Chapter I (2)

Ten or twelve volumes which belonged to him are still in existence, and they attest that he knew a great deal more than the graduates of our modern colleges,--though he knew nothing of the things they aim at. At eleven o'clock he closed his lexicons, bade adieu to his preceptor and to the pedagogy, bestrode his horse, and rode to Paris, to the house of one of his uncles, who had taken it upon himself to teach the boy everything that he could not learn from his books. Our forefathers carefully watched their sons' first contact with reality. They tried not to leave to chance the duties of so important an initiation; and as a general thing their supervision left ineffaceable traces. Uncle Claude de la Mothe-Arnauld, Treasurer-General of France, installed his nephew in his private cabinet and gave him various bundles of endorsed papers to decipher. The child was obliged to pick out their meaning and then render a clear analysis of it in a distinct voice. When he was fifteen years old another uncle, a Supervisor of the National Finances, caused the student to "put his fist into the dough" in his own office. At sixteen years of age, "little Arnauld" was "M. Arnauld d' Andilly"; vested with office under the State, received at Court, and permitted to assist behind the chair of the King, at the Councils of Finance, so that he might hear financial arguments, and learn from the Nation's statesmen how to decide great questions. His education was not an exceptional one. The sons of the bourgeoisie were raised in like manner. Attempts to educate boys were more or less successful, according to the natural gifts of the postulants. Omer Talon, Advocate-General of the Parliament of Paris, and one of the great Parliamentary orators of the century, had pursued extensive classical studies, and "as he spoke, Latin and Greek rushed to his lips." He had "vast attainments in law," a science much more complicated in the sixteenth century than in our day. But, learned though he was, he had not lingered on the benches of his school. He was admitted to the Bar when he was eighteen years old, and "immediately began to plead and to be celebrated."

Antoine Le Maïtre, the first "Solitaire" of Port Royal, began his career by appearing in public as the best known and most important and influential lawyer in Paris when he was twenty-one years old.

Generally, the nobility sacrificed learning, which it despised, to an impatient desire to see its sons "in active life." The nobles made pages of their sons as soon as they were thirteen or fourteen years old, or else sent them to the "Academy" to learn how to make proper use of a horse, to fence, to vault, and to dance.[11]

* * * * *

In the eyes of people of quality books and writings were the tools of plebeians; good enough for professional fine wits, or lawyers' clerks, but not fit for the nobility.

* * * * *

In the reign of Louis XIII.,[12] M. d'Avenal wrote thus: "Gentlemen are perfectly ignorant,--the most illustrious and the most modestly insignificant alike. In this respect, with few exceptions, there is absolute equality between them."

The Constable, De Montmorency, had the reputation of a man of sound sense, "though he had no book learning, and hardly knew how to write his own name." Many of the great lords knew no more; and this ignorance was not shameful; on the contrary it was desired, affected, gloried in, and eagerly imitated by the lesser nobility.

"I never sharpen my pen with anything but my sword," proudly declared a gentleman.

"Ah?" answered a wit; "then your bad writing does not astonish me!"

The exceptions to the rule resulted from the caprices of the fathers; and they were sometimes found where least expected. The famous Bassompierre, arbiter of fashion and flower of courtiers, who, at one sitting, burned more than six thousand letters from women, who wore habits costing fourteen thousand écus, and could describe their details twenty years after he had worn them, had been very liberally educated, and according to a method which as may be imagined, was far in advance of the methods of his day. He had followed the college course until the sixteenth year of his age, he had laboured at rhetoric, logic, physics, and law, and dipped deep into Hippocrates and Aristotle. He had also studied _les cas de Conscience_. Then he had gone to Italy, where he had attended the best riding schools, the best fencing schools, a school of fortifications, and several princely Courts. At the age of nineteen years he was a superb cavalier and a good musician, he knew the world, and had made a very brilliant first appearance at Court.

The great Condé, General-in-Chief at the age of twenty-two years, had followed a college course at the school of Bourges, and had been "drilled" at the "Academy." He was tried by the fire of many a hard school. Wherever he went he was preceded by tart letters of instruction from his father. By his father's orders he was always received and treated as impartially as any of the lesser aspirants to education; he was severely "exercised," put on his mettle in various ways, and compelled to start out from first principles, no matter how well he knew them. When seven years old he spoke Latin fluently. When he reached the age of eleven he was well grounded in rhetoric, law, mathematics, and the Italian language. He could turn a verse very prettily; and he excelled in everything athletic.

Louis XIII. applauded this deep and thorough study,--perhaps because he regretted his lost opportunities. He told people that he should "wish to have ... Monsieur the Dauphin," educated in like manner.[13]

In measure as the century advanced it began to be recognised that a nobleman could "study" without detracting from his noble dignity. Louis de Pontis, who started out as a D'Artagnan, and ended at Port Royal,[14] wished that time could be taken to instruct the youth of the nation. Answering some one who had asked his advice as to the education of two young lords of the Court, he wrote[15]:

I will begin by avowing that I do not share the sentiments of those
who wish for their children only so much science as is "needed"--as
they call it--"for a gentleman"; I do not see things in that light.
I should demand more science.

