And so long as he was able to retain the uncertain favour of Louis XIII, Richelieu was king, in all but the name, and the greatest nobles in France trembled at his frown. A singular illustration of this is the way in which the once haughty and all-powerful d’Épernon was obliged to humble himself before him. “M. d’Épernon,” says Bassompierre, “who had arrived at Montech,[127] sent the Comte de Maillé[128] to me to request me to ask the Cardinal at what place he might meet him on the road to pay his respects to him, having heard that he was leaving on the morrow to return to the Court. He explained that, for a man of his age, the journey which he had performed that day was fatiguing, so that it had prevented him coming so far as Montauban, besides which it would have been difficult to find suitable accommodation there for himself and his suite. I executed this embassy to the Cardinal, who took it extremely ill and imagined that M. d’Épernon refused to humble his pride to the point of coming to visit him in his government of Guienne, in which the King had given the Cardinal absolute power. He was exceedingly angry, and told me to send him word that he declined to see him in the country or outside Guienne, and that, although it had been his intention to travel by way of Auvergne, he would travel by Bordeaux, for the express purpose of making himself recognised and obeyed in accordance with the power which had been conferred upon him, and that he would put matters on such a footing that the authority which M. d’Épernon exercised there would be curtailed. I softened these expressions in the answer I made to the Comte de Maillé, and wrote to M. d’Épernon begging him to come to Montauban, to avoid drawing upon himself the enmity of this all-powerful man. The Comte de Maillé took his departure, and in three hours’ time returned with an answer to the effect that M. d’Épernon would come to Montauban on the morrow to pay his respects to the Cardinal, since he had been assured that the Cardinal was not leaving until after dinner.... I went that evening to acquaint the Cardinal with M. d’Épernon’s approaching arrival, which appeased his anger, and he consented that I should go to meet him and that the infantry should be under arms when he arrived.” Bassompierre, from the above, would appear to have formed a pretty correct idea of the danger of offending the great Minister; he lived to know its full extent.