erious mother's will, in her efforts to free him from both. We see
in him a weak character, not naturally bad, torn to distraction by the
cruel forces about him, who when compelled to yield, as he always did
in the end, to that terrible woman, would give way to fits of impotent
rage against the fate which allowed him no peace.

The time had arrived when Catharine feared the influence of Coligny
more than that of the Guises. Brave, patriotic, magnetic, he had
succeeded in winning Charles's consent to declare war against Spain.
Philip II. of Spain was Catharine's son-in-law and closest ally. Her
entire policy was threatened. At all hazards Coligny must be gotten
rid of. The young King of Navarre, adored leader of the Protestants,
was a constant menace; he, too, must in some way be disposed of.

There were sinister conferences with Philip of Spain and with his
minister, that incarnation of cruelty and of the Inquisition, the Duke
of Alva.

To the honor of France it may be said that the initiative, the
inception of the horrid deed which was preparing was not French. It
was conceived in the brain of either this Italian woman or her Spanish
adviser and co-conspirator, the Duke of Alva. We shall never know the
inside history of the Massacre of St. Bartholomew. It must ever remain
a matter of conjecture just how and when it was planned, but the
probabilities point strongly one way.

Charles was to be gradually prepared for it by his mother. By working
upon his fears, his suspicions, by stories of plottings against his
life and his kingdom, she was to infuriate him; and then, while his
rage was at its height, the opportunity for action must be at hand.
The marriage of Charles's sister Margaret with the young Protestant
leader Henry of Navarre, with its promise of future protection to the
Huguenots, was part of the plot. It would lure all the leaders of the
cause to Paris. Coligny, Conde, all the heads of the party, were
urgently invited to attend the marriage feast which was to inaugurate
an era of peace.

Admiral Coligny was requested by Catharine, simply as a measure of
protection to the Protestants, to have an additional regiment of guards
in Paris, to act in case of any unforeseen violence.

Two days after the marriage, and while the festivities were at their
height, an attempt upon the life of the old admiral awoke suspicion and
alarm. But Catharine and her son went immediately in person to see the
wounde