CHAPTER XXI.

Period from which the Theory that makes Matthioly the Man with the Iron Mask dates—Numerous Writers who have concerned themselves with the Abduction of this Individual—Arguments of Reth, Roux-Fazillac, and Delort—M. Jules Loiseleur—His Labours—The Supposition that an obscure Spy was arrested in 1681 by Catinat—It cannot be admitted—Grounds on which M. Loiseleur rejects the Theory that makes Matthioly the Man with the Iron Mask—Soundness of his Reasoning and Justness of his Conclusions.

Prisoners have no history; their monotonous and uniform existence cannot be described, their lamentations remain without response, their sufferings have no other witnesses but their gaolers, their confidence is received by nobody. Poets alone imagine and sing the bitter sorrows of captivity.

The story of Matthioly’s imprisonment derives all its interest from the supposition that he may possibly be the Man with the Iron Mask. Of the life of the captive in his prison, we have nothing or almost nothing.[527]Louis XIV.has succeeded in surrounding with uncertainty and mystery the punishment of the audacious man who had deceived him. A single attempt, if not to corrupt, at least to interest in his lot one of his gaolers, the Sieur de Blainvilliers;[528]by turns the calm of the prisoner resigned to the definitive loss of his liberty, or the momentary madness of the wretched being separated for ever from all that is dear to him; a few efforts, renewed after long intervals, to write and make known his name outside the walls within which he is confined:this is all that we know, all that we shall ever know of Matthioly’s captivity. But what prisons did he successively inhabit? Where did he drag out his existence, and, above all things, where did he terminate it? Ought we to behold in him the Man with the Iron Mask?

Roux-Fazillac and Delort are generally considered as having been the first to reveal, the one in 1800, and the other in a more complete manner in 1825, the existence and abduction of Count Matthioly. This is a grave error, and we must go back long before these two writers in order to find the first traces and the first revelations of the diplomatic intrigue relative to Casale. In 1682 there appeared at Cologne a political pamphlet[529]in which the whole negotiation was disclosed, and in which the Abbé d’Estrades and Matthioly, Giuliani and Pinchesne, D’Asfeld, Catinat, and the Duke of Mantua figured. In August, 1687, a work, published at Leyden with the title ofHistoire Abrégée de l’Europe,[530]gave, under the head of Mantua, a French translation of an Italian letter which denounced the abduction of Matthioly. In 1749 the famous Muratori related, in hisAnnali d’Italia,[531]the story of the Casale negotiation, and the abduction of the principal agent in this intrigue. In the part of theJournal Encyclopédique[532]for August 15, 1770, was a letter from Baron d’Heiss, ex-captain in the regiment of Alsace, in which the whole of this affair was made known; and there is a copy of this letter in the numberof theJournal de Paris[533]for December 22, 1779. In 1786, the Italian Fantuzzi summarized in hisNotizie degli Scrittori Bolognesi,[534]the accounts already published on this subject. A similar opinion that Matthioly was the Man with the Iron Mask, was, in 1789, supported by the Chevalier de B——, in a work with the title ofLondres, Correspondance interceptée.[535]On November 26, 1795, M. de Chambrier, ex-Minister of Prussia to the Court of Turin, read, before the Division of Belles-Lettres of the Academy of Berlin,[536]a memoir in which “he endeavoured to establish, by tradition alone, that the Iron Mask and Ercole Matthioly were one and the same person.” Lastly, the 9 Pluviose, Year xi.,[537]the citizen Reth, the commissioner charged with organizing the national lottery in the twenty-seventh military division, addressed a long communication to theJournal de Paris[538]tending towards the same conclusion.[539]Thus we see that neither Roux-Fazillac, nor Delort, nor still less any writer of our own days, can claim to be first to have put forward the theory that Matthioly was the Man with the Iron Mask.

However, Delort had the incontestable advantage over his numerous predecessors of furnishing a portion[540]of the official despatches relating to the negotiation, and also of those which were exchanged between Saint-Mars and the various Ministers after Matthioly’s incarceration. Since then, and in our own days, M. Camille Rousset, in hisHistoire de Louvois, has in his turn disclosed the intrigue concocted by D’Estrades, the Duke of Mantua, and Matthioly; and contenting himself with merely giving his opinion on the Iron Mask, in a short note,[541]has declared that he sees in him the faithless Minister who betrayed Louis XIV. Depping, in hisCorrespondance Administrative sous Louis XIV., also adopts this view. But they have neither of them endeavoured—nor, indeed, did it belong to their subject—to establish what I shall term the perfect agreement and exact correspondence between the individual carried off from near Pignerol, May 2, 1679, and the prisoner who was interred in the Church of Saint Paul, November 20, 1703.

Here is the knot of the question. We have just seen, and this, moreover, has been known since a long time, that Matthioly was carried off in 1679 by a French ambassador and taken violently to Pignerol. But it is no longer a question merely of this intrigue, which is simply a preliminaryportion of the problem with which we are occupied. It is necessary to follow the Duke of Mantua’s Minister from prison to prison, and to ascertain, not only if he may not have been, but also if he could have been, any other than the mysterious prisoner conducted in 1698 by Saint-Mars from the Isles Sainte-Marguerite to the Bastille, where he died in 1703. Delort believed he had proved it. His conviction was profound, and to many persons his demonstration seemed irrefutable. On what grounds, then, did it rest, and how has a judicious writer of our own days entirely overthrown it?

