onsible for too many undeniable crimes.[679] The death of so
gallant and true-hearted a nobleman, a faithful and unflinching friend of
the Reformation from the time when it first began to spread extensively
among the higher classes of the French population, and who had amply
atoned for a momentary act of weakness, in the time of Henry the Second,
by an uncompromising profession of his religion on every occasion during
the reigns of that monarch's two sons, was deeply felt by his comrades in
arms. As "colonel-general of the French infantry," he had occupied the
first rank in this branch of the service,[680] and his experience was as
highly prized as his impetuous valor upon the field of battle. The
brilliancy of his executive abilities seemed to all beholders
indispensable to complement the more calm and deliberative temperament of
his elder brother. It was natural, therefore, that the admiral, while
pouring out his private grief for one who had been so dear to him, in a
touching letter to D'Andelot's children,[681] should experience as deep a
sorrow for the loss of his wise and efficient co-operation. He might be
pardoned a little despondency as he recalled the prophetic words that had
dropped from D'Andelot's lips during a brief respite from his burning
fever: "France shall have many woes to suffer with you, and then without
you; but all will in the end fall upon the Spaniard!"[682] The prospect
was not bright. Peace was yet far distant--peace, which Coligny preferred
a thousand times to his own life, but would not purchase dishonorably by
the sacrifice of civil liberty and of the right to worship his God
according to the convictions of his heart and conscience. The burden of
the defence of the Protestants had appeared sufficiently heavy when Conde,
a prince of the blood, was alive to share it with him. But now, with the
entire charge of maintaining the party against a powerful and determined
enemy, who had the advantage of the possession of the person of the king,
and thus was able to cloak his ambitious designs with the pretence of the
royal authority, and deprived of a brother whom the army had appropriately
surnamed "le chevalier sans peur,"[683] the task might well appear to
demand herculean strength.

[Sidenote: New responsibility imposed on Admiral Coligny.]

Henry of Navarre had, indeed, just been recognized as general-in-chief,
and he was accompanied by his cousin, Henry of Conde; but Navarre was a
boy of litt