In the second week in January, 1623, the Court reached Paris, and Louis XIII made “a kind of entry” into his capital. This event appears to have given rise to a good deal of unpleasantness:—

A few days after the King’s return to Paris, Schomberg was deprived of the post of Surintendant of Finance and banished the Court. Since the Treaty of Montpellier Puisieux had been busily intriguing against him, in company with La Vieuville, a sworn enemy of Schomberg, and had accused him of gross mismanagement of the finances, if not worse. That he had mismanaged them was true enough, though how any other result could have been expected, when he was required to combine the duties of Surintendant with those of Grand Master of the Artillery on active service, it is difficult to see. However, his hands appear to have been perfectly clean, otherwise Richelieu would scarcely have recalled him to office so soon as he came into power, and, though he had committed a grave error in attaching himself to CondÉ and the war party, he was a more honest, as well as an abler, man than those who had brought about his fall.

Bassompierre, who had taken no part in this intrigue, and had, indeed, endeavoured to protect Schomberg, now proposed to the King to reappoint Sully to the office which he had filled so ably under Henri IV, a suggestion which did him much honour, since he and the old statesman had never been on friendly terms. But Puisieux and his father, the Chancellor Brulart de Sillery, objected, on the score of Sully’s religion, and La Vieuville was made Surintendant.

La Vieuville was a man of some ability, but he was rash, corrupt and an unscrupulous intriguer; and no sooner was he admitted to the King’s Council than he began to conspire, first, to get rid of the Chancellor and Puisieux, his benefactors, then, of all those whom the King admitted to his intimacy, and particularly of Bassompierre, of whom he appears to have conceived the bitterest jealousy.

Towards the end of that year a dispute of long standing between Diane de France, the widow of the ConnÉtable de Montmorency, and the Duchesse de Chevreuse, was adjudicated upon by Louis XIII. It appears that Madame de Montmorency had accepted the post of dame d’honneur to the Queen on the understanding that no Surintendante of her Majesty’s Household should be appointed over her. This condition, however, had not been observed, and the Duchesse de Chevreuse, or the Duchesse de Luynes, as she was at that time, had been appointed Surintendante. The Duc de Montmorency, acting on behalf of his step-mother, requested the King to appoint someone to inquire into this weighty matter and report to the Council, and, as the Duc de Chevreuse, representing his wife, raised no objection, her request was granted. Neither nobleman had, of course, the least intention of compromising the interests of the lady he represented by adopting this course; and their mortification may be imagined when, in November, Louis XIII cut the Gordian knot by depriving both Madame de Montmorency and Madame de Chevreuse of their charges.

In a conversation with Bassompierre, Puisieux asked him his opinion of the King’s decision. Bassompierre frankly replied that he considered it the worst he had ever known him give, as he had thereby offended both parties, and that “the judge would be condemned to pay the costs of the action.” Puisieux inquired what he meant, when he said that, in the unsettled condition of the kingdom, and the probability of another war with the Huguenots, who were angrily demanding the destruction of Fort Saint-Louis at La Rochelle,[18] it was most imprudent of the King to displease two such great Houses as those of Montmorency and Lorraine, and that he ought to indemnify forthwith both ladies for the loss of their charges; otherwise, in the event of war, he might not be able to rely on the loyalty of their relatives.

Bassompierre spoke to Puisieux as one friend might speak to another, and, of course, believed that the latter would regard it as a private conversation. But the Minister, “to play the good valet,” reported what the marshal had said, very possibly with some little embellishments of his own, to Louis XIII, who, in turn, informed La Vieuville; and La Vieuville, delighted to find an opportunity of injuring Bassompierre, professed the utmost indignation, and “told the King that such words were criminal, and that they deserved the Bastille or worse.” His Majesty did not send Bassompierre to the Bastille, but he frowned angrily whenever he saw him, and for a whole week refused to honour him with so much as a word. At the end of that time, however, he unbosomed himself to the Cardinal de la Rochefoucauld and his confessor PÈre Seguiran, who, fortunately, happened to be on friendly terms with the marshal, and, through their good offices, the latter succeeded in making his peace with the King.