On May 2 and 3, 1679, when Matthioly and his valet were incarcerated at Pignerol, this State prison contained, besides Fouquet and Lauzun, four prisoners, incontestably obscure and of very slight importance. One, Eustache d’Auger, brought there August 20, 1669, had for some time acted as Fouquet’s valet.[542]Another, arrived at Pignerol April 7, 1674, was a Jacobin monk; “a finished scoundrel,” wrote Louvois, “who cannot be sufficiently maltreated or made to suffer the punishment he has deserved.” The Minister recommended Saint-Mars “not to give him a fire in his chamber except when great cold or illness obliged it, and not to provide him with any other diet but bread, wine, and water.”[543]Louvois afterwards enjoined Saint-Mars “not to let him be seen by any one, nor to give news of him to any person whatever.” But this order was in some sort a mere form, since a like injunction had been given to Saint-Mars, July 19, 1669, at the time Eustache d’Auger wassent to him.[544]The latter, as well as the Jacobin monk, and Caluzio, brought there in September, 1673,[545]and Dubreuil, imprisoned in June, 1676, were treated in exactly the same manner and without any kind of consideration. The expense for each of them was not to exceed twenty sous a day,[546]and they were so insignificant, that when Saint-Mars was called from the command of the donjon of Pignerol to the government of Exiles, Louvois requested from him “a list of the persons in his charge, begging him to indicate, at the side of each name, what he knew of the reasons for which they had been arrested.”[547]It is certain, and this has never been a matter of doubt to any of those who have occupied themselves with this problem, that the Man with the Iron Mask is not to be sought for amongst these obscure wretches, the causes of whose confinement the Minister himself had forgotten. We have seen that Fouquet, undoubtedly, died at Pignerol during the month of March, 1680; and, with regard toLauzun, it is not less incontestable that he left the citadel April 22, 1681.

From the moment of his arrest Matthioly received the fictitious name of Lestang, as a despatch of Catinat’s clearly shows.[548]He was sometimes designated by his right name, sometimes by this fictitious one. A letter from Louvois, August 16, 1680, authorises Saint-Mars “to place the Sieur de Lestang with the Jacobin, so as to avoid any intercourse between two priests;” and Saint-Mars’ reply, dated September 7, 1680, shows that Matthioly was confined with the Jacobin monk in the lower tower. In this letter Saint-Mars informs the Minister that Matthioly at first thought that he had been placed with a spy charged to watch him and give an account of his conduct. But the monk, a prisoner since several years, had become mad, of which Matthioly was soon convinced “by seeing him one day get out of bed stark naked and preach, as well as he could, without rhyme or reason.” The same letter shows Saint-Mars to us just as we have always known him, and watching through a hole over the door what his prisoners were doing.[549]

On May 12, 1681, Louvois, when announcing to Saint-Mars his nomination to the governorship of Exiles, rendered vacant by the death of the Duke de Lesdiguières, “orders him to take with himthe two prisoners of the lower Tower.” According to Roux-Fazillac, Delort, and all those who have occupied themselves with this question, these two prisoners are undoubtedly Matthioly and the Jacobin monk. OnJanuary 20, 1687, Saint-Mars, whose health had been affected by the rigorous climate of Exiles, was appointed to the governorship of the Isles Saint-Honorat and Sainte-Marguerite in the sea of Provence. He took with him one prisoner only. Reth and Delort do not hesitate to admit that, of the two prisoners in question, he who was taken by Saint-Mars to the Isles Sainte-Marguerite was Matthioly. Though unable to furnish a sure proof of it, they have no doubt. Roux-Fazillac, more circumspect and less positive, contents himself with remarking that either the Jacobin monk or Matthioly was the Man with the Iron Mask; and it is by means of general considerations, by proofs drawn from the mysterious manner in which the abduction had been accomplished, from Louis XIV.’s evident interest in concealing such a violation of international law, that Roux-Fazillac endeavours to prove Matthioly’s identity with the Iron Mask.

Thus, of the very numerous writers who have advanced this opinion, some, such as Baron d’Heiss, M. de Chambrier, M. Depping, and M. Camille Rousset, have done so by only taking account of the circumstances accompanying the abduction, by invoking probabilities, and by showing a preference. Others, such as Roux-Fazillac, Reth, and Delort, have endeavoured to support their demonstrations with more precise and less general proofs, not occupying themselves exclusively with the arrest of this individual, but with the captive’s existence and his changes of prison. They have, in a word, attempted to follow him without losing sight of him for an instant, from the moment of his incarceration to that of his death. How have they succeeded?

