Page images
PDF
EPUB

pictures well defigned and coloured; but what renders thefe memoirs the more interefting to an hiftorian, is the kind of gallery which they contain, with the portraits of all Lewis the XIVth's minifters, in the attitudes peculiar to each.

Memoires de Rabutin, Comte de Bufi, 1769, and the Amorous Hiftory of the Gauls, reprinted in 1754.

Memoirs toward a univerfal Hifery of Europe, from 1600 to 1716, by Father d'Avrigny, 1757. These laft memoirs are extremely judicious, clear, fhort, and written in a manner which is fometimes farcaftic, but always agreeable.

Memoirs of Anne of Auftria, Confort of Lewis XIII. by Mad. De Motteville, one of her favourites. 1723. The title of favourite, fays M. ANQUETIL, muft not prejudice the reader against the veracity of Mad. de Motteville. Her attachment to her Royal Mistress did not prevent her from feeing the faults of that princess, though the treats them with proper respect and delicacy. Befide a regular feries of events, we find in these memoirs portraits of men and women, with accounts of their manners, characters, families, fecret adventures, and descriptions of feafts and fashions, with very juft and moral reflections.

Memoirs of Mademoiselle de Monpenfier, daughter of Gafton of Orleans, brother to Lewis XIII. King of France, 1728. These are genuine Memoirs of Mademoiselle, for fhe is the only subjec throughout. She never fpeaks of any event, public or private, but what is relative to herfelf. She is blamed for filling her book with accounts of feafts, drefs, fafhions, etiquette, precedence, genealogies, and all fuch fubjects as appear frivolous; but it thould be remembered, that thefe are ever important affairs to perfons of her rank.

The Hiftory of Princess Henrietta of England, firft Wife of Philip Duke of Orleans, and Memoirs of the Court of France for the Years 1688 and 1689, by the Countefs de la Fayette, 1779. She begins, according to the fashion of the times, by drawing portraits. Her ftyle is noble, and the periods are of a proper length, and well rounded. In the Memoirs of the Court of France, he is fond of contrafting her characters, making them retire and advance dramatically, to prolong the action; so that we seem reading an epifode of Clelia and Artament,

* In our Review for November, p. 399. we gave an account of thefe Effays, from an English translation, which faid that they had never, before, been published. This circumftance induced us to doubt their authenticity; but the mention of them by M. ANQUETIL, feems to remove this fufpicion. Yet, then, the affertion that they were now published for the first time, is untrue;-and the tranflation, likewife, is without the plates here mentioned. Per. haps, the works are not the fame.

a cele

a celebrated romance, which authors were then ambitious of imitating, even in writing hiftory.

Hiftorical Letters, by M. Peliffon, 1729. The ftyle of thefe letters is fimple, and purely epiftolary; but though they chiefly contain a journal of the expeditions and campaigns of Lewis XIV. from 1670 to 1688, it is not a dry relation; the writer has enriched it with feats and facts that the Greek and Roman hiftorians would not have omitted.'

Memoirs of Madame Staal, 1755. The hiftory of her infancy and of her early years, is written with a facility that pleases and interefts; the difgrace of the Duke of Maine is rerelated with an appearance of truth that perfuades. Her ftyle, in general, is pure and flowing; her defcriptions are animated, and the pleasantries are well expreffed.

The political Annals of the Abbé de Saint-Pierre. His productions have been called the dreams of an honeft man; and this work does not prove the title to be ill imagined. His head was filled

with fo many projects for infpiring princes with the love of glory, founded on the wisdom and the happinefs of their people, that his (chemes may well be called reveries. The Abbé goes to the fource and motives of actions, but by the shortest road. He never dwells long on facts, unless he can draw from them useful reflections; and this benevolent defign makes us excufe the whimfical ideas which he fometimes conceives.

Memoirs of the Regency of the Duke of Orleans, during the Minority of Lewis XV. 1730. As a hiftory, this is but a mean work; but as a collection of facts, it is excellent.

