Quotation from: A Popular History of France from the Earliest Times, Volume 3

Written by: Francois Pierre Guillaume Guizot


The same rule of historical equity makes it incumbent upon us to remark
that, in spite of his feelings of suspicion and revenge, Louis XI. could
perfectly well appreciate the men of honor in whom he was able to have
confidence, and would actually confide in them even contrary to ordinary
probabilities. He numbered amongst his most distinguished servants
three men who had begun by serving his enemies, and whom he conquered,
so to speak, by his penetration and his firm mental grasp of policy.
The first was Philip of Chabannes, Count de Dampmartin, an able and
faithful military leader under Charles VII., so suspected by Louis XI.
at his accession, that, when weary of living in apprehension and
retirement he came, in 1463, and presented himself to the king, who was
on his way to Bordeaux, "Ask you justice or mercy?" demanded Louis.
"Justice, sir," was the answer. "Very well, then," replied the king,
"I banish you forever from the kingdom." And he issued an order to that
effect, at the same time giving Dampmartin a large sum to supply the
wants of exile. It is credible that Louis already knew the worth of the
man, and wished in this way to render their reconciliation more easy.
Three years afterwards, in 1466, he restored to Dampmartin his
possessions together with express marks of royal favor, and twelve years
later, in 1478, in spite of certain gusts of doubt and disquietude which
had passed across his mind as to Dampmartin under circumstances critical
for both of them, the king wrote to him, "Sir Grand Master, I have
received your letters, and I do assure you, by the faith of my body,
that I am right joyous that you provided so well for your affair at
Quesnoy, for one would have said that you and the rest of the old ones
were no longer any good in an affair of war, and we and the rest of the
young ones would have gotten the honor for ourselves. Search, I pray
you, to the very roots the case of those who would have betrayed us, and
punish them so well that they shall never do you harm. I have always
told you that you have no need to ask me for leave to go and do your
business, for I am sure that you would not abandon mine without having
provided for everything. Wherefore, I put myself in your hands, and you
can go away without leave. All goes well; and I am much better pleased
at your holding your own so well than if you had risked a loss of two to
one. And so, farewell!" In 1465, another man of war, Odet d'Aydie,
Lord of Lescun in Warn, had commanded at Montlhery the troops of the
Dukes of Berry and Brittany against Louis XI.; and, in 1469, the king,
who had found means of making his acquaintance, and who "was wiser,"
says Commynes, "in the conduct of such treaties than any other prince of
his time," resolved to employ him in his difficult relations with his
brother Charles, then Duke of Guienne, "promising him that he and his
servants, and he especially, should profit thereby." Three years
afterwards, in 1472, Louis made Lescun Count of Comminges, "wherein he
showed good judgment," adds Commynes, "saying that no peril would come
of putting in his hands that which he did put, for never, during those
past dissensions, had the said Lescun a mind to have any communication
with the English, or to consent that the places of Normandy should be
handed over to them;" and to the end of his life Louis XI. kept up the
confidence which Lescun had inspired by his judicious fidelity in the
case of this great question. There is no need to make any addition to
the name of Philip de Commynes, the most precious of the politic
conquests made by Louis in the matter of eminent counsellors, to whom he
remained as faithful as they were themselves faithful and useful to him.
The _Memoires of Commynes_ are the most striking proof of the rare and
unfettered political intellect placed by the future historian at the
king's service, and of the estimation in which the king had wit enough
to hold it.

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