A very sagacious writer, M. Jules Loiseleur, has, forsome years past, applied the processes of a rigorous historical criticism and the qualities of a penetrative mind to some of those secondary questions which the historian often neglects or avoids, either because they would retard the rapidity of his progress, or because their exact solution would perhaps be contrary to the general theory upon which theensembleof his task has been conceived. These species of minute inquiries, pursued according to a judicial model, concentrate the attention upon certain points, isolated from all others, and present, with some inconveniences, some precious advantages. For, if by such a process, we cease to take account of the necessary influence of general facts, if the marvellous chain of causes and effects be a little neglected, this method, in return, assures to him who employs it entire liberty to study the question under all its phases, and above all things frees him from any preconceived idea, from the necessity of sacrificing himself to a theory, or of obeying too servilely the conditions of art or the sovereign rules of proportion. It is thus that M. Loiseleur has studied,[550]by introducing new documents into the discussion, the question of the pretended poisoning of Gabrielle d’Estrées and of the supposed marriage of Anne of Austria and Mazarin.

The problem of the Man with the Iron Mask has also attracted the scrupulous attention and meditations of this trained mind. M. Loiseleur has not brought forward any new documents in considering this question. It is to those already published that he has directed his examination, and to the theory that makes Matthioly the Man with the Iron Mask.[551]The following is the first result of his observations.

In August, 1681, at the moment when Saint-Mars is about to leave Pignerol for Exiles, of which he had just been named Governor, he receives an order from Louvois to defer his departure. The affair of Casale, abandoned, as we have seen after Matthioly’s arrest, had been taken up again two years afterwards. The Abbé Morel, addressing himself directly to the Duke of Mantua to whom he was accredited, had obtained his consent, and the treaty of surrender, this time confided to sure hands, was about to be definitively executed. As before, Boufflers occupied the frontier with his troops. As before, Catinat is about to penetrate to Pignerol, in order to proceed afterwards to Casale, and take possession of the place. The following is the letter in which Louvois announces to Saint-Mars the early arrival of Catinat:—

“Fontainebleau, August 13, 1681.“The King having commanded M. de Catinat to proceed as soon as possible to Pignerol, on the same business that took him there at the commencement of the year 1679, I write you these lines by his Majesty’s order, to give you intelligence thereof, so that you may prepare him an apartment in which he may remain concealed during three weeks or a month; and also to tell you that when he shall send to let you know that he is arrived at the place where you went to meet him in the said year 1679, it is his Majesty’s intention that you should go there again to meet him and conduct him into the donjon of the citadel of the aforesaid Pignerol with all the precautions necessary to prevent any one’s knowing that he is with you. I do not charge you to assist him with your servants, your horses, andwhatever carriages he may have occasion for, not doubting that you will do with pleasure on these heads, whatever he shall ask.”

“Fontainebleau, August 13, 1681.

“The King having commanded M. de Catinat to proceed as soon as possible to Pignerol, on the same business that took him there at the commencement of the year 1679, I write you these lines by his Majesty’s order, to give you intelligence thereof, so that you may prepare him an apartment in which he may remain concealed during three weeks or a month; and also to tell you that when he shall send to let you know that he is arrived at the place where you went to meet him in the said year 1679, it is his Majesty’s intention that you should go there again to meet him and conduct him into the donjon of the citadel of the aforesaid Pignerol with all the precautions necessary to prevent any one’s knowing that he is with you. I do not charge you to assist him with your servants, your horses, andwhatever carriages he may have occasion for, not doubting that you will do with pleasure on these heads, whatever he shall ask.”

According to M. Loiseleur the words,—“the same business that took him there at the commencement of the year 1679,” signifies to Saint-Mars the arrest of a political prisoner. “Since,” says M. Loiseleur, “of all the occurrences of the negotiation undertaken in 1679, this was the only one of which Saint-Mars was officially informed.”[552]This interpretation is very important, because M. Loiseleur seems to conclude from it that in 1681, as in 1679, Catinat was sent to Pignerol to arrest a new individual, and confide him to the care of Saint-Mars. We are unable to share this opinion. The words in question have evidently only one meaning,—the taking possession of Casale. Catinat was not sent to Pignerol to arrest Matthioly, since Louvois’ letter announcing to Saint-Mars the first arrival of this officer, is dated December 29, 1678, when there was not only no intention of carrying off the Mantuan Minister, but when his good offices were continued to be employed, without the suspicion of any treason, which, indeed, did not as yet exist. Moreover, if Catinat remained three months at Pignerol, during January, February and March, 1679, it was because the execution of the treaty of Casale was continually hoped for, and because multiplied and diverse efforts were made to obtain from Matthioly the exchange of the ratifications. M. Loiseleur says, “There was the greatest interest in surrounding Catinat’s mission and his stay at Pignerol with the most profound mystery; it was necessary,in truth, to deceive the vigilance of the Court of Turin, so near to the scene of the events in preparation, and also of the Germans, Spaniards, Venetians, and Genoese, who were not less unquiet.” No doubt; and this is one of the reasons why Catinat took an assumed name. “How then,” adds this writer, “is it to be explained that Louvois should have confided the purpose of this mission to so subordinate an agent as the Captain Saint-Mars?”

