Chapter II

The Education of Louis XIV.--Manners--Poverty--Charity--Vincent

de Paul, a Secret Society--Marriage of Louis XIV.--His Arrival

at Power, on the Death of Mazarin--He Re-educates himself.

The remembrance of the Fronde was destined to remain a heavy weight

during the remainder of the reign of Louis XIV. Its shadow dominated for

more than half a century interior politics and decided the fate, good

and bad, of the great families.

The word "Liberty" had become synonymous with "Licence, Confusion,

Disorder,"[35] and the ancient Frondeurs passed the remainder of their

lives in disgrace, or at least in disfavour. The Grande Mademoiselle was

never pardoned, although she did not wish to avow this, even to herself.

She might have realised the fact at once upon her return to Court, if

she had not decided to believe the contrary. Warnings were not wanting.

The first was her encounter with the Queen Mother in the field of Sedan.

When Anne of Austria saw arrive to sound of trumpets, with manner at

ease and triumphant, this insolent Princess who had drawn her cannon

upon the King, hardly embracing her niece, the Queen Mother burst into

reproaches, and declared that after the battle of Saint-Antoine, "if she

had held her, she would have strangled her."[36] Mademoiselle wept; the

Court looked on. "I have forgotten everything," said the Queen at

length, and her niece was eager to believe her. The meeting with the

King was still more significant. He arrived on horseback, soaked and

muddy, from the city of Montmedy, taken that same day from the Spaniards

(August 7, 1657).

His mother said to him, "Behold a young lady, whom I present to you and

who is very sorry to have been so naughty; she will be 'very good' in

future." The young King only laughed and replied by talking of the siege

of Montmedy.

Mademoiselle nevertheless departed from Sedan filled with joyous

thoughts. She imagined reading in all eyes the news of marriage with the

brother of the King, the little Monsieur. He was seventeen, she thirty,

with hair already partially white.

Some months ensued, passed in a half retreat, and the Grande

Mademoiselle remained with the Court during the years of transition in

which the personal government of Louis XIV. was maturing. A new regime

was being born and a new world with it.

One could gradually see this new formation relegating to the shadow of

the past the old spirit of independence, and stifling the confused

aspirations of the country towards any legal liberties. Mazarin

incarnated this great political movement. On the eve of disappearance,

this unpopular minister had become all France.

He was master; no one thought any longer of resisting him; but he was

always detested, never admired. France having at this date neither

journals nor parliamentary debates, the foreign policy of Mazarin, which

in our eyes did him so much honour, remained very little known even at

Paris. This explains why his glory has been in large part posthumous. It

has increased in measure as it has been possible to judge of his entire

policy, from documents contained in our national archives or in those of

other countries. His correspondence displays so fine a diplomatic

genius, that the historians have turned aside from the evil side of the

man, his littlenesses, in order to give full weight to his services as

minister. Precisely a contrary course had been taken in the seventeenth

century. Little besides the Cardinal's defects, open to all eyes, were

realised. Bad fortune had redoubled his rapacity. Mazarin had guarded in

his heart the experience of poverty at the time in which he was expelled

from the kingdom. He had sworn to himself that he would not again be

taken without "ammunition." He had worked industriously since his return

in putting aside millions in safe keeping. Everything aided him in

raising this kind of war treasure. He sold high functions of State, and

also those belonging to low degree, even to that of laundress to the

Queen. He shared the benefits with the corsairs to whom he gave letters

of marque. He undertook contracts for public service, pocketed the

money, left our ambassadors without salaries, our vessels and

fortifications without means of subsistence. The army was crying with

hunger and thirst as soon as he made himself its sutler and its

commissariat. He furnished bread of diminished purity and even found

means, said the courtiers, to make the soldiers, so rarely paid

themselves, pay for the water they drank. Turenne once broke up his

plate to distribute the pieces to his troops, who were perishing from

want.

Comical scenes mingled with these tragic ones. Bussy-Rabutin, who served

in the army of Turenne, had been fortunate at play. The Cardinal had

learned of this, and ordered it to be represented to Bussy that his pay

which had been pledged in the game would be guarded by the Cardinal as

his portion of the gain. He had extended his traffic into the royal

palace. It was he who furnished furniture and utensils. He undertook to

provide the Court mourning, and costumes for the fetes: when the King

danced a ballet, his first minister gained by the decorations and

accessories. The housekeeping accounts passed through his hands. During

the campaign of 1658, he suppressed the King's cook, in order to

appropriate to himself what the table would have cost. Louis XIV. was

forced to invite himself to dine with this one and that one. Mazarin

touched even his pocket money and the young King permitted it with a

patience which was a constant source of astonishment to the courtiers.

His mother was neither better treated nor less submissive.

The Cardinal was as jealous of his authority as of his money. The King

had no voice in his council; when he accorded a pardon, however trivial,

his first minister revoked it, "scolding him like a schoolboy."[37]

It was said of the Queen Mother that her influence was only worth a

hundred crowns, and she agreed. Still more, she was scolded from morning

till night. Age had rendered Mazarin insupportable. He had no delicacy

with the King, still less with the King's mother: the courtiers shrugged

their shoulders in hearing him speak to Anne of Austria "as to a

chambermaid."[38]

The Queen was not insensible to this rudeness. She confessed to the

faithful Motteville "that the Cardinal had become so bad tempered and so

avaricious that she did not know how in the future it was going to be

possible to live with him." But it did not seem to occur to her that it

might be possible to live without the Cardinal. Can it be believed that

Anne of Austria and Mazarin were married, as La Palatine,[39] mother of

the Regent, asserted? As they gradually grew old, one is tempted to

believe it, so strongly the spectacle offered by these illustrious

persons, he so disagreeable, she so submissive, gives the impression

of two destinies "united together," according to the expression of the

Cardinal himself,[40] "by bonds which could not be broken." The question

to be solved is, could Mazarin marry? According to tradition he was not

a priest. According to the Euridite that point is open to

discussion.[41] Until this matter is fixed, the marriage of Anne of

Austria with her minister will remain among historical enigmas, for

everything said will be words in the air.

PRIERE DU ROY.

Jesus-Christ Roy du Ciel et de la Terre, ie vous adore et

reconnois pour le Roy des Roys. C'est de vostre Majeste Diuine

que ie tiens ma Couronne: mon Dieu ie vous l'offre, pour la

Gloire de la tres Saincte Trinite, et pour l'honneur de la

Reine des Agnes la Sacree Vierge Marie que iay choisy pour ma

Protectrice, et des Estats que vous m'auez donne; Seigneur

baillez moy vostre crainte et une si grande Sagesse et

humilite, que ie puisse deuenir un homme selon vostre coeur; en

sorte que ie merite efficacement le tiltre aimable de Louis

Dieu donne le Pacifique pour maintenir vostre Peuple en Paix,

afin qu'il vous serve avec tranquilite, et l'acomplissement de

toutes les Vertus.

VOEU ET PRIERE DES PEUPLES POUR LE ROY.

Adorable Redempteur Jesus-Christ, qui estes le distributeur des

Couronnes, receuez la piete du Roy tres-Crestien, et exaucez

ses Prieres respectueses faites par l'entremise de vostre

Saincte Mere Vierge, que linfluence des Graces du St. Esprit

luy soit donnee, afin croissant en aage, it croisse aussi en

telle Sagesse, qu'il puisse maintenir vostre peuple in Paix,

pour mieux obseruer vos saincts commandemens.

(Translation of the above.)

PRAYER OF THE KING.

Jesus Christ, King of the Heavens and the Earth, I adore Thee

and recognize Thee for the King of Kings, the divine majesty

from whom I receive my crown, which I offer to Thee for the

Glory of the Most Holy Trinity, and for the honor of the Queen

of Angels, the blessed Virgin Mary, whom I have chosen as my

Protector, and also of the States which Thou hast given me.

Lord grant me due reverence and that I may possess so much

wisdom and humility that I may become a man after Thine own

heart, so that I may truly merit the title of the Beloved

Louis, the God-given and peaceful, and be able to maintain Thy

people in peace that they may live in tranquillity and

virtuously serve Thee.

VOW AND PRAYER OF THE PEOPLE.

Adorable Redeemer Jesus Christ; who art the giver of crowns;

regard the piety of the most Christian King and listen to his

prayers for the intervention of the most blessed Mother Virgin;

and grant that the influence of the Holy Spirit may so be

poured out upon him that as he increases in years he may also

grow in wisdom; and that he may keep Thy people in peace that

they may better be able to preserve Thy commands.

[Illustration: =LOUIS XIV. AS A BOY, DEDICATING HIS CROWN= After the

painting by Greg Huret]

The patience of Louis XIV. can only be explained by his entire bringing

up and by the state of mind which had been its fruit.

Louis's cradle had been surrounded by a crowd of servitors charged to

watch over his least movement. His mother adored him and, for a queen,

occupied herself much with him. Nevertheless, there could hardly a child

be found throughout the entire kingdom so badly cared for as the son of

the King.

Louis XIV. had never forgotten this neglect and spoke of it all his life

with bitterness.

"The King always surprises me," relates Mme. de Maintenon at Saint Cyr,

"when he speaks to me of his education. His governesses gossiped the

entire day, and left him in the hands of their maids without paying any

attention to the young Prince." The maids abandoned him to his own

devices and he was once found in the basin of the fountain in the Palais

Royal. One of his greatest pleasures was to prowl in the kitchens with

his brother, the little Monsieur. "He ate everything he could lay his

hands on without paying attention to its healthfulness. If they were

frying an omelette, he would break off a piece, which he and Monsieur

devoured in some corner."[42] One day when the two little Princes thus

put their fingers into the prepared dishes, the cooks impatiently drove

them away with blows from dishcloths. He played with any one. "His most

frequent companion," again relates Mme. de Maintenon, "was the daughter

of the Queen's own maid." When he was withdrawn from such surroundings,

to be led to his mother, or to figure in some ceremony, he appeared a

bashful boy who looked at people with embarrassment without knowing what

to say, and who cruelly suffered from this shyness.

