Memoirs Of Jean Francois Paul De Gondi, Cardinal De Retz, Volume II.

J >> Jean Francois Paul de Gondi, Cardinal de Retz >> Memoirs Of Jean Francois Paul De Gondi, Cardinal De Retz, Volume II.


The Queen gave an odd smile which I did not very well like, but I would
not seem to take any notice of it, and to stop Meilleraye in his encomium
upon me, I assumed the discourse myself, and said, "Madame, we are not
come upon my account, but to tell you that the city of Paris, disarmed
and submissive, throws herself at your Majesty's feet."

"Not so submissive as guilty," replied the Queen, with a face full of
fire; "if the people were so raging as I was made to believe, how came
they to be so soon subdued?"

The Marshal fell into a passion, and said, with an oath, "Madame, an
honest man cannot flatter you when things are come to such an extremity.
If you do not set Broussel at liberty this very day, there will not be
left one stone upon another in Paris by tomorrow morning."

I was going to support what the Marshal had said, but the Queen stopped
my mouth by telling me, with an air of banter, "Go to rest, sir; you have
done a mighty piece of work."

When I returned home, I found an incredible number of people expecting
me, who forced me to get upon the top of my coach to give them an account
of what success I had had at Court. I told them that the Queen had
declared her satisfaction in their submission, and that she told me it
was the only method they could have taken for the deliverance of the
prisoners. I added other persuasives to pacify the commonalty, and they
dispersed the sooner because it was supper-time; for you must know that
the people of Paris, even those that are the busiest in all such
commotions, do not care to lose their meals.

I began to perceive that I had engaged my reputation too far in giving
the people any grounds to hope for the liberation of Broussel, though I
had particularly avoided giving them my word of honour, and I apprehended
that the Court would lay hold of this occasion to destroy me effectually
in the opinion of the people by making them believe that I acted in
concert with the Court only, to amuse and deceive them.

While I was making these and the like reflections, Montresor came and
told me that I was quite mistaken if I thought to be a great gainer by
the late expedition; that the Queen was not pleased with my proceedings,
and that the Court was persuaded that I did what lay in my power to
promote the insurrection. I confess I gave no credit to what Montresor
said, for though I saw they made a jest of me in the Queen's Cabinet, I
hoped that their malice did not go so far as to diminish the merit of the
service I had rendered, and never imagined that they could be capable of
turning it into a crime. Laigues, too, came from Court and told me that
I was publicly laughed at, and charged with having fomented the
insurrection instead of appeasing it; that I had been ridiculed two whole
hours and exposed to the smart raillery of Beautru, to the buffoonery of
Nogent, to the pleasantries of La Riviere, to the false compassion of the
Cardinal, and to the loud laughter of the Queen.

You may guess that I was not a little moved at this, but I rather felt a
slight annoyance than any transport of passion. All sorts of notions
came into my mind, and all as suddenly passed away. I sacrificed with
little or no scruple all the sweetest and brightest images which the
memory of past conspiracies presented in crowds to my mind as soon as the
ill-treatment I now publicly met with gave me reason to think that I
might with honour engage myself in new ones. The obligations I had to
her Majesty made me reject all these thoughts, though I must confess I
was brought up in them from my infancy, and Laigues and Montresor could
have never shaken my resolution either by insinuating motives or making
reproaches, if Argenteuil, a gentleman firmly attached to my interest,
had not come into my room that moment with a frightened countenance and
said:

"You are undone; the Marechal de La Meilleraye has charged me to tell you
that he verily thinks the devil is in the courtiers, who has put it into
their heads that you have done all in your power to stir up the sedition.
The Marechal de La Meilleraye has laboured earnestly to inform the Queen
and Cardinal of the truth of the whole matter, but both have ridiculed
him for his attempt. The Marshal said he could not excuse the injury
they did you, but could not sufficiently admire the contempt they always
had for the tumult, of which they foretold the consequence as if they had
the gift of prophecy, always affirming that it would vanish in a night,
as it really has, for he hardly met a soul in the streets."

