Henri II: His Court and Times (58 page)

Meanwhile hostilities had been resumed. François de
Guise, with a force composed of the garrisons of the Three
Bishoprics and some troops levied in Germany, operated on
the Moselle and took Thionville, which the enemy had
reckoned impregnable (June 22); while another corps under
Paul de Termes, who had been appointed governor of Calais,
crossed the Aa below Gravelines, took Mardyck and Dunkerque, and ruthlessly wasted all the Flemish coast up to
Nieuport. It had been arranged that Guise should join
Termes after Thionville had fallen, but a mutiny among his
landsknechts
delayed the duke; and Termes, not receiving any
news from him, was retreating, laden with booty, when he
learned that a force much superior to his own, which had
been hastily raised by Comte d'Egmont, the governor of
Flanders, lay at Gravelines, barring his way.

Termes had no alternative but to force a passage along the
sands, between the town of Gravelines and the sea, and at
low water on July 13 he made the attempt.

The French fought splendidly, and, notwithstanding their inferiority in
numbers, and the fact that the cannon of the town played unceasingly on their
left flank, would probably have succeeded in cutting their way through. But, at
the crisis of the battle, ten English ships, which had been cruising in the
neighbourhood of Calais, hove in sight, attracted by the sound of
firing, and, standing close in shore, discharged their broad-sides into Termes's right flank. Caught thus between two
fires, the French gave way, and a furious charge by Egmont,
at the head of his cavalry, changed the retreat into a rout.
Termes himself and most of his officers were taken prisoners,
while the soldiers were ruthlessly massacred by the Flemings,
furious at the devastation of their country. Altogether, some
five thousand men — nearly one-half of the army — are said to
have fallen.

If the fleet to which the squadron which had intervened so
successfully at Gravelines belonged, and which numbered
some two hundred and forty vessels, large and small, had been
at hand to take advantage of this victory, Calais would have
been recovered more easily than it had been lost. But it was
loitering at Spithead, and effected absolutely nothing beyond
an ineffective descent upon the Breton coast.

On learning of the disaster which had befallen Termes,
Guise hurriedly repassed the frontier and collected all the
French forces at La Fère. The Duke of Savoy, with the
Spanish Grand Army, which had now assembled, established
himself on the Authie; the two kings joined their respective
camps, and a great battle seemed imminent. But both
Henri II and Philip II wanted peace, not war. The
conquests of the former had been counterbalanced by the
victories of the latter; the Pope, the author of their quarrel,
had withdrawn from the fray; they were anxious to have
their hands free to deal with the religious question in France
and the Netherlands; Henri II ardently desired the return of
the Constable to free him from the despotism of the Guises,
while Philip was in desperate financial straits.

And so a suspension of arms was agreed to, and was
followed, in the middle of October, by a congress at the Abbey
of Cercamp, in the Cambrésis, under the mediation of
Christina of Denmark, Duchess-dowager of Lorraine, the
two distinguished prisoners, released on parole, being among
the French plenipotentiaries. Just before the congress met,
the Constable received permission to visit his master at
Beauvais. The King received him as though he had won
and not lost the battle of Saint-Quentin, never loosed his
hand during the whole of their public interview, and ordered
a bed to be prepared for him in the wardrobe adjoining his
own chamber.

After this short meeting, the King more than ever deplored
the absence of his old friend, and wrote him the most touching
letters, in one of which he declared that "his heart was so sad
that he could not tell him anything, except to assure him that
he was the person in the world whom he loved the most";
while in another he informed him that "he had brought him
all the ease and the contentment that he had ever had, and that
he had no hope of recovering it until he saw him definitely at
liberty." It was certainly a politic move on the part of Montmorency's
captors to authorise the interview at Beauvais.

Although neither France nor Spain could boast any very
decisive advantage over the other, the Spanish plenipotentiaries,
aware of the private interests involved on the French side,
insisted on the evacuation of Savoy and Piedmont, which
were to be given back to Emmanuel Philibert, the restoration
of all other conquests made by France in Italy, and the
renunciation of Henri II's claims to the Milanese and Naples.
And to these demands they continued to adhere, even after the
death of Mary (November 16, 1558), and Elizabeth's refusal of
Philip II's hand, had deprived Spain of all hope of English
assistance in the event of the negotiations being broken off.

