Second Hypothesis--First Feelings of Anne of Austria towards Louis
XIII.--Joy which she experienced on arriving in France--First
Impressions of Louis XIII.--His Aversion to Spain--His Dislike to
Marriage--Austerity of his Manners--His persistent Coldness--Means
adopted to induce him to consummate the Marriage--Political Position
of Anne of Austria--Louis XIII. and Richelieu--Watch kept by the
Minister over the Queen--The King’s Illness at Lyons.
The political story of Louis XIII.’s marriage with Anne of Austria has
been told; the motives which determined this union, the negotiations
which preceded it, the great interests connected with it, and the
powerful springs which put it in action, have all been set forth and
weighed in a decisive manner.[46]
If, neglecting this grave examination, which is entirely foreign to
our work, we occupy ourselves solely with the character and secret
thoughts of the persons thus tied to one another, and whose private
life has been ransacked in order to give a solution to the problem
of the Man with the Iron Mask, we see that a very strong liking for
France and for her King, on Anne of Austria’s part, was in accord
with the necessities of policy. Contrary to what frequently happens in
the case of royal marriages, the obligations imposed on the Infanta by
her rank were not repugnant to the sentiments of the woman, and when
she crossed the French frontier for the first time, she realized a
hope long since conceived and dearly cherished in her heart. With only
eight days between their births and at once betrothed to one another
in public opinion, the Infanta and the Dauphin had been the object of
the researches and predictions of all the astrologers of the time,[47]
who proclaimed that, having come into the world under the same sign,
they were destined to love each other, even though they might not be
united. The Infanta had believed in this augury. She had early liked
to hear the young King spoken of, she sought after his portraits, she
preferred garments of French cut, she willingly wore ear-rings formed
of fleurs-de-lis, and, the changes of the negotiation having for a
moment fixed the choice of the two Governments on her sister Doña
Maria,[48] Anne, then nine years old, declared, “that if it was to be
thus, she was resolved to pass her life in a monastery without ever
marrying.”[49] When, three years afterwards, the Duke de Mayenne, on
quitting Madrid, whither he had come to sign the marriage contract of
Anne and Louis XIII., asked the former what she wished him to say on
her behalf to the King of France, she replied: “That I am extremely
impatient to see him.” This answer having shocked the austere Countess
d’Altamira, her governess, who exclaimed--“What! madam, what will the
King of France think when M. de Mayenne tells him that you have made
such a speech?”--the Infanta rejoined, “Madam, you have taught me that
one should always be sincere; you should not be surprised then if I
speak the truth.”[50]
The two years which elapsed before her departure saw no change in these
sentiments. The 9th November, 1615, she parted at Fontarabia from her
father, Philip III., with less sorrow than he showed in allowing her
at length to leave, and it was with pride and contentment that the new
Queen, radiant with youth and beauty,[51] crossed the Bidassoa, on her
way to Bordeaux, where the French court was stopping. What kind of
husband was she about to meet there?
