at Meaux, or such other city as the king might hereafter prefer. A month
later (on the twentieth of January) the prelates were to come together
wherever the king might be, thence to proceed to the national, or to the
general council, if such should be held. Meanwhile, in each bailiwick
and "senechaussee," the three orders were to be separately assembled, in
order to prepare minutes of their grievances, and elect delegates to the
States General; and all legal proceedings and all punishment for the
matter of religion were to be suspended save in the case of those who
assembled in arms and were seditious.[902]

Such was the history of this famous assembly, in which, for the first
time, the Huguenots found a voice; where views were calmly expressed
respecting toleration and the necessity of a council, which a year
before had been punished with death; where the chief persecutor of the
reformed doctrines, carried away by the current, was induced to avow
liberal principles.[903] This was progress enough for a single year. The
enterprise of Amboise was not all in vain.

[Sidenote: New alarms.]

[Sidenote: Antoine and Conde summoned to court.]

The Assembly of Fontainebleau had not dispersed when the court was
thrown into fresh alarm. An agent of the King of Navarre, named La
Sague, was discovered almost by accident, who, after delivering letters
from his master to various friends in the neighborhood of Paris, was
about to return southward with their friendly responses. He had
imprudently given a treacherous acquaintance to understand that a
formidable uprising was contemplated; and letters found upon his person
seemed to bear out the assertion. The most cruel tortures were resorted
to in order to elicit accusations against the Bourbons from suspected
persons.[904] Among others, Francois de Vendome, Vidame of Chartres, one
of the correspondents, was (on the twenty-seventh of August) thrown into
the Bastile.[905] Three days later a messenger was despatched by the
king to Antoine of Navarre, requesting him at once to repair to the
capital, and to bring with him his brother Conde, against whom the
charge had for six months been rife, that he was the head of secret
enterprises, set on foot to disturb the peace of the realm.[906] At the
same time an urgent request was sent to Philip the Second for
assistance.[907]

[Sidenote: Philip adverse to a national council.]

[Sidenote: Projects to crush all heresy and its abettors.]