Page:A Biographical Dictionary of the Celebrated Women of Every Age and Country (1804).djvu/497

Rh country, yet she grew tired of the place, and returned to Paris, where she was brought to bed of a daughter, who lived only four years.

The troubles of the minority of Louis XIV. opened a grand career to her ambition. Her natural indolence would have made political discussions unpleasant to her, had they not been developed by the prince de Marsillac, who, as well as herself, was irritated against her brother, and opposed to him the prince de Conti. Thus she found herself between the court and the faction, the mediator between them, and equally looked up to by Condé, Mazarin, and the Coadjutor.

Yet they mistrusted Madame de Longueville at Paris, and her brother at St. Germain's. They feared their enmity was only feigned, and they could only persuade them they were not of intelligence the one with the other, by widening the breach; yet a sincere reconciliation soon took place on the cessation of the troubles, but the good understanding' between them was one principal cause of renewing them, as Madame de Longueville continually spirited up her brother against the court.

She could not dispense with going to St. Germain's, but she would not go as a suppliant. She sent word the day and hour on which she would go, but was expected some time before she appeared. When she came, the court was very full, and the queen in bed. Every one was anxious to hear what a woman of so fine an understanding would say upon the occasion; but trembling as if she had the fever, she only pronounced distinctly the word Madame; and the rest of her speech was so low, that with the utmost attention the queen could not hear her; and this meeting, cold on both sides, only served to augment the queen's resentment.

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