As on the hill by
the field of Dreux, her veteran bands of pikemen, dark masses of
organized ferocity, stood biding their time while the battle surged
below, and then swept downward to the slaughter,--so did Spain watch
and wait to trample and crush the hope of humanity.
In these days of fear, a second Huguenot colony sailed for the New
World. The calm, stern man who represented and led the Protestantism of
France felt to his inmost heart the peril of the time. He would fain
build up a city of refuge for the persecuted sect. Yet Gaspar de
Coligny, too high in power and rank to be openly assailed, was forced to
act with caution. He must act, too, in the name of the Crown, and in
virtue of his office of Admiral of France. A nobleman and a soldier,--
for the Admiral of France was no seaman,--he shared the ideas and
habits of his class; nor is there reason to believe him to have been in
advance of his time in a knowledge of the principles of successful
colonization. His scheme promised a military colony, not a free
commonwealth. The Huguenot party was already a political as well as a
religious party. At its foundation lay the religious element,
represented by Geneva, the martyrs, and the devoted fugitives who sang
the psalms of Marot among rocks and caverns. Joined to these were
numbers on whom the faith sat lightly, whose hope was in commotion and
change.
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