told this valet not to quit the threshold of the house, and to inform him as soon as the chaise appeared.  He then suffered himself to be led to the back of the house, in order to lie down.  The post-mistress, immediately after, goes to one of her friends in a by-street, relates her adventure and her suspicions, makes the friend agree to receive and secrete in her dwelling the person she expected, sends for an ecclesiastic, a relative of them both, and in whom she could repose confidence, who came and lent an Abbe’s dress and wig to match.  This done, Madame L’Hospital returns to her home, finds the English valet at the door, talks with him, pities his ennui, says he is a good fellow to be so particular, says that from the door to the house there is but one step, promises him that he shall be as well informed as by his own eyes, presses him to drink something, and tips the wink to a trusty postilion, who makes him drink until he rolls dead drunk under the table.  During this performance, the wary mistress listens at the door of the English gentleman’s room, gently turns the key and locks him in, and then establishes herself upon the threshold of her door.

Half an hour after comes the trusty valet whom she had put on guard:  it was the expected chaise, which, as well as the three men who accompanied it, were made, without knowing why, to slacken speed.  It was King James.  Madame L’Hospital accosts him, says he is expected, and lost if he does not take care; but that he may trust in her and follow her.  At once they both go to her friends.  There he learns all that has happened, and they hide him, and the three men of his suite as well as they could.  Madame L’Hospital returns home, sends for the officers of justice, and in consequence of her suspicions she causes the English gentleman and the English valet, the one drunk, the other asleep, locked in the room where she had left him, to be arrested, and immediately after despatches a postilion to Torcy.  The officers of justice act, and send their deposition to the Court.

The rage of the English gentleman on finding himself arrested, and unable to execute the duty which led him there, and his fury against the valet who had allowed himself to be intoxicated, cannot be expressed.  As for Madame L’Hospital he would have strangled her if he could; and she for a long time was afraid of her life.

The Englishman could not be induced to confess what brought him there, or where was Douglas, whom he named in order to show his importance.  He declared he had been sent by the English ambassador, though Stair had not yet officially assumed that title, and exclaimed that that minister would never suffer the affront he had received.  They civilly replied to him, that there were no proofs he came from the English ambassador,—­none that he was connected with the minister:  that very suspicious designs against public safety on the highway alone were visible; that no harm or annoyance should be caused him, but that he must remain in safety until orders came, and there upon he was civilly led to prison, as well as the intoxicated valet.