;
the middle party grew in strength daily, and when once Henri had allowed
himself to be converted, he became the national sovereign, the national
favourite, and the high Catholics fell to the fatal position of an
unpatriotic faction depending on the arm of the foreigner.

4. The civil wars were not over, for the heat of party raged as yet
unslaked; the Politiques could not all at once adopt a Huguenot King, the
League party had pledged itself to resist the heretic, and Henri at first
had little more than the Huguenots at his back. There were also
formidable claimants for the throne. Charles II. Duc de Lorraine, who
had married Claude, younger daughter of Henri IL, and who was therefore
brother-in-law to Henri III., set up a vague claim; the King of Spain,
Philip II., thought that the Salic law had prevailed long enough in
France, and that his own wife, the elder daughter of Henri III. had the
best claim to the throne; the Guises, though their head was gone, still
hoping for the crown, proclaimed their sham-king, the Cardinal de
Bourbon, as Charles X., and intrigued behind the shadow of his name. The
Duc de Mayenne, their present chief, was the most formidable of Henri's
opponents; his party called for a convocation of States General, which
should choose a King to succeed, or to replace, their feeble Charles X.
During this struggle the high Catholic party, inspired by Jesuit advice,
stood forward as the admirers of constitutional principles; they called
on the nation to decide the question as to the succession; their Jesuit
friends wrote books on the sovereignty of the people. They summoned up
troops from every side; the Duc de Lorraine sent his son to resist Henri
and support his own claim; the King of Spain sent a body of men; the
League princes brought what force they could. Henri of Navarre at the
same moment found himself weakened by the silent withdrawal from his camp
of the army of Henri III.; the Politique nobles did not care at first to
throw in their lot with the Huguenot chieftain; they offered to confer on
Henri the post of commander-in-chief, and to reserve the question as to
the succession; they let him know that they recognised his hereditary
rights, and were hindered only by his heretical opinions; if he would but
be converted they were his. Henri temporised; his true strength, for the
time, lay in his Huguenot followers, rugged and faithful fighting men,
whose belief was the motive power of their