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We let the priest know, first, that we did not want money, and, next, that we were very sensible of the obligation he offered us; and I told him in particular, if I lived to see him again I would acknowledge it.

as we afterWe had left

This accident of our horse was, wards found, of some use to us. our two servants behind at Calais to bring our baggage after us, by reason of some dispute between the captain of the packet and the customhouse officer, which could not be adjusted, and we were wishing to be at Paris: the fellows followed as fast as they could; and let us know, as near as we could learn, in the time we lost our way, they were robbed, and our portmanteaus opened. The villains took what they pleased: but as there was no money, only linen and necessaries, the loss was not great.

Our guide conveyed us to Amiens, where we found the express and our two servants, whom the express met on the road, and having a spare horse, had brought back with him hither.

We took this for a good omen of our successful journey, having escaped a danger which might have been greater to us than it was to our servants; for the highwaymen in France do not always give a traveller the civility of bidding him stand and deliver his money, but frequently fire upon him first, and then take his money.

We stayed one day at Amiens to adjust this little disorder, and walked about the town, and into the great church, but saw nothing very remarkable there; but going across a broad street near the great church, we saw a crowd of people gazing at a mountebank doctor, who made a long harangue to them with a thousand antic postures, and gave out bills this way, and boxes of physic that way, and had a great trade; when on a sudden the people raised a cry of Larron! Jarron! (in English, thief! thief!) on the other side the street, and all the auditors ran away from the doctor to see what the matter was. Among the rest we went to see, and the case was short and plain enough.

Two English gentlemen and a Scotchman, travellers, as we were, stood looking at this prating empiric, and one of them caught a fellow picking his pocket: he had got some of the gentleman's money, for he dropt two or three pieces just by him, and had got hold of his watch, but being surprised, let it slip again. My reason for telling this story is for the agility of its manage

ment.

The thief had his seconds so ready, that as soon as the Englishman had seized him, they fell in, pretended to be mighty zealous for the stranger, taking the fellow by the throat, and making a great bustle. The gentleman, not doubting but the man was secured, let go his own hold of him, and left him to them. The hubbub was great, and 'twas these men cried Larron ron! but with a dexterity peculiar to themselves had let the right fellow go, and pretended to be all upon one of their own gang.

lar

At last they bring the fellow to the gentleman, to ask him what he had done; who, when he saw the person they had seized, presently told them that was not the man: they then seemed to be in more consternation than before, and spread themselves all over the street, crying

Larron! larron! pretending to search for the thief, and so one one way, and one anotherthey were all gone-the noise went over-the gentlemen stood looking one at another, and the bawling doctor began to have the crowd about him again.

This was the first French trick I had the opportunity of seeing; but I was told they have a great many more as dexterous as this.

We soon got acquainted with these gentlemen, who were going to Paris as well as us; so the next day we made up our company with them, and were a pretty troop of five gentlemen and four servants.

We had no design to stay long at Paris; indeed, excepting the city itself, there was not much to be seen. Cardinal Richelieu, who was not only a supreme minister of the church, but prime minister of the state, was now made also general of the king's forces, with a title never known in France before nor since, viz. Lieutenant-general au Place du Roy, in the king's stead, or, as some have since translated it, representing the person of the king.

Under this character he pretended to execute the royal powers in the army without appeal to the king, or without waiting for orders; and having departed from Paris the winter before, had now actually begun the war against the Duke of Savoy, in the process of which he restored the Duke of Mantua; and having taken Pignerol from the duke, put it into such a state of defence as he could never force it out of his hands. The cardinal reduced the duke rather by good conduct and management than by force, to make peace without it; and annexing it to the crown of France, has ever since been a thorn in his foot, and has always made the peace of Savoy lame and precarious. France has since made Pignerol one of the strongest fortresses in the world.

The cardinal, with all the military part of the court, was in the field, and the king, to be near him, was gone with the Queen and all the court, just before I reached Paris, to reside at Lyons. All these considered, there was nothing to do at Paris: the court looked like a citizen's house when the family are gone into the country; and I thought the whole city looked very melancholy, compared to the fine things I had heard of it.

