Charles de Guise

“ He may tell the Duke of Guise."
"Let him!" answered Epernon. "Go not one of you; but bring the rest of them along hither."
Without giving any intimation of his intent, Charles of Montsoreau turned his horse suddenly back to the side of the litter, and drew the curtain back, saying to Marie de Clairvaut, who sat pale and anxious within it, "You hear what has happened; there is no power of resistance, for they are ten to one: but the boy has escaped, and will give the Duke notice of where you are. ”

“ Charles of Montsoreau was seated at the table, and lifted his eyes as she entered with a sad and despairing look, expecting to see no one but the attendant. Marie was in his arms in a moment, however, and holding up her finger to enjoin silence, she whispered, "Not a word, Charles; but come with me, and we shall be safe! Every one is in the chapel at prayers; orders are given for my liberation; and in five minutes we may be at the Hôtel de Guise."
"What are all those sounds," demanded her lover in the same tone, "those sounds which I have heard in the streets? ”

“ The nobility of France regarded Guise, who had driven the English out of France by the capture of Calais, as the real defender of the country; and Condé, who had brought them in again by the surrender of Havre and Dieppe, was considered a traitor. Numbers flocked to the standard of Guise and the Queen-Regent, who were joined by the King of Navarre. The Royal army, with Charles in person, besieged Rouen, to which Poynings, the English commander at Havre, sent a reinforcement. ”

“ Metz was invested by the duke of Alva in October with an army of 60,000 men, and the emperor joined his forces in November. An army of brigands commanded by Albert of Brandenburg had also to be reckoned with. Charles was obliged to raise the siege on the 2nd of January 1553, having lost, it is said, 30,000 men before the walls. Guise used his victory with rare moderation and humanity, providing medical care for the sick and wounded left behind in the besiegers’ camp. ”

“ In the mean time, with loud cries of "Lorraine! Lorraine [2] ! A Guise! a Guise!" the adverse cavalry came down; but the German horse could not stand for a moment before the long lances of the men-at-arms, and in a few minutes all was confusion, flight, and pursuit.
As soon as the cavalry of Lorraine had passed by, Charles of Montsoreau drew his men out again from the wood, and, perfectly secure from any further annoyance, began to count his loss, and to examine into the state of the wounded men who had continued to fight on by his side. ”

“ The apparent favour of the Admiral de Coligny, the return to Paris of the [Pg 470] Guises, the seeming fusion of the two great parties that had so long distracted France, were preludes to the massacre of St Bartholomew. In narrating the strange and important events that crowded the year 1572, M. de Bouillé lays bare the vile qualities of Charles IX., his cold-blooded cruelty, his odious treachery, and the powers of profound dissimulation he had inherited from his mother. One anecdote, extracted from Fornier's MS. History of the House of Guise, is extremely characteristic. ”

“ Most certainly it will not lead him to the hand of Marie de Clairvaut as long as Henry of Guise can draw a sword. If he have not betrayed me, he has abandoned me; if he have not shown himself a coward, he has shown himself a weak defender of those intrusted to his charge; and under such circumstances, had he the wealth of either India and the power of Cæsar, he should never wed Marie de Clairvaut." He laid his hand upon the shoulder of Charles of Montsoreau, and he said, "You have heard my words, good friend ”

“ Had he remained in Paris no evil could have befallen him. He was safe, on my life, and on my honour.
"I believe you, cousin of Guise; I believe you;" replied the Queen, who thought she saw that the tone of the Duke of Guise was not quite so peremptory as it had been, while the King had seemed entirely in his power. "But now, in order to prove your good will entirely, let me beseech you to exert yourself to save the unhappy men who have been placed in such a situation of danger." ”

