The Life and Death of John of Barneveld, Advocate of Holland, 1610a | Page 4

a wood. I don't know if it is to kill her
or to take her out of France. Take care of my money and keep up the
game."
Bassompierre followed the king shortly afterwards and brought him his
money. He said that he had never seen a man so desperate, so
transported.
The matter was indeed one of deepest and universal import. The reader

has seen by the preceding narrative how absurd is the legend often
believed in even to our own days that war was made by France upon
the Archdukes and upon Spain to recover the Princess of Conde from
captivity in Brussels.
From contemporary sources both printed and unpublished; from most
confidential conversations and revelations, we have seen how broad,
deliberate, and deeply considered were the warlike and political
combinations in the King's ever restless brain. But although the
abduction of the new Helen by her own Menelaus was not the cause of
the impending, Iliad, there is no doubt whatever that the incident had
much to do with the crisis, was the turning point in a great tragedy, and
that but for the vehement passion of the King for this youthful princess
events might have developed themselves on a far different scale from
that which they were destined to assume. For this reason a court
intrigue, which history under other conditions might justly disdain,
assumes vast proportions and is taken quite away from the scandalous
chronicle which rarely busies itself with grave affairs of state.
"The flight of Conde," wrote Aerssens, "is the catastrophe to the
comedy which has been long enacting. 'Tis to be hoped that the sequel
may not prove tragical."
"The Prince," for simply by that title he was usually called to
distinguish him from all other princes in France, was next of blood.
Had Henry no sons, he would have succeeded him on the throne. It was
a favourite scheme of the Spanish party to invalidate Henry's divorce
from Margaret of Valois, and thus to cast doubts on the legitimacy of
the Dauphin and the other children of Mary de' Medici.
The Prince in the hands of the Spanish government might prove a
docile and most dangerous instrument to the internal repose of France
not only after Henry's death but in his life-time. Conde's character was
frivolous, unstable, excitable, weak, easy to be played upon by
designing politicians, and he had now the deepest cause for anger and
for indulging in ambitious dreams.
He had been wont during this unhappy first year of his marriage to
loudly accuse Henry of tyranny, and was now likely by public
declaration to assign that as the motive of his flight. Henry had
protested in reply that he had never been guilty of tyranny but once in
his life, and that was when he allowed this youth to take the name and

title of Conde?
For the Princess-Dowager his mother had lain for years in prison, under
the terrible accusation of having murdered her husband, in complicity
with her paramour, a Gascon page, named Belcastel. The present prince
had been born several months after his reputed father's death. Henry,
out of good nature, or perhaps for less creditable reasons, had come to
the rescue of the accused princess, and had caused the process to be
stopped, further enquiry to be quashed, and the son to be recognized as
legitimate Prince of Conde. The Dowager had subsequently done her
best to further the King's suit to her son's wife, for which the Prince
bitterly reproached her to her face, heaping on her epithets which she
well deserved.
Henry at once began to threaten a revival of the criminal suit, with a
view of bastardizing him again, although the Dowager had acted on all
occasions with great docility in Henry's interests.
The flight of the Prince and Princess was thus not only an incident of
great importance to the internal politics of trance, but had a direct and
important bearing on the impending hostilities. Its intimate connection
with the affairs of the Netherland commonwealth was obvious. It was
probable that the fugitives would make their way towards the
Archdukes' territory, and that afterwards their first point of destination
would be Breda, of which Philip William of Orange, eldest brother of
Prince Maurice, was the titular proprietor. Since the truce recently
concluded the brothers, divided so entirely by politics and religion,
could meet on fraternal and friendly terms, and Breda, although a city
of the Commonwealth, received its feudal lord. The Princess of Orange
was the sister of Conde. The morning after the flight the King, before
daybreak, sent for the Dutch ambassador. He directed him to despatch a
courier forthwith to Barneveld, notifying him that the Prince had left
the kingdom without the permission or knowledge of his sovereign, and