His envoys at Paris, the Earl of Carlisle and Lord Holland, found themselves confronted by Cardinal Richelieu, commissioned, together with some of his colleagues, to negotiate the affair.

M.Guizot, in his _Projet de Mariage royal_ (1 vol.

18mo: 1863; Paris, Hachette et Cie), has said that the marriage of Henry IV.'s daughter with the Prince of Wales was, in Richelieu's eyes, one of the essential acts of a policy necessary to the greatness of the kingship and of France.

He obtained the best conditions possible for the various interests involved, but without any stickling and without favor for such and such a one of these interests, skilfully adapting words and appearance, but determined upon attaining his end.
The tarryings and miscarriages of Spanish policy had warned Richelieu to make haste.

"In less than nine moons," says James I.'s private secretary, James Howell, "this great matter was proposed, prosecuted, and accomplished; whereas the sun might, for as many years, have run his course from one extremity of the zodiac to the other, before the court of Spain would have arrived at any resolution and conclusion.