Anne-Marie-Louise d'Orléans, Duchesse de Montpensier, who had taken a stronghold unaided save by a few boatmen, heard thanksgiving on all hands, and to crown her joy—for she loved to dance—the city gave a great fête in her honour. But there was one bitter drop in her cup: her father had been made sick by her arrival. He dared not punish her in the face of the people's joy; but he retired to his bed and abandoned himself to the pangs of colic and, when Mademoiselle, flushed with pride, arrived at the Luxembourg, he refused to see her; he sent word to her to "Begone!" he was "too sick to talk of affairs of State."
Monsieur had cares of various species. Condé and his associates had forced him to take a prominent position in politics, and his terror of possible consequences made his life a torment. Condé was deep in treasonable plots. He had returned from his Southern expedition flaming with anger; he had goaded the people to the verge of fury, and reduced Parliament to such a state that it had adjourned its assemblies without mention of further sessions. He had made all possible concessions to the foreigners; he had so terrified Monsieur that the unhappy Prince saw an invasion in every corner. But Gaston had still another master; he had fallen a victim to the machinations of the wily Retz. For reasons of his own, the Archbishop's coadjutor had found it expedient to familiarise Monsieur with the canaille, and he had so impressed the people with the idea that "d'Orléans" sympathised with them that they fawned upon Gaston and dogged his footsteps. An incoming and outgoing tide of ignoble people thronged the Luxembourg. Monsieur's visitors were the lowest of the mobility, and they forced their way even into his bed-chamber. They sat by him while his coiffeur dressed his hair, they assisted at his colics, and officiously dropped sugar in his café-au-lait. Among his visitors were ex-convicts, half-grown daughters of the pavement, and street urchins, and they all offered him advice, sympathised with him, urged him to take courage, and assured him of their protection, until Gaston, helpless in his humiliation, writhed in his bed. When he had been alone and free from the sharp scrutiny of his natural critic, his daughter, his lot had been hard, but with Mademoiselle at hand it was torment. Mademoiselle was a general of the army; she had taken her father's place; she felt that her exploits had given her the right to speak freely, and one day when she visited Madame (she told the story herself), she "rated her like a dog." Madame was in her own apartment; she studied her complaints, sipped her "tisanes," swathed her head in aromatised linen, and neither saw nor heard the droning of the throngs who buzzed like flies about her husband.
VIEW OF THE LUXEMBOURG (LATER CALLED THE PALAIS D'ORLÉANS) IN THE 17TH CENTURY
FROM AN OLD PRINT
It is worthy of note that the princes did not forecast the future. Reason ought to have shown them that the revolution would sweep them away as it swept all else should not Royalty intervene in their behalf. The Canaille was mistress of the streets, and her means was always violent. Her leaders were strong men. In 1651 she had her Marats and her Héberts, who used their pens to incite France to massacre; and her Maillards, who urged her on to pillage the homes of the nobility and to fell, as an ox is felled in the shambles, all, however innocent, whom it served their purpose to call suspicious. Such men did bloody work, and they did not ask what the nobles thought of it. Insolent, on fire with hate, lords of a day! they sprang from the slimy ooze with the first menace of Revolution to vanish with the Revolution when the last head rolled in the sawdust; cruel, but useful instruments, used by immutable Justice to avenge the wrongs of a tormented people!
When Mademoiselle returned from Orleans Paris wore the aspect of the early days of the Terror. Even the peaceable and naturally thrifty sat in idleness, muttering prayers for help or for vengeance, either to God or to the devil. All were afraid. The people of the Bourgeoisie had set their faces against the entrance of Condé's troops. The devastated suburbs were still in evidence; it was supposed that Condé would bring with him drunkenness, rapine, fire, and all the other horrors of a military possession. So matters stood when the army of the King and the army of the Fronde, after divers combats for divers issues, fought the fight which gave Mademoiselle her glory.
She was then the Queen of Paris. Her palace was the political centre as well as the social centre of France. Of those days she said: