Citizens rather than by her own strength or the assistances of Strangers With these better times began the Principality of Francesco Erizzo assumed to be Duke after the death of Nicholo Contarini with great applause for having through the course of many years assisted the Country with counsel and joyntly defended it by Arms. And because he held the Generalship of the Terra firma there was put into that Charge as his Successor Luigi Giorgio at that time Proveditor in the Army But States being like the Sea where it fluctuates though there be no storm there arose at this time several diversities in opinion and unkindnesses with the Pope which though they molested not Italy with Arms distracted nevertheless mens minds with troublesom business Vrban after the death of Francesco Maria della Rovere the last Duke of Vrbin had united to the Church that most noble Fief And because during the life of the Duke who was now grown very old he kept a Prelate in that Country which assisted in all affairs he had after his death so little trouble to possess himself of it that Taddeo Barberino Prince of Palestrina entring into it with Souldiers to take quietly possession of it it looked as if the old Dominion was rather continued than another new one introduced The Pope under the pretext of the Commotions of Italy was already in Arms expecting this accident to the end that if in so great a confusion of affairs any body should go about to disturb him he might be able to maintain his right with a puissant Force But the Princes rather offered him to strives their assistance and exhorted him to invest his Nephews with it some believing to oblige him others by dismembring that State desiring that the Church should not so much increase its temporal Dominion The Pope having regard to the severe Bulls of his Predecessors and apprehending to leave to his House a Patrimony of unquietness and trouble rather than a peaceable Dominion made shew to think his Kinsmen more worthy of the Principality by refusing it than by retaining it He only confers as the Spoils of so noble a Conquest upon his Nephew Taddeo the Government of Rome a long time enjoyed by the Family of Rovere This dignity retains a certain ancient and venerable memory of the Praetor Praetorii in the times of the Caesars of so much esteem and authority though at present there remained nothing of it but the dress and the name From hence brake forth a great distaste with the Princes because the Prefect or Governour pretending precedency of Ambassadours who in the most solemn Functions assisting at the Popes Chair of State representing the members of all Christendom united to their head did all dissent from it The Barberins attempted to gain the Emperour because from his example other great Princes would certainly depend and they omitted not any means offering him great succours and powerful assistances But in vain for the Emperour resolving not to depart from what was fit and complaining that Merchandize for private respects was made of his necessity pulled upon him by maintaining of a cause in which Religion had the chief part orders his Ambassadour to abstain from the Churches and the other Ministers of the Crown followed him considering the Pope in his own house and in the cause of his Kindred Uncle and Party no less than a Prince From this common distaste of the Princes rose afterwards a particular one of the Venetians for Giovanni Pesari Cavalier Ambassadour of the Republick meeting casually in a street with the Prefect who stopping his Coach and the other not observing it by reason of the obscurity it being now late though he civilly caused an excuse to be made for it yet the Prefect taking offence at it meets him another time on purpose having corrupted the Ambassadours Coach-man who feigning that his Hat was fallen off staid the Horses and run his way Pesary was no sooner got home to his house but the Coach-mans flight was backed by some armed men to rescue him from the punishment he deserved The Court of Rome always talking and always greedy of occasions for it measuring things by appearances and shadows judges such Formalities to be of no less account than bloody Battels and important Conquests use to be esteemed elsewhere An. Dom. 1632 It being on this occasion in some disorder and the other Ambassadors taking it for their common interest offer themselves to the Venetian to do him right The Senate knowing that by the support of the Uncle the party of the Barberins would be too strong in Rome order Pesary that for a publick resentment he should immediately leave the City without taking leave of the Pope or his Nephews and at Venice they suspend giving audience to the Nuntio With this another disgust was interwoven upon occasion that Vrban at a time which was judged very unseasonable while Christendom was in a flame and Italy destroyed betwixt War and Plague had in the year past by his Bull decreed to the Cardinals the Ecclesiastical Electors and the great Master of Malta the Title of Eminence forbidding them to receive any other except from Kings The Republick notwithstanding continued to write in the stile accustomed but some of the Cardinals taking occasion from the affliction which they saw it would be to the Pope and his Kindred refused the Letters to the great resentment of the Senate There were added sharp contests betwixt those of Loreo subjects to the Venetians and those of Arriano which belong to those of Ferrara where the Cardinal Palotta the Legate disturbing the undoubted Confines of the Venetians by imprisonings and other mischiefs shewed an intention to attempt greater novelties by erecting new high-ways making the Po useless and changing the course of the Waters Nor were the Venetians wanting by equal mischiefs to repair themselves but Luca Pesaro Captain of the Gulph entring into the Sacca di Goro with certain Gallies and armed Barques stopped the Ships which with Victuals and Merchandise contrary to the Decrees of the Republick passed by Sea towards Ferrara He destroyed also in the River the works newly made to divert its course whereupon spirits imbittering it looked as if things would have proceeded further because Troops increasing on both sides the Ecclesiasticks on their Confines raised a Fort called delle Bocchette and the Venetians opposed another calling it della Donzella ANNO MDCXXXII To the end this first heat of Arms might not proceed to greater ingagements the French Ministers interposed proposing a suspension of offences and that the Souldiers should be withdrawn from those Borders where just at that time the Agreement was ready to be concluded it hapned that in an occasion some of those of the Popes were killed and thirty three taken Prisoners with hurt on the Venetians side But the Pope and the Republick giving their promise to King Lewis not to offend one another by Arms and to remove the souldiery there remained a larger field
Negotiation and some through the conjuncture of time although they awakened jealous thoughts in some yet they seemed not of importance to disturb the Peace under which some not remembring that one ring is not a Chain yet a Chain is formed of many rings thought themselves secure and others happy But by the death of Henry the Fourth France falling into a long minority the Spanish Ministers judged the conjuncture fit to reap their advantages with Counsel and with Arms. And to say truth the occasion in Italy seemed favourable because the French as hath been said being excluded and now fallen under the government of a Child and of a Woman and Ministers divided in their private Interests the Country was believed so low in courage and strength that if at any time strangers in the attempt to subdue it had gotten great company both People and the Princes themselves would now place their safety and greatest glory in yielding their obedience Some by a pecuniary Interest were already dependent upon Spain others by blood and others by pretensions The Popes taken up in the care of Holy things or distracted in the concerns of their own Family side always with the strongest so that the safety and protection of Italy was now committed to the Venetians alone Nevertheless it was judged that they also would prefer Peace before all things either from the experience of the hazards and events of former Wars or because Monarchies being subject to various changes and accidents it was believed that time might produce such successes from which they thought their Republick as standing upon a more sure foundation exempt and free But in this general Quiet and Peace of Europe there wanting rather pretexts than minds to disturb Italy it was abundantly supplied by the death of Francis Gonzague Duke of Mantua hapned in the flower of his Age about the last of October 1612. He left for posterity to his House Mary yet at Nurse to the Estate two Brothers Ferdinand a Cardinal and Vincenzo and to Italy a sad series of Calamities and Troubles By his Marriage with Margarite Daughter of Charles Emanuel Duke of Savoy it was generally believed that the Peace of Italy would have been established composing thereby the pretensions of those two Houses upon Monferrat They had their ancient Original from the very root of the succession to that State from the Paleologhi and the Gonzagui and after many litigious proceedings Charles the Fifth Emperour as Soveraign of the Fief did rather foment than extinguish them by a certain sentence whereby the possession was adjudged to Mantua leaving undecided to Savoy the right of certain donations of Lands and of the Dowry of Blanche Wife to Charles the First Duke of Savoy which though it exceeded not 80 Thousand Crowns yet with the interest of a long time came near to a Million In the Marriage aforesaid it was studiously endeavoured to ballance all Interests besides the Dowry in Money and Jewels the Father ceding in favour of the Daughter and her Posterity the Revenues of Monferrat and there was a line to be drawn which was to distinguish the confines much intangled with Piedmont upon some lands whereof those of the house of Gonzaghi having a right they renounce it and made a mutual exchange of several places for common convenience and advantage But the affections of Princes being not to be bound by those Bonds which among private men pass for Sacred designs ceased not nor were pretensions extinguished For the Line they could never find a point where to begin it but that of the life of Duke Francis being cut they fell back into discord and the confusion of their former Interests Margarhite called the Infanta according to the custom of Spain in regard of her Mother Daughter of the Catholick King Philip the Second who in her young days was left a Widow in the house of Mantua retained very lively affections for that of her Father whose maxims and sence were so deep imprinted in her that she played that part which was most pleasing to the Savoyards Carlo Emanuel was then Duke of Savoy who it may be said had with much virtue adorned and as much ambition embroiled two Ages He was born in the 61. year of the last and with him at a birth Generosity Courage and the desire of Dominion In the 19. year of his Age he succeeded his Father in the Estate important for its scituation plentiful by its Fertility and for its extent considerable but not proportionable to his mind Being invironed with two so great powers as are France and Spain he could not but know how difficult it would be to make conquests and as impossible to keep them Nevertheless the divisions of France having opened a way to the surprisal of the Marquisat of Salusses and other great attempts he espoused together with the Daughter of Philip the Second a partiality to that Crown and the Maxims thereof But the assistance of his Father-in-Law who had no mind to make him greater towards the Confines of the Milanese not being such as hope and desire had suggested to him he at last concluding a Treaty with Henry the Fourth more to the advantage of the Spaniards than himself adheres to France and enters with Henry as a sharer in these designs which that great King upon firm foundations had laid against the Austrian Monarchy His treacherous and sudden death discharges him leaving Carlo in the grief of his lost hopes and in fear of the revenge of Spain which nevertheless having pacified by sundry means and the Hostage of one of his Sons since he had not been able to make his profit with the great Ones he now purposes to disturb his Neighbours of more moderate power The death of his Son-in-Law gives him the occasion and on the first notice of it he dispatches as his Ambassadour to Mantua the Count Francisco Marteningo and afterwards the Marquess of Lucerna to console his Daughter She then publishes her self with child to suspend a while the succession of Ferdinand the Cardinal and leave the Government fluctuant and uncertain Soon after the Prince Vittorio Amadeo her elder Brother arrives and at the same time the Count Guido di San Giorgio a Subject by birth of Monferrat but by discontent with his own Prince becomes a near Confident of Carlos was by frequent goings and comings driving on a secret Treaty at Milan The Mine at last was sprung for Vittorio perswades his Sister with her little Daughter to return home to her Father or at least to retire to a neutral place as might be Milan and if in consideration of the Child not yet born her going out of those Countries were not approved he insinuated that there was Monferrat where she might remain with more decency That it was not fit that a young Princess should remain amidst the said memorials of her past contentments and under the eye of the Cardinal her Kinsman as young in years as jealous of the
Succession That the Daughter ought to go with the Mother not to separate the affections of Nature and to bring her up with that tenderness which is proper for a mothers care Under such appearances was hid a more secret mystery for as the Fief of Mantua did not admit to the Succession any but Males so by that of Monferrat Women were not excluded In Mary therefore was considered the security of that important State and therefore Carlo desired to have her in his power For grant that Practice and Right have excluded Women when any of the Male-line is remaining of a degree never so remote nevertheless if to his own right he should have been able to joyn that of the Princess there was no doubt but it would have much strengthened the cause Ferdinand that well knew what those instances meant defended himself with several conveniencies and excuses That the Dutchess could not stir from Mantua while she carried in her womb the pawn of the felicity of that State That it was not the custom that the Princes of Gonzagui should be born in any other place than where they command That his Niece much less ought not to be removed out of that house where possibly Fortune designed her Heir and Mistress If the object of the Palace of Mantua were a place too sad and mournful others were not wanting and particularly that of Goito wherein to divertisement was joyned safety and convenience But Carlo 's to the Governour of Milan who was John Mendoza Marquess of Inoiosa intimates that that business was to be managed by the Authority of Spain Was it fit that the Child Niece of the King should be brought up by him who was Vncle by the Fathers side and Competitor of the Command where should this tender Pledge of the Fortune of Italy be better placed than under the Royal care of him who is the Arbiter of it That the Child did possess in her self the right of Monferrat so near and important to the Milanese If she should carry it in Dowry to some troublesom and unquiet Prince and if wanting Issue male as from the Complection of the Princess was prognosticated the Line of Nivers now naturalized in France should come to succeed what would become of the Affairs of Italy and the Authority which without controul the King at present enjoys there These reasons which as the Report went were quickned with rich gifts moved the Governour to speed the Prince of Ascoli with a great number of Souldiers to demand with a high hand both the Child and the Mother Ferdinand was astonished betwixt wrath and danger It seemed a great matter that the only Issue of that Family should be ravished from its Fathers house But on the other side to the power and will of so great a Monarch there was no resisting Nevertheless taking counsel suitable to his fear and pretexts from the present state of Affairs he answers That his Niece being Niece to the Emperour and Queen of France he was not to dispose of her alone That he declined contest with his sister-in-law about the Guardianship and referred it to him who is Soveraign of the State With this Ascoli and the Prince of Piedmont depart either respecting the name of so great Princes or rather because unexpectedly meeting with a reluctancy in Ferdinand things were not yet concerted and adjusted to proceed further Ferdinand presently gives notice to the Imperial Court and into France of this jealous accident in which it appeared that the security liberty and dignity of all was concerned because betwixt power and violence there being no mean but that of reason if to will and interest right should give place nothing in the World would any longer be safe and unviolated Matthias of Austria was now Emperour of Germany and his Counsels as the World thought governed by Melchior Cardinal Gleselius and supposed that as the Prince so the Minister was little inclined to the Spaniards And therefore naturally abhorring all that was pleasing to them and holding it for a Maxime that the shadow of their Authority in Italy would more serve to oppress the Emperours than augment it the Emperour decrees That the Tutelage of the Niece did belong to Ferdinand absolving him from any defect of age required by the Common Law neither did the Queen Regent of France differ from that Judgment and being angry at the proceedings of the Savoyards declares her self to maintain the Decree giving them to understand that she would not endure that the Niece should be removed from her Fathers house and State not without some kind of threatning Carlo to resent it whensoever he should imploy Art or Force about it and with this it was believed that the designs of Savoy were for the present suppressed and the thoughts of Spain laid aside All this was seconded by the Council of the Venetians who having after the death of Francisco sent to Mantua under the pretext of private Affairs Ferrante da Rossi their General of the Artillery a great Confident of the Gonzagui had charged him to observe the tendency of things and the accidents thereupon By this means Ferdinand held a strict communication of all things with the Republick and still incouraged him not to bend under the weight and troubles of the new Government to maintain his Interest and the Decorum of it and to lose no time to make use of his dexterity among the great Princes and to procure with all his power the good offices and assistances of his Allies so to be able to make a counterbalance to Spain The Senate also pressed seriously Pope Paul V. the Emperour and the Crowns to awaken necessary reflections for the diverting these calamities and imbroilments which mature Judgment foresaw to be at hand But Margaret's supposed being with Child being now vanished with time Ferdinand above his Purple assumes the Title and Power of Duke and at the same time the Prince of Piedmont appears at Goito to carry away his Sister and his Niece now the pretext of her being with Child ceased There was there besides Isabella Dutchess of Modena only Sister of Margaret And here by artifices and fears Ferdinand was overcome to be content that his Sister-in-law retiring her self to Modena her Daughter should be carried thither also with solemn promises that she should be sent back to Mantua whensoever Margaret should have a mind to return into Piedmont But this Concert was no sooner divulged but France in particular ascribing the Dukes consent to his own inexperience and the corruption of his Ministers it was remonstrated to him to how many hazards he exposed that only Child and to how many cross interests he abandoned the Family What was the Duke of Modena able to do against the artifices of Carlos or the commanding power of Inoiosa He should have considered that by the Succession if God should inrich her with Posterity there would remain betwixt Mary and her Sons divided hopes pretensions and designs Ferdinand acknowledging
