A Popular History of France from the Earliest Times | Page 4

at Chinon, where he still was when Henry
III. was in his turn murdered. On becoming king, the far-sighted Henry
IV. at once bethought him of his uncle and of what he might be able to
do against him. The cardinal was at Chinon, in the custody of Sieur de
Chavigny, "a man of proved fidelity," says De Thou, "but by this time
old and blind." Henry IV. wrote to Du Plessis-Mornay, appointed quite
recently governor of Saumur, "bidding him, at any price," says
Madame de Mornay, "to get Cardinal de Bourbon away from Chinon,
where he was, without sparing anything, even to the whole of his
property, because he would incontinently set himself up for king if he
could obtain his release." Henry IV. was right. As early as the 7th of
August, the Duke of Mayenne had an announcement made to the
Parliament of Paris, and written notice sent to all the provincial
governors, "that, in the interval until the states-general could be
assembled, he urged them all to unite with him in rendering with one

accord to their Catholic king, that is to say, Cardinal de Bourbon, the
obedience that was due to him." The cardinal was, in fact, proclaimed
king under the name of Charles X.; and eight months afterwards, on the
5th of March, 1590, the Parliament of Paris issued a decree
"recognizing Charles X. as true and lawful king of France." Du
Plessis-Mornay, ill though he was, had understood and executed,
without loss of time, the orders of King Henry, going bail himself for
the promises that had to be made and for the sums that had to be paid to
get the cardinal away from the governor of Chinon. He succeeded, and
had the cardinal removed to Fontenay-le-Comte in Poitou, "under the
custody of Sieur de la Boulaye, governor of that place, whose valor and
fidelity were known to him." "That," said Henry IV. on receiving the
news, "is one of the greatest services I could have had rendered me; M.
du Plessis does business most thoroughly." On the 9th of May, 1590,
not three months after the decree of the Parliament of Paris which had
proclaimed him true and lawful King of France, Cardinal de Bourbon,
still a prisoner, died at Fontenay, aged sixty-seven. A few weeks before
his death he had written to his nephew Henry IV. a letter in which he
recognized him as his sovereign.
The League was more than ever dominant in Paris; Henry IV. could not
think of entering there. Before recommencing the war in his own name,
he made Villeroi, who, after the death of Henry III., had rejoined the
Duke of Mayenne, an offer of an interview in the Bois de Boulogne to
see if there were no means of treating for peace. Mayenne would not
allow Villeroi to accept the offer. "He had no private quarrel," he said,
"with the King of Navarre, whom he highly honored, and who, to his
certain knowledge, had not looked with approval upon his brothers'
death; but any appearance of negotiation would cause great distrust
amongst their party, and they would not do anything that tended against
the rights of King Charles X." Renouncing all idea of negotiation,
Henry IV. set out on the 8th of August from St. Cloud, after having told
off his army in three divisions. Two were ordered to go and occupy
Picardy and Champagne; and the king kept with him only the third,
about six thousand strong. He went and laid the body of Henry III. in
the church of St. Corneille at Compiegne, took Meulan and several
small towns on the banks of the Seine and Oise, and propounded for

discussion with his officers the question of deciding in which direction
he should move, towards the Loire or the Seine, on Tours or on Rouen.
He determined in favor of Normandy; he must be master of the ports in
that province in order to receive there the re-enforcements which had
been promised him by Queen Elizabeth of England, and which she did
send him in September, 1589, forming a corps of from four to five
thousand men, Scots and English, "aboard of thirteen vessels laden with
twenty-two thousand pounds sterling in gold and seventy thousand
pounds of gunpowder, three thousand cannon-balls, and corn, biscuits,
wine, and beer, together with woollens and even shoes." They arrived
very opportunely for the close of the campaign, but too late to share in
Henry IV.'s first victory, that series of fights around the castle of
Arques which, in the words of an eye-witness, the Duke of Angouleme,
"was the first gate whereby Henry entered upon the road of his glory
and good fortune."
After making a demonstration close to Rouen, Henry IV., learning that
the Duke of Mayenne