One day after they had given him a lesson, his timidity prevented him

from remembering the right words and he burst into tears with rage and

anger. The King of France to make a fool of himself!

At five and a half years, they gave him a tutor and many masters,[43]

but he learned nothing. Mazarin for reasons known to himself would not

force him to work; and circumstances favoured the views of the first

minister. The Fronde came, and rendered any study impossible on account

of the complete upsetting of the daily life of the Court of France,

which was only encamped when it was not actually on the move. Louis XIV.

was fourteen at the date of the reinstallation of the Court at the

Louvre and there was no question of making him recover the lost time; he

thenceforth passed his days in hunting, in studying steps for the

ballet, and in amusing himself with the nieces of the Cardinal. The

political world believed that it divined the reason for this limited

education and severely expressed its opinion about it. "The King," wrote

the Ambassador from Venice,[44] "applies himself the entire day to

learning the ballet.... Games, dances, and comedies are the only

subjects of conversation with the King, the intention being to turn him

aside from affairs more solid and important." The Ambassador returns to

the same subject upon the occasion of an Italian opera,[45] in which the

King exhibited himself as Apollo surrounded by beautiful persons

representing the nine muses:

Certain people blame this affair, but these do not understand the

politics of the Cardinal, who keeps the King expressly occupied

with pastimes, in order to turn his attention from solid and

important pursuits, and whilst the King is concerned in rolling

machines of wood upon the stage, the Cardinal moves and rolls at

his good pleasure, upon the theatre of France, all the machines of

state.

Some few observers, of whom Mazarin himself was one, divined that this

youth, with his air of being absorbed in tomfooleries, secretly

reflected upon his profession of King, and upon the means of rendering

himself capable of sustaining it. Nature had endowed him with the

instinct of command, joined to a very lively sentiment of the duties of

his rank. Louis says in his _Memoires_, "even from infancy the names

alone of the kings _faineants_ and mayors of the palace gave me pain if

pronounced in my presence."[46]

His preceptor, the Abbe of Perefixe, had encouraged this sentiment, at

the same time, however, permitting his pupil, by a contradiction for

which perhaps he was not responsible, to take the road which leads in

the direction of idleness, and thus making it possible for Louis to

become a true King _faineant_ himself.

Perefixe had written for the young King a history of King Henry the

Great in which one reads

that royalty is not the trade of a do-nothing, that it consists

almost entirely of action, that a King should make a pleasure

of his duty, that his enjoyment should be in reigning and he

only should know how to reign, that is, he should himself hold

the helm of the state. His glory is interested in this.

In truth, who does not know that there can be no honour in bearing

a title whose functions one does not fulfil--

a doctrine which would suppress the first ministers and by which Louis

XIV. profited later.

Chance came to the aid of the preceptor. On June 19, 1651, the ancient

governess of the King, Mme. de Lansac, disturbed him in the midst of a

lesson, in order to make a gift of "three letters written by Catherine

de Medicis to Henry III.,[47] her son, for his edification." Perefixe

took the letters and read them aloud, the King listening "with much

attention." One of them was almost a memorial.[48] In it, Catherine gave

to her son the same precept as Perefixe to his pupil: "a king must

reign," that is to say, carry out the functions belonging to his title.

In order to "reign," one must begin to work at once upon awakening, read

all the dispatches and afterwards the replies, speak personally to the

agents, receive every morning accounts of receipts and expenditures;

pursue this course from morning till night, and every day of one's life.

It was the programme for a slave to power. Louis XIV. made it his own,

in the bottom of his soul; he was not yet thirteen.

Such beautiful resolutions however, were destined to remain dead so long

as Mazarin lived. They could only be executed to the detriment of his

authority, and the idea of entering into a struggle with the Cardinal

was repugnant to the young King, partially on account of old affection,

partially on account of timidity and the habit of obedience.

The mind of Louis XIV. had however been awakened and the fruits of this

awakening were later visible, but for a time he was content to find good

excuses for leaving affairs alone. He explains in his _Memoires_ that he

was arrested by political reasons; as he had too much experience also

(however strange this word may appear when applied to a child so

foolishly brought up) not to realise the danger of a revolution in the

royal palace in the present condition of France after the devastations

of the civil wars.

In default of the science which one draws from books, Louis XIV. had

received lessons in realities from the Fronde: The riots and barricades,

the vehement discourse of the Parliament to his mother, the humiliating

flights with the Court, the periods of poverty in which his servants had

no dinner and he himself slept with his sheets full of holes, and wore

clothes too short, the battles in which his subjects fired upon him, the

treasons of his relations and of his nobility and their shameful

bargains; nothing of all this had been lost upon the young King.

With a surface order re-established, he perceived how troubled the

situation remained at bottom, how precarious, and he judged it prudent

to defer what he both "wished" and "feared," says very clearly his

_Memoires_. He queries if this were an error:

It is necessary [says he] to represent to one's self the state

of affairs: Agitations throughout the entire kingdom were at

their height; a foreign war continued in which a thousand

advantages had been lost to France owing to these domestic

troubles; a Prince of my own blood and a very great name at the

head of my enemies; many cabals in the state; the Parliaments

still in possession of usurped authority; in my own Court very

little of either fidelity or interest, and above all my

subjects, apparently the most submissive, were as great a care

and as much to be suspected as those most openly rebellious.

Was this the moment in which to expose the country to new shocks?

Louis XIV. had remained convinced[49] to the contrary, avowing, however,

that he had much to criticise in the fashions of Mazarin,

a minister [pursued he] re-established in spite of so many

factions, very able, very adroit, who loved me and whom I

loved, and who had rendered me great services, but whose

thoughts and manners were naturally very different from mine,

and whom I could not always contradict nor discredit without

anew exciting, by that image, however erroneous, of disgrace,

the same tempests which had been so difficult to calm.

The King had also to take into consideration his own extreme youth, and

his ignorance of affairs. He relates in regard to this point his ardent

desire for glory, his fear of beginning ill, "for one can never retrieve

one's self"; his attention to the course of events "in secret and

without a confidant"; his joy when he discovered that people both able

and consummate shared his fashion of thinking.

Considering everything, had there ever been a being urged forward and

retarded so equally, in his design to take upon himself "the guidance of

the state"?

This curious page has no other defect than that of having been dictated

by a man matured, in whose thoughts things have taken a clearness not

existing in the mind of the youth, and who believes himself to recollect

"determinations" when there existed in reality only "desires."

Louis XIV. would be unpardonable if full credit were given to his

_Memoires_. Why, if he saw so clearly, did he grumble at any kind of

work? When Louis was sixteen, Mazarin had arranged with him some days in

which he might be present at a council. The King was bored and retired

to talk of the next ballet and to play the guitar with his intimates.

Mazarin was obliged to scold him to force him to return and remain at

the council.

With a capacity for trifling, he cared for nothing serious, and there

was much laziness contained in his resolution to leave all to his

minister. The Court had formed its own opinion: it considered the young

King incapable of application. It was also said that he lacked

intelligence, and in this belief there was no error. Louis himself

alluded to this and said with simplicity, "I am very stupid."

The libertine youth who surrounded him, and whom his solemn air

restrained, did not conceal the fact that they found him a great bore,

as probably did also Madame de Maintenon a half-century later. The

Guiche and the Vardes believed him doomed to insignificance and did not

trouble themselves much about him. The city was less convinced that he

was a cipher, perhaps because otherwise it could not so easily have

taken his part. Paris was commencing to fear those princes with whom,

for one reason or another, first ministers were necessary, and the

Parisian bourgeoisie was on the watch for some proof of intelligence in

the young monarch. "It is said that the mind of the King is awakening,"

wrote Guy Patin in 1654; "God be thanked!"

This first light not having an apparent development, Paris, whilst

waiting for something better, admired the looks of the sovereign. "I

have to-day seen the King on his way to the chase," again wrote Guy

Patin four years later. "A fine Prince, strong and healthy; he is tall

and graceful; it is a pity that he does not better understand his

duties."[50] His serious air was also lauded, his dislike to debauchery

in any form, and the modesty which made him bravely reply before the

entire Court, to a question about a new play: "I never judge a subject

about which I know nothing."[51]

This was not the response of a fool.

In fine, as he was very cold, very capable of dissimulation, as he spoke

little, through calculation as much as through instinct, and generally

confined his conversation to trifles, this youth upon whom all France

had its eyes fixed remained an unknown quantity to his subjects.

In September, 1657, two strangers crossing the Pont Neuf found

themselves in the midst of a pressure of people. The crowd precipitated

itself with cries of joy towards a carriage whose livery had been

recognised.

It was the Grande Mademoiselle returning from exile, and coming to take

possession of the palace of the Luxembourg, in which her father

permitted her to lodge, feeling certain that he himself should never

return to it. The two strangers noted in their _Journal de Voyage_[52]

that the Parisians bore a "particular affection" for this Princess,

because she had behaved like a "true amazon" during the civil war.

The Court had resigned itself to the inevitable. Mademoiselle had

remained popular in Paris, and her exploits during the Fronde and her

fine bearing at the head of her regiment were remembered with

enthusiasm. She only passed through the city at this time, having

affairs to regulate in the Provinces. Upon her definite return on

December 31st, the Court and the city crowded to see her. The Luxembourg

overflowed during several days, after which, when society had convinced

itself that Mademoiselle had no longer a face "fresh as a fully blown

rose,"[53] its curiosity was satisfied and it occupied itself with

something else.

[Illustration: =LOUIS XIV. AS A YOUNG MAN= From a chalk drawing in the

British Museum Print Room]

Mademoiselle herself had much to do. The idea of marrying the little

Monsieur had not left her mind since the meeting at Sedan. She was

assured that the Prince was dying of desire for her, and Mademoiselle

naively responded that she very well perceived this. "This does not

displease me," adds she; "a young Prince, handsome, well-made, brother

of the King, appears a good match."

