Milan which he had renounced. At the same time he pretended a right to Savoy, through his mother, although the reigning duke, Emmanuel Filibert, was her brother's

son.

The French troops took possession of almost all Savoy and Piedmont, and the dispossessed duke carried his complaints to the emperor, who in great indignation renewed the war. He not only chased the French out of Piedmont, but crossed the Var and invaded Provence. The defence had been intrusted to the Count of Montmorency, a man of some talent, brave, honest, but pitiless, who wasted the country before the enemy, burning every village or unwalled town. Thus, though Charles's army was starved out and forced to retreat, the peasants suffered still more, and countless families were ruined, besides the hosts who died of misery. Marseilles held out, but the emperor entered Arles, where he would have been crowned as King of Burgundy, had he not found the place deserted by the nobles and clergy. Hunger and disease made such havoc with his army that he was forced to retreat to Italy as Francis marched southward. During this advance the dauphin died, and Francis actually accused the emperor of having poisoned him. Also, in imitation of Philip Augustus, the king held a court, and cited Charles, as Count of Flanders and Artois, to answer for having made war on his liege lord, and, as he scorned to reply, he was declared to have forfeited these domains. But to take them was a different matter. No French party could be stirred up in Italy, and all Francis could effect among his allies was to cause the shores of Otranto to be ravaged by a Turkish and Moorish fleet. When driven off by the Venetian and Genoese ships, the Moslems took refuge in the port of Marseilles, and there sold their slaves and plunder. All Europe was indignant, and shame as well as exhaustion forced Francis to agree to a ten years' truce. By this he gave up his Turkish alliance in return for Charles withdrawing his support from the Duke of Savoy; but peace was not made, because the emperor, who had once offered Milan to Francis's son Henry, as Duke of Orleans, would not give it the heir to the crown.

22. Visit of Charles to France, 1540.-Montmorency, who had much influence over both the king and his son, persuaded them of the hopelessness of the struggle. Presently Charles, having occasion to reach Ghent more rapidly than was possible by sea, requested a safe-conduct

through France. The king replied by an invitation to his court, which the emperor accepted on condition that he should hear nothing about Milan. He was welcomed with lavish display and a course of brilliant feasts, but all the time he was tormented with entreaties to give Milan to the dauphin. To these he turned a deaf ear, but ominous hints were given, such as the court jesters saying that he was a fool for coming, but that the king would be a greater fool still for letting him go as he came. Charles would not be beguiled into any promise, though, when he had been safely escorted to the frontier, he offered the Low Countries, with his daughter's hand, to the youngest son of Francis, on condition that Savoy was restored to Emmanuel Filibert. Two years later the emperor met with a disaster in attacking the Moors in Africa; Francis again began to harass him, bringing a fleet of Turkish ships to besiege Nice, the last place remaining to the Duke of Savoy. When it had been sacked and burned, the Turks wintered in Toulon harbour, and Henry VIII. was so indignant that he took up arms and himself besieged and took Boulogne on the 14th of September, 1544.

23. The Peace of Crespy, 1544.-Again Francis was crushed into accepting terms of peace, and agreed to restore the Duke of Savoy, and work with Charles at bringing quiet to the Church, and defending Christendom from the Turks. Peace was signed at Crespy on the 18th of September, 1544, just fifty years since the Italian war had been begun by Charles VIII., a war in which France had gained nothing, but had lost 2,000,000 brave men! The peace did not include Henry VIII., and Francis went with his two sons to retake Boulogne, but fever was raging in Picardy, and the younger died. The king had no heart to carry on the war, and made peace with Henry, undertaking to ransom Boulogne in eight years. Still he avoided restoring Savoy to his cousin, and kept up a secret understanding with the Protestants in Germany, who were resisting the assembly of the Council of Trent in 1545. Another war was impending when he died on the 31st of March, 1547, in his fifty-fourth year. His health had been ruined by vice; for, though he has been a favourite hero with those who can be dazzled with false glitter, he had neither honour nor honesty, and was a profligate in life, with only enough religion to satisfy the corrupt court clergy, persecuting at home

what he protected abroad that he might annoy his enemies.

24. Henry II., 1547.-Henry II. was a less clever, but more honest man, and in better times might have been a good king. He had a kind of sturdy constancy, which might have been turned to better account than by his unswerving devotion to Montmorency (now constable) as his friend, and to Diana of Poitiers as his mistress. She was a widow, twelve years his elder, while his wife, the Florentine Catharine de' Medici, was neglected and despised. His heirloom being hatred to Charles V., he declared himself Protector of the Protestants of Germany, while he persecuted the Calvinists at home. At the same time he helped the Scots in their resistance to a marriage between their infant Queen Mary Stewart and Edward VI. of England. The mother of the little queen was Mary of Lorraine, daughter of Claude, Duke of Guise, the second son of René, Duke of Lorraine. She, being in the French interest, hoped to shelter her child from factions at home and enemies across the border, by shipping her off to France, to be bred up as wife to the dauphin Francis. When she was thus secured, Henry made peace with England in 1550, and ransomed Boulogne.

