this cold-blooded way, too, did his Catholic Majesty order the execution
of some thousand Huguenots additionally, in order more fully to carry out
his royal brother's plans; yet Philip could write of himself, "that all
the world recognized the gentleness of his nature and the mildness of his
intentions."

In truth, the advice thus given by Saint Goard on the subject of the
French prisoners in Alva's possessions, was a natural result of the Saint
Bartholomew. Here were officers and soldiers whom Charles IX. had
himself sent into the Netherlands to fight for the Protestant cause
against Philip and Alva. Already, the papers found upon them had placed
him in some embarrassment, and exposed his duplicity to the Spanish
government, before the great massacre had made such signal reparation for
his delinquency. He had ordered Mondoucet, his envoy in the Netherlands,
to use dissimulation to an unstinted amount, to continue his intrigues
with the Protestants, and to deny stoutly all proofs of such connivance.
"I see that the papers found upon Genlis;" he wrote twelve days before
the massacre, "have been put into the hands of Assonleville, and that
they know everything done by Genlis to have been committed with my
consent."

[These remarkable letters exchanged between Charles IX. and
Mondoucet have recently been published by M. Emile Gachet (chef du
bureau paleographique aux Archives de Belgique) from a manuscript
discovered by him in the library at Rheims.--Compte Rendu de la Com.
Roy. d'Hist., iv. 340, sqq.]

"Nevertheless, you will tell the Duke of Alva that these are lies invented
to excite suspicion against me. You will also give him occasional
information of the enemy's affairs, in order to make him believe in your