Memoirs of the Marquis de Dangeau. This is a MS. Journal of the Court of France, from 1686 to 1720, in 58 vols. 4to. M. ANQUETIL fays that he has read them all; and though they abound in ufelefs and minute details, they furnish fome curious anecdotes. As a hiftory, they are defective, but the materials are good.

Fragments of original Letters by the Princess Charlotte Elizabeth of Bavaria, Widow of Monfieur, only Brother of Lewis XIV. 1788*. Thefe letters, fays M. ANQUETIL, appear to be genuine. They contain anecdotes and memorandums of Lewis, particuJarly of his private life, in a ftyle more familiar than we dare. ufe. The anecdotes concerning all the perfonages about the court are pleasant and interefting. This prince's had an inveterate hatred for Mad. de Maintenon, whom he treats with feverity on all occafions.

THE PHILIPPICS, a MS. Satire against the Regent Duke of Orleans.

Thefe are the principal fources whence M. ANQUETIL has drawn his materials, and we have more willingly prefented our See Review, vol. lxxx. p. 151.

9

readers

readers with a sketch of the account which he has given of each, as it seems juft and characteristic.

LEWIS THE

FOURTEENTH.

Few fovereigns had ever fuch obligations to their fubjects, as this prince. When he affumed the reins of government, the French, who from the time of Henry IV. had been always under the dominion of minifters, felt a pride in obeying a king. The young monarch became the delight of the nation. A fingle word of benevolence, or an action that could poffibly be conftrued into a wifh for the national profperity or glory, was retailed with rapture. From the capital, this loyal spirit flew into the provinces; and hence may be deduced that esteem, confidence, zeal, fidelity, and popular fubmiffion, which he enjoyed to the end of his life.

Cardinal Mazarin, charged with the education of the young king, and his brother, Philip Duke of Orleans, commonly called Monfieur, with the queen-mother's approbation, endeavoured to render the one robuft and manly, and the other effeminate. Lewis, tall, active, and healthy, fucceeded in all bis exercises. He had already a commanding afpect without dif dain, was ferious without ill humour, and acquired respect at an age when he could be only expected to pleafe. Philip had, in foftness, all that his brother poffeffed in majefty. He had a natural tafte for the drefs and ornaments of the other fex. This the queen mother encouraged, and feemed delighted to fee him dreffed like a girl, and to appear publicly thus traveft.ed with other young courtiers in the fame garb. The eldest brother was very early taught to at the King; and left he fhould be tired of his part, or escape from his barnefs, the cardinal took care to provide him with regal amufements fuitable to his trappings.

Mazarin, who had brought from Italy feven nieces, wifhed that the young monarch fhould fee, or at leaft admire, no other females. However, the attendants of thefe ladies feem to have exercised more powerful enchantments over his affections, than had been furnished to them either by nature or art; though Mary Mancini, one of the cardinal's nieces, afterward feems feriously to have attached Lewis, notwithstanding his more tranfient amufements: but the defcription of this lady's charms, excites no pleasurable ideas in the hearts of us old critics: for Mad. de Motteville fays, that her complexion was brown, rather bordering on yellow; her neck and arms lean and fcraggy, and her mouth wide and flat; but he had good teeth, a fine figure, and eyes, which, though ftaring and vacant, feemed as if they might, one day or other, acquire fenfibility and an

7

mation."

mation." This does not feem to imply a prodigy of beauty. Yet, with the freshness of fourteen or fifteen, and a premature fpirit of coquettrie, the found little difficulty in touching so new and inexperienced a heart, as that of the young monarch. Indeed, he became fo attached to this lady, that if the cardinal's ambitious views had not been checked by the fear of national refentment, the might have been Queen of France.

When the time came for forming an alliance for his Majefty, at once conjugal and political, Mary Mancini was placed in a convent, in order to wean the young prince from her fociety. The feparation, fays M. ANQUETIL, was extremely afflicting; and the adieus were of the tendereft kind. The King could not contain his tears. You weep! fays Mary, with a forrow mixed with indignation, you weep! who are a king, and yet fuffer me to be torn from you!

