Page:Secret History of the French Court under Richelieu and Mazarin.djvu/120

106 the good of the State that she should keep this place under her own control for the king. The tears of a woman who had once been so proud moved the queen, who, after having reflected on her reasons, deemed it proper to leave things as they were." It was Mazarin doubtless who suggested to the Duchess d'Aiguillon the sound and politic reasons which persuaded the queen, so well do they accord with the language which he continually holds towards her in his Carnets. Madame de Motteville says that he "confirmed her in her inclination to preserve Havre to the Duchess d'Aiguillon." Here, as in many other things, the art of Mazarin consisted in seeming simply to confirm the queen in the resolutions which he himself had suggested.

Observe that it is not we who attribute these various designs, this judicious and logical course of policy, to Madame de Chevreuse, but La Rochefoucauld, who ought to be correctly informed on the matter—indeed, he attributes it to her both in her own affairs and in that of the Vendômes. Mazarin was not deceived by her; and more than once we read in his private notes these words: "My greatest enemies are the Vendômes, and Madame de Chevreuse who animates them." He also informs us that she had formed the design of marrying her daughter, the beautiful Charlotte, then sixteen years of age, to the Duke de Mercoeur, the eldest son of the Duke de Vendôme, while his brother Beaufort was to have espoused the noble and amiable Mademoiselle d'Epernon, who, baffling these and many more brilliant schemes, buried herself at twenty-four in a convent of the Carmelites. These marriages, which would have allied, strengthened, and united so many noble houses already but