soul of the conspiracy; recoiling from no danger and ready to risk his
own head; but from a sort of royal dignity he left the explanation of
the enterprise to his minister, and contented himself with studying
the new instrument he was about to use.

"My child," said Chaudieu, in the Huguenot style of address, "we are
about to do battle for the first time with the Roman prostitute. In a
few days either our legions will be dying on the scaffold, or the
Guises will be dead. This is the first call to arms on behalf of our
religion in France, and France will not lay down those arms till they
have conquered. The question, mark you this, concerns the nation, not
the kingdom. The majority of the nobles of the kingdom see plainly
what the Cardinal de Lorraine and his brother are seeking. Under
pretext of defending the Catholic religion, the house of Lorraine
means to claim the crown of France as its patrimony. Relying on the
Church, it has made the Church a formidable ally; the monks are its
support, its acolytes, its spies. It has assumed the post of guardian
to the throne it is seeking to usurp; it protects the house of Valois
which it means to destroy. We have decided to take up arms because the
liberties of the people and the interests of the nobles are equally
threatened. Let us smother at its birth a faction as odious as that of
the Burgundians who formerly put Paris and all France to fire and
sword. It required a Louis XI. to put a stop to the quarrel between
the Burgundians and the Crown; and to-day a prince de Conde is needed
to prevent the house of Lorraine from re-attempting that struggle.
This is not a civil war; it is a duel between the Guises and the
Reformation,--a duel to the death! We will make their heads fall, or
they shall have ours."

"Well said!" cried the prince.