H. Noel Williams

Alarm of the conspirators at the arrest of the VendÔmes—Chalais, at the instigation of Madame de Chevreuse, urges Monsieur to take flight and throw himself into a fortress—Monsieur and Chalais join the Court at Blois—The Comte de Louvigny betrays the latter to the Cardinal—Chalais is arrested at Nantes—Despicable conduct of Monsieur—Chalais, persuaded by Richelieu that Madame de Chevreuse is unfaithful to him, makes the gravest accusation against her, in the hope of saving his life—He is, nevertheless, condemned to death—He withdraws his accusations against Madame de Chevreuse—His barbarous execution—Death of the MarÉchal d’Ornano—Marriage of Monsieur—Bassompierre declines the post of Surintendant of Monsieur’s Household—Indignation of Louis XIII against Anne of Austria—Public humiliation inflicted upon the Queen—Banishment of Madame de Chevreuse—Bassompierre nominated Ambassador Extraordinary to England—Differences between Charles I and Henrietta over the question of the young Queen’s French attendants—The Tyburn pilgrimage—Expulsion of the French attendants from England—Resentment of the Court of France.

The news of the arrest of the VendÔmes, following upon that of Ornano and the miscarriage of the Fleury affair, had filled the conspirators with dismay. They feared the effect of these repeated reverses upon the timid and vacillating mind of Monsieur, who, deprived of both the marshal and the Grand Prior, the two persons who had exercised the most influence over him, would be more difficult to decide than ever; and the less resolute began to entertain serious doubts as to the wisdom of proceeding with the enterprise. Madame de Chevreuse, however, refused to be discouraged. She had surprised Chalais’s secret, won him back to the cause and compelled him to commit himself more deeply than ever, and she believed that she had, in the influence the young man possessed over Monsieur, a means which, if well employed, might re-establish everything. She proceeded to exploit it with her usual audacity and address, and, spurred on by his passion for the beautiful duchess, Chalais lost no occasion of urging the prince to take flight and to throw himself into some fortified place. Gaston, however, could not make up his mind to this course, and, though nearly persuaded, he was still wavering, when orders came from the King to join him at Blois.

Monsieur left Paris, accompanied by Chalais and two of his young favourites, Puylaurens and Bois d’Annemetz, the latter of whom has left us an interesting, though not altogether reliable, account of the conspiracy in which he was engaged.[36] They united their entreaties to those of Chalais, and by the time the party reached Blois, Monsieur would appear to have at last decided to follow the counsels which had been so long tendered to him in vain. It was then agreed that Gaston should write to d’Épernon inviting him to declare, in his favour, and that Chalais should despatch one of his friends, named La LoubÈre, to the Marquis de la Valette, d’Épernon’s eldest son, who commanded in Metz, requesting him to receive the prince in that fortress.

While Chalais was labouring thus to merit the favours of Madame de Chevreuse, whom he had the happiness of seeing again when he joined the Court at Blois, to lull the suspicions of Richelieu he had continued to profess the greatest devotion to his interests and gave him sometimes useful information. It is not surprising that this double game should have aroused the suspicion of some of his allies, and the author of the MÉmores d’un favori accuses him of desiring to safeguard himself whichever side was ultimately victorious. There can be no doubt, however, that Madame de Chevreuse knew the secret of Chalais’s communications with the Cardinal, and that he was acting with her full approval.

It was a dangerous game to play for long with a person so vigilant and penetrating as Richelieu. The reports which daily reached the Cardinal from his secret agents all tended to show that Monsieur had grossly violated the solemn pledge that he had given at Fontainebleau, and that want of courage alone prevented him from throwing aside the mask; and he found it difficult to reconcile Chalais’s assurances of devotion to himself with those midnight visits en robe de chambre lasting two or three hours which his spies informed him the count was in the habit of paying to Gaston’s apartments. Already he was more than half-convinced that the young man was playing him false, when an act of shameful treachery settled the question.

On June 27 the Court left Blois for Tours, from which town Chalais despatched La LoubÈre to Metz.

