decamp till he brought the Besieged to Reason in so much that on the Assumption-day they were reduced to a Capitulation They gave up two hundred Hostages their Walls were pull'd down their Moats and Grafts fill'd up and three hundred Houses with Turrets demolish'd These were Inns belonging to Gentlemen who had the like at Toulouze and other great Cities in those Provinces Going thence the King went into Provence and all the Towns surrender'd to him within four Leagues of Toulouze The Season growing bad and he somewhat tender of Constitution he takes his way back towards France leaving the Conduct of his Forces and the Government of those Countries in the hands of Imbert de Beau-jeu Year of our Lord 1226 Upon his return one of the Grandees of the Kingdom whom History has not dar'd to name caused some Poyson to be given him whereof he died at the Castle of Montpencier in Auvergne upon a Sunday being the Octave of All-Saints He had Year of our Lord 1226 lived Thirty nine years and had Reigned three and about four Months He is buried at St. Denis by his Father The Clergy because of his Piety and his Chastity reported that his Sickness proceeded from his too great Continence for his Wife did not go with him and that he chose rather to dye then make use of an unlawful Remedy they presented him for Cure As he foresaw things in a posture that threatned great troubles after his death he took the Oaths and Seals of Twelve Lords that were about him that they should cause his eldest Son to be Crowned and if he failed they should put the Second in his stead By his Wife Blanche de Castille he had nine Sons and two Daughters there were but five Sons alive Lewis Robert Alphonso Charles and John According to his Will and Testament Lewis Reigned Robert had the County of Artois and propagated the branch of that name Alphonso had that of Poitou and Charles that of Anjou From him sprung the first Branch of Anjou John dyed at the age of 14 years Of the two Daughters only Isabella was left who having been promised to divers Princes and grown to be an old Maid took on the Holy vail and shut her self up the year 1260. in the Monastery of Longchamp between Paris and St. Cloud which the King her Brother founded for her Saint Lewis King XLIII Aged Eleven years six Months POPES HONORIUS III. Five Months GREG. IX Elect in April 1227. S. Fourteen years Five Months CELESTINE IV. Elect in Sept. 1241. S. Eighteen days Vacancy of Twenty Months INNOCENT IV. Elect in June 1243. S. Eleven years Five Months and a half ALEXANDER IV. Elect in Decemb. 1254. S. Six years Five Months URBAN IV. Son of a Cobler of Troyes Elected about the end of August 1261. S. Three years Thirty four days CLEMENT IV. Elected in Feb. 1265. S. Three years and about Ten Months Vacancy of Thirty five Months from Dec. in the year 1268. the Cardinals not agreeing amongst themselves in the Conclave about the Election THis is the Third Minority in the Capetine Race and the First wherein a Year of our Lord 1226. in Novembre Woman had the Regency Blanche de Castille a stranger but courageous and able undertook it and carried it being assisted by the Counsels of Romain the Cardinal Legat who had great power with her and grounded upon the Certificates of some Lords who attested that her Husband being on his Death-bed had ordered that he would have his eldest Son with the Kingdom and all his other Brothers be left to her Guardianship and Government Immediately before the Lords had time to contrive any obstacles to her Regency Year of our Lord 1226 she drew all the Forces she possibly could together and with them went and caused her eldest Son Lewis to be Crowned in the City of Rheims The Episcopal See being vacant the Bishop of Soissons who is the Suffragant performed the Ceremony It was on the First day of December The Lords of the Kingdom had been invited thither by Letters but the greatest part refused to come amongst others Peter Duke of Bretagne Henry Earl of Bar his Brother-in-law Hugh de Luzignan Earl de la Marche Thibauld Earl of Champagne Hugh de Chastillon Count de St. Pol and divers others They were framing a League amongst them demanding that the Regent who was a Stranger should give security for her good Administration that whatever had been taken from the Lords during the two last Reigns should be restored to them and such as were prisoners should be released especially Ferrand Earl of Flanders Year of our Lord 1226 After her departure from Rheims notwithstanding the severity of the Winter she marched towards Bretagne where lay the strength of the League The Confederates being not yet ready avoided what mischief they could by a Retreat but she followed so close at their heels that the Earl of Champagne fell off from the party then the others entred into a Treaty and promised to appear in full Parliament which was to be held at Chinon and which at their request was removed to Tours then to Vendosme Year of our Lord 1227 In that Parliament which was held in the Month of March a Peace was patched up between the Regent and the Lords but the same year they being assembled at Corbeil plotted to surprize the King as he was coming from Chastres to Paris their design had infallibly succeeded if the Queen Regent had not been informed and cast her self with the King into Montlehery The Citizens of Paris having taken up Arms went thither to guard him and brought him back with joyful acclamations to their City The Earl of Champagne was the man that had given this private intelligence to the Queen This young Prince had a pretence of Love or Gallantry for her rather out of some Court-like vanity then for the power of her charms she being a Woman of above Forty years of age she knew how to make her own advantage of his folly and wished him to continue amongst those discontented People that he might betray all their intrigues to her Year of our Lord 1227 The King of England would needs concern himself in this quarrel and promised them his assistance and the Earl of Toulouze taking his opportunity during these Brouilleries and Stirs had got possession again of all his Places The Queen Regent fearing this Flame might be blown too high renew'd a Treaty with the Princes of this League whom by that means she kept from farther proceeding all this year and in the mean while she confirm'd the Alliance with the Emperour Frederick made a Truce with the English for a Twelve-month and came to an agreement with the Duke of Bretagne who gave his Daughter to be Married to a Son of hers named John Thus the Earl of Toulouze was left alone Imert de Beau-jeu having received a notable re-inforcement bethought himself instead of taking the Castles one by one it would do
to stay for the Assistance the King was sending to him Solyman did not fail of that help he had promised him for by Land he fell upon Hungary and took from Ferdinand the Cities of Strigonia and Alba and by Sea he sent an Hundred and Thirty Galleys to the King commanded by Barbarossa who after he had filled the City of Ostia and the Coast along the Popes Territories with Terror and Amazement without doing them any mischief because the Year of our Lord 1544 forementioned Paulin being with him took them into the Kings protection cast Anchor on the Coasts of Provence the Fifth of July Francis de Bourbon Earl of Enghien joyned him with two and twenty Galleys and both of them in Conjunction besieged the City of Nice the fifth day of August The City having been Batter'd from the tenth of the Month to the twentieth the Governor Andrea de Montfort abandoned it and carried all into the Castle which being Built upon a Rock and generously defended feared neither Mines nor Guns Besides the French had taken so little care to furnish themselves either with Ammunitions or Provisions for the Mouth that they soon found want of it and were forced to borrow Powder and Ball of the Turks When Barberossa therefore perceived that he lost his Reputation and Men before this Place and that moreover Andrea Doria and the Duke were coming to Relieve it he raised the Siege and retired to the Coasts of Provence He staid there all the Winter not without committing many Barbarities upon the very French themselves whom he held in scorn for their negligence and want of care even to the Treating the Count d'Enghien by the name of Youth and little pretty Minion In the Spring he asked leave of the King who wanted not much entreaty to let him be gone either being very little satisfied with the other The Siege being raised Enghien brought back his Land Forces to this side the Var and took post to find out the King upon a report spread abroad that there would be a Battle to Relieve Landrecy After his departure the Duke of Savoy and the Marquess Du Guast employ'd their Army in taking Montdevis and in Fortifying Carignan There was only a Garrison of Swiss in Montdevis who Capitulated but Du Guast brutish and perfidiously put them all to the Edge of the Sword Boutieres had abandoned Carignan and begun to demolish the Fortifications Du Guast seized upon the Place Repaired it and put in a Garrison of Four Thousand men and three Thousand more at Quiers to assist them in Case of necessity The King not being satisfied with the Conduct of Boutieres who had forsaken a place which Commanded a good part of the Country on the one side and the Plain even to Suza recalled him and gave the Command of all beyond the Mountains to the Count d'Enghien When this Prince Arrived Boutieres was besieging Yvree and was just upon the taking it he was very unwilling another should bear away the Honour of a Conquest so near at hand wherefore the Prince having sent to him for some of the Forces to Convoy him he goes and meets him with the whole Army chusing rather if we may say so to let the Prey escape then that another should have the Quarry After the Emperor had subdued the Duke of Cleves had received a body of twelve Thousand English and re-inforced his Army to the number of fifty Thousand Fighting men he came and laid Siege to Landrecy The King had put Captain la Lande into the Place with two Hundred Horse and three Thousand Foot and had ordered the Lord Desse to assist him but the Fortifications were new and apt to crumble and be beaten down and the Frosts intermingled with cold showers did equally incommode the Besiegers and the Besieged who stood in myre up to the Mid-Leg The Attacks were weak and faint the Emperor thought to gain the Place by Famine In effect they suffer'd much but when they could scarce hold any longer after a brave resistance of two Months the King went from la Fere upon the Oyse and putting himself at the head of his Army approached within two Leagues of the Besiegers The Emperor believing he would give him Battle drew his Forces from the further side of the Sambre and joyned them with those on this side so one side of the place remaining open and free the King Relieved the Garrison and provided it with all things necessary then having executed what he desired he made his Retreat by Night very securely and put his Army into Garrisons on the Frontiers Four or Five dayes after his departure the Emperor likewise marched off but not willing to loose all his time and pains and to recompence his not taking Landrecy he seized upon Cambray by Correspondence of the Bishop who was of the House of Crouy put in a Garrison as a bridle upon the Town and Built a Citadel to curb them which was Erected at the Citizens proper Charges making them believe it was to preserve them from falling into the hands of the French Year of our Lord 1544 In the Year 1544. Four great Eclipses were Visible in our Hemisphere one of the Sun which hapned upon the Four and Twentieth of February and the other three of the Moon The first being in the same Month was not a Total one but at the two others which were seen in July and November the whole Disque of that great Luminary of the Night was quite obscured During these frightful events in the Heavens Francis the first Son of Henry the Dausin came into the World the Twentieth day of January The beginning of this Year found William Earl of Fustemberg a German before Luxemburgh which he block'd up with Twelve Thousand of his Country-men For upon I cannot tell what discontent whether real or affected he had quitted the Service of France for that of the Emperor The Prince of Melfy having order from the King marched that way with his Forces and with so brave a Resolution that Fustemberg durst not stay for him but retired The Frosts were so excessive sharp that it turned the Wines into Ice in the Vessels which they were fain to cut with Axes and the Lumps were sold by the pound In Piedmont the Count d'Enghien young valiant and who with an Army of well disciplin'd Men sought only an opportunity of Fighting having taken all the Posts about Carignan began his Blocade there the first day of February The Marquess Du Guast that he might put in some Supplies thought to Seize upon Carmagnoles the Count got thither before him and left him no possibility of saving the Place but by hazarding a Battle The Kings Council having given the Count leave to venture it he observing that Du Guast was on his March to pass over the Po prevented him and passed it first himself to meet him Thus the two Armies came to engage nigh the Burrough of Cerizolles the Fourteenth of April which
in peace telling him That he had not lâ—v'd four score years without learning to die a quarter of an hour At his Funeral Pomp Year of our Lord 1567 they carried his Effigies which is an honour done to none but to Kings and to the Sons of France The Queen very glad to be ridd of him who alone did in a manner limit her power within bounds of reason would not fill up that Office of Constable but that she might retain the general Command of the Armies in her own hands gave it to her Son the Duke of Anjou who was not yet fourteen years of age and placed trusty people about him to dispose both of his person and that great Command as she directed The fifth day after the Battel the Huguenots fearing they might be overwhelmed by those of Paris took their March towards Montereau to meet John Casimir Son of Lewis Elector and Count Palatine who brought them an Army from Germany The Royal Army did not pursue them but kept within Paris there being since the death of the Constable no General as yet appointed The Queen Mother had by Lansac and Bochetel Bishop of Rennes her Ambassadors declared to the Protestant Princes of that Country that in this War Religion was not at all concerned since the Huguenots were allowed all manner of liberty but the Regal Authority which they directly opposed so that the Electors William Duke of Saxony and Charles Marquiss of Brandenburg had denyed the Prince to make any Levies in their Territories but had allowed it to the King The Palatine being also prepossest had for a while kept back those Forces his Son was to command but being afterwards otherwise informed by an Envoyé who accompanied Lansac to the Court of France and who upon his return saw the Prince of Condé he exhorted his Son to go on with his March Year of our Lord 1567. September and October They sojourned at Montereau fifteen days to wait for the Troops which their Chiefs were raising in several Provinces as the King had likewise ordered his part to encrease his Army Those that were raised for them in Poitou Angoumois and Saintonge had for Commanders Francis de la Rochefoucant Claude de Vaudré-Mouy Giron de Luzignan Bessey and Francis de la Nouë whose wisdom and probity was held in admiration amongst the very Catholicks In their favour the City of Rochel by means of Truchard their new Maire and perhaps by the connivance of Guy Chabot Jarnac who was Governor for the King entred into their party whereof it hath been as it were the strongest Tower and Asylum for sixty years together In their March la Nouë being detached to get Orleans for them managed the Business so well that with the help of the Inhabitants who were of the Religion he made himself Master of it the eight and twentieth of September and forced out the Governor who had cantoned himself at the Porte-Baniere From Orleans they Marched towards Montereau and forced Ponts Sur-Yonne The Admiral having joyned them there with a gross of Cavalry would try the City of Sens but he there found the young Duke of Guise who having season'd his courage in the War of Hungary endeavour'd to let him see that he should find in him an Enemy as brave and more dangerous then his Father Those of Languedoc were employ'd by James Crussol d'Acier in taking the Castles of Nismes and Montpellier they having the Towns already by means of the Inhabitants Those of the Countries of Foix Albigeois and Lauraguais conducted by the Vicount those were seven Gentlemen bearing that Title having joyned him assisted him in the taking some places about Avignon and in Daufiné From thence they went to Orleans where by their Arrival they freed the Princess of Condé and the Wives of the other Chief Commanders from the great fear and trouble they were in who having but few Soldiers were every hour under some apprehension of being taken with the Town it self As for the Forces of Auvergne Forez and Beaujolois led by Poncenas and Verbelay they received a check in the Country of Forez from Terride la Valette and Monsalez who were bringing some Levies out of Guyenne to the King but however they made a shift to get clear Poncenas upon another occasion in the night was kill'd by his own Men. The Duke of Newers who had an Army of twelve or thirteen thousand Men six thousand being Swiss and the rest made up in Piedmont and Italy took as he was on his way the City of Mascon whereof la Loüe was Governor but as he was passing thorough his own Dutchy of Nivernois he met with some Huguenot Horse of the Garrison of the little Town of Antrain he charged them and pursuing them in their retreat was wounded in the knee with a Pistol-shot which made him lame all his life after and much exasperated against the Huguenots Year of our Lord 1568 The Huguenot Army at their departure from Montereau took their March thorough Champagne by Chaalons passed the Meuse and went into Lorrain They were five or six dayes in great pain that Prince Casimir appeared not and no less afterwards when upon his first Arrival he demand d an Hundred Thousand Crowns the Prince had promised to pay him when he could joyn him At this time hapned what had never till then been known the Princes Soldiers even to the very Snap-sack boys freely disbursed to make up part of the said Sum and thus one Army paid the other which consisted of six Thousand five Hundred Horse and about three Thousand Foot Year of our Lord 1580 With this considerable Re-inforcement the Confederates returned into France They took the Garrisons of Joinville and Chaumont passed the Marne and crossing the Bishoprick of Autun came to the head of the Seine the Forces under the month January Duke of Nevers not being able to hinder their passage over it From thence they steer'd their Course by Auxerre Chastillon and Montargis whence they extended into la Beausse The Prince having been at Orleans to receive those Troops were brought him from Guyenne marched Twenty Leagues in one day to lay Siege to Chartres He thought when he should have taken this Town he might promise to himself it being one of the Granaries of Paris that he might return to Block up that City its self so deep the Imagination was imprinted in him that he should never attain the ends he designed but by mating that great City by Famine and other inconveniences attending War The enterprize proved more difficult than he expected Antony de Lignieres was got into Chartres with a Strong Garrison and had put all things in good Order If nevertheless he had at first which he did not till the latter end turned the River another way which wrought their Mills the Besieged would soon have wanted bread During this Siege the Conferences for a Peace were again set on foot the Cardinal de Chastillon going to Longjumeau treated a
about mid January arrived the 12 th of February at Reims and was Crowned three days after by the Cardinal de Guise the See being vacant The Duke of Guise who was yet in Favour had the precedency of the Duke of Montpensier This latter being come within two Leagues of Reims resolved to carry it this time received an Order from the King which forbid him coming any nearer The next day the King Married Lovisa Daughter of Nicholas Earl of Vaudemont paternal Uncle of Charles II. Duke of Lorrain the Cardinal de Lorrain had when living made the first proposal for this Match When the King had made his entrance into Paris with his new Spouse the Deputies for the Protestant and Politique Party came thither to discourse concerning a Peace having first consulted by their Envoyez with the Prince of Condé who was at Basil They demanded Right might be done them upon Ninety two Articles many of which sounded very boldly but those that shock'd most were the holding of the General Estates the lessening of the Tailles and reducing them to the same Standard they were in under Lewis XII and that exemplary punishment should be inflicted upon Atheists and Blasphemers and the Laws and Ordonnances put in execution against Year of our Lord 1575 those enormous and infamous Pailliardise which provoked and called down the wrath of God upon France This malicious censure rendred the Huguenots more execrable at the Court then either their Rebellions or their Heresie These Conferences which lasted above Three Months and the several Negotiations wherewith they endeavoured to amuse the Rochellers and Damville were so far from healing all the suspitions fears and animosities in the minds of either party that they rather more increased and envenomed them So that the War continued every where In the neighbourhood of Montauban which was invested by the Catholiques and delivered by Choupes who marched thither with the Forces of la Noüe In Auvergne where Montal was defeated and slain by a Dame whom we may equal to the Amazones this was Magdeline de Sainct Neciaire Widow of Guy de Sainct Exupery Miraumont always followed by Threescore of the bravest Gentlemen who strove to do prodigious feats of Arms to merit her favour In Perigord where Langoiran surprized and cruelly sack'd the City of Perigueux In Languedoc where Damville did as much at Vzez and at Alez and in Daufiné where Montbrun gained a Battle against Gordes his enemy near Die and besieged him in that Town Some days after going forth to meet some Forces that were coming to deliver him he was himself defeated taken and sent to the Parliament of Grenoble who made his Process and condemned him to lose his Head This was in punishment for his having plundered the King's baggage and making this insolent reply to those that blamed him for it That Gaming and War made all men equal Francis de Bonne Lesdiguieres month February a private Gentleman but who had already attained to a great reputation supplied his Place in Daufiné and raised himself to a much nobler height by restoring a strict Military Discipline then the other had ever been able to do by permitting all manner of Licentiousness I shall pass over in silence those disturbances the Government of the Mareschal de Rais occasioned in Provence and the two Factions which troubled that Province Year of our Lord 1574 the one bearing the name of Carcistes from the Count de Carces Lieutenant for the King who was their Head the other Rasats who opposed his exactions Nor shall I mention some exploits of Montclue whom they had newly made a Mareschal of France For they were inconsiderable and after that the ill-favour'd wound in his Face by a Musquet shot at his besieging of Rabasteins for which he wore a Vizor-Masque the Huguenots dreading him no more then a Girl The Senate of Poland besought the King with all the respect and deference imaginable that he would be pleased to return into that Countrey if not they would proceed to the election of another Pibrac whom the Queen-Mother had sent thither to get the term prolonged found they had passed a Decree of the Fourteenth of July signifying that the Crown was vacant as by death and that the Estates should proceed to a new Election Finding they were resolved upon it he thought it more becoming and decent to retire then be spectator of the affront they were going to do his Master In the Diet they were divided into two parties whereof the one elected the Emperour Maximilian the other Sigismond Bathory Prince of Transylvania upon condition he should Marry Anne Sister of the deceased King This last more diligent then his Rival posted immediately to Poland Married the Princess and got himself into Possession which would have occasioned infinite troubles if death had not prevented it by snatching Maximilian out of the World A Court overflowing with voluptuousness and where all was steered by other hands then the Sovereign Pilots could not but be mightily agitated by the continual intrigues of busy Women and of Favourites Du Gua and Souvré were then the month June c. Kings chief Darlings the Queen-Mother employ'd these to set the Duke of Alenson and the King of Navarre at variance and to scatter some seeds of jealousie between the King and his Wife for fear she should make her self Mistriss of her Husbands Affairs pursuant to the Councils of the Duke of Guise They had likewise frequent counterscuffâ—es with the brave Bussy d'Amboise Favourite to the Duk of Alenson and with the Queen of Navarre who upheld the courage of that Prince upon whom they were eternally putting their little tricks It hapned about this time the King fell sick they made him believe he was poison'd month August by his Brother Upon this imagination he sends for the King of Navarre and commanded him to rid his hands of that mischievous Man so he termed him but instead of obeying him in his revenge tho that were to bring him one step nearer to the Throne he abhorred it and left the King the time to repent it Year of our Lord 1575 When he was recover'd the Mareschal de Montmorency ran great risque of his Life those that had been the occasion of his confinement having just cause to fear he would resent it if he got out of the Bastille resolved to thrust him out of the world that they might fall no more under such apprehensions To this end they reported that Damville who alone could deter them from so damnable an attempt was dead Indeed he was very sick of some morsel which had been given him and upon this rumour they perswaded the King to give order to Souvré to strangle the Mareschal in prison but Souvré though they assured him of being made Captain of Bois de Vincennes after the feat done made so many delays that they had certain news of the recovery of Damville and so durst not lay violent hands upon his Brother
