could not bend to any compromise, and thus she recklessly augmented the
amount of dislike which was growing up against her.

On the 8th of July the ex-Queen Marguerite gave a magnificent
entertainment to the Court at her beautiful estate of Issy; on her
return from whence to the capital, the Regent mounted a Spanish jennet,
and, surrounded by her guards, galloped at full speed to the faubourg,
where she dismounted and entered her coach, still environed by armed
men. As she had her foot upon the step of the carriage, a poor woman who
stood among the crowd exclaimed with an earnestness which elicited
general attention, "Would to God, Madame, that as much care had been
taken of our poor King; we should not then be where we are!"

The Queen paused for a moment, and turned pale; but immediately
recovering her self-possession, she took her seat, and bowed affably to
the people. The greeting on their part was, however, cold and reluctant.
They were still weeping over the bier of their murdered sovereign, and
they could not brook the apparent levity with which his widow had
already entered into the idle gaieties of the Court.[56]

"Only five months after Henry's assassination," says Rambure, "such of
the nobles as were devoted to his memory expressed among themselves
their indignation at the bearing of the Queen; who, although compelled
at intervals to assume some semblance of grief, was more frequently to
be seen with a smiling countenance, and constantly followed the hunt on
horseback, attended by a suite of four or five hundred princes and
nobles." [57]

In order to avert all discontent among the people, the ministers had
induced the Regent not only to diminish the duty upon salt, a boon for
which they were always grateful, but also to delay the enforcement of
several obnoxious commissions, and to revoke no less than fifty-four
edicts which had been issued for the imposition of new taxes; while
presents in money were made to the most influential of the Protestant
party, and the Edict of Nantes was confirmed.

Such was the state of the French Court on the return of the Prince de
Conde, whose arrival had been anxiously anticipated by his personal
friends and adherents, and strongly urged by the Regent herself; but
when she ascertained that a large body of nobles had gone as far as
Senlis to receive him, and that among these were all the Princes of
Lorraine, the Marechal de Bouillon, and the Duc de Sully, she became
appre