This affair was only the prelude to further and more determined attempts by La Vieuville to deprive Bassompierre of the royal favour, but for the moment he was more intent on bringing about the downfall of the Chancellor and Puisieux, in which task he had the powerful support of Richelieu.

Since the dismissal of Schomberg, the BrÛlarts, pÈre et fils, had been all-powerful[19] and had mismanaged matters both at home and abroad. The treaty which had been signed between France, Savoy, and Venice in February, 1623, had pledged the contracting parties to take vigorous measures for the recovery of the Valtellina. But the Chancellor and his son had no wish to embark in a war which they felt themselves incapable of conducting, and when the Spanish Government offered to hand over the fortresses of the Valtellina to the Pope in deposit, on condition that his Holiness would assure the tranquillity of the country or restore them to Philip IV, they eagerly embraced this way out of the difficulty. Rome and Spain, however, were in accord to deceive France. The Duke of Feria, governor of the Milanese, did not deliver all the forts to the Papal troops, and the two most important strongholds, Ripa and Chiavenna, remained in Spanish hands; while, on his side, Gregory XV claimed that the Grisons should become Catholic, or that the Valtellina should be constituted a fourth League, with the same rights as the other Leagues of the Grisons. The Treaty of Paris had, in the words of the disgusted Venetian Ambassador, proved itself to be “nothing but a demonstration on paper.”

At home, the BrÛlarts trafficked in offices, and allowed, as was the custom, their relatives and friends to enrich themselves at the expense of the State. Such practices were regarded in those days as mere peccadilloes, but Richelieu, who was slowly but surely paving the way for his return to office, and was aware that there was no chance of realising his ambition so long as the Chancellor and his son remained in power, professed to be scandalised, and there can be no doubt that more than one of the pamphlets which appeared attacking the incapacity and greed of the Ministers in vigorous and not too refined language were inspired by his Eminence. At the same time, Richelieu adroitly insinuated to the King, through Marie de’ Medici, that the BrÛlarts were turning the great project on the Valtellina announced by the League of Paris to the shame of France, and Louis XIII, who keenly resented the impotence of his diplomacy, became more and more incensed against them. La Vieuville, on his part, was not idle and accused the BrÛlarts, probably with justification, of having levied toll on the subsidies which were being sent to the Dutch. The consequence was that on New Year’s Day, 1623, the King demanded the Seals from the Chancellor, and at the beginning of February ordered both him and his son to retire to one of their country-seats.

The King gave the Seals to d’Aligre, who, it will be remembered, would have received them in the autumn of 1622 but for Bassompierre’s intervention. In consequence, the marshal was somewhat apprehensive that he might cherish a grudge against him, and went to offer him his congratulations with considerable misgivings as to how they would be received. To his surprise, however, d’Aligre greeted him with marked cordiality.

But if Bassompierre had nothing to fear from the good-natured d’Aligre, he had everything to apprehend from the jealous and unscrupulous La Vieuville.

However, the marshal did not allow any fear of approaching ruin to interfere with his enjoyment of the Fair of Saint-Germain and the other gaieties of that winter, during which the negotiations for the marriage of the Prince of Wales (afterwards Charles I.) with the Infanta Maria Anna, sister of Philip IV, having been definitely broken off, the Earl of Holland arrived in Paris to sound the French Court on the question of an alliance between the prince and Henriette-Marie. The King and Queen each organised a grand ballet. In his Majesty’s, which was entitled les Voleurs, Louis XIII represented a Dutch captain, M. de la Roche-Guyon a Dutch lady, and the Ducs de Chevreuse and de Luxembourg and the MarÉchaux de CrÉquy and de Bassompierre impersonated pirates. Bassompierre had to recite the following verses:—

At the beginning of March, La Vieuville complained to the King that, with the connivance of Puisieux, when he had been Secretary of State for War, Bassompierre had been drawing every year for the maintenance of the Swiss 24,000 livres more than he was entitled to. The marshal, on learning of this, angrily denied that he had received a sol more than was justly due, and proceeded to prove his statement in the presence of the King, when high words passed between him and the Minister. Nevertheless, his accounts were not passed, and the matter remained in abeyance.