a right to concern themselves and to intermeddle about the Marriage of their Kings offended at so unnatural an act and besides touched with a just sence of pity for Wisgard whom Theodebert had contracted seven years before obliged the King to repudiate Deuteria and take Wisgarda This lived but two years and made room for a third Wife Year of our Lord 541 The following year Childebert's Uncle and he fell unawares upon Clotaire he had only time to retire with what people he could get together to the Forrest d'Arelaune neer the Banks of the Seine and to stop up the Avenues with great Trees cut down and laid across When they were ready to force him in this Post the Heavens moved by the Prayers of the Queen Clotilda excited a miraculous Tempest which not hurting the Camp of Clotaire and thundering upon theirs did so astonish them that they sent to him to desire a Peace and his Amity Theudis Reigned then over the Visigoths the French being ever their mortal enemies Year of our Lord 543 Childebert and Clotaire passed the Pireneans and ravaged all Arragon The City of Saragossa being besieged the Inhabitants bethought themselves of making a general Procession round their Walls in the habit of Penitents and Mourners carrying instead of a Banner the Vest of St. Vincent Martyr their Patron This extraordinary Spectacle amazed Childebert and mollisied him insomuch as he accepted of some Presents made him by the Bishop amongst which was the Robe of St. Vincent which he brought to Paris where he built a Church in Honour of that Martyr and put that precious Relique there in Depositum The Spanish Authors say that upon their return the French were beaten at their passage to the Mountains by one of the Generals of the Visigoths who was called Tediscle If this be so there is some likelyhood that they made two Expeditions into Year of our Lord 544. or 545. Spain at different times yet soon after one another In the year 548. Theudis King of the Visigoths was killed in his Palace and this Theudiscle set upon his Throne but within two years after be was Treated in the same Year of our Lord 548 manner and Agila put in his place Whilst the Imperialists and the Ostrogoths were engaged with each other Theodebert who was already master of Rhetia of Vindelicia and of Suevia would needs take his advantage of that War and by his Lieutenants Hamingue was the Principal made himself Master of the lesser Italy that is to say what they have since called Lombardy Year of our Lord 548 After which Justinians Forces having gained some advantage over his That Emperour had the vanity to thrust in amongst his other Titles that of Francica which is to say Conquerour of the French Theodebert not able to suffer it would cross over Panonia and Mesia and bring all his Power into Thrace to let him see the French were not vanquished As he was preparing for this Expedition a mournful accident took away his Life Being one day a Hunting an exercise fatal to many Princes a wild Bull pursued by his Huntsmen whom he waited for with a Javelin in his hand broke down a Branch which hit him so rudely upon the Head that a Fever seized him whereof he dyed in the 14th of his Reign and about the 43 of his Age. He had one Son and one Daughter Theodouval or Theodebaldus and Bertoaire Theodebaldus born of Deuteria succeeded in his Estates a Prince of a weak Mind and Body who became impotent and benummed from his Waste downwards Bertoaire kept her Virginity and served the Church with great Devotion About the time of the death of Theodebert hapned that also of Clotilda who piously ended her days at Tours She retired her self thither to pray to God on the Year of our Lord 548 Sepulchre of St. Martin where in those times were the greatest Devotions of the Gauls and French As Theodebert had been a Prince of vast Undertakings he had mightily burthened Year of our Lord 548 or 49. his Subjects with Imposts even the French Partenius had been the chief Author and Minister he was a terrible Glutton as most of those Men or Cattle generally are who took Aloes to digest his Meat wherewith he cramm'd himself and so emptied his Belly more Beast-like then he filled it The French Men being stirred up to do Justice upon him he besought two Bishops to convoy him to Tryers he was in no more safety there then at Mets the People seeking for him to murther him and having haled him out of a Church Chest where those Prelates had concealed him affronted him by a thousand Outrages and after tied him to a Post where they stoned him to death CHILDEBERT in Neustria at Paris CLOTAIRE in Neustria at Soissons THEODEBALDUS Aged 13 or 14 years in Australia Burgundy belonging to both these  Ambassadors from Justinian sollicited Theodebaldus to abandon the Defence of the Year of our Lord 551 Ostrogoths and to make a League with the Empire he refuses the one and the other and nevertheless sends his to Constantinople to Treat of some difference concerning the Cities he held in Italy They had full satisfaction from Justinian but could not prevail with him whatever instances they urged upon the requests of the Italian Bishops to restore to their Sees Pope Vigilius and Datius Bishop of Milan whom he detained and Treated very ill Year of our Lord 552 c. A Civil War being broke out amongst the Visigoths between King Agila and Athanagildes this last had recourse to the assistance of the Emperour Justinian who failed not to make use of so good an occasion The Patrician Liberius having conducted several Forces there on his behalf seized on several Towns and was going to regain all Spain as Belisarius had Africk if the Visigoths had not killed Agila and Elected Athanagildes which did not however prevent the Romans by the Alliances they made in the Countrey and with the assistance they received from time to time to maintain themselves there about 90 years till the Reign of Suintila who drove them quite out from thence Year of our Lord 552 Totila King of the Ostrogoths too proud of the Victories gained over the Romans is Defeated and slain in Battle by Narses the Eunuque Lieutenant to the Emperour Justinian Teia his Successor hath the same misfortune a short time after and Narses brought under the Imperial Laws the greatest portion of what that Nation possessed Thus the Kingdom of the Ostrogoths was extinguisht in Italy where it had subsisted but 58 years The remainder of the Ostrogoths having implored the assistance of the French two Alman Lords who were Brothers they were called Leutarius and Bucelinus by the permission rather then by Order of Theobaldus descend into Italy with 75000 Combatants partly Almans and partly French and ravage it both on the Right and Left even to the further end of the Countrey Year of our Lord 554 The Army of
meet him and himself went and received him at Rheims whence he had him to his Palace of Crecy upon the Oise to pass his Christmass and from thence to Aix la Chapelle to consecrate the Church The Holy Father having been there eight dayes went back again to Rome thorough Bavaria He had undertaken this Journey to complain how that Maurice Duke of the Venetians and his Son John whom he had joyned with him persecuted the Patriarch Fortunatus whom he had approved of and honoured with the Pall and also how they favoured the Grecian Emperour The City of Venice was not yet built and the Seventy two Islands that compose it together with the Country and Towns upon the Shoars of the Gulph were governed by Tribunes who counter-balanced the power of the Duke Now those Tribunes Beat and Obelier whom our French Authors of those Times call Willeric had caused themselves to be Elected Dukes by one part of the People and had driven away Maurice and John who had recourse to the Assistance of the Greeks Year of our Lord 806 These therefore and John Duke of Zara with some other Lords of Dalmatia came to the Palace at Thionville to desire assistance of the Emperour in case the Greeks should assault them Whilst he remained there he shared his Estates between his three Sons in such manner that either of them hapning to dye without Children his Portion should ☞ be re-divided betwixt the other two but if a Son were born and that the People would Elect him to succeed his Father the Uncles were to consent thereunto This partition was made all his Sons being present subscribed by the French Lords and carried to the Pope that he might likewise Sign it not to make it the more Valuable but to render it the more Authentique Year of our Lord 806 This Year the Navarois were reduced to the Obedience of the French from whom they had withdrawn themselves upon what motives is unknown to put themselves under the dominion of the Saracens The Emperour's eldest Son employ'd himself without intermission in subduing the remaining Idolatrous people in Germany The preceding Year he had gained a very great Victory over the Beheman Sclavonians or Behains they are now called Bohemians and slew their Duke named Lechon This Year he had the like advantage over the Sclavonian Sorabes who inhabited on the other side of the River Elbe At the same time his two other Brothers laboured each in his division to encrease their Limits upon the Infidels Pepin made War against the Saracens at Sea Ademar Count of Genoa lost a Battle and his Life but Bouchard Count de l'Estable obtained another very signal one Lewis with his Aquitains made his Incursions to the further Shoar of the Elbe Year of our Lord 807 Nicetas Patrician of the East sent into the Adriatique Sea by the Emperour Nicephorus to recover Dalmatia restored that Country to the obedience of his Master and re-settled Maurice and John Dukes of Venice who had been expell'd and they soon expelled all those that had taken part with France Pepin had resolved to attaque Nicetas yet he made a Truce with him for some Months perhaps because he had enough to do with the Saracens who infested the Tuscan Seas This Year 807. was seen in the Heavens two extraordinary Phenomena besides three Eclypses two of the Moon and the third of the Sun For on the last day of January the Planet Jupiter seemed to enter into the Moon who was in her 17th day and the 14th of March Mercury appeared in the diske of the Sun a little above the Center like a little black speck which lasted so eight dayes Year of our Lord 807 The Pyracies of the Normands and their Descents and Landing on the Coasts of Neustria and even in the Mediterranean became more frequent and troublesome Charlemaine one day being in Provence and seeing some of them appear was so touched with the Misery France was like to suffer by these Pyrats that he could not refrain from Tears Year of our Lord 807 The Ambassadors from the King of Persia brought him Rare Presents Tents all of Silk and a Striking Clock with wonderful Automata They were accompanied by some Monks whom the Patriarch of Jerusalem for Syria was then under the obedience of the Persians had given them to be their Guides In the East all acknowledged or honoured Charlemaine There was none but Godfrey that countermined his Grandeur and Charles desired to get into his Country not to take possession of the Ice and barren Rocks of that Northern Region but to bring those poor ignorant Wretches to the Knowledg of true Faith Year of our Lord 808 The Dane prevented him and had the confidence to attaque his Country At first he made a great bustle drove before him Traciscon Duke of the Abrodites who was under the dominion of the French took by Treachery and hanged another of their Dukes and made two thirds of those people become his Tributaries Nevertheless having lost his best Men and his Brothers Son upon the storming of a Castle being informed that Charles eldest Son to the Emperour had passed over the Elbe he retreated and spoiled or ruined his Haven at Reric whither much Goods and Merchandise had wont to be brought for fear the French should fortify themselves there He designed likewise to shut up and cover his Country of Danemark by drawing a line and making a great rampart just opposite to the Saxons Territory from that Gulph of the Sea on the Eastern part to that on the West and all along the Banks of the River Egidore or Egid and in this part of his Earthen Wall or Work he had but one Gate well flanked for the passage of Carts and Soldiers Amongst divers exploits which were done in the Marches of Spain Lewis King of Aquitain took by force of Engins and assaults the City of Tortosa in Catalonia But Count Aureolus who had the Government of those Frontiers dying the year after Amoroz a Saracen Prince of Sarragosa seized upon several Fortresses of the French protesting notwithstanding he was ready to restore these places and his own person to the Emperors disposal Whereupon a Treaty was begun during which Abular King of Cordoüa to whom these Negotiations were no way pleasing sends his Son Abderaman who craftily seized upon Sarragosa and constrained Amoroz to retire himself to Huesca Year of our Lord 808 The Truce being expired between the French and the Greeks Pepin enters into the Gulph of Venice and gave Battel to Paul who was Patrician and one of the Greeks Generals Each side pretended they had gained the Victory Year of our Lord 809 The following year Nicetas having presented him Battel near Comachio was rudely repulsed At the same time Charlemain desiring to repress the Danes incursions sent orders and materials to build a great Fort on the River Sturia at the place called Aselfelt The Gascons were again revolted Lewis being gone to Dags
the divertisement with women and taking counsel only of the lowest and meanest People gave the Lords of Lorraine just cause to forsake him to submit themselves to Louis Those that had the Government of this young Prince brought him purposely to Thionville where they put the Crown upon his Head and Zuentibold endeavouring to revenge it was slain in a Battel fought between them the Year of our Lord 900 3 d. day of August in this year 900. He Reigned five years Charles in Neustria or West-France Louis in Germany Lorraine Rodolph I. in Burgundy Louis in Provence Lambert and Berenger in Italy In the War which Arnold Earl of Flanders made against Hebert Earl of Vermandois Eudes had favoured Hebert and King Charles took part with Arnold to whom he was in some sort obliged for what he enjoy'd Now Eudes being dead Hebert who was subtil and insinuating found means to make friends with Charles and got into so much credit with him that this simple and un-knowing King took the City of Arras from Baldwin and gave it to Count Altmar that he might restore Peronne to Hebert Baldwin or Baudouin coming to the King to beseech him to let him have his Town again was denied with rough language Now Fulk Arch-Bishop of Reims great both by birth and merit was then chief Counsellor to Charles and holding the Abbey of Saint Vaast had excommunicated Baldwin for invading the Lands thereof Wherefore Winomach Lord of the Island Vassal to the Count imputing the affront his Lord had received to the Counsel of this Arch-Bishop way-laid him in a Wood and murthered him for which being pursued and excommunicated by all the Bishops made his escape into England where he was eaten up with Lice It seems this was an Epidemical distemper in those days For we find divers persons in History that died thereof amongst others Arnold the Emperor the preceding year and King Rodolph of whom we shall hereafter make mention The Hungarians began to make themselves known about the latter end of the Reign of Charles the Fatt They then seated themselves in Pannonia having chased out the Huns and from thence became a Scourge to all the Provinces beyond the Rhine and the Year of our Lord 900 Danube as the Normans were to all on this side They were Originally a People of Scythia Brutish and Barbarous beyond all imagination Their Mother 's trained them to inhumanity from their Birth gashing and mangling their Faces that they might have nothing of humane and by swallowing down blood mixed with their own tears before they sucked their first Milk they might grow Blood-thirsty and pitty-less to all mankind They caroused in blood and fed upon raw flesh cut the hearts of those they took Prisoners in quarters and swallowed the gobbets reeking warm had no faith nor truth nor honour no wit but to defraud and contrive mischief always a turbulent and furious courage either against an Enemy or against one another The women were yet worse then the men They had scarcely any other weapons besides Arrows but were so dextrous in the use of them that every one they shot did some execution and every wound almost was Mortal They were all Horsemen very serviceable in flat and open Countries who would notably harrass an Army within their Bow-shot but aseless in Mountainous or Woody places or for Sieges Nor indeed would they ever adventure to come to handy-blows but ever made a running Fight King Arnold had brought them in to fall upon the back of Zuentibold a Sclavonian Prince who would have usurped Moravia and make himself King He being dead they were not afraid to fall upon the Countries belonging to Louis his Son And this year they gained a great victory against his Forces near the Year of our Lord 901 City of Augsburgh and afterwards Plundred Bavaria Scwaben Franconia and Saxony Year of our Lord 902 The year following having good information of the Civil War betwixt Berenger and Louis the Son of Boson they marched into Italy The Italians An. 899. tired with the Government of Berenger and above all with Adebert Marquiss d'Yvree Father of another Berenger who was likewise King of Italy had called in Louis But Berenger I. had made himself so strong with the assistance of Adebert Marquiss of Tuscany that he hemm'd him in and forced him to a promise he would renounce the Kingdom upon condition he would give him free liberty to march home again without farther lett or molestation The oaths of ambitious Princes are as frail and short liv'd as the vows and promises of Lovers the same Adelbert who had supported Berenger's cause turning Coat and solliciting Louis to return thither again that un-advised Prince confides in Faithless men But he had time to repent at leasure For they delivered him up to Berenger who deprived him both of his Empire and his fight That done he forces the Pope it was John IX to Crown him Emperor but so soon as he was gone from Rome the Pope sent for Lambert who was then private in some corner of Italy and Crowned him Which was confirmed by a grand Council held Year of our Lord 902 at Ravenna Berenger Governed 22 years we might say happily enough had it not been for the incursions of the Bulgarians In the Month of August this same year they again entred Italy with a numerous Army and having ransack'd the Territory of Aquilea Verona Coma and Bergamo came at last towards Pavia Berenger mean while had got his Forces together When they saw his numbers three times more then they expected they endeavoured to make a retreat and when he followed and pursued them so close that they could not get off without fighting they profer'd him all their Plunder and their own Baggage The Italians would hear of nothing less then to have them all upon discretion Necessity converted their fear into fury and dispair the Hungarians now attaque their pursuers and cut their Army all in pieces And Lombardy did afterwards become their prey Nor did they attempt to drive them thence but with their money a Bait so sweet that it allured them to return again often In the year 903. a Star appeared near the Pole-Artick which darted from the North-North-East towards the South-West along Train resembling a Lance which passing between the Signs of the Lyon and the Twinns crossed the Zodiack It was seen for three and twenty days For seven or eight years together there was nothing so remarkable as the cruel incursions of the Normans An. 903. Heric and Haric two of their Captains burnt Year of our Lord 903 the Castle of Tours and Saint Martin's Church Year of our Lord 905 An. 905. Rodolph and Gerlon two other Commanders of the same Nation took the City of Rouen upon composition and there setled their Habitation fortifying the Castles that were near them From thence for five years space they made Incursions into all the neighbouring Provinces conquered Constentine and Inhabited
and garb being attir'd in Cloth of Gold and his Hair pleated or wove with strings of the same those that follow'd him were so bewitch'd that they drank his Urine kept some as Treasures and Relicks and took it as a particular favour that he would in their presence abuse their Wives and Daughters At the same time another Innovator wandred through Provence Gascongne and Languedoc named Peter de Bruys Preaching that Baptisme was ineffectual before the age of Puberty that they ought to pull down the Churches such places not being necessary for Christians to worship in That the sacrifice of the Mass was nothing That the Prayers of the Living did not avail the Dead and above all things he pretended we ought to have the Cross in abomination because our Lord had been most ignominiously nailed to it Himself burnt a large heap upon Good-Friday and with that Fire boiled several pots with Meat of which he made a publique Meal and invited the people to eat with him But Peter de Clugny going into that Countrey to hunt him thence the people seized on his Person and burnt him alive in the City of St. Giles His Sect was not blown away with the Wind like his Ashes one of his Disciples named Henry made himself their head this was a Monk that had mew'd his Frock who becoming a vagabond because his Apostacy had left him no place of security set himself to preach up these Heresies from place to place to which he added some others of his own invention Peter de Clugny refuted him in an excellent Treatise St. Bernard in a journey he made into that Countrey confounded him by his sound Doctrine and moving Sermons justified with many miracles informed the poor People he had seduc'd and follow'd him so close that at length he was taken and deliver'd up to the Bishop bound Hands and Feet An. 1147. They called these Innovators Petrobrusians and Henricians the names of their two principal Doctors The same St. Bernard had likewise to deal with another sort of Hereticks who gave themselves the name of Apostoliques bragging they were the only people that followed exactly the Doctrine of the Apostles and were the true mistical Body of Jesus Christ none other Christians having the true Belief like them They held many of the extravagancies as those who since have been called by the name of the Illuminated or Enlightned We may well reckon amongst the Heresies those over-bold and too subtil propositions broached by Peter Abailard touching the Trinity since they were condemned as such in the year 1140. at the Council of Sens which was confirmed by the Pope though it appears to some that if there were too much presumption on his part there was also a little too much heat and some want of understanding on theirs However it were his Humility repaired his fault for having appeal'd to the Holy See he was easily perswaded to stop at Clugny by Peter the Venerable and there spent the rest of his days His Wife Heloise had also put on the Holy Vail The History of their Lives and their Loves is well enough known this is not a place to mention it in The Preachings of a certain Monk named Rodolph were something worse then Heresies I find that in the times of the Croisado or Crusado in the year 1146. having assembled I know not how many thousand Men to go into the Holy-Land he preached that they ought before they went to kill all the Jews who were much greater enemies to JESVS CHRIST then the Mahometans St. Bernard had much ado to save those miserable creatures from the fury of the common people who are never so easie to be moved as when some act of cruelty is propounded and ☜ to get the Monk to return into his Covent The Popes were persecuted by other Heretiques whom we might call Politiques because they would not allow the Church-men should have any dominion nor jurisdiction in Temporals The Romans stirred up as we have related by Arnauld de Bresse designed amongst themselves to take it from the Pope in their City and leave him only the Spiritual So that Eugenius III. flying from their persecution was forced to retire into France An. 1147. whilst he was there he called a Council at Reims where they examined the propositions of Gilbert Poret or Poree Bishop of Poitiers who having for Thirty years together profest Philosophy in the chief Cities of the Kingdom spake of God and the persons of the Trinity rather according to the Topicks of Aristotle then conformably to the language of the Holy Scripture He said the Divine Essence was not God that the proprieties of the Three Persons were not the persons that the Divine nature had not been incarnate that there was no merit but that of JESVS CHRIST and that none were truly Baptized unless he were to be saved His Arch-Deacons themselves moved with Zeal or Enmity became his Accusers St. Bernard stoutly Seconds them the business was debated in two conferences the one at Auxerre and the other at Paris and at last determined in a Third which was held after the Council of Rheims the Pope being unwilling before so great an Assembly to censure a Bishop of so much Learning and who besides protested he would submit to what his Holiness should think fit to judge of it His propositions were condemned he received this judgment with all possible submission but some of his Disciples were still so confident as to maintain them That we may know how prone our humane nature is to be deluded and led into the most extravagant novelties we need but consider and mention a wretched fanatical Dotard who was presented to the Pope in the beginning of this Council His name was Eon de l'Estoile a Gentleman of Bretagne he was so ignorant that having heard them Sing at Church Per Eum qui venturns est judicare vivos mortuos he fancied to himself and affirmed to others that it was he should judge both the quick and the dead It is almost incredible how many people were infatuated with this ridiculous extravagancy they follow'd him as a great Prophet sometimes he marched with a stately Train sometimes he hid himself then he appear'd again more Glorious then before They said he was a Magician and made sumptuous Feasts to allure the World but that it was but illusion and that the Meats they eat at his Table and the Presents he bestowed were only charms that alienated the Mind The Arch-Bishop of Rheims having taken him presented him to the Council and to his Holiness His Answers full of frantick Conceits and Whimseys made them look upon him as a mad-Man or rather a Fool but yet they clapt them into close imprisonment where he died shortly after Many of his Disciples more senceless yet then he chose rather to be burnt to death then renounce him There was certainly some remainders left of that Leaven of the Petrobrusians and Henricians which infecting many people
St. Riquier undertook to Confess some Seculars and to Preach without leave of the Ordinary of which complaint was made against him at Rome the Pope caused him to be cited before him but he pleaded his Cause so well that the Holy Father allowed him both the one and the other and gave him Sandals which in those times were the Marks or Badge of a Preacher The Clergy busied themselves mightily in multiplying the Ceremonies the Ornaments and practise of Devotions and in making a great many frivolous Disputes upon each of these The profession of Physick and that of Law were hardly exercised by any but the Churchmen the Laity being very little addicted to Study and as they were very profitable the Monks and Regular Canons had likewise an itch to practise them The Council of Latran under Innocent II. did expressly forbid their medling with either of them The Mortifications and Austerities the Sackcloth Shirt of Hair knotted Girdle and voluntary Fustigation which they called Discipline was much in practise at least in the precedent Age since Peter Damianus mentions it as a thing that was very common When they desired to appease the Wrath of God or obtain some particular favour from his Bounty the Pope and sometimes the Bishops of their own Heads would ordain new Fasts Thus in the year 1187. Gregory VIII sorely afficted for the loss of Jerusalem thought fit thereby to animate the Christians to Arm themselves powerfully for its Recovery to command all both Men and Women to fast every Friday for five years successively with the same strictness as in Lent and to abstain from Flesh the Wednesdays and Saturdays He enjoyn'd all the Cardinals and their Families to do the same and imposed it upon himself and all his As for the Fast of Lent it was then very strictly observ'd they eat but once in the whole day and that after Sun-set all the Divine Service and Masses being then over We may see some footsteps of it remaining to this day in that they say Vespers with the Mass before Noon Some gave themselves the liberty of eating at the hour of Noon which is Three hours after Twelve or Dinner time The Friers fasted but till that hour from the Septuagesima to the Quadragesima but from the Quadragesima till Easter they nor any of the Faithful did eat till after Vespers The Princes and great Persons did not omit this abstinence nor fasting neither which did not so much impair their Health as it abated their Concupisence and in these Holy Times the least Devout were obliged at least in Honour to give Alms every day The Functions of those in holy Orders were yet different and different and distinct the Priest seldom did the Office of a Deacon or Sub-Deacon Many out of humility remained Deacons still or at least a long time not taking upon them the Order of Priesthood till near the end of their days We read that Celestine III. at the time he was elected Pope was but a Deacon and had lived Sixty five years in that Order without aspiring to be a Priest They sometimes tolerated the Marriage of Sub-Deacons but it was Sacriledge in a Deacon Baptisin was commonly not Ministred or Conferr'd but at the time of Easter if those that were to receive it were not in danger of Death They plung'd them three times in the Sacred Font to shew them what operation that Sacrament hath on the Soul washing and cleansing it from Original Sin After they had given the extream Unction to the Sick they ordinarily laid them upon a Bed of Straw where they gave up the Ghost Some would needs die upon a Bed of Ashes with their Heads lying on a Stone In those times the Clergy called all those Martyrs of their Order that were kill'd though it were neither for Religion or the maintaining of Christian Doctrines We find in the Decretals some Apostolical Letters of Alexander III. which forbids they should honour the Prior of the Monastery of Gristan as a Martyr The History is strange and odd enough The Monks of that House distributed to the People I know not what sort of Water which they hallowed with certain Prayers and by that invention got store of Alms wherewith they made good Chear It hapned one day that their Prior being drunk wounded two of his Friers with his Knife who immediately beat out his Brains with a Staff that was at hand by chance The rest of their Fellows instead of concealing this Scandal had the impudence to make advantage and profit of this accident and feigned divers Miracles upon his Corps by vertue whereof they Crowned him with the Laurel of Martyrdom and the silly People gave credit to the Cheat. They had been mightily puzled in the other Age to bring the Priests to Celibacy There were some yet that could not agree to it The Popes Calistus II. and Eugenius III. compell'd them by divers Punishments and amongst others deprived them of their Benefices and Excommunicated all such as went to hear them say Mass Now it not being allowed them to make use of the rights of Nature by Marriage there were some though but few in number who made use of things against Nature burning with such flames of Lust as ought not to be extinguished but by Fire from Heaven As for the greater part of the rest the Law of God that is to say his Church forbidding them to have Children the Author of all Confusion substituted great Throngs and Crowds of Nephews in their stead and from thence follow'd great Disorders for if those Nephews were Ecclesiasticks they perpetuated the Benefices in their Families by Coadjutories or otherwise and possess'd as by Right of Inheritance the Sanctuary of the Lord If they were of the Laity and thrifty People they made their Uncles grow Covetous Usurers and Extortioners to heap up Riches for them or else they endeavour'd by all ways imaginable to alienate the Lands of the Church and joyning them to their own appropriate all to themselves Often times they became Masters of their Parents House and living there with too great a Train squandred away the Patrimony of the Cross and the Poor in Feasting Equipage of Hounds and Horses and sometimes in things much worse We might quote a great many Examples of this scandalous Nature I shall instance one which is of the Nephews of an Archdeacon of Paris who committed extraordinary Violences and Exactions in his Place whereof Thomas Prior of St. Victors having often given him warning they Murther'd this holy Holy Friar in the very Arms of the Bishop himself near Gournay as he returned from a Visit The Councils of the Gallican Church having now but little Authority because their Decisions were often annul'd at Rome without hearing their Reasons the Bishops took not so much care to call any I cannot tell in which it was where an old Bishop appear'd with ill Cloaths a Crosier half broken and a Mitre out of order to