Since science teaches man how to reason and to speak well in
public, is it not necessary to men, who, by the grandeur of their
birth, their employment, and their duties, may need it at any
moment, and who make use of it in their numerous meetings with
the enlightened of the world? There are several personages who
hold that the society of virtuous and talented women expands and
polishes the mind of a young cavalier more than the conversation of
men of letters; but I am not of their opinion....

Notwithstanding this declaration, Pontis desired that great difference should be established between the treatment of a child training for the robes and the treatment of one training for military service. "The first ought never to end his studies; it is sufficient for the second to study until his fifteenth or sixteenth year; after that time he ought to be sent to the Academy...."

In this opinion Pontis echoed the general impression. At the time when La Grande Mademoiselle was born, the man of quality no longer had a right to be "brutal,"--in other words, to betray coarseness of nature. New customs and new manners exacted from the man of noble birth tact and good breeding, not science. But it was requisite that the nobleman's mind should be "formed" by the influence and discourse of a man of letters, so that he might be capable of judging witty and intellectual works ("works of the mind").

Marshal Montmorency,[16] son of the Constable, who "hardly knew how to write his own name," had always in his employ cultured and intellectual people, who "made verses" for him on a multitude of such subjects as it was befitting his high estate that he should know; such subjects as were calculated to give him an air of intelligence and general information. His intellectual advisers informed him what to think and what to say of the current questions of the day.[17] It was good form for great and noble houses to entertain at least one _autheur_. As there were no public journals or reviews, the _autheur_ took the place of literary chronicles and literary criticism. He talked of the last dramatic sketch, or of the last new novel.

It was not long before another step in advance was taken, by which every nobleman was permitted to entertain his own personal _autheur_, and to compose "works of the mind" for himself. But he who succumbed to the epidemic (_cacoëthes scribendi_), owed it to his birth and breeding to hide his malady, or to make excuses for it.

Mlle. de Scudéry puts in the mouth of _Sapho_ (herself) in _Le Grand Cyrus_[18]:

Nothing is more inconvenient than to be intellectual or to be
treated as if one were so, when one has a noble heart and a
certain degree of birth; for I hold that it is an indubitable fact
that from the moment one separates himself from the multitude,
distinguishing one's self by the enlightenment of one's mind; when
one acquires the reputation of having more mind than another, and
of writing well enough--in prose or in verse--to be able to compose
books, then, I say, one loses one half of one's nobility--if
one has any--and one is not one half as important as another of
the same house and of the same blood, who has not meddled with
writings....

About the time this opinion saw the light, Tallemant des Réaux wrote to M. de Montausier, husband of the beautiful Julie d'Angennes, and one of the satellites of the Hôtel de Rambouillet: "He plys the trade of a man of mind too well for a man of quality--or at least he plays the part too seriously ... he has even made translations...."

This mention is marked by one just feature: the man who wrote, who could write, or who indulged in writing, was supposed to have judgment enough to keep him from attaching importance to his works. The fine world had regained the taste for refinement lost in the fracas of the civil wars; but in the higher classes of society was still reflected the horror of the preceding generations for pedants and for pedantry.

Ignorant or learned, half-grown boys were cast forward by their hasty education into their various careers when they had barely left the ranks of infancy. They were reckless, still in the flower of their giddy youth; but they were enthusiastic and generous. France received their high spirits very kindly. Deprived of the good humour, and stripped of the illusions furnished by the young representatives of their manhood, the times would have been too hard to be endured. The traditions of the centuries when might was the only right still weighed upon the soul of the people. One of those traditions exacted that--from his infancy--a man should be "trained to blood." A case was cited where a man had his prisoners killed by his own son,--a child ten years old. One exaction was that a man should never be conscious of the sufferings of a plebeian.

France had received a complete inheritance of inhuman ideas, which protected and maintained the remains of the savagery that ran, like a stained thread, through the national manners, just falling short of rendering odious the gallant cavaliers. All that saved them from the disgust aroused by the brutal exercise of the baser "rights" was the bright ray of poetry, whose dazzling light gleamed amidst their sombre faults.

They were quarrelsome, but brave. Perchance as wild as outlaws, but devoted, gay, and loving. They were extraordinarily lively, because they were--or had been but a short time before--extraordinarily young, with a youth that is not now, nor ever shall be.

They inspired the women with their boisterous gallantry. In the higher classes the sexes led nearly the same life. They frequented the same pleasure resorts and revelled in the same joys. They met in the lanes and alleys, at the theatre (_Comédie_), at balls, in their walks, on the hunt, on horseback, and even in the camps. A woman of the higher classes had constantly recurring opportunities to drink in the spirit of the times. As a result the ambitious aspired to take part in public life; and they shaped their course so well, and made so much of their opportunities, that Richelieu complained of the importance of women in the State. They were seen entering politics, and conspiring like men; and they urged on the men to the extremes of folly.

Some of the noblewomen had wardrobes full of disguises; and they ran about the streets and the highways dressed as monks or as gentlemen. Among them were several who wielded the sword in duel and in war, and who rode fearlessly and well. They were all handsome and courageous, and even in the abandon of their most reckless gambols they found means to preserve their delicacy and their grace. Never were women more womanly. Men adored them, trembling lest something should come about to alter their perfection. Their fear was the cause of their desperate and stubborn opposition to the idea of the education of girls, then beginning to take shape among the elder women.

