However, I believe terror was what most ailed the old gentleman (not that the French would call him so). He must always have been chicken-hearted, for he had changed his religion out of fear. His wife was all sincerity, but the dear good woman was religious for both of them!
And as time went on his alarms could not but increase. The Parliament really might have prevailed if it had any constancy, for all the provincial Parliaments were quite ready to take part with it, and moreover the Duke of Bouillon had brought over his brother, the Vicomte de Turenne, to refuse to lead his army against them, or to keep back the Spaniards. The Queen-Regent might really have been driven to dismiss the Cardinal and repeal the taxes if the city had held out a little longer, but in the midst the First President Mole was seized with patriotic scruples. He would not owe his success to the foreign enemies of his country, and the desertion of the army, and he led with him most of his compeers. I suppose he was right—I know Clement thought so—but the populace were sorely disappointed when negotiations were opened with the Queen and Court, and it became evident that the city was to submit without any again but some relaxation of the tax.
The deputies went and came, and were well mobbed everywhere. The Coadjutor and Duke of Beaufort barely restrained the populace from flying at the throat of the First President, who they fancied had been bribed to give them up. One wretch on the steps of the Palais de Justice threatened to kill the fine old man, who calmly replied, ‘Well, friend, when I am dead I shall want nothing but six feet of earth.’
The man fell back, daunted by his quietness, and by the majesty of his appearance in his full scarlet robes. These alarms, the continual shouting in the streets, and the growing terror lest on the arrival of the Court all the prominent magistrates should be arrested and sent to the Bastille, infinitely aggravated President Darpent’s disorder. We no longer saw his son every day, for he was wholly absorbed in watching by the sick-bed, and besides there was no further need, as he averred, of his watching over us. However, Sir Francis went daily to inquire at the house, and almost always saw Clement, who could by this time speak English enough to make himself quite intelligible, but who could only say that, in spite of constantly being let blood, the poor old man grew weaker and weaker; and on the very day the treaty was signed he was to receive the last rites of the Church.
CHAPTER XX. — CONDOLENCE
(By Margaret)
Our siege was over at last. I can hardly explain how or why, for there was no real settlement of the points at issue. I have since come to understand that the Queen and the Cardinal were alarmed lest the Vicomte de Turenne with his army should come to the assistance of his brother, the Duke of Bouillon, and thus leave the frontier open to the Spaniards; and that this very possibility also worked upon the First President Mole, who was too true a Frenchman not to prefer giving way to the Queen to bringing disunion into the army and admitting the invader. Most of the provincial Parliaments were of the same mind as that of Paris, and if all had united and stood firm the Court would have been reduced to great straits. It was well for us at St. Germain that they never guessed at our discomforts on our hill, and how impossible it would have been to hold out for a more complete victory.
I was glad enough to leave St. Germain the day after the terms had been agreed upon. The royal family did not yet move, but my term of waiting had long been expired; I burned to rejoin my mother and sister, and likewise to escape from the assiduities of M. de Lamont, who was becoming more insufferable than ever.
So I asked permission of the Queen to let my son resume his studies, and of Mademoiselle to leave her for the time. Both were gracious, though the Queen told me I was going into a wasp’s nest; while, on the other hand, Mademoiselle congratulated me on returning to those dear Parisians, and said she should not be long behind me. I was too much afraid of being hindered not to set out immediately after having received my license, so as to take advantage of the escort of some of the deputies with whom I had a slight acquaintance. I also hoped to avoid M. de Lamont’s leave-takings, but I was not fortunate enough to do this. The absurd man, learning that I was on the point of departure, came rushing headlong into the court where the carriages stood, having first disordered his hair and untied his scarf, so as to give himself a distracted appearance, and thus he threw himself on his knees between me and the coach door, declaring that I was killing him and breaking his heart by my cruelty.