Fate often gives man the balsam before the wound: January received his fifth son, whom I shall never call anything but the Infante, still earlier than the tidings of his forfeited blessing of children. The chief Chamberlain, Von Le Baut, had wedded the mother of the Infante (his Lordship's niece); but he dated his marriage three quarter-days back, instead of announcing it one later. I have never been able to see the connection of this anachronism or misreckoning of time with the Prince's vow. For the rest, dangerous as January's _votum_ made him to the _husbands_ of his court, and harmless to the _fathers_, nevertheless, the virtuous confidence which the husbands reposed in the female virtue which they had appropriated to themselves by marriage was so unlimited, that they, without hesitation, led that virtue into the midst of his unbridled flames. Nay, they even disdained the fear of being suspected of doing so in order that, when he laid down his crown on the toilet-table of their spouses, they might play with the shining wall-crown (_corona muralis_) as with a _joujou_, and with its brilliancy throw a dazzling light into people's windows: for a courtier cares more to own his wife than to watch over her.[27] It will come on presently, cry the puppet-players; it will be over presently, say I. When, at length, his Lordship returned empty-handed, he was greatly surprised, not at the presence of the Infante, but at his adoption,--namely, at the marriage of Le Baut. But this High Chamberlain was--and no one minded it less than Horion--an ardent friend of the Prince; this rendered him capable of doing for him (as Cicero requires) even that which he would never have done for himself,--namely, a dishonorable action. In fact, it is an uncommon piece of good fortune for a courtier or a world's man, whose honor his high position exposes often to the worst of weather, that this honor, however sensitive to slight contusions,[28] easily gets over great ones, and can, if not by words, yet by deeds, be assailed without injury. Something similar is remarked by physicians in regard to madmen, or rather their skin, which to be sure feels the lightest touch, but on which no blister will draw. The Prince was knit to Le Baut by a threefold ligament,--by gratitude, son, and wife; his Lordship plucked the ligament asunder; that is to say, he laid bare to his niece the Chamberlain's heart, and discovered to her the poison-bag therein, and a dramatically carried out _plan_, which she had hitherto regarded as an _indulgent confidence_. All the nobility and pride of her nature flamed up in her with shame and wrath, and, pursued by crashing recollections, she flew with her child, and with the prospect of a second, out of the city to a country-seat of his Lordship's.