Nevertheless, the Spaniards had not the remotest intention
of provoking a renewal of hostilities, for their resources were
so exhausted that to continue the war was absolutely out
of the question; and even while his plenipotentiaries were
arrogantly pressing their demands, and threatening a recourse
to arms unless they were conceded, Philip II was writing
to Granvelle as follows:

"I have already expended one million two hundred thousand
ducats that I have drawn from Spain. . . . I shall have
need of another million from here next March. Spain can do
nothing further for me. It appears to me that I must come to
an arrangement of some kind, or I am lost. . . .
On no account
are the negotiations to be broken off
."
⁰⁶

However, thanks to the feverish impatience of Henri II for
the release of the Constable and Madame de Valentinois's
jealousy of the Guises, the Spaniards obtained nearly all
they demanded; and on April 3, 1559, at Cateau-Cambrésis,
whither the negotiations had been transferred at the beginning
of February, France "surrendered by a single stroke of the pen
all the Italian conquests of thirty years,"
⁰⁷
with the exception
of the little marquisate of Saluzzo. To be more precise,
Henri II restored to the Duke of Savoy, Bresse, Bugey,
Valromey, Savoy, and Piedmont, annexed by François I in
1536, retaining, however, garrisons in Turin, Chieri, Pinerolo,
Chivasso, and Villanuova dAsti, until his pretensions as heir
of his grandmother, Louise of Savoy, had been adjudicated
upon by arbitrators, such adjudication to be made within
three years. Valenza, in Lombardy, was restored to Spain;
Montferrato, with Casale, to the Duke of Mantua; Montalcino
to Cosimo de' Medici; and Corsica to Genoa. In all, close
upon two hundred towns and fortresses were surrendered.
The two monarchs agreed to restore reciprocally their
conquests in the Netherlands and Picardy.

The question of the restitution of the Three Bishoprics was
reserved, which meant that, though France's right to them was
not formally acknowledged, she was to be left in peaceable
possession. As a pledge of future amity, Philip II was to
marry Henri II's eldest daughter, Madame Élisabeth, and the
Duke of Savoy that rather mature
bas-bleu
Madame Marguerite.
The former princess was to receive a dowry of
400,000 écus; the latter one of 300,000. Finally, the Duke
of Lorraine, who had married Madame Claude in January
1559, was to receive Stenay, and France to evacuate the duchy.
The thorny question of Calais, which had been much simplified
by the demise of Mary and her successor's refusal of
Philip II's hand, was settled by a separate peace between
England and France, signed on the preceding day. Calais
and the adjoining fortresses were to be left in the hands of
France, to be restored in eight years. If they were not
restored, France was to pay the sum of 500,000 écus. If
England committed any aggression against either France or
Scotland, she forfeited all right to restitution or recompense.
Peace between England and Scotland was made on the
same day.

When the terms of the Treaty of Cateau-Cambrésis were
made known in France, there was a violent outcry against it,
which grew louder as the return of the French garrisons from
Piedmont, Savoy, Luxembourg, and Flanders enabled people to
realise the magnitude of the surrender. François de Guise told
the King that he had lost more in a single day than twenty years
of continuous reverses could have wrested from him, and his
opinion was shared by the whole army, even by those who,
like Brissac and Vieilleville, disliked him heartily. The treaty
was named the "Prisoners' Peace," and the enemies of Montmorency
accused him of having sacrificed the interests of the
King and of France to his desire of recovering his liberty;
while some even went so far as to assert that the Duke of
Savoy, to whom he had surrendered at Saint-Quentin, had
accepted a nominal ransom, in consideration of the concessions
which his captive had procured for him.

