and who, to their equal surprise and
satisfaction, discovered that, while he had unguardedly preserved all
the papers which could tend to his own destruction, he had destroyed
every vestige of their criminality, rejoiced at their escape, and
flattered themselves that their participation in his treachery would for
ever remain undiscovered; a circumstance which rendered them at once
patient and silent.

That the necessity for taking the life of the Marechal had been bitterly
felt by the King himself, we have already shown; and it was further
evinced when he declared to those who interceded for the doomed man,
that had his personal interests alone been threatened by the treason of
the criminal, he should have found it easy to pardon the wrong that had
been done him; but that, when he looked into the future, and remembered
that the safety of the kingdom which had been confided to him, and of
the son who was to succeed him upon the throne, must both be compromised
by sparing one who had already proved that his loyalty could not be
purchased by mercy, he held himself bound to secure both against an evil
for which there was no other safeguard than the infliction of the utmost
penalty of the law.

Many argued that, having spared the lives of the Ducs d'Epernon, de
Bouillon, and de Mayenne,[205] all of whom had at different times been
in arms against him, Henry might equally have shown mercy to Biron; but
while they urged this argument, they omitted to remember that the
political crime of these three nobles had not been aggravated, like that
of the Marechal, by private wrong; and that they had not, by an
unyielding obstinacy, and an ungrateful pertinacity in rebellion,
exhausted the forbearance of an indulgent monarch. Moreover, Biron, in
grasping at sovereignty, had not hesitated to invite the intrusion of
foreign and hostile troops into French territory, or to betray the
exigencies and difficulties of the army under his own command to his
dangerous allies; thus weakening for the moment, and imperilling for the
future, the resources of a frank and trusting master; two formidable
facts, which justified the severity alike of his King and of his judges.

The lesson was a salutary one for the French nobility, who had, from
long impunity, learnt to regard their personal relations with foreign
princes as matters beyond the authority of the sovereign, and which
could involve neither their safety nor their honour; for it taught them