ut
conviction, and with a lukewarmness which deeply wounded Conde's
high-souled sister. She felt that she was no longer loved commensurately
with the heroic and tender ideal of which she had dreamed, and that a
struggle with fortune, too long continued, had cast down his inconstant
and wavering spirit. Hence also arose that momentary error which we have
neither disguised nor excused. Love enfeebled and discouraged had
delivered her up once more to her natural coquetry, and coquetry
stimulated by politics had made her brave the semblance of an infidelity
towards La Rochefoucauld and herself. Without being hurried away in the
slightest degree by the senses or the heart, in her endeavour to carry
off the Duke de Nemours from Madame de Chatillon and the peace party,
and engage him more deeply in that of the war and Conde, she had
slightly compromised herself; and La Rochefoucauld, influenced by an
implacable resentment, instead of breaking with her openly, had, at
Paris, entered into a shameful league with Madame de Chatillon and his
pretended rival, the Duke de Nemours, in order that they might rob the
poor Duchess of her last consolation, the esteem and affection of Conde.
Left in Guienne, without any great or engrossing occupation, with a
vacant mind, discontented both with others and herself, Madame de
Longueville was no longer the brilliant Bellona of Stenay, but her pride
and dignity, which she could not lose, never failed to sustain her. She
therefore resolved to remain even unto the end faithful to that brother
whose heart was sought to be steeled against her by the whispers of
calumny: to remain in Bordeaux as long as possible, without recoiling
from any means which necessity might prescribe. Not for a single day,
not for an hour, did she dream of separating her fate from that of
Conde, and of bending the knee before his victorious enemies.

At length, however, it was her inevitable fate to yield to the star of
Mazarin and Louis XIV., who having obtained the mastery over the South
as elsewhere, she was compelled to quit the factious city, and repair,
by command of the Court, to Montreuil-Bellay, a domain belonging to her
husband in Anjou. Shortly afterwards she obtained permission to go to
Moulins, where her aunt, the inconsolable widow De Montmorency, was
superior of the convent (_Filles de Sainte-Marie_). From that visit to
Moulins may be dated the conversion of the beautiful and adventurous
princess. On emerging