of the murders of Blois--the destruction of Guise and his
brother the Cardinal, and the subsequent imprisonment of the Archbishop
of Lyons, the Cardinal Bourbon, and the Prince de Joinville, now, through
the death of his father, become the young Duke of Guise--all these events
are too familiar in the realms of history, song, romance, and painting,
to require more than this slight allusion here.

Never had an assassination been more technically successful; yet its
results were not commensurate with the monarch's hopes. The deed which he
had thought premature in May was already too late in December. His mother
denounced his cruelty now, as she had, six months before, execrated his
cowardice. And the old Queen, seeing that her game was played out--that
the cards had all gone against her--that her son was doomed, and her own
influence dissolved in air, felt that there was nothing left for her but
to die. In a week she was dead, and men spoke no more of Catharine de'
Medici, and thought no more of her than if--in the words of a splenetic
contemporary--"she had been a dead she-goat." Paris howled with rage when
it learned the murders of Blois, and the sixteen quarters became more
furious than ever against the Valois. Some wild talk there was of
democracy and republicanism after the manner of Switzerland, and of
dividing France into cantons--and there was an earnest desire on the part
of every grandee, every general, every soldier of fortune, to carve out a
portion of French territory with his sword, and to appropriate it for
himself and his heirs. Disintegration was making rapid progress, and the
epoch of the last Valois seemed mare dark and barbarous than the times of
the degenerate Carlovingians had been. The letter-writer of the Escorial,
who had earnestly warned his faithful Mucio, week after week, that
dangers were impending over him, and that "some trick would be played
upon him," should he venture into the royal presence, now acquiesced in
his assassination, and placidly busied himself with fresh combinations
and newer tools.

Baked, hunted, scorned by all beside, the luckless Henry now threw
himself into the arms of the Bearnese--the man who could and would have
protected him long before, had the King been capable of understanding
their relative positions and his own true interests. Could the Valois
have conceived the thought of religious toleration, his throne even then
might have been safe. But he preferred playing