The next meeting between Mademoiselle and Condé was full of triumph. They parted, she to betake herself to the towers of the Bastile, he to the belfry of Saint-Antoine. Toward Bagnolet in the valley the princess saw the king's troops gathering for a fresh attack. Having communicated with Condé through a page, she left the Bastile, giving stringent orders that, in case of necessity, its cannon should be turned upon the royal army; and returned to her post near the gate to invigorate the soldiers with wine and brave words.
There was indeed need for encouragement. Frondeurs were falling back in dire extremity—royalists pressing forward, hopeful, and strengthened with reinforcements. The hours of the Fronde seemed numbered—when heights of the Bastile blazed forth a flash of light; the cannon thundered out in quick succession—the royal army paused, reeled, and retreated in amazement. Mademoiselle had saved the day, and "killed her royal husband," as Mazarin expressed it. Henceforth she was to be more than ever an object of distrust to the queen and minister. But though this victory lent a dignity to the last days of the Fronde, there was no principle of stability in the party. Weak policy, quarrels, treachery on their side—opposed to them, Mazarin, whose keen perception told him that temporary withdrawal from the ministry would insured unlimited power in the future; and Turenne, with double the forces of Condé,—nothing was fairly matched except the courage of the two parties.
The Fronde came to an abrupt end, and every one was left to make his own terms. Mademoiselle had shown disinterestedness, courage, and humanity worthy of a better cause. The fruits which she reaped were a notice to leave Tuileries, and the refusal on her cowardly father's part to protect one whom the king had condemned. There appear to have been about eight years and a half enforced banishment from court, which she spent on her numerous estates, amusing herself with writing romances, portraits (then in vogue) and her Mémoires, which she continued until within a few years of her death. M. Sainte-Beuve tells us that the style of her imagination belongs rather to the close of Louis XIII.'s reign, and to the Hôtel Rambouillet, than to the poorer literary period of Louis XIV.
And now, having given a faint delineation of Mademoiselle during her prosperous and fêted youth, and during the days of the Fronde, which we are inclined to regard as the period at which she gave most evidence of kinship with her grandfather, the great Henry; we pass on to a time when fortune ceased to favor her, and the world began to hustle her about, as roughly as it does common mortals. La Grande Mademoiselle, who had hitherto looked upon human griefs and passions as upon a brilliant theatrical spectacle, was destined at last to leave the royal box, and figure on the stage herself for the diversion of her fellow creatures. An amusing afterpiece this exhibition seemed to her contemporaries; but to us, who have not suffered from her airs of superiority, there is a certain pathos in this genuine devotion lavished upon the wrong object at an age when such blindness is simply absurd. That heart of adamant which had looked above kings and princes to covet the imperial crown, fell prostrate in the dust before a colonel of dragoons, a member of the royal household. Alas for pride of race!
Mademoiselle was forty-three years old when the conviction seized her that it would be well to marry, that M. Lauzun was the most attractive person in existence, and that for once it would be pleasant to receive the love of some one worth loving. That M. Lauzun admired her seemed evident, but how to give an opportunity for expression to one whose sense of reverential duty always kept him at a distance?
One day they had an interview in the embrasure of a window, the first of many similar ones, in which she consulted him about her proposed alliance [{370}] with Prince Charles of Lorraine. The tactics of our modest suitor are worthy of all praise. "By his proud bearing he seemed to me like the emperor of the world," writes Mademoiselle, whose circumstantial account must be pressed into few words. "Why should she marry," he reasoned, "since she had already everything that could embellish life? The position of queen or empress was little more exalted than her own, and would be encumbered with burthensome duties. True, in France she could raise some one to her own rank, and unite with him in untiring devotion to the king, who must ever be her first object in life. It was easy to build a castle in the air, but how to find a companion worthy to share it with her, when no such being existed? A woman of forty-three had three resources: a convent, a life of strict retirement apart from court and city, and finally marriage. Marriage would insure liberty to enjoy the world at any age, but it might be at the cost of her happiness." Hints only plunged him into reverential silence. At last the secret was revealed by writing; then comes incredulity met by protestations, and finally amazed conviction. "What! would you marry your cousin's servant? for nothing in the world would make me leave my post. I love the king too well, I am too much attached to my position by inclination, to leave it even for the honor you would confer upon me." And when she assured him that his devotion to the king only endeared him the more to her (for loyalty appears to have been the mainspring of their attachment), he answered: "I am not a prince; a nobleman I am assuredly, but that will not suffice for you;" and she replies, "I am content; you are all that would become the greatest lord in the kingdom, and wealth and dignities are mine to bestow upon you," etc., etc, etc.
The story is well known. Louis XIV., after much hesitation, gave his consent to the marriage. Mademoiselle was to confer great wealth upon Lauzun, together with the sovereignty of Dombes, the duchy of Montpensier, and the county d'Eu; always with the agreement that he should not resign his post at court, but unite with her in exclusive devotion to the king.
The night before the wedding day Mademoiselle was summoned to his majesty's presence, with directions to pass directly to his room through the in garde-robe. '"This precaution not a good omen. Madame de Nogent remained in the carriage. While I was in the garde-robe Rochefort entered and said, 'Wait a moment.' I saw saw that some one was introduced into the king's room whom I was not intended to see. Then he said 'Enter,' and the door was closed behind me. The king was alone, and looked unhappy and agitated. He said, 'I am in despair at what I have to tell you. I am told that the world says I have sacrificed you in order to make Monsieur de Lauzun's fortune. This will injure me in the eyes of foreign powers, and I ought not to allow the affair to proceed. You have good reason to complain of me; beat me if you like, for there is no degree of anger I will not submit to, or do not deserve.' 'Ah!' I exclaimed, 'who do you mean, sire? it is too cruel! but whatever you do to me, I will not fail in the respect due to you. It is to strongly implanted in my heart, and has been too well nourished by Monsieur de Lauzun, who would have given me these feelings if I had not already been actuated by them, for no one can love him without acquiring them,' I threw myself at his feet, saying: 'Sire, it would be kinder to kill me outright than to place me in this position. When I told your majesty of the affair, if you had bade me forgot it. I would have done so, but think how I shall appear in breaking it off now that I have gone so far! What will become of me? Where is Monsieur de Lauzun?' 'Do not be uneasy; nothing will happen to him.' 'Ah! sire, I must fear everything [{371}] for him and for myself, now that our enemies have prevailed over the kindness you felt toward him.'
"He threw himself on his knees when I knelt, and embraced me. We remained thus three-quarters of an hour, his cheek pressed to mine; he wept as bitterly as I did: 'Oh why did you give time for these reflections? Why did you not hasten matters?' 'Alas! sire, who would have doubted your majesty's word? You never failed any one before, and you begin now with me and Monsieur de Lauzun. I shall die, and I shall be glad to die. I never loved anything before in all my life, and I love, and love passionately, the best and noblest man in your kingdom. The joy and delight of my life was in elevating him. I had thought to pass the rest of my days so happily with him, honoring and loving you as much as I do him. You gave him to me, and now you take him away, and it is like tearing out my heart. This shall not make me love you less, but it makes my grief the more cruel that it comes to me from him whom I love best in the world."