I cannot say that the men were not in the wrong; but I do say that I understand and appreciate their motives. Woman, or goddess, of the order of the nobles of the time of Louis XIII., was a work of art, rare and perfect; and to tremble for her safety was but natural!

It happened that La Grande Mademoiselle came to the age to profit by instruction just when polite circles were discussing the education of girls. The governess whose duty it had been to guide her mind was caught between two opposing forces: the defendants of the ancient ignorance and the first partisans of the idea of "_enlightenment for all_."

V

_Les Femmes Savantes_ might have been written under Richelieu. _Philamente_ had not awaited the advent of Molière to protest against the ignorance and the prejudice that enslaved her sex. When the piece appeared, more than half a century had elapsed since people had quarrelled in the little streets about woman's position,--what she ought to know, and what she ought not to know. But if the piece had been written long before its first appearance, the treatment of the subject could not have been the same. It would have been necessary to agree as to what woman ought to be in her home and in her social relations; and at that time they were just beginning to disagree on that very subject. Nearly all men thought that things ought to be maintained in the existing conditions. The nobles had exquisite mistresses and incomparable political allies; the bourgeois had excellent housekeepers; and to one and all alike, noble and bourgeois, it seemed that any instruction would be superfluous; that things were perfect just as they were. The majority of the women shared the opinions of the men. The minority, looking deeper into the question, saw that there might be a more serious and more intellectual way of living to which ignorance would be an obstacle; but at every turn they were met by men stubbornly determined that women should not be made to study. Such men would not admit that there could be any difference between a cultivated woman and "_Savante_,"--the term then used for "blue-stocking." It must be confessed that there was some justice in their judgment. For a reason which escapes me, when knowledge attempted to enter the mind of a woman it had great trouble to make conditions with nature and simplicity. It was not so easy! Even to-day certain preparations are necessary,--appointment of commandants, the selection of countersigns, establishment of a picket-line--not to say a deadline. We have _précieuses_ in our own day, and their pretensions and their grimaces have been lions in our path whenever we have attempted the higher instruction of our daughters; the truly _précieuses_, they who were instrumental in winning the cause of the higher education of women--they who, under the impulsion given by the Hôtel de Rambouillet, worked to purify contemporary language and manners--were not ignorant of the baleful affectation of their sisters, nor of the extent of its compromising effect upon their own efforts. Mlle. de Scudéry, who knew "nearly everything that one could know" (by which was probably meant "everything fit to be known"), and who piqued herself upon being not less modest than she was wise, could not be expected to share, or to take part in, and in the mind of the public be confounded with, the female _Trissotins_ whose burden of ridicule she felt so keenly. She would not allow herself to resemble them in any way when she brought them forth in _Grand Cyrus_, where the questions now called "feminist" were discussed with great good sense.

_Damophile_, who affects to imitate _Sapho_, is only her caricature. _Sapho_ "does not resemble a '_Savante_'"; her conversation is natural, gallant, and easy (commodious).

_Damophile_ always had five or six teachers. I believe that the least learned among them taught her astrology.

She was always writing to the men who made a profession of science. She could not make up her mind to have anything to say to people who did not know anything. Fifteen or twenty books were always to be seen on her table; and she always held one of them in her hand when any one entered the room, or when she sat there alone; and I am assured that it could be said without prevarication that one saw more books in her cabinet than she had ever read, and that at _Sapho's_ house one saw fewer books than she had read.

More than that, _Damophile_ used only great words, which she pronounced in a grave and imperious voice; though what she said was unimportant; and _Sapho_, on the contrary, used only short, common words to express admirable things. Besides that, _Damophile_, believing that knowledge did not accord with her family affairs, never had anything to do with domestic cares; but as to _Sapho_, she took pains to inform herself of everything necessary to know in order to command even the least things pertaining to the household.

_Damophile_ not only talked as if she were reading out of a book, but she was always talking about books; and, in her ordinary conversation, she spoke as freely of unknown authors as if she were giving public lessons in some celebrated academy.

She tries ... with peculiar and strange carefulness, to let it be
known how much she knows, or thinks that she knows. And that, too,
the first time that a stranger sees her. And there are so many
obnoxious, disagreeable, and troublesome things about _Damaphile_,
that one must acknowledge that if there is nothing more amiable nor
more charming than a woman who takes pains to adorn her mind with a
thousand agreeable forms of knowledge,--when she knows how to use
them,--nothing is as ridiculous and as annoying as a woman who is
"stupidly wise."

Mlle. de Scudéry raged when people, who had no tact, took her for a _Damophile_, and, meaning to compliment her, consulted her "on grammar," or "touching one of Hesiod's verses." Then the vials of her wrath were poured out upon the "_Savantes_" who gave the prejudiced reason for condemning the education of woman, and who provoked annoying and ridiculous misconception by their insupportable pedantry; when there were so many young girls of the best families who did not even learn their own language, and who could not make themselves understood when they took their pens in hand.