He added that fires so quickly extinguished as this were not likely to
break out again; that he conjured me to provide for my own safety; that
the King's authority would shine out the next day with all the lustre
imaginable; that the Court seemed resolved not to let slip this fatal
conjuncture, and that I was to be made the first public example.

Argenteuil said: "Villeroy did not tell me so much, because he durst not;
but he so squeezed my hand 'en passant' that I am apt to think he knows a
great deal more, and I must tell you that they have very good reason for
their apprehensions, because there is not a soul to be seen in the
streets, and to-morrow they may take up whom they list."

Montresor, who would be thought to know all things beforehand, said that
he was assured it would be so and that he had foretold it. Laigues
bewailed my conduct, which he said had raised the compassion of all my
friends, although it had been their ruin. Upon this I desired to be left
about a quarter of an hour to myself, during which, reflecting how I had
been provoked and the public threatened, my scruples vanished; I gave
rein to all my thoughts, recollected that all the glorious ideas which
have ever entered my imagination were most concerned with vast designs,
and suffered my mind to be regaled with the pleasing hopes of being the
head of a party, a position which I had always admired in Plutarch's
"Lives." The inconsistency of my scheme with my character made me
tremble. A world of incidents may happen when the virtues in the leader
of a party may be vices in an archbishop. I had this view a thousand
times, and it always gave place to the duty I thought I owed to her
Majesty, but the remembrance of what had passed at the Queen's table, and
the resolution there taken to ruin me with the public, having banished
all scruples, I joyfully determined to abandon my destiny to all the
impulses of glory. I said to my friends that the whole Court was witness
of the harsh treatment I had met with for above a year in the King's
palace, and I added: "The public is engaged to defend my honour, but the
public being now about to be sacrificed, I am obliged to defend it
against oppression. Our circumstances are not so bad as you imagine,
gentlemen, and before twelve o'clock to-morrow I shall be master of
Paris."

My two friends thought I was mad, and began to counsel moderation,
whereas before they always incited me to action; but I did not give them
hearing. I immediately sent for Miron, Accountant-General, one of the
city colonels, a man of probity and courage, and having great interest
with the people. I consulted with him, and he executed his commission
with so much discretion and bravery that above four hundred considerable
citizens were posted up and down in platoons with no more noise and stir
than if so many Carthusian novices had been assembled for contemplation.
After having given orders for securing certain gates and bars of the
city, I went to sleep, and was told next morning that no soldiers had
appeared all night, except a few troopers, who just took a view of the
platoons of the citizens and then galloped off. Hence it was inferred
that our precautions had prevented the execution of the design formed
against particular persons, but it was believed there was some mischief
hatching at the Chancellor's against the public, because sergeants were
running backwards and forwards, and Ondedei went thither four times in
two hours.

Being informed soon after that the Chancellor was going to the Palace
with all the pomp of magistracy, and that two companies of Swiss Guards
approached the suburbs, I gave my orders in two words, which were
executed in two minutes. Miron ordered the citizens to take arms, and
Argenteuil, disguised as a mason, with a rule in his hand, charged the
Swiss in flank, killed twenty or thirty, dispersed the rest, and took one
of their colours. The Chancellor, hemmed in on every side, narrowly
escaped with his life to the Hotel d'O, which the people broke open,
rushed in with fury, and, as God would have it, fell immediately to
plundering, so that they forgot to force open a little chamber where both
the Chancellor and his brother, the Bishop of Meaux, to whom he was
confessing, lay concealed. The news of this occurrence ran like
wild-fire through the whole city. Men and women were immediately up in
arms, and mothers even put daggers into the hands of their children. In
less than two hours there were erected above two hundred barricades,
adorned with all the standards and colours that the League had left
entire. All the cry was, "God bless the King!" sometimes, "God bless
the Coadjutor!" and the echo was, "No Mazarin!"

The Queen sent her commands to me to use my interest to appease the
tumult. I answered the messenger, very coolly, that I had forfeited my
credit with the people on account of yesterday's transactions, and that I
did not dare to go abroad. The messenger had heard the cry of "God bless
the Coadjutor!" and would fain have persuaded me that I was the
favourite of the people, but I strove as much to convince him of the
contrary.