the rest submitted to his will From thence he sends 14000 men into Silesia which threatning the Metropolis Vratislavia made themselves masters of Glosgaw This Province and Moravia had a little before been over-run by the Cossacks of Homonay and Frederick who held a Diet at Bruna had been forced to save himself from their swift Incursion with four persons only into Prague The Moravians sent four Ambassadours to meet with these Barbarians to offer them money that forsaking Ferdinands Party they adhere to their interest But the Cossacks with a cruel document killing two of them let the other go free that they might relate what was the duty of their fidelity and what punishment they ought to expect from their rebellion Those Provinces had an effectual tryal that the yoke of War is more heavy than that of obedience The upper Austria also confessed it with tears and blood because Buquoy having during the winter-season gently tempted it with allurements and Treaties rather than with Arms Lintz being re-inforced by Mansfelt with 2000 men the Province was then confirmed in the Rebellion But the Duke of Bavaria being entred into it with 20000 Foot and 4000 Horse filled it with such a terrour that the people having neither defence nor excuse knew not where to resist him nor how to appease him The States of the Country assembled in Lintz were willing to propound Conditions of Peace but the Duke despising them because they had let him come too near upon the 4. of August caused the Gates to be opened by force Where some of the guilty being punished the rest oppressed with a great Garrison and all chastised with the general sack and spoil of the Country obedience was re-established It was fit to follow fortune while she smiled with success and therefore it was resolved to enter into Bohemia to make an end of the War while it was but beginning The Duke then taking the one way and Buquoy the other marched in such a distance that the numbers did not hinder their progress and Victuals were supplied to all each taking in such places and Castles as lay in their way At Buduais they met to speak together thence uniting their Forces but not their minds which for sundry emulations were always in this Expedition at discord they moved towards Pisec and that taken in they advanced to Pilsen The Army of the Bohemians superiour in number but an equal in prowess and discipline coasted upon them and troubled their march The Chiefs were persons of no great reputation and Frederick in a Labyrinth of endless interests could not govern nor would be governed His endeavours to hinder the Catholicks from coming near to Pilsen succeeded not but Mansfelt supplied it with art because in that place as in his own Conquest he had fixed the seat of his Fortune By proposing a Treaty he hoped to gain time till the season should be more advanced to afford him succours Neither did the Duke and Buquoy despair of drawing him to their party because he feigned discontents which besides the custom of Mercenaries wont to abandon their party in the ambiguity of Fortune they might easily give credit too in him that served a foreign Prince and a distracted people But he after some days feigning also Orders from Anhalt which in regard of his honour obliged him to make resistance discovers the fraud whereupon the Catholicks not willing to waste their Forces in a long Siege nor entertain Fortune with lingring hopes leaving Pilsen went to Prague Frederick assaulted from so many parts and worsted in all was in disorder the people stood in a fright and the Army was wavering Near to Raconits the Armies met and that of the Protestants was driven from most of their Posts Buquoy being hurt which nevertheless hindred him not to go on in his march Anhalt perceiving whither the Enemy bent sent la Tour before to Prague with some Troops and himself leaving the Baggage behind by ways to rights hastens thither to prevent their possessing of the Wiisemberg or White Hill in which might much consist the defence of the City of a vast circuit open in several parts and in many commanded and that within shot A little after arrive there also the Duke and the Count so that both the Armies were now near to Prague The Bohemian in the superiority of Forces shewing a distrust of courage intrench upon the highest part of the Hill placing their Cannon in certain Redoubts and part of their Souldiers in the Park called the Star a place of pleasure for their Kings There was in the Austrian Army the Father Domenico of Giesu Maria a bare-footed Carmelite reputed for a man of singular piety who stirred up the Chiefs to fight promising a certain Victory But in the Council there was difference of opinions some considering the Enemies greater number and particularly of Horse and others the disadvantage of the situation in that the Souldiers before they could come to handy blows with the Enemy were to go a good way exposed to the Cannon and Musket-shot Some added the unevenness of the Hill which by several sloapings and in windings gave the Bohemians means to fortifie themselves and at every pass to make good their Retreat But hope of Victory and the greatness of the recompence over-ballancing dangers the Battel was resolved on Anhalt kept the Ports of Prague shut to take away from the Souldiers the hope of escaping thither In the Army he took for himself the right Wing and assigns to Hollach the left Frederick though so chief a part of the Judgment of Fortune stood in a place a little remote to observe the event Of the Catholicks the Imperialists had the right and the Bavarians the left hand Their Word was the Glorious Name of the Virgin under the protection of which represented in the chief Standard the Wing of the Bavarians moved over which next the Duke Giovanni Count of Tilly commanded To come to the Hill they were to file over a Bridge and then to pass a dirty Valley and in that disadvantage the young Anhalt would have charged them if the Count of Hollach had not staid him whereupon the Catholicks dis-engaged themselves and being defended from the Cannon with the rising of the Hill they advanced in better order Buquoy to avoid the Cannon-shot to which his men divided into three great Battallions with Horse on the Wings stood most exposed hastened his pace and came to the charge at the very same time that Tilly made his attaque The shouting of the Souldiers the noise of the Drums and the roaring of the Cannon deafned Heaven making the Hill a deadly Theatre of outrage and slaughter The two Armies consisted of more than sixty thousand men At the beginning advantage smiled on the Bohemians for young Anhalt with the assistance of the Count Slich repulsed the first Charge pursuing the Enemy with the gain of some Colours the death of Prainer and dead wounds of the Colonel Macau The
affections the thoughts of Carlo were commended and his propositions embraced if for no other yet at least to give exercise and vent to the minds now inflamed amidst these Preludiums to War But to the end all the League might concur therein the Proposals were carried to the Venetians with a differing success for although the French and Savoyards had made themselves believe that mindful of ancient emulations they would easily have assented yet those animosities as good as cancelled by time and the long Peace being in the Senate put in ballance with the motives of equity and common interest Giovanna Basadonna in opposition to some who did consent to it spake to this purpose Ought we then to revenge the provocations and jealousies of the Austrians upon a State that is innocent Oh how pernicious shall the example be to all if the opportunity of a situation and the Wealth of a State shall be a sufficient argument to raise a War It is true that the Genouese are bound up to Spain but the fear and necessity into which we have a mind to precipitate them is not the means to loosen them from those Chains If they lend their Ports at present and consent passage they will then think it necessary to accept Garrison If private men contribute money we shall constrain the publick to receive the Law Doth the League on the one side pretend with applause to drive the Spaniards out of the Valteline exclude the Austrians out of Rhetia redeem the Grisons and restore them to their liberty and dominion and on the other shall it with injustice attempt to oppress Genoua to extinguish a Republick and change perhaps the name but not the subjection of Italy But what do I say to Conquests We shall see that instead of moderating the Command of the Spaniards too too burdensom to that afficted Country it will without dispute increase with a new and greater dependancy under the specious title of defence Who knows but that the Genouese may one day mind again their fortune and that Italy coming to change its aspect may not restore lustre to their Government But let us not lose the hope for ever if to the bonds of gold by which some are bound at present we shall joyn those of Iron into which the danger drives them with misery to all The proposed Conquest is not so easie as by the French and Savoyards we hear described The Territory of Genoua is made strong by situation and defended by Nature The City by its greatness and population is able to maintain it self the Sea being open will furnish succours the Milanese being near will contribute assistance And what will become of Carlo if he should find himself environed on all sides by the Spaniards and Genouese and perhaps left as a prey to dangers by the French from their natural inconstancy It is no short nor easie work to over-turn a Government radicated by time nourished by good Laws and strengthened by the thoughts or at least the imagination of a peaceable liberty The people will resist the change of Government and falling under the Domination of a Prince they hate The Citizens will be obstinate in defending themselves and although the imployments of the Spaniards in Rhetia or elsewhere should interrupt or retard the succours a State that is rich hath when put to it Garrison and Relief within it self With what hopes will our Republick participate in this design Will it peradventure aspire to so difficult and remote Conquests or will it only for anothers profit bear a part in the charges and in the dangers The perpetuity of our Government is maintained by immutable Maxims and Institutions The free and honourable quiet of not provoking nor being easily provoked hath always been the vital Element of our Dominion We have always joyned our Arms to the better side and never offended any but those that went about to injure us Who sees not but Carlo in the greatness of his mind hath the presumption to force the nature of things decaying and forgetting the years he reckons will be sooner abandoned by them than his high thoughts will forsake him Who knows not the succours of the French to be uncertain the Genius of the Nation easily to embrace designs and then with the same inconstancy abandon them and with short interims seek always in Peace War and in War Peace Experience in the present affairs shews it the League for so long a time not considered transgressing so often in the Treaty forgetting as it were the Princes united with them and now the final concerts scarce setled the Armies ready to march either diverting them with difficult designs or confounding them with new Proposals The diversion is with much wisdom concluded to be out of Italy to the end to keep Armies far off because Strangers have never come near this Country but to bring all sorts of calamity into it and to carry away the spoils It is not our interest certainly to draw the body of the Austrian Forces into the very center of Italy within the sight of our Confines But if the desire of glory or the itch of War incite to just and great enterprises let the Milanese be the Lists let it carry our Ensigns against that State which is that that troubles us provokes and torments us The Conquest there may may be great and common and if it be impossible to take Genoua so long as that State subsists why is not the first blow given at the root Italy will find its liberty there the Princes their quiet the Confederates profit and glory and who doubts but the common yoke once shaken off the Genouese also will withdraw themselves from it for ever The Senate fully concurred in this opinion declaring that they would have no hand in the business of Zuccarello as a thing out of the design of the League far from common interest and contrary to the good of Italy But to impress upon France the reasons of this their dissent and withal divert the mind of the King they appoint Girolamo Priuli Cavalier Ambassadour Extraordinary to him who notwithstanding was obliged to stop at Turin by reason of the death of Lorenzo Parula Ambassadour in Ordinary with that Duke and because the Constable Desdiguieres being come down into Piedmont with a great many men and a greater noise the Court of Carlo became the seat of so weighty a business There met then in Susa the Duke with his Sons and the Constable with the Mareshal de Crequi his Son-in-law and the President Buglion both with Characters of Ambassadours Extraordinary from the Crown for the present occurrences and Priuli chanced to be there He contested highly that their Arms might be imployed in any other place except the Genouese and if they would resolve upon an open War gave consent that they might be managed against the Milanese But the French persisted in the Council to make a War without breaking Peace with Spain and Carlo frustrate of
means to provide for it better and to be vigilant for its relief which at first he in a manner resolved to neglect He made his place of Arms in Crescentino which stands opposite to it on the Po and laying over a Bridge fortifies himself upon the banks of the River The Spaniards Force was by this means rendred vain for succours at the Dukes pleasure entred into the place with flying Colours the Guards were changed Drums beating Souldiers were relieved the weak and hurt withdrawn and if Feria battered it on the one side Carlo on the other repaired it There was notable service for many days at a Ravelline which was at the bottom of the Town defended from the upper part by certain Trenches and Cuttings which ascended in most parts above the steep of the Hill the one giving countenance and defence to the other There for the conquest of so small a piece of earth the blood of many was without consideration sported away in infinite Factions it being contentiously attacqued and defended with most manifest proofs of valour Destroyed at last rather than gained the Spaniards endeavoured by little and little to advance creeping as it were upwards but with slow and always disputed progress whilst with a pace more swift the season sickness and death bringing the Army to nothing overcame the constancy of the Governour of Milan The Duke insulted upon it with so much the greater boldness as by his pressing instances notwithstanding the Winter the Marquess Vignoles with about four thousand Souldiers were coming out of France Whereupon the besiegers themselves seemed in a manner besieged for the waters and the mire encompassed their un-inhabited Quarters in which there was great doubt to be over-powred by the boldness of the Enemy and the Chiefs of the Army were just in consultation to yield the Punctilio to Fortune when Carlo and Chrequi giving on upon the same Quarters and possessing certain Posts obliged Feria to rise by night and to retreat à la sourdine The difficulty of the ways hindred the Duke to pursue him and the opposition of the French Chiefs diverted him from going into the Milanese So that Feria with the small reliques of his great Army was able to get to Pontestura at the same time that Santacroce having left Piedmont was returning to imbark These events in which the two Crowns had gained rather the satisfaction to have protected their friends than reaped the honour of noble enterprises must not interrupt the relation of Actions in the Valteline where the Army of the Confederates being come to Riva as to the boundary of their progress had remained for some months idle although by the succours they had received they consisted of eight thousand Foot and five hundred Horse in the field besides Garrisons and a Body of men which was with Harcourt at Chiavena Nevertheless the other Party though inferiour in number because Serbellione being gone the Governour of Milan had recommended those Posts to Papenhaim alone with five thousand five hundred Foot and four hundred Horse had the advantage of the strength of the situation and the facility of relief nor could that be hindred by four Barks which being built in those parts were armed with Souldiers of the Republick because the Spaniards being superiour in number and their Cannon from the Posts thereabouts beating upon them did not give them leave so much as to put off from the shore Besides the proceedings were much retarded by the emulation betwixt Coevre and Monsieur de Vobcour Mareshal de Camp grown to such a height that he envying the glory and authority of the Marquess contradicted always the counsels or diverted the executions Thus remained the Confederates amidst the difficulty of the Enterprise and the tediousness of Consults to the great discontent of the Venetians many imputing also to the Marquess as it was usual that he was too much in love with the continuance of the command and the management of the War and Money Resolving at last to attempt Nova which having at first been abandoned by the Spaniards and neglected by the Confederates was now with many Trenches joyned unto Riva but the Chiefs of the French deferring the execution for a month the Spaniards had time not only to be pre-advertised but to repair the ruines of Codera and plant Batteries in flank at San Fedele and at Francesca keeping themselves in a readiness to withstand the attacque Nevertheless it was attempted Vobcour with the French in the march having the Vanguard the stranger Militia of the Republick under Melander and the Italians commanded by Count Niccolo Gualdo followed Vobcour at a little River makes a stand to lay over a Bridge but Papenhaim drawing many Squadrons into Arms on the other side disputes it with him and the Skirmish grew so hot that if night had not separated both Armies would have been ingaged in a general fight The Confederates finding the opposition strong and the batteries annoying under shot whereof the Troops being obliged to pass with a loss greater than they on the other side received retired having two hundred hurt and almost as many killed amongst which Marc Anthonio Gualdo Nephew to the Count Nicholas was of greatest name It was imputed to Vobcour first to have made a halt unseasonably and next to have ingaged in a fight without staying for the gross and because from the delays and ill successes pretexts and accusations were never wanting betwixt him and the Marquess he was recalled to Court In the hot months of Summer both Armies by the unwholesomness where they lay being infected with sickness languished being daily weakned by death and run-aways so that there was a secret cessation of Arms. The Venetians notwithstanding not at all trusting in such a calm brought into the Valteline fifteen hundred Foot and two hundred Horse more there being now few others besides their Troops there Valaresso fallen sick they ordered Luigi Giorgio to succeed and to Barbaro General at Land Francesco Erizzo Cavalier and Procurator Leopold from the side of Tirol threatned the Valley of Partentz but levying at the common charge of the League two thousands of the Peasants of those parts to keep the passages the danger presently vanished Papenhaim at last re-inforced with men and not at all less by the slow proceedings of the Confederates passed over the Mountain with three thousand Foot and his Horse at the same time by way of the Lake disbarking in the mouth of the Valley enters into the little Campagnia called the Back Melander with Souldiers of the Republick had the guard of it but finding himself not strong enough and having required and not received succours from Coevre who uncertain whither the Enemies march would tend would not separate his Forces he retires in good order first burning the Ammunition leaving notwithstanding seven little Pieces and four empty Barks in the power of the Germans Giorgio to a Redoubt which guarded the high-way and had been gallantly at the first
