citizens had been assembled at the Hôtel de Ville, and harangued by Marcel, the late provost of the merchants, who explained to them the intentions of the court, and the necessity for the sanguinary measures about to be adopted.

The chiefs of the conspiracy held a meeting to decide the extent of the massacre, and whether the King of Navarre and the Prince of Condé should be comprised in it. Among the conspirators present were the queen-mother, the Duke of Anjou, the Duke of Nevers, Cardinal Birague, Marshal Tavannes, and the Count de Retz; whether Charles himself was there, is considered by some to be a matter of doubt. According to his own statement, as reported by his sister Margaret, in her Memoirs, he was visited about the middle of the day, in his chamber, by his mother, who was soon followed by the Duke of Anjou and other lords of the Catholic party; and then he was suddenly informed that the Protestants were engaged in a conspiracy; that Coligny and his friends were plotting his destruction, and that if he failed to anticipate them, and waited till the next morning, he and his family would be the victims of their designs. Influenced by this representation, he gave, he says, a reluctant and hurried consent to the proposals of his counsellors, exclaiming as he left the room, that he hoped not a single Huguenot would be left alive to reproach him with the deed." The measures adopted in the course of the day, for the execution of the detestable plot, seem to have been intended at the same time to allay the suspicions of the Protestants, and to ensure their destruction. The king sent several gentlemen to visit Coligny on his part; he even sent his sister Margaret, the newly married Queen of Navarre, on the same mission. He ordered the necessary process to be commenced against those who had attempted the life of the admiral, and he received the Duke of Guise very coldly in public. Under pretence of giving the Protestants guards to protect them from the Guises, of whom Charles affected to entertain apprehensions, the municipal officers of the different quarters of the city were sent to all the houses in which they dwelt, with orders to write down the name and residence of each of them. Permission had been given to the Protestant lords and gentlemen to take up their abode in the admiral's quarter, that they might enjoy the protection of the guard assigned to him; a large number availed them-a selves of it, and for their accommodation, the Catholic inhabitants were obliged to give up their houses. Fifty soldiers were stationed around the hotel of Coligny; but the pretext of ensuring his safety received an ominous contradiction from the fact that they were commanded by the Sieur de Cosseins, a creature of the queen-mother, and a sworn enemy of the admiral.

The evening of Saturday, the 23rd, brought with it some alarming indications; specious explanations were given, and the suspicions of the Protestants were still lulled by their reliance on the royal word. Bands of armed men were gathering in the neighbourhood of the Louvre; "It is the

Some of the Protestants dwelling in the admiral's neighbourhood, were awakened by the noise and bustle naturally incident to the execution of so great a plot; and upon going to the Louvre, to inquire of the sentinels the reason of the extraordinary movements, they were insulted and repulsed. One of them, complaining of this treatment, was killed by Gascon soldier, with the blow of a partizan; and the others were immediately slain. The impatient Catherine availed herself of this opportunity. "It is no longer possible to restrain the ardour of the troops," she said to her son; "disorders will ensue, of which we shall have cause to repent,-it is time to give the signal." The king then gave the fatal order for sounding the tocsin from the neighbouring church of St. Germain l'Auxerrois.

Soon after two o'clock on the morning of Sunday, the 24th of August, 1572, the day on which the Catholics celebrate the annual festival of St. Bartholomew, the memorable massacre, which has derived its appellation from the name of that holiday, commenced in the quarters contiguous

to the royal palace of the Louvre. Cosseins was at his post | ingly conveyed it, and suspended it by the thighs with before the admiral's hotel, in the Rue de Béthizy, anxiously iron chains. The head was embalmed by order of the awaiting the preconcerted signal, when the light of the court and sent, it is said, to Rome as a trophy of the dawn discovered to him the approach of the Duke of Guise, victory. at the head of an armed body, and announced to him that the moment for action had arrived. Placing soldiers opposite to the windows, to cut off all escape in that quarter, he knocked loudly at the gate, and demanded admission in the king's name. One of Coligny's gentlemen came down, and opened it: Cosseins instantly despatched him with a dagger, and, followed by his men, entered the court-yard, where | the attendants who presented themselves were slain on the spot. The inmates of the house were speedily aroused; but the admiral and his friends resigned themselves to a fate which they saw was inevitable; and, asking pardon of God, prepared to meet it with tranquillity. A gentleman of the household entered the chamber, and, in reply to an inquiry from the surgeon, Ambroise Paré, concerning the cause of the tumult, turned towards Coligny, and addressed him in these words, "Monseigneur, God calls us to himself; the house is forced, and there are no means of resistance." The admiral calmly answered: 'I have long been prepared to die; as for you, save yourselves if it be possible, for you cannot protect my life." Several availed themselves of this permission, and endeavoured to escape by passing over the roof; but only a few succeeded in thus saving their lives. After an ineffectual attempt to barricade the entrance of the house, and to arrest the murderers on the staircase, the door of the admiral's room was forced. A German, named Besme, a Picard captain, named Attin, and several others, all in the pay and employ of the Guises, all covered with cuirasses, and armed with swords and daggers, entered the chamber. Besme advanced towards Coligny, who had but recently arisen from bed, and was still in his night-dress, and placing the point of a sword at his throat, said to him, "Are you not the admiral?"-"I am," replied Coligny, firmly; and then looking calmly upon the sword which threatened him he added, "young man you ought to respect iny old ge and my infirmities, but you shorten my life only by a few days. Besme plunged the sword into his breast, and drawing it out again, struck him with it several times in the face. The details of this horrid scene were afterwards furnished by the murderers themselves, and particularly by the Picard captain Attin, who declared that he never saw a man with death before his eyes face it with such firmness as the admiral did. His assassins were indeed astonished at his noble demeanour; and Attin said that for a long time he retained an impression of the terror with which he was inspired by the imposing figure of the old man, at the moment of his death.

