shall remember that it was his work, and I shall not always
be a child."

A short time subsequently, while playing with a favourite fawn, he hid
himself among the shrubs in the gardens of the Tuileries, and remained
so long in his concealment that his attendants became alarmed and were
compelled to inform the Queen that although they had sought the King
everywhere, to entreat him to return, they could not ascertain where he
had gone. Marie in great alarm caused all around her to join in the
search, while she remained at one of the windows in a state of agonizing
anxiety. At length the retreat of the fugitive was found, and M. de
Souvre threatened him with the rod.

"As you please," he said sullenly; "but if, in order to satisfy the
Queen, you lay a hand upon me to-day, I will keep up appearances with
you, but I will never forget it." [89]

Only a few days subsequently (2nd of October) Louis XIII, attended by
his Court, proceeded to Rheims for his coronation, the royal ornaments
used upon such occasions having been removed from St. Denis to that
city. The Cardinal de Joyeuse performed the ceremony, the archiepiscopal
chair being vacant at the time; and the Princes de Conde and de Conti,
the Comte de Soissons, the Ducs de Nevers, d'Elboeuf,[90] and d'Epernon
represented the ancient Dukes of Burgundy, Normandy, and Aquitaine, and
the Counts of Toulouse, Flanders, and Champagne.

[Illustration: LOUIS XIII. KING OF FRANCE.]

On the morrow the young sovereign was invested with the Order of the
Holy Ghost, which he immediately afterwards conferred upon the Prince de
Conde, and on Tuesday the 19th he stood sponsor for the child of the
Baron de Tour; after which he proceeded to St. Marcou, where he touched
a number of persons suffering under the loathsome disease which it was
the superstition of the age to believe could be removed by contact with
the royal hand.

On the 30th of the month the Court returned to Paris, and was met at the
Porte St. Antoine by the civic authorities, at the head of two hundred
mounted citizens, amid a cannonade from the Bastille, and ceaseless
flourishes of trumpets and hautboys. The Regent had, however, preceded
her son to the city, and stood in a balcony at the house of Zamet to see
him pass, where he no sooner perceived her than he withdrew his plumed
cap, which he did not resume until having halted beneath the window he
had saluted her with a profound bow. He then proceeded by torchlight to