Page:A Biographical Dictionary of the Celebrated Women of Every Age and Country (1804).djvu/596

582. Her jewels were then sent to M. Colbert, and she staid some time in the abbey De Chelles. There, with a young friend of hers, she amused herself with childish sports, such as putting ink into the receptacles for holy Water, &c. Her husband wanted to carry her off from this place, but was prevented, and after many divisions, in which the king interfered, they were in a manner reconciled, and lived together. But though still passionately fond of her, he interrupted her amusements, crossed her wishes, and took every pains to blacken her reputation. One of her servants, in consequence, hearing a calumny against her, drew his sword to revenge it, an indiscretion which was illnaturedly interpreted; and the duchess J Who had not admitted the duke lately into her presence, heard with affright that she should be obliged to be reconciled. Inexperienced and rash, she disguised herself as a man, and, attended by a maid servant who had taken the same precaution, followed by two valets, she fled from her house, in 1667) and sought refuge with her elder sister, in Italy. She soon however felt the consequences of her flight, and declared, that could she have foreseen the danger she ran, and the slanders her absence from her husband occasioned, she would have preferred perpetual imprisonment and a violent death to incurring them.

After passing some lime in a convent, and travelling over Italy; after many disguises, voyages, and resolutions, the duchess, in 1675, passed over to England to the duchess of York, who was her relation, and determined to remain there the rest of her life. Charles II. granted her a pension, which was continued by James n. and William III. who opposed the wish of parliament that she might leave the kingdom. Her husband was continually urging her return, but she would not be suaded