“ You think to rule them, Guise; but the first time you speak of money to Commons or to Clergy, you will find that cabalistic word, money, acts on them as the sign of the cross upon the fiends we read of, and makes the seeming angels resume their shapes of devils in a moment."
"Well, Sire, well," exclaimed the Duke of Guise, tossing his lofty head with a proud smile, "if they refuse us, we will shame them. You and I together will put our lances in the rest, as in days of old: we will call the nobility of France about us ”

“ They will not refuse me; and I pledge myself before this hour to-morrow to bring you such tidings from both clergy and commons as you could wish to hear."
"If you do, cousin," cried the King eagerly, "if you do, you are my best of friends and counsellors for ever."
"Fear not. Sire; fear not," replied the Duke of Guise; "I will be bold to undertake it. But I must see the presidents and some of the deputies speedily, to know what are the vain and idle notions on which they have hesitated in regard to a step imperatively necessary. ”

“ Guise gazed at him for a long--a very long time, with eyes full of deep feeling, and then replied, "By Heaven! you are one of the most extraordinary young men I ever met with. I know the whole, Monsieur de Logères; and the words there spoken let me into the secrets of your bosom which I wished to know. I now understand how to deal with you; and while I do my best to secure your happiness, trust to the Duke of Guise to avoid, as far as possible, any thing that is painful to you in the course. ”

“ My pretensions to the hand of Mademoiselle de Clairvaut are too small, too few to be thought of even by myself. My brother, indeed, may have greater pretensions. Your Highness knows that his estates in the south are considerable; that his race, though certainly not equal to that of the princely house of Guise, is as old and as pure as any in France; but he has a thousand high qualities that you do not know. He is brave, skilful, with far more experience than myself, faithful and true in his attachments, and even more zealous and eager than I am in every thing he undertakes. ”

“ We will give this young man the authority which he has so insolently demanded, to seek for Mademoiselle de Clairvaut, and having found her--if she have not joined the Duke of Guise long before--to escort her in safety to our cousin's care. But, Monsieur de Logères, you show your ignorance of every custom of the court and state, by supposing that the King of France can write down at the bottom of the powers given you by the Duke of Guise his name in confirmation of the same, like a steward at the bottom of a butcher's bill. ”

“ What would become of the young Count and his bride, if----"
"Ay, well bethought," replied the Duke. "Bring me here paper and the ink-horn;" and when the boy brought them, Guise bent down over a large coffer that stood near, and wrote a few lines.
"Take that to the Count," he said, as soon as he had finished writing. "Quick, Ignati: but, after all, these warnings are but nonsense. There is nobody in France dares do it. Look, I have delayed too long. Here comes a messenger from the King." ”

“ Surely I saw her upon the stairs!"
"The porter, madam, declares, that there was no lady entered with your Majesty; that two or three gentlemen came in; and that it was some time before your chair, and the rest of your male attendants could come up, on account of the crowd. I have ventured to ask Madame de Montpensier and the rest of the ladies in the house, before I intruded here: but no one has seen Mademoiselle de Clairvaut, and she is certainly not in the house."
"Is this the way I am treated?" exclaimed the Duke of Guise, his brow gathering into a tremendous frown. ”

“ Henry III. eventually placed himself at the head of the League, and resumed the war against the Huguenots; but on the conclusion of peace (September 1577) he seized the opportunity of disbanding the Catholic associations. The king’s jealousy of Guise increased with the duke’s popularity, but he did not venture on an open attack, nor did he dare to avenge the murder by Guise’s partisans of one of his personal favourites, Saint-Mégrin, who had been set on by the court to compromise the reputation of the duchess of Guise. ”

“ They now entrenched themselves with the king at Orleans, and the Bourbon princes, Anthony, king of Navarre, and his brother Condé, were summoned to court. The Guises convened a special commission to try Condé, who was condemned to death; but the affair was postponed by the chancellor, and the death of Francis II. in December saved Condé. Guise then made common cause with his old rival Montmorency and with the Marshal de Saint André against Catherine, the Bourbons and Coligny. ”

