Peace is signed with the Emperor at Ratisbon--The Queen-Mother
deprives Richelieu’s niece Madame de Combalet of her post of _dame
d’atours_ and demands of Louis XIII the instant dismissal of the
Cardinal--The Luxembourg interview--“The Day of Dupes”--Triumph of
Richelieu--Bassompierre’s explanation of his own part in this
affair--His visit to Versailles--“He has arrived after the
battle!”--He gives offence to Richelieu by refusing an invitation
to dinner--He finds himself in semi-disgrace--_Monsieur_ quarrels
with the Cardinal and leaves the Court--The King again treats
Bassompierre with cordiality--Departure of the Court for
Compiègne--Bassompierre learns that the Queen-Mother has been
placed under arrest and the Princesse de Conti exiled and that he
himself is to be arrested--The marshal is advised by the Duc
d’Épernon to leave France--He declines and announces his intention
of going to the Court to meet his fate--He burns “more than six
thousand love-letters”--His arrival at the Court--Singular conduct
of the King towards him--The marshal is arrested by the Sieur de
Launay, lieutenant of the Gardes du Corps, and conducted to the
Bastille.
So soon as his health was re-established, the King is said to have
warned Richelieu of the hostile intentions of his mother, and when, on
October 19, the Court left Lyons, the Cardinal, with the object of
regaining her friendship, travelled with her in the same boat from
Roanne to Briare--“in complete privacy,” says Bassompierre, and appears
to have spared no pains to conciliate her. Marie dissembled so well that
he believed that all immediate danger was over; but scarcely had she
arrived in Paris than she called upon the King to carry out the promise
he had made her at Lyons.
Louis pleaded the interests of the State, and demanded time to settle
the troubles. But it was necessary to find other arguments. Père Joseph
and Brulart de Léon, who had been sent to Ratisbon to settle with the
Emperor the question of Casale and Mantua, had concluded with him a
general peace (October 13). Schomberg was on the march towards Casale,
which was in the utmost peril, for the Spaniards had already captured
the town and were pressing the citadel closely, when he received news of
the treaty. He paid no attention to it and continued to advance. On the
26th he came in sight of the place, and a cannonade between his forces
and those of the besiegers had actually begun, when the young Papal
agent Mazarini, at the risk of his life, rode in between the hostile
armies, waving a paper and crying: “Peace!” The proposals he brought for
the evacuation of the town by the Spaniards and of the citadel by the
French pending the acceptance of the Ratisbon treaty by Spain were
acceded to, and the great siege of Casale came suddenly to an end.
When this agreement was known in Paris, and the war regarded as over,
the Queen-Mother, refusing to listen to any remonstrance from the King,
promptly deprived Richelieu’s niece, Madame de Combalet, of her post as
_dame d’atours_, in an interview in which she is said to have heaped the
grossest abuse upon the unfortunate young woman, and demanded of her son
the instant dismissal of the Cardinal. The King demurred and, to escape
maternal importunities, withdrew to his hunting-lodge at Versailles; but
Marie was resolved to give him no rest until she had gained his consent;
and on the morning of November 10 Louis returned to Paris, and went to
visit the Queen-Mother at the Luxembourg.
On his arrival at the Luxembourg, whither he was accompanied by
Bassompierre, the King and his mother entered the latter’s cabinet, and
gave strict orders that no one should be allowed to interrupt them. They
then locked the door of the cabinet, and the Queen-Mother’s attendants
those of the ante-chamber.
Hardly, however, had the conversation begun, when a little door leading
from the chapel of the Luxembourg into the Queen’s cabinet, which their
Majesties had not thought of securing, gently opened, and the tall,
scarlet-robed figure and pale, thin face of the man whose fate they had
met to decide appeared to their astonished eyes. Richelieu, informed of
the King’s return to Paris and his arrival at the Luxembourg, had formed
a shrewd suspicion of what was in the wind, and had determined to be
present at the interview between mother and son. Finding the doors of
the ante-chamber locked, he had made his way to the cabinet along the
gallery of the palace, and, on discovering the door of the cabinet also
secured, had bethought himself of that which communicated with the
chapel.
