The League, gliding so long unheeded, now reared its crest in the very palace of France, and full in the monarch’s face.  With a single shudder the victim fell into its coils.

The choice was made.  On the 18th of July (1585) the edict of Nemours was published, revoking all previous edicts by which religious peace had been secured.  Death and confiscation of property were now proclaimed as the penalty of practising any religious rites save those of the Roman Catholic Church.  Six months were allowed to the Nonconformists to put their affairs in order, after which they were to make public profession of the Catholic religion, with regular attendance upon its ceremonies, or else go into perpetual exile.  To remain in France without abjuring heresy was thenceforth a mortal crime, to be expiated upon the gallows.  As a matter of course, all Huguenots were instantaneously incapacitated from public office, the mixed chambers of justice were abolished, and the cautionary towns were to be restored.  On the other hand, the Guise faction were to receive certain cities into their possession, as pledges that this sanguinary edict should be fulfilled.

Thus did Henry III. abjectly kiss the hand which smote him.  His mother, having since the death of Anjou no further interest in affecting to favour the Huguenots, had arranged the basis of this treaty with the Spanish party.  And now the unfortunate King had gone solemnly down to the Parliament of Paris, to be present at the registration of the edict.  The counsellors and presidents were all assembled, and as they sat there in their crimson robes, they seemed, to the excited imagination of those who loved their country, like embodiments of the impending and most sanguinary tragedy.  As the monarch left the parliament-house a faint cry of ‘God save the King’ was heard in the street.  Henry hung his head, for it was long since that cry had met his ears, and he knew that it was a false and languid demonstration which had been paid for by the Leaguers.

And thus was the compact signed—­an unequal compact.  Madam League was on horseback, armed in proof, said a contemporary; the King was on foot, and dressed in a shirt of penitence.  The alliance was not an auspicious one.  Not peace, but a firebrand—­’facem, non pacem’—­had the King held forth to his subjects.

When the news came to Henry of Navarre that the King had really promulgated this fatal edict, he remained for a time, with amazement and sorrow, leaning heavily upon a table, with his face in his right hand.  When he raised his head again—­so he afterwards asserted—­one side of his moustachio had turned white.

Meantime Gregory XIII., who had always refused to sanction the League, was dead, and Cardinal Peretti, under the name of Sixtus V., now reigned in his place.  Born of an illustrious house, as he said—­for it was a house without a roof—­this monk of humble origin was of inordinate ambition.  Feigning a humility which was but the cloak to his pride, he was in reality as grasping, self-seeking, and revengeful, as he seemed gentle and devout.  It was inevitable that a pontiff of this character should seize the opportunity offered him to mimic Hildebrand, and to brandish on high the thunderbolts of the Church.