the eldest was the most happy being joyned this year to Lewis King of France a Prince that Year of our Lord 1235 was much greater by his Virtues then his Crown The same year the Earl of Champagee it is not said for what cause fell again into Rebellion for which he was punished with the loss of his Cities of Montereau-Faut-Yonne Bray and Nogent upon the Seine These losses did not make him much wiser he persisted still in his foolish passion for the Queen who had ruin'd him and retired to his Castle of Provins to write Verses and Songs for entertainment of his amorous Dotage Year of our Lord 1235. and 36. Nevertheless he was soon diverted by the death of Sancho VIII called the Strong King of Navarre who dying without any Males left the Kingdom to him as the next Heir and Son of his Daughter Blanch. So he went and took possession and transported a great number of Husbandmen from his Landes in Brie and Champagne who improved and made that Countrey very fertile and populous The Countrey of Artois was erected to an Earldom Pairrie in favour of Robert the Kings Brother on whom his Father had bestow'd it by his Will Some place this erection in the time of Philip Augustus However it were I think we may be confident it is the first of that nature At the sollicitation of Pope Gregory who had as well a quarrel to the Emperour Frederick's Forces his Enemy declar'd they being in possession of the remainder of Year of our Lord 1237. and 38. the Kingdom of Jerusalem as to the Saracens there was a great Crusado of French Lords over whom the new King of Navarre was made Chief But these Adventurers had no better success then all the rest for the ill conduct of these new Soldiers of the Cross and their Divisions brought the whole Army almost to ruine and most part of the Officers and Commanders were slain there or taken prisoners Year of our Lord 1238 Peter Duke of Burgundy died in his return from this Expedition his only Son John Surnamed Rufus succeeded him The affairs of Constantinople were no whit better the Emperour Baldwin comes into France to beg assistance against the Greeks and for a great sum of Money sold the Crown of Thorns wherewith our Saviour was Crowned the Spung and the Lance which pierced his Side to St. Lewis the King who put them into his Treasury of Reliques in the Holy Chappel which he had purposely built in his own Palace It was now about three years that all the Doctors both Seculars and Regulars of the Sacred Faculty of Divnity at Paris which was then almost the only School for that Science and as it were the perpetual Council of the Gallican Church had resolv'd the question and were all agreed upon this judgment in a famous Assembly and after mature deliberation and discussion that oue and the same Ecclesiastical person could in Conscience hold but one Benefice at one time This year 1238. William III. Bishop of Paris held another Assembly of the same Faculty in the Chapter of the Jacobins where it was unanimously concluded That one could not without forfeiture of Eternal Happiness possess two Benefices at the same time provided one of them were of the value only of Fifteen Liures parisis per annum There were none but Philip Chancellour of the Vniversity and Arnold afterwards Bishop of Amiens who were obstinately resolv'd to hold their own The First when he lay on his Death-bed being earnestly desired and pressed home by the Bishop William to discharge himself of that burthen which would sink him down to Hell replied That he would try whether that were true How few are to be seen in these days that do not chuse to run the same hazard or are not troubled that they cannot have the opportunity of such ✚ a Trial But it does not appear so great a risque to them since the Popes give Dispensations Year of our Lord 1239 The quarrels between Pope Gregory IX and the Emperour Frederic growing hot to all extremity of Outrages on either side Gregory sent to St. Lewis King of France to proffer him the Empire for his Brother Robert Earl of Artois The Lords assembled by the King upon a proposition so important did not approve that violent proceeding and said it was sufficient for Robert that he was Brother to a King who was more excellent in Dignity and Nobility then any Emperour whatever The Albigensis could not submit themselves to the Orders of the Inquisition Trincavel Son of the Vicount de Beziers and five or six Lords of the Countrey putting themselves at the head of them they seized upon Carcassonne and some Year of our Lord 1239 other places and ran into some parts belonging to the King in hostile manner He presently sent some Forces thither Commanded by John Earl of Beaumont who drove them out from Carcassonne and besieged them in Mont-real where after they had held some time they made their capitulation by means of the Earls of Foix and Toulouze Year of our Lord 1239 The old de la Montagne so they named the Prince of the Assassins a People that occupied the mountainous Canton of Syria had dispatched two of his Murtherers into France to kill the King but soon after I cannot say by what motive he repented and countermanded them by some others who before they could find them out advertised the King to have a care of himself This old de la Montagne bred up great numbers of young Youths in pleasant aud delicious Palaces and the hopes of an Eternal Felicity in the other World if they obey'd his Commands blindfold and to make them the more capable and fit to execute his bloody Will in all Countreys he made them learn all Languages Year of our Lord 1239 The interests of the Pope and the Emperour were not at all compatible together and therefore Frederick and Honorius and then Gregory IX who succeeded Honorius fell necessarily into discords and afterwards into mortal hatred Gregory le ts fly the Thunder-bolts of the Church against Frederick and his Legat having called the Prelats of France together at Meaux order'd several of them to go to Rome to hold a Council where they pretended to degrade that Emperour He complained to the King desired him not to permit his Bishops to go out of France and his desire not taking effect he caused them to be way-laid and watch'd at Sea and having taken them distributed them in divers prisons Then in his turn he for a while slighted the Kings intercession for their release which thing made some alteration in that good correspondence that for some time had continued between France and the Empire In the year 1240. The King having assembled the flower of the Barons and the Year of our Lord 1240 Knights of his Kingdom at Saumur gave the Girdle of Knighthood to his Brother Alphonso whose Marriage had a little before been compleated with Jane
came to the Crown Three hundred years after by King Henry the Fourth surnamed the Great The Daughters were named Isabella Blanch Margaret and Agnes Isabella was Married to Thibauld the II. King of Navarre and died without Off-spring Blanch a little before this Voyage to Africk Married Ferdinand called De la Cerde eldest Son of Alphonso X. King of Castille and had two Sons who were unjustly deprived of the Kingdom by their Grandfather because their Father had preceded him and Representation had no place Margaret was Affianced to Henry Duke of Brabant and Limbourg then that Prince turning Monk Married to John his Brother and Successor They had no Children Agnes Espoused Robert Duke of Burgundy and brought him many Philip III. King XLIV POPES A Vacancy GREGORY X. Elected the 1st of September 1271. S. Four years four Months ten days INNOCENT V. Elected in January 1276. S. Seven Months JOHN XXI Elected in July 1276. S. Eight Months NICHOLAS III. Elected in November 1277. S. Two years nine Months Vacancy of Two Months Martin IV. Elected Feb. 21. 1281. S. Four years one Month seven days HONORIUS IV. Elected in April 1285. S. Two years one Month whereof six Months in this Reign PHILIP III. Surnamed the Hardy King XLIV Aged Twenty five years four Months Year of our Lord 1270 THE Christian Army wholly disconsolate for the death of their King and ready to sink under their Toils and Dangers resumed courage and received refreshments upon the arrival of Charles King of Sicily who with his Naval Forces landed at the very time the King his Brother was giving up the Ghost Being come ashoar he came and paid him his last Duty and caused his Flesh to be all taken from his Bones as it was then the Custom when any died in Foreign Countries He carried the said Flesh to Sicily with him and buried it in the Abby of Montreal near Palermo and King Philip kept the Bones which he deposited in St. Denis in France The Funeral being over they continued the Siege Charles having the Command of the whole Army because Philip being fallen Sick could not act At the end of three Months the taking of the place being most infallibly certain though not till the Winter was over King Philip's impatience who much desired to Year of our Lord 1270 go and take possession of his Kingdom and yet more the interest of his Uncle Charles who cared for nothing but to get Money and oblige the King of Tunis to pay him Tribute were the Motives that made them give Ear to Propositions of Peace with that Barbarian King Year of our Lord 1270 They allowed him a Truce for Ten years provided he would defray the whole Expences of that Expedition and that he would pay to Charles as much Tribute as he paid to the Pope Annualy That he would deliver up all the Christians he then held in Slavery That he would grant free liberty of Trade and exemption of Imposts to all their Merchants and would permit them to dwell in Tunis and have the Exercise of the Christian Religion At the end of the Siege Prince Edward of England arrived there with his Forces hoping that after the taking of that place the two Kings would go into the Holy-Land as they had promised but they thought it fitter to return to their own homes and left him to pursue his Voyage Year of our Lord 1270 Heaven seemed to be angry at their return all manner of misfortunes followed them Part of the Vessels wherein Philip was Embarked arrived happily enough at the Port of Trapani or Trapos in Sicily but the others that had King Charles and his on board were overtaken with a moit furious Tempest which destroy'd most of them with the loss of Four thousand Men all their Equipage and the Treasure that was in them Besides all this Thibauld King of Navarre being taken Sick ended his days at Trapani about the end of December his Brother Henry the Fat succeeded him Isabella of Arragon Queen of France being great with Child hurt her self by a fall from her Horse and died in the City of Cosenza Alphonso Brother of St. Lewis was taken off with a Pestilential Fever at Siena and his Wife Isabella de Toulouze died in the same place about twelve days after him So that King Philip cloathed in Mourning Weeds for the Death of his Father his Wife and his nearest Relations after so much Expence and Toil brought nothing back into France but empty Chests and Coffins full of the Bones of the dead Year of our Lord 1271 He staid in Sicily about two Months departed towards the end of February crossed Italy and arrived at Paris in the beginning of Summer He was Crowned at Rheims the Fifteenth day of August or as others say the thirteenth by the Bishop of Soissons the Archbishops See being vacant Of the ancient Pairs of the Laity there was none assisted at this time but the Duke of Burgundy and the Earl of Flanders Robert Earl of Artois bore the Sword of Charlemaine they name it Joyeuse At their going thence he intreated the King to go and visit his Country and received him in his City of Aâ—ras with such Welcom and Expressions of Joy as hitherto had not been heard of in France This King passing thorough Rome paid his Devotions on the Tomb of the Apostles At Viterbo finding the Cardinals had been there Assembled for two years together without coming to any agreement concerning the Election of a â—ope he exhorted them to make some end that the Church might be no longer without a Head His good Advice did not take effect till Eight Months afterwards upon their electing of Thibauld de Piacenza Archdeacon of Liege who went Legat into Syria with Prince Edward he took the name of Gregory X. Year of our Lord 1271 The Earldom of Toulouze was vacant by the decease of Jane the Daughter of Raimond and Wise of Alphonso Philip put himself into possession pursuant to the Terms of the Treaty made with Raimond in the year 1228. but it was King John that annexed it to the Crown Year of our Lord 1271 This year died Richard pretended King of the Romans The year after his Brother Henry III. King of England followed him and his Son Edward I. of that name who was in the Holy Land succeeded Year of our Lord 1272 Year of our Lord 1272 In a Bloody Quarrel the Earl of Armagnac had against Gerard Lord of Casaubon his Vassal it hapned that Roger Earl de Foix whom the Earl of Armagnac had called to his aid pursued Gerard and besieged him in a Castle belonging to the King whither he was fled and had put himself under his Protection The King angry for the little Respect these Earls had for him marched into those Countries with an Army capable of striking a terrour to the very heart of Spain He besieged Roger in his Castle de Foix and being resolved to level a Mountain wich hindred his approach
on the highest part of the Gibbet with the other Thieves he was hanged His immense Riches sufficiently proved the Justice of this Sentence Afterwards those Receivers or Officers of the Treasury who were of his gang were laid hold on and several put to the Wrack they would confess nothing however so well those Caterpillars know how to wind up their bottoms desiring rather in the greatest extremity to lose their Lives then part with their Money They carried on this search even to his very friends and particularly Peter de Latilly Bishop of Chaalons and Chancellor of France He was accused of giving the Morsel that is to say of having poysonn'd the Bishop his Predecessor and also the late King He was put out of his Office and left a prisoner in tbe hands of the Arch-Bishop of Reims his Metropolitan The execrable Custom of Poysonning was grown very common in France and it grew so in my opinion because the Ministers of the deceased King had been so extream Violent and vindicative This Prelat accused of so Villanous a Crime was referr'd to the Judgment of the Bishops of his Province To that end there was a Council Assembled at Senlis in the Month of October of this year 1315. where the Archbishop of Reims was present with his Suffragans The Party accused upon his request and according to Law was first redintegrated to his Liberty and his Bishoprick and afterwards it having been proved that four Women had been Convicted and Punished for Poysonning his Predecessor he was absolved fully and wholly Year of our Lord 1315 The Gentry and Commonalty of the Country of Artois having divers causes of Complaint against their Countess Mahaut the King sent for her in presence of Ame the Great Earl of Savoy and obliged her to give him her Hand that he might take notice of it Year of our Lord 1315 This Ame the Great was one of the most considerable Princes of his time He acquir'd the Title of a Prince of the Empire which was granted him by the Emperor Henry VII in Anno 1310. He increased his Territory with the Lordships of Bresse and Baugey by his Marriage with Sibilla the only Daughter of Guy Lord de Baugey as likewise with a part of the little Country of Revermont by Purchase of the Duke of Burgundy who had it of Humbert Dauphin of Viennois and the Earldoms of Ast and Yvree the first whereof came to him by the Concession of the Emperor Henry VII the second by the voluntary subjection of the People His Wisdom made him reign in all the greatest Courts in Europe the Emperors King Philip's of France Edward King of England's and made him find the Art to be so much a Friend to all these Princes who were at great variance that he became the perpetual Mediator concerning those Differences which Interest and their Jealousie bred amongst them Year of our Lord 1316 The Truce with the Flemming being at an end about the very time of the Coronation the King assembled his Forces and whilst on the other side William Earl of Hayâ—ault ravaged the Country along the Scheld he besieged Courtray The unseasonable Weather did what the Flemming durst not undertake and forced him to raise the Siege but the infinite havock and spoil the Soldiers made caused a horrible Famine in Flanders About the end of the Month of May in the year 1316. King Lewis began to feel the effects of those Poysonnings grown so rife in France They had given him a Dose so violent by what hand was not known that it carried him off the Fifth day June An Accident which the Vulgar thought to be presag'd by a Comet which had Year of our Lord 1316 display'd its terrible Train in the Heavens the One and twentieth of the Month of December before He died at the Bois de Vincennes the Nineteenth Month of his Reign and the Eight and twentieth of his Age. He left Clemence his second Wife with Child being four Months gone By his first which was Margaret Daughter of Robert II. Duke of Burgundy he had had a Daughter named Jane to whom belonged the Kingdom of Navarre and the Counties of Brie and Champagne but the Kings Philip the Long and Charles the Fair found out pretences to detain them REGENCY without a KING for Five Months Year of our Lord 1316 WHen Lewis Hutin left this World Philip the Long Earl of Poitiers his Brother was at Lyons where in pursuance of his Orders he laboured to make them elect a Pope to supply the See that had been vacant for above three years He had employ'd himself with so much zeal that at length he got all the Cardinals to Lyons and had shut them up in Conclave in the Jacobins Convent They had been there together some days when the news was brought him of the death of Hutin this made him return to Paris with diligence after he had left the guard of the Conclave with the Earl de Fores. After the end of fourty days the Cardinals could come to no other agreement about the election of a Pope then to refer it to the single Vote of James Dossa a Cardinal Bishop of O Porto who without hesitation named himself to the great astonishment of the whole Conclave who notwithstanding let it pass so He took the name of John the Twenty second of that name He was of the Country of Quercy the Son of a poor Cobler but very Learned for those times The Succession of the Males to the Crown was established not by any Written Law but by the inviolable Custom of the French nevertheless because in all other Kingdoms and in great Fiefs the Daughters succeeded and that in France of a long time no occasion had been offer'd to exclude them The Friends and Parents of little Jane particularly Eudes Duke of Burgundy Brother of her deceased Mother were on the Watch pretending the Crown belonged to her in case the Fruit of Queen Clemences Womb should come to no Perfection In the mean time they named Philip the Kings Brother for Regent till the time of her delivery Philip V. King XLVII POPE JOHN XXII Elected the 7th day of August 1317. S. Eighteen years and Three Months whereof Five years under this Reign PHILIP V. Called the Long because he was Tall King of France XLVII and enjoying the Kingdom of Navarre Aged Twenty six years Year of our Lord 1316 THe Fifteenth of November the Queen brought a Son into the World whom they named John but he went out of it again eight days after He was buried in St. Denis and in the Funeral Pomp was declared King of France and Navarre Which hath given some occasion to some Modern Authors to increase the number of the Kings of France and to call him John I. Year of our Lord 1317 Then the Dispute touching the Crown was renewed with more heat then before Charles Earl of Valois seemed to favour little Jane and the Duke of Burgundy her Uncle claimed and
united Year of our Lord 1415 When all his Forces were in readiness he made no scruple to declare his Pretensions and after he had written Letters full of Protestations and Threatnings to the King whom he stiled only his Cousin Charles of France he came and landed at Havre de Grace at the mouth of the River of Seine where he put on shoar six thousand Men at Arms thirty thousand Archers and all other Necessaries proportionably With these he laid Siege to Harfleur The place defended it self bravely by the courage of four hundred Men at Arms and seven or eight Lords of that Province that had thrown themselves in there In fine it was taken by assault and sacked perhaps not without some secret intelligence or at least the cowardize or baseness of the Chiefs of the French Army who took no great care to relieve them The blame fell on the Constable d'Albret In the mean time the King having set up the Oriflamme or Standard at St. Denis got his Soldiers together The English had lost a great many of their bravest Men upon their Attaques Diseases reigned in their Army and a scarcity of Provisions for they were forced to keep close together reduced them to great streights Insomuch as having held his Quarters for three weeks together along the Sea Coasts they were forced to remove and took their march towards Calais They crossed the Country of Caux the Earldom of Eu and the Lands of Vimeu with intention to pass the River Somme at Blanquetaque Year of our Lord 1415 The French Army which was as yet nothing but a multitude of Rascals pickt up in haste durst not attaque them in their march but when the King who was come in Person to Rouen had sent fourteen thousand Men at Arms and all the Princes to them excepting the Dukes of Guyenne Berry Bretagne and Burgundy it wa resolved they should go and fight them and instead of strongly guarding the passages over the Somme whereby to ruine them they went to way-lay them on the other side of the River and lodged themselves at Azincour in the County of St. Pol. The English being tired seeing the French to be four times stronger then themselves and believing they should be utterly lost if they came to an Engagement sent to profer them reparations for all damages done from the time of their landing in France But their Offers were rejected and Battle presented for the next day being the five and twentieth of October Year of our Lord 1415 The same causes that made them lose that of Crecy and that of Poitiers made them again lose this same I mean the necessity or desperate condition they reduced them unto either to vanquish or to dye their impetuous precipitation the confusion in which they fought all the Chiefs striving to be in the Head besides the ill order of their Van-guard drawn up so close that none but the first Ranks had room to stir themselves and the inconvenience of the Soil so fat and slippery with the Rain and withal so deep that they stood half way the Leg in Myre The Field was bestrewed with Six thousand of theirs and with Sixteen hundred of the English Amongst the slain were the Earl of Nevers and Anthony Duke of Brabant Brothers to the Duke of Burgundy the Duke of Alenson the Constable d'Abret the Duke of Bar the Mareschal de Boucicaut the Admiral Dampierre the Archbishop of Sens Brother of Montaigu and the Vicount de Lannois Son of the same Amongst the Prisoners the Dukes of Orleans and of Bourbou the Earls of Vendosme and Richemont and fourteen hundred Gentlemen The Army indeed Victorious but as much shatter'd as if they had been vanquish'd had much ado to crawl to Calais from whence their King Henry went over again into England Year of our Lord 1415 This great misfortune begot such Civil Discords as made the Wound much greater The Duke of Burgundy went on with his design of usurping the Government and he believed this Juncture very favourable towards it But when it came to be known that he was marched to Dijon with the Duke of Lorrain and ten thousand Horse to come again to Paris they brought the King back with speed and the Duke of Guyenne quartered Men in all the places thereabout The Burgundian being arrived at Lagny sent to the King to desire he might come to him and that the Duke of Guyenne might receive his Wife again whom he had pack'd away to entertain a Mistress He was promised satisfaction in this second thing he demanded but for the first he could never obtain it he was expressly forbidden to come near Paris but only with his own Servants There had been no security for him he found they had put all his Friends in Prison Hang'd up all his Soldiers they could light upon and sent for the Count of Armagnac his greatest Enemy to take the Constables Sword The mischief proceeded principally from the evil Counsels of certain Plagues in Court who for their private Interests promoted the differences between the Princes and plunged the young Duke of Guyenne into all Debauchery The University and Parliament made loud Complaints and moved that young Prince so much that he did promise to take some order but in few days afterwards he fell sick of a Loosness whereof he died the Five and twentieth of December not without visible marks Year of our Lord 1415 of Poyson The Count d'Armagnac being arrived at Paris the nine and twentieth of the same Month set aside the Propositions for Peace envenomed the Sore instead of healing it and made himself absolute Master of the Government having obtained the Soveraign Administration of the Treasury and the Command of Captain General of all the Fortresses with power to put in what Governors and what Garrisons he pleased After the death of the Duke of Guyenne the Succession to the Crown was to fall to his second Brother John Duke of Touraine The Earl of Hainault whose Daughter he had Married had carried him into his Country all honest Frenchmen wished he might return to inform himself in all Affairs In the mean time to gain the affection of the People and shew he was not engaged to any Party he Commanded both of them to lay down their Arms. The Burgundian who had stood gaping idly in Lagny was glad of so fair a pretence to retire He went back into the Low-Countries vexed to the very Soul that his Enemies should deride him and call him John de Lagny not much in haste The Emperor Sigismund desiring to procure the Churches Peace and also a Peace amongst Christian Princes made a Voyage into France and from thence Year of our Lord 1416 into England but without any success because the Constable refused the Truce for four years which he had propounded betwixt those two Crowns The King received him magnificently at Paris and was willing he should take his place in Parliament but it was not so well