The Court minions of the two last centuries knew not what they did when
they reduced that effectual regard which kings ought to have for their
subjects into mere style and form; for there are, as you see, certain
conjunctures in which, by a necessary consequence, subjects make a mere
form also of the real obedience which they owe to their sovereigns.

The Parliament hearing the cries of the people for Broussel, after having
ordered a decree against Cominges, lieutenant of the Queen's Guards, who
had arrested him, made it death for all who took the like commissions for
the future, and decreed that an information should be drawn up against
those who had given that advice, as disturbers of the public peace. Then
the Parliament went in a body, in their robes, to the Queen, with the
First President at their head, and amid the acclamations of the people,
who opened all their barricades to let them pass. The First President
represented to the Queen, with becoming freedom, that the royal word had
been prostituted a thousand times over by scandalous and even childish
evasions, defeating resolutions most useful and necessary for the State.
He strongly exaggerated the mighty danger of the State from the city
being all in arms; but the Queen, who feared nothing because she knew
little, flew into a passion and raved like a fury, saying, "I know too
well that there is an uproar in the city, but you Parliamentarians,
together with your wives and children, shall be answerable for it all;"
and with that she retired into another chamber and shut the door after
her with violence. The members, who numbered about one hundred and
sixty, were going down-stairs; but the First President persuaded them to
go up and try the Queen once more, and meeting with the Duc d'Orleans,
he, with a great deal of persuasion, introduced twenty of them into the
presence-chamber, where the First President made another effort with the
Queen, by setting forth the terrors of the enraged metropolis up in arms,
but she would hear nothing, and went into the little gallery.

Upon this the Cardinal advanced and proposed to surrender the prisoner,
provided the Parliament would promise to hold no more assemblies. They
were going to consider this proposal upon the spot, but, thinking that
the people would be inclined to believe that the Parliament had been
forced if they gave their votes at the Palais Royal, they resolved to
adjourn to their own House.

The Parliament, returning and saying nothing about the liberation of
Broussel, were received by the people with angry murmurs instead of with
loud acclamations. They appeased those at the first two barricades by
telling them that the Queen had promised them satisfaction; but those at
the third barricade would not be paid in that coin, for a journeyman
cook, advancing with two hundred men, pressed his halberd against the
First President, saying, "Go back, traitor, and if thou hast a mind to
save thy life, bring us Broussel, or else Mazarin and the Chancellor as
hostages."

Upon this five presidents 'au mortier' and about twenty councillors fell
back into the crowd to make their escape; the First President only, the
most undaunted man of the age, continued firm and intrepid. He rallied
the members as well as he could, maintaining still the authority of a
magistrate, both in his words and behaviour, and went leisurely back to
the King's palace, through volleys of abuse, menaces, curses, and
blasphemies. He had a kind of eloquence peculiar to himself, knew
nothing of interjections, was not very exact in his speech, but the force
of it made amends for that; and being naturally bold, never spoke so well
as when he was in danger, insomuch that when he returned to the Palace he
even outdid himself, for it is certain that he moved the hearts of all
present except the Queen, who continued inflexible. The Duc d'Orleans
was going to throw himself at her feet, which four or five Princesses,
trembling with fear, actually did. The Cardinal, whom a young councillor
jestingly advised to go out into the streets and see how the people stood
affected, did at last join with the bulk of the Court, and with much ado
the Queen condescended to bid the members go and consult what was fitting
to be done, agreed to set the prisoners at liberty, restored Broussel to
the people, who carried him upon their heads with loud acclamations,
broke down their barricades, opened their shops, and in two hours Paris
was more quiet than ever I saw it upon a Good Friday.

As to the primum mobile of this revolution, it was owing to no other
cause than a deviation from the laws, which so alters the opinions of the
people that many times a faction is formed before the change is so much
as perceived.

This little reflection, with what has been said, may serve to confute
those who pretend that a faction without a head is never to be feared. It
grows up sometimes in a night. The commotion I have been speaking of,
which was so violent and lasting, did not appear to have any leader for a
whole year; but at last there rose up in one moment a much greater number
than was necessary for the party.

