Page:Secret History of the French Court under Richelieu and Mazarin.djvu/129

Rh de Chevreuse and the chiefs of the Importants was clearly laid open to the eyes of Mazarin; either by their incessant and skilfully concerted intrigues about the queen to cause her to abandon a minister for whom she had not yet openly declared herself, or to treat this minister as Luynes had treated the Marshal d'Ancre, and as Montrésor, Barrière, and Saint-Ybar had wished to treat Richelieu, The first part of the plan being unsuccessful, they began to think seriously of the second, and Madame de Chevreuse, the true head of the party, judiciously proposed to act before the return of the Duke d'Enghien, as the duke would protect Mazarin if at Paris; it was necessary, therefore, to profit by his absence to strike the decisive blow. Success seemed certain and even easy. They were sure of the people, who, wasted by a long war, and groaning beneath the weight of taxes, would joyfully welcome the hope of peace. They could count on the open support of the parliament, burning to regain that importance in the state which Richelieu had wrested from them, and which Mazarin disputed with them. They had the entire secret, and even public, sympathies of the episcopate, which, with Rome, detested the Protestant and demanded the Spanish alliance. They could not doubt the eager concurrence of the aristocracy, which still regretted its ancient and turbulent independence, and whose most illustrious descendants, the Vendômes, the Guises, the Bouillons, the Rochefoucaulds, were avowedly opposed to the rule of a foreign favorite, without fortune, without family, and as yet without glory. Even the princes of the blood resigned themselves to rather than loved Mazarin; Monsieur did not pride himself on an extreme fidelity to his friends, and the politic Prince de Condé would think twice on the subject before embroiling himself with the victors. He flattered all the parties by turns, but was only attached to his own interests. His son would act with his father, and they could gain him by loading him with honors. The next day there would be no resistance, and the day itself, scarce any