pular enthusiasm. The Protestant nobles of Saintonge and Poitou
flocked in. A royal ally was announced; the Queen of Navarre, Jeanne
d'Albret, was bringing her son Henry, fifteen years of age, whom she was
training up to be Henry IV. Conde went to meet them, and, on the 28th of
September, 1568, all this flower of French Protestantism was assembled at
La Rochelle, ready and resolved to commence the third religious war.

It was the longest and most serious of the four wars of this kind which
so profoundly agitated France in the reign of Charles IX. This one
lasted from the 24th of August, 1568, to the 8th of August, 1570, between
the departure of Conde and Coligny for La Rochelle and the treaty of
peace of St. Germain-en-Laye: a hollow peace, like the rest, and only two
years before the St. Bartholomew. On starting from Noyers with Coligny,
Conde had addressed to the king, on the 23d of August, a letter and a
request, wherein, "after having set forth the grievances of the
Reformers, he attributed all the mischief to the Cardinal of Lorraine,
and declared that the Protestant nobles felt themselves constrained, for
the safety of the realm, to take up arms against that infamous priest,
that tiger of France, and against his accomplices." He bitterly
reproached the Guises "with treating as mere policists, that is, men who
sacrifice religion to temporal interests, the Catholics inclined to make
concessions to the Reformers, especially the Chancellor de l'Hospital and
the sons of the late Constable de Montmorency." The Guises, indeed, and
their friends did not conceal their distrust of De l'Hospital, any more
than he concealed his opposition to their deeds and their designs.
Whilst the peace of Longjumeau was still in force, Charles IX. issued a
decree interdicting all Reformers from the chairs of the University and
the offices of the judicature; L'Hospital refused to seal it: "God save
us from the chancellor's mass!" was the remark at court. L'Hospital,
convinced that he would not succeed in preserving France from a fresh
civil war, made up his mind to withdraw, and go and live for some time at
his estate of Vignay [a little hamlet in the commune of Gironville, near
Etampes, Seine-et-Oise]. The queen-mother eagerly took advantage of his
withdrawal to demand of him the seals, of which, she said, she might have
need daily. L'Hospital gave them up at once, at the same time retaining
his title of chancellor, and letting the