The True History of the State Prisoner, commonly called the Iron Mask

The only point in dispute appears to have been, what the sum of money should be which was to be given by the French Monarch to the Duke of Mantua. The stipulation for 100,000 pistoles was decidedly rejected by Lewis; and at length, after some difficulty, Estrades reduced the demand of the other party to 100,000 crowns, and those not to be paid till after the signature of the treaty between the two sovereigns.31

The next event of importance in the negociation was the interview, effected at Venice during the Carnival, between the Duke of Mantua and Estrades. It took place at midnight, on the 18th of March, 1678, in a small open space, equally distant from the residence of the Duke and the Ambassador, and lasted a full hour. In it the Duke dwelt32 much upon his impatience for the conclusion of the treaty with France; and for the speedy appearance of the troops of the latter in Italy, alleging as his reason, the constant and lively fear he was in of the Spaniards. He also announced his intention of sending Matthioli, in whom, says Estrades, “He has a blind confidence, and who governs him absolutely,” to the French court; thinking that his presence there might bring matters to a speedier issue.

Estrades, who had now ascertained that his master could not possibly spare an army for Italy that year (1678), and who therefore was more than ever anxious to prevent such a consummation, consented with considerable difficulty to the project; resolving, at the same time, to obstruct the departure of Matthioli for France as long as possible; and writing to M. de Pomponne to delay him and his business, when at length he arrived there, by every means in his power.33

Subsequently the procrastinating intentions of Estrades were more easily put into execution than he expected; for Matthioli, of his own accord, deferred his journey from spring to autumn on various pleas, of which the principal one was, his unwillingness to leave his master, exposed to the insinuations, and perhaps menaces, of the Spanish partizans, by whom he was surrounded.34

Finally, after many delays, Matthioli, accompanied by Giuliani, set off for Paris in the beginning of November, 1678, and arrived there towards the end of the same month.35 He found the Abbé d’Estrades, who had quitted his Venetian Embassy, arrived there before him, and had several interviews with him and M. de Pomponne; during which a treaty was agreed on to the following effect: —

1. That the Duke of Mantua should receive the French troops into Casale.

2. That if Lewis sent an army into Italy, the Duke of Mantua should have the command of it.

3. That immediately after the execution of the treaty, the sum of 100,000 crowns should be paid to the Duke of Mantua.36

The treaty contained also some other articles of minor importance.

Matthioli himself had the honour of being received in a secret audience by Lewis,37 who made him a present of a valuable ring.37 He also received a sum of money for himself,37 and a promise of a much larger gratification38 after the ratification of the treaty. He was also promised that his son should be made one of the King’s Pages; and that his brother, who was in the Church, should receive a good benefice.39 He was then sent back to Italy, with a detailed instruction from Louvois,40 upon the manner of executing the articles of the treaty.

The French Government was thus far so entirely satisfied of the sincerity and good faith of Matthioli, and so convinced of the speedy admission of the French troops into Casale, that they immediately upon his departure took decided measures in furtherance of their plan.41 Thus the Marquis de Boufflers,42 Colonel-General of the Dragoons, was sent to take the command of the forces, which were assembling near the frontier of Italy, at Briançon, in Dauphiny. Catinat,43 Brigadier of Infantry, afterwards the celebrated Marshal of that name, who was to serve under the command of Boufflers, had orders to conceal himself in the fortress of Pignerol,44 and to adopt a feigned name, that of Richemont;45 while the Baron d’Asfeld,46 Colonel of Dragoons, was despatched to Venice, upon a mission for exchanging the ratifications of the treaty; for which purpose he was to unite with M. de Pinchesne, the Chargé d’Affaires there, during the absence of an ambassador.47

Though these measures were taken with the greatest secrecy, it was impossible but that the report of the assembling of the French forces so near the territories of the Duke of Savoy,48 should reach the ears of the Spaniards, and excite their suspicions; as well as those of the Venetians, and of the other Italian states. Accordingly, we find that remonstrances were several times made by the ambassadors of the Emperor49 and King of Spain50 at Venice, to the Duke of Mantua, upon the rumour of his intention of delivering the capital of the Montferrat to Lewis. Ferdinand Charles denied that this was the case;51 but was not believed.