the Government Conde made wary by past experiences taking himself off from his pretensions in favour of his Daughter which in the concurrence of so many interests he saw served but for a state or pretext the male-contents betook themselves to Engines more powerful making to oppose the Queen-mother the Queen Regent through impressions of jealousie believe that the Marriage with Monpensier succeeding to be fruitful she should be neglected and in case of Widowhood be necessitated with shame and scorn to subject her self to one of her own Vassals They let it fall to her that breaking the Treaty of Marriage with Monpensier she should promote that with her own Sister the Infanta of Spain to conjoyn France to that Crown with a double obligation and establish for her self in all events stronger defence and more pleasing supports To introduce such thoughts into the Queens mind the abhorrency which she had of the Cardinal Richelieu prevailed much which was fomented by the Dutchess of Chevereufe her Confident who with many artifices had the power of her will and besides augmented her party for the Grand Prior of Vendosm being her Gallant was by her perswaded to owne it and to bring the Duke his Brother into it Brothers both though base born of King Lewis With such supports they went on to greater designs deliberating to offer to the Huguenots Gaston for their Head suborning Governours of Provinces and places not without whispering that Gaston himself after having killed the Cardinal with his own hand and retiring himself from Court with the applause of a great party should not only have constrained the King to pardon him but disposed as he thought fit of the Marriage of the Government and of the Crown Nothing passed without Richelieu's knowledge for Monsieur de Chalais Master of the Wardrobe to the King a great Confident of Chevereuses discovering of her the secrets of the business reported them to the King with so terrible a prospect as if the Conspiracy being against his own Person the design was to shut him up in a Convent exalt his Brother to the Throne and make him marry the Queen so that Lewis suspicious by nature and distrustful to extremity might have been perswaded to believe things yet more absurd Nature had afforded to few the Magick I may call it of the tongue so powerful as to Richelieu for with a quick and nervous eloquence inriched with ready replies and strengthened oftentimes at his pleasure with tears oaths and passions moving affections he overcame mens minds and governed above all the will of King Lewis who full of fear referred himself to his wisdom and conduct to the end that he might conjure down so many false appearances The beginning was made by the imprisonment of Ornano done at Fontainbleau whither the Court was removed expresly to avoid those uproars and confusions which are but too easily raised at Paris The King there talking to him of the Marriage of his Brother with Monpensier and he shewing himself not inclined to it he was presently after arrested by the Guards to the astonishment of all the rest of his party that so much the more as it was quickly followed by his death ascribed by some to the indispositions of his old age and by others attributed to poyson The Cardinal ordered it so that at the time of the arrest he was far off to the end it might be believed though he directed every thing that the King had done it upon his own will nay he desired leave to retire himself and withdraw his life from the hatred and snares of so potent enemies but the King and his Mother were so far from consenting to it that though he with express instances covetously desired the contrary they permitted him to arm himself against those that envied him with Guards which serving at first for a defence became quickly an apprehension and jealousie to the power it self of the Soveraign By the imprisonment and death of Ornano the design of the Factionaries seemed in a good measure broken but was not totally destroyed those of most power being far off they of Vendosm particularly who having the Government of Britany by their great dependencies gave great jealousies The Court set forward that way but moved slowly to give time for the Cardinals Arts who deluding the Grand Prior with his own very desires and designs and giving him hopes of the Admiralship of the Sea which he with great longing pretended perswades him to come to Blois where the King was and to bring his Brother with him but were no sooner arrived but they saw themselves made Prisoners The Court then with so much the more haste goes to Nantes preventing the uproar of the Province Others upon this would not at all trust themselves The Count of Soissons who aspired to the Marriage of Monpensier and to obtain it was entred into the party of the male-contents left the Kingdom and made a Voyage into Italy Chevereuse commanded to remain at a house in the Country making an escape gets into Lorrain and with a spirit above the custom of the Sex greedy of novelties passes afterwards to other Courts carrying every where in her mind the fire of War against France and that of the loves of great Princes in her rare beauty Chalais alone remained unwarily taken in the net which he had laid for others for either trusting in the good turn he had done more than mindful of the offence committed thinking his service not well recompensed conceived too vast hopes or that repenting to have said too much he would discover no more was by sentence of Judges as guilty of the Conspiracy it self beheaded in Nantes Where at last the Marriage with Monpensier was performed for the Kings Brother having no body near him that might suggest the contrary married her and immediately intangled in loves and the first pleasures of Marriage was careless of the ruine of all his Confidents These were then the confusions of Court amidst which the Treaty of Monzone being concluded if they took not wholly away the blame they at least served to make some sort of excuse but the Duke of Savoy not admitting of any despising the flatteries of Bouillon was so greatly offended that swearing an implacable hatred and the most open resentments against the Cardinal by the means of Alexander the Abbot of Scaglia his most sharp-sighted Minister he closes with the male-contents of the Kingdom offers them all incouragement and forces and particularly to Gaston assistance and retreat if as he effectuall perswaded him he would revenge himself of the Cardinal But at Court the seeds of discord being extinguished he turns his practices to the Huguenots and to England sending Scaglia to London to the end that promoting a fierce War against France he might either gain upon that Kingdom those Conquests which he complained he had been elsewhere traversed in by those Ministers or at least molest and punish him that had dared to abandon
much the more applause as to have got the day after he was little less than overcome so that Chance which in Battels usurps so great a share could not in this by the Victory upbraid the one with its favours or by the loss blemish the praise of the other At the price of such a days work not only the remainder of the conquered who straitned in Luther rendred at discretion but Northeim and all the Countries of Luneburg and Brunswick with many other Cities and places yielded consequences prosperous to Ferdinand spreading themselves into every part of the Empire Nor could it fall out at a time more unseasonable for the King of Denmark for that England and France ready to break betwixt themselves denied him the assistance he hoped for The States of Holland only who apprehended Tilli his old design of getting into Frizland by the way of Embden sent him some succours of men being able to do it with so much the greater convenience as that in this year besides the taking of Oldensel which was of no great moment they had stood either attentive on the Affairs of the Empire or only imployed themselves to hinder the cutting off a Chanel which the Spaniards attempted in vain to unite the Maze with the Rhine The King himself within a while took new vigour from six thousand Foot and a thousand Horse sent him by the Administrator of Hall and from Recruits of his own Subjects whereupon marching out of the Country of Holstein whither he was retired for refuge he was able to take Hoye though himself hurt there with a Musket-shot and his Son by a double stroke much more dangerously Taking his Quarters afterwards in the Bishoprick of Bremen Tilli also divided his throughout the Lower Saxony for a bridle and punishment of those refractory Provinces But the defeat at Luther had given its counter-blow in every other part To reduce the Upper Austria whose stirring carried great danger with it Ferdinand had invited Bavaria to signalize himself by the recovery of that Province once more to God and the Austrians But he wont above all men in all Negotiations to joyn together two things so contrary as are Religion and Interest offers to do it at his own charge provided nevertheless for his re-imbursement that the Country as a fresh pledge might remain in his hand Ferdinand doubtful if another Country should be offered him of recovering this and recompensing him was contented that he should only lend him some Souldiers with which joyning some Horse under the Command of Papenhaim the Peasants were forced to remove from Lintz and having their Quarters afterwards beaten up at Entz were at last wholly subdued with much blood and a mighty slaughter In Silesia Mansfelt had lost the opportunity of going forward by a Truce interposed by Gabor that he might joyn with him so that the Imperialists had him shut in betwixt two Rivers but when they thought to keep him so inclosed he gets loose from them by stealth and advances into the Mountains of Hungary where at last Gabors Brother joyns him with three thousand Horse and a little after a great Body of Turks with which he might have had the better of the Enemy by reason of the number of his Forces and the inclination of the people if the fame of the Victory of Luther had not been to Wallestain in place of a great supply For Gabor applying himself to new projects of Peace separates from Mansfelt and by his example the Turks retire so that the Count environed in the Mountains by the Imperialists without victuals without money and with Troops almost disbanded and consumed leaving order to the small reliques of his Army that they should endeavour to joyn with the Transilvanian slips away almost alone and by a desperate counsel getting into the Turkish Dominions proposes new Unions and Treaties to the Ottoman Ministers and takes his way towards Dalmatia so to get to Venice and from thence pass to those Princes which had formerly assisted him But being come to Vracoviz an obscure place in Bosnia near to the Confines of the Venetians wearied with cares and wants he dies ordering his Corps to be buried in the Territories belonging to the Republick And so Ernest Count of Mansfelt having sought for a glorious death amongst so many famous occasions was ignobly surprized by it there where he least expected to the end it might be said that Fortune had defrauded him both in his birth and death A man otherwise that without envy may be called Famous and be celebrated without blame for great An. Dom. 1627 in an Age wherein some are chosen from Heaven for Ministers of Divine Justice and publick Calamities He had the courage to provoke alone and by his own private Authority and Conduct the formidable power of the Austrians He was alone overcome in Battel but by his felicity of getting up again no less renowned than the Conquerours Superiour in Negotiations to the greatest Wits Bold in encountring dangers and highly subtil in winding himself out of them a Lover of disorders and novelties enduring hunger watchings and excess eloquent wise and vigilant prodigal of his own covetous of anothers lived amidst great hopes and designs and dyed without Lordships and without Treasure The Marquess of Dourlach thought by his example to be able to attempt Alsatia having raised some Troops in Basil by encouragement of the Protestant Switzers and some little money with which France and England secretly furnished him but not with an equal success for the greatness of the Austrians so firmly rooted with so many Victories being no more to be moved with little shocks the Marquess no sooner began to put himself in order but an Army of Ferdinands arriving in those parts ruined the design intimidated the Switzers and obliged those of Basil to discharge him He therefore passes into Denmark but had first sent to Venice the Colonel Niccolas Boet to communicate his intentions to the Republick and desired assistance at a time that the King of Denmark also by Joachim Cratz and the effectual interposition of the Ambassadours of England and Holland demanded money for the maintaining of five or six Regiments The Senate having fully deduced the obligation which the Republick had to the common Cause by what had been done in the course of many years in Italy shewed their sense in the importunity without engaging themselves further ANNO M.DC.XXVII Ferdinand now feared by many and respected by all kept under the Empire with an armed hand keeping his Armies dispersed in the Countries of the Electors and Princes that where any held up his head they were ready to suppress and chastise them Nor seemed the design longer concealed to reduce Christian Religion and the Authority of the Austrians to an Union in Germany The discourse now was to make the Empire successive Walestain in particular not dissembling his thoughts so to moderate the power of the Electors that like Grandees of Spain according to
pacifie the Austrians but all in vain because interest lying thwart and looking at him born in France and brought up there with Goods Countries and Governments they could never be perswaded that he would sincerely separate himself from that Crown King Lewis declared himself that he would maintain him in his Right with all his Forces and with his own Person if it were necessary to go into Italy but finding himself ingaged with the Huguenots and the English such a report served only for an appearance and the King well knowing it made tryal of the way of a Treaty having sent Monsieur de Saint Simon to the Duke of Mantua to the end he might dispose him to strengthen the Rights of Nevers by the Marriage formerly proposed The Ambassadour found the Duke still deluded with the hopes he should live long so that he obtained nothing else but the gaining of the Marquess Striggio upon whose counsels Vincenzo mostly relyed to promote the cause and advantages of Nevers when the occasion should be presented He returns then into France but the designs of the Savoyards discovering themselves to advance in proportion as the dissolution of the Marriage was scrupled at Rome and the indispositions of the Duke increased in Mantua he was sent back to Carlo Emanuel to offer him Revenues and Lands in Monferrat in exchange of his pretensions and withal to demonstrate to him How much it was better for him rather to preserve Peace in Italy than give nourishment to the Potency of Spain against which he having in other times made his breast a defence he ought not to obscure the Glory of it by new Maxims foreign to his own advantage and his ancient practices But the Duke so much the more high and lofty as he was smoothed and sought to not thinking the advantages proposed equal to his hopes pretended a great Party of the Monferrat not only on the score of his old Rights but as a kind of revenge that Ferdinand had not performed the agreement some few years before concluded and turning the state of affairs and times to his own advantage considered that Spain remaining resolute to hinder that a Prince protected by or rather subject to France should have Soveraignty in Italy it was best for him to make use of his own connivence and force for the possessing of Monferrat rather than leave it in prey to the more powerful Whilst he had his thoughts bent upon this in Turin greater inducements fell out in Mantua where the Duke by the craziness he had contracted fallen very sick gave occasion for many treacheries and designs Caesar Son of the Prince of Guastalla was then in Milan to promote the interest of his Family or rather to have his Name made use of by the Spaniards who laying hold of any pretext armed powerfully and ordered many contrivances and preparations to prevent the attempts which Nevers might make and sending four thousand Foot and one thousand Horse to the Confines of Mantua under the Count de Guerrara waited only till the Duke should expire to enter and take possession of it But Vincenzo An. Dom. 1628 by the perswasions of Striggio had in great secrecy called to him Rhetel that he might marry the Princess and be in the City at the time of his death the better to secure to himself the Succession and Principality and he with a seasonable diligence being arrived there unlooked for dissipated a great storm before it brake forth for many of the chief persons being averse to the very name of the French abhorred to have Nivers their Soveraign and entertained Treaties and Intelligences to raise as soon as the Duke should be dead and before some commotion in favour of Guastalla and of Spain for which purpose Francesco Rota Serjeant Major had been corrupted and many Arms were gathered together in the house of Frederick Gonzagha But so soon as Rhetel was arrived the Duke immediately made him Lieutenant General and the better to corroborate his Right by a solemn Testament declares him Heir To perfect the Marriage nothing was wanting but the Dispensation of the Pope by reason of the Kindred St. Simon was come to Mantua to sollicite it and the Count of Serbellone was dispatched from Milan by his endeavours and protestations to hinder it and from the Duke of Savoy the Bishop of Mondovi but they came too late For the dispence from Rome seasonably arriving at the instant that the night after Christmas-day the Duke dyed the Marriage was consummated that very hour the Corps of Vincenzo being yet warm who it was given out had by his last words ordained it The day following the Bridegroom together with mourning assumes the Title of Prince of Mantua and having in his power the Garrison and the Citadel called Porto requires from the people the Oath of Fidelity in the Name of his Father Guastalla publishes a Patent of the Emperours Commissary secretly afterwards obtained by the favour of the Spanish Ministers in which Ferdinand enjoyns to him to take possession in the Emperours Name of the Country of Mantua till the right should be declared without innovating any thing requiring Cordua that now governed Milan to maintain the Decree by force if need required He had thoughts of going himself to Mantua but seeing the passage stopt by the anticipations of Rhetel he sends the Count Mandelli to Casale to cooperate in practices which Cordua had set on foot there and to alienate the minds of that people from acknowledging the new Prince But all in vain because the name of Nevers by the endeavours chiefly of Trajano Viscardi great Chancellor was by those of Casale and the Monferrins with universal applause cryed up ANNO M.DC.XXVIII The Interests of Princes being now discovered and the secrets unveiled Reason or Justice were no longer debated in the Cause of Mantua but calculations made of force opportunity and advantage so that it was like a fluctuant Sea from which proceeded and whither tended the affections of Princes as they were more or less inclined to the one or other Party At Venice they were all agreed to maintain the liberty of Italy and their own safety which was understood to be in danger by the oppression of a neighbour State but they were as much differing about the means some with offices alone desiring to divert the dangers others by open declarations not declining to oppose the designs of the Austrians There wanted not inclinations to enter into Alliance with France but others calling to mind the late proceedings of that Crown in the Affairs of the Valteline and esteeming the assistance of Strangers little less disadvantagious to this Country than the injuries of War preferred a League with the Pope and other Princes of Italy with whom forming a middle Party they believed it easie to protect the Justice of Nevers by Negotiation and defend themselves on all occasions against violence This opinion was represented by the Senate to Vrban who no whit perplexed was
