demand of all the fees appertaining to the lesser seals, that the salary of his office should be doubled, and that he should have letters of nobility in Normandy.  All the officers of the Crown sought an increase of twenty-four thousand livres to their several pensions; members of the Council, augmented emoluments; governors of provinces, the revenues of these provinces which had hitherto reverted to the Crown; municipal companies, exemptions and privileges previously unthought of; and finally, Concini, who had arrived in the French capital only a few years previously comparatively destitute, set forth his requirements to be these—­the baton of Marshal of France, the governments of Bourg, Dieppe, and Pont-de-l’Arche, the proceeds of the salt duties of Languedoc, and those of the reduction accorded at Moissets and Feydant.

Such, and much more of the same description, were the contents of the documents upon which the wrath of Sully scarcely permitted him to dwell with patience.  It was a chaos whence he dreaded even to attempt to draw the elements of order, feeling as he did that every concession made to one of the parties must necessarily evoke the jealousy and indignation of another, while it was utterly impossible, and would, moreover, be dangerously impolitic in any case, to satisfy the pretensions of all.  The enormous sums produced by the imposts, whose transfer from the Crown to individuals was thus unblushingly demanded, would have rendered the Princes to whom they might be granted more wealthy than many of the petty sovereigns of Europe; while the governments and provinces sought to be obtained by others must inevitably make them independent of the King, and thus place the subjects who should have been the support of the throne in direct rivalry with their sovereign.  The finance minister was aghast; and the more earnestly he considered the subject, the more he became convinced that there was no alternative save to negative all these egregious claims en masse; a conviction which satisfied him that by fearlessly adopting this course, his tenure of office would, had he still desired to contend with the cabal which had already been formed against him, become utterly impossible.

Nevertheless Sully did not shrink from what he considered an imperative duty; and accordingly he resolved no longer to trust the lip-deep assurances by which he had been beguiled since his return to Court, but immediately to declare his resignation of office, and to follow it up by the most resolute and determined opposition.[96]

He had no sooner, therefore, irrevocably arrived at this decision, than he addressed a letter to the Regent, in which he requested her permission to retire from the Government; and, satisfied that his suit must prove successful, he calmly awaited her reply.  Meanwhile, resolved that no reproach should be cast upon him after his departure, he demanded an audience of the King, in order to explain to him the exact