Note 575 — Chapter XV · (continued 2)

Davila and De Thou, ubi supra. De Thou seems certainly to be wanting in his accustomed accuracy when he represents—iv. (liv. xliv.) 136, 137—the submission of the test-oath to the Protestants as posterior to, and consequent upon the fall of L'Hospital: "La reine délivrée du Chancelier, et n'ayant plus personne qui s'opposât à ses volontés, ne songea plus qu'à brouiller les affaires, etc." I have shown that the papal bull which L'Hospital opposed was dated at Rome on the same day (August 1, 1568) on which Charles sent his orders to the president of the Parisian parliament to administer the oath to the Protestants of the capital. Yet, as early as on the 12th of May, 1568, the English ambassador, Norris, wrote to Cecil that Anjou, a cruel enemy of the Protestants, had a privy council of which Cardinal Lorraine was the "chiefest" member, and his own chancellor, who sealed everything submitted to him, "which thing he [the good olde chauncelor of the Kinges] hathe so to harte as he is retirid him to his owne house in the towne of Paris; and wheras the King's chauncelor I meane, who nether for love nor dread wolde seal enything against the statutes of the realme, or that might be prejudiciall to the same, this of Mr. d'Anjou's refusithe nothing that is proferid to him." State Paper Office, Duc d'Aumale, ii. 360.