A difficult task.

For three months the courtiers were equal to it; from May to July, 1619, the court and the government were split in two; the king at Paris or at Tours, the queen-mother at Angers or at Blois.

Two eminent men, Richelieu amongst the Catholics and Du Plessis-Mornay amongst the Protestants, advised them strongly and incessantly to unite again, to live and to govern together.

"Apply yourself to winning the king's good graces," said Richelieu to the queen-mother: "support on every occasion the interests of the public without speaking of your own; take the side of equity against that of favor, without attacking the favorites and without appearing to envy their influence." Mornay used the same language to the Protestants.

"Do not wear out the king's patience," he said to them: "there is no patience without limits." Louis XIII.