The Constable did not altogether deserve these reproaches.
In consenting to the demands of the Spaniards he was merely
the too complaisant agent of the King, whose dread of the
increasing power of the Guises was continually stimulated by
Diane de Poitiers, until he had become perhaps more
impatient for the release of Montmorency than was the
prisoner himself.
⁰⁸

"My friend," he writes to him, "I assure you that M. de
Guyse does not desire peace, warning me that I have more
means for carrying on the war than I ever had, and that I
should not lose so much if I make war as I should if you
come to an arrangement. . . . Do what you can to procure
us peace; and do not show this letter to any one save the
Maréchal de Saint-André, and burn it afterwards. The person
whom I name in my letter [Guise] has said to some one here
that, so long as the war lasts, not one of you will ever come
out of prison. As for this, think of it as a matter which
concerns you."
⁰⁹

The Constable did think of it, and he must share with the
King and Diane the responsibility for the treaty; but these
two, and not Montmorency, were its principal authors.

As for the ransom, the Duke of Savoy did certainly reduce
it from 300,000 écus, the price which he had at first demanded,
to 200,000 écus; but even that was an enormous sum. Therefore,
the Constable can scarcely be accused of having sold
Savoy and Piedmont.

But was Cateau-Cambrésis really the "base and damaging
peace"
¹⁰
which contemporary writers declare it with one
voice to have been? Almost all modern historians seem to
be of their opinion; Sismondi, Michelet, Henri Martin — to cite
only a few names — are as emphatic in their condemnation as
De Thou, Tavannes, Brantôme, and Montluc. But there are
one or two notable exceptions. That very high authority on
the sixteenth century, M. Alphonse de Ruble, has consecrated
to the defence of this much-abused treaty an erudite monograph,
in which he declares it to have been "the greatest
benefit which Henri II left to his people." And here is the
substance of his argument:

Henri II retained almost all the useful conquests of his
reign: Calais, which had served as the rallying port for all
the English invasions during two centuries, Metz, Toul, and
Verdun, advanced posts of the Empire, which had threatened
Champagne. "The recovery of Calais, the conquest of Metz,
Toul, and Verdun, the consecration of the autonomy of
Lorraine and Alsace, assured our natural limits. The
ensemble
of these successes gave to the realm of the Valois a cohesive
force which no other country has been able to attain, even in
our time. France had proof of this during the Wars of
Religion, when, though rent within and betrayed without by
pitiless factions, her integrity was never seriously threatened
by any foreign Power." As for the renunciation of her Italian
ambitions, she lost nothing thereby, but was a distinct gainer,
for Italy, since the time of Charles VIII, had been a veritable
quicksand, swallowing up French lives and treasure.
¹¹

There is a great deal of force in what M. de Ruble says,
and there can be no doubt that Henri II has been hardly dealt
with both by his contemporaries and historians in this matter.
But the writer has overlooked the radical defect of the treaty;
it did not, as he asserts, assure the natural frontiers of France.
Let us listen to M. Lemonnier:

"As to the treaty in itself, it offered the advantage of giving
us Metz, Toul, Verdun, and Calais, undoubtedly valuable
acquisitions, and of restoring to us certain places lost in the
north-east during the course of the war. In forcing us
formally to renounce Italy, it rather served our true interests;
but the great fault, almost irremediable, of the contract, was
in the abandonment, if not of Piedmont, at least of Savoy,
Bresse, and Bugey. The conquests made in the north hardly
compensated for this loss, which retarded for more than a
century the annexation of the Franche-Comté."
¹²

Further, M. de Ruble does not appear to us sufficiently to
appreciate the moral effect of the treaty of which he has
constituted himself the apologist. France made great concessions
to Philip II, and the compensation which she received
was not at the expense of Spain, but of England and the
Emperor. In the eyes of Europe, she lost from that moment
her claims to rank as the equal of Spain; and Philip II,
although deprived of the Empire by his uncle, and of
England by the death of Mary Tudor, was regarded as the
arbiter of European affairs.

(1)
Soranzo, in Armand Baschet.

(2)
The title "King of Scotland" was allowed to the Dauphin under the
marriage-contract.

(3)
"
Discours du grand et magnifique triumphe fait au mariage de très noble
. . . François de Valois avec Marie d'Estreuart, royne d'Ecosse,
"
in
Archives curieuses
; Ruble,
la Première Jeunesse de
Marie Stuart
.