varre was struggling with
his foes upon the field of battle, Marguerite, his wife, was dancing
and flirting with congenial paramours amid all the guilty pleasures of
the court. Henry wrote repeatedly for her to come and join him, but
she vastly preferred the voluptuousness of the capital to the gloom
and the hardships of the Protestant camp. She never loved her husband,
and while she wished that he might triumph, and thus confer upon her
the illustrious rank of the Queen of France, she still rejoiced in his
absence, as it allowed her that perfect freedom which she desired.
When she saw indications of approaching peace, she was so
apprehensive that she might thus be placed under constraint by the
presence of her husband, that she did what she could to perpetuate
civil war.

It will be remembered that several of the fortified cities of France
were in the hands of the Protestants. Henry of Navarre held his
comparatively humble court in the town of Agen, where he was very much
beloved and respected by the inhabitants. Though far from
irreproachable in his morals, the purity of his court was infinitely
superior to that of Henry III. and his mother Catharine. Henry of
Navarre was, however, surrounded by a body of gay and light-hearted
young noblemen, whose mirth-loving propensities and whose often
indecorous festivities he could not control. One evening, at a general
ball, these young gentlemen extinguished the lights, and in the
darkness a scene of much scandal ensued. Henry was severely censured
by the Protestant clergy, and by many others of his friends, for not
holding the members of his court in more perfect control. His
popularity suffered so severely from this occurrence, that it even
became necessary for Henry to withdraw his court from the town.

Catharine and Marguerite, accompanied by a retinue of the most
voluptuously-beautiful girls of France, set out to visit the court of
Henry of Navarre, which had been transferred to Neruc. Henry, hearing
of their approach, placed himself at the head of five hundred
gentlemen, and hastened to meet his mother-in-law and his wife, with
their characteristic and congenial train. These were the
instrumentalities with which Catharine and Marguerite hoped to bend
the will of Henry and his friends to suit their purposes. Catharine
had great confidence in the potency of the influence which these
pliant maidens could wield, and they were all instructed in the part
which they were to