ve
begun. I know that the Parliament did very good service there."

In fact, several counsellors, on foot in the street and in the very midst
of the revolters, had, at the peril of their lives, defended Le Tellier
de Tourneville, receiver-general of gabels, and his officers, whilst the
whole Parliament, in their robes, with the premier president at their
head, perambulated Rouen, amidst the angry mob, repairing at once to the
points most threatened, insomuch that the presidents and counsellors were
"in great danger and fear for their skins." [_Histoire du Parlement de
Normandy,_ by M. Floquet, t. iv.] It was this terror, born of tumults
and the sight of an infuriated populace, which, at a later period,
retarded the Parliament in dealing out justice, and brought down upon
it the wrath of the king and of the cardinal.

Meanwhile the insurrection was gaining ground, and the local authorities
were powerless to repress it. There was hesitation at the king's council
in choosing between Marshal Rantzau and M. de Gassion to command the
forces ordered to march into Normandy. "That country yields no wine,"
said the king "that will not do for Rantzau, or be good quarters for
him." And they sent Colonel Gnssion, not so heavy a drinker as Rantzau,
a good soldier and an inflexible character. First at Caen, then at
Avranches, where there was fighting to be done, at Coutances and at
Elbeuf, Gassion's soldiery everywhere left the country behind them in
subjection, in ruin, and in despair. They entered Rouen on the 31st of
December, 1639, and on the 2d of January, 1640, the chancellor himself
arrived to do justice on the rebels heaped up in the prisons, whom the
Parliament dared not bring up for judgment. "I come to Rouen," he said,
on entering the town, "not to deliberate, but to declare and execute the
matters on which my mind is made up." And he forbade all intervention on
the part of the archbishop, Francis de Harlay, who was disposed, in
accordance with his office of love as well as the parliamentary name he
bore, to implore pity for the culprits, and to excuse the backward
judges. The chancellor did not give himself the trouble to draw up
sentences. "The decree is at the tip of my staff," replied Picot, captain
of his guards, when he was asked to show his orders. The executions were
numerous in Higher and Lower Normandy, and the Parliament received the
wages of its tardiness. All the members of the body, even the most