We made a short drive to Maidstone, where we stopped over night. The next day a longer journey brought us to Canterbury, where we spent two nights and a day, visiting the cathedral both by sunlight and moonlight; the combination of moonlight and Bettina being very trying to me. From Canterbury we drove in the rain to Dover, where we lodged at that good inn, the Three Anchors, to await a fair wind for Calais. During the next three days the wind was fair, but it was blowing half a gale, and therefore the passage was not to be attempted. Though I was enjoying myself, I was anxious to post our letters, as mine gave a full account of several matters at court concerning which I knew George ought to be informed. Among other news, I told him that King Charles had sent a messenger into France carrying a personal letter to King Louis, asking his help in finding the man Hamilton, who had threatened Charles's life. I also suggested in my letter that the king of France was trying to buy the city of Dunkirk from King Charles, and that because of the friendly negotiations then pending, Louis might give heed to our king's request. In that case, it might be well, I thought, for Hamilton to leave France at once. With this urgency in mind, I suggested to Frances and Betty that I cross to Calais alone, regardless of the weather, leaving them at Dover till my return. But they would not be left behind, so we all set sail on a blustery morning and paid for our temerity with a day of suffering. In Calais we posted our letters, having learned that a messenger would leave that same day for Paris, and two days later we returned to Dover. Our journey home was made in the rain, Bettina sleeping with her head on my shoulder a great part of the way. And I enjoyed the rain even more than I had enjoyed the sunshine. We reached London nearly a week before the king's return, so that nothing was known of our journey at court. CHAPTER XI "ALL SUNSHINE MAKES THE DESERT" Whatever faults Whitehall may have had as a place of residence, dulness was not among them. There were balls, games with high stakes, theatres, gossip, scandals, and once in a long while an affair of state to interest us. In order to interest the court thoroughly, an affair of state must have involved the getting of money for the privy purse; that is, for the king's personal use, for out of it the courtesans were fed and gambling debts were paid. The time of our Dover journey was one of extreme depletion in the privy purse. The king had borrowed from every person and every city within the realm who, by threats or cajolery, could be induced to part with money. But now he had reached the end of his tether.