of all these was Lonvet the President of Provence who had an ambition to govern in despite of all the Grandees He chose rather to be the ruine of his Master whom he had strangely fetter'd then to be thrust away from him so that Year of our Lord 1425 he found means by his contrivances to animate him against the Constable but the Constable made his Party so good that the King found himself abandoned of all the Grandees and all his places refused obedience to him excepting Selles and Vierzon Then he saw it was high time to discharge Louvet and all the rest Taneguy generously sacrificing his fortune to serve his King begged leave to be gone as his Reward Louvet upon his retreat as his Master-piece of Court-craft put the Lord de Gyac in his place The Constable had no little ado to reconcile himself to the King who fled before him that he might not see him At length he suffers him to approach that he might get assistance of the Breton Who being in the end satisfied by the expulsion of his Enemies came to him at Saumur rendred him Homage and gave him his Contract and the Contracts of all the Lords within his Dutchy under Hand and Seal commanding them to go upon his Service They did him but little good but they might Year of our Lord 1425 have done him a great deal of hurt The Seventh of September Charles the Noble King of Navarre ended his Life Blanch his only Daughter Married to John the Brother of Alphonso King of Arragon was his Heiress Year of our Lord 1424 and 25. As on the one hand these Broils prejudiced the Affairs of King Charles on the other hand the Quarrel which hapned between the Duke of Burgundy and the Duke of Gloucester about Jacqueline Countess of Hainault and the Duke of Brabant her lawful Husband did much retard nay set back those of the English forasmuch as it diverted the Forces of those two Princes who would undoubtedly have wholly subdued France had they joyned them to the Duke of Bedfords Jacqueline would not endure that the Duke of Brabant whom she affirmed was nothing to her should enjoy her Lands and the Duke of Gloucester who had Married her did serve and assist her in that Quarrel The Duke of Bedford desiring not to distaste the Duke of Burgundy endeavour'd to patch up some agreement between the Parties the Duke of Brabant submitted but Gloucester regarded it not but still pursued the right of his pretended Wife with Sword in hand Year of our Lord 1424 and 25. He and the Burgundian pickered by Letters and went on so far as to defie each other to a Personal Combat agreeing upon the time the place and the Weapons The Duke of Bedford having assembled the chiefest of the French and English Lords brought that Challenge to nothing and declared that there was no just or legal cause for Combat And to testifie to the Burgundian that he had no hand in the Enterprizes of his Brother he desired they might see one another at Dourlens as they did upon the Eve of St. Peters day This did not hinder them from making a brisk War in Holland where the Duke of Gloucester and the Duke of Burgundy tried their Forces but at two years end the Pope having declared that the Marriage of Jacqueline with the Duke of Gloucester was of no value that Prince desisted from his prosecution and Married a Damlet whom he entertain'd Year of our Lord 1425 The English had taken and fortified the City of Pontorson nigh Auranches from whence they perpetually molested Bretagne the Constable laid siege to it and regained it in a short time He was not so happy at Saincte James de Beuveron which they had repaired His Soldiers having forsaken him for want of their pay he made a shameful retreat and left all his Artillery and Equipage to the Enemy Pontorson was afterwards besieged by the English and having surrender'd the Duke of Bedford came to the Frontiers of Bretagne with a great Army upon which the Duke was so astonished that he renounced the Alliance he had made with France returned to that with England and promised to do Homage to King Henry The shocks great Captains meet with does often times proceed from the malice Year of our Lord 1426 and envy of those that are of the Kings Council whose care and province it is to provide for the subsistance and payment of the Armies The Constable knew that Gyac was the cause of his disaster because in stead of sending him Money he stop'd the current from running that way and diverted it to his own use and entertained his Prince in solitude and private pleasures that he alone might enjoy his Person and his Favours For this reason in the Month of January following he went with a strong hand to surprize him in his Bed at Issoudun and after some slight formalities of Justice caused his Head to be cut off or as others relate drowned him Year of our Lord 1426 Another Gentleman named le Camus de Beaulieu undertook to supply the place of Gyâ—c and tread in his footsteps some while after People were amazed to see the Constable rid himself of him as he had done of the other The Mareschal de Bouslac by his order slew him in the open Street and almost in the Kings sight in the City of Poitiers He remembred too well what the Favourites had contrived at Montereau and against the Duke his Brother wherefore he would suffer none to be near the King of whom he was not well assured he therefore places the Lord de la Trimouille at Court whom he judged to have sentiments contrary to the two former his House owing all their good fortunes and rise to the Dukes of Burgundy But this Man soon blinded with his new fortune as well as those whose post he now had taken he kept the Princes as much at distance as he possibly could so that even the Constable himself retired into Bretagne This proceeded to a kind of a War which divided the Court and retarded all the Kings Affairs for seven or eight Months Year of our Lord 1426 and 27. It would be endless to take notice of all the Sieges Fights and Enterprizes in these Wars both Foreign and Domestick There was not a City or Burrough but had Garrisons Forts and Castles were built in all convenient places upon Hills on Rivers in narrow ways and in the open Fields Every Lord had his Soldiers or to speak more properly his Bands of Robbers who maintained themselves by feeding on the poor Country People I shall therefore mention only the most remarkable Events in this place that the French raised the Siege of Montargis in the year 1426. and the year after recovered the City of Manse which had been taken by the English during the divisions of the Court. The Siege of Orleance was yet much more memorable and more important The Year of our Lord 1428 Earl of
honour Those were the four heads of her Accusation but which they proved very ill as being unable to make out any thing clearly against her but only that she cloathed her self in the habit of a Man and had taken up Arms which they imputed a Crime because said they that change of habit stained the modsty of her Sex and flatly contradicted the express command of God against it Peter Cauchon Bishop of Beauvais in whose Bishoprick she was taken the Vicar to the Inquisition some Doctors in Divinity and Canon Law were her Judges the Chapter of Rouen during the vacancy of the See lending them place After divers captious interrogatories they condemned her to perpetual imprisonment the bread of sorrow and bitter water of affliction but the English not being satisfied with moderate injustice pressed them so earnestly that some days afterwards they said she had relapsed in putting on the Habit of a Man again Excommunicated her and delivered her over to the Secular Power who burnt her alive the Thirtieth day of May in the Market place of Rouen Being on the Pile of Faggots she foretold the English that the hand of God was lifted up to strike them and that his Justice would not only drive them out of France but pursue them even into England and make them suffer the same calamities and mischiefs they had inflicted on the French It is related that her heart was found entire amongst the ashes and that a milk white Dove was observed to fly out of the midst of the flames a token of her innocency and her purity Year of our Lord 1431 Charles Duke of Lorrain died in the year 1430. without any Male Children There was a debate for the succession between Antony Earl of Vaudemont his Brother who pretended that Dutchy was Masculine and Rene d'Anjou already Duke of Bar who had Married Isabella who was but the third Daughter of Duke Charles but the two elder had renounced the Dutchy The Burgundian in hatred to the House of Anjou the capital Enemy to his and the Duke of Savoy his Allie assisted Antony and fortune was kind to him in the Battle that was fought between Bullegueville and Neufchastel in Lorrain For Rene's Army was totally routed Lord Bazan a great Soldier slain and Rene taken and led away to Dijon to the Duke of Burgundy who detained him till the year 1437. Year of our Lord 1431 After the death of the Pucelle the English Affairs went still worse and worse To remedy this they brought their young King to Paris and Crowned him with a double Crown in Nostre-Dame the Twenty seventh of November and withal the better to retain the Duke of Burgundy who was ready to start from them they confirmed the donation of the Countries of Brie and Champagne to him Year of our Lord 1431 The Lord de la Trimouille made ill use still of his favour and interest against the Constable and the rest of the Lords One day he being with the King at the Castle of Chinon they by confederacy brought two hundred Men in thither who took him in his Bed gave him a wound in the Belly and led him Prisoner to the Castle of Montresor The Queen her self consented to it and therefore soon appeased the King and that his fancy which never could be satisfied without some particular favourite might not be left unfurnished she helped Charles of Anjou Earl of Mayne to gain the Kings good will and more then ordinary kindness La Trimou I le was not set free till he deliver'd up the City of Touars which he had usurped and the King in an Assembly of the Estates at Tours owned all that had been done in respect to him Year of our Lord 1431 By vertue of what had been ordained at Pavia by the Council and the Pope the Council of Basle began this year upon the Three and twentieth of July under Engenius IV. who newly succeeded to Martin V. There was never any good correspondence between him and the Fathers of this holy Assembly For if on their part the Fathers at the very first gave him to understand that they would put some curb to his Authority by stoutly maintaining that ancient rule That the Council is above the Pope he on his part made them know that his greatest desire was to dismiss or dissolve them But as he could not so suddenly do it because the Emperor upheld them he was obliged to confirm the Council after two years of Controversies Year of our Lord 1431 32 33 and the following The War was carried in all the Provinces of France with various success but very feebly Do not wonder to see it languish in this manner for seven or eight years together the weakness of both Parties was the cause thereof they wanting Money could set no great Armies on foot Add to this the weakness of the two Kings Henry of England for his minotity and Charles of France for the easiness of his mind still held in leading-strings by his Favourites and Mistresses Year of our Lord 1431 The Twenty fourth of November in the year 1431. Lewis of Anjou King of Naples died at Cosenza in Calabria without any Issue The Second of February the year following Queen Joan or Jane ended her life also and left Rene the Brother of Lewis to inherit her Kingdom The Pope confirmed this Institution but as Rene was yet a Prisoner to the Duke of Burgundy Alphonso King of Arragon had full leisure to seize upon the Kingdom In this Jane ended the first Branch of Anjou which had produced above thirty other Sprigs furnished Hungary and Poland with Kings and lasted near two hundred years Year of our Lord 1434 Ame VIII Duke of Savoy wearied with the noise and perplexity of Soveraignty had made his retreat to the delicious Hermitage built by himself at Ripailles and taken on the habit of a Hermit with two more Gentlemen his Confidents having resigned his Estates to Charles his Son Earl of Geneva whom he had Married some years before to Anne Daughter of Janus King of Cyprus Year of our Lord 1435 Amongst an infinite number of petty Combats hapning within these two or three years I do not meet with any that was considerable but that of Gerbroy a little City near Beauvais Saintraille and la Hyre had undertaken to fortifie it and the English to hinder them These although three times more in number were beaten the Earl of Arundel their Achilles mortally wounded with a Culverin Shot in his Heel and eight hundred of their Men left dead upon the place Year of our Lord 1434 and 35. The earnest intreaties of the Council and the Pope to the Duke of Burgundy did at length incline his good nature to shew his just resentment and to take pitty of the miseries of France His Treaty had been first begun and rough drawn by Ame Duke of Savoy who in the year 1423. had mediated a Truce between the King and him for the Dutchies of
Orange and from thence into the Franche-Comte from whence he was conducted into Brabant The Duke of Burgundy received him as the Son of his Soveraign and assigned him twelve thousand Crowns for his use and the Castle of Gueneppe within four Leagues of Bruxels for his oridinary Residence Year of our Lord 1457 Whatever noble Reception and Entertainment he met with in that Country he had not been long there before he sowed division between the Father and the Son having gained the Lords of the House de Crouy who governed the Father and countenancing and abetting them against the Son who could not endure them The first year of his sojourning there they brought Charlotte of Savoy to him to Consummate his Marriage by whom a Son was born about three years afterwards who died Year of our Lord 1456 The Kings wrath discharged it self upon John Duke of Alenson the Dauphins God-father This Prince returning from Dauphine where he had been to brew some Intrigue with his God-son and having contrived I know not what League with the English to make some disturbance in favour of them was seized and imprisoned in the Castle de Loâ—hes Year of our Lord 1457 In the year 1457. as it is usual after a long War to squeeze the Finances of what they have sucked in during the publick Calamities the King called those to account who had managed the Treasury One John Xancoins Receiver General convicted of misdemeanour and of having detained sixty thousand Crowns was banish'd for ever his Goods consiscate and the fair Houses he had built bestowed upon the Count de Dunois Year of our Lord 1458 Two years after the imprisonment of the Duke of Alenson for it required all that time to find out proofs the King convened his parliament and his Pairs at Montargis to make his Process They laboured three Months in it he being at Baugency The business not going on with that expedition as he desired he removes the Assembly to Vendosme where he intended to be present At last by a Sentence of the Tenth of October they condemned the Duke to lose his Head and confiscated all his Estate The King gave him a pardon for his life but took the best of his Lands and sent him back Prisoner to Loches Year of our Lord 1458 The Twenty sixth of December of the same year was the last of brave Arthur's days Earl of Richmond Constable of France who had likewise been Duke of Bretagne a year and an half by the death of Peter the Simple second Son of his eldest Brother He had no child and so the Duthy went to Francis his Nephew Son of Richard Earl of Estampes his younger Brother Charles of Anjou Earl of Mayne had the Office of Constable The same year the Twenty seventh of June Alphonso King of Arragon and Sicilia pass'd into the other World At his death he left the Kingdom of Naples then called Sicilia on this side the Fare to Ferdinand his Natural Son Rene of Anjou finding this a fair opportunity to pursue his right against him before he could be well setled sent John Duke of Calabria his Son into those Countries This Prince guided by the destiny of his Predecessors had very prosperous beginnings and an unfortunate end Year of our Lord 1459 Since the taking of Constantinople the Duke of Burgundy had for two or three times made shew as if he would employ his Forces and Person against the Insidels We may fee in Oliver de la Marche the Vows which he and the Lords in the Assembly of Bruges made on the Peacock at a stately Banquet all this vanish'd into Air together with the Wine and Mirth of the Feast Year of our Lord 1459 As little did Pope Pius II. this was Aeneas Sylvius succeed in his Project which was to unite and engage all Christendom against the Turks In order to which he had convened a General Assembly at Mantoua where appeared Ambassadors from all Soveraign Princes and the War was resolved upon with great designs but without any effect The French Ambassadors returned but ill satisfied the Pope not condescending to favour Rene in his pretence to the Kingdom of Naples but threatning to Excommunicate the King upon the score of the Pragmatick whereupon John Dauvet Attorney General of the Parliament made Protestations and appealed to the future Council Year of our Lord 1458 and 59. The Duke of Tork had for the second time vanquish'd and taken King Henry Prisoner afterwards Queen Margaret with the aid of the Scots slew that Duke in Battle and deliver'd her Husband but Edward Son of that Duke having brought other Forces tried fortune once more and defeated the Queens Army under the Walls of York Then Henry being fled into Scotland and Queen Margaret into France he was Crowned King in the year 1461. This was the first Act of the Tragedy between the Houses of York and Lancaster that of York wore the White Rose and Lancaster the Red. Year of our Lord 1460 and 61 It was now thirteen years that the Dauphin had been absent from the Court his Father sent often for him which he cared not to obey he often called upon the Duke of Burgundy to send him back telling him he nursed and hugged a Serpent which when well warmed in his Bosom would one day make him feel his mortal Sting He sometimes proceeded even to threaten the Duke and stirred up divers of his own People against him who finding himself so harrass'd sent at last a smart Message desiring him to consider whether he would maintain the Peace of Arras or not For this time therefore the King left him quiet but two years after his Counsel or his own Resentment pressing him he was about to go and fetch him with an Army However he changed his mind again and thought it were better punish him by advancing Charles his second Son to the birth-rights of eldership according to the power the Kings of the first and second Race had had Which no doubt he would have put in execution had not the Pope strongly dissuaded him or perhaps if he could have had time enough to dispose the minds of the French Nation to admit of such a change Year of our Lord 1461 While he was at Meun on the Yeurre in Berry he had notice that his Domesticks had plotted to take away his life The poor Prince after that thought he saw nothing but poyniards and poyson His apprehensions were so great that not knowing from what hands he might take his food without danger he refrained from eating some days after which it was not in his power when he would have done it to swallow any thing So that he died of hunger the Two and twentieth of July about the midst of his Sixtieth year and near the end of the Nine and thirtieth of his Reign Never Prince had greater Traverses or more potent Enemies nor overcame them more gloriously After he had driven those out of France that
Year of our Lord 1465 days after This was the 4 th of January In hatred towards that good Prince and in prejudice of the pretensions he had to Milan the King had a little while before acknowledged Francis Sforza for Duke of Milan and with that had not only given up to him all the right the French had to the Seigneury of Genoa But had also remitted and given him Savona which he yet held declaring to all the Princes of Italy that whosoever should assist the Genoese against Sforza should be his enemy So that Sforza by the support of his great name made himself master of Genoa and of all that Signeury Year of our Lord 1465 The Author of the Antiquities of Orleans says that the River of Loire was Frozen this year in the Month of June If this prodigie were true we must needs conclude it proceeded from a natural cause since Chronology demonstrates to us that the thing upon which he would have it to be a Miracle could not happen in that time as he hath put it The Breton having dispatched his Ambassadors to Tours to demand the Term of three Months carried his practises on so cunningly that his League was ready for their purpose before the King had discovered any steps of it The Dukes of Bourbon and Alenson all the other Princes of the Blood except the Counts d'Estampes de Vandosme and d'Eu almost all the Grandees and all the late Kings old Captains were in it amongst others the Duke of Nemours and the Counts of Armagnac of St. Pol of Dunois of Dammartin who made his escape from the Bastille through a hole the Mareschal de loheach the Lords D'Albret de Bueil de Gaucour and de Chaumont d'Amboise They called it a League For the Publick Good because the Princes gave it that fair pretence While the King was at Poitiers the Bastard d'Armagnack Siezed his only Brother Charles and carryed him into Bretagne All the zealous Servants of the Deceased Charles his Father flocked in to him and got him to write a Manifesto to all the Princes of France inviting them to unite with their Party for the easing of the People and the reformation of the Kingdom After the King had attempted in vain to reclaim them by fair promises and flattering words he went to strike the first blow at them who had the first declared themselves These were the Dukes of Bourbon and Dammartin who had begun the War in Berry Bourbonnois and Auvergne All Berry submitted except Bourges which was guarded by the Bastard of Bourbon Rion in Auvergne waited a Siege and sustained it John Duke of Nemours the Count d'Armagnac and Charles Sire d'Albret brought a considerable reinforcement to the Duke nevertheless he gave Ear to a Treaty with the King promising to summon his Confederates to a Peace and to abandon them if they would not accept of reasonable conditions Nemours gave his positive word to the King to side with his Party but he kept it not and the King kept the Oath he made to himself to be revenged in time and place convenient Year of our Lord 1465 In this Country the King had notice that the Count of Charolois had taken the Field with the Duke his Fathers leave who had assured him when they parted that if he fell into any danger he should not want an Hundred Thousand Men to bring him out again He knew likewise that this Count had fifteen Hundred men of Arms eight Thousand Archers and a great equipage of Artillery and Waggons that he had made his Rendevous before Paris and that the Duke of Bretagne and Monsieur were to joyn him Year of our Lord 1465 The Charolois sent the fairest pretence in the World before him the Abolition of Imposts and the publick good He burned the Seats of those Officers at all the places of Receipts and tore their Registers paid the expences of his Soldiers and kept them in good Discipline If this good order could have held all had been his own or if the Breton had come at the time appointed they had been Masters of Paris there being few Soldiers in it and many male-contented and lovers of Novelties The fear of losing Paris made the King leave his other game to get to Paris before the Charolois As soon as he had repassed the Loire the Duke of Bourbon Dammartin Nemours and Albret broke their words with him and having gotten together ten Thousand men marched to joyn with the other Confederates The Lords of the League were all to be at St. Denis towards the end of the month of June the Charolois waited for them ten or twelve days and in the interim attempted the Suburbs of Paris by several Skirmishes When he found none stirred in his favour and that he had no certain news of them nor of the Bretons march he was in great perplexity and thought to retire back again Nevertheless the Vice-Chancellor Romille a Normand and very subtil shewing him from time to time Letters from his Master which he wrote upon blanks Signed before wrought so far that he engaged him to pass the River Seine over the Bridge at St. Cloud to go and joyn the Breton towards Estampes where he thought to have met him He quartered that day at the Village of Lonjumeau his advanced Guard at Montlehery The King returning from Berry kept the same Road and came to Quarter at Chastres a League on this side of Montlehery Both Armies were mightily surprised to find themselves so near each other The Kings design was to slip aside and reach to Paris without hazarding a Battel but Peter de Breze Grand Seneschal of Normandy concerned that he should ask him whether he had not given his Hand and Seal to the Princes engaged them to fight where he was killed one of the very first Thus hapned it to be a rencounter rather then a Battel It was on Tuesday 16 th of July near Montlehery from whence it took Year of our Lord 1465 name Both Armies to speak properly had the worst and neither of them any advantage The Kings left Wing and the Burgundians right were broken and in the rout the fright was so great that there were run-aways both of the one and other Party that posted it for fifty Leagues together without baiting or looking behind them each of them declaring they had lost the Battel on their â—â—de The two Chiefs fought Valiantly in person the Burgundian was twice near being taken Prisoner or slain In the Evening the King tyred with being on Horse-back all the day was conducted by the Scotch-men of his Guards to the Castle of Montlehery His men seeing him no more believed him to be dead And the Count du Mayne and the Lord de Montauban withdrew themselves with Eight Hundred Lances The Burgundian Army being half broken all in a Consternation fearing a new Engagement the next day which they could not have sustained the Principal Officers were in deliberation to dislodge that
night and go towards Burgundy Fear is an evil Counsellor all were of that opinion the Lord of Contay only hindred that retreat which would have turned to a rout The next day they had certain intelligence that the King was decamped and gone to Corbeil and a few hours after they were assured the Breton was arrived at Estampes Thus the Field was left to the Charolois which filled his head with so much pride that it may well be said that day was the cause of all his misfortunes The next day the King fearing to be hemm'd in descended directly to Paris along the Seine The same night he supped in the company of the principal Ladies of that City to gain their hearts by the power of that insinuating Sex and to have a Party amongst the Beauties to oppose the intrigues of those that were for the interests of the Princes He also highly commended the Fidelity of the Citizens and to allure the People he caused to be proclaimed in all the Suburbs an abatement upon Wines from a fourth part to an eighth part and a general revocation of all Imposts the five great Farmes only excepted These favours being against his will did not last long no more then the establishment he made of a Council of eighteen persons six of the Parliament six of the Body of the University and six of the chiefest Citizens by whose Counsel and advice he promised to be governed according to the remonstrances of the Clergy the Parliament and the University The danger past he kept nothing of all this but a mortal hatred against those that had made the proposition and particularly against the Bishop who first mentioned it in the name of the rest This was William Brother of Allen Chartier a man of great vertue and hugely zealous of the publick good ✚ Being in want of money he made great borrowings amongst his Officers Which was the first occasion of making employments vendible for he set aside those that had refused to lend him what he demanded About fifteen days after having well provided for the security of the City he went into Normandy to raise men and Money In the mean time the Count de Charolois marching to meet the Breton took the House d'Estampes to refresh his Soldiers and dress the wounded which were to the number of almost two Thoúsand At the end of three days the Breton arrived having with him the Counts of Dunois and Dammartin the Mareschal de Loheack the Lords de Bevil de Gaucour and d'Amboise 800 Men at Armes and six Thousand Light-horse It hapned one day that Monsieur a young Prince who had but a faint heart seeing the wounded men who were carried thorough the Streets of Estampes and the sick that crawled up and down let fall some expressions which signified his repentance for that enterprize The Count de Charolois heard it and perhaps he heard likewise that the Bretons upon the rumour that had been spread how the King was slain in the Battel of Montlehery had consulted of a means to rid themselves of him that they might govern the new King alone upon which he imagined that he might be left betwixt the Hammer and the Anvil and in this apprehension he sent to Edward King of England to treat of an Alliance with him and desire to have his Sister Margret His design was but to entertain him with hopes that he might make no League with the King for he mortally hated the House of York and was for the interest of Lancaster nevertheless by over-acting the dissembler he engaged himself so far as to compleat the marriage and took the Order of the Garter Year of our Lord 1465 When the Princes had staid two Weeks at Estampes they resolved to return before Paris to try a second time whether they could move them to declare themselves for the publick good Having therefore foraged the Country of Gastinois they passed the Seine over a Bridge of Boats between Melun and Montereau At this passage John of Anjou Duke of Calabria and Lorrain the Son of good King Rene and a great Captain joyned them with the Forces of both Burgundy's He had but eight hundred Horse but of the very best and amongst his Foot which were but few five Hundred Swisse the first that were seen in France When all the other Lords were come with their Forces there were near a Hundred Thousand Horse in that Army The Burgundian had his Quarters at Charenton and was lodged in his Castle of Conflans the Dukes of Berry and Calabria at St. Maur and the rest at St. Denis and the places thereabouts In this multitude of principal Officers there was no Head considerable enough to command this vast Body they staid three days before Paris without doing any thing Perhaps they might have forced it by assaults had they undertaken it for there were but five hundred Lances and some Bands of Archers however they rather furnished themselves then starved the City to a Compliance It is true they narrowly missed the gaining of it by Treaties and Intreagues For some out of a desire to see the Blockade at an end and the rest for fear of some sad event gave Ear to certain Letters brought them by the Heralds from the Brother of their King They sent Deputies to him from the Chiefest of the Clergy the Parliament the University and the Citizens The Bishop was Speaker At their return notwithstanding the contrary orders of the Count d'Eu who was Governor it was concluded at their Town-Hall that they should desire the King to Assemble the Estates that the Princes might come into Paris in small companies and that they should be furnished with Provisions for their money The King being informed thereof returned to Paris the 28 th of August and broke off this project Had he staid two days longer he might perhaps have found the Princes in Paris and the Gates shut against him Had that hapned he had resolved to have retired to Lewis Sforza Duke of Milan his good Friend who had sent him a relief of seven or eight Thousand Men that mightily harrassed the Duke of Bourbons Country Year of our Lord 1465 After his Arrival no day passed without Skermishings unless upon some Truces which were renewed divers times for four and twenty hours only There had been a Conference agreed upon by Deputies the third of September which was held at Mercers Grange From that hour there was nothing but bargaining to debauch people the Confederates grew jealous of each other that Party disunited and the Kings grew strong and better fortified and Confirmed It was resolved the Council of Sforza Duke of Milan should be followed which was to dissolve the League at what price soever and for that purpose to grant to every one in particular almost whatever he demanded The King had very near made an agreement which each of them excepting only about the Appenage for his Brother they being obstinately bent to have Normandy allowed him
