Dame, where a Te Deum had just been sung, when
Councillor Broussel and President Blancmesnil were arrested in their
houses, and taken one to St. Germain and the other to Vincennes. This
was a familiar proceeding on the part of royal authority in its
disagreements with the Parliament. Anne of Austria herself had practised
it four years before.

[Illustration: Arrest of Broussel----352]

It was a mistake on the part of Anne of Austria and Cardinal Mazarin
not to have considered the different condition of the public mind.
A suppressed excitement had for some months been hatching in Paris and in
the provinces. "The Parliament growled over the tariff-edict," says
Cardinal de Retz; "and no sooner had it muttered than everybody awoke.
People went groping as it were after the laws; they were no longer to be
found. Under the influence of this agitation the people entered the
sanctuary and lifted the veil that ought always to conceal whatever can
be said about the right of peoples and that of kings, which never accord
so well as in silence." The arrest of Broussel, an old man in high
esteem, very keen in his opposition to the court, was like fire to flax.
"There was a blaze at once, a sensation, a rush, an outcry, and a
shutting up of shops." Paul de Gondi, known afterwards as Cardinal de
Retz, was at that time coadjutor of the Archbishop of Paris, his uncle
witty, debauched, bold, and restless, lately compromised in the plots of
the Count of Soissons against Cardinal Richelieu, he owed his office to
the queen, and "did not hesitate," he says, "to repair to her, that he
might stick to his duty above all things."

[Illustration: Cardinal de Retz----352]

There was already a great tumult in the streets when he arrived at the
Palais-Royal: the people were shouting, "Broussel! Broussel!" The
coadjutor was accompanied by Marshal la Meilleraye; and both of them
reported the excitement amongst the people. The queen grew angry.
"There is revolt in imagining that there can be revolt," she said: "these
are the ridiculous stories of those who desire it; the king's authority
will soon restore order." Then, as old M. de Guitaut, who had just come
in, supported the coadjutor, and said that he did not understand how
anybody could sleep in the state in which things were, the cardinal asked
him, with some slight irony, "Well, M. de Guitaut, and what is your
advice?" "My advice," said Guitaut, "is to give up that old rascal of a
Bro