"The majority of women," said Nicanor, "seem to try to write so
that people will misunderstand them, so strange is their writing
and so little sequency is there in their words."

"It is certain," replied Sapho, "that there are women who speak
well who write badly; and that they do write badly is purely their
own fault.... Doubtless it comes from the fact that they do not
like to read, or that they read without paying any attention to
what they are doing, and without reflecting upon what they have
read. So that although they have read the same words they use when
they write, thousands and thousands of times, when they come to
write they write them all wrong. And by putting some letters where
other letters ought to be, they make a confused tangle which no one
can distinguish unless he is well used to it."

"What you say is so true," answered Erinne, "that I saw it proved
no longer ago than yesterday. I visited one of my friends, who has
returned from the country, and I carried her all the letters she
wrote to me while she was away, so that she might read them to me
and let me know what was in them."

Mademoiselle de Scudéry did not exaggerate; our great-grandmothers did not see the utility of applying a knowledge of spelling to their letters. In that respect each one extricated herself by the grace of God.

The Marchioness of Sablé, who was serious and wise, and, according to the testimony of _Sapho_, "the type of the perfect _précieuse_" had peculiar ways of her own in her spelling. She wrote, _J'hasse, notre broulerie votre houbly_. Another "_précieuse_," Madame de Brégy, whose prose and verse both appeared in print, wrote to Madame de Sablé, when they were both in their old age:

Je vous diré que je vieus d'aprendre que samedi, Monsieur, Madame,
et les poupons reviene a Paris, et que pour aujourd'hui la Rayue
et Madame de Toscane vout a Saint-Clou don la naturelle bauté sera
reausé de tout les musique possible et d'un repas magnifique don je
quiterois tous les gous pour une écuelle non pas de nantille, mes
pour une devostre potage; rien n'étan si délisieus que d'an mauger
en vous écoutan parler. (19th September, 1672.)

It is but just to add that as far as orthography was concerned many of the men were women. The following letter of the Duke of Gesvres, "first gentleman of Louis XIV.," has no reason to envy the letter of the old Marchioness.

(Paris, this 20th September, 1677.) Monsieur me trouvant oblige
de randre vuue bonne party de l'argan que mais enfant out pris de
peuis quil sont en campane Monsieur cela m'oblije a vous suplier
très humblement Monsieur de me faire la grasse de Commander
Monsieur quant il vous plaira que l'on me pay le capitenery
de Movsaux monsieur vous asseurant que vous m'oblijeres fort
sansiblement Monsieur, comme ausy de me croire avec toute sorte de
respec Monsieur vastre très humble et très obeissant serviteur.

Enough is as good as a feast! Though we stand in no superstitious awe of orthography, we can but laud Mademoiselle de Scudéry for having crossed lances in its favour. And well might she wish that to the first elements of an education might be added a certain amount of building material suitable for a foundation so solid that something more serious than dancing steps and chiffons might at a later date be introduced into the brains of young girls.

Seriously, [she said] is there anything stranger than the way
they act when they prepare to enter upon the ordinary education
of woman? One does not wish women to be coquettish or gallant,
and yet they are permitted to learn carefully everything that
has anything to do with gallantry; though they are not permitted
to know anything that might fortify their virtue or occupy their
minds. All the great scoldings given them in their first youth
because they are not proper[19]--that is to say dressed in good
taste, and because they do not apply themselves to their dancing
lessons and their singing lessons--do they not prove what I say?
And the strangest of all is that this should be so when a woman
cannot, with any propriety, dance more than five or six years
of all the years of her life! And this same person who has been
taught to do nothing but to dance is obliged to give proof of
judgment to the day of her death; and though she is expected to
speak properly, even to her last sigh, nothing is done--of all
that might be done--to make her speak more agreeably, nor to act
with more care for her conduct; and when the manner in which these
ladies pass their lives is considered, it might be said that they
seem to have been forbidden to have reason and good sense, and that
they were put in the world only that they might sleep, be fat, be
handsome, do nothing, and say nothing but silly things.... I know
one who sleeps more than twelve hours every day, who takes three or
four hours to dress herself, or, to speak more to the point: not to
dress herself--for more than half of the time given to dressing is
passed either in doing nothing or in doing over what has been done.
Then she employs fully two or three hours in consuming her divers
repasts; and all the rest of the time is spent receiving people to
whom she does not know what to say, or in paying visits to people
who do not know what to say to her.

In spite of her strictness, Mlle. de Scudéry was no advocate of the idea which makes a woman her husband's servant, or installs her as the slave of the stew-pan. Whenever she was urged to "tell precisely what a woman ought to know," the problem was so new to her that she did not know how to answer it. She evaded it, rejecting its generalities. She had only two fixed ideas: that science was necessary to women; and that the women who attained it must not let it be known that they had attained it. She expressed her two opinions clearly:

It [science] serves to show them the meaning of things; it makes
it possible for them to listen intelligently when their mental
superiors are talking--even to talk to the point and to express
opinions--but they must not talk as books talk; they must try
to speak as if their knowledge had come naturally, as if their
inherent common sense had given them an understanding of the things
in question.