As, therefore, the ferment and discontent in the north of Italy increased, the agents of the French Government were naturally anxious that the treaty should be ratified and executed as soon as possible; for which purpose, the Duke of Mantua had promised to meet the Baron d’Asfeld at Casale, during the month of February, 1679. In proportion, however, as the French became more impatient for the conclusion of the affair, the Count Matthioli found fresh excuses for delaying it. At one moment his own ill health detained him at Padua, and prevented his coming to Venice to confer with Messrs. de Pinchesne and d’Asfeld; at another, the Duke of Mantua could not raise a sufficient sum of money to enable him to transport his court to Casale; at another, it was necessary to have time to persuade Don Vincent Gonzaga52 to accompany the Duke to Casale, as it was not considered safe to leave him at Mantua; and again, the Duke of Mantua was obliged to stay at Venice, having promised to hold a carrousel there.53

In spite of all these difficulties, it was, however, finally arranged, that the Baron d’Asfeld and Matthioli should meet, on the 9th of March, at Incréa, a village ten miles from Casale, in order to make the exchange of the ratifications; that the Duke of Mantua himself, should go to Casale on the 15th of the same month; and should put the troops of Lewis into possession of the place on the 18th; on which day, being the ninth after the ratification, it was decided they could without fail be there.54

The various excuses made by Matthioli, for the non-execution of his agreement, all more or less frivolous, appear first to have given to the French Government a suspicion of his fidelity. Whether the reception of Matthioli at the French court had not been such as he expected, though it would appear to have been most gracious; or whether, which is more probable, the sum of money there given to him did not content him; – or whether, which is also probable, the Spaniards having got some knowledge of the transaction, had offered him a still larger bribe, it is impossible for us, at this distance of time, exactly to decide; but it appears evident, that, from the time of his return from Paris, his conduct with regard to the negociation became entirely changed; and he was as anxious to procrastinate, as he had formerly been to advance it. It was, therefore, natural for the French diplomatists to conclude, supported as this opinion also was by various circumstantial evidence, that he had been bought by the other side – a circumstance of no extraordinary occurrence in the career of a needy Italian adventurer.

His weak and timid master followed implicitly his counsels; but appears to have been himself in the intention of acting fairly and faithfully by the French Government. The first intimation that is given in the correspondence of the suspicions, with regard to the conduct of Matthioli, occurs in a letter from Pomponne55 to Matthioli himself, dated February 21st, 1679, in which he says that Lewis “is unwilling to doubt that the promise which has been so solemnly made56 him will not be kept;” an expression which certainly seems to imply, that some doubt did exist in the mind of Lewis and of his ministers upon the subject.

The next is an elaborate and skilful letter of Estrades to Matthioli, written on the 24th of March, 1679,57 from Turin, where he was then awaiting the execution of the treaty, in which he mingles promises and threats to encourage him to perform his stipulations; and shows sufficiently his suspicions to the object of them, to frighten him; at the same time leaving open the hope of forgiveness in case of future good conduct.

By the subsequent letters58 of Pomponne to Pinchesne, it appears, that the treachery of Matthioli soon became more apparent. Indeed, Estrades, during his stay at Turin, obtained the most indubitable evidence of the fact; for the Duchess of Savoy59 showed to him the copies of all the documents relative to the negociation respecting Casale, which Matthioli had given to the President Turki, one of her ministers who was in the interests of Spain, when he passed through Turin on his return from Paris.60 From Turki, as it subsequently appeared, Matthioli had received a sum of money for his information.61

Meanwhile Asfeld was arrested by the orders of the Count de Melgar, the Spanish Governor of the Milanese, as he was on his way to the rendezvous at Incréa; and Matthioli was the first person who acquainted the French agents with this misfortune,62 as well as with the fact that the Duke of Mantua had been obliged to conclude a treaty with the Venetians, in a directly contrary sense to the one he had first entered into with France;63 “having probably been,” as Pomponne remarks, in a letter to Pinchesne,64 “himself the sole author of the accidents and impediments he acquaints us with.”

Upon the arrival of the intelligence at Paris, of the arrest of Asfeld, the French ministers, though their suspicions of Matthioli were now changed into certainties, being still anxious, if possible, to get possession of Casale, empowered Catinat to supply his place, and to conclude the ratification of the treaty. Intelligence of this change was conveyed to Matthioli in a letter65 from Pomponne, of the date of March 14th, 1679.

