urged to reside in Tuscany—­She proceeds to Holland, and is magnificently received—­The Prince of Orange intercedes in her behalf with the French King—­Richelieu reiterates his wish that she should retire to Florence—­The Dutch request her to leave the country—­Marie de Medicis embarks for England—­She is received at Gravesend by Charles I—­Takes up her abode in St. James’s Palace—­Meeting between the two Queens—­Precarious position of the English King—­The Court of the Queen-mother—­The French Ambassador is instructed to abstain from all intercourse with the royal exile—­A last appeal—­Obduracy of the Cardinal—­Richelieu, his sovereign, and his benefactress.

Richelieu, however, was far from intending that the Duc d’Orleans should remain unmolested in his retreat.  Puylaurens was the first individual who had dared to dictate his own terms, and to enforce their observance; and although his Eminence had a great affection for his niece, he was by no means inclined to pardon the arrogance of her husband.  An opportunity of revenge soon presented itself.  The attractions of the Carnival proved too great for the prudence of Gaston, who accordingly proceeded to the capital, in order to share in its delights; and when, on the 14th of February 1635, he reached the Louvre, where he was expected to attend the rehearsal of a ballet, his favourite, by whom he was accompanied, was arrested in the royal closet by the captain of the guard, and conveyed to Vincennes.  This act of severity was as unexpected at the moment as it remained unexplained in the sequel.  Suffice it that Monsieur did not permit the disgrace of his chosen and trusted friend to interfere with his own amusement and gratification at so exciting a season, although he could not fail to feel that, once in the grasp of the Cardinal, the unhappy Puylaurens was doomed.

The result proved the truth of this apprehension; nobler and prouder lives than that of the spoiled favourite of Gaston had been sacrificed to the enmity of Richelieu.  The tears and supplications of the heart-broken bride were disregarded; and four months after his arrest Puylaurens expired in his prison of, as it was asserted, typhus fever—­the same disease to which, by an extraordinary coincidence, two former enemies of the Cardinal, the Marechal d’Ornano and the Grand-Prieur de Vendome, had both fallen victims when confined at Vincennes.[215]

During this time the unhappy Queen-mother, who found herself abandoned on every side, had retired to Antwerp with the Princesse Marguerite, in order to escape the mortifications to which she was constantly subjected by the increasing coldness of her Spanish allies; and thence she wrote earnestly to the Sovereign-Pontiff entreating his interference to effect her reconciliation with the King, and begging him to exert his influence to avert the war with Spain which the Cardinal was labouring to provoke.  The answer which she received to this despatch was cold and discouraging, but she