rks, Charles was anxious to have free hand
in Germany. Under the mediation of Paul III. the agreement of Nice was
come to, which included a ten years' truce and the abandonment by
Francois of all his foreign allies and aims. He seemed a while to have
fallen completely under the influence of the sagacious Emperor. He gave
way entirely to the Church party of the time, a party headed by gloomy
Henri, now Dauphin, who never lost the impress of his Spanish captivity,
and by the Constable Anne de Montmorency; for a time the artistic or
Renaissance party, represented by Anne, Duchesse d'Etampes, and Catherine
de' Medici, fell into disfavour. The Emperor even ventured to pass
through France, on his way from Spain to the Netherlands. All this
friendship, however, fell to dust, when it was found that Charles refused
to invest the Duc d'Orleans, the second son of Francois, with the duchy
of Milan, and when the Emperor's second expedition against the sea-power
of the Turks had proved a complete failure, and Charles had returned to
Spain with loss of all his fleet and army. Then Francois hesitated no
longer, and declared war against him (1541). The shock the Emperor had
suffered inspirited all his foes; the Sultan and the Protestant German
Princes were all eager for war; the influence of Anne de Montmorency had
to give way before that of the House of Guise, that frontier family, half
French, half German, which was destined to play a large part in the
troubled history of the coming half-century. Claude, Duc de Guise, a
veteran of the earliest days of Francois, was vehemently opposed to
Charles and the Austro-Spanish power, and ruled in the King's councils.
This last war was as mischievous as its predecessors no great battles
were fought; in the frontier affairs the combatants were about equally
fortunate; the battle of Cerisolles, won by the French under Enghien
(1544), was the only considerable success they had, and even that was
almost barren of results, for the danger to Northern France was imminent;
there a combined invasion had been planned and partly executed by Charles
and Henry VIII., and the country, almost undefended, was at their mercy.
The two monarchs, however, distrusted one another; and Charles V.,
anxious about Germany, sent to Francois proposals for peace from Crespy
Couvrant, near Laon, where he had halted his army; Francois, almost in
despair, gladly made terms with him. The King gave up his claims on
Flande