Very different from those of the Princess Anne were the impressions
of Louis XIII., concerning the marriage and the family to which he
was going to unite himself. People had frequently, and at an early
age, conversed with him about the project. The first replies of
the Dauphin, questioned from his most tender infancy, would have
no significance.[52] But as he advanced in age, his aversion to
everything Spanish manifested itself with characteristic energy. Twice
he replied in the negative to Henri IV., when the latter spoke to him
of the Infanta as his future wife.[53] One day, on M. de Ventelet
asking him if he liked the Spaniards, he answered, “No.” “And why,
sir?” “Because they are papa’s enemies.” “And the Infanta?” added De
Ventelet, “do you love her, sir?” “No.” “Why, sir?” “I don’t want any
Spanish love.”[54] Later, when his chaplain was making him recite
the Commandments, on coming to “Thou shalt not kill,” the Dauphin
exclaimed: “What, not the Spaniards? Oh, yes, I shall kill the
Spaniards, because they are papa’s enemies! I will beat them well!” And
on his chaplain observing that they were Christians, he replied: “May I
only kill Turks then?”[55]
To this aversion, a great deal more significant since it was contrary
to a project generally acquiesced in by those about him, soon came to
be added a certain distaste for marriage. Born with the ardent and
lascivious temperament of his father, impelled to follow his example
by conversations often loose, sometimes obscene, Louis XIII. succeeded
in modifying these early tendencies by a force of will and a power of
reflection truly rare. He was naturally an observer, he spoke little
and laughed still less. He was usually serious and grave at times when
his pages found cause for great merriment. All that he remarked became
profoundly engraved on his mind, and enabled him years afterwards to
reply with marvellous pertinency to questions which were sometimes
embarrassing. His young imagination was early struck by the singular
effects which the King’s conduct produced at the court. In his cradle
he received frequent visits, not only from his mother, but also from
Henri IV.’s repudiated wife,[56] and from his numerous mistresses. They
all sometimes found themselves assembled around him, the latter proud
of their master’s affection, Marie de Medicis irritated, jealous, and
showing it. The issue of these very open intrigues, were the Dauphin’s
companions; but he instinctively abhorred them. He struck them without
motive; would not have them at his table; absolutely refused to call
them brothers; and when Henri IV., after having beaten him without
overcoming this insurmountable repugnance, asked him the reason of it,
he answered, “Because they are not mamma’s sons.”[57]
This hatred for everything connected with illegitimacy was certainly
the origin of the chaste reserve which was to characterize so
particularly him who was the son of Henri IV. and the father of Louis
XIV. From his illegitimate brothers, this aversion extended to their
mothers, whom he qualified in very contemptuous terms, and to the
intrigues in which they were engaged. “Shall you be as ribald as
the King?” said his nurse to him one day. “No,” he answered, after
a moment’s reflection. And on her asking him if he was in love, he
replied, “No, I avoid love.”[58]
It was especially after Henri IV.’s death that the tendencies of the
young king revealed themselves. He loved his father tenderly, a great
deal more than Marie de Medicis did, who, moreover, never showed much
affection for her elder son. He worthily wept his violent death,[59]
and long afterwards, hearing at the Louvre, one of the late King’s
songs, he went aside to sob.[60] But if, while yet a child, he had
appreciated the glory of Henri IV., if he had shared his patriotic
sentiments, if he was proud of his victories, he had silently blamed
the licence which, in acts, and still more in language, then rendered
the French Court one of the most gross in Europe. As King, he would
not tolerate these excesses. He showed himself openly austere in his
speech, and modest in his actions, forbade in his presence obscene
songs and scandalous conversations, and in order to avoid any pretext
for them, replied sharply to M. de Souvré, his governor, when he wished
to talk with him about marriage: “Do not let us speak of that, sir; do
not let us speak of that.”
It was nevertheless necessary to speak of it, and to set out for
Bordeaux. Louis XIII., then in his fifteenth year, still possessed,
and was to preserve for a long time, the tastes and predilections of
his infancy. He gave himself up to them in order to divert his mind
from the marriage festivities. He kept birds, armed his gentlemen, and
enrolled them in a vigilant and disciplined troop; then he assisted
at the Council, replied pertinently to the deputations presented to
him, and thus mingled the simple amusements of the child with the
grave accomplishment of his business as King.[61] Much less desirous
of fulfilling his duties as husband, he nevertheless affected towards
the Infanta, either from self-esteem, or from a sense of propriety
towards the strangers who were bringing her to him, an attention
which surprised and charmed the court. He went to meet the train
which accompanied her, showed himself curious and pleased to see her,
and was timid, but attentive and courteous, in the first interviews
which he had with her.[62] This was all; and, if for an instant,
he possessed the manners of a gallant and attentive cavalier, he
by no means exhibited the behaviour of a lover. During the evening
after the celebration of the ceremony, he remained insensible to the
encouragements of M. de Grammont,[63] and Marie de Medicis had to exert
her authority in order to induce him to go to Anne of Austria. Four
years afterwards the marriage was not yet consummated; and this event,
ardently desired by the Court of France, disconsolate at the King’s
coldness; by the Court of Spain, which saw an insult in this disdain;
by the Pope’s nuncio, and by the Court of Tuscany, which had so much
contributed towards the union, became in some degree an affair of State.