Catinat accordingly went, on the appointed day, from Pignerol to Incréa, accompanied by St. Mara,66 the Commandant of that part of the fortress of Pignerol, which was appropriated for a state prison, and by a person of confidence, belonging to the embassy of Estrades. But the appointed day passed over, without bringing Matthioli to Incréa; and the next morning Catinat was informed that his arrival there was discovered; that the peasants of the neighbourhood were in arms; and that a detachment of cavalry was on its way, for the purpose of seizing upon him and his companions. What became of the latter does not appear, except that they escaped the threatened danger; but he himself got away secretly, and in disguise, to Casale; where he gave himself out as an officer of the garrison of Pignerol. The Governor there, who was well-disposed to the French interest, received him with great civility; and, at a dinner he gave to him, joined in drinking the King of France’s health with enthusiasm.67 The next day Catinat was too happy to return undiscovered to Pignerol.

Matthioli, meanwhile, instead of keeping his engagement at Incréa, had returned to Venice, and had had several interviews with Pinchesne, the particulars of which we are unacquainted with, as the letters containing the accounts of them, though alluded to by M. de Pomponne68 in his answers, have not been published.

Pinchesne was, at this time, convinced of the perfidy of Matthioli, having, in addition to various other suspicious circumstances, discovered that he had been secretly at Milan for some days. He, however, did not think it advisable entirely to break with him; but advised him to go and confer with Estrades, at Turin; representing to him the danger to which he exposed himself if this affair failed of success through his fault.69 Matthioli followed the advice of Pinchesne to his own ruin, and going to Turin, presented himself forthwith to Estrades,70 to whom he offered many insufficient excuses for his delay.

The vindictive Lewis had, meanwhile, determined to satisfy his wounded pride and frustrated ambition, by taking the most signal vengeance of Matthioli; as we find by the following note from Louvois to his creature, St. Mars, dated, St. Germain, April 27th, 1679. – “The King has sent orders to the Abbé d’Estrades, to try and arrest a man, with whose conduct his Majesty has reason to be dissatisfied; of which he has commanded me to acquaint you, in order that you may not object to receiving him when he shall be sent to you; and that you may guard him in a manner, that not only he may not have communication with any one, but that also he may have cause to repent of his bad conduct; and that it may not be discovered that you have a new prisoner.”71

Nothing therefore could be more opportune to Estrades, than the arrival of Matthioli at Turin, and accident soon enabled him to lay a successful plan for executing the wishes of the French monarch. The plan he is said to have communicated to the Duchess of Savoy, who consented to the arrest taking place, but objected to its happening on her territories.72

Matthioli complained much of want of money, occasioned by the expenses of his journies, and the bribes he had been obliged to offer to the Duke’s mistresses. Estrades took this opportunity of forwarding his scheme, by telling him that Catinat, who, under the name of Richemont, commanded the troops destined to take possession of Casale, had considerable sums at his disposal, which he would be happy to make so good a use of as in ministering to his wants; provided he, Matthioli, would give him a meeting on the frontier towards Pignerol, at which also Estrades would be present.73 Of course, the reason assigned for naming the frontier as the place of rendezvous was, that Catinat could not leave the neighbourhood where his troops were stationed.

To this proposition Matthioli readily consented; and having first made a journey to Casale, he returned and met Estrades (who was accompanied on this expedition by his relation the Abbé de Montesquiou) by appointment, in a church half a mile from Turin, from whence they proceeded together to the frontier. At three miles from the place of rendezvous they were stopped by a river, of which the banks were overflowed, and the bridge broken. Matthioli himself assisted in repairing the bridge, which was to convey him to his captivity;74 and they then proceeded on foot to the place where Catinat awaited them accompanied only by two officers, the Chevaliers de St. Martin and de Villebois, and by four soldiers of the garrison of Pignerol.75

Before, however, Matthioli was arrested, Estrades held some conversation with him, and obliged him, in the presence of Catinat, to confess that he had in his possession all the original papers regarding the delivery of Casale, and that they were left in the custody of his wife at Bologna; who was living in the convent of the nuns of St. Thomas76 in that city. This was necessary, because Matthioli had lately refused to give them up to the Duke his master,77 alleging that he no longer knew where they were. His confession, upon this occasion, afterwards turned out to be false, and that the papers in question were concealed in a wall at Padua.78

Immediately after this avowal had been extracted from him, he was arrested; and offered no resistance, though he always carried a sword and pistols about his person. He was conducted to Pignerol, where he arrived late at night.

