CHAP. from all communication with the internal parts of the continent. XXIX. In imitation of this Spanish Almirazgo, Richelieu instituted the company of Morbihan, of 100 members, and a capital of 1,600,000 livres, giving them the port and islands, with copious privileges and immunities. But the despotic governments of Paris and Madrid vainly strove to imitate the freer Dutch. Capitalists would not trust the lawless extortions of absolute minister and monarch; and though historians lay the blame on the jealousy of the Breton parliament, the failure was, in all probability, more owing to the holding back of capitalists and subscribers. The minister, therefore, was obliged to have recourse to the only mode of naval armament and strength possible to a government like that of France-the undertaking it at state expense and under royal authority. He commenced by suppressing the office of admiral, as well as that of constable, vacant by the death of Lesdiguières. Not only were the expenses of both enormous-400,000 livres annually-but there was no possibility of keeping military accounts, the constable rendering none. Richelieu caused himself to be appointed super-intendant of navigation, which gave him power over all the ports of the kingdom. His letters attest the activity which he applied to his duties; and D'Effiat declares that he made one million go as far as six millions did before. There was, indeed, the most urgent demand for economy. Two-thirds of the revenue were mortgaged and paid away to creditors. The troops had not received their pay of 1625 or 1626. This pay amounted to 2,000,000 a month, and lenders required 20 per cent. interest. Such a state of things checked Richelieu more than all the representations of the ultra-Catholic * Etats-Généraux, tom. xviii. XXIX. party; created dangerous doubts in the king's mind of CHAP. the wisdom of his minister; compelled him, in consequence, to patch up treaties with the Huguenots and with Spain; and rendered it imperative that he should consult and obtain aid from an assembly. From a representative one the cardinal shrank. He could not face the deputies of the communes, whose municipal and provincial rights he was daily destroying; nor yet those of the nobles, whose rank he ignored, and whose influence he set aside. He now summoned fifty-three notables-twelve prelates, twelve inferior nobles, who were knights of the order or members of the council, and twenty-nine presidents or king's officers of the law and finance courts. Before this body of officials, assembled in the Tuileries*, the keeper of the seals, Marillac, communicated, on the 2nd of December 1626, the necessities of the state. The treasurer, D'Effiat, afterwards entered into particulars, and made certainly a most liberal confession of the dilapidation and disorder of the finances, These ministers represented the government as having spent forty millions annually during the war, without more than sixteen millions to meet them. The conse quence was a debt of fifty millions. They had kept armies amounting to 91,000 foot and 6000 horse, costing two millions a month. This, counting active service at eight months, was sixteen millions, beside two and a quarter millions required for the troops in garrison. Marshal Schomberg declared that the army, even in time of peace, could not be reduced below 30,000 men. And a navy had become indispensable— the cost of it not less than twelve millions. These expenses, however, might be met by the existing revenue, were it free. There were nineteen millions raised from the taille, of which but six were unmort * Assemblée des Notables, 1626. Etats-Généraux, t. xviii.; Mercure Français, t. xii. ; Mémoires de XXIX. pay the interest of the The aides were equally CHAP. gaged and came to the treasury. Of the seven and a half millions of salt duty, little more than a million reached it, and this went to rentes at the Hôtel de Ville. burdened. What the government asked, and what the notables granted, was to fund all this debt. The latter recommended the keeping up of two armies of 20,000 each; to do away with all but frontier garrisons; to abolish the system of pensions, as well as that of royal orders on the treasury without the countersign of a minister. D'Effiat drew a frightful picture of the administration of finance. The taille he depicted as paid into the hands of 22,000 collectors, by them to 160 receivers, and by these again to 21 receivers-general. And as the treasurers were continually changing, there was no mode of control, except by a weekly inspection of accounts. Of the money spent on the artillery, or upon the navy, no one knew the details; not more than onehalf the expenditure was clearly set down. When the king blamed Schomberg's administration of finance, in presence of Arnaud, the latter observed, "Your majesty appointed Schomberg super-intendant, but, at the same time, you sold all the places of his subordinates to the highest bidder, each of whom wanted to make his fortune. How then could Schomberg be held responsible?" The king was silent.* The sole remedy that Richelieu could devise for this embezzlement was a permanent court to try financial peculators; and he proposed another, to try those guilty of rebellion or treason. The notables, composed of financiers and legal judges, of course, and justly, negatived these proposals. He also recommended a maximum price of bread, to which the notables replied by advising him to make the transport of corn free Memoirs of Arnaud d'Andilly. between province and province. It is quite evident that domestic administration would have been conducted more legally, wisely, and humanely by Richelieu, in conjunction with a large council, even of officials, than it was by himself. The cardinal-minister was not, like De l'Hôpital, in advance of the notables or of the estates, whom he consulted, but in many points far behind them. When, however, Richelieu happened to be right, his strong will availed to carry out what any other individual or body must have shrunk from. Thus was it with his edict rendering duelling a capital crime, which he enforced against the highest. La Chappelle and Montmorency Boutteville were executed at this time for no other cause.* Before and during the assembly of notables, the relations of the French court, both with the Huguenots and with England, were fast tending to a rupture. Whilst the French nullified all the hopes and broke all the promises made in the marriage treaty with England, and in the subsequent one which the ministers of that country had guaranteed to the Huguenots, they exacted a full performance of all the engagements of the English court to them. In March, some few weeks after peace was concluded, the Rochellois sent to the English court to say, that not one stipulated condition was observed towards them: the king's troops were not withdrawn, and so far from the fleet being sent away, it was reinforced by twelve more vessels, and more forts were erecting in the Isle of Rhé.† The French court, too, was equipping vessels in Holland.‡ * Richelieu was doomed to be the great foe of the Montmorencies. The name would have perished beneath the blows of the executioner, in his time, had not Boutteville's widow given birth to a posthumous son, who was the future Maréchal Duke de Luxemburg. Another of his measures, directed against the feudal noblesse, and † Rochellois's complaint to English ‡ Mémoires sur les Troubles. MS. Bethune, 9162. CHAP. XXIX. CHAP. In August King Charles found it necessary to dismiss all the queen's French servants, who were setting their mistress at variance with him, and rendering the palace insupportable. Charles gave them £50,000 worth of jewels and valuables.* But Louis was greatly incensed at what he considered a personal affront; whilst the English were no less annoyed at the alliance between the French and Spaniards, and alarmed at Richelieu's project of the Breton admiralty. "It looked," said they, "to the mastership of the narrow sea."† Soubise was then lodged at Charlton House, to be near the court at Greenwich, and failed not to exaggerate all the hostile acts of Richelieu. The English were at the time dreading a hostile attack from the Spanish navy, and in their zeal and efforts for defence their commanders made little difference between the Spanish flag and that of the French, now allies of Spain. There were frequent complaints of captures, the French retaliating by the seizure, in November, of all the English vessels in the river of Bordeaux. Bassompierre was sent to London, and having the good sense to perceive that the priests and women of Queen Henrietta had overcome Charles's patience, patched up an accord, which would have sufficed for peace had the French court been inclined to it. But Bassompierre was ill received on his return to Paris, and his treaty disavowed.§ The assembly of notables had been called and consulted in the evident intention of proceeding against the Rochellois. The king took advantage of their communications with England-which were inevitable results of their guarantee, and of the French breach of all conditions-to declare that he would chastise them. He sent in February to demand that La Chapelle, Salbert (both pastors), and Des Herbières should be exiled, for holding communication with England. The Rochellois, alarmed, * Conway to Carlisle, Aug. 9. S.P. + Still standing. |