Old Court Life in France, Volume II (of 2). Elliot Frances Minto Dickinson

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СКАЧАТЬ Not the bay of a hound is heard. Moss gathers on the paths and among the tangled shrubberies, and no flowers catch the radiance of the sunshine. Within is the great, the terrible Cardinal. The ground is sacred to the despot of France, the ruler of the monarch, the glance of whose eye is death or fortune. Journeying direct from Lyons in his chamber on wheels – after the execution of Cinq-Mars – to Fontainebleau, where he rested, he is come here to die. Yonder he lies on a bed of state, hung with embroidered velvet in a painted chamber, the walls covered with rare pictures and choicest tapestry, the windows looking towards the garden. The moment approaches when he will have to answer for his merciless exercise of absolute power over king and people, to that Heavenly Master whose priest and servant he professes to be. How will he justify his bitter hatred, his arrogant oppression of the great princes and nobles of France? How will he meet the avenging ghosts of the chivalrous Montmorenci, the poetic Chalais, the gallant Cinq-Mars, the witty Saint-Preuil, the enthusiastic Urbain Grandier, in the unknown country whither he is fast hastening? Who tried to seduce, then to ruin, the Queen, Anne of Austria, and send her back, divorced and disgraced, into Spain? Who turned the feeble Louis into a servile agent of his ambition, and exercised over his weak mind a tyranny as shameful to himself as degrading to the sovereign? True, Richelieu may plead reasons of State, a rebellious nobility, traitorous princes, and an imbecile king; but the isolation of the throne, begun under his rule, was both barbarous and impolitic, as after ages showed. True, he possessed rare genius, and his life was industriously devoted to what he called "the glory of France"; but it was a mean and selfish glory, to attain which he had waded through the noblest blood of the land.

      Look at him now – he has just received extreme unction. A hypocrite to the last, he folds his hands on his breast and exclaims – "This is my God; as in his visible presence, I declare I have sacrificed myself to France." When he is asked by the officiating priest – "If he forgives his enemies?" – he replies, "I have no enemies but those of the State." Now the hand of death is visibly upon him. In a loose robe of purple silk, he lies supported by pillows of fine lace. He is hardly recognisable, so great have been his sufferings, so complete is his weakness; his bloodless lips pant for breath, his hollow eyes wander on vacancy, his thin fingers work convulsively on the sheets, as though striving against the approach of invisible foes.

      But, before he departs, a signal honour is reserved for him. Behold, the rich velvet curtains, heavy with golden embroideries, are held aside by pages who carry plumed hats in their hands, and Louis XIII. enters hastily. He is bareheaded, and is accompanied by the princes of the blood and the great ministers of State. Louis is so shrunken and attenuated, so white and large-eyed, that in any other presence he might have been deemed a dying man himself. As he advances to the ruelle that encloses the bed, he composes his thin lips and pinched face into a decent expression of condolence. How can he but affect to deplore the death of a minister whose fierce passions overshadowed his whole life like a moral upas-tree? Nevertheless the fitting phrases are spoken, and he embraces the ghastly form stretched out before him with a semblance of affection. The expiring Cardinal presses the hand of his master, and makes a sign that he would speak. Louis bows down his head to catch the feeble voice, which says – "Sire, I thank you for this honour; I have spent my whole life in your service. I leave you able ministers; trust them, Sire; but," – and he stops and struggles fearfully for breath, – "but, beware of your Court. It is your petit coucher who are dangerous. Your favourites have troubled me more than all your enemies." Then the Cardinal sinks back, fainting on his pillows.

      Louis withdraws with affected concern; but, ere he reaches the spacious anteroom, lined with the Cardinal's retainers in magnificent liveries, he bursts into an inhuman laugh – "There goes a great politician to his death," he says to Chavigny, who is beside him, and he points with his thumb towards the Cardinal's chamber; "a wonderful genius. Now he is gone I shall be free – I shall reign." He chuckles with delight at the idea of being at last rid of the Cardinal; and a grim smile spreads itself over his ashen face.