In expectation of the betrothal, she stopped her pursuits of the happy

interval at Saint-Fargeau in which she had loved intellectual pleasures,

in order to make herself the comrade of a child only absorbed in

pastimes belonging to his age, and passed the winter in dancing, in

masquerading, in rushing through the promenades and the booths of the

fair of Saint-Germain.[54]

The public remarked that the little Monsieur appeared "not very gay"

with his tall cousin, and troubled himself but little to entertain

her,[55] and that he would have preferred other companions better suited

to his seventeen years.

Mademoiselle did not perceive this. Philip, Duke of Anjou, had a face of

insipid beauty posed upon a little round body. He did not lack _esprit_,

had not an evil disposition, and would have made an amiable prince if

reasons of state had not tended to reduce him to the condition of a

marionette.

His mother and Mazarin had brought him up as a girl, for fear of his

later troubling his elder brother, and this education had only too well

succeeded. By means of sending him to play with the future Abbe de

Choisy, who put on a robe and patches to receive him; by means of having

him dressed and barbered by the Queen's maids of honour and putting him

in petticoats and occupying him with dolls, he had been made an

ambiguous being, a species of defective girl having only the weaknesses

of his own sex. Monsieur had a new coat every day and it worried him to

spot it, and to be seen with his hair undressed or in profile when he

believed himself handsomer in full face. Paris possessed no greater

gossip; he babbled, he meddled, he embroiled people by repeating

everything, and this amused him.

Mademoiselle considered it her duty to "preach" to him of "noble deeds,"

but she wasted her time. He was laziness and weakness itself. The two

cousins were ill-adapted to each other in every way.

When they entered a salon together, Monsieur short and full, attired in

the costume of a hunter, his garments sewed from head to foot with

precious stones, Mademoiselle a little masculine of figure and manner

and negligent in her dress, they were a singular couple. Those who did

not know them opened their eyes wide, and they were often seen together

in the winter at least, for the society was at this date most mixed,

even in the most elite circles.

From Epiphany to Ash-Wednesday, the Parisians had no greater pleasure

than to promenade masked at night, and to enter without invitation into

any house where an entertainment was taking place. Louis XIV. gladly

joined in these gaieties. Upon one evening of Mardi-Gras, when he was

thus running the streets with Mademoiselle, they met Monsieur dressed as

a girl with blond hair.[56] Keepers of inns sent their guests to profit

by this chance of free entry. A young Dutchman related that he went the

same night "with those of his inn" to five great balls, the first at the

house of Mme. de Villeroy, the last with the Duchess of Valentinois, and

that he had seen at each place more than two hundred masks.[57]

The crowd would not permit that entrance should be refused on any

pretext.

The same Dutchman reports with a note of bitterness that on another

evening it had been impossible to penetrate into the house of the

Marechal de l'Hopital, because the King being there, measures had been

taken to avoid too great a crowd. Custom obliged every one to submit to

receiving society, choice or not. At a grand fete given by the Duc de

Lesdiguieres, which in the bottom of his heart he was offering to Mme.

de Sevigne, "The King had hardly departed when the crowd commenced to

scuffle and to pillage every thing, until, as it was stated, it became

necessary to replace the candles of the chandeliers four or five times

and this single article cost M. de Lesdiguieres more than a hundred

pistoles."[58]

Such domestic manners had the encouragement of the King, who also left

his doors open upon the evenings on which he danced a ballet. He did

better still. He went officially to sup "with the Sieur de la

Baziniere," ancient lackey become financier and millionaire, and having

the bearing, the manners, and the ribbon cascades of the Marquis de

Mascarille. He desired that Mademoiselle should invite to the

Luxembourg, Mme. de l'Hopital, ancient laundress married twice for her

beautiful eyes; the first time by a _partisan_, the second by a Marshal

of France. These lessons were not lost upon the nobility. Mesalliances

were no more discredited, even the lowest, the most shameful, provided

that the dot was sufficient. A Duke and Peer had married the daughter of

an old charioteer. The Marechal d'Estrees was the son-in-law of a

_partisan_ known under the name of Morin the Jew. Many others could be

cited, for the tendency increased from year to year.

In 1665, the King having entered Parliament,[59] in order to confirm an

edict, a group of men amongst whom was Olivier d'Ormesson were regarding

the Tribune in which were seated the ladies of the Court. Some one

thought of counting how many of these were daughters of parvenues or of

business men; he found three out of six. Two others were nieces of

Mazarin, married to French nobles.[60] The single one of aristocratic

descent was Mlle. d'Alencon, a half-sister of the Grande Mademoiselle.

One could hardly have anticipated such figures, even allowing for

chance.

The King, however, approved of this state of affairs and the nobility

was ruined; every one seized on what support he could. The general

course of affairs was favourable to this confusion of rank. From the

triumphal re-entry of Mazarin in 1653, until his death in 1661, a kind

of universal freedom continued at the Court which surprised the ancient

Frondeurs on their return from exile. The young monarch himself

encouraged familiarities and lack of etiquette.

It was the nieces of the Cardinal who were largely responsible for these

changes in manners and who gained their own profit through the

additional freedom, since Marie, the third of the Mancini, was soon to

almost touch the crown with the tip of her finger. Mademoiselle had some

trouble in accustoming herself to the new manners towards the King.

For me [says she], brought up to have great respect, this is

most astonishing, and I have remained long time without

habituating myself to this new freedom. But when I saw how

others acted, when the Queen told me one day that the

King hated ceremony, then I yielded; for without this high

authority the faults of manner could not be possible with others.

The pompous Louis XIV. wearing the great wig of the portraits did not

yet exist, and the Louvre of 1658 but little resembled the particular

and formal Versailles of the time of Saint-Simon.[61]

The licence extended to morals. Numbers of women of rank behaved badly,

some incurred the suspicion of venality, and no faults were novelties;

but vice keeps low company and it was this result which proud people

like Mademoiselle could not suffer.

When it was related to her that the Duchesse de Chatillon, daughter of

Montmorency-Boutteville, had received money from the Abbe Foucquet[62]

and wiped out the debt by permitting such lackey-like jokes as breaking

her mirrors with blows of the foot, she was revolted. "It is a strange

thing," wrote she, "this difference of time; who would have said to the

Admiral Coligny, 'The wife of your grandson will be maltreated by the

Abbe Foucquet'?--he would not have believed it, and there was no mention

at all of this name of Foucquet in his time."

In the mind of Mademoiselle, who had lived through so many periods, it

was the low birth of the Abbe which would have affected the Admiral.

"Whatever may be said," added she, "I can never believe that persons of

quality abandon themselves to the point which their slanderers say. For

even if they did not consider their own safety, worldly honour is in my

opinion so beautiful a thing that I do not comprehend how any one can

despise it."

Mademoiselle did not transgress upon the respect due to the hierarchy of

rank; for the rest, she contented herself with what are called the

morals of respectable people, which have always been sufficiently

lenient. She understood, however, all the difference between this

morality and Christian principles.

The _Provinciales_ (1656) had made it clear to the blindest that it was

necessary to choose between the two. Mademoiselle had under this

influence made a visit to Port Royal des Champs[63] and had been

entirely won by these "admirable people" who lived like saints and who

spoke and wrote "the finest eloquence," while the Jesuits would have

done better to remain silent, "having nothing good to say and saying it

very badly," "for assuredly there were never fewer preachers amongst

them than at present nor fewer good writers, as appears by their

letters. This is why for all sorts of reasons they would have done

better not to write."

Seeing Mademoiselle so favourably impressed, one of the Monsieurs of

Port Royal, Arnauld d'Andilly, said upon her departure, "You are going

to the Court; you can give to the Queen account of what you have

seen."--"I assure you that I will willingly do this."

Knowing her disposition, there is but little doubt that she kept her

word; but this was all. The worthy Mademoiselle, incapable of anything

low or base, did not dream for a second of allowing the austere

morality, ill fitted for the needs of a court, to intervene in

influencing her judgments upon others, or in the choice of her friends.

She blamed the Duchesse de Chatillon for reasons with which virtue,

properly named, had nothing to do. We see her soon after meeting Mme. de

Montespan, because common morality has nothing to blame in a King's

mistress.

Mme. de Sevigne agreed with Mademoiselle and they were not alone. This

attitude gave a kind of revenge to the Jesuits.

Tastes became as common as sentiments; those of the King were not yet

formed, and the pleasure taken in the ballet in the theatre of the

Louvre injured the taste for what was, in fact, no longer tragedy.

Corneille had given up writing for the first time in 1652, after the

failure of his _Pertharite_. The following year, Quinault made his debut

and pleased. He taught in his tragi-comedies, flowery and tender, that

"Love makes everything permissible," which had been said by Honore

d'Urfe in _l'Astree_, a half-century previous, and he retied, without

difficulty, after the Corneillian parenthesis, the thread of a doctrine

which has been transmitted without interruption to our own days.

Love justifies everything, for the right of passion is sacred, nothing

subsists before it.

Dans l'empire amoureux,

Le devoir n'a point de puissance.

L'eclat de beaux yeux adoucit bien un crime;

Au regard des amants tout parait legitime.[64]

The idea which this verse expresses can be found throughout the works of

Quinault. He has said it again and again, with the same langourous,

insinuating sweetness, for a period which lasted more than thirty years,

and in the beginning no one very seriously divided with him the

attention of the public.

At the appearance of his first piece in 1653, Racine was fourteen;

Moliere did not return to Paris until 1658. Corneille, in truth, was

preparing his return to the theatre; but he found when his last

tragedies were played, that he had done well to study Quinault, and in

doing this he had not wasted his time;--a decisive proof of the echo to

which souls responded,[65] and of the increasing immorality of the new

era.

Thus the Court of France lost its prestige. The eclat cast by the Fronde

upon the men and women seeking great adventures had been replaced by no

new enthusiasms. The pleasures to which entire lives were devoted had

not always been refining, as we have seen above, and people had not

grown in intelligence. The bold crowd of the Mazarins gave the tone to

the Louvre, and this tone lacked delicacy. The Queen, Anne of Austria,

groaned internally, but she had loosed the reins; except in the affair

of her son's marriage she had nothing to refuse to the nieces of

Cardinal Mazarin.