thirteen nimble Gallies and lands her at Trieste with such treatment and magnificence that in the straightness of the Ships was seen abundantly contained all that which every Element furnishes for the use of Luxury and the honour of Greatness For which the Republick in the Name of the Emperour and Catholick King received thanks Spinola had pressed the Siege of Casal now brought to straights for Provisions beginning to fail and the Garrison diminished being reduced to only two thousand Foot and three hundred Horse no hope remained but in the Succours of the French excepted by the Inhabitants who although weary of so long vexations retained nevertheless a constant fidelity towards their Prince Ferdinand Duke de Maine incouraged the defence with his presence but the command the fatigue and the vigilancy rested upon Monsieur de Thoiras with great equality of Valour and Renown of two so great Captains for if Spinola had a confidence that at his name alone as to a fatal Conquerour of strong places Casal should yield the glory gotten at the Isle of Rhé did no less stir up the other to confirm it with most vigorous proofs Spinola towards the Citadel had strengthened his approaches which in the circumference of the Camp were four divided to the Spanish German Neapolitan and Lombard Nations and beyond the Po caused to drive away the French with the slaughter of many out of a Fort upon a certain Island which defended the Mills Thoiras not amazed at any thing bringing into the Citadel for its better defence some French Companies tormented the besiegers with frequent Sallies and in one particularly upon the Lombards killing the Count Soragna with many Souldiers drives him out of certain Redoubts flinging down the Works The Enterprise not advancing with the speed supposed the Duke of Savoy was highly offended with Spinola because neglecting to succour him with all his Forces in his great dangers in hopes to profit by his calamities he had ingaged himself before Casal Wherefore the dispatching the Abbot de Scaglia to Madrid to accuse him and complain was a motive to perswade him to send him more powerful assistance by which the Siege slackning gave time to the French to send new Forces into Italy under the Mareshal de la Force and Schomberg and the Duke of Momorancy He with his Troops which exceeded not three thousand men passing towards Pignarol to joyn with the others was near Avigliana attacqued by the Prince Vittorio with five thousand Foot and one thousand Horse in a narrow passage where the gross being passed beyond it the Duke was left with only six hundred Foot and two hundred Horse But the resistance of the French and the Valour of the Duke was such that he not only passed but routed the Savoyards taking Prisoner Pagano Doria who commanded the Spanish Cavalry The Prince saving himself with few Schomberg arrives thereupon to besiege Avigliana which was rendred after a Siege but of eight days Colalto having refused to send succours to the Castle On the other side la Force had reduced into his power Saluzzo making the Garrison Prisoners Villa Franca and Poncalieri yielded to the Conquerour and the best of the Austrian Forces being intrenched at the Bridge of Carignano to hinder the passage over the Po received a great blow for being assaulted by the French and losing a Half-moon they abandoned the Post with great loss and no less confusion Nevertheless the French pressed not forward destroyed amidst the advantages of War by a most cruel plague Piedmont now really served for a miserable spectacle being made the Stage of all sort of Cruelty destroyed by the Enemies through hatred and by Friends in derision Amidst so many and so grievous accidents the Duke Carlo Emanuel burdened with sixty and nine years but much more pierced to the heart by infinite afflictions and the mocqueries of Fortune towards the end of July being surprized by an Apoplexy dies in Savigliano Death surely took him in the greatest straight of his affairs and he just at that time had his thoughts busied in more violent designs But cancelled the memory of them in the fire burning a little before he expired many Papers which contained as was divulged to the prejudice of the Milanese Intelligences and Agreements with Wallestain who was to come for the Emperour into Italy so much the more easily believed by how much the Duke was against the Spaniards for their scanty and longsom succours the more implacably provoked and Wallestain above measure disgusted with the Emperour because resolving to take from him the absolute Command of the Armies he had a mind to send him into Italy as into a specious Banishment but amidst so great chastisements God spared Italy from so great slaughter Carlo Emanuel was without question a great Prince brought up in the experience of the one and the other Fortune magnanimous persevering and valiant in War vertues which might be said defiled by ambition lust and prodigality if his very defects dressed up by his lively Art had not passed almost for things approved and commended He directed his actions immoveably to his own interest alone and measuring by the same steps profit and glory discovered himself highly inconstant in his friendships more than liberal of his own greedy of what was anothers always poor never wanting with the money of his friends he out-stood so many Wars together with the Wealth of his Subjects oppressed with most grievous Impositions Nevertheless exercising Command in his Country and Authority in his House and among Strangers keeping up his honour he was by all reverenced and esteemed In Wars seeking advantages or in Peace sowing the seeds of other Wars his designs wanting success rather than industry as the Architect of so many confusions he dyed buried amidst his own ruines With his death the face of affairs was changed for Vittorio though of a profound yet of a more composed ambition assuming the Government inclined to Peace and not having with Richelieu causes of so great diffidence but rather as the Kings Kinsman shewing himself prone towards France would not close with the Spaniards nor totally separate from them Declaring himself therefore to adhere to that side which would most facilitate Peace he exhorted the Popes Ministers to urge new Propositions whereupon Mazarine had the luck in September to conclude a Truce which though blamed by reason of the conditions by every one was nevertheless by necessity observed by all It was to last till the end of October following within which time delivering to the Spaniards the City and Castle of Casal they were to furnish Victuals for the Citadel and afterwards to have it if within the prescribed time no succours should arrive Some imputed in this Treaty to the French that by rendring the Town they yielded a point of so much honour and left means to the Enemy to hinder the succours Others accused the Spaniards that hunger having reduced all to extremity they would be contented only
had brought a Garrison into the Imperial City of Ratisbone Wallestein follows the Kings Army who directing his march towards Wittemberg thought by drawing the Imperialists after him to consume and weary them to overcome them afterwards more easily when he should meet with a fit place and an occasion seasonable to give Battel But Wallestein considering that for the approaching Winter he lost these better quarters the further he went from those convenient Provinces ceasing to follow goes into Misnia taking Leipzick and every other place of any moment He had a mind in Saxony to attacque Dresden the residence of the Elector not so much to divert him from making progress in Silesia as to chastise him by taking quarters in his Country Thence in the Spring he designed to go into Mechelburg to recover that Province causing Papenhaim to be his forerunner who in the mean time in the Lower Saxony attempted important Conquests The King perswaded by the prayers and dangers of the Elector or rather by his protests that if he abandoned him he would incline to Peace joining Bannier sets forwards to his succours whereupon Fridtland recalling Papenhaim thought to possess Naumburg to stop his way but prevented by the King resolves to protract time and sends back Papenhaim to relieve Colen by another body of the Swedes besieged Nor was the King much inclined to a Battel but seeing the Imperialists weakened follows them to Lutzen a small Town not far from Leipzick There Fridtlandt doubting to be constrained with great disadvantage to some encounter recals in all haste Papenhaim who willingly keeping himself in a command apart was ingaged in the Siege of Hall But the King hastned the Battel so much that Papenhaim hardly arrived in time with those of his Troops which were in the greatest readiness The sixteenth of November was the day on which with the blood of sixty thousand Souldiers that in both Armies boldly exposed their lives it seemed that the fortune and glory both of the King and of the Austrians was to be decided The Troops were the day before marshalled into their distinct orders the Imperialists composed of great Battalions of Foot with the Horse that defended the flanks the Swedes in two very long Lines mingled with Foot and Horse Each had great store of Cannon in the front nor could there on either side be seen better order or greater daring Nevertheless the Fight was deferred the King seeming irresolute and troubled but expressed himself that for reputation it was fit to fight doubting nevertheless that Heaven would punish him by letting many that worshipped him as a God see that he was indeed but Man Each kept their order all the night and Wallestein took a great advantage by lining with Musquetiers certain ditches just before his Enemy So that about these at the first peep of day was he hottest of the Fight and the Swedes prospered in the gaining of them though hindred by a thick mist discerned not in the Fight either their danger or advantages Six Cannons being taken they turned them against the Imperialists doing great slaughter with them They nevertheless getting into order again repulsed beyond the ditches the Enemy who left four of the Cannon nailed and carried away two The left Wing of the Imperialists where was the Polish and Croatian Horse used more to Incursions than set Battels being charged by the Kings left easily gave way and would have disordered other Squadrons if Papenhaim bringing them again to fight had not stopped the Enemy till struk with a Cannon bullet he dyed with that commendation of valour and courage which with the testimony of many scars appeared imprinted upon his face The King that thought it the honour and duty of a great Captain not to overcome only with the blood of others but having ordered his Troops and given directions for the Battel to hazard himself no less than a common Souldier was there killed also leaving it uncertain whether in truth he overcame or dyed first Some will have it that in the beginning of the Battel passing from division to division accompanied but with few he fell into a Company of the Enemies Horse by reason of the Mist not discovered and that while unknown with his Sword in his hand he defended himself and by a shot of a Carabine being flung out of the Saddle and by one foot in the Stirrup by the Horse dragged away he was afterwards by another shot slain Others that having in the left Wing beaten the Imperialists and now certain of the Victory he was hasting elsewhere but by a Company of Horse which advanced to charge was flung to the ground and as an ordinary man trampled upon and amongst others stript There wanted not some who reported and this is the most rational account of them who were in the Battel that the King whilst at the head of the Regiment of Colonel Verde of Finlanders seconded by two others of Swedes charged a great Body of eight hundred Cuirassiers commanded by Ottavio Piccolomini was shot with a Pistol in the Arm for his Cuirasse by reason of some old hurts incommoding him he wore no Arms in the Battel but not to discourage the Souldiers concealing the hurt and though willing to redouble the charge yet constrained by pain had resolved to retire with a few when at the instant he was with a Carabine shot in the Back by a Souldier who was killed in the same occasion Piccolomini returning then to the charge passed over him yet alive and left him under a heap of dead bodies ignobly covered It was never known who could boast of such a blow either because in Battels chance bears so great a sway that confounding the Fate of the King with that of the Souldiers they are not distinguished after death but by Glory or Oblivion or because in this Fortune had withal a mind to shew her self favourable that no mean person may vaunt himself to have killed so great a King and withal so noble a Souldier The Swedes continuing the fight ended the Victory before they knew of his death So that the Souldiers accustomed to fight under the eye of him from whom they expected reward and commendation believing he was fighting with them and would overcome disordered not their Ranks nor grew cool in their accustomed courage Bernard Duke of Weimar alone knowing the Kings Horse that ran loose and was bloody being aware of what was happened but inraged with the grief not to give time to the Souldiers to take notice of it charged with such a force that the Imperial Army was constrained to give way The Horse of both Wings were now fled Piccolomini alone remained the last with his Regiment and with proofs of wonderful valour after four Horses killed under him had five wounds upon him which Wallestain with a generous Present of twenty thousand Crowns cured and acknowledged And the Swedes would now have environed the Enemies Foot on all sides when the Mist which arose towards
the evening hindred them and the darkness of the night after ten hours separated this cruel fight Ten with the title of Generals were killed in both the Armies Wallestain was rather threatned than hurt with the shot of a Musket which favourably passed betwixt the seat and the buttock though at the blow not without a mark of excessive fear he let the bridle fall out of his hand and his Horse ran away with him The Imperialists by night retired towards Leipzich leaving their Cannon in the field because in the confusion of the Battel the Draught-horses were run away But in the Triumph of the Swedes the General was wanting which filling the Army that infinitely loved him with sorrow and lamentation some deplored the flower of his age others the vigour of his mind and all together the quality of a great Prince and no less Souldier He was found amongst the dead bodies mangled with wounds bruised with the trampling of Horses stript totally that not so much as his shirt remained as a Trophy of so many Conquests and so great an Empire A King certainly saving the errour of his Religion endowed with those qualities which have rendred the Conquerours of the World famous Possessing in an equal degree courage and prudence and if in conquering he seemed fierce and violent he was as wise and circumspect in preserving His vertues being solid and all of a piece it could not be discerned to which in his knowledge of the Military or Civil Affairs the prize was to be given Yet all his life having been in a continual exercise of Arms it seemed that he himself gave it the preference And indeed Fortune in these so far favoured him that having fought many Battels and always conquered in this very instant of death he dyed victorious after death and a long course of prosperity hath crowned in such sort his Sepulchre that his very ashes may be called Triumphant This was the issue of the Battel of Lutzen both Parties judged fatal the one having lost the field and the other their King but if these got the Victory the others saved themselves Wallestain staying but a few moments at Leipzich retires afterwards into Bohemia and the Swedes conducting the Body to Weissenfelt solemnized his Funeral with Revenge and Arms. Leipzich was rendred to Saxony to Weimar Chemnits to Kniphausen Pleiffenberg and Zuiccan to Horn and to the Rhingrave after the defeat of the Imperial Cavalry in Alsace Rheinfelt Colmar Haghenau and other places Frederick Prince Palatine under the countenance of this the Swedes Fortune regains Frankendale but taking the death of Gustavus to heart An. Dom. 1633 dyes himself within a while after Baudissen having taken Andernach troubled the Elector of Colen and the Dukedom of Berg. In this year also were in mourning through unhappy Fate almost all the Royal Families of Europe for in Spain whilst King Philip kept his Court in Catalogna dyes Charles his Brother in the flower of his Age a Prince of a haughty mind and impatient of being idle to such a degree that being designed to temper with more quiet imployments the heat of his nature to the Government of Portugal while the Infante Cardinal his other Brother was going to that of Flanders he raging with anger within a while dyes either from the weariness of his condition or by disorders having in a manner dissolved his mind in idleness and wasted his natural strength in pleasures Fame nevertheless accused the Conde Duke as if fearing the opposition of his hot spirit against his Authority he should have procured his death by poyson But it is not becoming without more certain proofs to give credit to so hainous a wickedness In Germany Leopold Archduke of Inspruch weary of the blows of Fortune prejudicial to his House and Country dyes leaving little Sons under the Tutelage of Claudia de Medici his Wife In Poland King Sigismond departs this life and in the Diet of the Kingdom was substituted Vladislaus his Eldest Son The Republick to congratulate his coming to the Crown made choice of Giovanni Pisari Cavalier for Ambassadour Extraordinary who afterwards appointed elsewhere leaves Giorgio Giorgio Cavalier to perform it and it was answered in the Name of the King by the Duke of Ossolinschi after he had been to present obedience to the Pope ANNO M.DC.XXXIII By the death of Gustavus all the World believed notwithstanding the posthumous Victory and the advantages of Arms that as great and weighty bodies when they fall are split into small pieces so Fortune would be shaken and such a breach made into that Power that the Armies should disband Princes disunite Conquests be lost and after a short flash there would remain of this great Thunder-stroke no more but the memory and the ashes But quite contrary for after having setled in Swede the Succession of the Crown in Christina the only Daughter of the King deceased and placed the Tutelage of her that was not above seven years old in the hands of the principal Ministers the Chiefs of the Army calling a Council in Germany resolved to continue the War so much the more earnestly by how much they hoped that Honour and Booty will in future accrue to their advantage To Axel Oxenstern great Chancellor a man of a notable Talent they yielded the direction of the ordinary Counsels and to Weimar they committed the chief management of the Armies not without distasting the Elector of Saxony who by reason of his dignity thought it due to him So the War under divers Chiefs and with several Armies was presently spread into many Provinces to the so much ruine of places and people that if it ordinarily be nourished with cruelty and blood at present it seemed that the alone desolating of Germany was the aim of the Armies Amongst infinite successes which changing felicity and fortune hapned in several places it shall suffice to make choice of the most signal that serve most for the reflection of Princes and the alteration of States Whilst the Swedish Chiefs were dividing designs and charges Fridtland not only goes far from Leipzich but out of the Countries of the Elector of Saxony though with the fright of his Arms he might easily have perswaded him to an agreement and leaving but a few Troops in Bohemia goes into Silesia under pretext to oppose the Saxons who indeed made less disturbance there than elsewhere The Austrians joyful for the death of the King Gustavus stormed nevertheless against their own General accusing him that neglecting so great a conjuncture to end the War with advantage he had not made use of the arts proper to a Conquerour nor his wonted ones of a great Captain Wherefore the confidence Ferdinand had in him did henceforward degenerate into suspicion that he was pleased with War and the Command whereupon to satiate his ambition or rather to found his intention a great sum of money in the name of the Spaniards was offered him that by his reputation and conduct an