Mademoiselle had in her mind one woman whom she would have liked to set up as a pattern for all other women. That one woman knew Latin, and because of her sense and propriety, was esteemed by Saint Augustine, and yet no one had ever thought of calling her a "_Savante_."

Mlle. de Scudéry was very grateful to the charming Mme. de Sévigné, because she plead the cause of woman's education by so fine an example, and she depicted her admirable character with visible complaisance, under the name of Clarinte.[20]

Her conversation is easy, diverting and natural. She speaks to the
point, and evinces clear judgment; she speaks well; she even has
some spontaneous expressions, so ingenuous and so witty that they
are infinitely pleasing.... Clarinte dearly loves to read; and
what is better, without playing the wit, she is admirably quick to
seize the hidden meaning of fine ideas. She has so much judgment
that, though she is neither severe, nor shy, she has found the
means to preserve the best reputation in the world.... What is most
marvellous in this person is that, young as she is, she cares for
her household as prudently as if she had had all the experience
that time can give to a very enlightened mind; and what I admire
still more, is that whenever it is necessary she can do without
the world, and without the Court; she is as happy in the country,
she can amuse herself as well there, as if she had been born in
the woods.... I had nearly forgotten to tell you that she writes
as she speaks; that is to say, most agreeably and as gallantly as
possible.

The programme used for the distribution of studies by means of which the De Sévignés were fabricated is not revealed. Nature herself must have furnished a portion of the plan. As far as we can judge the part played by education was restricted to the adoption of some of the suggestions of very rich moral endowments.

Mlle. de Chantal had been admirably directed by her uncle, the Abbé de Coulanges, and, aside from the cares of the profession which now presides over the education of woman, it is probable that more efficient means could not be found for the proper formation of the character of a girl than it was Mademoiselle de Chantal's good fortune to enjoy.

Ménage and Chapelain had been her guides in rhetoric. She had read Tacitus and Virgil in the original all her life. She was familiar with Italian and with Spanish, and had ancient and modern history at her tongue's end,--also the moralists and the religious writers.

These serious and well-grounded foundations, which she continually strengthened and renewed until death, did not prevent her from "adoring" poetry, the drama, and the superior novels,--in short, all things of enlightenment and worth wherever she found them and under whatever form. She was graceful in the dance; she sang well,--her contemporaries said that her manner of singing was "impassioned."

FROM AN ENGRAVING OF THE PAINTING BY MUNTZ]

The Abbé Coulanges had raised her so carefully that she was orderly; and, unlike the majority, she liked to pay her debts. She was a perfect type of woman. She even made a few mistakes in orthography, taking one, or more, letter, or letters, for another, or for others. In short, she made just the number of errors sufficient to permit her to be a writer of genius without detracting from her air of distinguished elegance, or from the obligations and the quality of her birth.

There were others at Court and in the city who confirmed their right to enlightenment, thereby justifying the theses of Mademoiselle de Scudéry. But a large number of women gave the lie to her theories by their resemblance to _Damophile_. Of these latter was "the worthy Gournay," Montaigne's "daughter by alliance," who, from the exalted heights of her Greek and Latin, and in a loud, insistent voice, discoursed like a doctor of medicine on the most ticklish of subjects,--subjects far from pleasing when rolled out of the mouth of a woman, even when so displaced in the name of antiquity and all that is venerable! (For in these names "the good Gournay" evoked them.) There was another pedant, the Viscountess d'Auchy, who had "founded conferences" in her own house; the people of the fine world flocked there to smother as they listened while it was proved, for their edification, that the Holy Trinity had natural reasons for its existence. On those "foundations" the Innate Idea also was proved by demonstrative reason by collecting and by analysing the ideas of young children concerning philosophy and theology. The lady who founded the conferences had bought some manuscript _Homilies on the Epistles of St. Paul_, of a doctor of theology. She had had them imprinted and attached to portraits of herself. Thus accoutred for their mission, they were circulated with great success, and their proceeds formed the endowment fund of the _Conférence_ Library.

"The novelty of seeing a great lady of the Court commenting on the most obscure of the apostles caused every one to buy the book."[21] It ended by the Archbishop of Paris intimating to the "Order of the Conferences" that they "would better leave Theology to the Sorbonne."

Mlle. Des Jardins declaimed her verses in the salons with great "contortions" and with eyes rolling as if in death; and she was not at all pleased when people preferred Corneille's writings to her own.

Mlle. Diodée frightened her hearers so that they took to their heels when she began to read her fine thoughts on Zoroaster or on Hermes Trismegistus. Another learned lady would speak of nothing but solar or lunar eclipses and of comets.

The pedantry of this high order of representative woman transported the "honest man" with horror. The higher the birth of the man the greater his fear lest by some occult means he might be led to slip his neck into the noose of a "_Savante_." But there was one counter-irritant for this virulent form of literary eruption. The young girls of the highest nobility were all extremely ignorant. Mlle. de Maillé-Brézé, niece of Cardinal de Richelieu, had not an idea of the most limited degree of the knowledge of books when she married the great Condé (1641). She knew nothing whatever. It was considered that ignorance carried to such length proved that neglect of instruction had gone too far, and when the great Condé went on his first campaign, friends seized the opportunity to add a few facets to the uncut jewel. She was turned and turned about, viewed in different lights, and polished so that her qualities could be seen to the best advantage. "The year after her marriage," says Mlle. de Scudéry, "she was sent to the Convent of the Carmelite Nuns of Saint Denis, to be taught to learn to read and write, during the absence of Monsieur her husband."

