prince of the blood at a solemnity expressly intended as a
demonstration against the designs hatching by the first of all the
princes of the blood under patronage of Spain was a severe blow to his
pride and a check to his policy.'

Yet it was inconceivable that he could at such a moment commit so
superfluous and unmeaning a blunder. He had forced Conde into exile,
intrigue with the enemy, and rebellion, by open and audacious efforts to
destroy his domestic peace, and now he was willing to alienate one of his
most powerful subjects in order to place his bastards on a level with
royalty. While it is sufficiently amusing to contemplate this proposed
barter of a chief command in a great army or the lieutenancy-general of a
mighty kingdom at the outbreak of a general European war against a bit of
embroidery on the court dress of a lady, yet it is impossible not to
recognize something ideal and chivalrous from his own point of view in
the refusal of Soissons to renounce those emblems of pure and high
descent, those haughty lilies of St. Louis, against any bribes of place
and pelf however dazzling.

The coronation took place on Thursday, 13th May, with the pomp and
glitter becoming great court festivals; the more pompous and glittering
the more the monarch's heart was wrapped in gloom. The representatives of
the great powers were conspicuous in the procession; Aerssens, the Dutch
ambassador, holding a foremost place. The ambassadors of Spain and Venice
as usual squabbled about precedence and many other things, and actually
came to fisticuffs, the fight lasting a long time and ending somewhat to
the advantage of the Venetian. But the sacrament was over, and Mary de'
Medici was crowned Queen of France and Regent of the Kingdom during the
absence of the sovereign with his army.

Meantime there had been mysterious warnings darker and more distinct than
the babble of the soothsayer Thomassin or the ravings of the lunatic
Pasithea. Count Schomberg, dining at the Arsenal with Sully, had been
called out to converse with Mademoiselle de Gournay, who implored that a
certain Madame d'Escomans might be admitted to audience of the King. That
person, once in direct relations with the Marchioness of Verneuil, the
one of Henry's mistresses who most hated him, affirmed that a man from
the Duke of Epernon's country was in Paris, agent of a conspiracy seeking
the King's life.

The woman not enjoying a very reputable character found it imposs