together from the Month of December It 's Head was in the Sign of the Ballance and it had a long Tail turning a little towards the North. In Spring the King drew near towards Guyenne the Monk had perhaps reiterated his Dose However it was Monsieur died the 12 th of May. In the mean time the Burgundian passionately desiring to recover St. Quintin and Amiens was entred into a Treaty with the King who promised to restore it and to leave the Counts of Nevers and St. Pol to his Mercy and the Duke reciprocally did oblige himself to abandon Monsicur and the Breton to him Neither of these Dreamt of keeping their Word of Faith The Duke Signed the first the King deferr'd from day to day expecting what would become of his Brother when he had certain news of his Death he scoffed at the Duke and Seized Guyenne again into his own hands Although in many actions he had not too much of the Fear of God before his Eyes nevertheless he had great Devotion towards the Saints enriched their Churches went several Pilgrimages every year particularly to places Consecrated to our Lady He Ordained on the first of May that at the sound of the great Bell at Noon every one should kneel down and say the Ave Maria. The same day after the procession William Chartier Bishop of Paris Died suddenly not without suspicion that some had contributed towards his Death Year of our Lord 1472 It was in this year that Philip de Comines quitted the Duke of Burgundy whose Domestick and Subject he was to go into the Service of the King his Soveraign Lord. If the Motive thereto had been Honest no doubt but it would have been explained by him who hath reasoned so well on every thing else Who could express the rage the Duke of Burgundy was in when he Learn'd the Death of the Duke of Guyenne He entred into Picardy with a Torch in one hand and his Sword in the other Hitherto burnings had not been practised by either Party nevertheless he made a Bon-fire of all the open Country and Sacrificed all that fell under his power to his Friends Ghost Nesle taken by assault endured all sorts of cruelties because the Inhabitants had killed a Herald at Arms who went to Summon them and two men besides during a Surcease which had been allowed them to Treat in The reverence to the Altar could not save those innocent people who fled to the Church for refuge and such as escaped the Sword were all hanged or had their hands cut off His blind fury ran aground at the Siege of Beauvais The want of attacking it roundly at first made him lose six Weeks time and two Thousand Men. It is Memorable that upon a General Assault which was given the Thursday 9 th of July the Men within being ready to give ground the Women conducted by one Jane Hatchete did wonders repelling the Enemy with showers of Stones Wild-fire and Lead melted with scalding Rozen The Effigies of that Woman is yet to be seen in their Town-Hall grasping a Sword in her hand and there is a procession the 10 th of July which is the Day on which the Siege was raised where the Women march first the Men following after Year of our Lord 1472 Going thence the Burgundian Ravaged all the Country of Caux took Eu and St. Valery but was repulsed before Diepe then before Rouen and having threatned Noyon he retired to Abbeville From Guyenne the King passed into Bretagne to force the Duke to renounce the League and surrender the Monk to him who had Poyson'd Monsieur For Odet-Daydie had Seized him and transfer'd him to Nantes The Monk was found dead in Prison the Devil as was said having broken his Neck the Night before that day wherein they were to pronounce his Sentence This was what the King desired that so the Proof of the Crime might perish with the Poysoner and it was more easie now for the Breton to avoid the heavy strokes of his power by the ordinary craft of his Landays He granted him a Truce the 10 th of September and remained still in Poitou till it was converted into a final peace Which was brought about by the Mediation of Odet-Daydie whom he allured to his Service by great rewards He knew better then any Prince in the World how to gain Men discover his Enemies secrets distract them with jealousies divide the most united but in his mirth he could not hide his secrets every thing came to light and he was likewise more subject to commit faults then able to repair them which he strove to do by Methods more frequently bad then good Year of our Lord 1472. 73. In the beginning of Winter the Burgundian accepted a Truce In the Month of February the Duke of Alenson who had a troubled and unquiet mind for having contrived I know not what League with him was made Prisoner and conveyed to the Castle of Loches and from thence to the Lowre The following year the Parliament by a Sentence of the 18 th of July Condemned him to loose his Head The King his Godson gave him his Life and Seventeen Months after took him out of Prison and put him into a Citizens House at Paris under a good Guard Year of our Lord 1474 where he soon Died. John V. Count of Armagnac who had been once more driven from his Country after the Death of Monsieur had again Siezed upon his City of Leytoure by certain correspondence and had there surprised Peter de Bourbon Beaujeu Governor of Guyenne He was straightly besieged in that place by the Kings Army commanded by the Cardinal of Arras 'T is said that having capitulated with him that good Prelate broke his Faith so that the City was invaded during the Suspension and the Count miserably Murth'red in his House His Brother Charles was brought Prisoner to Paris During the Truce the Burgundian wont to conquer the Dutchy of Guelders Duke Arnold had either sold or given it to him disinheriting his wicked Son Adolph who had a long time held his Father Prisoner and was himself so now by the Burgundian at Ghent This new Acquisition gave him the Appetite to encrease on the German side He flatter'd the Emperor Frederick with the marriage of his Daughter to his Son Maximilian and was even willing she should give him her promise and a Diamond With this Lure he brings Frederick to Mets thinking by his Authority to make himself Lord of that Town which did not Succeed and got his promise that he would raise his Dukedom to a Kingdom With these hopes he went awhile after to him at Treves carrying along the Regal Ornaments and made him a Feast with more then Royal Profusion But the Emperor meant the Marriage should be first accomplished and the Duke would sign the Contract in Quality of King They could not agree thereon And the Emperor left him there without taking his leave Year of our Lord 1473 The King let
him run after his fancies and endeavoured then to recover Perpignan whereof John King of Arragon was repossessed by Intelligence it was only the Town for the Castle held out still for the French Their Army went thither after the taking of Leytoure King John besieged in the City though Aged above Seventy years defended himself bravely for two Months together till his Son Ferdinand came to his assistance and relieved him The Twelfth day of August Nicolas d'Anjou Son of John of Calabria who had Succeeded to the Dutchy of Lorrain after the Death of his Father Died of the Plague at Nancy Thus his Cousin Rene of Lorrain Son of his Aunt Yoland d'Anjou and de Ferry who was Son of Antony Count of Vaudemont restored the Dukedom to their House whence it came For about four or five years past the Constable play'd double betwixt the King and the Burgundian and incited them the one against the other He thought their broils was his only safety but both offended with his duplicity agreed his ruin at the price of his head and his plunder if they could but catch him He had some hint of it and broke the project by the many reasons he gave the King in writing But after he had obtained his pardon he again offended him more grievously then ever For he Seized on the City of St. Quentin and which was worse had the impudence to confer with him well Armed upon a Bridge with a Barrier betwixt them as he had been his equal Year of our Lord 1474 The Burgundians ambition was insatiable He had invited Edward of the House of York to make a descent in France where the Burgundian promised to do as much by his correspondence as they with their Forces and nevertheless instead of waiting for them he went and ruined his Army before the Town of Nuz building great designs upon the taking of this place which lies on the Rhine The apparent reason why he laid that Siege was to re-settle Robert de Bauiere in the Arch-Bishoprick of Cologn whose Channons had refused to admit him and for their Chief had taken one of their Colleagues to wit Herman Brother of the Landgrave of Hesse Year of our Lord 1474 As King Rene was good liberal and devout so was he inconstant and variable of Courage tame and weak His Sons and Grand-sons being all dead there remained only his Daughter Yoland mother of Rene Duke of Lorrain but that House was at distance from him and such as were near made him believe that having received so many troubles from her he ought not to love her and inclined him according to their interests to give his Succession one while to the King of France another while to Charles Count du Maine his Nephew Son of his Brother of the same name another time to the Duke of Burgundy And this is the reason of so many several Wills and divers Donations made by him on that Subject It is believed that he caused one to be written in Letters of Gold and Adorned with Miniature whereby he made the King his Heir to the County of Provence It is certain that this year 1474. he instituted Charles du Maine in all his Lands reserving only the Dutchy of Barr which he left to his Daughters Son Duke Rene. Now the following year when he saw the King had Seized his City of Anger 's and the Castle of Barr for the Portion said he of Mary d'Anjou his Mother he changed his mind or pretended so and to make him afraid said he would bestow it upon the Duke of Burgundy but the King being purposely advanced as far as Lyons hindred him and thereupon hapned the defeat of that Duke as you shall see Whilst he was battering his Head against that potent Body of Germany which is all of Iron the King accumulated Enemies on that part against him especially the Swisse whose alliance he had gained with the Cities of Basle and Strasburgh and others on the Rhine Sigismund Duke of Austria Rene Duke of Lorrain and even the Emperor Frederic Sigismund with the aid of the Swisse re-enters the County of Ferrete and caused Hagenbac's head to be cut off for the Concussions he had useâ— â—ene Duke of Lorrain sent to declare War against him even before Nuz by a Moorish Servant who belonged to the Lord de Craon and Frederick Armed all the power of the Empire to force him to raise the Siege Nevertheless durst he not attack him though he were four times more in number The Bishop of Munster alone had brought thither 1200 Horse and 60000 Foot all cloathed in Green with 1200 Waggons Year of our Lord 1475 The Truce betwixt the King and the Duke being expired the King goes into the Field and snatched from him Roye Montdidier and Corbie but neither this multitude of Enemies nor the Winter long and sharp nor the loss of his Towns could not make his stubborness Flexible which held him still to that Siege for ten Months from its beginning In the Month of June Edward King of England caused his Army to Land at Calais which took up three Weeks time Whilst he was putting them ashoar he sent two or three dispatches to him prayed him and pressed him to come and joyn with him the Duke making now one delay and then another The Mediation of the Apostolick Legat and of the King of Denmark who was in a City near at hand was a plausible pretence for him to withdraw from that dangerous enterprize with Honour but he obstinately refused it In the end when he saw it was too long a business though he was within ten days of taking the City by Famine he consented it should be put into the hands of the Legat. That done he comes post to find the English at Calais leaving his Forces in Barrois so shatter'd that he durst not let them be seen He conducted the King all along the way to Peronne and from thence went to see the Constable at St. Quentin who gave him his word he would deliver that City and all his other places up to the English the Duke assured them of it But when they would have approached he caused them to Fire upon them It is hard to express whether was then greatest their amazement or their rage the Duke having spent a great many words to Interpret this in the best Sence returned to Barrois to recruit his Forces Edward was a Voluptuous Prince very Fat and naturally slow who sought only to cram his Purse and who having undertaken this War rather to screw money from his Subjects then to acquire Dominion or Honour had brought over with him some of the Fattest London Citizens such as loved their ease mightily that so their weariness and toyl might make them sooner willing to desire a Peace It hapned therefore that during the Burgundians absence the King by force of intrigues of flattery and withal some Presents whereof the English are very greedy persuaded that Prince and
Vrsins in the City of Soissons for the same end and one at Avignon by the Legate Peter de Foix Archbishop of Arles Anno 1457. Some perhaps would in this Rank place the two Assemblies of Bourges called by Charles VII the one where the Pragmatick was framed the other with whom he consulted to which of the two Popes they were to adhere either to Nicholas or Felix and that which was held at Lyons Anno 1447. whither the Deputies of the Council of Basile resorted and the Ambassadors from the German Princes and likewise the Electors of Treves and Colen to regulate the Conditions upon which Felix should renounce the Papacy Neither any of Nickclif's nor the Hussite Sectaries spread so far as to infest France or at least did take no rooting there but in the Year 1412. there sprung up a Sect in Picardy who were called Men of Intelligence whereof a Frier William de Hildernissen a German of the Carmelites Order and one Giles le Chautre a Secular were the Evangelists This Giles said he was the Savior of Mankind and that by him the Faithful should see Jesus Christ as by Jesus Christ they should behold God the Father That the Devil and all the Damned should one Day be saved That the Pleasures of Love being simple acts of Nature were no Crimes but a fore-tast of Paradice That Fastings Pennance Confession and Ceremonies were but useless things That the time of the Old Law was that of God the Father the time of the New Law that of God the Son and that there would shortly be a third which should be the time of the Holy Ghost and therein all Mankind stould be set at Liberty That their Actions contributed neither to Salvation nor Damnation for that Our Lord Jesus Christ had abundantly satisfied for the whole World These with many other Whimseys they openly taught The Carmelite was forced to retract them at Bruxels at Cambray and at Saint Quentines where he had dogmatized before Peter Dailly who about that time was created Cardinal The Court of Rome did likewise place in the number of Hereticks another Carmelite named Thomas Connect a Breton by birth and caused him to be burnt alive in the Year 1431. though many believe that the Evangelical Liberty he took to reprove the abominations of the Prelates and the Confidence he had in carrying on his reformation to the very Spring-head of Corruption was all his Crime However his Sermons were so powerful that they wrought a wonderful Change where ever he went moveing even the wanton Women so much as to sell their very Cloaths and Jewels to bestow in Alms and throw all their amorous Toys and Ammunition into the Fire that they might be no longer tempted with those Vanities and dangerous Triflcs A certain French Priest going to Rome at the time of Jubile in Anno 1450. ran the same hazard as the Carmelite because he affirmed he had lived four years without eating They believed it to be either an Impostor or a Compact with the Devil and he was banisht after they had first whipped him We find that in the Year 1453. one William Edeline Doctor in Divinity and Prior of Saint Germans en Laye was condemned by Sentence of the Bishop of Euureux to perpetual Imprisonment for having abused a Woman of Quality and to effect this it was said he had made a Contract with the Devil had worship'd him in the shape of a Ram and had often been transported through the Air to those Nocturnal Assemblies which they called their Sabat We read likewise in the Bourdelois Chronicle that Anno 1435. in the time of Peter Berland Archbishop of Bourdeaux in that Country was discover'd a grand Cabal of those Wretches called Witches that many of them were thrust into Prison some of them were burned and the rest poysoning themselves left their Carkasses to be served as the others This Archbishop was a Peasant by Birth and but little Polished nay as I guess more Scrupulous then Wife or Intelligent since he opposed the Pragmatick but yet he led a pure and innocent life There was War still betwixt the Jacobins and the Cordeliers as between two opposite Powers and mutually jealous each of them watching an opportunity to take advantage of his Adversary In the year 1460. one James de la Marchea Cordelier having preached at Bresse in Lombardy that the Blood of Jesus Christ whilst it was poured out of his Veins at the time of his Passion had lost the Hypostatical Union and that therefore during those three Days it was neither Divine nor Adorable a Jacobin Inquisitor of the Faith cried out it was an Heresy commanded him to revoke that Proposition and caused a Frier of his Order to preach in contradiction to him The dispute grew warm and then it was no longer the Opinion of two private Persons but of both the whole Orders the Devout took part with either according to their Affections and Interest the People were cabaled and were divided as it is usual though they never understood the Question in debate Pope Pius II. fearing the consequences of these partialities commanded the Generals to send the most learned of their Friers to him that he might hear their Arguments and Reasons in this Point This question was bandied three whole Days before the Pope and in the presence of the Cardinals the Bishops and the most Famous Doctors in Law who are more numerous in that Court then the Divines The greatest part of that Assembly and the Pope himself inclined to the Opinion of the Jacobins but having need of the Cordeliers to preach up the Croisade which ran much in his mind they referr'd the decision of this Contest to another time which is not come to this very Day and in the interim the Holy Father made a Constitution which forbid them upon pain of Excommunication and being rendred uncapable of all lawful Functions to Mention Preach or Teach in Private or Publick any thing concerning this Question or to maintain that either the one or the other of these Opinions is Heretical Nevertheless there have been some School-Men in the last Age who out of a strange Itch of raking together all these Niceties and Punctillios much fitter for Sophisters then solid Divines have thrust this Question into their large Volumes And there are besides some People of such a depraved Taste and so ignorant of all Antiquity that they do more delight in reading this Rubbish then in perusing the Holy Fathers or the Councils For this little advantage the Jacobins frequently met with great rubbs and checks upon the Point of the Conception of the Virgin They from time to time renewed the attack upon this question but they were ever routed beat from their ground It happened in the year 1497. that one of their Doctors having Preached at Rouen that she had indeed been purified not preserved from the Original stain was cited before the University and condemned to recant
so stored them that they had plenty sufficient to furnish that vast multitude and above Thirty Thousand Soldiers ☞ for a whole Year together Which demonstrates that Paris if not surprized is not so easily famished as some might Imagine In retribution the Parisians proffer'd him a store of Brass Guns and to maintain Ten Thousand Soldiers as long as the Enemies remained upon the Frontiers Never was there a more Melancholly Spectacle then the retreat of the Emperors Army miserably shatter'd without being able to come to any Battle The Roads from Aix even to Frejus were all strewed with Armes Horses Baggage dead Corps and men dying Montmorency was mightily blamed for not pursuing them Those that excuse him say that at that very juncture the King received news of the extream danger Peronne was in which obliged him to draw out a great part of his Forces to go and Succour them However Four or Five days after he had Information that the Enemies were returning into Flanders and the thing being taken into deliberation the second time the Emperor making some days stay at Frejus it was concluded to be the safer and more prudent method not to force the Lyon that was running off to turn head and make them feel the effects of desperation His retreat over the Alpes was difficult and Bloody the Daufins Light Horse harcelling him perpetually in his March He at length Arrived at Genoa the second of October and his Army passed thence into Milanois commanded by the Marquess du Guast Governor of those Countries who en passant put Garrisons into the rest of the places belonging to the Duke of Savoy Thus that unfortunate Prince saw his Estates shared betwixt his Enemy and his Friend having scarce any thing left for himself but the City and Castle of Nice where he made his residence After the Emperor had remained at Genoa about Fifteen dayes he went on Board his Galleys the Eighteenth of November and sailed towards Spain He was no more fortunate at Sea then he had been on Land a furious Tempest overtook his Fleet and sunk Six of his Galleys and a couple of great Ships the one carrying his Plate the other his Horses after all which without doubt he was fitter for Consolations then Panegyricks The fear they had conceived in Italy left he should Conquer France had as soon as he was gone armed several petty Princes and Lords whom the great States that durst not openly declare maintained and encouraged underhand The King gave them Guy Count de Rangon to be their General their place of Rendezvous was Mirandola They set ten thousand men on Foot with whom they attempted Genoa a Supply of Eight Hundred Arriving during the time of their Assault made the business miscarry As they were marching towards Ast the Spaniards raised the Siege of Turin and suffer'd them to take Carignian Raconis Carmagnola and most of the Marquisate of Salusses Year of our Lord 1537 On the other hand the Count de Saint Pol with Six Thousand Lansquenets whom the King drew out of his Army ruined the Country of Tarentaise and regained Chamberry which the Inhabitants of that Valley had surprized but Burie whom the King had made Governor beyond the Mountains in place of Brion was hemm'd in and taken with Twelve Hundred men by the Marquess du Guast in Casal which he had just surprized Humieres was sent to Command in his stead with a Re-inforcement of ten thousand Lansquenets of whom Christopher Duke of Wirtemberg was General Upon the noise that the Emperor was going to swallow up all France James King of Scotland remembring the ancient Alliances of his Nation and Predecessors took Shiping with Sixteen Thousand men to come to his Assistance without the least Intreaty The Wind beat him back three several times to his own Coasts At length he got with some Vessels to Diepe from whence he rode post to the King but met him on this side Lyons upon his return In acknowledgment of this so kind and nobly free assistance the King could not refuse him Magdelin his Eldest Daughter though that Prince had before betroathed a Daughter of the Duke of Vendosmes The Nuptials were celebrated at Paris the first day of the Year 1537. but she Died of a Hectick Feaver within the same year and James Married Mary Daughter of Claude Duke of Guife and Widow of Lewis Duke of Longueville The King of England did not much like this double lincking himself to France by two such Matches which was one of the main causes that made him fall off from King Francis and close again with the Emperor the more easily for that Catherine of Arragon his repudiated Wife was dead and he had caused Anne Bullen to be Beheaded on the Green within the Tower for Adultery whether true or supposed Perhaps too he would have made him feel the Resentments of his Anger at that very time had he not been involved in troubles at home for some Nobles and some English Prelates prompted with Zeal to prevent a Schisme and withal apprehending some danger to their own Persons after the example of his Chancellour Sir Thomas Moor and John Fisher Bishop of Rochester whose Heads he had unjustly brought to the block had made a Holy League and taken up Arms against him And although he had dispersed their Forces or sent them home again by granting them conditions of advantage nevertheless he feared they might break out afresh and therefore was contriving underhand to surprise their Chiefs who had just cause to repent as it most frequently happens upon the like occasions to men who dare not rather resolve to die with their Sword in hand There was so little Rain and such great heats during the whole Spring and Summer of the Year 1536. that it begot a prodigious drowth most of the Wells and Springs were dried up the Marshes and Ponds quite parched and the waters of most great Rivers grown so shallow and weak as scarce able to drag along their Languishing Streams being generally foordable in all places and in many passable dry-foot The Kings Councel thought it necessary to do something that might pull down the Emperors Vanity and withal shew the Injustice and the Nullity of the Treaties of Madrid and Cambray To this purpose the King sitting in his Seat of Justice in Parliament the Nineteenth of January attended by the Princes and Pairs after his having heard James Capel Attorney-General who made it appear that the Provinces belonging to the Crown were Inalienable that he could not give away the Soveraignty of Flanders and Artois and that Charles of Austria they gave him only that Name being still a Vassal to the King for those Counties and for Charlois had committed the Crime of Felony It was Ordained That he should be Summoned by a single Edict peremptory and once for all at the nearest place of safe access to answer the Attorney General upon his Conclusions of the Forfeit Reversion and Re-union of those
