embalmed and sent to Rome, a grateful present to the
Cardinal of Lorraine and Pope Gregory the Thirteenth.[991] It has been
questioned whether the ghastly trophy ever reached its destination.
Indeed, the French court seems to have become ashamed of its inhumanity,
and to have regretted that so startling a token of its barbarous hatred
had been allowed to go abroad. Accordingly, soon after the departure of
the courier, a second courier was despatched in great haste to Mandelot,
governor of Lyons, bidding him stop the first and take away from him the
admiral's head. He arrived too late, however; four hours before Mandelot
received the king's letter, "a squire of the Duke of Guise, named Pauli,"
had passed through the city, doubtless carrying the precious relic.[992]
That it was actually placed in the hands of the Cardinal of Lorraine at
Rome, need not be doubted.

[Sidenote: Coligny's character and work.]

Gaspard de Coligny was in his fifty-sixth year at the time of his death.
For twelve years he had been the most prominent man in the Huguenot party,
occupying a position secured to him not more by his resplendent abilities
as a general than by the respect exacted by high moral principles. With
the light and frivolous side of French character he had little in common.
It was to a sterner and more severe class that he belonged--a class of
which Michel de l'Hospital might be regarded as the type. Men who had
little affinity with them, and bore them still less resemblance, but who
could not fail to admire their excellence, were wont to liken both the
great Huguenot warrior and the chancellor to that Cato whose grave
demeanor and imposing dignity were a perpetual censure upon the flippancy
and lax morality of his countrymen. Although not above the ordinary height
of men, his appearance was dignified and commanding. In speech he was slow
and deliberate. His prudence, never carried to the extreme of
over-caution, was signalized on many occasions. Success did not elate him;
reverses did not dishearten him. The siege of the city of St. Quentin,
into which he threw himself with a handful of troops, and which he long
defended against the best soldiers of Spain, displayed on a conspicuous
stage his military sagacity, his indomitable determination, and the
marvellous control he maintained over his followers. It did much to
prevent Philip from reaping more substantial fruits from the brilliant
victory gained by Count Egmont on the feas