Many efforts, many attempts were necessary to induce Louis XIII. to
change his course of behaviour, of which the remote cause may be
ascribed to his early impressions as Dauphin, and of which a more
immediate one has been discovered by the Nuncio Bentivoglio.[64]
Sometimes the King’s pride was attempted to be touched, and the politic
Nuncio, availing himself of the marriage of the Princess Christine with
the Duke of Savoy, asked Louis XIII., “If he wished to have the shame
of seeing his sister have a son before he had a Dauphin.”[65] Sometimes
recourse was had to influences still more direct.[66] At length,
January 25, 1619, Albert de Luynes, after vainly begging him to cede
to the wishes of his subjects, carried him by force into the Queen’s
chamber.[67] The following day, all the ambassadors announced this
event to their respective governments.
From that time, Louis XIII. was less scared, but almost as timid[68]
as ever, and though, preserving all his repugnances, he sometimes
overcame them as a matter of duty, and showed himself a tolerably
ardent, but never very tender husband. In the month of December, 1619,
there were reasons for hoping that the Queen was pregnant.[69] This
hope, which soon vanished, was renewed at the commencement of 1622, but
was again destroyed by a fall, which Anne of Austria had while playing
with the Duchess de Chevreuse.[70] Buckingham’s rapid visit to France,
if it left a profound remembrance in the Queen’s heart, certainly
had no influence upon the King’s conduct. Nothing was changed in the
intercourse of the two spouses, which was neither more frequent, nor
ever entirely interrupted.[71] After, as before this visit, Louis XIII.
almost invariably saw in the Queen the Spaniard in blood and affection;
and when in May, 1621, he had to announce to her the death of her
father, he did it in this wise: “Madam,” said he, “I have just now
received letters from Spain, in which they write me word for certain,
that the King your father is dead.” Then, mounting his horse, he set
out for the chase.[72] It is undoubtedly true, moreover, that Anne of
Austria, who was, to her eternal glory, to become thoroughly French on
assuming the Regency, and perceiving the true interests of her young
son, to serve them with patriotism, intelligence, and firmness, even
in opposition to her old friends, was, during the life-time of Louis
XIII., the natural centre of a secret but constant and implacable
opposition to the system which Richelieu supported. Good, but proud,
she had been galled by her husband’s indifference, humiliated by
Richelieu’s chicanery and mistrust, and irritated at not possessing
any influence, so that, in the midst of the war which divided Spain
and France, she had not wished to dissimulate the attachment which
she preserved for her own family and for her country. Badly advised
by the frivolous and restless Duchess de Chevreuse, she had engaged
in different enterprises by which, without betraying France, she had
furnished her enemies with arms sufficiently powerful for them to be
able to maintain her in disgrace with Louis XIII.
This Prince, who during his whole life longed for the moment when he
should quit his state of tutelage,[73] and who, from being under the
control of his governor, was to pass under his mother’s, then under
Albert de Luynes’, and lastly, under Richelieu’s, joined to rather
a fierce pride a true and just sense and exact knowledge of his
inferiority. He detested the yoke, but he felt that it was necessary.
