eans, _Mem_. pp. 149-152.

[197] Siri, _Mem. Rec_. vol. vii. pp. 685-687. Le Vassor, vol. vii. pp.
1-4.

[198] Le Vassor, vol. vii. pp. 6-9. Mezeray, vol. xi. pp. 428, 429. Le
Clerc, vol. ii. pp. 122, 123.

[199] Capefigue, vol. v. pp. 223, 224.

[200] Le Clerc, vol. ii. pp. 123, 124.

[201] Le Vassor, vol. vii. book xxxv. pp. 248-251.

[202] Francisco de Moncade, Marques d'Ayetona, Conde d'Osuna, was born
at Valencia in 1586; he was successively Councillor of State, Governor
of the Low Countries, and generalissimo of the Spanish armies. He
died in 1635.

[203] Sismondi, vol. xxiii. p. 240.

CHAPTER XI

1634

Increasing trials of the exiled Queen--Her property is seized on the
frontier--She determines to conciliate the Cardinal--Richelieu remains
implacable--Far-reaching ambition of the minister--Weakness of Louis
XIII--Insidious arguments of Richelieu--Marie de Medicis is again urged
to abandon her adherents--Cowardly policy of Monsieur--He signs
a treaty with Spain--The Queen-mother refuses to join in the
conspiracy--Puylaurens induces Monsieur to accept the proffered terms of
Richelieu--He escapes secretly from Brussels---Gaston pledges himself to
the King to "love the Cardinal"--Gaston again refuses to repudiate his
wife--Puylaurens obtains the hand of a relative of the minister and
becomes Duc de Puylaurens--Monsieur retires to Blois.

The early months of the year 1634 were passed by Marie de Medicis in
perpetual mortification and anxiety. The passport which she had obtained
for the free transport of such articles of necessity as she might deem
it expedient to procure from France was disregarded, and her packages
were subjected to a rigorous examination on the frontier; an insult of
which she complained bitterly to Louis, declaring that if the Cardinal
sought by such means to reduce her to a more pitiable condition than
that in which she had already found herself, and thus to bend her to his
will, the attempt would prove fruitless; as no amount of indignity
should induce her to humble herself before him.

The unhappy Princess little imagined that in a few short weeks she
should become a suppliant for his favour! Meanwhile[204] the struggle
for pre-eminence continued unabated between Puylaurens and Chanteloupe;
and the life of the former having been on one occasion attempted, the
faction of Monsieur did not hesitate to attribute the contemplated
assassination to the adherents of the Queen-mothe