Henry IV., preparatory to pouring his troops into the German empire, entered into secret negotiations with England, Denmark, Switzerland, Venice, whom he easily purchased with offers of plunder, and with the Protestant princes of minor power on the continent.  There were not a few, indifferent upon religious matters, who were ready to engage in any enterprise which would humble Spain and Austria.  Henry collected a large force on the frontiers of Germany, and, with ample materials of war, was prepared, at a given signal, to burst into the territory of the empire.

The Catholics watched these movements with alarm, and began also to organize.  Rhodolph, who, from his position as emperor, should have been their leader, was a wretched hypochondriac, trembling before imaginary terrors, a prey to the most gloomy superstitions, and still concealed in the secret chambers of his palace.  He was a burden to his party, and was regarded by them with contempt.  Matthias was watching him, as the tiger watches its prey.  To human eyes it would appear that the destiny of the house of Austria was sealed.  Just at that critical point, one of those unexpected events occurred, which so often rise to thwart the deepest laid schemes of man.

On the 14th of May, 1610, Henry IV. left the Louvre in his carriage to visit his prime minister, the illustrious Sully, who was sick.  The city was thronged with the multitudes assembled to witness the triumphant entry of the queen, who had just been crowned.  It was a beautiful spring morning, and the king sat in his carriage with several of his nobles, the windows of his carriage being drawn up.  Just as the carriage was turning up from the rue St. Honore into the rue Ferronnerie, the passage was found blocked up by two carts.  The moment the carriage stopped, a man sprung from the crowd upon one of the spokes of the wheel, and grasping a part of the coach with his right hand, with his left plunged a dagger to the hilt into the heart of Henry IV.  Instantly withdrawing it, he repeated the blow, and with nervous strength again penetrated the heart.  The king dropped dead into the arms of his friends, the blood gushing from the wound and from his mouth.  The wretched assassin, a fanatic monk, Francis Ravaillac, was immediately seized by the guard.  With difficulty they protected him from being torn in pieces by the populace.  He was reserved for a more terrible fate, and was subsequently put to death by the most frightful tortures human ingenuity could devise.

The poniard of the assassin changed the fate of Europe.  Henry IV. had formed one of the grandest plans which ever entered the human mind.  Though it is not at all probable that he could have executed it, the attempt, with the immense means he had at his disposal, and with his energy as a warrior and diplomatist, would doubtless have entirely altered the aspect of human affairs.  There was very much in his plan to secure the approval of all those enlightened men