Catinat, in his letter to Louvois, giving an account of this seizure, which took place on the 2d of May, 1679, dwells much upon the secrecy with which it was effected, so that, says he, “no one knows the name of the rascal, not even the officers who assisted in arresting him.”79 And he concludes by mentioning, that in order to perpetuate the mystery in which his prisoner is enveloped, he has given him the name of “Lestang,” – “not a soul here knowing who he is.” In the subsequent correspondence of Louvois with Catinat and St. Mars, he is very generally designated by that name. At first, St. Mars carried his precaution so far as to serve Matthioli himself, and not allow any of the garrison to approach him; soon afterwards his valet, who had been arrested by the exertions of Estrades,80 was allowed to attend upon him; and subsequently St. Mars appointed those of his officers, in whom he had the most confidence, to assist in guarding him. It may be remembered that Louvois, in his letter to St. Mars, which has been before quoted, orders that the prisoner, who was to be brought to Pignerol, “should have intercourse with no one;” and in the subsequent letters from the same Minister, difficulties are even made to his being permitted to see either a physician or a confessor.81

These extraordinary precautions against discovery, and the one which appears to have been afterwards resorted to, of obliging him to wear a mask, during his journeys, or when he saw any one, are not wonderful, when we reflect upon the violent breach of the law of nations, which had been committed by his imprisonment. Matthioli, at the time of his arrest, was actually the plenipotentiary82 of the Duke of Mantua, for concluding a treaty with the King of France; and for that very sovereign to kidnap him and confine him in a dungeon was certainly one of the most flagrant acts of violence that could be committed; one which, if known, would have had the most injurious effects upon the negociations of Lewis with other sovereigns; nay, would probably have indisposed other sovereigns from treating at all with him. It is true the Duke of Mantua was a prince insignificant both in power and character, but, if in this way might was allowed to overcome right, who could possibly tell whose turn might be the next. Besides, it was important for Lewis that the Duke of Mantua should also be kept in good humour, the delivery of Casale not having been effected; nor is it to be supposed that he would have consented to give it up to the French monarch within two years of this period, had he had a suspicion of the way his diplomatic agent and intended prime minister had been treated. The same reasons for concealment existed till the death of Matthioli, since that event happened while both Lewis XIV. and the Duke of Mantua were still alive, which accounts for his confinement continuing to be always solitary and always secret.

The arrest of Matthioli, certainly appears to have been the effect of a vindictive feeling against him in the breast of Lewis himself; for it is impossible to imagine that any minister would have ventured, of his own free-will, upon a step by which so much was to be hazarded, and nothing, in fact, was to be gained. The act is only to be explained in this manner; that the monarch insisted upon his revenge, which the ministers were obliged to gratify; and, at the same time, in order to prevent any ill consequences that might result from it, determined upon burying the whole transaction under the most impenetrable veil of mystery.

The confinement of Matthioli is decidedly one of the deadliest stains that blot the character of Lewis the Fourteenth: for, granting that Matthioli betrayed the trust reposed in him by that monarch, one single act of diplomatic treachery was surely not sufficient to warrant the infliction of the most horrible of all punishments, – of solitary confinement, for four and twenty years, in a dungeon! – It was, however, an act of cruel injustice that was to be expected from the man, who, when the unhappy Fouquet83 was condemned by the tribunals of his country to exile, himself changed his sentence to that of perpetual imprisonment; – who, to please his mistress, confined his former favourite, Lauzun,84 for nine years in the fortress of Pignerol, and only then released him in order, by that means, to swindle Mademoiselle de Montpensier85 out of her fortune, in favour of his bastard, the Duke du Maine; – who shut up so many other persons, guilty only of imaginary crimes, in various prisons, where they died of misery and ill-treatment; – who revoked the Edict of Nantes; – ordered the burning of the Palatinate; – persecuted the saints of Port Royal; – and gloried in the Dragonades, and the war of the Cevennes; – who, in short, whether we regard him as a man or a sovereign, was one of the most hardened, cruel, and tyrannical characters transmitted to us in history. Providence doubtless made use of him as a scourge befitting the crimes of the age he lived in; and, in this point of view, his existence was most useful. Nor is his memory less so; which has been left to us and to all posterity, as a mighty warning of the effects, even in this world, of overweening ambition; and as a melancholy example of the perversion of a proud heart, which “gave not God the glory,” and was therefore abandoned by the Almighty to the effects of its own natural and irretrievable wickedness.

