Louis XIV Part 7

Mary returned to Paris pondering deeply her awful destiny. She saw that she was fated to meet continually the king and queen in their festivities; that with a broken heart she must feign gayety and smiles; that by lingering torture she must sink into the grave. There was no refuge for her but to escape from Paris and from the court.

Apparently the only way to accomplish this was to accept the proffered hand of the Prince Colonna, who would remove her from Paris to Rome.

[Ill.u.s.tration: PALACE OF FONTAINEBLEAU.]

The next morning, pale and tearless, Mary drove to Vincennes, where Cardinal Mazarin then was, and informed him that she was ready to marry Prince Colonna, provided the marriage could take place immediately, and that the cardinal would, without an hour's delay, write to the king to obtain his consent. The cardinal was rejoiced, and proceeded with energy. The king, without one kind word, gave his cold and indifferent consent. In accordance with the claims of etiquette, he sent her some valuable gifts, which she did not dare to decline.

"Mary walked to the altar," says Miss Pardoe, to whom we are indebted for many of these details, "as she would have walked to the scaffold, carrying with her an annual dower of one hundred thousand livres, and perjuring herself by vows which she could not fulfill. Her after career we dare not trace. Suffice it that the ardent and enthusiastic spirit which would, had she been fated to happiness, have made her memory a triumph for her s.e.x, embittered by falsehood, wrong, and treachery, involved her in errors over which both charity and propriety oblige us to draw a veil; and if all Europe rang with the enormity of her excesses, much of their origin may safely be traced to those who, after wringing her heart, trampled it in the dust beneath their feet."

A few days after the scenes of presentation at Fontainebleau, the royal pair made their triumphal entry into Paris. In those days of feudal oppression and ignorance, the ma.s.ses looked up to kings and queens with a degree of superst.i.tious reverence which, in our enlightened land, seems almost inconceivable. Louis XIV. was a heartless, selfish, pleasure-loving young man of twenty-one, who had never in his life done any thing to merit the especial esteem of any one. Maria Theresa was an amiable and pretty girl, who never dreamed that she had any other function than to indulge in luxuries at the expense of others. Millions were to be impoverished that she and her husband might pa.s.s through life reveling in luxury and charioted in splendor. One can not contemplate such a state of things without being agitated by the conflicting emotions of pity for such folly and indignation for such outrages. Louis and Maria Theresa were received by the populace of Paris with as much reverence and enthusiasm as if they had been angels descending from heaven, fraught with every blessing.

Scarcely had the morning dawned ere the whole city was in commotion.

The streets were thronged with countless thousands in the most brilliant gala dresses. Triumphal arches spanned the thoroughfares through which the royal procession was to pa.s.s. Garlands of flowers and hangings of brilliantly colored tapestry concealed the fronts of the houses from view. The pavements were strewn with flowers and sweet-scented herbs, over which the wheels of the carriages and the hoofs of the horses would pa.s.s without noise. At the barrier a gorgeous throne was erected. Here the young queen was seated in royal state, to receive the homage of the several distinguished officers of the city and of the realm. At the close of these ceremonies, which were rendered as imposing as civil and ecclesiastical pomp could create, the apparently interminable procession of carriages, and hors.e.m.e.n, and footmen, with the most dazzling adornments of caparisons, and uniforms, and banners, with resounding music, and shouts of acclaim which seemed to rend the skies, commenced its entrance into the city.

An antique car had been constructed, of ma.s.sive and picturesque proportions, emblazoned with gold. Upon this car the young queen was seated. She was, in reality, very beautiful, but in this hour of triumph, with flushed cheek and sparkling eye, robed in the richest attire, brilliant with gems, and so conspicuously enthroned as to be visible to every eye, she presented an aspect of almost celestial loveliness.

The young king rode by her side, magnificently mounted. His garments of velvet, richly embroidered with gold and jewels, had been prepared for the occasion at an expense of considerably more than a million of dollars. The splendors of this gala-day were never forgotten by those who witnessed them.