La Vieuville, with all his faults, showed both energy and ability; and he was the first to reverse the disastrous Spanish policy of the Court. He recalled the Commandeur de Sillery, the French Ambassador to Rome, where he had shown himself as feeble and undecided as his relatives in Paris; sent the Marquis de Coeuvres, a good soldier and a skilful diplomatist, as Ambassador to Switzerland, to urge the Cantons, both Protestant and Catholic, to go to the assistance of the Grisons; concluded offensive and defensive alliances with the Dutch, which assured to them a subsidy for the next two years; and warmly supported the English marriage-project. But he made many enemies besides Bassompierre, and feeling the need of conciliating the Queen-Mother, who for some weeks had absented herself from Court, as a protest against the treatment of Richelieu, he promised to obtain for her favourite admission to the Council.

This was no easy task, for the mediocrities who had so long surrounded Louis XIII had succeeded in inspiring him with their own dread of this great man, and the King was, in consequence, very unwilling to entrust him with office, added to which he still associated him with the followers of Concini, all of whom he held in aversion. “There is a man who would like to be of my Council,” he observed one day to Praslin, as Richelieu passed by; “but I cannot bring myself to this step, after all he has done against me.” “I know him better than you do,” he said on another occasion to Marie de’ Medici, when she had been urging the Cardinal’s claims upon him; “he is a man of unmeasured ambition.” Now, however, he did not withstand the request of his Minister, reinforced by the solicitations of the Queen-Mother, and on April 29, 1624, Richelieu re-entered the Council.

Meanwhile, La Vieuville had resumed hostilities against Bassompierre, whose intimacy with the King he appears to have regarded as the chief obstacle in the path of his ambition. This time he launched a far more serious charge against the marshal than that of drawing more money on account of the Swiss than he was entitled to, and accused him of being a pensioner of Spain.

It is difficult to say with any degree of certainty on what grounds this charge was based, since Bassompierre himself throws no light upon the subject. But it would appear from a manuscript of Dupuy in the BibliothÈque Nationale that, during the marshal’s embassy to Madrid, the Spanish Government had proposed to him a commercial treaty between France and Spain, and that in 1623 Bassompierre had presented a memorial to Louis XIII in favour of this project. In the margin of his copy of this memorial Dupuy gives his own opinion of the proposed treaty, and while praising the ability with which Bassompierre has stated the case in its favour, he foresees several objections, and among them, the following:—

It is therefore not improbable that, at the beginning of the following year, La Vieuville had seized the pretext of this memorial to accuse Bassompierre of having accepted money from the Court of Madrid to advocate a proposal which was to the disadvantage of France.

However that may be, La Vieuville was very active in the matter, and in May caused the arrest of one Alphonso Lopez, a Spanish Moor, who had long resided in Paris, where he carried on an extensive trade in jewellery, tapestries, and objets d’art, and who, in the course of his business, was a frequent visitor to Bassompierre’s house, “imagining that by his means,” says the marshal, “he might discover something against me.”

Bassompierre demanded an audience of Louis XIII, who was at CompiÈgne, in order that he might have an opportunity of defending himself; but his Majesty did not seem anxious to grant it.

However, if La Vieuville was about to be ruined, it looked very much as though he would succeed in ruining Bassompierre first, notwithstanding that Richelieu, d’Aligre, and the Constable had all assured the marshal that they were resolved not to allow the Minister to prejudice their minds against him. Le Doux, a maÎtre des requÊtes, who had been entrusted with the duty of examining Lopez’s ledgers and papers, had reported to La Vieuville that he had found that a certain Spaniard named Guadamiciles had furnished Bassompierre with a sum of 40,000 francs. The entry upon which Le Doux based this information was as follows:—

“Al Sr. Mal. de Bassompierre por guadamiciles, 40,000 Ms.”[20]

Now, as Bassompierre explains, Lopez had received 40,000 maravedis from a merchant in Spain on account of some tapestries of gilded leather (guadamiciles) which the marshal had commissioned him to sell for him. But Le Doux and La Vieuville believed, or affected to believe, that guadamiciles was a proper name, and the latter pressed the King most urgently to have Bassompierre arrested forthwith and conveyed to the Bastille.

