at Gaillon, ready to applaud his well-turned
sentences. But he had chosen an unlucky moment for his oratorical display.
His glowing periods were rudely interrupted by one of the princely
auditors. This was Louis of Conde--now doubly important to the court on
account of the military undertaking that was on foot--who complained of
the speaker's insolent words. So powerful a nobleman could not be
despised. And so the voluble Damours, with his oration but half delivered,
instead of meeting a gracious monarch's approval and returning home amid
the plaudits of the multitude, was hastily taken in charge by the archers
of the royal guard and carried off to prison. The rest of the Rouenese
disappeared more rapidly than they had come. The avenues to the city were
filled with fugitives as from a disastrous battle. Even the grave
parliament, which the last winter had been exhibiting its august powers in
butchering Huguenots by the score, beginning with the arch-heretic
Augustin Marlorat, lost for a moment its self-possession, and took part in
the ignominious flight. Shame, however, induced it to pause before it had
gone too far, and, putting on the gravest face it could summon, it
reappeared ere long at Gaillon with becoming magisterial gravity. Never
had there been a more thorough discomfiture.[273] A few days later the
Marshal de Bourdillon made his entry into Rouen with a force of Swiss
soldiers sufficient to break down all resistance, the "for-issites" were
brought in, a new election of municipal officers was held, and comparative
quiet was restored in the turbulent city.[274]

[Sidenote: Commissioners to enforce the edict.]

[Sidenote: Alienation of a profligate court.]

[Sidenote: Profanity a test of Catholicity.]

So far as a character so undecided could frame any fixed purpose,
Catharine de' Medici was resolved to cement, if possible, a stable peace.
The Chancellor, Michel de l'Hospital, still retained his influence over
her, and gave to her disjointed plans somewhat of the appearance of a
deliberate policy. That policy certainly seemed to mean peace. And to
prove this, commissioners were despatched to the more distant provinces,
empowered to enforce the execution of the Edict of Amboise.[275] Yet never
was the court less in sympathy with the Huguenots than at this moment. If
shameless profligacy had not yet reached the height it subsequently
attained under the last Valois that sat upon the throne of France, it was
undou