Army being raised he would send it against the States of Holland for the Conquest of Friesland of which with the title of King they willingly gave him the propriety He by rejecting the offer increased the jealousie and much more by entring into a project of agreement with Arnheim General of the Saxons justly offensive to the Emperour though Fridland with wonted craft let him know that he had no other end but to delude and amuse the Enemy But Arnheim having taken his march towards Leutmerits to attacque Gallas he makes a show to follow him but on a sudden falls near Stenan upon a body of men commanded by the old Count de la Tour and the Collonel Tubald and surprises them in such sort that wanting means and time to defend themselves the Souldiers rendred themselves upon the shameful conditions to deliver up the Cannon and Colours to inroll themselves amongst the Imperial Troops and to leave their Commanders Prisoners until the other places of Silesia should be rendred to Ferdinand But the Governours refusing to obey the orders of Tubald and la Tour Fridland nevertheless increasing as it were with his military attempts the suspicions which were had of his intentions gave to the one together with many Officers liberty and promoted the escape of the other He afterwards recovers Lignits Glogau and Francford on the Oder and would have passed on further aspiring to the recovery of Mechelburg without considering those greater mischiefs which the Emperour suffered elsewhere if new and greater accidents had not recalled him After the death of the King Gustavus France saw the Affairs of the Empire constituted in a state which was more pleasing to them the prosperity of those Arms declining which at first gave them great jealousie and all the party of the Protestants reduced to a necessity to receive with its assistances the law and motion of its interests Therefore renewing in Hailbrun for other ten years with the Chiefs of the Swedes Army the Treaty which France had with the King deceased and inlarging it with other Princes of that faction it obliges them to hold him for a common Enemy that should dare to separate himself or conclude a Peace without the consent of all Supplying then the Confederates with money the King of France begins also to dispose of those Forces Whereupon to divert the United Provinces from the wonted Treaties about a Truce with Spain he brings to pass that the Colonel Melander who served the Landgrave of Hesse should be sent with a good number of Troops to join Orange who so re-inforced might take Rhinberg and keep the Armies of Spain so distracted that the French under the title of protection might have success in making themselves Masters of all the Country of Trier without resistance In Westphalia then the Duke George of Luneburg and William Landgrave of Hesse in their progress against the Elector of Colen and other Catholicks of that quarter defeated the Count John Merode who with an Army of thirteen thousand men raised with Spanish money defended that circle and intended to attempt the relief of Hamelen but being put to flight by the Protestants left them in prey not only almost all his Souldiers with Cannon and Baggage but the place it self and many others thereabouts Weimar in this interim employs himself in Francony and Horn with Bannier opposed themselves to the Elector of Bavaria who with his own Forces alone upholding in those parts the Affairs of the Catholicks was after the taking of Raim passed into Swevia and there taken Meminghen and Kempen The Swedes effectually strengthened at Donawert to the number of seven thousand Horse and eight and twenty thousand Foot did most terrible mischiefs in his Country possessing themselves of Munichen and the Bishoprick of Aichstadt but by Aldringher who came speedily to his assistance were constrained to retire out of it The Austrians were not a whit less troubled by the Rhingrafe in Alsatia and for the defence of it had stirred up with great promises Charles Duke of Lorrain who equally ready to take Arms and to lay them down had in order to the executing of the Treaty with France delivered to the King some Troops but in such sort that they immediately disbanding and re-assembled anew under the name of the Emperour with others which he feigned to license forming an indifferent Army they took in Haghenau Colmar and other places which being presently put into his hand served for the price of his ingagement and a spur to his declaration in favour of the Emperour He hoped to quell the Swedish Force by Arms and to preserve himself from the invasion of the French by the revolutions which Orleans promised to raise up in that Kingdom But on the one side his design was betrayed by fortune and on the other success answered not his hopes for in the first place the Swedes being come to recover Haguenau whilst Charles attempted to relieve it he was entirely defeated by them whereupon Lorrain no less than alsatia remaining a prey to the Enemy the Rhingrave with many incursions did miserably afflict him Lewis then taking upon himself the revenge of the common injury possesses without dispute the Dukedom of Bar after an arrest of Parliament which declared it devolved to the Crown for that Charles had not done his Homage for it and St. Michael Pont a Mousson Chaunes Luneville and other places of less importance being rendred he comes near with his Army to Nancy Duke Charles having brought the War into his own Country without means to maintain it endeavours to pacifie the King with several propositions of submission and agreement But Richelieu admitted not for caution of his faith other pledge than the depositing of Nancy the Metropolis of the Country the residence of the Duke and a very strong place The Duke seeing that by nourishing distrusts he had put all things into a confusion renounces on a sudden to the Cardinal Nicola Francisco his Brother with the Title the Country to the end that being new as to offences he might better mitigate the resentments Richelieu despising the shift and calling the contrivance fraudulent refuses any propositions from the new Duke though having laid down his Purple sought in marriage Mad. Combalet the Cardinals beloved Neece offered instead of Nancy to deposit la Motha and to cause to pass into France Margaret whose marriage with Orleans King Lewis pretended was null as contrary to the Laws of the Kingdom which prohibit those in succession to the Crown to marry without the Kings consent But these very propositions were by Richelieu turned into distrusts and accusations for that Margaret while these things were in agitation going out of Nancy disguised and deceiving the French Guards which environed the place on all sides made her escape by flight and came to her Husband at Brussels after having wandred in the woods and narrowly avoided the risque of falling into the hands of some Swedish parties of Souldiers whence
Richelieu ascribing all to the fallacious faith of the Lorrainese and scorning the alliance offered constrains him at last to promise To separate himself from stranger friendships and not to meddle in the Affairs of Germany to join close with France and deliver Nancy in Hostage till time and their actions should mitigate jealousies and that the marriage with Orleans were broken In the place aforesaid consisted the security of the conditions no less than the fortune of the Duke Therefore the Governour by secret Orders which he had from them denys the French Garrison entry and on the other side the King threatens all sorts of rigour and force so that within a few days the same Treaty was confirmed with the addition only that both the Dukes had liberty to keep their Residence in Nancy a condition which tended reciprocally to deceipt for by keeping a foot there the Lorrainese hoped to maintain themselves the strongest and the French proposed to keep them little less than Prisoners As force is always accustomed to get the better of wit so Duke Charles finding no longer protection in his own Country nor from Strangers expecting succours was forced to submit for being come to the French Camp under a shew of confidence as that which was the last remedy to humble himself to the King he perceived that under the appearance of honour he was under the custody of Guards and was thereupon obliged to give precise orders to the Governour of Nancy that he should receive Monsieur de Brasac with a French Garrison so that having by this means obtained his liberty he thought good to leave Lorrain and the King leaving there the Mareshal de la Tour with a great Army to favour the Siege of Brisach undertaken by the Rhingrave extends as far as the Rhine his quarters and advantages having obtained of one of the Dukes of Wirtemberg to put a great Garrison into the Town of Monpeliard All this vexed the Austrians and particularly the Spaniards because if the French should remain in the possession of Lorrain and Brisach were lost they saw the passage hindred of succours for Flanders which they were wont to draw out of Italy by that way They resolved that Ferdinand Cardinal Infanta should pass to Milan to be conveyed from them to his Government of Flanders sollicited by a double care both out of necessity to oppose to the proceedings of Fridtland in Germany another Chief of consideration and power and to provide for the Affairs of the Low Countries which by the death of the Infanta Isabella fallen under the direction of the Marquess d' Aitona were tottering both from the unquiet humours of the people who were ill satisfied and the vast designs of neighbouring Potentates The Cardinals Voyage could not be performed without great preparations which consumed time and money nor without some apprehensions of the Princes of Italy who saw the Provinces filled with Souldiers and Provisions and the minds of the Ministers big with bitter disgusts and troubled thoughts the Condé Duke venting frequent aggravating expressions that Peace could never be enjoyed if Italy were not restored to its former Constitution And to say truth there appeared no more that face of Authority and Rule which the Ministers of that Monarchy were wont to enjoy because besides the Dukes of Savoy and Mantua the one by the Bridle of Pignarol and the other by the custody of Casal and of the Monferrat being made dependants on the Crown of France almost all were wavering and some for their profit made merchandise of their inclinations put at present in ballance betwixt the one and others Crown Nay the Pope himself though he refused the Duke of Crequi sent by King Lewis in the usual Ambassy of obedience to enter into that League which he proposed to him yet he gave manifest signs of the ancient partiality towards that Crown so that the Cardinal Antonio his Nephew had thereupon and with large pensions accepted the protection of that Kingdom and although Vrban opposed it with the loudest appearances the Spaniards nevertheless believing rather a secret consent feared from it pernicious designs They therefore dispatched to Rome the Bishop of Cordoua and Giovanni Chiaumazzero in quality of Commissoners to require reformation of some abuses of the Dateria which tended to the oppression of the Kingdom of Spain but in effect to oppose themselves to the Negotiations of France and if they could effect nothing else to avenge the disgusts with disgusts whence it was thought fit that they should have secret instructions to demand a Council and straighten the Pope with threatnings and offensive demands Sure it is that Vrban denying to receive them with the Title of Commissioners which it seems signifies a certain Jurisdiction and Authority wearied with difficulties and delays in such sort the business and cooled also the Bishop with the hopes of a greater Dignity that the King being aware of it recalled him and conferred upon the other the Title of Ambassadour whilst with time the heat of Spirits being mitigated and by the contrariety of successes the Spaniards bowing themselves more and more to sufferance the business vanished of it self The French Ministers ceased not to imprint in the Princes of Italy jealous thoughts and to exhort them to joyn together to drive under the protection of their Crown the Spaniards out of Italy They on the other side proposed to all great advantages offering by means of the Regent Villani to the Grand Duke great Pensions and to the Duke of Modena to deliver him Corregio a little Soveraign State which being by the Emperour confiscate from its ancient Princes for the imputation of false Money the Spaniards had in Pawn to the end to make Merchandise of it with the bordering Princes To Parma they offered the Generalship of the Sea and a Vice-Regency provided he would in exchange and as a pledge of confidence permit a Levy of six thousand Foot to be serviceable to the Cardinal Infante in his Voyage into Flanders That Dukedom was possessed by Edwardo Farnese young in years and of a spirit more elevated perhaps than the narrowness of his Country and Fortune could bear He by a certain lively Genius inclined naturally to the French and they incouraging it with frequent sending of Ministers brought him at last to their Party Taking Jealousie therefore at the preparatives for the Cardinal Infante and at the Marriage of Stigliana with the Duke of Medina las Torres Vice-King of Naples as though he would call in question again Sabioneda armed and under that pretext receives under his own Colours Souldiers which were sent to him out of France The Venetians above all were more earnestly pressed so that Razzillier after having visited in the Name of King Lewis the other Princes came to incourage them not only to continue in the custody of Mantua but to exhort them to pay at least half the Garrison in Sabioneda and to take part in the Affairs of the Grisons and
were commanded to obey him that would shew their fidelity to the Emperour and separate themselves from Wallestain now in open Rebellion Upon the publishing of this resolution he perceived how slippery is the trust to Fortune which turns her head from those from whom the Prince withdraws his favour Seldom to say truth hath that Power been seen to subsist which having grown up under the shadow of Soveraign Authority goes about to separate it self from it At the Name of Ferdinand the Regiments fell into commotion the Officers and Chiefs withdrew the sound in a moment separating themselves from the infected Being then left with a few not thinking himself secure in Pilsen where he now was he leaves the Government of it to one of his Confidents and takes his way towards Egra beleft to be a fit place as being the door of the Kingdom by which he might either let into Bohemia Stranger Armies or save himself into the neighbouring Provinces He had sought to Weimar to come speedily to his assistance offering to deliver him places but whilst the Duke in so weighty a matter was considering the advantages and the hazards and that not to hazard all his Forces he sent Birchenfelt with one part into the Palatinate to give him countenance and Duke Francesco Albert of Saxe to Egra to discover the designs the Scene was changed and the occasion vanished Wallestain did believe that those that stuck to him bound by the bonds of gratitude and obligation would run all sorts of Fortune with him but there wanted not some that followed him for the opportunity to vent by betraying him secret hatred and designed revenge and for the hope to get from the Emperour great rewards He had with him the Irish Regiment of Colonel Walter Butler John Gordon of the same Nation Tersica his Kinsman the Count Lesly Scotch-man Captain of his Guards L'Illo and other as well Officers as Souldiers believed to be most in confidence with him Some of these began among themselves to consider and then discourse with their Friends That in Battels the danger was common to all but the Reward and Glory was to a few that an occasion was here offered to gain a rich Prize with Renown worthily memorable that the Victory depended upon their own wills and hands To what purpose follow an unfortunate Rebel abhorred of all that would sell their Blood their Honour together with their Faith and Towns to Strangers One sole blow kills the Sacrifice expiates the fault pacifies the Prince nay obliges him to retribute wealth and favours to those that with their obedience preserve Kingdoms This was enough to animate them for every one was already perswaded of his own Interest whereupon Lesly Butler and Gordon promising fidelity to one another drew in some others and inviting L'Illo and Tersica to Supper in their Lodging growing hot in discourse among their Cups feigning a Wrangle confounding Wine with Blood and violating Hospitality kill them Thence not to give time to divulge it hasting to Wallestains Chamber and forcing the door whilst he awakened would have looked out of a Window to call for help and reproached the Conspirators they with many blows killed him with a Halbard Then leaving him dead upon the ground they went out of the Castle to inform the Souldiery with what was done and flatter them with great promises Nor found they any great trouble to do it for the Chiefs being dead not one durst shew resentment The day following keeping the Gates shut that the death might not be published they went out of the City under the pretence of honour and conduct to meet the Duke Francesco Albert who came in the name of Weimar to settle some agreements and arresting him Prisoner carried him to Vienna where they found great commendations and bountiful rewards Such was the unhappy destiny of Albert of Wallestain Duke of Fridtland who had formerly subdued the Empire by Arms and frighted Europe with his name He exalted the Nobleness of his Birth by his Military Vertue which from the lowest degrees lifted him up to a great Fortune so much the more honourable as carried to it by his own Merit he ascended not upon the ruine of others Amidst many faults of ambition cruelty and violence with which he afflicted his very friends his enemies commended his prudence his wariness and his discipline It seemed that he was always above Fortune and accidents or rather that foreseeing and mastering every thing in his mind he prevented difficulties and cross adventures He was accustomed to overcome and if at any time he seemed to have the worst the World in the belief of his felicity was perswaded that he had no mind to overcome Some condemned a certain rashness in his actions that rendred him precipitate nevertheless being always guided by hidden motives it was easily discerned that leaving little to chance he rewarded not without judgment nor punished without distinction Whatsoever the cause was if he lived with Glory he dyed with scorn Nevertheless opinions upon his case were diversly contested some believing him a Traitor before adjudged others that he cast himself into the Precipice after he saw himself lost Whereupon various were the Judgments the one by the infamy of his present actions cancelling the Glory of those past and the others by attributing his disgrace to the Fortune of great Imployments easily suffering his death whose life they hated before But in Vienna in regard of his Kindred and Friends which were in the Court quickly suppressing the discourse of the causes and of the fact and punishing some of the Conspirators it was resolved that the King of Hungary should go into the field to chear up the Army with his presence contain the Souldiers in their duty and hinder competition amongst the Chiefs This could not be done so suddenly that the Swedes made not great advantage of the past alterations for that in Alsace the Rhingrave routing near Tarn the Imperialists took amongst more considerable conquests Ensheim Friburg and Rinfelden In Swabe were yielded to Horn Meminghem and Chempem The Elector of Saxony having besieged Budweis and first burnt it with Bombes before he took it passed to Gorlitz which he found abandoned Retiring then into his own Country leaves to Arnheim the Command of the Army and he offering the Imperialists Battel near Lignitz after a long and doubtful fight defeats them with the death of three thousand of their men the gaining of many Colours and nine pieces of Cannon possessing Stenau Glogau and other places of importance at the same time that Banier took Francfort on the Oder and Crossen The King of Hungary coming forth at last with powerful Forces and the Army incouraged with his presence joyns the Bavarians who had recovered Strubingh and begirts Ratisbone with a Siege battering it with a hundred piece of Cannon Weimar draws near to it disturbing the Royal Camp which had not its Circumvallation yet finished but for want of Victuals he was forced
