ng his
offence at the Place de Grave.

"The consequences of the affair would have been less injurious, however,
had it been managed, even as it stood, with better judgment and temper.
But it was improperly entrusted to the Baron de Breteuil and the Abbe
Vermond, both sworn enemies of the Cardinal. Their main object was the
ruin of him they hated, and they listened only to their resentments. They
never weighed the danger of publicly prosecuting an individual whose
condemnation would involve the first families in France, for he was
allied even to many of the Princes of the blood. They should have
considered that exalted personages, naturally feeling as if any crime
proved against their kinsman would be a stain upon themselves, would of
course resort to every artifice to exonerate the accused. To criminate
the Queen was the only and the obvious method. Few are those nearest the
Crown who are not most jealous of its wearers! Look at the long civil
wars of York and Lancaster, and the short reign of Richard. The downfall
of Kings meets less resistance than that of their inferiors.

"Still, notwithstanding all the deplorable blunders committed in this
business of De Rohan, justice was not smothered without great difficulty.
His acquittal cost the families of De Rohan and De Conde more than a
million of livres, distributed among all ranks of the clergy; besides
immense sums sent to the Court of Rome to make it invalidate the judgment
of the civil authority of France upon so high a member of the Church, and
to induce it to order the Cardinal's being sent to Rome by way of
screening him from the prosecution, under the plausible pretext of more
rigid justice.

"Considerable sums in money and jewels were also lavished on all the
female relatives of the peers of France, who were destined to sit on the
trial. The Abbe Georgel bribed the press, and extravagantly paid all the
literary pens in France to produce the most Jesuitical and sophisticated
arguments in his patron's justification. Though these writers dared not
accuse or in any way criminate the Queen, yet the respectful doubts, with
which their defence of her were seasoned, did indefinitely more mischief
than any direct attack, which could have been directly answered.

"The long cherished, but till now smothered, resentment of the Comtesse
de Noailles, the scrupulous Madame Etiquette, burst forth on this
occasion. Openly joining the Cardinal's party against her form