for the like time This was Proclaimed at Carmagnoles he present the Eight and Twentieth of November Both Princes got by it to the loss of the unfortunate Duke of Savoy because either of them remained in Possession of what they were seized on The King made Montejan his Lieutenant-General in that Country and William du Bellay Governor at Turin Year of our Lord 1538 When he was come back into France he honoured Montmorency who was a Mareschal and Grand-Maistre with the Constables Sword the Tenth of February He also raised Annebaut and Montejan to the Offices of Mareschals of France which were vacant the one by the promotion of Montmorency to that of Constable the other by the death of the Mareschal de Florenges who ended his days soon after the Siege of Saint Quentin These Offices were limited to the number of four only which the Kingdom encreasing have likewise been encreased to three or four times as many The same year the Chancellor Anne du Bourg lost his life by a strange accident Being with the King who made his Entrance into Laon there was so great a croud of Horses that he was thrust off from his Mule and trod under foot whereof he died His Office was given to Charles Poyet Son of an Advocate of Angiers and then a President in Parliament There was a second Conference at Locate to Treat of a final Peace The Deputies could agree to nothing but a prolongation of the Truce for six Months but the Pope who ardently desired to reconcile the two Princes fearing left their Division should hinder the effects of a great League which he the Emperor and the Venetians had concluded at the beginning of the Year against the Turks dispatched two Legates to them and sollicited them so earnestly that both of them resolved to meet at Nice and to accept of those Offices of Mediation which he proferr'd He came the first thither about the end of May the Emperor almost at the same time to the Port of Villa-Franca and Francis with the Queen his Wife to Villa-Nuova some days after The Duke found himself mightily perplex'd the Pope desired to Lodge in the Castle and that the Garrison might be drawn out the Emperor would have had it so but the King advised the Duke underhand to beware of it for that he would else disoblige him He followed the Kings Counsel and went to visit him the third day of the Month the Emperor took some jealousie upon it and yet for fear of loosing him Treated him the better in all appearance The Pope therefore Lodged in the Town the Emperor held Conference with him in a Tent under the Castle the King saluted him apart but the Princes saw not each other Was it that the Pope desiring to treat under Hatches the Year of our Lord 1538 Marriage of his Nephew Octavian Farnese with Margaret the Emperors Bastard and that of his Niece Victoria with Anthony Eldest Son of Charles Duke of Vendosme kept them thus assunder fearing lest the one should discover what he was negotiating with the other or else perhaps it was that the Emperor apprehending if he saw the King he must be obliged to promise him in express words the Dutchy of Milan and the Pope knowing it might possibly let the King understand it was only to amuse him What ever it were this Conference produced nothing but a prolongation of the Truce for Nine years but the Emperor promised the King to see him at Aigues-Mortes in Languedoc before he returned to Spain It was Queen Eleonora who procured this Enter-view The Emperor came and Dined in the Kings-House the next day the King went to Visit the Emperor in his Galley where he was entertained in like manner The subject of their entertainment was not known but they were observed to embrace so closely and shew such Signes of Amity for two dayes they were together that the most sharp-sighted were deceived and imagined it was in good earnest Three Months after the King was grievously Tormented with a troublesome Ulcer which hapned in that part the Physicians name the Sutura or Seame between the Testicles This they said was the effect of some ill adventure he had with the beautiful Ferronniere one of his Mistresses This Womans Husband enrag'd at that abuse which the Courtiers reckon only a piece of Gallantry contrives to go to some leud place and Infect himself that he might spoil her and Convey his revenge thus to his Rival The unhappy Woman died the Husband recover'd by timely Remedies the King had all the bad Symptomes and his Physicians treating him rather according to his Quality then his Distemper he had some Relicks remaining upon him all his Life the Malignity whereof did much discompose the sweetness of his disposition and made him Melancholy suspicious and hard to be pleased but to say truth more exact sparing and sticking closer to his business Year of our Lord 1539 The remainder of this Year he made several excellent Edicts amongst others That the Curates should keep a Register of all Christnings and that hereafter all Decrees and other Acts of Justice should be no more drawn up in Latine but in French If the Emperor continued to heap his marks of Affection on the King it was but to hinder him from embracing the Protection of the Ghentois They were revolted because of some new Imposts which Queen Mary Governess of the Low-Countries had laid upon them particularly upon Wines and had Massacred some of her Officers after which expecting no pardon they went on to that Degree that this Year they sent Deputies to the King to Intreat he would receive them as their Soveraign Lord and they promised provided only that he would own them to hazard Fifty Thousand Men in Battle against the Emperor But this same King that had with so great formality newly confiscated Flanders and Artois not only accepted not of their submission for fear of violating the Truce but also by an excess of generosity gave the Emperor notice of it The Rebellion growing in strength day by day it was to be apprehended that all Flanders would follow the example of Ghent and that the King of England might accept what the French had refused Nothing but the presence of the Emperor was capable of allaying this furious heat but the danger was too eminent to pass thorough Germany where it would have been in the power of the Protestant Princes to have stopp'd him and it was no less to have gone by Sea He intreated the King therefore to allow him passage thorow France and to obtain it he began to Lure him with the Dutchy of Milan In the Council every one was for granting him passage but not without having a writing under his hand and good Securities The Constable de Montmorency by what motive it is not known was not of that opinion and argued that he ought not to be setter'd by any Conditions This Sentiment appearing full of generosity highly pleased the
the Parliament of Provence which they durst never have undertaken had it not been upon an assurance of the support of those that govern'd and even by their instigation particularly the Connestable who thought to involve the Cardinal de Tournon as principal Author of that Massacre he being his Capital Enemy The business was first brought before the Kings Great Council then the King took it upon himself and afterwards referr'd it to the Grand Chamber of the Parliament of Paris The Cause was Pleaded at Fifty Audiences or Hearings with great heats and vehement sollicitations After all this noise there was none but Guerin the Kings Advocate in the Parliament of Provence who paid for all those that had contributed to this Massacre He was Beheaded in the place called the Greve at Paris The Historian of Provence relates how on the day he lost his head his Picture or Effigies appeared in the palm of his wives hand traced in lines of blood and was seen by great numbers of people during several days Lewis Adhemar Earl of Grignan and Governour of Provence who had given Commission to d'Oppede to Levy Forces in his absence was like to have lost his Lands D'Oppede was sent away absolv'd having done nothing but by good order from the King but he survived not long after it and the Huguenots were revenged on him by giving out that he died of an inward fire which cruelly burnt up all his Bowels Year of our Lord 1550 and 51. The abuse of the Banquiers and of the Datary of the Court of Rome touching the resignation of Benefices were come to that pass that all the Clergy of France complained of it The King redressed this by an Edict and Charles du Moulin the most resolute of all the French Lawyers wrote a most Learned Book against the Petites Dates but which being very vehement raised so great a Storm against him amongst the Catholique Zealots for the interests of the Pope that for fear of being Treated as an Heretique he retired into Germany where he kept himself private till the rupture which hap'ned between the King and Pope Julius III. The Pic's Lords of Mirandola being at variance amongst themselves for the possession of that County Paul III. had endeavour'd to reconcile and agree them and not able to compass it had sequestred it in the hands of King Francis That King had restored it to Lewis Pic. Galeot Pic his Nephew assassinated his Uncle and Usurped it then fearing his other Relations would revenge this parricide retired to King Henry II. and had admitted a French Garrison into the place and also as it was reported had agreed upon an exchange for some other Lands in France However it were the King used it as a City properly his own and made it his place of Arms and his Assemblies in that part of the World The King wanted some occasion to interrupt the Progress of the Emperor he was over-joy'd to meet with this which follows D'Aramon his Ambassador made use of all industry with Solyman who was returned from the Persian War to break the Truce of Hungary and he wanted not considerations and motives to incite him to it for the Emperor had in Barbary taken the Cities of Mahadia and Monester from the Corsair Dragut one of the Grand Seignior's Captains and King Ferdinand held secret intelligence with Frier Georges Monk of the Order of Saint Poll a Hermit who by the testamentary institution of John Year of our Lord 1551 the pretended King of Hungary governed the Affairs and Country of Isabella and Stephen her young Son Solyman had given orders to take that Monk dead or alive the Monk having notice of it retired had cantonniz'd himself in some strong Castles he had purchased and provided from whence he began to make War upon the Queen He was reconciled and fell out again with her two or three several times and as he apprehended the power of the Turk he privately made an agreement with Ferdinand and perswaded the Widdow to restore Transilvania to him upon conditions very advantageous both for him and the Pupil if they had been observ'd But soon after Ferdinand fearing this mans inconstancy or rather that he would force him to make good what he had promised sent word to John Baptist Castalda General of his Forces to make him away which he Executed by the hands of some Assassines who went and Murthered him in a House of Pleasure to which he was retired Solyman could not suffer that Transilvania for which John had rendred him Homage should be possessed by Ferdinand He powred a very numerous Army in upon that side and almost totally Invaded it The Imperailists did not fail to publish that the King of France had drawn him thither but we find by the Memoirs of those times that he did his utmost to disswade him from making War in Hungary because the common danger re-united all the German Princes with the Emperor and it was his interest to divide them And therefore he could rather have wished that Solyman would have made use of his Sea Forces and landed in Puglia to facilitate an enterprize the French then had upon Sicily All these things make it evident that the King had firmly resolv'd to concern himself in the business of Parma by other ways and means then mediation or accommodation and that it was not the Dutchess of Valentinois that made him enter upon that War that there might be occasion to bestow some employment upon Brissac whom she loved infinitely It is true that at that Ladies request or perhaps to keep him at distance and absent from her he made him Governour of Piedmont in the place of John Caracciol Prince of Melsy whom he recalled to Court and to make up the Complement of good fortune for Brissac it hap'ned that the said Prince returning into France died at Suza and left a vacancy for a Mareschal which the King immediately conferr'd on him It sufficed the King to assist his Allies without directly breaking with the Emperour wherefore he sent to Brissac to make use of some indirect means to that end Brissac therefore disbanded a part of the Forces in Piedmont who had order to File away towards Parma over the Milanois under favour of the Truce two by two sometimes three without any weapons and by easie Journeys Gonzague mistrusting the Craft and Contrivance set Guards upon the ways who Massacred the greatest part of them so that there came not above four or five hundred to Miranda who went over by the Mountains at Genoa During this assay the Pope strove to perswade the King to abandon the Duke of Parma and the King endeavour'd to gain the Popes good Will that he might take him into his Protection But as the first had sharply replied to the Kings Remonstrances threatning him with his Ecclesiastical Thunder the French Ambassador raising the Tone of his Voice declared that the King would for no consideration whatever relinquish his
Montmorency being suspected by them When the Parisians had recover'd their Armes again the Prince of Condé was the weaker and durst not Challenge the upper hand or dispute the Wall with the Triumvirs but to salve these sores a Composition was made by means of the Cardinal his Brother That the Heads of both Parties should leave the Town at the same time He therefore retired to his House de la Ferté-Aucou near Mâ—aux and the Duke of Guise went to Fountainbleau where the King was carrying so great a Convoy along with him that he made the Queen quickly sensible his Forces were much more numerous then the Princes She was gone thither amidst her irresolution which she ought to chuse either to cast her self into the Arms of the Prince and follow him to Orleans for he was to be there upon her first notice or to suffer her self to be carried to Paris by the Confederates Either of these made her a Captive the first was the more odious because of the great peril she would have put the Catholick Religion into and the latter appeared to her the more dangerous month March She would willingly have been in a Capacity of keeping them in equal balance on both hands and for that purpose had sent for the Prince who having gotten his friends together was Travelling towards her and had passed over the River at Saint Cloud His approach put the Parisians in Arms as if they might have been besieged by a handful of Men and gave occasion to the Confederates to let the Queen know it was necessary to remove the King to Paris lest he should fall into the Huguenots hands The King of Navarre carried her this unwelcome Message and she seeming to hesitate he told her plainly that if she were not pleased to go along with them she might stay behind She had not leasure to consider upon it but must follow or else loose the Party for at the same moment they carried the weeping King to Melun the next day to Bois de Vincennes and then to Paris Thus were all Addresses from that Queen fruitless and all the prudent Counsels of the Chancellor de l'Hospital which tended but to prevent a Civil War that he foresaw would be inevitable as soon as ever the King was in the hands of either Party Year of our Lord 1562. April In effect the Prince of Condé partly out of spight and revenge for having been deluded by a Woman for so he guessed it partly anger to see his Enemies Masters of the Kings Person and fear likewise of being left to their Mercy or suffer the zeal of his Friends and the Huguenot Party to grow cold ran post hast with two thousand Horse to Orleans where Dandelot had slily seized upon one of the Gates the day before which was the first of April This was as it were the place of Armes and Capital Seat of all his Party Now to keep them in Unity and under good Discipline the only bonds necessary to all establishments he took an Oath from all that were there That they would remain united for the defence of the Kings Person and of the Queens for the reformation and the benefit of the State That they should lead a Life without reproach and Christian-like observe the Laws of the Land and Military Year of our Lord 1562 Rules and should take care to provide Ministers to Preach the word of God to them That they should own him for their Head should obey all his Orders serve him with their Persons and should furnish him with Armes and Money He afterwards wrote to all the German Princes setting forth the cause of his taking up Arms and then sent the Queen Mothers Original Letters to perswade them thereby to send him some Assistance and lend a friendly and helping hand to redeem both the King and her from their Captivity At the same time he published a Manifesto to all the Kingdom to the same purpose and some dayes after sent after it the Copy whether real or supposed of a League made between the Pope the King of Spain and the Guises to exterminate all the Sectaries of the new Religion month April This was a strong motive to draw those Princes to his side who made profession of it and to retain and bind fast to him the Huguenots of France for the Kings Council thinking to dis-unite or lull them asleep by a deceitful security put out a Declaration upon the very same day directed only to their Bailiffs and their Lieutenants which confirmed the Edict of January granted Indemnity for all that was past forbid the molesting or doing them any injury for matters of Religion and gave them the Liberty of exercising the same in all places excepting within the City and Suburbs of Paris When the Prince had declar'd himself the Officers that took his part and the Huguenots of themselves seized upon several Cities as Mans Anger 's Vendosme la Charité upon the Loire Angoulesme Lyons Valence Romans and almost all those in Daufiné a great number of those in Guyenne and Languedoc In Normandy upon Rouen Caen Dieppe Havre de Grace Bayeux Saint Lo Vire Falaise and many others Matignon the Kings Lieutenant in that Province under the Duke of Bouillon who was Governor saved Granville and Cherbourg This was a signal Service for those Ports would have given an easie entrance to the English Wherever the Huguenots were Masters they utterly abolished the exercise of the Catholick Religion overturn'd the Altars broke the Images in pieces burned the Reliques and cast the ashes into the Air Tormented and Massacred the Monks and Priests not observing that equality and moderation herein which they expected should be measured to themselves but rendring their Party execrable to the People by the horrible profanation of all things Sacred The Prince neither by Intreaties nor by Remonstrances nor even by punishment had power to stop their fury which he knew must be very prejudicial to his cause And indeed they were even with them in many Cities where they Massacred huge numbers as particularly at Cahors Sens Amiens and at Beauvais and their pulling down and plundering continuing the Parliament by a Decree of the last of June enjoyned all persons to fall upon them and destroy and slay them in all places wherever they should find them as People that were mad and declared Enemies both to God and Man Though all the Kingdom were in a flame the Chancellor a right good Frenchman endeavour'd to remedy that evil he could not prevent and sought wayes for an Accommodation which did not seem impossible to him since their Forces had not yet engaged nor any Blood as yet been drawn but what was spilt in Tumults and Seditions The Queen consider'd likewise finding the Huguenots Masters of so many places that the Triumvirs might seize upon the rest and so both her Son the King and she might be wholly stripped of all and therefore she sent the Baron de la Garde to find
maintaining the ancient Religion they laboured to set up an absolute and unlimited power over those Provinces who owed no further obedience then according to their Laws and Priviledges The procedure of the Cardinal de Granvelle who treated the Grandees of the Country very imperiously exasperated them yet more Divers Conspiracies were contrived against him the fear of which forced him to retire to Besanson but his Spirit Reigned in Flanders still and perswaded the Council of Spain not to abate in the least but proceed and carry on the work with the utmost severity The Council of State of the Order of the Fleece and Governors of the Provinces wherein Margaret Dutchess of Parma Governess of the Low-Countries presided thought good to send Egmont into Spain to represent the ill Consequences that would attend the publication of their too severe Edicts He returned with fair words and great caresses but Philip sent Orders to the Governess to publish the Council of Trent and set up the Inquisition The States of Brabant opposed it the Religionaries heated the people the Governess apprehending a revolt was constrained to put forth a Declaration which revoked the Inquisition and would not suffer the Council to be published but with restrictions conformable to the Priviledges of the Country But the Populace for the most part pre-possest with the Doctrine of the Sectaries were not satisfied with that but threatned to fall foul upon the Nobility in so much as the Lords of the Country dreading their fury or pretending so assembled at Gertrudemberg and made a League amongst themselves for the preservation of their Liberties The Governess being much amazed at this Conspiracy the Count de Barlaimont who hated them mortally told her they were only a Company of Gueux The Conspirators hearing of it took that Epithet or word for the name of their Faction and began to wear upon their Coats the figure of a wooden Porringer or Dish with this Inscription Servants of the King even to the Budget Immediately as if that had been the Signal for their rising the Religionaries broke loose in every part of the Country They began to hold Assemblies to destroy and break in pieces all what the Catholicks esteem most sacred and to seize upon some Towns as the Huguenots of France did formerly with whom they had kept intimate correspondence for several years Year of our Lord 1566 and 67. Of two Opinions debated in the Council of Spain touching the Method to extinguish this Flame Philip chose that of the Duke d'Alva as most suitable to his mercyless humour and his desire of absolute authority which was to use the utmost severities to quell those Tumults and not to receive the people to any kind of Mercy till they had given up their Priviledges their Estates and even their Lives to his discretion Wherefore after he had pretended for three Months together that he would go personally thither to settle that people he sent the Duke of Alva with Orders to execute those sanguinary resolutions of which he was the Author He Marched by Savoy Bress the Franche-Comté and Lorrain with the Forces of Milanois and of the Kingdom of Naples Whilst he was yet in Italy he advised Queen Catherine to arm on her part to exterminate the Huguenots at the same time as he would destroy the Gueux In effect she raised six thousand Swiss and ordered the Governors of Provinces to send the Companies already on foot called d'Ordonnance and to levy new ones but it was under pretence of Coasting the Duke to observe and hinder him from undertaking any thing upon the Frontiers of the Kingdom Before he left Spain the Marquiss de Bergue and Floris de Montmorency Montigny were arrested having been sent on the behalf of the States of the Low-Countries to make their Remonstrances to King Philip. The first died either of grief or some morsel prepar'd for the purpose the second had his head cut off though both of them were very stanch Catholicks which made it apparent that the Council of Spain intended no less against the liberty of the Low-Countries then against the new Religion Year of our Lord 1567. June c. Now it is certain that the Duke of Alva's Army kindled the flame of Civil War again in France The Huguenots seeing them march imagin'd That the Pope and the House of Austria had conspired their ruine that this design was evident because they every day restrained them more and more of that liberty which had been granted them by Edicts so that it was almost reduced to nothing Year of our Lord 1567 that the people fell upon them in all places where they were the weaker and where they were able to defend themselves the Governors made use of the Kings Authority to oppress them that they dismantled those Cities that had favour'd them that they built Citadels there that they could not have justice done them either in Parliaments nor by the Kings Council that they Massacred them impunitively that they restored them not to their Estates and Employments These were in substance the complaints they carried twice or thrice to the Prince of Condé and Coligny who having met them two several times still answered them that they must endure any thing rather then take up Arms again That a second disturbance would make them become a horror to all France and the particular object of hatred to the King in whose mind it would make so deep an impression of prejudice against them in his blooming youth as nothing hereafter would be able to blot out But when one of the Chief Persons about the Court had given them certain notice that it was resolved on to seize upon the Prince and the Admiral the first to be detained a perpetual Prisoner the other to be brought to the Scaffold Dandelot the boldest of them made them resolve not only to defend themselves but to attack their Enemies by open force and to that purpose drive away the Cardinal de Lorrain from the King and cut the Swiss in pieces this was their first aim but no man alive nay not themselves could have told to what height their success might have carried them had it proved such as they desired The little City of Rosoy in Brie was Assigned for Rendezvous of the Nobility of the Party on the eighth and twentieth day of September The Prince with the Admiral Dandelot and the Count de la Rochefaucaut seized upon it without any difficulty there being Arrived several Gentlemen from divers parts one by one till they made up the number in all of Four Hundred Masters They had a mind to surprize the Court which was then at Monceaux on the Feast day of Saint Michael when the King was to have held the Chapter of his Order but the Queen having Information that they were upon their March immediately retired with the King to Meaux And to give her Swissers time who were quarter'd in the Neighbouring Villages to get into the