Because the Court was in general lazy and frivolous, a hasty opinion of

the remainder of France should not be formed. The Court did not fairly

represent the entire nation; outside of it there was room for other

opinions and sentiments. It was during the years of 1650 to 1656, which

appear to us at first sight almost a moral desert, that private charity

made in the midst of France one of its greatest efforts, an effort very

much to the honour of all concerned in it.

I have noticed elsewhere[66] the frightful poverty of the country during

the Fronde. This distress which was changing into desert places one

strip after another of French territory, must be relieved, and amongst

those in authority no one was found capable of doing it.

It is hardly possible to represent to one's self to-day the condition

left by the simple passage of an army belonging to a civilised people,

through a French or German land, two or three hundred years ago.

The idea of restricting the sufferings caused by war to those which are

inevitable is a novel one. In the seventeenth century, on the contrary,

the effort was to increase them. The chiefs for the most part showed a

savage desire to excite the mania for destruction which is so easily

aroused with soldiers during a campaign. Towards the end of the Fronde,

some troops belonging to Conde, then in the service of the King of

Spain, occupied his old province of Bourgogne. If any district of France

could have hoped to be respected by the Prince, it was this one; his

father had possessed it before him and it was full of their friends.

Ties of this kind, however, were of no advantage. March 23, 1652, the

States of Bourgogne wrote to M. de Bielle, their deputy at Court:

The enemies having already burned fourteen villages [the names

follow], besides others since burned, these fire-fiends are

still in campaign and continuing these horrible ravages, all

which has been under the express order of M. le Prince, which

the commandant [de la ville] de Seurre has received, to burn

the entire Province if it be possible. The same Sieur de Bielle

can judge by the account of these fires, to which there has so

far been no impediment presented, in what state the Province

will be in a short time.

The common soldier troubled himself little whether the sacked region was

on the one or the other side of the frontier. He made hardly any

difference.

Some weeks after the fires in Bourgogne, two armies tortured the Brie.

The one belonged to the King, the other to the Duc de Lorraine, and

there was only a shade less of cruelty with the French forces than with

the others. When all the troops had passed, the country was filled with

charnel houses, and there are charnel houses and charnel houses.

That of Rampillon,[67] particularly atrocious, must be placed to the

account of the Lorraines: "at each step one met mutilated people, with

scattered limbs; women cut in four quarters after violation; men

expiring under the ruins of burning houses, others spitted."[68] No

trouble was taken to suppress these hells of infection.

It would be difficult to find any fashion of carrying on a war both more

ferocious and more stupid. Some chiefs of divisions, precursers of

humanitarian ideas, timidly protested, in the name of interest only,

against a system which always gave to campaigning armies the plague,

famine, and universal hatred. A letter addressed to Mazarin, and signed

by four of these, Fabert at the head, supplicates him to arrest the

ravages of a foreigner in the services of France, M. de Rosen. Mazarin

took care to pay no attention to this protest: it would have been

necessary first to pay Rosen and his soldiers. If it is expected to find

any sense of responsibility in the State, in the opinion of

contemporaries, for saving the survivors, left without bread, animals,

nor harvests, without roof and without working tools, there is

disappointment; the State held itself no more responsible for public

disasters than for the poor, always with it.

The conception of social duty was not yet born. Public assistance was in

its infancy, and the little which existed had been completely

disorganised by the general disorders; like everything else. Each city

took care of its beggars or neglected them according to its own

resources and circumstances. On the other hand, the idea of Christian

charity had taken a strong hold upon some circles, under the combined

influence of the Jansenism which exacted from its devotees a living

faith; of a secret Catholic society whose existence is one of the most

curious historical discoveries of these last years[69]; and of a poor

saint whose peasant airs and whose patched _soutane_ caused much

laughter when he presented himself before the Queen. Vincent de Paul is

easily recognised. Relations with great people had not changed him. It

was said of him after years of Court society, "M. Vincent is always M.

Vincent," and this was true: men of this calibre never change, happily

for the world.

He became the keynote of the impulse which caused the regeneration of

provincial life, almost ruined by the wars of the Fronde. Even after the

work was ended it would be difficult to decide upon the share of each of

these bodies in this colossal enterprise. The society to which allusion

has been made was founded in 1627, by the Duc de Ventadour, whose

mystical thought had led him, as often happens, to essentially practical

works. The name of Compagnie du Saint Sacrement was given it, and

without doubt its supreme end was "to make honoured the Holy Sacrament."

Precisely on account of this, the society sought to "procure" for itself

"all the good" in its power, for nothing is more profitable to religion

than support, material as well as spiritual and moral, distributed under

its inspiration and as one might say on its own part.

One passes easily from the practice of charity, a source of precious

teaching, to the correction of manners. After comes the desire to

control souls, which naturally leads to the destruction of heresies,

with or without gentleness.

This programme was responsible for many admirable charitable works, two

centuries in advance of current ideas, and, at the same time, for

cruelties, infamies, all the vices inseparable from the sectarian spirit

in which the end justifies the means.

Once started, the society rapidly increased, always hidden, and

multiplying precautions not to be discovered, since neither clergy nor

royalty were well disposed towards this mysterious force, from which

they were constantly receiving shocks without being able to discover

whence came the blows.

It was an occult power, analogous in its extent and its intolerance, and

even in the ways and means employed, to the Free Masonry of the present.

The Compagnie du Saint-Sacrement had links throughout France and in all

classes. Anne of Austria was included in its sacred band and a shoemaker

played in it an important role. Vincent de Paul enrolled himself in the

ranks towards the year 1635, contributed to the good, and probably was

ignorant of the evil to be found in its folds. Dating from his

affiliation, his charitable works so mingled with those of the society

that it was no longer to be recognised. The society brought to the Saint

powerful succour, and aided him effectively in finding the support of

which he had need; it would be difficult to say from whom came the first

idea of many good works.

As for what at present concerns us, however, the point of departure is

known. It was neither Vincent de Paul nor the Compagnie du

Saint-Sacrement which conceived and put in train the prodigious work of

relieving the Provinces. The first committee of relief was founded in

Paris, in 1649, by a Janseniste, M. de Bernieres, who was also

responsible for the invention of the printed "Relations" which were

informing all France of the miseries to be relieved. It was the first

time that Charity had aided itself through publicity. It soon found the

value of this. M. de Bernieres and his committee, in which the wives of

members of Parliament dominated, were soon able to commence in Picardie

and Champagne the distribution of bread, clothing, grain, and working

implements. Hospitals were established. They put an end to the frightful

feeling of desolation of these unfortunate populations, pillaged during

so many years by mercenaries of all races and tongues. But the number of

workers was small even if their zeal was great, and the Janseniste

community was not equipped for a task of this dimension. From the end of

the following year, the direction of the enterprise passed entirely into

the hands of Vincent de Paul, who led with him his army of sisters of

charity, his mission priests, and an entire contingent of allies, secret

but absolutely devoted.

It does not seem as if at first there was any conflict. Mme. de

Lamoignon and the Presidente de Herse were the right arms of M. Vincent

as they had been of M. de Bernieres. When the Queen of Poland,[70] a

spiritual daughter of Port-Royal and brought up in France, wished to

subscribe to the work, she sent her money to the Mother Angelique,

telling her to communicate with M. Vincent. But this harmony was of

short duration. The members of what the public were going to baptise

with the sobriquet of "Cabale des Devots," not being able to discover

the real name, could not suffer the Janseniste concurrence in charitable

works. They showered upon M. de Bernieres a mass of odious calumnies and

denunciations which resulted in the exile of this good man.

This was one of the most abominable of the bad actions to which a

sectarian spirit has pushed human beings.

The "Relations" were continued under the direction of Vincent de Paul.

One knows through them and through the documents of the time, the

details of the task undertaken. The first necessity for the public

health was the clearing the surface of the ground, in the provinces in

which there had been fighting, of the putrifying bodies, and of the

filthiness left by the armies. There was one village from which such an

odour exhaled that no one would approach it. A "Relation" of 1652

describes in these terms the environs of Paris:

At Etrechy, the living are mingled with the dead, and the

country is full of the latter. At Villeneuve-Saint-Georges,

Crosne, Limay, one hundred and seventy-four ill people were

found in the last extremity, with neither beds, clothes, nor

bread.

It was necessary to commence by taking away the seeds of

infection which increased the maladies, by interring the

corpses of men, of dead horses and cattle, and removing the

heaps of dirt which the armies had left behind. The cleansing

of the soil was the specialty of M. Vincent and one of his most

signal benefits. He employed for this work his mission priests

and his sisters of charity. The missionaries placed themselves

at the head of the workmen, the sisters sought the abandoned

sick. Cloth and cap died at need "the arms in the hand," said

their chief, but their work was good; and finally the work was

taken hold of in the right way.

After the dead the living:

The cure of Boult[71] [reports another "Relation"] assures us

that he buried three of his parishioners dead from hunger;

others were living only upon cut-up straw mixed with earth, of

which was composed a food called bread. Five tainted and

decaying horses were devoured; an old man aged seventy-five years

had entered the presbytery to roast a piece of horse-flesh, the

animal having died of scab fifteen days previously, was infected

with worms, and had been found cast into a foul ditch.... At

Saint-Quentin, in the faubourgs, in which the houses had been

demolished, the missionaries discovered the last inhabitants in

miserable huts, "in each of which," wrote one of them, "I found one

or two sick, in one single hut ten; two widows, each having four

children, slept together on the ground, having nothing whatever,

not even a sheet." Another Ecclesiastic, in his visit, having met

with many closed doors, upon forcing them open discovered that the

sick were too feeble to open them having eaten nothing during two

days, and having beneath them only a little half rotten straw; the

number of these poor was so great that without succour from Paris,

the citizens under the apprehension of a siege, not being able to

nourish them, had resolved to cast them over the walls.

