I Am Louis XIV

   Chapter 538 The Queen Mother's Funeral (Part 1)

   It goes without saying how grand the Queen Mother's funeral was.

In money, there is a whole wealthy country to support; in character, although she is a foreign princess, the French praise this lady in unison for her virginity and kindness; emotionally, she is lacking, but this lack Not because of her true heart—as a woman of this era, she has done a good job; except for the Palace of Versailles, the commoners even love the Queen Mother deeply, one is because she has given birth to two outstanding talents for France, especially Louis XIV, the second is because the Queen Mother is very keen on charitable activities with the support of Louis. Thirty years ago, when it came to doing good deeds, ladies would go to church, and the Queen Mother was always at Mass. They spend a lot of money on pilgrimages, but in the past three decades, this kind of behavior has hardly been seen. The ladies prefer to build sanctuaries, almshouses and orphanages.

Louis' minister Colbert came from a humble background, and knew nothing about the tricks played by the lower-level officials. He also knew how low the moral bottom line of the seemingly lonely poor people was - almost nothing, and he knew more about those who were hidden in the dark. , how criminals who are more terrible than the devil are good at finding needles - if you continue to set up projects as you like, allocate funds in disorder, and place managers only on the surface and relationships, the result is probably the same as that described by a famous writer. Charities are almost there.

   In short, it's a battlefield where the strong eat the weak, a quagmire where things go wrong, a theater for making a name for yourself, and a den that nourishes poisonous insects and beasts.

In view of the above reasons, Colbert carefully dispatched his most powerful assistants to the noble ladies headed by the Queen Mother, to ensure that tens of thousands of rivulets would not flow to places that would make His Majesty the King furious , such as someone's pocket. These funds may be nothing to the church. They can easily spend thousands of livres for a single mass, not counting additional expenses such as prayer fees, special fees, announcement fees, preaching fees, etc. Icons, priests and bishops, all require additional money.

  But when Louis XIII bought what is now Versailles—even if it was just a barren sandy land, 117 acres was not a small number, and it only used 10,000 livres.

Paris-Versailles, these two cities that mirror each other like pearls, there are still a lot of useless land around, especially the marshes and gravel that cannot be used for planting. These places are very cheap to buy, and in order to build the Palace of Versailles, here It also gathered a large number of craftsmen, so that a small town of Limoges was formed. The carpenters and plasterers in the town were very happy to work for the Queen Mother and the poor. To put it in a bad way, a profession like them has no means to support a family. problem, but once injured, there is only an asylum to go to.

   It's just that these people didn't expect that they thought it was just a job for extra money that would make them work for ten years, and they may continue to do it in the future.

   Mainly because the officials of Colbert, after diligently investigating the situation of the almshouse, found that these places could no longer keep men, women, the elderly, and children together as before, as if they were livestock.

   Their report was startling. In the imagination of the good people, there are always some poor but virtuous people gathered in the almshouse. Although they may not give so many donations, if the industrious young people are willing to work hard, the elderly People and children can always get by by doing what they can, even saving up some money to leave the workhouse.

   Not really, the real almshouse is a stinking garbage dump. Here, people with moral conscience always die the fastest - newcomers will be exploited by the administrator and the people around them, completely empty, not even a fig leaf will be left for you, women can't be. Avoid being a communal vessel, young men are sometimes no exception, old men are the objects of humiliation and beatings - purely for fun, as for the children - they are the collection of the three and the bottom doll because they Their physical strength is not comparable to that of adults, and their brains are not comparable to that of old people. They work all day long and are insulted. Some prostitutes come in to choose future money-making tools, and factory owners and workshop owners come to buy slaves at a low price, or It was the leaders of thieves and robbers who recruited new blood and scapegoats—but it was a way out, and more children disappeared without a trace in doorless, windowless rooms.

   The worst thing you can think of will happen here.

Colbert and his disciples were even terrified that they could not guarantee that such a thing would not happen in the almshouse they opened - so, after submitting a report to the king, the charitable cause of the Queen Mother - from the architectural system Above all, it has become a sanctuary, an orphanage and an orphanage.

Among them, shantangs are only for the elderly over the age of 50, while the orphanages are separated for men and women, and young people over the age of 14 are gathered here. Garden of Eden. To say whether they can be compared with the charity places hundreds of years later, of course not, except for the old people who are immobile, about to be oiled, and the babies who can't walk and talk, everyone here has to work It's just that they have a place to live without paying high rents, and the poll tax is exempted. The workshops and workshops of the Queen Mother and other noble women can also provide them with a job.

How to arrange the managers here is also a problem. The salary of the managers is meager, but it can't stop the huge profits from the prostitutes, factory owners and criminal leaders. Later, His Majesty the King found a good method for them, that is Let the administrators be selected from the soldiers and officers who have retired from the army. These retired non-commissioned officers have already had the retirement money promised by His Majesty the King. It was paid out on a monthly basis. At that time, it was to prevent them from throwing the money on the pub and the wandering girl. Now it can be a restraint - unless the money of bribery and embezzlement can exceed this money, otherwise the managers will not be moved.

Moreover, in order to avoid long-term employment and eventually turn management into domination, these managers will also change the almshouse at regular intervals. When handing over, the accounts will be checked by special supervision and accounting. In a chaotic place, the responsible person would not want to leave the almshouse if he did not make up the shortfall, or, in other words, went directly from the almshouse to the Bastille.

