nry IV. to the Roman Church had been duly
accomplished that monarch had sent a secret envoy to Spain. The mission
of this agent--De Varenne by name--excited intense anxiety and suspicion
in England and Holland and among the Protestants of France and Germany.
It was believed that Henry had not only made a proposition of a separate
peace with Philip, but that he had formally but mysteriously demanded the
hand of the Infanta in marriage. Such a catastrophe as this seemed to the
heated imaginations of the great body of Calvinists throughout Europe,
who had so faithfully supported the King of Navarre up to the moment of
his great apostasy, the most cruel and deadly treachery of all. That the
princess with the many suitors should come to reign over France after
all--not as the bride of her own father, not as the queen-consort of
Ernest the Habsburger or of Guise the Lorrainer, but as the lawful wife
of Henry the Huguenot--seemed almost too astounding for belief, even amid
the chances and changes of that astonishing epoch. Yet Duplessis Mornay
avowed that the project was entertained, and that he had it from the very
lips of the secret envoy who was to negotiate the marriage. "La Varenne
is on his way to Spain," wrote Duplessis to the Duke of Bouillon, "in
company with a gentleman of Don Bernardino de Mendoza, who brought the
first overtures. He is to bring back the portrait of the Infanta. 'Tis
said that the marriage is to be on condition that the Queen and the
Netherlands are comprised in the peace, but you know that this cannot be
satisfactorily arranged for those two parties. All this was once
guess-work, but is now history."

That eminent diplomatist and soldier Mendoza had already on his return
from France given the King of Spain to understand that there were no
hopes of his obtaining the French crown either for himself or for his
daughter, that all the money lavished on the chiefs of the League was
thrown away, and that all their promises were idle wind. Mendoza in
consequence had fallen into contempt at court, but Philip, observing
apparently that there might have been something correct in his
statements, had recently recalled him, and, notwithstanding his blindness
and other infirmities, was disposed to make use of him in secret
negotiations. Mendoza had accordingly sent a confidential agent to Henry
IV. offering his good offices, now that the king had returned to the
bosom of the Church.

This individual, whose name