ich was put
into the mouth of Louis by a contemporary pamphleteer:--

"Si la France est en deuil, qu'elle pleure et soupire;
Pour moi, je veux chasser, galantiser et rire."

But we are somewhat anticipating events, and therefore return to them in
the order of time.

BOOK V.

CHAPTER I.

CONDE'S ADVENTUROUS EXPEDITION.

CONDE passed several months in Guienne, occupied with strengthening and
extending the insurrection at the head of which he had placed himself,
and in repulsing as far as possible in the south the royal army,
commanded by the skilful and experienced Count d'Harcourt. Amidst very
varied successes, he learned from different quarters the bad turn which
the Fronde's affairs was taking in the heart of the kingdom, the
intrigues of De Retz who held the key of Paris, and the deplorable state
of the army on the banks of the Loire.

On receiving these tidings at Bordeaux in the month of March, 1652,
Conde saw clearly the double danger which menaced him, and immediately
faced it in his wonted manner. Instead of awaiting events which were on
the eve of taking place at a distance, he determined on anticipating
them, and formed an extraordinary resolution, of a character very much
resembling his great military manoeuvres, which at first sight appears
extravagant, but which the gravest reason justifies, and the temerity of
which even is only another form of high prudence. He formed the design
of slipping out of Bordeaux, traversing the lines of Count d'Harcourt,
to get over in the best way he might the hundred and fifty leagues which
separated him from the Loire and Paris, to appear there suddenly, and
to place himself at the head of his affairs.

He left behind him in Guienne a force sufficiently imposing to allow of
it there awaiting in security the successful results he was about to
seek. In possessing himself of Agen, Bergerac, Perigueux, Cognac, and
even for a moment of Saintes, and by pushing his conquests into Haute
Guienne, on the side of Mont-de-Marsan, Dax, and Pau, he had made
Bordeaux the capital of a small but rich and populous kingdom,
surrounded on all sides by a belt of strongholds, communicating with the
sea by the Gironde, and admirably placed for attack or defence. This
kingdom, backed as it was by Spain, was capable of receiving continuous
succour from Santander and St. Sebastian, and a Spanish fleet could
approach by the Tour de Corduan, bringing subsidies and troops, whil