in April, 1565. Representatives-most of them stage representatives of twelve nations defiled before him, among them being some real " Canarians, savages, Americans, Brazilians, and Taprobanians," each speaking in his native tongue. A picture was painted to perpetuate the memory of the scene.* Bordeaux was a wealthy city, its foreign trade extensive, its population so numerous that it could furnish 10,000 fighting men, and its parliament ranked next after Paris and Toulouse. In 1560, Dieppe possessed a mercantile marine equal to that of all the rest of France. The population of the city amounted to 60,000, now it is about 20,000. The ship-owners of this "northern Rochelle " may compare with the Medicis. When John Ango entertained Francis I. at his chateau of Varengeville (now an undistinguishable heap of ruins), he received the king with a magnificence unusual even in those magnificent times. The rooms were decorated with costly hangings, curious furniture, Italian sculpture, and precious vases. Ango lent money and ships to the court, and often had as many as twenty armed vessels afloat, with which he ventured to measure strength with the King of Portugal. When the government of the Low Countries seized all the French ships in Flemish waters, Henry II. ordered Coligny to equip a fleet instantly and take summary vengeance. But the ports were empty, and there were no ships. "It is only the people of Dieppe," said the admiral, "who can supply your majesty with a fleet." The citizens, proud of the honor, offered. to pay half the expense, and fitted out nineteen vessels of one hundred and twenty tons each. Ships of Caen went to Africa and the New World, bringing back so much more gold than could be exchanged, that the king permitted the merchants to have a mint of their own. Lyons, owing to its fairs, possessed a stronger foreign ele * Favin: Hist. de Navarre, an. 1565; Godefroy: Cérémonial de France, i. p. 909; Aubigné: Hist. liv. iv. ch. 5; Popelinière, i. liv. 10; Abel Jouan: Voyage de Charles IX. ment among its inhabitants than any other town in France. In 1575 Lippomano called it “one of the most celebrated cities;" and there was a proverb that "Lyons supported the crown by its taxes, and Paris by its presents." The revenue contributed by the former city alone was so great, that when there was a talk of suspending the fairs, it was calculated that the change would involve a loss of ten millions of gold yearly. The immense business led to the appointment of special tribunals for the fairs, and a sort of clearing-house for bills of exchange. The principal merchants and bankers were Italians: Capponi, Gondi, Spini, Deodati. Lorenzo Capponi, one of the most munificent of his class, kept open house during each fair, and entertained more than 4000 persons. After the introduction of silk-growing, Lyons received a great development. The first mulberry-tree planted in the 16th century at Alais, about a league from Montelimart, was still alive in 1802. In this century all Europe was supplied withbooks from the presses of Lyons-no city, Venice perhaps excepted, circulating more. The names of Gryphæus and Dolet, Tournes and Roville, are familiar to all book-collectors. In the house of Henry Stephens (Etienne) every body spoke Latin from garret to cellar. The old city occupied the space between the Cours Napoleon and a line drawn from the Pont Morand to the Pont de la Feuillée, the Church of St. Nizier being about the middle. There were only two bridges-one over each river; and a small suburb on the right bank of the Saone, clustering round the cathedral and the Church of St. Lawrence. The superior comfort of the inhabitants may be estimated from the report of a traveler, who mentions as a circumstance worthy of note, that "most of their windows were made of white paper;" although in some of the better houses the upper part of the window was filled with glass. The smaller towns of France have all undergone a change more or less great: even those in the agricultural districts have outgrown their walls. At Boulogne-sur-Mer the lower town consisted of two or three convents and a few fishermen's huts clustered round the Church of St. Nicholas. lous suburb now covers the site of the old harbor. A popu Dijon, now a mere provincial town, was once a great parlia ment centre: a little capital in Eastern France.* It had a vast ducal palace; churches and abbeys were crowded close together. Of the palace of Jean sans Peur, the fire has spared little beyond a tall tower and some precious fragments. Modern improvements and renovations have destroyed much of the old city; but that gem of the Renaissance La Maison Milsand, in the Rue des Forges, still remains as an unapproachable model of architectural decoration. The charming little town of Moulins in the Bourbonnais filled the space now enclosed by the inner promenade the Cours Doujar, d'Aquin, and Berulle - constructed on the ditches of the old wall. None of the "curious birds and beasts " remain in the park; and of the magnificent chateau where Charles IX. held his court little has survived beyond the huge unbattlemented tower; and of the steeples for which the town was once so famous, only one (the clock-tower) still soars above the houses. The greatest change of all has taken place in the district that lies around the great manufacturing town of St. Etienne. In 1560 it was a pleasant wooded valley; no clanging engines disturbed its silence, no clouds of smoke defiled the air. Now it is one of the busiest centres of modern industry, and in noise and dirt may almost vie with Birmingham. Toulon, now the great arsenal of the French navy, was a small port containing only 637 houses, and covering an area of 660 acres. Its whole artillery consisted of two bombardes and twenty-five pounds of powder. Its naval importance dates from the reign of Henry IV. In 1543, when Barbarossa's fleet was received into the harbor, the inhabitants were ordered to Et ainsi Dijon a le bruit D'être l'une, sans point de tache, Blason et Louenge de la noble Ville de Dyjon. abandon the town for six months under pain of death, leaving their houses and all they could not remove at the mercy of the Turks.* From this imperfect sketch of the condition of France at the outbreak of the Religious Wars, the reader may in some degree be able to understand how such a crime as the St. Bartholomew massacre was possible. Although right and wrong are always the same, our appreciation of them depends in the main upon our education and the circumstances around us s; and it would be unfair to judge the men of the sixteenth century by our nineteenth century standard. Registres du Conseil de Toulon, B, No. 10, fol. 247. FROM THE ACCESSION OF CHARLES IX. TO THE MASSACRE AT VASSY. [1560-1562.] Character of the Boy-King-Portrait of Catherine-The States-GeneralThe Chancellor's Address-Speeches of the Three Orators-Agitation in the Provinces-Religious Amnesty-Edict of July-Provincial Assemblies Convoked-Instructions of the Isle of France-The Triumvirate-States of Pontoise-Proposals of Reform-Colloquy of Poissy-Beza-Conference in the Queen's Chamber-King's Speech-Beza's Defense-Catherine's Liberal Spirit-Spread of New Doctrines-Monster Congregations -The Guises Intrigue with Spain-Violence of the Clergy-Massacres at Cahors and Aurillac-Amiens-Huguenot Outrages-Riot of St. Medard -Notables at St. Germains-Edict of January, 1562-Violence at Dijon and Aix-Anthony's Apostasy-The Duke and the Cardinal at Saverne -Massacre at Vassy-Both Parties Arm-Guise Enters Paris-Plot to Seize the King. THE accession of Charles IX., a child not eleven years old, was a revolution. "Now we fell from a fever into a frenzy," quaintly writes an old historian; "a reign cursed in the city and cursed in the field; cursed in the beginning and cursed in the ending."* The new king is described by the Venetian embassador as an amiable, handsome boy, with fine eyes and graceful carriage, eating and drinking little, quick-witted and spirited, gentle and liberal.t The same gossiping writer supplies a striking picture of the * A General Hist. of France, by John de Serres (Serranus). Fol. Lond. 1624, p. 692. + Beza had a favorable opinion of the boy-king, but not of the mother: "De rege optimam spem esse, et hoc tibi, ut certissimum, confirmo. Sed puer est et matrem habet." Beza to Haller, 24th January, 1561, in Baum's Beza, ii. p. 25, App. K |