When the news of this astounding piece of bad faith was communicated to Louis Philippe, at the first blush he was inclined to repudiate it; but Guizot persuaded him to delay a while. And now Lord Palmerston had returned to office and suggested a Prince of Saxe-Coburg as a consort for the Spanish Queen--in which suggestion Guizot immediately detected a chance to indict England for disloyalty to the House of Bourbon. It may be said that this objection was puerile. But what happened was that on October 10, 1846, the poor Queen and her sister were simultaneously married at Madrid, as per programme of Maria Cristina and the French Ambassador. Of this performance Fyffe says (p. 506): “Few intrigues have been more disgraceful than that of the Spanish marriages; none more futile. The course of history mocked its ulterior purposes; its immediate results were wholly to the injury of the House of Orleans. The cordial understanding between France and Great Britain, which had been revived after the differences of 1840, was now finally shattered. Louis Philippe stood convicted before his people of sacrificing a valuable alliance to dynastic ends; his Minister, the austere and sanctimonious Guizot, had to defend himself against charges which would have covered with shame the most hardened man of the world.” All of which goes to affirm the familiar lesson taught by history that, in the long run, intrigue does not pay. As to the charge met in this speech that Great Britain led to the downfall of Louis Philippe, Lord Palmerston’s answer is easily adequate.