t the Queen was not pleased with my proceedings,
and that the Court was persuaded that I did what lay in my power to
promote the insurrection. I confess I gave no credit to what Montresor
said, for though I saw they made a jest of me in the Queen's Cabinet, I
hoped that their malice did not go so far as to diminish the merit of the
service I had rendered, and never imagined that they could be capable of
turning it into a crime. Laigues, too, came from Court and told me that
I was publicly laughed at, and charged with having fomented the
insurrection instead of appeasing it; that I had been ridiculed two whole
hours and exposed to the smart raillery of Beautru, to the buffoonery of
Nogent, to the pleasantries of La Riviere, to the false compassion of the
Cardinal, and to the loud laughter of the Queen.

You may guess that I was not a little moved at this, but I rather felt a
slight annoyance than any transport of passion. All sorts of notions
came into my mind, and all as suddenly passed away. I sacrificed with
little or no scruple all the sweetest and brightest images which the
memory of past conspiracies presented in crowds to my mind as soon as the
ill-treatment I now publicly met with gave me reason to think that I
might with honour engage myself in new ones. The obligations I had to
her Majesty made me reject all these thoughts, though I must confess I
was brought up in them from my infancy, and Laigues and Montresor could
have never shaken my resolution either by insinuating motives or making
reproaches, if Argenteuil, a gentleman firmly attached to my interest,
had not come into my room that moment with a frightened countenance and
said:

"You are undone; the Marechal de La Meilleraye has charged me to tell you
that he verily thinks the devil is in the courtiers, who has put it into
their heads that you have done all in your power to stir up the sedition.
The Marechal de La Meilleraye has laboured earnestly to inform the Queen
and Cardinal of the truth of the whole matter, but both have ridiculed
him for his attempt. The Marshal said he could not excuse the injury
they did you, but could not sufficiently admire the contempt they always
had for the tumult, of which they foretold the consequence as if they had
the gift of prophecy, always affirming that it would vanish in a night,
as it really has, for he hardly met a soul in the streets."

He added that fires so quickly extinguished as this were not likely t