The murderer was Jean Poltrot de Méré, a gentleman of Angoumois and a convert to the Reformed faith, whose temper had been soured by misfortune. Imagining the Duke of Guise to be the great obstacle to the victory of the Huguenot cause, he determined upon his assassination, and after watching him for several days, succeeded in shooting his victim as he was passing, slenderly escorted, through a wood.[328] Poltrot fled, and would probably have escaped; but not knowing the country, he rode round and round until he returned nearly to the spot where he had fired at the duke. He was soon captured and taken to Paris, where, after being tortured to force him to reveal the names of his accomplices, he was sentenced to a cruel death. He was dragged to the place of execution on a hurdle, surrounded by a strong guard to prevent his being torn in pieces by the populace. His right hand was cut off, his flesh torn by pincers, and melted lead poured into the wounds. His limbs were then tied to four horses, who, pulling in opposite directions, endeavored to tear him asunder; but they pulled in vain, until the hangman severed the muscles with a sword. Finally his head was cut off and his body burned to ashes. While stretched upon the rack in the torture-chamber, Poltrot acknowledged that he had been bribed by Coligny to kill the duke. It is true he had been much in the Huguenot camp, and the admiral had given him money to purchase a horse--circumstances that tended to corroborate his confession; but his hasty execution, without confronting him with the admiral, or giving the latter an opportunity of vindicating himself, was highly suspicious. Some persons have supposed that the queen-regent had a share in the murder, on the ground that she once said (or is reported to have said) to Tavannes: “The Guises wished to make themselves kings, but I took good care of them before Orleans.” Both suspicions are equally baseless, but the Guise family persisted in charging Coligny with the murder; and it must be acknowledged that the admiral’s conduct and language were not altogether satisfactory. In his remarks on Poltrot’s interrogatory he says, that when some one declared he would kill the duke in the midst of his soldiers, he had not discouraged him (ne l’avait point détourné), adding that he remembered well his last meeting with Poltrot, who went so far as to say that it would be easy to kill M. de Guise, and that he (Coligny) had made no reply to it, “considering it to be mere idle talk.” In a letter to the queen-mother, which accompanied these remarks, he says: “During the last few months, I have no longer contested the matter against those who displayed such intentions, because I had information that certain persons had been practiced upon to kill me.... Do not imagine, however, that what I say proceeds from any regret which the duke’s death occasions me. No, far from that, I esteem it the greatest