ssions in the human breast, and by highly-colored
accounts of the boldness with which the "new doctrines" had for weeks
been preached within the precincts of the court, that serious
apprehension was entertained lest Beza and his companions might be
assaulted by the way.[1109] The peaceable ministers of religion were,
therefore, accompanied by a strong escort of one hundred mounted archers
of the royal guard. After a ride of less than half an hour, they reached
the nuns' convent, in which the prelates had been holding their
sessions.

[Sidenote: Assembly in the nuns' refectory.]

[Sidenote: The prelates.]

Meantime, an august and imposing assembly was gathered in the spacious
conventual refectory.[1110] On an elevated seat, upon the dais at its
farther extremity, was the king, on whose youthful shoulders rested the
crushing weight of the government of a kingdom rent by discordant
sentiments and selfish factions, and already upon the verge of an open
civil war. Near him sat his wily mother--that "merchant's daughter"
whose plebeian origin the first Christian baron of France had pointed
out with ill-disguised contempt, but whose plans and purposes had now
acquired such world-wide importance that grave diplomats and shrewd
churchmen esteemed the difficult riddle of her sphinx-like countenance
and character a worthy subject of prolonged study. Not far from their
royal brother, were two children: the elder, a boy of ten years, Edward
Alexander, a few years later to appear on the pages of history under
the altered name of Henry the Third, the last Valois King of France; the
younger, a girl of nine--that Margaret of Valois and Navarre, whose
nuptials have attained a celebrity as wide as the earth and as lasting
as the records of religious dissensions. Antoine and Louis of Bourbon,
brothers by blood but not in character; Jeanne d'Albret, heiress of
Navarre, more queenly at heart than many a sovereign with dominions far
exceeding the contracted territory of Bearn; the princes representing
more distant branches of the royal stock, and the members of the council
of state, completed the group. On two long benches, running along the
opposite sides of the hall, the prelates were arranged according to
their dignities. Tournon, Lorraine, and Chatillon, each in full
cardinal's robes, faced their brethren of the Papal Consistory,
Armagnac, Bourbon, and Guise, while a long row of archbishops and
bishops filled out the line on either sid