Editing Ranavalona I (section)

==== Foreign plots ====
[[File:Radama II with crown.jpg|thumb|Ranavalona's son and heir, Prince Rakoto (later King [[Radama II]]).]]

The French were eager to hasten Radama II's succession in the interest of capitalizing on the Lambert Charter, an 1855 agreement between French representative [[Joseph-François Lambert]] and Radama that could only come into effect upon the prince's succession. The charter guaranteed Lambert and his business associates first rights to the exploitation of many of the island's commodities and natural resources. According to a British account, Lambert conspired with Jean Laborde and local leaders to persuade Radama II to sign a document written in French—a language in which the prince was not fluent—which Lambert orally translated as containing only an account of the excessive pressures the Queen's policies were placing on her subjects. Radama, who was sympathetic toward the commoners and interested in easing their burden but suspicious about the letter's true purpose, reluctantly signed the document under intense pressure from the French.  He was not told the letter included a request for French military intervention that could have potentially brought Madagascar under French rule. France did not however intend to take such an action without the accord of Britain, whose influence had been well-established on the island, and refused to intercede on behalf of the prince. In the meantime, Radama, who had been made to swear on the Bible not to speak of the letter to anyone, had grown concerned enough to contact a British diplomat, thereby revealing the true circumstances under which the letter had been signed. The British refused to cooperate in the French plot, and an attack was averted.<ref name="plot">Oliver (1886), pp.&nbsp;80–85</ref> According to Lambert, however, the prince had indeed been an enthusiastic partner in the bid to end Ranavalona's reign, and his own true feelings about the endeavor had been misrepresented by the British diplomats.<ref>Pfeiffer (1861), p. 225</ref>

Having failed to gain the backing of a European state power to place Radama on the throne and bring the treaty into effect, Lambert decided to instigate a ''coup d'état'' independently. He traveled to Ranavalona's court in May 1857 in the company of the celebrated 19th-century Austrian globetrotter [[Ida Pfeiffer]], who became an unwitting participant in the plot. She documented her perspective on these events in one of her late works. According to Pfeiffer, Radama and Lambert had planned to dethrone the queen on 20 June, when ministers and soldiers loyal to Radama would infiltrate the Rova grounds and declare loyalty to the prince and support for a political transition. Pfeiffer blamed the failure of the plot on [[Rainilaiarivony]], then Commander-in-Chief of the army who reportedly had been unable to ensure the presence of soldiers in the courtyard who were loyal to Radama.<ref name="Pfeiffer">Pfeiffer (1861), pp.&nbsp;225–277</ref> According to a British account, however, Radama himself was credited with warning the queen of the plot, in which his cooperation was merely a ploy to entrap the conspirators. The account claimed that Ranavalona deliberately allowed the plot to unfold almost to its conclusion in order to ascertain the loyalties of her members of government.<ref name="plot" /> After the plot's discovery, the Europeans were largely confined to their houses on the palace grounds and prohibited from receiving visitors, until an order was issued to immediately and permanently quit the queen's territory in late July.<ref name="Pfeiffer" />