The conclusion is neither searching nor exact. Not only was Saint-Mars really in the secret of the political mission entrusted to Catinat in 1679, but, as we have seen, he also helped him to fulfil it, by accompanying him to Increa, for the meeting appointed by Matthioly to exchange the ratifications, by following him to Casale, and by sharing his danger. Saint-Mars, moreover, far from being a subordinate agent, possessed, and justly possessed, the entire confidence of Louis XIV. and Louvois;[553]and despatches which will be quoted hereafter show him to have been on the most friendly terms with D’Estrades and Catinat.[554]The precautionsadopted to conceal the stay of the latter at Pignerol were designed to leave in ignorance the officers of the citadel, the notabilities of the town, the governor himself, the Marquis d’Herleville—every one, in fact, except Saint-Mars, whose presence became so indispensable, that, for this reason alone, he delayed his departure for Exiles. In fact, in a despatch addressed to Louvois, April 15, 1679, Catinat complains that the Marquis d’Herleville suspects his presence in the donjon, and at the same time congratulates himself on the precautions which Saint-Mars adopts with regard to him.[555]Moreover, we cannot too strongly insist that the business which brought Catinat to Pignerol in 1679 was the taking possession of Casale. This, for more than three months, was the appointed object of his exertions. The abduction of Matthioly was only a second commission, much less honourable, and much less worthy of Catinat than the former. It was confided to him because he was on the scene of events, and because its accomplishment required a man who was resolute and sure in acting. But it was for him only an unexpected and subordinate character, andformed but an incident, and a sad incident, of his visit, which could not in any way affect the prime, essential, and incontestable cause of his being there, viz., to take possession of Casale.

M. Loiseleur insists the more upon this unfounded interpretation, because it is almost the sole pretext,[556]I will not say for the theory—he is too cautious to call it so—but for the supposition that an obscure and unknown spy was arrested by Catinat in 1681, and confided, like Matthioly, to Saint-Mars’ care. Nothing, indeed—and M. Loiseleur does not deny this—absolutely nothing in the history of the resumption of the negotiations relative to Casale allows us to admit the truth of this hypothesis. While in 1679, there was uncertainty, hesitation, and embarrassment produced by Matthioly’s equivocal behaviour, in 1681 everything was simple, clear, and definitive. No doubt the preparations were still concealed; but observe the rapidity of execution and the startling revenge taken by Louis XIV.! On July 8, 1681, the treaty of surrender is signed at Mantua by the Duke himself and the Ambassador of the King of France. On August 2 Catinat is ordered from Flanders. On the 13th Louvois announces to Saint-Mars the journey of this officer to Pignerol. From September 1 to 22 the French troops muster at Briançon. On the 27th theyarrive at Pignerol. On the 30th they enter Casale with the Marquis de Boufflers as commander and Catinat as governor of this new possession.[557]This time there was no intermediary between the negotiators, no obstacle to Louis XIV.’s project; and no employment of an embarrassing or perfidious spy. There is nothing that is suspicious, nothing that is obscure in the despatches relating to this enterprise. There is no void in them, nothing has been suppressed. Moreover—and this is a point upon which we cannot too strongly insist—the King, the ministers, and the ambassadors who penned them, could not foresee that they would one day no longer be buried in the impenetrable archives of Versailles, but be delivered to investigation and comment.

Where is there anything in them about that obscure spy whom Catinat is said to have arrested? M. Loiseleur has wished rather to open a new field for conjecture than to put forward a definite opinion. He has comprehended so well the fragile nature of his train of reasoning that he does not hesitate to express himself in the following manner concerning this pretended prisoner of 1681:—“There is nothing to explain to us his true name, his position in life, or his crime. The only two theories which are now current concerning the Iron Mask are both equally erroneous. This is all that we have intended to establish.”[558]

Let us hasten to say that he has completely succeeded. There is no need for us to return to that one of these twotheories which makes the Man with the Iron Mask a brother of Louis XIV.[559]But with reference to the other, which represents Matthioly as being the masked prisoner, M. Loiseleur’s refutation of it is very remarkable; and the researches which we have made, as well as the new documents which we have brought to light, confirm what his clear-sighted sagacity had enabled him to discover. “December 23, 1685,” says M. Loiseleur, “Saint-Mars writes from Exiles to Louvois, ‘My prisoners are always ill and taking remedies. For the rest, they are very quiet.’ We possess no official document relating to what passed at Exiles during the year 1686; but it was in this year, as we are about to establish, that Matthioly’s death took place. On January 20, 1687, Saint-Mars learns that the King has just conferred on him the governorship of the Isles Honorat and Sainte-Marguerite. He hastens to thank Louvois for it, and adds, ‘I shall give my orders for the care of my prisoner so well,’ &c. &c.”

