Madame d’Entragues did not fail to follow this advice and, on meeting with a flat refusal from Bassompierre, promptly instituted proceedings against him. “I soon recognised the hand which had cast this stone at me, and _Monsieur le Comte_ boasted publicly that he was in a position to ruin me in fortune or honour. I assembled a council of my advocates to learn how I was to comport myself in this situation. They were unanimously of opinion that, in strict justice, I had nothing to fear, but that _Monsieur le Comte_ was a redoubtable enemy, and advised me to drag the affair out until a favourable time arrived.” Bassompierre endeavoured to persuade the Regent to intervene in his behalf, but, though Marie de’ Medici, with whom he was a favourite, since he was one of the few nobles whose loyalty to the Crown admitted of no question, was very sympathetic and promised him every assistance in her power, her position was far too precarious just then to admit of her offending a Prince of the Blood. All he could do, therefore, was to act upon the advice of the legal luminaries whom he had consulted; and, on various pretexts, he succeeded in deferring his appearance before the diocesan court for some months, at the end of which he appealed to the jurisdiction of the Archbishop of Sens, who was the metropolitan of the Bishop of Paris. This insured him a further respite, and, before the case came on for trial, he appealed to the Parlement of Paris, and was beginning to plume himself on his astuteness, when the Comte de Soissons interposed and got the affair transferred to the Parlement of Rouen, to the great consternation of Bassompierre, who knew that Soissons would not scruple to use all his influence as Governor of Normandy to prejudice that body against him. The annoyance and expense which this affair was occasioning him, and for which, it must be admitted, he is hardly entitled to much sympathy, did not prevent Bassompierre from continuing his life of pleasure, and he took a prominent part in the splendid fêtes in honour of the double betrothal of Louis XIII to Anne of Austria, and of the Infant Philip, afterwards Philip IV of Spain, to Élisabeth of France, eldest daughter of Henri IV. For Marie de’ Medici had completely reversed the foreign policy of her husband, and Spanish influence was once more in the ascendant at the Court of France. These fêtes, originally fixed to begin on March 25, 1612, the day on which the formal announcement of the approaching marriage was made at the Louvre, in the presence of the Spanish Ambassador and the officers of the Crown of France, had been postponed until April 5, owing to the death of the Queen’s brother, Vincenzo I, Duke of Mantua. Their principal feature was a carousal in the Place-Royale on a scale of unprecedented magnificence, in which Bassompierre appeared as one of the challengers.