"Before I reply to any particular questions," answered the President, "I will, with the permission of the Parliament, read the procès verbal of our proceedings at the conference at Ruel. Then having seen what we have really done, the chambers will be enabled to judge whether they can approve of the treaty of peace we have concluded."
"You had no power, you had no power," shouted forty or fifty voices at once,--"you had no power to conclude anything! Your authority expired four or five days ago! There is no peace; we will have no peace! The deputies have gone beyond their powers; they have abandoned disgracefully our generals and our friends!"
In vain the Chief President attempted to read the paper which he had in his hand. Every time he opened his mouth his words were drowned in murmurs and reproaches; and, even when he abandoned the endeavour and sat down, it was clear that the rest of the assembly only waited for some new word to break forth again into tumult and invective. All solemnity, all dignity, was laid aside: the turbulence had not even the impressiveness derived from being terrible: it was simply ridiculous; and the only image presented to the mind by the whole scene was a body of fishwomen scolding in a market.
After the silence of perhaps a minute which ensued, a little pale young man, who seemed to be slightly deformed, and who I afterwards found was the Prince de Conti, rose near the head of the hall, and said, in a mild and sweet-toned voice, that he did wonder that the deputies from the Parliament had thought fit to conclude a peace with the Court, without consulting himself and the generals of the army. Another person, who was afterwards addressed as the Duke de Bouillon, with a broad, unmeaning countenance, which, however, lighted up in an extraordinary manner when he began to speak, followed the Prince de Conti in addressing the Parliament:--
"Gentlemen," he said, "since you have thought fit to conclude a peace with the Court, and allowed the Cardinal Mazarin, whose enmity I have so highly provoked in your service, to remain prime minister, the only favour and reward that I shall require of you is, to obtain me a passport, as speedily as possible, to quit the country with my family."
"We have not concluded a peace; we disavow it. The deputies had no power," cried a dozen voices at once; and everybody again began speaking together, as if the sense of hearing had suddenly left the whole assembly. One man, the Duke de Beaufort, who was handsome enough, indeed, but whose good looks were principally composed of high health and stupidity, laid his hand upon the hilt of his sword, and declared that it should never draw blood for Mazarin. Another protested that the Parliament had rendered itself for ever unworthy of the confidence of the people; and, what between reproaches and tumult, more than an hour passed without anything being concluded.
In the midst of all this uproar, however, a piece of buffoonery, performed by the well-known Bachaumont, restored some sort of good humour to the assembly; for, seizing a momentary pause, when every tongue, as if by common consent, halted to take breath, he passed behind the famous De Retz, then archbishop-coadjutor of Paris, snatched forth a poniard, which he had espied lying concealed in the bosom of that factious prelate, and, holding it up to the eyes of the Parliament, exclaimed, "Gentlemen, gentlemen, look at the breviary of our archbishop!"
A roar of laughter succeeded, which left the whole of that grave assembly so much out of countenance, that it was some time before they could speak of any serious business, much more return to the angry disputation in which they had been interrupted.
Taking advantage of the change, one of the lawyers, called the President de Coigneux, rose, and made the most sensible proposition which had yet been heard; namely, that, as the deputies had acted without authority, and as the responsibility of what they had done, of course rested upon themselves, they should be sent back with the treaty they had framed, and, though permitted to take it for the basis of a new one, should be directed, in addition, to stipulate for immunity and recompence to the generals and nobles who had engaged in the cause of the Parliament.
He had not yet concluded his harangue, however, when a tremendous noise in the court below, and even in the hall without, together with loud shouts of "Down with Mazarin! Down with the Parliament! Hang up the deputies! Long live the noble generals! Let us have a republic! Set fire to the palais!" and other such sweet and delectable exhortations, roared by the stentorian voices of the crowd, caused the orator to turn very pale, and to sit down before he had finished his oration. Another lawyer rose, to second the proposal of the first: but by this time the noise had become so tremendous that what he said could not be distinguished; and the moment after the great door of the hall opened, and one of the doorkeepers entered, pale and trembling, announcing, in a voice scarcely articulate with fear, that the populace had forced their way into the Salle des pas perdus, and demanded to speak with the Duc de Beaufort.