of Milan, and would not speak to him." Lautrec found an occasion for
addressing the king, and complained vehemently of "the black looks he
gave him." "And good reason," said the king, "when you have lost me such
a heritage as the duchy of Milan." "'Twas not I who lost it," answered
Lautrec; "'twas your Majesty yourself: I several times warned you that,
if I were not helped with money, there was no means of retaining the
men-at-arms, who had served for eighteen months without a penny, and
likewise the Swiss, who forced me to fight at a disadvantage, which they
would never have done if they had received their pay." "I sent you four
hundred thousand crowns when you asked for them." "I received the
letters in which your Majesty notified me of this money, but the money
never." The king sent at once for the superintendent-general of finance,
James de Beaune, Baron of Semblancay, who acknowledged having received
orders on the subject from the king, but added that at the very moment
when he was about to send this sum to the army, the queen-mother had come
and asked him for it, and had received it from him, whereof he was ready
to make oath. Francis I. entered his mother's room in a rage,
reproaching her with having been the cause of losing him his duchy of
Milan. "I should never have believed it of you," he said, "that you would
have kept money ordered for the service of my army." The queen-mother,
somewhat confused at first, excused herself by saying, that "those were
moneys proceeding from the savings which she had made out of her
revenues, and had given to the superintendent to take care of."
Semblancay stuck to what he had said. The question became a personal one
between the queen-mother and the minister; and commissioners were
appointed to decide the difference. Chancellor Duprat was the docile
servant of Louise of Savoy and the enemy of Semblancay, whose authority
in financial matters he envied; and he chose the commissioners from
amongst the mushroom councillors he had lately brought into Parliament.
The question between the queen-mother and the superintendent led to