urselves of him, and to concert the means of
doing so with the Duchess of Nemours. To her alone we believed that we
might safely disclose our purpose, on account of the mortal hatred which
we knew that she bore to him."[939] The Duchess of Nemours was born of an
excellent mother; for she was Anne d'Este, daughter of Renee of France,
the younger child of Louis the Twelfth. In her youth, at the court of her
father, the Duke of Ferrara, and in society with that prodigy of feminine
precocity, Olympia Morata, she had shown evidences of extraordinary
intellectual development and of a kindly disposition.[940] Although she
subsequently married Francis of Guise, the leading persecutor of the
Protestants, she had not so lost her sympathy with the oppressed as to
witness without tears and remonstrances the atrocious executions by which
the tumult of Amboise was followed. But the assassination of her husband
turned any affection or compassion she may have entertained for
Protestantism into violent hatred. Against Coligny, whom, in spite of his
protestations, she persisted in believing to be the instigator of
Poltrot's crime, she bore an implacable enmity; and now, having so often
failed in obtaining satisfaction from the king by judicial process, she
eagerly accepted the opportunity of avenging herself by a deed more
dastardly than that which she laid to the charge of her enemy. Entering
heartily into the project which Catharine and Anjou laid before her, the
Duchess of Nemours enlisted the co-operation of her son, Henry of Guise,
and her brother-in-law, the Duke of Aumale, and herself arranged the
details of the plan, which was at once to be put into execution.[941]

[Sidenote: Was the massacre long premeditated?]

[Sidenote: Salviati's testimony.]

Such was the germ of the massacre as yet not resolved upon, which, rapidly
developing, was to involve the murder of thousands of innocent persons
throughout France. In opposition to the opinion that became almost
universal among the Protestants, and gained nearly equal currency among
the Roman Catholics--that the butchery had long been contemplated, and
that Charles was privy to it--and notwithstanding the circumstances that
seem to give color to this opinion,[942] I am compelled to acquiesce in
the belief expressed by the Papal Nuncio, Salviati, who, in his
despatches, written in cipher to the cardinal secretary of state, could
certainly have had no motive to disguise his real sentim