The morning after the barricades were removed, the Queen sent for me,
treated me with all the marks of kindness and confidence, said that if
she had hearkened to me she would not have experienced the late
disquietness; that the Cardinal was not to blame for it, but that
Chavigni had been the sole cause of her misfortunes, to whose pernicious
counsels she had paid more deference than to the Cardinal. "But; good
God!" she suddenly exclaimed, "will you not get that rogue Beautru
soundly thrashed, who has paid so little respect to your character? The
poor Cardinal was very near having it done the other night." I received
all this with more respect than credulity. She commanded me to go to the
poor Cardinal, to comfort him, and to advise him as to the best means of
quieting the populace.

I went without any scruple. He embraced me with a tenderness I am not
able to express, said there was not an honest man in France but myself,
and that all the rest were infamous flatterers, who had misled the Queen
in spite of all his and my good counsels. He protested that he would do
nothing for the future without my advice, showed me the foreign
despatches, and, in short, was so affable, that honest Broussel, who was
likewise present upon his invitation, for all his harmless simplicity,
laughed heartily as we were going out, and said that it was all mere
buffoonery.

There being a report that the King was to be removed by the Court from
Paris, the Queen assured the 'prevot des marchands' that it was false,
and yet the very next day carried him to Ruel. From there I doubted not
that she designed to surprise the city, which seemed really astonished at
the King's departure, and I found the hottest members of the Parliament
in great consternation, and the more so because news arrived at the same
time that General Erlac--[He was Governor of Brisac, and commanded the
forces of the Duke of Weimar after the Duke's death]--had passed the
Somme with 4,000 Germans. Now, as in general disturbances one piece of
bad news seldom comes singly, five or six stories of this kind were
published at the same time, which made me think I should find it as
difficult a task to raise the spirits of the people as I had before to
restrain them. I was never so nonplussed in all my life. I saw the full
extent of the danger, and everything looked terrible. Yet the greatest
perils have their charms if never so little glory is discovered in the
prospect of ill-success, while the least dangers have nothing but horror
when defeat is attended with loss of reputation.

I used all the arguments I could to dissuade the Parliament from making
the Court desperate, at least till they had thought of some expedients to
defend themselves from its insults, to which they would inevitably have
been exposed if the Court had taken time by the forelock, in which,
perhaps, they were prevented by the unexpected return of the Prince de
Conti. I hereupon formed a resolution which gave me a great deal of
uneasiness, but which was firm, because it was the only resolution I had
to take. Extremities are always disagreeable, but are the wisest means
when absolutely necessary; the best of it is that they admit of no middle
course, and if peradventure they are good, they are always decisive.

Fortune favoured my design. The Queen ordered Chavigni to be sent
prisoner to Havre-de-Grace. I embraced this opportunity to stir up the
natural fears of his dear friend Viole, by telling him that he was a
ruined man for doing what he had done at the instigation of Chavigni;
that it was plain the King left Paris with a view to attack it, and that
he saw as well as I how much the people were dejected; that if their
spirits should be quite sunk they could never be raised; that they must
be supported; that I would influence the people; and that he should do
what he could with the Parliament, who, in my opinion, ought not to be
supine, but to be awakened at a juncture when the King's departure had
perfectly drowned their senses, adding that a word in season would
infallibly produce this good effect.

Accordingly Viole struck one of the boldest strokes that has perhaps been
heard of. He told the Parliament that it was reported Paris was to be
besieged; that troops were marching for that end, and the most faithful
servants of his late Majesty, who, it was suspected, would oppose designs
so pernicious, would be put in chains; that it was necessary for them to
address the Queen to bring the King back to Paris; and forasmuch as the
author of all these mischiefs was well known, he moved further that the
Duc d'Orleans and the officers of the Crown should be desired to come to
Parliament to deliberate upon the decree issued in 1617, on account of
Marechal d'Ancre, forbidding foreigners to intermeddle in the Government.
We thought ourselves that we had touched too high a key, but a lower note
would not have awakened or kept awake men whom fear had perfectly
stupefied. I have observed that this passion of fear has seldom that
influence upon individuals that it generally has upon the mass.