Favourite agrees with the King his Brother Puilaurens had been gained by Richelieu so that as he in compliance with his own loves to the Princess of Falsburg another Sister of Carlo's had already driven on Orleans to the Marriage with Margaret so now weary of those inclinations and baited by the Cardinal with promises of great recompence and the Marriage with his own Niece perswades him to leave his Mother and Wife at Brussels and to return by stealth into the Kingdom But Puilaurens was not long ere he felt the punishment of his over-much credulity for being allured by the Marriage and at that very time new offences being produced and he condemned to lose his life his death dissolved it The Spaniards remained by the escape of Orleans frustrated of their hopes and the surprise of the Islands of Ere 's in Provenze was deferred contrived by them to be executed under Imperial Colours upon pretence of succours and diversion for Lorrain For five and twenty Gallies seven great Ships with Souldiers and all other Provisions being come from Naples into Sicily to joyn with other eight Gallies and to take on Board Souldiers found things there in so little readiness that they were forced to put it off till the next year From such provisions and so great designs was easily to be comprehended that some great motion to War was near And therefore the Venetians failed not to attempt by their endeavours effectually imployed by Luigi Contarini in France and Giovanni Giustiniani in Spain to pacifie their minds and moderate animosities but the evil being at the point of breaking forth was rather provoked so that all diligence became fruitless and reasons were heard but not considered both the Crowns endeavouring rather by allurements and promises to bring the Republick into their opinions and change the Mediation into an adhering either to the one or other side An. Dom. 1635 THE HISTORY OF THE REPUBLICK OF VENICE THE TENTH BOOK ANNO MDCXXXV THE slaughters and calamities which dishonouring Christendom and destroying Europe have made famous the rancour of two great Ministers will give posterity just occasion to number this rather amongst the most doleful than a renowned year in which France and Spain came to an open breach and gave a beginning to a long War with memorable accidents and bloody successes intermingled with fallacious Treaties vicissitudes of Arms insurrections of people and the mockeries of Fortune It was already discovered that the emulation betwixt Richelieu and Olivares could no longer remain concealed neither wanted there on either side occasions or pretexts for the Fleet in Italy the Armies in Spain the Treaties with Orleans the stirring up the discontented abundantly discovered what engine was preparing by the Spaniards and on the other side the possession of Lorrain the progresses in Germany the Treaties with the Swedes and the Subsidies to Holland pointed out what designs the French were contriving The Cardinal sent the Count of Botru to Madrid and the Condé Duke Benavides to Paris but rather to espye the state of things than to beget confidence having rather mutually brought back instead of fair words and kind usage provocations and stinging incentives it is not credible to what a height rage was inflamed and minds irritated made sensible through ambition and resolute in revenge the better to confirm authority amidst Arms and uphold favour and glory Richelieu was happy who in these preludiums of War experienced in every Treaty the more lucky destiny to conclude with the Vnited Provinces of the Low Countries the League offensive and defensive which so much awakened in the World discourses expectation and fame and stirred up in the Austrians so many apprehensions and fears for by the Articles of the same The Provinces in obedience to the King of Spain were to be assaulted by the Confederates with Forces united of fifty thousand Foot and ten thousand Horse after that by a publick Manifest they should be invited and for three months their answer expected to shake off the Yoak and to unite themselves with others in one common body of liberty saving to every one their priviledges and in particular their Religion but when that time was past they designed them a pray to their Arms and the Conquests were to be divided Lutzemburg Namur Henault Artois and the Territory of Cambray were to be yielded to France with a part of Flanders on this side of a line which was to be drawn from Blankenburg betwixt Bridges and Dam taking in Ruplemond the rest was to belong to the States of Holland with a promise to leave the Catholick Religion every where in the state they found it It was agreed not to make Peace or Truce but by common consent and not to admit of any terms till the Spaniards were first totally driven out of the Low Countries They proposed to attacque Towns in an alternative order one of the repartition to France and then another of those assigned to Holland but leaving the choice to the will of the Generals A Fleet at Sea was over and above this agreed upon and the French were to declare War to the Emperour and every body else that upon this account should molest the States All this tended to give a great stroke if in the management of the War the interests of the Confederates had met with a parity as in the Treaty their minds were equally disposed and their wills agreeing The Spaniards coming to the knowledge hereof to the Pope and in all Courts laid load upon the French with bitter invectives as if they would expose Religion in pray to the Hereticks and that not contented to see it through the countenance of their assistance depressed in Germany they went about to extirpate it also in those Provinces where under the Government of their Monarchy the true Worship was retained But all that availing little placing their confidence in Arms rather than complaints they determine upon prevention by shutting that door by which the French assaulting the back-side of the Provinces intended to bring their Army to join with that of Holland The Count of Embden then sent by the Cardinal Infanta to attempt the gaining of the Citadel of Triers succeeded in the surprise of it by night through the negligence with which Arnoud the French Governour kept it the Garrison in the exploit being cut to pieces and the Elector remaining Prisoner for that hindred by the Gout he was not able to make his escape He was sent to Vienna to give account to the Emperour of his putting himself under the protection of the French and to have introduced into his Towns stranger Garrisons contrary to the constitutions of the Empire At the same time Fortune applauding beginnings Colonel Bamberg who after a long Siege had rendred Phillipsburg to the Swedes by whom it was afterwards delivered over to France by the favour of the Ice passing the ditch happily surprised that very strong place At two so great and unexpected blows the French were
thousand Foot and not many above a thousand Horse comes close to the Trenches and without giving time to the Spaniards to take a considerate view of them assaults them forcing them in a very narrow passage By which entring in the evening they were forced night coming upon them to halt within the Enemies Camp The Spaniards surprised could not or had not the skill to oppose them but rather considering that the day following it would be impossible to avoid a Battel silently under the favour of the night retire leaving Leucate free the Camp empty and forty piece of Cannon with infinite Provisions in the power of the French From so many fortunate successes some flattered themselves that the Cardinal having thus provided for his glory would more easily incline to Peace It appeared nevertheless that he became no less amorous of new Conquests than Olivares was irritated at this his adversity And for this cause although in both Courts a truce was proposed by the Ministers of the Pope and the Venetians and that the General of the Minims carried secretly from Paris to Madrid projects betwixt the two favourites yet nothing was concluded because in the Truce the French would have their Confederates comprehended and keep what they had gotten and both the one and the other was denied by the Spaniards not to treat with the Hollanders as equals nor accustom their Enemies to a peaceable enjoyment for so many years of the places possessed Hereupon arose quickly new difficulties the French denying as hath been said elsewhere to acknowledge Ferdinand the Third for King of the Romans and successor into the Imperial Crown of his Father who in the month of February of this year being the fifty ninth of his age yields to the frail condition of Mortality This Prince had experienced such various accidents of things prosperous and unfortunate as may be equally observed both for a testimony of divine Providence and an example of humane vicissitudes From slender beginnings and a very narrow condition he rose to great hopes and afterwards to greater power amidst the oppositions and treacheries of Strangers and of Subjects but they being brought under and the other conquered for the overcoming also of jealousie and envy he wanted nothing but the moderation of counsels He had a tryal therefore of the reflux of Fortune with such blows as made him see his Greatness panting under the Forces of a King almost unknown and despised But the death of Gustavus ascribed to a blow from Heaven the Victory at Nortlinghen no less seasonable than great and the Peace of Prague which contented the chief of the Protestants confirmed to the Son all the Dignity of the Father It was looked at as a great miracle nay rather a singular protection from Heaven that the Election of a King of the Romans should succeed so opportunely and that after so great agitations and so many calamities the Patrimony untouched together with an hundred and ten thousand men in Arms should remain to the Successor It cannot be denied but that to Ferdinand the Second may be assigned a most deserved station amidst the best deserving Princes who have received Splendour and Renown from the Catholick Religion for that with fervent zeal he propagated it in the Hereditary Provinces nay rather may be said to have restored it by Example by Laws and by Arms. He was singular in piety constant in vertue and inflexible in all Fortunes Some laid to his charge a too much yielding to the opinions of others with a too violent heat in execution an undistinguished liberality in giving and a too patient tolerance of so many excesses with which his Souldiery and Generals afflicted Germany and Italy But his vertues were his own his faults were ascribed to Fortune and the Times And now Ferdinand the Third taken into the Empire in the nine and twentieth year of his Age the Venetians to congratulate him sent Renieri Zeno Cavalier and Procurator and Angelo Contarini Cavalier by whom they sollicited the concession of Pass-ports to facilitate the agreement of a Meeting for Peace and the King of Poland also cooperating therein with his endeavours those for Swede and Holland were consented to by the new Emperour but upon condition that they should not be delivered to the parties till after France should have dispatched his own for his Ministers with Titles and Quality of Emperour But the Meeting being still more and more prolonged military successes were in this year reciprocally ballanced in Germany for the Swedes having pursued the Saxons taken Erfordt in Thuringia and advanced into Francony were by them joyned with Gallas forced back to the Frontiers of Pomerania There Banier re-inforced with Wranghel makes head a new obliging the others through want of Provisions and Pay to retire back After this Hermestain kept by the French being rendred to Werdt was deposited into the hands of the Elector of Collen till the cause of him of Triers to whom that place belonged should be decided Werdt after this draws near to Hanau and Weimar hastes with speed to its succours wherein he was not able to succeed though he beat the Duke Carlo of Lorrain who had attempted to hinder him in his way The Duke therefore turns his march into the Franche Conté attempting to possess Besanzon an Imperial City but in vain and thereupon goes into Alsace leaving Hanau to be taken by Werdt He after the place gained follows him joyned with the Duke of Savelli and other Chiefs and seeing Weimar ingaged under Rhinfeldt attacques him obliging him with the loss of his Cannon to rise In this Encounter Rohan who was with Duke Bernard received such a hurt that he a while after dyed leaving the Arms he was wont to wear to the Republick of Venice as a gift of affection and Monument of that Renown which inrolled him in the number of the most famous Captains of the World The Imperialists not contenting themselves with this success by pursuing the Victory lost it whilst at Laufenburg whither Weimar was gone they attacqued him and he made appear of what importance is the Courage of an excellent Captain for inferior in Reputation and Forces he encounters them and fights them with so great resolution that he defeats them putting almost all to the Sword possessing Cannon and Baggage taking the Colours and numbring amongst the Prisoners of Quality Werdt himself and Enchefurt Rheinfeld under which Weimar returned was the reward of the Victory and after that Neoburg and Friburg followed That nevertheless happened in the year following but for the present in Italy the War being transported out of the Country of Parma into the Monferrat Leganes feigned to himself great progress finding himself strong eighteen thousand Foot and five thousand Horse with all sorts of other provisions But his hopes were not seconded by the event In the Langhe Martino d'Aragona took in Ponzone to open the way of succours by Sea and the Communication with Final Gilles de Haes
intending to surprise Nizza della Paglia arrived there so late in the day that he was easily discovered And not thinking it honourable to retreat fortifies himself in a Convent obliging Leganes who by the weakness of the place hoped for a short conquest of it to repair thither with the whole Army Nor was he deceived for after four days the Governour renders it there going forth four hundred Monferrins two hundred forty French and some Horse Savoyards Thence passing into the Territory of Asti orders Philippo di Silva to take in Algiano which easily succeded With the Duke of Mantua who complained of the Invasion of Monferrat and with the Venetians who did not willingly hear of his prejudice the Governour of Milan justified himself alledging that he was not bound to use respect where he found Garrisons of that Nation which with molestations and jealousies afflicted the Frontiers of the Milanese But the progress of the Spanish Arms quickly terminated in this period for Crequi returned out of France where he had been to justifie his past conduct joyning with six thousand Foot and two thousand Horse Savoyards attempted la Rocca d'Arasso a little before taken by the Spaniards but Leganes coming near with all the Army he was constrained to retire This Campagnia afterwards ended with certain Incursions and some Encounters betwixt Brem and Vercelli which were of no small moment where Villa beat Arragona with the death of some Officers on the Spaniards side and among them Spadino the known Promoter of the first Siege of Casal and the same Chiefs not far from Monbaldone putting it to a new tryal Aragona went away with the worst who hardly saving himself by flight abandoned six Cannons and his Baggage After these the accidents of Nature promoted new and unthought of successes for Italy greatly afflicted by the death of two of its Princes opened the bosom to new strokes The Duke Vittorio in Vercelli upon the seventh of October in the one and fiftieth year of his Age ended his days with various judgments upon the nature of his sickness there wanting not some who imputed it to poyson given by Crequi either for private hatred or the publick distrusts of the Crown and they drew their argument from an invitation where were with the Duke the Count de Verrua his most confident Minister and the Marquess Villa the most faithful General of his Army of which falling sick together with the Duke the first dyed and the other hardly by the strength of his complexion overcame the accidents Others believed that the powder of Diamonds given him some time before had corroded his inward parts But besides that the French are abhorring such Arts it ought not to seem strange that the Duke macerated with many cares and tedious indispositions in the decline of his age should run the common Fate so that in such cases of doubt and concealment it is more beseeming to give credit to Nature than authorize falshood Let it be as it will he left with three Daughters two Sons both very young and to them War for an Inheritance and for a Patrimony the hatred of one of the Crowns and the distrust of the other without support of any sincere friendship Francesco Giacinto the eldest having scarce tasted the benefit of life but not of command was after a few months snatched away by death leaving the Title to Carlo Emanuel his Brother Vittorio dead the Tutelage and Regency were assumed by the Dutchess Christina alledging the Will of her Husband expressed in his Testament which committed it to her alone The Princes Maurice the Cardinal and Tomaso pretended to have a share in it and pressed it so much the more as believing the life of the little Duke doubtful by reason of his tender age and weak constitution and because by the Laws of the Country Women being excluded they were incouraged to conceive great hopes that the Succession might devolve to them For which cause the Cardinal who resided at Rome leaves the Court notwithstanding that the Pope doubtful of what happened endeavoured to stop him with offers of imployments and advantages He come to the Borders of Piedmont and finding an Order there from the Dutchess that he should retire further off with a promise if he did of satisfaction and an Appennage things being not yet in a condition to use force retired into the Genouese King Lewis freed from those suspicions in which the deep and wise Conduct of the Duke Vittorio held him was glad to see his Sister Regent who since she could not adhere to her Brothers-in-law nor put trust in them remained constrained to shelter her self under his protection On the other side the Spaniards by reason of this dependence and conjunction of Blood endeavoured to have her excluded or at least that she might govern with an Authority so limited and restrained that she might not be able to bring prejudice to their interests Expecting therefore accidents from time Leganes was not solicitous to make advantage in that Conjuncture with Arms save only that he took in the Castle of Pomar in Monferrat which he abandoned so soon as he saw Crequi joyned again with Villa These two Chiefs were joyned notwithstanding their disgusts grown even to publick distrust from the time that Crequi taking occasion from the death of the Duke had attempted to cast a Garrison of French into Vercelli and Villa had prevented him by bringing in a strong Renfort of Savoyards The other accident which gave no less apprehension to Italy was the death of Carlo Duke of Mantua upon the 21. of September in the sixty and one year of his age He whilst he lived privately had had several thoughts and designs of a great Prince but having attained the Principality with great hazard governed himself amidst great troubles with the spirit and manners of a private man The Succession fell to Carlo Nephew of the Duke deceased and Son of the Prince Carlo Duke of Rhetel yet in Minority and therefore recommended by Testament and by a Codicil of the Grandfather to the protection of the French and the Venetians and to the Regency of the Mother a Princess of a most prudent understanding who altering nothing of the present state of things requires the Oath in the name of the Son and sends to Venice the Senator Paraleoni to obtain the continuance of the assistance and the direction of the Senate The Republick doubling to the end to preserve that State their diligence passed immediately effectual offices with the Emperour to divert all thoughts of novelty and in Spain used remonstrances to the end the Infanta Maria should have no thoughts of returning to Mantua to sow unseasonable suspicions Nor was it difficult to obtain it for although the Spaniards were not pleased at the assistance of Monsieur de la Tour a French Commander in Mantua yet fancying to themselves greater advantages on the side of Piedmont An. Dom. 1638 they thought it best as yet not to
