By one of those caprices to which he was subject, the King had refused to sacrifice either of these Princes; and he had accordingly summoned them to his presence, where he had offered them the alternative of an instant abjuration of their heresy. Shrieks and groans already resounded on all sides; the groans of strong men, struck down unarmed and defenceless, and the shrieks of women struggling with their murderers; while through all, and above all, boomed out the deep-toned bells of the metropolitan churches--one long burial-peal; and amid this ghastly diapason it was the pleasure of the tiger-hearted Charles to accept the reluctant and informal recantation of his two horror-stricken victims; after which he compelled them without remorse to the agony of seeing their friends and followers butchered before their eyes. Enraged by what they denounced as the weak and impolitic clemency of the King, in having thus shielded two of the most powerful leaders of the adverse faction, Catherine de Medicis and the Guises, having first wreaked their vengeance upon the corpse of the brave and veteran de Coligny, which they induced the King to dishonour himself by subjecting to the most ignominious treatment, next endeavoured to alienate Marguerite from her husband, and to induce her to solicit a divorce. It had formed no part of the Queen-mother's intention that the Princess should remain fettered by the bonds which she had herself wreathed about her; nor could she brook that after having accomplished a _coup-de-main_ which had excited the indignation of half of Europe, Henry of Navarre should be indebted for an impunity which counteracted all her views to the alliance which he had formed with her own family. Marguerite, however, resolutely refused to lend herself to this new treachery, declaring that as her husband had abjured his heresy, she had no plea to advance in justification of so flagrant an act of perfidy; nor could the expostulations of her mother produce any change in her resolve. [Illustration: THE EVE OF SAINT BARTHOLOMEU Paris: Richard Bentley and Son 1890.] It is probable that the perfect freedom of action for which she was indebted to the indifference of her young bridegroom had great influence in prompting this reply, and that the crown which had so recently been placed upon her brow had at the same time flattered her ambition; while the frightful carnage of which she had just been a witness might well cause her to shrink from the probable repetition of so hideous a catastrophe. Be her motives what they might, however, neither threats nor entreaties could shake the resolution of the Princess; and she was supported in her opposition by her favourite brother, the Duc d'Alençon, who had secretly attached himself to the cause of the Protestant Princes.