Efforts were made, more or less feeble, for the delivery of the incarcerated Queen by Louis,--fearful of offence to the Yorkist King,--and by René, who had no resources with which to back up his appeal. Anyhow, Margaret was, at the Christmas following the fatal battle, released from durance vile, and consigned to the care of the Duchess-Dowager of Somerset,--one of her earliest friends,--and went to live under her wing at Wallingford. Edward made her the beggarly grant of 5 marks weekly for the support of herself and two maid-servants! There Margaret remained for five years, each one more intolerable than its predecessor. At the Peace of Picquigny, August 29, 1475, between Louis and Edward, the latter agreed to accept a ransom of 50,000 gold crowns for the widowed Queen. This compact was not an act of grace on the part of Louis so much as a _quid pro quo_. He insisted upon René ceding Provence to the crown of France, upon his death, by way of payment of the ransom. Still, in this matter Edward was as good as his bond, and directly the first instalment of the amount was paid in London to John Howard, Edward’s Treasurer, Margaret was conducted to Sandwich, not without indignity, and placed upon a common fishing-boat. Landing at Dieppe, January 14, 1476, she was taken on to Rouen, where she received the following affecting letter from her sorrowing father, King René: “_Ma fille, que Dieu vous assiste dans vos conseils, car c’est rarement des hommes qu’il faut en attendre dans les revers de fortune. Lorsque vous désirerez moins ressentir vos peines, pensez aux miennes; elles sont grandes, ma fille, et pourtant je vous console._”[A] [A]“My child, may God assist thee in thy counsels, for rarely do men render help in times of fortune’s reverses. When you desire to resent your trials the least, think of mine; they are great, my child, and therefore I wish to console you.” True enough, the troubles and reverses of King René were more than fall to the lot of most men of high culture and degree; but what of Queen Margaret’s shipwreck? For nearly thirty years she had endured experiences which had tried no other Queen half so hardly; and all the while she had set a unique example of devotion, loyalty, courage, and endurance, unexampled in history. There never was a truer wife, a more self-sacrificing mother, a more intrepid and a nobler Queen, than Margaret of Anjou. From Rouen the Queen sent a message to King Louis, desiring to see him; but he, knowing well her desperate case, and seeing no likelihood of profit accruing to himself, coward-like, evaded an interview. His miserable aunt might forage for herself, for all he cared, and go where she listed, but not to Paris nor Amboise. With bent head and slow feet, the great heroine of the Wars of the Roses, broken like a pitcher at a fountain, took her lonely way no more in gallant cavalcade, but almost in funereal cortège, to Anjou and Angers--the cradle of her race.