lly with, and was probably derived from, the version given in
Hotman's Gasparis Colinii Vita (1575), 106, 107. On comparing it, however,
with the transcript of the original autograph in the remarkable collection
of the late Col. Henri Tronchin, given by M. Jules Bonnet in the Bulletin
de la Soc. de l'hist. du prot. francais, i. (1853), 369, I discover
extraordinary discrepancies, and find that, in addition to a different
phraseology in every sentence, one clause is inserted by Hotman of which
there is not a trace in the Tronchin MS. I refer to the words: "Soyez
asseuree de ma part que, parmi ces festins et passe-temps, _je ne donneray
fascherie a personne_"--which would, of course, point to the prevailing
fears of a collision between the admiral and the young Duke of Guise, or
his retainers, whose hatred of Coligny was so well known that Charles IX.
had issued a special injunction to the parties to keep the peace. The
letter contains at the commencement of the postscript a playful allusion
to the hope of his wife soon to be a mother.
[933] Mem. de l'estat, _ubi supra_, 88, 89; De Thou, iv. (liv. lii.) 570.
The mechanical part of these exhibitions was well executed. In the
"_enfer_" there were "un grand nombre de diables et petis diabloteaux
faisans infinies singeries et tintamarres avec une grande roue tournant
dedans ledit enfer, toute environnee de clochettes." The singer, Etienne
le Roy, was again the "deus ex machina," coming from heaven and returning
thither, in the character of Mercury mounted upon a gigantic bird. The
final explosion inspired so much consternation among the spectators, that
it effectually cleared the hall.
[934] They were married at Blandy, a castle belonging to the Marquise de
Rothelin, near Melun, where its ruins are still to be seen (Saint-Fargeau,
Dict. des communes de France, s. v.), about a week before the marriage of
Navarre, August 10, 1572. Tocsain contre les massacreurs (Arch. curieuses,
vii. 42). Marie of Cleves was a daughter of the Duke of Nevers, and sister
of Catharine of Cleves, Prince Porcien's widow, whom Henry of Guise had
married in Sept., 1570. Journal de Jehan de la Fosse, 146.
[935] It is astonishing to see what considerable distances the Protestants
were obliged to go in order to enjoy any religious privileges, and what
fatigue they willingly underwent in order to avail themselves of them. In
1563, immediately after the close of the first civil war, instead of being
as
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