While these things were passing above, the Duke of Guise, with several other Catholic lords, remained in the court below. Impatient to learn the catastrophe, he at last exclaimed, "Besme, have you finished?" The assassin replied, "It is done." The duke rejoined, "Monsieur d'Angoulême will not believe it unless he sees it with his own eyes; throw the body out of the window." Accordingly, Besme and another lifted up the admiral's body, and let it fall into the court. The face was so disfigured with wounds and blood, that d'Angoulême and Guise doubted if it was Coligny; but having wiped it with a handkerchief, Guise observed, "It is indeed he," and after he had trodden the head under his feet they remounted their horses and departed. The duke, then addressing his men, cried out, Courage, soldiers, we have begun well; let us go to the others, for the king commands it." He repeated incessantly the words, "The king commands it-it is by his express command-such is his will."

After this dreadful deed, the tocsin from the palace responded to that of St. Germain l'Auxerrois, and the streets resounded with the cry "To arms." The Duke of Guise and his party rode through the city, sword in hand, exciting the people to the massacre; and the better to effect their purpose, they affirmed that Coligny and the Huguenots had conspired against the life of the king and of the princes, that the conspiracy had just come to light, and that the friends of the throne must unite to destroy this impious race, the king being determined to crush and destroy those serpents the heretics. Thus excited and authorized, the people flew to the massacre, and gave way to every species of excess, without fear or remorse-one party rushed to Coligny's dwelling, insulted and mutilated his corpse, and having dragged it through the streets of the city, were about to throw it into the Seine, when it was suggested to carry it to the gibbet at Montfauçon, where they accord

We are told by a writer of that period, that the queenmother went to feast her eyes with the sight of poor Coligny's maimed body, as it hung on the gibbet at Montfauçon, taking with her, her sons, her daughter, and her son-in-law. The generous and too-confiding Téligny had been one of the first to suffer: he was slain at Coligny's house, by the guards of the Duke of Anjou. The streets of Paris on that dreadful Sabbath morning, presented a most horrible scene of pillage, massacre, and blood, and the air resounded with mingled cries of savage triumph, and of agony and death. Not even the Louvre itself was free from these scenes, nor did the hapless victims find any mercy when they threw themselves on the compassion of the king. Nancey, captain of the guard, went with a body of soldiers into the apartments of the King of Navarre and the Prince of Condé, deprived of their arms all the servants and gentlemen attached to the suite of these princes, and forced them from their sleeping apartments to the gate of the Louvre. Here, their Swiss executioners were waiting to despatch them, and when the unhappy gentlemen began to remind the soldiers that they had the king's promise of protection, Charles himself appeared at one of [the windows of the Louvre, charging the executioners to do their office, and spare no one. During the whole of that morning, the massacre went on in the royal palace. One of the wretched Protestants rushed into the sleeping apartment of the young Queen of Navarre, and wounded and bleeding as he was, threw his arms around her and besought her protection. The young queen, though terrified and fainting, begged his life, and it was granted to her intercessions. Early in the morning, Charles posted himself at a window looking towards the Seine, and aimed with carbines at such of the fugitives, as having escaped the poignard, were attempting to save their lives by swimming across the river. The same morning he sent for the young King of Navarre and the Prince of Condé, and, while he endeavoured to justify the massacres, as well as the assassination of Coligny, promised to spare and pardon them, on condition of their renouncing the Protestant faith, and embracing Popery, and on that condition alone. The King of Navarre, amazed at such a proposition, reminded his brother-in-law of the promises and oaths made at the time of the marriage, of the difficulty of giving up the religion in which he had been brought up, &c., but at the same time conceded to most of the king's wishes. The Prince of Condé spoke more boldly, and with greater energy and indignation; so much so, as to irritate and enrage the king, who loaded him with oaths and threats, and gave him three days only, to consider whether he would renounce his faith, or lose his head. Both princes yielded to the pressing necessity.

