Basilea de Marsac waited on Her Highness the day after her interview with M. D’Avaux; a curious coincidence had strengthened her desire to see the Princess, and piqued her curiosity as to the sentiments of that lady. One of the fast packets that were constantly plying between the States and England had brought her a letter from Lady Sunderland, who was, to Basilea, a person who of all others must find it her interest and duty to be intensely loyal. My lady wrote a long and involved letter, but the sum of it seemed to be what M. D’Avaux had put much more plainly, namely, that the King’s party (among whom was, of course, Lord Sunderland) had become alarmed at the crisis the actions of His Majesty had brought upon the country in attempting to push forward his own religion, and that they feared an active interference on the part of the Prince of Orange, now his wife’s claims were indefinitely postponed by the birth of the Prince of Wales, and his hopes of an English alliance against the French for ever shattered by the policy of King James. Lady Sunderland concluded by asking of Basilea what M. D’Avaux had asked—that she should discover the mind of the Princess, and draw some promise from her for the satisfaction of Royalist and Romanist, to the effect that Her Highness would never let her title to the English throne be a handle for her husband’s political designs. Basilea was half roused, half amused by the double errand. She was not very well informed about politics, but she felt in her heart an absolute doubt of any revolution in England. All her life there had been talk of it, but it had always ended in a few executions or fights in Scotland, or some such vague conclusions in which she had never been very interested; but she could understand that Lady Sunderland did not feel lukewarm in the matter. Ever since the May of last year, when the Earl had been converted to the Church of Rome (a step which none other of the King’s ministers had taken), he had been as detested in England as it was possible for a man to be. The King alone protected him, and if he fell, there was little doubt that his fall also would be swift and terrible. Basilea liked the Countess; she was better pleased to serve her than to serve M. D’Avaux, and she anticipated, with pleasure, being able to write in answer that the Princess was still a Stewart, despite ten years’ residence in Holland.