“This La LoubÈre,” writes Bassompierre, “came to take leave of the Comte de Louvigny,[37] in whose service he had been, and, knowing him to be an intimate friend of Chalais, did not hesitate to tell him where he was going and with what object. From Tours the King journeyed along the River Loire to Saumur, and on the way Louvigny had some dispute with M. de Candale,[38] with whom he was not on good terms, owing to some amourettes.[39] However, this passed without any disturbance. On the evening we arrived at Saumur, Chalais and Bouteville[40] came to dine with me, and begged me to reprimand Louvigny, which I did in their presence; and the others told him that he must take care not to have any quarrel with M. de Candale, if he did not wish to lose their friendship, because they were bound to M. de Candale by particular obligations. He, on the contrary, while going on the morrow from Saumur to the Ponts-de-CÉ, picked a quarrel with M. de Candale, and then all those whom he thought his friends left him to offer their services to M. de Candale. At which this malicious lad was so enraged, that on the morrow, when the King arrived at Ancenis,[41] he requested to speak to him, and informed him that La LoubÈre had gone to Metz by order of Chalais, and of several other things which he knew or which he invented.”[42]

Other writers assert that the real cause of Louvigny’s treachery was that he had, like Chalais, fallen violently in love with Madame de Chevreuse and was jealous of the preference which that lady showed for the Master of the Wardrobe; and it is therefore possible that the affair of which Bassompierre speaks was only a pretext. Anyway, a few days later Chalais was arrested at Nantes, where the Court had arrived on July 3, and imprisoned in a gloomy dungeon in the basement of one of the towers of the chÂteau.

Gaston knew that the game was up. Richelieu requested the King to send for his brother, and succeeded in reducing that miserable prince to a condition of such abject submission that, despicable as had been his conduct at Fontainebleau a few weeks earlier, he, on this occasion, far surpassed it and plunged into a veritable abyss of infamy.

Not only did he consent to the marriage against which he had so indignantly protested, but he furnished the most damning evidence against the leaders of the conspiracy of which he was the chief. He revealed all the communications into which Ornano had entered with the discontented nobles and with foreign princes, undeterred by the knowledge that the unfortunate marshal, for whom he had professed so much zeal, was already awaiting his trial on a capital charge. He declared that it was the Grand Prieur de VendÔme, likewise in Richelieu’s clutches, who had counselled him to go to Fleury and assassinate the Cardinal, if he refused to set Ornano at liberty. He denounced the Comte de Soissons, the Duc de Longueville, Soubise, and many others, some of whom had but a very remote connection with the conspiracy. And he gave so circumstantial an account of his relations with Chalais and of the persistent efforts the latter had made to push him into revolt, that he rendered it quite futile for that misguided young man to attempt any defence. Finally, he confessed that Anne of Austria had several times entreated him to refuse his consent to the marriage proposed to him, except on the condition that Ornano should be set at liberty, and declared that, more than two years before, Madame de Chevreuse had advised him to remain unmarried, promising that, in the event of the King’s death, he should marry the Queen.

It was decided to bring Chalais to trial before one of those special commissions to which Richelieu henceforth assigned most State prosecutions, for greater certainty of result. It assembled at Nantes, under the presidency of the new Chancellor, Michel de Marillac, and no one doubted that Richelieu intended to make a terrible example of the Master of the Wardrobe.

The unfortunate young man comprehended this, and his courage failed him. He would have led the most forlorn of hopes or faced the most redoubtable of bretteurs cheerfully enough, but he shrank in terror from the shadow of the headsman’s axe. With the scaffold before his eyes, he revealed himself as the most cowardly of poltroons and rivalled in baseness even Monsieur himself.

