Page:Margaret of Angoulême, Queen of Navarre (Robinson 1886).djvu/207

192 Vaudois from their early faith. They took Geneva for a standard and defence. In reality, by allying themselves with the Reform, they made themselves doubly obnoxious in the eyes of Rome.

Since that year of 1536, the Cardinal de Tournon had kept an angry watch upon them. In 1540 he nearly gained his ends. There were at that moment ten thousand Vaudois households. The Cardinal believed he had made a good bag. But, before the writ could be carried out, Francis had projected his alliance with the Porte, in which case he would need to conciliate the German Lutheran princes. The King willingly let himself be led by Du Bellay into cancelling the writ. He had no natural taste for murder; and he was glad to let these Vaudois live; these Vaudois, whom the good King Louis XII. had declared to be better Christians than himself.

But, as soon as the Treaty of Crépy was signed, the Cardinal saw his chance. Political necessity no longer bound the Most Christian King to curry favour with heretics; on the contrary, he was pledged to conciliate Spain, to forward the holy office of the Inquisition. A campaign against the Vaudois would push his chances not only in Heaven but on earth. Thus argued the Cardinal, not without effect; and about Christmas-time he clinched his argument with a most plausible and likely proof of treachery on the part of this nest of heretics. They were not only heretics, but most contumacious rebels, so the Cardinal affirmed. And he assured the King of a plot laid among them, discovered by D'Oppède, the fanatic governor of Provence, to seize the city of Marseilles and make it a centre for heresy and rebellion.

It is scarcely possible that either Francis or the