Education of Henri II. de Bourbon, Prince de Condé--Appearance
and character of the young prince--He is offered and accepts
the hand of Charlotte de Montmorency, unaware that Henry
IV. is desperately enamoured of the lady--Conversation of
the King with Bassompierre--Marriage of Condé and Mlle.
de Montmorency--Infatuation of the King for the young
princess--Condé refuses to accept the odious rôle assigned
him, and “plays the devil”--Violent scenes between him and the
King--He removes with his wife to Picardy--Amorous escapade of
Henri IV.--Condé, summoned to Court for the accouchement of the
Queen, leaves the princess behind him--Indignation of Henri
IV.--Condé flies with his wife to Flanders--Fury of the King,
who sends troops in pursuit of the fugitives--Refusal of the
Archdukes to deliver them up--Condé goes to Cologne, while the
princess proceeds to Brussels.
Henri IV. charged himself with all the expenses of the little Prince
de Condé’s education; the Cardinal de Gondi, Bishop of Paris, was
entrusted with the task of instructing him in the Catholic faith, and
on 24 January, 1596, the boy attended Mass for the first time.
To assist the _gouverneur_, the Marquis de Pisani, in his
important duties, the King decided to appoint a _sous-gouverneur_,
and selected for that post Nicolas d’Aumale, Sieur d’Harcourt.
D’Harcourt was a Protestant, and his appointment was probably due to
Henri IV.’s desire to conciliate the Huguenots and to prove to them
that, though the heir presumptive to the throne was to be brought
up as a Catholic, there was no intention of separating him entirely
from those of his father’s faith. For preceptor, the prince was given
Nicolas Lefebvre, Counsellor to the Departments of Waters and Forests,
who was a devout, though a by no means intolerant, Catholic, and one of
the most learned men of his time.
The education of the boy would have progressed smoothly enough, but
for the interference of the Dowager-Princesse de Condé, who aspired to
direct everything herself, and continually countermanded the orders of
Pisani, who was obliged to appeal to Henri IV. to uphold his authority.
He complained that the princess refused to admit that anything was
right that came from the King; and there can be no doubt that the lady,
who was aware that none but political motives had induced Henri IV. to
put an end to her imprisonment, was but little disposed to respect his
Majesty’s wishes.
Not content with quarrelling with Pisani, the princess endeavoured to
create dissension between him and d’Harcourt, by insinuating to the
latter that he was distrusted by his superior, on account of his being
a Huguenot. Then she tried to persuade the King to allow Texeira to be
associated with d’Harcourt and Lefebvre in the education of her son--a
proposal which was greatly resented by the _sous-gouverneur_ and
the preceptor.
The disputes to which his mother’s meddlesome activity gave rise were
very unfortunate for the young prince. And Pisani declared that it was
“pitiable to see him thus guided, served, and treated,” and expressed
his fear “lest he should be found wanting, and that those who had been
charged with his education should be blamed and despised for it.”[142]
In October, 1599, Pisani died suddenly, at the Abbey of
Saint-Maur-des-Fossés,[143] to which he had removed with his charge to
escape a terrible epidemic--probably typhus--which was then ravaging
Paris. The choice of his successor was not an easy one, for now that
Queen Marguerite had given her consent to the dissolution of her union
with the King, and negotiations had been set on foot for Henri’s
marriage with Marie de’ Medici, the post was diminishing in importance.
General astonishment, however, was expressed when it was known that the
King had conferred it upon the Comte de Belin. The count was a former
Leaguer, Governor of Paris under the Duc de Mayenne, and had been one
of the first of that party to attach himself to the cause of Henri
IV. He had since testified great devotion to the monarch, but he was
but little esteemed by the public, and had lost any military prestige
he ever possessed by the promptitude with which he had capitulated at
Arques, in 1596. Some privileged courtiers ventured to remonstrate with
his Majesty on this appointment, to whom he drily replied: “When I
wanted to make a King of my nephew, I gave him Pisani; when I wanted to
make a subject of him, I gave him Belin.”