“All is lost; here he is!” exclaimed the King, looking as guilty as a
timid schoolboy detected by a stern master in some breach of discipline.
The Cardinal advanced with a smiling face. “I will wager,” said he,
“that their Majesties were speaking of me.” And then, turning to the
Queen-Mother, he added: “Confess it, Madame.” “We were,” replied Marie.
And then, beside herself with passion at the Minister’s audacity, she
broke forth into a torrent of accusations and reproaches, charging him,
amongst other things, with plotting to marry his niece to the Comte de
Soissons and set him upon the throne in place of the King. The Cardinal
appeared to quail before the tempest; he fell on his knees and protested
his innocence; he wept; he was in despair. But this pretence of
humility, instead of disarming the wrath of the Queen-Mother, served
only to inflame it. “It is for you,” she cried, turning to the King, “to
decide whether you intend to prefer a valet to your mother.” “It is more
natural,” interposed Richelieu, “that it is I who should be sacrificed.”
And he demanded pardon and permission to retire. The King remained
silent; Marie overwhelmed him with a fresh storm of reproaches, and he
quitted the room, convinced that his power was at an end.
Louis XIII, dumbfounded by the violent scene of which he had been a
witness, informed his mother that he was quite unable to come to a
decision that day, and quitted the Luxembourg.
On the following morning the King signed a despatch which his mother had
extracted from him which gave the sole command of the army of Italy to
Louis de Marillac and recalled Schomberg and La Force, who were
adherents of the Cardinal. Then he departed for Versailles, without
again seeing the Queen-Mother, but the Keeper of the Seals, Michel de
Marillac, whom Marie had designated as Prime Minister in place of
Richelieu, had orders to follow him.
This order appeared decisive; all the Court believed that the Cardinal
had fallen. A crowd of courtiers invaded the Luxembourg, where the
Queen-Mother paraded her triumph and received their felicitations,
without deigning to inconvenience herself by following the King to
Versailles, as some of the more prudent of her friends urged her to do.
She flattered herself that she held the place of Catherine de’ Medici;
but she had none of Catherine’s _finesse_ and intelligence; Catherine,
in similar circumstances, would not have allowed the King out of her
sight for a moment.
Anne of Austria, _Monsieur_, the Spanish Ambassador, the grandees were
transported with joy; and couriers started to carry the good news to
Madrid, Vienna, Brussels, and Turin. It was reported that the hated
Cardinal was busy making his preparations for departure; that he
intended to retire to the government of Le Havre, and that his mules had
been seen defiling along the Pontoise road.
It would appear, in fact, that Richelieu, believing himself ruined, had
for a moment contemplated taking refuge at Le Havre, but that two of his
friends who had remained faithful to his fortunes, Châteauneuf and the
Président Le Jay, had strongly opposed this resolution and persuaded him
to remain in Paris. Anyway, he did so, and in the course of the
afternoon he received a message from the First Equerry, Saint-Simon,
bidding him come with all speed to Versailles.
Saint-Simon and the Cardinal de la Valette, who had followed the King,
had pleaded the cause of Richelieu; but it is probable that “reasons of
State” had pleaded still more eloquently for him. For Louis, with all
his faults, did not, as we know, lack intelligence; and now that the
decision which for weeks he had postponed had to be made, he recognised
that the Cardinal’s dismissal would mean his own reduction to impotence,
disorder, corruption, and intrigue at home and the triumph of the
enemies of France abroad. His hesitation was at an end, and he
authorised Saint-Simon to send for Richelieu.
The Cardinal came; he threw himself at the feet of the King, who raised
him up and praised the zeal and fidelity which he had shown in his
service. He knelt again and offered to retire, so as not to be a subject
of discord between mother and son. Louis declined to accept his
resignation, and then gave orders that they should be left alone
together, and proceeded to discuss with the Cardinal the measures to be
adopted against the cabal. It was decided that Michel de Marillac should
be deprived of the Seals and banished the Court, and that another
despatch should be sent to the Army of Italy, cancelling the one which
was already on its way and ordering Schomberg to have the Maréchal de
Marillac arrested and sent a prisoner to France. And so, while the
Queen-Mother was triumphing at the Luxembourg, Richelieu triumphed at
Versailles. That day--November 11, 1630--has remained famous in history
as “The Day of Dupes.”
