On the evening of the day on which Henry had been received into the Roman Catholic Church at Saint Denis, he had recklessly ridden up to the crest of the height of Montmartre and looked down on Paris, which was still in the hands of the League. The feelings of the Parisians were also changing. The League was seamed with dissensions; Mayenne had quarrelled with the "Sixteen," and the partisans of these fanatics of the League had street brawls with the citizens of more moderate opinions. _Parlement_ took courage and denounced the presence of Spanish soldiers within the capital. The loyalists opened the way for the royal troops, Henry entered Paris (March 22nd), and marched to Notre Dame, where the clergy chanted the _Te Deum_. From the cathedral he rode to the Louvre through streets thronged with people, who pressed up to his very stirrups to see their King, and made the tall houses re-echo with their loyalist shoutings. Such a royal entry had not been seen for generations, and took everyone by surprise. Next day the foreign troops left the city. The King watched their departure from an open window in the Louvre, and as their chiefs passed he called out gaily, "My compliments to your Master. You need not come back." With the return of Paris to fealty, almost all signs of disaffection departed; and the King's proclamation of amnesty for all past rebellions completed the conquest of his people. France was again united after thirty years of civil war. § 22. _The Edict of Nantes._ The union of all Frenchmen to accept Henry IV. as their King had not changed the legal position of the Protestants. The laws against them were still in force; they had nothing but the King's word promising protection to trust to. The war with Spain delayed matters, but when peace was made the time came for Henry to fulfil his pledges to his former companions. They had been chafing under the delay. At a General Assembly held at Mantes (October 1593-January 1594), the members had renewed their oath to live and to die true to their confession of faith, and year by year a General Assembly met to discuss their political disabilities as well as to conduct their ecclesiastical business. They had divided France into nine divisions under provincial synods, and had the appearance to men of that century of a kingdom within a kingdom. They demanded equal civic rights with their Roman Catholic fellow-subjects, and guarantees for their protection. At length, in 1597, four delegates were appointed with full powers to confer with the King. Out of these negotiations came the Edict of Nantes, the Charter of French Protestantism.