at Rue St. Honore, just as they
were about to turn on to the Pont Neuf, a band of armed men fell upon
them, "and a cookshop-lad, advancing at the head of two hundred men,
thrust his halbert against the premier president's stomach, saying,
'Turn, traitor, and, if thou wouldst not thyself be slain, give up to us
Broussel, or Mazarin and the chancellor as hostages.'" Matthew Mole
quietly put the weapon aside, and, "You forget yourself," he said, "and
are oblivious of the respect you owe to my office." "Thrice an effort
was made.to thrust me into a private house," says his account in his
Memoires, "but I still kept my place; and, attempts having been made with
swords and pistols on all sides of me to make an end of me, God would not
permit it, some of the members (Messieurs) and some true friends having
placed themselves in front of me. I told President de Mesmes that there
was no other plan but to return to the Palais-Royal and thither take back
the body, which was much diminished in numbers, five of the presidents
having dropped away, and also many of the members on whom the people had
inflicted unworthy treatment." "Thus having given himself time to rally
as many as he could of the body, and still preserving the dignity of the
magistracy both in his words and in his movements, the premier president
returned at a slow pace to the Palais-Royal, amidst a running fire of
insults, threats, execrations, and blasphemies." [_Memoires de Retz._]

The whole court had assembled in the gallery: Mole spoke first. "This
man," says Retz, "had a sort of eloquence peculiar to himself. He knew
nothing of apostrophes, he was not correct in his language, but he spoke
with a force which made up for all that, and he was naturally so bold
that he never spoke so well as in the midst of peril. Monsieur made as
if he would throw himself on his knees before the queen, who remained
inflexible; four or five princesses, who were trembling with fear, did
throw themselves at her feet; the Queen of England, who had come that day
from St. Germain, represented that the troubles had never been so serious
at their commencement in England, nor the feelings so heated or united."
[_Histoire du Temps,_ 1647-48. (_Archives curieuses,_ vi. p. 162.)] At
last the cardinal made up his mind; he "had been roughly handled in the
queen's presence by the presidents and councillors in their speeches,
some of them telling him, in mockery, that he had only to give h