The new _gouverneur_ showed himself infinitely more complaisant
towards the Princesse de Condé than had his predecessor; indeed,
Tallemant des Réaux declares that they “made _belles galanteries_
together,” though no attention need be paid to the unsupported
statement of this incorrigible scandalmonger. He was also far more
indulgent with his pupil than Pisani had ever been--a change which
is generally believed to have had a very injurious effect upon the
character of the young prince, who was one of those lads who require
a strong hand over them. Thanks, however, to the perseverance of
Lefebvre, his studies were not permitted to suffer, and he received an
education both sound and varied. He became a tolerable Latin scholar,
spoke Italian fluently, understood Spanish, wrote his own language
correctly--a rare accomplishment in those days--and had some knowledge
of theology and mathematics. In appearance, he was rather below the
middle height, with a slight, well-knit figure, and “the strongly
marked features which generally distinguished the Bourbons.”[144] He
was passionately devoted to the chase and an excellent horseman; nor
does he seem to have lacked the courage of his race, since in February,
1607, when the prince was in his nineteenth year, Henri IV. was obliged
to exercise his authority to prevent a duel to which he had challenged
the Duc de Nevers.
With the exception of this incident, his early youth appears to
have been very uneventful, for, since France was now at peace, no
opportunity occurred for his initiation into the art of war. The King
kept him constantly about his person, less through any affection for
his kinsman than from a desire to protect him against the influence
of ambitious and scheming persons who might seek to use him for the
furtherance of their own ends. But the young prince did not possess
the qualities which would have fitted him to shine in the gay and
licentious society of the time, being shy and awkward, particularly in
the presence of ladies, while his revenues were not at all commensurate
with his rank; and after the birth of sons to Henri IV. had deprived
him of all hope of the throne, he seems to have occupied a very
inconspicuous position at Court.
Condé’s comparative lack of fortune made a wealthy marriage a
necessity, and when, at the beginning of the year 1609, the King
announced his intention of bestowing upon him the hand of Charlotte
de Montmorency, daughter of the Connétable Henri de Montmorency,[145]
and one of the richest heiresses in France, he accepted the offer
with a gratitude which was not diminished by the fact that Mlle. de
Montmorency united to the advantages of wealth remarkable personal
attractions.
There was, indeed, no more lovely girl at Court than the daughter of
the Constable. Cardinal Bentivoglio, the Papal Nuncio at Brussels, who
saw her towards the close of the same year, has left us the following
description of her:
“She was then sixteen years old, and her loveliness was adjudged by all
men to accord with the fame thereof. She was very fair; her eyes and
all her features full of charm; an ingenuous grace in all her gestures
and in her manner of speaking. Her beauty owed its power to itself
alone, since she did not bring to its aid any of the artifices of which
women are wont to make use.”[146]
It is certain, however, that Condé would have received the proposition
in a very different spirit if he had been aware of the reasons which
had prompted the King to make it; for it was not the young prince’s
interests, but his own convenience, that his Majesty had in mind.
One day in January, 1609, it happened that Henri IV. was passing
through the great gallery of the Louvre, when he came upon a bevy of
young ladies of the Court practising for a ballet, nymphs of Diana,
armed for the chase. Among them was Mlle. de Montmorency, whose charms,
enhanced by the classical costume she was wearing, made so profound an
impression upon the susceptible monarch that he was quite unable to
take his eyes off her.
Shortly after this encounter, his Majesty was laid up with an attack of
gout. Several of the ladies of the Court came to visit him, and among
those who were most assiduous in their attentions was the Duchesse
d’Angoulême, who was invariably accompanied by Mlle. de Montmorency,
her niece. Henri IV. was fifty-five, and his hair and beard, whitened
by a life of peril and hardship, made him look considerably older.
But his heart was still young, and he was as amorous as he had been
at twenty. From the first, he took the keenest pleasure in Mlle. de
Montmorency’s society; soon he was hopelessly in love, although for
some time he appears to have deluded himself with the belief that his
interest in the damsel was of a paternal nature only.