* * * * *
“The Day of Dupes”! This name has been attributed to Bassompierre, and
no one was better able to appreciate its justice, since, whatever he may
say to the contrary--and he would fain have us believe that he was only
the innocent victim of circumstances--the marshal was undoubtedly one
of these dupes. But let us listen to his explanations.
He begins by denying most solemnly that before November 10 he had any
knowledge that the Queen-Mother and Richelieu were at variance, except
what he had gathered from “scraps of information,” and that he had no
idea until some time afterwards that Marie had actually demanded from
the King the disgrace of the Cardinal. He accompanied Louis to the
Luxembourg on the morning of the 10th, as we have mentioned, but he
assures us neither the King nor the Cardinal--whom he saw that
evening--said a word to him about the stormy scene in the Queen-Mother’s
cabinet, and that the matter was kept a profound secret between all the
parties concerned.
“This quarrel,” says he, “was kept so secret on all sides that no
one knew anything about it or suspected it.”
He then goes on to relate how on the evening of the 10th he accompanied
the King to the apartments of _Monsieur_, from whom Louis had extracted
a promise to be reconciled to the Cardinal.
“The King sent to summon the Cardinal, and, after saying a few
words to his brother, presented the Cardinal to him, and begged him
to love him and to regard him as his servant. This _Monsieur_
rather coldly promised the King to do, provided that he [Richelieu]
would comport himself towards him as he ought to do. I was present
at this agreement, and afterwards, happening to be near the
Cardinal, he drew me aside and said to me: ‘_Monsieur_ complains
about me, and God knows if he has reason to do so; but the beaten
pay the forfeit.’ I said: ‘Monsieur, do not attach any importance
to what _Monsieur_ says. He only does what Puylaurens and Le
Coigneux counsel him to do; and when you wish to hold _Monsieur_,
hold him by means of them, and you will stop him.’ He said nothing
to me afterwards about his quarrel;[134] and may God confound me
if I even suspected it! After supper I went to visit the Princesse
de Conti. I had previously attended the King’s _coucher_, and he
did not give me any cause to suspect it. I inquired if he were
leaving on the morrow;[135] and he told me that he was not. I found
the Princesse de Conti in such ignorance of this affair, that not
only did she not speak of it, but I shall certainly dare to swear
that she knew nothing about it.
“On Monday, the 11th, St. Martin’s Day, I came early to the
apartments of the King, who told me that he was returning to
Versailles. I did not imagine for what reason. I had arranged to
dine with the Cardinal, whom I had been unable to see at his house
since his arrival [from Lyons], and I went there towards midday. I
was told that he was not there, and that he was leaving that day to
go to Pontoise. Up to then I did not suspect anything, nor did I
even do so, when, having re-entered the Luxembourg and the Cardinal
arriving there, I accompanied him up to the door of the Queen’s
chamber, and he said to me: ‘You will no longer take any account of
a disgraced man like myself.’ I imagined that he intended to refer
to the bad reception which _Monsieur_ had given him the preceding
day. I intended to wait to go and dine with him; but M. de
Longueville enticed me away to go and dine with _Monsieur_ at M. de
Créquy’s house, as he had invited me to do. While we were there, M.
de Puylaurens said to me: ‘Well, it is certainly true this time
that our people have quarrelled, for the Queen-Mother said openly
to the Cardinal yesterday that she never wished to see him again.’
I was very much astonished at this news, which was shortly
afterwards confirmed by M. de Longueville. I sent at once to the
Princesse de Conti to beg her very humbly to send me news; but she
swore to my man that this was the first that she had heard of it;
and that she begged me to furnish her with particulars concerning
it. I knew nothing about it, save that Madame de Combalet had taken
leave of the Queen-Mother and that the King and the Cardinal had
left Paris. In the evening _Monsieur le Comte_ took me to the
Queen-Mother’s, but she never spoke, except to the Queen and the
princesses.
“_Tuesday, the 12th._--I went to Chaillot, where I spent the whole
day, and, on my return, I met Lisle, who told me that M. de
Marillac had been deprived of the Seals and sent under an escort of
the Guards to Touraine.
