iii. 81, 82.

Madame de Chevreuse made her way, therefore, to her estate of Duverger,
between Tours and Angiers. The deep solitude that there reigned
around her embittered all the more the feeling of defeat. She kept up,
however, a brisk correspondence with her stepmother, Madame de
Montbazon--banished to Rochefort; and the two exiled Duchesses mutually
exhorted each other to leave no stone unturned towards effecting the
overthrow of their common enemy. Vanquished at home, Madame de Chevreuse
centred all her hopes in foreign lands. She revived the friendly
relations which she had never ceased to cherish with England, Spain, and
the Low Countries. Her chief prop, the centre and interposer of her
intrigues, was Lord Goring, our ambassador at the French Court; who,
like his ill-starred master, and more especially his royal mistress,
belonged to the Spanish party. Croft, an English gentleman who had
figured in the train of the Duchess some years previously, bestirred
himself actively and openly in her behalf, whilst the Chevalier de Jars
intrigued warily and in secret for Chateauneuf. Beneath the mantle of
the English embassy a vast correspondence was carried on between Madame
de Chevreuse, Vendome, Bouillon, and the rest of the _Malcontents_.

CHAPTER VI.

CONSEQUENCES OF THE QUARREL BETWEEN THE DUCHESSES DE LONGUEVILLE AND
DE MONTBAZON.--FATAL DUEL BETWEEN THE DUKE DE GUISE AND COUNT MAURICE
DE COLIGNY.

AS has been said, the 2nd of September, 1643, had been truly a memorable
day in the career of Mazarin, and, indeed, in the annals of France; for
it witnessed the confirming of the royal power, shaken to its base by
the deaths of Richelieu and Louis XIII., and the ruin of that dangerous
faction the _Importants_. The intestine discords which threatened the
new reign were thus forced to await a more favourable opportunity for
development. They did not raise their heads again until five years
afterwards--on the breaking out of the Fronde, in which they showed
themselves just the same men as ever, with the same designs, the same
politics, foreign and domestic; and after raising sanguinary and sterile
commotions, re-appeared only to break themselves to pieces once more
against the genius of Mazarin and the invincible firmness of Anne of
Austria.

Mazarin, therefore, who soon found himself without a rival in the
Queen's good graces, continued steadily to carry on within and without
the realm the system of hi