Mary Beatrice knew that it grieved King Louis to banish her son, but he was forced by the turn political affairs had taken to do it.
The Jacobites, as the opponents of William and Mary were called in England, never gave up the hope of seeing "the king over the water"—a name they had given to the Chevalier de St. George—restored to the throne, and many of them went to France from time to time on purpose to pay their respects to the queen-mother.
At the close of the year a report reached Mary Beatrice that her son was about to renounce the Catholic faith and become a member of the Church of England; but a letter from him reassured her on that score, for he wrote: "I doubt not that the reports which are in circulation of my having changed my religion have reached you, but you know me too well to be alarmed; and I can assure you that, with the grace of God, you will sooner see me dead than out of the church."
There was a great deal of distress at St. Germain on account of poverty; and as it was the loyal and faithful followers of Mary Beatrice who actually suffered the pangs of hunger at times, she was sorely afflicted on their account.
A.D. 1714. At last a small part of the money due her in England was ordered to be paid by Queen Anne, which relieved the wants of many for the time; but it was all Mary Beatrice ever received from that quarter, and by no means freed her from debt.
Shortly after this beneficent act Queen Anne died, and the moment the Chevalier de St. George heard it he travelled post-haste, incognito, to Paris to consult with his mother and other friends, having made up his mind to proceed at once to England to assert his claim to the throne. The Duke de Lauzun had hired a small house at Chaillot in his own name for the reception of the royal adventurer, and thither Mary Beatrice went to meet him. He did not dare to venture near St. Germain, because he was too well known there, and preferred to keep his presence in France secret until he could ascertain what Louis XIV. would decide to do. That monarch had already paid dearly for the sympathy he had shown the royal widow and her son; besides, France was in no condition to maintain another war, so his majesty sent his minister, De Torcy, to persuade the Chevalier de St. George to return at once to Lorraine, and ordered at the same time that in case of refusal the young claimant of the British crown was to be compelled to leave France immediately.
Utterly destitute of money, ships, or men, the prince was powerless to take any stand, and meanwhile George I. was proclaimed King of England.
Louis XIV. had yielded to the urgent entreaties of Mary Beatrice in behalf of her son in so far as to command arms to be furnished for ten thousand men, and ships to transport them to Scotland, but before these arrangements were completed his majesty died.
A.D. 1715. Then a formidable insurrection broke out in Scotland, and King James III., as well as Mary, the queen-mother, were prayed for in the churches. When Mary Beatrice heard this she was in an agony of suspense, because she had had no news of her son for nearly three weeks. She knew that he had left Lorraine, and vague reports had reached her of his being in different parts of France in disguise, when suddenly one day he appeared before her at Chaillot in the habit of a monk. The chevalier spent only twenty-four hours with his mother, and then bade her farewell to set out on a journey fraught with danger. Spies were everywhere, and the identity of the strange monk was soon made known to his enemies. He started from Chaillot in one of the post carriages belonging to the Baron de Breteul, a warm partisan of the Stuarts. The chevalier was still disguised as a monk, and travelled attended by some horsemen who wore the livery of his friend, the baron. At the village of Nonancourt a shabbily dressed old woman stopped the carriage, and going close up to the door said to the disguised occupant: "If you are the King of England go not to the post-house or you are lost, for several villains are waiting there to murder you."
Knowing that a bribe of a hundred thousand pounds had been set on his head by the British government, the chevalier dared not disregard such a piece of intelligence, but he questioned the woman further. She told him that her name was L'Hopital, and added: "I am a lone woman, mistress of the post-house of Nonancourt; I warn you not to approach, because I overheard three Englishmen discussing with some desperate characters of this neighborhood a design to kill a traveller who was to change horses with me to-night on his way to Château Thierry. I drugged their wine, and now they are so intoxicated that I locked them in the house, and came to conduct you to the cottage of our curate, where you will be safe."