“_Wednesday, the 13th._--M. de la Vrillière, returning at a gallop
from Versailles; told me that M. de Châteauneuf had been appointed
Keeper of the Seals, and, in the evening at the Queen-Mother’s, I
saw M. de la Ville-aux-Clercs, who had come to inform her on behalf
of the King.”
Now, Bassompierre is generally regarded as a singularly reliable
chronicler, but we must remember that his _Mémoires_ were written, or
rather arranged and revised, during his imprisonment in the Bastille,
and that there was always a by no means remote possibility that they
might be impounded and placed under the eyes of Louis XIII and
Richelieu. It was therefore manifestly to his interest to make out as
good a case for himself as he could, and to pose as the victim of
unfounded suspicions. When he declares that on the evening of the 10th
he had no suspicion of what had taken place at the Luxembourg, and that
he was positive that the Princesse de Conti knew nothing about it, he is
probably speaking the truth. For it was not until the following morning
that Louis XIII signed the despatch appointing the Maréchal de Marillac
to the command of the army of Italy, and until the King had taken what
appeared to her a decisive step against Richelieu, the Queen-Mother may
well have refrained from speaking of the matter to anyone, even to so
close a friend and confidante as the Princesse de Conti. But when he
asks us to believe that until the afternoon of the 11th, by which time
the affair must have been already known to half the Court, and, by his
own admission, _was_ known to _Monsieur’s_ favourite Puylaurens and to
the Duc de Longueville, both he and his wife were still in ignorance,
and that when the Cardinal said to him: “You will no longer take any
account of a disgraced man like myself,” he really believed that he was
referring to
[Illustration: CHARLOTTE LOUISE DE LORRAINE, PRINCESSE DE CONTI.
From an engraving by Thomas de Leu.]
his differences with _Monsieur_, we must entirely decline to do so.
* * * * *
On the morning of the 14th, the Spanish merchant Alphonso Lopez,[136]
who was one of Richelieu’s secret agents, came to visit Bassompierre and
“told him that he would do well to go to Versailles to see the King and
the Cardinal.” The marshal, however, learning that the new Keeper of the
Seals, Châteauneuf, with whom he was on very friendly terms, was coming
to Paris that day to pay his respects to the two Queens, thought it
advisable to defer his visit to the morrow, and, meanwhile, to go and
offer his compliments to Châteauneuf on his appointment and ascertain
from him what reception he was likely to receive.
“He told me,” says Bassompierre, “that he had not perceived that
there was anything against me, but that I should do well to go and
present myself. This I did on Friday, the 15th. I entered the
chamber of the King, who, so soon as he caught sight of me,
observed, loud enough for me to hear: ‘He has arrived after the
battle,’ and greeted me very coldly. I assumed a cheerful
countenance, as though nothing had been the matter. Finally, the
King told me that he should be at Saint-Germain on the Monday, and
that I was to bring his Swiss Guards there. At the same time, I
heard Saint-Simon, the First Equerry, say to _Monsieur le Comte_:
‘_Monsieur_, do not invite him to dinner, nor me either, and he
will return as he came.’ The insolence of this nasty little wretch
(_petit punais_) put me in a rage inwardly, but I concealed it, for
the laughers were not on my side, though I knew not why.
Nevertheless, _Monsieur le Comte_ said to me: ‘If you will dine
with me, I have three or four dishes above for us to eat.’
‘Monsieur,’ I replied, ‘I have asked MM. de Créquy and de Saint-Luc
and the Comte de Sault to dine with me to-day at Chaillot, and they
are awaiting me; but I thank you very humbly.’ Upon that the
Cardinal arrived. He greeted me coldly and spoke to me rather
indifferently, and then went with the King into his cabinet. I
began to talk to _Monsieur le Comte_, when Armaignac[137] came from
the Cardinal to ask me to dine with him. But, as I had just refused
_Monsieur le Comte_, before whom he spoke, I made the same excuse
as I had done before; with which the Cardinal was offended, and
said so to the King.”
