Madame de Motteville extols the splendour and gaiety of the court; and although the portraiture of the galaxy of beauties whom she describes belongs to a later period, one may readily conceive that attractions were not wanting in that sphere graced by Anne of Austria and Henrietta Maria. The impression made by Buckingham on the French was favourable. “He had,” observes Madame de Motteville, “a fine figure. His face was very handsome; his mind and character were free from littleness. He was magnificent in his deportment and liberal; and, as the favourite of a great prince, he had funds at his disposal, and all the crown jewels of England to employ in his own adornment.” “It is not to be wondered at,” she continues, “that with so many attractions, he should have dared to cherish presumptuous thoughts--to have harboured desires at once so lofty, so dangerous, and so reprehensible; and he had the good fortune to persuade those who were aware of his wishes that they were not proffered impertinently;” “yet,” adds the confidante, almost reluctantly, “one may venture to suppose that his vows were received in the same degree as that in which the gods suffer the homage of mortals.”[215] Footnote 215: Memoires de Madame de Motteville, vol. i, p. 14. The object of these aspiring and criminal hopes was, it appears, the young Queen of France. Nor is there reason to conclude that the same indifference was manifested by Anne to Buckingham as had been shown by her to her former admirers. In after times, when the perilous illusion had for ever passed away, Anne, according to Madame de Motteville, admitted that in that season of her youth she had not perceived that the delightful and sprightly conversation, known to her by the term of _l’honnête galanterie_, could possibly be censured, especially when no secret understanding was couched beneath the lively converse; nor did the thoughtless Queen attach to it any greater possibility of blame than she should do to those ladies of her native Spanish Court, who, being forbidden to talk to men, except in the presence of the King and Queen of Spain, were accustomed to boast of their conquests amongst each other, and to consider them rather as enhancing, than detracting from, their reputation.[216] The Duchess de Chevreuse, Anne confessed, had been wholly occupied with gallantries and diversions, and the Queen, led by her advice and example, could not, in spite of her modesty and principle, avoid becoming interested in an expression of passion which seemed to her far more flattering to her self-love than dangerous to her virtue. In these terms did Anne, after the lapse of years, refer to the transient but intoxicating adulation paid to her by Buckingham. Footnote 216: Memoires de Madame de Motteville, vol. i., p. 16.