banished from the Court, and that other great ladies
had shared the same fate.[150]

The will of Richelieu had indeed proved omnipotent. Not one of those
whom he had doomed to disgrace was suffered to escape without submitting
to humiliations degrading to their rank. The unfortunate Princesse de
Conti, the sister of the Duc de Guise, whose only crime was her
attachment to her royal mistress, and her love for Bassompierre, was
exiled to Eu; where her separation from the Queen, and the imprisonment
of the Marechal, so preyed upon her mind that she died within two months
of a broken heart; while all was alarm and consternation in the capital,
where the greatest and the proudest in the land trembled alike for their
lives and for their liberties.

Of all the victims of the Cardinal the Queen-mother was, however, the
most wretched and the most hopeless. So soon as Anne of Austria had
quitted her apartment, feeling herself overcome by the suddenness of the
shock to which she had been subjected, she caused her physician M.
Vautier to be summoned, and was abruptly informed that he had been
arrested, and conveyed a prisoner to Senlis.

"Another!" she murmured piteously. "Another in whom I might have found
help and comfort. But all who love me are condemned; and Richelieu
triumphs! My history is written in tears and blood. Heaven grant me
patience, for I am indeed an uncrowned Queen, and a childless mother."

Her lamentations were interrupted by the announcement of the Marechal
d'Estrees, who having been admitted, communicated to her the will of the
King that she should await his further orders at Compiegne.

"Say rather, M. le Marechal," she exclaimed with a burst of her habitual
impetuosity, "that I am henceforth a prisoner, and that you have been
promoted to the proud office of a woman's gaoler. What are the next
commands which I am to be called on to obey? What is to be my ultimate
fate? Speak boldly. There is some new misfortune in reserve, but I shall
not shrink. 'While others suffer for me, I shall find courage to suffer
for myself." "His Majesty, Madame, will doubtless inform you--"
commenced the mortified noble.

"So be it then, M. le Marechal," said Marie haughtily, as she motioned
him to retire; "I will await the orders of the King."

Those orders were not long delayed, for on the ensuing morning the Comte
de Brienne presented to the imprisoned Princess an autograph letter from
Louis XIII, of which the following