It is easy to fix the eyes so intently upon the destructive side of Richelieu’s war with the nobles as to forget that in his sight it was by far the least important part of his work. The execution of traitors and peculators, the banishment of conspirators and _intrigantes_, were necessary steps towards the abolition of their political power, not the satisfaction of private vengeance. As with the Huguenots, so with the nobles, he did not wish to root them out, but to make them powerless for evil. As long as they enjoyed in right of their birth political power, based upon personal privilege and territorial possessions, so long would they refuse absolutely to render themselves amenable to the new institution of the prime-ministership, and would be always in danger of preferring the interests of their order to those of the state. When once they had been deprived of territorial power, they would naturally become the foremost servants of that Crown of which they had before been the rivals. They would be eager to serve, where before they had been determined to rule. Throughout the government of Richelieu the work of centralisation goes steadily on. A powerful structure of royal government is gradually built up, and the abortive plots, and the subsequent executions, mark the chafings of those who felt that power was slipping steadily away from them, and by a sure instinct directed their efforts against the man who was identified with the system which they hated. The destruction of the feudal castles, the development of the professional army, the substitution of royal administrative officers for those of the territorial nobles in Brittany and Languedoc, after the rebellions of Vendôme and Montmorency, the administration by the Crown directly through its own officials of the Huguenot towns, after the peace of Alais, and of Lorraine and Sedan after their conquest, the establishment of a royal post throughout the kingdom, were all steps in the direction of undermining the political power of the nobles. [Sidenote: =Appointment of Intendants, 1637.=] Finally in 1637 came the greatest blow of all. For many years Richelieu had been in the habit of appointing royal commissioners, under the name of Intendants, to take cognisance of certain matters of local administration, usually of a judicial nature. In 1637 by a royal edict, he appointed Intendants in each province, and placed in their hands the whole financial, judicial and police administration. The effect of this was to concentrate powers, which had hitherto been enjoyed by the territorial nobility and the local administrative bodies, wholly in the hands of officials appointed by the minister and responsible to him alone. It created in fact a permanent civil service of professional men of the middle class, entirely dependent upon the royal favour, and thus did much to foster the growth of absolute power, and to give stability to the government,