      It is a ghastly joke, as cruel as it is selfish. As if Louis's life were bound up in the existence of his great minister – he is himself a corpse within a year!

       CHAPTER VIII.

      THE QUEEN REGENT

      LOUIS XIV. was four years and a half old when his father died at Saint-Germain, aged forty-two. Tardy in everything, Louis XIII. was six weeks in dying. The state christening of his son was celebrated during his illness. When asked his name, the little lad replied, "I am Louis XIV."

      "Not yet, my son, not yet," murmured the dying King, "but shortly, if so it please God."

      Anne of Austria, named Regent by her husband's will, rules in her son's name. A splendid Court assembles round her, at the Louvre, at Saint-Germain, and at Fontainebleau. Her exiled favourites are there to do her homage. The Duchesse de Chevreuse, after a long sojourn in Spain, England, and Flanders, – for she loves travel and the adventures of the road, either masked, or disguised as a page, a priest, or a cavalier, – is reinstated in her Majesty's favour. In Spain the Duchess's vanity was gratified by enslaving a royal lover – the King of Spain, brother of Anne of Austria; in England she diverted herself with fomenting personal quarrels between Charles I. and Henrietta Maria; in Flanders – a dull country – she found little to amuse her.

      Mademoiselle de Hautefort (soon to become Duchesse and Maréchale de Schomberg) returns in obedience to the Queen's command, who wrote to her even when the King was alive, "Come, dearest friend, come quickly. I am all impatience to embrace you!"

      The Duchesse de Sennécy arrives from the provinces, and the Chevalier de Jars from England. The latter had been imprisoned in the Bastille, and threatened with torture by Richelieu, to force him to betray the Queen's correspondence with Spain at the time of the Val de Grâce conspiracy. He had been liberated, however, but while the Cardinal lived had remained in England.

      These, among many other faithful attendants, resume their places at the petit coucher, in the grand cercle, and at the morning lever.

      Then there are the princes and princesses of the blood-royal: – Monsieur the Duc d'Orléans – no longer breathing vows of love in the moonlight, but a veteran intriguer – living on the road to Spain, which always meant rebellion, together with his daughter, La Grande Mademoiselle, a comely girl, the greatest heiress in Europe; Cæsar, Duc de Vendôme, son of Gabrielle and Henry IV., with his Duchess and his sons, the Ducs de Mercœur and De Beaufort; Condé, the uncrowned head of the great house of Bourbon – more ill-favoured and avaricious than ever – his jealous temper now excited against the bastards of the house of Vendôme, with his wife, Charlotte de Montmorenci, sobered down into a dignified matron, devoted to her eldest son, the Duc d'Enghien, and to her daughter, the Duchesse de Longueville, the brightest ornament of the Court; the Duc de Rochefoucauld and his son, the Prince de Marsillac, the author of Les Maximes, to become a shadow on the path of the last-named Duchess, who is to die in a convent; the great House of La Tour d'Auvergne, Viscomtes de Turenne and Ducs de Bouillon, from which springs Henri de Turenne, the rival of young Condé; Séguier, Duc de Villemer, generously forgiven for the part he took against the Queen as Chancellor, at the Val de Grâce; and, last of all, Henry, Duc de Guise – by-and-by to astonish all Europe by his daring escapade at Naples, where, but for Masaniello, he might have been crowned King, with the Queen's beautiful maid of honour, Mademoiselle de Pons, at his side.

      There is also about the Court a young man named Giulio Mazarin, born in Rome of a Sicilian family, late secretary to Cardinal Richelieu. He has passed many years in Spain, and can converse fluently in that language with her Majesty whenever she deigns to address him. He has a pale, inexpressive face, with large black eyes, à fleur de tête, generally bent on the ground. His manners are modest, though insinuating; his address is gentle, his voice musical. Like all Italians, he is artistic; a conoscente in music, a collector of pictures, china, and antiquities. So unobtrusive and accomplished a gentleman cannot fail to please, especially as he is only a deacon, and, with a dispense, free СКАЧАТЬ