d'Hautefort, but more gentle and tender than she, and who gave her heart in all guilelessness to that king so powerful, so a-weary, and so melancholy at the very climax of his reign.

Happily for Richelieu, he had a means, more certain than even Mdlle.

d'Hautefort's pride, of separating her from Louis XIII.; Mdlle.

de La Fayette, whilst quite a child, had serious ideas of becoming a nun; and scruples about being false to her vocation troubled her at court, and even in those conversations in which she reproached herself with taking too much pleasure, Father Coussin, her confessor, who was also the king's, sought to quiet her conscience; he hoped much from the influence she could exercise over the king; but Mdlle.

de La Fayette, feeling herself troubled and perplexed, was urgent.
When the Jesuit reported to Louis XIII.