Venice had, time out of mind, always been "most serene," and was by all parties admitted to be so. But the Queen of the Adriatic insisted upon being not only most, but sole serene, and would give the coveted title to none of the disputing parties. Once indeed, we read, the Cardinal d'Este being at Venice, did somehow manage to betray the Doge into speaking of his brother, the reigning Duke of Ferrara, as "his Most Serene Highness;" and great was the triumph of the House of Este. But it was short; for the assembled senate were much displeased at what their Doge had done; and solemnly decreed that it was only a slip of the tongue. Meantime poor Francesco was, if anything, rather worse off than all the illegitimate serene highnesses. For those wicked and unprincipled confounders of all distinctions agreed together to call each other serene, while nobody would call him so. It was a cruel case; and the Grand Duke, we read,[203] shook with rage, at the thought of all the trouble he had taken, and all the money he had spent in procuring this title, only to find himself after all no serener than his neighbours. But the cruellest cut of all was to hear that some of these vile pretenders had obtained recognition of their false serenity at the court of France, at the hands of a Medici, and she the head of his house! He sent an envoy to Paris, who under pretext of asking payment of certain moneys lent by him to Charles IX., was to see if the queen–mother could be got to favour his views in the title question. But Catherine replied to his first hint of the matter, that "she did not see how she could do anything for the Grand Duke in that business, seeing that he could give the King of Spain a million of gold at a time, while with her and her son, on the other hand, he looked after so small a matter as that which they owed." The envoy humbly observed that the King of Spain had not done his master the ill–turn in the title business which the Queen had done. "And I did it on purpose," rejoined Catherine, "in return for the small respect the Duke has paid me and my son, in committing assassinations beneath our eyes. And you may write to your master, that he do nothing of the sort again, and specially that he lay hand on no man within this realm; for the King, my son, will not endure it." So Francesco took nothing by that motion. [Sidenote: AN ARGUMENTUM AB INFERIORI.]