Meanwhile, in the city, numbers of persons who had received protestations of friendship from the king on the preceding day, were suffering the penalty of their repose in royal promises. La Rochefoucauld who had been spending the evening of Saturday at the palace, and to whom Charles had jokingly said, when at eleven o'clock his visitor departed, "that he would come and give him the whip in the night," was awakened by masked assassins and stabbed to the heart by one of them named La Barge. Brion, the tutor to the Prince of Condé, in spite of the tears and entreaties of his pupil, was slain in his arms. Pierre de la Place gave three thousand crowns to the chief executioner, in the hope of escaping the general doom. He was seized in his own house, and ordered immediately to repair to the Louvre. His unhappy wife threw herself at the feet of the officer, and besought mercy with many tears. La Place raised her, and, reproving her for the humiliating posture she had assumed, bade her adieu, and tearing from his child's cap a cross which he had previously placed there to preserve it from the murderers, he courageously followed the soldiers. Before he reached the Louvre, five or six assassins fell upon him and poignarded him. A celebrated Professor of that time, Ramus, who had done much for the advancement of literature and mathematical science, but who was also an opponent of the religion and the philosophy of that day, was first induced to give a large ransom for his life, and then assassinated in the college of Presles. Very few were found to offer resistance to the murderers. A lieutenant named Tavernay is distinguished, as having, with the single aid of his servant, kept his

enemies at bay for eight or nine hours. Having exhausted nearly all the historians of the period if we exculpate him all his ammunition, he was at length overcome, and fell from a large share in the cruelties of that memorable time. beneath the weapons of the murderers, after having Not to speak of his visit to the gibbet of the faithful and destroyed many who opposed him. François Nompar de too-credulous Coligny, and the expression he made use of, Caumont, who, with his two sons, had been lodged in the that "The body of a dead enemy always smells sweet," vicinity of the Louvre, fell beneath the assassins' steel, with nor of his incitement of the people with oaths and exclaone of his children. The other, scarcely twelve years of age, mations to hasten their work, aiding with his own hand in escaped the fury of the murderers. Lying on the ground, the slaughter, we have an unanswerable proof of the delight and bathed in the blood of his father and brother, he was he took in the sufferings of the Protestants, in his conduct supposed to be dead, and in this situation, the child re- towards Cavagnes, a councillor of the parliament of Toumained a whole day without moving, till in the evening he louse, and Brique-maut, a retired military officer of rank, heard some of those who entered the house, bewailing the who had been thrown into prison during the massacre, and fate of this murdered family, and saying, that God would were reserved for greater sufferings at the king's pleasure. not surely leave unpunished so dreadful a crime. Encou- It was the aim and object of the court to persuade people raged by these words, the boy raised his head, and attracted generally that the massacre had been perpetrated merely the attention of these benevolent persons. They asked his in self-defence, inasmuch as a conspiracy on the part of name, but he was prudent enough to reply, "I am the son the Huguenots for the murder of the royal family had been of one of these dead persons, and the brother of the other." on the eve of breaking out at the time when Coligny and When they still further pressed to know who he was, he his party were thus suddenly overpowered and destroyed. said, "that he would tell them as soon as they had taken That they might obtain something confirmatory of this him to a place of safety. Let me be taken to the arsenal," assertion, Catherine and her son caused a strict search to said he, I am related to Biron, the master of the artillery, be made among Coligny's papers, and this having failed, and you will be rewarded for your trouble." They took they brought forward the two prisoners before mentioned, him there with all the necessary precautions, and the child and accused them of being concerned in the treason for was saved. which the admiral suffered death. Not the slightest But how great was the number of those who were not shadow of evidence could be found to criminate these genequally fortunate! It would be impossible to relate even a tlemen beyond the bare assertions of those who were prosmall portion of the events of that and of the two succeeding cured to accuse them, and the judges accordingly declared days; but, as some relief to our painful narrative, we may their innocence. Another tribunal was then found, and an mention the escape of a party of Protestants, lodged in the unsuccessful attempt made to allure the venerable prisoners Faubourg St. Germain, among whom were the Count of (for they were both advanced in years) to confess themselves Montgomery, the Vidame of Chartres, the Sieur de Fonte-guilty by a promise that their lives should be saved. Findnay, and others. Being informed of the tumult in the city, ing them to remain firm, and to be proof against all the they felt so persuaded that it must have originated with the arts employed against them, the court pronounced sentence Guise party, and that not only was the king innocent of any of death on them, and the confiscation of their goods. ill intent towards the Protestants, but that he must be him- Although Charles had been intimately acquainted with self in danger from this sudden disturbance, that they these unhappy men, and had shown them many marks of were actually on their road to the Louvre, to offer their favour and regard, he nevertheless indulged his savage assistance to his majesty, when, as they were stepping disposition with the sight of their dying agonies. For this into the boats which were to convey them across the river, they purpose he repaired early in the evening to the Hotel de beheld about two hundred soldiers of the king's guard ad- Viile, with his mother and some chosen guests, and partook vancing on the opposite side, and the king himself stationed of a sumptuous repast, while the gray-haired prisoners sat at the window of the Hotel de Bourbon, firing as fast as bound together on hurdles, (in which state they had been guns could be handed to him, and encouraging the men previously dragged from their prison to this, the place of below to proceed with their work of destruction. At this execution,) waiting for the conclusion of the royal banquet, sight the Protestants lost not a moment in making their | and exposed to all the indignities which a brutal populace escape, and some on foot, some on horseback, contrived could heap upon them. At ten o'clock the windows were to elude their pursuers, leaving, however, their homes and thrown open, and Charles, and his mother and brothers, families to pillage and massacre. came forward to view, by the blaze of many torches, the last agonies of their former friends. Nor did they shrink from the dreadful spectacle, but looked on with fixed attention and apparent satisfaction.