Millions were needed to relieve such distress, but Vincent de Paul and

his associates had a better dream; they wished to put these dying

populations in a condition to work again and to undertake the reparation

of the ruins themselves. The enterprise was organised in spite of

obstacles which appeared insurmountable, the exhaustion of France and

the difficulty of communication being the principal. The Parisians

raised enormous sums and sent gifts of all kinds of materials, and found

the means of transporting provisions. The committee divided the environs

of Paris; Mme. Joly took the care of one village; the Presidente de

Nesmond, four villages; and so on. Missionaries were sent outside the

boundaries. One of the later biographers of Vincent de Paul[72] values

at twelve millions of francs, at this date worth about sixty millions,

the sums distributed, without counting money spent directly for the work

of piety nor for the support of those engaged in it. However this may

be, this latter body certainly consumed a large portion. The immensity

of the enterprise, and its apparent boldness, gives us an idea of the

wealth and power of the middle classes of the seventeenth century. After

Vincent de Paul and M. de Bernieres, the honour for this work of relief

belongs to the parliamentary world and the Parisian bourgeoisie; the

aristocracy only playing a very secondary role. The middle classes

provided for this enormous effort, at a period in which all revenues

failed at once. We are told that many were forced to borrow, that others

sold their jewels and articles of silver; still this supposes luxury and

credit. In one way or another, the citizen was in a position to give,

while the small noble of Lorraine or of Beauce was obliged to receive;

and this emphasises an historic lesson. Gentlemen as well as peasants

lacked bread. After remaining two days without eating, one is ready to

accept alms; at the end of three days, to demand them on account of the

children. The decadence of the one class, the ascension of the other

until their turn comes; it has always been the same since the world

began.

One last detail, and perhaps the most significant:

There is no reference in the Memoirs of the times[73] to the principal

work of Vincent de Paul. Their authors would have made it a matter of

conscience not to forget a Court intrigue or a scandalous adventure; but

what can be interesting in people who are naked and hungry? One avoids

speaking of them. It is even better not to think of them. In 1652, the

year in which poverty was at its height in oppressed Paris, the Mother

Angelique wrote from Port-Royal, to the Queen of Poland (June 28th):

With the exception of the few actually engaged in charity, the

rest of the world live in as much luxury as ever. The Court and

the Tuileries are as thronged as ever, collations and the rest

of the superfluities go on as always. Paris amuses itself with

the same fury as if its streets were not filled with frightful

spectacles. And, what is more horrible, fashion will not suffer

the priests to preach penitence (Letter of July 12th).

The lack of pity for the poor was almost general among the so-called

higher classes. There is no need of too carefully inquiring as to what

is passing in hovels.

Vincent de Paul and his allies struggled six years. Not once did the

government come to their aid, and the war always continued; for one ruin

relieved, the armies made ten others. The group of the "good souls" who

had made these prodigious sacrifices was at length used up, as one might

say, and was never reinforced, in spite of the inexhaustible source of

devotion offered by the Compagnie du Saint-Sacrement. This body had been

composed of men and women so exceptional in character, as well as in

intelligence, that its ranks, emptied by death, and by the exhaustion of

means and courage, could not be filled up. In 1655, the receipts of the

committee were visibly diminished. Two years later, the resources were

entirely exhausted and the work of relief remained unfinished.

It was well that it was attempted; a leven of good has remained from it

in the national soul.

The actual benefits however, were promptly effaced; the famine of 1659

to 1662, especially in the latter year, counts amongst the most

frightful of the century, perhaps in our entire history. The excess of

material poverty engendered immense moral misery, particularly in the

large cities, in which luxury stood side by side with the most frightful

conditions, and Paris became both excitable and evil, as always when it

suffers.

The Carnival of 1660 was the most noisy and disorderly which old

Parisians had ever known. Great and small sought amusement with a kind

of rage, and dissensions and quarrels abounded from the top to the

bottom of the social scale. Public places were noisy with riots and

affrays. During the nights, masks were masters of the streets, and as

has been seen above, no security existed with these composite crowds,

which stole candles from the houses into which they had surged.

One ball alone received in a single evening the visit of sixty-five

masks, who ran through the city three nights in succession. These

hysterics in Paris, while France was dying with hunger, are so much the

more striking, inasmuch as the Court was not there to communicate to the

outer world its eternal need of agitation and amusement. Louis XIV.

spent a large portion of these critical years in journeying through his

kingdom. One of the first journeys, lasting from October 27th to the

following January 27th, had for its end the meeting of the Princess of

Savoie at Lyons. There had been some question of marrying this Princess

to the young King. On passing to Dijon, the Court stopped more than

fifteen days. Mademoiselle tells us the reason for this delay; it is not

very glorious for royalty. The Parliament of Dijon refused to register

certain edicts which aggravated the burdens of the province. Le Tellier,

"on the part of the King," promised that there should be no more

difficulty if the states of Bourgogne would bring their subsidy to a sum

which was indicated. "Upon which they agreed to what was demanded and

presented themselves to account to the King."

Upon the next day, with a cynical contempt for the royal promise, "Her

Majesty went to the Dijon Parliament to register the deeds."[74]

Mademoiselle had the curiosity to be present at the session. The first

president did the only thing in his power. He courageously expressed his

"regrets" and was praised by all those who heard him.

The Court hastily departed the following day, leaving Dijon and the

entire province "in a certain consternation." Mademoiselle blamed only

the manner of action. At the bottom of her heart, she had the belief of

her times: that the sovereign owed only control to his people, and that

there was no question of giving them happiness.

Some weeks after the incident at Lyons, the vicinity of the principality

of Dombes[75] gave her the desire to visit this place, which she had

never seen. Dombes did not pay any impost to the King, and this fact

alone sufficed to render it prosperous. Mademoiselle was scandalised at

this prosperity. The peasants were well clothed, "they ate meat four

times a day," and there were "no really poor people" in the country;

"also," pursued Mademoiselle, "they, up to this time, have paid no

duties, and it would perhaps be better that they should do so, for they

are do-nothings, taking no interest in either work or trade."

The people had left everything and dressed themselves in their fine

clothes to receive Mademoiselle. In order to thank them, Mademoiselle

drew from them all the money she could. It is necessary to recollect,

however, that in the eyes of the great, even those of the better sort, a

peasant was hardly a man. It would hardly be worth while for us to be

indignant at this attitude. We now admit that the so-called superior

races have the right to exploit those considered inferior, and thus at

need destroy them. It was the habit of our fathers to treat a lower

class as to-day we treat a less advanced race; the sentiment is

precisely the same.

Upon her return from Dombes, Mademoiselle found the Court again at

Lyons. Every one was all eyes and ears for a spectacle which might

derange the admitted ideas of kings. Marie Mancini was trying to make

Louis XIV. marry her, and the attempt had not so absurd an air as might

be imagined. The Savoie project had failed under painful conditions,

which gave subject of thought to the courtiers. The King had conducted

himself like an ill-bred man to the Princess Marguerite.

People were demanding whether the Spanish marriage was also going to

fail, and with it the so greatly desired peace, because it pleased two

lovers, one of whom ought not to have forgotten his kingly duties, to

proclaim the sovereign rights of passion. Anne of Austria became uneasy.

Mazarin, yielding to temptation, left the field to his niece, who "took

possession" of the young King with looks and speech. She fascinated him,

and he swore all that she wished. The contest was not an equal one

between the passionate Italian and the timid and somewhat unformed Louis

XIV.

On his return from Lyons, Louis knelt down before his mother and

Mazarin, supplicating them to permit him to marry the one he loved. He

found them inflexible. The Queen realised that such a _mesalliance_

would cast disrepute on royalty. The Cardinal was torn by conflicting

emotions, but in the end sent away his niece.

A second journey lasted more than a year. The Court set out on June 29,

1659, and passed through Blois. It stopped with Gaston. We owe to the

_Memoires_ of Mademoiselle a last glimpse of this Prince, formerly so

brilliant, now become a lazy good-for-nothing in his provincial life,

where nothing of Parisian fashion was found; neither toilettes nor

cooking, nor household elegance, nor even Monsieur himself, who no

longer knew how to receive, and was vexed that the King should kill his

pheasants. He permitted it to be seen that he was put out, and this

became so plain that every one was eager to depart, and there was a

sudden scattering.

The eldest of his daughters by his last marriage, Marguerite d'Orleans,

had a great reputation for beauty. Her parents had for a long time

anticipated seeing her Queen of France.

On the night of the King's arrival at Blois, this damsel was disfigured

with mosquito bites. Her dancing was much extolled, but on this special

evening, she danced very badly. Gaston had announced that this little

girl of ten "would astonish every one with her brilliant conversation."

No one could draw a single word from her. In short, nothing succeeded.

Mademoiselle was not especially vexed at this failure; she had trembled

at the thought of seeing her younger sister "above her."

Hardly had the Court remounted their carriages, before the royal

cavalcade, according to the universal custom, commenced to mock its

hosts. The King joked at the sight of his uncle's face on seeing the

pheasants fall dead. Mademoiselle laughed with the others. She had,

however, been moved by a tender scene played by her father.

He had come to awaken her at four o'clock in the morning:

He seated himself on my bed and said: "I believe that you will

not be vexed at being waked since I shall not soon have the

chance of again seeing you. You are going to take a long

journey. I am old, exhausted; I may die during your absence. If

I do die, I recommend your sisters to you. I know very well

that you do not love Madame: that her behaviour towards you has

not been all it should be; but her children have had nothing to

do with this, for my sake take care of them. They will have

need of you; as for Madame, she will be of little help to

them."

He embraced me three or four times. I received all this with

much tenderness; for I have a good heart. We separated on the

best terms, and I went again to sleep.

Mademoiselle believed that at length they again loved each other. Six

weeks later a scandal broke out at the Court of France, then at

Bordeaux.

The Duc de Savoie had refused to marry the Princess Marguerite

d'Orleans, and Mademoiselle was accused of having secretly written to

him that her sister was a humpback. The accusation came from Gaston

himself, who said that he had proof of it. This was a most disagreeable

incident for Mademoiselle and further illusion was impossible; Gaston

was always Gaston, the most dangerous man in France.

From Bordeaux, the Court went to Toulouse; there it was rejoined by

Mazarin, who had just signed the peace of the Pyrenees (November 7, 1659).