After the arrest of Matthioli, he underwent several interrogatories,86 in which, in spite of his numerous prevarications, his treachery was still more amply discovered. The examinations were all sent to Louvois by Catinat, who, as soon as they were concluded, left Pignerol, and returned to the court.87

At first, Matthioli was, by the direction of Estrades,88 well-treated in his prison; but this was not by any means the intention of Lewis, and accordingly, we find Louvois writing thus to St. Mars. “It is not the intention of the King that the Sieur de Lestang should be well-treated; nor that, except the absolute necessaries of life, you should give him any thing that may make him pass his time agreeably.”89 Again, in the same strain: “I have nothing to add to what I have already commanded you respecting the severity with which the individual named Lestang must be treated.”90 And again; “You must keep the individual named Lestang, in the severe confinement I enjoined in my preceding letters, without allowing him to see a physician, unless you know he is in absolute want of one.”91 These repeated injunctions to the same effect are a proof, how much importance the rancorous Lewis attached to his victim’s being compelled to drink the bitter cup of captivity to the very dregs.

The harshness and hopelessness of his prison seem to have affected the intellects of Matthioli,92 for after he had been nearly a year confined, St. Mars acquaints Louvois, that “The Sieur de Lestang complains, he is not treated as a man of his quality, and the minister of a great prince ought to be; notwithstanding which, I continue to follow your commands most exactly upon this subject, as well as on all others. I think he is deranged by the way he talks to me, telling me he converses every day with God and his angels; – that they have told him of the death of the Duke of Mantua, and of the Duke of Lorrain;93 and as an additional proof of his madness, he says, that he has the honour of being the near relation of the King, to whom he wishes to write, to complain of the way in which I treat him. I have not thought it right to give him paper or ink for that purpose, perceiving him not to be in his right senses.”94

The unhappy prisoner, in his phrensy and despair, sometimes used very violent language to his keepers, and wrote abusive sentences with charcoal on the walls of his prison; on which account St. Mars ordered his lieutenant, Blainvilliers, to threaten him with punishment, and even to show him a cudgel, with which he was to be beaten, if he did not behave better.

These menaces so far intimidated Matthioli, that a few days afterwards, while Blainvilliers was serving him at dinner, he, in order to propitiate him, took a valuable ring from his finger and offered it to him. Blainvilliers told him he could accept nothing from a prisoner, but that he would deliver it to St. Mars; which he accordingly did.95 St. Mars estimates the ring at fifty or sixty pistoles: and M. Delort conjectures it to have been the one given to him by Lewis the Fourteenth, during his stay at Paris. St. Mars inquires from Louvois96 what he is to do in consequence; and the latter returns for answer, that he “must keep the ring, which the Sieur Matthioli has given to the Sieur de Blainvilliers, in order to restore it to him, if it should ever happen that the King ordered him to be set at liberty.”97

Matthioli apparently expressed a wish to confess to a priest; and Louvois desires that he may be only allowed to do so once in the year.98 It appears that St. Mars had at this time in his custody a Jacobin monk, with whose crime, as well as name, we are unacquainted; but in the correspondence of St. Mars and Louvois, he is designated as “the Jacobin in the lower part of the tower.” This man was mad; very possibly had been made so, like Matthioli, by solitary confinement and ill-usage. St. Mars advised the putting Matthioli with him, in order to avoid the necessity of sending for a priest for each prisoner.99 To this proposal Louvois returned the following answer: “I have been made acquainted, by your letter of the 7th of this month (August 1680), with the proposal you make, to put the Sieur de Lestang with the Jacobin, in order to avoid the necessity of having two priests. The King approves of your project, and you have only to execute it when you please.”100