But, while denouncing his accomplices, he, to the mortification of Richelieu, kept faith with Madame de Chevreuse, and neither before the commission, nor in the private examinations to which he was subjected, could anything compromising to the duchess be extracted from him. His passion for this woman who had lured him to his destruction was as potent as ever, and from his gloomy dungeon he addressed to her letters filled with extravagant expressions of adoration, which the lovers of those days were wont to employ, but which come strangely from a man menaced by a traitor’s death.[43] Madame de Chevreuse, not unnaturally, refused to incriminate herself in writing, and though she sent, on more than one occasion, verbal messages to the prisoner, these do not appear to have reached him. Anyway, Richelieu, who was particularly anxious to secure evidence against the duchess, whom he knew to be one of his most dangerous enemies, contrived to persuade Chalais that she had forgotten her hapless admirer and was occupied with other love-affairs, and that she had not scrupled to save herself at his expense. Exasperated to the last degree against the woman who, he believed, had repaid his devotion by such base ingratitude, and in the delusive hope that further important revelations might induce the Cardinal to spare his life, the wretched Chalais was gradually led to make the gravest accusations against the duchess. It was all useless. So soon as Richelieu judged that he had extracted from the prisoner all the information he could hope, the proceedings were hurried on, and on August 18 the court pronounced the inevitable sentence, and “declared Henri de Talleyrand, Sieur de Chalais, attainted and convicted of the crime of lÈse-majestÉ”; for reparation whereof it condemned him to be taken by the executioner of the High Justice, and conducted, with bare head, to the Place de Bouffay of Nantes, and there, on a scaffold which should be erected for that purpose, to have his head struck off and placed on a pike on the Porte de Sauvetour, his body to be quartered and fastened to gibbets at the four principal avenues of the said town, and that, before execution, he should be subjected to torture for the revelation of his accomplices. The court further declared all his property forfeited to the King, his posterity ignoble and roturiÈre and deprived of all the privileges of the nobility, and ordered his residences to be demolished and his woods cut down to within a man’s height of the ground.

This barbarous sentence was modified by the King, who, “yielding to the very humble prayer of the Dame de Chalais, mother of the said Chalais, and to several of his faithful and affectionate subjects, to whom the said Chalais was related,” remitted all that was uselessly cruel, and directed that, after decapitation, the body should be given to his mother for burial in holy ground. His Majesty also annulled the attainder.

Before going to execution, the condemned man withdrew all the accusations he had made against Madame de Chevreuse, declaring that “what he had written, he had written in the extremity of rage and by reason of an erroneous belief which he entertained that she had deceived him,” and, after signing the recantation, he sent for his confessor and charged him to inform the King that everything he had said against the Queen and Madame de Chevreuse was false.

In the hope that the intercession of Monsieur, who had been shamed into making some belated efforts to induce the King to spare Chalais’s life, and that the gain of a few days might mean his salvation, the friends of the condemned had bribed the executioner of Nantes to leave the town. Their intervention merely served to make the unhappy man’s end the more cruel, for, instead of postponing the execution until the headsman of Nantes could be fetched, Richelieu sent for a criminal then lying under sentence of death in the prison of Nantes, who, on the promise that he should be accorded his life, undertook to replace him. The improvised executioner bungled the business in the most shocking manner, and, according to one contemporary account, more than thirty blows were required before the head at last fell. Chalais’s body was given to his mother, who caused it to be buried beneath the high altar in the Church of the Franciscans at Nantes.[44]

Such was the end of Chalais and of the conspiracy which is sometimes known by his name, though it might with far more justice be called by that of Madame de Chevreuse, since it was she who had pulled the strings by which her luckless puppet of a lover danced to the scaffold. If it had succeeded, it would have changed the face of the realm, but its complete failure, which placed all its leaders, with the exception of the Comte de Soissons who had prudently taken to flight, in the power of Richelieu, immensely strengthened the government it was intended to overthrow. On September 2 the MarÉchal d’Ornano anticipated the executioner by dying in prison,[45] and, two and a half years later, the Grand Prior followed him to the grave. The Duc de VendÔme remained in captivity until 1630, when he was set at liberty, though his government of Brittany, which had made him so great a power for mischief, was never restored to him.

As for Monsieur, he was discharged in order that he might marry Mlle. de Montpensier. The marriage contract was signed on August 5, and the wedding celebrated the following day by the triumphant Richelieu.