De Thou reckons the number of Protestants slain in Paris alone, on St. Bartholomew's day, at two thousand, and other writers tell us that ten thousand were killed during the three days more particularly set apart for massacre in that city. The river Seine was laden with corpses, and no fewer than eleven hundred bodies were cast ashore in the neighourhood of St. Cloud, Anteuil, and Chaillot. The bodies were not all removed from the streets of Paris for more than a month, and even at the distance of a year from the time of the massacre, they were frequently discovered on the roofs of houses, in cellars, and other remote places. The total number of those who were slain throughout the kingdom, has been estimated by De Thou at 30,000, but there are other historians who believe it to have amounted to 100,000.

At about five o'clock in the evening, proclamation was made by the sound of a trumpet in the king's name, that all the citizens were to retire to their homes; this order, however, was not sufficient wholly to restrain the people from continuing the massacre. On the following morning (Monday) they returned to their work with fresh vigour, and it is said that the slaughter was as great as on the preceding day. Tuesday was scarcely less dreadful, and throughout the remaining days of the month and the early part of September, the Protestants were gradually traced to all their hiding places, and entirely exterminated. It has been very much questioned, whether Charles was at first so active in this dreadful affair as he is represented to have been, or whether he was at all aware of the extent of those proceedings in which he was persuaded by Catherine to take the first step. Whatever may have been his reluctance to commence the attack on the Protestants, (and this supposition is very contradictory to some of the accounts of his duplicity towards them, related above,) there can be no question as to his enjoyment of, and participation in, the scene of blood which followed. We must disbelieve

The conduct of the queen-mother and of the court, after the perpetration of this horrible crime, shows that they had not sufficiently calculated its consequences, and that they were filled with apprehensions lest a just vengeance should overtake them. They at first endeavoured to excuse their conduct by accusing the Huguenots of treasonable intentions, then they laid the blame on the Guises, and Charles wrote to all the provincial governors, assuring them that the disorder had commenced without his knowledge or sanction, and that the Guises, having been informed of the intention of the friends and relations of Coligny to avenge the wounds which the admiral had received, had raised all the citizens against them in order to prevent it. Then two days after, (August 26,) the king, in contradiction to all this, called in religion to excuse his crimes, and after hearing a solemn mass at Notre Dame, went and formally declared before the parliament that he had himself commanded the massacre to take place, in order to put a stop to the conspiracies of the Protestant rebels. On the same day he published an edict, in which he declared himself anew the "sole author of the massacres," but in which he placed the Protestants under the protection of the law, and commanded that so long as they lived in peace, no further injury should be done to their persons or their property. What he commanded in public, however, he counter-ordered in private, the destruction of individuals and appro priation of their property went on as before under the very eyes of the king at Paris, and with his knowledge in nearly all the towns of France.

The court was now greatly harassed by fears of the ambition of the Guises, and of the vengeance of the Mont morencis, and of all the Protestants. The vacillation displayed in its edicts were sufficient to prove its weakness