To this Louis XIII refused to consent, but he and all his Council admitted that it was most necessary to ascertain the identity of this mysterious Guadamiciles and to arrest him, if he were in France, and, in the event of his proving to be a Spanish banker, Bassompierre likewise.

The marshal learned all this from LesdiguiÈres, who, so soon as the Council rose, sent for him to warn him of his danger:

Bassompierre had judged the situation correctly, for the man whom La Vieuville had introduced into the Council, in the hope of strengthening his own position, was gradually undermining it. La Vieuville’s intention had been to make of Richelieu a mere consulting Minister, who would give advice only when called upon to do so, and whose sphere of activity would be limited by the four walls of the Council-chamber. The Cardinal resigned himself to this rÔle, in appearance at least; nevertheless, it was not long before he and his chief came into sharp collision.

At the beginning of June the Earls of Holland and Carlisle arrived in France to demand the hand of Henriette-Marie for the Prince of Wales, and La Vieuville, d’Aligre, and Richelieu were charged to discuss with the representatives of James I the clauses of the marriage treaty. The Cardinal, although a warm partisan of the English alliance, had declared that “it was necessary for the men of France to seek in this alliance all the advantages possible for religion [i.e., the Catholic religion].... If not, it was greatly to be feared that they would bring down upon themselves the wrath of God, as did Jehosaphat, who, although a pious king, felt severely the Hand of God for having allied himself with Ahab, King of Israel, who persecuted the servants of God.” He now demanded that the English Government should make the Catholics of England, in favour of the French princess, the same concessions in regard to the public exercise of their religion as they had consented to in the case of the Infanta. This was at once refused, and all that Holland and Carlisle would promise was liberty of private worship, and that, not by a formal engagement inserted in the treaty, but by a simple verbal promise on the part of James I. Richelieu pressed for an article in the contract, so that the engagement might be “more solemn and public,” his object being that the English Catholics might feel themselves under a greater obligation to France. But the Ambassadors, perceiving his motive, remained firm, even when he declared it to be a sine qu non.

La Vieuville was incensed that Richelieu should be compromising the English alliance for the sake of the English Catholics. “Morbleu!” said he, “these priests are spoiling all my work.” He recalled from England the French Ambassador, the Comte de TilliÈres, a brother-in-law of Bassompierre, who had also shown himself too solicitous for the interests of the Catholics, and told Holland and Carlisle that the French demands were only made for form’s sake and to satisfy the Pope and the Catholics of France, and that it was really a matter of indifference to Louis XIII how their master treated his Catholic subjects. A little later, becoming uneasy at the slow progress of the negotiations, he caused James I to be informed that the King would be content with a simple promise of toleration. Richelieu, warned by the Secretary of State Brienne of the game La Vieuville was playing, vowed to make him repent it.

La Vieuville, all unconscious of his danger, went forward boldly. He gave Marescot, who was being sent on an embassy to Germany, instructions differing materially from those which had been decided upon in the Council. He tried to persuade Monsieur that Richelieu had been responsible for Ornano’s disgrace. In connivance with his father-in-law Beaumarchais, a high official of the Treasury, he entered into important financial transactions without consulting the King or his colleagues. He left the pensions even of the greatest nobles unpaid and ignored their remonstrances. He was haughty, churlish, and incautious in his language, even when speaking of the King. Never did Minister so persistently court his fall.

Richelieu, perceiving that the time to strike had come, launched against him his friend FanÇan, a canon of Saint-Germain l’Auxerrois, and the ablest publicist of his time, whom he had already employed with effect against the BrÛlarts, and who published a pamphlet entitled la Voix Publique au Roi, which appears to have had a great vogue:—

The voice of the public had, however, nothing but praise for the Cardinal de Richelieu, who was “refined up to twenty-two carats,” “adroit and prudent,” and “showed no inclination to seek any other support than in the legitimate authority of his Majesty.” It was hoped that he would be to the King what the Cardinal Georges d’Amboise had been to the well-loved Louis XII.

