Jean-Antoine de Mesmes was finally dismissed and replaced with the comte Lauzun, who was favoured by James and his queen, Mary of Modena. At the very end of his mission, before embarking to return to France in April 1690, Jean-Antoine de Mesmes explained to his successor that "you are come to be a sacrifice for a poor, spirited and cowardly people whose soldiers will never fight and whose officiers will never obey orders, and therefore they would meet the same fate his Master's [i.e. Louis XIV's] army met with at the Siege of Candia, that is to be wasted and destroyed.", referring to the disastrous French intervention in favour of the Venetian Republic at the Siege of Candia in 1669.