their leaders, and were
ready on every signal to fly to arms. The king and queen mother
were living in great security at Monceaux, in Brie, when they found
themselves surrounded by Protestant troops, which had secretly marched
thither from all quarters; and had not a body of Swiss come speedily to
their relief, and conducted them with great intrepidity to Paris,
they must have fallen, without resistance, into the hands of the
malecontents. A battle was afterwards fought in the plains of St.
Denis; where, though the old constable, Montmorency, the general of the
Catholics, was killed combating bravely at the head of his troops, the
Hugonots were finally defeated. Conde, collecting his broken forces and
receiving a strong reenforcement from the German Protestants, appeared
again in the field; and laying siege to Chartres, a place of great
importance, obliged the court to agree to a new accommodation.

So great was the mutual animosity of those religionists, that even had
the leaders on both sides been ever so sincere in their intentions for
peace, and reposed ever so much confidence in each other, it would have
been difficult to retain the people in tranquillity; much more where
such extreme jealousy prevailed, and where the court employed every
pacification as a snare for their enemies. A plan was laid for seizing
the person of the prince and admiral; who narrowly escaped to Rochelle,
and summoned their partisans to their assistance.[*]

* Davila, lib. iv.

The civil wars were renewed with greater fury than ever, and the parties
became still more exasperated against each other. The young duke of
Anjou, brother to the king, commanded the forces of the Catholics; and
fought in 1569, a great battle at Jarnac with the Hugonots, where the
prince of Conde was killed, and his army defeated. This discomfiture,
with the loss of so great a leader, reduced not the Hugonots to despair.
The admiral still supported the cause; and having placed at the head of
the Protestants the prince of Navarre, then sixteen years of age, and
the young prince of Conde, he encouraged the party rather to perish
bravely in the field, than ignominiously by the hands of the
executioner. He collected such numbers, so determined to endure every
extremity, that he was enabled to make head against the duke of Anjou;
and being strengthened by a new reenforcement of Germans, he obliged
that prince to retreat and to divide his forces.

Coligny then laid