other
powerful nobles. It gave law in the _salons_, thanks to a brilliant bevy
of pretty women, who drew after them the flower of the young nobility.
In short, the army itself was divided. Turenne, with his troops, who
were stationed near the Rhine until the perfect conclusion of the treaty
of Westphalia, obedient to the suggestions of his elder brother, the
Duke de Bouillon, who wished to recover his principality of Sedan, had
just raised the standard of revolt, and was threatening to place the
Court between his own army and that of Paris. The parliament of the
capital had sent deputies to all the parliaments of the kingdom, and was
thus forming a sort of formidable parliamentary league in the face of
monarchy. Conde took command of all the troops that remained faithful,
and everywhere opposed the insurrection. He wrote himself to the army of
the Rhine, which well knew him, and which after the rout sustained by
Turenne at Mariendal, had been led back by him to victory: these
letters, supported by the proceedings of the government, succeeded in
arresting the revolt; and Turenne, abandoned by his own soldiers, was
obliged to fly to Holland.[1] At ease on this head, Conde marched upon
Paris, and placed it under siege. Instead of disputing the ground, as
he might have done, foot by foot, with the sedition, he allowed it the
freest course, in the certainty that the spectacle of licentiousness
which could not fail to appear would, little by little, restore to
royalty those who had for a moment gone astray. He began by summoning,
in the Queen's name and through his mother, all his family to
Saint-Germain. The Prince de Conti and M. de Longueville did not dare
disobey; but La Rochefoucauld, seeing that the Fronde was in the
greatest peril, hastened after these two princes. Having brought them
back to Paris, he made the Prince de Conti generalissimo--placing under
him the Dukes d'Elbeuf and de Bouillon--and who shared authority with
the Marshal de la Mothe Houdancourt, governor of Paris. Madame de
Longueville excused herself to the Queen and to her mother on the
grounds of her delicate condition, which would not permit her to
undertake the least fatigue. In fact, Madame de Longueville, it may be
noted, was _enceinte_ for the last time in 1648, when, it must be
confessed, her connection with La Rochefoucauld was well known. It was
in this condition that, willing to share the perils of her friends,
proud also of playing a part and