On the 18th Bassompierre went to Saint-Germain, where the King “gave him
the worst reception in the world.” He returned two days later, and was
again received in the most frigid manner. He decided to remain there, in
the hope that his Majesty might relent, and stayed for three weeks,
during which the King never spoke to him, except to give him the
password. The two Queens were also in a sort of semi-disgrace, for
though Louis treated them with every courtesy, in public it was only on
very rare occasions that he entered their private apartments. Beringhen
and Jaquinot, two of the King’s first _valets de chambre_, who had been
mixed up in secret intrigues against Richelieu, were banished the Court,
but for the present no further steps were taken against the Cardinal’s
more prominent enemies. On the other hand, Montmorency and Toiras were
created marshals of France, in order to secure them; and, to keep
_Monsieur_ quiet, the Cardinal bought the good offices of his two
favourites, Puylaurens and Le Coigneux, the former by the promise that
he should be created a duke, and the latter by the charge of _Président
au mortier_ in the Parlement and the present of a large sum of money.
Meanwhile, efforts were made to persuade the Queen-Mother to be
reconciled to the Cardinal, and Louis XIII sent Père Suffren and the
Nuncio Bagni to Marie to offer never to oblige her to restore the
relatives of Richelieu to their posts in her Household, provided she
would consent to resume her place in the Council. This she refused to
do, so long as the Cardinal sat there.
With the New Year intrigues began again. The Président Le Coigneux,
under the impression that the new Keeper of the Seals, Châteauneuf, was
working to ruin him, persuaded _Monsieur_ to break with the Cardinal and
quit the Court. On the morning of January 30, Gaston went to Richelieu’s
hotel, informed the Cardinal, in a threatening tone, that he renounced
his friendship, since he had failed in all the promises which he had
made him; then, refusing to listen to any explanation, he added that he
was retiring to his appanage and that, “if he were molested, he should
defend himself very well.” And, the same day, he left Paris for Orléans.
On learning of the abrupt departure of _Monsieur_, Bassompierre went to
the Cardinal for his orders, as the King was still at Saint-Germain,
when Richelieu told him that he had sent in all haste to acquaint his
Majesty with what had happened and to counsel his immediate return to
Paris. Louis XIII arrived that same evening and alighted at the
Cardinal’s hotel, where Bassompierre was awaiting him. To his surprise,
the King greeted him most cordially, presented him with a wild boar
which he had killed that day, and, after visiting the Cardinal, invited
Bassompierre to enter his coach and accompany him to the Louvre.
On the way Louis informed the marshal that “he was going to scold the
Queen his mother for having persuaded his brother to leave the Court.”
Bassompierre answered that, if the Queen-Mother had done so, she would
be much to blame, but he should be greatly surprised if she had
counselled such a thing. To which the King rejoined that he was positive
she had, “on account of the hatred which she entertained for the
Cardinal.”
A few days later Louis XIII announced his intention of spending the
Carnival at Compiègne, whither the two Queens decided to follow him, for
Marie cherished the illusion that, with the aid of her daughter-in-law,
she might yet succeed in undermining the power of the Cardinal, and she
was determined not to repeat the fault she had committed on the Day of
Dupes.
On February 16, the day before the Court set out for Compiègne,
Bassompierre, who had been given permission to remain in Paris, went to
take leave of their Majesties. The King received him very graciously and
promised him a _gratification_ to compensate him for the heavy expenses
which he had incurred during his embassy to Switzerland. Afterwards the
marshal went to visit the Princesse de Conti, who was to accompany the
Court to Compiègne. Little did he imagine as he bade his wife farewell
that they were never to meet again!
In the afternoon of Sunday, February 23, as Bassompierre, who had been
dining with the Maréchal de Créquy, was on his way to the Place-Royale
to visit his brother-in-law Saint-Luc, his coach had to pull up, owing
to the road being blocked by a waggon on which was a sumptuous
four-poster bed. He sent one of his servants to inquire to whom the bed
belonged, and was told that it was the property of the Abbé de Foix, a
meddlesome ecclesiastic, who had been concerned somewhat prominently in
the recent intrigues against Richelieu, and that it was on its way to
the Bastille, whither its owner had been conveyed a prisoner that
morning. From the fact that Foix had been arrested Bassompierre inferred
that the Cardinal had resumed the offensive against his enemies; and
this surmise proved to be only too correct.