a little paltry Place situate upon a Hill in the Diocess of Valence He laid Siege to it about mid June and was forced to raise it again about a Month after month July Almost at the same time came forth two Manifesto's one by Danville whose irresolutions at last determined upon the Apprehensions of the Dangers and Ambuscades the Queen Mother was ever contriving against him to make an Union with the Huguenots the other by the Prince of Condé who being gotten to Heidelberg easily obtained of the Elector Palatin that Casimir his youngest Son should raise some Horse and Foot for him provided he would advance ready Money without which neither Vertue nor Religion nor Skill can do any thing in that Country The News of this being brought into France did marvellously encourage the Huguenots and made the Assembly of Millaud Elect him for their Chief General a Declaration whereof they sent him to Neuf-Chastel in Swisserland in which they did not forget to hint to him that he must be obliged to follow the reiglements of the Assembly and act nothing without the advice of a Council they would appoint for him La Noüe found to his cost that his Prudence had been over-reached by a too great desire of a Peace for during the Truce the Duke of Montpensier having recruited his Army which was much encreased by the Normandy Forces had like to over-whelm the Rochellers He took all the little Places in Poitou and after them the City of Fontenay it self even in a time of Conference about Capitulation This blow did very much astonish the Rochellers Fontenay being the Key of all the Commodities they fetched out of the Lower Poitou and yet it wrought no more than the Exhortations of la Noüe to rowze them up to do their utmost for their own Preservation so agreeably were they flatter'd by the Queen Mother with the vain hopes of Peace In the other Provinces they made a better defence In Languedoc they surprized the City of Castres and in Agenois though very weak they would not let Clairac nor Montâ—â—anquin be torn from them their Courage fortifying those places as the Divisions of Cossé and la Valete betwixt whom the Queen had shared the Government weakned the Catholicks Army The Couriers from the Queen Mother arrived in Poland the Fourteenth and the Fifteenth of June The King took his Bed the better to consult on what he was to do There were two things propounded the one to delude the Polanders and to get out of that Country at soonest according to the pressing desires month June of the Queen Mother the other to gain the good will and consent of the Senate for his departure The last was the most civil and becoming the first the more expedite and certain The King after he had secretly disposed of all things month June stole away in the Night between the Eighteenth and Nineteenth of June got to Peizna the first Town in Austria and from thence to Vienna His evasion being known the Polanders ran in multitudes to his Palace a Troop of Four hundred Horse spurred after but could not overtake him The French that were left behind at Cracovia ran the hazard of being knocked on the Head the Senate being assembled gave order to stop the chiefest of them Nevertheless Charles Danzay whom Henry had appointed for Ambassador to Denmark coming to them and giving some Reasons for his so sudden Departure allayed their first fury Then by the friendly Assistance of some Palatins whom the King had Charmed by his worthy Qualities he so well managed those fiery Spirits that they sent him back all his Equipage and Domestick Servants humbly intreating him to return again which he excused upon the Information he said he had received that the Prince of Condé was ready to enter upon France with an Army of Thirty thousand Germains He spent Six dayes at Vienna the Emperour entertain'd him with as great Affection as Magnificence Being glad he had quitted the Crown of Poland to which he aspired and that the House of France let go an advantage which made Year of our Lord 1574 them Powerful on that side It is said he propounded the Marriage of his Daughter Isabella Widow of Charles IX and advised him to let Peace enter with him into his Kingdom shewing him it would be the only means to obliterate the horrid Idea's of the Massacres out of the Minds of those People and to lay all the fault and load thereof upon the late King's Councellors The Emperour 's two Sons Rodolph King of the Romans and the Arch-Duke Ernestus conducted him to the Frontiers of Friuli He chose that Road to avoid all Attempts of the Elector Palatin and the reproaching sight of the other Protestant Princes All what Ingenuity and Magnificence could contrive that might appear curious or obliging was made use of by the Venetians to Honour the greatest King of all their Allies In every City belonging to them he was received as Soveraign Four Senators cloathed in Scarlet Velvet Robes received him at the side of the Gulf presented him as many Boats lined with the same and one for himself enriched with Gold and Azure and hung within-side with Cloath of Gold on a blew ground carrying him to the Island Moran famous for Glass-work where he lay that Night The next day they put him aboard the Bucentauro a Vessel never used but upon great Ceremonies about which flocked a world of Gondola's amongst the rest Two hundred not so much adorned by the riches of the Gold and Silver Ornaments about them as the Beauty of those fair Ladies that sate in them The Duke at his Landing in the City presented him the Canopy of State born by Six Procurators of Saint Mark and conducted him to the Palace they had prepared for him During Nine dayes he Sojourned at Venice the Dukes of Savoy Ferrara and Mantoüa who were come thither on purpose to honour him accompanied him every where The Seigneury defray'd both him and all his Train and caused a Hundred young Gentlemen to serve him all the while He went to the Senate to see the Method of their Balotting was placed above the Duke and perform'd all acts of Soveraignty After this he saw the Arsenal with much Admiration but the Ladies with more Pleasure and even the Curtesans whom he found as Divertising as they were Beautiful But some one amongst them was too Prodigal of a Favour which he repented all his life the having accepted it After those Nine dayes of Inchantments so he called them he took his farewel of the Senate and was accompanied by four Senators to Rodigino the last place of the Signoria From thence he was conducted to Ferrara by that Duke's Cavalry then having staid there Two dayes he Embarqued on the Po and went to Turin But first passed by Mantoüa at the intreaty of Duke William Brother to the Duke of Nevers Don Juan of Austria Governour of Milan paid him the same Honours in Cremona
and the other Cities of that Dutchy where he passed as if he had been King of Spain himself He remained at Turin Eight or Nine dayes The Dutchess Margaret his Aunt one of the wisest and most accomplish'd Princesses of her Age gave him the same Counsel the Emperor had done and the Duke presented Damville his Kinsman to him whom he had sent for expresly upon his Parol that he might restore him to his Favour That Affection the King had otherwhile had for this Lord revived again He made him lye in his own Chamber and willingly gave ear to his Advice for granting a Peace to the Huguenots to ruine them afterwards by such Projects as he propounded and to take all the Government of State Affairs into his own hands But the Queen Mother having some hint of it sent Chiverny and Fifes who soon destroy'd all he had been Building in the King's Mind and represented him so odly that the King would have had him seized The Dutchess finding this gave notice of it to the said Lord and the Duke sent a strong Convoy along with him to Nice whence his Galleys carried him into Languedoc When he found he was got clear he Vow'd he would never see the King more but in a Picture nor did he break his Vow The becoming Civilities of the Duke and kind Caresses of the Dutchess whose graceful Presence Wit and Royal Qualities had yet preserved some Empire over the French and even over her Nephews were not useless to them The King was pleased and being picqued with Generosity and Justice promised to render up Pigâ—orol Savigliani and Perugia to the Duke who made it appear plainly to him that he could not detain them any longer unless he chose rather Year of our Lord 1574 to be guided by what they call Maxims of State than the common Rights of Men and the Faith of Treaties The Duke having obtained this Favour gave him Four thousand Soldiers and a Thousand Horse to attend him to Lyons lest the Huguenots of Daufiné should interrupt his Journey He accompanied him in Person and staid there some dayes but was call'd away again before he had obtained the accomplishment of his Promises having word brought him of the Death of the Dutchess his Wife whom God called into the other World the Fourteenth of September Henry III. King LXI Aged XXIII years almost compleat POPES GREGORY XIII Ten years and Seven Months under this Reign SIXTUS V. Elected the 24th of April 1585. S. Five years Four Months Three days whereof Four years Twenty five days under this Reign Year of our Lord 1574. September IT was the Fifth of September when King Henry arrived at Pont de Beauvoisin the place which parts the Territories of France from Savoy The Queen his Mother went thither to meet him and presented the Duke of Alenson and the King of Navarre to him to be disposed of as he pleased He received them with extraordinary coldness though they saluted him with the greatest Humility Some hours afterwards he granted them Pardon and Liberty but it was only in appearance for he appointed Guards who secretly observed them and there were certain Ladies who ever held them in their amorous fetters and denied them nothing that they might dive into the secrets of their very Souls In the same place he made Bellegarde a Mareschal of France he had promised him this Office whilst he was in favour but now he was not so he could not keep that post above Fifteen days Du Gua had set him besides the Cushion and got into his place One might to speak properly call the Reign of Henry III. the Reign of Favorites The softness of his Soul and his carelesness left him wholly in the hands of those People who went on to enervate all that little virtue that was left in him and to dissolve him in voluptuousness So that they obscured the luster of all those brave actions had been attributed to him and would have put the whole World in doubt whether he had ever any real share in them had not some rayes of truly Royal qualities darted sometimes through all those mists and foggs and kept up his Reputation Quelus Maugiron and St. Maigrin were his first Minions Afterwards St. Luc Arques and the young la Valete then Termes since named Bellegarde and some others The Queen-Mother was ravish'd to see him in those hands because at first they gave her an exact account of his most secret Thoughts and whilst they amused him either in the Anti-chamber amongst the Ladies or in his Closet where he spent whole days in consultation about the trimming of a Suit of Cloaths or the fitting of a Ruff the retained almost all the Authority not foreseeing that by little and little they would draw the greatest part even from her together with the affection of her Son Now that they might the more entirely posses him they did perswade him not to communicate himself so frequently to his Subjects as his Predecessors had wont but to keep himself behind the skreen like the Eastern Monarchs and not be seen by Year of our Lord 1574 them but in great splendour and magnificence nor made known but by absolute Commands and above all to dis-accustom and wean the French from making Remonstrances to him and to make them understand that there was no other Law but his Will Thereupon they wrought him to have a high opinion of himself deafned and confounded him with their flatteries and puft him up with an opinion that he was the greatest Prince in the World that he infinitely surpassed all the preceding Kings that he had shew'd himself an absolute Master in Politiques even in his first Essay and Apprentiship and that the prudence of the most knowing and experienc'd Statesmen was but meer ignorance in comparison of his Inebriated with these flattering perswasions he establish'd new forms of Grandeur set on foot again the Regiment of Guards of Ten Companies Charles IX a little before his death had reduced them to three caused Banisters to be set round his Table went rarely abroad in publique and always shut up in a Litter or a Boat adorned with Gold and Painting in his Promenade upon the smooth-fac'd River of Soane and allowed the Grandees no more that credit of recommending the little ones to him no not themselves but by the credit and access of those Minions There wâ—re no Favours but for them they set all Offices and Governments at a high price to wrest them out of the hands of such Noble Persons who by the eminent Services of their Fathers or their own Merits had justly acquired them A great many of the best qualified finding they were but little regarded retired from Court male-contented and then the Favorites being at large introduced that pernicious invention of Acquits Comptants with which they have so often and with impunity pillag'd and wasted the Kings Exchequer The Agents from the Duke of Savoy did mightily press for performance of the
Duke of Anjou's Tongue in the height of his anguish enraged the Favourites the more and gave them some thoughts of contriving his ruine there to prevent his revenge in case he return'd So that when he sent to demand succours of the King they obliged him to answer That he should put himself in a condition to receive them that he should make himself strongest for fear of being turn'd out by those Merchants as the Arch-Duke Matthias had been and what they counsell'd him on purpose to destroy him the Queen Mother advis'd him to do to preserve him pressing him to seize upon the best Places and to settle his Soveraignty upon some solid foundation Those that Govern'd him more particularly were People without Honour and without Faith amongst others Quinsay his Secretary Fervaques and Ourilly his Son in Law a Youth Son of one Sâ—rgent de la Ferte near Blois whose Lute Voice Dancing and other qualities more worthy of the esteem and affection of some Lady then a great Prince had brought him in very great favour with his Master These People ever keeping him at defiance with the Duke of Montpenseir and other Persons of Worth and Honour who would have been able to dissuade him from all unhandsom or unjust actions spurr'd him on perpetually with motives sometimes of revenge sometimes of interest to seize upon certain Places of which they promised Year of our Lord 1582. December and January to themselves the Governments Thus a young Prince of little conscience and who saw himself reduced to great distress resolved to follow their pernicious Councils and gave his Captains order to seize upon seven or eight of the best Towns all on one day which was appointed the Eighteenth of January Year of our Lord 1583. January The Enterprize succeeding upon Dunkirk Dixmude Denremond Vilvoord Alost and Meenen but failed upon Ostend and Bruges The Undertakers were taken at Bruges and confessed the whole Conspiracy even that the Duke was to seize upon Antwerp and the Person of the Prince of Orange to force him to give back those Writings by which he had obliged himself to leave him the Counties of Holland and Zealand Those of Antwerp had also scented the Plot and put themselves in Arms nevertheless the Dukes Orders being to seize upon the Port of Kornebergh the nearest Gate to his Palace that same day being the Eighteenth and news of what had been done in those other parts coming to him late at night he durst not defer it any longer Wherefore notwithstanding the intreaties of the Prince of Orange he went out of the City with his Guards and two hundred Horse he had then about him pretending to go to see his Army which was encamped near at hand As he was passing along he makes a halt upon the Bridge that so his Guards upon the Signal given might seize the Kornebergh Gate Those Gentlemen that marched before him turned back on a suddain beat off the Burghers and set Fire to the next House as their Beacon to the Army In less then three quarters of an hour there were seventeen Companies of French and six hundred Lancers within the City crying out Kill Vive the Mass and the Town is our own But the Burghers who were prepared for it come out of their Houses chain up the Streets make strong Barricades set Courts of Guards in the Market places and Carrefours and the Women fly to the Windows with Stones and such like Artillery Fervaques who with a hundred Horse thought to creep along the Rampart into the place before the Citadel unseen meets at St. Georges Gate with five hundred Men well barricado'd who put him to a full stand Two Companies of Foot which he set on to force them thence were beaten off in the mean time his retreat is cut off behind so that he can neither go forward nor backward The Prince of Orange coming thither goes directly to him masters him and leads him away Prisoner with his hands bound behind him His defeat greatly encouraged the Burghers All without distinction either of Religion Sex or Condition animate each other against the Common Enemy The French are worsted every where they betake themselves to flight the precipitate haste of those that fled out of the Town with that of the Swiss who strove to come in to assist made an embarras at the Gate they crowd more and more and stisle one another Several after they had run from place to place about the Rampers finding no way to get out and being closely pursued were glad to leap down from the Wall The Duke of Anjou beheld them with a great deal of pleasure thinking Year of our Lord 1583. January they had been Burghers when he found they were his own and at the same time heard the snoaring of two or three Vollies of Cannon scowring through his Troops then he thought it high time to recall his Swiss and retire leaving fifteen hundred of his Men whereof three hundred were Gentlemen stark dead upon the place and two thousand shut within the City The Prince of Orange and the mercy of the Burghers saved the lives of these last for so soon as there was no more resistance they endeavour'd to secure them assist the wounded and withdraw those that lay in heaps at the Gate some of them yet gasping for life and even within three days after sent those Prisoners to the Duke with a great deal of civility Fervaques only ran great hazard the People who believed him to be the Author of that infamous Treachery would have torn him in pieces if the Prince of Orange under pretence of strictly guarding him had not lock'd him in a Chamber within the Castle strongly barr'd with Iron and placed two Files of Soldiers at his Door The attempt failing the Duke of Anjou touched at least with shame and confusion if not with remorse and repentance retired to the Castle of Berken with the rest of his Forces who yet made up ten thousand Men and from thence wrote Letters to the Deputies of the States wherein having reminded them of his Services and much exagerated the contempt and unhandsome treatment he had received from them told them the indignities done to him that very day had put his People out of all patience and cast them into those disorders for which he was extreamly troubled That he had not yet in the least changed the good will he had by so many effects expressed towards them of which he was desirous to give them notice intreating they would send him an account of their last Resolutions that he might take his measures by their Answer The States resolved some Deputies should be sent to him and Orange obtained they should suffer Provisions for his Army to be carried after him This favour having lasted but two days he thought of gaining Dendremond but those of Antwerp hindred his passage over the Scheld and when afterwards he would have taken his way by Vilvoord those of Malines let go
River Adour that she had forsaken that and had made her self a new one but longer and more tortuous by which she discharged her self into the Sea at Cape-breton He forced it by strong Banks to take the former way which is much the more commodious and in a direct line The greatest apprehension King Philip lay under was lest the Low-Countries should give themselves up to the King of France rather then fall again under the tyranny of his Governors Every one desired it the honest Frenchman to remove the Civil War out of the Kingdom the Favourites in hatred to the Duke of Anjou and the Huguenots to avoid the mischiefs threatned by the League This was it made Philip endeavour and try by all means and ways to set France on fire first to prevent them from doing so in his own Countries It is said that having found amongst the Papers belonging to Don Juan of Austria some kind of Treaty between that Prince and the Duke of Guise he threatned the said Duke he would reveal his secrets to the King unless he would contract the like private Intelligence with him and would at the same time have obliged him to take up Arms but could not engage him to the last particular neither by his Menaces nor by his Prayers Having missed his end tha◠〈◊〉 he took another quite contrary one and would needs make the Huguenots riâ—e aâ—â—ressing himself to the King of Navarre profering to give him fifty thousand Crowns a Month and two hundred thousand for advance That King gave Ear to him for a while but on a suddain repented it and gave information to the King This was because they had put another design into his Head Gebard Truchses Archbishop of Colen had Married and struggled hard to keep both his Wife and his Bishoprick too which induced him to embrace the Religion of Calvin whose Principles allow the joyning those two things together which are not compatible in the Roman Church It concerned the reputation of the Protestant Party to maintain him in his Archbishoprick the King of Navarre fancied therefore that it might prove a considerable business to unite all the Princes of that Religion to undertake his defence month July and to this end he sollicited and exhorted them by a famous Embassy His design was by all applauded but seconded by none so that Gebard who in the beginning had some advantage being forsaken by all the World even by Casimir who was busie about getting the possession of the Palatinate after the death of the Year of our Lord 1583 Elector Lewis his elder Brother was turned out of all the places he held and retired to the Hague in Holland experimenting at leisure and to his own cost that a Wife without an Estate is a thing much more inconvenient then a Benefice without a Wife month October and Novemb. c. The King of Spain continually presâ—â—d the Guises to rivet themselves more closely to him And to engage them he let them see a Treaty of Montmorencies which was then on foot who being push'd at by Joyeuse he undertaking to thrust him out of Languedoc had indeed made application for his secret protection Besides the Favourites shock'd them every hour and stripping them day by day of their Offices and Governments hurried them to dispair nevertheless considering the inconveniencies and peril such are liable to who take up Arms against the King they could not yet resolve to play so dangerous a part Though the Duke of Guise knew that the Duke of Anjou hated him to death yet he forbore not to tempt him with divers Propositions for it would have been or infinite advantage to have had a Son of France at the Head of his Party The Duke of Anjou listned for a while to his profers but when it was least thought on or month February and March expected they were amazed to behold that Prince upon his Knees before the King humbly craving pardon for his faults This was in the time of Carnaval which fell out this year about the latter end of February but he staid not above seven or eight days at Court and then returned to Chasteau-Thierry month May and June After this his Health continually impaired a confirm'd Phtisick troubled him so grievously that he went seldom out of Doors and his violent Cough having burst a Vein in his Breast he lost so much Blood as cast him into fits of fainting the Twentieth day of May. After which accident he yet languished twenty days more with a slow Fever then gave up his Soul the Tenth of June He carried with him to his Grave the Tears and Sighs of those unhappy People who had assisted him in the War of Flanders for he died in Debt Three hundred thousand Crowns and the King would rather vainly expend two hundred thousand on his Funeral then pay one Penny of his Debts Many imagined that his Death was not Natural and said this was the first Act of that Tragedy whereof Salsede had made the Prologue Now that which gave most credit to such Discourse was two horrible attempts which were set on foot at the same time One against Queen Elizabeth by a Natural Englishman named William Parry who had undertaken to kill her in her Park but he was detected and punished the other upon the Prince of Orange who was unfortunately kill'd by Pistol-Shot in his own House month July by one Balthâ—zar Gerard a Native of the Franche-Comte and an Emissary of the Spaniards Philip the eldest of that Princes two Sons being then in the Spaniards hands where he was held a long time the States gave the second named Maurice the Government of Holland Zealand and West-Frise together with the Admiralty though he were scarce Eighteen years of Age. Year of our Lord 1584 As Monsieurs Life gave the Queen Mother work enough put some stop to the ambition of the Guises and lull'd the King of Navarre asleep his Death quite changed the whole Scene and Interests of those Factions It seemed already as if the succession of the Crown were open the whole World knew the King was uncapable of getting Children by reason of his debility proceeding from a Distemper which made him shed his Hair The Queen Mother who little valued the Fundamental Laws of France would needs call the Children of her Daughter by the Duke of Lorrain to the Crown she had sounded the Kings mind upon it and endeavour'd to persuade him that there remained but little of the Blood Royal 〈…〉 sixth degree which must needs become very cold and languid at that distanâ—â— that the Bourbons were no more of his Parentage then by Adam and Eve and that it would be more natural to leave the Succession to his Nephews then to Persons so far off There is some likelihood she might have succeeded in her intentions had the Duke of Lorrain and his Son but inherited as much courage and as many noble qualities as the Duke of Guise was Master of This
about preparing and equipping it and every year he laid out above a Million of Gold for the expences The King apprehending that the Leaguers if he ran them into despair might get them to land upon the coasts of France durst no longer deny those things they ask'd of him He gave them that Edict which bare the specious name of Year of our Lord 1588 Re-Vnion By which renewing his Coronation Oath he swear to root out all Schisms and Heresies and never make any Peace or Edict in favour of the Huguenots ordained likewise all his Subjects of what quality soever to swear the same and that his death hapning they should acknowledge no Prince for their King who was an Heretique or abettor of Heresie Declared Rebels and Criminals de Lesae Majestatis those who refused to Sign this Edict and approved all that had been done the 12 th and 13 th of May and since as well at Paris as in other Cities as being done out of pure Zeal for the Catholique Religion He swear this Edict with an appearance of great joy all those that were of his Council and of his Court did the same thing excepting the Duke of Nevers who refused the Oath three or four times till the King enjoyned him to it upon pain of disobedience The Parliament did forthwith Register and make publication of it and all the great Cities received it This done the King returned to Chartres towards the end of the Month and the Queen brought thither the Duke of Guise and presented him to the King There appeared in their countenances and in their discourse and in either of their proceedings so many marks of Confidence and a cordial Affection that the whole Court was overjoy'd at this reconciliation and the most cautelous believed it might be unfeigned At this time the King of Navarre was returned from Bearn to Rochell and sought to gain the favour of that City where indeed he had no very great credit during the life of the Prince of Condé Lesdiguieres was buisy in Danfiné curbing the Cities of Gap and Grenoble with Ports he mated Grenoble so effectually that they demanded a Truce for six Months He and Montmorency had also besieged the Pont Sainct Esprit when the Edict of Re-Union was brought to him It made the Mareschal put up his Sword but hastned la Valete to make a League Offensive and Defensive with Lesdiguieres There was nothing in Daufiné that made head against the last but only Charles de Simiane d'Albigny nor did he spare any thing to gain his amity he offer'd to give him his Daughter in Marriage to share his Authority between them and to leave it solely to him at his death These advantageous proffers had less power and influence over the Spirit of Albigny then that zeal he was confirmed in for the Religion of his Ancestors he ever constantly resisted him but not with so much success as courage month September and October The Provenceaux in the mean time were risen up against Valete the Kings private Orders the Parliaments hatred to the Duke of Espernon and the ambition of Vins who pretended to that Government did but too much animate those Spirits whose Blood is soon heated and easily incited to a commotion The supplies which came to him from Daufiné did but little service when the Parliament had once set him beside the Government most of the Gentry and all the Cities abandon'd him excepting four or five petty places which he maintained till the death of the Duke of Year of our Lord 1588 Guise when the face of Affairs were changed by the Kings changing of his mind month August In the precedent Month of August the Duke of Espernon saw himself in most dreadful danger his kind fortune and great courage drew him out of it Having staid some days in the Castle of Loches after his leaving the Court before he resolved to go to Angoulesme the Mayor of the Town had order from the King to oppose his entrance and not able to do so because Espernon had prevented the Courier he undertook to seize him in the Castle or the Kings House where he lodged He entred therefore with Ten Men well armed under colour of bringing a Courier to him but running rashly into the Wardrobe instead of going directly to his Closet he mist his prey and perish'd with his Brother-in-law who crept in thorow a hole to come to his aid The other Conspirators and their friends who had taken Arms in the City apprehending to be over-born by the Soldiers who came thundring in to the Dukes assistance and the Duke to be starved to death having not eaten in Thirty hours this fear and that necessity made an accommodation between them and obliged them to stand to it Villeroy was taxed as having abused or contrived Letters under the Signet to destroy Espernon but the King clearly owned the business He was grown so peevish that towards the end of the same Month he dismiss'd the Chancellor de Chiverny Villeroy and Pinard Secretaries of State and Pompone de Bellievre Sur-Intendant des Finances At the same time he heaped Favours upon the Leaguers for he put the Seals into the hands of Francis de Montolon Advocate in Parliament whom they revered because of his servent zeal for the Catholique Religion He also declared the Cardinal de Bourbon the nearest of kin to his Blood In effect he was so but not the fittest to succeed and he permitted the Clergy to furnish Five hundred thousand Crowns towards the expences of the War Now that the said Body Ecclesiastical might raise it without alienating their Fund he consented to the erection of an alternate Receiver and two Comptrollers of the Tenths hereditary in each Diocess This Fund was ordained for the maintenance of two Armies which he had raised He gave the one to the Duke of Mayenne and the other to the Duke of Nevers but this was upon the refusal of the Duke of Guise who by advice of the Arch-Bishop of Lyons resolved to remain at Court and got a constant and certain Fund setled to keep his Table of Grand Maistre month July and August The event made it appear that this resolution was not prudent for the beams of his power shining perpetually so bright in the Kings Eyes awakened his resentments which perhaps might else by little and little have been extinguished and laid to sleep in the shades of oblivion He was offended that the Pope should in a Letter call the Duke and the Cardinal de Bourbon Machabéans and say they had saved the people of Israel Besides this the Duke of Nevers and Lognac Captain of Year of our Lord 1588 the Forty-five did perpetually stir up his indignation The Duke of Nevers because he irreconcileably hated the Duke of Guise and Lognac because having in some manner succeeded to the Kings favour after Espernon as Second with Bellegarde Cosin-Germain to that Duke well knew that the House of Guise always enemies
