Note 149 — Chapter IV
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On the 16th of the month the Spanish Duke had his first audience of the young King, at which were assembled the Princes of the Blood, all the high nobility of France, and the Cardinals de Sourdis and de Gondy.[149] The two latter dignitaries endeavoured to excuse themselves, on the pretext that their rank as Princes of the Church would not permit them to seat themselves below the Princes of the Blood; but this pretension on their part was considered so monstrous, even by the Regent herself, that, anxious as she was to secure their attendance in order to render the ceremony more imposing to the Spanish envoy, she did not venture to support them in their arrogant assumption of equality with the first subjects of the Crown; and she accordingly informed them in reply that upon the present occasion there would be no regard paid to precedence, but that each individual who was entitled to attend the audience would be at liberty to seat himself as he saw fit.