Thence M. Loiseleur concludes that either in 1686, or in January, 1687, one of the two prisoners had died.[560]He also adduces the testimony of Father Papon, of the Oratory, who, visiting the Isles Sainte-Marguerite, in 1778, questioned an officer there named Claude Souchon, then seventy-nine years old, and whose father had formed one of the free company of the islands in the time of Saint-Mars. Now, both in a memorandum drawn up at the request of the Marquis de Castellane, governor of the islands, and in his replies to Father Papon, the Sieur Souchon said he had heard from his father that the envoy of the Empire—theDuke of Mantua was a prince of the Empire—carried off by order of Louis XIV., died nine years after his arrest—that is to say, in 1688.[561]Muratori relates this tradition, and it is also confirmed by the fact “that the name of Matthioly disappeared entirely from Saint-Mars’ correspondence previous to his departure from Exiles.”

The following despatches from Louvois to Saint-Mars, till now unpublished, justify M. Loiseleur’s suppositions:—

“Fontainebleau. October 9, 1686.“I have received the letter that you have written to me the 26th of last month, which requires no answer except to say that you should have named to me which of your prisoners it is that has become dropsical.”

“Fontainebleau. October 9, 1686.

“I have received the letter that you have written to me the 26th of last month, which requires no answer except to say that you should have named to me which of your prisoners it is that has become dropsical.”

“Fontainebleau, November 3, 1686.“I have received your letter of the 4th of last month. It is right to cause that one of your two prisoners who has become dropsical to confess, when you perceive the appearance of an approaching death. Till then neither he nor his companion must have any communication.”

“Fontainebleau, November 3, 1686.

“I have received your letter of the 4th of last month. It is right to cause that one of your two prisoners who has become dropsical to confess, when you perceive the appearance of an approaching death. Till then neither he nor his companion must have any communication.”

“Versailles, January 13, 1687.“I have received your letter of the 5th of this month, by which I learn the death of one of your prisoners. I do not reply to you concerning your desire to change your government,because you have since learnt that the King has granted you one more important[562]than yours, with a good climate, at which I am delighted, and I rejoice again with you at the share which I have taken in what concerns you.”[563]

“Versailles, January 13, 1687.

“I have received your letter of the 5th of this month, by which I learn the death of one of your prisoners. I do not reply to you concerning your desire to change your government,because you have since learnt that the King has granted you one more important[562]than yours, with a good climate, at which I am delighted, and I rejoice again with you at the share which I have taken in what concerns you.”[563]

Thus we see that the death of one of the two prisoners brought by Saint-Mars from Pignerol to Exiles is undeniable. Supposing that we reject the testimony of the Sieur Souchon—which, although not possessing the character of an official document, does not the less deserve the most serious attention—supposing that we are not absolutely convinced that the prisoner who died of dropsy was Matthioly, it is, nevertheless, necessary to admit that the fact of this death places in the greatest uncertainty and almost entirely destroys the value of the theory put forward by Baron d’Heiss, De Chambrier, Reth, Roux-Fazillac, Delort, Depping, and Rousset. How, in fact, can one now insist that Matthioly was the Man with the Iron Mask, who mysteriously entered the Bastille September 18, 1698, when we see that he was confided to the care of Saint-Mars along with another prisoner; that one of the two captives died in 1687; and that from this time the name of the Mantuan Minister altogether disappears from the correspondence of Louvois and Saint-Mars? After having attentively read M. Loiseleur’s work, and especially after having found the despatches confirming the essential portions of it, I by no means arrived at the conclusion that Catinat in 1681 abducted some spy,the fact of whose arrest or even existence is altogether devoid of proof; but I acquired the conviction that this problem would never receive a definitive solution, and that it was impossible to disperse the mysterious gloom with which the Man with the Iron Mask was surrounded.

Such was my confirmed opinion when, studying more attentively one of the despatches which I had been permitted to examine, a new direction was impressed on my researches, and led me to a result which I am about to unfold.

