solicit my
release. The King was in a fury, and forebade the Nuncio to pass Lyons.
The Pope told the Abbe Charier that he was afraid to expose his and the
Church's authority to the fury of a madman, and said, "Give me but an
army, and I will furnish you with a legate." It was a difficult matter
indeed to get him that army, but not impossible, if those that should
have stood my friends had not left me in the lurch.

In the meantime Noirmoutier and Bussi Lamet wrote a letter to Mazarin,
declaring they could not help proceeding to extremities if I were
detained any longer in prison. The Prince de Conde declared he would do
anything, without exception, which my friends desired, for my liberty,
and offered to march all the Spanish forces to their assistance; but the
misfortune was that there was nobody to form the proper schemes; and
Noirmoutier, who was the most enterprising man of them all, was hindered
from action by Madame de Chevreuse and De Laigues, who, the Cardinal
said, would be accountable for the actions of their friends, and that if
they fired one pistol-shot they must expect what would follow. Therefore
Noirmoutier was glad to elude all the propositions of the Prince de
Conde, and to be content with only writing and speaking in my favour, and
firing the cannon at the drinking of my health.

M. de Pradello, who commanded the French and Swiss Guards in the castle,
came one day to tell me of the happy return of Cardinal Mazarin to Paris,
and of his magnificent reception at the Hotel de Ville; and he informed
me that the Cardinal had sent him to assure me of his most humble
services, and to beg of me to be persuaded that he would forget nothing
that might be for my service. I made as if I did not heed the
compliment, and was for talking of something else; but as he pressed me
for a direct answer, I told him that I should have been ready at the
first word to show him my acknowledgments were I not persuaded that the
duty of a prisoner to the King did not permit him to explain himself in
anything relating to his release, till his Majesty had been graciously
pleased to grant it him. He understood my meaning, and endeavoured to
persuade me to return a more civil answer to the Cardinal, which I
declined to do.

The Cardinal was so pestered with complaints from Rome, and so disturbed
with the discontent which prevailed in Poitou and Paris, on account of my
imprisonment, that he sent me an offer of my liberty and gr