Protestantism in France From Death of Francis I to Edict of Nantes - James Aitken Wylie

the king rapidly sank, and before Conde's deathwarrant
could be signed, or the abjuration test
presented for subscription, Francis II had breathed
his last.[26]
The king died (5th December, 1560) at the age
of seventeen, after a reign of only as many months.
The courtiers were too busy making suit for their
places, or providing for their safety, to care for the
lifeless body of the king. It lay neglected on the
bed on which he had expired. Yesterday they had
cringed and bowed before him, today he was
nothing more to them than so much carrion. A few
days thereafter we see a funeral procession issuing
from the gates of Orleans, and proceeding along
the road to the royal vaults at St. Denis. But what a
poor show! What a meager following!
We see none of the usual pageantry of grief--no
heralds; no nodding plumes, no grandees of State
in robes of mourning; we hear no boom of cannon,
no toiling of passing bell--in short, nothing to tell
us that it is a king who is being borne to the tomb.
A blind bishop and two aged domestics make up
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