At the conclusion of the betrothal ceremony, the King, addressing Monsieur before Bassompierre, said: “Brother, I tell you before the MarÉchal de Bassompierre, who loves you well, and who is my good and faithful servant, that I have never in my life accomplished anything which has pleased me so much as your marriage.” Monsieur then invited Bassompierre to walk with him in the garden which is on the bastion [of Nantes] and said to him: “Betstein,[46] you will see me now without fear, since I stand well with the King.” He then proposed to Bassompierre that he should enter his service as Surintendant of his Household and chief of his council, as Ornano had been, and begged him to speak to the King and obtain his consent. The marshal, however, begged to be excused, foreseeing that such a position, though very honourable and lucrative, was likely to prove extremely embarrassing. “I answered,” says he, “that if the King were to offer me 100,000 crowns a year to enter his service, I should decline, not because I should not deem it a great honour and that I have not an ardent desire to serve you, but because it would be necessary for me to deceive one or the other of you, and I am not skilful in that.”

Mlle. de Montpensier brought her husband a revenue of 350,000 livres and immense estates, amongst which was the sovereign principality of Dombes, and Louis XIII, on the advice of Richelieu, gave Monsieur, as the price of his honour and the lives of his friends, a rich appanage. He exchanged the duchy of Anjou for those of OrlÉans and Chartres and the county of Blois, with a revenue of 100,000 livres and pensions amounting to more than six times that sum.[47] Little wonder, then, that he should have received the news of the unfortunate Chalais’s death with equanimity![48]

The brother was pardoned, but the wife had transgressed beyond forgiveness. The King, already violently irritated against the Queen by her coquetry with Buckingham, was exasperated beyond measure at the part which she was reported to have played in this miserable affair. His jealous and suspicious nature easily persuaded him that there was some intrigue between her and Monsieur, not perhaps to hasten his demise, but to marry whenever that event should take place; and such remained his settled conviction until the end of his life.[49] In the first transports of his wrath, he summoned his consort to appear before a special council, at which Richelieu and the Queen-Mother assisted. Instead of being accommodated with the fauteuil due to her royalty, Anne suffered the indignity of having to sit upon a folding-seat, as though she had been a criminal, the while the King upbraided her with having conspired against his life, in order to have another husband. “The Queen,” writes Madame de Motteville, “to whom innocence gave strength, incensed by the cruelty of the accusation, spoke with firmness and a generous boldness, and told him, as I have heard from her own lips, that she had too little to gain by the change to blacken her soul for so small a profit. Then, with the imperiousness of a princess of her birth, she reproached the Queen-Mother with the persecutions which she and the Cardinal de Richelieu were inflicting upon her.”

Anne’s boldness, and particularly the disdainful answer which she had given him, served only to exasperate the angry monarch still further, and he resolved to punish her by a public humiliation. Accordingly, an order was issued, signed by Louis and countersigned by the Cardinal, forbidding entry to the Queen’s apartments to all nobles and gentlemen other than those attached to her Household, unless they paid their respects to her Majesty in the King’s presence and entered and quitted her apartments in his suite. He also forbade the Queen to grant any private audience without informing the Queen-Mother or the Cardinal, and naming the person whom she proposed to receive and the object of the interview.

Madame de Chevreuse remained to be dealt with, and for a time it looked as though matters were likely to go hardly with her. Her husband, however, who was in high favour with Louis XIII, intervened and persuaded the King to be content with her banishment from the Court, promising to be answerable for her future conduct. She accordingly retired to the duke’s chÂteau of Dampierre, near Rambouillet, where she was kept under close surveillance, all communication with the Queen being strictly forbidden her. She would appear, however, to have been so imprudent as to disobey this command; anyway, six months later she received orders to leave France. Her request that she might be permitted to retire to England was refused, and she was obliged to seek an asylum at Nancy, with her husband’s kinsman, Charles IV of Lorraine.

At the end of September of that year, Bassompierre was despatched on another important diplomatic mission, this time to England, where the differences between Charles I and Henrietta Maria over the thorny question of the Queen’s French attendants had reached a crisis.

In the marriage treaty, signed on November 24, 1624, the French Government had succeeded in obtaining practically all that it had demanded, though when one reads the articles of this astonishing document, it is impossible to believe that James I, or Charles, when after his accession he confirmed them, ever intended that they should be carried out, or that they conceived it possible to do so.

