A letter from the governor of Alessandria informed Condé of the tragedy. He received the news with somewhat mixed feelings, in which, however, to his honour be it said, regret seems to have predominated. His position was a very embarrassing one, as it was difficult for him to cast off the ties which bound him to Spain. Virey, in the account in Latin verse which he wrote of his master’s adventures, part of which he subsequently translated into French, under the title of “l’Enlèvement innocent, ou la retraite clandestine de Monseigneur le Prince (de Condé) avec Madame la Princesse,” affirms that Fuentes came to the prince to congratulate him as the “legal heir” of the murdered monarch; and there can be no doubt that the Ministers of Philip III. approached the Pope, with the view of ascertaining whether he would be prepared to annul the marriage of Henry IV. and Marie de’ Medici, in which event it was their intention to put Condé forward as a candidate for the throne. As they received no encouragement from Paul V., they were forced to abandon the idea, but they still cherished the hope that the prince would, on his return to France, dispute the Queen-Mother’s title to the regency, and, consequently, no objection was raised to his departure from Milan. Condé left Milan on 9 June, and deeming it unsafe to cross France in the then unsettled state of the kingdom, and while still under the ban of high treason, proceeded to Brussels, where he arrived nine days later. In spite of the remonstrances of the Spanish members of the Archdukes’ Council, he lost no time in despatching the faithful Virey to Paris, with letters for Louis XIII. and the Queen-Mother, wherein he protested his devotion to the new King. His overtures were very graciously received, and Virey returned to Brussels with an assurance that a cordial welcome awaited his master. The secretary brought also a letter from the Dowager-Princesse de Condé, in which she endeavoured to incite her son against his wife, informing him that up to the last moment she had continued to encourage the late King’s passion, and begging him to refuse to see her and to leave her with the Archdukes. Condé did not see his way to comply with the latter injunction, and accordingly consented to the Constable “sending for his daughter;” but he firmly refused to meet her. “_Monsieur le Prince_ has been some days in Brussels,” writes Malherbe to his friend Peiresc, under date 24 June, 1610. “The Infant (the Archduke) told him that he had a request to make to him. The latter, who did not doubt that it was that he should consent to see his wife, replied that he besought him very humbly not to lay any command upon him in which he should be reduced to the extremity of disobeying him. Thus matters remain in this affair. It is believed that he will take her back, but that he wishes to be requested to do so by the Constable and her relatives. All the letters which the King had exhibited, in which he was addressed