All histories give the articles of this peace. The results for Europe

have been summed up in some brilliant lines written by the great German

historian, Leopold Ranke, who had been struck with the advantages which

this treaty gave France over Germany:

If it were necessary to characterise in a general fashion the

results of this peace ... we would say that the importance of

the treaty consisted in the formation and extension of the

great (geographically) military system of the French monarchy.

On all sides, to the Pyrenees, to the Alps, above all, to the

frontiers of the German Empire and of the Netherlands, France

acquired new fortified points ... many positions as important

for defence as favourable for attack. The position of France

upon the upper Rhine, which it owes to the peace of Westphalia,

received by this new treaty its greatest extension.[76]

Mazarin found that he had done well in himself following the

campaigning armies. He knew the military importance of most of the

places. The Spanish negotiator could not have said as much. In the

interior, the first comer could easily comprehend the political benefits

of a treaty which should as far as possible abolish the past. Conde had

been included in the terms of the peace and returned to France, well

resolved to keep quiet. He rejoined the Court at Aix, January 27, 1660,

and found there was a certain curiosity exhibited as to how he would be

received.

Mademoiselle hastened to Anne of Austria: "My niece," said the Queen to

her, "return to your own dwelling; M. le Prince has especially asked

that I should be absolutely alone when I first receive him."

I began to smile with vexation, but said: "I am nobody; I

believe that M. le Prince will be very astonished if he does

not find me here." The Queen insisted in a very sharp tone; I

went away resolved to complain to M. le Cardinal; this I did on

the following day, saying that if such a thing happened again,

I should leave the Court. He made many excuses. This was

Mazarin's system. He poured forth explanations but in no way

changed his methods in the future.

It is known that M. le Prince demanded pardon on his knees, and that he

found before him in Louis XIV. a judge grave and cold, who held himself

"very straight."[77] To fight against the King was decidedly no more to

be considered a joke; it could not be overlooked, even if one were the

conqueror of Rocroy.

Mademoiselle did not succeed in comprehending the real situation. Conde,

surprised and deceived, felt his way. One evening at a dance, when

talking with Mademoiselle, the King joined them. The conversation fell

upon the Fronde. On the part of a man of as much _esprit_ as M. le

Prince, one can well believe that this was not by chance: "The war was

much spoken of," relates Mademoiselle, "and we joked at all the follies

of which we had been guilty, the King with the best grace in the world

joining in these pleasantries. Although I was suffering with a severe

headache, I was not in the least bored." Mademoiselle had laughed

without any second thoughts. Conde, clearer sighted, trembled during the

remainder of his days, before this monarch so capable of dissimulation,

and so perfectly master of himself.

Almost at the same moment there expired another of those belated feudal

ideas, which neither royalty nor manners could any longer suffer among

the nobility. Gaston d'Orleans died at Blois, February 2nd,[78] his

death being caused by an attack of apoplexy. They had heard him murmur

from his bed regarding his wife and children, _Domus mea domus

desolationis vocabitur_ ("My house will be called the House of

Desolation"). He spoke better than he knew. Madame surpassed herself in

blunders, and still more. She went to dinner while her husband was

receiving the last unction, sent away the servants of Monsieur

immediately after the final sigh, locked up everything, and concerned

herself no more. Her women refused a sheet in which to wrap the body; it

was necessary to beg one from the ladies of the Court. Some priests came

to sit up with the dead, but finding neither "light nor fire" they

returned, and the corpse remained alone, more completely abandoned than

had been that of his brother, the King, Louis XIII. The body was borne

without "pomp or expense"[79] to Saint-Denis, and the widow hastened to

Paris, to take possession of the Palace of the Luxembourg, in the

absence of Mademoiselle.

The Court did not take the trouble to feign regrets. The King gave the

tone in saying to his cousin, gaily, after the first formal compliments:

"You will see my brother to-morrow in a training mantle. I believe that

he is delighted at the news of your father's death. He believes that he

is heir to all his belongings and state; he can talk of nothing else;

but he must wait awhile."

Anne of Austria heard this, and smiled. "It is true," pursues

Mademoiselle, "that Monsieur appeared the next day in a wonderful

mantle." Mademoiselle had great difficulty in keeping her own

countenance. Her grief was, however, very real, notwithstanding the

past, or rather, perhaps, on account of what had gone before; it was,

however, only an impulse affected by the impression of the moment. She

exhibited this sorrow a little too effectively:

I wished to wear the most formal and deepest mourning. Every

one of my household was clad in black, even to the cooks, the

servants, and the valets; the coverings of the mules, all the

caparisons of my horses and of the other beasts of burden.

Nothing could be more beautiful the first time we marched than

to see this grand train, expressive of grief. It had an air

very magnificent and of real grandeur. Everybody says how much

wealth she must possess!

The mules' mourning is well worth the training mantle of the little

Monsieur. This magnificent funeral pomp had the one inconvenience of

recalling to all comers that Mademoiselle must resign other pleasures.

At the end of some weeks, she would have willingly resumed her share in

Court gaieties; Anne of Austria kindly commanded her to return to life.

The summer was, however, approaching. The Court continued to drag itself

from city to city, waiting until it should please the King of Spain to

bring his daughter, and the time seemed long. Mazarin shut himself up to

work. Louis drilled the soldiers of his guard. The Queen Mother spent

long days in convents. Mademoiselle wrote, or worked tapestry. A large

number of the courtiers, no longer able to stand the ennui, had returned

to Paris; those who remained, lived lives of complete idleness. The King

had at this time a fine occasion to study the condition of his

provinces; but he did not possess an investigating mind. He spent long

months in front of the Pyrenees, without seeking to know anything of

their formation, showing an unusual indifference to knowledge, even for

this period. One of the few persons who risked themselves in the

Pyrenees, Mme. de Motteville, relates her astonishment at discovering

valleys, torrents, cultivated fields, and inhabitants. She had believed

that she should only find a great wall of rock, "deserted and untilled."

The journey went on; but nature had not yet the right of entrance into

literature, and society spoke but rarely of its charms. Of the vast

world, only what came directly under the eyes of the individual was

known.

At length, on June 2d (1660), the Court of France, "kicking its heels"

at Saint-Jean-de-Luz during an entire month, received news of the

arrival at Fontarabia of Philip IV. and of the Infanta Marie Therese.

The next day, the marriage ceremonies commenced.

Six long days and the best intentions on both sides were needed to

consummate this great affair without offending etiquette. The problem

presented was this: How to marry the King of France with the daughter of

the King of Spain, without permitting the King of France to put his foot

on Spanish territory, nor the King of Spain on that belonging to France,

and at the same time not to allow the Infanta to quit her father before

the ceremony had actually taken place?

On the side of the French Court, whose discipline left much to be

desired, difficulties of detail arose constantly to complicate affairs.

The little Monsieur wept for desire to go to Fontarabia to see a Spanish

ceremony; but etiquette made it necessary to consider this brother of

the King the present heir presumptive to the crown, and, alleged Louis

XIV., "the heir presumptive of Spain could not enter France to see a

ceremony."[80]

After consideration of this point, the heir was forbidden to pass the

frontier. Then Mademoiselle arrived, who wished to be of the party. She

represented that the order was not applicable to her, and cited the

Salic law which gave her the right to traverse the Bidassoa: "I do not

inherit," said she; "I should have some compensation. Since daughters

are of no value in France, they should at least be permitted to enjoy

spectacles."

Mazarin convoked the ministers to submit this argument. The discussion

lasted "three or four hours." Finally, Mademoiselle gained her cause,

although the King himself was rather against her. The important question

of "trains" gave also some embarrassment to the Cardinal. A duke had

offered to bear the train of Mademoiselle in the nuptial cortege.

Mazarin was obliged to seek two other dukes for the younger sisters of

Mademoiselle, two children whom the lady of honour of their mother had

led to the marriage. He could only find a marquis and a count; the dukes

hid themselves. The lady of honour uttered loud protests; "her

Princesses must have 'tail-bearers' as titled as those of their tall

sister, or they should not go at all." "I will do what I can," replied

the Cardinal; "but no one wishes the task."

Mademoiselle had the good grace to sacrifice her duke, and Mazarin

believed the affair terminated, when the Princess Palatine[81] caused a

novel incident, upon the day of the ceremony, and even when the last

moment was approaching. She appeared in the Queen's chamber, wearing a

train, to which, being a foreign Princess, she had no right. La Palatine

had counted upon the general confusion to smuggle herself in and to

create a precedent. It was needful to delay matters. The train had been

reported to Mademoiselle, and no marriage should prevent her protest.

The Cardinal and after him the King were forced to listen to a discourse

upon the limitations of foreign princesses. "I believe," writes

Mademoiselle, "that I was very eloquent." She proved herself at least

very convincing, for La Palatine received the order to take off her

train.

But it is necessary to retrace our steps; trains have carried us too

far. The relations between the two monarchs had been regulated with a

minutia worthy of Asiatic courts. They met only in a hall, built

expressly for the purpose upon the Isle des Faisans, and on horseback

upon the frontier. The building was half in French, half in Spanish

territory. The decorations of the two sides were different. Louis XIV.

must walk upon French carpets, Philip IV. upon Spanish ones. The one

must only sit upon a French chair, write only upon a French table with

French ink, seek the time only from a French clock, placed in his half

of the hall; the other guarded himself with the same care from every

object not Spanish. Two opposite doors gave passage at precisely the

same instant. An equal number of steps led them to the place where the

red carpet of France joined the gold and silver one of Spain; and the

two Kings addressed each other and embraced over the frontier. Thus

demanded the laws of ceremonial monarchy. Their rigour commenced to

astonish the good people of France. The interviews upon the Isle des

Faisans became legendary. La Fontaine has alluded to them in one of his

last fables, _Les Deux Chevres_,[82] in which he has found no better

comparison for the solemnity with which the two goats, equally "tainted"

with their rank, equally curbed, advanced towards each other upon the

fragile and narrow bridge.

Je m'imagine voir, avec Louis le Grand,

Philippe quatre qui s'avance

Dans l'isle de la Conference[83]

Ainsi s'avancaient pas a pas,

Nez a nez, nos aventurieres.