Destined by his own incapacity to be for ever accomplishing the designs
of others, he submitted to constraint, although constantly disposed
to revolt. But he loved neither his mother, whom he discarded, nor De
Luynes, whose death he did not regret. Richelieu alone, not only by the
vast superiority of his genius, but especially by the obsequiousness of
his language, by incessant precautions, by continually new artifices of
humility, succeeded in seducing that unquiet and distrustful spirit,
over which flattery had no power.[74] He ended by even attaching the
King to himself, whatever may have been said about it, and by inspiring
in him an affection which was bestowed quite as much upon the man
as upon the indispensable Minister. Louis XIII. had the greatest
solicitude for Richelieu, and paid him the most delicate attentions;
and it can be affirmed, after a perusal of his letters, as yet
unpublished, that these marks of lively friendship were not merely the
result of self-interest.[75] Moreover, even when he was in possession
of supreme authority, Richelieu, ever on the alert, showed himself
to the last as studious in preserving it as he had been ingenious
and supple in acquiring it. His efforts were constantly exerted to
neutralize the influence of a Spanish Queen over a King whom he wished
to maintain in the glorious policy of Henri IV. But he did not content
himself with depriving the legitimate wife of his King of the whole of
her power, which was a matter of no difficulty. Although incapable of
criminal desires, since he could abstain from lawful pleasures, Louis
XIII., sickly and morose as he was, reaping from love only jealousy
and trouble, devoured by inquietudes and cares, had need of pouring
out his complaints, of exposing his griefs, of unbosoming himself to a
friendly heart, away from the pomp and noise which he fled. Richelieu
always directed this inclination; and if he subjugated the King’s mind
by the force of his own genius, if he fascinated him by the seductive
power of his words, he watched over all his actions by means of spies,
with whom he surrounded him, and governed even his soul through his
confessors.[76] When the Prince’s affections, “purely spiritual, and
enjoyments always chaste,” as says a contemporary, were bestowed on
instruments, indocile to the directions of the ruling Minister, the
latter knew how to conjure up scruples in the King’s mind, even for
these pure connections, and which triumphed over his inclinations. To
Madame de Hautefort succeeded, in the royal affections, Mademoiselle
de la Fayette, to her Cinq-Mars, and these three individuals, whose
relations with the King always continued perfectly irreproachable,
but who rebelled against Richelieu’s imperious will, expiated their
resistance--one in exile, another in a convent, and the third on the
scaffold.
If, then, it was true that Anne of Austria had, in 1630, committed
adultery in order to give an heir to her dying husband, how are we
to admit that a Minister so suspicious and vigilant would not have
been cognisant of it, and knowing it, would not, by informing the
convalescent King of this crime, have brought about the ruin of a
Queen whom he detested, and who, in union with Marie de Medicis, was
then plotting his downfall? It is in vain to object that a feeling of
propriety would have restrained the Cardinal:[77] he was incapable
of any such sentiment. Inflexible towards his enemies, because he
regarded them, with reason, as the enemies of the State, to unmask and
ruin them he employed a stubbornness and a persistence which nothing
could overcome. When it was necessary to persuade Louis XIII. of the
communication which the Queen kept up with Spain, the implacable
Minister could make the most minute search and put the most humiliating
questions. He could cause her dearest servants to be arrested; he could
confront her with spies; he could treat her as an obscure criminal; and
the admirable devotion of Madame de Hautefort[78] could alone enable
the Queen, very strongly suspected, but not entirely convicted, to
escape from this grave danger. And yet people desire to maintain that
Richelieu would have left Louis XIII. ignorant of a much greater crime,
and one which touched more immediately the King’s honour! Moreover,
where, when, how, and in what interest would this crime have been
committed? To conjectures and vague insinuations let us oppose positive
facts, which prove that Richelieu did not acquaint Louis XIII., because
Anne of Austria had never ceased to be innocent.