The queen-mother and her party were chagrined at the cardinal, who, though he owed his grandeur to her immediate favour, was now grown too great any longer to be at the command of her majesty, or indeed in her interest; and therefore the queen was dissatisfied, and her party looked very much down.

The Protestants were everywhere disconsolate; for the losses they had received at Rochelle, Nismes, and Montpellier, had reduced them to an absolute dependence on the king's will, without possible hopes of ever recovering themselves, or being so much as in a condition to take arms for their religion; and therefore the wisest of them plainly foresaw their own entire reduction, as it since came to pass and I remember very well, that a Protestant gentleman told me once, as we were passing from Orleans to Lyons, that the English had ruined them; "and therefore," says he, "I think the next occasion the king

:

takes to use us ill, as I know 'twill not be long before he does, we must all fly over to England, where you are bound to maintain us for having helped to turn us out of our own country."

I asked him what he meant by saying the English had done it?

He returned short upon me-" I do not mean," says he, "by not relieving Rochelle, but by helping to ruin Rochelle, when you and the Dutch lent ships to beat our fleet, which all the ships in France could not have done without you."

I was too young in the world to be very sensible of this before, and therefore was something startled at the charge; but when I came to discourse with this gentleman, I soon saw the truth of what he said was undeniable, and have since reflected on it with regret, that the naval power of the Protestants, which was then superior to the royal, would certainly have been the recovery of all their fortunes, had it not been unhappily broken by their brethren of England and Holland, the former lending seven men-of-war, and the latter twenty, for the destruction of the Rochellers' fleet; and by those very ships the fleet were actually beat and destroyed, and they never afterward recovered their force at sea, and by consequence sunk under the siege, which the English afterwards in vain attempted to pre

vent.

These things made the Protestants look very dull, and expected the ruin of all their party; which had certainly happened, had the cardinal lived a few years longer.

We stayed in Paris about three weeks, as well to see the court, and what rarities the place afforded, in which time an incident happened which had like to have put a short period to our ramble.

Walking one morning before the gate of the Louvre, with a design to see the Swiss drawn up, which they always did, and exercised just before they relieved the guards, a page came up to me, and, speaking English, "Sir," says he, "the captain must needs have your immediate assistance."

I had not the knowledge of any person in Paris but my own companion, whom I called captain; had no room to question but it was he that sent for me; and crying out hastily to him, "Where?" followed the fellow as fast as possible. He led me through several passages which I knew not, and at last through a tennis-court and into a large room, where three men, like gentlemen, were engaged very briskly, two against one. The room was very dark, so that I could not easily know them; but being fully possessed with an opinion before of my captain's danger, I ran into the room with my sword in my hand: I had not particularly engaged any of them, nor so much as made a pass at any, when I received a very dangerous thrust in my thigh, rather occasioned by my hasty running in than a real design of the person; but enraged at the hurt, without examining who it was hurt me, I threw myself upon him, and run my sword quite through his body.

The novelty of the adventure, and the unexpected fall of the man, by a stranger come in, nobody knew how, had becalmed the other two, that they really stood gazing at me. By this time I had discovered my captain was not there,

and that it was some strange accident brought me thither.

I could speak but little French, and supposed they could speak no English; so I stepped to the door to see for the page that brought me thither; but seeing nobody there, and the passage clear, I made off as fast as I could, without speaking a word; nor did the other two gentlemen offer to stop me.

But I was in a strange confusion when, coming into those entries and passages which the page led me through, I could by no means find my way out at last seeing a door open that looked through a house into the street, I went in, and out at the other door; but then I was at as great a loss to know where I was, and which was the way to my lodging. The wound in my thigh bled apace, and I could feel the blood in my breeches.

In this interval came by a chair; I called and went into it, and bid them, as well as I could, go to the Louvre; for though I knew not the name of the street where I lodged, I knew I could find the way to it when I was at the Bastile.

