Saumur a short note running
thus: "Monsieur de Montsoreau, I have instructed the sieur de Puigaillard
to write to you respecting a matter that concerns the service of the king,
my lord and brother, as well as my own. You will, therefore, not fail to
believe and to do whatever he may tell you, just as if it were I myself."
In the same package with these credentials Montsoreau[1083] received a
letter from Puigaillard, like himself a knight of the royal order of St.
Michael, which reveals only too clearly the purpose of the king and his
Brother. "Monsieur mon compagnon, I will not fail to acquaint you with the
fact that, on Sunday morning the king caused a very great execution to be
made against the Huguenots; so much so that the admiral and all the
Huguenots that were in this city were killed. And his Majesty's will is
that the same be done wherever there are any to be found. Accordingly, if
you desire ever to do a service that may be agreeable to the king and to
Monsieur (the Duke of Anjou), you must go to Saumur with the greatest
possible number of your friends, and put to death all that you can find
there of the principal Huguenots.... Having made this execution at Saumur,
I beg you to go to Angers and do the same, with the assistance of the
captain of the castle. And you must not expect to receive any other
command from the king, nor from Monseigneur, for they will send you none,
inasmuch as they depend upon what I write you. You must use diligence in
this affair, and lose as little time as possible. I am very sorry that I
cannot be there to help you in putting this into execution."[1084]

[Sidenote: Two kinds of letters.]

The statement of the author of the Memoires de l'estat de France is,
therefore, in full agreement with the ascertained facts of the case. He
informs us that, soon after the Parisian massacre commenced, the secret
council by which the plan had been drawn up despatched two widely
differing kinds of letters. The first were of a private character, and
were addressed to governors of cities and to seditious Roman Catholics
where there were many Protestants, by which they were instigated to murder
and rapine;[1085] the others were public, and were addressed to the same
functionaries, their object being to amuse and entrap the professors of
the reformed faith. And in addition to the double sets of written
instructions, the same author says that messengers were sent to various
points, to give orders for sp