Henry III. left the room and visited his mother, who was ill in bed. “The king of Paris exists no longer, madam,” said he; “henceforth I shall reign alone; I have now no rival.” “It is a clean cut, my son,” replied Catherine, “but it must be sewn up again; have you taken proper precautions?” Twelve days after this event Catherine died, leaving her last son with an insecure crown, the kingdom inflamed, and the whole nation discontented. She descended to the tomb amid the execration of the Calvinists, and the disdain of the (Roman) Catholics. “There were none to care for her, her malady, or her death,” says L’Estoile, “and no more notice was taken of her than of a dead she-goat.” Lincestre, one of the preachers of the League, in announcing this news to the people, said, “A difficulty presents itself to-day, and that is whether the Church should pray for one, who has lived so ill, and so often countenanced heresy; upon which I would say, that if you should think it worth while to venture upon giving her a _Pater_ or an _Ave_, as an act of charity, it will be as useful to her as it can be.” Here then were the fruits of thirty years of intrigue, treason, and crime. The murder of the duke of Guise interposed an abyss between the king and the Leaguers. Seventy theologians of the Sorbonne, after having attended mass, absolved the people from their oath of fealty. The priests formed a procession of one hundred thousand children, who carried lighted tapers, and extinguished them by trampling them underfoot, whilst repeating, “God grant that the race of Valois may soon become utterly extinct!” From the pulpits, dreadful imprecations were denounced against Henry III.; the duty of regicide was openly proclaimed, and one of the preachers declared that France could only recover from its malady by a potion of French blood. Reduced to the greatest extremity, and compelled to shut himself up in the city of Tours as a last resource, Henry III. made advances to the Calvinists, who were in possession of the country on the other side of the Loire. The latter had undertaken no enterprise of importance. They had lost, in the month of March, 1588, Henry of Condé, their second chief in rank, but the first perhaps in the confidence with which he inspired them. This prince died at Saint Jean d’Angély, at the age of thirty-four years. His early death, and the mysterious circumstances attending it, gave rise to suspicion that he had been poisoned, which was confirmed after the body had been opened. His wife, Princess Charlotte de la Trémoille, a recent convert, and surrounded by a (Roman) Catholic family of high rank, was accused of the crime. This affair, however, which was subsequently brought before the Parliament of Paris, has never been properly cleared up.