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Updated: May 10, 2025
Marshal d'Hocquincourt was encamped at Bleneau, and Turenne a little farther off, at Briare; the two Marshals were to unite their forces on the morrow.
That the haughty spirit of Marie de Medicis was stung by this abrupt abandonment, and that her woman-pride revolted, will admit of no doubt; nor is it wonderful that her indignation and jealousy should have been aroused when she discovered that, instead of pursuing his way to the capital, where the public arrangements necessitated by the peace with Savoy, which he had just concluded, required his presence, the King had embarked at Roanne, and then proceeded from Briare, where he landed, to Fontainebleau, whence on the morrow, after dining at Villeneuve, he had travelled at once to Verneuil, and remained there three days before he entered Paris.
The magnificent canal of Languedoc, due to the generous initiative of Riquet, united the Ocean to the Mediterranean; the canal of Orleans completed the canal of Briare, commenced by Henry IV. The inland custom-houses which shackled the traffic between province and province were suppressed at divers points; many provinces demurred to the admission of this innovation, declaring that, to set their affairs right, "there was need of nothing but order, order, order."
Having secured their prisoner, M. Murat and his coadjutors caused him to deliver up his sword, and to exchange the powerful charger upon which he was mounted for a road-hack that had been prepared for him, upon which he proceeded under a strong guard to Briare, whence he was conducted in a carriage to Montargis, and, finally, conveyed in a boat to Paris.
Other great works were also undertaken throughout the kingdom; the junction of the Garonne with the Aude, an attempt which presented considerable difficulty and which was only terminated during the reign of Louis XIV, was vigorously commenced; other rivers, hitherto comparatively useless, were rendered navigable; and the canal of Briare, with its two-and-thirty locks, although not more than half completed at the death of Henry, had already cost the enormous sum of three hundred thousand crowns.
We see by Beaumarchais' correspondence that one of his friends travels around in the environs of Paris to find bread. If this were so I would bargain with a reliable man there to carry it to you by water-carriage between Briare and Paris... In the mean time I do not despair of finding a loaf."
Their pace was much slower than it had been the night before, and it was almost daybreak when they passed the bridge at Briare, having ridden over forty miles. They rode two or three miles into the mountains after crossing the Loire, and then halted. "We must give the horses twenty-four hours here," Francois said.
All France knew of the disaster which happened in the heart of Paris to the first suspension bridge built by an engineer, a member of the Academy of Sciences; a melancholy collapse caused by blunders such as none of the ancient engineers the man who cut the canal at Briare in Henri IV.'s time, or the monk who built the Pont Royal would have made; but our administration consoled its engineer for his blunder by making him a member of the Council-general.
I fell asleep then under the fire of his eyes, and awoke to find them still blazing; the passionate gaze remained unchanged, but what thoughts had come and gone meanwhile! Twice he had kissed me on the forehead. At Briare we had breakfast in the carriage.
What a trip was that descent of the Loire from Roanne to Briare in the same boat and "at very close quarters between the queen-mother and the cardinal!" says Bassompierre.
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