When all was arranged, on June 3rd, neither the bride and bridegroom nor

their parents having seen each other, the King of France, represented by

Don Luis de Haro, was married by proxy in the church of Fontarabia to

the Infanta Marie-Therese.

This was the expedient which saved the dignity of the two crowns. After

the ceremony, the new Queen returned to her father. She wrote the next

day a letter of official compliment to her husband. We possess the

response of Louis XIV., in which he has well performed a somewhat

difficult task.

SAINT-JEAN-DE-LUZ, June 4, 1660.

To receive at the same time a letter from your Majesty, and the

news of the celebration of our marriage, and to be on the eve

of seeing you, these are assuredly causes of indelible joy for

me.

My cousin, the Duke of Crequi, first gentleman of my chamber,

whom I am sending expressly to your Majesty, will communicate

to you the sentiments of my heart, in which you will remark

always increasingly an extreme impatience to convey these

sentiments in person.

He will also present to you some trifles on my part.

The same day, in the afternoon, Anne of Austria met for the first time

with her brother and niece together. The interview took place in the

hall of the Isle des Faisans. Philip IV. astonished the French,

decidedly less bound up in tradition than the Spanish. Philip dwelt so

immobile in his gravity that one would have hardly taken him for a

living man.[84]

Anne of Austria wishing to embrace her brother, whom she had not seen

for forty-five years, he decided to make a movement, but it was only "to

withdraw his head so far that she could not catch it."[85] The Queen

Mother had forgotten the customs of her own land. To embrace in Spain

was not to kiss; it only consisted in giving a greeting without touching

the lips, as we see done at the Comedie Francaise by personages of the

classic repertoire. Kissing was, as we read in Moliere only permitted in

certain rare cases. In the _Malade Imaginaire_, Thomas Diafoirus

consults his father before kissing his fiancee: "Shall I kiss her?"

"Yes," replies M. Diafoirus.

The evening of the interview, June 4th, Mademoiselle was curious to know

whether the King of Spain had kissed the Queen Mother. "I asked her; she

told me 'no'; that they had embraced according to the fashion of their

own country."

How was this strange fashion established at the Court of France, and

from there transferred to our theatres? Was it after the marriage of

Louis XIV.? I leave to the amateurs of the theatre the solving of this

little problem in dramatic history.

They brought a French chair for the Queen Mother, a Spanish one for

Philip IV., and they seated themselves nearly "upon the line which

separated the two kingdoms."[86]

Marie-Therese, Infanta of Spain and bride by proxy of the King of

France, was still to be seated. Should this be done in France or Spain?

upon a Spanish or French chair? They brought one Spanish and two French

cushions; piled them upon Spanish territory, and the young Queen found

herself seated in a mixed fashion, suitable to her ambiguous situation.

Louis XIV. did not accompany his mother. Etiquette did not yet permit

the new couple to address a word to each other. It had been arranged

that the King of France should ride along the banks of the Bidassoa and

that the Infanta should regard him from afar through the window. A

romantic impatience which seized the husband with longing to become

acquainted with his wife caused this part of the programme to fail.

Louis XIV. looked at Marie-Therese through a half-open door. They

regarded each other some seconds, and then returned, she to Fontarabia,

he to Saint-Jean-de-Luz.

On Sunday, the sixth, they saw each other officially at the Isle des

Faisans. Affairs were but little further advanced; Philip IV. had

declared that the Infanta must conceal her impressions until she arrived

on French territory. On the seventh, Anne of Austria brought her

daughter-in-law to Saint-Jean-de-Luz, where the young people could at

length converse together, awaiting the definite celebration of the

marriage, which took place June 9th in the church of Saint-Jean-de-Luz.

Some days later, the Court retook the road to Paris. Marie-Therese made

her solemn entrance into the capital, August 20th. The procession

departed from Vincennes. "It was necessary to rise at four o'clock in

the morning," reports Mademoiselle, who had a frightful sick headache.

At five o'clock, every one was in gala costume, and they reached the

Louvre at seven in the evening. Mademoiselle was at the end of her

endurance; but a Princess of the blood had no right to be ill on the day

of a Queen's entrance. Sometimes ridiculous and sometimes ferocious;

such appears ancient etiquette to our democratic generation. Monarchs

formerly felt the value of its services too keenly to shrink from

submitting to its dictates. They knew that a demi-god never descends

with impunity from his pedestal. It is impossible to witness his efforts

at remounting without laughter. To-day the Princes themselves desire

less etiquette. The monarchical sentiment is not sufficiently strong to

make them willing to support the ennui of ceremonial; they are capable

of any sacrifice of dignity to escape it. We see them resign to others

their rank and privileges in the hope of finding in obscurity the

happiness which they have missed in the King's palace.

The present lack of form makes it difficult for the mass to take royalty

seriously, and thus vanish together the respect for formal courtesies

and for aristocracies. Louis XIV. and Philip IV. in spite of La

Fontaine, were in the right in attaching capital importance to the

placing their feet upon the right carpets. This precision of etiquette

prolonged the existence of the monarchy.

Life retook its habitual course in the Palace of the Louvre. The King

was studying a new ballet. Very few persons remarked that he found time

also to make long visits upon Mazarin. The Cardinal, feeling himself in

the clutches of death, was preparing his pupil for his "great trade" of

sovereign. He made him acquainted with affairs, spoke to him in

confidence of the people connected with the administration of the

kingdom; discussed political questions, and recommended him to have no

longer a first minister.[87] The one thing which he could not yet

resolve to do was to permit the King to give a direct order. His dying

hands would not let fall a half-crown or relax an atom of authority.

The young Queen was astonished at the money restrictions which had

oppressed her since her sojourn in France; Mazarin supervised her

household through the intermediary of Colbert, "who saved upon

everything,"[88] and he (Mazarin) pocketed the savings. On New Year's

day, he absorbed for himself three-fourths of the gifts of

Marie-Therese. The Queen Mother having shown some discontent, "the poor

Monsieur the Cardinal," as she called him, cried out boldly, "Alas! if

she knew from whence comes this money and that it is the blood of the

people, she would not be so liberal."

In vain Mazarin hastened; he did not have time to finish his task.

February 11, 1661, the King, realising that his minister was lost, began

to weep and to say that he did not know what he should do. All France

experienced the same fears. It did not occur to any that the King was

capable of governing, or that he would take the trouble to do so. The

doubt was only as to the name of the one who should take the helm in

place of the Cardinal. Anne of Austria believed in chance; Conde had one

party amongst the nobility. The Parisian bourgeoisie said to itself that

Retz was perhaps going to return from over sea "for necessity."[89] The

ministers admitted that there was only one man fitted for the position.

While these various intrigues were progressing, Mazarin expired (March

6th), and some hours later there came that _coup de theatre_ of which

one reads in all histories. Louis XIV. signified to his ministers and

grandees his intention of himself governing. Those who knew him well,

beginning with his own mother, did nothing but laugh, persuaded that it

was only a fire of straw. Louis at first shut himself up entirely alone

during two hours, in order to establish a "rule of life"[90] as an

effective monarch. The programme resulting from this meditation

surprisingly resembles the one given by Catherine de Medicis in the

letter already cited. It exacts the qualities of a great worker. From

that day, Louis showed these qualities. "For above all," says he in his

_Memoires_, "I resolved not to have a first minister, and not to permit

to be filled by another the functions belonging to the King, as long as

I bear the title."

The passage in which he describes his "wedding" with the joy of work is

moving and beautiful. It is even poetical.

I felt immediately my spirit and courage elevated. I found

myself a different individual. I discovered in myself a mind

which I did not know existed, and I reproached myself for

having so long ignored this joy. The timidity which judgment at

first gave caused me pain, above all when it was necessary to

speak in public a little lengthily. This timidity, however, was

dissipated little by little.

At length it seemed to me I was really King and born to rule. I

experienced a sense of well-being difficult to express.

Louis would now have need of all his courage. In measure as his mind

became "elevated," shame for his gross ignorance overcame him. "When

reason," says he, "commences to become solid, one feels a cutting and

just chagrin in finding oneself ignorant of what all others know."

The practical utility of his neglected studies was realised by him. Not

to know history with his "trade" was a difficulty felt every instant.

Not to be capable of deciphering alone a Latin letter when Rome and the

Empire wrote their dispatches only in Latin, was an insupportable

slavery to others. Never to have read anything upon the "art of war"

when the ambition was aroused to become an expert in this art and to

acquire glory through it, "was to put brakes on one's own wheels." The

young King's education must be remade; the only difficulty was the

finding sufficient leisure. He would not allow himself to be hindered by

other difficulties, of which the principal one was the danger of

hazarding the newly acquired authority by returning to the schoolroom.

Louis XIV. braved public opinion with remarkable courage. This is one of

the finest periods of his life. He proved himself truly great by his

sentiment of professional duty, and by his empire over himself, the day

upon which he dared to say to himself as the bourgeois gentleman of

Moliere was forced to say, knowing well the ridicule to which he was

exposed: "I wish ... to be able to reason among intelligent people."

In order to do him full justice, it is necessary to remember the foolish

effect at that date produced by a scholar of twenty-three.[91] Classes

were then finished at fifteen or sixteen, and the memory of them was

inseparably connected with birch rods, without whose aid there was no

teaching in the seventeenth century. When it was known that the King was

again taking Latin lessons from his ancient preceptor, and that he

passed hours in writing themes, the courtiers might easily have had it

upon the end of their tongues to demand as Mme. Jourdain of M. Jourdain:

"Are you at your age going to college to be whipped?"

He did not console himself with the illusion that his rank would save

him from such railleries. He confesses _a propos_ of history, which he

wished to study again, how keenly sensitive he was to the thought of

what might be said. "One single scruple embarrassed me, which was, that

I had a certain shame, considering my position in the world, of

redescending into an occupation to which I should earlier have devoted

myself." Everything had yielded to the desire "not to be deprived of the

knowledge that every worthy man should have."

