y-actor. The cardinal remained inexorable. It
is said that the king wept in the excess of his chagrin as he felt
compelled to yield to the representations of his domineering minister.
As he unfolded to him the miseries which would be inflicted, not only
upon the kingdom, but upon the court, should the desolating and
expensive war be protracted, the king threw himself upon a sofa, and
buried his face in his hands in silent despair. It was decided that
Mary should be exiled from the court.

The king, thwarted, vexed, wretched, repaired to the cabinet of his
mother. They conversed for an hour together. As they retired from the
cabinet, Madame de Motteville says, "the eyes of both were red with
weeping. The orders were immediately issued for Mary's departure. She
was to go with an elder sister and her governess. The morrow came; the
carriage was at the door. Mary, having taken leave of the queen,
repaired to the apartment of Louis to bid him adieu. She found him
deluged in tears. Summoning all her resolution to maintain
self-control, she held out her trembling hand, and said to him
reproachfully, 'Sire, you are a king; you weep; and yet I go.'"

The king uttered not a word, but, burying his face in his hands upon
the table, sobbed aloud. Mary saw that it was all over with her; that
there was no longer any hope. Without speaking a word, she descended
the stairs to her carriage. The king silently followed her, and stood
by the coach door. She took her seat with her companions, and, without
the interchange of a word or a sign, the carriage drove away. Louis
remained upon the spot until it disappeared from sight.

[Illustration: ISLE OF PHEASANTS.]

The Isle of Pheasants, a small Spanish island in the Bidassoa, a
boundary river between France and Spain, was fixed upon as the
rendezvous for the contracting parties for the royal marriage. Four
days after the exile of Mary, the king and court, with a magnificent
civil and ecclesiastical retinue, set out for the island. The king
insisted, notwithstanding the vehement remonstrances of the queen,
upon visiting Mary Mancini on the journey. As the splendid cortege
passed through the streets of Paris, the whole population was on the
pavement, shouting a thousand blessings on the head of their young
king.

Mary Mancini had received orders from the queen to proceed with her
sister to Saint Jean d'Angely, where, upon the passage of the court,
she was to have an interview with the kin