The party accordingly proceeded to Meaux, where they dressed for the ballet, and then bestowed themselves, with their pages, the musicians, and all their paraphernalia in six of the royal coaches, and set off for Monceaux, where they danced their ballet, which appears to have caused the good-natured monarch, who took the jest at his expense in excellent part, much amusement. “After which,” says Bassompierre, “as we were removing our masks, the King rose and came amongst us, and inquired where Bassompierre was. Then all the princes and nobles presented me to him to embrace his knees; and he received me most affectionately, and I should never have believed that so great a King would have shown so much kindness and familiarity towards a young man of my condition. Afterwards, he took me by the hand and presented me to the Duchesse de Beaufort, his mistress, whose gown I kissed; and the King, in order to give me the opportunity of saluting and kissing her, stepped aside.” Humility was certainly not a fault of this young gentleman from Lorraine, who had a nice appreciation of his own attractions. And he proceeds to relate with complacency how, a few days later, they danced again the same ballet at the Tuileries, for the diversion of Catherine de Bourbon and Gabrielle d’Estrées, who, by permission of her royal lover, had come to Paris expressly to witness it again, and that “when the twenty-four men and women came forward to perform the dances, all the spectators were delighted to behold a selection of such handsome persons. So that, when the dances were over, they insisted on their being performed again, an incident which I have never seen happen since.”