The people had left everything and dressed themselves in their fine clothes to receive Mademoiselle. In order to thank them, Mademoiselle drew from them all the money she could. It is necessary to recollect, however, that in the eyes of the great, even those of the better sort, a peasant was hardly a man. It would hardly be worth while for us to be indignant at this attitude. We now admit that the so-called superior races have the right to exploit those considered inferior, and thus at need destroy them. It was the habit of our fathers to treat a lower class as to-day we treat a less advanced race; the sentiment is precisely the same. Upon her return from Dombes, Mademoiselle found the Court again at Lyons. Every one was all eyes and ears for a spectacle which might derange the admitted ideas of kings. Marie Mancini was trying to make Louis XIV. marry her, and the attempt had not so absurd an air as might be imagined. The Savoie project had failed under painful conditions, which gave subject of thought to the courtiers. The King had conducted himself like an ill-bred man to the Princess Marguerite. People were demanding whether the Spanish marriage was also going to fail, and with it the so greatly desired peace, because it pleased two lovers, one of whom ought not to have forgotten his kingly duties, to proclaim the sovereign rights of passion. Anne of Austria became uneasy. Mazarin, yielding to temptation, left the field to his niece, who "took possession" of the young King with looks and speech. She fascinated him, and he swore all that she wished. The contest was not an equal one between the passionate Italian and the timid and somewhat unformed Louis XIV. On his return from Lyons, Louis knelt down before his mother and Mazarin, supplicating them to permit him to marry the one he loved. He found them inflexible. The Queen realised that such a _mesalliance_ would cast disrepute on royalty. The Cardinal was torn by conflicting emotions, but in the end sent away his niece. A second journey lasted more than a year. The Court set out on June 29, 1659, and passed through Blois. It stopped with Gaston. We owe to the _Memoires_ of Mademoiselle a last glimpse of this Prince, formerly so brilliant, now become a lazy good-for-nothing in his provincial life, where nothing of Parisian fashion was found; neither toilettes nor cooking, nor household elegance, nor even Monsieur himself, who no longer knew how to receive, and was vexed that the King should kill his pheasants. He permitted it to be seen that he was put out, and this became so plain that every one was eager to depart, and there was a sudden scattering. The eldest of his daughters by his last marriage, Marguerite d'Orleans, had a great reputation for beauty. Her parents had for a long time anticipated seeing her Queen of France.