wife, Mary I. of England, met this last attack with an army commanded by
the Duke of Savoy. It advanced into France, and besieged St. Quentin.
The French, under the Constable of Montmorençy, came to relieve the
city, and were utterly defeated, the Constable himself being made
prisoner. His nephew, the Admiral de Coligny, held out St. Quentin to
the last, and thus gave the country time to rally against the invader;
and Guise was recalled in haste from Italy. He soon after surprised
Calais, which was thus restored to the French, after having been held
by the English for two hundred years. This was the only conquest the
French retained when the final peace of Cateau Cambresis was made in the
year 1558, for all else that had been taken on either side was then
restored. Savoy was given back to its duke, together with the hand of
Henry's sister, Margaret. During a tournament held in honour of the
wedding, Henry II. was mortally injured by the splinter of a lance, in
1559; and in the home troubles that followed, all pretensions to Italian
power were dropped by France, after wars which had lasted sixty-four
years.




CHAPTER V.

THE WARS OF RELIGION.


1. The Bourbons and Guises.--Henry II. had left four sons, the eldest
of whom, _Francis II._, was only fifteen years old; and the country was
divided by two great factions--one headed by the Guise family, an
offshoot of the house of Lorraine; the other by the Bourbons, who, being