The fair Charlotte was already betrothed, with the King’s approval, to
François de Bassompierre, a handsome young noble of Lorraine, high in
favour with his Majesty, and one of the most redoubtable lady-killers
of the Court. Henri, however, having himself become a candidate for the
lady’s affections, had no mind to endure a rival so formidable as the
fascinating Bassompierre, and, accordingly, decided that the projected
marriage must be broken off.
One night, when Bassompierre was on duty in the King’s chamber,
endeavouring to soothe his master’s pain by reading to him M. d’Urfé’s
sentimental romance “l’Astrée,” then at the height of its vogue,
Henri informed him, after some preamble, that he intended to marry
him to Mlle. d’Aumale, and to revive the duchy of that name in his
favour. “You wish then, Sire, to give me two wives!” exclaimed the
astonished courtier. “Baron,” rejoined the King, “I wish to speak to
you as a friend. I am not only in love, but distracted about Mlle. de
Montmorency. If you marry her and she loves you, I shall hate you. If
she loves me, you will hate me. It were better that the marriage were
broken off, lest it should mar the good understanding between us, and
destroy the affection I entertain for you. I have decided to marry her
to my nephew, the Prince de Condé, and to keep her near the person of
my wife. She will be the solace and support of the old age upon which I
am about to enter. I shall give her to my nephew, who is only twenty,
and prefers hunting a thousand times to ladies’ society; and I desire
no other favour from her than her affection, without pretending to
anything further.”
Bassompierre, who was above all things a courtier, seeing that the
King was determined, and that, unless he submitted with a good grace,
he would lose both his bride and the royal favour, protested his
willingness to obey, adding the hope that “this new affection would
bring his Majesty as much joy as it would occasion him pain, but for
his consideration for his Majesty.”[147] His chagrin was, nevertheless,
intense, and when, next morning, the young lady having been acquainted
with the change that had been made in the disposition of her hand,
greeted her too facile lover with an expressive shrug of her pretty
shoulders and a glance of the most withering disdain, his grief and
mortification were such that he fled precipitately to his lodging,
where, he assures us, he spent three days without food or sleep.
The betrothal of Condé and Charlotte de Montmorency took place shortly
afterwards (2 March, 1609), in the great gallery of the Louvre. The
Constable gave his prospective son-in-law 100,000 écus; while the King
granted him an increase of his pension and a present of 150,000 livres.
The bride received 18,000 livres from his Majesty, for the purchase of
jewellery, as well as a magnificent trousseau. Owing to the necessity
of obtaining the Papal dispensation for the union of cousins,[148] the
marriage-ceremony was postponed until 16 May, when it was celebrated at
Chantilly, “very inexpensively, but very gaily.”
This gaiety was not of long duration. Scarcely had the young couple
rejoined the Court, which was then at Fontainebleau, than the King
began to lay the closest siege to the princess’s heart and strove by
every means in his power to gain her affection. The girl, flattered
by the homage of her Sovereign, of which she perhaps did not divine
the end, was far from discouraging his attentions, and, if we are
to believe Tallemant des Réaux, appeared one evening on the balcony
of her apartments in a _peignoir_, with her hair falling over
her shoulders, in order to please the King, who was transported with
admiration. “_Dieu!_” cried she, “how foolish he is!” And she
laughed heartily.
Her husband, however, did not laugh. The affair had become a public
scandal. Even in the streets, people laughed and jested about the
infatuation of the King, and “talked with the utmost freedom of his
Majesty and of the corruption and debaucheries of his Court.”[149] If
Condé had little love for his wife, he was exceedingly jealous of his
honour, and, to Henri’s intense chagrin, absolutely declined to accept
the odious rôle he had intended for him, and began, in his Majesty’s
phrase, “to play the devil.”[150]
In vain, the King endeavoured to reassure him as to the innocence of
his intentions; in vain, the Constable, at his Majesty’s request, made
the strongest representations to his son-in-law. Condé was deaf to
all appeals, and, towards the middle of June, carried off his wife to
Valery, in the hope that, during his absence, the King’s passion might
cool or be diverted to some fresh object.
