Note 127 — Chapter III

The invitation was accepted; the hunt took place, and was succeeded by high play, after which the different personages apparently separated for the night; but within half an hour the two royal kinsmen and their confidential friends were closeted together, and before dawn an alliance offensive and defensive was concluded between the Princes, who each pledged himself to receive no favour or benefit from the Government to the exclusion or loss of the other; and that, moreover, in the event of the disgrace or disgust of either, the other should withdraw from the Court at the same time, whither neither was to be at liberty to return alone; and this compact, which, as will immediately be seen, could not fail to prove dangerous to the interests of Marie, was religiously observed until the death of M. de Soissons.[127]