re child, are
attacking the kingdom and the king himself. Now, in order that you may
not suppose that you will be acting herein against your consciences, I am
quite willing to be the first to protest and take God to witness that I
will not think, or say, or do anything against the king, against the
queen his mother, against the princes his brothers, or against those of
his blood; and that, on the contrary, I will defend their majesty and
their dignity, and, at the same time, the authority of the laws and the
liberty of the country against the tyranny of a few foreigners.'" [De
Thou, t. iii. pp. 467-480.]

"Out of so large an assemblage," adds the historian, "there was not found
to be one whom so delicate an enterprise caused to recoil, or who asked
for time to deliberate. It was agreed that, before anything else, a
large number of persons, without arms and free from suspicion, should
repair to court and there present a petition to the king, beseeching him
not to put pressure upon consciences any more, and to permit the free
exercise of religion; that at almost the same time a chosen body of
horsemen should repair to Blois, where the king was, that their
accomplices should admit them into the town and present a new petition
to the king against the Guises, and that, if these princes would not
withdraw and give an account of their administration, they should be
attacked sword in hand; and, lastly, that the Prince of Conde, who had
wished his name to be kept secret up to that time, should put himself at
the head of the conspirators. The 15th of June was the day fixed for the
execution of it all."

But the Guises were warned; one of La Renaudie's friends had revealed the
conspiracy to the Cardinal of Lorraine's secretary; and from Spain,
Germany, and Italy they received information as to the conspiracy hatched
against them. The cardinal, impetuous and pusillanimous too, was for
calling out the troops at once; but his brother the duke, "who was not
easily startled," was opposed to anything demonstrative. They removed
the king to the castle of Amboise, a safer place than the town of Blois;
and they concerted measures with the queen-mother, to whom the
conspirators were, both in their plans and their persons, almost as
objectionable as to them. She wrote, in a style of affectionate
confidence, to Coligny, begging him to come to Amboise and give her his
advice. He arrived in company with his brother D'Andelot, and urged