CONDÉ, URGED BY HIS SISTER, GOES UNWILLINGLY INTO REBELLION.

Anne of Austria now seriously prepared to make head against CondÉ, and with that intent she rallied round her all the forces of the Fronde united with those of the royal army. In fine, with the firm design of inspiring the Fronde with perfect confidence, at the same time that the nomination of France to the Cardinalate had devolved upon the Coadjutor, the Queen again brought into the cabinet, as a sort of Prime Minister, the statesman of the party, the friend and instrument of Madame de Chevreuse, the aged but ambitious ChÂteauneuf, with the two-fold engagement to serve Mazarin in secret and to contribute to the utmost of his power to destroy CondÉ. In such arrangements, let it be thoroughly understood, no one was acting with good faith: De Retz and ChÂteauneuf in nowise proposed to re-establish Mazarin; ChÂteauneuf did not dream of making another man’s bed, but, once having attained power, he intended to keep it for himself, and Mazarin was firmly resolved to dismiss ChÂteauneuf as soon as he could. But if these crafty politicians were ready to betray one another in everything else, there was one point on which they were sincerely united—the destruction of CondÉ. At that they laboured in concert, or rather vied with each other. Queen Anne manifested therein a fervour, a constancy, a marvellous skill, and succeeded in carrying off from CondÉ the chief supports of his great strength. He saw that war was inevitable, and yet, says Sismondi, he only yielded to it with repugnance. “You will have it so,” said CondÉ at last; “but understand that if I do draw the sword, I shall be the last to return it to the scabbard.” It was the women especially who hurried their admirers into the mÊlÉe.

Considering the nomination of the New Cabinet, with ChÂteauneuf at its head, as a veritable declaration of war, CondÉ went to Chantilly, and, it is said, had a very narrow escape from falling into an ambuscade which the Court had prepared for him at Pontoise.

He remained for some few days at Chantilly, pensive and agitated in presence of the great resolution he was on the eve of taking. The mediation of the Duke d’Orleans, the only one he could accept, offered no security, the Duke instead of governing the Coadjutor and Madame de Chevreuse, was then governed by them. His individual inclination was to come to an understanding with the Queen and even with Mazarin, as he had very clearly shown. He had continually returned to it; but after so many lying words and odious plots, the execution of which alone was wanting, he thought he would be in a better position to treat solidly with the Court at the head of a powerful and victorious army, than in the midst of wretched intrigues, unworthy of his character, in which he momentarily staked his honour and his life. He never permitted the idea of raising himself above royalty to enter into his mind; he merely thought that to obtain better conditions from it it was necessary to render himself imposing to it, and to make himself feared. That is what was then passing in his mind. Civil war inspired him with horror, and we may learn from La Rochefoucauld,[73] who was then in his most intimate confidence, that he long weighed “the consequences of so grave a determination.” Let us be chary, therefore, of accusing CondÉ of levity; let us recognise that insensibly his position had become such that he could neither remain in it nor quit it, in one way or another, save with equal danger.

Among the different motives which rendered CondÉ averse to civil war, the passion that he had just begun to feel for the Duchess de ChÂtillon must not be forgotten. We shall return a little further on to this episode in CondÉ’s life. It is sufficient to remark here that it was grievous to him to quit the lovely Duchess, who then was residing very close to Chantilly, in the charming chÂteau of Merlon or Mello, near Pontoise, the enjoyment of which had been granted to her for life by the old Princess de CondÉ, Charlotte Marguerite de Montmorency, who expired in her arms at ChÂtillon-sur-Loing, in December, 1650—a gracious grant, which the Prince, her son, had hastened to ratify with a somewhat interested generosity. Madame de ChÂtillon had her reasons of more than one kind for being opposed to the war, and in the intimate counsels of the Prince she urged him to an understanding with the Court. In that she made common cause with La Rochefoucauld, and was in open quarrel with Madame de Longueville. Sensible of CondÉ’s passion without sharing it, she managed that lofty lover with infinite tact, at the same time that she was deeply enamoured of the young, handsome, and brave Duke Charles Amadeus of Savoy, Nemours,[74] who from his youth and adventurous instincts would have longed for war, and whom she alone, seconded by La Rochefoucauld, retained in the party of peace.

Everything, however, tended to precipitate CondÉ towards the fatal resolution. Prudence did not permit him to remain any longer at Chantilly,[75] and it behoved him to place himself beyond the risk of a coup-de-main by withdrawing to his government of Berri, whither he had already sent his son, his wife, and his sister. It was, it is true, the road to Guienne, but he might stop there. All the population was devoted to him, and the tower of Bourges and the strong fortalice of Montrond offered him a safe asylum.

CondÉ, even after reaching Berri, still hesitated, not wishing to take any step before again conferring with his sister, who was then at Montrond with the Princess. There he held a final council, a supreme deliberation, at which Madame de Longueville, Conti, and La Rochefoucauld were present. More than one grave motive urged him to war: the well-founded dread of assassination or of a fresh incarceration, the ardent hatred of his enemies, of the Queen and the Fronde, the power of ChÂteauneuf which certainly had not been given him in vain, the inutility of negotiations with people who seemed decidedly to have taken their choice, the necessity of avoiding the fate of Henri de Guise, the consciousness of his strength so soon as his foot should tread the field of battle, the promises seemingly so sure of the Bouillons and many others. At the same time, his good sense, his loyalty, the scarcely stifled instincts of duty, and his innate aversion for anything which resembled anarchy, restrained him; and in that prolonged and dubious struggle between conflicting feelings, there were others which hurried him onward. Madame de Longueville, the Prince de Conti, La Rochefoucauld also urged him to declare himself against the Court, and Madame de Longueville with more vivacity than anyone else.[76] CondÉ still resisted, explaining to them all the strength of royalty, the ascendancy of the King’s name, the weakness and treachery of factions, the bad faith of Spain. Then concluding by yielding, he addressed them in these memorable words: “You commit me to a strange line of action, of which you will tire sooner than I, and in which you will abandon me.” He spoke truly as regarded Conti, and perhaps also La Rochefoucauld; but it remains to be seen whether Madame de Longueville, after having helped to drive her heroic brother into civil war, did not follow him with an inviolable constancy, whether she did not share, even to extremity, the dangers and adversities of the Prince, and whether, during his long exile, she reappeared for a single moment at Court or in those salons of the Louvre and the Palais Royal, which had witnessed her early successes, and in which her wit and beauty still promised her fresh triumphs.