set in
blood, had made good his escape to the friendly shores of France, where
he had found a fresh field for his valour.

Meanwhile his daughter was happy in the charge of the widowed Queen
Henrietta Maria, who although, as Cardinal de Retz tells us, she
frequently "lacked a faggot to leave her bed in the Louvre," and even a
crust to stay the pangs of hunger, proved a tender foster-mother to
brave Walter Stuart's child, and watched her growth to beauty with a
mother's pride.

Even before she emerged from short frocks, Frances Stuart had
established herself as the pet _par excellence_ of the Court of France.
With Anne of Austria the little Scottish maiden was a prime favourite;
every gallant, from "Monsieur" to the rakish Comte de Guise, loved to
romp with her, and to join in her peals of childish laughter; and the
King himself, Louis XIV., stole many a kiss, and was proud to be called
her "big sweetheart." So devoted was His Majesty to _La belle Ecossaise_
that, when her mother talked of taking her away to England, he begged
that she would not remove so fair an ornament from his Court, and vowed
that he would provide the child with a splendid dower and a noble
husband if she would but allow her to remain.

But Madame Stuart had other designs for her pretty daughter; and when
Henrietta Maria took boat to England to shine again at the Court of
Whitehall, under her son's reign, Frances Stuart joined her retinue, and
found herself transported from the schoolroom to the most brilliant and
dangerous court in Europe. When this transformation came in her life
Walter Stuart's daughter was just blossoming into as sweet and fragrant
a flower as ever bloomed in woman's guise. Fair and graceful as a lily,
with luxuriant brown hair, eyes of violet, and a proud, dainty little
head, she had a figure which, although yet not fully formed, was
faultless in its modelling and its exquisite grace. And these physical
charms were allied to an unspoiled freshness, which combined the artless
fascinations of the child with the allurements of the woman.

Such was Frances Stuart when she made her appearance at the Court of
Charles II. as maid-of-honour, to his Queen, Catherine; and one can
scarcely wonder that, even among the most beautiful women in England,
the French "Mademoiselle," as she was called, was hailed as a new
revelation of female fascination, especially as she brought with her the
bubbling gaiety and passionate zest of life of t