FOOTNOTES:[527]Louvois writes to Saint-Mars, May 15, 1679: “It is not the intention of the King that the Sieur de Lestang [the name given to Matthioly after his arrest] should be well treated, nor that, except the absolute necessaries of life, anything should be given to him that would enable him to pass his time agreeably.” Again, on May 22, he writes: “You must keep the individual named Lestang in the severe confinement I enjoined in my preceding letters, without allowing him to see a physician unless you know him to be in absolute need of one.” In July he is allowed pen and ink “to put into writing whatever he may wish to say.” In February, 1680, Saint-Mars writes to Louvois that Lestang “complains that he is not treated as a man of his quality and the minister of a great prince ought to be,” to which Louvois replies in the July following: “With regard to the Sieur de Lestang, I wonder at your patience, and that you should wait for an order to treat such a rascal as he deserves when he is wanting in respect to you:”—Louvois to Saint-Mars andvice versâ, Archives of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.—Trans.[528]“Sir,” said he to him, “here is a ring which I make a present to you, and which I beg of you to accept.” It was no doubt the diamond given to Matthioly by Louis XIV.[Saint-Mars wrote to Louvois: “I believe he made him this present as much from fear as from any other cause: this prisoner having previously used very violent language towards him, and written abusive sentences with charcoal on the walls of his room, which had obliged that officer to threaten him with severe punishment, if he was not more decorous and moderate in his language for the future. When he was put in the tower with the Jacobin, I charged Blainvilliers to tell him, at the same time showing him a cudgel, that it was with that the unruly were rendered manageable, and that if he did not speedily become so, he could easily be compelled. This message was conveyed to him, and some days afterwards, as Blainvilliers was waiting upon him at dinner, he said, ‘Sir, here is a little ring which I wish to give you, and I beg you to accept of it?’ Blainvilliers replied ‘that he only took it to deliver it to me, as he could not receive anything himself from the prisoners.’ I think it is well worth fifty or sixty pistoles:”—Letter from Saint-Mars to Louvois, October 26, 1680, quoted by Roux-Fazillac.—Trans.][529]La Prudenza Triomfante di Casale con l’Arni sole de trattati e negotiati di Politici della M. Chr., small duodecimo, 58 pp.[530]This was printed at Leyden by Claude Jordan.[531]Annali d’Italia, Milan edition, vol. xi. pp. 352-354.[532]Vol. vi. part i. p. 182., Letter from Baron d’Heiss, June 28, 1770.[533]Journal de Paris, p. 1470.[534]Vol. v. p. 369.[535]This is a collection of letters interchanged between the Marquis de L. and the Chevalier de B., in which the latter gives an account of his travels in France, Italy, Germany, and England, from September 5, 1782, to January 29, 1788. In it, Matthioly is confounded with another agent named Girolamo Magni.[536]Mémoires de l’Académie de Berlin, 1794 and 1795, Division of Belles-Lettres, pp. 157-163.[537]January 31, 1800.—Trans.[538]Pp. 814-816.[539]In this list I do not include the Hon. George Agar Ellis, whose work was translated into French and published by Barbeza, (Paris, 1830), because his book is itself only the almost literal reproduction of Delort’s.[540]We have already seen that Delort had examined, in the Archives of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, only a portion of the sections Venice and Mantua, and that of Savoy not at all. As to the despatches interchanged between the Minister of War and Saint-Mars, he had inspected the rather numerous letters in the Archives of the Empire, but not the drafts which are at the Ministry of War.[541]“We share the opinion of those who think that the Man with the Iron Mask was no other than Matthioly:”—Histoire de Louvois, vol. iii. p. 111,note.[542]Despatch from Louvois to Saint-Mars, January 30, 1675.[543]Unpublished despatch from Louvois to Saint-Mars, April 18, 1674:—Archives of the Ministry of War.[544]Letter from Louvois to Saint-Mars, July 19, 1669. We have already mentioned that the same precautions were adopted (ante, p. 234) even for the Protestant ministers who were confined at the Isles Sainte-Marguerite later. See Depping:Correspondance Administrative sous Louis XIV.[545]Buticary was set at liberty at Saint-Mars’ request. The following extract from a despatch proves that he ought not to be confounded with Caluzio, as M. Loiseleur has done: “In the correspondence of Saint-Mars,” he says (Revue Contemporaine, July 31, 1867, p. 202, note), “Caluzio is sometimes called Buticary. One of the two names is a surname.” Now, September 14, 1675, Louvois writes to Saint-Mars: “You have done right to give a sergeant and two soldiers to take the Sieur Caluzio to Lyons, and as to the Sieur Buticary, when the King is at Saint-Germain, I will willingly speak in his favour and endeavour to obtain his release.”[546]Delort,Histoire de la Détention des Philosophes, vol. i. and Roux-Fazillac.[547]Letter from Louvois to Saint-Mars, May 12, 1680.[548]Letter from Catinat to Louvois, May 3, 1679.[549]Letter from Louvois, August 16, 1680, and from Saint-Mars, September 7 of the same year.[550]Problèmes Historiques, Paris. Hachette.[551]Revue Contemporaine, July 21, 1867, pp. 194-239.[552]Revue Contemporaine, p. 206.[553]François Michel le Tellier, Marquis de Louvois, whose name occurs so frequently throughout this work, was Louis XIV.’s Secretary of State for War and Prime Minister. He is responsible for the barbarous devastation of the Palatinate, and for the revocation of the Edict of Nantes. After having served his Sovereign faithfully for six-and-thirty years, he fell under his displeasure, and was only saved from disgrace by a sudden death, which occurred in 1691, it is said from poison.[554]M. Loiseleur afterwards brings forward two arguments which are as little conclusive as those which have just been discussed. “Saint-Mars was so persistently left in ignorance,” he says, “that after having confided to his lieutenant the care of recovering the important documents concealed at Padua, Catinat thought better of it, and charged a trusty servant of the Abbé d’Estrades with this mission.... When Louvois requested the list of the prisoners imprisoned at Pignerol, with the reasons for which they were detained, he added to his letter, ‘with reference to the two of the lower tower you need only indicate them by this name, without putting anything else.’” If Giuliani was charged, as we have mentioned in the preceding chapter, to seek at Padua the papers in the possession of Matthioly’s father, it was because, being supposed a friend of Matthioly, he would inspire no suspicion, while it would have been very different if this mission had been confided to Saint-Mars’ lieutenant. As for the letter in which Louvois requests from Saint-Mars the names of his prisoners, the dispensing with information concerning the prisoners in the lower Tower can be explained in a very simple manner—by the fact that Louvois knew all about them, since a short time previously they had been referred to in the correspondence.[555]Delort, p. 206.[556]Louvois writes to Saint-Mars, September 20, 1681:—“The King does not disapprove of your going from time to time to see the last prisoner that you have in your care, when he is settled in his new prison.” M. Loiseleur concludes from this that at this period there was only one prisoner, and as two are again spoken of afterwards, he infers that a new prisoner was confided to Saint-Mars. We shall hereafter concern ourselves with this despatch, the meaning of which we shall explain.[557]Archives of the Ministry of War;Mémoire de Chamlayon the events of 1678 to 1688:—Archives of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, sections Mantua and Savoy.[558]Revue Contemporaine, p. 238.[559]See ChaptersI. toV. of the present work.[560]Revue Contemporaine, p. 209,et seq.[561]This is within a year of the date that M. Loiseleur states, and the exactness of which we are about to confirm. M. Loiseleur observes with reason that the error of a year in an old man’s early reminiscences is very probable.[562]The governorship of the Isles Sainte-Marguerite-Saint-Honorat.[563]Unpublished despatches from Louvois to Saint-Mars:—Archives of the Ministry of War.