The treaty stipulated that the free exercise of the Catholic religion should be permitted to Henrietta, and likewise to all the children who should be born of the marriage, who were to be brought up by their mother until they reached the age of thirteen. The Queen was to have a chapel in all the royal palaces, “and in every place of the King of Great Britain’s dominions where he or she should reside.” She was to have in her house twenty-eight priests and ecclesiastics, almoners and chaplains included, to serve in her chapel, and if there were any regular clergy amongst them, they should wear the habit of their Order. Her domestic establishment was to consist exclusively of French Catholics, chosen by the Very Christian King.

These terms, if decidedly obnoxious to British prejudice, were, with the exception of the exclusively French composition of the Queen’s Household—a most startling innovation and one which was bound to lead to trouble—only what might have been expected if the King of England chose for his wife a Catholic princess. But the treaty contained in addition private or secret articles, which, admitting as they did the right of a foreign power to meddle in domestic affairs, were unlikely to be tolerated for a moment by a self-respecting people. These secret articles stipulated:—

1. That the Catholics, as well ecclesiastical as temporal, imprisoned since the last proclamation which followed the breach with Spain, should all be set at liberty.

2. That the English Catholics should be no more searched after nor molested for their religion.

3. That the goods of the Catholics, as well ecclesiastical as temporal, that were seized since the aforementioned proclamation, should be restored.

The insertion of these secret articles in the marriage treaty is the more extraordinary, since, on his return from Spain, Charles had pledged his word, in response to a petition from the Commons, that, in the event of his marrying a Catholic princess, “no advantage to the recusants at home” should accrue from the match. He had therefore to choose between breaking faith either with Parliament and the nation or with France.

To aggravate the difficulty of the situation, Henrietta had been sent to England as though she were a missionary of the Propaganda going forth to fight her battle for God and the Church. Urban VIII had exhorted her to prove the guardian angel of the English Catholics and told her that the eyes of both worlds, earthly and spiritual, were upon her; while, on taking leave of her, Marie de’ Medici had placed in her hands a lengthy epistle, purporting to contain her own final counsels and admonitions, though in all probability it was the work of her confessor BÉrulle, in which she was enjoined to model her conduct upon that of her ancestor Saint-Louis, and, like him, to fight a good fight for the Christian [i.e., Roman Catholic] religion, in defence of which he exposed his life, dying faithful amongst infidels. The sequel leaves no doubt that the child—she was but fifteen—took to heart the lessons which she had received.

Charles I’s dream of domestic happiness speedily vanished. On the road to London there was a warm dispute between the royal pair on the question of the precedence to be enjoyed by Madame de Saint-George, Henrietta’s lady of the bedchamber, to whom the young Queen was tenderly attached; and this affair appears to have embittered the early days of their married life. Other troubles were not long in arriving, for Henrietta was impetuous and indiscreet, Charles punctilious and tactless.

After a very short stay in London, their Majesties, to escape the plague which was devastating the capital, removed to Hampton Court. A few days later, a deputation from the Privy Council waited upon the Queen to acquaint her with the regulations which the King desired should be observed in his Household, which were substantially the same as those which had been in force during the lifetime of his mother, Anne of Denmark.

Henrietta took umbrage at once. “I hope,” she replied pettishly, “I shall have leave to order my house as I list myself.” Charles attempted to argue the point with her in private, but the answer he received was so rude that he did not venture to transcribe it when a year later he sent a long account of his consort’s misdoings to his ambassador in France, with the intention that it should be submitted to Marie de’ Medici.

As time went on, matters grew worse. The Queen obstinately declined to make any attempt to learn the English language or to understand English customs, and appeared to regard herself as in a foreign land, where everyone was hostile to her. Even her almoner, the Bishop of Mende, a prelate in no way inclined to be over-conciliatory, was forced to admit that “it would be À propos should the Queen show a greater degree of courtesy towards the King and the great dignitaries of State; adding that to none, of what rank soever, did she pay so much as a compliment.”

Unfortunate as was the attitude adopted by Henrietta, it must be allowed that she was not without cause for complaint. She had come to England in the full persuasion that her arrival was to inaugurate an era of liberation for the English Catholics, but scarcely had she set foot in the country than Charles proceeded to evade his engagements. Faced with the alternative of breaking his promise to his subjects or to the King of France, he attempted to find a way out of the difficulty by steering a middle course. He pardoned and set at liberty the priests who lay in prison, and allowed them to leave the country in the train of the French Ambassadors Extraordinary, Chevreuse and Ville-aux-Clercs, on the understanding that they would not attempt to return, which done, he announced to the Parliament that henceforth the laws against the Catholics would be put into execution.

