The reader will not have forgotten the way in which a feeling of antagonism had grown up between Cormier and the Chevalier. The ill-will cherished by the latter for his quondam friend had not disappeared. On the contrary, the belief that Lady Atkyns was keeping him deliberately at arm’s length had intensified the jealousy. The result was inevitable. Chagrined at being thus left on one side, and at being supplanted, as he felt, in his fair lady’s affections, he soon began to devote himself entirely to his new _rôle_ as a Chouan leader, and ceased to interest himself any longer in the drama of the Temple. In truth, he was not without pretexts for this semi-desertion of the cause. On March 16, anxious to explain himself to Lady Atkyns, he writes to tell her just how he is feeling on the subject. He would have her realize that there is no longer any ground for hopes as to the Dauphin’s safety. When in touch with the representatives of the Convention who took part in the conference at La Mabilais, he had taken one of them aside, it seems, and questioned him frankly as to whether the Republican Government would consent to listen to any proposal regarding the young Prince, and whether he, Frotté, would be allowed to write to the Temple. The member of the Convention made reply, after taking a day to consider the matter and to consult his colleagues, that what Frotté suggested was out of the question. “Your devotion,” he said, “would be fruitless, for under Robespierre the unhappy boy was so demoralized, mentally and physically, that he is now almost an imbecile, and can’t live much longer. Therefore you may as well dismiss any such idea from your head--you can form no notion of the hopeless condition the poor little creature has sunk into.” These lines, reflecting the view then current among the official representatives of the Convention, stand out strikingly when we recall the situation at the Temple in this very month of March, 1795, and the absolute order given to Frotté not to allow the child to be seen. They tally at all points with what we know of the substitution that had been effected. To this substitution, indeed, Frotté himself proceeds to make an explicit allusion towards the end of the letter. “Perhaps the Convention is anxious,” he writes, “to bring about the death of the child whom they have substituted for the young King, so that they may be able to make people believe that the latter is not really the King at all.” As for himself, he has made up his mind. He will make no further efforts for the deliverance of the Dauphin.