Henri IV. was in despair. In obedience to his orders, the poet
Malherbe consented “to degrade his muse to the office of pander,”[151]
and composed stanzas wherein the King, under the name of Alcandre,
cries:
Il faut que je cesse de vivre
Si je veux cesser de souffrir;
and the princess, under the name of Orante, replies:
La cœur outrée du même ennui,
Jurait que s’il mourait pour elle,
Elle mourait aussi pour lui.[152]
Condé and his wife remained at Valery until the first week in July,
when they were compelled to return to Court, in order to attend the
marriage of César de Vendôme, Henri IV.’s eldest son by Gabrielle
d’Estrées, and Mlle. de Mercœur. The King’s passion became more violent
than ever, and his conduct would have been ludicrous to the last degree
had it been less culpable. Not only did he continue to commission
Malherbe to bombard the princess with elegies and sonnets, but “one
saw him alter in less than no time his hair, his beard, and his
countenance.” He who had hitherto been distinguished from the nobles of
his Court by the simplicity and even negligence of his attire, might
now be seen dressing and adorning himself with as much care as the
youngest and most dandified of his courtiers, and, on one occasion, he
appeared at a tilting-match wearing “a scented ruff, a doublet with
sleeves of Chinese satin, and the colours of the Princesse de Condé,
who called him ‘her knight.’”[153] “The King is well and grows younger
every day,” wrote Malherbe to his friend Peiresc.
The unfortunate husband began to “play the devil” again, and, though
Henri, in the hope of bending him to his will, had the meanness to give
orders to Sully that the instalment of his pension due at Midsummer
should not be paid him, and to threaten him with even more severe
measures unless he mended his ways, his complaints grew louder than
ever. Violent scenes took place between him and the King, in one of
which Condé allowed the word “tyranny” to escape him, and his Majesty,
losing all control of himself, replied that the only occasion on which
he had merited such a reproach was when he had recognized the prince
for what he was not--that is to say, a legitimate son.
Finally, Condé took his wife back to Valery, and, though Henri employed
every means in his power to induce him to return, it was to no purpose.
“Beaumont,” writes the King to the Constable, on 23 September,
“returned yesterday, and says that he found our friend (Condé) more
unmanageable than ever. He leaves Valery this morning for Muret.”[154]
Muret was a château belonging to Condé in Picardy, not far from the
Flemish frontier, and the prince’s pretext for removing thither was the
excellent hunting which the neighbourhood afforded. Early in November,
he and his wife went to join a hunting-party at the Abbey of Verteuil,
and, while they were there, M. de Traigny, governor of Amiens, invited
the Princesse de Condé and the dowager-princess, who was with her, to
dine at his country-house, situated some three leagues from the abbey.
We will allow Lenet, the faithful servant of the Condés, who had the
story from the princess’s own lips, to relate what followed:
“It would seem very much as though this party had been concerted
with the King, but he was, at any rate, informed of it by the Sieur
de Traigny, who always abetted him in his pleasures, so that the
princesses, while on their way thither, saw a carriage pass with the
King’s liveries and a great number of hounds. The princess-mother, who
was passionately attached to her son, and watched the actions of the
young princess very narrowly, feared that, under the pretext of some
hunting excursion, the King had prepared for them a rendezvous. She
summoned the huntsmen, whom she saw at a distance; but one of them,
advancing before the others, came to the door of the coach to answer
the princess’s questions, and disarmed her fears, by telling her that
a captain of the hunt, who was in the neighbourhood to celebrate
the feast of St. Hubert, had placed the relays where she saw them,
because he was hunting a stag with some of his friends. Whilst the
princess-dowager was speaking to the huntsman, the young princess, who
was at the coach-door, glanced at the others, who stood some little
distance off, and perceived that one of them was the King, who, the
better to disguise himself under the livery he wore, had put a large
black patch over his left eye and held two greyhounds in a leash.
