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

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.” 79And 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, 80was 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 plenipotentiary 82of 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 Fouquet 83was 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, 84for nine years in the fortress of Pignerol, and only then released him in order, by that means, to swindle Mademoiselle de Montpensier 85out 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, 86in 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, 88well-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.” 89Again, 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.” 90And 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.” 91These 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, 92for 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; 93and 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