Then Richelieu revealed to the King the irregular proceedings of La Vieuville, and experienced little difficulty in arousing Louis to a high pitch of resentment against a Minister who was acting without his knowledge, and who, in the matter of the English Catholics, was misrepresenting his sentiments and compromising his conscience. Towards the end of July the disgrace of La Vieuville was resolved upon, and the King, who was at Germigny-l’ÉvÊque, the summer residence of the Bishops of Meaux, sent Toiras to Paris to inform Bassompierre of his decision.

On the way this gentleman had the misfortune to meet a certain Sieur de Bernay, who, happening to have a grievance against him, insisted on receiving satisfaction then and there; and, as the duel which ensued resulted in M. de Toiras having to take to his bed, the royal message never reached Bassompierre. However, two or three days later, he received orders from the King to come to Saint-Germain early on the morrow without fail. He went, accompanied by the Duc de Bellegarde, and was very cordially received by his Majesty, who told him and the Grand Equerry that he had decided to disgrace La Vieuville.

While they were with the King, who should arrive but La Vieuville himself, accompanied by his brother-in-law the MarÉchal de Vitry, and the Minister could not conceal his astonishment and mortification at the sight of Louis walking up and down between Bellegarde and Bassompierre and apparently on the best of terms with the latter. On perceiving La Vieuville, the King left his companions and went to speak to him, while Bassompierre approached the MarÉchal de Vitry, who told him that he had been much distressed at seeing him on such bad terms with his brother-in-law, and that he was most anxious to effect a reconciliation between them. “Why should I be reconciled to him,” answered Bassompierre, “at the moment that he is about to be disgraced, when I refused when he was all-powerful?” “What! disgraced!” cried the astonished Vitry. “Yes, disgraced; and never trust me again if a fortnight hence he is still Surintendant.”

No sooner was the conversation between the King and La Vieuville at an end, than Vitry drew his brother-in-law aside and informed him of what Bassompierre had just said; upon which the Minister, in his turn, immediately reported it to Louis XIII. The King assured him that he had not the least intention of dispensing with his services, and that Bassompierre was more likely to be disgraced than himself; and, so embarrassed was the young monarch that, had La Vieuville been bold enough to demand the immediate exile of the marshal, as Richelieu would have done in similar circumstances, it is not improbable that the latter would have had good reason to regret his indiscretion. However, fortunately for Bassompierre, he did not do so.

Louis XIII afterwards reprimanded Bassompierre sharply for having placed him in such an awkward position; but the marshal excused himself on the ground that, after all the distress that La Vieuville had caused him for months past, it would be letting him off far too lightly only to make him feel the bitterness of disgrace when it arrived, and that “he had wished him to taste it in anticipation.”

A few days later, during a meeting of the King’s Council, his Majesty sent for Bassompierre and, to the great astonishment of La Vieuville, to whom he had said nothing about the matter, informed the marshal that, having carefully examined the accounts of the Swiss which were in dispute, he had come to the conclusion that he had only claimed what was justly due. And then, turning to La Vieuville, he curtly directed him to see that the money was paid forthwith.

A day or two after this, Bassompierre requested permission of Louis XIII to bring an action against La Vieuville before the Parlement, so soon as he should cease to be a Minister, for having falsely accused him to his Majesty of being a pensioner of Spain, in order that he might be punished as he deserved. But the King assured the marshal that he intended to punish him sufficiently himself, by dismissing him with ignominy from office and imprisoning him. However, he enjoined him to say nothing about it to anyone.

Louis XIII seems to have played with the unfortunate La Vieuville up to the very moment of his disgrace much as a cat would play with a mouse. The young King was, not only deceitful, but, like most weak natures, cruel and spiteful, and he would appear to have taken a positive pleasure in inflicting suffering upon those who had the misfortune to incur his resentment.

From the day of La Vieuville’s disgrace Richelieu was the virtual head of the Council, and for the first time since the death of Henri IV a firm hand guided the ship of State.