"When he is fairly gone," said Caron, "it is to be hoped that the King's
head will no longer be so muddled about these things. I wish it with all
my heart."

It was a dismal prospect for the States. The one ally on whom they had
a right to depend, the ex-Calvinist and royal Defender of the Faith, in
this mortal combat of Protestantism with the League, was slipping out of
their grasp with distracting lubricity. On the other hand, the Most
Christian King, a boy of fourteen years, was still in the control of a
mother heart and soul with the League--so far as she had heart or soul--
was betrothed to the daughter of Spain, and saw his kingdom torn to
pieces and almost literally divided among themselves by rebellious
princes, who made use of the Spanish marriages as a pretext for unceasing
civil war.

The Queen-Mother was at that moment at Bordeaux, and an emissary from the
princes was in London. James had sent to offer his mediation between
them and the Queen. He was fond of mediation. He considered it his
special mission in the world to mediate. He imagined himself as looked
up to by the nations as the great arbitrator of Christendom, and was wont
to issue his decrees as if binding in force and infallible by nature. He
had protested vigorously against the Spanish-French marriages, and
declared that the princes were justified in formalizing an opposition to
them, at least until affairs in France were restored to something like
order. He warned the Queen against throwing the kingdom "into the
combustion of war without necessity," and declared that, if she would
trust to his guidance, she might make use of him as if her affairs were
his own. An indispensable condition for much assistance, however, would
be that the marriages should be put off.