The supporters of Conde in France were openly changing their note and
proclaiming by the Prince's command that he had left the kingdom in order
to preserve his quality of first prince of the blood, and that he meant
to make good his right of primogeniture against the Dauphin and all
competitors.

Such bold language and such open reliance on the support of Spain in
disputing the primogeniture of the Dauphin were fast driving the most
pacifically inclined in France into enthusiasm for the war.

The States, too, saw their opportunity more vividly every day. "What
could we desire more," wrote Aerssens to Barneveld, "than open war
between France and Spain? Posterity will for ever blame us if we reject
this great occasion."

Peter Pecquius, smoothest and sliest of diplomatists, did his best to
make things comfortable, for there could be little doubt that his masters
most sincerely deprecated war. On their heads would come the first
blows, to their provinces would return the great desolation out of which
they had hardly emerged. Still the Archduke, while racking his brains
for the means of accommodation, refused, to his honour, to wink at any
violation of the law of nations, gave a secret promise, in which the
Infanta joined, that the Princess should not be allowed to leave Brussels
without her husband's permission, and resolutely declined separating the
pair except with the full consent of both. In order to protect himself
from the King's threats, he suggested sending Conde to some neutral place
for six or eight months, to Prague, to Breda, or anywhere else; but Henry
knew that Conde would never allow this unless he had the means by Spanish
gold of bribing the garrison there, and so of holding the place in
pretended neutrality, but in reality at the devotion of the King of