s." Walsingham to Leicester, Aug. 10, 1572, Digges, 234.

[922] Sir Thomas Smith's plea in her behalf is interesting and plausible,
but will not receive the sanction of any one who takes into account the
vast difference in the positions of Elizabeth and Charles, or considers
the principles of which the former was, or should have been, the advocate.
The good secretary, I need not remind my reader, was never reluctant to
parade his Latinity: "If you there [in France] do _tergiversari_ and work
_tam timide_ and underhand with open and outward edicts, besides excuses
at Rome and at Venice by your ambassadors, you, I say, which have Regem
expertem otii, laboris amantem, cujus gens bellicosa jampridem assueta est
caedibus tam exterioris quam vestri sanguinis, quid faciemus gens otiosa et
paci assueta, quibus imperat Regina, et ipsa pacis atque quietis
amantissima." Smith to Walsingham, Aug. 22, 1572, Digges, 237.

[923] Puntos de Cartas de Anton de Guaras al Duque de Alva, June 30th: MS.
Simancas, _apud_ Froude, x. 383.

[924] Froude, x. 385.

CHAPTER XVIII.

THE MASSACRE OF ST. BARTHOLOMEW'S DAY.

[Sidenote: The Huguenot nobles reach Paris.]

The marriage of Henry of Navarre and Margaret of Valois had been delayed
in consequence of the death of the bridegroom's mother, but could now no
longer be deferred. The young queen of Charles the Ninth was soon to
become a mother, and it was desirable that she should have the opportunity
to leave the crowded and unhealthy capital as soon as possible. Jeanne
d'Albret's objection to the celebration of the wedding in Paris had been
overruled. The bride herself, indifferent enough, to all appearance, on
other points, was resolute as to this matter--she would have her nuptials
celebrated in no provincial town. Accordingly, the King of Navarre,
followed by eight hundred gentlemen of his party, as well as by his cousin
the Prince of Conde, and the admiral, made his solemn entry into the city,
which so few of his adherents were to leave alive. Although still clad in
mourning for the loss of the heroic Queen of Navarre, they bore no
unfavorable comparison with the gay courtiers, who, with Anjou and Alencon
at their head, came out to escort them into Paris with every mark of
respect.[925]

[Sidenote: Betrothal of Henry and Margaret.]

The betrothal took place in the palace of the Louvre, on Sunday the
seventeenth of August. Afterward there was a supper and a ball; and when
thes