he King's command to furnish, at
his Majesty's expense, the apartments, as the Baron de Gondy, he said,
had long since sold and eaten up all the furniture. He likewise laid in
six pieces of wine and as many of beer, "tavern drinks" being in the
opinion of the thrifty ambassador "both dear and bad."

He bought a carriage lined with velvet for the commissioners, and another
lined with broadcloth for the principal persons of their suite, and with
his own coach as a third he proposed to go to Amiens to meet them. They
could not get on with fewer than these, he said, and the new carriages
would serve their purpose in Paris. He had paid 500 crowns for the two,
and they could be sold, when done with, at a slight loss. He bought
likewise four dapple-grey horses, which would be enough, as nobody had
more than two horses to a carriage in town, and for which he paid 312
crowns--a very low price, he thought, at a season when every one was
purchasing. He engaged good and experienced coachmen at two crowns a
month, and; in short, made all necessary arrangements for their comfort
and the honour of the state.

The King had been growing more and more displeased at the tardiness of
the commission, petulantly ascribing it to a design on the part of the
States to "excuse themselves from sharing in his bold conceptions," but
said that "he could resolve on nothing without My Lords the States, who
were the only power with which he could contract confidently, as mighty
enough and experienced enough to execute the designs to be proposed to
them; so that his army was lying useless on his hands until the
commissioners arrived," and lamented more loudly than ever that Barneveld
was not coming with them. He was now rejoiced, however, to hear that they
would soon arrive, and went in person to the Hotel Gondy to see that
everything was prepared in a manner befitting their dignity and comfort.

His anxiety had moreover been increased, as already stated, by the
alarming reports from Utrecht and by his other private accounts from the
Netherlands.

De Russy expressed in his despatches grave doubts whether the States
would join the king in a war against the King of Spain, because they
feared the disapprobation of the King of Great Britain, "who had already
manifested but too much jealousy of the power and grandeur of the
Republic." Pecquius asserted that the Archdukes had received assurances
from the States that they would do nothing to violate the tru