25. Seizure of Metz, 1552.-On the election of a new pope, Julius III., Henry tried to follow in his father's steps by forming leagues in Italy with the kindred of Paul III. The great revolt of Maurice, Elector of Saxony, also gave him an excuse for calling himself Protector of the Liberties of Germany. In that capacity he seized the three bishoprics of Metz, Verdun, and Toul, and laid Elsass waste. There was an undecided battle at Renty, and Henry's troops ravaged, the Netherlands, and Charles's ravaged Picardy, till the emperor agreed in 1555 to a five years' truce. He was designing the abdication which he carried out in that year and the next. From this time the Spanish and German dominions of the house of Austria were quite separate. Charles's brother Ferdinand went on reigning in Austria, while his son Philip inherited Spain, the Sicilies, the Netherlands, and Charles's other hereditary dominions. In the empire he was succeeded by Ferdinand of Austria, who was already King of the Romans. Strictly, Ferdinand was only Emperor-elect; but from this time, as no emperor was crowned after Charles the Fifth, he and his successors were commonly spoken of as emperors.

26. War with England and Spain, 1557.-The Neapolitan Carlo Caraffa, who had just become pope as Paul IV., hated Spain for seizing his country, and invited Henry to follow the old French fashion of a raid into Naples; but Henry sent in his stead the Duke of Guise. Long before his arrival however the pope was threatened by the Duke of Alva, the Spanish Viceroy of Naples, and found his guard would not fight, so that he was only saved by Alva's respect for Rome, which prevented any attack on the city. The Spaniards retreated as Guise advanced; but the French were most insolent and offensive at Rome, and their former conduct was so fresh in the minds of the Neapolitans that Guise could gain nothing. Meantime Philip II., with Emmanuel Filibert, the dispossessed Duke of Savoy, entered France at the head of an army of Spaniards, Flemings, and English, the last as subjects of his wife, Queen Mary. He besieged St. Quentin, which, though ill-fortified and illprovisioned, held out bravely under the Admiral of France Gaspar de Coligny, till the Constable de Montmorency marched to its relief, sending Coligny's brother, the Sieur d'Andelot, to throw troops and provisions into the place. D'Andelot succeeded, but Montmorency was surprised by the Duke of Savoy and totally routed, being made prisoner, with half the nobles of France and all the artillery. The way to Paris was open, but Philip would not advance till St. Quentin was taken, and Coligny held out for seventeen days, thus giving the nation time to rally. Henry wrote to recall Guise from Rome, saying, "I hope the pope will do as much for me in my need as I did for him." But Paul was in despair at losing the protection of the French army, and when the duke declared that no chains could keep him from his king, the pope broke forth, "Go, then, having done little for your king, less for the Church, and nothing for your own honour." But Guise, on his return, at once restored the spirits of the French by a sudden attack on Calais, which he captured and restored to the crown of France. Thus, after more than two hundred years' possession, the last remains of the French conquests of the English kings passed away, as the last remains of their Aquitanian heritage had passed away a hundred years earlier.

27. The Peace of Câteau Cambresis, 1559.—At Gravelines Guise was defeated, and Henry was forced to accept Philip's terms. France kept Calais and also the three

bishoprics, though they were not as yet formally ceded by the Empire. But he had to restore the Duke of Savoy to his dominions, and to give him in marriage his sister Margaret. He was also to give his daughter Elizabeth either to Philip himself or his eldest son. The peace was signed at Câteau Cambresis in 1559, and was the real end of the Italian wars. Henry further bound himself to promote the re-assembling of the Council of Trent, and to exterminate heresy in France. The Parliament of Paris however objected to persecution until the Council should have decided what heresy really was, and Henry, going to the parliament, found the counsellor Anne Dubourg, not only arguing in favour of the Reformed, but speaking plain truths against court vices. Henry was so much offended that the staunch counsellor was arrested, and put on trial for treason. Burnings went on, and were beheld by the court as a meritorious action. Diana of Poitiers is said to have taken the opportunity of revenging herself of a poor tailor employed about the palace, who had once rebuked her for her evil life. It was said that the man, on his way to execution, cast a glance on the king which Henry was never able to forget during the short remainder of his life. During the tournaments which celebrated the arrival of the Duke of Savoy for his marriage, the guard slipped from the lance of the Count of Montgommery, and the point pierced the king's eye, so that he instantly lost consciousness. He died in eleven days' time, on the 29th of June, 1559, in his forty-first year, leaving four sons and four daughters. While he lay expiring, his sister Margaret was married in haste to Emmanuel Filibert, and Dubourg's trial was proceeded with, so that he was put to death a little later. Montgommery escaped, and did not fall into Catharine's hands till much later.

CHAPTER VII.

THE RELIGIOUS WARS.

I. Francis II., 1559.-Francis II., the eldest son of Henry II., was only fifteen, a sickly boy, married. to Mary, the young Queen of Scots, and niece of Francis,