The King fell ill at Lyons, not during the early part of August, as
has been said, but on September 22, and here especially dates are of
the utmost importance.[79] He was seized with a fever, which consumed
him. The seventh day--the 29th--it was complicated by a dysentery,
which exhausted him. The attack of this last complaint, produced by
one of those medicines then much in vogue, was so violent, and its
consequences so rapid, that by midnight the doctors despaired of
saving him. Marie de Medicis had retired. Anne of Austria, who did not
leave the royal patient, resolved to have him warned by his confessor
of the danger he was in. But, at the first cautiously spoken words,
Louis XIII. conjured Father Suffren, and those who surrounded him, not
to hide the truth from him. He learned it with calmness and courage,
confessed, communicated, and asked pardon of all for any wrong he might
have done them; then, calling the Queen, he embraced her tenderly, and
addressed to her a touching farewell. As she retired on one side in
order to weep freely, the King prayed Father Suffren to go and find
her, and again beg her from him “to pardon him all the unpleasantnesses
he might have caused her the whole time of their married life.” He
afterwards conversed with Richelieu, and offered a spectacle of
the most edifying resignation. Towards the middle of the day, the
Archbishop of Lyons was preparing himself to bring in the extreme
unction, when the doctors, who had already bled this exhausted body
six times in succession, ordered a seventh bleeding.[80] But then the
true cause of the illness, which was unknown to them, was made clear;
an internal abscess broke, and nature saved the patient at the moment
when the intervention of his physicians promised to be fatal.[81] Louis
XIII., soon re-established in health, left Lyons with the Queen, who
did not cease to lavish on him the most tender cares, and whose sincere
grief had touched him. In this crisis the two spouses had forgotten
the past.[82] The repugnance and the coldness of the one, the wounded
pride of the other, had disappeared, and they were naturally led to
appreciate whatever goodness and amiability were to be found in each
other’s natures.[83]
Strong in the unaccustomed sway which she exercised, but exaggerating
its extent, Anne of Austria was not content with holding in the King’s
heart the place which properly belonged to her. Aided by the ambitious
and vindictive Marie de Medicis, after having occupied herself with
her griefs as a wife, she desired to extend her censure to affairs of
State, and to attack, in Richelieu, not only one who had kept alive
the mistrust of herself, who had called suspicion into existence, and
had separated King and Queen, mother and son, but also the stubborn
pursuer of the great policy of Henri IV., who maintained abroad the
pre-eminence of France over Spain, and the abasement of the House of
Austria. We know how Louis XIII., who was incapable of vast projects,
but who understood their value, was recalled by reasons of State to
Richelieu, and, on a famous day, confirmed his authority at the very
instant that it seemed annihilated.[84]
To what period are we to assign the commission of the fault resulting
in Anne’s pregnancy of January, 1631? It cannot have been on September
30, 1630, when Louis XIII.’s life was in danger, for the Queen was
delivered during the first five days of April, 1631.[85] Was it on the
arrival of Louis XIII. at Lyons, at the commencement of August, 1630?
But Anne of Austria did not then have the same interest in being a
mother, which, according to her accusers, she would have on September
30, when the King was dying. Either the child was still-born, or else
its conception dates from a period when Louis XIII. was its father. The
origin of this pregnancy is suspected because Richelieu, in a journal
attributed to him, and of which it has been said “that it lent to
Voltaire’s supposition rather a serious ground of argument,”[86] was
pleased to note the progress of the Queen’s condition, often sent to
inquire after her health, carried off her apothecary, then returned
him to her, forbade the Spanish ambassador to make too frequent visits
to the Louvre, and, in a word, exercised over Anne of Austria a
suspicious and unceasing vigilance. But if we admit the authenticity
of this journal, which, probable enough in certain details, is much
less so when taken as a whole, all the facts which it relates, the
espionage which it chronicles, the suspicions which it insinuates,
concern the Spaniard, irritated at Richelieu’s unexpected triumph and
dreaming of overthrowing him, not the guilty spouse whose crime it is
desired to prove. Accepting this last theory, why should Richelieu have
restored to the Queen the medical attendant who could have aided her
in concealing the consequences of her fault? Why was she not entirely
separated from all her confidants? Why were not the visits of the
Spanish ambassador altogether forbidden? Richelieu, it is true, caused
the Countess de Fargis to be dismissed. But it was only because she
had advised the Queen to espouse her brother-in-law, Gaston d’Orléans,
if she became a widow, because she had inflamed Anne of Austria’s
resentment, and because she was the soul of the opposition, of the
political intrigues, and of the secret plots against the Cardinal.
