He died at Arras early in September, as many thought of chagrin at the ill success of his mission, while others ascribed it to a surfeit of melons and peaches.
"Senectus edam maorbus est," said Aerssens with Seneca.
Henry said he could not sufficiently wonder at these last proceedings at his court, of a man he had deemed capable and sagacious, but who had been committing an irreparable blunder.

He had never known two such impertinent ambassadors as Don Pedro de Toledo and Richardot on this occasion.

The one had been entirely ignorant of the object of his mission; the other had shown a vain presumption in thinking he could drive him from his fixed purpose by a flood of words.

He had accordingly answered him on the spot without consulting his council, at which poor Richardot had been much amazed.
And now another envoy appeared upon the scene, an ambassador coming directly from the Emperor.

Count Hohenzollern, a young man, wild, fierce, and arrogant, scarcely twenty-three years of age, arrived in Paris on the 7th of September, with a train of forty horsemen.
De Colly, agent of the Elector-Palatine, had received an outline of his instructions, which the Prince of Anhalt had obtained at Prague.