In spite of these efforts, Louis was never educated; he never knew

Latin, which was deemed the real knowledge of the seventeenth century,

in which century the language was well taught. Too much business or too

many pleasures prevented the young King from pursuing his design during

a sufficiently long period. It is possible, also, that his lack of

natural facility may have discouraged him. Louis XIV. had memory and

judgment, but his intelligence was slow. In short, he abandoned his

studies too soon; he felt, and repeated till the day of his death the

confession, "I am ignorant."

But Louis never relaxed the labours belonging to him as chief of the

State. His days were regulated once for all. Mme. de Motteville tells

the arrangement the day following the death of Mazarin. Saint-Simon

gives it again a half-century later, and it is identical. Apart from

extraordinary and unexpected business, and formal functions, so numerous

and important at this epoch, the King regularly devoted six to eight

hours daily to ordinary business. Add to these hours the time for

sleeping and eating, for seeing his family and taking the fresh air, and

but little time would have been left for diversion if the King had not

had the capacity of doing without sleep almost at will. It was this

physical gift which permitted him to provide as largely for pleasure as

for work. Nevertheless, the Court had trouble in adapting itself to the

new regime. It did not know what to do while the King worked.

"It is more wearisome here than can be imagined," wrote the Duc

d'Enghien, son of the great Conde, in 1664. "The King is shut up almost

the entire afternoon."[92] Outside the Court, the people could have

cried with joy. It had been a delightful surprise to discover a great

worker in this ballet dancer. Paris was ready to permit him to indulge

in his little weaknesses, provided that he would govern, that he himself

would use his power. The bourgeoisie Frondeuse was disarmed.

It is necessary [wrote Guy Patin to a friend] that I should

share with you a thought which I find very amusing. M. de

Vendome has said that our good King resembles a young doctor

who has much ardour for his profession, but who demands some

_quid pro quo_. I know those who see him intimately, who have

assured me that he has very good intentions and, that as soon

as he is _completely the master_, he will persuade all the

world of them. Amen.[93]

The italicised words are significant of the opinion of Guy Patin. In

establishing absolute monarchy, Louis XIV. had the good wishes of all.

Other testimony quite as remarkable exists to confirm this statement.

After the death of Mazarin, Olivier d'Ormesson, who had been of the

opposition party in the Parliament, and whose independence would soon

cost him his career, let three entire years roll by before admitting any

statement in his journal to the detriment of the King. This writer also

believes in Louis, and, on the whole, approves of the compensations

(_quid pro quo_) demanded by the governing novice.

After the first astonishment, the sudden change in Louis's methods

provoked but few commentaries in the immediate surroundings of the King.

Anne of Austria had a fit of vexation in realising that she would never

again have any influence; after which, indolence aiding, her course was

taken. The Queen Mother had no objection on principle to absolute

monarchy: she had always favoured it. She could not, as a Spanish

Princess, conceive of royalty being the least limited. Once resigned to

the new situation, she became a truly maternal old Queen, who preached

virtue to youth, and endeavoured to lighten the monotony of her

daughter-in-law's life.

Marie-Therese had only one single political opinion; good government was

that under which a king could pass much time with his wife. This poor

little wife died without having ever really lived with her husband.

Mademoiselle had no reason to regret the first ministers; there had been

too little reason to enjoy the two with whom she had had intercourse.

She imagined herself liberated from all dependence through the death of

the Cardinal, succeeding that of her father, and this thought was most

agreeable to her. She did not perceive that she had only changed

masters, and that the new one would prove himself infinitely more

difficult to please, more exacting, than that sceptical Italian who

confined himself to watching that she did not carry away her millions to

strangers and who simply mocked at everything else.

Mademoiselle finally passed through the state of apprenticeship to

absolute monarchy. Her eyes were opened only on the day on which the

thunder cloud burst upon her.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 35: See the _Memoires de Louis XIV._, edited by Charles

Dreyss. The _Memoires_ of Louis XIV. were not written by himself. He

dictated them to his secretaries afterward adding notes in his own

handwriting and correcting the proofs. See the _Introduction_ by M.

Dreyss.]

[Footnote 36: _Memoires de Mademoiselle de Montpensier. Memoires de

Montglat._]

[Footnote 37: Montglat.]

[Footnote 38: _Id._]

[Footnote 39: Letters of January 3, 1717, of September 27, 1718, and of

July, 1722. Madame adds in this last: "Now, all the circumstances are

known."]

[Footnote 40: Letter to the Queen, Anne of Austria, October 27, 1651.]

[Footnote 41: March 23, 1865, Pere Theiner, Guardian of the Secret

Archives of the Vatican, replied to some one who had pressed the

question: "Our acts of December 16, 1641, in which Jules Mazarin was

created Cardinal, do not say whether or not he was a priest. How could

he then have been admitted to the order of Cardinal-priest? No doubt he

was a priest." The letter of Pere Theiner has been published by M. Jules

Loiseleur in his _Problemes historiques_.]

[Footnote 42: _Letters of Madame de Maintenon_ edited by Geoffroy.]

[Footnote 43: For further details see the excellent volume of M.

Lacour-Gayet, _L'education politique de Louis XIV._]

[Footnote 44: December 24th, _Relations des ambassadeurs venitiens_.]

[Footnote 45: The letter is dated April 21, 1654. Louis XIV. was then

fifteen and a half years of age.]

[Footnote 46: Mme. de Motteville had heard him express the same idea.

_Cf._ his _Memoires_, v., 101, ed. Petitot.]

[Footnote 47: _Les fragments des memoires inedits_ by Dubois, valet of

Louis XIV., published by Leon Aubineau in the _Biblotheque de l'Ecole

des Chartes_, and in his _Notices litteraires_ upon the 17th century.]

[Footnote 48: _Cf._ Lacour-Gayet, p. 203.]

[Footnote 49: M. Dreyss dates the writing of this portion of the

_Memoires_ about 1670.]

[Footnote 50: Letters of June 9, 1654, and April 9, 1658.]

[Footnote 51: _Segraisiana._ Louis XIV. was seventeen when he made this

remark.]

[Footnote 52: _Journal de voyage de deux jeunes Hollandais a Paris_

(1656-1658).]

[Footnote 53: _Memoires de Mme. de Motteville._]

[Footnote 54: The fair of Saint-Germain was held between Saint-Sulpice

and Saint-Germain-des-Pres, from February 3d to the evening before Palm

Sunday. The Court and the populace elbowed each other there.]

[Footnote 55: _Journal de deux jeunes Hollandais._]

[Footnote 56: _Memoires_ of Mademoiselle.]

[Footnote 57: _Journal de deux jeunes Hollandais._]

[Footnote 58: _Journal de deux jeunes Hollandais._]

[Footnote 59: April 29th.]

[Footnote 60: To the Duc de Bouillon and to the son of the Marshal Duc

de La Meilleraye, who took the title of Duc de Mazarin.]

[Footnote 61: It must not be forgotten that Saint-Simon was presented at

Court in 1692. Louis XIV. was then fifty-four, and had reigned

forty-nine years. Saint-Simon only knew the end of the reign.]

[Footnote 62: Brother of the Superintendent of Finances.]

[Footnote 63: In the summer of 1657.]

[Footnote 64: _Vers d'Atys_, opera played in 1676, and _d'Astrate_,

tragedy of 1663.]

[Footnote 65: The phrase is M. Jules Lemaitre's.]

[Footnote 66: See _The Youth of La Grande Mademoiselle_. For this

chapter _cf._ _La misere au temps de la Fronde et Saint-Vincent de

Paul_, by Feillet; _La cabale des devots_, by Raoul Allier;

_Saint-Vincent de Paul_, by Emanuel Broglie; _Saint-Vincent de Paul et

les Goudi_, by Chantelauze; _Port-Royal_, by Sainte-Beuve.]

[Footnote 67: Village of the arrondissement of Provins.]

[Footnote 68: Feillet, _La misere au temps de la Fronde_.]

[Footnote 69: See the volume of Raoul Allier, _La cabale des devots_.]

[Footnote 70: Marie de Gonzague.]

[Footnote 71: En Picardie.]

[Footnote 72: M. Emanuel de Broglie.]

[Footnote 73: Saul in the _Journal des guerres civiles de

Dubuisson-Aubenay_. He mentions the date of December 2, 1650, upon which

"large donations" were sent into Champagne, by Mmes. de Lamoignon and de

Herse, Messieurs de Bernieres, Lenain, etc.]

[Footnote 74: The Parliament of Dijon had a bad reputation with the

ministers, who accused it of refusing all reform. This does not excuse

such a lack of good faith.]

[Footnote 75: Dombes was a small independent principality which had only

been definitely united to France on March 28, 1782; its capital was

Trevoux.]

[Footnote 76: _Histoire de France._ Tr. by Jacques Porchat and Miot.

Paris, 1886.]

[Footnote 77: _Memoires de Montglat; Memoires de Mme. de Motteville._]

[Footnote 78: The ball took place on the 3rd. Several days elapsed

before the news of the death reached Aix.]

[Footnote 79: _Memoires_ of Mademoiselle.]

[Footnote 80: _Memoires_ of Mademoiselle.]

[Footnote 81: Anne de Gonzague.]

[Footnote 82: This appeared in 1691.]

[Footnote 83: Isle des Faisans was also called _Isle de la Conference_,

since Mazarin had there discussed the treaty of the Pyrenees with Luis

de Haro.]

[Footnote 84: _Memoires de Montglat._]

[Footnote 85: _Memoires de Mme. de Motteville._]

[Footnote 86: _Ibid._]

[Footnote 87: There exists in the _Archives d'Affaires etrangeres_ a

fragment of the instructions of Mazarin to Louis XIV., written under the

dictation of the King. M. Chantelauze, who discovered it, published it

in the _Correspondant_ of August 10, 1881.]

[Footnote 88: Motteville.]

[Footnote 89: Guy Patin. Letter of January 28, 1661.]

[Footnote 90: Motteville.]

[Footnote 91: He was even twenty-four when he asked Perefixe again to

give him Latin lessons.]

[Footnote 92: Letter of June 27th to the Queen of Poland (_Archives de

Chantilly_). The King dined at one o'clock.]

[Footnote 93: Letter of July 15, 1661.]