Before the Queen Mother's death, such charitable places had expanded to three hundred, Paris, Versailles and several other cities in the basin, people saw the black iron gate with golden lilies, the sun and the belt of the Virgin hanging on it. The coat of arms, you know that this is the almshouse donated by the Queen Mother. The Queen Mother has no personal coat of arms, so the king gave her his sun head and golden lily. As for the Virgin's belt, it is a popular among noble ladies. The leather belt inlaid with the head of the Virgin. The 37-year-old queen mother had a miscarriage. People said she could not give birth to a healthy heir, but a storm kept the king in the Louvre - she had Louis fourteen.

At that time, the Queen Mother was wearing the belt of the Virgin Mary when she was pregnant, and Louis XIII also vowed to dedicate France to the Virgin Mary, so the Queen Mother's coat of arms would have the belt of the Virgin Mary, and the other is , All almshouses are named after the Holy Name of the Virgin Mary plus the place name, such as - Notre Dame - Paris Sanctuary, or Notre Dame - Limoges almshouse.

But for those poor and lonely people, the Queen Mother is their Virgin, or she is the human incarnation of the Virgin. When they heard the news of the Queen Mother's death, they couldn't help crying, like the ancient Romans, tossing their hair. , taking off their shoes, smearing sand on their faces, this mourning is without pretense and looks extremely ugly, but no one will accuse them of being uneducated.

Some of them proposed to the administrators to go to Paris to say goodbye to the Queen Mother, which would of course cost them several days of wages, exhaust their meager savings, and even directly affect their lives in the next ten years. But they still showed a firm will, like a devout pilgrim going on a pilgrimage to Jerusalem, "If you don't agree. We'll run away, and it doesn't matter if we don't come back." The people who are here can't be unshakable, not to mention that the managers here are also the king's believers. When they think of how sad the king is, they can't help but agree to these people's requests.

A few clever administrators also gathered people who wanted to go to the funeral and formed a team to Paris, lest they get lost or have an accident, or be stopped by local officials and people - their colleagues too. I think this method is very good, so this kind of team becomes longer and longer, more and more, for a time there are still people who think they are really a pilgrimage team-because they really hold the cross and pray all the time on the way .

When the Marquis of Lois and Colbert received the application from his subordinates, and the king also learned about it from the "birds" and officials, he didn't take it too seriously. Who knows that there will be ten thousand in the end. Five thousand people came to Paris.

Louis XIV's original plan was to transform Paris from the political center of France into an economic center and an artistic center, and to move the political center to Versailles, not only because the Parisians no longer trusted him, but also because Paris was an ancient capital, Louis XIV's needs were no longer met. Not to mention, if the current French government and all the officials and nobles were to be packed into the city of Paris, the city of Paris would be overcrowded to the point of bursting, and the Louvre would not allow everyone who the king valued and liked. Have a room of your own.

   Thankfully, also for this reason. Paris, as well as Versailles, had innumerable houses, even on the sides of the boulevards that connected them, where astute people built rows of three- or four-story buildings, where the servants of Versailles and Attendants live here, as well as the families of officers and soldiers, officials from other provinces, tourists, etc. They are also hotels, shops, restaurants... In Versailles and Limoges on one side, it is enough to supply the needs of 100,000 people. And when Paris was home to 150,000 people, it wasn't a problem to accommodate the unexpected arrival of 15,000 people.

After Louis XIV allocated a sum of money to guarantee these people's accommodation and meals during their stay in Paris, as well as their travel expenses, to ensure that even if these people would not make a fortune, their future life would not be affected. , but compared with his previous pain and grief, this grief adds a touch of soft comfort - if the Queen Mother can know about this, she will definitely feel happy - not only because she has been rewarded for her efforts, but also Because this is not because she is the princess of Austria, or the queen of France, the queen mother, but only because of her own kindness.

Even noble ladies like Queen Teresa and the Duchess of Montpensier couldn't help but be moved, and they brought candles to these people themselves, because they knew they couldn't afford candles - although candles could already be sold from Extracted from oil, but it is not yet affordable for the poor. After they came back, they all said that more almshouses would be built. Louis looked at those twinkling eyes and couldn't find any reason to object—he didn't want to object at all.

The injustice to women in this era is inscribed on the canons and steles. Louis XIV's school allowed to accommodate both female and male students, which led to many accusations. If it wasn't for the power of the Sun King, maybe they would have been early for various reasons. Even so, for more than ten years, the way out for female students can only be found in marriage. It can only be said that compared with those women who are still sleeping in tradition, they who have received education finally know how to start to find a way forward. - Of course, it's hard, very hard, and Louie won't accuse the girls who back down from all kinds of difficulties, but he still wants them to see a little light.

  If women are still stubbornly rejected on the battlefield, in politics, and in academia, what about charity? Women have an advantage over men in this regard. If men are sentimental, they will be seen as cowardly, but women are recognized as beings born with maternal and benevolent hearts. Men should not mind giving up their power in this regard— It's just that they don't know that anything, any matter, will bring the same amazing power when it becomes huge.

   It’s just that that might be a long time away.

  ———

But from now on, Anne of Austria will be firmly remembered. In the history books, she is no longer just the king's daughter, the king's wife, the king's mother, or the king's grandmother - she is also a saint, saving A good person who has helped countless people, such a title may be the most suitable for this ill-fated lady.

   "Your Majesty..."

   "Look," said Louis to Bontang, "how beautiful they are seeing her off."

   (end of this chapter)