connivence the party of the malecontents increasing had thoughts of retiring from Narbonne where he thought himself not safe but before he would do it supplicates the King that he would come to see him either to unloose him from the malecontents or to awaken in him with Eloquence and Art his former thoughts of him Lewis refusing to do it be then knew he was totally lost and therefore as fast as he could though in a bad season causes his Guards to carry him by hand in a certain Couch of Wood where he reposed upon a Bed towards the Baths of Terrascona to go forwards afterwards into Dauphiné and Provenze whither the Governours of those Provinces which were depending upon him invited him In this Conjuncture came the News that Guische had been defeated on the Frontiers of Flanders and that Paris was in great apprehension Many judged that the Count being in a strict intelligence with the Cardinal had by an affected negligence been the cause of this sinister accident to the end that in the confusion of things the King might know how necessary would be to him the Minister in whom the intelligence of the Kingdom rested In effect no other Expedient offered it self to Lewis but to send a Courrier after the Cardinal requiring him that to so sudden an emergency he would apply seasonable remedies for the better ordering whereof he desired in some place to speak with him But as the same Fortune in opposition to the Kingdom contributed to the prosperity of the Cardinal so did he heap much greater advantage from the accident for continuing his Journey very uncertain what measures to take the Treaty of Orleans made with the Spaniards came to his hands He presently sends it to the King to the end that he might know that whatsoever wounded the authority and favour of the Minister did withal strike through his own felicity and the Grandeur of the Kingdom Lewis was as much moved as the relapse of his Brother the ingratitude of le Grand and the perfidy of others deserved wherefore changing his affections into anger he goes to Narbonne and there to the end the Arrest might be done out of the Camp and with less noise he caused St. Mars and de Thou to be put Prisoners ordering secretly in Italy whither Bouillon was gone to command the Army that the same should be done with him He then goes to Tarrascona where the Cardinal staid and there speaking together they vented even with tears their affections and past disgusts The King communicates all that to the Cardinal which they had suggested against him and this confirmed the King in the opinion that in his fidelity and power consisted the greatest defence against foreign Forces and domestick Treacheries Thus the Mine being sprung into the Air Orleans asked the Kings pardon who grants it him on condition to see him no more and that with an assignment of two hundred thousand Francs he would retire to Nissi a Town upon the Confines of Savoy Melo the hope vanishing of raising so great a storm in France draws near to Sedan to perswade at least the Mother and Wife of Bouillon who was now a Prisoner in Italy at Casal to admit into the place a Spanish Garrison But he obtained it not because those Princesses considered the preservation of it the best caution they had of the Dukes life Making then an Incursion into the Territory of Bologne with the taking of certain Forts presently retaken by Harcourt the Spaniards ended the Campagnia on the side of Flanders The minds of the King and his Minister being reconciled and by that concord the Forces also of the Army strengthened before Perpignan by the concourse of much Gentry from the neighbouring Provinces the French prepared themselves to resist the more resolute attempts which the Spaniards gave out they would hazard The Naval Army of Spain under the Command of the Prince John Carlo di Medici General of the Sea was to second by Water the Relief which the Marquess di Torrecuso was to attempt by Land But retarding his march too too long Perpignan the Victuals after several months siege being spent and the Garrison wasted was at last rendred to the Mareshals Schomberg and la Meilleray whilst the King weakly in his health was at some distance from the Camp The loss of this place was of importance to the Spaniards and most afflicting to the Conde Duke who to hinder it had without effect imployed Treasures Treaties and Arts infinite The doubt more particularly tormented him lest while the happiness of successes maintained Richelieu amidst so many contrarieties his ill Fortune should at last weary the Kings affection towards him And the report was that he came into the Kings Cabinet lamenting and afflicted and falling upon his knees with tears demanded leave to expose himself to some certain danger to kill himself or at least to retire into the most obscure corner of the World to deliver himself from that unhappy Destiny which pursued him and that the King asking with apprehension the cause and understanding it to be the loss of Perpignan did embrace and comfort him ascribing all to the disposition of the Divine Will After Perpignan Salses was also taken and at last out of time the Army appears commanded by the Marquess of Leganes which consisted of twenty thousand Foot and six thousand Horse but coming to a Battel with the French that were inferiour in number the Spaniards at first prevailed but at last superfluously busying themselves in drawing off three Cannon gained in the first shock la Mothe Haudancourt rallying his men charges the Vanguard and disorders it Night thereupon coming on both Armies retired each ascribing to it self the Victory The Spaniards having possessed Aitona a weak place and more weakly defended were quickly wasted through scarcity of Victuals which were to be brought from far and with excessive charge Richelieu triumphed over his intestine no less than foreign Enemies for Perpignan rendred St. Mars and Thou had their heads cut off at Lyons and Bouillon threatned with the same punishment ransoms himself with the delivery of Sedan to the King to which Cardinal Mazarine betwixt the terrours of death and the hopes of great recompence perswaded him In these distractions was highly advantagious to Richelieu the common desire of the Confederates of France to maintain him for having some of them his Pensioners and in a manner all depending on him they imployed their offices with the King and Orange in particular little less than with protests gave him to understand that in the belief of the Cardinals ruine he contrary to his former inclinations had counselled the Provinces to hearken to a Truce with Spain fearing lest Maxims being changed with the change of Government there might be a change also with new Favourites in the faith of the Crown towards its Confederates At this time the Queen Mary Wife Mother-in-law and Mother of the greatest Kings of Europe wandring without shelter or refuge
as a spectacle of humane misery dyes at Collen in a poor and hired house driven by the Parliament from London rejected by the Hollanders and forsaken by the Spaniards This accident also was by the Cardinal as a despiser of Fame numbred amongst his felicities risen to say truth in the eye of the World to the highest point but in himself contaminated by unquietness of mind and infirmities of body He had discovered many of the Kings Guards participants in the contrivances of St. Mars and in particular Monsieur de Treville Captain of the Musquetiers For the last proof of his Authority and of the Kings patience he desires that he would discharge him and moreover that he would come out of St. Germans to speak with him and give way that his Guards might mingle with the Kings for his greater security The King was truly troubled at it as loving Treville and comprehending how insolent the demand was yet after certain days reluctancy the Cardinal otherwise protesting he would retire he complies with him out of a belief that the War promoted by his ambition and the affairs imbroiled by his Arts could not be supported and dis-intangled but by his abilities But when the Cardinal thought himself in a manner delivered from the changeableness of Fortune Nature would exercise her rights for wasted with many diseases death took him away upon the 4. of December in the fifty eighth year of his age Armand Cardinal and Duke of Richelieu of noble but ordinary Parents and as it happens that the beginnings of our lives buried in the deepest darkness give no discerning whither the Laws of Destiny will be extended he applies himself in his Youth to Studies and afterwards to the life of a Church-man Aspiring always to the greatest things he made it visible that from every corner of Fortune the highest degrees are to be attained to provided a man have the confidence to promote and believe himself worthy of them Insinuating himself into the Court he intrudes himself into the Factions and succeeds either in sowing discords or composing them so excellent that Art never failed him and was seldom abandoned by Fortune If he introduced himself into favour if he enjoyed it it was always against the inclination of the Prince that raised him He sets the King at enmity with his Mother with his Brother and it may be said with his own self constraining him to give up his Authority to him though he denied him his affection He ballanced favour against envy supported by the King but always hated by the Princes execrated by the people and sought to be intrapped by Strangers He never grew remiss in prosperity nor despaired in the crosness of affairs in which either chance furnished him with accidents or his wit suggested counsels Having disarmed the Huguenots in France laid low the Great Ones weakned the people and the Parliaments he established the vigour of the Kingly Government On the other side usurping all power to himself fearing the security of Peace and thinking himself more secure amidst the revolutions of Arms he was the Author of Wars and of long and grievous calamities with so much shedding of blood and tears within and without the Kingdom that it is no wonder that many have published him for a man fallacious in his word cruel in his hatred and inflexible in revenge But certainly leaving to God the more exact judgment of his intentions and deeds those gifts cannot be denied him which the World is accustomed to attribute to great Personages his Enemies agreeing in a confession with his Friends that he possessed such and so many that whithersoever he had directed affairs he had reaped success and power This may be said that having united France succoured Italy confounded the Empire divided England and weakned Spain he was the Instrument chosen by Divine Providence for the ruine of Europe The King honouring his death with tears and his memory with praises fluctuated amidst many thoughts in the choice of another Minister doubting lest after one so great and so accredited every one else would be despised by his Subjects and not esteemed by the Princes his Friends Yet he now tasted the liberty of Government without the shadow of a troublesom Favourite But being rather accustomed to leave execution to others than to set forth his own counsels he proved timid and irresolute Richelieu disposing also as he was dying of the Kings Will had left Mazarine Heir to the Post he possessed beseeching the King to establish him in it and to maintain him for the important Service of the Crown whilst instructed by him in the Affairs Interests and Designs he had in all found him of so excellent an ingenuity that he seemed born for that alone in which he had according to occurrences been variously imployed The King perswaded by his Wife inclined not to leave the direction of things to a Confident of the deceased by reason of the hatred which he saw universally of his name Many others therefore aspired to the favour and thereto imployed the Arts of Court which is as much as to say An. Dom. 1643 Frauds and Intrigues which the King abhorring or fearing that with the change and novelty of Ministers the Train of Affairs and the felicity of his Arms would be interrupted confirms those of the Council and confers on Mazarine the primacy and the favour His Ancestors being of Sicily he was born at Rome with noble but slender beginnings of Fortune but scorning his first foundation from the Militia in which he commanded a Company of Foot in the Valteline passing to the Treaty of Piedmont from that to Prelacy and the Nuntiature of France and from thence to the strict confidence of that Crown by the nomination thereof to the Cardinalat he seemed arrived whither not so much as his own hopes had pointed him out the way Seeing Richelieu falling at Perpignan he thought of withdrawing from the thunder stroak and got himself to be sent into Italy under pretext to adjust the differences of Parma with the Pope but the Duke rejecting him as distrusted by him or for old distasts by reason of the dependency which Mazarine had upon the Cardinal Antonio this hinderance served as a rebound to his Fortune for by Richelieu's surmounting the snares laid for him continuing at the Court he was also in a capacity to succeed him in his station He though a stranger and without support nay rather with the hatred which from the very ashes of Richelieu rose up against those which had been his Confidents knew how to exercise a precarious authority Therefore governed himself in such sort that leaving to Lewis the pleasure of the Government and easing him of the burden he seemed rather a Minister than director of the Royal intentions Then towards others he endeavoured that that which is so envious should in him be rendred acceptable from his modesty So with obsequiousness to the Prince with liberality to the Courtiers to all
acts past and to the excommunication he should legitimate the crimes of Felony which were laid to his charge But no sooner was this exhibited to the French Ministers but Barbarino sollicites the Spanish Cardinals to propose to the Grand Duke a suspension of Arms and the depositing Castro into his hand with a Brief apart which should give him power to render it to the Duke of Parma when he should perform those humiliations which should be agreed on The Confederates besides displeasure conceived at the late manner of proceeding in the Treaty found many doubtful significations and sly evasions to be contained in the present Propositions and above all become jealous that Mediators and Propositions were so often changed refused the suspension of Arms declaring notwithstanding to the Ambassadours of both the Crowns their will to be most inclined to Peace when it might be obtained upon conditions that might render it lasting honourable and safe The Count della Rocca Ambassadour Extraordinary from Spain being at this time arrived at Venice and Giovanni d'Frasso at Florence and they insisting upon things already rejected obtained answers not differing The Spanish Cardinals thereupon at Rome hearkened to new Propositions of Union betwixt the Pope and King Philip which the Cardinal Barberino ceased not to suggest to give jealousie to the Confederates but the Republick in the name of all the League made so lively complaints of it at Madrid with a protest that the League on the other side would accept the invitations which France had so long made them to close with that Crown that the King immediately orders that all such practices should be broken off Nay the Vice-King of Naples upon the Popes demand of nine hundred Horse due for the investiture of that Kingdom in case the Ecclesiastick State should be invaded denys them this not being the cause of the holy See but of his Family and Kindred And to say truth the Crowns by reason of the employments wherein they were ingaged and much more for the condition of their domestick affairs had little reason to interest themselves but by mediation and offices for in Spain with the disgrace of the Minister and in France with the death of the King Government was changed King Philip returned from Saragossa to Madrid had in his heart somewhat cooled his affection towards the Condé Duke whether it was that by reason of continual disgraces the unhappy director of his Affairs was become troublesom to him or that he had perceived things had been hitherto represented to him by the Favourite in a prospective differing from the truth And now many from necessity saw themselves bound laying flattery and fear aside to speak plain but none durst be the first till the Queen supported by the Emperour with Letters under his own hand to the King and with the discourse of the Marquess di Grana his Ambassador resolved to break through the vail and discover the secrets All then took the Cue and the very meanest persons either by notes in writing or by word of mouth sollicited the King to put away the Minister and assume the Government to himself He marvelling within himself to have ignored till now the causes of this disgrace overcome with the light of so many advertisements which all at a time unvailed him was wavering at first with himself apprehending the burden of the Government and doubting lest the wonted frauds of Court were practised against the Favourite but at last not able to resist the consent of all orders him one day on a sudden to retire himself to Loeches Olivares undaunted readily obeys going disguised out of the Court for fear of the people who if they are wont to follow Favourites whilst they shine in the station of favour and greatness endeavour much more to tread them under foot when they are precipitated by Fortune This resolution was applauded by all with excess of joy The Grandees formerly sent away and oppressed returned to serve the King and render the Court more majestical and the People offered to strifes men and money animated by the report that the King would take upon him the care of the Government hitherto neglected But either fainting at the burden or new to business and with more new Ministers in the tediousness of business and the difficulties of various accidents he had fallen back insensibly into the former affection towards Olivares if all the Court had not with an unanimous murmuring opposed it nay if Olivares himself had not rather precipitated his hopes for willing by the publishing of certain Writings to clear himself he offended many in such sort that the King thought it best to send him yet further off and confine him to Toro There not accustomed to quiet and afflicting himself as great wits are wont to do he dyes within a while of grief It cannot be denyed but that he had great parts of vivacity of wit and application to business but they were either corrupted by a rash violence which oftentimes in counsel carried him to extremities or were frustrated by fortune which always crost his designs He never suffered himself to be corrupted by Strangers but it was imputed to him that with flattery or not opposing he sometimes betrayed the Kings service He possessed with great jealousie the Kings favour and the power which to arrogate it to himself alone he took from the Council and every body else He employed few and those of his dependants but he proved so unfortunate a Judge of abilities that of all those he employed some wanting diligence many capacities and all approbation he was very often for the faults and errours of others condemned by the world He always vainly shewed his power but he laid up no great riches nor fortified his private power against the publick authority with Places Armies and Governments For this cause if his Government was not applauded his fall made no great noise nor was his death considered The King in truth though he published the contrary could not or would not govern by himself alone Whereupon Luigi d' Haro Nephew but withall an Enemy to Olivares insinuates himself by little and little and with great modesty shewing his obedience to the King in a short time takes upon him the administration of the Government But in France conformable to the nature of the people the changes passed with a greater noise for that Lewis amidst the cares of his mind and the unquietness of his body was fallen sick even to extream languishing By reason of the tender age of his Son he was exercised in difficult thoughts about the direction of affairs and no less were troubled the principal Ministers the reliques of Richelieu's Faction fearing lest the Queen coming to the authority of the Regency should for former disgusts revenge her self against them Mazarine therefore Bottiglier Superintendent of the Finances and his Son Chavigni Secretary of State being reduced to serious consults about their Fortune endeavoured to possess the King with the