If everything in her long correspondence seized by the latter, and
existing in the archives,[87] justifies him for having exiled the
dangerous Countess, if we find in it traces of the hopes of the two
Queens, of the affections which bind them to Spain, of the successes
they desire, of the reverses they hope for, nothing can be discovered
that sullies Anne of Austria’s honour. The Countess de Fargis appears
in it as the active instigator of cabals, but not as the complacent
accomplice and the confidant of a crime.
The truth is that _enceinte_ for the third time, and fearing a third
accident, Anne of Austria did not wish the news of her condition to be
spread abroad, or to arouse in the minds of the people a hope which
the remembrance of the past rendered very uncertain of fulfilment.
That this pregnancy was due to the reconciliation arising from the
King’s illness, Richelieu himself attests, not as the doubtful author
of a journal which, however, does not contain a single line really
accusing the Queen, but as the indisputable writer of those innumerable
letters, papers, and authentic documents, which have passed from the
hands of the Duchess d’Aiguillon, his niece, into the archives of
the State.[88] “It is suspected, not without good reason, that the
Queen is _enceinte_,” he writes. “If this happiness befalls France,
it ought to receive it as a fruit of the blessing of God and of the
good understanding which has existed between the King and the Queen,
his wife, for some time past.”[89] The same care which Anne of Austria
took to conceal a third miscarriage, she had already shown with
regard to a second, which occurred March 16, 1622, and at that time
“they had hidden from the King as long as possible the destruction
of his hopes.”[90] But from the first day that Richelieu entered
upon power, nothing escaped the penetrating regard of the attentive
Minister. He watched, he observed, he knew everything. Every member
of the royal family was surrounded by some of his agents. If from
this incessant surveillance, and from the written evidence in which
it stands revealed, springs the proof that the Queen had coquetted
with Buckingham, been swayed by the counsels of the Duchess de
Chevreuse,[91] and faithful to the last recommendations of her father,
Philip III., had been always ready to support the Spanish interest near
the King; if, in a word, Richelieu represents her as a Queen but little
French, he never insinuates that she has been a guilty spouse; and
history can scarcely hope to be better informed, and certainly ought
not to show itself more rigorous than the clear-sighted and pitiless
Minister.
FOOTNOTES:
[46] _Les Mariages espagnols sous le règne d’Henri IV. et la Régence de
Marie de Medicis_, by M. Perrens, Professor at the Lycée Bonaparte.
[47] Manuscripts of the Imperial Library, _fonds Harlay_, 228, Nos. 14,
15; Court of Spain, Embassy of M. de Vaucellas, already quoted by M.
Armand Baschet in his amusing work, very rich in rare documents, _Le
Roi chez la Reine_.
[48] The Infanta Maria, married to Ferdinand III., King of Hungary,
afterwards Emperor.
[49] Despatch from M. de Vaucellas, November 20, 1610. Manuscripts
quoted above.
[50] _Mercure Français_, vol. ii. p. 549.
[51] Manuscripts of the Imperial Library, _fonds Dupuy_, 76, p. 145,
and Archives of the Château of Mouchy-Noailles, No. 1706. _Mariages des
Rois et Reines_, by M. Baschet in his book already quoted.
[52] _Journal de Jean Héroard sur l’Enfance et la Jeunesse de Louis
XIII._ Manuscripts of the Imperial Library. It has just been published
by Didot, having been edited by MM. Eud. de Soulié and Ed. de
Barthélemy, with an intelligence, a carefulness, and an erudition on
which they cannot be too strongly felicitated.
[53] _Journal d’Héroard_, November 3, 1604, and March 2, 1605.
[54] _Ibid._, April 4, 1605.
[55] _Ibid._, January 29, 1607.
[56] Marguerite de Navarre.
[57] _Journal d’Héroard_, _passim_.
[58] _Ibid._, June 9, 1604, and October 21, 1608.
[59] “Ha!” he said, when he was told of Ravaillac’s act, “if I had been
there with my sword, I would have killed him.”--_Journal d’Héroard_,
May 14, 1610.
[60] Another day, November 14, 1611, he proceeded to St. Germain. “He
went there to visit his brother, who was ill of an _endormissement_,
accompanied with slight convulsions. He awoke, and Louis XIII. said to
him, ‘Bonsoir, mon frère.’ He replied, ‘Bonsoir, _mon petit papa_.’ At
these words Louis XIII. commenced to weep, went away, and was not seen
for the whole of the day.”--_Journal d’Héroard_, Nov. 14, 1611.
[61] _Mémoires du Maréchal de Bassompierre.--Journal d’Héroard._
[62] Despatch from the ambassador of the Grand Duke of Tuscany,
Matteo Bartolini, December 4, 1615, quoted by M. A. Baschet. _Journal
d’Héroard_, November 21, 1615.
[63] _Journal d’Héroard_, November 25, 1615.
[64] Despatch of the Nuncio Bentivoglio, January 30, 1619.
[65] _Ibid._, January 16, 1619.
[66] Despatch of Contarini, ambassador from Venice, Jan. 27, 1619.
[67] Despatches of the Nuncio Bentivoglio, vol. i. pp. 157, 240, 300;
and vol. ii. pp. 10, 31, 39, 40, 44, 80, 82, and 84. Despatch of
Bentivoglio, January 30, 1619. See also despatches from the Venetian
ambassador, January 27, and February 5, 1619; the _Journal d’Héroard_,
January 25, 1619; Letter from Father Joseph to the Minister of Spain,
February 14, 1619; and, lastly, the _Mémoires de Bassompierre_, vol.
ii. p. 147.
[68] To the causes of Louis XIII.’s reserve, which we have just cited,
may be added another, which the duty of not omitting anything causes
us to indicate. According to the _Rélation de Don Fernando Giron_
(Archives of Simancas), Louis XIII. held aloof from Anne of Austria
“because he had been persuaded that if he had a son, while yet so
young, it would cause a civil war in the kingdom.” Nothing, however,
confirms this supposition, or renders it likely.
[69] Despatch of the Nuncio Bentivoglio, December 4, 1619.
[70] _Mémoires de Bassompierre_, confirmed by the _Journal d’Héroard_,
March 26, 1622.
[71] _Journal d’Héroard_, _passim_, and especially June 8, and August
21, 1626.
[72] _Ibid._, May 10, 1621.
[73] “He was playing with some little balls, rolling them along his
taper stand, and calling them soldiers. M. de Souvré reproved him,
and told him that he was always amusing himself at childish games.
‘But, Monsieur de Souvré, these are soldiers; this is not a child’s
game!’ ‘Sir, you will always be a child.’ ‘It is you who keep me
one!’”--_Journal d’Héroard_, February 21, 1610.
[74] Several facts cited by Héroard prove that Louis XIII. was not at
all sensible to flattery. (See particularly Oct 8, and Dec. 3, 1610.)
[75] Archives of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Manuscripts. Original
Letters of Louis XIII. Section France, 5.
[76] Archives of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Manuscripts. Section
France, vol. lxxxviii. fol. 99, and lxxxix. fols. 3, 23, 67, 78, and
103.
[77] M. Michelet indicates another motive which it is only necessary to
cite in order to show its improbability. “Richelieu,” he says, “trusted
in the weakness of the Queen’s nature, and, consequently, that one day
or other she would be involved in some embarrassment or thoughtlessness
which would leave her at his mercy.”
[78] _Mémoires de La Porte_, p. 370.