Viole's proposition at first startled, then rejoiced, and afterwards
animated those that heard it. Blancmenil, who before seemed to have no
life left in him, had now the courage to point at the Cardinal by name,
who hitherto had been described only by the designation of Minister; and
the Parliament cheerfully agreed to remonstrate with the Queen, according
to Viole's proposition, not forgetting to pray her Majesty to remove the
troops further from Paris, and not to send for the magistrates to take
orders for the security of the city.

The President Coigneux whispered to me, saying, "I have no hopes but in
you; we shall be undone if you do not work underground." I sat up
accordingly all night to prepare instructions for Saint-Ibal to treat
with the Count Fuensaldagne, and oblige him to march with the Spanish
army, in case of need, to our assistance, and was just going to send him
away to Brussels when M. de Chatillon, my friend and kinsman, who
mortally hated the Cardinal, came to tell me that the Prince de Conde
would be the next day at Ruel; that the Prince was enraged against the
Cardinal, and was sure he would ruin the State if he were let alone, and
that the Cardinal held a correspondence in cipher with a fellow in the
Prince's army whom he had corrupted, to be informed of everything done
there to his prejudice. By all this I learnt that the Prince had no
great understanding with the Court, and upon his arrival at Ruel I
ventured to go thither.

Both the Queen and the Cardinal were extremely civil, and the latter took
particular notice of the Prince's behaviour to me, who embraced me 'en
passant' in the garden, and spoke very low to me, saying that he would be
at my house next day. He kept his word, and desired me to give him an
account of the state of affairs, and when I had done so we agreed that I
should continue to push the Cardinal by means of the Parliament; that I
should take his Highness by night incognito to Longueil and Broussel, to
assure them they should not want assistance; that the Prince de Conde
should give the Queen all the marks of his respect for and attachment to
her, and make all possible reparation for the dissatisfaction he had
shown with regard to the Cardinal, that he might thereby insinuate
himself into the Queen's favour, and gradually dispose her to receive and
fallow his counsels and hear truths against which she had always stopped
her ears, and that by thus letting the Cardinal drop insensibly, rather
than fall suddenly, the Prince would find himself master of the Cabinet
with the Queer's approbation, and, with the assistance of his humble
servants in Council, arbiter of the national welfare.

The Queen, who went away from Paris to give her troops an opportunity to
starve and attack the city, told the deputies sent by Parliament to
entreat her to restore the King to Paris that she was extremely surprised
and astonished; that the King used every year at that season to take the
air, and that his health was much more to be regarded than the imaginary
fears of the people. The Prince de Conde, coming in at this juncture,
told the President and councillors, who invited him to take his seat in
Parliament, that he would not come, but obey the Queen though it should
prove his ruin. The Duc d'Orleans said that he would not be there
either, because the Parliament had made such proposals as were too bold
to be endured, and the Prince de Conti spoke after the same manner.

The next day the King's Council carried an order of Council to Parliament
to put a stop to their debates against foreigners being in the Ministry.
This so excited the Parliament that they made a remonstrance in writing,
instructed the 'prevot des marchands' to provide for the safety of the
city, ordered all other governors to keep the passages free, and resolved
next day to continue the debate against foreign ministers. I laboured
all night to ward off the fatal blow, which I was afraid would hurry the
Prince, against his will, into the arms of the Court. But when next day
came, the members inflamed one another before they sat, through the
cursed spirit of formality, and the very men who two days ago were all
fear and trembling were suddenly transported, they knew not why, from a
well-grounded fear to a blind rage, so that without reflecting that the
General had arrived whose very name made them tremble, because they
suspected him to be in the interest of the Court, they issued the said
decree, which obliged the Queen to send the Duc d'Anjou,--[Philippe of
France, only brother to King Louis XIV., afterwards Duc d'Orleans, died
suddenly at St. Cloud, in 1701.]--but just recovered from the smallpox,
and the Duchesse d'Orleans, much indisposed, out of town.

This would have begun a civil war next day had not the Prince de Conde
taken the wisest measures imaginable, though he had a very bad opinion of
the Cardinal, both upon the public account and his own, and was as little
pleased with the conduct of the Parliament, with whom there was no
dealing, either as a body or as private persons. The Prince kept an even
pace between the Court and country factions, and he said these words to
me, which I can never forget: