Pope Eugenius IV. and the Emperor Joannes Paleologos, who were both at Florence, received the royal fugitive ardently, blessed him, and awarded him and his heirs, disregarding the victory of King Alfonso, the right to govern the Two Sicilies in perpetuity. The Medici and other Florentines of mark and wealth offered subsidies for the recovery of the Neapolitan throne, and at Genoa and Milan men and supplies were to be had for the asking; but René had had his fill of war, and bloodshed was now to him abhorrent. “Too much blood,” he remarked, “has been shed already. We will rest awhile, and ask God to pardon our sins.” René returned to Marseilles in 1442 a sadder and a wiser man. There he met once more his Queen, to rejoice his stricken heart; but that heart, and hers too, tenderly bled again and again, for not only did the melancholy news of his good mother’s death in Anjou shatter him, but Isabelle and he had the terrible grief of parting with their dearly-loved second son, the Marquis of Pont-à-Mousson. Prince Louis, so promising, so handsome, and so loyal, they buried sadly: he was his mother’s favourite child, the companion of her triumphs and her trials. King René was called from his grief over the tomb of his young son to Tours by Charles of France. To the French Court had come Ambassadors, with the Earl of Suffolk at their head, to treat for peace between the two conflicting kingdoms. The French King, with his usual lassitude, deputed to King René the conduct of the deliberations, which ended honourably for all parties concerned, in the guarantee of two years’ cessation of hostilities, with the acknowledgment of in _statu quo_. Nearer home, however, matters were not so stable; the state of the allied duchies was deplorable. So insecure were the roads in Lorraine,--infested by wandering bands of discontented peasantry and ill-affected townspeople,--that travelling was attended with the utmost danger. The higher the dignity of a wayfarer, the greater the eagerness to attack and pilfer. Queen Isabelle was herself the victim of a dastardly outrage. Journeying forth soon after her dear son Louis’s death, to pray at his grave at Pont-à-Mousson, her cortège was attacked by a party of marauders from Metz. They compelled her to leave her litter, with its cloth of gold curtains and luxurious cushions, and subjected her to rough treatment in spite of her protestations. “You villains!” she cried, “you know perfectly who I am. How dare you offer this gross insult to your Sovereign! Begone, and let me pass. You shall richly pay for your temerity.” Jeers and offensive remarks greeted this haughty command. They cared nothing for Isabelle nor her consort; indeed, they were unrighteous allies of the Count of Vaudémont. The Duchess was stripped of her jewellery, her _coffrets_ were rifled, and her servants beaten, and then the miscreants made off.