was only repulsed by the steadiness of
some old soldiers, who gave time for reinforcements to arrive. But the
crisis was at hand; for each party began to be suspicious of the other
gaining over its supporters--Mazarin lavishing promises of place and
money, and the Duchess de Chatillon, invested with full powers by
Conde, appearing in the opposite camp as the most irresistible
ambassadress that ever was seen.

Thus matters stood in the early summer of 1652, and "all that was most
subtle and serious in politics," La Rochefoucauld tells us, "was brought
under the attention of Conde to induce him to take one of two
courses--to make peace or to continue the war; when Madame de Chatillon
imbued him with a design for peace by means the most agreeable. She
thought that so great a boon might be the work of her beauty, and
mingling ambition with the design of making a new conquest, she desired
at the same time to triumph over the Prince de Conde's heart and to
derive pecuniary advantages from her political negotiations."

We have already cursorily mentioned the Duchess de Chatillon: it is now
indispensable, in order to thoroughly understand what is about to
follow, to know something more of that celebrated personage.

Isabella Angelique de Montmorency was one of the two daughters of that
brave and unfortunate Count de Montmorency Bouteville, who, the victim
of a false point of honour and of an outrageous passion for duelling,
was decapitated on the Place de Greve, on the 21st of June, 1627. She
was sister of Francois de Montmorency, Count de Bouteville, better known
as the illustrious Marshal de Luxembourg. Born in 1626, she had been
married in 1645 to the last of the Colignys, the Duke de Chatillon, one
of the heroes of Lens, killed in the action of Charenton in 1649. Left a
widow at twenty-three, her rare loveliness won for her a thousand
adorers. She was one of the queens of politics and gallantry during the
Fronde; and even, after manifold amours, at thirty-eight could boast of
captivating the Duke de Mecklenbourg, who espoused her in 1664. To
beauty, Madame de Chatillon added great intelligence, but an
intelligence wholly devoted to intrigue. She was vain and ambitious, and
at the same time profoundly selfish, moderately scrupulous, and somewhat
of the school of Madame de Montbazon. While both were young, she had
smitten Conde; but he had thought no more of her after becoming absorbed
with his love for Mademoiselle de Vige