[79] Letter from Richelieu to Marshal de Schonberg, September 25,
1630; Letter from Father Suffren, Louis XIII.’s confessor, to Father
Jacquinot, October 1, 1630.
[80] Letter from Father Suffren, already quoted. In one year Bouvart,
Louis XIII.’s doctor, had him bled 47 times, made him take 212
medicines and 215 injections.--_Archives Curieuses de l’Histoire de
France_, by Cimber and Danjou, 2nd series, vol. v. p. 63.
[81] Letter from Richelieu to Schonberg, September 30, 1630; Letter
from Richelieu to d’Effiat, October 1, 1630.--_Mémoires de Richelieu_,
book xi. vol vi. p. 296. Letter from Father Suffren, already quoted.
[82] A similar and as perfect return of lively affection and reciprocal
tenderness was produced anew on the occasion of the illness of
February, 1643, to which Louis XIII. succumbed. See the _Mémoire fidèle
des choses qui se sont passées à la mort de Louis XIII._, written by
Dubois, his valet-de-chambre. The ingenuousness and the precision in
details which it exhibits does not permit us to doubt the exactitude
and authenticity of this account. See also Archives of the Ministry of
Foreign Affairs: _Mémoires Manuscrits de Lamothe-Goulas, Secrétaire des
Commandements du Duc d’Orléans_, vol. ii. p. 368.
[83] Archives of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs: _Mémoires Manuscrits
de Lamothe-Goulas, Secrétaire des Commandements du Duc d’Orléans_, vol.
ii. p. 367.
[84] November 11, 1630--known in French history as “the Day of the
Dupes”--when the Duke de Saint-Simon, father of the famous memoir
writer, brought about a secret interview between Richelieu, who, in
disgrace, was on the eve of retiring to Havre, and Louis XIII., then at
his hunting-seat of Versailles. At the moment when every one believed
the downfall of the once all-powerful Minister to be complete, the
latter succeeded in recovering his lost influence over the King, of
which he had been deprived through the intrigues of Marie de Medicis,
who had demanded of her son whether he was “so unnatural as to prefer a
valet to his mother.” Richelieu, when firmly reinstated in power, did
not spare the queen-mother’s partisans, upon several of whom he avenged
himself with his accustomed severity.--_Trans._
[85] This date is given in Richelieu’s Journal, of which we are about
to speak.
[86] M. Jules Loiseleur, _Revue Contemporaine_, of July 31, 1867, p.
223. This Journal has been published in the _Archives Curieuses de
l’Histoire de France_, of Cimber and Danjou, 2nd series, vol. v.
[87] Imperial Library. Manuscripts, _ancien fonds Français_, No. 9241.
[88] _Lettres et Papiers de Richelieu_, published in the collection of
_Documents inédits de l’Histoire de France_, by M. Avenel, Conservator
of the Bibliothèque Sainte-Geneviève, with a profound knowledge of the
period with which he is concerned, and an exactitude, an intelligence
and a care for which one cannot too highly praise him.
[89] _Lettres et Papiers de Richelieu_, vol. iv. p. 115.
[90] _Mémoires de Bassompierre._
[91] Marie de Rohan, Duchess de Chevreuse, who possessed so great an
influence over Anne of Austria, was the daughter of Hercule de Rohan,
Duke de Montbazon, Governor of Paris, and one of the first noblemen
of France. In 1617, she espoused Albert de Luynes, favourite of Louis
XIII., who on the occasion of the marriage created his confidant a duke
and appointed his wife Superintendent of the Queen’s Household. Shortly
after the death of her husband, in 1621, from fever caught at the siege
of Montauban, she married Claude de Lorraine, Duke de Chevreuse, the
son of that Duke de Guise whom Henry III. caused to be assassinated at
Blois. The Duchess de Chevreuse was a charming and beautiful woman,
gifted with extraordinary powers of intellect and proud of her high
lineage, but incorrigibly given to intrigue.--_Trans._