whole period of her
sojourn in Spain the most solid foundation of her favour and power.

Through the Queen the _camerara-mayor_ was certain of governing the
King. Proportionately as the absolute monarchy, in spite of the severest
warnings, set up pretensions even more and more excessive and insensate,
it became also more manifest that its old traditions had rendered the
princes degenerate, and that the blood was equally menaced with
impoverishment in the family of Louis XIV. as in that of Charles V. The
new King of Spain was deficient in moral force and determination. He had
generous proclivities, without the least doubt. He was gloriously born,
as the phrase then ran. Like all his race, he showed bravery on the
field of battle; but energetic persistence in long-continued designs
firmly conceived, he was ever wanting in. Wearied to excess by the
weight of a crown, he ended by resigning its functions; compelled to
resume them, he succumbed beneath their weight, conceived scruples
touching the legitimacy of his royalty, and sunk into a crazy
melancholy, which degenerated later into downright insanity.[20]

[20] The singing of Farinelli had at first the effect of charming
away his dark moods, but he speedily gave way to such hallucinations
that he quite neglected his personal appearance, pretended to go
fishing in the middle of the night, and to mount the horses which
figured on the tapestry of his chamber.

The Princess des Ursins in directing her steps towards Villefranche, the
little Piedmontese port, which had been fixed upon as the place of
Marie-Louise's embarkation, had merely wished to present herself to the
Queen, her mistress, at the moment when the latter would be ready to
enter her galley and set sail for Spain. By that means, she would avoid
the necessity of putting all the royal train in mourning. For, as she
had already suggested with remarkable foresight to the Marechale de
Noailles--the Court of Turin was then in mourning, and there would have
been a necessity to conform to the French custom, followed by the Dukes
of Savoy: on the contrary, by stopping at Villefranche and meeting the
Queen at the moment of her embarkation, she would merely have to observe
the usage of Spain, which only enjoined mourning upon the master and
mistress of a house.

Authorised to do what seemed fit to her on that score, she had awaited
therefore the arrival of the young princess at Villefranche, and with