[Illustration: TRITONS AND NEREIDS FROM THE OLD FONTAINE DES INNOCENTS. JEAN GOUJON.] The treaty of St. Germain, which has so often been charged on Catherine as an act of perfidy, was rather an imperative necessity, if respite were to be had from the misery into which the land had fallen. Its conditions were honourably carried out, and Catholic excesses were impartially and severely repressed. Charles IX., who was now twenty years of age, began to assert his independence of the queen-mother and of the Guises,[109] and his first movement was in the direction of conciliation. The young king offered the hand of his sister, Princess Marguerite, to Henry of Navarre, and received Coligny and Jeanne of Navarre with much honour at court. Pressure was brought to bear upon him, but, pope or no pope, the king said he was determined to conclude the marriage. The Catholic party, and especially Paris, were furious. The capital, with the provost, the Parlement, the university, the prelates, the religious orders, had always been hostile to the Huguenots. The people could with difficulty be restrained at times from assuming the office of executioners as Protestants were led to the stake. Any one who did not uncover as he passed the image of the Virgin at the street corners, or who omitted to bend the knee as the Host was carried by, was attacked as a Lutheran. When the heralds published the peace with the Huguenots at the crossways of Paris, filth and mud were thrown at them, and they went in danger of their lives: now Coligny and his Huguenots were holding their heads high in Paris, proud and insolent, and the heretic prince of Navarre was to wed the king's sister. Jeanne of Navarre died soon after her arrival at court,[110] but the alliance was hurried on. The betrothal took place in the Louvre, and, on Sunday, 17th August 1572, a high daïs was erected outside Notre Dame for the celebration of the marriage. When the ceremony had been performed by the Cardinal de Bourbon, Henry conducted his bride to the choir of the cathedral, and went walking in the bishop's garden while mass was sung. The office ended, he returned and led his wife to the bishop's palace to dinner, and a magnificent state supper at the Louvre concluded this momentous day. Three days of balls, masquerades and tourneys followed, amid the murmuring of a sullen populace. These were the _noces vermeilles_--the red nuptials--of Marguerite of France and Henry of Navarre.