After the conversion of Henry iv. to the Roman Church had been duly accomplished that monarch had sent a secret envoy to Spain.  The mission of this agent—­De Varenne by name—­excited intense anxiety and suspicion in England and Holland and among the Protestants of France and Germany.  It was believed that Henry had not only made a proposition of a separate peace with Philip, but that he had formally but mysteriously demanded the hand of the Infanta in marriage.  Such a catastrophe as this seemed to the heated imaginations of the great body of Calvinists throughout Europe, who had so faithfully supported the King of Navarre up to the moment of his great apostasy, the most cruel and deadly treachery of all.  That the princess with the many suitors should come to reign over France after all—­not as the bride of her own father, not as the queen-consort of Ernest the Habsburger or of Guise the Lorrainer, but as the lawful wife of Henry the Huguenot—­seemed almost too astounding for belief, even amid the chances and changes of that astonishing epoch.  Yet Duplessis Mornay avowed that the project was entertained, and that he had it from the very lips of the secret envoy who was to negotiate the marriage.  “La Varenne is on his way to Spain,” wrote Duplessis to the Duke of Bouillon, “in company with a gentleman of Don Bernardino de Mendoza, who brought the first overtures.  He is to bring back the portrait of the Infanta.  ’Tis said that the marriage is to be on condition that the Queen and the Netherlands are comprised in the peace, but you know that this cannot be satisfactorily arranged for those two parties.  All this was once guess-work, but is now history.”

That eminent diplomatist and soldier Mendoza had already on his return from France given the King of Spain to understand that there were no hopes of his obtaining the French crown either for himself or for his daughter, that all the money lavished on the chiefs of the League was thrown away, and that all their promises were idle wind.  Mendoza in consequence had fallen into contempt at court, but Philip, observing apparently that there might have been something correct in his statements, had recently recalled him, and, notwithstanding his blindness and other infirmities, was disposed to make use of him in secret negotiations.  Mendoza had accordingly sent a confidential agent to Henry iv. offering his good offices, now that the king had returned to the bosom of the Church.

This individual, whose name was Nunez, was admitted by De Bethune (afterwards the famous Due de Sully) to the presence of the king, but De Bethune, believing it probable that the Spaniard had been sent to assassinate Henry, held both the hands of the emissary during the whole interview, besides subjecting him to a strict personal visitation beforehand.  Nunez stated that he was authorized to propose to his Majesty a marriage with the Infanta Clara Isabella, and Henry, much to the discontent of De Bethune, listened eagerly to the suggestion, and promised to send a secret agent to Spain to confer on the subject with Mendoza.