The princess told us that she had never been more astonished in her
life, and that she did not dare to mention what she had seen to her
mother-in-law, from fear lest she should inform her husband. At the
same time, she confessed to us that this gallantry had not displeased
her, and, continuing her story, she told us that, having arrived at
Traigny and entered the salon, she remarked upon the extreme beauty of
the view, whereupon Madame de Traigny said to her that, if she cared to
put her head out of a window which she would show her, she would see
one still more agreeable. Advancing to it, she perceived that the King
was placed at the window of a pavilion opposite, he having preceded her
after having had the pleasure of seeing her on the road, and that he
held all the time one hand to his lips, as though to send her a kiss,
and the other to his heart, to show her that he had been wounded.
“The surprise of this _rencontre_ did not allow the princess
time to reflect what she should do, and she retired abruptly from
the window, exclaiming, ‘_Ciel!_ what is this? Madame, the
King is here!’ On which the princess-dowager, greatly incensed,
divided her words between giving directions for the horses to be
immediately harnessed to her coach and loading Traigny and his wife
with reproaches. Even the King, who hastened to the spot on hearing
the commotion, did not escape her anger. The enamoured prince employed
all the entreaties which his passion could dictate, and all the
promises possible, to induce her to remain, but to no purpose; for the
princesses re-entered their coach and returned forthwith to Verteuil,
where that same night the princess-mother broke the promise which the
King had extracted from her, and related the whole story to her son.”
A few days later, Condé received a letter from the King, written in
a strain half-coaxing and half-menacing, summoning him to Court, to
be present at the approaching accouchement of the Queen. Etiquette
required that the first Prince of the Blood should be in attendance on
these auspicious occasions, and it was impossible for him to refuse.
But he came alone. Henri was furious, and his anger and disappointment
rendered him so insupportable to all about him, that Marie de’ Medici
herself begged Condé to send for his wife, promising to keep the
strictest watch over her. Such was the King’s wrath that he apparently
could not trust himself to interview his cousin personally, but sent
for the prince’s secretary Virey,[155] and told him that, if Condé
desired a divorce from his wife, he would not oppose it, and would
even undertake to obtain the parents’ consent. The prince, it should
be explained, had no such wish, but, a few months before, after a
stormy interview with the King, he had chanced to observe to the Duc de
Villeroy, whom he had met on leaving the royal presence, and who had
inquired the cause of his agitation, that, rather than consent to his
own dishonour, or expose himself any longer to his Majesty’s anger,
he would get himself “dismarried”; and these hasty words, which had
been duly reported to the King, had been wrested into a request for a
divorce.[156]
Virey withdrew, and the next day returned and handed the King a very
skilfully-worded memorial from Condé, which had been drafted for him by
the Président de Thou, wherein he begged his Majesty to appoint such
persons as he might think fit to assist him with their counsel in this
delicate affair; adding that, until the matter was decided, he did not
doubt that the King would think it necessary that the princess should
remain at Muret.
This answer completely disconcerted the amorous monarch’s plans,
and made him more angry than ever. Ignoring the memorial, he turned
furiously upon Virey, to whose influence he attributed the firm tone
which Condé maintained, reproached him bitterly with the counsels he
had given the prince, threatened him with his severe displeasure,
and, finally, dismissed him, bidding him tell his master that, if he
declined to yield to his will or attempted the slightest violence
against the princess, he would give him cause to rue it. He added
that, had he been still only King of Navarre, he would at once have
challenged the prince to a duel.
After receiving the King’s message, Condé decided to feign submission,
and accordingly begged his Majesty’s leave to return to Muret to fetch
his wife. His request, as we may suppose, was readily granted, and on
25 November, the day on which the ill-fated Henriette-Marie was born,
he set out for Picardy.