France was, at this time, at war with Spain; and both nations, tired of the conteft, and the long enmity which had fubfifted between them, were glad to terminate their difputes by a marriage between the young Lewis and the Infanta; and which took place in 1660 The defcription of the feftivity on this occafion, in Spain, Germany, and France, is truly characteriftic. Marfhal de Grammont, the moft gallant nobleman of the French court, rode poft to Madrid, with his whole fuite, fumptuously dreffed, to manifeft the impatience of his mafter. The Admiral of Caftile gave him a moft fuperb entertainment, << but more for the fight than the palate. Seven hundred difhes," fays the Marshal, "with the admiralty arms on them, were ferved; but fo faffroned and gilt, that they went away as they came, without any one being able to touch them, though the dinner lafted above four hours."

A ceremonial entertainment given in Germany, fome time before, to the fame Marfhal, forms a perfect contraft to this. "The Electors of Mayence and Cologne (fays he) were there. The dinner lafted from noon till nine o'clock at night, to the found of kettledrums and trumpets, which never let the ears of the guests have a moment's reft. At least two thousand healths were drank. The table being cleared, the Electors, and others of the company, danced on it; and I myself (fays the Marfhal), though lame, led off a courant, and we all got as drunk as wine could make us." But though this marriage was celebrated at Fontarabia with true Spanish gravity; in France, the rejoicings were lefs remarkable for magnificence than for hilarity. The people, in general, feemed intoxicated with joy, efpecially when the King and Queen entered the capital. Mad. Scaron, afterward Mad. de Maintenon, at this time confounded in the crowd, fays in one of her letters, written the day after, that he had been, for ten or twelve hours, all eyes and ears; and feeing a little farther APP, Rev. VOL, LXXXI.

X x

than

than the moment, adds, that "the queen muft certainly have retired that evening, well pleased with the busband which the nation had given to her."

This alliance, and the confequent peace, with Spain, was the fummit of cardinal Mazarin's glory. The people, who had before abufed and pelted him, now received him with acclamations; and thofe magiftrates by whom he had been profçribed, now haftened to compliment him on this auspicious occafion. This artful and rapacious minifter furvived the public joy but a few months; dying, fays M. ANQUETIL, in perfect tranquillity after his ftormy regency, more like a philofopher than a Chriftian, March 9th, 1661, at fifty-nine years of age. Of his seven nieces, he had three ftill to provide for: whom he had refused to foliciting fovereigns. During the Pyrenean treaty, he let our Charles II. flip through his fingers, who, offering his hand to Mary Mancini, was thanked by the cardinal; who afterward offered her to Charles when he had afcended the throne, with a portion of five millions of livres, but was then thanked in his turn. But he had all the honour of refufing the princes of Savoy and Lorrain. These princes, indifferent about money, only wifhed perfonally to have a strong fortified town put into their hands on the frontiers of France; but the minifter honourably refused to comply with conditions fa difadvantageous to the kingdom; and married his niece Mary to the contable Colonna, giving her near fifty thousand pounds fterling per annum, and his fine palace at Rome. Hortenfia, the most beautiful of his nieces, he bestowed on the D. de la Meillerie, grand mafter of the king's household, on condition that he took the name of Mazarin, with a fortune of 70,0001. per annum, and an immenfe quantity of rich furniture; and laftly, he fettled on the youngest a portion fufficient for an alliance to the house of Bouillon, when the became of age. For the others, who were already married in France, he obtained new grants. The king refused him nothing; or rather, he fubmitted to his wishes with the docility of a pupil, habituated to obedience, or through gratitude for the care he had taken in forming him;-for it is but juft to fay, that if during early youth the cardinal only taught him how to at the king, as he advanced to manhood, he inftructed him how to be a king indeed.

The riches left by the cardinal were enormous. According to the D. de St. Simon, in fpite of the oppofition of two furious factions, it was proved in court (at the trial of the D. of Mazarin, with his fon, for the reftitution of his mother's dowry), that, during an adminiftration which lafted twenty years, he gave this lady upward of a million fierling; befide the prodigious fortunes bestowed on the duchefs de Mercoeur, the princess of

« PreviousContinue »