thin the
compass of one year number not less than _twelve hundred and seventeen_.
The victims were taken out of all grades of society--from noblemen,
military men, judges, priests and monks, down to humble mechanics and
laborers. The lists made out by their enemies prove at least one fact
which the Huguenots had long maintained: that they counted in their ranks
representatives of the first families of the country, as well as of every
other class of the population. Happily sentence was pronounced generally
upon the absent, and the barbarous punishment of beheading, quartering,
and exposing to the popular gaze, remained unexecuted. But the incidental
penalty of the confiscation of the property of reputed Huguenots, which,
so far from being a mere formal threat, was in fact the principal object
contemplated by the prosecution, proved to be sober reality, and the goods
of the banished Protestants afforded rich plunder to the informers.[671]

[Sidenote: Queen Elizabeth becomes colder.]

Upon Elizabeth of England the first effect of the reported victory at
Jarnac was clearly marked. Her favorite, the Earl of Leicester, assured
the French ambassador that, although the queen was sorry to see those
professing her religion maltreated, yet, as queen, she would arm in behalf
of Charles when fighting against his own subjects.[672] Her own
declarations, however, were not so strong, or perhaps, after a little
reflection, she took a more hopeful view of the fortunes of the Huguenots.
For, although she exhibited curiosity to hear the "true" account, which a
special messenger from Charles the Ninth was commissioned to bring her,
and received the tidings in a manner satisfactory to the French
ambassador, she would not rejoice at the death of Conde, whom she held to
be a very good and faithful servant of his Majesty's crown, and deplored a
war which, whether victory inclined to one side or the other, must lead to
the diminution of Charles's best forces and the ruin of his noblesse.[673]

[Sidenote: Spirit of the Queen of Navarre.]

In point of fact, however, the defeat which the royalists had flattered
themselves would terminate the war, and over which they had sung Te Deums,
weakened the Huguenots very little.[674] The Queen of Navarre, on hearing
the intelligence, hurried to Cognac, where she presented herself to the
army, and reminded the brave men who heard her voice that, although the
Prince of Conde, their late leader, was dead, th