Coligny recovered.  The deadly peace between the Huguenots and the Court succeeded.  The Admiral, despite his sagacity and his suspicions, embarked with his whole party upon that smooth and treacherous current which led to the horrible catastrophe of Saint Bartholomew.  To occupy his attention, a formal engagement was made by the government to send succor to the Netherlands.  The Admiral was to lead the auxiliaries which were to be despatched across the frontier to overthrow the tyrannical government of Alva.  Long and anxious were the colloquies held between Coligny and the Royalists.  The monarch requested a detailed opinion, in writing, from the Admiral, on the most advisable plan for invading the Netherlands.  The result was the preparation of the celebrated memoir, under Coligny’s directions, by young De Mornay, Seigneur de Plessis.  The document was certainly not a paper of the highest order.  It did not appeal to the loftier instincts which kings or common mortals might be supposed to possess.  It summoned the monarch to the contest in the Netherlands that the ancient injuries committed by Spain might be avenged.  It invoked the ghost of Isabella of France, foully murdered, as it was thought, by Philip.  It held out the prospect of re-annexing the fair provinces, wrested from the King’s ancestors by former Spanish sovereigns.  It painted the hazardous position of Philip; with the Moorish revolt gnawing at the entrails of his kingdom, with the Turkish war consuming its extremities, with the canker of rebellion corroding the very heart of the Netherlands.  It recalled, with exultation, the melancholy fact that the only natural and healthy existence of the French was in a state of war—­that France, if not occupied with foreign campaigns, could not be prevented from plunging its sword into its own vitals.

It indulged in refreshing reminiscences of those halcyon days, not long gone by, when France, enjoying perfect tranquillity within its own borders, was calmly and regularly carrying on its long wars beyond the frontier.

In spite of this savage spirit, which modern documents, if they did not scorn, would, at least have shrouded, the paper was nevertheless a sagacious one; but the request for the memoir, and the many interviews on the subject of the invasion, were only intended to deceive.  They were but the curtain which concealed the preparations for the dark tragedy which was about to be enacted.  Equally deceived, and more sanguine than ever, Louis Nassau during this period was indefatigable in his attempts to gain friends for his cause.  He had repeated audiences of the King, to whose court he had come in disguise.  He made a strong and warm impression upon Elizabeth’s envoy at the French Court, Walsingham.  It is probable that in the Count’s impetuosity to carry his point, he allowed more plausibility to be given to certain projects for subdividing the Netherlands than his brother would ever have sanctioned.  The Prince was a total stranger to these inchoate schemes.  His work was to set his country free, and to destroy the tyranny which had grown colossal.  That employment was sufficient for a lifetime, and there is no proof to be found that a paltry and personal self-interest had even the lowest place among his motives.