That evening, as Bassompierre was about to set out for the house of his
friend Saint-Géran, to witness a play, which was to be followed by a
ball, he received a message from d’Épernon begging him to come to him at
once. On his arrival, the duke informed him that the King and Court had
quitted Compiègne that morning for Senlis, leaving the Queen-Mother
under arrest at the château; that the Princesse de Conti had been exiled
to her brother’s estate at Eu, by a _lettre de cachet_; that Vautier,
the Queen-Mother’s first physician, had been arrested and conveyed to
Senlis, and, finally, that he had learned on good authority that it had
been proposed to arrest Bassompierre, Créquy, and himself. He added that
no resolution had as yet been taken against Créquy or himself, but it
had been decided to arrest Bassompierre when the King returned to Paris
on the Tuesday, and that he had sent for him to warn him of his danger.
Bassompierre asked d’Épernon what he advised him to do, and what he
proposed to do himself. The old noble replied that, if he were only
fifty years old--the age of the marshal--he would not remain in Paris a
single hour, and would make for some place of safety, from which he
would be afterwards able to make his peace; but that, since he was
nearly eighty and had no desire to play the courtier any longer at his
age, he should employ all the influence he possessed to disarm the
resentment of the King and the Cardinal, at least so far as to obtain
permission to retire to his government and spend the rest of his days
there in peace. With Bassompierre, however, the case was different. He
was still comparatively young, and could afford to wait until Fortune
smiled again; and he therefore advised him to leave France at once and
offered him the loan of 50,000 écus to enable him to live a couple of
years abroad in a style befitting his rank, which he could repay him
when his exile was at an end.
“I thanked him very humbly,” says Bassompierre, “first for his good
counsel and then for his offer, and told him that my modesty
prevented me from accepting the latter and my conscience from
following the other, since I was perfectly innocent of any offence
and had never committed any action which was not rather deserving
of praise and reward than of punishment; that I had always sought
glory before profit, and that, preferring as I did my honour, not
only to my liberty, but to life itself, I should never compromise
it by a flight which might cause my integrity to be suspected and
doubted; that for thirty years I had served France and applied
myself to making my fortune there, and that I would not now, when
I was approaching the age of fifty, seek a new country, and that
having devoted to the King my service and my life, I might as well
give him my liberty also, which he would soon restore to me, when
he recollected my services and my fidelity; that, at the worst, I
should prefer to grow old and to die in prison, judged by everyone
innocent and my master ungrateful, than by an ill-advised flight to
cause myself to be deemed guilty and suspected of ingratitude for
the honours and charges which the King had bestowed upon me; that I
could not believe that I should be thrown into prison without
having committed any offence, nor retained there without any charge
against me; but that, if both were to happen, I should support it
with great firmness and moderation.”
He concluded by declaring that, instead of taking to flight, it was his
intention to go on the morrow to Senlis to present himself to the King,
in order to justify himself, if he were accused, or to go to prison, if
he were suspected, or even to die, if his ill fortune or the fury of his
enemies went to that extremity.
When he had finished speaking, d’Épernon embraced him, with tears in his
eyes, and said: “I know not what will happen to you, and I pray God with
all my heart that it may be nothing but good; but I have never known a
gentleman better born than you, nor who better deserved all good
fortune. You have enjoyed it up to the present. May God preserve it for
you! And, although I fear the resolution which you have taken,
nevertheless, after having heard and considered your reasons, I approve
of it and counsel you to follow it.”
The marshal and d’Épernon then proceeded to Saint-Géran’s house, where
they found Créquy, whom the duke informed of the warning which had
reached him and of what Bassompierre intended to do. Créquy expressed
his approval of his resolution, and said that, for his part, he should
do what he could to avert the storm, but that he should not run away
from it. After the ball was over, they all three went to sup at Madame
de Choisy’s house, where they were presently joined by the Duc de
Chevreuse, who did not appear to be much affected by the exile of his
sister, the Princesse de Conti, and was as gay as usual. As they were
leaving, the Comte du Plessis-Praslin, who had been sent by the King to
convey to Chevreuse an official notification of his sister’s disgrace,
arrived, and informed the duke that the princess had been exiled, not
from any hostility which his Majesty entertained towards the House of
Guise, but “for the good of his service.”