[527]Louvois writes to Saint-Mars, May 15, 1679: “It is not the intention of the King that the Sieur de Lestang [the name given to Matthioly after his arrest] should be well treated, nor that, except the absolute necessaries of life, anything should be given to him that would enable him to pass his time agreeably.” Again, on May 22, he writes: “You must keep the individual named Lestang in the severe confinement I enjoined in my preceding letters, without allowing him to see a physician unless you know him to be in absolute need of one.” In July he is allowed pen and ink “to put into writing whatever he may wish to say.” In February, 1680, Saint-Mars writes to Louvois that Lestang “complains that he is not treated as a man of his quality and the minister of a great prince ought to be,” to which Louvois replies in the July following: “With regard to the Sieur de Lestang, I wonder at your patience, and that you should wait for an order to treat such a rascal as he deserves when he is wanting in respect to you:”—Louvois to Saint-Mars andvice versâ, Archives of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.—Trans.

[528]“Sir,” said he to him, “here is a ring which I make a present to you, and which I beg of you to accept.” It was no doubt the diamond given to Matthioly by Louis XIV.[Saint-Mars wrote to Louvois: “I believe he made him this present as much from fear as from any other cause: this prisoner having previously used very violent language towards him, and written abusive sentences with charcoal on the walls of his room, which had obliged that officer to threaten him with severe punishment, if he was not more decorous and moderate in his language for the future. When he was put in the tower with the Jacobin, I charged Blainvilliers to tell him, at the same time showing him a cudgel, that it was with that the unruly were rendered manageable, and that if he did not speedily become so, he could easily be compelled. This message was conveyed to him, and some days afterwards, as Blainvilliers was waiting upon him at dinner, he said, ‘Sir, here is a little ring which I wish to give you, and I beg you to accept of it?’ Blainvilliers replied ‘that he only took it to deliver it to me, as he could not receive anything himself from the prisoners.’ I think it is well worth fifty or sixty pistoles:”—Letter from Saint-Mars to Louvois, October 26, 1680, quoted by Roux-Fazillac.—Trans.]

[528]“Sir,” said he to him, “here is a ring which I make a present to you, and which I beg of you to accept.” It was no doubt the diamond given to Matthioly by Louis XIV.

[Saint-Mars wrote to Louvois: “I believe he made him this present as much from fear as from any other cause: this prisoner having previously used very violent language towards him, and written abusive sentences with charcoal on the walls of his room, which had obliged that officer to threaten him with severe punishment, if he was not more decorous and moderate in his language for the future. When he was put in the tower with the Jacobin, I charged Blainvilliers to tell him, at the same time showing him a cudgel, that it was with that the unruly were rendered manageable, and that if he did not speedily become so, he could easily be compelled. This message was conveyed to him, and some days afterwards, as Blainvilliers was waiting upon him at dinner, he said, ‘Sir, here is a little ring which I wish to give you, and I beg you to accept of it?’ Blainvilliers replied ‘that he only took it to deliver it to me, as he could not receive anything himself from the prisoners.’ I think it is well worth fifty or sixty pistoles:”—Letter from Saint-Mars to Louvois, October 26, 1680, quoted by Roux-Fazillac.—Trans.]

[529]La Prudenza Triomfante di Casale con l’Arni sole de trattati e negotiati di Politici della M. Chr., small duodecimo, 58 pp.

[530]This was printed at Leyden by Claude Jordan.

[531]Annali d’Italia, Milan edition, vol. xi. pp. 352-354.

[532]Vol. vi. part i. p. 182., Letter from Baron d’Heiss, June 28, 1770.

[533]Journal de Paris, p. 1470.

[534]Vol. v. p. 369.

[535]This is a collection of letters interchanged between the Marquis de L. and the Chevalier de B., in which the latter gives an account of his travels in France, Italy, Germany, and England, from September 5, 1782, to January 29, 1788. In it, Matthioly is confounded with another agent named Girolamo Magni.