For succeeding weeks and months the court luxuriated in one continued round of gayety and extravagance. Night after night the magnificent saloons of the Louvre and the Tuileries resounded with music, while proud lords and high-born dames trod the floors in the mazy dance, and inflamed their pa.s.sions with the most costly wines. It can not be denied that a man who is trained from infancy amidst such scenes could acquire elegance of manner which those engrossed in the useful and enn.o.bling employments of life rarely attain. Neither can it be denied that this is as poor a school as can possibly be imagined to prepare one wisely to administer the affairs of a nation of twenty millions of people. In fact, Louis XIV. never dreamed of consulting the interests of the people. It was his sole object to aggrandize himself by promoting the splendor, the power, and the glory of the monarchy.

One does well to be angry when he reflects that, to maintain this reckless and utterly useless extravagance of the king and the court, the millions of the peasantry of France were compelled to live in mud hovels, to wear the coa.r.s.est garb, to eat the plainest food, while their wives and their daughters toiled barefooted in the fields. One would think that guilty consciences would often be appalled by the announcement, "Know thou that for all these things G.o.d will bring thee into judgment?"

Though this revolting state of society was the slow growth of time, and though no one there could have regarded this aristocratic oppression as it is now estimated in the clearer light of the present day, still these outrages, inflicted by the strong upon the weak, by the rich upon the poor, merit the unmitigated condemnation of men, as they have ever incurred the denunciations of G.o.d.

Cardinal Mazarin, more than any other man in France, was accountable for the enormous luxury of the court, and the squalid misery of the people. He knew better. He was professedly a disciple of Jesus Christ, and yet a more thorough worldling could hardly have been in Christian or in pagan lands. He was one of the most gigantic robbers of the poor of which history gives any mention.

In the midst of these festivities, Mazarin decided to invite the court to a grand ballet, which should transcend in splendor every thing which Paris had witnessed before. To decorate the saloons, a large amount of costly draperies were manufactured at Milan. In arranging these tapestries, by some accident they took fire. The flames spread rapidly, utterly destroying the room, with its paintings and its magnificently frescoed roof. The fire was eventually extinguished, but the shock was a death-blow to the cardinal. He was then in feeble health. His attendants conveyed him from the blazing room to the Chateau Mazarin.

The terror of the scene so aggravated the maladies from which the cardinal had for a long time suffered, that he was prostrated upon his bed, and it soon became evident that his dying hour was near at hand.

There are many indications that the haughty cardinal was tortured by the pangs of remorse. He was generally silent, though extremely dejected. His body was subjected to the most extraordinary convulsions, while inaudible murmurs escaped his lips.

Count de Brienne, in his memoirs, states that, on one occasion, he entered the chamber of the cardinal on tiptoe, his valet informing him that his eminence was asleep. He found Mazarin bolstered in an arm-chair before the fire, apparently in a profound slumber, "and yet," writes the count, "his body rocked to and fro with the greatest rapidity, from the back of his chair to his knees, now swinging to the right, and again to the left. These movements of the sufferer were as regular and rapid as the vibrations of the pendulum of a clock. At the same time inarticulate murmurs escaped his lips."

The count, much moved by the wretched spectacle, summoned the attendant, and awoke the cardinal. Mazarin, in awaking, betrayed that troubled state of soul which had thus agitated his body. In most melancholy tones, he said,

"My physician, M. Guenaud, has informed me that I can live but a few days."

Count de Brienne, wis.h.i.+ng to console him, said, "But M. Guenaud is not omniscient. He may be deceived."

The cardinal, uttering a heavy sigh, exclaimed, "Ah! M. Guenaud well understands his trade."

Mazarin, as we have mentioned, had acquired enormous wealth. The resources of the kingdom had been in his hands. The poor had been oppressed by as terrible a system of taxation as human nature could endure and live. With the sums thus extorted, he had not only maintained the army, and supported the voluptuousness of the court, but he had also appropriated vast sums, without the slightest right to do so, to his own private enrichment. He was now dying. The thought of going to the bar of G.o.d with his hands full of this stolen gold tortured him. Constrained by the anguish of a death-bed, he sent for a Theatine monk to act as his confessor, and to administer, in his last hours, the services of the Church.

