By an agreeable fiction he was received at court not as cardinal but as minister, and accommodated with an humble place at table.

Many looking on with astonishment thought he would have preferred to dine by himself in retirement.

But this was not the bitterest of the mortifications that the pastor and guide of Matthias was to suffer at the hands of Ferdinand before his career should be closed.

The visit at Dresden was successful, however.

John George, being a claimant, as we have seen, for the Duchies of Cleve and Julich, had need of the Emperor.