She changed the dinner hour to noon in accordance with the English custom, and had a heavy supper at night, when she would make the king gorge himself with unhealthful food and coax him “to drink as much as brother Henry,” which invariably resulted in Louis de Valois finding lodgment under the table.  This amused the whole court, except a few old cronies and physicians, who, of course, were scandalized beyond measure.  She took the king on long rides with her on cold days, and would jolt him almost to death, and freeze him until the cold tears streamed down his poor pinched nose, making him feel like a half animated icicle, and wish that he were one in fact.

At night she would have her balls, and keep him up till morning drinking and dancing, or trying to dance, with her, until his poor old heels, and his head, too, for that matter, were like to fall off; then she would slip away from him and lock herself in her room.  December, say I, let May alone; she certainly will kill you.  Despite which sound advice, I doubt not December will go on coveting May up to the end of the chapter; each old fellow—­being such a fine man for his age, you understand—­fondly believing himself an exception.  Age in a fool is damnable.

Mary was killing Louis as certainly and deliberately as if she were feeding him slow poison.  He was very weak and decrepit at best, being compelled frequently, upon public occasions, such, for example, as the coronation tournament of which I have spoken, to lie upon a couch.

Mary’s conduct was really cruel! but then, remember her provocation and that she was acting in self-defense.  All this was easier for her than you might suppose, for the king’s grasp of power, never very strong, was beginning to relax even what little grip it had.  All faces were turned toward the rising sun, young Francis, duke of Angouleme, the king’s distant cousin, who would soon be king in Louis’s place.  As this young rising sun, himself vastly smitten with Mary, openly encouraged her in what she did, the courtiers of course followed suit, and the old king found himself surrounded by a court only too ready to be amused by his lively young queen at his expense.

This condition of affairs Mary welcomed with her whole soul, and to accent it and nail assurance, I fear, played ever so lightly and coyly upon the heart-strings of the young duke, which responded all too loudly to her velvet touch, and almost frightened her to death with their volume of sound later on.  This Francis d’Angouleme, the dauphin, had fallen desperately in love with Mary at first sight, something against which the fact that he was married to Claude, daughter of Louis, in no way militated.  He was a very distant relative of Louis, going away back to St. Louis for his heirship to the French crown.  The king had daughters in plenty, but as you know, the gallant Frenchmen say, according to their Law Salic:  “The realm of France is so great and glorious a heritage that it may not be taken by a woman.”  Too great and glorious to be taken by woman, forsooth!  France would have been vastly better off had she been governed by a woman now and then, for a country always prospers under a queen.