This compromise satisfied neither party. The English, seeing so many priests suddenly emerge from prison, not unnaturally asked themselves whether the King was really sincere when he declared that the Penal Laws were to be enforced; while the Queen and her ecclesiastical guides and counsellors were indignant that he should thus attempt to evade his pre-nuptial pledges, although, had they had the slightest acquaintance with the state of public feeling, they would have known that to execute them in full was impossible.

The difficulties of the religious situation were accentuated by the lamentable want of tact and patience displayed by both sides. The priests in Henrietta’s suite, with the Bishop of Mende at their head, seemed to be eager for battle, nor was Charles inclined to meet them in a conciliatory spirit. The ecclesiastics were importunate to have the Queen’s chapel at St. James’s completed; but the King, according to a news-letter of the time, replied that, if her Majesty’s closet were not large enough, they could say Mass in the great chamber; that were it not wide enough, they might use the garden; if that would not serve their turn, then the park was the fittest place. “So,” adds the writer, “they wished themselves at home again.” On one occasion, when their Majesties were dining together, there was an unseemly dispute between Henrietta’s chaplain and the King’s as to which of them should say grace. The Frenchman stole a march on his rival, upon which Charles rose, and taking the Queen by the hand, left the table, refusing to partake of meat thus irregularly blessed. On another, while they were staying at a country-house, Henrietta and some of her ladies passed, talking and laughing, through the hall where divine service was being held, and, to make matters worse, returned shortly afterwards and caused a fresh interruption.

As the months passed, it became daily more apparent that, so long as Henrietta’s French attendants remained in England, there could be no hope of a good understanding between husband and wife. The Queen’s ladies taught her to look upon the English of both sexes with distrust and dislike. Her priests fomented by every means in their power the indignation with which Charles’s broken promises in regard to his Catholic subjects had inspired her, and encouraged her to make an ostentatious display of her devotion to the observances of her Church. When, on February 2, 1626, Charles’s coronation took place, they persuaded her, not only to refuse to be crowned with him, but even to decline to assist at the ceremony, though a latticed place in the church had been made ready for her. Her absence involved that of Blainville, the French Ambassador, which was regarded as a serious affront to the sovereign to whom he was accredited, and did not serve to increase the cordiality between the two Courts.

When Henrietta was with her ladies she was as gay and light-hearted as might have been expected from one of her age and nation. Her ill-humour was reserved for her husband, in whose presence she gave herself the airs of a martyr. Charles’s patience was rapidly becoming exhausted; more than once he thought of “cashiering his Monsers,” as he expressed it, of packing the whole company back to France; but the marriage treaty protected them, and for a time he held his hand.

Fresh disputes soon arose. The Queen desired to nominate some of her French attendants to take charge of her jointure, to which Charles refused to consent. One night, after the royal pair were in bed, high words passed between them. “Take your lands to yourself,” exclaimed the angry wife. “If I have no power to put whom I will into those places, I will have neither lands nor houses of you. Give me what you think fit by way of pension.” Charles took refuge in his dignity. “Remember,” said he, “to whom you speak. You ought not to use me so.” The Queen declared that she was miserable; she had no power to place servants, and business succeeded the worse for her recommendation. She would have him to know that she was not of that quality to be used so ill. She continued in this strain for some time, refusing to listen to her husband’s explanations. “Then,” wrote Charles afterwards, in giving an account of the scene to Carleton, for the information of the French Government, “I made her both hear me and end this discourse.”

An incident which occurred at the end of June, 1626, brought matters to a climax.

One evening, after spending the greater part of the day in devotions in her chapel at St. James’s, the Queen, with some of her French attendants, amongst whom appear to have been several priests, strolled out to breathe the fresh air in St. James’s Park. From there they made their way into Hyde Park, and, by accident or design, directed their steps towards Tyburn,[50] where stood the gallows on which so many of their co-religionists had died. What happened then is uncertain. Henrietta afterwards denied that she approached within fifty paces of the gallows-tree, but it is possible, as Bassompierre admitted in his speech before the Royal Commissioners appointed to discuss with him the question of the dismissal of the Queen’s French attendants, that some words of prayer for the souls of the Catholics who had suffered there may have risen to her lips.

