defensive movement. Some advocated the seizure of
Orleans, and counselled that, with this refuge in their possession,
negotiations should be entered into with the court for the dismissal of
the Swiss; others that the party should fortify itself by the capture of
as many cities as possible. But to these propositions the pertinent reply
was made that there was no time for wordy discussions, the controversy
must be settled by means of the sword;[431] and that, of a hundred towns
the Protestants held at the beginning of the last war, they had found
themselves unable to retain a dozen until its close. Finally, the prince
and his companions resolved to make it the great object of their endeavors
to drive the Cardinal of Lorraine from court and liberate Charles from his
pernicious influence. This object was to be attained by dispersing the
Swiss, and by conducting hostilities on a bold plan--rather by the
maintenance of an army that could actively take the field,[432] than by
seizing any cities save a few of the most important. On the twenty-ninth
of September, the feast-day of St. Michael, the Huguenots having suddenly
risen in all parts of France, Conde and Coligny, at the head of the troops
of the neighboring provinces, were to present themselves at the court,
which would be busy celebrating the customary annual ceremonial of the
royal order. They would then hand to the king a humble petition for the
redress of grievances, for the removal of the Cardinal of Lorraine, and
for the dispersion of the Swiss troops, which, instead of being retained
near the frontiers of the kingdom which they had ostensibly come to
protect, had been advanced to the very vicinity of the capital.[433] It
might be difficult to prevent the enterprise from wearing the appearance
of a plot against the king, in whose immediate vicinity the cardinal was;
but the event, if prosperous, would demonstrate the integrity of their
purpose.[434]

[Sidenote: The secret slowly leaks out.]

The plan was well conceived, and better executed than such schemes usually
are. The great difficulty was to keep so important a secret. It was a
singular coincidence that, as in the case of the tumult of Amboise, over
seven years before, the first intimations of their danger reached the
Guises from the Netherlands.[435] But the courtiers, whose minds were
taken up with the pleasures of the chase, and who dreamed of no such
movement, were so far from believing the report, that C