The virtuous monk was quite startled when the cardinal, with pale and trembling lips, informed him that he had acc.u.mulated a fortune of over forty millions of francs--$8,000,000. Mazarin allowed that he considered it a sin that he had by such means acc.u.mulated such vast wealth. His pious confessor boldly declared that the cardinal would peril his eternal salvation if he did not, before his death, make rest.i.tution of all his ill-gotten gains, reserving only that for which he was indebted to the bounty of the king.

The dying sinner, trembling in view of the judgment, replied in faltering accents, "In that case I must relinquish all. I have received nothing from the king. My family must be left in utter beggary."

The confessor was deeply moved by the aspect of despair presented by the cardinal. Embarra.s.sed by the difficulties of the position, he sent for a distinguished member of the court, M. Colbert, to confer with upon the situation.

The shrewd courtier, after a little deliberation, suggested that, as it would be manifestly impossible to restore the money to the different individuals, scattered all over the realm, from whom it had been gathered in the ordinary collection of the taxes, the cardinal should make a transfer of it, as a donation, to the sovereign. "The king," added M. Colbert, "will, without any question, annul so generous an act, and restore the property to you. It will then be yours by royal grant."

The cardinal, who had lived, and moved, and had his being in the midst of trickery and intrigue, highly approved of the suggestion. The papers were immediately made out, transferring the property to the king. It was the 3d of March, 1661. Three days pa.s.sed, and there was no response of rejection--no recognition of the gift. The cardinal was terror-stricken. As he sat bolstered in his chair, he wrung his hands in agony, often exclaiming, "My poor family! my poor family! they will be left without bread."

At the close of the third day M. Colbert entered the dying chamber with a doc.u.ment in his hand, announcing that the king had restored to the cardinal all his property, authorizing him to dispose of it as he judged to be best.

It is scarcely possible that this trickery could have satisfied the conscience of the cardinal. His confessor professed to be satisfied, and granted the dying man that absolution which he had previously withheld. Still Mazarin was extremely reluctant to die. He dressed with the utmost care; painted his wrinkled brow and emaciate cheeks, and resorted to all the appliances of art to maintain the aspect of youth and vigor. But death could not thus be deceived. The destroying angel on the 9th of March bore his spirit away to the judgment seat of Christ. He died in the Chateau Mazarin, at the age of fifty-two, having been virtually monarch of France for eighteen years.

[Ill.u.s.tration: CHATEAU MAZARIN.]

It appeared by the will of Mazarin that his property was vastly greater even than the enormous sum which he had reluctantly admitted.

That portion of it which might be included under the term real estate, consisting of houses, lands, etc., amounted to over fifty millions of francs, while his personal effects, embracing the most costly furniture, diamonds, and other jewels, of which he strictly forbade any inventory to be taken, amounted to many millions more. The legacies to his nieces and to other aristocratic friends were truly princely. To the _poor_ he left a miserable pittance amounting to about twelve hundred dollars.

The cardinal was a heartless, avaricious man, of but little ability, and yet endowed with a very considerable degree of that cunning which sometimes proves to be temporarily so successful in diplomatic intrigues. The king was probably glad to be rid of him, for he could not easily throw off a yoke to which he had been habituated from childhood. During most of the cardinal's illness Louis continued his usual round of feasting and dancing. Upon his death he manifested no grief. It seems that he had previously made up his mind no longer to be troubled by a prime minister, but to rule absolutely by his own will.

Two days before the death of Mazarin, when he was no longer capable of transacting any business, the president of the ecclesiastical a.s.sembly inquired of the king "to whom he must hereafter address himself on questions of public business." The emphatic and laconic response was, "_To myself_."

CHAPTER V.

FESTIVITIES OF THE COURT.

1661-1664

Influence and reputation of Mazarin.--Character of M.

Fouquet.--Information given by M. Colbert.--Appearance of Louis XIV.--Charles II., King of England, and family.--The Princess Henrietta.--Marriage of Philip.--Fascinations of Henrietta.--Grief of Maria Theresa.--The queen-mother appealed to.--Mademoiselle de la Valliere.--Visit to the palace of Blois.--Fascination of Louis.--Louise captivated.--Festivities at Fontainebleau.--Discussion of the court ladies.--Vexation of Louise.--Discovery by Louis.--Louis and Mademoiselle de Valliere.--Sudden interruption of festivities.--Attentions of Louis.--Anecdote.--The lottery and the bracelets.--The palace of Vaux.--Splendor of the palace.--Rebuke of Louis.--Magnificent scenes.--Continued festivities.--Significant motto.--Fouquet in danger.--Intervention of Louise.--M. Fouquet imprisoned.--Continued gayety at court.--Important dispatches.--The king's orders.--Relations.h.i.+p of the French and Spanish courts.--The apology of Philip IV.--Conduct of M.

