[5] The King, on the 12th of December this year, held an assembly
of the Protestants at Mantes, in which he publicly declared that
his changing his religion should make no alteration in the affairs
of the Protestants. And, the Calvinists having asked many things of
him, he told them he could not comply with their requests, but that
he would tolerate them.
The Duke of Mayenne, finding that in this last scheme, which he had
believed infallible, he was disappointed as well as in the rest, placed
all his future dependence upon his old friends the Parisians, and
neglected no method by which he might awaken their mutinous disposition;
but so far was he from succeeding in this attempt that he could not
hinder them from discovering their joy at what had just passed at St.
Denis. They talked publicly of peace, and even in his presence; and he
had the mortification to hear a proposal to send deputies to the King to
demand a truce for six months, and they obliged him to give his consent
to it. The truce for three months, which had been granted them at Surene,
had only inspired them with an inclination for a longer one.
The King gave audience to the deputies in full council. The greatest
number of those who composed it, listening to nothing but their jealousy
of the Duke of Mayenne, whom they feared as a man that had the means in
his power of purchasing favor and rewards, were of the opinion that no
attention ought to be paid to this demand of the deputies, because the
person who sent them persisted in his revolt against the King, even after
his abjuration.
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