This combination of good intention with weakness of purpose, these feminine requisites of piety and gentleness, added to her natural sagacity, rendered Anne of Austria one of the most engaging of all those lofty personages who figured in a capital of which one of its monarchs observed, comparing it to a head, “that it was so spiritually gross and full of disease as to require, from time to time, bleeding, in order to secure the repose of its members.”[[206]]
During the early years of this young Queen’s married life, she had been addressed in the language of passion by several successive suitors. “Notwithstanding the respect which her Majesty inspires,” writes Madame Motteville, “her loveliness did not fail to touch the hearts of certain individuals, who ventured to manifest their passion.”[[207]]
Amongst these, first in the list was the Duc de Montmorenci, distinguished for bravery, for a handsome person, and for his great magnificence in his mode of living. This nobleman had been enamoured of the Marquise de Sable, the reigning beauty at the French Court when Anne of Austria first came to grace it; but her coldness and self-esteem chilled the ardour of her admirer. Platonic attachments, the fashion for which was first introduced by Catherine de Medici from Italy, were still in vogue; to this fashion, more fatal, perhaps, to virtue than the more direct blandishments of vice, Madame de Sable inclined. The alliance between Spain and France had introduced many of the Spanish authors to the lettered portion of the French community, and the gallantry of that nation, imbibed from the Moors, appeared to correspond with the delicate sentiments of the Italians. It did not, however, change man’s nature, nor act as an antidote to his fickleness. The Duc de Montmorenci beheld Anne of Austria, and the Marquise was forgotten. Proud and yet humble, that lady, upon the first surmise of his alteration of sentiment, withdrew from the contest with one so much more elevated than herself, and refused to see him again. Nevertheless, Montmorenci found little favour in the heart of Anne of Austria, who could never believe that his passion for her was either sincere or ardent; and who regarded, in after times, the petty gratification which it gave her as one of the symptoms of flattered vanity.
The Duc de Bellegarde, old, and a veteran in the court, for he had been the favourite of two preceding monarchs, was the next who sought to occupy the heart in which there existed a void; for Anne’s indifference to her royal consort daily increased. The love-suit which this ancient nobleman presumed to address to the Queen was received by her as incense to her vanity which could not, possibly, injure her reputation; and, although she listened to his avowal of admiration at first with resentment, she soon treated it as a jest; and even the King, although disposed to be jealous, entered into the pleasantry which the devotion expressed in the lisping accents of age naturally induced.
But a far more dangerous suitor lurked about the young Queen’s haunts, who, watching her from the retired recesses of the court, at once loved and persecuted her. This was the Cardinal de Richelieu.
This extraordinary character, acknowledged even by his enemies to have been the greatest man of his time, had manifested the mad attachment with which Anne of Austria inspired, in a singular manner, this astute politician. To her confidante, Madame Motteville, the Queen had imparted a strange incident in the life of this minister, whose thoughts, designs, and affections appeared to be centered in public affairs, or, as he termed it, in the good of the state.[[208]]
One day, when, with ill-concealed disgust, Anne was listening to the conversation of the Cardinal, she was surprised by a sudden burst of hitherto subdued feelings from that crafty churchman; and she heard, with what mingled consternation and anger may be conceived, expressions of a passionate attachment. As she was about to reply in terms of indignation and contempt, the King entered the closet in which she and the Cardinal were conversing, and a sudden check was given to the subject, never to be resumed; for Anne dared not to recur to it, lest she should flatter the wishes of the Cardinal by showing her remembrance of his addresses; she would only reply to him by showing tacitly her hatred, and by her incessant refusal to accept either his proffered friendship, or his offer of mediation between her and the King. It was in vain she perceived that her conduct aggravated the bad understanding between her and her royal partner; in vain she knew that whilst the presumptuous love of the Cardinal preponderated in his breast, she yet drove him to extremities by her abhorrence. He demonstrated “his affection,” by persecutions which ceased only with his existence; for he hoped, possibly, if he could not succeed by gentle means, to prevail over her contempt by fear.
It was at this juncture, whilst Anne, estranged from her consort, and pursued, watched, and loved by the Cardinal de Richelieu, most truly required a friend and monitor, that Buckingham arrived to throw fresh temptations and difficulties in her path. Unhappily her favourite, Madame de Chevreuse, afterwards banished from Court by Richelieu, was not a woman of prudence, and, perhaps, scarcely of virtue. By Madame de Motteville, the Duchesse de Chevreuse is regarded as the true source of all Anne’s errors and misfortunes. Anne loved her, as those to whom the natural channels of affection are forbidden, or poisoned, love the soothing and humble. She never forgave Richelieu the disgrace of her favourite, nor even when she knew that it was the wish of her husband that Madame de Chevreuse should be sent away, could she submit to his wishes. Anne, in the commencement of her career, had shown much disgust to those who were termed “les dames gallantes,” and had appeared, to those who knew her best, to possess the most rigid notions of female decorum. But the society of Madame de Chevreuse had broken down that barrier in which the young and fascinating Queen found her best protection. Even after sundry imprudencies, those who were cognizant of her actions accorded to her the credit of a perfect purity of life, and bestowed upon her all the esteem which is due to the most undoubted virtue. In after life, the frankness and simplicity with which she spoke of these early passages of her life showed that no evil was attached to them, and that to vanity alone were to be attributed those rash adventures in which her reputation incurred so severe an ordeal. How far, on a review of the circumstances of her career, Anne may be acquitted of a want of feminine modesty, of a prudence the representative of virtue, must be a question for the moralist. Her character must, however, be measured in some respects by the standard of the age in which she lived.
Unhappily for Anne, at the time that Buckingham arrived in Paris, Madame de Chevreuse was passionately in love with the handsome and dangerous Earl of Holland, and made no secret of that disgraceful attachment.[[209]] It was, therefore, her endeavour to promote everything that could produce a continued intercourse between France and this country.
Of the first meeting between Anne of Austria and Buckingham, during his embassy, there is no account. We can suppose it to have occurred under circumstances of dazzling splendour, to which many considerations, not guessed by the public, lent a strong interest. The suppressed and dangerous admiration of Richelieu might not be penetrated by Buckingham; but it was notorious that whilst Louis XIII. distrusted, and apparently neglected, his Queen, he was really disposed to respect and cherish her; and was known to have confessed to a confidant one day, in speaking of the Queen’s personal attractions, that “he dared not show her any tenderness, lest he should displease the queen-mother and the Cardinal, whose aid and counsels were much more essential to him than the affection of his wife.”[[210]]