The _Contes de Perrault_--faithful mirror of the habits of those days--teaches us what an accomplished princess ought to be like. All the fairies to be found in the country had acted as godmothers to the _Belle-au-Bois-dormant_,

so that each one of them could bring her a gift ... consequently
the princess had acquired every imaginable perfection.... The
youngest fairy gave her the gift of being the most beautiful
woman in the world; the one who came next gave her the spirit
of an angel; the third endowed her with power to be graceful in
everything that she did; the fourth gave her the art of dancing
like a fairy; the fifth the art of singing like a nightingale;
and the sixth endowed her with the power to play all kinds of
instruments to perfection.

Perrault had traced his portraits over the strongly defined lines of real life. La Grande Mademoiselle was trained after the manner of the _Belle-au-Bois-dormant_. Her governess had had too much experience to burden her with a science that would have made her redoubtable in the eyes of men; so she had transferred to the fairies the task of providing her young charge with a suitable investiture. Unhappily for her eternal fame, when she distributed her powers of attorney some of the fairies were absent; so Mademoiselle neither sang like a nightingale, nor displayed classic grace in all her actions. But her resemblance to Perrault's heroines was striking. The fairies empowered to invest her with mind and delicacy of feeling had been present at her baptism, and they had left indisputable proof of the origin of her ideas. Like their predecessors, the elves of the _Contes_, they had never planned for anything less than the marriage of their god-daughter to the King's son. By all that she saw and heard, Mademoiselle knew that Providence had not closed an eye at the moment of her creation. She knew that her quality was essential. She knew that it was written on high that she should marry the son of a great King.

Her life was a conscientious struggle to "accomplish the oracle"; and the marriages that she missed form the weft of her history.

VI

The first of the _Mémoires_ show us the Court of Louis XIII. and the affairs of the day as seen by a little girl. This is an aspect to which historians have not accustomed us; and as a natural result of the infantine point of view the horizons are considerably narrowed. The little Princess did not know that anything important was taking place in Germany. She could not be ignorant of the fact that Richelieu was engaged in a struggle with the high powers of France; she read the general distress in the clouded faces surrounding her. But in her mind she decided that it was nothing but one of her father's quarrels with the Cardinal. The judgments she rendered against the high personages whose houses she frequented were dictated by purely sentimental considerations. "Some she liked; some she did not like"; consequently the former gained, and the latter lost. Many contestants were struggling before her young eyes; Louis XIII. was among the winners.

He was a good uncle, very affectionate to his niece, and deeply grateful that she was nothing worse than a girl. He could never rid himself of the idea that his brother might have endowed him with an heir. He had Mademoiselle brought to the Louvre by the gallery along the river, and allowed himself to be cheered by her turbulence and uncurbed indiscretions.

Anne of Austria exhibited a deep tenderness for Mademoiselle; but no one can deceive a child. "I think that all the love she showed me was nothing but the effect of what she felt for Monsieur," writes Mademoiselle; and further on she formally declares that the Queen, believing herself destined to a near widowhood, had formed the "plan" of marrying Monsieur. Whatever the Queen's plans may have been, it is certain that she caressed the daughter for love of the father. Anne of Austria never forgave Mademoiselle for the part that she had played before her birth, in the winter of 1626-1627, when the Duchess of Orleans so arrogantly promised to bring forth a Dauphin. Monsieur had no reason to fear the scrutiny of a child. He was a charming playfellow; gay, complaisant, fond of his daughter, at least for the moment,--no one could count upon the future!

Cardinal de Richelieu could not gain anything by thoughtful criticism. To the little Princess he was the Croquemitaine of the Court. When we think of his ogre face--spoil sport that he was! as he appeared to the millions of French people who were incapable of understanding his policy--the silhouette traced by the hand of Mademoiselle appears in a new light, and we are forced to own that its profound and simple ignorance is instructive.

Marie de Médicis had managed to disappear from the Luxembourg and from Paris, after the _Journée des Dupes_ (11 November, 1630), and her little granddaughter had not noticed her departure. She writes: "I was still so young that I do not remember that I ever saw her." The case was not the same after the departure of Monsieur. He had continually visited the Tuileries, and when he came no more the child knew it well enough. She understood that her father had been punished, and she was not permitted to remain ignorant of the identity of the insolent personage who had placed him on the penitential stool. Mademoiselle, then less than four years old, was outraged in all her feelings by the success of Richelieu. She made war upon him in her own way; and, dating from that day, became dear to the people of Paris, who had always loved to vex and to humble the Government. She wrote with a certain pride: "On that occasion my conduct did not at all answer to my years. I did not want to be amused in any way; and they could not even make me go to the assemblies at the Louvre." As she had no better scapegoat, her bad humour was vented on the King. She constantly growled at him, demanding that he should bring back her "papa." But Mademoiselle was never able to pout to such purpose that she could stay away from the palace long, for she was a true courtier, firmly convinced that to be away from Court was to be in a desert, no matter how many servants and companions might surround her. She soon mended her broken relations with the assemblies and the collations of the Louvre, and could not refrain from "entering into the joy of her heart" when "Their Majesties" sent word to her guardians to take her to Fontainebleau. But she never laid down her arms where Richelieu was concerned. She knew all the songs that were written against him.

