He at length succeeded, however, in freeing himself, and casting the intended assassin on the ground.

He shouted for assistance; and the lights borne by the servants who rushed into the room revealed to him the face of his brother-in-law.

Cesarini, though in strong convulsions, still uttered cries and imprecations of revenge; he denounced De Montaigne as a traitor and a murderer! In the dark confusion of his mind, he had mistaken the guardian for the distant foe, whose name sufficed to conjure up the phantoms of the dead, and plunge reason into fury.
It was now clear that there was danger and death in Cesarini's disease.
His madness was pronounced to be capable of no certain and permanent cure; he was placed at a new asylum (the superintendents of which were celebrated for humanity as well as skill), a little distance from Versailles, and there he still remained.

Recently his lucid intervals had become more frequent and prolonged; but trifles that sprang from his own mind, and which no care could prevent or detect, sufficed to renew his calamity in all its fierceness.

At such times he required the most unrelaxing vigilance, for his madness ever took an alarming and ferocious character; and had he been left unshackled, the boldest and stoutest of the keepers would have dreaded to enter his cell unarmed, or alone.
What made the disease of the mind appear more melancholy and confirmed was, that all this time the frame seemed to increase in health and strength.