French ambassador "que c'estoit abus d'estimer que
un heretique revint jamais; que ce n'estoit que toute dissimulation, et
que c'estoit un mal ou il ne falloit que le feu, et soubdain!" The last
expression is a clue to the attitude of the Roman See to heresy under
every successive occupant of the papal throne. Letter of La Bourdaisiere
to the constable, Rome, Feb. 25, 1559, MS. Nat. Lib. Paris, Bulletin,
xxvii. (1878) 105.

[1252] Gabutius, _ubi supra_.

CHAPTER XX.

THE SEQUEL OF THE MASSACRE, TO THE DEATH OF CHARLES THE NINTH.

[Sidenote: Widespread terror.]

The blow had been struck by which the Huguenots were to be exterminated.
If a single adherent of the reformed faith still lived in Paris, he dared
not show his face. France had, as usual, copied the example of the
capital, and there were few districts to which the fratricidal plot had
not extended. Enough blood had been shed, it would seem, to satisfy the
most sanguinary appetite. After the massacre in which the admiral and all
the most noted leaders had perished--after the defection of Henry of
Navarre and his more courageous cousin, it was confidently expected that
the feeble remnants of the Huguenots, deprived of their head, could easily
be reduced to submission. The stipulation of Charles the Ninth, when
yielding a reluctant consent to the infamous project, would be fulfilled:
not one of the hated sect would remain to reproach him with his crime.
And, in point of fact, throughout the greater number of the cities of
France, even where there had been no actual massacre, so widespread was
the terror, that every Protestant had either fled from the country or
sought safety in concealment, if he had not actually apostatized from the
faith.[1253]

[Sidenote: La Rochelle and other cities in Protestant hands.]

But when the storm had spent its first fury, and it became once more
possible to look around and measure its frightful effects, it was found
that the devastation was not universal. A few cities held for the
Huguenots. La Rochelle and Sancerre--the former on the western coast, the
latter in the centre of France--with Montauban, Nismes, Milhau, Aubenas,
Privas, and certain other places of minor importance in the south, closed
their gates, and refused to receive the royal governors sent them from
Paris.[1254] Not that there were wanting those, even among the
Protestants, who interposed conscientious scruples, and denied the right
of resistance to t