As soon as Isabella had recrossed the Spanish frontier, the French court proceeded to Nerac in Gascony to visit Joan, the widowed Queen of Navarre. When her husband apostatized, he would have made her apostatize also; but she refused, and took refuge in Bearn. Anthony ordered Montluc to stop her and keep her prisoner--a danger she happily escaped, as also a conspiracy entered into by some of her Catholic subjects to seize and deliver her to the King of Spain. Joan abolished popery in her hereditary states, and confiscated the church property for the benefit of the new clergy and of education. For this the pope summoned her to appear at Rome to answer a charge of heresy, on pain of being excommunicated and deprived of her territories (1564).[371] In this Pius IV. overshot the mark: his proceedings endangered every crowned head in Europe. He had also about the same time issued a citation against the Cardinal of Chatillon,[372] the Bishop of Valence, and four other prelates. The papal citation being a gross infringement of the privileges of the Gallican Church, a special embassador was sent to Rome to remonstrate with the Holy Father, and the opinions of the government may be gathered from a letter written by the queen-mother to the Bishop of Rennes, her embassador in Germany: “We acknowledge no authority or jurisdiction on the pope’s part over those who bear the title of king or queen, and that it is not for him to give away states and kingdoms to the first conqueror.... Let me know how the emperor takes this matter, for it concerns all rulers to understand whether it is for the pope at his own pleasure to assume authority and jurisdiction over them, and to make a prey of their territories and dominions. We for our part are determined never to submit to it.” The pope retreated: the citations against the bishops were abandoned, the bull against the Queen of Navarre was revoked. But a more formidable danger than this threatened Joan not long after, Philip II. having concerted a plan with Montluc to seize her and her two children, and carry them to Spain, where they would be committed to the cruel mercies of the Inquisition. Treatment like this confirmed the queen in her faith; she swept her dominions of every vestige of Romanism, and denied to her Catholic subjects that religious liberty which she claimed for her co-religionists in France.