On the evening of the 29th, while Henri was at the card-table, word was
brought him that a messenger had arrived from Picardy with intelligence
that _Monsieur le Prince_ had early that morning left Muret, in
a coach with his wife, accompanied by his chamberlain, the Baron de
Rochefort, Virey, and two of the princess’s ladies. Condé had given out
that they were bound on a hunting-expedition; but the messenger--an
archer of the Guard named Laperrière--had learned from his father,
who was in the prince’s service, that the party had taken the road to
Flanders.
The consternation of the King knew no bounds. The moment he learned
the news, he at once summoned his most trusted counsellors, who
found him pacing up and down the room, with downcast eyes and hands
clasped behind his back. As each arrived, he informed him of what had
occurred and demanded his advice, refusing to give him even a moment
for reflection. The prudent Sully advised his master to let the matter
rest, pointing out that, in that case, the fugitive prince, being
unable to draw his pension, would soon be reduced to sue for terms;
whereas, if Henri showed anxiety to get him back, the enemies of
France would be only too ready to assist him, in order to spite the
King.
The infatuated monarch, however, was in no mood to follow such counsel,
and that very night, without pausing to reflect on the probable effect
of such a step, wrote to the governors of Marle and Guise, directing
them to send the whole strength of their garrisons to capture Condé,
“wherever he might be;” and despatched La Chaussée, an officer of the
Guards, with orders to pursue the prince even over the frontier, “and
if he should discover him in any town beyond his dominions to address
himself to the governor and magistrates of that city, and to inform
them that his Majesty had given him authority to require and entreat
them to have the prince and his suite arrested and well guarded,
assuring them that, in acting thus, they would be doing great service
to the Archdukes.”[157]
La Chaussée came up with the fugitives at Landrecies, the first Spanish
fortress in Flanders, which they had reached in the early morning
of the 30th. Since leaving Muret, they had only rested for a few
minutes at a village inn; the almost impassable state of the roads had
compelled them to abandon their coach before crossing the Somme, and
the unfortunate princess had passed fifteen hours on the crupper of
Rochefort’s saddle, under a continuous downpour of rain.
La Chaussée produced the royal warrant for the arrest of Condé, but the
authorities of Landrecies refused to allow it to be executed until they
had referred the matter to the Archdukes. Rochefort, at the prince’s
request, was permitted to proceed to Brussels to beg the Archdukes to
grant his master a safe-conduct through their dominions, in order that
he might visit his sister, the Princess of Orange,[158] at Breda. An
envoy from Henri IV. arrived almost simultaneously to denounce the
prince as a traitor and an enemy to the public peace, and to request
their Highnesses to permit his arrest, or, at least, not to grant him
an asylum in Flanders.
The Archdukes found themselves in a very embarrassing position, and
took refuge in a compromise. They declined to allow the rights of
nations to be violated by the arrest of Condé, and granted his wife
permission to continue her journey, but gave orders that the prince
should quit the Netherlands within three days.
Rochefort returned to Landrecies with this answer on the night of 2–3
December, and, without waiting for the day, Condé quitted the town and
set out for Cologne, a city whose ancient liberties protected him from
any attempt at molestation by his enraged Sovereign. On the following
morning, the princess, under the charge of the faithful Virey, started
for Brussels, where she arrived the same night, and was lodged at the
Hôtel de Nassau, the residence of the Prince of Orange.
The Prince and Princess of Orange were at Breda, and their palace
was only occupied by a few servants. Virey was very uneasy at the
situation in which he found himself, since _Madame la Princesse_
had for the moment no protector at hand but himself, and he feared lest
Praslain, the envoy whom Henri IV. had despatched to Brussels, should
take advantage of his helplessness and carry her off. Such, indeed,
was Praslain’s intention, but, before resorting to this extreme step,
he wished to endeavour to obtain the consent of the Prince of Orange,
for which purpose he set off for Breda. There he was received by the
princess, who told him what she thought of his proposal in such very
forcible language, that he was glad to beat a retreat. He hastened back
to Brussels, but, on arriving there, found a guard, which Virey had
contrived to obtain, posted before the Hôtel de Nassau, and was obliged
to abandon all idea of a _coup de main_.