nly withdrawn. With anthems in Saint Gudule, with bonfires, festive
illuminations, roaring artillery, with trumpets also, and with shawms,
was the glorious holiday celebrated in court and camp, in honor of the
vast murder committed by the Most Christian King upon his Christian
subjects; nor was a moment lost in apprising the Huguenot soldiers shut
up with Louis of Nassau in the beleaguered city of the great catastrophe
which was to render all their valor fruitless. "'T was a punishment,"
said a Spanish soldier, who fought most courageously before Mons, and who
elaborately described the siege afterwards, "well worthy of a king whose
title is 'The Most Christian,' and it was still more honorable to inflict
it with his own hands as he did." Nor was the observation a pithy
sarcasm, but a frank expression of opinion, from a man celebrated alike
for the skill with which he handled both his sword and his pen.

The French envoy in the Netherlands was, of course, immediately informed
by his sovereign of the great event: Charles IX. gave a very pithy
account of the transaction. "To prevent the success of the enterprise
planned by the Admiral," wrote the King on the 26th of August, with hands
yet reeking, and while the havoc throughout France was at its height, "I
have been obliged to permit the said Guises to rush upon the said
Admiral,--which they have done, the said Admiral having been killed and
all his adherents. A very great number of those belonging to the new
religion have also been massacred and cut to pieces. It is probable that
the fire thus kindled will spread through all the cities of my kingdom,
and that all those of the said religion will be made sure of." Not often,
certainly, in history, has a Christian king spoken thus calmly of
butchering his subjects while the work was proceeding all around him. It
is to be observed, moreover, that the usual excuse for such enormities,
religious fanaticism, can not be even suggested on this occasion.
Catharine, in times past had favored Huguenots as much as Catholics,
while Charles had been, up to the very moment of the crime, in strict
alliance with the heretics of both France and Flanders, and furthering
the schemes of Orange and Nassau. Nay, even at this very moment, and in
this very letter in which he gave the news of the massacre, he charged
his envoy still to maintain the closest but most secret intelligence with
the Prince of Orange; taking great care that the Duke of Alva