A week or two passed before the story of that evening walk reached Charles’s ears, much exaggerated, as one may suppose, in its passage, through the mouths of men. The Queen of England, he was told, had been conducted on a pilgrimage to offer prayers to dead traitors who had suffered the just reward of their crimes.[51] The King’s indignation knew no bounds, and, without apparently troubling to inquire into the truth of the matter, he forthwith resolved that whatever the marriage-treaty might say, those who were responsible for this scandal should no longer remain in England.

As, however, he felt that it would be advisable to do something to lessen the indignation with which the news of the expulsion of his wife’s French attendants would certainly be received in France, he found a pretext for sending Carleton on a special mission to Louis XIII, in order that he might be at hand to explain matters; but no sooner did he learn that his Ambassador had crossed the Channel than he proceeded to carry out his intentions.

On July 31 the King and Queen dined together at Whitehall. When they rose from table, Charles conducted his wife into his private apartments, where, having locked the door, he informed her that her attendants must return to France. Meanwhile, Lord Conway was informing the members of the Queen’s Household that it was the King’s command that they should remove forthwith to Somerset House—Henrietta’s dower-palace—where they would learn his Majesty’s pleasure. The Bishop of Mende expostulated, and the women “howled and lamented as if they had been going to execution.” But the Yeomen of the Guard intervened, thrust them all out and locked the doors after them.

Charles’s task was not so easy. No sooner did the Queen realise what was being done than she rushed to the window, in order to bid farewell to her departing attendants. The King attempted to draw her away, bidding her “to be satisfied, since it must be so.” But Henrietta, who was in a violent passion, broke away from him, and since he prevented her from opening the window, contrived to dash the glass to pieces, in her determination to make her voice heard. Charles, it is said, dragged her back, with her hands bleeding from the energy with which she clung to the bars.

The next day Conway went to Somerset House and informed the indignant attendants of Henrietta that they must leave the country, with two or three exceptions, which had been made at the Queen’s earnest entreaty. Presents to the amount of £22,000 were offered them, and they were told that if anything were owing to them, it should be discharged out of the Queen’s dowry, which had not yet been paid, owing to a misunderstanding between the two Courts. On various pretexts, however, they delayed their departure for several days, until at last Charles, thoroughly exasperated, wrote to Buckingham from Oaking as follows:

The duke proceeded to give effect to his Majesty’s orders, and next day despatched to Somerset House a number of coaches, carts, and barges for the conveyance of the Queen’s retinue and their baggage. But the French with one voice declared their determination not to depart, saying that “they had not been discharged with the proper punctilios.” Thereupon a body of heralds and trumpeters, accompanied by a strong detachment of the Yeomen of the Guard, were marched down to Somerset House. The heralds and trumpeters formally proclaimed the King’s pleasure at the gates, after which the Yeomen advanced to execute it, their orders being, if the French continued refractory, “to thrust them all out head and shoulders.” These drastic measures, however, were not resorted to, as, recognising that further resistance was useless, they departed that same tide, and were conducted to Dover, where they embarked for France so soon as the wind served.

Charles’s high-handed action was, as might have been expected, deeply resented by the Court of France. “The King of England,” says Bassompierre, “sent the millord Carleton to make the King and the Queen-Mother agree to what he had done. He was very badly received.” Louis XIII told Carleton that his sister had been treated cruelly, and that he proposed to send an Ambassador of his own to England, in the person of the MarÉchal de Bassompierre, to investigate the affair. When he had received his report, he would decide what action he would take in the matter; and from this resolution Carleton was unable to move him.

On August 24 the Court left Nantes to return to Paris. Shortly after its arrival in the capital, Charles sent Walter Montague to France to offer his felicitations to the Royal family on the marriage of Monsieur. Louis XIII, however, refused to receive him, and sent orders to him “to make the best of his way back,” and, at the same time, pressed Bassompierre to set out for England with as little delay as possible.