Page:Harris Dickson--The black wolf's breed.djvu/227

Rh occupied all my thoughts. I wonder at this time how I then held so firm by the duty of returning to the colonies, when the very thought of war and turmoil was so distasteful to me. When I rode to Paris and clothed myself once more in my own proper garments, their friendly folds gave me a new courage to meet whatever Fate might send.

It may be pertinent to chronicle here, what history has already recorded, the result of placing those dispatches in the King's hands.

The Duke of Maine, as all the world knows, disavowed his wife's act in treating with Spain, and thus saved his own dainty carcass from sharing her captivity in the Bastille. But both he and Madame were imprisoned until he made most abject submission and apology to Orleans.

Madame de Chartrain was sent to a provincial fortress, and bore her incarceration with great fortitude, winning even from her enemies the admiration always accorded to firmness and virtue.

Philip of Orleans being once firmly established in the Regency, changed his usual course, and pardoned many of those who had conspired against him. Their prison doors were opened, and the Duke of Maine, becoming reconciled to his haughty lady, forgave her and gained great credit thereby in the vulgar mind. They spent their lives quietly at Sceaux during the Regency, and naught else of them concerns this history.

Philip of Orleans possessed some of the virtues of a great man, and many of a good man, but these he kept