Page:History of Freedom.djvu/154

 110

ESSAYS ON LIBERTY

of Venetian State-Papers the most valuable report of the sixteenth century.l He \vas admitted ahnost daily to secret conference with Anjou, Nevers, and the group of Italians on whom the chief odium rests; and there \vas no counsellor to whom Catherine more willingly gave ear. 2 Michiel affirms that the intention had been long entertained, and that the Nuncio had been directed to reveal it privately to Pius V. s Salviati was related to Catherine, and had gained her good opinion as Nuncio in the year 1570. The Pope had sent him back because nobody seemed more capable of diverting her and her son from the policy which caused so much uneasiness at Rome. 4 He died many years later, with the reputation of having been one of the most eminent Cardinals at a time when the Sacred College was unusually rich in talent. Personally, he had always favoured stern measures of repression. When the Countess of Entremont was married to Coligny, Salviati declared that she had made herself liable to severe penalties by entertaining proposals of marriage with so notorious a heretic, and demanded that the Duke of Savoy should, by all the means in his power, cause that wicked bride to be put out of the way.s When the peace of St. Germains was concluded, he assured Charles and Catherine that their lives were in danger, as the Huguenots were seeking to pull down the throne as well as the altar. He believed that all intercourse with them was sinful, and that the sole remedy was utter extermina- tion by the sword. "I am convinced," he wrote, (( that it will come to this." " If they do the tenth part of what I have advised, it will be well for them." 6 After an audience of two hours, at which he had presented a letter from Pius V., prophesying the wrath of Heaven, Salviati perceived that his exhortations made some impression.

1 Ranke, Französische Geschichte, v. 76. 2 Digges, p, 258; Cosmi, Memorie di Morosini, p. 26. 3 Alberi, xii. 294, 4 Mittit eo Antonium Mariam Salviatum, reginae affinem eique pergratum, qui earn in officiocontineat (CardinalofVercelli, Comment. de Rebus Gregorii XIII. ; Ranke, Päþste, App, 85). r; Desp, Aug, 30, 157 0. 6 Oct, 14, I570,