scelerati sui ministri in strage illa nobilium ut alias
multas diripuerunt, accepisse ea fertur."

[1046] Memoires de l'estat, _ubi supra_, 150. Versailles, which thus
passed into the hands of the family of Marshal Retz--the Gondi family--was
an old castle situated in the midst of an almost unbroken forest. The
Gondi family sold it to Louis XIII., who built a hunting lodge, afterward
transmuted by Louis XIV. into the magnificent palace, which, for more than
a century, was the favorite residence of the most splendid court in
Europe. The mode in which the title was acquired did not augur well for
the justice or the morality which was to reign there. M. L. Lacour has
contributed an animated sketch, "Versailles et les protestants de France,"
to the Bulletin de la Soc. de l'hist. du prot. fr., viii. (1859) 352-367.

[1047] Discours sur les causes de l'execution, _ubi supra_, 249.

[1048] Royal orders of Aug. 25th, Aug. 27th, etc. Order of the Prevot des
marchands, Aug. 30th. Registres du bureau de la ville, Archives curieuses,
vii. 222-230. Euseb. Philadelphi Dialog., i. 45.

[1049] Registres du bureau de la ville, pp. 222, 223.

[1050] Ibid., p. 227.

[1051] "Aucuns malades languissans, ayant ouy ce miracle, se firent porter
audit cymetiere pour veoir laditte espine; lesquelz, estans la avec ferme
foy, firent leur priere a Dieu en l'honneur de nostre dame la vierge Marie
et devant son ymage qui est en laditte chapelle, pour recouvrer leur
sante, et, apres leur oraison faicte, s'en retournerent en leurs maisons
sains et guaris de leur maladie, chose tres-veritable et bien approuvee."
Mem. de Claude Haton, ii. 682.

[1052] Ibid., _ubi supra_; Tocsain contre les massacreurs, 146;
Reveille-Matin, 193, 194; Mem. de l'estat, 155; Jean de Serres, iv., fol.
41; De Thou, iv. (liv. lii.) 596.

[1053] Dr. White (Massacre of St. Bartholomew, 459) has tabulated the
estimates, nine in number, afforded by twenty-one distinct authorities.
The lowest estimate--1,000 victims--is that of the Abbe Caveyrac, whose
undisguised aim was to place the number as low as possible, so as to
palliate the atrocity of the massacre. Being based apparently upon the
number of the _names_ of victims that have been recorded, it may be
dismissed as unworthy of consideration. The highest estimate, of 10,000,
though adopted by such writers as the authors of the Reveille-Matin and
the Memoires de l'estat de France, is vague or excessive. The Tocsain and
Agr