duke of La Trémoille amongst the Protestants, refused to join in this adhesion; the former saying that his conscience would not permit him to serve a heretic king, the latter alleging that his conscience forbade him to serve a prince who engaged to protect Catholic idolatry. They withdrew, D’Épernon into Angoumois and Saintonge, taking with him six thousand foot and twelve thousand horse; and La Trémoille into Poitou, with nine battalions of reformers. They had an idea of attempting, both of them, to set up for themselves independent principalities. Three contemporaries, Sully, La Force, and the bastard of Angoulême, bear witness that Henry IV. was deserted by as many Huguenots as Catholics. The French royal army was reduced, it is said, to one half. As a make-weight, Sancy prevailed upon the Swiss, to the number of twelve thousand, and two thousand German auxiliaries, not only to continue in the service of the new king but to wait six months for their pay, as he was at the moment unable to pay them. From the 14th to the 20th of August, in Ile-de-France, in Picardy, in Normandy, in Auvergne, in Champagne, in Burgundy, in Anjou, in Poitou, in Languedoc, in Orleanness, and in Touraine, a great number of towns and districts joined in the determination of the royal army. * * * * * As the government of Henry IV. went on growing in strength and extent, the moderate Catholics were beginning, not as yet to make approaches toward him, but to see a glimmering possibility of treating with him, and obtaining from him such concessions as they considered necessary, at the same time that they in their turn made to him such as he might consider sufficient for his party and himself.