At the time he said this he had with him the Sieur de Cosse, captain of the guard, and a number of Scottish archers.  The Queen my mother, fearing, from the King’s haste and trepidation, that some mischief might happen to my brother, begged to go with him.  Accordingly, undressed as she was, wrapping herself up in a night-gown, she followed the King to my brother’s bedchamber.  The King knocked at the door with great violence, ordering it to be immediately opened, for that he was there himself.  My brother started up in his bed, awakened by the noise, and, knowing that he had done nothing that he need fear, ordered Cange, his valet de chambre, to open the door.  The King entered in a great rage, and asked him when he would have done plotting against him.  “But I will show you,” said he, “what it is to plot against your sovereign.”  Hereupon he ordered the archers to take away all the trunks, and turn the valets de chambre out of the room.  He searched my brother’s bed himself, to see if he could find any papers concealed in it.  My brother had that evening received a letter from Madame de Sauves, which he kept in his hand, unwilling that it should be seen.  The King endeavoured to force it from him.  He refused to part with it, and earnestly entreated the King would not insist upon seeing it.  This only excited the King’s anxiety the more to have it in his possession, as he now supposed it to be the key to the whole plot, and the very document which would at once bring conviction home to him.  At length, the King having got it into his hands, he opened it in the presence of the Queen my mother, and they were both as much confounded, when they read the contents, as Cato was when he obtained a letter from Caesar, in the Senate, which the latter was unwilling to give up; and which Cato, supposing it to contain a conspiracy against the Republic, found to be no other than a love-letter from his own sister.

But the shame of this disappointment served only to increase the King’s anger, who, without condescending to make a reply to my brother, when repeatedly asked what he had been accused of, gave him in charge of M. de Cosse and his Scots, commanding them not to admit a single person to speak with him.

It was one o’clock in the morning when my brother was made a prisoner in the manner I have now related.  He feared some fatal event might succeed these violent proceedings, and he was under the greatest concern on my account, supposing me to be under a like arrest.  He observed M. de Cosse to be much affected by the scene he had been witness to, even to shedding tears.  As the archers were in the room he would not venture to enter into discourse with him, but only asked what was become of me.  M. de Cosse answered that I remained at full liberty.  My brother then said it was a great comfort to him to hear that news; “but,” added he, “as I know she loves me so entirely that she would rather be confined with me than have her liberty whilst I was in confinement, I beg you will go to the Queen my mother, and desire her to obtain leave for my sister to be with me.”  He did so, and it was granted.