The chairmen went on their own way; and being stopped by a company of the guards as they went, set me down till the soldiers were marched by; when, looking out, I found I was just at my own lodging, and the captain standing at the door looking for me: I beckoned to him, and, whispering, told him I was very much hurt; but bid him pay the chairmen, and ask no ques tions, but come to me.

I made the best of my way up stairs; but had lost so much blood that I had scarcely spirits enough to keep me from swooning till he came in.

He was equally concerned with me to see the in such a bloody condition, and presently called up our landlord, and he as quickly called in his neighbours, that I had a room full of people about me in a quarter of an hour.

But this had like to have been of worse consequence to me than the other; for by this time there were great inquiries after the person had killed a man at the tennis-court.

who

My landlord was then sensible of his mistake. and came to me and told me the danger I was in, and very honestly offered to convey me to a friend's of his, where I should be very secure.

I thanked him, and suffered myself to be earried at midnight whither he pleased: he visited me very often till I was well enough to walk about, which was not in less than ten days, when we thought it best to be missing, so took post for Orleans; but when I came upon the road I found myself in another error, for my wound opened again with riding, and I was in a worse condition than before, being forced to take up at a little village on the road, a few miles from Orleans, where there was no surgeon to be had, but a sorry country barber, who nevertheless dressed me as well as he could, and in about a week more I was able to walk to Orleans at three times. Here! stayed till I was quite well, and then took coach for Lyons, and so through Savoy into Italy.

I spent near two years after this bad beginning in travelling through Italy, and to the several courts of Rome, Naples, Venice, and Vienna.

When I came to Lyons, the king was gone

from thence to Grenoble to meet the cardinal, but the queens were both at Lyons.

The French affairs seemed just at this time to have but an indifferent aspect; there was no life in anything but where the cardinal was, and he pushed on everything with extraordinary conduct, and generally with success. He had taken Suza and Pignerol from the Duke of Savoy, and was preparing to push the duke even out of all his dominions.

But, at the same time, everywhere else things looked ill; the troops were badly paid, the magazines empty, the people mutinous, and a general disorder seized the minds of the court; and the cardinal, who was the soul of everything, desired an interview at Grenoble, in order to put affairs into some better method.

This politic minister always ordered matters so, that if there was success in anything, the glory was his; but if things miscarried, it was all laid upon the king.

This conduct was so much the more nice, as it is the direct contrary to the custom in like cases, where kings assume the glory of all the success in an action, and when it miscarries make themselves easy by sacrificing their ministers and favourites to the complaints and resentments of the people; but this accurate, refined statesman got over this point.

While we were at Lyons, and, as I remember, the third day after our coming thither, we had like to have been involved in a state broil, without knowing where we were.

It was on a Sunday evening: the people of Lyons, who had been sorely oppressed with taxes, and the war in Italy pinching their trade, began to be very tumultuous. We found the day before the mob got together in great crowds, and talked oddly: the king was everywhere reviled, and spoken disrespectfully of, and the magistrates of the city either winked at, or durst not attempt to meddle, lest they should provoke the people.

But on Sunday, about midnight, we were waked by a prodigious noise in the street. jumped out of bed, and running to the window, I saw the street as full as it could hold; some, armed with muskets and halberds, marching in good order; others in disorderly crowds; all shouting and crying out," Du bain, le Roi!" and the like.

One that led a great party of this rabble carried a loaf of bread on the top of a pike, and other lesser loaves, signifying the smallness of their bread, occasioned by the very high price of

corn.

In the morning the crowd was gathered to a great height: they ran over the whole city, shut up all the shops, and forced all the people to join with them; from thence they went up to the castle, and, renewing the clamour, a strange consternation seized all the princes.

They broke open the doors of the officers, collectors of the new taxes, and plundered their houses; and had not the persons themselves fled in time, they would have been very ill treated.

