Count Louis, rising from his sick bed, paid his respects in person to the victorious generals, at their request.  He was received in Alva’s camp with an extraordinary show of admiration and esteem.  The Duke of Medina Coeli overwhelmed him with courtesies and “basolomanos,” while Don Frederic assured him, in the high-flown language of Spanish compliment, that there was nothing which he would not do to serve him, and that he would take a greater pleasure in executing his slightest wish than if he had been his next of kin.

As the Count next day, still suffering with fever, and attired in his long dressing-gown, was taking his departure from the city, he ordered his carriage to stop at the entrance to Don Frederic’s quarters.  That general, who had been standing incognito near the door, gazing with honest admiration at the hero of so many a hard-fought field, withdrew as he approached, that he might not give the invalid the trouble of alighting.  Louis, however, recognising him, addressed him with the Spanish salutation, “Perdone vuestra Senoria la pesedumbre,” and paused at the gate.  Don Frederic, from politeness to his condition, did not present himself, but sent an aid-de-camp to express his compliments and good wishes.  Having exchanged these courtesies, Louis left the city, conveyed, as had been agreed upon, by a guard of Spanish troops.  There was a deep meaning in the respect with which the Spanish generals had treated the rebel chieftain.  Although the massacre of Saint Bartholomew met with Alva’s entire approbation, yet it was his cue to affect a holy horror at the event, and he avowed that he would “rather cut off both his hands than be guilty of such a deed”—­as if those hangman’s hands had the right to protest against any murder, however wholesale.  Count Louis suspected at once, and soon afterwards thoroughly understood; the real motives of the chivalrous treatment which he had received.  He well knew that these very men would have sent him to the scaffold; had he fallen into their power, and he therefore estimated their courtesy at its proper value.

It was distinctly stated, in the capitulation of the city, that all the soldiers, as well as such of the inhabitants as had borne arms, should be allowed to leave the city, with all their property.  The rest of the people, it was agreed, might remain without molestation to their persons or estates.  It has been the general opinion of historians that the articles of this convention were maintained by the conquerors in good faith.  Never was a more signal error.  The capitulation was made late at night, on the 20th September, without the provision which Charles IX. had hoped for:  the massacre, namely, of De la None and his companions.  As for Genlis and those who had been taken prisoners at his defeat, their doom had already been sealed.  The city was evacuated on the 21st September:  Alva entered it upon the 24th.  Most of the volunteers departed with the garrison, but many who had, most unfortunately, prolonged