Despair was general in Spain, where this Queen was universally adored.  There was not a family which did not lament her, not a person who has since been consoled.  The King of Spain was extremely touched, but somewhat in a royal manner.  Thus, when out shooting one day, he came close to the convoy by which the body of his queen was being conveyed to the Escurial; he looked at it, followed it with his eyes, and continued his sport!  Are these princes made like other human beings?

The death of the Queen led to amazing changes, such as the most prophetic could not have foreseen.  Let me here, then, relate the events that followed this misfortune.

I must commence by saying, that the principal cause which had so long and scandalously hindered us from making peace with the Emperor, was a condition, which Madame des Ursins wished to insert in the treaty, (and which the King of Spain supported through thick and thin) to the effect that she should be invested with a bona fide sovereignty.  She had set her heart upon this, and the king of Spain was a long time before he would consent to any terms of peace that did not concede it to her.  It was not until the King had uttered threats against him that he would give way.  As for Madame des Ursins, she had counted upon this sovereignty , with as much certainty as though it were already between her fingers.  She had counted, too, with equal certainty upon exchanging it with our King, for the sovereignty of Touraine and the Amboise country; and had actually charged her faithful Aubigny to buy her some land near Amboise to build her there a vast palace, with courts and outbuildings; to furnish it with magnificence, to spare neither gilding nor paintings, and to surround the whole with the most beautiful gardens.  She meant to live there as sovereign lady of the country.  Aubigny had at once set about the work to the surprise of everybody:  for no one could imagine for whom such a grand building could be designed.  He kept the secret, pretended he was building a house for himself and pushed on the work so rapidly that just as peace was concluded without the stipulation respecting Madame des Ursins being inserted in the treaty, nearly all was finished.  Her sovereignty scheme thoroughly failed; and to finish at once with that mad idea, I may as well state that, ashamed of her failure, she gave this palace to Aubigny, who lived there all the rest of his life:  Chanteloup, for so it was called, has since passed into the hands of Madame d’Armantieres, his daughter.  It is one of the most beautiful and most singular places in all France, and the most superbly furnished.