The queen-mother, as she was very much displeased to see such consequences of the government, in whose management she had no

share, so I suppose she had the less concern upon her.

However, she came into the court of the castle, and showed herself to the people, gave money amongst them, and spoke in a courtly manner; and, by her endearing behaviour, pacified the mob, gradually sent them home with promises of redress, and the like; and so appeased this great tumult in two days by her prudence, which the guards in the castle had no mind to meddle with, and, if they had, would in all probability have made the better side the

worse.

There had been several seditions of the like nature in sundry other parts of France; and the very army began to murmur, though not to be mutinous, for want of provisions.

This sedition at Lyons was not quite over when we left the place; for, finding the city all in uproar, we thought we had no business there; and what the consequence of a popular tumult might be we did not see, so we prepared to be gone.

We had not rode above three miles out of the city, but we were taken and brought as prisoners of war by a party of mutineers, who had been sent upon the scout, and were charged with being messengers sent to the cardinal for forces to reduce the citizens: with these pretences they brought us back in triumph, and the queenmother being by this time grown something familiar to them, they carried us before her.

When they inquired of us who we were, we called ourselves Scots; for as the English were very much out of favour in France at this time, the peace not having been made many months, and not supposed to be very durable, because particularly displeasing to the people of England, so the Scots were on the other extreme with the French. Nothing was so much caressed as they; and a man had no more to do in France, if he would be well received there, than to say he was a Scotchman.

When we came before the queen-mother, she seemed to receive us with some stiffness at first, and caused her guards to take us into custody; but as she was a lady of most exquisite politics, she did this to amuse the mob, and we were immediately after dismissed; and the queen herself made a handsome excuse to us for the rudeness we had suffered, alleging the troubles of the times; and the next morning we had three dragoons of the guards to convov us out of the jurisdiction of Lyons.

I confess this little adventure gave me an aversion to popular tumults all my life after; and if nothing else had been in the cause, would have biassed me to espouse the king's party in England, when our popular heats carried all before them at home.

But I must say, that, when I called to mind since the address, the management, the compliance in show, and, in general, the whole conduct of the queen-mother with the mutinous people of Lyons, and compared it with the conduct of my unhappy master the King of England, I could not but think that the queen understood much better than King Charles the management of politics and the clamours of the people.

Had this princess been at the helm in Eng

land, she would have prevented all the calamities of the civil war here, and yet not have parted with what that good prince yielded in order to peace neither: she would have yielded gradually, and then gained upon them in the same manner: she would have managed them to the point she had designed them, as she did all parties in France; neither could any effectually subject her but the very man she had raised to be her principal support-I mean the cardinal.

We went from hence to Grenoble, and arrived there the same day that the king and the cardinal, with the whole court, went out to view a body of six thousand Swiss foot, which the cardinal had wheedled the cantons to grant to the king, to help to ruin their neighbour the Duke of Savoy.

The troops were exceedingly fine, well accoutred, brave, clean limbed, stout fellows indeed.

Here I saw the cardinal: he had an air of church gravity in his habit, but all the vigour of a general, and the sprightliness in his face of a vast genius; he affected a little stiffness in his behaviour, but managed all his affairs with such clearness, such steadiness, and such application, that it was no wonder he had such success in every undertaking.

Here I saw also the king, whose figure was mean, his countenance was hollow, and always seemed dejected, and every way discovered that weakness in his countenance that appeared in his actions.

If he was ever sprightly and vigorous, it was when the cardinal was with him; for he depended so much on everything he did, that he was at the utmost dilemma when he was absent, being always timorous, jealous, and irresolute.

After the review the cardinal was absent for some days, having been to wait on the queenmother at Lyons, where, as it was discoursed, they were at least seemingly reconciled.

I observed, while the cardinal was gone, there was no court, the king was seldom to be seen, very small attendance given, and no bustle at the castle; but as soon as the cardinal returned, the great councils were assembled, the coaches of the ambassadors went every day to the castle, and a face of business appeared upon the whole court.

