The Valet's Tragedy, and Other Studies — John Shaqi
The Valet's Tragedy, and Other StudiesLang, Andrew
History
The Valet's Tragedy, and Other Studies
Lang, Andrew
History; World history
The substance of the letter (given in full in Note I.) is to the
following effect. P. du Moulin (Paris, May 19-29, 1669) writes to
Arlington. Ever since Ruvigny, the late French ambassador, a Protestant,
was in England, the French Government had been anxious to kidnap Roux
de Marsilly. They hunted him in England, Holland, Flanders, and
Franche-Comte. As we know from the case of Mattioli, the Government of
Louis XIV. was unscrupulously daring in breaking the laws of nations,
and seizing hostile personages in foreign territory, as Napoleon did
in the affair of the Duc d’Enghien. When all failed, Louis bade Turenne
capture Roux de Marsilly wherever he could find him. Turenne sent
officers and gentlemen abroad, and, after four months’ search, they
found Marsilly in Switzerland. They took him as he came out of the house
of his friend, General Balthazar, and carried him to Gex. No papers were
found on him, but he asked his captors to send to Balthazar and get ‘the
commission he had from England,’ which he probably thought would give
him the security of an official diplomatic position. Having got this
document, Marsilly’s captors took it to the French Ministers.
Nothing could be more embarrassing, if this were true, to Charles’s
representative in France, Montague, and to Charles’s secret
negotiations, also to Arlington, who had dealt with Marsilly. On his
part, the captive Marsilly constantly affirmed that he was the envoy
of the King of England. The common talk of Paris was that an agent
of Charles was in the Bastille, ‘though at Court they pretend to know
nothing of it.’ Louis was overjoyed at Marsilly’s capture, giving out
that he was conspiring against his life. Monsieur told Montague that he
need not beg for the life of a would-be murderer like Marsilly. But as
to this idea, ‘they begin now to mince it at Court,’ and Ruvigny assured
du Moulin ‘that they had no such thoughts.’ De Lyonne had seen Marsilly
and observed that it was a blunder to seize him. The French Government
was nervous, and Turenne’s secretary had been ‘pumping’ several
ambassadors as to what they thought of Marsilly’s capture on foreign
territory. One ambassador replied with spirit that a crusade by
all Europe against France, as of old against the Moslems, would be
necessary. Would Charles, du Moulin asked, own or disown Marsilly?
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