Meanwhile Monsieur had not taken any steps to make himself interesting. As soon as he had crossed the French frontier he entered upon a pleasure debauch which rendered him unfit for active service, for a time at least. He paid for his high flight in Spanish money. In 1632 he further distinguished himself by entering France at the head of a foreign army. On that occasion he caused the death of the Duke of Montmorency, who was executed for "rebellion."

Immediately after the Duke's execution, it was discovered that Monsieur had secretly married a sister of the Duke of Lorraine. He, Monsieur, crowned his efforts by signing a treaty with Spain (12 May, 1634), for which act France paid by yielding up strips of French territory.

But to his daughter Monsieur was always the victim of an impious persecution. Speaking of the years gorged with events so closely concerning her own life, she says:

Many things passed in those days. I was only a child; I had no part
in anything, and could not notice anything; All that I can remember
is that at Fontainebleau (5 May, 1663) I saw the Ceremony of the
Chevaliers of the Order. During the ceremony they degraded from the
Order Monsieur the Duke d'Elbœuf, and the Marquis de la Vieu Ville.
I saw them tear off and break the arms belonging to their rank,--a
rank equal to all the others; and when I asked the reason they told
me they had insulted them "because they had followed Monsieur."
Then I wept. I was so wounded by this treatment that I would have
retired from Court; and I said that I could not look on this action
with the submission that would become me.

The day after the ceremony an incident exciting much comment added to Mademoiselle's grief. Her enemy, the Cardinal, took part in the promotion of the Cordons Bleus. On this occasion Louis XIII. wished to exalt his Minister by giving him a distinguishing mark of superiority. He wished to distinguish him, and him only, by giving him a present. His choice of a present fell upon an object well fitted to evoke the admiration of a child. The chevaliers of the _Saint Esprit_ were at a banquet. At dessert they brought to Richelieu the King's gift, an immense rock composed of various delicate confitures. From the centre of the rock jetted a fountain of perfumed water. Given under solemn circumstances and to a prince of the Church, it was a singular present. It attracted remark, its familiarity tended to give colour to the rumours circulating to the effect that an alliance then in process of incubation would eventually unite the House of France and the family of a very powerful Minister. The people voiced the current rumour volubly; they said that "Gaston's marriage with a Lorraine" would never be recognised, and that the young Prince would buy his pardon by marrying the niece of the Cardinal. Mademoiselle heard the rumours and her heart swelled with anguish at the thought of her father's dishonour.

I was not so busy with my play that I did not listen attentively
when they spoke of the "accommodating ways" of Monsieur! The
Cardinal de Richelieu, who was first minister and master of
affairs, had made up his mind that it should be so,--that he
should marry _that one!_ and he had expressed his wishes with such
shameful suggestions that I could not hear them mentioned without
despair. To make peace with the King, Monsieur must break his
marriage with Princesse Marguerite d'Orléans, and marry Mlle. de
Combalet, niece of the Cardinal, now Madame d'Aguillon! From the
time I first heard of the project I could not keep from weeping
when it was spoken of; and, in my wrath, to avenge myself, I sang
all the songs against the Cardinal and his niece that I knew.
Monsieur did not let himself be "arranged" to suit the Cardinal.
He came back to France without the assistance of the ridiculous
condition. But how it was done I do not know. I cannot say anything
about it, because I had no knowledge of it.

If it is true that Mademoiselle did not know the details of the quarrels in which the House of France engaged during her childhood, she was not inquisitive. Her knowledge in that respect had been at the mercy of her own inclination. By the thoughtful care of Richelieu, all the correspondence and all the official reports exposing the Court miseries were placed where all might read who ran. Richelieu had divined the power of the press over public opinion, although in that day there was no press in France. There were no journals to defend the Government. The _Mercure Française_[22] was not a journal; it appeared once a year, and contained only a brief narration of "the most remarkable things that had come to pass" in the "four parts of the world." Renaudot's _Gazette_[23] was hardly a journal, though it appeared every eight days, and numbered Louis XIII. among its contributors. Louis furnished its military news. Richelieu and "Father Joseph" furnished its politics. Neither Renaudot nor his protectors had any idea of what we call a "premier Paris" or an "article de fond"; they had never seen such things and they would not have been capable of compassing such inventions. The _Gazette_ was not a sheet of official information; it did not contain matter enough for one page of the _Journal des Débats_. But the necessity of saying something to France was a crying one. It had become absolutely necessary to put modern royalty in communication with the nation, and to explain to the people at large the real meaning of the policy of the Prime Minister. The people must be taught why wars, alliances, and scaffolds were necessary. Something must be done to defend France against the attacks of Marie de Médicis and the cowardly Gaston. At that time placards and pamphlets rendered the services now demanded of the journals. By means of the placards the King could speak directly to the people and take them to witness that he was in difficulty, and that he was trying to do his best. In his public letters he confided to them his family chagrins, and the motives of his conduct toward the foreign powers. His correspondence with his mother and his brothers was printed as fast as it was written or received by him. Apologies for his conduct were supported by a choice of documents. From time to time the pamphlets were collected and put in volumes--the volumes which were the ancestors of our "yellow books."