On the following morning Bassompierre rose before daybreak, and,
foreseeing that, if he were arrested his house would be searched, burned
“more than six thousand love-letters” which he had received from various
fair ladies during his long career of gallantry, “these being the only
papers I possessed,” says he, “which might be able to injure anyone a
little.” This task accomplished, he set out for Senlis, in company with
the Cardinal de la Valette, the Comte de Soissons, the Duc de Bouillon
and the Comte de Gramont. As they were on the point of starting,
Soissons warned Bassompierre that he had positive information that it
was intended to arrest him, and advised him to make his escape, which he
offered to facilitate. The marshal thanked him, but declined, declaring
that, “as he had nothing sinister on his conscience, he feared nothing,”
and that he proposed to have the honour of accompanying _Monsieur le
Comte_ to Senlis.
“On our arrival,” says he, “we found the King in the Queen’s
chamber, with her and the Princesse de Guymené. He approached us
and said: ‘Here is good company,’ and, then having talked a little
to _Monsieur le Comte_ and the Cardinal de la Valette, he conversed
with me for some time, telling me that he had done what he could to
reconcile the Queen his mother with the Cardinal, but had failed.
He said nothing to me about the Princess de Conti. Then I told him
that I had been warned that he intended to have me arrested, and
that I had come to him in order that he might have no trouble in
finding me, and that, if I knew what prison he designed for me, I
would repair thither voluntarily, without his having to send me.
Upon which he said these very words: ‘How, Betstein, can you have
thought that I intended to do so? You know that I love you.’ And I
truly believe that, at that moment, he spoke as he felt. Then they
came to inform him that the Cardinal was in his chamber, and he
took leave of the company, telling me to send the company which was
on guard in advance early on the morrow, in order that it might be
able to mount guard in Paris. Then he gave me the password.
“We remained for some time in the Queen’s chamber, and then all
went to sup at M. de Longueville’s, and from there returned to the
Queen’s, whither the King came after supper. I saw plainly that
there was something against me, for the King always kept his head
bent down, playing on the guitar, without looking at me, and during
the whole evening he never spoke a word to me. I spoke of this to
M. de Gramont, as we were going together to sleep in a lodging
which had been made ready for us.”
The next morning the anticipated blow fell:
“On Tuesday morning, the 25th day of February, I rose at six
o’clock, and was standing before the fire in my dressing-gown, when
the Sieur de Launay, lieutenant of the Gardes du Corps, entered my
chamber and said to me: ‘Monsieur, it is with tears in my eyes and
a heart which bleeds that I, who for twenty years have been your
soldier and have always been under your orders, am obliged to
inform you that the King has commanded me to arrest you.’ I did not
experience any particular emotion at these words, and said to him:
‘Monsieur, you will have no great difficulty about that, seeing
that I have come here expressly for that purpose, because I had
been warned of it. I have been all my life submissive to the wishes
of the King, who is able to dispose of me and of my liberty as he
wills.’ Upon which I inquired if he desired my servants to
withdraw; but he answered that he did not, since he had no other
orders than to arrest me and afterwards to send to inform the King
of it, and that I could speak to my people, write, and send for
anything that I wished for, and that everything was permitted. M.
de Gramont then rose from his bed and approached me weeping, at
which I began to laugh, telling him that if he were not more
distressed at my imprisonment than I was, he would feel no
resentment, as in truth I did not trouble myself much about it, not
believing that I should remain there long.[138]
“Launay did not permit any of the Guards who were with him to enter
my chamber, and, shortly afterwards, one of the King’s coaches, his
Musketeers and thirty of his Light Horse arrived before my lodging.
I entered the coach with Launay only, meeting as I went out _Madame
la Princesse_, who appeared touched by my disgrace. We preceded the
King by two hundred paces all the way to the Porte de Saint-Martin,
where I turned to the left, and, passing through the Place-Royale,
was brought to the Bastille. Here I dined with the governor, M. du
Tremblay,[139] who afterwards conducted me to the chamber in which
_Monsieur le Prince_ had formerly been confined, where they shut me
up with a single valet to attend on me.”