together master'd almost all the rest of Daufine In Auvergne the Count de Randan a zealous Catholick had made sure of Limagne but on the contrary most of the Lords of the Province as we have before hinted resisted him stoutly The Parisians who thought the taking of the Bearnois so they called him infallible were mightily surprized when they saw he after the having received a supply of four thousand English the evening before the day that the Duke of Mayenne decamped from Diepe having made a long march came on All-Saints day attaqu'd and forced their great Retrenchments of the Fauxbourgs Saint Jacques and Saint Germains then the Fauxbourgs themselves with so much vigour that he might have entred the month November City had his Cannon but come timely enough to beat open the Gates It 's said he got up into the Steeple of the Abby St. Germains and thence at leasure contemplated the tumults and hurry he caused in Paris Bourgeing Prior of the Jacobins was taken in the Trenches of the Fauxbourg Saint Jacques with his Armour on and fighting courageously they convey'd him to Tours where the Parliament condemned him to be drawn by four Horses upon the Depositions of some Witnesses whether true or false who gave Evidence that he had incited Jacques Clement to kill Henry III. which he ever constantly denied and died so The Duke of Mayenne knowing the King drew toward Paris sent the Duke of Nemours thither with all expedition who did not arrive till towards night the next day he came himself with the gross of his Army Upon the noise of his arrival Year of our Lord 1589. November the King withdrew his out of the Fauxbourgs into the Field and having stood there three hours in battalia went to Linas From thence he went and took Estampes and Janville then Vendosme Maille Benehard who was Governor not having the discretion either to surrender it in time or defend it bravely was there beheaded He marched afterwards to Tours where he staid but two days and went to attaque Mans. In it there were twenty Companies of Foot and one hundred Gentlemen Bois-Daufin commanded there They had caused all the Suburbs to be burnt down as if resolved to defend themselves to the utmost extremity and yet at the first Cannon Shot glancing upon their Wall they made Composition which the more honourable by so much was it the more shameful In fine in Anjou Mayne and Touraine the League could preserve only the Town de la Ferte Bernard The King left that it being of more importance to employ his Arms for the reduction of Normandy In the Month of September Pope Sixtus had chosen the Cardinal Caetan to go Legat into France His Orders were To take care they should provide France month September with a King that were Pious a Catholick and agreeable to the French To that effect to go directly to Paris where the Ambassadors of Spain and Savoy were to meet to hear all the Propositions should be made to him to shew himself wholly disinteressed to engage for no Pretender to hear even the King of Navarre if there were any hopes of reconciling him to the Church with honour and dignity to the Holy See After these Instructions given the Pope received Letters written to him by the Duke de Piney deputed to his Holiness on behalf of the Royalist Nobility assuring him he was upon his Journey towards Rome to give him a good Account of that Body this caused him to stop his Legat for some weeks but the League importuned him so much that he was at last obliged to let him go month November He arrived at Lyons the Ninth of November so fraught with an opinion of his great Power and Conduct that he thought to dispose of all France at to his own pleasure and unravel all the grand Affairs with those little Intrigues and trivial Subtilties they make use of in deciding those amongst themselves at Rome So having refused the offer the Duke of Nevers made him of his City which ever since the death of Henry III. he had kept neuter betwixt both Parties and without giving notice of his coming to the Catholick Lords who were with the King but only to the Duke of Mayenne he caused his Brief to be published containing the subject of his Legation and afterwards came to Paris Year of our Lord 1589. November Now because in the Brief no mention was made of the Cardinal de Bourbon the Duke was possest with some apprehensions lest the Pope and the Spaniard had agreed to make some other Person King and by consequence make him lose that Authority he would preserve under the name of that Cardinal and therefore to prevent that danger he made haste before the arrival of the Legat to have him solemnly declared King and in effect he was proclaimed so in all the Cities of that Party by vertue of a Decree of the Council for the Union verified in Parliament and from that time Justice and all other publick Acts began to be administred in the name of Charles X. the Title and the Power of Lieutenant General still reserved to the Duke There were then four different Factions in Paris besides that of the Royalists who durst not too openly discover themselves That is the Party called the Politicks because they considered the State much more then Religion for which the greater part being less concern'd then for their own proper interest believed the stronger side was ever the most just and wished the King might become so but in the mean while never declar'd for him The second was that of the Lorrain Princes consisting of their Friends and a Party of Zealous Catholicks The third were the Spanioliz'd if we may use this Phrase whom the luster of Peruvian Gold had fetter'd to King Philips Interest and the fourth a sort of People too amorous and fond of liberty who aimed to set up a Government whereby absolute Authority might be restrained within the bounds of Laws This latter did not long subsist the other three though Enemies amongst themselves conspiring to make them odious and to destroy them in so much as not knowing which way to turn they quickly joyned with the Spanish who received them with open Arms. In the beginning the Spaniards promised themselves their own hearts desires from the charming power of their Pistols they did not know they had to do with People that were ever craving and never satisfied Wherefore when Mendoza the Ambassador imagining he had made a Party sufficient propounded in Council that they should chuse the King his Master for Protector of the Holy Union The Duke was hugely surprised and after he had consulted with his ablest Heads made Answer that the Legat being so near it would be thought a Crime to resolve upon so weighty a business without first communicating of it to him This reply piqued the Spaniard much and they were quits with him for some days after when he demanded Money
otherwhile their Head being ruin'd both in his Estate and Credit he lived meanly and affected to appear yet poorer then he was knowing his want of Power and Riches was now his only security But divers of those that had served the King taking themselves to be ill used absented yet more from him then he was alienated from them The most discontented were the Mareschal de Bouillon the Duke de la Trimouille the Constable de Year of our Lord 1599 month April Montmorency the Duke of Montpensier More then these yet the Duke d'Espernon and the Mareschal de Biron This last more bold and confident then the rest exhal'd his discontents by odious complaints and vauntings not to be endured He could speak well of no body but himself which was his Eternal Theme and Entertainment He exalted himself above the greatest Captains it was he alone that had done all there was no Place or Dignity he did not think beneath his Merit Nought but the Soveraignty could satisfie him and he would Crown himself with his own hands Too great applause had corrupted this brave Courage the King himself had praised him too much had raised him too high After the loss of Dourlens and Cambray the Nobless and the Soldiery all cast their Eyes upon him only as both the Sword and Buckler of the State At his return from the Siege of Amiens he was intoxicated by the fondness of the Parisians and when he went into Flanders to Witness the Archdukes Swearing to the Peace the Spaniards knowing his Vanity and ill disposition gave him such lofty Elogies as filled his Head with Air and Vanity and his Heart with wicked Thoughts and Sentiments From that time nay even before he sought and courted the favour of the Populace affected for the Catholick Religion a Zeal that proceeded even to Beads and month May and June Confrairies as if he would again set up that League his Sword had beaten down This year in the Month of May having made a Journey into Guyenne he there regaled the Nobility with Feasts Presents and Caresses held private Conference with such as had most Credit in the Province and behaved himself after such a manner that the King apprehending some Disturbance there descended to Blois month June c. and set a Report on Wing that he would pass on to Poitiers thereby to prevent many who might have engaged themselves in his Contrivances He was yet there when the news of the Duke of Savoy's Voyage obliged him to return to Fontainebleau During his abode in that Country Philip Hurat Chiverny Chancellor of France who had desired leave to go and see his House of Chiverny did there fall sick and died the Nine and twentieth day of June He stood much upon his Nobility and did as much affect the Quality of Earl and of Governor of Orleannois and Blesois as that of Chancellor which he had held twenty years His Posterity as almost all those that attain great Fortunes at Court sunk in a short time Pompone de Bellievre succeeded him in that great Office and at first began with two things which were most necessary viz. a severe Edict against Duels and a Rule that none should be admitted to the Office of Master of Requests till he had been ten years in the Soveraign Courts or twenty in some Court Subordinate Year of our Lord 1599 month June c. This new Chancellor Villeroy Secretary of State Sillery President in the Parliament of Paris Jannin in that of Burgundy and the Marquiss de Rosny Sur-Intendant of the Finances had the greatest share in the Administration of Affairs The last governing the Purse had great advantage over the others besides the King made himself more familiar with him and consider'd him as a Creature he had raised and one that had never held any Party but his own And indeed he was shaped every way to his humour and very fit to manage that Office as he intended it should be For besides that he was indefatigable thrifty and a Man of great order he was rough in denial impenetrable to Prayers and importunities and with both hands greedily scraping Money into the Kings Coffers To this purpose he received all manner of Proposals the easiest he made benefit of in his time and the refuse was left to glut the following Reign He made thorough inquisition after such Money as had been mis-employ'd and wherever that lighted he fell upon the great as boldly as the little ones took the hatred and blame of all denials or disappointments upon himself stopt his Ears at their Complaints or Reproaches not minding any other thing but where to raise new Fonds from day to day Hereby did he become most necessary to the King and got into his favour more and more He often shewed him a just state of Receipts and Payments in every Concern distinctly as likewise the Projects of such Expences as were to be made and the Inventories of all the Arms Ammunition and Cannon in his several Places all by Summary Abridgments to give the more gusto in perusal and inform him without tiring him For he knew very well that the King being of a ready and quick apprehension could not dwell long upon any one particular neither in Reading or Writing nor endure any tedious Discourse or Reasoning Those that had managed the Revenues or Finances had put things in a most horrible disorder and confusion and the Expences in the Civil War had drained them so low that it was almost impossible to remedy them by the ordinary ways The King was charged with Six Millions of yearly Rents and Pensions above five Millions Salary for his Officers of Justice and the Treasury with Petitions of an infinite number of brave Soldiers Officers Gentlemen and Lords who prayed some for Rewards others for some Benevolence and Charity that they might at least subsist It would therefore have been but reasonable if for a time they had exceeded the bounds of the common methods to repair these Disorders were it not that such Examples remain even after the necessity is over and that a Tax or Charge once imposed turns to a common Right or Claim ☜ Year of our Lord 1599 That they might bring the Revenues into the grand Channel of the Exchequer or Espargne he studied in the first place to open all the Springs from whence they were to slow and stop up all by-leaks which made them drop aside and lose themselves Most enormous abuses were committed upon the levying of such Moneys as were raised by extraordinary Commissions and it was the custom of some of the Council to procure very easie Adjudications that they might share in the profit As to the former he order'd the Receivers to make Receipts for these as for the other and as to the second having found out that the Sub-farms amounted to twice as much as the general Adjudication he tied up the hands of the Principal Farmers and caused the whole to be brought into the
Sully arrived It had never been his design to come to the Swords point with his King but only to make use of his Wits and retard his March by suggesting many Dangers and things he neither would or indeed could do On the other hand Villeroy had all the desire imaginable to conclude the Treaty that he might ravish the honour of this Expedition from Sully So that upon the second Conference he had with the Mareschal he brought him to agree To Surrender the Place to the King and to consent that he should keep a Governor and a Garrison there during the space of four years The King on his side fully Pardon'd him for all that he could ever have done or said to that day without any Reservation whereof he caused Letters of Abolition to be expedited and sent them to be verified in Parliament dispensing with his Personal Appearance and many other customary Forms The next day being the last of April the Mareschal relying on the credit of Villeroy and the Protection of the Queen who was willing to gain so knowing and so Potent a Lord came to wait on the King at Donchery in the Morning asked his Pardon and took a new Oath of Fidelity to him The following Thursday month April the Courrier having brought back the Letters of Abolition verified in Parliament the King made his entrance into Sedan and setled Netancourt his Governor there This done he returned to Paris where he would needs be received as Triumphant with the noise of all the Cannon in the Arsenal The Mareschal de Bouillon came soon after and the world much admired to see him the very first day as much in the King's favour and in his most familiar Conversations as he had been before his absenting At the same time the King went to Sedan the most furious Winds that ever yet were heard of agitated the Air and Sea not only in France but also in England the Low-Countries and Germany In the Campagne it forced back not only those that travell'd on foot but even Horses threw several often on the ground put Carts and Coaches to a full stop tore up the strongest Trees by the Roots beat down Towers and Steeples whose Coverings and Walls buried great numbers of People under their ruines At Paris so long as this Tempest lasted which was all Saturday Easter-Sunday and Monday the Tyles Stacks of Chimneys nay the very Rafters of the Houses flew about the Streets and killed or maimed above Seventy Persons This Storm did as it were threaten to tear up the very Foundations of the Earth and force the vast Element of Waters out of its Natural Bed to cause a second deluge after it had caused infinite Shipwracks in the securest Harbours In the Month of June the King coming from Saint Germains to Paris by Coach Year of our Lord 1606 wherein were the Queen his Wife the Princess of Coâ—ty the Duke of Montpensier month June and the Duke of Vendosme and designing to cross the Seine at Port Nully one of his Horses instead of going into the Ferry-boat for as then there was no Bridge stray'd into the Water and drew the Coach after him into a place very deep The Gentlemen that follow'd on Horseback threw themselves instantly into the River and happily saved the King and then all the rest of his Company The Queen was in the greatest Danger la Chasteigneraye drew her forth and for this good Service deserved to be Captain of her Guard some while after The Marchioness de Verneuil as she was wont play'd with her Wit maliciously upon this Adventure and told the King that if she had been there she would have cryed out The Queen Drinks * which re-inflamed the Queens resentments and caused new Picqueerings Queen Catherine de Medicis had given the Counties of Auvergne and of Laraguais to Charles Natural Son of her Son King Charles IX Queen Margaret pretended that she could not do it because that by the Contract of Marriage with Henry II. those Lands had been substituted to the Children that should proceed from it of whom none were remaining but her self month June So that taking advantage of the disgrace of Charles she had waged Law with him to retrieve it and even Six years before the Parliament of Toulouze had pronounced in her favour for the County of Lauraguais This favourable Prejudication and the Juncture of Affairs invited her to bring the like Action before the Parliament of Paris for the County of Auvergne and with the like success for by a Decree in March they adjudged it to her Immediately she made a Present of the said Lands to the Daufin by absolute Deed of Gift executed while living upon condition they should be united to the Crown for ever and not alienated month March but she reserved the Profits to her self which the King purchased by a large Pension The Court enjoying a perfect repose now celebrated the Ceremonial Baptism of the Daufin and the two Daughters of France for the Essential Baptism was administred immediately after their Birth They had made Magnificent Preparations at the Louvre for this Ceremony but the Plague beginning to Infect Paris about the end of June and spreading much in July and August obliged the King to transfer it to Fontainebleau It was there performed upon Holy-Cross Day in the Court de L'Ovale where they erected an Amphitheater as having no place spacious enough within Doors to contain all their Pomp. The Cardinal de Gondy month Septemb. was the Minister they began with the second Daughter who was the youngest of the three Children She was named Catherine and for God-father had the Duke of Lorrain the Dutchess of Tuscany for her Godmother represented by Don John de Medicis The Eldest Daughter had no Godfather only a Godmother who was the Arch-Dutchess Clara Isabella Eugenia Madam d'Angoulesme represented her and gave the Name of Elizabeth to the Child At the Baptism of the Daufin the Cardinal de Joyeuse stood Godfather for Pope Paul V. who for this purpose had declared him Legat in France during three Months The Dutchess of Mantoua Sister to the Queen was Godmother She being invited to come expresly into France the Queen prevailed she might take place of the Princesses of the Blood a Novelty not very pleasing to the French nor to the King himself On the day which preceded that of this Ceremony a light appeared towards the Western Quarter of the Heavens which expanding by little and little cast forth as it were long flashes towards the South and the East with most admirable swiftness After these Fusées which lasted near a quarter of an hour appeared divers Chariots of Fire which seemed to shock one the other and wherein they fancied to discern some appearances of Lances Pikes and Arms which darted them This Spectacle ended not till about Midnight and by a cleer Light which made the whole Hemisphear seem to sparkle then insensibly decay'd in half an hours time But two
from which the Reader may draw what consequence he pleases the one That when they had taken him seven or eight Men were seen to come up with their drawn Swords who cried aloud he deserved ☞ and ought to be cut in pieces presently and then immediately sheltred themselves in the Crowd the other That he was not presently put into Goal but into the hands of Montigny where they kept him two days in the Hostel de Rais with so little care that all sorts of people spake with him and amongst others a Frier who had great Obligations to the King having accosted him and called him My Friend said to him he should have a care of accusing honest people There were in the Kings Coach the Dukes of Espernon and of Montbason the Mareschals de Lavardin and de Roquelaure and the Marquesses de la Force and de Mirebeau these Lords being allighted and having cover'd his face and drawn the Curtains made them drive back towards the Louvre and commanded at their Entrance they should call out for a Chyrurgeon and some Wine that it might be believed he was not yet dead They laid his Bleeding Corps upon a Year of our Lord 1610 Bed with negligence enough and he was there exposed for some hours to any that would see him but attended or regarded only by those who had no great interest of Fortune at the Court All such as were in hopes of any thought more upon their own Affairs than on him who could now do no more for them Thus was there but a moment space between their Adorations and Oblivion ☜ The pressing necessity of Affairs obliged the Queen to disband her Sorrows and dry up her Tears she left the care and present management of all Affairs to such as she confided in most particularly to the Duke of Espernon and the Mareschal de Lavardin We shall show in the following Reign if the times will permit us how the Court wholly changed it's Face the Government its Maximes the Ministers their designs How the Orders which Henry the Great had established were renversed his Oeconomies dissipated his faithful Servants turned out of doors and his Alliances forsaken to take up new ones so that France which was so lately triumphant and Mistress of Europe saw her self almost reduced month May. under the Government and Direction of Spain and the Agents of the Court of Rome who were the Oracles of the Regency It must however be acknowledged that it proved very happy both for the quiet and the ease of the People in general So soon as the King was dead the Duke of Espernon ran to order the Companies of the Regiment that had the Guard to seize upon the Gates of the Louvre sent for the rest who were quarter'd in the Fauxbourgs to come and post themselves upon the Pont-neuf in the Street Daufine and about the Augustins thereby to invest the Parliament and compel them if requisite to declare the Queen Regent The President de Blanc-mesnil who then held the Afternoon Audience broke off upon the dreadful rumour of the King 's being wounded but durst not or would not stir from thence And in the mean time the President Seguier whom the Duke of Espernon had been with for his advice and assistance came thither immediately with a good number of his Friends So that the Company was assembled to serve the Duke in his Design Amidst that innumerable and confused multitude of People wherewith Paris was then thronged who were of so great diversity of Humours and Interests amidst the Animosities betwixt the Catholicks and the Huguenots the Feuds amongst the Grandees the Suspitions which the one cast upon the other concerning this Murther the specious pretence there was to animate the People to revenge the Death of a Prince so greatly and generally beloved and the avidity of the Rascally sort to be Plundering it is manifest that the least spark of Sedition would have set all Paris in a flame and the more easily because the Bourgeoisie had their Arms in readiness having Mustered twice or thrice a Week for above a Month to be prepared for the entrance of the Queen The Prudence of her Magistrates I mean the Prevost des Marchands and the Lieutenant Civil did most happily obviate those Disorders The first was James Sanguin the second Nicholas le Jay a man of great Sence and who had acquired a great deal of Credit amongst the Citizens because he made the Honor of his Office to consist in serving the Publick well Both appeared every where about the Streets amused the populace with divers reports exhorted the considerablest Bourgeois to keep them in awe managed every thing so wisely and gave such excellent Orders the one Commanding the Captains of every Precinct the other the Commissaries Archers and Huissiers to be in a readiness that nothing was able to make the least disturbance Henry IV. died in the midst of the Fifty seventh year of his Age three Months before the end of the Two and twentieth of his Reign leaving three Sons and three Daughters by Mary de Medicis his Second or rather his only Wife since the Marriage between him and Margaret de Valois was declared Null The eldest named Lewis hath reigned the second had no Baptismal Name and died within the fourth year of his Childhood he bare the Title of Duke of Orleans The Third had it likewise and the Name of John Baptista Gaston The three Daughters were called Elizabeth Christian and Henriette-Maria The eldest was Wife of Philip IV. King of Spains the second of Victor Amedea Prince of Piedmont then Duke of Savoy after the death of Duke Charles his Father the last of Charles I. King of Great Britain The number of his Natural Children did by much surpass his Legitimate ones for besides those whom he would not or could not well own he had Eleven S ix Year of our Lord 1610 by Gabriella d'Estree which were Caesar Duke de Vendosme Lewis Francis and Isabella these three died young Alexander Grand Prior of France and Catharine Henrietta Wife of Charles Duke de Elbaeuf Two by Henrietta de Balsac d'Entragues to wit Henry Duke de Verneüil and Bishop of Mets at present Governor of Languedoc and Gabriella Wife of Bernard de Nogaret Duke de la Valette then Duke of Espernon one only by Jacqueline de Bueil which was Anthony Count de Moret And two Daughters by Charlotta des Essars a private Gentlewoman They were named Jane and Mary Henrietta the former was Abbess of Fontevrault and the latter of Chelles It may be seen and judged by the course of his whole life whether he justly merited the Title they gave him of Great with that of Arbitrator of Christendom There were some would needs reproach him That he loved Money too well and that to gather it he exposed his Kingdom to the avidity of Partisans who amongst a great number of odd Projects they put him upon made him establish the Paulete or