Even then the queen was not satisfied. She continued to play the vixen to such an extent that, regardless of her rank, Bassoinpierre took it upon himself to administer a bit of plain language. She had been flattered into believing that all her little tyrannies were quite becoming to a pretty queen, but she was now told that she behaved unlike a true wife, and that her conduct should be reported to her family in France.
Henrietta was surprised at this honest dealing; but the effect was wholesome, and secured for her nearly eighteen years of happiness with her husband. Instead of being received with honors on his return to France, de Bassompierre was frowned upon because he had avoided extreme measures in his capacity of mediator, and because he had spoken the truth too plainly.
Shortly after a war broke out between England and France; but it did not in the least disturb Queen Henrietta's tranquillity, for she and her husband were never on better terms.
But the French nation despised Charles I., and considered his wife a martyr and a victim. This led to the belief in an imposture of a crazy girl, who, calling herself the persecuted Queen of England, presented herself at a convent in Limoges, and claimed the protection of the nuns. She declared that she had escaped from England because she was persecuted on account of the true faith. She described the court and household of the queen so correctly that she was eagerly listened to by the whole neighborhood, who flocked to see her. Louis XIII., who knew how happily and peacefully his sister was then living, was so incensed at this imposition that he had the girl imprisoned, and she was heard of no more.
A.D. 1628. The sudden death of Buckingham occurred when Henrietta was just eighteen years old, and she was thus rid of a person who had never ceased to be an object of dislike to her.
Queen Henrietta had a great fancy for dwarfs; so, at an entertainment given to her once when she was making a progress through her kingdom, an immense venison pasty was placed in the centre of the table. The crust was removed and Geoffrey Hudson, a little man just eighteen inches high, stepped out, prostrated himself before her majesty, and asked to be taken into her service. His request was immediately complied with, and he was employed to carry state messages of slight importance. He was not the only dwarf at courts for there was a married pair of these little monsters besides.
A.D. 1630. The queen had a son born at St. James's Palace in 1630, who succeeded to the throne as Charles II.
A Welsh nurse was provided for the royal infant, because it was the custom that the first words uttered by any Prince of Wales should be Welsh.
He could not have been a handsome child, for his mother wrote of him to her friend, Madame St. George: "He is so ugly that I am ashamed of him; but his size and fatness supply the want of beauty."
A.D. 1632. The royal family was increased by the birth of a daughter a couple of years later. She was named Mary, baptized, as her brother had been, according to the form prescribed in the Book of Common Prayer, and placed under the care of Catherine, Lady Stanhope.