I told the Prince that, considering how the minds of the Parliament were embittered, I doubted whether they would care to confer with the Cardinal; that his Highness would gain a considerable point if he could prevail with the Court not to insist upon the necessity of the Cardinal’s presence, because then all the honour of the arrangement, in which the Duc d’Orleans, as usual, would only be as a cipher, would redound to him, and that such exclusion of the Cardinal would disgrace his Ministry to the last degree, and be a very proper preface to the blow which the Prince designed to give him in the Cabinet.

The Prince profited by the hint, so that the Parliament returned answer that they would send deputies to confer with the Princes only, which last words the Prince artfully laid hold of and advised Mazarin not to expose himself by coming to the conference against the Parliament’s consent, but rather, like a wise man, to make a virtue of the present necessity.  This was a cruel blow to the Cardinal, who ever since the decease of the late King had been recognised as Prime Minister of France; and the consequences were equally disastrous.

The deputies being accordingly admitted to a conference with the Duc d’Orleans, the Princes de Conde and Conti and M. de Longueville, the First President, Viole, who had moved in Parliament that the decree might be renewed for excluding foreigners from the Ministry, inveighed against the imprisonment of M. de Chavigni; who was no member, yet the President insisted upon his being set at liberty, because, according to the laws of the realm, no person ought to be detained in custody above twenty-four hours without examination.  This occasioned a considerable debate, and the Duc d’Orldans, provoked at this expression, said that the President’s aim was to cramp the royal authority.  Nevertheless the latter vigorously maintained his argument, and was unanimously seconded by all the deputies, for which they were next day applauded in Parliament.  In short, the thing was pushed so far that the Queen was obliged to consent to a declaration that for the future no man whatever should be detained in prison above three days without being examined.  By this means Chavigni was set at liberty.  Several other conferences were held, in which the Chancellor treated the First President of the Parliament with a sort of contempt that was almost brutal.  Nevertheless the Parliament carried all before them.

In October, 1648, the Parliament adjourned, and the Queen soon after returned to Paris with the King.

The Cardinal, who aimed at nothing more than to ruin my credit with the people, sent me 4,000 crowns as a present from the Queen, for the services which she said I intended her on the day of the barricade; and who, think you, should be the messenger to bring it but my friend the Marechal de La Meilleraye, the man who before warned me of the sinister intentions of the Court, and who now was so credulous as to believe