Here the measures of the Duke of Savoy's ruin were concerted; and, in order to it, the king and the cardinal put themselves at the head of the army, with which they immediately reduced all Savoy, took Chamberry, and the whole duchy, except Montmelian.

The army that did this was not above twentytwo thousand men, including the Swiss, and but indifferent troops neither, especially the French foot, who, compared to the infantry I have since seen in the German and Swedish armies, were not fit to be called soldiers. On the other hand, considering the Savoyards and Italian troops, they were good; but the cardinal's conduct made amends for all these deficiencies.

From hence I went to Pignerol, which was then little more than a single fortification on the hill near the town called St Bride's; but the situation of that was very strong. I mention this, because of the prodigious works since added to

it, by which it has obtained the name of the right hand of France: they had begun a new line below the hill, and some works were marked out on the side of the town next the fort; but the cardinal afterwards drew the plan of the works | with his own hand, by which it was made one of the strongest fortresses in Europe.

While I was at Pignerol, the governor of Milan, for the Spaniards, came with an army and sat down before Casal. The grand quarrel, for which the war in this part of Italy was begun, was this: the Spaniards and Germans claimed the duchy of Mantua; the Duke of Nevers, a Frenchman, had not only a title to it, but had got possession; but, being ill supported by the French, was beat out by the Imperialists, and after a long siege the Germans took Mantua itself, and drove the poor duke quite out of the country.

The taking of Mantua elevated the spirits of the Duke of Savoy; and the Germans and Spaniards being now at more leisure, with a complete army came to his assistance, and formed the siege of Montferrat.

For as the Spaniards pushed the Duke of Mantua, so the French, by way of diversion, lay hard upon the Duke of Savoy: they had seized Montferrat, and held it for the Duke of Mantua, and had a strong French garrison under Thoiras, a brave and experienced commander; and thus affairs stood when we came into the French army.

I had no business there as a soldier; but having passed as a Scotch gentleman with the mob at Lyons, and after with her Majesty the queen-mother when we obtained the guard of her dragoons, we had also her Majesty's pass, with which we came and went where we pleased; and the cardinal, who was then not on very good terms with the queen, but willing to keep smooth water there, when two or three times our passes came to be examined, showed a more than ordinary respect to us on that very account, our passes being from the queen.

Casal being besieged, as I have observed, began to be in danger, for the cardinal, who, it was thought, had formed a design to ruin Savoy, was more intent upon that than upon the suc cour of the Duke of Mantua; but necessity calling upon him to relieve so great a captain as Thoiras, and not to let such a place as Casal fall into the hands of the enemy, the king, or rather cardinal, ordered the Duke of Montmorency and the Mareschal d'Effiat, with ten thousand foot and two thousand horse, to march and join the Mareschals de la Force and Schomberg, who lay already with an army on the frontiers of Genoa, but too weak to attempt the raising the siege of Casal.

As all men thought there would be a battle between the French and the Spaniards, I could not prevail with myself to lose the opportunity, and therefore, by the help of the passes above mentioned, I came to the French army under the Duke of Montmorency. We marched through the enemy's country with great boldness and no small hazard, for the Duke of Savoy appeared frequently with great bodies of horse on the rear of the army, and frequently skirmished with our troops; in one of which I had the folly

can call it no better, for I had no business there || with honour, and might have called it a victory; -to go out and see the sport, as the French gentlemen called it.

but endeavouring to break the whole party, and carry off some cannon, the obstinate resistance I was but a raw soldier, and did not like the of these few dragoons lost him his advantages, sport at all; for this party was surrounded by and held him in play till so many fresh troops the Duke of Savoy, and almost all killed, forgot through the pass again as made us too strong they neither asked nor gave quarter. for him; and had not night parted them, he had been entirely defeated.

I ran away very fairly one of the first, and my companion with me, and by the swiftness of our horses got out of the fray; and not being much known in the army, we came into the camp an hour or two after, as if we had been only riding about for the air.

