I know that one of the said queen’s most intimate ladies was so presumptuous as to say to her one day, laughing and joking, that since she had no children by the king and could never have them, for reasons that were talked of in those days, she would do well to borrow a third and secret means to have them, in order not to be left without authority when the king should die, but rather be mother to a king and hold the rank and grandeur of the present queen-mother, her mother-in-law. But she rejected this bouffonesque advice, taking it in very bad part and nevermore liking the good lady-counsellor. She preferred to rest her grandeur on her chastity and virtue than upon a lineage issuing from vice: counsel of the world! which, according to the doctrine of Macchiavelli, ought not to be rejected. But our Queen Louise, so wise and chaste and virtuous, did not desire, either by true or false means, to become queen-mother; though, had she been willing to play such a game, things would have been other than they are; for no one would have taken notice, and many would have been confounded. For this reason the present king [Henri IV.] owes much to her, and should have loved and honoured her; for had she played the trick and produced the child, he would only have been regent of France, and perhaps not that, and such weak title would not have guaranteed us from more wars and evils than we have so far had. Still, I have heard many, religious as well as worldly people, say and hold to this conclusion, namely: that Queen Louise would have done better to play that game, for then France would not have had the ruin and misery she has had, and will have, and that Christianity would have been the better for it. I make this question over to worthy and inquiring discoursers to give their opinion on it; it is a brave subject and an ample one for the State; but not for God, methinks, to whom our queen was so inclined, loving and adoring Him so truly that to serve Him she forgot herself and her high condition. For, being a very beautiful princess (in fact the king took her for her beauty and virtue), and young, delicate, and very lovable, she devoted herself to no other purpose than serving God, going to prayers, visiting the hospitals continually, nursing the sick, burying the dead, and omitting nothing of all the good and saintly works performed by saintly and devoted good women, princesses, and queens in the times past of the primitive Church. After the death of the king, her husband, she did the same, employing her time in mourning and regretting him, and in praying to God for his soul; so that her widowed life was much the same as her married life.