I have before me one of these volumes, dated 1639, without name of editor or publisher. It bears the title: _Recueil de divers pièces pour servir a l'histoire_. Two thirds of its space are consecrated to the King's quarrels with his family. Mademoiselle must have learned from it many things which she has not the air of suspecting. Perhaps she found it convenient or agreeable to be ignorant of them. In the pages of this instructive volume none of her immediate relations appear to any advantage. Louis XIII. is invariably dry and bombastic, or constrained and affected; he shows no trace of emotion when, in his letter of 23 February, 1631, he informs the people that

being placed in the extremity of choosing between our mother and
our minister we did not even hesitate, because they have embittered
the Queen our very honoured lady and mother against our very dear
and very beloved cousin, Cardinal de Richelieu; there being no
entreaty, no prayer or supplication, nor any consideration, public
or private, that we have not put forward to soften her spirit;
our said cousin recognising what he owes her, by reason of all
sorts of considerations, having done all that he could do for her
satisfaction; the reverence that he bears her having carried him to
the point of urging us and supplicating us, divers times, to find
it good that he should retire from the management of our affairs;
a request which the utility of his past services and the interests
of our authority have not permitted us to think of granting.... And
recognising the fact that none of the authors of these differences
continue to maintain their disposition to diverge from our royal
justice, we have not found a way to avoid removing certain persons
from our Court, nor even to avoid separating ourselves, though
with unutterable pain, from the Queen, our very honoured lady and
mother, during such time as may be required for the softening of
her heart....

Another letter, from the King to his mother, is revolting in its harshness. After her departure from France, Marie de Médicis addressed to him some very tart pages in which she accused Richelieu of having had designs on her life. In the same letter she represented herself as flying from her son's soldiers:

I will leave you to imagine my affliction when I saw myself in
flight, pursued by the cavalry with which they had threatened
me! so that I would be frightened and run the faster out of your
kingdom; by that means constraining me to press on thirty leagues
without either eating or drinking, to the end that I might escape
from their hands. (Avesnes, 28 July, 1631.)

Instead of feeling pity for the plaints of the old woman who realised that she had been conquered, Louis XIII. replied:

Madame, I am the more annoyed by your resolution to retire from my
state because I know that you have no real reason for doing so.
The imaginary prison, the supposititious persecutions of which you
complain, and the fears that you profess to have felt at Compiègne
during your life there, were as lacking in foundation as the
pursuit that you pretend my cavalry made when you made your retreat.

After these words, the King delivered a pompous eulogy on the Cardinal and ended it thus:

You will permit me, an it please you, to tell you, Madame, that
the act that you have just committed, and all that has passed
during a period more or less recent, make it impossible for me to
be ignorant of your intentions in the past, and the action that I
have to expect from you in the future. The respect that I owe to
you hinders me from saying any more.

It is true that Marie de Médicis received nothing that she did not deserve; but it may be possible that it was not for her son to speak to her with brutality.

In their way Gaston's letters are _chefs-d'œuvre_. They do honour to the psychological sensibility of the intelligent _névrosé_. Monsieur knew both the strength and the weakness of his brother. He knew him to be jealous, ulcerated by the consciousness of his own insignificance--an insignificance brought into full relief by the importance of the superior Being then hard at work making "of a France languishing a France triumphant"[24]; and with marvellous art he found the words best qualified to irritate secret wounds.

His letters open with insinuations to the effect that Richelieu had a personal interest in maintaining the enmity between "the King and his own brother," so that the King, "having no one to defend him," could be held more closely in his, Richelieu's, grasp.

I beseech ... your Majesty ... to have the gracious prudence to
reflect upon what has passed, and to examine more seriously the
designs of those who have been the architects of these plans; if
you will graciously examine into this matter you will see that
there are interests at stake which are not yours,--interests of
a nature opposed to your interests, and which aim at something
further, and something far in advance of anything that you have
thought of up to the present time (March 23, 1631).

In the following letter Monsieur addresses himself directly to Louis XIII.'s worst sentiments and to his kingly conscience. He feigns to be deeply grieved by the deplorable condition of his brother, who, as he says, is reduced, notwithstanding

"the very great enlightenment of his mind" to the plight of a
puppet ... nothing but the shadow of a king, a being deprived of
his authority, lacking in power as in will, counted as nothing in
his own kingdom, devoid even of the external lustre ordinarily
attached to the rank of a sovereign.

Monsieur declares that Richelieu has left the King

"nothing but the name and the figure of a king," _and that for a
time only_; for as soon as he has ridded _himself of you ... and of
me! ... he means to take the helm and steer the Ship of State in
his own name_.

Monsieur depicted the new "Mayor of the Palace" actually reigning in overburdened, crushed, and oppressed France,