This little rout made the general very cautious; for the Savoyards were stronger in horse by three or four thousand, and the army always marched in a body, and kept their parties in or very near hand.

I escaped another rub in this French army about five days after, which had like to have made me pay dear for my curiosity.

The Duke de Montmorency and the Mareschal Schomberg joined their army about four or five days after, and immediately, according to the cardinal's instructions, put themselves on the march for the relief of Casal.

The army had marched over a great plain, with some marshy grounds on the right, and the Po on the left; and as the country was so well discovered that it was thought impossible any mischief should happen, the generals observed the less caution. At the end of this plain was a long wood, and a lane or narrow defile through the middle of it.

At last, finding our troops increase and spread themselves on his flank, he retired and gave over: we had no great mind to pursue him, though some horse were ordered to follow a little way.

The duke lost above a thousand men, and we almost twice as many; and, but for those dragoons, should have lost the whole rear-guard and half our cannon.

I was in a very sorry case in this action too, being with the rear in the regiment of horse of Perigoort, with a captain of which regiment I had contracted some acquaintance. I would have rode off at first, as the captain desired me, but there was no doing it, for the cannon was in the lane, and the horse and dragoons of the van, eagerly pressing back through it, must have run me down, or carried me with them. The wood was a good shelter for saving one's life, but was so thick there was no passing it on horseback.

Our regiment was one of the first that was broke; and being all in confusion, with the Duke of Savoy's men at our heels, away we ran into the wood. Never was there so much disorder imong a parcel of runaways; as the wood was so exceeding bushy and thick at the bottom, there was no entering it; and a volley of small shot from a regiment of Savoy's dragoons, pouring in upon us at our breaking into the wood, made terrible work among our horses.

Through this pass the army was to march, and the van began to file through it about four o'clock; in three hours all the army was got through, or into the pass, and the artillery was just entered, For my part, I was got into the wood, but was when the Duke of Savoy appeared, with four thou-forced to quit my horse, and by that means, with sand horse and fifteen hundred dragoons, with a great deal of difficulty, got a little further in, every horseman a footman behind him; whether he where there was a little open place, and, being had swam the Po, or passed it above at a bridge, quite spent with labouring among the bushes, I and made a long march after, was not examined; sat down, resolving to take my fate there, let it but he came boldly up the plain, and charged be what it would, for I was not able to go any our rear with a great deal of fury. further. I had twenty or thirty more, in the same condition, came to me in less than half an hour; and here we waited very securely the success of the battle, which was as before.

Our artillery was in the lane, and as it was impossible to turn them about, and make way for the army, the rear were obliged to support themselves, and maintain the fight for above an hour and a half.

In this time we lost abundance of men, and had it not been for two accidents, all that line would certainly have been cut off: one was, that the wood was so near, that those regiments which were disordered presently sheltered themselves therein; the other was, that by this time Marshal Schomberg, with the horse of the van, began to get back through the lane, and to make good the ground from whence the other had been beat, till at last, by this means, it came to almost a pitched battle.

There were two regiments of French dragoons who did excellent service in this action, and maintained their ground till they were nearly all killed.

Had the Duke of Savoy contented himself with the defeat of five régiments on the right, which he quite broke and drove into the wood, and with the slaughter and havoc which he had made among the rest, he would have come off

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It was no small relief to those with me to hear the Savoyards were beaten, for otherwise they had all been lost and for myself, I confess I was glad as it was, because of the danger; but otherwise I cared not much which had the better, for I designed no service among them.

One kindness it did me; I began to consider what I had to do here; and as I could give but a very slender account for what it was I ran all these risks, I resolved they should fight it out themselves, for I would come among them no

more.

The captain, with whom, as I noted above, I had contracted some acquaintance in this regiment, was killed in the action, and the French had really a great blow here, though they took care to conceal it all they could; and I cannot, without smiling, read some of the histories of this action, which they are not ashamed to call a victory.

We marched on to Saluces, and the next day the Duke of Savoy presented himself in battalia

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