Chancellor Sillery, whom he unhesitatingly accused of extortion and avarice, of publicly making a trade of justice to the dishonour of the nation, and of ruining those who were compelled to solicit his protection.  On this point alone he was in accord with Concini; and it was to this mutual hatred of the ministers that their partial good understanding must be attributed.  The reasons which induced the Marechal de Lesdiguieres to approve the alliance we have already stated:  the ducal crown which he was so anxious to secure must have been irretrievably lost by any opposition on his part to the proposed alliance, and this vision was for ever before his eyes.  The approbation of the Connetable de Montmorency, who had originally declared his objection to so close a union between the two countries, was purchased by a promise that the hand of one of the Princesses of Mantua, niece to the Regent, should be conferred upon his son; and the brilliant promise of the one marriage caused him to overlook the probable perils of the other; while the Duc de Bouillon, although he occasionally declared in the Council that he seriously apprehended the result of so intimate a connection with Spain, never remonstrated with any energy against the measure, and was believed by those who knew him best to have already made his conditions with Philip.  On the departure of the two Princes, Marie urged the Duc de Guise to afford her his support, together with that of his house, which he did with a frankness worthy of record, concluding, however, with these emphatic words:  “I have but one favour to request of you, Madame; and that is, that after this important service your Majesty will not abandon us, as you have already once done, to the resentment of the Princes of the Blood.” [135]

The Duc d’Epernon, who had left the Court, as elsewhere stated, if not in actual disgrace, at least mortified and disappointed, was now recalled; and as his failing was well known, he was received on his arrival at Fontainebleau with such extraordinary distinction that all his past grievances were at once forgotten.  Sillery, Villeroy, and Concini overwhelmed him with respect and adulation, and his adherence to the party of the Regent was consequently purchased before the question had been mooted in his presence.

Meanwhile the English Ambassador declaimed loudly against the contemplated alliance, which he declared to be unequivocally antagonistic to the interests of his sovereign; and his undisguised indignation so alarmed the Council that it was immediately resolved to despatch the Duc de Bouillon on an extraordinary embassy to the Court of London in order to appease the displeasure of James.  The minister of the United Provinces was equally violent in his opposition, and exerted all his energies to prevent the conclusion of a treaty which he regarded as fatal to the interests of the republic that he represented, but his expostulations were disregarded.  An envoy was sent to the Hague with assurances of amity to Prince Maurice and the States-General; and finally, the Marechal de Schomberg was instructed to visit the several Protestant Princes of Germany in order to dispel any distrust which they might feel at the probable results of an alliance so threatening to their interests.[136]