o relieve their
misery, and when finally the city of Etampes was taken, the spectacle
of starvation, woe, and death was more awful than words can express.

As the king was entering the city, he passed a group lying upon the
ground, consisting or a mother and three children, huddled closely
together. The mother had died of starvation. Two of the skeleton
children were also dead by her side, and the third, a babe, was
straining at the exhausted breast, which could no longer afford it any
nourishment.

The Prince de Conde retreated to Paris with about three thousand men.
The royal troops, eight thousand in number, pursued. Each party
gathered re-enforcements, so that the Prince de Conde, with about five
thousand men, held at bay the royal troops, then numbering about ten
thousand. The citizens, as we have mentioned, were in sympathy with
the Parliament. They hated Cardinal Mazarin, and with good reason
regarded the king as a prisoner in his hands. The king also detested
Mazarin personally, while the force of circumstances compelled him to
regard the cardinal as the advocate of the royal cause.

A very severe battle was fought between the two parties in the
Faubourg St. Antoine. The ranks of the Fronde, shattered by
overpowering numbers, were, in a disordered retreat, hotly pursued by
their foes under Marshal Turenne. The carnage was dreadful. Suddenly
the cannon of the Bastile flamed out in rapid succession, hurling
their deadly shot through the compact masses of the Royalists. They
recoiled and fled in confusion. Paris was in the hands of the Fronde.
The populace surged through the streets, shouting "Long live the king!
Death to Mazarin!"

The cardinal, taking the king with him, retired to St. Denis. Turenne
re-collected his scattered forces at Pontoise, about twenty miles
north from Versailles. The cardinal, with the king, took refuge at
that place in the centre of Turenne's army. Here the king issued an
ordinance, transferring the Parliament from Paris to Pontoise; but the
Parliament replied "that they could not obey the royal command so long
as Cardinal Mazarin, whom they had outlawed, remained in France." They
also issued an ordinance of their own, forbidding any member of the
Parliament to leave Paris. The king, we know not under what
influences, acquiesced in both of these decrees. This led the cardinal
immediately to tender his resignation and retire. This important step
changed the whole aspect of affairs. Af