trary to custom (his difficulty of articulation
rendering the King unwilling on ordinary occasions to indulge in much
speaking, diffuse as he was on paper), he enlarged at greater length,
and with infinitely more violence than Richelieu had done, upon the
misdemeanours of the three individuals whom he claimed at the hands of
the Queen-mother, as well as on the necessity of her prompt obedience,
which alone could, as he declared, tend to convince him that she had
been guiltless of all participation in their crimes.

As the mission of the envoy was accomplished, he commenced his
preparations for leaving France; but before they were completed he
received fresh despatches from Marie de Medicis, in which she confirmed
her former promises both to her son and his minister, in terms still
more submissive than those of her previous letters, and requested a
passport for Suffren, her confessor, in order that he might plead
her cause.

Richelieu was, however, too well aware of the timid and scrupulous
nature of the King's conscience, and of the eagerness with which the
able Jesuit would avail himself of a similar knowledge, to suffer him to
approach the person of Louis; and he consequently replied that "it would
be useless for the Queen-mother to send her confessor, or any other
individual, to the French Court, unless they brought with them her
consent to the condition upon which his Majesty had insisted; as the
King had come to an irrevocable determination never to yield upon that
point, and to refuse to listen to any other envoy whom she might
despatch to him, until she had afforded by her obedience a proof of
submission which was indispensable alike to her own reputation, the
tranquillity of the royal family, and the welfare of the kingdom."

While awaiting the reappearance of De Laleu, all the household of Marie
de Medicis, with the exception of Chanteloupe and one or two others,
began to anticipate a speedy return to France. The concessions which she
had made were indeed so important and so unforeseen, that it seemed idle
to apprehend any further opposition on the part either of the King
himself, or of his still more obdurate minister. Great, therefore, was
their dismay when they discovered that their unhappy mistress had
sacrificed her pride in vain, and that she still remained the victim of
her arch-enemy the Cardinal. But among the murmurs by which she was
surrounded not one proceeded from the lips of the persecuted exile