e conjures her either to permit him to retire or to declare
herself in favour of his policy.

This exciting contest continued with the keenest activity, but no change
had occurred up to the end of July, and even the first days of August,
1643, though this critical state of affairs had become greatly
aggravated. The violence of the _Importants_ increased daily; the Queen
defended her minister, but she also showed consideration for his
enemies. She hesitated to take the decided attitude which Mazarin
required at her hands, not only in his individual interest, but in that
of his government. Suddenly an incident, very insignificant apparently,
but which by assuming larger proportions brought about the inevitable
crisis--forced the Queen to declare herself, and Madame de Chevreuse to
plunge deeper into a baleful enterprise, the idea of which had already
forced itself upon her imagination. A great scandal occurred. We allude
to a quarrel between the two duchesses, de Longueville and de
Montbazon.

CHAPTER II.

THE DUCHESS DE MONTBAZON.--THE AFFAIR OF THE DROPPED LETTERS.--THE
QUARREL OF THE TWO DUCHESSES.

ON declaring itself of the party of Mazarin, the house of Conde had
drawn down the hatred of the _Importants_, though their hostility
scarcely fell upon Madame de Longueville. Her gentleness in everything
in which her heart was not seriously engaged, her entire indifference to
politics at this period of her life, with the graces of her mind and
person, rendered her pleasing to every one, and shielded her from party
spite. But apart from affairs of State, she had an enemy, and a
formidable enemy, in the Duchess de Montbazon. We have said that Madame
de Montbazon had been the mistress of the Duke de Longueville, and as
one of the principal personages of the drama we are about to relate, she
requires to be somewhat better known.

We shall pass over in silence many of her foibles, without attempting to
excuse any. Before sketching her life, or at least a portion of it, it
will be necessary, in order to protect her memory against an excess of
severity, to recall certain traditions and examples for which unhappily
her family was notorious.

Daughter of Claude de Bretagne, Baron d'Avangour, she was on her
mother's side granddaughter of that very complaisant Marquis de La
Varenne Fouquet, who, successively scullion, cook, and maitre d'hotel of
Henry the Fourth, "gained more by carrying the amorous King's _poulets