Crequi.--The Pope humbled.--Remorse of de la Valliere.--Illness of Anne of Austria.--Trials of Mademoiselle de la Valliere.--Disappointment.--Flight of Mademoiselle de la Valliere.--Seeks admission to the convent, and is denied.--Reproaches of the queen-mother.--Fury of Louis.--Power of Louis over Mademoiselle de la Valliere.--Return of Mademoiselle de la Valliere to the court.--Reinstated.--Resolve of Louis.--Versailles.--Extravagance of the king.--Magnificent fetes.

Cardinal Mazarin was exceedingly unpopular both with the court and the ma.s.ses of the people. Haughty, domineering, avaricious, there was nothing in his character to win the kindly regards of any one. His death gave occasion to almost universal rejoicing. Indeed, it was with some difficulty that the king repressed the unseemly exhibition of this joy on the part of the court. The cardinal, as we have mentioned, had been for many years virtually monarch of France. He, in the name of the king, imposed the taxes, appointed the ministry, issued all orders, and received all reports. The accountability was so entire to him that the monarch, immersed in pleasure, had but little to do with reference to the affairs of the realm.

Immediately upon the death of Mazarin, the king summoned to his presence Tellier, minister of War, Lionne, minister of State, and Fouquet, minister of the Treasury. He informed them that he should continue them in office, but that henceforth he should dispense with the services of a prime minister, and that they would be responsible to him alone. The young king was then twenty-two years of age. He was very poorly educated, had hitherto developed no force of character, and appeared to all to be simply a frivolous, pompous, self-conceited young man of pleasure.

Fouquet had held the keys of the treasury. When the king needed money he applied to him for a supply. The almost invariable reply he received was,

"Sire, the treasury is empty, but his eminence will undoubtedly advance to your majesty a loan."

The money came, the king little cared where from while reveling in luxury, and dancing and flirting with the beauties who crowded his court.

Fouquet was an able but thoroughly unprincipled man. He had grown enormously rich by robbing the treasury. The king disliked him. But Fouquet knew that the king could not dispense with his services. He was a marvelously efficient financier, and well knew how to wrench gold from the hands of the starving millions. The property he had acquired by fraud was so great that he often outvied the king in the splendor of his establishments. Conscious of his power, he doubted not that he should still be able to hold the king, in a measure, subject to his control.

Scarcely had Louis returned from his brief conference with his ministers to his cabinet at the Louvre, ere the secretary of the deceased cardinal, M. Colbert, entered, and requested a private audience. He informed the king, to his astonishment and inexpressible delight, that the cardinal had concealed fifteen millions of money (three millions of dollars) in addition to the sums mentioned in his will; that it was doubtless his intention that this money should immediately replenish the utterly exhausted treasury of his majesty.

The king was overjoyed. He could scarcely believe the intelligence.

Concealing the tidings from Fouquet, he speedily and secretly recovered the money from the several places in which it had been deposited. Fifteen millions of francs would be a large sum at any time, but two hundred years ago it was worth three or four times as much as now. Fouquet was utterly bewildered in attempting to imagine where the king had obtained the sums he was so lavishly expending.

Louis XIV. by nature and by education was excessively fond of the pomp and the punctilios of court etiquette. As this new era of independence dawned upon him, it was his first and most anxious object to regulate even to the minutest details the ceremonies of the court. He was of middling stature. High-heeled shoes added between two and three inches to his height. His hair was very fine and abundant, and he wore it long, in ma.s.ses of ringlets upon his shoulders. Deep blue eyes, a fair complexion, and well moulded features formed an unusually handsome countenance. He was stately in his movements, pompous in his utterance, and every word of every sentence was p.r.o.nounced slowly and with distinct enunciation, as if an oracle were giving out its responses.