To this infantine terror, this early association with death and murder, may be traced the strange character of Louis; weak in body and mind, timid, suspicious, melancholy, superstitious, an undutiful son, a bad husband, and an unworthy king. The fame of his great father, and the enthusiasm his memory inspired, instead of filling him with emulation, crushed and depressed him. He became a complete “_Roi fainéant_.” His reign was the reign of favourites, and nothing was heard of the monarch but in connection with them, save that, with a superstition worthy of the Middle Ages, he formerly placed France “under the protection of the Virgin.” His early favourite, Albret the Gascon, created Duc de Luynes and Constable of France, was his tyrant. As long as he lived Louis both hated and feared him. He hated his mother, he hated Richelieu, he hated his wife, Anne of Austria. Louis, surnamed “the Just,” had a great capacity for hatred. Poor Anne of Austria, to whom he was married at fifteen, she being the same age, what a lot was hers! Her personal charms actually revolted the half-educated, awkward boy, whom all the world thought she would govern despotically. He could not help acknowledging her exceeding loveliness; but she was his superior, and he knew it. He shrank back, terrified, at her vivacity and her talents. Her innocent love of amusement jarred against his morbid nature. Melancholy himself, he disliked to see others happy, and from the day of their marriage he lived as much apart from her as state etiquette permitted. Maria de’ Medici, ambitious and unprincipled as ever, widened the breach between them. She still sat supreme in the council, and regulated public affairs. Richelieu, her favourite and minister during the Regency, in continual dread of a possible reconciliation between Louis and his wife, and in love with the young Queen himself, was rapidly rising to that dictatorship which he exercised over France and the King until he died. Both he and the Queen-mother roused Louis’s jealousy against his wife, and dropped dark hints of danger to his throne, perhaps to his life. They succeeded only too well; the King and Queen become more and more estranged. Anne of Austria uttered no complaint. She showed no anger, but her pride was deeply wounded, and amongst her ladies and her friends her joyous raillery did not spare the King. Reports of her flirtations also, as well as of her _bon mots_ and her mimicry, heightened by the malice of those whose interest it was to keep them asunder, reached Louis, and alienated him more and more. Anne, too young to be fully aware of the growing danger of her position, vain of her success, and without either judicious friends or competent advisers, took no steps to reconcile herself to her husband. Coldness and estrangement rapidly grew into downright dislike and animosity; suspicions were exaggerated into certainty, until at last she came to be treated as a conspirator and a criminal.