But besides the Duke of Guise and Anthony of Navarre, there was a man of noble birth and large family influence--the representative of a great party in the kingdom--whom it was not safe to neglect. This was Gaspard de Coligny, Governor of Picardy, Admiral of France, and second son of the Count of Chatillon. The Chatillons were originally a sovereign house, and Gaspard’s father had been a marshal of France. He had married Louisa of Montmorency, sister to the constable, and thus became allied to one of the noblest houses in France. The eldest son of this marriage was Cardinal Odet, the youngest François de Chatillon, sieur of Andelot.[99] Gaspard, Count of Coligny, was born in 1518, and in his earlier years was very intimate with Francis of Guise (then Prince of Joinville). He was present at the battle of Renti, all the glory of which the Lorraine party wished to ascribe to Prince Francis. Coligny thought “he might have done better,” and this remark being exaggerated by false friends, the coolness already beginning to exist between them, and which was the work of Diana of Poitiers, gradually increased until they became totally estranged. The admiral was at one time a great favorite with Henry II. and the sharer of all his pleasures. He was Governor of the Isle of France, captain of a hundred men-at-arms (an expensive honor), and knight of the order of St. Michael. He had been made prisoner at the battle of St. Quentin (1557), and it was during the consequent enforced retirement from public life that he strengthened those religious convictions which he had first learned at his mother’s knee. Andelot, the younger brother, was the first convert to the new opinions. Made prisoner in 1551, and detained in the castle of Milan until 1556, he employed his long captivity in studying the works of Calvin: “Such are the sad fruits of leisure and idleness,” says Brantome with a sigh. He was taken with his brother at the siege of St. Quentin, but made his escape, and was present at the surprise of Calais. When he visited his vast estates in Brittany, he encouraged two Reformed ministers in his suite to preach openly wherever he halted, thus laying the foundations of many a Christian church in the north-west of France. Returning to the court where he was in high favor with Henry II., he was denounced by the Cardinal of Lorraine as a heretic and impudent violator of the edicts. To the king’s questions Andelot replied that he had never gone to the Pré aux Clercs, although the religionists did nothing there but sing the Psalms of David, and offer up prayers for the welfare of the king and the safety of the kingdom. He confessed that he had forwarded books of consolation to his brother the admiral, and had countenanced the preaching of a good and sound doctrine, deduced from Holy Scripture. “Your Majesty,” he continued, “has loaded me with such favor that I have spared neither body nor goods in your service, and I will continue to spare neither so long as I live.