those Forts possessed by them near Loreo provided in some measure on that side against the disturbance which resulted from thence on the borders The Austrian Ministers bore with great impatience to be excluded from this Treaty and the Emperours Ambassador shews in Venice a Plenipotence to assist at the meetings but the Confederates easily excused it For the conditions of Peace being by the Barberins put into the hand of the French Mediator they could not but lend their ear to him that brought more ample and the securest propositions The Treaty therefore went on although some millitary accidents interposed for the Venetians had contrived the surprise of the Fort of Lagoscuro on the other side of the Po but by uncessant rains for three whole days the ways being overflowed the design was hindred and Cardinal Antonio having got the Wind of it strengtheus the Garrison and for fear of intelligence changes the Commander Marino Badoaro also from Figarolo attempts that of that other Fort on this side but some few Souldiers coming like labourers to possess it being discovered the others that followed were constrained to retire Giacomo Riva had success in beating up the quarters of the Pontificians at Zecca and the armed Barques of the Venetians after some contest carried away from Premiero some Vessels laden with Corn. To make themselves amends for these insults the Pontificians assaulted a quarter of the Venetians at Schienta but being repulsed and pursued by Giovanni Paulo Gradenigo Paymaster in the field and by la Valetta the encounter grew hot near to Lagoscuro on the other side of the River and ended in the flight and loss of the aggressors so that the Cardinal Antonio who sallying out of Ferrara attempted to countenance the faction was hardly able to save himself with the swiftness of his Horse leaving more than a hundred of his men dead upon the place and about an hundred and fifty Prisoners amongst which were the Vice Legate of Ferrara Carassa Antonio Doria Governour of that Fort and other Officers and French Captains The death if it had hapned of Vrban fallen now extreamly sick might have caused a great alteration in the Treaty whereupon Cardinal Bichi hastens the conclusion and fearing not to compass it time enough proposes a suspension of Arms lest perchance there might happen a vacant See The Confederates although such an accident which could not pass without great revolutions in the Dominions of the Church and in the Court of Rome would open to them a way to many advantages were not against it by reason of that respect which they professed towards the holy See and because with the death of the Pope the authority also of the Nephews expiring those motives would fall to the ground which had been the cause of taking Arms. Nay the Grand Duke upon the first notice of Vrbans sickness which was thought deadly dispatches Letters to the Cardinal Montalto in the which justifying his intentions to the future Conclave offers himself to interpose with the other Princes for the consenting to a Truce The Senate also wrote to Cardinal Bragadino requiring him by provision if there should be a vacancy in the See to assure the Conclave of their upright intentions for Peace but it was in truth believed that the Grand Duke had been transported too far by separating his endeavours and offering that of which the League had not as yet been desired by the Court of Rome Wherefore he excusing the speed of his dispatch with the doubt that the Popes life would not have lasted so many days as were requisite to understand the judgments of others recalls his orders to Montalto and leaves the instances of Cardinal Bichi to be consulted of in the wonted Assemblies in Venice Edward remonstrates the fit conjuncture to revenge themselves of the Barberins to attempt Conquests and by the means of them to secure Peace The Duke of Modena shews also the opportunity which was opened for advantages but fell back notwithstanding as at last Edward also did to more wholsom counsels so that it was concluded That the Truce should be accepted during the vacancy of the See and some certain days after the election of a new Pope provided nevertheless it should be desired in the name of the Conclave and that in that interim a Letter should be written to the Cardinals in the name of all the League to justifie the necessity of their past resolutions to inform them of their intentions tending to Peace and to offer all their Forces for the security and liberty of the said Conclave But as they were ready to send their answer to Bichi the notice of the Popes recovering induces them omitting further Treaty of a Truce to hasten the conclusion of a Peace The Articles proposed by the Cardinal had in several Assemblies been ventilated where rejecting some and correcting others they were at last concluded by the common consent of the Confederates and the Cardinal having a mind to carry them with all speed to Rome was received in all places of the Ecclesiastick State with the acclamations and prayers of the people longing for Peace Nor in approving of the project was there any difficulty made by the Pope or his Nephews by whom were only altered some few words but of no importance Passing then with the same diligence through Florence he returns to Venice with the Treaty signed by Donghi and with his Powers in which the Confederates having desired some amendment in the expressions no difficulty was made The Duke of Parma refused to admit the Treaty in other form than that agreed at Venice but he was by the League given to know that there being an agreement in substance and the few words changed at Rome not altering it at all the end being accomplished for which the Princes had united when the Powers of Donghi should be received in the form desired their intention was to proceed to the conclusion though without his consent With this protest and a Voyage Cardinal Bichi made to Parma to render him that respect which was the thing he aimed at he also was perswaded to approve it So that it was subscribed in Venice for France by the Cardinal Bichi for the Republick by Giovanni Nani Cavalier and Procurator by the Cavalier Giovanni Battista Gondi for the Grand Duke and for Modena by the Marquess Hippolito Estense Tassoni in whom the Plenipotence appeared to be The Capitulations were divided the one agreed by France with the Pope in that which concerned the Duke of Parma who for the observance of what was promised had given a Writing to the said King the other concluded immediately betwixt the Pope and the Confederates In the first some wonted expressions being premised concerning the Popes zeal to Peace The King besought him for absolution and pardon for Edward That so the Excommunication being taken off from his Dominion he might be restored into the favour of Urban desired by the Duke himself with the humility which was expedient
deliver her but the Spaniards insist upon it 7 8. Matthias the Emperour and the Queen Regent of France dissent from it 8 9. thoughts of marrying her to the Duke of Rhetel 272. and married to him 271. assumes the Regency 435. disgusted with France 489. in concert with the Spaniards procures the taking of Casal 417 Mary Queen of Hungary comes into Italy 338. the Republick deny her passage by Sea and at last conduct her with their own Fleet. 338 Mary Queen Regent of France against War in Italy imploys endeavours in favour of the Duke of Mantua 25. sends Ambassadours into Italy 66. imprisons Conde ibid. against Nevers 280. offended at Richelieu 280 309. attempts putting him out of the Government 326. under custody at Compiegne escapes to Brussels 362. dyes at Cologne Marcheville Ambassadour of France in the Empire stirs up the Princes against the Emperour 262 Martin Tromp Admiral of the Hollanders Fleet defeats that of Spain 472 Maximilian Archduke of Austria dyes 130 Maximilian Duke of Bavaria refuses the Imperial Crown 126. possesses the upper Austria 153. and Prague having defeated the Palatine 156. the Elector at conferred upon him 197. treats with France and England 197 198. jealous of the Emperours power not separate from him 261. exclaims against Wallestain 346. proposed General of the Armies 348. closes with the French 361 Maestricht besieged and taken by the Hollanders 373 Marriages reciprocal betwixt France and Spain much contested by the Princes malecontents 33. executed 58. that of the Prince of England with the Sister of the King of France causes disgusts betwixt those Crowns 221 Mattheo Cardinal Priuli refuses the Bishoprick of Bergamo 80 Matthias Galasso beats a body of Venetian Souldiers 327. re-inforces Goito 331. drives la Valette out of his Quarters in the Mantuan and pursues the Venetians 332. takes Valezzo 333. invades France 423. retires with little advantage ibid. Matthias the Emperour sends the Prince of Castiglion into Italy 15. does not assist the Archduke against the Republick 60. nominates Commissioners for the Peace 63. cedes the Crown of Bohemia to Ferdinand 105. endeavours to pacifie the Bohemians 129. jealous of Ferdinand ibid. moved at the imprisonment of Cardinal Gliselius 130. dies 134 Maurice Cardinal Prince of Savoy opposes the Spaniards in Piedmont 82. upon the death of his Brother the Duke comes to the Borders of Piedmont 435. returns thither with great applause 460. takes Nizza and Villa Franca 463. inclines to marry 475 Maurice Prince of Orange relieves Bergen Opzoom 193. succeeds not in the relief of Breda 219. nor in the surprise of the Castle of Antwerp 220. dyes 222 Melchior Cardinal Glisclius Favourite of the Emperour Matthias 8. arrested Prisoner 130. sent to Rome and there absolved 131 Meldole shakes off the yoke of the Prince of Castiglione 149. the neighbouring Princes stirring in it the business is adjusted ibid. Michael Priuli takes Ostia 331. Proveditor in Terra firma 436. incourages those of Rovigo 560. Proveditor in the field 561. dyes 562 Meilleray takes Hesdin and made Mareshal of France 471. takes the Town of Air 496. chosen for the Siege of Perpignan 532. takes Collivre 533 Monaco garrisoned by the Spaniards puts it self under the protection of the French 501 Monferrat pretended by the Duke of Savoy 5. described 10. an exchange proposed by the Spaniards 33. oppressed on all sides 80. several places possessed by the Savoyards 84 98. others garrisoned by the Spaniards 84. invaded the French and Savoyards 229. and by Leganes Governour of Milan 433 Mont Albano besieged by the King of France without success 176. taken by Richelieu 305. the Mountain of Pleurs falls 131 Montvesuvius casts fire 360. Moravians rebel 134. vexed by the Cassocks 153 Mustapha succeeds to Achmet in the Turkish Empire 98. deposed 117. put to death 466 N. NIchola Francesco Duke of Lorrain marries and flies out of Nancy 394 Niccolo Contarini perswades the Senate to assist the Duke of Savoy 69. Commissioner for executing of the Peace 115. Duke 321. dyes 363 Niccolo Delfino takes many places from the Pontificians 547 Niccolo Marquess of Bagni commands the Popes Troop in the Valteline 217 Niccolo Donato Doge 116 Nizza della Paglia besieged by the Savoyards 23. taken by the Spaniards 287 433 Novi surprised by the Venetians complaints of the Archduke their justification 53 Nuntio presents to the Republick a Letter from the Pope for the Victory of their Fleet over the Pirates of Barbery 456. exhorts to send Ambassadours to Rome 457. endeavours to take away jealousies at their raising Arms against the Duke of Parma 506. promised himself too much of the Venetians 509. endeavours to amuse them with flatteries 512. and invitations to send an Ambassadour to the Pope 462. sent away from Venice 554 O. O Edward Duke of Parma tempted by the Spaniards 383. joyns with France 401. invades the Milanese 407. attacqued by the Spaniards 418. inclines to peace and concludes it 426. his parts and distaste against the Barberins 503. fortifies Castro 505. hath recourse to the Republick 506. publishes a Manifest 513. excommunicated proceeds to secure his affairs 515. puts himself into the field demands assistance 517. marches against the State Ecclesiastick with a memorable Voyage 521. deluded after many Treaties returns into his own Country 527. makes new attempts by Sea 542. had a mind also to do it through Tuscany 543. inclines not to enter into the League ibid. marches and possesses Bondeno and the Stellata 544. confounds the designs of the Confederates by not seconding them 546 549. succours not the Republick 560. nor the Great Duke 564. after some difficulty consents to the peace 570 Olland levies in the Republicks pay 90. to the great disturbance of the Spaniards who complain of it to the Pope but are quieted by the Ambassadour of the Republick 139. confederate with the Venetians 145. assist the Palatine 153. do not succour Rochel 265. refuse a Truce offered by the Spaniards 308. beaten at the Scheld and at Ghelre 441 Oneglia besieged and taken by the Spaniards 41 Oratio Baglioni perswades to pursue advantages upon the Carso against the Austrians 92. endeavours to hinder succours to Gradisca is killed 108 Oration in the Senate to stir up moving Arms for the outrage of the Uscocchi 21. others of a contrary opinion 22. of the Duke of Savoy with invectives against Spain 31. and to exhort the Republick to joyn with them 41. of Carlo Scaglia his Ambassadour with the Republick to demand assistance 67. of Niccolo Contarini to perswade the Senate to assist the Duke of Savoy 69. of Simeon Contarini to the Pope 90. of Henry Count de la Tour to the Bohemians 128. of John Nani to disswade the Republick from a League with the Hollanders 141. of Sebastian Veniero perswading it 143. of Girolamo Priuli to the King of France 162. of Count Mansfelt to his Souldiers 292. of Giovanni Basadonna against the undertaking of Genoua 212. of Girolamo Trevisano to approve the
Empires to totter The Elector of Trier seeing him of Mentz driven out of his Country took occasion to publish the protection which France had secretly some years before consented to him when he offended with the Emperour for not having adjudged the Abby of St. Maximine which he pretended was annexed to that Crown and now opening the Gates to his Forces puts Hermestain into their hands Bavaria who forced to play fast and loose without separating himself from the Austrians but no less to hazard himself with them had likewise made a late Treaty with the French in which they promising him the conservation of the Electoral Vote in his Family both the King and Duke obliged themselves mutually to defend those Countries which they then possessed with a certain number of Horse and Foot By this alliance Richelieu obtained the separation of Bavaria as head of the Catholick League from giving assistance to Lorrain because that Duke after the Conspiracies with the English despairing of ever reconciling himself to that Minister had not only given himself to the protection of the Austrians but during the War of Italy had perswaded the Emperour to fortifie Moyenvich a place of consequence upon the Frontier of Mets and of the jurisdiction of that Bishoprick and afterward to deliver the place to him to the end that with it he might cover his own Country and withall upon occasion give passage for the invading of France He had afterwards received Orleans in his Country and now though the protection which he expected from the Emperour appeared weakned nevertheless provoking the King with offences and the Cardinal with disgusts drew unseasonable troubles into his bosom The said Duke of Orleans by the suggestion of the Queen Mother and of his Sister in Law no less than of his Favourites taking the plausible pretext of ill Government of a sudden retires from Court The King now comprehending that both by domestick and foreign encouragements his Brother went about to obtain the Kingdom in present rather than hope any longer for it follows him towards Orleans with so much speed that the Duke not willing to be taken by force nor to trust to any accord departs towards Burgundy where with the Duke of Bellegard Governour of that Province he had already contrived intelligences and agreements The King coming thither also and the Cardinal constrained him to pass into the Franche Conté and from thence to take refuge in Lorrain Lewis well to secure himself first in the Kingdom reforms the Court of the Queen his Wife discarding the persons suspected and forbidding the Ambassador of Spain to visit her in private Afterwards brings his Mother to Compiegne and of a sudden parting thence leaves her there kept under the care of the Mareshal d' Estré His will after was that she should be removed to Molins a Town not strong and in the heart of the Kingdom giving her as a token of honour the Government of the Bourbonois but the Queen interposing delays by the pretext of her weakness insinuated to the Governour of la Chapelle that giving her entrance she should resign again the place to him and in this confidence whilst the Cardinal privy to all to facilitate her flight dexterously causes the Guards to be slackened she secretly departs But coming to la Chapelle finds it in Arms against her there being entred into it the Marquess de Vardes Father of the Governour sent thither seasonably by the Cardinal himself whereupon entrance being denied her she was forced to pass into the Province of Henault and thence to be conveyed to Brussels where being received with great tenderness by the Infanta Isabella she spreads throughout the whole world the complaints of her condition that being driven out of that happy Kingdom where she had heretofore commanded she was now in her old age put to seek for entertainment and perhaps a Grave amongst strangers The Spaniards hoped from these domestick broils in France great advantages having the Mother of the King in their hand and the Brother in the house of a Prince their friend Nevertheless they could not with Forces proportionable to so great a design promote the disturbances of the Kingdom being engaged in Germany and beaten in Flanders by the Hollanders whilst by the Scheld they were attempting a surprise in Zealand They saw Orleans also not well provided with Forces nor with the intelligencies they expected for those who as it was said were to take Arms and kindle the War in the Kingdom being prevented by the vigilance and authority of the Cardinal had been able to effect nothing but provide for their safety by running away The Duke of Lorrain who had in his hand the pledge of the Successor of the Crown thought himself secure yet to bind him faster perswades him to marry Margaret his Sister a Princess of great virtue and rare beauty On the advice whereof Lewis was inflamed with extream anger and Richelieu taking hold of the occasion to revenge himself perswades him to cause the Mareshal de la Force to invest Moyenvich which the Imperialists being not able to relieve nor the Duke of Lorrain daring without their help to attempt it was within a few days rendred The French Army would then have proceeded farther if Carlo in person humbling himself to the King had not made this agreement To renounce all intelligence and junction prejudicial to France to cause the Rebels and enemies to the King to go out of his Country denying them entrance for the future and to join to the Kings Army four thousand Foot and two thousand Horse with which entring into Germany the third part of the Conquests should be the Dukes For warranty he delivers for three years the Town of Marsall to the French the King promising not to make Peace without comprehending him in it This Agreement concluded the last day of the year men truly judged that on the Dukes side it would be no longer lived than the necessity which dictated it at present The King to make it appear that the more Richelieu was attacqued by envy and hatred the more he embraced him in his favour created him Duke and Peer of France So that by those applauses with which over and above the rejoycings of those of his own party fame exalted him he vindicated himself from certain invectives which spread abroad in print by unknown Pens came to be published by the discontented and especially by those in the Low Countries In Venice also at the requisition of the Ambassador d' Avan he was by the great Council received into the Order of the Patricians with unanimous Votes THE HISTORY OF THE REPUBLICK OF VENICE THE NINTH BOOK WE shall now describe some peaceable years of the Republick rendred more joyous from the memory of past calamities and the hideousness of dangers undergone out of which amidst Fire and Sword she was with safety and glory rescued after the assistance of Heaven by the constancy and counsels of the