man nature, and one of the
strongest proofs of that corruption "which standeth in the following of
Adam."

Louis XIV. had reasons of his own for his determination to destroy the
Surintendant. First of all, he was afraid of him. The Fronde was fresh
in the royal memory. Fouquet had enormous wealth, an army of friends and
retainers; he could command Brittany from his castle of Belleile, which
he had fortified and garrisoned. Why might he not, if his ambition were
thwarted, revive rebellion, and bring back misery upon France? The
personal reminiscences of the King's whole life must have made him feel
keenly the force of this apprehension. He was ten years old, when, to
escape De Retz and Beaufort, the Queen-Mother fled with him to St.
Germain, and slept there upon straw, in want of the necessaries of life.
After their return to Paris, the mob broke into the Louvre, and
penetrated to the royal bedchamber. He could not well forget the night
when his mother placed him upon his knees to pray for the success of the
attempt to arrest Conde, who thought himself the master. He was twelve
when Mazarin marched into France with seven thousand men wearing green
scarfs, the Cardinal's colors, and in the Cardinal's pay. After the
young King had joined them, the Parliament of Paris offered fifty
thousand crowns for the Cardinal's head. He was thirteen when Conde, in
command of Spanish troops, surprised the royalists at Bleneau, and would
have captured King and Court, had it not been for the skill of Turenne.
A few years before, Turenne had served against France, under the Spanish
flag. The boy-King had witnessed the battle of St. Antoine,--had seen
the gates of Paris closed against him, and the cannon of the Bastille
firing upon his army, by order of his cousin, _Mademoiselle_, the
grand-daughter of Henry IV. He had known a Parliament at Paris, and an
Anti-Parliament at Pontoise. In 1651, Conde, De Retz, and La
Rochefoucauld fought in the Palais Royal, almost in the royal presence.
In 1652 he had been compelled to exile Mazarin again; and it was not
until 1658 that Turenne finally defeated Conde and Don John of Austria,
and opened the way to the Peace of the Pyrenees, and the marriage with
the Infanta. Oliver Cromwell aided the King with six thousand of his
soldiers in this battle, and seized upon Dunkirk to repay himself,--only
three years before. No wonder Louis was anxious to place the throne
beyond the reach of danger and insult, and