[536]Mémoires de l’Académie de Berlin, 1794 and 1795, Division of Belles-Lettres, pp. 157-163.

[537]January 31, 1800.—Trans.

[538]Pp. 814-816.

[539]In this list I do not include the Hon. George Agar Ellis, whose work was translated into French and published by Barbeza, (Paris, 1830), because his book is itself only the almost literal reproduction of Delort’s.

[540]We have already seen that Delort had examined, in the Archives of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, only a portion of the sections Venice and Mantua, and that of Savoy not at all. As to the despatches interchanged between the Minister of War and Saint-Mars, he had inspected the rather numerous letters in the Archives of the Empire, but not the drafts which are at the Ministry of War.

[541]“We share the opinion of those who think that the Man with the Iron Mask was no other than Matthioly:”—Histoire de Louvois, vol. iii. p. 111,note.

[542]Despatch from Louvois to Saint-Mars, January 30, 1675.

[543]Unpublished despatch from Louvois to Saint-Mars, April 18, 1674:—Archives of the Ministry of War.

[544]Letter from Louvois to Saint-Mars, July 19, 1669. We have already mentioned that the same precautions were adopted (ante, p. 234) even for the Protestant ministers who were confined at the Isles Sainte-Marguerite later. See Depping:Correspondance Administrative sous Louis XIV.

[545]Buticary was set at liberty at Saint-Mars’ request. The following extract from a despatch proves that he ought not to be confounded with Caluzio, as M. Loiseleur has done: “In the correspondence of Saint-Mars,” he says (Revue Contemporaine, July 31, 1867, p. 202, note), “Caluzio is sometimes called Buticary. One of the two names is a surname.” Now, September 14, 1675, Louvois writes to Saint-Mars: “You have done right to give a sergeant and two soldiers to take the Sieur Caluzio to Lyons, and as to the Sieur Buticary, when the King is at Saint-Germain, I will willingly speak in his favour and endeavour to obtain his release.”

[546]Delort,Histoire de la Détention des Philosophes, vol. i. and Roux-Fazillac.

[547]Letter from Louvois to Saint-Mars, May 12, 1680.

[548]Letter from Catinat to Louvois, May 3, 1679.

[549]Letter from Louvois, August 16, 1680, and from Saint-Mars, September 7 of the same year.

[550]Problèmes Historiques, Paris. Hachette.

[551]Revue Contemporaine, July 21, 1867, pp. 194-239.

[552]Revue Contemporaine, p. 206.

[553]François Michel le Tellier, Marquis de Louvois, whose name occurs so frequently throughout this work, was Louis XIV.’s Secretary of State for War and Prime Minister. He is responsible for the barbarous devastation of the Palatinate, and for the revocation of the Edict of Nantes. After having served his Sovereign faithfully for six-and-thirty years, he fell under his displeasure, and was only saved from disgrace by a sudden death, which occurred in 1691, it is said from poison.

[554]M. Loiseleur afterwards brings forward two arguments which are as little conclusive as those which have just been discussed. “Saint-Mars was so persistently left in ignorance,” he says, “that after having confided to his lieutenant the care of recovering the important documents concealed at Padua, Catinat thought better of it, and charged a trusty servant of the Abbé d’Estrades with this mission.... When Louvois requested the list of the prisoners imprisoned at Pignerol, with the reasons for which they were detained, he added to his letter, ‘with reference to the two of the lower tower you need only indicate them by this name, without putting anything else.’” If Giuliani was charged, as we have mentioned in the preceding chapter, to seek at Padua the papers in the possession of Matthioly’s father, it was because, being supposed a friend of Matthioly, he would inspire no suspicion, while it would have been very different if this mission had been confided to Saint-Mars’ lieutenant. As for the letter in which Louvois requests from Saint-Mars the names of his prisoners, the dispensing with information concerning the prisoners in the lower Tower can be explained in a very simple manner—by the fact that Louvois knew all about them, since a short time previously they had been referred to in the correspondence.

[555]Delort, p. 206.

[556]Louvois writes to Saint-Mars, September 20, 1681:—“The King does not disapprove of your going from time to time to see the last prisoner that you have in your care, when he is settled in his new prison.” M. Loiseleur concludes from this that at this period there was only one prisoner, and as two are again spoken of afterwards, he infers that a new prisoner was confided to Saint-Mars. We shall hereafter concern ourselves with this despatch, the meaning of which we shall explain.

[557]Archives of the Ministry of War;Mémoire de Chamlayon the events of 1678 to 1688:—Archives of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, sections Mantua and Savoy.

[558]Revue Contemporaine, p. 238.

[559]See ChaptersI. toV. of the present work.

[560]Revue Contemporaine, p. 209,et seq.

[561]This is within a year of the date that M. Loiseleur states, and the exactness of which we are about to confirm. M. Loiseleur observes with reason that the error of a year in an old man’s early reminiscences is very probable.

[562]The governorship of the Isles Sainte-Marguerite-Saint-Honorat.

[563]Unpublished despatches from Louvois to Saint-Mars:—Archives of the Ministry of War.

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