“ The young Count smiled: "And is it needful my Lord Duke," he asked, "to take all these precautions in the courtly world of Paris?--Do you yourself take them, my Lord?--I fear not sufficiently."
"Oh! with regard to myself," replied the Duke, it is different. "I am so marked out and noted, they dare not do any thing against me. They would raise up a thousand vengeful hands against them in a moment, and they know that, too well to run such a risk. Neither Henry nor Villequier would hold their lives by an hour's tenure after Guise was dead. ”

“ The spirit of the Catholic Church was consonant to, and harmonious with, the whole tone of his own feelings, at once deep, powerful, imaginative, enthusiastic, politic, and commanding. Chivalry, feudalism, and the Church of Rome, went hand in hand: all three were, indeed, in their decay; but if ever man belonged to the epoch of chivalry, it was Henry Duke of Guise ”

“ The only result that could follow an attempt upon a person so beloved by the whole nation, and especially by the States, as the Duke of Guise, would be to arm the people of France in an instant against the sovereign authority. ”

“ These are the common every-day ideas of men in this unhappy country, now. Perhaps famine may be added some day soon, and yet there will be light laughter, and merriment, and jest. Well, let it be so. Why should we cast away enjoyment because it can but be small? Life is at best but made up of chequered visions: let us enjoy the bright ones while we may, and make the dark ones short if we can."
While he thus thought, the Duke of Guise whispered a word or two to the Count of Brissac, and that gentleman nodded to Laval. ”

“ I fear you have come at great peril to yourself, good cousin! You know not how angry the minds of men are; you know not how much hostility reigns against you in the breasts of many of the highest of the land; you have not bethought you, that on every step to the throne there stands an enemy----"
"Who shall fall before me, madam," replied the Duke of Guise.
"Till you have reached the throne itself, fair cousin?" said the Queen-mother. ”

“ The king immediately adopted the welcome suggestion, and decided that, throughout the whole realm, women should be freed from the unjust restraint to which they had so long been subject. Guise had already gained the good-will of the nobility and of the army, and he now became a universal favorite with the ladies, and was thus the most popular man in France. ”

“ Some of the young men stole away, indeed, whether I would or not, and took service with the good Duke of Guise against the reiters. They have almost all come back now; but the tales they bring of battles here and there, and driving the Germans out of France like sheep, are not likely to make those that remained more fond of home."
"I have no wish," replied the Count, "to drain the place of its peasantry, good seneschal. A hundred men will be enough for my purpose, and of those, none but such as are willing. ”

“ With the old soldiers who accompanied him, and the aid of such of his peasantry as had served before, whatever was wanting to the discipline of the rest was soon accomplished. The providing them with arms and horses occupied a some--what longer time; but every thing was in active preparation, when, at the expiration of about a fortnight, a courier from the Duke of Guise arrived at Logères, bearing a letter dated from Soissons, and addressed to the young Count. ”

“ To his apartments then the boy proceeded with all possible speed, having in his hand the note from the Duke of Guise, which he had almost forgotten in the agitation of the late events. He found the young nobleman already dressed, and concluding with his attendants various arrangements for his approaching union with her he loved--an union, indeed, entirely dependent upon the life of him who was at that very moment falling under the blows of assassins. ”

“ René’s eldest surviving son by his marriage with Philippa, daughter of Adolphus of Egmont, duke of Gelderland, was Anthony, who succeeded his father as duke of Lorraine (d. 1544) , while the second, Claude, count and afterwards duke of Guise, received the French fiefs. The Guises, though naturalized in France, continued to interest themselves in the fortunes of Lorraine, and their enemies were always ready to designate them as foreigners. ”

“ I knew you but as Maître Henri, with a grey doublet and a cock's feather, so that I deserve neither thanks nor recompense, though I will gladly serve your Highness under him, if God and the good Count so will it."
"Would that there were many such as thou art!" said the Duke of Guise, thoughtfully. "There are few who will not quit old kindness for new preferment. ”